Farm to Table in Boulder

D and I traveled to Boulder, Colorado for the second annual Grand Masters Ultimate Frisbee tournament. He was competing with a team from Atlanta called Ball and Chain. During my research for stuff to do on our trip, I searched for restaurants featuring locally-produced food. I was thrilled to find out that one of D's teammates has a cousin who, along with three other partners, runs Cafe Aion, a farm-to-table restaurant in the university area of Boulder and invited the team to a private dinner party at the restaurant on Sunday night after the tournament. Cafe Aion's website says it perfectly:

We aspire to cultivate this tradition in our own local soil. We gather our ingredients from farmers, ranchers and fishmongers we know and admire, and we draw upon the time-honored practices of the osteria and tapas bar as we cook for our friends and neighbors.

We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves here, the decor and ambiance; the food and drink; and the professional and resposive waitstaff were all lovely.




We started by sampling some local beer, and I settled on a New Belgium Fat Tire from Fort Collins. The staff set out tasty hummous, bread, and really delicious oysters wth homemade horseradish. At the table, we found dishes of vegetable anti-pasta (green pepper, onion, and olives) and marinated lentils.

I enjoyed the way the staff did the party for us: they just sent stuff out and we didn't have to choose from the menu. I have a very hard time making restaurant decisions, particuarly with a new place, and it was nice to sample a variety of things sent from the kitchen. I read a review of the restaurant online after the meal, and I love the way the chef creates little treats for the table from kitchen leftovers: :

Dakota Soifer's chicharrones, seasoned with a dash of chile oil and salt, are crispy puffs that crack between the teeth and dissolve on the tongue almost instantly, leaving behind nothing more than the sweet smokiness of pork. They're not on the menu at Cafe Aion, but they're sent, along with other scraps-turned-tapas, to diners as thanks for their business, and as a way to use every part, even the skin, of the pig the chef buys to make sausage and ribs and pancetta.

The house-cured meats were delicious. We sampled some sausage and a pate that was served with bread and olives.

For our main courses, the kitchen staff sent out a nice paella with squid, shrimp, and chorizo. For me, the dish was a bit heavy on the rice and a touch bland--but I like fiery dishes. I might have put a dash of hot sauce on it, but I didn't ask for hot sauce and none was on the table. They also brought us plates of rare and medium-rare strips of beef, perhaps a london broil or a flank steak, with roasted vegetables. Best of all was that I recogznized the baby white turnips on the plate as those I saw on display at the farmer's market the day before. I so wanted to buy a bunch and prepare them back in our kitchen hotel, but we didn't have the time.

Dessert was a slice of fresh strawberry tart with a luscious cream base. They also brought us a plate of biscotti, iced ginger snaps, and caraway-seeded shortbread to go along with coffee or espresso.

What a wonderful find in Boulder. I definitely recommend putting Cafe Aion on your agenda if you visit the Boulder area.

The.Best.Tomato.Soup.Ever.

A group of us went out to dinner at a place called The Kitchen, a recommendation from a friend who recently visited Boulder. The service wasn't so hot, and they had a disappointingly small number of local wines on the menus, but the food and the ambiance were outstanding. Especially good was the tomato soup that our 7-year old dinner companion ordered. You wouldn't think tomato soup would be so remarkable, but she shared it with everyone at the table and we all raved and tried to guess the secret. If you instinctively guess "butter" for the ingredient that makes everything better, you win--to my great surprise. I thought the soup was made of fresh tomatoes and olive oil, but I was totally wrong.

The waiter was kind enough to ask the chef to give me the recipe.

The Kitchen's Tomato Soup

1 can quality tomatoes (the chef used organic tomatoes from California canned with basil)
2 medium onions
Cream
Butter
Salt & Peper

Sweat down the chopped onions in butter. Combine with the canned tomatoes and cook over low heat. Finish with cream and blend in a blender. Add salt and pepper to taste.

I'm looking forward to making this with both canned and fresh roasted tomatoes to see if there's a difference. I'll report back. : )

Independence Sourdough Pancakes

I have three sourdough starters going in my fridge: one from San Francisco, one from Denmark, and one from the week that we got married two months ago. We're going on vacation next week, and we're also experiencing a heat wave, so I don't want to make bread today, but I hate wasting the sourdough starter when I feed it. I used the wedding sourdough to make these sourdough pancakes this morning with some leftover mixed berries from the tart we made yesterday for the family Fourth of July picnic. We made the tart with raspberries, blueberries, and blackberries from the Farmer's Market. Topped with maple syrup with a side of pork sausage, it was delicious.

Sourdough Mixed Berry Pancakes

1 large egg
1 cup sourdough starter
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 cup granulated sugar

Mix together all; drop 3 tbsp plops into a smoking cast iron griddle with melted butter. Watch carefully and turn once when the pancake top starts to bubble; turn again and watch even more carefully 'cause the second side burns quickly. Turn to make sure the pancake is a golden brown. If it is, place it on a plate, top with a prudent pat of butter, and pour some maple syrup over them to taste. Enjoy!

50 Year Old Cupcakes

My dear friend turned 50 this week and invited a few of us to a dinner party on Friday night. I polled his closest friends about his favorite things, and everyone agreed that buttercream frosting, maple, and bourbon were his three favorite sweet tastes. I created the frosting from a basic Martha Stewart frosting recipe, in consultation with my mother. It was a little tricky because the syrup and bourbon started to candy and harden while I was making it, but it really was worth it. Delicious.

I debated over what cupcake to use, and finally settled on an Apple Spice Cupcake from the book "cupcakes" that D and I received for our wedding. (cupcakes: Luscious bakeshop favorites from your home kitchen by Shelly Kaldunski). The finalists were carrot, zucchini, and french vanilla. If it were Fall, I might consider a pumpkin cupcake. The cupcakes came out a little too tender; D suggested baking them a little longer than the recipe called for. I already baked them for about 15 minutes more than the recipe below called for because our oven's temperature is a little bit off.

I also used silicone baking cups that my sister in law gave me a few months ago, but I don't think I will use them again. The cupcakes stuck to them too much, and they weren't as convenient as the paper ones. I'm not convinced that the paper ones are so bad for the environment anyway that you have to use re-usable ones.

Bourbon-Maple Buttercream Frosting

3 large eggs
1 cups pure maple syrup, preferably grade A dark amber
3 tbsp bourbon
2 sticks unsalted butter, chilled and cut into small pieces
1/4 cup

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat egg yolks on high speed until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes.

Meanwhile, pour maple syrup into a medium saucepan. Place pan over medium-high heat; bring syrup to a boil. Cook syrup for about 15 minutes as it begins to thicken. When done, it will start to harden on the spoon when you stir and remove the spoon with some syrup residue and let sit for a moment.

Remove the saucepan from the heat. While the electric mixer is running, pour the syrup in a slow, steady stream down the side of the mixing bowl into the egg-yolk mixture (it is essential that the syrup touches the side of the bowl as you pour it in so the sugar will be very evenly incorporated and not splatter onto the sides of the bowl and harden into candy) until the syrup has been completely incorporated, about 1 1/2 minutes. Beat until the bowl is just slightly warm to the touch, 5 to 6 minutes.

Add butter, one piece at a time, until all of it has been completely incorporated and the frosting is fluffy, about 4 minutes more. Use immediately, or keep refrigerated for up to a week. Makes 2 cups.

Apple Spice Cupcakes

1 cup unsalted butter at room temperature
5 apples, peeled, cored, and cut into small chunks
4 tbsp plus 1 1/2 cup sugar
2 cups all-purpose or cake flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cardamom
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 pinch of cloves
4 large eggs at room temperature
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup sour cream

Preheat your oven to 350 F. Line a 12-cup muffin pan with paper liners.

In a saucepan over medium-high heat, melt 4 tbsp of butter. Add the apple chunks and the 2 tbsp of sugar and cook, stirring often, until the apples start to turn brown and carmelize, about 5-7 minutes. Set aside to cool.

In a bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, baking soda, cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg, and cloves. In another bowl, mix with an electric mixer the remaining 12 tbsp of butter and the 1 1/2 cup of sugar together until light and fluffy, about 2-3 minutes. Add the eggs and vanilla and beat until combined.

Slowly add the flour mixture and beat on low speed until combined. Add the sour cream and the cooled apple mixture, beating until just combined. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed.

Spoon batter into prepared muffin cups, filling each about 2/3 full. Bake until golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center of the cupcake comes out clean, about 18-20 minutes. Let the cupcakes cool in the pan on a wire rack for 5 minutes. Transfer the cupcakes to the wire rack and let cool completely for about an hour.

Frost the cupcakes and serve.

I decorated mine with candied ginger.

Searching for Kimchi

A few weeks ago, D and I discovered Oaxaca Taqueria, a restaurant that had opened in our neighborhood in Brooklyn. I was really impressed with the simplicity, freshness, and decor of this place. I especially fell in love with the Korean Tacos made with bulgogi and kimchi. They were tiny, but they were tasty and filling. On our second visit, we asked for extra kimchi because it was so delicioso. We asked the owner where they got their kimchi, and he told us that he got it from a Korean deli just a few blocks away. He couldn't remember exactly where, but he said that the deli has the pre-packaged industry kimchi, but they also sell one that they make right there on the premises alongside the manufactured kimchi. I went to the corner he said he thought the deli was at (5th and Carroll), but the owner disavowed making her own kimchi; she also disavowed the fact that there were any other Korean delis in the neighborhood! Off I went to another Korean deli one block over at Garfield and Carroll. No homemade kimchi. 7th and Carroll--nope. 7th & Garfield--bingo! The unassuming containers of kimchi sat on the shelf and the cashier had to ask the owner in the back how much the containers were. I took 2 for $3.99 each because we go through an entire container in one sitting.

We're desperate to figure out how to make our own, but no online recipes work out well, and I don't know anyone who's willing to share their favorite recipe. A colleague of mine has a roommate who started Mother In Law Kimchi based on her MIL's restaurant in LA--the company has been pretty critically acclaimed, but they don't sell in some of the key places...like Trader Joe's, which has some of the best pre-prepared bulgogi I've ever tasted. Unfortunately, MILK doesn't market itself very well, and despite the fact that the kimchi is very good, the website offering it for sale is horribly designed and misleading. Nor do I think the owner would share her recipe with me.

We served the kimchi with TJ's bulgogi over some organic jasmine rice. Definitely one of our favorite dinners.

Tasty Eight Balls

This used to mean something else at a different time in my life, but tonite, it meant delicious 8-ball zucchini stuffed with quinoa, onions, garlic, toasted walnuts and herbs and spices. It seems labor intensive, but it's not. You'll have some of the quinoa mixture leftover, which is good all on its own. You can mix some seasoned tofu into this, which is how I had meant to make it but forgot. It was fine on it's own. The spices you use will really make this dish special.

Toasted Walnut & Quinoa Stuffed Eight Ball Zucchini

4 Eight Ball Zucchinis
1 cup quinoa
1 cup vegetable broth
olive oil
1/4 cup toasted walnuts
1/4 cup currants
3 tbsp chopped parsley
3 tbsp chopped basil
1 medium onion
4 garlic cloves, chopped
spice mix (I used a Yucatan Spice mix described here; but you can use cumin, paprika, cinnamon . . .)

Cut the zucchini heads off like you were cutting out a pumpkin for Halloween. Scrape out the insides, chop them up into little pieces, and set them aside. Set the empty zucchinis into a baking dish with a bit of broth on the bottom.

Toast the quinoa in a cast iron pan and then cook with one cup of water and one cup of broth. Season with salt and pepper.

Sautee the onion and garlic in a cast iron pan. Once the onion starts to brown, add the zucchini and sautee until tender. Add half of the chopped herbs, the currants, and the walnuts. Once everything is mixed and heated through, add to the quinoa with the rest of the fresh herbs. Mix thoroughly. Spoon into each of the eight ball zucchinis and bake at 400 F for about 30-45 minutes.

We served this with a dollop of lebne and a bit of sriracha sauce on the side (you could substitute plain yogurt or sour cream and hot sauce), and a Middle Eastern Beet Salad with parsley, toasted walnuts, and rosewater.

English Muffin Afternoon

I found this recipe on Epicurious after hearing a co-worker talk about making it a few weeks ago. I hate wasting my sourdough when I feed it, so this is another good alternative. I used the sourdough starter I'm calling "Wedding Sourdough" because its a combination of my San Francisco starter and 25-year-old Swedish starter that got mixed up the week before my wedding and I just started a new one with it. I've been feeding it with whatever happens to be around, so it's nicely unidentifiable.

Apparently, this epicurious recipe that I adapted myself was adapted from a Mark Bittman recipe. I used a Martha Stewart recipe to alter it.

Whole Wheat Seeded Sourdough English Muffins

1 cup sourdough starter
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup flour for dusting and rolling
1 tsp. instant yeast
2 tsp. salt
2 Tbl. olive oil
1 Tbl. honey
2/3 cup lukewarm milk

For the topping
1 egg
Seeds (I use a variety of poppy seeds, black and white sesame seeds, hemp seeds, and sea salt)

Mix together the the starter, flour, yeast and salt, then add all the rest of the ingredients and mix together until it starts to form a ball around your spoon. At that point, start kneading the dough until it's a well-defined ball that's tacky but not truly sticky.

Lightly grease a plastic or wooden bowl. Place the dough in the bowl and cover it loosely. Let it sit until it's doubled in size, about two hours. Deflate and let rest for 15 minutes.

Oil a cookie tray and sprinkle with semolina. Roll the dough out onto a well floured surface and using a bisquit cutter (or cooker cutter or the mouth of a glass), divide the dough into eight to 12 pieces (depending on how big you want your muffins). Lift each muffin up and set it on the cookie tray. Let them sit for about 30 minutes.

When they've puffed up a bit, use an egg wash to brush the tops of the muffins and sprinkle with seeds.

Heat up an unoiled cast-iron skillet and cook each muffin in olive oil on both sides until lightly browned. It should take about 1-2 minutes per side. When they are nicely browned, take them out of the pan and place them on a cleaned, oiled, and semolina-ed cookie sheet and pop them in the oven for about 10-15 minutes, or until the insides of the muffins are about 190 degrees F.

Venison Experiment

Last year, D and I were given a gift of venison meat cubes from a friend of D's who is a bow hunter. At that time, we were venison virgins and had no idea what we would do with the meat, or what to expect. I think we were both a little afraid of a "gamey" taste. We decided to do a tagine with it, and it's now one of our signature dishes. I wrote a blog entry about the recipe I adapted here.

This year, my new brother-in-law, also a hunter, brought over a bag of deer meat just before our May 1st wedding. We didn't have the time to look at it, much less do anything with it, before the wedding. We got a tagine as a gift, and the first thing I thought about was taking the venison out of the freezer and making a stew as our first tagine. When I defrosted it over the weekend, I realized to my dismay that what we'd been given was cutlets, which would certainly not work in the tagine. I'm not sure why I felt stymied by cutlets, but I did. I decided to marinate two servings of it in some olive oil, garlic, salt, pepper, and thyme and pop it back into the fridge until I could decide what to do.

I decided to cook it in a cast iron pan and top it with a black currant sauce with a side of sugar snap peas that I picked up at the Farmer's Market over the weekend. I couldn't find a black currant sauce that I liked, so I made this one up:

Black Currant Sauce

1 cup chopped onions
1 cup black currants
1 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp cornstarch
1 tsp dry mustard
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 1/2 cups water

Sautee chopped onions until starting to brown. Add the brown sugar, cornstarch, and dry mustard. Stir for about a minute, add vinegar, currants, lemon juice, and water. Continue cooking, stirring constantly, until thick. Turn the heat off and let cool for a bit. Blend 3/4 of the mixture in a blender and add back to the saucepan. Reheat and spoon over the meat when heated through.

Rich People's Bread

I've been experimenting with sourdough bread since Christmas; I think I've made over a hundred loaves of bread since then. I keep looking for a recipe that combines the right timing with the right flavor. Many a morning I've been late to work because I'm waiting for dough to rise or bread to finish baking. Many of the sourdough recipes I've found require days of developing the dough and rising, and those recipes are just not practical for everyday bread for someone who works full time. This recipe, which I tried early on and just filed, was a hit. Every time I tried a new recipe, D would say: "Why don't you make that oat and flax bread again? That was great!" The first time I made it, he called it "rich people's bread." So that's what I'll call it here. I adapted it from a recipe I found on a blog called Kath Eats Real Food: A Blog Devoted to Healthy Living

The blog suggests a way to make your sourdough starter from scratch, but I've used a sourdough starter that a friend from Sweden gave me: it's a hearty wheat-grain sourdough that's been going for 25 years! I feed it about once every two weeks with 1/2 cup of warm water + 1/2 cup of wheat or rye flour. Sometimes I throw a drop of honey or a tsp of flax into the mix.

Rich People's Oat and Flax Sourdough Bread

1 3/4 cup starter
1 1/2 cup wheat flour
1 ¼ cup bread flour
1 cup oats
3 Tbsp flax seeds
2 ½ tbsp honey
1 ½ cup water
1 tsp instant yeast
1 tbsp kosher salt
1/3 cup walnut pieces

Warm water to body temperature. Pour in oats and flax and let soak for 5-10 minutes. Then mix all ingredients EXCEPT walnuts until mixture comes together. Add walnuts. It should be fairly sticky but not runny, and have good strength when tugged. Let dough ferment for 2 hours, folding after the first hour. After the second hour, shape into a compact ball and allow to rest for 10-20 minutes. Shape dough ball into two oval loaves and place in two 9×5 loaf pans. Oil and dust pans with some kind of a dusting agent (I've used oats, sesame seeds, hemp seeds, and pysllium husks) Allow to rise for 1 1/2 hours. After 1 hour preheat oven to 400. Brush the top of the risen loaves with an egg wash and sprinkle with oats or seeds. Bake for 30-35 mins until very dark in color and interior hits 190.

This bread is delicious with fried eggs and smoked salmon, which is how we ate it this morning! It's also delicious toasted with butter, or all by itself. The author of the original blog recommends french toast, which sounds intriguing.

Wedding Rehearsal Dinner

We hosted our wedding rehearsal dinner at our dear friends' home down the street for about 40 people. In addition to all of our other preparations for the wedding, which was the following day, in retrospect it was probably not the best idea, but it turned out really well.

The week before the wedding, David decided we needed a new stove. It stopped working two days before the wedding, which sent me into a bit of a panic. Thankfully, a friend called and said she was going to make the cupcakes for me (from my own blog recipe!) and have her husband deliver them to D so that I didn't have to worry about it. Making everything for this dinner was a real source of pride for me, but I let it go on the dessert and it really was a godsend. I will forever be grateful to Deb.

This is what was on the menu:

Appetizer

Pickled eggs
Cheese and crackers
Spiced nuts

Sides

Green salad with homemade sprouts
Roasted vegetable couscous
Kalamata olive sourdough bread

Main Course

Grass-Fed Beef Shishkebabs served with either Teryaki Sauce, or Chipotle Sauce (homemade)
*made with beef cubes, pineapple chunks, cherry tomatoes, mushrooms, red onions, and green peppers

Dessert

Carrot cupcakes

I think folks enjoyed the food and appreciated the effort.

Potato Salad To Go!

We're off to another frisbee tournament this weekend on Long Island, so I put the leftovers to use in some yummy potato salad for us to nosh on at the field. Mayonnaise-based salads are never a good idea for a hot day, so I made this recipe up with olive oil, rice wine vinegar, and mustard. This kind of a salad is best made one or two days before you plan to eat it, although it's great fresh too.

Fresh Dill and Radish Potato Salad

6 medium potatoes (I used some butter potatoes from the farmer's market)
6 large cherry tomatoes
2 stalks of celery
4 nice sized radishes
1 scallion
2 hard boiled eggs
1/2 cucumber
2 tbsp chopped fresh dill
1 tbsp dijon mustard
1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
1 tbsp olive oil
healthy dash of salt and pepper

Make two hard boiled eggs and pop in the fridge to cool down. Boil the potatoes until tender. Drain and pop in the fridge (or freezer, depending on how quick you chop!) Chop up the vegetables. Chop the potatoes into at least six pieces each. Chop up the hard boiled eggs into small pieces, Mix the whole lot together really well. Refrigerate for at least a day.

Easy peasy.

St. Pat's by Lamplight

After Christmas last year, we spent a week at our friends' country house in Pennsylvania. We usually go and stock up on buffalo meat from the buffalo farm about forty-five minutes away. A few times, we decided to stop at an antique store called The Glass Hat, where we found this amazing lamp. It took us a few months to decide whether we wanted to plunk down so much money for it, but even when money is tight, we never regret buying this oil lamp from the 1880s. We don't light it very often, but when we do, it makes any meal feel really special. We lit it for St. Patrick's Day this year.


Our meal only looks like it took a lot of work, but it didn't. The weekend before, we picked up a brined brisket from Trader Joe's (I meant to make my own this year, but . . . well, next year). I stuck that in a crock pot with some Guinness Beer, carrots, and onions this morning and let it cook for 8 hours. Then I boiled cabbage with caraway sees, heated up some aging carrot puree, and baked some sliced baby potatoes with olive oil, salt, pepper, and chopped rosemary.

The most unique thing about this year's meal was the whole wheat soda bread. I found a recipe that claimed to produce little confetti shamrocks when you sliced the bread. And it did! The sunflower seeds react somehow to the dough when it sits and then bakes in such a way that the seeds turn green! Totally fun. And it was very tasty. I will definitely make this bread again next year.

Shamrock Soda Bread

1 3/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour or graham flour, plus more for shaping
3 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into tablespoon-sized pieces
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 3/4 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1/4 cup wheat bran
1/4 cup oat bran
1/4 cup untoasted wheat germ
2 tablespoons flaxseed
1/3 cup raw sunflower seeds
1 large egg
About 1 3/4 cups buttermilk

Adjust an oven rack to the center position and preheat the oven to 425°F. Coat a heavy baking sheet with vegetable cooking spray or line it with a silicone baking pan liner or aluminum foil.In a large bowl, stir together the all-purpose flour and whole wheat flour. Add the butter and work it into the dry ingredients with your fingertips until the fat particles are very fine. Stir in the baking soda, salt, sugar, wheat bran, oat bran, wheat germ, flaxseed, and sunflower seeds. Beat the egg lightly with a fork in a 2-cup glass measure. Add enough buttermilk to come to the 2-cup line and stir with the fork to combine well. Add the liquid to the dry ingredients and stir with a wooden spoon or rubber spatula until the dough gathers into a thick, wet-looking mass.

Sprinkle your work surface with whole wheat flour and scrape the dough onto it. Dust the dough with a bit more whole wheat flour. Pat the dough into a circular shape about 7 inches across and 2 inches high and transfer it to the prepared baking sheet. Don't be concerned about evenness—the loaf should look rustic. Make a cross-shaped indentation on top of the loaf going right to the edges. I use a plastic bench scraper and press it into the dough very gently; don't actually cut the dough. During baking the indentation expands, giving the top of the loaf an attractive pattern.

Bake the bread for about 40 minutes, until it is well browned and sounds hollow when rapped on the bottom. An instant-read thermometer inserted into the center of the loaf should register 195° to 200°F. Cool the loaf on a wire cooling rack, and serve warm or at room temperature. Cut into quarters and slice each quarter with a sharp serrated knife. Delicious with butter.
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An Orgasm of Flavors

"It's wednesday . . . I know what you're trying to say girl. You're trying to say oh yeah, It's business time." --Jemaine, Flight of the Conchords

A couple of years ago, I started cooking really nice meals in celebration of American Idol-watching. That tradition has kind of fallen off with wedding planning, trying to go to the gym more, and just general busy-ness at work, but last night was an exception. I found a recipe I wanted to try from the March 2010 edition of Saveur magazine, and made it this Wednesday night. D said it was "an orgasm of flavors." I think that's a good description.

Moroccan Chicken with Carrot Puree

4 boneless skinless chicken breasts
olive oil
2 cups chicken broth
2 lbs carrots
1 large white onion
4 large garlic cloves
1 1/2 cup orange guice
4 tbsp unsalted butter
2 peeled and seeded oranges, segmented
3/4 cup harissa*
2 tsp sherry or champagne vinegar
2 cups salad greens
1/2 cup pitted, oil-cured black olives, roughly chopped
2 shallots, thinly sliced

*Harissa is a North African pepper paste. I'm a very lucky person, as my friend S brought a jar of homemade Tunisian harissa over last month. This is the first I've had a chance to use it. (Clicking on "harissa" above will bring you to the Wikipedia page describing it).

Start by boiling roughly chopped carrots until soft in order to make the puree. I started this the night before, and while the carrots were boiling, I placed the chicken breasts in a container with olive oil, salt and pepper to sit overnight. I then sauteed the onions and garlic until carmelized, added the carrots and sauteed until they started to carmelize as well. Then I put the mixture in a food processor and made the puree. I set that aside for the next day.

The next day, I browned the chicken in a pan with olive oil and then placed them in the oven topped with most of the harissa at about 400 degrees F. While the chicken was finishing, I made the orange sauce by reducing 1 1/2 cups of orange juice in a pan, adding 4 tbsp butter, salt and pepper. As the mixture started to thicken, I added the orange segments.

I then tossed the greens with olive oil, vinegar, shallots and chopped olives.

I heated up the carrot puree, and plated the dish by putting a dollop of carrot puree on the side of the plate, and arranging the greens on top. I then placed one chicken breast on the bed of greens and topped the whole thing with orange sauce.

The whole thing was both festive looking and delicious.

Practicing with Sourdough

This past summer, I brought back some sourdough starter from a trip to San Francisco. It sat around for a few months until I had some time over the holidays to see what I could do with it. I've been experimenting with different recipes since Christmas. There is a rich body of literature out there about how to do sourdough, but what I like best about what I've learned so far is that, as I'd suspected, making bread can be less about science and formulas, and more about art.

This is the most simple recipe I've found for sourdough, and the cinnamon-raisin bread that I made pictured here is the best loaf I've made so far. I'll keep practicing, though, and someday I'll make "the perfect loaf."

Basic White Sourdough Bread

1 cup sourdough starter (at room temperature)
1 1/2 cups warm water
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup oil (I use olive oil)
6 cups bread flour
1 tsp yeast
1/4 cup of warm water
2 tbsp whole wheat flour or oat bran
1 tsp honey

Mix sugar, oil, salt, water, and 1 cup of sourdough starter together in a large bowl. Sift the flour and add to the mixture. Grease or oil the dough. Place the dough in an oiled bowl, cover, and let rise overnight.

The next day, stir the 2 tbsp of flour or bran and 1 tsp of honey into warm water and sprinkle with 1 tsp of yeast. Let this mixture sit for about 10 minutes. While you are waiting, grease & dust two bread pans with either oat bran, semolina, or corn meal. When the yeast mixture starts to look a little frothy or bubbly, pour the mixture into the bread dough and knead for 10 minutes. Allow the dough to double in size. Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 40 to 45 minutes, or until bread is golden brown and taps hollow. Turn out to cool on wire racks.

To adapt to a cinnamon-raisin bread, make a mixture of cinnamon-sugar by mixing 2 tbsp sugar with healthy dashes of cinnamon. Add 1 cup of raisins right before you knead the bread. Divide the bread in half, and roll out each half into a long, narrow rectangle. Sprinkle a mixture of sugar and cinnamon over the rectangle and then roll up into a compact shape to place into your bread pans. Bake as directed above.

Coffee Marinated Bison Ribs

While visiting a friend's farmer's market in Phoenixville, PA, I found another source of grass-fed buffalo meat. It was more expensive than the farm that we visit in Hamlin, PA, but I picked up two packages of buffalo short ribs anyway (about $25). I found this recipe on the web from the February 2008 Bon Apetit and adapted it to use my slow cooker. The recipe is time consuming, but well worth it. Each portion came out to be about $7 with all the ingredients.

Coffee-Marinated Bison Short Ribs

Marinade

4 cups water
3 cups chilled strong brewed coffee
1/2 cup coarse kosher salt
3 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons (packed) dark brown sugar
1/4 cup pure maple syrup
2 tablespoons chopped fresh rosemary
2 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
2 cups ice cubes
4 pounds bison (often labeled buffalo) short ribs

Short Ribs

2 cups chopped onions
1/2 cup chopped shallots
6 garlic cloves, chopped
1 small jalapeño chile, seeded, chopped
1 cup strong brewed coffee
1 cup low-salt chicken broth
1/4 cup chili sauce or ketchup
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon soy sauce

To prepare the marinade

Stir 4 cups water, coffee, 1/2 cup coarse salt, and sugar in large bowl until salt and sugar dissolve. Add syrup and next 3 ingredients; stir until ice melts. Add ribs. Place plate atop ribs to keep submerged. Cover and chill 4 to 6 hours. Drain ribs; discard marinade. Drained ribs can be made 2 days ahead. Cover and chill.

To prepare the short ribs

Heat until smoking a deep cast iron pan and add olive oil. Sprinkle ribs with salt and pepper. Working in batches, cook ribs until browned on all sides, about 7 minutes per batch. Transfer to large plate. Add onions, shallots, garlic, and jalapeño to pot. Reduce heat to medium, cover, and cook until vegetables are soft, stirring occasionally, about 10 minutes. Add coffee and broth; stir, scraping up browned bits. Add chili sauce and all remaining ingredients; bring to boil. Transfer all to a slow cooker and cook for at least 6 hours, more to taste. We like our ribs falling off the bone, so we cooked them for about 8-9 hours.

We weren't ready to eat ours right away so I put them in the freezer almost immediately after they cooled with a generous portion of the liquid they cooked in. When we were ready to eat them a few days later, I defrosted them overnight, and then when we got home from work, I put them into a foil covered pan and heated them at 400 degrees for about 45 minutes. They were delicious.

White Chocolate Christmas Triangles

Friends of ours had a holiday party and asked that all of their guests bring triangle-shaped foods. Everyone's first thought is always phyllo dough triangles, but I wanted to do something different. I found this recipe after googling for "triangle recipe": Double Ginger Shortbread Triangles, and I sprinkled a little red sugar on the white chocolate tips to make them look more festive. They were a hit and I would definitely make them again.

Double Ginger Shorbread Triangles with White Chocolate and Red Sugar Sprinkles

Ingredients

2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, softened

1 cup confectioners’ sugar

1 Tbsp ground ginger

1 T bsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp salt

2 cups all-purpose flour

1/3 cup crystallized ginger, finely diced
1 ounce of white chocolate, melted according to package directions (I used white chocolate chips)
crystallized ginger, cut into thin strips

Preparation

Heat oven to 325°F. Line a 15 1/2 x 10 1/2 x 1-in. jelly roll pan with parchment paper. Beat butter, sugar, ground ginger, vanilla and salt in a large bowl with mixer on medium speed until creamy. On low, beat in flour just until blended. Press evenly with floured fingers over bottom of prepared pan. With a knife, cut dough lengthwise into 4 equal strips, then crosswise into 4 equal strips, making 16 rectangles. Cut each rectangle in half diagonally. Prick each triangle several times with a fork. Bake a half an hour or until shortbread looks dry and pale gold. Cool in pan on a wire rack 5 minutes; recut cookies while still warm. Cool completely in pan before decorating. To decorate: Dip short sides of each triangle into melted white chocolate, or spread melted chocolate on triangles. Decorate with a few strips of ginger. Refrigerate to set chocolate.

Wedding Favors

So I'm getting married! Wow. I haven't written about this on my blog yet; sadly, I've been spending all of my blogging time on another site, the Off Beat Bride Tribe. I keep a running journal of wedding planning updates there, but the last update overlaps with this blog, so here you have it.

The only person who will truly know what I went through to create my wedding favors will be my BFF/maid of honor, and who I call my Top Chick, but for here will be referred to as M. I had 160 little jars shipped to her place because there's no room for them in my apartment in Brooklyn, and I drove myself, 75 hot peppers, and a food processor to her house this weekend to make my favors. We got up early to go to the green market near her house for 30 bell peppers (I didn't get them at home at my own green market on Saturday because I was afraid they wouldn't keep all week), ran some errands, and I got started chopping at around noon. I was committed to using local ingredients, so everything that went into these little buggers came from either my green market at Grand Army Plaza or her green market in Phoenixville, PA. I was going to use the peppers that are growing on my back balcony, but I didn't get a bumper crop this season, so I had to settle for someone else's.

I chopped half of the hot and bell peppers by hand so that the relish wouldn't be too mushy, and chopped up the other half in the food processor. I was chopping for FIVE STRAIGHT HOURS! Tomatillos go in the recipe, too, and I ran into a huge problem when the tomatillo skins got stuck in her garbage disposal unit. I had to fish around in there with my bare hands to clear it up, and even then, I had to use some Liquid Plummer. By 5:30, the relish was brining and my hands were burning like a &$((##@. I consulted an article on Chow about how to soothe burning hands after cutting chiles (Avoiding Chile Eyeball), and jumped in the car to buy some lemons, lemon juice, and yogurt.

You should have seen me at Target wheeling around a cart resting my hands on two frozen bags of edamame, and then in the parking lot pouring lemon juice over my hands.

It took me from about 8 pm until 11:30 to rinse the brine, drain the relish, wash the little jars, spoon in about 5 teaspoons into each jar, and then pour boiling hot vinegar syrup in each little jar. By the time Saturday Night Live came on, I was sitting on the floor with a glass of wine and each hand dunked into a big bowl of yogurt. Quite a sight (and very difficult to drink the wine). I was only able to do about 115--I ran out of relish. So I'll do the remaining 50 or so as sweet pepper relish this weekend. I don't think I can handle another batch of the hot anytime soon. I guess that answers my question about switching careers.

Lemon Pepper Chicken on Shitake Farro

I've been looking all over for farro for about a year. None of my usual spots carries it.

I read about it on someone else's blog, and I had to travel all the way to San Francisco to find it. Everytime I visit my friends in San Francisco, I visit the Rainbow Grocery Cooperative, and I always find stuff that I can't find back East. I usually pack an extra bag so that I can bring back groceries from this place. http://www.rainbow.coop The last time I was there, I brought back heirloom beans, three different kinds of salt, and mission burrito shells. This time I got the farro, blue cornmeal, and orecchiette (literally, "little ears," or "lambs ears pasta"). We cooked the orecchiette with homemade pesto, inspired by our lunch at Chez Panisse which we visited while in the Bay Area.

I finally made the faro last week, which is actually spelt. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farro I cooked it with shitake mushrooms from the green market, topped with lemon pepper chicken breast strips and lemon-butter sauce with thyme. It was a delicious meal.

Shitake Farro

3 T olive oil
2 cloves garlic. each cut in half lengthwise
1/2 cup diced red onions
1 cup sliced shitake mushrooms
1/4 cup marsala wine
1 Tbsp chopped fresh thyme
3 cups cooked farro

To make 3 cups cooked Farro:
1 cup farro
1 3/4 cups water
pinch salt

First, boil your water so that you're ready to use it in the faro, which you'll toast next. Place farro in a dry, cast iron pan and heat it until it starts to smell roasted, maybe 3-4 minutes. Shift the farro around with a wooden spoon or other cooking implement. Turn off the heat, and then carefully pour the boiling water over the farro. Add salt, simmer and cover and cook until the farro is tender and chewy. This may take 20-30 minutes and you may have to add a bit more water.

Heat oil in another cast iron pan, add the onion and garlic and saute until onions are starting to soften, about 3 minutes. Add sliced mushrooms and stems, season with salt, and saute over medium high heat until mushrooms have released their liquid and are well browned, about 5 minutes or longer.

Stir in the marsala/water mixture and cook until liquid is mostly evaporated, about 2 minutes. Add chopped thyme, and then add thecooked farro and heat 2-3 minutes, stirring gently. You may need to add some water to keep the farro moist. Heat through and you'll be ready to serve.

Lemon-Pepper Chicken
This is the simplest part of the whole dish. You can prepare the chicken en paillard, in strips, chunks, or as whole or half breasts--on the bone or off.

Chicken (enough for your guests, plus some for lunch!)
Lemons
Salt
Peppers
Olive oil

Heat the oil in a pan until it's smokin' hot. Add the chicken, season with salt and pepper, then squeeze the lemon(s) over the chicken when it's just starting to brown. You can throw the lemon (in slices, or chunks) right into the pan with the chicken. Brown the chicken until it's cooked, and until it's cooked to your liking.

Lemon-Thyme Butter Sauce

2 tbsp. ghee (or clarified butter)
(if you're making it from scratch, you'll need abt 1/2 stick butter)
2 tbsp finely-minced yellow onion
2 tbsp finely-minced garlic
6 tbsp fresh lemon juice
2 tbsp dry white wine
Kosher salt to taste
Freshly-grnd white pepper to taste
2 tbsp cool butter

To clarify butter: Heat 1/2 stick butter over low heat. When melted, remove from heat and set aside for several min to allow the lowfat milk solids to settle to the bottom. Skim the clear (clarified) butter from the top and throw away sediment. (This can be done ahead.)

To make sauce: Heat clarified butter, add in onion and garlic and saute/fry till transparent. Add in lemon juice and white wine and season to taste with salt and pepper. Simmer 2 to 3 min to reduce liquid. Remove from heat and swirl in cool butter till sauce is smooth and emulsified.

Food on the West Coast Road Trip

A relative recently asked me why I hadn't posted in so long.....well, D and I got engaged! And I recently became a replacement for my boss who went out on maternity leave! So I've been busy...and not paying attention to the blog. But D and I are on a trip from Laguna Beach to San Francisco, and we've had an interesting culinary experience along the way:

Plane Food

Korean BBQ

Chinese Food--LA Chinatown

Hawai'ian Restaurant in Pasadena

Laguna Beach

In "n Out Burger

Wahoo's

Clam Chowder, salad, and Calamari

Frank and ....whatsername?


Half Moon Bay


Peets....


Alcatraz


Dinner with Friends--Artichoke, pasta, local, bio-dynamic wine


Rainbow Grocery


Chez Panisse


Home


Brunch in the Mission

Denver-inspired Sweet Potato Pancakes with Honey-Cinnamon Butter and Pecans

I was in Denver, Colorado last week to watch D play a frisbee tournament, but ended up not watching too much frisbee. Another of the players had a 6-year old daughter who kindly accompanied me to some Denver-area restaurants. We joined another friend there for Saturday brunch at a restaurant called Snooze on the recommendation of a co-worker in New York who used to work there. She said, "You simply must try the sweet potato pancakes." So we did. The entire meal was delicious (we all shared the sweet potato pancakes, chocolate chip pancakes, and poached eggs with hash and English muffins--the best I've ever had in my life, and discussed in a separate blog entry here). But I was underwhelmed by the sweet potato pancakes, so I just had to try my hand at them.

This weekend, we went to our friend's country house in Pennsylvania and spent time with a mutual friend who was up from Florida. D thought the sweet potato pancakes would be too heavy for a summer morning, but I was determined to make them better than Snooze did. They turned out really well, and we couldn't have asked for better company or a setting--at a lovely table on a porch by a noisy river. I served them with sweet chicken and roast pepper sausage, honey-cinnamon butter, pecans, and maple syrup.

Sweet Potato Pancakes

2 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup white flour
3 tsp baking soda
6 tbsp brown sugar
3 tsp cinnamon, 2 tsp nutmeg
3 cups milk, 3 eggs, 5 tbsp butter
1 1/2 cup boiled or roasted mashed sweet potatoes
1/2 cup chopped pecans

Mix dry ingredients together (you can even do this days ahead of time, or before a trip to impress a host if you go visiting). Stir in the moist ingredients until well-blended. Ensure that the batter is drippy enough, but not too drippy. Heat a generous amount of oil in a pan and drop in approximately 1/4 cup or 3 tbsp of the batter until browned on either side. Serve with honey-cinnamon butter, a sprinkling of chopped pecans, and heated maple syrup.