A snack

Lest everyone think I eat only bacon-filled soups and homemade cookies, here is my post-gym snack: plain yogurt with almonds, dates, flax seed oil, and cinnamon. Check out the beautiful Japanese stoneware bowls I found at the Goodwill this weekend for 50 cents apiece.

For Christmas we gave Lawson's parents an Omaha Steaks gift certificate, so yesterday we had them over to eat the steaks. They requested ribeye, which was gristly but really tasty. Lawson had a New York strip instead, which had much less flavor. We had to keep the meal pretty traditional, so I made beets vinaigrette and that lemon custard souffle thing I love, and Lawson made wonderful roasted potatoes with rosemary, and sauteed spinach & mushrooms.

The best things I've made lately are: a) polenta using ground heirloom corn from the local mill one of my friends works at. Wow. And b) brussels sprouts braised in garlic butter. Finally I like brussels sprouts.

Recital Refreshments and Guisado de Pollo

After my piano students perform in a recital I always put on a dessert buffet for them to make up for the trauma--complete with a lace tablecloth and 100-year-old china. Yesterday's spread included German chocolate cake, cream cheese and blueberry tart, lemon bars, chocolate chip cookies, grapes, and various candies. Continuing with the Valentine theme we had pink lemonade to go with the coffee.

Tonight we are having an old favorite, Guisado de Pollo, which is a Mexican chicken stew. It's light but flavorful and simmers away with a minimum of fuss. I serve it with flour tortillas.

Guisado de Pollo

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
2 pounds chicken pieces (I like thighs)

In large casserole, heat olive oil and brown chicken pieces on all sides.

2 tomatoes, diced (canned or fresh)
2 onions, sliced
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 slice (1 ounce) boiled ham, chopped (optional)
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon thyme
1/4 teaspoon oregano
2 mild green chiles, cut in strips
1 tablespoons capers, drained
Approximately 1 1/2 cups dry white wine or vermouth
Salt and pepper to taste

Add remaining ingredients, using enough of the white wine to barely cover them. Simmer, covered, for 40 minutes or more until tender. (White meat will cook much faster than dark.) If the sauce is too soupy, remove chicken and boil the sauce to reduce before serving.

Peanut Blossoms, The Definitive Recipe

This is the recipe Grandma Oty baked for us back in the fifties:

Peanut Blossoms

1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar

Cream butters and sugars thoroughly.

1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla

Add egg and vanilla. Mix.

1-3/4 cups flour
1 teaspoon soda
1/2 teaspoon salt

Combine flour, soda, and salt; add to creamed mixture and mix.

Sugar
1 package Hershey's chocolate kisses, unwrapped

Form dough into one-inch balls and roll in sugar. Place on baking sheet and bake at 375º for 8 minutes. Remove from oven, squash one chocolate kiss into the center of each cookie, and return to oven for 2 to 5 minutes, or until light brown.

Kale, White Bean, Bacon, and Potato Soup

This is a modified version of a Louis Osteen recipe. (By the way, we have two identical copies of this book if you would like one.) I served it with skillet cornbread.

My friend Mary has commented on how much you and I seem to use cookbooks. I suppose we do, but most of the time it's for ideas, not instruction. The night I made this soup, for instance, I was feeling uninspired and tired, not at all in a cooking mood, but I needed to use the kale I'd bought the week before, so I started poking around through some likely cookbooks. And when I found the Louis Osteen recipe for soup with mustard greens, country ham, and white beans, I got really excited. I ended up having a great time cooking that night.

Mary tends to get an idea for a dish first, then look up recipes online to get an idea of how to make it. Sometimes it works that way for me: yesterday I decided to make peanut blossoms for today's Valentine party at work. You used to make them when I was a kid and I loved them but hadn't had them since. And none of my cookbooks had a recipe, so I had to find several online and choose the most credible-looking recipe. But I hate not knowing a recipe's source well. I know I can trust Joy's cookie recipes and would rather bake something from there.

The cookies are a success. And the soup is even better left over than it was the first night.

Update 02-08-08: Now I've posted the soup recipe.

Restaurant food

This post may appear to have nothing to do with cooking, but there's nothing that makes me want to stay home and cook like a solid week and a half of restaurant food. Even when it's good, it's still too much -- too rich, too big. But I ate some wonderful food. Here are some of the highlights from my trip to see Mary, meet Alex, and watch Brent get married. Somehow Mary's hands appear in most of the pictures. I should have let her take the pictures -- she's the pro.

This Cuban restaurant was so good that I forgot to take a picture until after we'd eaten. Empanadas, beet salad, soupy beans, a Cuban sandwich, and many little roulade-type things I can't remember the names of:



Pizza at a bar in Belltown in Seattle (onions, sun-dried tomatoes, and sausage):



My daily breakfast from the bakery across the street from the hotel: a latte and a fresh fruit muffin (I failed to take a picture of the incredible lemon-lavender coffeecake):



Sushi in Portland. The best thing was albacore with basil.



Tapas in Portland (pre-dinner snack) -- that's salami, cornichons, cheeses, figs stewed in port, and crostini:



More pizza, wood-fired and incredible this time, with rare lamb in the background:



Not pictured: a falafel sandwich, a piroshky, airplane pretzels, good mayonnaise-based salads and cold cuts at Brent's wedding, and bad pickled herring at IKEA.

All in all, a wonderful trip for eating. But I'm happy to be home having a breakfast of plain yogurt, almonds, and a banana.

Piedmont Peppers and Polenta

I forgot to include this photo of our wonderful Piedmont Peppers from the weekend. The recipe is in Rustic Italian Cooking by Kathleen Sloan. Everyone should own this cookbook. You can buy a barely used copy at amazon.com for a couple of dollars and spend weeks happily cooking your way through the book.

Best Caramel Sauce

I'm here today simply to pass on a recipe of my favorite kind--three ingredients and no unnecessary fuss.

Caramel has been near the top of my flavor list all my life. When we were little kids stopping by the Dairy Queen for a treat, I would always order the caramel sundae.

This is from Bon Appetit November 2006. It was intended to accompany an apple tart; I stuck the leftover jar in the freezer and brought it out twice to serve with warm date bars and French vanilla ice cream. It didn't separate or get grainy. I suspect it would make a great drizzle over a dark chocolate brownie.

CARAMEL SAUCE

1 cup dark brown sugar
1 cup heavy whipping cream
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) butter

Bring ingredients to boil in a heavy medium saucepan, whisking constantly until sugar dissolves. Boil gently, stirring often, until sauce coats a spoon thickly, about 10 minutes. Serve slightly warm.

Pho, and more to come

I'm back! But only for another few minutes; I'm off to Atlanta for the night with Lawson. I have many, many pictures of food I ate in Portland, Seattle, and Austin, but for now I'll just post one of the best things I had: a big bowl of pho in downtown Portland.

Kuku

These are paperwhites that I forced from bulbs Nancy gave us for Christmas.
I made a Persian kuku today. It’s like a frittata or omelette, except that it’s baked and surprisingly light and fluffy.

The version I made, from The New Book of Middle Eastern Food by Claudia Roden, is the traditional dish served on Iranian New Year’s Day. It had shredded spinach, green onions, two handfuls of fresh herbs (I used dill, parsley, and cilantro), and a few walnuts and raisins, all lightly mixed with six eggs and baked for 45 minutes. I will definitely be making this again, especially for a picnic or cold lunch.

We had the kuku for dinner tonight along with baba ganoush, Ak-Mak, olives, feta chunks, Greek yogurt, and cherry tomatoes—a light Sunday night supper.

I have a recipe for cauliflower kuku that I’m planning to try next.

Lighter Fare

We had a nice, reasonable dinner last night instead of stuffing ourselves. I made fresh albacore in an Italian red wine sauce, whole wheat ciabatta with sage and cheese, and Dad’s beautiful collards.

I used a Greek recipe for the greens which involved sautéeing garlic in olive oil; adding the greens and a half cup of Kalamata olives and simmering until tender; and dressing them before serving with the juice of half a lemon. I ended up cooking them about 45 minutes—they were tender sooner, but I was aiming for that wonderful sweetness that long cooking brings to collards.

For dessert we had a little bowl of fresh blackberries and a piece of dark chocolate.

Of course, this “simple” dinner required that someone lovingly plant the collards and cover them every night to keep them from freezing, and to pick and wash them; someone going to the market for fresh fish and berries; and someone being there to tend the bread intermittently throughout the afternoon. It’s great entertainment, though.

Zucchini Gratin

Neither Lawson nor I was very hungry tonight, but I bought some nice zucchini, so I went digging through my recipe file* to find the old recipe you gave me for Zucchini Cheese Casserole. It's a recipe from your low-fat cooking era, and thus contains fat-free cottage cheese and egg whites, but that was easily modified. I changed the name to make it sound fancier. It's just zucchini, a few different cheeses, eggs, green chiles, and some dill seed and black pepper.



The Le Creuset dish you gave me makes a perfect gratin -- good browned, crusty cheese all around the edges -- so the answer to your question from three weeks ago is yes, you should buy their gratin dish to replace your old copper one when it finally goes.

* My recipe file is cumbersome, but I am emotionally attached to it and have no intention yet of switching to something more useful. It's a legal-sized folder, so it won't fit on any bookshelves, and it's packed full of hand-scribbled recipes, notecards and postcards with recipes from you and Grandma, printouts of old emails you sent me in undergrad, magazine clippings, and random notes. Some of the recipes are written on the backs of old flyers from shows my first band played. One page contains your old recipe for sesame broccoli with a note in my handwriting saying "Don't buy cooking wine EVER."

***
Edited 05/20/07 to add: Here's an actual recipe to go with this post.

I Love My New Toys

I finally turned my back on decades of Cuisinart food processing and asked for a KitchenAid for my birthday this year. Ain’t it handsome? My main problem with the Cuisinart was that the bowl wasn’t as durable as the early models, and after a couple years of use the switch/latch assembly would degrade, and finally get to the point where I had to hold down the lid with one hand and operate the buttons with the other. This KitchenAid bowl is thick and heavy, and the switch is simpler. It also has a mini-bowl that stores inside, for small jobs. I usually do those small jobs with a knife, but this is cute. I used the big bowl to make chorizo this week and it mixed powerfully and evenly, without my having to stop and scrape the sides. I’m delighted with it.

I also received four cookbooks for Christmas and my birthday this year. They are all spread out on the countertop along with my shopping-and-menu notebook, and every meal I cook I’m becoming more intimate with them. This has been a wonderful couple of weeks to experiment with new recipes, partly because of the cool weather, but also because of the lull between the holidays and the piano teaching season (spring competitions, festivals, etc.)

The Olive and the Caper: Adventures in Greek Cooking by Susanna Hoffman
This book is fun to read because the pages are filled with sidebars and inset boxes about Greek history, customs, and ingredients. I wondered if the recipes would be secondary, but they are indeed delicious and well-written. Last night we had Chicken Kapama--chicken browned and braised in an intensely dark red sauce containing coffee, tomato, red wine, brandy, honey, and herbs—kind of like a Greek barbeque sauce. With it I served a bulgur and vegetable pilaf, and tzatziki (thick Greek yogurt, Persian cucumbers, lots of garlic chopped with salt, and fresh mint and dill). I put fava beans in the pilaf. Did you know that after you shell the fava beans, you then have to blanch them and remove a tough outer membrane from each bean?

The New Book of Middle Eastern Food by Claudia Roden
I am most fascinated by the fish recipes in this book. By far the best fish I have made this month is her Pan-Cooked Fish with Preserved Lemon, Green Olives, and Capers. Many of the fish recipes are made in a single skillet. The salad and cold vegetable chapter is intriguing. I hope to try the lentil salad next, because we bought beautiful red lentils at the Caravan Market. I am thinking of starting a movement: Promoting World Peace through Eating the Foods of Other Cultures. This movement badly needs an acronym before it can catch on.

Vegetables Every Day by Jack Bishop
Sautéed Fennel with Raisins, Pine Nuts, and Garlic! What more can I say? Tonight I am making his grilled eggplant which is first marinated in garlic, oregano, and lemon. I have consulted this book for information every time I’ve cooked a vegetable lately. I am looking forward to Zucchini, Corn, and Red Pepper Sauté—cream and cilantro are added at the end, doesn’t that sound delicious?

La Cocina de la Frontera by James W. Peyton
To read this cookbook is to dwell in the world of sunshine and chiles. If I ever had to move to Siberia or Seattle, I would take this cookbook to bed with me every night. I love the simplicity of the recipes: green chile enchilada sauce made with just the addition of garlic, onion, and tomato, for instance; and the wonderful Border Town Margarita. Peyton offers both traditional and modern versions of many of his recipes, as well as information on how popular dishes vary from Arizona to New Mexico to Texas. At present I think this is the most satisfying Mexican cookbook I own. I think I told you that your copy came from the Panther Junction gift shop at Big Bend National Park. Everyone should head down there and pick one up. (Or order it on the Internet.)

If there’s anyone out there that would like to give me a job reviewing cookbooks, please call.

Saturday Morning Marketing

It’s cold here today—what Katherine charitably calls “cooking weather.” Dad and I were inspired to visit two ethnic markets this morning and we’re thrilled with our purchases. We are really rich in food resources here.

At the Caravan Middle East Market, for $24, we bought:

a little jar of mastic (the pitch of pistachio trees, for Greek recipes)
yellow split peas
red lentils
frozen fava beans
canned fava beans “Palestinian style”
Medjool dates
little pears
Persian cucumbers
tomatoes
a bunch of fresh dill
bulk green olives with Tunisian seasonings
bay leaves
a dark chocolate Lindt candy bar named “Intense Pear”

Then we proceeded on to Food City, the Mexican grocery chain, and spent $22 on:

3 pounds freshly roasted green chiles
poblano chiles
jalapeno chiles
tomatillos
kiwis
a pineapple
5 cans salsa
a wedge of cotija cheese, sold in bulk
a piece of Oaxaca cheese
Gala apples
avocados

It’s hard to decide what to cook first, but I would like to use the mastic, which is wonderfully aromatic. Watch this space for details as they develop.

Soft Foods

Lawson had some dental surgery this week, so for the last several days we've been eating soft foods. It's been a fun challenge. The problem with foods for sick people (milk toast, chicken noodle soup, etc.), as I see it, is that they are mostly low in fiber, and who wants to be both sick AND constipated?

So here's what we've been eating:

Sweet potato and red pepper soup: I found a recipe for this in that great soup book you gave both me and Grandma a few years ago, but the recipe was dumb -- throw everything in some vegetable stock and boil it for half an hour? So I roasted the sweet potatoes until they sweetened up properly; softened the onions, garlic, and pepper in oil; simmered the whole thing for a while with leftover duck stock; seasoned it; then pureed it. It was wonderful. I added some Texas Pete to my bowl.




Roasted beets: my new obsession. If you roast them long enough, cut them into 1/2-inch pieces, and toss them with lemon, salt, and olive oil, they are soft and sweet and perfect.

Homemade mushroom soup: Sauteed cremini, dried shitake, stock, sherry, and fresh thyme, mostly. It was creamy without dairy. I was happy.

Puddings: puddings! If they are not already, I predict that puddings will be the next silly comfort food trend. My homemade butterscotch pudding was a bit too firm, but the flavor was excellent. I made rice pudding with cardamom, honey, and lemon zest -- excellent with a glass of tawny port, in case Dad's interested. But the most incredible discovery from this series of dental surgeries has been simple vanilla pudding. Here's the Joy of Cooking's recipe (mostly), which is perfect (and small -- enough for four tiny ramekins):

Mix in a heavy saucepan:

- 1/3 cup sugar
- 2 T plus 1 1/2 t cornstarch
- 1/4 t salt

Thoroughly blend in 1/2 cup, then stir in the rest of:

- 2 cups milk or cream or some combination thereof

Stir slowly and constantly over medium heat until it begins to thicken (this is usually rather dramatic). Then stir fast. The pudding will start to simmer; hold it there for a minute, then take it off the heat and stir in:

- 2 t vanilla

Pour the pudding into bowls and put them in the fridge for as long as you can stand it. Once I unmolded the puddings from tiny ramekins onto tiny plates and scattered them with fresh raspberries. That was pretty special.

A Religious Experience Involving Chorizo

It may just have been indigestion, but in the early hours of this morning I believe I had a vision. The Supreme Being informed me that it wasn’t “Let there be light” at all, that had been a misunderstanding. It’s “Let there be chiles.” So now I’m a prophet; my holy book is James Peyton’s La Cocina de la Frontera; and by way of religious observance I am to eat lots of Mexican food.*

Dad got me a copy of the Peyton book for my birthday, and it’s great the second time around. Last night I made his homemade chorizo recipe, which was so good it brought tears to my eyes. I was swooning so hard I forgot to take a picture. With it we had along green chile enchiladas filled with goat cheese, Steaming Soupy Beans, and carrots.

Maybe not everyone has had a chance to eat beans this way, from Mexican Family Cooking by Aída Gabilondo:

Cook a pot of Anasazi or pinto beans with plenty of water. Add salt halfway through cooking time.

To serve, place a portion of beans in a soup bowl. Top with a teaspoon of olive oil, a teaspoon of vinegar, ¼ teaspoon of crumbled oregano, and chopped green onions.

*This is a great religion, really. Anyone can join. The other two rules are to be nice to people, and—She specifically mentioned this—don’t start wars.