Food Eaten

Pear Tart and Panna Cotta

2012-01-30T10:13:00.001-06:00

I'm just making a quick post to update with some photos of my most recent dessert platings. My baking production class has become quite time consuming, and with a bar mitzvah at work last weekend and a stage at the Grey Plume this weekend, I have had time only to work and watch an hour of television before I go to bed. I'm hopeful that this week will provide some respite from that schedule. I'll only be spending 9 hours at school today!

Last week, my desserts were featured once again at the Sage Bistro. I made a pear and almond tart and a coconut-mango panna cotta. In the end, I did come to love both desserts but it took time for them to grow on me. I was initially excited about them, but last Monday I was disappointed with the caramel sauce and the pastry cream filling. I tweaked them the next day, but it wasn't until I was plating them on Thursday evening that I really adored the tarts. I finally finally finally mastered the tart shells with a new trick (top secret). The panna cotta, once it set up, was just beautiful (if you ask me). I love the clean lines and the tuile top. It looks like it belongs at a black tie event. I am satisfied.

More Foibles in Plating

2012-01-08T22:43:00.001-06:00

I have been forced lately to think about my personal aesthetic. In the past, I just buy or am gifted my style. I don't think much about it. For a while, I would follow fashion blogs and pull away ideas, but now I need to apply what little I know about design to what I know about food, and more specifically pastries, to present it in a visually pleasing manner. This is a challenge. I normally put on a plate as if there were TV-dinner compartments. One spot is for vegetables, one spot for meat and another for potatoes. Desserts go on small plates and are garnished with a large dollop of whipped cream. In many ways, I ascribe to the school of thought that one shouldn't judge a book by its cover. That saying can get one into trouble. While true, if a book has a beautiful cover but not substance it will be cast aside. However, giving no thought to exterior presentation at all shows a laziness which is fine when serving dinner for your family or friends but is not acceptable when you expect someone to be impressed or better yet to lay down money for a good or service.

So I've been thinking about my personal style lately. After contemplating my wardrobe choices on a very very long road trip I have come to a few conclusions about myself. I like simplicity matched with a bit of flair. I own a large volume of plain T-shirts in various colors, mostly short-sleeved, and with differing neck-lines--boat, crew, v-neck--to name just a few. I wear three pairs of jeans: skinny, higher-waisted flairs and white jeans. I have one jacket, with a herringbone pattern, that I wear all the time along with this one pair of moccasins (brown) and subdued gladiator sandals. All boring, except for this one element: a pin. I got the pin at a clothing exchange with friends. It is completely singular and must be handmade. It is an old pocketwatch with the workings removed. In its place glued, tied and somehow or another way affixed is delicate drapings of chain mail, small rhinestone daisies and a large and somewhat gaudy plastic-pearl clip-on earring. I put a safety pin through the top of the brass pocket watch and it has hung galantly on my jacket for two years now. That is the perfect point of style for me. Minimal and simple and then there's this one piece of intrigue. I like scarves, funky sunglasses, I tuck my T-shirts into my pants to show of a belt. I have this one necklace that I bought in Spain for 6 euros in 2004. It's black with gold etchings of birds and flowers chiseled out of it. So what I want to learn and to refine is how to present a dessert that is delicious while being simple with just a touch of flair.

I am discovering there are as many ways to dress a plate as there are to dress a person. For instance, there's flashy with too much going on:

There's skill with a lack of a focal point:

There's trendy to a point of silliness:

What I want is minimalism with a point of interest:

The shape is nice, flattering. The goods are well made. Everything is great about this outfit. Her skirt is the obvious focal point, but it all shows off the person--her hair, her great body (jealous) and her cute face. There aren't these beautiful pieces distracting people from how lovely she is. Here is a reinterpretation of a lemon tart. We can't actually taste it, but the elements look well executed. The lemon curd is creamy and lump free, as does the meringue. The crumb layer appears to add some crunch. It's a basic tart presented in a different way. If only I could come up with something like this.

Last week, I made chocolate pots de creme. My instructor was insistent upon them being chocolate--not mocha flavored, not chocolate-hazelnut or chocolate peppermint. Plain but rich chocolate. The challenge is how to present it in a way that exhibits fine technique and good ingredients. I ended up using Tartine Bakery's recipe--no surprise there--which was rich and bitter and perfectly creamy.

I started with a quenelle of creme fraiche on the suggestion of the bakery student manager. I liked the plating below--looks like the last pedal left on a flower. However, no one agreed with me. I do really like the whipped and sweetened creme fraiche. It's something I hadn't tried before but worked nicely--it had that bit of sourness to give it one more piece of flavor.

At the suggestion and with the help of classmates and the TA, I flooded the top of the pots de creme with caramel creme anglaise. I then added a garnish of chocolate sauce. I learned that garnishes should be present only if they add something to the dessert--an idea I love but which can make plating trickier.

I came back from break with an idea for a triple chocolate pots de creme with a white chocolate creme anglaise and milk chocolate sauce. My instructor thought flooding the top with plain cold creme would be better along with some chocolate shavings. I'm not too crazy about the chocolate shavings because thinking of garnishes and desserts as a whole it's not much, however, the plate was just so white without the chocolate. I don't have a photo of the final dessert, but I'm pleased and hope that my efforts will come more easily in the future.

Lessons in Plating

2011-12-19T10:04:00.001-06:00

One great thing has happened that directly impacts this blog: I have an iPhone! Which means that I have a decent camera with me at all times, ready to document all my culinary adventures. And believe me, there have been a few this past week.

Right now, I'm enrolled in baking production class. It meets twice a week for like 10 hours--until the school's restaurant Sage Bistro closes on Monday and Tuesday--and we make the baguettes for the restaurant along with any desserts for catered events. The class meets at the same time as the Plated Desserts class, which essentially has students be the pastry chef for the bistro for the quarter. There happens to be only one student in that class this quarter, and she is responsible for producing four completely unique desserts each week. So alleviate her insanity, our instructor is having different students from my class fill in to help her each week. I got to go first, along with my friend Katie. Let me say, thank goodness I had Katie to bond with, freak out with and laugh with because it was a complete cluster.

We we responsible for two desserts: creme brulee (pretty easy really) and this thing called a tian (refer to the strawberry-orange dessert displayed above). I would be very happy to never make that dessert again.

The thing was Chef Mar's idea. She brought us a print out of the concept: cookie, marmalade, mousse, and packed with fruit. She said we could reinterpret it how we wanted. So we made a sable cookie, used some in-house marmalade, I made an orange-vanilla bavarian cream stabilized with gelatin, and then we chopped up a bunch of fruit. Monday morning before the restaurant opened, Chef Mar hated it. It was all wrong, she said. The fruit looked disgusting--it kind of did. Katie and I were clueless. I had no idea how to fix it. Finishing things is not my forte--Katie is much better at it than I, but we were both at a loss. Finally Chef Mar came over and showed us what to do, but not after an agonizing period during which time we flubbed around with the dessert. We got out of the kitchen after more than 12 hours of work without more than a 15-minute break then we turned around and came back the next day for more.

I had made a batch of the mousse on Monday to use Tuesday and Wednesday, except that by the time we left the kitchen at 10 p.m. or so the mousse was still a runny mess. I was paranoid that it wouldn't set and that there wouldn't be enough time to make another batch and set it so that it stood up on the plate long enough to travel from the kitchen to the dining room. The only way I got any sleep was to give it up. I thought, "There's nothing to be done now. I'll just arrive and remake it." But Tuesday, miracle of miracles, the mousse was solid enough to work--barely. Tuesday went much better. Katie and I both had a handle on what we were doing and what to expect, and we left planning to leave everything to the student managers on Wednesday and Thursday. That is until some of the Table Service students tried to eat our dummy dessert.

We had to make a false dessert to display to the restaurant's customers. The creme brulee was really, but the tian--not being shelf stable for hours--needed a stunt double. Katie made this perfect model out of Crisco and a little food coloring. It looked so realistic that the students got hungry and ate the creme brulee and started in on the mousse. The student manager caught them before they finished it, but they had effectually ruined the dessert. I got called in to remake the dessert for Thursday's service. What a week.

Deer Tenderloin

2011-12-10T15:18:00.001-06:00

I had four or five paragraphs written out about this deer tenderloin, but things just kept rambling on and on very amateurishly so I deleted it. There were all sorts of ponderings about life and blogging and eating and dating--trust me it was boring. Just look at the photos.

I cooked the deer, brought to me straight from the woods from my friend Dan, with a fennel and crushed bay leaf rub. I've used it before on pork tenderloin--quite tasty and not at all as weird as it sounds. Try it with this season's trappings.

Me Oh My, I Love Pie

2011-12-03T13:36:00.001-06:00

I'm usually a nut for pumpkin pie at Christmas and Thanksgiving, but I have lately been converted to the pecan variety. I've been making this pecan pie for work quite a bit lately to pretty rave reviews, but I hadn't tried it myself yet until last week. It is great. No surprise here, the recipe hails from Tartine Bakery's cookbook. Every recipe is a knockout. This one is great with the addition of whiskey and my substitution, orange zest. Tasting the batter before the bake, the whiskey is overpowering but ends up perfectly balanced.

The recipe also calls for several kinds of sugar, as opposed to just corn syrup. It adds a lot of depth the pie, making it not just sweet sweet sweet--my usual complaint with pecan pies. I was careful to add extra salt here too if you're not using salt pecans. I just love salted nuts, it seems such a shame to miss the opportunity for salted and toasted pecans covered in caramel.

Pecan Pie: www.tartinebakery.com
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup maple syrup, I've also used honey
1/2 cup corn syrup
2 tablespoons whiskey
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup butter, unsalted
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 eggs, lightly beaten
2 cups pecans
zest from one orange

One partially baked pie shell.

In a small saucepan, melt the sugar, maple syrup and corn syrup together with the salt. Boil for one minute. Remove from heat and pour in a mixing bowl. Let cool a minute then add the vanilla, whiskey and butter. Stir. Then add the beaten eggs. Stir to mix. Pour the pecan in the partially baked pie shell then pour the batter over the top. Bake for 45 to 60 minutes at 350 degrees until the filling is just set.

Three Posts in One Week and an Awesome Tart

2011-11-29T19:53:00.001-06:00

I hosted dinner last night for friends in honor of a couple friends who are embarking on big journeys this week. One friend, Liz, is traveling to the brand new country of South Sudan tomorrow morning. She has "humanitarian" stamped into her passport. Incredible. And my friend Justin and his girlfriend Audrey are moving to Colorado on Thursday. Justin has never lived outside Omaha before, so this is sure to be a great adventure, one that should be marked off by a homey dinner with friends.

It's finally starting to get cold here, and with leftover turkey on my mind, I made two pot pies. One all mushrooms and one chicken. It actually took quite a bit of searching to come up with a meal plan. Justin is a vegetarian, so there couldn't be meat, but it's not exactly prime produce season and I didn't want to serve a bunch of sides. I leafed through what seemed like all my cookbooks (sometimes I can get obsessive), and finally found something on Nigel Slater's column about a mushroom shepherd's pie. It was an easy jump to pot pie (in theory). I have come to realize through my cakes final and my first year testing that I need a lot of work on finishing products. I start out strong, cover my bases with good technique, some expertise and quality ingredients. And then I've got to put the top on the pie, which it shall be noted was not in a pie shell, and I just throw it on. Of course it totally shrank in the oven. I may as well not have even topped it (the topless chicken pie turned out just fine).

I do this with everything I've come to realize. All projects. Writing a story; I get through the first draft and read through it and turn it in. I'll come back and give it some work, maybe. But by the end, I'm just doing the bare minimum. How do I motivate myself to put forth as much energy at the end as I do at the beginning when I'm absolutely slaving over coming up with the perfect lede for a story. Does anyone out there have any tips? One thing I can think of is practice. For example, if I'm well practiced at making petit fours, I can do them just as well after oh say 15 hours of work as I do after one hour. So there's something. But what about writing? If any of you have tips on that front, let me know!

I found three different kinds of mushrooms for the pot pie at Wohnler's: dried shiitake that I rehydrated, baby portobellos and oysters. Slater recommended pairing the mushrooms with a sliced leek, sauteing, deglazing with red wine and and lemon juice and adding vegetable stock before popping it in the oven. A couple heaping tablespoons of flour was plenty to thicken the stock to a stew inside the flaky pie crusts, and the pot pie turned out exactly how I had hoped: a sweet and woodsy hash with chunks of mushrooms. I treated the chicken pot pie in the same way, except added some extra celery and carrots that had been chilling in the freezer for a loooong time (yikes), almost as long as the chicken.

But the highlight of the meal was definitely dessert. I saw a recipe a for hazelnut-plum tart on Smitten Kitchen and made a mental note to make it as soon as there was time. (And I'll be making it again for work this week.) In absence of fresh plums, I used cranberries. It. was. incredible. The hazelnut butter crust was was crunchy with a bit of sweetness and just a hint of salt. The salt was the kicker. I love a salty dessert. And then there was the center. Creamy baked custard filled in the cracks around the tart little cranberries that just bled out juice under the heat of the oven. And to top it all was the rest of the hazelnut crumb crust and a little whipped cream (homemade, might I add). My good friend Dan has never ever eaten more than a polite bite of any desserts I have made (he doesn't like sweets) asked for a second slice--there wasn't any.

Mushroom Pot Pie:
Filling: by Nigel Slater
16 ounces assorted mushrooms, cleaned and sliced
1 leek, sliced
a couple tabs of butter and glugs of oil, enough to get all the mushrooms
2 heaping tablespoons flour
3 tablespoons red wine or marsala
1 1/4 cup vegetable or chicken stock
salt and pepper
fresh thyme
juice from half a lemon

Crust: from Tartine Bakery Cookbook yields two 9-inch pies
1 1/2 cups cold butter
16 ounces flour
1 cup ice cold water
1 teaspoon salt

I mix smaller batches of flaky crust by hand nowadays. I slice up the butter and add the flour and salt to it. Then I crumble up the butter with my fingers until they're about the size of peas, some smaller pieces some bigger. Then I add about half the water and stir with a wooden spoon. Then add only enough water until the dough comes together. I knead it a couple times, then wrap it in plastic wrap and chill it for at least an hour before rolling. This recipe makes enough for two whole pies with the tops, if you conserve your leftover pieces.

For the filling, slice up all the vegetables. Heat the oil on medium in a stock pot. Saute the leeks and the heartier mushrooms like portobellos, then add the shiitakes and oysters and the like. Saute until the moisture is starting to leech out of the mushrooms. Add the flour and stir to coat. Deglaze with the wine and the lemon juice. Then add the stock. Season throughout cooking with salt and pepper. It should taste good before it goes into the shell. Pour into the shell, pinch the top closed, brush with an egg wash and bake at 350 degrees for an hour or until the crust is a nice golden brown.

Hazelnut Cranberry Tart: from Smitten Kitchen
Crust:
3/4 cup butter
1 1/2 cups flour
1/3 cup hazelnuts, toasted (this is a crucial step!)
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt

Filling
10 ounces fresh or frozen cranberries
1 egg
1 egg yolk
1 tablespoon flour
1/4 cup plus two tablespoons sugar
1/3 cup cream
1/4 cup milk
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

Toast the hazelnuts until they are light brown and nicely fragrant. Pulse in a food processor until coarsely ground. Combine with the butter, flour, salt and cinnamon, blending using your hands until the butter is the size of a pea. Use about two-thirds of the crumb mixture and press into the bottom of a tart pan or spring form. Bake at 350 degrees until "set," about 15 minutes. Let the crust cool a bit.

Add the cranberries and arrange on top of the crust. In a separate bowl, whisk together the rest of the ingredients. Carefully pour over the cranberries. Bake at 350 for 45 to 50 minutes or until the custard has set and the top has browned a little. If you gently shake the tart and the center is visibly quite jiggly keep baking. But if it seems more solid than liquid pull it out, it will continue to set while it cools.

Breaded Squash

2011-11-27T13:06:00.001-06:00

And the beat goes on. It would have been a great idea to post this recipe before Thanksgiving, but I'm not exactly punctual. Up until last week, I was barely treading water. I have reclaimed my life, if only temporarily. If there's anything I've learned going to school the second time around, it's to soak up the free moments. I've got another two days off this week before winter classes start (International Breads, so excited), and I'm glad to spend a few minutes recording some recipes in this space.

I hosted another potluck probably three weeks ago now, and I found this easy fall recipe at Sprouted Kitchen, which is a vegetarian blog (some seafood I believe) with the absolute worst most disgusting photos you can ever imagine (sarcasm) and written by the ugliest meanest writer (lies, she's so gorgeous you want to hate her). The breaded squash turned out to be a real hit at the party though. There were a few pieces left at the end for me to nibble while cleaning up. I love winter squash. It's so hearty and bold. It's a vegetarian's best friend. I love that this dish is roasted--such a fall thing--with rosemary and thyme and a whole clove of garlic. I just love a kitchen that smells like rosemary and garlic. The rosemary comes straight out of the forest while that garlic is remotely offputting in a way that makes you want more--you know how you keep smelling that gym bag? This, my friends, is a winner.

Panko-breaded Butternut Squash:
1 butternut squash
1/2 cup panko bread crumbs, smashed up a bit more than how they come in the bag.
1 clove garlic with the bottom sliced off
several sprigs of fresh rosemary and thyme
olive oil
salt and pepper
1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

Peel and dice the squash into equally-sized portions. Place in baking pans.

In a separate bowl, combine the panko crumbs, which you will want to smash up a bit more than how they come in the bag so they really stick to the squash, parmesan cheese, and salt and pepper. Drizzle the squash with olive oil and toss to coat. Season a bit with salt and pepper--not too much remembering the seasoning in the bread crumbs. Toss the bread crumb mixture in with the squash. Press the crumbs into the squash if necessary. Add the rosemary, thyme and garlic to the pan. Roast at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until the squash is soft to the bite but not mushy.

The Ends of Cakes

2011-11-20T18:14:00.001-06:00

It has officially been the longest since I have posted on this blog. More than a month. In fact, this is the second time I've attempted completing this particular post. I fell asleep the first time. (If even the writer is falling asleep, this is not a good sign.) Obviously I have been busy. I have finally made it to the end of a clusterf*** of a week-and-a-half that went something like this: two stories due, cakes final examination, out-of-town wedding that served as a nice break, three grueling days going through the first-year culinary tests , a 15-hour day at work, intense cleaning at school (I took on a deep fat fryer--gross) and some light-to-heavy drinking (whoops).

I have emerged somewhat unscathed. I passed my exams and assumedly my cakes final, the output of which you can see in these photos. I look at the cakes up close and cringe a little. They look so sloppy--look at that broken ladyfinger below. I swear none of the other ladyfingers broke. And that chocolate cake doesn't look polished at all. It's supposed to have these smooth finished sides. But, they did taste delicious.

For a project, our cakes instructor gave each of the students an artist to design two cakes and 20 petit fours for. I drew Maria Martinez, who is an American Indian pottery artist known for developing this amazing black on black technique. She is credited with being the artist to bring American Indian art to museums and collectors.

I really lucked out with her because she is from New Mexico, an area with a distinct culinary tradition. I developed my cakes around the flavors of the Southwest. Note: Do not attempt these at home. It took me six hours, including quite a bit of actual running, to finish on time. The pink cake has a corn meal sponge bottom followed by a layer of lemon curd mousse, a sunflower seed baked meringue (which was awesome), then a prickly pear mouse and surrounded by ladyfingers. The chocolate cake had a chocolate sponge base, then chocolate-cinnamon-cayenne pepper mousse and a brown-sugar bavarian cream with another sunflower meringue and topped with chocolate-cinnamon-cayenne ganache and chocolate feather cutouts. The petit fours have a lemon sponge with sage-flavored pastry cream filling, a poured fondant top and royal icing piping.

I enjoyed playing around with the Southwest theme and thought everything turned out alright, aside from the fact that I think the cakes are the equivalent of a third graders coloring book instead of a professional but whatever.

I really grew to adore mousse even more in this class. I hadn't realized how easy it can be to attempt, although I feel a long way from perfecting it. During my later examinations, I was chided for mixing the chocolate with the whipped cream when the chocolate was too warm, which causes the cream to break. But if the chocolate is too cool it seizes up and hardens mid-blending. It's such a subtle art this pastry, and I am not a subtle person.

Almost Thai Green Curry

2011-10-17T22:12:00.002-05:00

I have no photo to share, and whenever I don't have a photo I assume that no one will read what goes along. Truth is, I'm probably right--not that my writing is something to slow down your day for. I haven't been snapping photos, but I have been cooking. A couple weeks ago I made a vegetable curry stew for friends. It was so good, I saved the leftovers and ate them all, which is something I never do. I don't ever eat leftovers, aside from soup. But this curry, this curry could not be thrown away. It came from Nigel Slater's Tender: Volume 1, a most beautiful tome that I haven't even read through despite the pictures, the useful information and the riveting prose (listen to this: "the dusty 'old as time itself' taste of ground turmeric" I could never come up with that). This curry was the closest I have ever come to replicating the green curry I would order almost nightly from Phee Lek, my Thai grandma. When I was teaching and eating in Thailand, she was the cook at the restaurant on the compound of my apartment complex. Was teeny tiny, not even five feet tall and a sweet sort of wily. She ran this tiny little restaurant that had five or six tables and a large television that played a lot of MTV, her daughter's favorite. She spoke hardly any English, which was perfect because I spoke hardly any Thai. We communicated with action and pointing.

After getting sick of rice for every meal, I tried ordering vegetables without it. Complete with hand motions I said the English equivalent of "No want rice. Vegetables. Big big vegetables." With some trial and error, I received before me a platter of the sauteed tomatoes, baby corn, eggplant, onions, peppers and several kinds of mushrooms--it was a veritable cornucopia--all doused in delicious MSG. She also taught me how to properly pronounce green curry with chicken in Thai, quite a feat considering the intonation. I don't order it much any more--too much disappointment--but I have requested green curry at a restaurant downtown and the waiter was very impressed. The curry was my other standby in Thailand. Lek made it with Japanese eggplant and pumpkin, if they were available. I ordered the smokey curry with a spice level of one and slurped down the stew sweetened with coconut milk with only a little rice.

This dish doesn't have the complications of making a curry paste beforehand out of God knows how many herbs, spices and aromatics, but it still has that depth that makes you wonder, what is in here? I went to the Asian Market, a relatively new store, to find real lemongrass, which made such a difference. I always want to substitute lemons for lemongrass but it's not quite right, not earthy enough or something. I didn't even realize how close I would come to Pee Lek's green curry, but with the inclusion of squash or pumpkin--it's nearly there.

Pumpkin-chickpea Curry: from Tender by Nigel Slater, serves 6

1 15-ounce can chickpeas or 1/2 cup dry chickpeas, soaked overnight

1 large onion, diced

1 teaspoon canola oil

4 cloves garlic, minced

1 thumb-size piece ginger, minced

3 stalks lemongrass

2 teaspoons ground coriander

2 teaspoons ground turmeric

1 teaspoon ground cardamom

dash of cayenne pepper (to taste)

1/2 small pumpkin (about 8 ounces), cubed

250 mL vegetable or chicken stock

400 mL coconut milk

1 tablespoon mustard seeds

2 cups rice, cooked

Mince the garlic and the ginger together. Saute the onion until it's translucent. Add the minced garlic and ginger. Stir in the spices. Add the pumpkin, chickpeas and vegetable stock as well as the lemongrass with its tough outer leaves removed. Bring to a boil and reduce heat to a simmer. Cook until the pumpkin has softened a bit and the chickpeas have split. Thicken with cream, season to taste. In a separate pan, saute the mustard seeds until they spit, add to the curry. Serve over rice.

Hummingbird Cake

2011-10-02T12:58:00.001-05:00

I know I swore I hated cakes, but I'm learning some aren't so bad. Every Thursday I go to my class devoted entirely to the subject. All I eat all day Thursdays is cakes. Everyone in the class makes a different cake, and I try them all. Sometimes I can't stop, especially on mousse day. I was dipping my fork in everything chocolate, caramel and fruit-flavored. This hummingbird cake, the one pictured above, was part of the classic American cakes day. It was so easy and such a showstopper. The Southern favorite reminded me of carrot cake, really moist and sweet. The batter has crushed pineapple, bananas and pecans in it.

Below is the Heaven and Hell cake, which apparently goes for like $100 at the Mansion, a fancy hotel-restaurant in Dallas. It's certainly a Texas-style cake: six layers with peanut-butter mouse in between each and covered with chocolate ganache. The cake cleverly features alternating layers of angel food and devil's food cake. Decadent and ridiculous--that's Texas for you. I much prefer the simpler, homier hummingbird.

Hummingbird Cake:
110 grams pecans, chopped and toasted
420 grams flour
400 grams sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3 eggs, beaten
180 mL canola oil
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
227 grams crushed pineapple, undrained
2 cups mashed bananas (3 to 4 bananas)

Cream Cheese Frosting:
57 grams butter, room temperature
227 grams cream cheese, room temperature
454 grams powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
55 grams pecans, chopped and toasted

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Makes two nine-inch rounds. Mix flour, sugar, baking soda, salt and cinnamon. In a separate bowl, mix together eggs, oil, vanilla, pineapple, bananas and pecans. Combine ingredients being careful not to overmix. Divide the batter evenly and bake 25 to 30 minutes until a toothpick comes out of the cake cleanly. Let cool before frosting.

For the frosting, cream the butter and cream cheese together until light and fluffy. Sift the powdered sugar and add to the butter gradually. Add the vanilla and beat until smooth. Stir in the pecans by hand. Ice the cake.

Zuccotto, Dessert of the Gods

2011-09-24T15:52:00.001-05:00

Just when I'm ready to write off all things cake, cup and otherwise, something comes along that completely changes my mind. This time it is a cake called zuccotto. It's Italian, as all good things are, and it is divine.

The cake is constructed, something I love about pastries. It's layers pieced into layers; in the way a good tart has a crust, a filling and a garnish, this cake has a crust filling and more filling. I made the cake for a school presentation--because I had time and desire to make more cake last week (I was so over them until this moment). Look at my kitchen. It's a complete mess; I don't even want to talk about it. I had signed up for the cake on a whim from a list of 18 choices. When I did a quick look online about the cake I saw "semifreddo Italian confection" and I wanted to scream at Chef Mar, "You assigned a freaking ice cream cake?!" I was thinking of the quick Italian ice cream that doesn't need a machine to aerate it, but I was blessedly wrong. Semifreddo in this case refers to mousse.

Mousse has been my new sweet obsession since Sylvain Leroy visited the Institute. I made chocolate-raspberry-lime flavored mousse and plain vanilla for my pastries final, mixed berry for a catering order at work and a chocolate mousse pie with candied pecans and caramel sauce for the deli. This is a new incarnation that tops all the previous efforts, thanks, in no small part, to the inclusion of amaretto liqueur, which improves all baked good, if you ask me.

The cake starts with a pound cake base lining any sort of bowl. I followed Giada dii Laurentis' recipe, which recommended store-bought pound cake making the zuccotto that much simpler. I questioned things pretty whole-heartedly at this point. Martha Stewart's Real Simple makes the cake look so easy and beautiful, but you know the cake in the photograph could very easily be glued together with actual glue. Mine would not have glue and could feasibly fall apart once I turned it out. I had nothing to do though but continue on. I soaked the pound cake in amaretto liqueur and then lined the inside with a concoction of whipped cream, sugar, almond extract and ground almonds leaving a large well to be filled with the food of the gods, chocolate mousse. I closed the cake with more pound cake and refrigerated it overnight.

The cake flipped out of the bowl in a snap and looked nearly as good as the Martha Stewart version (except for the visible uneven distribution of amaretto syrup in the pound cake). But the real life flavor of the cake was just perfection. The cake was soft with an aroma of almond and cherries, the whipped cream with almond was light and crunch and then the mousse, the mousse was light and fudgy. Just the absolute perfect combination. I won't speak badly of cakes for at least another week.

Zuccotto: Giada dii Laurentis (with some help from me)
1 loaf store-bought pound cake
2 tablespoons amaretto liqueur
4 cups whipping cream
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup almond, ground
1 teaspoon almond extract
6 ounces semi-sweet chocolate morsels

The proportions here depend on how large your bowl is. I used a fairly big on and had to increase the amount of chocolate mousse filling (what a shame). You can buy or make the pound cake for the shell. Slice the cake and arrange along the bottom of the bowl. Whip two cups of the heavy whipping cream with sugar and almond extract until stiff peaks. Fold in the almonds. Spread the cream across the pound cake, leaving a well in the middle. Whip the remaining cream until medium-stiff peaks. Melt the chocolate in the microwave or in a double boiler. Combine the chocolate and whipped cream, being sure that the chocolate is just barely warm to the touch, not too hot or the whipped cream will melt and it won't be good at all. Fill the rest of the bowl with the chocolate mousse. Cover with the rest of the pound cake, wrap and refrigerate until the mousse has set. Turn out, slice and enjoy.

Cupcakes and a Broken Dream

2011-09-19T20:44:00.000-05:00

Having a cupcake stand at the Old Market Farmer's Market was a lot like the KoolAid stand my sister and I set up in front of our house when we were six and three years old except more expensive. It was fun and silly and we ate more product than we sold.

Back in March when I hated my job, I signed up to sell cupcakes weekly at the farmer's market. Now I love that same job and I hate all things cake. I had this fantasy of my sister and me frolicking around the Old Market in sundresses selling cutesy little cupcakes with fancy garnishes, flavors like French lavender, apricot and Meyer lemon. We would be the most popular vendors at the market. Men would cluster at our table, vying for our phone numbers. Reality, my friends, is cold and cruel.

They called me Tuesday of last week to see if I could work the market. I said yes without even thinking about the logistics of my weekend. Fridays I wake up at 4 a.m. to bake something I like to make (bread) and work for 10-plus hours on my feet the entire time. That leaves the rest of Friday to make 200-some cupcakes and interview three people for a story due Monday. Stupid. Just stupid. I don't function well on not enough sleep. I get mean and dramatic and I have big meltdowns.

After work and emergency errands, I got started on the cupcakes around 4 p.m. I made a large batch of orange-chiffon and burned one tray. Calmly, I threw them out and kept going--really keeping my cool. My sister joined me at 5:30 or so and got going on the sign (see top photo of the classy sign to go with the "classy" Husker tent we were extremely happy to have). The sign, so cute, but never to be used again. She worked on the sign for four hours. She was happy. She was singing, talking aloud "Oh I just love this. It's so creative. I just love making things like this. Lalala." She cut out letters and ironed them to the banner while watching episodes of Sex and the City. Meanwhile, I labored away in a hell of my own making. Cupcakes are messy. And for a messy person such as myself, things get out of control quickly. There's runny batter and sticky icing, flour everywhere. I would gaze into the oven after each batch, hoping that they would rise to the perfect level, ballooning over the rim of the cupcake liners. But the cake-making was a cinch compared to the icing.

Buttercream, real buttercream, is a hot whipped meringue that you let cool and then add butter until it forms a fully emulsified, creamy and airy, delicious frosting. The key here would be letting the meringue cool. Patience is not something I can boast about personally. In the end, it took half an hour or so of whipping on near maximum velocity in the mixer until I could add the butter. This was after two failed attempts. It was 10 p.m. or so, my sister was nearly done with the sign and I was totally ready to give up. It seemed like a better idea to call the market people and tell them I couldn't do it. Or better, just not show up. I could sleep in until 10 p.m. on a Saturday, at which point the market would be nearly over, and life would be beautiful and cupcake free. Instead, I took a shower. In the shower, I was so tired that I couldn't stand anymore, so I sat down and took a bath. I thought about giving up a little more. One more attempt at buttercream, I thought, one more attempt.

I sent my sister to the store for more butter and eggs. I hated just a little to tear her away from the happy world of sign-making into the den of cupcakery, but also, I wanted to scream at her. I told her we should give up. She was so cheery in her response "No, this is great." Her sweetness doesn't belong with the cupcakes. I called my mom. We had a pep talk, I got a new plan and called Allison to pick up cream cheese and powdered sugar at the store. "I'm baaaack," she answered in a sing-song voice. There's nothing worse than happiness when all you want to do is throw a pastry bag of whipped cream at the wall (which I had earlier that day at work). But it worked. Allison filled the peach cupcakes with mousse while I made cream cheese icing, just enough for the peach and orange-chiffon cupcakes. And this time, I made the buttercream right. I was in bed in time for four hours of sleep for the second night in a row.

Even after the cupcakes were made, our farmer's market dreams did not come true. We did not wear sundresses and only a few young men visited our tent but only because they happen to be good friends. We froze our asses off when Seattle weather descended upon Omaha, Neb., in September. Hardly anyone came to the market; the balloon man who usually has a line 10 deep was pacing around quite bored. I actually will give myself a little credit for not crying on the spot. I didn't care anymore about selling the cupcakes to make back all the money I had spent on supplies and a portion scoop ($18!). At least the cupcakes were over and I never have to make them again. And the sign really was quite cute

Tortilla Soup

2011-09-09T19:09:00.001-05:00

Some weeks life feels a little like a no-hit winner. It's long. Nothing really good is happening. Thankfully someone makes a mistake and you get on base with a ball and you steal your way to home plate.

I chipped a tooth at work this week. Big time. I looked like a hillbilly when I opened my mouth. I bumped into a cart I was pushing when it bumped into the sink in the meat kitchen. My right front tooth just crumbled in my mouth, painlessly but dramatically nonetheless. In the basement bathroom, I cried, sobbed actually, and for three straight hours, any extended thought spent on my tooth and my now inability to ever get a date ever again led to more and more tears. It wasn't until lunch that I pulled it together and not until 2 p.m. that I got official word that workman's comp was going to cover it. One of my co-workers hugged me and said "Don't worry baby, you still sexy." Something I needed to hear, though I'm not sure I really believe I'm sexy at all (I'll take the compliment).

I got my tooth filled the next morning and things are fine, though no dates to speak of--I will forever blame the tooth. I've been babying my mouth ever since. Avoiding apples and carrots, even gingerly biting into crackers with my left front tooth instead of the right. Soup seemed about right for the occasion. So I dusted off my Dutch oven for the first time in months and made a tortilla soup.

I don't just search for any recipes online. There are a lot of bunk tips on the interwebs. Mark Bittman plus anything food is a worthy search, and this time proved to be no error. I didn't even have all the ingredients--avocado would have been a plus, but my fresh chili pepper (straight from the garden) worked just fine. The garden is wilting a little, so I plucked all the ripe black cherry tomatoes I could and plopped them in with an onion and some garlic. I added about a tablespoon of chili powder plus my very spicy pepper (serrano? habanero? not sure). The soup, once blended with roasted chicken added, was comforting in a way only soup can be with a little fire to finish.

Tortilla Soup: inspired by Mark Bittman
6 flour tortillas
1/2 cup canola oil
1 large onion, small dice
3 garlic cloves, sliced
3 medium tomatoes, diced
1 serrano pepper, finely chopped
1 teaspoon chili powder
6 cups chicken stock
6 ounces shredded chicken
juice from one lime (or lemon)
avocado and Mexican cheese to garnish

Heat up the oil and then fry the tortillas. Remove from pan. I tried this but my tortillas were about one year old and started to smell sour and break apart in the pot so I tossed them. Chips will work fine. With the remaining oil, saute the onion for a couple minutes then the garlic, which cooks faster and should be added second. Once the aromatics have softened, add the tomatoes, the pepper and the chili powder. Saute for five minutes. Add the chicken stock and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes. Puree the soup. Put back in the pot and add the chicken. Simmer for five minutes until chicken is warm. Add juice and serve garnished with avocado and/or cheese.

Bacon Lettuce Tomato Sandwich

2011-08-31T15:15:00.001-05:00

I've been eating a lot of BLTs lately with tomatoes from my garden and a honey-mustard mayonnaise I made two months ago and forgot about.

My tomatoes have been a smashing success this year. The large red heirlooms (variety forgotten) are plump and juicy, but the little black cherry tomatoes are the showstopper. These guys are the best tomatoes I have ever eaten in my entire life. Every time. When people come over to my house, I make them sample the tomatoes. "Try it, just try it," I goad on. They all agree--quite good. The little orbs are so pretty: they're red, green and purple. But inside, oh inside, they just burst open in your mouth with sour juice and seeds.

The BLT has so much potential, and without good tomatoes you may as well skip it. But I am just rationing out this mayo liberally on all pieces of toast. I have eaten BLTs probably at least twice a week since the beginning of August. There's so much crunch and juice going on that the creamy mayo is just the icing on the cake, so to speak.

The mayo first appeared in this meal back in June (but not written about until July, just so can get a feel for how long I let things sit in my fridge). If you haven't ever made mayonnaise, it is something that just must be done. I can't tell you how much better it is than Hellman's or gawdawful Miracle Whip, which has this jello-like consistency. (I know people love it, but no thanks here.) It's so soft and creamy. My mom raised me to be afraid of the fat and cholesterol content, but dang mayo is totally worth it for a tablespoon a couple times a week.

Honey Mustard Mayonnaise:
3 egg yolks
1 tablespoon vinegar, plus more to taste
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard, plus more to taste
3/4 cup vegetable or canola oil
3/4 cup olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
1 tablespoon honey

I started this by making the basic mayonaise out of James Peterson's Sauces in which I whisked the yolks, mustards and vinegar together. Then slowly poured a combination of both oils into the yolks, whisking constantly. The mayonaise will thicken up quite a bit. Just go until the oil is completely incorporated. Season with salt and pepper. Add the honey and a bit more vinegar. Taste and adjust mustard, salt, pepper, honey and vinegar to taste. You'll want to have the vinegar to water down the dressing a bit so it's easier to pour. Toss the mayo with the fruit and vegetables and plate the salads.

All-day Croissants

2011-08-29T11:33:00.000-05:00

It's a bit unbelievable that I am able to make bread. Shocking really. Patience is a trait everyone who knows me well teases me about not having. When I was in high school, my parents told me I wouldn't make a good social worker because I wasn't patient. I would expect people to change on my schedule, and they wouldn't. My friend Katy once gave me a "patience" candle. Maybe one of those aromatherapy things, or possibly a sales gimmick--either one.

Yeast bread is one of those things that comes absolutely on its own time. And maybe that's why it has taken me so long--with so many trials and errors--to get it. It involves precision, attention to detail, (another thing NOT on my list of strengths) and waiting. But I think I like it because it's such a challenge. Plus, wow, the payoff is pretty great.

I made croissants for the first time when I got back from Thailand. It was this phase I went through, cooking everything I had never tried before. At the time, I only had a part-time job then and had just spent six months in Thailand without a kitchen. The apartment I was living in there had like one pan and someone gave me a rice cooker, which was completely ridiculous since I could go downstairs and buy plain rice for like 20 cents. Back in Omaha, I had my mom's newly remodeled kitchen and an endless supply of free food waiting for me to experiment with. I can recall making croissants, French baguettes (which turned out horribly), squash risotto and a pork roulade. The croissants, I recall, were incredible. A fluke I'm sure. I hadn't made them again since probably because they are definitely something worth buying over making.

It takes hours, half a day to finish. Whereas one can buy a perfectly crafted chocolate croissant at the Bread Oven in Dundee for probably $2. Well worth it. Not that I think my time was wasted making croissants five years ago or a couple weeks ago for that matter. Au contraire. It's illogical to think that I would spend six-plus hours on anything that had incredible potential to be a bust based on my lack of skill. I do possess the tools now to make something that in this case turned out incredibly tasty, light, flaky everything croissant-like yet very lopsided and burned on the bottom. I couldn't even eat all the croissants I made. I gave more than half of them away to happy recipients: friends and neighbors. These were filled with not quite enough almond frangipane cream and strawberry jam (if it's even possible to overdo this not-too-sweet almond filling).

The process in making something like a yeasted croissant is not difficult, but it is so impractical and food is above all things practical. It's essential to life, yet here I am go taking all day to make something that did turn out quite delicious. It's essential to me in another way. To me, cooking is good for the soul. It's essential to me to spend a quiet afternoon listening to Cat Stevens while crafting a not-quite-perfect but soft and flaky pastry.

Almond Cream: from Tartine Bakery Cookbook
1/4 cup sugar
3 tablespoons butter
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup almond meal (ground of nuts of any sort really)
2 tablespoons flour

Cream the butter and the sugar in a mixer. Add the egg, mix, and then add the vanilla. Add both the almond meal and the flour at the same time, mixing until smooth. Set aside.

Laminated Brioche: (for other ideas with laminated brioche go here)

600 grams flour

15 grams salt

65 grams sugar

250 grams butter

30 grams yeast

50 grams water

6 eggs

Make sure all the ingredients are cold. Mix all ingredients except butter in a KitchenAid or similar mixer with the dough hook until you can pinch a piece of dough, pull it away and have it stretch but not break (that is full gluten development). Add the butter a tablespoon at a time while still mixing. Ferment until doubled in size. Move on to the lamination step.

Lamination:

400 grams dough

80 grams butter

Roll dough out into a rectangle. Beat the butter with a rolling pin until it is thinner and more pliable. Place the butter on half the dough and then fold the top half down over it. Roll it out. Fold it three times, roll it out. Fold it three times again and roll it out, resting the dough in between folds, possibly in the fridge to keep the butter cool.

To form croissants, roll out laminated dough into a large sheet about one-fourth an inch thick. Cut into triangles. Spread the almond cream and/or a fruit jam or compote of any sort along the full length of the triangle. Starting at the flat end of the triangle and moving toward the point, roll the dough. Let the dough ferment again for another hour or so. Brush with an egg wash and bake at 350 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes or until golden brown on the outside and flaky.

Pastries Final

2011-08-17T12:49:00.000-05:00

Chef Mar's practical exams have a way of exhausting a person. Our Monday pastries final was four straight hours of intense concentration combined with running around the bakery in order to finish everything on time. It was a complete cluster.

We worked in groups to come up with a menu to start up our own pastry shop with the aim of making the offerings well rounded and along a theme. I love a them. Talking with Janelle and Gianni, we decided on comfort food of the Southern variety, and I went straight for the Georgia peaches (which I unfortunately burned), key limes and banana creams. The challenge was that we had to present a spectrum of skills learned in pastries fundamentals, while still finishing quality work on time. We could only use the same dough twice (tops) and we had to have three breakfast pastries.

My additions to the "pastry shop" were chocolate pavlovas (baked meringes) with a chocolate-lime-raspberry mousse, banana cream savarins (yeasted sweet dough) with vanilla bavarian cream and caramel sauce, a sweet potato-onion-bacon quiche (if that's not comfort food ...) and a laminated brioche filled with pecan frangipane and peach compote, except without the scorched peaches. The brioche was by far my favorite. It was so flaky and buttery--a heart-attack roll. They turned out enormous in the oven after the dough rose and the butter steamed out from between the pockets in which it was cushioned. The mousse and bavarian cream too were just devinely light. I stole home a deli container of the vanilla but didn't grab the chocolate before it found its way into the trash during cleanup.

I abhor meringues (see below), and my pavlovas turned out more like sugared cardboard than marshmallowy pillows. The quiche was a near disaster saved only by my partners. When I went to pull my dough out of the cooler, it had turned olive green over the weekend. Obviously inedible. Janelle had extra pate brisee dough, which was perfect, but all Gianni had was sweet tart dough for her creme fraiche pie. I used it anyway, hoping the instructors wouldn't eat from that quiche (they didn't!). My partners made beautiful rugelach, soft panna cotta, scones, sandwich cookies and a couple pies to round out our "display," which was totally overshadowed by the group who made a replica French bakery out of a cardboard box and Hobby Lobby supplies. It was somewhat ridiculous and totally made my group look like goons because we didn't even bring a cake stand or platter on which to display items in our fake bakery.

The final went from 8:30 a.m. until half past noon, after which point it took us all three or four hours to come down from the mind**** of the exam, which was great because that's how long it took Chef Mar to grade our pastries. The bakery was a complete disaster zone--one person had left a puddle of chocolate ganache on the counter in a rush to turn her pastries in on time. I cleaned every single sheet pan by hand, which was 20 to 30. The trash cans were spilling over. At least no one had injured themselves. We were all so exhausted in the end that we just sat around a table in the bistro laughing, laughing, laughing at nothing and everything at once. I came out of the class with an A, a point of great pride. I am extremely satisfied with a B in Chef Mar courses, so to get an A was a great feeling.

Puddle of ganache:

Chocolate Pavlovas: (if you like that sort of thing)
4 egg whites
1 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon vinegar
1/2 teaspoon cornstarch
1 tablespoon cocoa powder

Preheat oven to 300. In the bowl of a standing mixer, pour the egg whites and mix starting on low and slowly moving up to high. As the eggs begin to foam and set up to soft peaks, add the sugar slowly. Once white have reached hard (stiff) peak stage but are still glossy stir in the vinegar. Once incorporated, add the cornstarch and cocoa powder and stir to incorporate. Portion into rounds on a baking sheet with parchment paper and form a well in the middle of the round to fill with whipped cream or mousse. Bake at 300 for an hour to an hour and half. Remove from oven when the pavlovas have just started to dry out--they will dry out more once they're out of the oven.

Chocolate Mousse with Raspberry and Lime:
5 ounces bittersweet chocolate
3 ounces butter
1 tablespoon raspberry jam
juice from one lime
8 ounces heavy whipping cream

On a double boiler, melt the chocolate with the butter, jam and juice. Once melted and smooth, start whipping the cream until it is medium stiff peaks (not completely stiff). Make sure the chocolate is still melted but isn't super hot and stir the whipped cream into the chocolate. Refrigerate until cool. Fill pavlovas and top with fresh fruit.

Replica bakery:

Eggplant Hors d'oeuvres

2011-08-14T16:21:00.000-05:00

Wednesday was one of the most beautiful days of my life not so much as a day but as a recognition of my contentedness, of life's overall beauty. It was the day of the pastry demonstration, when my eyes were opened to the paradox of mousse; it being both deeply complex and incredibly simple. I went home feeling elated about the prospects of baking for a living and not so much for a living but for life. The weather was just perfection. The high, if you can believe it, on August 10 was 75 degrees. Seventy-five! I spent what seems like the entire month of July sequestered in air-conditioned buildings and now the air is thin enough that I can enjoy an afternoon on my screened in porch, sitting in my writing chair. I am sitting in it right now, in fact.

In total exuberance of life, which was only a little squashed by the reality of waking up before the sun in order to live my "baking life," I made a dinner for one. It was bruschetta with tomatoes, chives and basil from the garden, and sauteed eggplant. I had bought little Japanese and heirloom varieties from the Rhizosphere farm folks on Sunday at the market and by Wednesday they were already soggy (that orange globe in the first photo, by the way, is an eggplant). I had let them go too long! So I cooked them all, which turned into what could have been hors d'oeuvres for 10. Nevermind, it was delicious. I ate them on my porch, trying not to drip tomato juice on my legs.

Eggplant Bruschetta: from Tender Vol. 1 by Nigel Slater

2 eggplants

6 tablespoons olive oil

zest and juice from one lemon

small bunch basil leaves

small bunch chives

salt and pepper

triscuits or French bread if you've planned ahead

Slice the eggplants into coins. Salt the eggplant in a strainer, let set for 30 minutes. Water starts to leach out of the eggplants after a period. Rinse and dry the eggplant. Saute on medium high heat until tender. Meanwhile blend the oil, lemon juice, herbs and salt and pepper to make a dressing. Toss the finished eggplant in the dressing. Serve on crackers. Good with tomato bruschetta.

Getting Fancy with Chef Sylvain Leroy

2011-08-10T17:20:00.000-05:00

I just finished eating the most beautiful, most delicate desserts of my life. The Institute for Culinary Arts had a visiting chef in to demonstrate some fancy schmancy chocolate a local purveyor is carrying. Chef Sylvain Leroy, who visited the institute, works for the Paris Gourmet and travels some doing these demonstrations, mixing up the mousse that is the lightness of lightness and showing us the proper way to temper chocolate and how to make the best ganache. I am inspired. Mousse and Bavarian creams are things I have not been fond of. It's the gelatin. When used improperly, it is chunky and granular, but now I see that the gelatin allows the mousse to retain its effervescence.

It was a bit exciting to see Chef Leroy (named one of the best 10 pastry chefs in the country by Dessert Professionals magazine!) masterfully play with chocolate, meringues and purees. I struggle so much, making a complete mess of my station in class and at work. In the two-hour demo, he made three desserts whose names are actually quite meaningless to me until described: first was an exotic coconut and mango verrine, followed by a royale blueberry cremeux and finished with a douceur. Right. What are those?

The verrine was pineapple compote base with a coconut mousse filling and topped with mango gelee. Incredibly light and tropical. It tasted so much like Thailand to me. They were a little obsessed with those bubble teas when I lived there and the pineapple compote was a bit akin to a bubble tea, except delicious, whereas those tapioca balls are completely disgusting. But it had the best parts of the creaminess of those drinks.

The blueberry cremeux involved quite a bit of chocolate. He made a chocolate ganache, mixing hot heavy cream and pureed blueberries over chocolate morsels until they emulsified "like mayonaise" as he explained. He had a lavender streusel dough already chilled and ready to go, adding a delicate crunch to the chocolate. He then topped the dessert with glazed blueberries that were just in the absolute peak of ripeness.

The best dessert, however, was the mystery douceur. Let me say this: white chocolate mousse. He mixed the white chocolate with plain Greek yogurt (brilliant), which added just a tiny bit of tang to what can be an oversweet ingredient. The douceur had the same streusel topping and he added some glazed strawberries.

He closed the session with a demonstration in tempering chocolate. As much as baking and pastry is a delicate science, chocolate work is one more step beyond. He explained that the chocolate must be heated to this temperature and the cooled to this temp but not below and so on. My friend Ashley and I were sort of joking and chatting with him in the front row and he asked one of us to volunteer. We looked at each other and I sensed that she maybe wasn't quite convinced, though I'm sure she would have done it. But I just stood up and walked right up there to have him teach me how to make these lace-like chocolate fans. He poured out the melted chocolate on the counter and spread it thin with a spatula. After it cooled and dried a little, he used a bench scraper to quickly pinch and fold the chocolate into strips that then curled into a fan. I was so nervous to try that I couldn't even look up to see how many people were watching the demo. There were about 15 or so students plus pastry chefs from the casinos and some higher end restaurants in town. Fortunately, Ashley grabbed a photo before I screwed anything up or sat down. My heart was just beating beating beating. There I was about to make a fool of myself with chocolate, but it was, of course, fine. He gave me a few tips, and I got to see the chocolate up close. Tips from one of the best pastry chefs in the country. That's a once in a lifetime.

Below are photos from the demo and a few explanations.

Chef Leroy garnishing the tropical verrine with a feullettine, this delicious cookie that is a combination of chocolate, wafers and hazelnut butter. Die.

The blueberry cremeux.

Blueberry cremeux up close

More up close. So pretty.

Gone.

Strawberry-white chocolate goodness.

Tropical mousse

Working with chocolate.

Keeping a safe distance.

Ashley stealing the leftover white-chocolate mousse.

Christine, Melissa, Chef Leroy, myself and Ashley from my pastries class.

Salad of Fennel, Zucchini and Good Humor

2011-08-08T17:29:00.002-05:00

I kept busy all week, distracting myself from the missing friends and lovers. Wednesday I had dinner with a friend and drank on the back porch, Thursday was the taco ride, Friday was crab and karaoke, Saturday was rock climbing and sushi and Sunday I cook. Rather, I assembled cold salads.

I made two jars of pickles a few weeks ago and they are already gone (one I sent with Amanda as a parting gift), so that was definitely in order. I have been craving those pickles for nine or 10 months now. Best I've ever had. I've also started my spree of nonstop caprese salads. As tomatoes are nearly inedible outside of July, August and September, I have to overstimulate my taste buds while I can. The garden I am sharing with the downstairs neighbor is a panoply of produce. The tomatoes are behaving on the heavy-duty cages and the cucumber is training up toward the clothes line, there are enough strawberries to please my neighbors greedy three-year-old and the lawn care folks take caution to mow around the zucchinis.

Home-grown zucchinis are my new favorite. I like them smaller than they come in the store, nearly babies, with the blossom still attached, which I've been stuffing with soft cheese and sauteing. The little ones are crisper but delicate and light. That mush they get at the store does nothing for vegetables. Then there's this salad I saw on 101 Cookbooks. One with fennel and zucchini, arugula and pine nuts and then sprinkled with parmesan cheese, lemon juice and olive oil, salt and pepper. Just the thing to assemble while listening to This American Life and feeling just a teeny bit sorry for myself until I heard about a man who was tortured for protesting in Egypt. It's OK to be emotionally nostalgic, but I should always remember hold onto my grip on reality. I made my new roommate try the fennel alone and in the salad. It is sort of strange by itself and sort of awesome with parmesan cheese and lemon juice. Alone it's too much like licorice but with salty creamy sour flavors it's light and aromatic. Much better than celery. The pine nuts were so buttery. All these lovely Mediterranean ingredients just as the day's light began to fade. I could eat a salad like that every day.

Sunday spent with casual cooking at home was such a nice way to ground the week. I really felt so joyous today making breakfast pastries at school. I was just singing my own personal karaoke ("Landslide" by Stevie Nicks if you must know). I was thinking about writing this weekend. Do I even like it? Am I even good at it? But hanging out with my friends Sean and Phil, we were talking about what we would do if we won the lottery. Sure there's travel and not worry about money (which is certainly false--mo' money mo' problems right?), but I would do exactly what I'm doing right now, except I would write more. I would create more space in my life for writing and reflection and who gives a damn if it's not good (well, I do at some point), but quality is not necessarily the point. Peace and happiness is.

Summer Savarins

2011-08-03T16:41:00.000-05:00

My camera broke. Actually, I broke it. I carelessly put a water bottle in my purse along with everything else important (social security card) and it leaked all over everything, thus no camera, which is sad because I promised myself to take my camera to class more just last week for the express purpose of blogging. But it's also sad because time is a goon. My roommate moved last week and a few days later this fellow I've been seeing and liking quite a bit also moved. Pictures are one way of freezing a moment. I've been feeling a bit nostalgic lately, just letting the summer and previous few years steep in my mind.

But thinking about things too much inevitably leads to personal existential crises, mostly in the form of "what the hell am I doing with my life?!" So I freaked out about that for a few days, wondering why everyone was always leaving and I've always staying, I suddenly wanted to be the one leaving. Moving can be such a great adventure, but I have two thoughts on the subject, 1.) it's scary and never as much fun in reality as it is in my mind and 2.) you can have adventures anytime, anywhere, anyhow if you're up for it. Not that I blame anyone for moving. Sometimes it's just right; it's just what you've got to do (in addition to being new and exciting).

But doesn't it feel like people are always on the move these days? Not a few months go by without saying a hard goodbye or meeting someone brand new to the area. I should be more open to moving because if I frankly think about what I'm "doing with my life" it probably isn't living in Omaha forever and ever amen, but it does make me happy right now. I adore my friends. Adore them. And work, it's good. Really good most days. It's not forever, but gosh, it fits snugly right now. And school, I get to make mocha pots de creme that slide onto the spoon and down the hatch so smoothly. And these yeasted savarins soaked in orange syrup with apricot-orange mousse and creme anglaise -- so good and just the epitome of summer with fresh apricots and bright oranges. I get to spend all this time learning about ingredients and techniques and perfecting recipes. It's so good, it's all so good. Even when people I care about pass through too soon (it's always too soon).

A couple days ago, I settled into life again, knowing that the things I'm worried about (i.e. my ability to pay for loans and be employed for real at some point) will work out whether I worry or not. For the time being, I am happy making savarins and hopefully new friends.

Savarins:

1 1/3 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 teaspoon yeast
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 cup warm water
3 ounces butter, melted
1/2 cup raisins, soaked and drained (optional)
1 teaspoon citrus zest

Combine flour, salt, eggs, yeast, sugar and water in a mixer and mix for eight minutes on medium. Scrape down the sides. Add the melted butter and mix another five to eight minutes until the dough is sticky but thick enough to pull away from the sides of the bowl. Transfer to bowl and let ferment until about doubled. Transfer to greased molds and let double again. Bake at 350 degrees for 15 to 20 minutes until golden brown. Saturate in a simple syrup mix of half water and half sugar (and flavorings of citrus or liqueur, etc.). Can be filled with pastry cream or mousse or lemon curd.

Fruit Mousse: (easiest thing ever!)
12 ounces fruit puree
3 ounces sugar
1 ounce brandy or liqueur (or water or juice)
.25 ounces gelatin (softened according to package instructions) (optional)
8 ounces heavy cream

Puree the fruit and send through a sieve. Stir in and dissolve the sugar and liqueur. Whip the cream to medium peaks. Fold into the puree and refrigerate. Serve quickly if not using gelatin.

Crepes and My Francophilian Fantasy

2011-07-23T09:20:00.000-05:00

I started culinary school just about a year ago now, and my blogging frequency has gone way way down. I'd say that has more to do with lack of time than anything else (full diclosure: I blogged at work a lot). I has a little to do with a blog scare back in February, and something to do with me lazily not bringing my camera to school. I'm going to try to remedy that. We make a lot of incredible thing at school, such as these individual St. Honore Gateaux, but I rarely share them. Additionally the recipes have gotten far more complicated in a strange sort of way. I've got the basics down. Things like deep frying, braising, pastry cream and sauce making are a breeze--so easy I don't count them as part of the instructions. But they do count. Braising is simple once you get it, but it has a lot of steps, lots of places where mistakes can be made. I'll try to be better at keeping a record, if only to have a volume of recipes and my thoughts on them not stored on my bookshelf or strewn about in my school bookbag.

We worked on pate a choux dough, which is the stuff that make eclairs, meaning it's awesome. The Gateau St. Honore is a mishmash of a number of pastry elements stacked on top of and inside each other: chantilly cream (fancy for whipping cream) piped onto filled cream puffs which are glued to a puff pastry crust with caramel. It was alright. With the crepes, however, I may have found my calling card.

I first made them in eighth grade French class under the tutelage of Monsieur Srb, a plump and jolly gay man, probably the first outed man I ever met even though I had no idea of his sexual orientation or really the concept of sexual orientation back in 1997. That requires conidering that people are different than you, and thinking of someone aside from oneself is a stretch for the junior high set, or at least for 13-year-old me. Every year M. Srb would put on a mother's day brunch. Our class, nearly 100 percent teen girls, absolutely loved it. We were assigned a cubby to decorate using glitter, sequins, streamers, fancy paper of all sort and (I am not kidding here) fashion dolls dressed in a variety of French-themed costumes. We sliced up strawberries and made strawberry-whipped cream parfaits. And M. Srb had a crepe maker--a sort of upside-down saute pan that made flipping the crepes easy enough for teens. Thus crepes were solidified as quintessentially French in my Francophilian mind. When I went to Paris seven years later at the age of 20, purchasing a crepe from a cart and eating it in the Jardin des Tuileries, the park between the Louvre and the Arc de Triompe (and the Champs Elysee), was on my short list of things to do.

Another seven years later, I am realizing what a brilliant treat the crepe is. It easily straddles the savory-sweet divide and allows all combinations of items to be rolled in a thin and crisp pancake and served from a truck. If nothing works out for me with writing and culinary school, you'll find me at a farmer's market filling crepes with pork tenderloin and peach mostarda (a concoction I cooked up for class) and chocolate, pears and pastry cream.

Crepes: from On Baking yields 30 six-inch crepes

6 eggs

6 egg yolks
12 ounces water
18 ounces milk
6 ounces sugar
1 teaspoon salt
14 ounces flour
5 ounces melted butter

Whisk wet ingredients then add the sugar, salt and flour. Stir in the butter. Let sit for at least an hour before cooking.

Heat a non-stick pan on the stove, melting butter into the pan and then wiping it out just to season the first crepes. Pour one to one-and-a-half fluid ounces of batter into the hot pan, swirling the batter around immediately to coat the pan. Cook until lightly brown on one side, scrape up the edges off the crepe with a spatula, grab a corner with your finger and flip over quickly. Or, if you are deft at flipping sans spatula, give the pan a nice flick of the wrist to turn the crepe. Cook on the other side until golden brown. Remove and fill as you desire.

Old Cuban

2011-07-19T17:08:00.000-05:00

I've been posting recipes on this blog for three years now. There are more than 300 posts and at least 200 recipes. Is there anything out there I haven't cooked? Of course, of course. In cooking and baking the possibilities are trully endless. But the last few days, right when all the summer produce is at its best, all I want to make are the old standbys. Pine nut and basil pesto, caprese salads with heirloom tomatoes and fresh mozzarella, pickles, tea cake. While my vegeteable-starch-protein class stretched me creatively, at home I am seeking the creature comforts.

Amanda and I had another potluck last night. It's her last before she moves to Portland, Ore., next weekend, and it was a great way to send her out--with great friends and great food. I didn't cook anything. Too hot. To keep cool, I thought cocktails would be a nice change from the typical beer and wine we usually serve.

I bought some fresh mint at the Old Market farmer's market, along with some dill for the pickles and some zinnias for the kitchen table. The only logical drink to go with was a mojito, fresh and cold, but also not very strong on the alcohol, which for this party, wasn't exactly what I was looking for. My friends Sarah and Matthew have shared their interest in what I would deem sophisticated cocktails. No daquiris or margaritas flavored with sweet and sour mix here. They and my friend Lindsey are partial to champagne cocktails, where the champagne adds the fizz instead of tonic water or club soda, along with a bit more depth of flavor. I first tried a salty dog topped with champagne (it's grapefruit juice and gin) at Sarah and Matthew's, and Lindsey is a big fan of the French 75, which is made with gin, lemon juice, simple syrup and champagne. I settled on an Old Cuban, I guess you could call it a variation on a mojito. It's recipe is two ounces rum, two dashes bitters, 1 ounce simple syrup made with mint leaves, one ounce lime juice and topped off with two ounces of champagne. Plus loads of ice, especially if it's more than 100 degrees where you live.

The Final, Part Two

2011-07-10T15:50:00.000-05:00

So I've been busy, and posting on the blog has taken the greatest hit until I woke up yesterday morning with a scratchy throat, which soon developed into full-blown strep. I've spent nearly the whole of this beautiful Saturday lying in bed and sleeping, lying in bed and reading, and now lying in bed and blogging. I've been cooking and baking though, plenty. My second of three final practical exams for vegetable-starch-protein was Wednesday and went wildly successfully. Chef Reichardt was impressed that I made my own mayonaisse for the Waldorf salad (I can't believe no one else made theirs), my apple and pear mostarda (a sweet and sour sauce) was the best in the class (and he claimed he had some awful mostarda), and at the end of my pork tenderloin entree he declared that I was a good cook. Incredible. I was very complimented. And then I screwed up the dessert.

It was creme caramel reversee, or more popularly flan. Maria made cute little almond florentines and a strawberry gastrique. I burned the caramel four times. Four. I would look away for 0.2 seconds only to look back at a black and nearly smoking pan of sugar. Considering that I'm a pastry student, it was a little embarassing that I had so much trouble with the dessert. In the end, the flan was creamy with a simple syrup just barely shy of a bitter burned flavor.

Pork Tenderloin or Chop: adapted from Jamie Oliver
1 loin or 2 chops
2 bay leaves
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
salt and pepper
oil

The fennel really complemented the pork in this dish. It was so simple, yet really quite delicious. I just rubbed the outside of the loin and/or chop (I had chop to practice and loin in class), heated the oil in a saute pan on medium-high heat and pan fried the pork until it was done, leaving the loin at medium instead of cooking it all the way through and drying it out. In my opinion the tenderloin was a much better choice.

Pear and Apple Mostarda: yields 1 quart from James Peterson's Sauces
1 cup white wine vinegar
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 apples, cut into wedges
2 pears or any other combination of fruit, cut into wedges if necessary
1 teaspoon mustard seeds

This sweet-sour sauce goes well with pork. Again, it is incredibly easy. I brought the vinegar and sugar to a light boil on the stovetop and then added the apples, pears and some cherries that we had in the classroom. I left the saute pan on simmer, stirring occassionally for half an hour. Once the fruit is softened, remove it from the pan, raise the heat to high and reduce the liquid to the thickness of a sauce.

Waldorf Salad with Honey-mustard Mayonaise Dressing: serves 2
bunch of arugula
1 apple
1 stalk celery
1/4 cup walnuts
handful grapes

Dressing:
3 egg yolks
1 tablespoon mustard, plus more to taste
1 tablespoon white-wine vinegar
3/4 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup olive oil
salt and pepper
1 tablespoon honey

Chop the fruit and vegetables to a similar size for the salad. Set aside.

I started this by making the basic mayonaise out of James Peterson's Sauces in which I whisked the yolks, mustards and vinegar together. Then slowly poured a combination of both oils into the yolks, whisking constantly. The mayonaise will thicken up quite a bit. Just go until the oil is completely incorporated. Season with salt and pepper. Add the honey and a bit more vinegar. Taste and adjust mustard, salt, pepper, honey and vinegar to taste. You'll want to have the vinegar to water down the dressing a bit so it's easier to pour. Toss the mayo with the fruit and vegetables and plate the salads.

Creme Renversee aka Flan: from Mastering the Art of French Cooking
2 1/2 cups milk
1/2 cup sugar
3 eggs
3 egg yolks
1 teaspoon vanilla

Caramel:
1/2 cup sugar
2 tablespoons water
To make the caramel, bring the sugar and water to a boil in a sauce pan. Remove from heat once it has just barely browned. Pour into four to six oven-proof molds.

Preheat the oven to 325. In a stock pot, bring the milk to a simmer. Meanwhile, whisk together the eggs, yolks and sugar. Once the milk is simmering, pour it slowly into the egg mixture while whisking. Then pour the custard into four to six bowl molds which already have a bit a caramel in them. Place the molds in a baking pan that is filled with enough water to come halfway up the custard dishes. Bake for 40 to 60 minutes, until the custard has set. Remove from oven and let cool before turning the molded custards out onto serving plates.

Vegetable-Starch-Protein

2011-07-01T18:47:00.000-05:00

I haven't been posting lately. I'm in the throes of summer, which thus far has involved travelling to California, two camping trips involving climbing and a intensive five-week course entitled Vegetable-Starch-Protein Cookery. This is a great class. My chef is Deke Reichardt; he owns the Jackson Street Tavern on 11th and Jackson in the Old Market (go for the duck tacos). Class meets twice a week for seven hours and we, as a class prepare some five to 10 dishes from a set list of recipes and then everyone comes up with their own plate using only the ingredients that arrive in class on a cart.

Chef Reichardt humors me and Maria, who are the only pastry students in the class. We've made baklava, a banana and a blackberry clafoutis, mango semifreddo, rice pudding, bread pudding and pizza dough. For me, it's this great challenge to come up with something completely elaborate. Last session may have taken it all with seared scallops in a lime beurre blance over a barley pilaf with cilantro and tomato. Yeah, beurre blanc. It turns out I did learn a few things in Soups and Sauces class.

Today was day one of a three-day final exam. We were required to present a three-course meal of a wilted spinach salad, beef-short rib and caramelized onion ravioli with a muhroom cream sauce and a cherry clafoutis for dessert. There weren't any recipes, just ingredients and three hours in which to complete everything. It started out (for me at least) like a big cluster. I was assigned the second time slot and was suddenly scrambling to put things together when I didn't need. to. I screwed up the spinach salad with enough time to redo it (the first batch was overdone and inspired the gag reflex). I sauteed the spinach with olive oil and fried some proscuitto with garlic and shallots and deglazed the pan with balsamic vinegar to make a dressing with honey and warm olive oil.

The ravioli turned out so-so. It's surprisingly difficult to produce ravioli thick enough not to break but thin enough to not taste too doughy. Mine was too doughy. But the braised short ribs and caramelized onion stuffing was great. And I loved the sauce, even though it came out a bit on the salty side (I love salt). The clafoutis, of course, was fine, and I even had enough time to throw together a cherry compote sauce on the side. OK, so I did learn something in that awful Soup/Sauce class.

Clafoutis here

Wilted Spinach Salad with Honey Balsamic Dressing:

1 pound fresh spinach

1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons olive oil

1 shallot, diced

1 clove garlic, minced

1 ounce pancetta or prosciutto

3 ounces balsamic vinegar

1 ounce honey

salt and pepper

Wash spinach dry completely. Moist spinach wilted in olive oil is nasty stuff. Dice up all the veggie and meat. In a saute pan, heat the olive oil on medium. Add the spinach and toss around to coat with oil. Saute until spinach has only just barely wilted and isn't soggy and/or gross (can you tell I have a problem with warm spinach?). Remove from pan. Add the prosciutto and fry up a bit, then add the shallots and garlic. Cook until softened. Remove and pour over spinach. Deglaze the pan with the balsamic vinegar, turning the heat down and touch. Add the honey and then the olive oil and cook until warm. Season with salt and pepper. Toss vinagrette with the warm dressing being careful not to overdo it. Serve.

Basic Braised Beef Short Ribs:

4 beef short ribs

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 onion, coarsely chopped

2 stalks celery, coarsely chopped

2 stalks carrots, coarsely chopped

bay leaf

3 cups stock

1/2 cup red wine
salt and pepper

So this is your simple braising formula and instructions. Millions of variations exist for you to unfold changing the vegeatables, herbs, braising liquid and deglazing liquid (the wine in this case). Braising may have been one of my greatest culinary discoveries.

Anyway, here's how it goes: Preheat the oven to 300. Heat the oil in an oven-proof pot, like a Dutch oven. Dry the meat and season it with salt and pepper. Sear the outside of the meat in the oil, rotating to get all the sides good and browned. Remove from pot. Saute the vegetables and bay leaf in the same oil. Once they have been coated with oil and softened only slightly, add the wine using a wooden spoon to lift the juicy bits from the bottom of the pan. Once the wine has reduced slightly, return the meat to the pot. Add the stock covering only half of the meat. Bring the stock to a boil. Cover the pot and pop it in the oven for an hour and a half or until the meat is fork tender (it kind of flakes away from the fork when you pierce it).

To fill ravioli, we completed this tedious process in class and then tore apart the meat and mixed it with caramelized onions that I cooked on super duper low heat for several hours (four is standard--seriously, but it's so worth it). I made a little sauce of maple syrup and water and rosemary sprigs that I filled the raviolis with. I wouldn't recommend spending the time making and filling the raviolis because it's a pain in the arse, you should pay professionals to make stuffed raviolis--it is so worth it. The sauce I made was pretty easy though.

Mushroom Cream Sauce:
1 cup beef stock
1/2 cup port wine
4 ounces mixed mushrooms
1/2 cup cream
salt and pepper

Reduce the volume of the beef stock to one fourth. Reduce the volume of the port by half. Combine and add to a saute pan. Add the mushrooms and cook for 5 to 10 minutes. Add the cream to thicken and season with salt and pepper.

On the Lamb

2011-06-20T17:19:00.000-05:00

I have a tendency to get carried away. At the first or second farmer's market of the year, I splurged on a leg of lamb. I'm embarassed to say how much it cost. Twenty dollars--just under $20. The farmer swiped my card (very savvy, but a good idea if you're charging that much for meat), I walked away and later thought that spending twenty bones on a raw product was a tad irresponsible for a student. (I paid for it financial aid, and will furthermore justify the purchase by claiming the expense under "studying.") The leg of lamb sat in my freezer for weeks until the perfect moment last week when it wasn't too hot (just enough) and most my friends could come.

I fitted the leg, which took a couple days to dethaw in my fridge, with a Moroccan spice rub under the directions of Molly Stevens who wrote All About Braising, a book that's been on my Amazon wish list for at least a year. I roasted the spices and then sent them through a peppermill twist by aching twist of the wrist. I marinated the leg overnight then cooked the braise with a slew of Mediterranean vegetables, which all got too soggy in the Dutch oven but were still tasty if a bit mushy. Alongside, I made a slaw of sliced carrots and radishes, lighter to complement the heavy hand of the lamb.

Making dinner for friends will probably continue to be one of my favorite things no matter who I'm friends with or where I live. Well worth $20 for a leg of lamb and change for vegetables, although we would have the same happiness with vegetarian pasta so long as there's wine.

Moroccan Spice-rubbed Lamb: From All About Braising by Molly Stevens
Rub:
1/2 teaspoon fennel seeds
1/4 teaspoon coriander seeds
1/4 teaspoon black peppercorns
1/4 teaspoon allspice berries
1 teaspoon coarse salt
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
pinch turmeric
pinch cayenne

leg of lamb, bone-in
1 onion, sliced
1 bulb fennel, sliced
pinch saffron
1 eggplant, cubed
1 tomato, diced
2 cloves garlic
1 cup chicken/vegetables/beef stock

Heat the fennel seeds, coriander seeds, peppercorns, allspice berries in a saute pan without oil until they are aromatic. Grind with a pestel and mortar. Add the rest of the spices and rub on the exterior of the lamb. Let lamb marinate overnight.

Preheat the oven to 300 degrees. Meanwhile, heat some oil in a cast-iron Dutch oven. Sear the outside of the lamb, remove from heat. Saute the onion. Stir in the saffron threads and some salt. Pour in the stock and bring to a boil. Cover and bake for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and stir in the rest of the vegetables and bake another hour and a half until the meat is fork tender. Remove from oven and remove the lamb, setting it aside covered with foil. Meanwhile, bring the vegetables to a boil to reduce the volume of the liquid. Pour over bulgur wheat or quinoa and serve with lamb.

Carrot-Radish Relish: taught to me by a fellow student
3 carrots, peeled and sliced into rounds
10 radishes, sliced
1/2 cup white-wine vinegar
1/2 cup apple-cider vinegar
1/2 cup olive oil
1 teaspoon peppercorns
1 teaspoon mustard seeds
1 tablespoon sugar
salt to taste

Slice the carrot and radishes. Meanwhile, heat the vinegar, oil and seasonings until just barely simmering. Remove from heat and pour over vegetables. Let marinate for at least an hour in the fridge. Strain excess liquid and serve.

Poached Pear Tart

2011-06-01T17:06:00.000-05:00

I've been wanting to delve into more Italian pastries lately. I think it's something of a desire to make something more rustic and less composed than traditional French pastries. What I need is an Italian equivalent to Tartine Bakery's cookbooks, which lean heavily on the French side but is filled with completely awesome recipes (except the tea cakes, which have so far turned out disastrously for me--one sunken and the other spilled over and burned all over the oven). I decided to turn to Lidia Bastianich for some tried and true Italian specialties. She came through with this poached pear tart whose crust was softer than French variations. The ingredients were simple: pears, sugar, lemon juice and apricot jam. The only downside was that the soft dough breached and syrup flowed out of the tart into the oven and then on the counter making a bit of a sticky mess. I've never been known to shy away from a mess though.

Tart Dough:
2 1/2 cups flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons sugar
8 ounces cold butter
4 egg yolks
2 tablespoons cold water

Filling:
2 1/3 cups sugar
zest from one lemon
2 tablespoons butter
2 1/2 pounds firm pears
apricot jam
egg yolk

Mix all the ingredients for the tart dough in a standing mixer except the water. Add the water slowly until the dough just comes together. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate for an hour or overnight. Roll out and fit into fluted tart pan.

Preheat oven to 350. To make the filling, cut the pears in half and remove seeds. Saute the butter in a saute pan. Add the sugar and lemon zest and stir until it melts. Once the sugar is boiling, add the pears to the pan and cook on each side until softened and pierced easily with a fork. Spread apricot jam on the bottom layer of the dough in the tart pan. Add the pears. Turn up the heat on the sugar and reduce its volume by half. Pour over the pears. If you make a lattice top, glaze with whisked egg yolk. Bake for 40 minutes.

Like a Radish

2011-05-21T15:49:00.001-05:00

I've had several days off this week at the end of my spring quarter and have found myself with quite a bit of free time. Thursday, I rode my bike to Blue Line Coffee to sip espresso and read a great new book borrowed from my friend Liz. Blue Line has these great windows in the front of the shop, which are ideal for people-watching. Sitting and stealing glances at a group of college-age hipsters playing Scrabble outside, it occurred to me that life doesn't get much better than it is right now.

I had wasted the earlier part of that same afternoon nursing along an onion soup from Mastering the Art of French Cooking and assembling an Italian pear tart. The apartment had this musky earthy aroma, subtle in its sweetness like the sun setting over the plains--you only get it if you look up. It took hours for the onions to caramelize. The pears from the tart were so soft they were very nearly falling apart as syrup pooled on my counter dripping from a leak in the levy of pie crust. Those hipsters, with their ironic facial hair, intentional disarray of personal emsemble and poignant use of props (guitar, cigarettes hanging from lips, archaic novel), were a part of the scene of the cloudy May day that reminded me that I am living the life.

Sure, I'm in a perpetual state of singlehood, I feel a bit lost at sea in my writing at the moment and call either one of my parents (typically my mom) on a bi-weekly basis to cry about my woes. But god, this is the life. One made up of caramelized onions and braised radishes, my first purchase from 2011's farmer's markets. There's something so simple and soothing about vegetables, root vegetables in particular. They're a bit ugly, hidden from sight for so long during gestation. A bit of cooking with water and butter, salt, pepper and sugar, and the radish's bitterness was gone. Reducing the water made a pink glaze more radishy than the softened bulbs themselves. They just reek of the spring earth in the best possible way--light and reddish and undeniable crunch, a portend of the heartier roots to come later. So sweet are the carrots, beets, parsnips, and mysteriously, the potato. It's like the earth's great gift: "See how pretty I am even though I'm so brown." Amid the manure, worms and chemical refuse, the dirt holds us down and gives us sustainence.

I'd like to draw an analogy, but instead I'll just tell you that I solemnly swear to spend moreeffort in enjoying roots in a quiet way.

Braised Radishes:
1 pound radishes
salt and pepper
2 tablespoons butter
1 cup water
pinch sugar

Rinse the radishes thoroughly. I soaked them according to Molly Wizenberg's instructions for 20 minutes in water. Melt the butter and heat the water, season with salt and pepper and sugar and bring to a simmer. Add the radishes and simmer covered for 15 to 20 minutes until just softened. Taste the stock and adjust seasonings. Bring to a rolling boil and reduce in volume until the liquid becomes a sauce. Serve sauce over radishes.

Chip-and-dip Time

2011-05-20T16:55:00.002-05:00

There is this thing at our apartment that Amanda and I affectionately call “chip-and-dip time.” It’s snack time for grownups. Chip-and-dip time happens around the 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. timeframe. Amanda and I, back for the day from school or work, sit at the kitchen table and spill our guts while stuffing them. The subject matter starts out with drama from boys, friends, co-workers and bosses and then moves more casually into what interesting thing we each heard on NPR. But most importantly chip-and-dip time cannot happen without something smooth and creamy or chunky and something crunchy and salty (tortilla chips, pita crisps, crackers, hard bread, etc.) with which to scoop up the creamy item. The dip has been hummus, salsa is a favorite, cheese, and the other day I made my mom’s bean dip.

Bean anything is a rarity with my mom. She hates beans except in the case of chili. In fact, when I called over to get the recipe and asked if I could replace the black beans with kidney beans she answered an emphatic no before I could finish the question. It’s a vestige from childhood when she was forced to down lima beans before leaving the table. Now that my mom is emancipated and can decide what and how much she eats, what she eats never ever involves beans except in the case of this dip.
The recipe so simple I didn’t even bother to write it down when I talked to her on the phone: one can of black beans in no case to be substituted with anything other than black beans, two tablespoons of pickles jalapenos, some cumin, a crushed garlic clove, salt and pepper, and just enough water to bring the whole thing together in a pot on the stove (so a couple tablespoons tops). Once everything is heated through, you pour the mess of beans into the food processor and pulse until it’s smooth.

Do You Like Pina Coladas?

2011-05-16T18:58:00.000-05:00

So I made this brioche recipe, my invention, using part coconut flour, that I am a little bit proud of. The first time I made it, the round loaves were thick and chewy, not the airy texture expected from a brioche. I made some changes, reducing the proportion of the coconut flour, whose smell brings me back to Thailand when I would start my day with a few crunchy coconut cookies purchased a the Walmart-size C Store down the road. The result: a light brioche with a subtle nutty sweetness.

For my artisan bread final, we had to fill and braid a six-strand brioche. Six! Strands! I rolled out the dough and filled them with a coconut-pineapple pastry cream, which came out like a pina colada, and staired at the mass of dough. I may as well have been weaving a rug. Fortuneately, Alexandra knew exaclty how to fold the braids over and under to get an even loaf..

I feel a little invincible in the realm of bread-making. I still got a B on my final and probably bombed the test, but I get it. But the final's resulting bread defied my initial bitterness over having to devote an extra five minutes in the morning to taking care of the sourdough starter while not even getting good bread from all my trouble. Well, now I have good bread, really good bread. I even kept a teeny-tiny dollop of sourdough starter in my fridge, tucked away if I ever get the inspiration to make bread before I forget about it and the bacteria and yeast run out of food and die.

Tropical Brioche:
Pate Fermentee:
4.2 oz. bread flour
2.7 oz. coconut milk
.1 oz. salt
.01 oz. yeast

Final Dough:
23.4 oz. Bread flour
4.2 oz. coconut flour
.28 oz. vital wheat gluten
5 oz. coconut milk
13.7 oz. eggs
.07 oz. agave nectar
.3 oz. yeast
14 oz. butter (cold)
7 oz. pate fermentee

Yields 77 oz., enough for three large loaves

Prepare the pate fermentee the night before by mixing all the ingredients together and letting it sit, covered in plastic wrap, for 12 to 18 hours.

Mix together all the ingredients minus the butter in a bowl of an electric mixer. Pound the butter with a rolling pin to make it maleable. Add the butter one tablespoon at a time to the dough while still mixing it. Continue until the butter is completely incorporated and the dough can be stretched pretty well without breaking. Place the dough in a bowl to ferment. If the butter is melting, place brioche in the refrigerator for 15 minutes or so to come to temperature. Brioche can actually be retarded overnight in the fridge at this point. Let ferment an hour or so. Form into loaves. Brush with mixture of eggs and salt. Proof another hour. Brush with egg wash again and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes until golden brown and finished through.

Wheat Beer Sourdough

2011-05-11T16:44:00.000-05:00

It has been 95 degrees the past couple days, which is the ideal temperature for yeast and bacteria production (note: body temperature is 98). My sourdough culture has reached new levels of growth. This is a photo of the starter a mere two hours after a feeding, exploding with growth all over the counter, floor anything it get its grubby hands on. It may as well enjoy its few remaining days in my kitchen. My bread final exam is tomorrow, after which point this yeast is going down to Chinatown.

We were charged with making our own formula for bread for tomorrow's final, and I'm going to go ahead and toot my horn and say that my bread is pretty good. I'm pleased. The bread pictured above is a wheat beer sourdough with a bulgur wheat soaker. It's got a little spelt flour, just cuz, and yeasty beer for the flavor. It's nutty and has little sour kick to it. And with the weather the way it is, it took no time to rise.

I have somehow, in only 10 days of class and under the tutelage of a great chef, gotten the hang of breadmaking. There are 12 steps that didn't seem straightforward at first that I now more-or-less understand. I know what the bread feels like when it's time to move to the next stage. It's not something you can teach or talk about, it's just known. Once it's mixed, the dough feels this certain way with this certain stickiness that then gets worked out when you ferment and proof it. I mastered the art of shaping at work after forming 200 little pitas into perfect round balls before rolling them out. I do still get impatient and I mess things up a little (notice the exploding portion of the finished loaf above), but I know where I went wrong. I had to run and the bread wasn't quite finished proofing, so I baked it anyway. (I didn't learn any patience in this class unfortunately.) I don't have a spray bottle at home, so the crust of my bread was a little thicker than I'd like. But I know. I understand the process. I can work with the ingredients instead of trying to force them to work for me. That's something.

Wheat Beer Sourdough:
Levain Build:
6.1 oz. whole wheat flour (93.5%)
.5 oz. spelt flour (6.5%)
4 oz. wheat beer (60%)
1.2 oz. sourdough culture (20%)

Soaker:
2.1 oz. cracked (bulgur) wheat (33%)
4.1 oz. water (66%)

Final Dough:
32.9 oz. bread flour (85%)
5.8 oz. spelt flour (15%)
26.7 oz. wheat beer (69%)
2.2 oz. water (5.8%)
.9 oz. salt (2.3%)
11.8 oz. levain build (30.6%)
6.2 oz. soaker (20%)

Build the levain 12 hours or so before you're ready to start the rest of the process by mixing it together, covering it with plastic and letting it rest overnight.

Make the soaker by boiling the water and then pouring it over the wheat and letting it set for 10 minutes.

Assemble the rest of the ingredients. Mix the ingredients until shaggy, let sit for 20 minutes. Work the dough by kneading it until its surface is smooth and the gluten has just about fully developed. Let ferment in a covered bowl for 2 and a half hours, stretching the dough out and folding it over twice during that time. Divide the dough into 20 or 22 ounce portions. This recipe makes 88 ounces, more than enough for four loaves of 20 ounces each. Shape the portions into rounds or batons. Proof for another two hours. Bake at 440 degrees for 40 minutes.

Brioche Recycle

2011-05-02T16:30:00.000-05:00

A lot of bread has gotten stale on my counter as a result of this bread class I'm taking. I get so excited to take some extra bread home to try later, but I can't seem to get around to finishing it before it physically transforms into a brick. Not even with my roommate Amanda's help. A week or so ago I had a loaf of challah and a loaf of brioche from school plus a loaf of challah from work that was going to get thrown out during passover. I made French toast a couple times before I discovered a recipe for something called bostock in my trusty Tartine Bakery cookbook.

Bostock is billed as better than French toast, which I'd say is arguable at best--the only similarity is the use of old bread. Slices of rich dough get slathered in simple syrup and coated with apricot jam and the rest of my apricot pastry cream from Easter weekend and topped with almonds. Amanda and I ate several slices for dinner the other night, still steaming hot from the oven (we could really wait until they cooled). The bread had regained its lost moisture, and with crunchy outside edges, the bostock was a bit pastry-like.

Apricot Bostock:
syrup:
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup sugar
2 tablespoons orange liqueur (skipped this)
1/4 cup orange juice
1 tablespoon orange zest

day old brioche slices
apricot jam
apricot pastry cream (or frangipane cream)
sliced almonds

Combine syrup ingredients in a saute pan and heat until sugar has completely dissolved. Remove from heat and let cool.

Slice the brioche and arrange on a parchment paper-line baking sheet. Brush with simple syrup. Spread on the apricot jam and pastry cream. Sprinkle on the almonds. Bake at 375 for 20 to 25 minutes until the bread is toasted.

Apricot Pastries

2011-04-27T18:55:00.000-05:00

I had my first taste of brioche one week ago today. It's this buttery, light bread that needs no spread to wash it down the throat. It's in a category of rich dough, along with challah and panetone, which are making my artisan bread class well worth the mess and effort. It was obvious Chef Mar thinks very highly of brioche while she's no big fan of most artisan bread (if you're in a bread class, loaf after loaf can get a bit drab). She said many patissieres are using brioche for Danishes and other rich pastries instead of puff pastry because the brioche can have a more complex flavor with the incorporation of a starter of sorts.

I signed up to make laminated brioche. Laminated dough is not, as one might guess, sending dough through a machine to adhere a plastic cover to its exterior. It is folding a piece of butter into the dough, rolling it, folding the dough again, rolling and folding. This laminating is what gives croissants and puff pastry its flakiness. In a hot oven, the dough is rising while the butter is evaporating. As the water from the butter evaporates, it leaves light delicious little pockets all over the croissant, or brioche in this case.

We were charged with filling our laminated brioche. Anything. At first I was thinking of a cream cheese or ricotta something. Chef Mar said something more sophisticated. Apricot glaze popped into my head, then apricot pastry cream and, of course, almonds. I liked the end result so much that I decided to make the pastry for Easter dessert even though it would take me up to 24 hours to complete considering that the brioche was supposed to rest in the refrigerator overnight.

I made the broiche, nearly overheating my little KitchenAid mixer as the dough hook rotated endlessly around the mass of flour, water, sugar and butter. I let it ferment and proof more than the recipe called for and even retarded some of the dough overnight like I was supposed to. And the pastry cream. Oh the pastry cream. It one of those things I would have never done before culinary school. Now that I know how to do it, it's simple, never to be less than sweet and smooth. But it's a daunting task for the beginner to boil the milk with sugar yet not letting the milk to scald, then slowly slowly pouring the milk into a bowl of eggs whisked with cornstarch to the point at which the eggs are certain not to scramble. Then the whole thing goes back on the burner to activated the cornstarch, which thickens near boiling point. Voila, a pudding that I stirred almond extract and apricot jam into and spread along the middle of the rolled-out laminated dough.

I tucked the pastry cream into the dough, braiding it down. After the pastry had proffed once more it was into the oven with it. It puffed up flaky and rich, with a lightness unexpected from something with that much fat in it.

Pastry Cream: from Tartine Bakery cookbook (this book has steered me wrong but once)

2 cups whole milk

1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

4 tablespoons cornstarch

2 large eggs

a couple tablespoons butter to finish

1 teaspoon vanilla extract (or other flavoring)

Mix the sugar and milk together in a small stock pot and bring to a light boil. Whisk together salt, cornstarch and eggs. Once milk is boiling, pour it slowly into the eggs while stirring constantly (this does require some agility). Place entire mixture on hot burner and bring to a boil while whisking constantly. Remove from heat once the cream has thickened to a pudding consistency. Flavor as desired to taste.

Laminated Brioche:

600 grams flour

15 grams salt

65 grams sugar

250 grams butter

30 grams yeast

50 grams water

6 eggs

Lamination:

400 grams dough

80 grams butter

Spread the pastry cream down the center of the rolled-out dough. Sprinkle with almonds. You can just roll the dough up like a cinnamon roll or I cut strips along the side and folded the edges in around the pastry cream. Brush with egg wash. Let rise for an hour or until fully proofed and the dough bounces back slowly to the touch. Brush with egg wash again and bake at 350 degrees for 40 to 45 minutes.

The Rye Non-start

2011-04-25T22:13:00.000-05:00

Some days I think it might be best if I just stay in bed. Rye flour day in artisan bread was one of those days, except that I had a group presentation, which would have made missing class a little more costly. Actually the presentation was partly to blame for my mess of a morning. I set my alarm for 5 a.m. so I could turn no-knead bread (for the presentation) and then again at 6:30 to bake it. The bread came out just in time for me to hustle off to class with two sourdough starters, a steaming loaf, a necessary cup of coffee, my tool kit (see above) and my book bag. It took two trips to the car. I don't even take that many loads to the car when I go on an actual vacation.

One starter was for Jewish rye bread with a liquidy sponge starter, the other for a 70 percent rye with a soaker and whole wheat flour (that is what the book Bread: A Baker's Book of Techniques and Recipes called it, and I barely know what it means). I made my first haul of the bread loaf and book back into the class, set up a little cutting board and cut myself of my knife. I ran out to my car to get the starters because it was just a touch cool outside and I wouldn't want to kill off my bacteria/yeast culture or anything. Well, the lid of the Jewish rye starter had just popped off, and the soaker had pooled out of the container onto the seat of my car. It was like the blob moving in on the outside world, feasting on anything it could get. The sourdough starter has already adhered itself to my wallet, keys, kitchen floor, various sweaters, book bags and kitchen utensils (this stuff is like industrial glue). Well I introduced a hole host of new bacteria to the culture by scooping up what I could salvage with my hand and scraping it back into the faulty tupperware container. Frazzled I ran back inside before it started raining leaving my keys sitting on the center console of the car. Fortunately, I didn't lock the car and fortunately no one stole it.

Things did turn up in class. When I discovered I had messed up the starter for the 70 percent rye flour recipe (regular flour is not an acceptable substitute for rye), my friend Angie shared with me. Rye flour really soaks up a lot of water and makes this nice denser sandwich bread. Angie really got people excited (no one wants to eat rye bread plain, trust me) by pulling out some duck breast pastrami from her garde manger class and by making 1000 island dressing out of mayo, catsup, sweet pickles, capers, lemon and sriracha. We found some sauerkraut and really dipped into some reubens. Everything ends right with a full stomach thankfully.

Jewish Rye Bread:
Sponge:
96 grams bread flour
96 grams medium rye flour
1/2 teaspoon instant yeast
2 tablespoons sugar
345 grams water, room temperature

Dough:
285 grams bread flour
1 teaspoon instant yeast
2 tablespoons caraway seeds
1/2 tablespoon salt
1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil

Mix all the ingredients for the sponge together. Let ferment for 10 minutes covered.

Saving 1/4 cup of flour, mix the flour with the yeast. Place the flour gently on top of the sponge, cover and let ferment 1 to 2 hours. Add the salt and caraway seeds and mix for 5 to 8 minutes to develop gluten. Bread should be shaggy and moist, but do not add extra flour. Ferment for 40 minutes. Stretch the dough and fold it over on itself. Ferment for another 30 to 40 minutes. Form dough into a round loaf. Proof until it has nearly doubled in size. Score the bread and bake at 450 degrees for 30 to 40 minutes. Let rest for 24 hours before eating.

Field Day

2011-04-20T20:55:00.000-05:00

My protein fabrication class took a field trip last week to two cattle feed lots, one in Henderson, Neb., the other in Grand Island. I honestly expected to feel bad for the cows who spend about five months in dirt pens fattening up, but it was more of a "huh, so this is where they live." I don't even know how to frame a response because all I have are random musings and more questions.

At Circle 5 in Henderson, things were managed on a smaller scale, catering more to prime and finer choice beef and including some natural food programs. But to me, it didn't seem all that much different than the feed lot with more than 20,000 cattle, which also ran a few natural and organic programs but made more money off volume than quality. In the car on the drive back from Grand Island, we compared the two companies with most people siding with Circle 5 (an opinion which may have been influenced in no small way by our cold greeting at the Grand Island feed lot). To me, things were just business--no matter how big you are, you still need to turn a profit.

Alan at Circle 5 was incredibly knowledgeable about beef and the business. He talked about government policy in the '70's that consolidated feed lots under just a few extremely large businesses. Evolving government regulations made it impossibly expensive for small farms to raise and then fatten cattle on their own land, so larger companies took over giving us the barren wasteland of pens that we have today. I can see why the government had to regulate the disposal of waste from farms, but it's easy to forget that everything has a consequence and that these perhaps well-intentioned rules have had a lasting effect on the food industry, whether for the better or worse is for another argument.

We also stopped by Henderson Meat Processors where they slaughter, age (see below) and fabricate meat. It was a great little operation, exactly how things should be where immense care is taken with even the smallest cut. I guess I left the trip with a feeling that meat is something to think about because it's this living breathing animal who dies so people can eat. That's it's purpose and it wouldn't be here if people didn't want to keep them. But we've got this great power over these species to regulate its diet and breed, I just wonder if it's the best idea.

Pastry Elements

2011-04-10T20:21:00.000-05:00

I go to school twice a week learning about all facets of food service--nutrition, sanitation, sauteing, baking, knife skills--but now I really feel like I know a few things. Amanda and I had another potluck last night. I made a clafoutis and some gourgeres. Right. What the hell are those?

Clafoutis is a baked custard, like creme brulee except spotted with whole cherries. I have seen the recipe and corresponding photos before, which are enough to make you jump right in, but I was too intimidated to give it a try. Intimidated in the way things are scary before you try them, like learning to ride a bike or drive a car. It's easy, you just don't know it's easy.

I warmed the milk, sugar, vanilla and almond extract on the stove, removing it from the heat just as it started to boil and poured it slowly while whisking into an egg and flour mixture. To make pastry cream, you just put the entire egg, milk, sugar mixture back on the stove until it thickens to a pudding consistency. But in this case, I pour the custard into my fluted tart pan with a removeable bottom, careful not to spill, which I of course did. Amanda had to help me emotionally and physically. I plopped the cherries into place and slid the pan into the oven at 425 for about 40 minutes until it had set. Only a bit of the custard ran out the bottom of the pan and burned in the oven. Somehow I popped the custard out of the pan without inflicting too much damage on the tender dessert. It sliced like a dream, little slivers of cherry-flecked cream. Smooth with a thick cherry syrup stuck in the cracks of the custard.

Then came the gougeres, which are a variation on pate a choux for eclairs and cream puffs. These morsels were piped onto the baking sheet with parmesan cheese and thyme blended into the paste. They puffed up in the heat of the oven, leaving gaping holes on the inside that could have been filled with cheese but which I left alone. I grated parmesan cheese on the top of the gourgeres that ended up flaky and light. Very easy, once you know what you're doing.

Clafoutis: from Tartine Bakery Cookbook

2 cups whole milk

3/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/2 teaspoon almond extract

3 eggs

1/3 cup plus 1 tablespoon flour

2 cups cherries

1/4 cup sugar for topping

Both recipes came from the Tartine Bakery cookbook, which has served as a nice resource since I got it a month or so ago. They wrote that baked cherry pits often have an almond aroma to them, so in lieu of pits I decided that almond extract would suffice (and be elicit fewer complaints). I might even consider topping a clafoutis with toasted almonds in the future.

Heat the milk, sugar, vanilla and almond extract on medium low in a heavy saucepan. Meanwhile whisk together eggs and flour until smooth. Once the milk comes to a boil, pour it slowly, while whisking, into the bowl with the eggs. Pour the entire batter into a 10-inch greased pan, leaving room at the top for the cherries to displace some custard. Arrange the cherries in the custard. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes at 425 or until set. Remove from oven and turn the heat up to 500. Sprinkle the clafoutis with sugar and bake until it has caramelized (or use a blow torch if you have one).

Gougeres: from Tartine Bakery cookbook

1 1/4 cup skim milk

10 tablespoons butter

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup flour

5 eggs

3/4 cup parmesan cheese

1 teaspoon pepper

1 tablespoon fresh thyme

Topping:

1 egg

pinch salt

parmesan cheese

In a heavy saucepan, bring the milk, salt and butter to a boil. Whisk in the flour once it has boiled. Remove from heat and place batter in the bowl of an electric mixer. Once mixture has cooled slightly, add eggs one at a time beating to combine. Stir in the parmesan cheese, pepper and thyme with a spatula. Transfer the paste to a pastry bag and pipe 1-inch rounds onto a baking sheet. Bake at 350 for 25 to 30 minutes or until the gougeres are golden brown and dry. I ended up turning down the oven to 325 for the last 10 minutes.

Hello Lover.

2011-04-06T20:52:00.000-05:00

So far nothing in my protein fabrication class has been too gross, until we got to chicken. I only jumped back and closed my eyes when Chef Garvey jabbed a skewer along the backbone of a lobster that was supposed to be in a trance but wasn't actually. And OK, I did yelp and sort of cry when we accidentally clicked on a rabbit killing video on YouTube, but the crying was more in shock, I swear. But the chicken really made me want to yack. Also, I will never buy another non-organic bird again in my life.

It wasn't the chicken that was gross. It was what they put in the chicken. At some point in the processing and packaging of the carcass, someone added saline implants to these chickens, and it was not pretty. Apparently, it's a pretty common practice. Injecting saline between the skin and the flesh adds moisture and flavor to a product, and these implants, something like the consistency and texture of mucus, are gross. Chef Garvey demonstrated how to take apart the chicken into legs, thighs, wings, breasts and tenders. We followed, immediately noting the slimy saline slipping out of from under the skin after the first incision. My guess is these chickens were never treated right and probably needed the extra juice when it came time to cook. The carcasses had obviously been jostled en route to the Institute. I don't think I pulled out one intact wish bone (although maybe that was me), and by the end of class, there was just slime and mucus and chicken juice all over everything.

At home, things went a bit more smoothly. This organic minimally processed chicken courtesy of Trader Joe's cost about $5 for the entire thing and did not with saline injections. The skin was tight, the meat taut. The wish bone came out in one piece, and it made a nice roast.

Instead of giving you all step-by-step instructions on breaking down a chicken, here's a link to a video of my teacher fabricating a chicken. It has great tips on general knife handling as well as help with the bird.

Warm Salad Nights

2011-04-04T18:26:00.001-05:00

Up until my experimentations with pork tenderloin, I hadn't marinated anything since college when the farthest I went was to soak some boneless, skinless chicken breasts in off-brand Italian dressing--it needed the help. Now it's a whole new world of wine and vinegar with whole garlic cloves and rosemary with added honey to make a warm salad dressing. I made the whole tenderloin for myself in my quiet kitchen on a Wednesday evening last week. The days are longer making dinner come a little later. I used up the last of some autumnal butternut squash for the salad. Things will soon be fresh peas and salad greens.

On this last winter meal, I marinated that pork overnight. The red wine dyed the flesh dark purple, permeating deep into the meat. I love this trick of using the marinade or the leftover bits of meat stuck to the bottom of the pan (called sucs, if you want to know) to make a savory sauce. There's so much bang, and it's certain to pair well with the rest of the meal. It's so nice to have this: a quiet space to have dinner in the middle of another busy quarter of life.

Warm Tenderloin Salad with Squash: serves 2 from Epicurious
1 pork tenderloin
1 cup red wine
1 teaspoon rosemary
1 garlic clove, smashed
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1/4 cup red-wine vinegar
1 tablespoon honey
1/2 butternut squash, cubed
1/2 onion, julienned
salad greens

Pour the wine, garlic clove and rosemary into a bag with the tenderloin. Seal and let rest for an hour or overnight. Heat a saute pan on medium with a tablespoon or so of canola oil. Reserve the marinating liquid. Season the tenderloin with salt and pepper and add it to the pan. Sear the outside of the meat and then turn the heat down to medium-low and cover. Cook until the tenderloin reaches an internal temperature of 155 degrees or is just faintly pink on the inside. Remove from heat and let rest covered with tin foil for 10 minutes before slicing. Then add the squash and onions to the saute pan and cook until softened.

In another saute pan, bring the red-wine marinade to a boil with the vinegar, honey and red pepper flakes. Reduce in volume by half. Blend with a bit of olive oil and reserve as a warm dressing.

Serve the sliced tenderloin and warm vegetables over a bed of arugula and topped with the warm dressing.

Pain Rustique

2011-03-27T14:01:00.003-05:00

I've been struggling for a couple weeks now with bread class. Crafting the perfect or even acceptable bread is such a subtle art. A few minutes can make the difference between just right and under-proofed, which means the innards of the bread are exploding from a few cracks in the crust (this has been my problem). And the process involves a lot of waiting. We're talking hours, even days. For the pain rustique, I made the pre-ferment, a mixture of flour and yeast and water that adds a lot of flavor and some shelf life, the night before using it, and with the sourdough loaf, I began the sourdough starter two weeks before ever getting to use it. That means I babied some fungus and bacteria for 14 entire days before I popped it in the oven.

Patience is not strength of mine. I'm still weighing whether the payoff was worth it. Don't get me wrong, that sourdough bread is pretty good, and after four days and no preservatives, it's just about as good as is was on day one. Homemade bread making is such an antiquated thing these days. No one really values it. People want their bread soft, sweet and of the Wonder variety. It's consistent, pleasing and costs $2 or less and a short trip to the grocery. Gone are the days of fresh rolls with every meal, and I'll be honest and say I'm mourning that yet. I think about the slice of sourdough I ate toasted this morning. It had something, a very very slight sour (I wish it had more), and crunchy crust and a sweet, wholey center that melted butter tucked into so very nicely. Sprinkled with a little sugar, it was a pleasant morning start. As of week three in artisan breads class, I'm not sure about trading bread from the grocer that isn't bad but isn't super for a two-week process, but maybe my skill is still holding me back. I think that's a real possibility.

Pain Rustique: from Bread: A Baker's Book of Techniques and Recipes
Poolish:
1 pound bread flour
16 fluid ounces water
1/8 teaspoon yeast

Dough:
1 pound bread flour
6.1 fluid ounces water
2 pounds poolish (all of the above recipe)
1 tablespoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons yeast

Make the poolish the night before by mixing and letting it sit out to ferment for 12 to 16 hours.

Mix all the ingredients, starting with the water and poolish to loosen the pre-ferment, then adding the flour and yeast and finally the salt. Let sit (autolyze) for 15 minutes and then complete the kneading process. Knead until the dough has a smooth texture when stretched. Let ferment for 70 minutes. Stretch the dough by the corners and roll over to form a ball twice during the fermentation process. Divide the dough into three equal pieces. Form into a round loaf by folding the corners in and pressing out the air. Proof for 30 minutes. Score the bread and then bake for 35 minutes or until golden brown at about 450 degrees.

Meat and Potatoes

2011-03-19T14:24:00.000-05:00

I've never cooked a pork tenderloin before. I don't even know that I've eaten one before. I don't think my mom ever made it when I was growing up, and it's not the sort of thing I would select off a menu. "Oooh, grilled pork tenderloin with mashed potatoes." It doesn't really get me going. I guess it sounds rather boring, just plain meat and potatoes.

I'm in the process of discovering all that is great about pork. (We already know my fondness for bacon.) But there's something about pork that lends itself to pairing with sweet things, like apples or honey. It's a sultry flavor that isn't quite savory or salty, like a steak or hamburger, but is just loaded with this great fat that lends itself so well to being smoked or cured or ground up into sausage. Except the tenderloin. It's a piece of meat that has no fat in it. There's fat all around it, of course, and some residual flecks make it onto a fabricated piece, but it's just this great soft piece of muscle.

I practiced removing the silverskin on this tenderloin from Wohlner's and didn't mangle the meat as much as I had the first time, though it's by no means an A effort. I followed Ina Garten's instructions for a marinade and then made an integral sauce at the end of the cooking. My sauce class turned out to be fairly handy in the end as I now know some really fancy tricks. Not bad at all for a first effort if I do say so. The green beans and fingerling potatoes are another easy trick I learned from Culinary Foundations. I partially cooked the beans and the potatoes in boiling water and then blanched them with really cold water to halt the cooking process. Then I sliced the potatoes and lightly salted them and sauteed them right before service to get a golden-brown sear on them and to get them all good and hot right before dinner. So simple, but that's what makes it so good.

Herb-marinated Pork Tenderloin: from Barefoot Contessa Back to Basics
3 pork tenderloins
1/4 cup lemon juice (about 4 lemons)
1/2 cup olive oil
6 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2 tablespoons fresh rosemary
1 tablespoon fresh thyme
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
salt and pepper

For sauce:
1/4 cup apple-cider vinegar
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
1/2 cup chicken stock
2 tablespoons brown sugar
4 tablespoons cold butter

Place all the ingredients in an oven bag or large ziplock and let rest for three hours or overnight. Season the tenderloins with salt and pepper and cook in a very large saute pan with the lid on until the outside is seared and the inside is just cooked and reaches about 140 degrees. Remove the tenderloins and let rest for 10 minutes cover by aluminum foil.

Leaving the good bits of marinade and pork in the pan, deglaze the sucs with the vinegar. Add the mustard, stock and sugar and bring to a boil. Reduce in volume until the sauce is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. Mount with pieces of the cold butter and season with salt and pepper.

The Starter

2011-03-16T17:13:00.000-05:00

My new set of classes, protein fabrication and artisan breads, have me completely re-energized. The sun came out again, the smell of the earth is seeping up through my open windows and I get to start over just like everything else. Artisan bread is such an interesting course. There's so much I've learned in just one session (and a lot of reading), like how yeast was only just discovered as an organism that can be harvested and sold in the late 1800s by Louis Pasteur. Before that, folks just added water to flour, let it ferment, kept feeding it and using it and feeding and using the exact same starter sometimes for generations. Families would pass the bread starter on as a wedding gift. There's a sourdough starter in San Francisco that is more than 100 years old. This is exactly the sort of thing that completely enthralls me but is also the sort of thing I will absolutely fail at. I am going to kill it at one point or another. I've already had one close call.

One of our assignments for the artisan bread class is to make and maintain a sourdough starter for the entire quarter. We're supposed to show up the day of the final with our starter to make a loaf of sourdough bread. If the starter is dead, so are we. The starter is sitting out on my counter on day seven of the fermentation process. It's starting to get a little bit stinky with a faintly sour aroma. This starter is a tad bit high maintainence. Starting on day three it has to be fed twice everyday, like a pet. In the morning before work, I scrape about one-tenth of the goop into a clean glass bowl, stir in half a cup of water and then two-thirds of a cup of flour. Then I cover it and let the bacteria feast on the fresh flour. When I get home at 5 p.m., I repeat just dumping the leftover starter into the trash. Yesterday, I missed a feeding. I forgot to set my alarm for work. Fortunately, I woke up only 10 minutes late, but I ran out of the house before tending to my fermentation project. I thought for sure that would be the death of the starter, but it was still bubbling when I got home that night, which is probably only going to encourage more neglegent behavior on my part.

The starter won't be ready for the oven for another couple days, although I probably won't be ready to make the bread for another couple of weeks into the class. Apparently patience is key when it comes to delicious bread ... this should be interesting.

Let's Fabricate!

2011-03-09T17:38:00.000-06:00

Spring classes started for me this morning with Protein Fabrication, which is (in laymen's terms) butchering meat. It's a bit of a suprise that I signed up to learn about breaking down meat seeing as five to seven years ago I did not eat red meat. It wasn't for ethical or health-related reasons; it just kind of grossed me out in its raw form. So slimy and rubbery. Plus my mom had a tendency to overcook. But these days, things are different. I don't eat much meat truly. I try to always have bacon on hand, but other than that, I only buy meat or poultry when I have something specific I want to make in mind. I've moved far away from being jittery with grease or skin, and I suspect this class will only move me even further.

We started out with pork. Simple stuff really. Although I now have a greater appreciation for the word "butcher" because I butchered my tenderloin, trying to remove the tough, inedible silverskin from it. It was a bit of a juicy mess. Removing the back fat from my pork chops did not go smoothly, but it was only day one, and I have never spent this much time with a piece of raw meat before.

We were assigned to do some readings, look up information on pork and to watch some videos posted on Chef Garvey's Web site. The series of videos on pork follows the piglet from pretty much whole hog (minus the innards) to portion-size cuts. Not going to lie, it was a little shocking at first. There was Drew, the class teacher's aid, with the pig pointing out the kill point in its throat and then, yes, sawing the head off. It ended somewhat dramatically with him snapping its neck. I'm not sure I'm up to that. I'm not even sure I'm up to jabbing a live lobster between the eyes to snuff out its life, but if I'm eating it, shouldn't I be able to kill it? Sebastian and Wilbur deserve a little more respect than what I give them, I think. Trussing a pork tenderloin ... that I can do. I'm already working out a plan involving a dry rub. Now all I need is a guinea pig or two--and not to cook although I have eaten guinea pig (tender dark meat, very tasty).

Amaretto Biscotti

2011-03-07T17:47:00.000-06:00

I had three days off in a row last week. Three. It was nice. I slept, kind of a lot actually. I didn't even cook anything on my days off until Sunday evening when I was home alone. I almost drove to Noodles and Company but committed to making two of my favorites, my old standbys. One is a Giada de Laurentiis pasta recipe combining Italian sausage, artichokes, roasted tomatoes and parmesan cheese (so all things delicious). The other is the amaretto biscotti I found in a Gourmet magazine issue several years ago.

Biscotti are like cookies for adults, to be dunked in coffee instead of milk. This version of biscotti isn't too hard at all, not that I mind much the crunch. Dunking still leaves little remnants in the cup, saved for the last slurp. I use amaretto liqueur instead of kirsch because it's cheaper, also it reminds me of my early days of drinking. At 21, amaretto sours were just about all my friends and I could handle. That and midori sour. Those were our "adult" drinks after the too-early days of drinking Smirnof Ice, yikes. Now amaretto's only use in my house is in baked goods. Maybe once I'm in my 30s I'll start using kirsch brandy and drinking whiskey with ice (that seems a long way off).

The recipe is easy with almost no cleanup. And these beauts are addicting.

Amaretto Biscotti: makes 18
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter, melted
3 tablespoons amaretto liqueur
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 teaspoons almond extract
3 eggs
1 cup almonds, toasted and chopped
2 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 350. In a bowl, stir together sugar, butter, liqueur and extracts. Add the eggs and stir to combine. Add the almonds. Stir in the remaining dry ingredients until everything just comes together. Turn out on a baking sheet and mold into two logs that are eight to ten inches long, three inches wide and one or so inches thick. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove and let cool a bit. Slice into one-inch thick pieces and bake again for 20 to 25 minutes.

Here's To Breaking Things

2011-03-02T19:02:00.002-06:00

The winter quarter ended along with, you know, everything else. The only things left standing are my ability to throw together a kicking meal (albeit on a more restricted budget in the future) and my voice, which does nothing but complain.

I have a tendency for the dramatic (if you haven’t noticed). Every once in a while, the bike I’m riding breaks down (in this case literally; I broke the wheel of my bike) and I just throw it away and start again on a brand new bike and on a brand new trail. I went on a diet five years ago when I was about 20 to 30 pounds heavier (it’s hard to tell because I didn’t weigh myself much). Diets aren’t successful for most people, but for someone with my personality type (ENFJ, if you must know), they are fantastic. It’s invigorating to throw out old habits and start all over again. Of course, I gave it up after a couple months, but that was enough to change my life. New Year’s resolutions are great for me. I’m simultaneously self-analytical (to a fault) and persistent, which means I'm constantly trying to better myself in a one-step process. So when things started to sort of unceremoniously unravel in the past couple weeks, I was ready with a plan. Or perhaps the plan was ready for me.

I got fired. Well, I should (less dramatically) say that the steady contributing editor position I held at a newsweekly was given to somebody else (in the sales department, I might add), but they still want me to write for them. I found out and was a little crushed. I loved parts of that job. A lot. I drove 12 hours round-trip in winter weather for a story about George Paul’s artisanal vinegar, I get to hear about people’s lives and passions told through their food, and it sort of feels like that was shat on. But in the same vein, I understand why, and a week or so away from the let down, I’m a little relieved to go home from eight (or so) hours at work or school and not have to churn out a story or interview someone. But it feels devastating in a way because writing is what I love, it’s what I do, it’s what I want to do, and a door closed feels a little like all doors closed.

My bike broke, I bent a wheel on my car running over a pothole, I let go of a friendship and nearly lost another. Writing about the loss of friends at the end of statement like that makes it seem like no big deal, like they’re as easy to fix as a bent tire rim. I wish it were. With letting go, I hope that means I can come back. I do, I really do. Many times, I want to call or email and say that I take it all back and that I can get through on a bent wheel until the entire thing just breaks or maybe the road we’re on is already bumpy and a friendship with a bunch of dents in it doesn’t matter because it wasn’t going to be a smooth ride anyway. I need more time, time to fix my wheel. And then there’s the other friendship, the one nearly lost, which in the end exposed me to be a complete crazy person. I’m not the only one who acts completely irrational in this world. In fact, I would defend my actions (most of them) and am grateful that my friend was willing to hash everything out.

Then there’s dating. I am complete and total failure at dating. No one aces it, I know. And if you do, keep it to yourself thank you. My mom said it is supposed to be fun (is it?). For me, dating has never been fun. It occurred to me, well it occurred to my mom and sister who then told me, that I’m trying too hard and I should just give it up for a while. So I did. I am doing the cliché thing that everyone says they do right before they meet somone (gag me please all you people with your rose-colored hind-sight): I am giving up dating for something like a Lenten period. Forty days of not worrying about meeting a guy here or flirting with someone there or not making a fool of myself in this or that situation. The first thing I did was to give up Facebook. I have spent an entire week away from Facebook with barely a temptation to return.

On my first day off after the quarter ended, I fixed my car and set to work on fixing myself. Self-help, as far as I can tell—and I am no expert—involves quite a bit of journaling, venting to all your friends and doing the things that you love. One of the things I love is, as you may guess, cooking.

I finally learned something useful from my soup and sauce cookery class, and that is integral sauce made from pan sucs. For this sauce, I seared the outside of a whole chicken (divided into legs, thighs and breasts) to crisp up the skin and baked it at 350 degrees for a little less than an hour, leaving all those beautiful juices in the bottom of the pan. I removed the chicken once cooked and set to work on the sauce by deglazing the pan with a bit of dry white wine. I poured in some hot chicken stock and added beurre manie, which is equal parts flour and butter kneaded to a smooth consistency (about one-fourth a cup will do for one chicken). I brought the sauce to a boil to cook out the flour flavor and then served it sprinkled with fresh tarragon and alongside new potatoes and green beans. Ice cream for dessert and Nebraska Brewing Co. beer. It was a good meal in my almost excellent life.

They'll Probably Serve This in Heaven

2011-02-19T17:09:00.002-06:00

Eclairs don't travel well as you can see, but it doesn't really matter does it. They taste the same whether smashed or not. These were a product of my baking basics class--perhaps, no undoubtedly my favorite skill to have learned. It's actually a combination of skills. Three elements go into this pastry: pate a choux, pastry cream and ganache. None are hard, but they all require this knowing familiarity. The pate a choux has to be this certain consistency in order to puff up just so in a hot oven. The pastry cream should be thick, but you have to take caution not to burn it. And the ganache is just a simple blend of melted chocolate with heavy cream finished with butter for a shine but it should be poured (or dipped in this case) at just the right temperature or it will melt off (I've done it) or it won't pour.

Familiar knowing. I think "to know" is better said in French or Spanish, languages that have two words for "to know." Connaitre (or conocer) means to know a person and to me evokes this feeling of having met someone, talked to them, been in their presence. Whereas savoir or saber is to know about something, to have a well of information. Perhaps I'm being cavalier with my translations, but when I think if savoir, I think of reading. And when I think of connaitre, I think of doing. I would like to connaitre pastry cream. I'd like to connaitre it so well that I can transform it into other things. Something with a different flavor perhaps. Strawberry, saffron, lavender. I'm not there yet with chocolate eclairs. These are just plain ol' pate a choux with vanilla pastry cream and straight-up chocolate ganache.

Pate a Choux: yields 12

4 ounces butter

8 fluid ounces water

5 ounces flour

3 to 5 eggs

Preheat the oven to 400. In a small sauce pan, bring the butter and water to a boil. Stir in the flour with a whisk, let the mixture get pretty dry with the excess water evaporating out. Transfer the mixture to the bowl of a standing mixer. Let it cool down a bit, until the bowl is just warm to the touch. Add the eggs one at a time being sure they fully incorporate each time, until the consistency is pasty and not too runny. You'll be pipping it out, so it has to hold its shape. Using a pastry bag, pipe into logs or rounds (those can be cream puffs) and bake at 400 for 15 minutes and then reduce heat to 350 and bake until they're dried out and nice and brown.

Pastry Cream:

12 fluid ounces milk

4 fluid ounces cream

3 3/4 ounce sugar

5 egg yolks

1 ounce cornstarch

In a heavy saucepan, bring the milk and cream up to a boil being careful not to scorch it. Meanwhile, in a separate bowl, whisk together eggs, sugar and cornstarch. Once the milk boils, carefully and slowly pour one-third of it into the eggs mixture to temper it while whisking. Once the eggs have warmed slightly, pour it all into the saucepan with the milk and return to heat. Bring to a light boil and continue whisking (do not stop whisking) until the mixture thickens up quite a bit. Remove from heat and refrigerate.

Chocolate Ganache:

1 part chocolate

1 part whipping cream

a couple tablespoons butter

Melt the chocolate in a double boiler. Add the cream slowly until you reach a desired consistency, which should take no more than the same amount of chocolate you used. Finish by melting in some butter. Pour over cakes or pastries once it has cooled to 90 to 100 degrees, which is barely lukewarm.

At Last

2011-02-13T13:26:00.000-06:00

These scones signify a couple things for me. First off, a free weekend. Saturday I had nothing planned whatsoever, which meant I slept in, had time for French-press coffee and journaling, and made scones. Second, these are my new go-to scones. I shouldn't say new because I've never settled on a scone recipe. I've tried all sorts of scone recipes from Molly Wizenberg to Martha Stewart to Better Homes and Gardens. They've been too soft, too hard, too sweet, not sweet enough, and never ever flaky enough. But here it is, from the Tartine Bakery cookbook I just bought, my scone recipe.

With two sticks plus a tablespoon of butter blended (by hand--and this may be the key), I just knew I could get the flakiness I wanted. The outer edges of the currant scones caramelized to a crusty golden brown while the inside is soft like a buttermilk biscuit. Biting into them after 35 minutes in the oven at 400 wasn't the hallelujah moment I expected to have once I accomplished what feels like the goal of this blog. I tore off a piece, popped it into my mouth, and thought, "Yeah, this is it. I think this is the one." Like the rocky turning of winter to spring, or the slow realization of sweet, simple love: Yes, this is right. Yesterday was the pits, but today I can make scones and spring will come.

My sister and I were sitting at the bar of Senor Matias earlier this week, before the weather changed from 4 degrees to 54. We were both sipping on margaritas counting our woos on both hands, both of us down in the dumps. I kept saying, between bouts of lying my head on the bar, "It's going to get better once it's spring. The sun is going to come out and the snow will melt and it will be better." All said more as a reassurance to us both than in a real sense of hope. I swear that everyone I know is just aching for the long days of summer. I can think of so many people emerging slowly and limping from the great cloud that is winter in a temperate climate zone. It's so funny to talk of the weather, but do you realize what an impact the environment has on people? Of course we all talk about it. I'll celebrate 54 degrees on a Saturday in Feburary with scones, perhaps I'll commemorate 68 degrees coming up this Thursday (!) with a cake.

Buttermilk Scones: from Tartine Bakery yields 12
3/4 cup zante currants
4 3/4 cups flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup and 1 tablespoon cold butter
1 1/2 cups buttermilk
1 teaspoon lemon zest

top with melted butter and large-grain sugar crystals

Preheat oven to 400. Soak the currants in hot water for 10 minutes to plump up. Sift flour, baking powder and baking soda into a large mixing bowl. Add the sugar and salt and stir to combine. Cut the cold butter into cubes. Cut butter into the flour with your hands. Before my baking basics class, I used a pastry blender, but my teacher says she likes to get in and touch everything she bakes. I love the philosophy. Get to know it by feeling it, sort of thing. It works well in this case. Blend the butter into the flour until the mixtures forms pea-size crumbs. Pour in the buttermilk, lemon zest and currants. Stir with a wooden spoon to blend. Add more buttermilk if the mixture is too dry, which mine was but that's probably because it's winter and there's no moisture in the air. Once the dough has come together, turn out on a heavily floured work surface. Form into a log that is 18-inches by five- and is two inches thick. Cut out scones with a chef's knife. Arrange on baking sheet. Brush scones with melted butter and sprinkle with sugar. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes. I actually ended up needing to bake it for 35 minutes. But bake until the top is nice and golden brown.

Drunken and Sunken

2011-02-05T13:46:00.000-06:00

My world right now is sludgy and slick. Stepping outdoors requires a certain application of layers and once outside, walking down my outdoor steps is treacherous work (I fell two weeks ago and still have a bruise). But Tuesday I was gifted with a snow day. I woke up to check the school Web site and then slid back under the sheets, barely crawling out sometime around 10 to do some work. By noon I was ready to experiment in the kitchen. As you can see from the above photo, that experimentation did not go well the first round.

My sister gave me a cookbook from the Humingbird Bakery in London, which interestingly enough sells American baked goods specifically cupcakes. I forget about all the great sweets Americans bring to the global table: brownies, cookies, pies, a sweet and moist cake and cupcakes. My problem is that I often come to things like brownies, cookies and cakes and think they're too boring or too sweet, which they often are, so I want to mess with them. So I do things like replace the milk with whiskey, which frankly should be a lifelong rule of thumb, and add instant coffee. Using my now somewhat scientific knowledge of the baking process, I figured the moisture with the milk and with the whisky would equal out, what doesn't even out is the fat content--there being none in whiskey. So batch one of the drunken mocha cupcakes was a flop, literally.

I think the friends I rounded up to watch movies on the snow day would have been happy with the drunken-sunken cupcakes, but pulling what little bit of a perfectionist I have lying around deep down inside, I made another batch, which didn't turn out perfect (the recipe was listed in weight and I lost my scale, so measuring was a touch inaccurate) but it was acceptable. Someday I'll find a good American chocolate cupcake recipe, and when I do, I'll share it with you.

This is Hollandaise Sauce

2011-01-24T15:59:00.000-06:00

Now this, this is breakfast, not that I ate it in the morning. It was more around noon on a Saturday that I got around to making the Hollandaise to go on top of poached eggs and bacon, but it was the first meal of my day. And what a way to start.

It was something like two and half year's ago that I first made Hollandaise, botched it and wrote my first blog post about it. I over-cooked it, something I now know I could have fixed with a little hot water or another egg. But in a way it started me on a path of discovery involving food, a lot of mistakes and even more reflection. It was also the trajectory that landed me somewhere in a field of contentedness. Before Food Eaten I was up and down, all over the place really. Sky high one day, imagining myself as a young Senator fielding calls for outings with attractive celebrities (you think I'm kidding?), and then turning into a bumbering ball of tears the next day struggling with a weekly existential crisis. I won't say it was all food that led to this so-called healing. It was friends, family, vitamin B supplements (a miracle if you ask me, run to your nearest drug store), the realization that yes, I was at least somewhat attractive to the opposite sex (that was nice), plus the faith I tether my life to--if somewhat loosely tied. That's not to say I haven't run into the occasional full blown meltdown or the despressing string of a month or so. But it has gotten better, and so has my cooking.

There's this knowing that made the difference. For the longest time I had an unreasonable fear of pie crusts. I screwed them up a few times, one time getting the dough stuck in a too-small food processor and then trying to transform the mess into shortbread cookies. But this one time, I followed some detailed instructions for pate sucree and voila, perfect tart dough. Now I can't get enough. I will never mess up tart dough again because I know what it's supposed to feel like, look like, taste like. The same goes for this Hollandaise. You whisk two eggs with some cool water in a double boiler until the whisk slows down across the yellow sauce creates streaks. Removed from heat, you pour in seven ounces of clarified butter, slowly while still whisking until you don't think the sauce can take any more. And then comes the salt, enough lemon juice to flavor it and some cayenne pepper. In this way, I learned to walk, talk, kiss, write, love.

Brussels Sprouts Are Good

2011-01-19T16:33:00.000-06:00

I'm just going to go out there and state the obvious: Bacon is my favorite food. At least it's one of them. Along with tomatoes and vinegar. Brussels sprouts are another beast altogether. I'd wager that no one labels them among their personal top ten. My mother puts them at the bottom of her list, right next to any kind of beans (especially limas). But this is a dish that I think could change her mind, and it's not just because of the bacon.

Those cabbages in miniature soaked up just the right amount of grease, which slipped part of the way between the leaves like legs between sheets and lent a sultry edge to the greens. They were still crunchy after a good saute in the Dutch oven, taken off the heat just shy of the point at which they turn into the vegetable people loathe, bitter and slimy. You have to take care of these brassicas, watching not to overcook. The apple brought out the sweetness in the bacon, while the vinegar (the finest brand I've ever tasted) cut through the grease with a zing. I was popping down Brussels sprouts as if it were candy.

Sauteed Brussels sprouts with bacon and apples: serves 4
1/2 pound bacon, diced
1 pound Brussels sprouts, quartered
1 apple, peeled and diced
salt and pepper
apple cider vinegar to taste

Cook the bacon in a hot pan until just shy of crispy. Toss in the Brussels sprouts, stir to coat with oil and saute for five minutes or so, until the edges have turned slightly golden. Add the apples. Saute another minute or two until apples are toasted and sprouts are cooked. Season with salt and pepper. Remove from heat to a serving bowl. Drizzle with vinegar to taste.

On a Dark Night

2011-01-12T22:09:00.000-06:00

It's 2011 and I'm 27; I decided sometime last week that it was high time I get rid of my anxiety. I actually didn't even realize how anxious I can get until I got the job at the Jewish Community Center and I walked through the day with a tension headache and rock-hard back. I felt on edge, ready to cry and/or yell at the next person who crossed me. The more I thought about myself, the more I realized that I let anxiety build up to this level at which point I burst or my lung does, one or the other. The only thing to do is to let it go.

So let it go I did, starting on my birthday last week. At a restaurant, I let other people flag down our slow waiter, and under a time crunch to finish this apple frangipane tart before people showed up at our potluck on friday, I did not freak out like I did with the almond cupcakes. Last potuck, both Amanda and I were running around like crazy people screwing up cupcakes and shouting to Amanda's boyfriend to clean this and grab that. He performed the tasks with ease and even managed to pour us both wine. This potluck we were just as time-crunched but there was no harassing of the boyfriend, there were no early sign of high blood pressure just laughter (and wine pouring).

This potluck was arguably the best in the past year or so that we've been hosting them. True, Phelix didn't perform his clean-up dance, but the party carried on until well past one in the morning as Justin and Sean created a line drawing together while being serenaded by Amanda on her guitar. The buffet was lined with Lane's birthday cake (baked and decorated himself), doughnuts, two kinds of soup, vegetarian lasagna, red beans and rice and, of course, hummus.

The frangipane tart made it out of the oven just before the first guests arrived to feast on its creamy almond goodness. There's only just a bit left, still moist, sitting seductively on the counter.

Apple Frangipane Tart:
8 ounces butter
7 ounces almond paste
2 ounces granulated sugar
5 eggs
4 ounces flour
1 pate sucree crust
1 1/2 pounds apples, sliced and partially-sauteed with cinnamon and sugar

Cream the butter, almond paste and sugar. Beat in the eggs one at a time until it's smooth. Add the flour and mix. Transfer to the partially-baked crust. Arrange partially baked apples on top and bake at 375 for 30 to 40 minutes or until the batter is cooked through. Top with slivered almonds.

Braising to Health

2011-01-09T20:30:00.000-06:00

This recipe for braised beef and onions was touted as perfect on a cold winter night. It snowed the night I made it, so much that the intended recipient of this majectic meal was unable to make it to my cozy house in the snow and ice. After a brief albeit intense cry and once two other friends successfully arrived at my house, we settled in sheltered from the first real storm of the season. My fear of eating a grand dinner alone was not realized at all. We listened to soft music and plotted summer trips to California between bites of tender meat slathered with a savory beer reduction sauce. I wanted more people in my life in 2010, more people and more food. It happened. I recovered from old wounds, healing them up with food and friends. And while 2010 may have delivered its own scars (and some under-eye circles from my recent severe lack of sleep), it's nothing a pie crust and some listening ears won't fix ... right?

Braised Beef Short Ribs in a Beer Glaze:
1 tablespoon vegetable or corn oil
4 pounds beef short ribs (bone-in or -out)
1 large onion
2 sprigs thyme
3 tablespoons flour
2 bottles Trappist beer
2 bay leaves
1 tablespoon apple jelly

Preheat the oven to 350. Season the meat with salt and pepper and sear the outside until its brown in hot oil. Set aside. Lower the heat and saute the onions until just softened. Add the thyme and flour, stir to coat. Place the seared meat back in an oven-proof pot. Pour in the beer (and definitely go with Trappist, it's well worth it). Bring the liquid to a boil. Put a lid on the pot and place it in the oven for one to one-and-a-half hours or until beef is fork tender. About halfway through season with more salt and pepper and the apple jelly or apple butter (which is what I used).

Once the meat is cooked, remove the meat from the pot and strain out the onions. Place the cooking liquid back on the stovetop and turn the heat to high. Reduce the volume of the liquid until it is a glaze, nearly the consistency of gravy. Stir in slices of cold butter. Serve.

Cranberry-apple Pie

2010-12-18T18:25:00.000-06:00

I had one (almost completely) good day this week, save one rather intense fit of tears and the fact that my alarm didn't go off and I was late for class. The good part of the day involved making pie, and it seemed to be enough to salvage the dreary winter weather and a friend who ended up being a no-show for a dinner I made because of a lovely wintry mix of precipitation.

Running my fingers through soft flour and greasy butter was a welcome relief from the chaos that is my life at the moment. I've had barely a moment to relax. My new schedule of winter quarter classes and working what amounted to 40 hours-plus at a new (part-time) job has me reeling. But Wednesday, Wednesday, Wednesday. It was cold and grey with a sludge of old snow tossed in haphazard mounds, but I found it dark solace. I cooked a braise of Trappist beer, beef and onions in my house slippers while the afternoon sun dipped below the dead fingers of the trees.
It started with the pie though. Cranberry and apple pie topped with whipped cream. It was a beautiful mess, just a slop of fruit and syrup covered over with a latice top, just like a nice but insecure college girl mistakenly wearing fishnet tights out to some parties. She looks so provocative that there won't be anything left of her when she needs it.
Apple-cranberry Pie: from On Baking
1 pound apples, sliced
4 ounces brown sugar
4 ounces granulated sugar
1 tablespoon orange zest
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons corn starch dissolved in 2 tablespoons cold water
1 pint cranberries

Combine apples, sugar, zest, cinnamon and salt. Stir to coat the apples with the dry ingredients. Saute in a saucepan. Pour in the cornstarch and water. Continue sauteing until apples are softened but still firm to the bite. Remove from heat. Add the cranberries and dump into a pie shell. Bake at 400 for 25 to 30 minutes.

A Few Bad Decisions

2010-12-06T18:38:00.002-06:00

Mistakes were made in the construction of this tart. It was supposed to turn into a lemon-polenta cake so beautiful on Nigel Slater's Web site that I couldn't resist. Things came a little undone in my kitchen, unraveling slowly and then nearly landsliding into defeat.

Things started out well. I measured the ingredients to the gram using my new scale. I even pulverized the polenta, knowing it to be a little coarse.

When the cake came out of the oven, I was still encouraged. The smell was so pleasant and the top of the cake a lovely golden brown that I thought surely victory was mine. Until I turned it out and realized the cake was less than half the height it should have been. Did I make an error in converting Slater's Celsius to American Fahrenheit and made the oven too cold? Or was it the egg whites? Perhaps they weren't fluffy enough. Slater called for a 20 cm cake tin, mine is 9 inches, is that the same? No matter how I messed things up, it only got worse once I took the parchment paper off and the cake completely fell apart.

I had crumbs and a load of delicious light, creamy whipped topping mixed with lemon curd to frost them with. I just couldn't throw anything away. I stared at my products for a moment. The lemon whipped cream and the crumbs. And I thought, why not stir them together? Both taste good. Brilliance struck and I ladeled the crumby-whipped topping into cupcake sleeves to be eaten individually with a spoon. Maybe like ice cream?

A horrible idea! Just horrible. The cupcake things didn't hold their shape at all. It was a mushy mess. I was a mushy mess. I started crying alone in my kitchen on a Friday afternoon. I cursed. I cried some more. I cursed a little louder at my life, the crap cake I had just made, my skill as a baker, Nigel Slater. And then I threw one of the cupcake liners filled with sugary goo at the faucet of my sink. It splattered on the window, which actually felt good. Then I scraped all the goo back into the bowl, put the bowl in the fridge and went rock climbing at the gym.

At some point Friday, I came up with a decent idea. The goo tasted good, and I hated the thought of just throwing it away, plus there was so much of it, it seemed like it might make a good topping to a pie.

So I made a crust. This is where things started looking up. Things usually start looking up when that much butter is involved.

The crust came along nicely, and I used the remainder of the lemon curd for the icing with some berry jame for a thin filling.

And this tart is what came of the lemon-polenta cake. Really, it was quite good.

Onion Soup

2010-12-01T13:24:00.000-06:00

I was first introduced to French-onion soup back when Panera was the Saint Louis Bread Company and it was located only in Saint Louis. We were staying at a hotel that just happened to be within walking distance of this glorious cafe that served the hearty soup in a bread bowl. My sisters and mother and I would scrape the insides of the bowl clean with our spoons, sopping up the soggy bread. But I soon shied away from the aromatic concoction when I hit college, started eating badly and was plagued with painful and embarassing gastrointestinal issues (if you catch my drift--no pun intended). The simple onion soup was out for years and years and years. Until a couple weeks ago when my dad ordered it for lunch at Granite City.

Neither Emily nor I had heard him order, we were probably absorbed in something related to Harry Potter. But when the waitress brought out his soup, covered in a slice of melted cheese, we were immediately interested. We begged for one little sip. We wanted to know what kind of cheese that was. Did they use gouda, gruyere, Swiss, parmesan? Were there little chunks of crouton floating in it? We ordered a cup of our own, to share.

My mom made a batch later that week, the leftovers of which I enjoyed with aged gouda. Then when I finally retreated back to my own home, post-Thanksgiving, instead of delving into my fridge packed with leftovers, I made onion soup following Nigel Slater's recipe from Tender with a little help from Julia Child. That was the first recipe I had made from Slater's 500-some-page tome about his vegetable patch, complete with jelousy-inducing photos every few pages. I still haven't made it all the way through the volume that includes recipes on a couple dozen common garden vegetables.

The soup, it went too fast. After only two servings. It was splendid with parmesan cheese (which I was too lazy to bake to melting point) and soggy sourdough, but it stands well alone. Barely sweet yet dark and savory. It's a fine companion on a dark winter night.

Onion Soup:
3 large onions, sliced
3 tablespoons butter
bay leaf (I added rosemary and thyme only because I had them)
2 tablespoons flour
1/2 cup dry white wine
5 cups beef stock
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 cup red wine plus a teaspoon of sugar or cognac

Slice the onions julienne. A trick I learned in school is to cut the onion in half and then slice along the perforated ribs of the vegetable to get beautiful, sexy slivers. Saute the onions in melted butter on medium-low heat for 25 to 30 minutes until softened but not browned, stirring occasionally. Add the bay leaf and flour. Stir to coat the onions with the flour. Add the wine, let simmer for a minute. Add the stock. Bring to a boil then reduce heat to let it simmer for another 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the wine with sugar or cognac or madeira, let simmer another five minutes. Serve in bowls topped with a slice of mild and aged cheese. Pop the bowls in the oven at 350 for five minutes to let the cheese melt. Serve.

Paella?

2010-11-29T19:38:00.000-06:00

The only thing that makes this paella is the presence of saffron and seafood. I didn't bake it. I didn't use hardly any vegetables at all, just leftover mussels and shrimp from bouillabaisse night. But I think that's actually the point of rustic-dishes-turned-national treasures--they fill bellies by using up the leftovers or the produce and meat about to go bad. The working class perfected dishes like pasta, bouillabaisse or paella, and now those dishes are the dishes that visitors eat when they travel to those countries.

So on this dark evening in my lonesome apartment, I'm chomping down reheated paella that reminisces of the sea even though I live about as far from the ocean as one could possibly get. It's pretty good. It doesn't get this cold in Southern Spain where I lived for fourth months and where I first tried paella. My paella is not as good as real Spanish paella, but I'm tempted to think that's more a matter of geography and my serious lack of a pitcher of sangria rather than in the quality of the chef.

This time while eating paella I'm listening to "Where are you Christmas?" and tossing up lights willy-nilly around my apartment in attempt to infuse the space with a seasonal glow. In Portugal, a memorable time I feasted on paella, I was at a tiny restaurant, one with 10 tables or fewer, with my friend Myra. It was evening but still light and hot and humid. We shared a pitcher of sangria. I got fantastically drunk like you only can when you don't plan on it. I started talking about what if someone could cultivate gigantic peas, ones the size of, say, a tennis ball. The chef at the restaurant sent over an aperatif, like I needed another drink, before we walked out onto the cobbled streets of Lagos to find our friends en route from Lisbon. It all seems so exotic, that life I led. It was exotic, it was.

Easy Paella:
1/2 onion, diced
1 clove garlic, minced
1 bell pepper, diced
handful peas
1 15-ounce can diced tomatoes
generous pinch saffron
1 cup rice
2 cups chicken stock
assorted meats and seafood including but not limited to chicken, rabbit, chorizo, shrimp, lobster, mussels, scallops, cockles--just make sure this is all pre-cooked before using this recipe variation
salt and pepper to taste

Saute the onion and garlic in olive oil for five minutes. Add the bell pepper, peas and tomatoes and saffron and pan fry for 2 to 3 three minutes. Add the rice, stir to coat with oil. Add the chicken stock and bring to a boil then reduce heat to a simmer. Add the meat and seafood. If you're making authentic paella, you should put it in the oven at 375 right now. But otherwise, just let the rice cook as is. Serve hot.

An Homage to Mussels

2010-11-24T13:09:00.000-06:00

Bouillabaisse: The recipe and the name of this classic Provincial dish sound complicated. I read through Julia Childs' instructions multiple times and even read the version from my On Cooking textbook. It's actually quite simple. You make the stock, then you pour it over seafood. That's it. Brilliant. But the stock has to be really freaking good and so does the seafood. This stock was so-so. To be honest, I expected more out of the saffron. More of an Indian-spice quality. Spiciness that kicks you in the face with flavor. This was more about the mussels, which is something I'm more than happy to let take center stage.

I just love mussels. They're so salty, tasting of exactly where they came from just like wine. There's this excitement about cooking them, how you have to keep them alive until they're cooked and how they pop open with the steam from a little bit of white wine revealing their salty flesh. They stay stubbornly clamped shut even under the threat of certain death. They bathe in fresh water for a few hours, spitting out the sand you don't want to clamp down on mid bite. To their lack of mind, it may be jolly sitting in some water, getting a good cleaning under a brush. Maybe it's the wine that does the wooing. The kettle, it's just like a spa: The mussels go into the steam room with a bit of vino and don't ever come out. Really, I couldn't think of a better way to die than in a bath of Riesling.

I made the bouillabaisse and roasted vegetables for some friends on Monday night. I can think of no better way to usher in cool weather and dark evenings than a cozy dinner with friends followed by a food-induced coma on the couch. No, there could be nothing better. Maybe except taking a swim in a vat of wine.

Bouillabaisse: from Mastering the Art of French Cooking
1 medium onion, diced
1 leek, sliced
1/2 cup olive oil
4 cloves garlic, smashed
1 15-ounce can diced tomatoes, drained
1 tablespoon parsley
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon thyme
1/8 teasponn fennel
2 pinches saffron
1/2 teaspoon dried orange peel
1 quart clam juice
1 1/2 quarts water

1/2 cup spaghetti pasta, broken into 2-inch pieces
2 pounds mussels, already cooked
1 pound shrimp or assorted fish, already cooked

Saute the onion and leeks in the olive oil until tender. Add the garlic and tomatoes. Saute another five minutes. Add the clam juice and water and the rest of the ingredients except the pasta and seafood. Bring to a boil and let simmer for 30 to 40 minutes. Strain off the stock and save it. Taste and adjust seasonings.

Bring the stock to a boil and cook the pasta. Place the seafood in bowls and ladle the stock over the top of them. Season with parmesan cheese and the awesome rouille, recipe follows.

Rouille: from Mastering the Art of French Cooking
1 small can green chili peppers, diced
3 drops Tabasco sauce
1 potato, cooked in the stock of the previous recipe
3 cloves garlic
1 teaspoon thyme
4 tablespoons olive oil

Place chile peppers, Tabasco, potato, garlic and thyme in food processor and pulse until smooth. Add the olive oil slowly until it becomes the consistency of a mayonnaise. Season with salt or pepper if needed. Spoon into soup to season broth. Also tastes great on bread.

Chocolate Scones

2010-11-19T12:21:00.000-06:00

The saga continues. This has got to be what attempt number 5,283 in my apparently lifelong goal to make the perfect scone. This time I busted out the professional equipment. I had the pastry blender churning away. I used one of my full collection of 10 biscuits cutters, available in various sizes. The bench scrapper came out when I cleaned off the table. I used my pastry brush to paint on the egg wash--that brush works like a dream. And the silicon baking mat led to even baking and easy cleaning. Yet still I fall short. To be fair, my standard is perfection.

I love scones for their balence between flaky and chewy. They aren't moist or rich like a muffin can be, but they shouldn't be too hard like a biscotti. They should be just barely sweet, just barely. The perfect scone, I know I've written about it before, would be one like the blueberry version I ate at the Boston Public Library. Flaky and crisp on the outside, dense but crumbly on the inside and bursting with blueberries. I'd hate to hear that the scone they had came from a mix. The fruit and nut scones at Delice are quite good. A close second.

I'm being a little too hard on these chocolate scones, like a parent who's ashamed their B+ student didn't land an A. The chocolate chips lend a great bite, and they aren't too sweet. I just want some more flake. That's my fault. I should have blended in the butter a touch more. I shouldn't have been so afraid of turning out dry dough onto my table. Maybe that's been my mistake all along. Scones can be quite the mess. Instead of fearing the mess or trying to minimize it, perhaps I should embrace the mess because it's that crumbly, floury, buttery mess that is the scone.

Chocolate Scones: from Martha Stewart's Baking Handbook

2 1/4 cups flour

3 tablespoons cocoa powder

1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar

1 1/2 teapsoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt, cold and cut into small pieces

10 tablespoons butter

5 ounces semisweet chocolate morsels

1 egg plus one egg yolk

1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons cream

Whisk together flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder and baking soda and salt. Mix the butter into the dry mixture with a pastry blender until it forms large crumbs with a few bigger chunks (but not too many). In a smaller bowl, whisk together 1/2 cup plus one tablespoon cream and egg. Using a spatula, incorporate the egg into the crumbs, stirring until it just comes together.

Turn dough out on a floured surface and press into a one-inch thick square. Cut into three-inch squares with a knife or pastry wheel or into rounds with a biscuit cutter. Arrange on baking sheet one inch apart. Makes 20. Freeze for an hour or up to a week. Bake at 375 for 25 to 30 minutes.

Perfect Roasted Vegetables

2010-11-16T13:16:00.000-06:00

I love vegetables. Love them. I've come a long way from hiding broccoli under my plate or trying to feed it to the dog. My mom and I used to go tit for tat over finishing a serving of steamed vegetables (she would always win, but it was painful for all parties). My sister or I or both would be sitting in solitude on our booster seat at the kitchen table long after the dishes had been put away, sulking over soggy carrots. We would plug our nose, gulp down the last bite and chase it with a chug of milk.

As Chef O'Donnell said in class on the first day of class, "Animals don't want to be eaten--they run away, but vegetables were made to be consumed." And they can put on quite a show, even with the simplest of accoutrements. For example, these roasted root vegetables. To me, they might as well be candy. When we made them in class on roasting/baking day, I couldn't stop eating them, diving in with my fingers. Divinely crunchy but densely chewy. A faint sweetness from the beets and carrots. Earthy substance straight from the ground. These bite-size morsels go down oh so easily.

These vegetables need little help to coax them into deliciousness, just some heat, olive oil, salt and pepper, and a few sprigs of rosemary and thyme. After peeling and chopping, I sat down to play spider solitaire (a dangerous addiction I'm now fessing up to) for 45 minutes until they were fork tender and golden brown. I took them to a Sunday-night potluck with friends where we shared South African fare from Robyn, squash and red-bean salad from Sarah and Matthew, lamb kabobs with apricot sauce, cheesey potatoes, and cranberry-crumble pie in a dimly-lit home whilst listening to records. There could be no better way to usher in the shorter days of winter.

Roasted Root Vegetables:
1/4 pound parsnips
1/4 pound carrots
1/4 pound beets
1/4 pound turnips
1/4 pound red potatoes
1/4 pound celery root
olive oil
salt and pepper
2 sprigs rosemary
2 sprigs thyme

Preheat oven to 400. Peel and coarsely chop the root vegetables. Arrange on baking sheet. Drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Add rosemary and thyme sprigs. Bake until fork tender, about 40 minutes.

What I Should Have Done

2010-11-15T08:20:00.000-06:00

I should have just stuck with what I knew for yesterday's Culinary Foundations final. My Salade Nicoise turned out, well, I think OK would be generous. It was fine, totally edible. Except the potato--that was raw.

It's weird that my first cooking class in school is already over. I'm going to miss going on Tuesday, if only for a couple weeks until the next quarter begins. I really enjoyed cooking with all the nine others who made it through Chef Tim O'Donnell's course in intimidation. It's possible he might be a little disappointed to know that by the end of things, his tough critiques didn't phase anyone. "The sanitation was unacceptable." He was right, not enough gloves or hand washing. The plating, not up to standard. Yep. The salmon, either overdone or underdone.

When it came time to do the final yesterday, tension was pretty high with most the class. My friend Jess probably didn't crack a smile the entire four hours until her plate was turned in and she had her stellar grade. Chef O'Donnell said he would pay to eat her salad. That is not what he said about mine.

After chopping and dicing away at the most ginormous carrots I have ever seen (we're talking 1-foot long and a four- or five-inch diameter--they tasted awful), we got to the cooking part of the final. Hard-boiling an egg, boiling and then searing a potato, blanching and the sauteing green beans, searing a salmon, making dressing, etc. I got stalled out on the egg. I had to make five eggs before one came out right. Five. Five eggs. The first one cracked in the water immediately. The second, third and fourth weren't cooked all the way through. I had spent an entire hour trying to get a perfect egg before I finally peeled and sliced open the fifth egg to reveal a perfectly done hard-cooked egg. I did end up charring some of my green beans, but Chef had mercy on me there, and I ended up with an 81 percent. He asked if I was happy with my grade. I said yes because I can't imagine not agreeing with something Chef said. I think a low B is what I deserved, I do wish I had done better.

Coping with Cupcakes

2010-11-08T09:33:00.002-06:00

Some people eat to feel better, I cook. It usually works even when things barely come together in batter in the same way they barely come together in life.

Saturday Amanda and I hosted a potluck. I get so excited to cook food for people that I'm usually planning out my entree weeks ahead of time. This time for whatever reason I wasn't inspired by anything except the week-old frosting taking up half the top shelf in the fridge. So I started on almond cupcakes but a few hours before the party. And let me tell you, things were touch and go for a while there. Instead of using room-temperature butter, I used three blocks of rock-hard butter straight from the fridge. The butter and sugar don't "cream" well that way. The nine-horsepower KitchenAid mixer worked that butter so hard that the bowl got lodged pretty firmly in the mixer. Amanda's boyfriend had to remove it. And the batter was so thick that incorporating the frothy egg whites into it without breaking them was nigh impossible, yet somehow, the batter came together creamy and rich. While the cupcakes baked, I worked some magic on the frosting, which had seemed like enough to cover 24 cupcakes when I glanced in the bowl when grabbing the orange juice every morning. Either way, I conquered the cupcakes, all frosted and topped with almonds by 6:55 p.m. I even had time to vacuum the spider webs out of the back porch.

Somehow, just like I always do, I pulled it together enough to sit down for a moment and enough a moist almond-flavored cupcake before the fun started. And I think: I can't possibly be the only one out there who barely pulls it together enough to appear presentable. No, I'm not. I use cake to cope. I use cake and friends and Friends (the TV show) and family and faith. Sometimes, though usually not all at the same time, they fail me. And sometimes they come together at 6:55.

(this photo accurately represents how great the party was and how messy, another great analogy for life.)
Almond Cupcakes: adapted from Martha Stewart (serves 24)
3 cups flour
2 teapsoons baking powder
1 teapsoon salt
3 sticks butter, room temperature
2 1/4 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon almond
1 cup milk
8 large egg whites,

Preheat oven to 350. In a medium bowl, mix flour, baking powder and salt.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream the butter and 2 cups of sugar until fluffy. Mix in the vanilla and almond extracts. Add the flour in three batches, alternating with adding part of the milk each time and mixing til just combined. Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the egg whites until foamy. Add a scant 1/4 cup of sugar and beat until glossy. Fold into the batter, being careful not to deflate egg whites. Fill cupcake liners three-quarters of the way full with batter. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes. Frost and serve.

Salade Nicoise

2010-11-05T11:25:00.001-05:00

Our Culinary Foundations practical final is next week and includes a testing of knife cuts (julienne, macedoine, brunoise, batonet and other pretentious French words) and mastery of the Salade Nicoise. Our class did a warm-up for the final on Tuesday. I thought it went fairly well (my salad was way over-dressed and the potatoes were over-cooked), Chef O'Donnell thought a little differently. We botched the sanitation part to a certain degree, and pretty much everything needed work. Nevertheless, I'll miss our "little" critiques at the end of class when Chef tells us how we can improve (mixed in with a few anecdotes). I've had near mealtdowns in that little room next to the kitchen, but holy crap, I've tasted some awesome food.

The quarter flew by. I never thought my collapsed lung would heal (though it does still bother me on occasion). I'll really miss my classmates. All but one of them are in the chef's apprentice program, while I'm in the bakery/pastry option. I suppose it's likely I'll bond with all my future classmates. That's what happens when people cook and eat together, but still, this was nice. There is still one more anxiety-inducing day of cooking the famous Salade Nicoise. I'm a little nervous, so I thought it best to follow Chef's instructions and practice. Except now I'm a little more freaked out, but only just a little.

Everything did turn out fine in the end. The egg, potatoes and blanched green beans were a little underdone, but that was nothing compared the incredible haze of smoke that poured out when I tried searing the salmon. The saute pan needs to be hot. Nearly smoking hot. Well, some debris had fall at some unknown time under the right-front burner, which, under intense heat, starting smoking like crazy. We're talking fire alarms and a thick haze. I opened the back door to little relief. It got so bad my eyes started watering. But thank god, the salmon did not scorch. We'll probably have a permanent smoke smell in the house, but at least the meal was saved.

Nicoise Salad: serves four

2 eggs, hard boiled
4 tomatoes, sliced into wedges
4 potatoes
large handful green beans
canola oil
4 salmon filets
2 or 3 large handful mixed greens
1 tablespoon basil, finely chopped
1 tablespoon chives, chopped
2 scallions, sliced
2 cloves garlic, sliced
salt and pepper
12 Nicoise olives

for dressing:
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
2 tablespoon red-wine vinegar
6 tablespoons olive oil

For dressing, whisk mustard and vinegar together. Slowly pour in the oil while whisking until it has thickened.

Place potatoes in a pot of cold, salted water and bring to a boil. Remove when cooked al dente, shock to stop from continuing to cook and slice in half. Blanche and shock the green beans in salted water. Dry and season the salmon with salt and pepper. Sear in a hot skillet with a little canola oil service-side down for 1 to 2 minutes, flip and sear for another minute. Remove from pan. Turn down the heat to medium and place potatoes in saute pan to brown for a few minutes. Add the green beans, olives, shallot and garlice. Toss to coat with oil. Remove from heat quickly. Toss vegetables with salad greens and dressing. Assemble salads and serve.

Lavender Cupcakes

2010-11-01T18:58:00.001-05:00

Last week Brian Ferry's photography blog led me once again to inspiration in the form of a London cupcake shop and bakery called Violet. The Interwebs once again brought me something beautiful I never would have come across without it. Violet's owner makes cupcakes with delectable-sounding names like English raspberry, English strawberry and French apricot. I perused every single page of the bakery's site, and even the next day couldn't stop thinking about cupcakes. In my nutrition class on Friday morning, I spent my break looking up tips on adding lavender to baked goods so I could come up with something of my own.

The aromatic lavender has been holding its own in the garden, despite the efforts of nearby too-large tomato plants. Whenever I'm out in the yard, I take a moment to fondle the lavender. Just brushing it with my fingers leaves a clean, sweet scent behind. It reminds me of the New Mexican dessert where wild sage and lavender thrive alongside tumbleweed.

Of course I've heard of lavender in perfume, but lavender as an herb is something relatively new to me. I think it started with some shortbread cookies. Flaky, buttery and suddenly fresh with flowers. These lavender-lemon cupcakes are my first effort. A valient try, I'd say. I didn't have much blooming in the garden, but enough to make due. I added the lavender as I would an herb, and its flavor was isolated to bites of cupcake that actually had bits of flower in them. But those bites just burst with flavor once the flower's fragence opened up. I think I would try making a lavender-infused simple syrup next time to coax the herb to take over the entire cupcake.

Lavender Cupcakes: makes 18
1 cup butter plus more to grease pans
1 1/2 cups flour (sifted)
1 cup plus 3 tablespoons sugar
6 large eggs, separated
2/3 cup lemon juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon fresh lavender flowers
pinch of salt

Preheat the oven to 350.
In a medium or large bowl, beat together the sugar and egg yolks until light and fluffy with the whisk attachment (because I have that now!). Add the lemon juice and zest if you have it and want to use it and the vanilla and mix well. Using the paddle attachment, gradually mix the almonds and then the flour into the batter until combined. Set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk egg whites until soft peaks form. Add the salt and the last 3 tablespoons of sugar. Beat until stiff but not dry. Set aside.

Melt the butter. Fold the butter into the batter using a spatula. Then gently fold in the egg whites, being careful not to deflate the whites. Pour batter cupcake sleeves. Bake 20 minutes or until golden brown.

I Love Bacon

2010-10-25T19:03:00.000-05:00

In my quest to re-embrace pasta and Italian cuisine, I made Amatriciana sauce today (sounds fancy, eh?). My class actually had to do make pasta for a Culinary Foundations assignment: We are bringing frozen spaghetti to class tomorrow morning to defrost and taste in class. Of course, I've already critiqued my pasta and sauce up and down as I ate it for lunch today. First, I used the tomatoes I canned myself. I'm still alive and feeling well at the moment, so I must not have poisoned myself with botulism. That was the first time I had ever canned tomatoes and I'm neither here nor there on the taste. I didn't de-seed the fruit, which doesn't bother me much but may bother others. The tomatoes are on the sweet side, another thing I can't decide about. But the juice was very thick and made a really great sauce once reduced in volume. I'm thinking ahead to what Chef Tim will say when he tastes it, and I think I overcooked the bacon. But it's bacon, how bad can it ever be?

My roommate just decided last week to commit to eating vegetarian, a life decision I find very admirable. I'm also against the mistreatment of animals. But as I was pulling thick slabs of bacon out of its vacuum-sealed bag, a greasy film developing on my fingers, I told myself again that I could never give up meat completely. I go probably go without steak or burgers, and I definitely could go without dry chicken and tough pork. But it's the fat I can't do without. That bacon has a flavor you just can't get in the vegetable world, and it's the strips of fat lining the red strands of meat that melted into my sauce today or that crisps up in the skillet on a Saturday morning. I could live without it, but I wouldn't want to. I'm so glad Amanda and so many of my friends are committed to not eating meat or only eating meat that has been sustainable and humanely treated, but I think I'll just be your cheerleader if that's alright.

Amatriciana Sauce:
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
1 medium onion, diced
3 thick slices bacon or pancetta, cubed
1 28-ounce can whole tomatoes, chopped juices reserved
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
salt
Parmesan-Reggiano or Pecorino-Romano

In a saute pan, heat the oil and butter on medium. Saute the onion until translucent. Add the bacon and cook until fat has rendered and the meat has crisped a bit (five minutes). Add the tomatoes, red pepper flakes and salt (to taste), bring to a boil then reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes. Meanwhile cook pasta (spaghetti or fettucini) until al dente. Drain pasta and add to the sauce, stirring to coat. Serve sprinkled with grated cheese.

Pasta Revelations

2010-10-21T11:20:00.001-05:00

At some point in the past two years of blogging, I moved away from pasta. It was easy, I had done it before, it was kind of boring to eat and to make. I was wrong. It is simple; I was right about that. When we made four pasta sauces in class on Tuesday, all the recipes involved minimal ingredients and the simplest of techniques (simmer, stir, repeat), but ended up so delectable. Chef Tim mixed together an al fredo in five minutes with like five ingredients that was oh-so creamy yet still light and which clung to the pasta like dust to a TV screen. He boasted that people would pay a lot of money for that simple pasta with sauce, and they wouldn't be disappointed.

I took care of the puttanesca and making the pasta. Our pasta ended up a bit on the dry side (first time), which made it incredibly difficult to roll out. Chef rolled his perfect ball of dough into a nearly paper-thin sheet in minutes. I stood over mine sweating some flavoring into the tagliatelle that was anything but smooth and even. But I actually turned out to love my pasta with all its flaws. Chef advised making homemade pasta that looks like homemade pasta--makes perfect sense. But because my sauce had so many flaws, the sauce clung to the ridges and bumps perfectly. Usually, I douse my pasta with chunky sauce. I had never realized this was because the pasta itself was lacking. The puttanesca turned out fine (not as good as the boys' sauce, but still good), but I didn't need or want the chunks of cubed tomato. The briny-tomato juice had all the flavor of the nicoise olives and capers and stuck sublty and kindly to the outside of the wide noodles. The homemade pasta was so good, I don't know that I'd buy dry noodles ever again.

Pasta:
1 pound flour
4 eggs
salt
a tablespoonn or so of olive oil

Make a mountain of flour in a large bowl, leaving some of the pasta to the side to be mixed in as needed. Make a well in the mountain with a fork. Crack the eggs into the well. Sprinkle with salt. Incorporate the eggs into the flour by stirring with a fork. Add olive oil once about three-fourths of the flour is wet. Turn sticky dough out on a floured surface. Work and knead the dough with your palm, incorporating more flour as needed until the doughs stays in a ball and has a smooth surface. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for one hour.

Remove dough from fridge. Turn out on floured work surface. Roll dough until it is thin enough to read a newspaper through. Cut thin strips of pasta with a pizza cutter. Cook pasta in boiling, salted water for two minutes or until cooked through.

Puttanesca:
1/3 cup olive oil
1 tablespoon garlic
4 cups canned tomatoes and their juice
12 nicoise olives, halved
2 tablespoons capers, drained
1 tablespoon fresh oregano, finely chopped
1 anchovy filet
1 tablespoon fresh basil, finely chopped
1 tablespoon fresh parsley, finely chopped

In a saute pan, heat the oil. Add the garlic and saute until fragrant. Add the tomatoes, olives, capers and oregano, bring to a boil, reduce heat so it simmers and cover for 10 minutes while simmering. Add the anchovy filet, stir to incorporate. Season to taste. Let simmer another 10 minutes. Add the cooked pasta to the sauce, season with parsley and basil. Serves four.

Thanks to Jessica who took the photos.

A Subtle Taste

2010-10-18T18:35:00.000-05:00

I'm suddenly longing for long steamy summer evenings and popsicles that drip and run down your legs, as if that were a simpler time. But there was never a simpler time, was there? There is unknowing and knowing. Now I know a few things, and I'm trapped in this insecurity not knowing what to do next. This is a rare place for me. I'm decisive. I think about things and then I choose something. Sometimes (often) I choose wrongly. But then you get the knowing place, and it feels worth it there even if it's more painful and humbling. The paralyzing unknowing is where I stand now. There's no decision to make me feel safe; there is only . I can't control a .

Summer is that simple season. Same with winter. It's just hot, or it's just cold. You wear either as little or as much clothing as possible. You eat either salads or plain roasted vegetables and meats. Grilled or baked. But fall and spring, they are times of change and complexity. We go back to school (or finish out the year). There's a new bounty of produce to be made into stews or soups or braised for hours.
I'm scattered all over here today when what I should be doing is remembering and recounting a great meal I had last week. Most of the meal involved poaching, a form of cooking known for its subtlety. Subtlety, that is an art form I am decidedly not well-practiced in. Decisive, direct, to the point in my cooking and elsewhere. I lack the patience I think. My dad would tell me that the best things are the ones you wait for. He's so wise you sometimes want to punch his arm really hard.

So that brings us to the salmon poached in water infused with lemon and peppercorns. I say infused because it smelled like tea just before the salmon went in. And the salmon was just ever so lightly flavored with lemon that you couldn't much taste it once it was covered in the horseradish dressing. If I draw a silly metaphor, which I now will, my dad is the subtle quiet salmon who says the most important things at just the right moment. And the horseradish dressing, all zing and creamy spice, is my mom (and me), she keeps things interesting.

The poached apples were a bit of a showstopper, at least for me. A knife sliced through the apples cleanly, but they were cooked through--maybe you could call it al dente because it still had some bite. Incredibly, after an hour of soaking in hot apple cider, the fruit I had plucked from some trees last weekend actually tasted more like apples than when I had munched on some in the orchard. The candied almonds and amaretto whipped cream didn't hurt. And neither did the company. I called up a bit of a random group of friends to help me with my homework (eating the food, that is). I love to surround myself with people. And I always think the louder the more rambunctous the better. But maybe I'm wrong about that.

Poached Salmon Salad: from What Katy Ate
2 8-ounce filets of salmon
3 cups water
juice from one lemon
1 teaspoon black peppercorns

Salad:
2 or 3 large handfuls of mixed salad greens
1 15-ounce can garbanzo beans (rinsed and drained)
1 teaspoon capers, sauteed to cripsy in olive oil
salt and pepper
feta cheese

Dressing:
1 tablespoon minced horseradish
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1/4 cup cream
1/4 cup milk

Pour the water, lemon juice and peppercorns into a saute pan, turn on medium-high heat and bring to a boil. Let boil for five minutes so the flavors meld together. Remove from heat, add the salmon and cover, cooking for 15 minutes. Or until salmon is firm to the touch and light pink and flaky. Set aside to let cool and flake apart.

Arrange the lettuce on a serving platter. Toss on the garbanzo beans, capers, salmon and feta. I left the dressing on the side because I know not everyone is fond of horseradish.

Poached Apples with whipped cream and almonds: from Gourmet
6 apples
1/2 lemon
1/2 gallon apple cider
1/2 cup brown sugar

For whipped cream:
1/2 cup chilled whipping cream
1 1/2 tablespoon granulated sugar
1 tablespoon amaretto liqueur
1/4 teaspoon vanilla

Candied almonds:
1 cup slivered almonds
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 tablespoon butter
1 egg white

Apples: Peel top two-thirds of apples and rub outside with lemon to prevent discoloration. Bring the cider to a boil. Once it's boiling, add the apples and brown sugar. Remove from heat and let sit for one hour. Remove apples and let cool or chill. This can be done several days ahead of time.

For the whipping cream, combine all the ingredients in the bowl of an electric mixer. Mix on high speed until it forms soft peaks.

Preheat the oven to 450 for the almonds. In a small bowl, combine all ingredient and stir together. Lay out on a piece of parchment paper and bake for five minutes. Let cool and break apart to garnish the dessert. Combine all the parts for one apple drizzled with leftover cider served with almonds and a dollop of whipped cream.

Chicken Salad

2010-10-13T17:07:00.001-05:00

Pulverizing vegetables will always be gratifying.

Chicken Salad:
1 carrot
1 stalk celery
1/4 medium onion
1/2 pound cooked chicken
Landry's seasoned salt
mayonnaise

Put the carrot, celery, chicken and onion in a food processor. Pulverize. Stir in mayo with a spoon until it comes to the desired consistency and season to taste.

Apple Church

2010-10-12T17:05:00.001-05:00

Amy called it "apple church." On Sunday morning, two cars of friends headed to Nebraska City to appreciate the glorious outdoors for what has become an annual quest for apples by the peck. We rounded up pinova, golden delicious, gala, fuji, braeburn and cameos whilst avoiding the bees also feasting on the fruit. It's quiet work, at least if you get there right as the orchard opens.

Nebraska City is famous for the inception of Arbor Day. Once, long long ago, the state of Nebraska was completely devoid of trees, but this Morton guy (of Morton salt) moved here and planted saplings to make it a happier place for everyone.

Now his palacial home is a historical site, and a half dozen orchards and wineries are clustered in the town. My family used to visit when I was younger, and I just loved that old house. My imagination would go wild with picturing what my life would have been like if I had lived in that old house. Even at home when I played American Girl dolls with my sister, that house came to life. This year we had enough time to visit the site, which was the center of a meager reenactment. All the reenactment amounted to was a costumed guide through the house, a blacksmith and some ladies who were cooking cakes over coals in a Dutch oven--obviously this was the highlight and definitely something I need to bring to a high-maintenance camping trip (one involving a camper or at least a van). They had combined a cherry pie filling with a box of cake mix (because that was available for the pioneers in the 1860s) and sodas such as Dr Pepper or 7UP. I even scored a "Dutch Oven Cooking" cookbook from the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission's Becoming an Outdoors-woman Workshop. How could I have missed that workshop?! The cookbook includes recipes for cowboy potatoes, meat loaf, Dutch oven steak dinner and Dismal River Cow Camp coffee cake (among others).

We made it home by mid-afternoon, which gave me enough time to make another gallette with homemade whipped cream before watching Juno. Nothing like a movie about teenage pregnancy to remind you how insignificant your problems are.

Emerging Terrain

2010-10-07T19:32:00.000-05:00

My friend Sarah and I got the chance to cover this event called Stored Potential for The Reader, she as the art critic and I as the food person. The event brought together some of Nebraska's best chefs to serve 500 people family-style at the opening of a larger-than-life art installation. Thirteen of 300 submission were chosen to be printed on a large scale and hung from the side of some grain elevators in Omaha. The murals were chosen for how they addressed issues of feeding people and land use. The organization Emerging Terrain put on the installation and you can find better information about the art on their Web site or by reading the part of the article that Sarah wrote when it comes out next week. I was only there for the food.

When we got there, I was immediatley filled with energy. I think everyone was. There was a table that stretched nearly the entire length of the silos (which are owned by some friends who are converting it in a rock climbing area called SILO extreme outdoor adventure). I got to meet everyone I've written about and interviewed on the phone--all in one place. I even got to meet Jeanne of Jeanne Eats World, who was there as a volunteer server.

The story Sarah and I wrote covers a lot of the ins and outs of the installation including what messages they're trying to send to morning commuters who see the silos as they drive downtown on Interstate 80. But, as always happens with something worthy of a great story, the story doesn't quite capture the enormousness of what it was. Even now I'm having a difficult time translating the events that transpired into something more than two dimensional.

The dinner brought the meat, poultry and produce of local farmers into the skills hands of local chefs who made this spectacular meal out of a bison, two whole pigs, 50 chickens and countless vegetables. The story describes the meal in a little more depth but doesn't go into the energy of the event. Everyone there was so excited about what was going on. The silos, which have been something of a horizon eyesore in the past, now have this art meant to emphasize the importance of knowing about our food. The area where the tables were arranged is on the city's plan for an extension of the Field Club bicycle trail. And the chef's and students were so excited to be sharing this phenomenal local food to 500 eager eaters.

I had so much fun running around interviewing attendees, chefs, farmers and organizers, getting everyone's story on why they were there and why they cared. I interviewed Chef Brian O'Malley who is the chef in charge of the culinary program at Metro, where I'm attended. He is such a magnetic force. He's got this great booming voice and when he talks to you no one else is there but you and him. I got to interupt Chefs Matthew Taylor and Paul Kulik who were in this heated post-dinner discussion of the process and how amazed they were with the quality of food they were given to work with. They were going on and on about how great each course was. Chef Taylor was raving about this vinegar. The entire day just made me so excited to be around such outstanding lovers of food and especially to get the chance to hear their stories. This blog post seems more scattered than what came out splitting the story. It's like I couldn't even wrap my mind around what was going on.

The site was so poetic in its past of feeding people mass quantities of food juxtaposed against a 500-something foot long table of people eating organic and ethically grown and raise cuisine. For a moment, I could even faintly smell the sweet odor let off by a nearby rendering plant. I wanted to put it in the story because I thought it was a little ironic to be celebrating local food while the remains of sick and abused animals were being made into commercial products nearby, but Sarah hadn't smelled it and thought it was a little dramatic--it's true, for a reporter, I definitely err way too much on the meladramatic side. The truth should be strong enough.

Daily Grub's Chef Elle Lien's vegetable plate of roasted vegetables. (That sage just melted in my mouth.)

Roasted apples from Chef Kevin Shinn's (bread&cup) and Paul Kulik's (The Boiler Room) pork seven ways.

Chef Tim Shew of La Buvette and culinary students from Metro serving up the pork with fruit and vegetables. (I was dying over those pickled radishes, dying.)

From left, Clayton Chapman of Grey Plume, Mattew Taylor and Paul Kulik with culinary students.

I love this picture because you can tell the woman in the middle is a little nonplussed to be eating an entire pig but the lady on the left is loving it.

Tim Shew plating the bison with green cabbage choucroute.

Chef Brian O'Malley showing a server how to get the champagne glaze all over the bison.

Apple crisp, honey ice cream and carrot cake for dessert.

A Bird's Habit

2010-10-04T10:36:00.000-05:00

I'm sure other people get overwhelmed with the life that is swirling around them just like me. This past month has been a doozy. There has been so much new stuff to digest. I consciously gave away the comfort of knowing exactly what to expect at my old job. I could sit in cubicle, edit things when I felt like it, I knew where everything was, I knew everybody (and I liked them), I could listen to music all day long, I went on my walks around the industrial business park and that was good enough to get me through most days. Now I have this job at a pastry shop and cafe where there's something new I haven't been told every single time I go in. Not to mention the humilty of serving people their food and cleaning up after their mess. And that doesn't even touch on school. Culinary school is completely new. I'm used to reading and regurgitating. When it comes to academia, I can be a star. This is not so in Culinary Foundations. Typically, I can run or do yoga or bicycle or go climbing at the gym to burn off some stress, but not so when you have a lung that doesn't quite expand all the way. Simple things like sleeping have even been a physical challenge in the past couple weeks. As my friend Alexis says, "I've got a gypsy's heart with a bird's habit."

I've thrown out my old familiar ways for an exciting new path, but I'm grappling to find a routine that sets my racing mind at ease.

Thursday night I was pleasantly suprised that I could still come back to my own kitchen and lose myself in the preparation for a meal of roast chicken with vegetable risotto. The world was quiet while I rubbed salt and pepper all over the skin of young hen. I rhythmically diced carrots, peppers, mushrooms, (my favorite) onion and garlic into haphazard squares that flavored a creamy rice risotto. I could think of nothing but the moment--the smells, the sights, the sounds, the taste--which is the way I wish I could live always.

Lemon and Herb Roasted Chicken:
1 whole chicken
1 lemon, halved
1 head garlic, halved
1 sprig rosemary
2 sprigs thyme
salt and pepper
parsley

Preheat oven to 425. Sprinkle the inside and outside of the chicken with salt and pepper. Stuff with lemon, garlic, rosemary, thyme and parsley. Bake on roasting tray for 1 to 1 1/2 hours until juices run clear. Let sit for 10 minutes before carving.

Fry Day

2010-09-30T09:00:00.000-05:00

You'll have to excuse the quality of these photos; I found myself with only a camera phone in class on "fry day," and I just had to take an image to remember this smorgasbord of Southern- and deep-fried cuisine. From left to right we've got fried okra, French fries, hushpuppies, Southern-fried chicken and Southern-fried catfish. Just like last week, class went smoothly. It was fun for the second week in a row, and now I think I can relax and enjoy things without the anxiety that I may start the culinary school building on fire--although maybe I'm getting a little ahead of myself.

Frying suprised me. There was a little more intuition than I had originally thought, subtle things like not letting the oil get so hot it burns the outside of the chicken before the inside cooks and that the quality of the oil counts. We used butter and lard (something I would never ever ever use on my own, but as Chef said "It's all oil, every oil is just as bad as every other oil, more or less."). The chicken and the fries were the best parts of the day's production. The skin was cripsy and seasoned while the inside was tender and flavorful--nothing too greasy. The fries, who doesn't love fries, were done by the two-fry method, which meant we partially fried the potatoes in oil, let them rest and finished them off at a higher temp. The outside was again crisp while the inside held together with potato goodness.

Chopping and dicing is going better as well, but I still didn't really see the point of chopping things to complete uniformity that is until Tuesday night when I was eating at Mother India, which is this great Indian restaurant but also a total dive. Someone had diced the carrots macedoine (which is fancy for small dice), a one-fourth-inch cube. I couldn't believe it and was incredibly impressed that someone had taken the time. The presentation was nice as the carrots and the peas were about the same size. Who knew that an ethnic eatery would convert me to a firm believer in classical knife skills?

Risotto!

2010-09-27T18:00:00.001-05:00

After several failures in the kitchen (including continuous failure with trying to flip eggs), I think I was due for some sort of marginal success. Let it be known that I can make risotto.

True, I already knew I could make risotto, but this was a win I needed desperately. I was self-conscious and defeated in that commercial kitchen and running low on pep elsewhere. Wild mushroom risotto was a nice confidence booster. I've made risotto many times, so I get the basic premise of feeding the oiled rice aromatic stock periodically and massaging it with a spatula into creaminess. This by no means meant that I had the risotto in the bag. In my group of three, I was solely responsible for the risotto, which included simmering stock, roasting garlic and making parmesan crisps all in less than three hours. The list of ingredients was extensive and involved three different kinds of mushrooms (dried morels, porcini and buttons). But I did it. The rice was creamy and flavorful. The mushrooms added just the faintest sweetness, which I learned to enhance by adding lemon juice. The steamed soy beans and the mushrooms gave the dish an Asian depth to a traditionally Italian item. There was so much I learned: like how easy it is to make parmesan crisps (bake a pile of parmesan cheese until it melts together), about homemade stock (it doesn't take as long as I thought), and the incredible importance of mise en place (another extra fancy French word that basically means preparation and which I basically suck at as a general rule). Maybe, just maybe I can do this.

On Fancy French Words Like Julienne and Gallette

2010-09-21T17:17:00.000-05:00

Before this week's Culinary Foundations class, we were all tasked with slicing one entire pound of planks for making julienned carrots. Never before did I know that to julienne doesn't just mean to cut something into thin square-ish slices, it means to cut something into a thin square slice that measures one-eighth inch by one-eighth inch by two inches. What I want still don't know is when it is absolutely necessary for vegetables to look like they've been squared off by a planer.

My pound received a C. I blame the carrots. They were thin and bendy even before they were julienned, which means they were even worse once they had been sliced. Needless to say, I am getting better at chopping, even though I did slice my finger a little bit today (it had to happen). I got pretty winded in the hour-plus time I stood going to town on the carrots, and I didn't stop then. Taking advantage of inspiration to cook, I made two apple gallettes. There I was at the kitchen table wheezing and kneading flour and water into tart dough. It just seemed appropriate. The leaves are just beginning to change, only on the outer layers of trees, and it's time for baked apples and soup.

Gallettes are so pretty, even the name is so French and quaint. Beauty is one of the main reasons I'm drawn to pastries and desserts--this girl will not be making sloppy rice pudding. The dough turned into a nice crisp crust on the edges but soaked up the syrupy juice from the apples on the bottom. The tart apples gave way to sweetness with a little help, and all this is missing is a little ice cream.

Apple Gallette: from Martha Stewart's Baking Handbook

Pate Brisee Crust:

2 1/2 cups flour

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon sugar

2 stick cold butter

1/2 cup cold water

Apple filling for two small gallettes or one large:

3 apples, thinly sliced (one-eighth inch)

juice from 1/2 lemon

1/4 cup sugar

1 tablespoon cornstarch

pinch of salt

1 egg, beaten

sanding sugar (optional)

Blend the flour, salt and sugar in a large bowl. Slice the butter into 1-inch tablets. Incorporate the butter into the flour using a pastry blender, mixing until the product is crumbly. Slowly pour in the cold water a little at a time, stirring and lightly kneading to incorporate. Add water until the dough holds together.

Divide the dough in quarters (or halves). Flatten into a round disk. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for a least an hour.

Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 375 and put sliced apples in a medium bowl. Pour lemon juice over the apples. Toss apples with sugar, cornstarch and salt.

Take out your dough. Turn out on a floured surface and roll into a 8-inch round (or 14-inch for a larger gallette) that is about one-eighth-inch thick. Place on a piece of parchment paper and on a baking sheet. Arrange the apples in the center of the dough leaving a two-inch border. Fold over the border, overlapping when needed, pinching the overlapped portions together so the juice doesn't leak out onto your parchment like mine did. Paint the edge of the crust with egg. Sprinkle with sanding sugar and bake for one hour or until the crust is golden brown and the juice is bubbling.

An Homage to a Pneumothorax

2010-09-20T07:42:00.000-05:00

Life has been going pretty fast for me without much time to think. I used to stare up at the ceiling tiles at my old job, I don't have time for that or the daily walks through the (ugly) industrial park. It's all work and school, and it's a bit overwhelming all without a moment to catch ones breath.

Well, life has the good humor to take that away from you in a moment. I hate to be melodramatic when I write because it comes out so cheesy, but what happened on Friday afternoon was my left lung collapsed just walking around at work. The funny thing about breathing is that you rarely think about it except when it doesn't come easy. I suppose it was a good weekend for sitting and doing absolutely nothing. It was rainy and cloudy and fall just rolled into town with a thunderstorm. It's my favorite time of year, and I'd hate to miss it being in a rush. At this point, it's guaranteed that I won't be going anywhere fast for the next couple weeks.

Early to bed on a Saturday, early up on Sunday. I spent the afternoon reading for class and sipping tea with some candles illuminating the coffee table--it seemed only appropriate. Right now, some of my tomatoes are slow-roasting with garlic and time in the oven. The apartment smells divine. The tomatoes will be plump with syrupy juice ready to burst. And I've got a moment to sit. To sit and think about things like breathing even when it hurts. And cooking even when things don't turn out right. And loving when it's scary and finite. And starting things you may not be able to finish. But this time I don't think I can breathe/cook/love/start.

On Steak

2010-09-19T09:41:00.002-05:00

After Tuesday's steak fiasco, I thought it best I give grilling another go. I feel fairly certain I won't ever be working the line at a steakhouse, but you never know. And knowing how to cook a steak without killing someone is a skill that might come in handy someday. And let me tell you that as stress-inducing as class has been that is how relaxing "studying" is. Cooking for and with people, I think, will always be one of my favorite things. It's right up there with sleeping and drinking wine. And thankfully, I have a number of friends ready to help me study for culinary school.

With two big ribeyes from Wohlner's wrapped up in my fridge, I called on Liz and Sean to come to the rescue and help me eat the meat. I like steak. A good steak is simple; it consistes of a nice cut, salt, pepper and a little bit of oil and yet the end product is complex in flavor. Even considering this, I am not a big fan of steak. First of all, there's just always something else I'd rather eat. Like vegegtables. For me, meat alone is lifeless, but served alongside sauteed or braised vegetables and you've got something.

Because I don't currently have a grill (a travesty, I know), I had pan sear the steaks to medium rare, which involves heating a sauce pan (or sauteuse, as I now snobbily know) until scorching in a 500-degree oven, searing the seasoned and oiled steaks for 30 seconds on each side before popping it the 500-degree oven to cook for 2 minutes on each side. My steaks were pretty thick, and this didn't quite do the trick. But this time I recognized that they were still raw and threw them back in the oven for a bit. They came out tender and juicy and, as you can see below, medium rare.

I served them with a side of creamed spinach that Chef O'Donnell apparently pilfered from some famous steakhouse in New York. The spinach was more the sort of thing that you dip tortilla chips in, which also meant it was really hard to stop eating. As I was stirring together the concoction of wilted spinach, cream cheese and yogurt (instead of sour cream) I decided the dish was missing some toasted pine nuts. I was right. Topped with parmesan cheese and scattered with pine nuts, the spinach seemed more like an American version of Florentine classics verses the spinach and artichoke dip one gets at a bar and grill.

Even better than the cooking was the eating and wine drinking. Liz, Sean and I made quite the ruckus going on about boys and girls and love and whatever other topics one covers after a satisfying meal. All these things, the prep, the cooking, the serving and revelry-making, that is most definitely why I come to the table night after night.

Epic Fail

2010-09-14T20:13:00.001-05:00

Culinary Foundations causes me a fair amount of anxiety. The night before class I was up ironing my uniform, double checking my supplies and going through my already-completed homework to see if I missed anything. Same story when I was walking out the door. Turns out the thing I forgot wasn't my homework or any part of my uniform, it was the day's recipes.

I expect even more anxiety before next week's class because this week was a complete and total disaster. The assistant chef described it pretty accurately as a clusterf***. Thankfully, it wasn't just me. Only two people in the class of 15 actually wrote down notes for the four recipes we were responsible for reproducing today. Chef Tim demonstrated Pommes Anna, a classic dish of sliced and crispy potatoes, and then set us lose on Pommes Duchesse, twice baked potatoes and a creamy baked spinach dish and that's not even considering the steaks. I jumped in a group of very capable boys whose names I didn't have time to catch until the end of class because we were running around boiling water, sauteing onions and making a general mess of things for the next five hours.

Our Pommes Anna did not fall out of the cast iron skillet in a lovely floral pattern the way they were supposed to. Our twice-baked potatoes didn't even get baked once, and while the spinach and Pommes Duchesse looked alright, they were completely lacking in all flavor. What had come of the cheese, the salt and the pepper? The steaks were the only things that turned out--all completely thanks to the boys who were practically running each other over to get away from the potatoes and onto the grill.

But, but, through a miscommunique, we only plated one serving of steak, potatoes and spinach. We got to the tasting and the chef looked at our empty places and sent me and two of the guys from my group back to the grill. There were exactly three steaks left in the fridge, which we haphazardly grilled. My first presentation to the chef was a completely raw but carmelized New York strip with perfect grill marks--the only good thing about it. I had tested the temperature of the meat on the grill and it registered improperly as much much much hotter than it actually was. I sat at the grill turning and poking and sighing until I was the last one there with my medium rare steak serving the chef who said he would take it even though it was undercooked. I thought for more than a few moments toward that I might cry. I coped by imagining lying my head on the steering wheel of my car and heeving heavy tears, thinking quite poorly of my skills and wondering what in the hell I was thinking going to culinary school. This is nothing like cooking in my own kitchen. It's frenetic and nothing I make tastes good. But by the time we had finished cleaning, the moment had passed. It was a "there's no crying in baseball" moment. There's no crying in the commercial kitchen. There's certainly plenty of reasons to cry--I made the worst steak ever, that cow died to make nothing delicious--but that's just it, there's just no crying.

If I were 22-year-old Lainey, I would be having a complete existential crisis at the moment. But somewhere in the past four years, I stopped flipping out as if the world were coming to an end and I just reimagine the world--probably as it will never be. I live a lot in my head. Obviously, I will not be working at a steakhouse. I don't know exactly where I'll be, hopefully, it will be in at a home writing about food and people. Or maybe it will be a nice, happy, open kitchen that serves caprese salads and cheese plates with mini gherkins alongside house wine. My sister, serendipidously, sent me a link to this cafe she discovered in London called Look Mum No Hands! It was opened by cyclists who love good food. Allison saved the day, because while I now have the utmost respect for the steakhouse, what I really love is a niche cafe.

And when all else in my mind fails me, I will go to this moment, sitting outside at a street cafe in bustling Madrid sipping this exact coffee.

Even with all the people running around in the street, that is such a quiet memory for me.

Lessons in Flipping

2010-09-12T20:43:00.002-05:00

"Studying" for class, and you might guess, involves a fair amount of eating. I'm still working on egg mastery, and as you can see based on the picture below, I have not perfected the art of flipping an egg.

Chef Tim made it look so easy, just sliding the egg out of the pan, coaxing it into a gymnastic manuever and setting it down gently and unbroken to cook on the opposite side. In class, he instructed one of my lab partners to flip his egg right after his perfect dismount--and she nailed it. She passed the egg and pan off to the next person who flipped it right onto the floor. Back at our work stations, I tried my hand at flipping to a small audience of four and managed to toss only half the yolk on the floor. It's apparently all in the wrist.

Sunday afternoon, I gave it another go with what seemed like perfectly good eggs. However, there must have been something wrong with them because all they did was this:

And then this:

No self-respecting egg would ever act in this manner, falling apart and slopping all over the place. Whatever is the world coming to? No matter. They still tasted good even if they would have failed me out of class.

Chef Tim said of fried eggs, "It's a basic skill, but could you call yourself a chef if you couldn't even flip an egg?"

Botulism Is Bad

2010-09-08T17:44:00.001-05:00

As I was reading through the first assigned chapter out of the text for my culinary foundations course, I realized how lucky I am to be alive. Though that luck may run out once I eat these canned tomatoes because I'll probably get botulism from bacteria toxins. My home kitchen is a hotbed for mold, bacteria and viruses ready to wreak havoc on my intestinal tract.

Canning tomatoes was probably the most sanitary thing I've done in my kitchen. I sterilized the jars and lids in hot water for probably 30 minutes. I added extra lemon juice to add extra acid the pot of already acidic stewed tomatoes, which was actually closer to the consistency of tomato soup--this is what happens without a recipe. The tomato slop went into the sterile jars. Lids on, the jars went into a vat of boiling water for 15 minutes, which I now know far surpasses the minimum temperature required to kill bacteria in vegetables. Still, I doubt Chef O'Donnell would eat my tomatoes, and that man knows what he is doing.

I was a hot mess the first day of class. Thanks to my own idiocy, I thought classes started on Wednesday. Why would they start on Wednesday when it would make more sense to start the day after Labor Day? Right, they wouldn't. Katy saved me from missing the first class and getting kicked out for that reason. Maggie saved me from getting kicked out from not having a uniform. I showed up the first day, and everyone was wearing the proper chef coat, chef pants, skull cap and apron. I had just the coat donated from Maggie's brother. Like I said, hot mess. The chef docked me a few points and tossed me a hair net.

The lesson of day one at culinary school could be summed up as "forget just about everything you knew about cooking because it was at least off if not totally wrong." You think you know how to make scrambled eggs properly until you've tried Chef O'Donnell's eggs. I am not exaggerating when I saw that they were mind blowing, at least for me. It was so simple. Hot pan, add a teaspoon of canola oil, whisk two eggs until they are completely homogenous (and I mean no unblended egg whites), add the eggs to the hot oil, let sit for just a moment, scrape ever so gently with the corner of a spatula, season lightly with salt while still scraping, just before it becomes completely solid, remove from heat and toss in about a teaspoon of butter, fold it in. Pour the eggs from the hot pan and serve.

These eggs were creamy, just barely salty, and as one student noted, tasted a little cheesy. But after my bite was gone, a flood of sweetness washed over my entire mouth. The eggs delivered even after they were gone. Yes, these were eggs that someone would pay for, but now I don't have to because I can do it too.

Back from Peru

2010-09-06T13:08:00.000-05:00

I'm back. After quite the hiatis: a week in Peru, five days in Minnesota's Boundary Waters and a week of finishing up things at Home & Away and getting ready for school and a part-time job. I do not feel prepared at all, but classes will not wait. Life pushes me on, and Culinary Foundations is tomorrow from 8 a.m. until 4 p.m. I'm still breathing and actually not that stressed.

My two-week vacation was amazing. I couldn't stop staring at the mountains in Peru. I even got to hike up one of them. The people were fantastic, especially in the little Andean villages. And the food, lord the food. The Incans are apparently the source of everything good and tasty in the world--so said our overly proud guide. I don't disagree when it comes to ceviche, savory sauces and quinoa. I've had quinoa a couple times before, but this trip to Peru put the wholesome grain on my short list. This recipe is directly inspired by some quinoa salads that we were served--and I made it without a recipe.

I just love the texture of that quinoa--it's soft like rice but has this barely-detectable crunch to it. And here's the big draw: It's the only complete source of protein in the natural world that does not come from meat. Take note all you vegetarian friends. Supposedly, you could live on quinoa alone--plus it's a really fun word to say. This salad barely made it to a Labor Day party--my friend Liz and I could have downed the entire thing without a little self control.

Peruvian Quinoa Salad:

1 cup quinoa

2 cups water

olive oil

2 garlic cloves

olive oil

salt and pepper

1 large tomato

1 bunch of cilantro

juice from 1/2 a lemon

Cook the quinoa according to directions in salted water. One cup of dry quinoa makes about four cups cooked. It cooks like rice, so you don't have to drain it.

Place cooked quinoa in a serving bowl. In a saute pan, heat olive oil. Cook diced garlic for a couple minutes until lightly golden brown. Pour over quinoa. Dice Tomato and cilantro. Toss with the grain. Season with lemon juice, salt and pepper.

Another Adventure

2010-08-17T11:00:00.001-05:00

I'm writing this night before setting off on the last big adventure with Home & Away. I'm really going out with a bang here: Tomorrow I fly to Lima, Peru, to see Macchu Pichu and the Sacred Valley. Who gets that in life? Not many. And I choose to leave it all. I quit my job earlier last week to go to culinary school full time in September. It's scary, even scarier writing it. Now it's out there to be judged by all these people. I love cooking. I love writing. I've done the writing; I still want to do the writing. I still will for The Reader.

Talking to friend, I worried today that I might be one of those people who can't be pleased. I hope not. I feel more content with me, myself than ever before. I want to take a crack at it though, the bakery/pastry thing. I want to add to what I already know. More than what I know in my head, I want to add to what I know in my hands. It's scary. I could mess up. I could hate it. I might never get health insurance ever again. But I don't think so. Nothing gets me excited like cooking.