Paul's Recipe Page

Pulled Pork Tacos with Granny Smith Apples, Jalapenos, Green Bell Pepper & Cilantro

2011-10-27T14:16:00.001-07:00

Ingredients:

Pulled Pork
1 Bell Pepper
1 bunch Cilantro
1 Bell Pepper
1 Granny Smith Apple
3 cloves Garlic & 2 Jalapenos ,
diced and soaked in rice vinegar
for 15 minutes.

Rice Vinegar
Honey

Dice the produce and mix the honey and vinegar together. Mix. Serve cold.

Pulled Pork Tacos with Cilantro, Jalapeno, Apples & Green Bell Peppers

2011-10-25T13:28:00.001-07:00

Ingredients:

Pulled Pork
1 Granny Smith Apples
2 Jalapenos
1 Bell Pepper
1 Bunch Cilantro
3 Cloves of Garlic, diced and
    soaked for 20 minutes in Rice
      Vinegar

Rice Vinegar
Honey

Dice everything and mix it up.

*Optional: Add avocado and cotija/queso fresco

Purple Tomatillos!

2011-09-03T11:19:00.001-07:00

Stinkin' Delicious

The Best Nacho Refried Beans you will ever Eat!

2011-08-25T10:01:00.000-07:00

Mexican food has been a staple since I was in the womb. Pancho Villa's in Mamaroneck was some of the only food that my Mom could handle when she was pregnant with me. They used to have these nacho chips they fried in-house, topped with refried beans, monterey jack and a jalapeno slices. Simple and so satisfying. Big Poppa has been making some iteration of those nachos my whole life. We made them just recently, at Kayla's (my sister) behest after much begging. She was off to college and wanted one more taste, plus she wanted to know how to make them while she was up at school. Thus the post.

I have to fuss with things. Its my nature as a cook. Sometimes things just do not taste right. Like a big can of old el paso refried beans. There is no way they taste great if you just heat them up. Fuss paid off because everyone went crazy for the beans. "Paulie, you have to post this!" Here you go Kay.

Ingredients:

1 31oz. Can of old el paso refried beans
1/2 onion, diced
3 cloves of garlic, diced
Olive Oil or Corn Oil
2 small tomatillos, diced (optional)
1 large tomato or 2 small ones, diced
1/2 bunch cilantro, chopped
1 Tbsp of Cumin
1 tsp Adobo, more for seasoning probably
Chicken Broth or Water to keep it vegetarian

1. After you have diced and chopped everything, place enough oil to have a thin coat at the bottom of the pot (I used a pot you would noramlly cook pasta in). Heat on a medium flame and add the onion, tomatillos and garlic. Cook and stir for 5 minutes or until the onions become translucent. If you are pressed for time and hate chopping/slicing or just prefer speed, drop the onion, garlic, tomato and tomatillo into a blender and chop everything that way--college style. Then saute in the oil.

2. Pop open that can of beans and ease "the shape" into your pot. Add 1/2 cup of water or chx broth and mash up the beans until they look more like refried beans then something that just came out of a can.

3. Add cumin and adobo. Cook for another 5 minutes. The beans will start to bubble. Stir and add some more water/chx broth.

4. Add chopped cilantro and tomato. Stir, if the beans are bubbling too much, lower the heat. In total I probably use 1 cup of broth , but thats a guess-timate since I always do it by eye until I reach a desired consistency. Thats it.

5. Add to tortilla chips, top with cheese and a sliced jalapeno and broil for nachos. Add some sour cream to make a bean dip. Spread it on a veggie wrap or with fajitas. Let me know how they turn out.

Lucky Peach Food Quarterly by David Chang & Peter Meehan

2011-08-25T09:17:00.000-07:00

Hailed as a masterpiece of modern food culture by Time magazine and lauded by the NYTimes, Lucky Peach is one more outlet for David Chang's success. A present day Midas; whatever he touches turns into Troy Ounces. This magazine though, is the confluence of many great culinary minds weighing in on different themes for each quarterly release. Harold McGee, Bourdain, Wylie Dufresne, Peter Meehan and many others all have interviews or contributions.

Irreverant writing, travelogues, art, photography and a TON of ramen recipes. Ramen is the theme this issue and each subsequent issue will have varying themes. Issue 2 will be pastry. This quarterly is not about trends, its by and about the trendmakers and their ruminations. A culinary journal is an apt description. I have read it cover to cover and its pretty awesome. It gets a bit geeky and esoteric. So what, who cares (in the tone of Joy Behar)? There are interesting takes on current food trends by the chefs (Wylie Dufresne, NYC King of Molecular Gastronomy gives a good lashing to the farm-to-table folks. Nice.)

Here is a recipe preview that just sings Chang and Pork-Topia:

Red Eye Gravy-Serves 2

2 Thick Slices of American Country Ham
1/2 Cup Brewed Coffee
2 spoonfulls of Brown sugar (Tablespoons I suppose)

1. Render the ham-cook over medium heat in a skillet. You are just looking to brown it at the edges. Find ham that has some fat on it, or you're wasting your time and you should probably just make this with bacon.
2.Once the ham is warmed through and the pan is good and greasy with ham fat, remove the ham to a platter. Turn the heat up to high. Add a couple of spoonfulls of brown sugar and whats left of your morning coffee.
3. To finish-cook it down, stirring all the while until the coffee has more or less disappeared. Et voila! Red-eye gravy. pour it over biscuits. if you find you don't have enough gravy, you probably need more ham, too, soget back to the stove and make another batch.

Subscribe Here

No Recipe Needed

2011-08-21T15:37:00.000-07:00

To Summers simplest pleasures. Cheers.

Sent via digital carrier pigeons

Tomato Recipes from around the Net

2011-08-06T09:41:00.000-07:00

(Photo from Gilt Taste)

Tomatoes are one of the only great things about the month of August. August is hot, humid on the east coast, stifling and if you are in NYC you are always thinking about ways to get out. August also signals that the summers end is nigh. Ugh! Air conditioning is more important for 'keeping your cool' but tomatoes offer redemption. I have 64 tomato plants growing this summer in a patch, on my parents deck, in between bushes and any empty space I could find. After 4 years of living in Manhattan and not being able to plant any, I went way over board. Over doing it just tastes more delicious.

These recipes have been culled from different sites around the net. Enjoy:

Gilt Taste - Perfect Five-Minute Raw Tomato Pasta Recipe

A Whole Slew of NYTimes Tomato Recipes

The Tomato Sauce Master...Pete A., you will love this

Readers, feel free to add your own links in the comment section. -P

Heirloom Beauties from the Patch

2011-08-05T09:54:00.000-07:00

Recipes to follow...

A Delicious Read

2011-07-06T08:33:00.000-07:00

The Dirty Life by Kristin Kimball

Marriage is scary. Throw in a relocation, new jobs in different fields, starting up a business venture, planning a wedding and all of a sudden it’s a lot scarier. Patience dwindles and arguments elevate; both happen with startling speed. This is precisely what happens in Kimball's life/book.

The Dirty Life is a book about a freelance travel writer living in Manhattan that meets a philosophical agriculturist tethered to a dream of creating a new type of farm. It is a classic city meets country paradigm but Kimball writes with a depth, honesty and humor that keep the narrative fresh and alive.

There are some glaring similarities in this book that parallel what Alycia and I have gone through in the past 6 months. I have an obvious bias towards this book but it is an excellent read for anyone who is fascinated by relationships, having faith in dreams and the challenges of the ‘new.’ It is also about food and farming which is why its on this blog. The book is a fun and quick summer read.

Here is a link to the NPR review

Published in the INDY Weekly: Reliable Cheese Company

2011-06-24T08:42:00.000-07:00

Reliable Cheese Company opens in Durham, NC. Here is the Article.

Grilled North Carolina Pork Chops w/ Tomatillo-Pineapple Salsa

2011-06-16T08:01:00.000-07:00

Ok. The video, my first is not genius. It is a test run. The recipe however, is summer love in a dish. I have professed my infatuation for all things tomatillo, but the grilled pineapple adds another dimension. Its also another recipe with cilantro. Its June folks. Cilantro is the herb of the summer. Enjoy.

Grilled Pork Chops w/ Grilled Pineapple & Tomatillo Salsa
4 Pork Chops
-1/4 cup honey
-3 Tbls. Soy Sauce

Salsa:
1 Pineapple
1 lbs. Tomatillos
1 small onion
4 cloves of garlic, from one bulb
2 bell peppers
1 bunch cilantro
Oil
Salt & Pepper to taste

1. Marinade the Pork Chops in Soy Sauce and Honey for 30 minutes.
2. Cut the pineapple and get rid of the hard outer skin. Lay flat and slice horizontally. Slice in ½ inch thick large rounds. Lightly coat in Canola or vegetable oil.
3. Core & dice the tomatillos. Dice the onion, garlic, bell pepper, cilantro.
4. Preheat the grill.
5. Heat a sauté pan with 1 tbls of vegetable oil. Add tomatillo, onion and garlic. Cook for 5-10 minutes. Add bell peppers. Add 2 pinches of salt and pepper. Add 1/8 cup of water. Cook for another 10 minutes.
6. Once the salsa has finished cooking add the cilantro and mix well. Season and adjust. If you find the tomatillos are too acidic, add a dab of butter to mellow it out.
7. Spray the grill with PAM Grilling spray or brush with canola oil. Grill the pineapples and pork chops. The pineapple takes about 8 minutes (some black blistering on the pineapple is desirable for flavor). The pork chops take about 2 minutes on each side if they are less than inch thick or less.
8. Remove the core of the pineapple and dice the pineapple in a similar size to the other salsa ingredients. Add to salsa and mix well.
9. Place the salsa on top and devour.

Blue Fish Tacos with and Orange-Cilantro Salsa

2011-06-16T07:44:00.000-07:00

“We are wasting our time here”

This was Tony’s declaration after we had moved from the deep sea to troll for fish in shallower waters. We began catching blue fish and Spanish mackerel. Compared to the Bluefin Tuna I had just caught, he was right, but he decreed blue fish as uneatable. Mackerel is an excellent fish, but blue fish are often maligned as oily and not worth eating. I had heard this for years. I grew up on City Island where catching blue fish was done for sport. We always threw them back, except if you went out on a boat like ‘Rip Tide’ or the ‘Klondike’, they fileted it for you and we often went to the local restaurants that littered City Island Avenue to try and sell them. We would never recover what we spent fishing for the blues but any bit of money to a teenager is a good thing that never lasted anyway.

I only had blue fish once before. Chris Paschette, from Arties, cooked it. It was baked with lemon and bread crumbs. I remember thinking it wasn’t so bad. I never returned to it though. It is never on menus and so it was forgotten.

Even our first mate on our boat, who goes to all the big game fishing tournaments and who has made fishing his life agreed with Tony. Stubbornness can be a good quality in a chef. That being said, if you catch blue fish, it should be eaten that day. We caught harbor blues in the ocean which are smaller than the ones I used to catch in the bay so their meat was a bit sweeter. I will still argue that fresh blues out of the bays will be great that night for dinner. If not my pal Tony the fireman and lawyer will lambast this entry. He was converted though:

“Oh well this is amazing, you put a great sauce on it. Everyone wants to know what to do with Blue Fish. I am using this when I get back!”

A rewarding element to cooking is changing a previously negative opinion of a food and turning it into a meal worth remembering. Here you go:

Ingredients:

Fish:
4 fileted blue fish, freshly caught
Oil
Garlic Salt & Pepper

Salsa:
3 oranges, peeled
1 onion, diced fine
1 bunch of cilantro, diced coarsely
1 jalapeno (optional), diced
(everything diced smaller than in the picture)
¼ cup Orange juice
Salt & Pepper

Corn Tortilla’s

1. In a sauté pan, heat the vegetable oil on medium-high heat. Add garlic. Once the garlic starts to turn translucent, add the fileted blue fish.
2. Add the oranges, onion and cilantro, O.J., in a bowl. If you are adding the jalapeno, cut it in half and remove the seeds and white pith. Then dice and throw it in. Season with salt or adobo and pepper.
3. The bluefish should take 6-7 minutes; it will vary with the size of the filet. Break the fish up w/ a wooden spoon into taco sized pieces.
4. Heat up the corn tortillas. Set up bowls with spoons for each ingredient, assemble and eat.

Summer Bean & Cilantro Salad

2011-05-26T11:08:00.000-07:00

One of the extraordinary characteristics of North Carolina is that you have a long spring season and a long fall; basically, two of the best seasons for the longest period of time. The summer can be brutal here. Hot foods are no longer comforting. Enter Cilantro; THE summer time herb of choice. It’s refreshing and zesty and I crave it in the heat. It also grows quickly and in abundance when you plant it from seed.

Cilantro also makes eating healthier foods, sometimes not the tastiest, into a great experience. The first summer bean salad I made was for the Shakori Bluegrass festival. We needed food for the weekend and Lish loves cilantro and salsa was not an option, since we had eaten it 3 nights that week. This is really easy to make and it works well for summer BBQ pot luck or any party you will be attending in the heat. Canned beans are really the easiest and this dish should take no longer than 15 minutes to make all said and done. Feel free to mix up the beans—cannellini, black eyed peas. The ones in this recipe were whatever was in the pantry.

Ingredients:

1 15oz. can of Navy beans
1 15oz. can of black beans
½ bunch cilantro
½ large sweet onion or 1 whole red onion
½ lemon or lime
½ Tbsp. of cumin
1 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
Pinches of salt & pepper

1. Pour the canned beans into a colander and rinse thoroughly. Drain.
2. Dice the cilantro and onion.
3. Cut the lime or lemon and juice into a mixing bowl. Add cumin, olive oil and 2 pinches of salt and pepper.
4. Add all the ingredients into the mixing bowl and stir. You may want to add some more cumin, salt, and pepper depending on your preferences. I always add more cumin than necessary.

Ginger Sesame Lettuce Wraps

2011-04-11T06:22:00.000-07:00

Protein and more protein; thats my crash diet prescription before the wedding. I have increased the gym regimen, lightened my portions and have been eating more chicken then my mother, who thinks it grows on trees based on her diatribes about beef and pork. I mostly blame wine and tostitos artisan recipe chips for the current slump. So it goes.

Chicken is a staple at the Inserra home. Rotisseries, chicken cutlets, chicken sausages, marinated then grilled, roasted, in salads...a staple. It is often regarded as boring and in its ubiquity can be. Its also a canvas for a myriad of flavors. It will soak up whatever you marinate it within moments and it can be amazing when roasted properly. Garlic also plays a major role in every dish cooked by Big Poppa so if you want to minimize the cloves from four to two that will work.

Lettuce wraps are fun, healthy and you can add nearly any vegetable to the filling; cabbage, carrots, string beans, peas.

This dish takes about 35 minutes, mostly chopping.

1 Rotisserie Chicken, stripped of the meat or 1 Package of Chx Cutlets with
4 breasts
I head of iceberg Lettuce
1/4 Cup Sesame Oil
2 Tbsp. Rice Vinegar
4 Tbsp. Soy Sauce
1 Thumb sized piece of ginger
4 cloves Garlic, diced
1/2 Medium sized Onion, diced
1 Red Bell Pepper, diced
1/2 Bunch Cilantro, coarsely chopped

1. Break down the rotisserie or cook the chx cutlets. Set aside. Once cool, dice into small cubes.
2. Wash the lettuce, cut it in half and separate each leaf for wraps.
3. In a large sauté pan add the sesame oil add the diced onion and garlic. Cook on medium heat for 5 minutes.
4. Place the ginger in a blender with ¼ cup water. Puree. Strain the liquid with a sieve into the sauté pan. If there is any extra, use it for homemade ginger ale.
5. Add bell peppers, soy sauce vinegar and chicken. Cook for another 5 minutes. Taste. At this point you may want to add more soy sauce and or vinegar to boost the flavor. Once everything is flavored properly, add the diced cilantro, toss and place in a serving bowl.

Published in the INDY Weekly "Foraging for Wild Edible Mushrooms in North Carolina"

2011-03-30T12:11:00.000-07:00

Please read and circulate my first article in Durham's INDY Weekly. It includes additions to the Pittsboro piece earlier posted, plus its in Durham, NC's highly regarded newspaper.

A Recipe for Laughter and Killer March Madness Food (NYTimes)

2011-03-27T11:28:00.000-07:00

The New York Times is a requirement for Sundays in the Inserra house. Its like coffee every day of the week; if its not present anxiety ensues, voices are raised and the iPhone or Android app to locate the nearest Starbucks is employed. Phone calls are made with clear agitation and shaky withdrawal symptoms apparent; even over the phone.

This morning Dad arrived back home after taking a drive in the cold nasty rain.
"Do you have the New York Times?" Mom shouted across the house.
"No. Harris Teeters {a local grocery chain} said they didn't deliver it this morning."
"Did you check Starbucks?"
"No. If they didn't deliver it to Harr----"
"Ohhhhhhhhhhhh. You knowwwww you have to check the Starbucks. They always have it. And if they don't" she turned to me. "We go to the airport" Becuase airlifts of newspapers are clearly vital to the swarms of Northerners down here in North Carolina. Mom then proceeded to call up all the Starbucks within a 10-15 mile radius. The first two were sold out of the paper.

"No!? You don't have it? That is unacceptable. Can I have the number of the Starbucks on Old Chapel Hill Rd.?" Mom looked at me again, since Lish and I are new to the neighborhood she bequeathed her go-to NYTimes secret location. I am sure this was purely self-interest in the event Dad was away and I needed to pick up the paper in his place.

"You have one! Great! Will you save me a copy? My name is Marie. Put my name on it. My husband will be there to pick it up in 5 miniutes."

Crisis averted.

There are lots of informative articles to read. I go straight for the culinary themed pieces. Today there was culinary gold. Sam Sifton replaced Frank Bruni as the food writer/reviewer for the New York Times. He brought fun back to food writing. The Times has not had a food writer with this much style, wordsmithing ability and gusto since Ruth Reichl. The article is from the NYTimes Sunday Magazine and would be easy to miss online, since thats where most of us read it these days.

This article is hilarious. It also contains a recipe that will work for the March Madness fans. Its perfect sports food that requires a beer in hand and many paper towels to be used for cleaning the food madness off your face.

UNC today at 4:55pm EST. Go Tar Heels!

A Recipe for Environmental Improvement & Regeneration using Fungi

2011-03-22T08:49:00.000-07:00

This video is entitled 'Paul Stamets on 6 ways Mushrooms can Save the World.'

If you had not noticed already I have become a bit obsessed with mushrooms lately. The more I read about the funghi and whats underneath, the mycelium, the more fascinated I become. The world of mycology (the study of mushrooms/fungus) is widely misundersttod. What do you think of when you hear the word 'mushroom'? Maybe the magic kind? Maybe that they can poison and possibly kill you? Or maybe you just think about those bland button mushrooms that are in the grocery. This video and the speakers book "Mycelium Running" are revolutionary. They convey the importance of fungi and the mycelial mats underneath to the natural world. The video is 17 minutes long. One of the most impressive parts is the sequence on oil and petroleum cleanup. Make sure you at least see that part. Prepare to be amazed.

Mushroom & Sherry Soup

2011-03-01T21:52:00.000-08:00

They are known to form primordial bodies overnight. They can heal or be fatal. Some conjure dark magic. Some just taste delicious. Mushrooms are one of the culinary world’s most intriguing foodstuffs. Mushrooms are amazing. At least I think so. My devotion to them began after reading ‘Japanese Foods that Heal’ which lead to a Maitake/Hen-of-the-Woods pasta that is on this blog. They have been used for centuries as remedies and there are still many new discoveries being made. The most beneficial and newest research on fungi is focusing on cancer and HIV/AIDS medicines.
Armed with this devotion, I began searching out local mycophiles (mushroom foragers/experts). I found a NAMA certified group in Asheville, N.C. which is a few hours away. Charlotte Caplan was a great resource but was not as local as I needed. She pointed me in the direction of Robert Sprenger. He has been hunting around the triangle area for a few years but originally hails from Rochester, NY. He is a font of information when it comes to mushrooms. He began the Chatham Mushroom Club which leads family friendly foraging expeditions in Chatham County. Alycia, my Dad and I headed out to Pittsboro to meet the man and hunt some wild edible mushrooms. Solidly built and a bearded man of nature he is one of the most generous people I have met down here since our move. Generousity to strangers is a phenomenon that always surprises New Yorkers. He told us about the rich variety of premium wild fungi in the area; Maitake, Oyster, Puffballs, Lions Mane and Chicken of the Woods. He showed us his most highly regarded mushroom field guides and reference books. “Mycelium Running is the most important book on fungi. Stamets is a maverick and all his supposedly outlandish claims on mushrooms have proven to be true.” The National Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Mushrooms was his other most trusted field guide for identification. Its lightweight, has a sturdy cover and fits in a pocket. WARNING: if you do go out hunting mushrooms, pair yourself up with an expert and seasoned forager. Check out the NAMA website for clubs in your area.
Sprenger is also test developing inoculation techniques for farmers to use. He inoculates logs with mycelium and has a small growing operation in his backyard. The goal is for farmers to have one extra crop to sell at a very low cost. He keeps the operation extremely low energy, basically off the grid which gives farmers another advantage. So far he is testing out maitake, shitake, oysters and a few other species. He gave me 4 logs (2 Oysters & 2 Shitake) to take home and try out. There is definitely a demand for mushrooms in this area and everywhere else there are talented chefs and their devotees.

So the recipe…since Careme, Escoffier and maybe before, Sherry has been the ultimate pairing for mushrooms. It is just one of those perfect marriages like butter and popcorn. This soup is simple. While the mushrooms in the recipe were wild, the recipe does not require that. If you do head out to forage after a frost, the mushrooms can be a bit dried out, a rinse with water perks them right back up. Like with all soups, a good long simmer really draws out the flavors. I used organic chicken broth. I love this brand because of how rich the color, flavor and texture are. I first tried out this recipe with Marsala wine; not as good. Then I picked up Harvey’s Bristol Cream Sherry. It’s a sweeter sherry and adds another flavor component to the soup. We also picked fresh baby scallions as seen in the photo below and used them as a garnish. They were growing a few yards apart from the Oyster mushrooms. What grows together goes together.
My favorite wine pairing with mushrooms and mushroom dishes is a Falanghina or a Fiano de Avellino; they simply don’t let the mushroom fade away.

Ingredients:

1 ½ quarts Chx Broth (preferably Imagine Organic)
¼ cup of Harvey’s Cream Sherry
½ medium sized Onion
5 Sage leaves
1 lbs./16oz. Mushrooms
Salt & Pepper
Baby Scallions, Chives or Parsley for garnish

Procedure:
1. Pour chx broth into the same pot you boil pasta in. Let come to a boil.
2. Add mushrooms (we used oyster since that’s what we found. Portobello’s will work. I would not make the whole soup out of Button Mushrooms. Their flavor is mild so mix and match a few different mushrooms; Portobello, button, shitake, maitake,) etc. Destem if necessary. Add the onion, half the sherry, sage leaves some salt and pepper and let simmer for 25 minutes.
3. Add a bit more salt and pepper to taste. Cook for another 10 minutes at least.
4. Let the mixture cool. Puree in a blender.BE CAREFUL. Its hot liquid (if you didn’t let it cool enough) so have a dish towel ready. Puree in batches. Do not fill up the blender more than half way. Once half the blender is full, place the top on and a dish towel over that. Blend and puree. If there is a vent on the cap of the glass/plastic blender, have it open and have the dish towel over that. A blender works so much better than a food processor for soups. The soup will have a much smoother consistency from a blender. If you are feeling fancy strain the soup through a fine mesh sieve.
5. There is no cream or butter in this recipe. I found you don’t need it. By all means add it if you like. Pour the soup into bowls and garnish with the chives, parsley or scallions.
**The pictured soup was not pureed w/ a blender (it was temporarily out of service)

Simply Sauteed Mushrooms

2011-03-01T21:51:00.000-08:00

So this really does not count as a recipe but it does show off another excellent way to eat mushrooms; simply. The picture also shows the perfect color of sautéed mushrooms; lightly browned and crispy with a sprinkling of salt. Butter…anything with butter on it is usually delicious. At FCI if enough flavor was not coaxed out of a soup (usually do to time constraints), a stick of butter was dropped in. The French have always employed this sacred maneuver. I call this technique ‘The French Fix.’ The oil is added to ensure that the butter does not brown too quickly.

½ Tablespoon of Butter
1 Tsp. Olive Oil
Salt & Pepper
4-5ozs Mushrooms

Procedure:
1. If you have oysters or shitakes don’t slice them. For King Oysters, Buttons, Portabella’s and cremini’s slice thinly.
2. In a sauté pan melt the butter and add the oil to a mid-high heat. Add the mushrooms and coat them evenly. Cook for 5 minutes
3. Add 2 pinches of salt and let them sweat out their water. Cook for another 5 minutes. They should start to brown nicely. Once they are browned on both sides, put on a plate lined with a paper towel to drain up excess oil. Sprinkle some salt, pepper and chives on top.
Use these mushrooms as a topping for a salad, with rotisserie chicken, game meats or just leave them out and watch the grazers devour them. You can also make a quick pan sauce with chopped herbs and white wine or sherry to drizzle on some chicken….

Wild Foraged Mushrooms from Pittsboro, NC ...recipes to follow.

2011-02-24T15:21:00.001-08:00

The Secret Recipe for Coca-Cola...

2011-02-22T21:24:00.000-08:00

This was just too good to ignore. The amount of writing, conspiracy theories, hidden notations in previosuly long-lost notebooks is endless when it comes to 'Merchandise 7X' or to the non-executives and consumers 'Coca Cola'.

Ira Glass is one of my favorite journalists and the amount of traffic his story generated on the web crashed his site.

Here is the recipe by the founder of Coca-Cola, John Pemberton who was a close friend of Joe Jacob:

More fascinating to me was the 'de-cocaine-ing' of the coca leaves that still occurs TODAY. Shipments of the coca leaf come into NEW JERSEY. Surprise, surprise. Once arrived they are brought to the de-cocaine-ing warehouse. No convicted felons working there I imagine. Then after their journey from illegal to legal, the leaves are used in the flavoring. You can buy Coca leaves online very easily.

I think we all owe it to ourselves to give this recipe a shot.

Ingredients:
*7X Flavor
Grain Alcohol (Everclear) - 8 oz
Orange Oil - 20 drops
Lemon Oil - 30 "
Nutmeg Oil - 10 "
Corriander Oil - 5 drops
Neroli Oil - 10 drops
Cinnamon Oil - 10 drops

F.E. Coca(Fluid Extract of Coca) 3 drams = 4 oz
Citric Acid - 3 oz
Citrate Caffeine - 1 oz
Sugar - 30 lbs. !!!
Water - 2.5 gal
Lime Juice - 2 pints
Vanilla - 1 oz
Caramel - 1.5 oz or more to color Color sufficient

***Use 2 oz flavor (above) to 5 gals syrup

How to Make This Recipe

As we said in the radio story, this recipe includes two parts. The recipe for the syrup, and the recipe for the 7X flavoring formula. You can scale down the recipe for the syrup if you don't want to make gallons of the syrup. You will need one ounce of syrup mixed with 5 ounces of carbonated water to make a serving of soda.

When you buy your ingredients be careful that you buy FOOD GRADE. There are lots of things you can find on the Internet that can be used in this recipe that are not food grade and will make you sick.

1) Make the 7X flavor. To make this, you'll want food grade essential oils at 100 percent strength. They can be found by searching for food grade essential oils in the grocery section of Amazon.com and other places (this orange oil, for instance).

For a home recipe, you can get an eyedropper and count drops the old-fashioned way, but if you want to be more precise, Steve Warth at Sovereign Flavors says he estimated each drop was .025 grams, which means you want 0.5 grams of Orange Oil, 0.75 of Lemon Oil, 0.25 grams of Nutmeg Oil, 0.125 grams of Coriander Oil, 0.25 grams of Neroli Oil, 0.25 grams of Cinnamon Oil (historian Mark Pendergrast says the original Coke recipe was made with a kind of cinnamon called Cassia).

Combine those with 8 ounces of food grade alcohol. This ingredient, we'll be frank, will be kind of a pain in the ass to find. Important: Do NOT use Ethyl Rubbing Alcohol or Rubbing Alcohol or Denatured Ethyl Alcohol. These will make you sick. You need food grade ethyl alcohol. Sometimes people swap Everclear or other neutral grain spirits for this, and our beverage guys suggest this as an easy, cheap substitute.

2) Make your fluid extract of coca. Buy whole leaf coca tea. Instructions for making coca extract from this can be found online. You don't need much. The recipe calls for 3 fluid drams, which is equivalent to 1/8 of a fluid ounce or – an easier measurement for a home kitchen – 3/4 of a tablespoon.

3) Make the syrup. Once you have your 7X flavor, and your fluid extract of coca, you are ready to mix them with your other ingredients to make the syrup. Mix your ingredients in this order: water, sugar, then coloring, then coca extract, then vanilla extract, then caffeine, then lime juice and citric acid.

Several Notes:

-- If you do not want to make several gallons of the syrup, you can adjust the recipe by reducing all ingredients by the same rate -- one half the original amount, one quarter, and so on.

-- Another important thing about this step, as we said in the radio story about the recipe, the Sovereign Flavors chemists concluded that in order to compensate for the intensity of contemporary essential oils (125 years of advances in food technology means it's possible that they're much stronger than the oils Pemberton used in his lab in 1886) the 7X flavoring addition should be reduced by 75 percent. That means, if you make the full size batch, you should only use 1/2 ounce of 7X formula instead of the 2 ounces specified in the original recipe.

-- You might want to cut down on the caffeine. We all got a strong buzz from the soda we made with the recipe, and then one of the beverage professionals pointed out that it was because it had five times the amount of caffeine of a modern soda.

-- Some ingredients are measured in fluid ounces, others are measured in ounces by weight. The team at Sovereign Flavors says if an ingredient is liquid -- coca extract or vanilla extract -- it should be measured in fluid ounces. If it's a dry ingredient, like citric acid, it should be measured by weight.

4) Make the soda. Once you have mixed the syrup, it should be combined with carbonated water at a ratio of 1-to-5 (one part syrup to five parts bubbly water) to make the soda.

Legal language we have to include here: If you're making this soda, it's entirely at your own risk. The soda companies and radio stations involved in this story make no claims about the safety of this old recipe.

-'How to Make' reprinted from 'This American Life'

Its a big batch...for your next potluck party maybe?

Tomatillo Cilantro Chili

2011-01-31T09:03:00.001-08:00

Its been a while since my last post. A lot has happened. Alycia and I relocated to the Raleigh-Durham area of North Carolina. I will be starting up a mobile food truck to service the Durham area. Ideally, to be launched in September of 2011. In the meantime, ruminations on recipes and wine...

Tomatillo's are delicious. I didn't know how delicious until I found them in a grocery store for a salsa verde. I grilled pineapples, diced them, tossed in some cilantro sauteed onions and garlic. I then sauteed the Tomatillos and was instantly hooked. They are now an official obsession. Eggs in the morning with salsa verde, the above salsa on any meat (mostly pork) and now this chili. I was recently in White Salmon, WA watching my two cousins. One in particular is a classic growing boy that consumes food and milk with an insatiable appetite. He needed to be stopped. A big bowl of chili was in order; I could ladle this stuff endlessly. However, they expected more from me than just any old chili. It had to be different. Enter the tomatillo, this would be the substitute for the usual red chili they were used to. It was also Sunday and my uncle Frank had friends coming over; lots of mouths to feed. I also whipped up a homemade french onion dip that I remembered Jennifer Nelson making for a super bowl party. Perfect game day grub.

Recipe:
2 lbs. of Tomatillo's, diced
1 large Onion, diced
2 small Jalapenos, diced
3 cloves garlic, diced
1 Green Bell Pepper, diced
1 Can White Navy Beans
1 Lbs. Ground Pork
1 Bunch of Cilantro, diced
1/2 Tbsp Ground Fennel
2 Tsp. of Dried Oregano
1/2 Tbsp of Ground Cumin
1/2 Cup Chicken Broth/Stock
Salt to taste

Grated Cheese for garnish (I used Parmesan since it was in the fridge, cheddar is obvious but great, monterey jack with red pepper flakes...)

Serves 6 healthy portions

Procedure:
1. The dicing is the bulk of the work. Use anyone close by to help. After that, drizzle some oil at the bottom of the pot and place the tomatillo's, onion, garlic, bell pepper, chx broth and jalapenos into large stock pot, creuset, sauce pan or other 3.5-5 quart pot.
2. Put the cover on and cook at medium-low heat for 15 minutes. Stir.
3. Add pork, navy beans and all the spices. Increase temperature to med-high and stir. Cook for 10 minutes.
4. When the Chili is finished, turn off the heat and add the cut cilantro. Always do this last. Cilantro cooks and wilts quickly and its best served fresh. The minute this herb hits heat the flavors start to dissipate. Top with grated cheese and go at it.

Roasted Cauliflower

2009-09-17T08:16:00.000-07:00

Cauliflower originated in Cyprus and was introduced to France from Italy in the middle of the 16th Century. Louis XIV's mistress, the Comtesse DuBarry, asked the king's chef to make it so much that he named all the dishes with cauliflower in it after her. Whenever you see "DuBarry" in the title of a french dish, you know which vegetable is the primary ingredient. It can be colorful, fractal (as the Romanesco, and always delicious. It also doesn't need anything fancy. I roast cauliflower at least once a week. Olive oil, salt and 2 pinches of curry. I have to roast it until the tiniest florets are brown and crispy. Its just that much tastier. The cauliflower will reduce in size by about half when you roast it hard. Which means if you like picking while you're cooking, the amount you end up with could be a lot less.

2 Heads of Cauliflower
Olive Oil
2 Tspn Salt
2 big pinches of curry (substitute lemon if you don't like curry)

1. Preheat oven to 450F
2. Pick apart the florets into small pieces and place in a large mixing bowl. Add enough olive oil to coat the florets, salt and curry.
3. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper and place the florets on it.
4. Roast for 25 minutes. Rotate the cookie sheet and roast for another 5-10 minutes depending on how brown the florets are.

Pan-Seared Red Snapper with a Roasted Corn Succotash

2009-08-11T07:29:00.000-07:00

“Succotash” comes from the Native American word “msikwatash” or “msickquatash”, which means "broken into bits" or "boiled corn kernels" and can refer to any cooked mix of vegetables with corn and beans in it. ‘Tis the season for fresh, local produce so be creative with your vegetable blends. The tart bite of arugula and the acid from the roasted red peppers soaked in vinegar add texture and depth of flavor to the roasted corn. Smoked Paprika is one of my favorite flavors; smoky, like bacon. This dish took a total of 30 minutes from start to finish.

2 pcs of Striped Bass Filets

4 Cobs of corn
2 Roasted Red Peppers
1 ½ Cups of Arugula
2 Tbls of Greek Yogurt
2 Tbls of Olive oil
2 pinches of Smoked Paprika
Salt & White Pepper

1. Husk all 4 cobs of corn. Boil two for 3-4 minutes.
2. Preheat the oven to 400F. Shave off the kernels of the other two cobs with a chefs knife in a vertical motion. Place the shaved kernels in a large mixing bowl. Add smoked paprika and olive oil. Mix together and spread out evenly in a roasting pan. Cook until the kernels start to brown – 10 minutes approximately.
3. Dice up the roasted red pepper and arugula. Set aside in a mixing bowl.
4. Shave off the kernels of the cooked corn and place in a food processor. Add yogurt and ¼ cup of water. Puree.
5. Combine corn puree, roasted kernels and yogurt into the red pepper/arugula mixture. Stir and season with salt and pepper to taste. Add more paprika here if you like a strong smoky flavor.
6. The hard part is over. Just pan sear the fish. A crispy skin is always delicious and a great textural addition. Coat the fish with some vegetable oil, salt and pepper. Heat a skillet with some oil until the oil begins to ripple. Sear skin side down for 6 minutes depending on the thickness of the filet. Flip and sear for a 1-2 minutes. Plate.

Almond Encrusted Banana Corn Flake Cakes with Homemade Caramel and Vanilla Ice Cream

2009-08-11T07:25:00.000-07:00

I do not put many desserts on this website. I try, like the rest of the country not to eat many sweets. I had to come up with a dessert that worked quickly and was cooked on a grill. I cheated on the grill part (skillet on the grill) but this is one of the most delicious desserts I’ve ever tasted. The majority of the people at the cook-off thought so too. I am sorry there is no picture. The cakes are pan-seared and hot so the ice-cream melted before I could take a good picture. These are pretty simple to make. I used store-bought Haagen-Daazs Vanilla; sometimes time and travel requirements just don’t allow you to make homemade ice cream. The Corn Flakes act as a thickening/binding agent to the bananas. The Corn Flakes were an improvisation, I originally wanted to use Almond Flour but its hard to find it at the average grocery. I feel like Corn Flakes is enjoying a Renaissance because of David Chang’s pastry chef, Christina Tosi. The trickle down effect is amazing; I see cornflakes at least once in every food magazine lately. SO here is one more to add to the tasty expanding pool. These banana cakes are a summer time treat not to be missed.

2 Bananas
2 Cups of Corn Flakes
1 ½ Cup Slivered Almonds
Olive Oil

1 cup of Sugar
½ cup of Cream
3 Tbls of Unsalted Butter

Vanilla Ice Cream

1. Add the bananas and corn flakes into a food processor. Puree. Roll into palm size balls. Place in the freezer for 10-15 minutes.
2. Toast the slivered almonds, in a skillet, until golden brown. Set Aside.
3. Make the caramel. Pour the sugar into a skillet that is being heated on high. When the sugar starts to brown around the edges of the skillet, stir the sugar with a wooden spoon. Let the sugar brown a bit more evenly then slowly add in two tablespoons of cream and 1 tbls of butter. Stir vigorously. When the butter and cream are incorporated add the remaining amounts and stir. Keep warm.
4. Add vegetable oil to a large skillet and place over med-high heat.
5. In a mixing bowl add olive oil, banana balls and toasted almonds. Coat the banana cakes with the almonds. Place in the skillet, flatten into patties and brown on each side for about 4-5 minutes.
6. Plate: Drizzle the caramel on the plate in whatever fancy design comes to you. Plate the cake and add a dollop of ice cream to the top.

Cocktails for the Summer

2009-07-02T09:39:00.000-07:00

These drinks were featured in the Summer 2009 issue of 'Elegant Bride.' The Jewel of the CondeNast bridal group.

“Remembrance”

Canton Ginger Spirit – 1 oz
Blood Orange Juice - 2 ozs
Rosemary Simple Syrup – ½ Tspn
Triple 8 Vodka – 1 oz
½ Lemon – juiced
Splash Club Soda

1. Rosemary simple syrup: add equal parts sugar to water. Dice up a long sprig of rosemary into ultra fine pieces. Add everything to a pan and heat up until all the sugar has dissolved. Let infuse for 5 minutes. Strain through a fine-mesh sieve and reserve.
2. In a martini shaker combine all the ingredients, except club soda and shake. Pour into a martini glass and add club soda.

Garnish: Rosemary sprigs OR red sanding sugar

“Lavender Sweetheart”

Lavender Tea – 2 ozs
Beefeater Gin – 1 oz
St Germain – 1oz
Lime Zest
½ Lime – Juiced

1. Bring 4 ounces of water to a boil and infuse with 1 Tbsp. of lavender. Steep for 5 minutes, then strain. Let cool.
2. Zest half a lime and reserve.
3. Add all the ingredients except the zest into a highball glass, stir.
4. Sprinkle zest on top

Garnish: Oversize or Regular Lavender Ice cubes OR Lime Pinwheel

“French Cuffs”

6 Ozs.Champagne
½ Oz.Aperol
½ Oz. Elderberry

1. Pour Champagne into fluted glass.
2. Pour the elderberry over the bottom of a soup spoon slowly into the champagne. This will create the layers for the desired look.
3. Pour the Aperol over the spoon slowly.

Eyrie Vineyards

2009-07-02T09:38:00.001-07:00

Eyrie Pinot Blanc, 2006
$20 or Under
Willamette Valley, Dundee Hills, Oregon

A Brief Introduction to Eyrie Vineyards
If you love Oregon Pinot’s then you need to know where the story began, with David & Diana Lett. Eyrie (Eye-ree) is an iconic American vineyard. David Lett or ‘Papa Pinot’ was the first person to plant Pinot Noir and Chardonnay in the Willamette Valley of Oregon. He was the first to plant Pinot Gris in America. Eyrie’s 1975 Pinot Noir competed in the Paris and Beaune wine competitions and beat out the French Burgundies. Can you say ‘Upset’? Thanks to Ms. Wasserman who slipped David’s Pinot’s into the tasting panels, Oregon gained International acclaim as a place to grow Pinot Noir in the New World (I think only the Europeans still use this term to describe America).

So after the history lesson you should taste their wines. These should be easy to find, although not as prevalent as a Pinot like Erath, Eyrie’s wines are still very small production (15,000 cases total in 2007). The Pinot Blanc case production is 700 cases and in the words of Food & Wine “Eyrie doesn’t make a lot of pinot blanc, so buy it when you find it, and indulge in its lean, intense mineral and light pear flavors”

The wine undergoes malolactic fermentation in stainless steel which gives the wine a full and round sensation in the mouth plus tasty citrus profiles. It’s a medium to full bodied white with tangerine peel and sour apple flavors. 2006 was an excellent vintage. Drink up!

Pair with Oysters, Cheeses, Fish…the Summer

Wines?

2009-06-20T09:10:00.000-07:00

So I have been working with a wine importing & distribution company since November '08. I am always tasting wines from the portfolio and have decided to include a few of the wines on this blog. After all, I am sure many of you enjoy wine with your food and if you don't, you need to start. They are excellent compliments to each other.

Some wines will be from the portfolio I work with, others will not be. All of the wines reviewed here will be from family owned properties. Usually the wineries will be boutique operations with a small case production emphasizing a hand crafted sustainable approach to wine making.

2009-06-20T08:59:00.000-07:00

Raw Power Shiraz 2006
$15 or Under
Adelaide Plains, Australia

Falling just short of sniffing gunpowder and shooting up EPI pens there is ‘Raw Power Shiraz.’ A palate and marketing punch in the face, this wine screams at the anti-authoritarian crowd. The bottle adorns ‘Exploited’-esque skulls and safety pins on the label plus a totally punk rock importing story; that I cannot share in a public forum. Let’s just say the story on the back of the bottle is more ‘Spinal Tap’ than ‘Sex Pistols.’

This is an intense wine with fruit forward characteristics. The oak is well integrated on the palate. For a wine that boasts “Raw Power” it is not an oak bomb. The ‘Power’ is really in this wines longevity and resistance to deterioration after oxygen has been introduced, i.e. after being opened. You could pop this bottle and leave it open for 4 days and it would still be delicious on the 4th day. The oxygen aids in the evolution of the flavors.

Pair with pizza, curries, mexican food...cuisines with gutsy flavors

2009-06-20T08:55:00.000-07:00

Taft Street Russian River Valley Riesling, 2008
$18 or Under
Russian River, California

Let’s start by saying that the Russian River Valley is the premiere area for growing grapes in this country. The fruit is consistently dazzling. Enter Taft Street who has been around for over 30 years. They went from being a mass-producer of wine then pulled in the reigns, dramatically. They produced 57,000 cases, now down to 15,000. What does this mean? It means a return to the heart & soul of the operation; crafting elegant, well-structured wines with more of a personal touch thanks to winemaker Evelyn White.

These guys focus on Pinot Noir & Chardonnay and there selections of these varietals are outstanding. I picked the Riesling to write about because it has a fun story attached to it. One of the grape farmers that Taft Street buys from called up Evelyn and said “Hey I have 7 extra tons of Riesling do you want it?” She of course jumped at the opportunity and made a fantastic wine. With the Russian River mostly devoted to Chard & Pinot Noir, Riesling is small production and always limited. There were only 380 cases made; which means a bit harder to find but worth it. Taft Street, after the great success of this Riesling will continue to make more in the upcoming vintages.

This Riesling shows an excellent balance of off-dry characteristics with a rich mouth feel. There is no malolactic fermentation; Russian River fruit doesn’t need it. The minerality is minimal but there and in harmony. This wine should be exactly what you expect from a Riesling, a little sweet, structured with layers of flavor and the perfect amount of acid.

Pair with white fish dishes, shellfish, cured meats and cheeses, fondues

Hijiki

2009-06-18T17:34:00.000-07:00

More Calcium than a glass of milk!
More Iron than an egg!
A super antioxidant!

Its not pomegranate, not a maitake (though these are arguably one of the most potent super foods out there)

Its Hijiki; a type of seaweed or sea vegetable. You can find it at most sushi restaurants. Its served in a little dish or bowl and great to pick at. In NYC there are a few Japanese markets that sell it. The one I usually go to is Katagiri on 59th between 2nd & 3rd. Arame is another sea veggie that is a bit milder than Hijiki and can be used alternatively for the following recipe. This makes a great summer dish for its refreshing and chilled qualities.

1/2 Cup of Hijiki
1 small bulb of Ginger, skinned and diced fine
1/2 Tbls of Sesame oil
1/2 Tbls Tamari Soy Sauce
1/2 Tbls Mirin
Red Pepper Flakes
1 Tspn Sugar in the Raw
2 Tbls Toasted Pine Nuts*
1 Tspn White Sesame Seeds

1. Soak the hijiki for 15-20 minutes in cold water. They will swell to 2x their original volume.
2. While the hijiki is soaking. Peel and dice the ginger and toast the pine nuts.
3. Heat up the Soy Sauce, Ginger, Sesame Oil, Mirin, Pepper Flakes. Add sugar and reduce.
4. Strain and press the Hijiki. Add to the ginger/soy mixture. Stir. Add the pine nuts and place in a bowl.
5. Chill for a few minutes.
Done.

*Toasted Pine Nuts are expensive. Sub anything you want here that adds color and texture; Green or Red Bell Peppers, Carrots, Radishes...you get the idea.

Sauteed Broccoli with Garlic & Sundired Tomatoes

2009-06-18T09:31:00.000-07:00

If I were to go ‘Vegetarian’ this dish would be a staple of my diet. When I cook this dish its hard for me not to eat the whole head of broccoli. The flavors are robust, its healthy and soooo easy to make. It serves as a side dish to steak, chicken, fish, or on its own.

1 Head of Broccoli, florets broken off the stalk**
½ Cup Sundried Tomatoes
2 Cloves of Garlic, thinly sliced (more if you love garlic)
Adobo
Extra Virgin Olive Oil

1. Bring a pot of water to a boil.
2. Rehydrate the tomatoes for 5-10 minutes
3. In a skillet, over medium heat, sauté the sliced garlic. Saute for 2 minutes. If you notice the edges around the garlic getting brown lower the heat.
4. Chop up the sundried tomatoes and sauté with the garlic
5. Cook the broccoli for 1 ½ - 2 minutes. Strain and toss in with the garlic and sundried. Add some of the sundried tomatoe water (optional) and dust the broccoli with the adobo.
6. Dump contents into a serving bowl and stir to make sure the juices are dispersed. Taste and adjust.

**Those naked broccoli stalks...all the florets gone. DON'T THROW THEM OUT. They still contain nutrients. Make a pesto with them, slice them and pickle them, puree them with peanuts, cilantro, soy sauce and make a spread or dip. Just don't waste food ehh.

Pan-Seared Salmon with a Mirin-Dijon Sauce and Chorizo Brussel Sprouts

2009-04-01T07:57:00.000-07:00

Damn I cannot get enough of this sauce. Its like that ginger dressing at sushi joints, I could just drink it and slurp it down with anything…even shoes.

1 Lbs. Salmon, sliced in two pieces
Vegetable Oil

½ Lbs Brussel Sprouts
½ Cup Chorizo, sliced and quartered
¼ Cup Dry White Wine
Black Pepper

1 large Tbls Dijon Mustard
2 Tbls Tamari (High Quality Soy Sauce)
½ Cup Mirin
1 Rstd Red Pepper, diced
3 Cloves Garlic, minced
1 Shallot, minced

Procedure:
Brussel Sprouts:
1. Bring a pot of water to a boil. Cook the brussel sprouts for 3 minutes and strain.
2. In a sauté pan, drizzle some vegetable oil and put the flame up to high. Add the diced chorizo and sauté until crisp. Deglaze with the white wine and add the brussel sprouts. Coat well. Turn off the heat and set aside.
Sauce:
1. In a sauté pan add 2 tbls vegetable oil, shallots, garlic and red peppers. Put the flame on medium and stir with a wooden spoon until the shallots start to brown.
2. Add Mirin, Tamari and Dijon mustard. Whisk together and cook for one minute. Set aside and keep warm.
Salmon:
1. In a sauté pan add 2 tbls of vegetable oil. Put the flame up to high and wait until the oil starts to ripple. Add salt and pepper to both sides of the fish and place in the pan. If the oil does not sizzle when you add the fish, the oil is not hot enough.
2. Pan sear the fish on one side for 4 minutes. The skin should be a beautiful, crispy brown, if its not, sear for another 1-2 minutes.
3. Flip the fish and sear for another 1-2 minutes. At this point it should be medium depending on the thickness of the fish. **
To Finish:
1. Reheat the brussel sprouts and sauce while the salmon is cooking. Place the fish on a paper towel lined plate first to absorb any excess oil. Put the fish on the plate, drizzle the sauce on and plate the brussel sprouts.

**I had a very thick cut of Salmon. If the fish you find is thin, then adjust your cooking times accordingly. For thin slices it will take only 2 minutes one each side to bring to mid-rare.

Homemade Orecchiette with an Onion Sherry Sauce & Herbs

2009-03-06T15:46:00.000-08:00

*So I saved this image 4 times with 4 different rotations. No matter how I saved the file, it would not upload the photo properly. It always put the rosemary sprig to the right. Never facing up. Very odd. So that's why the pic is a little cockamamie.**

This dish is my paean to the Onion. Onions are one of the most obvious and available vegetables around. Cheap too. Usually they are used as the starting point for sauces or an addition to a marinade or the supporting role in a mirepoix. I discovered the magic of slow-cooked onions one Christmas when I decided I was going to make French Onion Soup. I dug through a slew of recipes and decided to meld 2 of them. One recipe called for cooking just the onions and butter for an hour. It was an old cookbook and had never thought to cook an onion for that long but I gave it a try. After 45 minutes of watching these onions go from eye-tearing white to a luscious caramel color I was hooked. They become so sweet and that raw intense onion flavor becomes nuanced. Cook onions this way and you will never forget the taste.

Orecchiette was the first pasta I ever made by hand. It was pretty rustic looking but fun to make and the name always struck me: “little ears”. Bill Buford writes about this pasta in “Heat” when he was chronicling the adventures at Mario Batali’s Babbo and I know it has a much more storied past than that. Mixing the dough, rolling it into ‘ropes’ and making the orecchiette only took about 45 minutes and I made this work with the recipe because the onions take a long low and slow cooking.
You don’t need any fancy machines or tools for this pasta which is another reason I like it so much. Plus, the ‘little ears’ cradle the perfect amount of sauce.

Orecchiette

½ Cup warm water
¾ Teaspoon Sea Salt
1 ¼ Cups Semolina Flour
1. Stir together water and sea salt in a bowl until salt has dissolved. 2. Form a well with the semolina and slowly add the water. Incorporate the water with the flour using a fork. Add more water as needed. Once all the water is included you should have an elastic dough ready to knead. 3. Cut half the dough and roll it into 2 ropes. Slice these into quarter-inch thick pieces. 4. Flour your hands and press your thumb down into the center of the pasta. Make one circular rotation pressing lightly on the pasta. That should be enough to form a ‘little ear.’ If you are difficulty on a counter top, place the pasta in the palm of your hand and use your other hand to shape. Continue until all your pasta is made.

Onion Sherry Sauce

2 Onions
3 Tbls Butter
½ Cup Sherry
¼ Cup Chx Broth
1 Tspn chopped, fresh Thyme
1 Small Sprig of Rosemary, chopped fine
Salt & White pepper*

1. Halve the onion then slice it in long, thin strands.
2. Add to a large skillet with the butter. Put the flame on low. Cover for fifteen minutes. Uncover and continue to cook for 25 minutes on low heat. The onions should be soft and browning.
3. While the onions are cooking, in a separate pot pour in all the liquid and reduce by half. Add a bay leaf if you like.
4. Add the thyme and rosemary to the onions along with a few pinches of salt and pepper. Add half the sherry/broth mixture. Stir. Let the liquid reduce slightly and add the rest of the mixture.

Finish
1. Bring salted water to a boil. Add orecchiette. Cook until al dente. This usually takes about 4-5 minutes because of the hard semolina flour. Taste one before you strain.
2. Once strained add the orecchiette to the Onion Sherry sauce. Coat well and serve. Sprinkle with some extra diced herbs

Salamagundi or Pirate Stew

2009-03-06T15:18:00.000-08:00

I have an obsession with pirates. So when I was down in Key West recently, and had the chance to visit Pat Croce’s Pirate Museum, I jumped all over it. For anyone remotely interested in pirates this is the spot. They house the only pirate treasure chest that was filled with treasure in salvaged existence. They also have one of two pirate flags known to exist in the world.

The Museum also has a recipe for ‘Salamagundi’; the last meal ‘Black Bart’ Roberts ate the day he was fatally shot in battle against the British Royal Navy and a common dish aboard a pirate ship.

As you may have guessed “cuisine” on any sea faring ship was not gourmet. However, this dish is similar to Beef Burgundy in the sense that it’s a long braise with a wine-centric marinade and vegetables. Its also a perfect winter stew.
The original recipe I found calls for turtle, fish, chicken, pig, cow, duck and pigeon. The marinade consists of spiced wine, herbs, palm hearts, garlic and oil and is to be accompanied with hard-boiled eggs, anchovies, pickled onions, cabbage, grapes and olives.
Unless your on Grand Cayman, you cannot eat turtle meat. Everything else is pretty easy to find, for “pigeon” use squab. I didn’t but you can.
Just a heads up, this dish from start to finish takes 4 hours.

1lbs “Beef for Stew” aka brisket or rump
2 Duck Legs (Save the breast meat for another use)
3 Chicken Thighs
¼ Lbs Codfish Cheeks*
Vegetable oil
1 Onion, chopped
1 Cup each of chopped Carrots & Celery
6 Radishes, cubed in half or quarters
5 Cloves of Garlic, minced
1 Tbls Clove
5 Sprigs of Thyme
1 Sprig Rosemary
1 Tbls Peppercorns
1 Bottle of Red cooking wine
1 Quart Beef Stock
1 Cup Chx Broth
½ Can of Hearts of Palm
1 Tspn Cinnamon

Accompaniments: Crusty bread for soaking up the stew

That’s a laundary list of ingredients. Ready, set, GO:
1. In a 4-5 gallon pot brown all the meat (chicken and duck first then the beef). If you start to notice the bottom getting dark brown lower the heat.
2. Take out all the meat and reserve. Throw in all the chopped fresh veggies; onion, celerey, carrots, diced radishes. Brown in the same oil that you just browned all the meat in. Add more oil if needed. Cook the veggies for 5 minutes on med-low heat. Deglaze the bottom of the pot with 1 cup of beef stock. Scrape up all that browned goodness on the bottom of the pan with a rubber spatula or wooden spoon.
3. Add all the meat back into the pan except for the chicken. Add the chicken in the last hour of cooking. I will remind you again.
4. Make a boquet garni with cheese cloth: add the clove, thyme, rosemary, peppercorn. Drop it into the pan. Also, add the 1 tspn of cinnamon
5. Pour in all the remaining broth, stock and wine. Make sure all the meat is covered by the liquid. If it’s not add more wine or stock to cover.
6. Braise for 2 hours on low heat. There should be the slightest of simmers going on in that pot. After the 2 hours add the chicken and hearts of palm. Cook for 45 more minutes then add the cheeks/fish. Cook for 15 more minutes and serve with a crusty piece of bread for soaking up all that good stew.

This should yield about 3 quarts of stew. Freeze some and eat the rest.

*Codfish cheeks are hard to find. I had frozen them from a time when I was going to make a bouilliabase. I ended up not making that when I was supposed to and had these leftover codfish cheeks. The cheeks cook in less than 2 minutes and are very mild. If you can’t find the cheeks use a very mild-tasting fish; halibut, mahi-mahi

Red & White Wine Jams

2008-12-05T16:55:00.000-08:00

There are sometimes when a bottle or bottles of wine are not finished in my apartment. This is rare, but after a big party there tends to be a few bottles of red left over that no one drinks and would otherwise go bad. I usually freeze the wine and use it for cooking in some vague future. That stockpile of frozen wine has built up. Thus these wine jams.

Wine and cheese, butter and popcorn, lamb and rosemary…these are a few of the iconic examples of ‘flavor pairings’; spices, libations or food combinations that enhance each other dramatically. You can pair almost any cheese with any kind of fruit preserve and its good! These jams just make it better.

Sauvignon Blanc, Chamomile & Pear Jam

Yield: 12 ozs.

5 Bosc Pears
1 ½ Bottles of White Wine (Sauvignon Blanc, Gewürztraminer, Riesling)
½ Tbls Whole Coriander Seeds*
1 Tbls Whole Cardamom Pods
½ Vanilla Pod
½ Cup of Sugar
2 small Bay Leaves
1 Tbls Loose Chamomile Tea

1. Peel Pears and core. Coarsely chop and put into a small empty boiling pot.
2. Pour in the wine/s (you can use a blend of these 3 wines or just one varietal. I only used sauvignon blanc and it turned out great.). Cut the vanilla pod in half and scrape the interior. Add the pod and scrapings into the wine and pears. Now put the stove on medium heat.
3. Shell the cardamom pods and crush the seeds with a mortar and pestle. Reserve.
4. Bouquet Garni: In a cheesecloth combine chamomile, bay leaves and cardamom pods. Secure the bouquet garni and add to the wine and pears.
5. Add the whole coriander plus the crushed cardamom seeds. Crank up the heat. Reduce by half.
6. After the pear/wine mixture is reduced by half, add ½ cup of sugar. Stir with a wooden spoon. At this point you should taste the jam. It maybe too tart, add more sugar. If you find that too much liquid is left in the pot AFTER you have added the sugar, reduce further. Add more sugar until the sweetness you desire is reached.
7. Chill and place in a jar

*I left the coriander seeds whole because once they cook for so long they soften up. Biting into a softened coriander seed with the pears is delicious. Plus it looks good in the jam. If it’s not your idea of ‘good’ then just grind it up in a mortar and pestle.

Pair this jam with a sheep’s milk Parmesan, Manchego or Gouda. Works well with roasted pork, Seared Wild Striped Bass or Black Cod or simply on toast in the morning.

Zinfandel, Herbs de Provence & Mixed berry Jam

Yield: 1 Quart
Time: 45 minutes-1 Hour

1 ½ Bottles of Zinfandel or Primitivo
½ Bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon
4 Containers of Blueberries*
2 Containers of Blackberries
½ Container of Raspberries
3 Tbls Herbs de Provence
1 Cup Sugar
1 Cinnamon Stick
4 Cloves
½ Tbls Allspice
2 bay leaves

1. Rinse all the berries and place into a 5-quart pot
2. Pour the wine into the pot. Turn the flame up to med-high heat.
3. Bouquet garni: Cinnamon. Cloves and bay leaves. Drop this into the simmering wine and berries. Add the Herbs de Provence.
4. Crank up the heat and reduce by half. Add sugar. If the mixture is still loose cook down further and stir with a rubber spatula keeping an eye on the heat. Do not allow the bottom to burn.
5. At this stage taste the mixture. If it is too tart, add more sugar. Remove the bouquet garni.
6. Chill and jar.

*Blueberries have pectin in them which is a natural gelatin. However, I used one Tbls of Knox dissolved in warm water and added it to the mixture before I chilled it.

Pair this with a Chicken liver pate or your turkey leftovers or cheese or toast or…you get the idea.

Chicken Liver Paté

2008-12-05T16:49:00.000-08:00

My first experience with chicken liver pate was at the French Culinary Institute. A classmate of mine, Long Xiong was sautéing a ton of these nasty looking organs, and in a separate pot he was boiling all manner of trees and leaves. It was all chucked into a food processor and pureed. He spread it on toast points and I was reluctant to eat it, which usually isn’t my M.O., but I did and it was one of those tastes I’ll never forget.

A year and a half later, on Thanksgiving Day 2008 I tried to replicate Long’s pate. It was different but still lip-smackin’ good. It’s perfect with toast points and wine jam!

Ingredients

1 Quart Chicken Livers
2 Branches Rosemary
6 Branches of Thyme
6 Sage Leaves
2 Bay Leaves
1 Pint Heavy Cream
½ Large Yellow Onion, chopped fine
1 Cup Sherry or Port Wine
Salt & Pepper

Yield: ½ Qt. of Pate

Procedure:

1. Pour the cream, bay leaves and herbs into a boiling pot. Reduce by half on high heat.
2. While the cream is reducing, heat up some vegetable oil in a skillet until the surface is rippling. Sauté the chicken livers on med-high heat until the bottom side caramelizes (appx 5 minutes or less) flip and brown. Once both sides are browned, remove the chx livers from the sauté pan, lower the heat and add the chopped onions. Sprinkle with salt and sauté. Once the onions begin to brown, pour off any excess fat and deglaze with the sherry or port wine. Reduce by half on high heat.
3. In a large food processor, add chx livers, onion/sherry reduction, ¼ small teaspoon of salt and pepper. Pour in the reduced cream. Puree for 1 minute. Taste and adjust.
4. Set in chilled ramekins and place in the refrigerator for an hour.

Pan-Seared Chicken with Rutabaga Puree, Bacon & Diced Scallions paired with Cisco Breweries ‘Pumple Drumkin’ Spiced Ale

2008-12-05T16:24:00.000-08:00

The Rutabaga. It’s gnarly looking and huge; bigger than the most feared pirate ever to sail the seas. Plus it’s really fun to say “Roo-tuh-bay-guh”. Root Vegetables are one of my favorite foods and an inside joke with my girlfriend and one of her best friends Meghan…I got shellacked on my birthday and came home ranting and raving about “Roo-OOT VEH-JUH-tuh-BullS” which I used to make a ravioli stuffing for culinary school on a previous night. I then, drunkenly started cooking under the watchful eye of my very concerned lady and demanded that everyone eat the ravioli stuffing. “No” was not an option. Anyways, I had never seen a rutabaga until recently at the Union Square Farmers Market. I had to have the biggest one and figure out what to do with it later.

When a chef doesn’t know what to do with something he or she usually puree’s it or it ends up in your Sunday brunch frittata as Anthony Bourdain points out in ‘Kitchen Confidential’.

Rutabaga pureed is like a smoother, richer mashed potato. However, it can have that bitter turnipy taste. To dull that bitterness down add a peeled potato (Big-ups to Sharlene for that trick), then either give the potato to the dog or chuck it out. It’s a worthwhile sacrifice. I am now a Rutabaga convert and found my enthusiasm is shared by such seemingly insane organizations as: The Advanced Rutabaga Studies Institute & The Mangold Hurling Association who has been known to use Rutabaga’s for their competitions.

Beer pairings are popular right now and with the ever-growing number of microbreweries there are many selections available to you in a myriad of flavors. During the fall and winter pumpkin ales abound in the supermarkets. One you won’t be able to find (unless you’re in Nantucket) is the ‘Pumple Drumkin’. It is a super tasty spiced ale with few equivalents. Dogfish Head’s Pumpkin Ale is fantastic and could be substituted with this dish. Cisco Brewers make the usual styles of beer in an unusually delicious manner. The brew master, Jeff, is top notch and I urge anyone who enjoys microbreweries to check this one out. It is worth the traveling time.

Ingredients:

Chicken
½ a Chicken, skin on (for one dish)
Salt & Pepper
Vegetable Oil

Rutabaga Puree (Yield: enough for 4 dishes)

1 Large Rutabaga
1/8 Tspn Nutmeg
1 Tspn Cinnamon
¼ Tspn Allspice
Salt
2 Tbls Salted Butter
1 Potato

Garnish
2 Strips of bacon per dish
1 Bunch of Scallions

Rutabaga Stock*
Coriander
Black peppercorns
2 bay leaves

Procedure:

1. Cut off all the skin of the Rutabaga. Also, you should notice a white layer of flesh that is between the flesh and the skin about an 1/8 of an inch thick, cut that out too. Cut the rutabaga into cubes and place them in a 5 Quart pot filled ¾ of the way with water. Peel a potato and cut it in half. Add that into the water with Coriander Seeds, Whole Pepper corns and 2 Bay leaves. Bring to a simmer until the rutabaga can be easily pierced with a knife. Remove the rutabaga but keep the water simmering. Discard the potato. Reduce the rutabaga stock by half, strain and freeze for later use.
2. Remove the cooked rutabaga and place in a large food processor. Add spices. I used more nutmeg than an eighth of a teaspoon but season it according to the way it tastes good to you…which means, “taste and adjust”. Keep warm.
3. Dice up the scallions on a bias and start cooking the bacon.
4. While the Rutabaga is cooking, season the chicken with salt and pepper. Add veg oil to a large sauté pan and put on med-high heat. When the oil is rippling and searing hot, add the chicken, skin side down to the pan. Cook for 5 minutes and check to see how golden brown the skin is, if it doesn’t look crispy delicious, then keep it cooking on that side. (Check the bacon.) Once the chicken is golden, flip it and cook for a minute and a half. Take the chicken out of the pan and let rest.
5. Spoon the Rutabaga puree onto a plate. Slice the chicken between the drumstick at the joint and plate. Garnish with bacon and scallions.
6. Drink with the ‘Pumple Drumkin’

*The Rutabaga stock is so sweet and delicious that it should not be thrown away. Use it for a chicken soup or Miso soup.

The Hybrid Hangover Remedy; The Bloody Oren

2008-08-06T13:11:00.000-07:00

Ahh tomatoes. An American icon and blessedly good to eat. The tomato is one more reason to love the summer. Red, luscious and lusty, Tomatoes are loaded with Lycopene . A powerful antioxidant. Tomatoes turn quickly, especially if you keep them in the refrigerator. They are a warm weather fruit and the coolness of the fridge expedites deterioration so keep them on the window sill or chill just before using. Bloody Mary mix is easy to make and its delicious without the booze. Its great in the morning whether you're fighting off the effects of a long night celebrating or simply as a wake-up jolt brought to you (in this recipe) by the zing of Sriracha and the twang from umeboshi's.

The Bloody Oren, named after Oren Ishii from 'Kill Bill', uses japanese pickled plums and the plum vinegar. Robbie Swinnerton boasts that umeboshi's are the culinary equivalent of taking a cold shower. "The abrupt, searingly tart, tangy salty taste jolts the eyes open, shakes the stomach awake, sandpapers off any staleness from the taste buds, and gets the day off to an unforgettable start." The umeboshi's "powerful acidity has an alkalinizing effect on the body, neutralizing fatigue, stimulating digestion an promoting the elimination of toxins. In addition, umeboshi is said to help the liver process excess alcohol and be an antidote for food poisoning" (1). I have tested out the hangover claim and I have to say its damn good. Comprable to the "Hair of the Dog" method.

2 Large Jersey or Beefsteak Tomatoes
1 Cup Water
2 Umeboshi
1 Tbls Umeboshi Vinegar
1/2 Tspn Sriracha
1/4 Tspn Celery Salt
4 Celery Stalks, skinned
1/2 Tbls Worstechire
3 Tbls Lemon Juice
2 Scallions

1. After you've skinned the celery and trimmed the scallions put the tomatoes, umeboshi, celery and scallions into a food processor. Puree. Strain that through a fine mesh sieve. Reserve 4 Tbls of the tomato/scallion/ume mixture.
2. Add the remaining ingredients plus the 4 Tbls of reserved puree into the mixture and shake.

Tomato-Blueberry Bruschetta & Carrot Miso Canapes

2008-08-06T11:52:00.000-07:00

The two titans of the summer season; blueberries and tomatoes are in abundance at all the farmers markets right now. I wanted to make some bruschettas for a party I was having and did not want to do the usual tomato, garlic, onion thing. Blueberries were close by and I was up in Maine a few weeks ago, tasted the first of the season on a hiking trail, and decided to roll with it. The combination was delicious. Garlic and blueberries though? First I blanched a bulb of garlic. Then I roasted the hell out of it, used three cloves and saved the rest. It was the right balance. The Fleur de Sel lends a subtle enhancement to the herbs de provence.

Tomato-Blueberry Bruschetta

1 Baguette
2 Tomatoes
1 Pint Blueberries
Juice of 1 lemon
3 Garlic Cloves, Roasted
Fleur de Sel
Herbs de Provence
Extra Virgin Olive oil

1. Slice the baguette into thin slices. In a small bowl, mix ½ cup olive oil and a few generous pinches of the herbs de province together. Lay bread slices on a cookie sheet. With a cooking brush or spoon, drizzle the mixture over the toast points evenly. Toast in the oven until golden brown. Allow them to cool on the side.
2. Wrap up the 2 cloves of garlic into aluminum foil, sprinkle with olive oil and roast at 500F for 10-15 minutes.
3. Dice up the tomato into small cubes. Drain excess water.
4. Halve or coarsely chop (depending on time and how fancy you want the bruschetta to look) the blueberries.
5. When the garlic is finished, puree it with the lemon and some olive oil.
6. Mix all the ingredients together except for the Fleur de Sel and spread on the toast points. Sprinkle salt onto the bruschetta.

Carrot Miso Canapés with Diced Scallions

I recently went to a David Chang chef demonstration at FCI. The kitchen at Ko was painted as a chef’s dream where new flavors are created using a myriad of techniques spanning Asian, Spanish and French cuisine. He’s not too far off the mark given the uber-positive reviews of culinary heavyweights like Ruth Reichl. One of the flavor combinations Chang’s team uses at Ko for vegetables is an equal mixture of sherry vinegar, miso and butter. It’s one of those tastes that when you taste it is branded into your gustatory memory. The combination is simple and brilliant. For canapés though it is too strong. So to dilute the intensity of the flavors I added a pureed carrot and almond milk. It makes a great spread for anything. Even as a sauce for pasta.

1 Tbls Butter
1 Tbls Sherry Vinegar
1 Tbls Miso
1 Large Carrot or 2 small thin ones
3 Tbls Almond Milk
Scallions
Baguette

1. Bring water to a boil. Peel and trim the carrot. Boil until soft.
2. Slice baguette and toast. Reserve and set aside.
3. Dice the scallions thinly and on a bias.
4. Heat up butter and Miso. Whisk together. Once melted and combined whisk in sherry vinegar.
5. In a food processor add all the ingredients except for the baguette and scallions. Puree.
6. Spread the mixture on the toasted slices and garnish with the scallions.

Clams Posillipo

2008-07-16T13:00:00.000-07:00

Clams Posillipo reminds me of City Island where I grew up. As you are approaching City Island by bus or by car, the smell of the salty air hits you. For me it’s the smell of nostalgic days fishing and swimming in the bay. For most other people the briny scent evokes an appetite. There are a myriad of restaurants on the strip. The best restaurant on the mile and half long stretch is by far, Arties Steak & Seafood. This is where I first encountered one of the most delicious clam preparations. You don’t see clams garner much fuss in restaurants today. There’s always a raw selection of clams or baked clams or clams casino, but never much more than that. Posillipo is a neighborhood in Naples, Italy where this dish originates from and raises the clam up on high. The acidy and the buttery flavors play in your taste buds and the herbal notes add a distinctive harmony.

Clams and mussels are so simple to cook. Some butter, some shallots, some herbs and presto! Throw in a slice of bread for dunking or linguine and there’s a dinner that takes less than 20 minutes to make.

1Lb Littleneck Clams
1 Clove Garlic, Chopped
3/4 Cup Dry White Wine
½ Cup Water
½ Shallot, diced fine
3 Tbls Butter
4 Sprigs of Oregano, coarse chop
6 Large Basil Leaves, cut in a chiffonade
½ Cup Cherry Tomatoes, sliced in half
½ Lemon, Juiced

1. In a covered boiling pot add water, 1 Tbls of butter, white wine and ½ of your measured garlic. Bring to a simmer and add the clams. Cover and cook for 2-3 minutes. Take the clams out and put them in a bowl, cover so they stay warm.
2. Strain the clam liquid through a fine mesh sieve to remove any sediment that may have been left on the clams. Clean out the pot you just cooked the clams in and pour the strained liquid back into it. Add the rest of the butter and throw in the tomatoes, shallots oregano and the rest of the garlic. Cook for 5 minutes on medium-high heat.
3. Reintroduce the clams into the mixture. Add the basil and lemon. Cook for 1 minute more. Enjoy the buttery and briny fragrance then Mangia!

*Shrimp are a great addition to this dish. If you add them, do so with their shells on when you start to cook the clams. After the clams are cooked and set aside, deshell the shrimp. Wrap the shells in cheesecloth and cook the shrimp with the clams for a bit longer, as they take more time to cook. Cook the shells with the broth until ready to eat.

Quick Pickles

2008-06-24T12:25:00.000-07:00

Pickles. In the supermarkets they are a frightening pigment of green. It seems as if they are glowing with radiation. Yes they are more convenient, drop them in your cart and pay for them. But if you just give your vegetables a little bit of briny love you’ll be much happier with the taste and crunch.

Pickling is a great way to preserve food, they aid in digestion and like most fermented foods provide important nutrients. You can use turnips, radishes, cabbage, pearl onions (for a homemade twist on a ‘Gibson’) or cucumbers. Right now at the Union Square Green Market 1 large bunch of radishes is $1 but they start to deteriorate drastically after a day so I started to pickle them, there was a carrot in the house and I bought a turnip for the express use of pickling (Because the only way they can taste better is if you roast them and that will not be happening in the summer heat).

This recipe is for a fairly large jar of pickles. So make 1”x1” cubes of the radish or turnip to add to a salad for zing or big rounds to put on your burgers (Lamb Burger) or use them to nurse a hangover. Have fun.

Quick Pickles

Ingredients:

1 Carrot
1 Daikon Radish
½ Cup Rice Vinegar
4 Tablespoons Soy Sauce
2 Tablespoons Mirin
1 Tablespoon Maple Syrup
3 Tablespoons Water
½ Tspn Sriracha
1 Clove

Equipment:

1 1000ml Mason Jar

1. Slice the carrots and daikon in whatever shape you think you’d like to eat pickles, place them in your jar. Rounds are great for sandwiches, the matchsticks for just snacking and the small cubes to add as a complement to a salad and on and on.
2. Combine all liquid ingredients and the clove into a sauce pan and bring up to a boil for 1 minute.
3. Pour pickling brine over vegetables and let sit out on the counter, top off (covered with a paper towel or clean dish towel to aid in fermentation) at room temperature for up to six hours. Refrigerate. They will keep for at least month, but you’ll probably be finished with them by then.

Mango Pico de Gallo

2008-06-09T22:39:00.000-07:00

Its HOT outside. Which means your body is craving cooler foods like salads, fruits, fresh veggies and of course the occasional roast pork butt and burgers (It wouldn't be summer without those two things for sure). For those of you that crave the former, salsa's and 'pico de gallo' are the answer. This recipe is kind of a cross between the two. You can use it as a compliment to a grilled fish dish, or as a salsa for dipping tortilla chips into or just as a fresh salad to munch on. Its quick and easy to make; this took me 20 minutes.

1 Mango, diced into small cubes
2 Roasted Red Peppers
½ Lemon, juiced
½ Lime, juiced
1 Tspn Sriracha (See Shrimp & Steel Cut Oats recipe)
½ Tspn Salt
1 Tbls Coriander
1 Tspn Extra Virgin Olive Oil
½ Large Red Onion, diced fine
1 Cup Cilantro, chopped fine

1. Dice up the mango into small cubes. This is more daunting than I lead you to believe. Toss the cubes into a large mixing bowl
2. I used ‘Roland Fire Roasted Red Peppers’. They are awesome and skinless, unlike the other Roland Red Peppers. You can of course roast your own but that takes 30-40 minutes. Dice’em up into similar sized cubes like the Mango.
3. Juice the lemon and lime in a separate small bowl. Add coriander, sriracha, salt and olive oil. Mix well with a whisk.
4. Dice up the onion and cilantro into smithereens! Are you having fun yet?
5. Toss it all into a bowl and mix. Taste and adjust seasoning. Serve with tortilla chips
6. Listen to all the laudatory comments you receive for less than 20 minutes worth of work.

*You may have observed Black Beans in the picture of the salsa, I did put them in but then wished I hadn’t. Leav’em out.

Maitake Mushroom Casarecce with Parmesan & Black Pepper

2008-05-23T20:22:00.000-07:00

I am currently reading a book called “Japanese Foods that Heal”. Kind of funny considering I just came back from China. If you are one of those people that are very conscience of what you put into your body, heard of the macrobiotic diet or are just interested in ‘food as medicine’ than you need to purchase this book. I have not been able to put it down since I’ve purchased it. If you or someone you know suffers from high cholesterol, check out the sections on Shitake, Maitake and Green Tea.

Mushrooms are one of the most miraculous foods Mother Nature has to offer. They have been revered for centuries as potent natural healers, a source of vitality (said to activate your ‘qi’ or life-force) and curing disease. We’ll start with the Shitake. Dried, this mushroom contains 25% Protein (All 8 amino acids are present). It is loaded with glutamic acid which is considered “brain food” due its “ability to stimulate neurotransmitter activity and its ability to transport potassium to the brain.” It also lowers cholesterol. “Studies with humans have shown that consuming only 3 ounces of shitake for one week can lower cholesterol by 12%.” It’s also a potent antibiotic. It kills the bad bacteria in your body, has the affect of reducing blood clots and separately, stimulates the immune system which means it makes your body produce more T-Cells. (1)

Maitake: The King of Mushrooms was considered so precious and rare in ancient Japan that it was literally worth its weight in silver. It contains up to 27% protein and like Shitake contains all the essential amino acids, is rich in vitamins and minerals (B-Vitamins, niacin, magnesium, calcium, iron, potassium, selenium and zinc) and in Japanese medicine is used as a tonic to strengthen the body and improve overall health. It also stimulates the liver which detoxifies your entire body. It is also used for weight loss. “A Tokyo clinic tested the effects of Maitake on over thirty overweight patients. Without making other changes in their diet, Masamori Yokota, M.D. gave patients both dried and powdered Maitake daily for 2 months. Yokota reported that Maitake is more effective than any other regimen he has ever tested…all of his patients lost weight and got nearly halfway to their optimal weight. Weight loss ranged between 11 pounds and 26 pounds; the average person lost 11-13 pounds in 2 months.” (2)

That being said, there is butter and cheese in this recipe which could tip the balance of healing factors in these mushrooms. So, subtract the butter and use more olive oil. You can subtract the cheese, but you would be making a huge mistake. Meat, I might be able to do without, take cheese away from my diet and you’re stealing my soul.

Ingredients:

4 Dried Shitake Mushrooms or 6 Fresh
200g Maitake Mushrooms or 2 big bunches
½ Lbs Pasta (Prefably fusilli, rotini, casarecce. Not spaghetti or Angel hair)
1 Tbls Extra Virgin Olive Oil
3 Tbls Butter
½ Onion diced fine
1 Cup Chx or Beef Stock/Broth*
4 Tbls Homemade Hazelnut Extract
¼ Cup Parmesan Cheese
Black pepper
¼ Tspn Truffle Oil

Procedure:

1. Fill up the pot you’ll be cooking the pasta in with water. Add shitake’s and a bay leaf. Bring to a boil. Turn off the flame until you are ready to cook the pasta. Let the mushrooms soak.
2. Add the olive oil and butter into a skillet. Add the finely diced onions. Cover and cook on a low flame for 15 minutes. During this time wash and chop the maitake’s.
3. Once the onions have cooked, add the maitake’s. Sauté for 2 minutes. Add salt. Sauté for another 2 minutes or until all the juices have dried up. Add the hazelnut extract and flambé.
4. Remove the shitake’s from the water and slice thinly. Add these and the Chx/Beef stock to the mushroom/onion mixture. Reduce by half.
5. Bring Shitake water to a boil and add the pasta. Cook until pasta is al dente. Times will vary depending on the pasta you make and how fresh it is.
6. Once the pasta is done scoop it out with a slotted spoon and add to the Mushroom/Broth mixture
7. Once all the pasta has been removed bring to a rapid boil and reduce for 5 minutes
8. While the pasta water is reducing coat the pasta and mushrooms together. Turn off the flame. Season with black pepper.
9. Add 4 Tbls of Shitake/pasta water. Heat up and toss in the parmesan and truffle oil. Coat evenly and serve.
10. All that pasta water is now a mushroom stock. Freeze it for a month or keep it in the fridge for up to 3 days. You can use it to reinforce a sauce, for a vegetable or miso soup, etc.

*If using the ‘College Inn’ or ‘Swanson’ Brand adjust the amount of salt & parmesan you add because these are heavily salted.

(1)& (2): Belleme, John & Jan. Japanese Foods that Heal. Tuttle Publishing. 2007

Pan-Seared Sable with a Carrot Miso Puree & Olive Citrus Salad

2008-05-20T10:29:00.000-07:00

Compared to the scallop dish, this fish preparation is much quicker and the flavors really pop in your mouth. Plus it is really healthy. Black Cod or Sable or Butterfish is not a true cod but its one of the most delicious fishes I have ever tasted when fresh. This is because of all the Omega-3 fatty acids in it.

Miso is one of the healthiest foods you can eat and is an essential part of the macrobiotic diet. If your local grocery does not carry it ask them to or buy it online. I’ll tout more pro-miso propaganda in upcoming recipes. Enjoy.

Fish:
1.5 Lbs Halibut or Sable/Black Cod (serves 3 or 4 small portions)
Oil
Salt & Pepper

Puree:
1 Carrot
1 ½ Tbls of Blonde Miso
½ Tbls Tamari or Soy sauce to taste
1 Tspn Sesame Oil

Salad:
Arugula
½ Cup Pitted Kalamata Olives, chopped coarsely
1 Orange, supreme

Citrus Dressing:
3 Tbls Orange Juice
2 Tbls Lemon Juice
1/8 Cup of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Salt & Pepper

Procedure:

Carrot Puree
1. Bring salted water to a boil. Add the carrot and cook until tender.
2. In a food processor or blender, add the carrot, miso, sesame oil and soy sauce. Puree. I added some of the water that I boiled the carrot in to make the puree more viscous. I added a drop or two more of the sesame oil as well. Trust your palate here and it get it to where you think it tastes good. Miso is a powerful flavoring agent so be careful if you add more of this. Set aside the puree and keep warm.

Salad
1. Dice up the olives and reserve.
2. Supreme the orange. Follow the link for a demonstration. Reserve.
3. Wash the arugula. Dry and reserve.
4. Dressing: Add the citrus to a mixing bowl and in a slow steady stream whisk in the olive oil. Add 2 large pinches of salt and taste. Salt enhances the citrus flavor so don’t be afraid of adding more salt to develop a stronger citrus flavor. Add pepper to your taste.
5. Add the olives & oranges to the arugula but do NOT dress yet.

Fish
1. Rinse the fish and pat dry. Leave the skin on. With a sharp knife make 3 scouring slices across the skin. This is important because the fish will contract into a horseshoe when you apply heat and it will cook unevenly.
2. Bring vegetable oil to almost smoking point. There should be a heat-haze coming off the pan. Season the top and bottom of the fish and place in the pan. Beware of spitting oil.
3. The fish is going to contract a little so with a flat spatula apply pressure to the top of the fish for appx. 30 seconds. Lower the flame to medium. As the fish cooks you will notice that the rawness gives way to a cooked white color that creeps up to the top of the fish. Once that cooked-white color is ¾ the way up the fish, flip it. The skin should be a beautiful brown not burnt. If it did burn don’t worry the fish isn’t ruined.
4. Cook the fish on the flipped side for 30 seconds. No longer.

Assembly
1. If you have a helper, once the fish is halfway done have the helper dress the salad and warm up the carrot puree either in a microwave or in a skillet.
2. Place the dressed salad on a plate, the fish on top and spread the carrot/miso on top of the fish. Devour.

Mixology Pt. 1

2008-05-17T11:05:00.001-07:00

Lillet has recently regained popularity in the New York bartending scene probably because of "Casino Royale". Its featured at "PDT" a speakeasy-esque bar in a N'awlins incarnation, "Marlow & Sons" as the 'White Manhattan' and similar cocktail venues. Inspired by the resurgence of an apertif wine as a mixer here are a few cocktails you can whip up with ease. The count measure refers to a one second pour out of the spout of the nozzled pour device that you may have noticed on the top of all liqour bottles at your nearest watering hole. If you don't have one of these nifty devices, one fluid ounce equals a one second count.

The French Connection

4 Count on Lillet Blanc
3 Count on Ketel One Vodka
2 Count on Cointreau
3 Tbls of Pom Pomegranate Juice
½ Lemon Squeezed
3 Mint Leaves

1. Combine all the ingredients in a martini shaker with ice and do the “White Man Shuffle” with more voracity than these two could ever muster. Strain. Voile!

Gettin’ Lillet’d

4 count on Lillet Blanc
2 count on Ketel
2 count on Cointreau
½ Lemon Squeezed
½ Orange Squeezed

1. Indulge in the previous step.

2008-05-17T10:58:00.000-07:00

A brief word on Beets

“The beet is the most intense of vegetables. The radish, admittedly is more feverish, but the fire of the radish is a cold fire, the fire of discontent not of passion. Tomatoes are lusty enough, yet there runs through tomatoes an undercurrent of frivolity. Beets are deadly serious…The beet is a melancholy vegetable, the one most willing to suffer. You can’t squeeze blood out of a turnip…” -Tom Robbins, “Jitterbug Perfume”

Nutritionally there are few veggies as good for you as the beet. Beets are high in Folate, which is necessary for the production and maintenance of new cells. They are also loaded with Vitamin C, dietary fiber and antioxidants. The beet is also high in betaine which is a nutrient that plays an important role in the health of the cardiovascular system. The beet because of these reasons has been described as a ‘panacea’ which plays a part in the secret to immortality in “Jitterbug Perfume”. Eat the beet.

Beet Gratin

This dish was a challenge. I wanted a dish to appeal to anyone who has celiac or is required to be on a gluten and dairy free diet. Gluten and dairy free meals are hard to come by and even harder to make well. Coming from a French culinary background I don’t feel the need to expound on their indulgent use of cream, butter and cheese. Whenever a dish wasn’t tasty enough, the “French Fix” was employed; a heavy wallop of butter and or cream into any soup, sauce, risotto, polenta etc. It was effective but there are other ways of coaxing out good flavors from food than just adding fat. Thus my Beet Gratin.

1 Bunch of Large Beets (3 pieces) or 2 Bunches of Small (6 Pieces)
450 Ml Fresh Squeezed Orange Juice
1 Nub of Ginger appx 1” in diameter
¼ cup of Onions, diced fine
1/2 Cup Whole Almonds
4 Tbls of Tahini
1 Cup Vegetable Stock*
1 Tbls Lemon juice
½ Tspn sriracha
Salt & Pepper to taste

*Vegetable Stock

Vitamins B & C are water soluble, which means that when you boil/steam vegetables as a cooking method you lose the nutrients thus the reason to eat them. Steaming is better but you still lose the vitamins. Vitamins are quicker to absorb into your body in a liquid fashion anyway so save the water that you cook all vegetables in. Boiling beets for this recipe? Reserve some of the juices (careful of the dirt). Boiling carrots for a puree? Or steaming broccoli? Save it all add a bay leaf, ½ Tbls of whole peppercorns and ½ Tbls of Coriander seeds boil it again for 20 minutes and use it to add depth to a soup or stir fry. Freeze it for a later use.

Procedure:
1. Boil beets in salted water until a knife pierces them easily (about 30 minutes depending on the size of the beet).
2. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
3. While the beets are boiling, dice up the ginger and onion fine and place in a skillet on med-high heat with orange juice. Reduce by half.
4. Add vegetable stock and reduce that by half.
5. Toast the almonds in a skillet without any oil. Allow them to cool in a bowl. Add a bit of extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper. Toss so it coats them evenly. Chop and set aside.
6. Once the vegetable/orange/ginger mixture is reduced, place it in a blender with tahini and lemon juice. Be mindful when blending hot liquids.
7. Run the beets under cold water when they are finished to stop the cooking. When they are cool enough to handle, slice into ½ cm rounds or thereabouts. Layer them in a small baking pan (I used an 8x8 pan). After the first layer is set, drizzle the tahini/orange mixture over the beets. Continue this procedure one more time or until there are 2 or 3 layers depending on the amount of beets you have.
8. Bake for 20 minutes and top the gratin with the chopped almonds.

Shrimp with Steel Cut Irish Oats and a Saffron Beurre Blanc

2008-04-13T13:02:00.000-07:00

Were you one of those people this year that bought John McCann’s Irish Oatmeal around St Patty’s day to feel more Irish? You know the one in the steel can that looks like mother antiquity herself birthed it? I wasn’t. I was the person who bought it LAST year and still have not used it all because the three times I followed the ‘Irish Porridge’ instructions on the back I was duped by marketing and a nostalgia that wasn’t even mine. I was raised with ‘Cream of Wheat’ and Honey Nut Cheerios.
I am currently in the midst of Operation Clear-Out-the-Cupboard. An effort to use victuals in there that I rarely, if ever, use. The first assassination; John McCann. The great thing about 100% Whole grain oats, besides being good for you (lots of Fiber, protein, iron and high in B-Viatmins) is the amount of sticky starch they give off when cooked properly. For oats, this characteristic gives a velevety mouth feel without the butter and cream. There is cheese and yogurt in this recipe, but it is in very small amounts and you could leave these out if need be.
Porridge is pretty poor tasting without the addition of lots of maple syrup, sugar or some other flavoring agent. This recipe takes these oats away from breakfast altogether and uses it in a savory application (My Irish grandmother would refuse it on principle).

Shrimp

1 Bag of Uncooked, Frozen U/10 Shrimp
Vegetable Oil
Butter

Saffron Beurre Blanc

½ Shallot, diced
100 ml Rice Vinegar
300 ml White Wine
1 Bay Leaf
2 ¾ Sticks of butter, cubed
3 Pinches of Saffron

Oats

3 Tbls Extra Virgin Olive Oil
2 Bay leaves
1 Cup McCann’s Steel Cut Irish Oats
4 Tbls Cup Rice Vinegar
1 Generous Pinch of Saffron
1/2 Tbls Sriracha
Salt, to taste
2 Rstd Red Peppers, diced
1/2 Cup Greek Fage Yogurt
1/2 Cup Goat Cheese
Cheese Rinds (Optional)
Scallions, sliced thin

Procedure:

1. Oats: Bring 4 cups of water to a boil. Add Olive Oil and bay leaves. Pour in 1 cup of Steel Cut Oats. Continue at a rolling boil until the water begins to thicken. Once the water is viscous, adjust the flame and continue at a low simmer for 15-20 minutes. If you have leftover cheese rinds you can add them now. After 8 minutes of simmering you’ll need to keep an eye on the oats because they will stick to the bottom if you don’t stir frequently. Think of it as a risotto, the more you stir the more starch is let off and the more velevety it will feel in your mouth.
2. While the oats are cooking add the pinch of saffron to warm water and let soak for 5 minutes. Dice up red peppers and slice the scallions.
3. Once the oats are thickened and most of the water has reduced, you have in front of you Porridge or Gruel. Take the oats off the heat and add vinegar, sriracha, yogurt, cheese, peppers, scallions and salt if needed. Taste and adjust. Set aside and keep warm.
4. Beurre Blanc: Add saffron to warm water and let soak. Place shallots, vinegar, bay leaf and wine into a skillet and reduce. Once the mixture has reduced to nearly a syrup, take skillet off the heat and whisk in the cold butter a little at a time. Add saffron and continue to whisk until everything is incorporated. Strain through a fine mesh sieve. Keep warm. If you want, you can add the shallots to the oats.
5. Shrimp: I bought one frozen bag of uncooked shelled U/10 Shrimp which means 10 per pound at Trader Joes for this dish, use what your supermarket has. Sub scallops for shrimp if the scallops are fresher. Devein and shell your shrimp. Keep the shells. Heat a skillet with 1 Tbls of butter and 1 tbls of veg oil. Saute shrimp with the shells. Shrimp cook quickly so this should be no longer than 5 minutes or so depending on how thick your shrimp are. Remove shrimp and shells separately. As long as your butter/oil mixture is not burned incorporate this into the beurre blanc.
6. Reheat oats, plate shrimp and drizzle the beurre blanc around your masterpiece.

Homemade Hazelnut Extract

2008-04-13T12:49:00.000-07:00

I am one of many believers that anything homemade is better than what you can buy in the store. Purchasing extracts has always annoyed me. Vanilla extract is to blame for this. Its one of the more expensive foodstuffs you can have in your cabinet. Obviously Vanilla is rare so I understand the price and I would rather use fresh vanilla pods for ice cream rather than make an extract out of them, however, a little vanilla goes a long way if you have it. Nut extracts too don’t come cheap either and are much harder to find in the average supermarket Perusing an out of print ice cream book I found a recipe to make your own extract. I thought it was interesting but didn’t take the book out because I said to myself “I’ll just find this again on the internet”. I couldn’t. I spent about 10 minutes digging on the web and gave up. I ended up going back to the culinary library at the French Culinary Institute and copied it down. This is adapted from J & C Dueker’s “The Old Fashioned Homemade Ice Cream Cookbook”. The only changes I made were to toast the nuts first before I soaked them in Brandy and to chop them. Most people have a stock of cheap brandy somewhere in the back of their liquor cabinet which they hide and use for holiday/party punches, break it out for this recipe.

½ Cup Hazelnuts*, skinless
1 Cup Brandy

Procedure:

1. Pour hazelnuts into a skillet and toast. This should take about 5-7 minutes. They should be lightly browned not burned. If there are burned nuts don’t add them to the brandy. Once cooled, chop them coarsely.
2. Place in a jar or bottle and cover tightly. Allow at least a month before using. Dueker recommends subbing 2 Tbls of homemade extract for 1 Teaspoon commercial when using for baking or ice cream. I think you can add less but I’ll let you know once the extract is finished.

*If you do this for vanilla use a half pod per cup of brandy and do not toast. Slice it in half and scrape the insides. Combine everything in a jar.

Seared Scallops atop Piquillo Pepper Coulis with Cilantro Lime Sauce

2008-03-06T16:13:00.000-08:00

Ingredients:

1 Lbs Scallops
½ Onion
5 Piquillo Peppers or 2 Roasted Red Peppers
1 ½ Cloves Garlic
2 Pinches of Salt
1 Tbls Butter
Salt & Pepper
Thick palmful of Cilantro, stems and leaves
½ cup Fage Greek Yogurt or Sour Cream
Juice of 1 Lime

Procedure:

Finely dice up the onion, garlic and peppers.
Coulis: Heat butter up in a skillet with low-med heat and add the onions. Cover pan for 10 minutes. Uncover and add salt. Sweat for 3 minutes. Add garlic and peppers. Sweat for 5 more minutes. If at this point there is remaining liquid from the onions and peppers increase the heat slightly and watch carefully until there is no more liquid left in the skillet. Reserve and keep warm.
Creamy Cilantro: Greek yogurt is probably the healthiest option but heavy cream can be subbed and it’s great. In a blender add the cilantro, lime, 2 pinches of salt and yogurt and blend. The consistency should be thick and it will taste tart and sour; this serves to cut the buttery flavor of the coulis and scallops. Add more cilantro or yogurt if needed. Taste and adjust seasoning. Keep chilled.
To Serve: Heat up a skillet and add 2 tbls of butter on med heat. Once melted and beginning to bubble or pop add the scallops slowly one at a time. The pan will cool down quickly if you add them all at once and the scallops will not brown as evenly. Sear the scallops until golden brown on the bottom, appx 5-8 minutes depending on heat. Reheat the coulis and add to the plates. Place the scallops on top and drip the creamy cilantro on top.

Composed Salads

2008-03-06T16:03:00.000-08:00

Composed Salads

Every night at Sfoglia NYC there is an Antipasti Della Casa comprised of 3 different items, 2 are usually composed salads and it’s a great item to share. We used to make a plate of composed salads at FCI as well and they were fun, great to snack on plus it’s an easy way to experiment with new flavor profiles. The salads below could work individually as appetizers, side dishes or served with a protein. A good combo could be the cauliflower salad underneath a piece of seared halibut or cod with an olive tapenade or the radish salad underneath bacon wrapped scallops. The apple, rosemary, parmesan combination was the brainchild of my brilliant gourmand gal one morning when we made crepes. It is an awesome combo and could easily be the star of any dessert tart or ice cream flavor (minus the celery and olive oil). It’s also a super refreshing salad.

½ Head of Cauliflower
Olive Oil
Salt
¾ Cup Whole Almonds
¾ Cup Kalamata Olives, pitted
3 sprigs of Thyme
1 tbsp fresh squeezed lemon
Salt & Pepper

Preheat oven to 400F.
Break off florets of cauliflower and place in a bowl. Drizzle enough oil to lightly coat the florets, add 2 pinches of salt and toss in a mixing bowl. Roast for 15 minutes. When finished place in a bowl.
While the cauliflower is roasting add 1 tsp of olive oil to a skillet. Heat for a minute and add the almonds. Add 2 pinches of salt. Coat evenly and heat until the skin starts to pop from the almonds or until they are a darker brown. Place in a bowl, add a pinch of black pepper and allow to cool.
Dice up the thyme, olives and almonds (once cool) and juice the lemon if you are using fresh. Combine the olives and almonds with the cauliflower.
Vinaigrette: Add the lemon and thyme to a bowl. In a slow steady, stream add 1/3 cup of extra virgin olive oil and whisk. Add some salt and pepper. Taste and adjust. Taste and adjust.
Mix everything up and serve.

3 Radishes
Bacon, 2 crispy strips
1/3 cup Almonds, toasted
1/3 cup Cranberries, diced coarsely
Sesame Ginger Vinaigrette

Cook the bacon until crispy. Lay on a plate with a paper towel to soak up the grease. Let cool.
Prepare the almonds as described in the above procedure
Dice up the cranberries, radishes and bacon.
Combine all ingredients with ginger vinaigrette (Store bought is fine, the Paul Newman’s is good but I prefer the Japanese orangey looking ones, Annie’s has a good one and Makoto). Taste and adjust.

1 Macintosh Apple
1 Stalk of celery, peeled
Parmesan Cheese
1/8 tsp fresh Rosemary (1/4 if you are using dried)
Lemon or Lime
Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Peel the apple. Use a melon-baller to get rounds and drizzle a enough lemon juice to coat (this prevents the apples from turning brown for an extended period of time). Reserve.
Rinse and peel the celery stalk. Slice very thin.
Vinaigrette: finely chop enough rosemary to yield a generous 1/8 tsp. Add to lemon or lime and whisk in olive oil in a slow and steady fashion.
Combine all the ingredients together and dust with parmesan cheese.

Cranberry & Goat Cheese Cucumbers with Ginger Dressing

2008-01-31T23:58:00.000-08:00

Need some quick nosh food? This would not work for Super Bowl Sunday but any other time its good for a dinner party, a cinch to make and healthy to eat.

Whole Cashews
4 oz of Goat Cheese
2 Tablespoons of dried cranberries, chopped
1 Teaspoon freshly ground pepper
1 Cucumber
Ginger Dressing

Procedure:

1. Rinse & peel cucumber.

2. Dice up the cranberries and mash into the goat cheese with a spoon. Ground in the pepper and mix.

3. Scoop up the goat cheese/cranberry mixture onto the cucumbers. Garnish with cashew and ginger dressing.

4. Wipe away all the sweat and tears it took to make this tasty app.

Beer N' Bacon Soup

2008-01-17T11:58:00.000-08:00

4-5 Strips of thick cut Bacon
1 Leek, Top trimmed, White part reserved
2 ½ Cups of Beer (Guiness. Smithicks, Murphys or any Dark Malt Ale)
1 Can of Tomatoes and all the juice
Cheddar Cheese
Black Pepper, to taste
*Salt, if needed. Use sparingly

Yield: 1/2 Quart or 2 servings

Render the bacon until very crispy but not burned on medium to high heat.
Use bacon grease to sauté leeks for 8 minutes appx. Leave the bacon in the pan while sauteeing leeks. If there is any black burnt residue clean it all out and do not deglaze, instead just reduce the beer as in Step 3.
Deglaze the pan with beer. Reduce.
While the beer is reducing puree tomatoes and add to leek/beer mixture. Simmer for 20-25 minutes.
Pass through a fine mesh sieve/chinois.
Grate cheddar cheese and serve with a beer.

*If you want to tone down the bacon flavor, blanch it for a 1-2 minutes in boiling water and add to the tomato, leek mixture right before the 25 minute simmer.

Vegetable Napolean with a Tomato Rosemary Vinagrette

2007-12-03T12:08:00.000-08:00

Napoloean

1 Butternut Squash, cut into 1” width rounds

1 Red Onion

2 Large Portabella Caps

¾ Cup Ricotta Cheese

½ Cup Walnuts, toasted and finely chopped

Salt

½ Tbsp Rosemary

3 Tbsp Olive Oil

1 Tbsp Butter

Tomato & Rosemary

Tomatoes, emonder,
seeds removed, cubed

1/2 Clove Garlic,
diced fine

½ Tbsp Rosemary,
Chopped fine

1/s Tsp Ground
Coriander seeds

Extra Virgin
Olive Oil

2 Tbsp Balsamic
Vinegar

Procedure:

Prep

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F
Cut squash into 1” width rounds and bake until squash is softened but firm. Appx 30 minutes. Reserve and keep warm.
Toast the walnuts, sprinkle with salt. Chop and add to ricotta mix well with a dash of salt.
Bring water to a boil in a sauce pan. Core tomatoes and make an “X” on the opposite side. Boil for 1 minute. Drain, cool and peel off skin. Seed the tomatoes, discard the whites, cut tomato into cubes AND reserve the juice of the tomato that leaked onto the board.
Slice red onion into 1” rounds.
Heat butter in a skillet with rosemary and olive oil. Add reserved tomato juice. Cook for 2 minutes on med-low heat. Mix well. Spoon this over the onions & Mushroom. Roast the mushrooms at 350 F for 10-15 mins.
Dice garlic.
Add balsamic vinegar into a mixing bowl and in a slow steady stream pour in olive oil and whisk. Once emulisified add seasoning and garlic. Don’t dress the tomatoes yet.

To Serve

Flash the onion, mushroom and squash in the oven to reheat. No more than 5 minutes.
Dress the tomatoes with the herb & vinaigrette emulsion, toss and mix well. Season if needed.
Assemble. Top with ricotta/walnut quenelle.

Lamb Burger with Sauteed Portabellas & Curried Yogurt

2007-12-03T11:21:00.000-08:00

Burger:

1 Lbs Ground Lamb

½ Tsp Cumin

½ Tsp Ground Coriander

1 Tbsp Adobo

½ Tbsp Curry

¼ Tsp Pepper

2 Tbsp Dijon Mustard

1 ½ Roasted Red Pepper, chopped

Mushrooms:

Half Package of
Baby Portabella’s,
sliced thin

½ Tbsp Thyme,
Chopped

1 Tbsp Salted
Butter

2 Pinches of Salt

Yogurt:

4 Large Dollops of Plain Greek Yogurt

Dash of Lemon Juice

1 Tsp Curry

1 Tsp Coriander

¼ Cup Scallions

Miscellaneous:

Oil for Pan Searing

Buns for the burgers

Procedure:

In a large mixing bowl combine spices, lamb and red peppers. Chill and set aside.
Melt butter in a pan. Add Mushrooms. Saute for 2 minutes. Add Salt. Let the juices release and add the thyme. Keep warm and reserve.
In a cereal bowl mix the yogurt and all the ingredients. Taste and adjust. Chill.
Heat oil in a sauté pan and heat until just smoking. Add patties and be cautious of hot oil splattering. Sear for 3 minutes on one side and 2-3 on the other. That should bring the patties to med-rare. Keep on the heat for longer to reach desired temp of the meat.
Toast the bun and spread yogurt on both sides. Add mushrooms and devour.

Ground lamb can be had at any butcher or the butcher at the supermarket could probably order it for you. It makes a delicious burger and it’s a good change-up from the usual ground chuck counterpart.

Greek yogurt is important here too, not only does it have a ton of protein and cultures but its flexible with a myriad of flavors because of its creaminess and tang.

Cranberry, Orange Ginger Granola

2007-11-08T13:33:00.001-08:00

Ingredients:

8 Cups Rolled Oats, Quick Oats
Zest of One Medium-sized Orange
1 Small Knob of Ginger, sliced into thin rounds
2/3 Cup of Dried Cranberries, chopped
2/3 Cup of Cashews (or mixed nuts; pecans, almonds etc)
2/3 Cup Water
2/3 Cup Sugar
2 Tbsp Cinnamon
½ Tbsp Allspice
¼ Tsp Nutmeg
¼ Tsp Vanilla Extract
2 Dashes of Salt

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Zest the orange and slice the ginger, place in small skillet with the water and sugar. Cook until simmering and allow ginger and lemon zest to infuse. Heat on med-low after sugar is dissolved for about 8 minutes. Let cool. Once cool, strain out the ginger and orange. Add the vanilla extract. Finely chop the orange zest and ginger. Reserve.
In a large baking/sheet pan/pyrex spread out the oats evenly. Add spices. Drizzle the infused syrup over the oats evenly. With a spatula, mix all the ingredients so that everything is coated well.
Place in the oven and bake for 15 minutes. Mix the oats again and rotate the baking sheet. Bake for another 15 minutes. The browner the granola gets, without burning, the crunchier it will be.
Remove pan from oven and empty granola into a bowl and allow it to cool. Add cranberries, nuts and the diced orange ginger. Mix well. Transfer to a sealed container and store in the refrigerator. It will keep indefinitely.

I make my own granola constantly. Its cheaper, you can flavor it however you want and get it crunchier than the store bought stuff. Want to cut down on time? Just use maple syrup instead of making your own syrup. Its what I use most often and it tastes great toasted. Honey works too. Use about 1 cup of maple syrup or honey. Mostly just make sure the syrup coats the oats evenly. I stay away from the dried store bought coconut because it has chemicals in it that make the strands stay white. Store bought coconut is also loaded with sugar. Different extracts work too, for example if you wanted to make a hazelnut granola sub out the vanilla extract. I’ve mixed almond & vanilla extracts together and that’s worked well too. Ovens bake differently, I have an old oven that bakes unevenly, if you have a newer oven, 350 degrees is probably a better temperature to bake at.

Butternut Squash & Apple Soup

2007-10-18T10:45:00.001-07:00

Ingredients:

1 2.5Lbs. Butternut Squash
1.5” Piece of Ginger (xtra used for broth reinforcement)
½ Macintosh or Cortlandt, peeled (Reserve skin and cores for stock reinforcement)
½ Onion
5 Tbls Salted Butter
½ Cup Maple Syrup
Apple Jack or Calvados
½ Cup of Cream (Can use water also)

Stock Reinforcement

3 Cups of Chicken Broth
1 Bay Leaf
Apple Cores & Skin
¼ Onion, Sliced
2 Small Cloves of Garlic
½ Stalk of Celery

Procedure:

Cut squash in half lengthwise. Roast squash at 400 degrees F for approximately 1 hour. At the 30 minute mark rotate the pan. At the 45 and 50 minute mark give it a check. When the squash is done it should be soft and easy to spoon out. Allow it to cool.
While the squash is roasting, dice up the ginger, core and cut the apples, slice the onion. Add butter to the pot you’ll be preparing the soup in. Melt the butter at a medium heat and add the onions. Let them soften and when they begin to brown add the apples and ginger. Reduce heat slightly continue to cook.
In a separate pan pour in the chicken stock. Add apple skins, cores, celery, onion scraps, garlic and bay leaf. Cook at medium to high heat for at least 15-20 minutes.*
Carmelized “sucs” will start to form at the bottom of the pan you are cooking the onion mixture in, deglaze with the Apple Jack (Pour the measured amount in off the flame) and scrape up all the sucs (scrape with a rubber spatula or wooden spoon so you don’t scratch up the bottom of the pan).
The squash should be cool at this point. Scoop it out and add to a food processor with the maple syrup and cream. Add a small amount of water if the mixture is too thick. Puree.
Add onion mixture to food processor. Puree. Pour pureed mixture back into the soup pot. Strain the reinforced broth into the squash/onion mixture. Stir and mix well. Taste and adjust. Keep warm until ready to serve.

*Storebought broth is just not that flavorful and its usually over salted. Reinforcing the broth in this recipe makes a big difference.

Dill Yogurt & Sundried Tomato Chicken Salad

2007-10-18T10:17:00.001-07:00

Ingredients:
-1 Rotisserie Chicken
-6 Baby Carrots (or one whole carrot)
-3 Stalks Celery
-1 Macintosh Apple
-¼ Onion, diced
-8 Sundried Tomato Wedges
-¾ Cup of Plain Yogurt
-¼ Cup Dijon Mustard
-Lemon
-Salt
-2 Dill Branches

The picture is more fancy than chicken salad needs to be, especially when you will just be throwing all the ingredients together. This recipe is really easy and the time is absorbed only by the cutting/slicing of the vegetables and the breakdown of the chicken which shouldn’t take more than ten minutes. I substitute yogurt for mayonnaise in everything recently and its much healthier. Dice up the dill and mix it with yogurt, lemon and salt.. After the veggies, fruit and chicken are sliced and diced add everything else. Taste and adjust the seasoning.

Seared Tuna with Lavender Risotto & Orange Supremes

2007-10-01T10:51:00.000-07:00

Tuna :

1 Lbs Tuna, cut into 4 even
segments
Panko Bread Crumbs
Olive Oil

Ponzu Glaze :

60ml Soy Sauce
15ml Rice Vinegar
30ml Mirin
15ml Fish Oil
½ Lime, Juiced
¼ Cup Brandy
3 Tbsp Sugar

Risotto :

500g Purple Cauliflower
1L Chicken Stock
2 Tbsp Lavender
1 ½ Cups Heavy Cream
300g Arborio Rice
125ml White Wine
Butter
2 Tbsp Parmiggiana
Reggiano
½ Vidalia Onion, ciseler
1 Bay Leaf
Salt

Garnish :

1 Large Navel Orange,
supremes

1. Risotto: Bring stock to a boil and cook purple cauliflower. Boil Cream with lavender and reduce. Combine half the stock, cauliflower and cream in a blender and puree. Set aside.

2. Melt butter in a sautoir and soften the onions without coloration. Add rice and bay leaf and cook until chalky white. Deglaze with white wine and reduce.

3. Add 1 cup of remaining stock and let the rice absorb it. Continue to add ½ cups of stock until rice is just tender. Set aside.

4. Ponzu: Combine soy sauce, rice vinegar, mirin and lime in a small sateuse. Bring to a simmer. Pull the pan off the heat and add brandy. Ignite and reduce slightly. Whisk in fish oil. Add sugar and cook until a syrup consistency develops. Keep warm and reserve.

5. Slice oranges into supremes.

6. Finish: In a small sautoir combine risotto, parmiggiana, lavender/cauliflower cream puree and a small dollop of butter and reheat. Taste and adjust. Place in the center of 4 hot bowls.

7. Tuna: Dip the top of the tuna filet’s into oil. Then dip the tops into panko bread crumbs that have been laid out on a plate. Heat a sauteuse with blended oil and sear the tops of the filets. Flip and sear bottom portion. Place on sizzle platter and drizzle ponzu glaze on top of tuna. Replace tuna into bowls atop risotto. Garnish with orange supremes.

Apple Beet Compote in Puff Pastry with Vacherins

2007-10-01T10:28:00.001-07:00

Pate Feuilletee Shells :

250g Puff Pastry
Egg Wash

Compote :

400g Granny Smith Apples
50g red Beet, Macedoine
¼ Cup Apple Jack
30g Granulated Sugar
50g Butter

Vacherin :

5 large egg whites
¾ cup granulated sugar
1 ¼ cups powdered sugar

Beet Syrup :

½ Cup Beet Water, Strained
½ Cup Sugar

1. Vacherin: Prepare a day ahead of time! Preheat oven to 200 degrees Fahrenheit. Pour egg whites into mixing bowl. Turn on tabletop mixer at medium speed and add granulated sugar a tablespoon at a time. Whip to stiff peaks (8 minutes). Remove bowl and sift in 10-x, folding gently as not to deflate the meringue. Pour mixture into pastry bag with small-mid size tip. Portion out small mushroom shape and size caps on top of a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Place in oven and bake for 1 hour or until firm to the touch. Turn off oven and let meringues sit 4-5 hours or overnight.

2. Preheat conventional oven to 500 degrees Fahrenheit.

3. Wash Beets and remove Greens. Bring 4 cups of water water to a boil and add beets. Cook until a paring knife easily slides into the flesh (Appx. 20 minutes). Cool and remove the skin and stem. Cut into macedoine. Reduce beet water until ½ cup remains. Add sugar and make simple syrup. Set aside.

4. Peel and core apples. Rub with lemon to stop browning. Coarsely chop apples.

5. Melt butter in sautoir. Add apples & beets and cook on medium heat with parchment lid. Once the juices have exuded remove the lid and stir. Remove the apple/beet mixture and cool.

6. Take pan off the heat and flambé with apple jack. Deglaze and reduce until syrupy, pour over compote. Set aside.

7. Roll out pate feuilletee dough to 1/8” thick.

8. Using circular mold cut 8 rounds from rolled out dough. In 4 of the pate circles cut out a circle in the middle so it looks like a cheerio or wheel. Place on top of the whole pate round. There should be 4 pate rounds with 4 pate wheels on top. Refrigerate until firm (5 minutes or more depending on heat in kitchen. Brush with egg wash and place in oven. Reduce heat to 450 degrees Fahrenheit. Bake until golden brown and cooked on the inside, appx. 35 minutes. Let cool when done.

9. Assembly: Place compote inside of puff pastry shells and nap the rest over the side. Place vacherin caps on top and around plate. drizzle beet syrup atop vacherins.

Oven-Roasted Tomato Stuffed with Truffles, Portabella & Pignoli’s

2007-07-24T14:18:00.000-07:00

Serves 4

Ingredients:

4 Plum Tomatoes
4 Bay Leaves, crushed
4 Sprigs Thyme
1 Teaspoon Coarse Salt
Olive Oil, to coat

1 Package Portabella Mushrooms, finely chopped
1 Preserved Black Truffle, finely chopped
1/8 Teaspoon White Truffle Oil
1 Tablespoon Butter
2 Tablespoons Dry White Wine
Salt
½ Cup Pignoli Nuts

Procedure:

Monder the tomatoes: Bring water to a boil (enough to cover the tomatoes). De-stem the tomatoes and on the opposite side make an “X” with a paring knife. Drop the tomatoes in the water for no more than 90 seconds. Take the tomatoes out with a slotted spoon and shock in an ice-bath. Peel off the skin, slice in half horizontally, remove the seeds.
Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Fahrenheit. On a baking sheet with parchment, place the tomato halves in a row. Sprinkle the crushed bay leaves, thyme leaves, thyme stems, salt and coat with olive oil. Bake for 1-2 hours.
Rinse the mushrooms and finely chop. Chop truffle. Heat butter in a skillet and add the mushrooms and truffle. Saute for 2 minutes. Add salt. Saute for another minute and add white wine. Cover with parchment. Keep heat on medium-low for another 2 minutes or until all the liquid has evaporated. Add truffle oil, reserve and keep warm.
Toast the pignoli nuts in the same skillet until lightly browned. Add to mushroom mixture.
When the tomatoes are done, remove the bay leaves and thyme stems. Stuff tomatoes with mushroom mixture and serve with a protein.

Potato Pancakes with Truffled Portabella & Creme Fraiche

2007-07-19T12:45:00.001-07:00

Serves 4

Ingredients:

2 Packages of Portabella Mushrooms
3 Tablespoons of Butter (1.5 for each package)
Salt
1/8 Teaspoon Truffle Oil

4 Idaho Russet Potatoes
Salt & Pepper
Clarified Butter or Olive Oil
Crème Fraiche

Equipment:

-Food Processor with shredding attachment (looks a lot like a cheese grater)

Procedure:

1. Chop mushrooms fine.

2. Heat butter in a medium skillet and sauté mushrooms for 2 minutes. Add 2 generous pinches of salt. Let the liquid evaporate and cook until all the liquid is gone. Add truffle oil (This oil is strong so be careful when adding, alternatively add more if the taste is too mild). Keep warm and reserve.

3. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Wash potato skins and peel. Place peeled potatoes in water until ready to use to prevent oxidation. Heat a skillet with clarified butter or oil until just smoking. Using a food processor with the shredding attachment shred the potatoes one at a time. Place shreds in a paper towel and squeeze out all the water.

4. Place potato shreds in the skillet, add salt and pepper and shape into a pancake. Brown on both sides and bake in the oven for 1-2 minutes depending on the thickness of the pancake (more time will be needed if the pancake is very thick).

5. Place on plate and add mushrooms and crème fraiche.

6. Garnish with chopped chives.

Tapas

2007-07-19T12:24:00.000-07:00

Serrano Wrapped Fig with Toasted Pignoli Nuts and Chive

Ingredients:

¼ Lbs. Serrano Ham
1 Package Dried Figs
1 Small Package of Pignoli Nuts
2 Pinches of Cayenne Red Pepper
1 Pinch of Salt
1 Bunch Chives

Procedure:

*The assembly is different than pictured. I think its best not to chop all the ingredients for the sake of aesthetics but the assembly is easier if everything is chopped. Let time decide. The flavors are the same, plus there’s the added surprise textures that are wrapped in the ham.

1. Destem figs. And shape into a wheel.

2. Carefully wrap the Serrano around the fig so that a cylinder is formed.

3. Toast the pignoli’s with salt and cayenne until lightly browned.

4. Drop a proportionate amount of nuts on top of the fig leaving enough room to seal the ham around them.

5. Use the chive as a wrap and encircle the fig and ham. Tie a knot and serve.

Award-Winning Tapas

2007-07-19T11:44:00.001-07:00

This recipe placed in the 'Tapas from Coast to Coast'

Machego & Marcona Almond Crostini with a Sherry Vinegar Reduction

Ingredients:

1 Cup Spanish Sherry Vinegar
1 Teaspoon Whole Coriander Seed
1 Teaspoon Whole Black Peppercorns
2 Bay Leaves
1/4 Cup Sugar

Machego Cheese, sliced into squares no larger than baguette rounds
Marcona Almonds
Salt & Pepper

Procedure:

1. Toast baguette rounds until lightly brown.

2. In a small skillet pour sherry, coriander seeds, peppercorns and bay leaves and simmer until reduced by half. Strain and pour back into the same skillet. Add sugar until a syrupy consistency is attained. Reserve.

3. Slice Machego into squares and refriegerate.

4. Heat up a separate small skillet and toast almonds with salt and pepper until lightly browned.

5. Assembly: Place cheese on top of crostini, with almonds. Drizzle Sherry Vinegar reduction on tapas and around the plate.

Tapas

2007-07-18T17:15:00.002-07:00

Stuffed Piquillo Pepper with Serrano Ham, Petite Basque and Pimenton Mayo on a Crostini

8 Small Piquillo Peppers
1 Baguette
1 Cup Mayonnaise
1 Tablespoon Pimenton
1/4 Teaspoon Cayenne Pepper
1 Small Handful of Chives, sliced thin
Petite Basque Cheese
1/8 Lbs. Serrano Ham

1. Roast Piquillo Peppers at 450 degrees fahrenheit for 10 minutes until skin is scorched, wrinkled or loose. Place in bowl, cover with plastic and let cool for 10 minutes. Remove skin and seeds. Reserve. (If you only jarred piquillo's are available use them.)
2. Slice baguette into 1/4" thick rounds. Toast until lightly browned. Set Aside.
3. Make mayonnaise (prefably homemade but storebought will be fine) and add Pimenton and cayenne. Mix well. Refrigerate.
4. Chop chives into thin slivers or on the bias.
5. Slice cheese into rectangles no larger than the ham.
6. Wrap ham around cheese and stuff into peppers.
7. Spread pimenton mayo on toasted bread and place stuffed pepper on top.
8. Garnish with sliced chives.

Tea-Centric Cocktail Recipes

2007-07-10T10:39:00.000-07:00

Sweet Dreams

Chamomile Tea
Wild Flower Honey
Lavender
Lemon Juice or wedges
Vodka

I don't have measurements for this one. I brewed a cup of chamomile tea with a small amount of lavender. If you're using loose leaf tea let it steep for 5 minutes. Mix in honey and let dissolve. Crush a wedge or 2 of lemon into the tea add about a shot or 2 of vodka. Shake with ice in a martini shaker or tumble with ice and serve.

Easy Tea

2 parts rum
2 parts triple sec
6 parts unsweetened, fresh brewed iced tea
1 part sour mix
splash club soda

shake and serve.

Scalliflower & Vanilla Bisque

2007-07-09T13:40:00.000-07:00

Bisque:

1/2 Head Cauliflower
1/2 Lbs Bay Scallops
3 Tbsp Cognac
1 3/4 Cups Heavy Cream
1/2 Tspn Pure Vanilla Extract
1/4 Cup Vidalia Onion, ciseler
1 Liter Chicken Stock
1/2 Tbsp Salted Butter
Salt & White Pepper

Procedure:

1. Bring stock to a boil. Break down Cauliflower, destemming and reserving the fleurets. Add cauliflower to stock.
2. In a separate pan reduce cream by half (double-cream)
3. Saute scallops in butter and salt until just done. Flambe scallops with cognac and deglaze. Set aside.
4. Melt butter in same pan and saute onion at low-medium heat for 15 minutes to extract sugars.
5. Puree scallops, double-cream and onions. Reserve.
6. Puree cauliflower and stock. Add more stock if puree is too thick.
7. Combine puree's in a large sauce pot and reheat to infuse flavors. Add vanilla. Season with salt and pepper. Taste and adjust.
8. Serve with warm nutmeg grissini's or sesame breadsticks.