A Curious Cupful

Something New

2010-08-01T13:28:00.000-04:00

Hi old friends.

I'd like to introduce you to the long awaited, long-time work in progress, Kaitie Rose Cakes.

www.kaitierosecakes.com

From small batch recipes in my kitchen to photo shoots in friends apartments, Kaitie Rose is officially in business! Currently based in Brooklyn, Kaitie Rose is now serving New York City and surrounding areas (we will travel...call with inquiries!!)

What does this mean for A Curious Cupful? Well the news is sweet. Quite literally. You may see a number of changes coming soon to this page, particularly that subject matter will generally focus on all things celebration cake-centric. Not so many veggies, lots of fruit, fillings, frostings and decoration. Visits to the Greenmarket in search of the best seasonal flavors. And no shortage of stories and recipes!

Also, check out our soon to be expanding Facebook page, where you may find a recipe or two from time to time as well... (up next, Plum and Currant Jam!)

Speaking of which those plums are calling. So that's the short and sweet of it folks! I could wait to share the news. As always thanks for swinging through here to catch up on what's cooking. Looking forward to sharing the journey ahead with you all!

Homemade

2010-04-06T23:26:00.003-04:00

There are times in life when I am demanding. Specifically, they are Saturday and Sunday mornings when Russ sleeps in late and I am hungry and we are in need of a trip to the grocery store and there is no milk left for cereal. Generally I pout on the couch, trying to ignore the roaring rumble in my stomach until Russ wakes up and makes something genius out of the scraps left from the week's shopping.

I'm not proud of this. So, recently I decided to do something for the betterment of both myself and Russ's state of weekend well-being: I made breakfast. Biscuits to be exact. I'd been eyeing a recipe in Alice Water's new cookbook, In the Green Kitchen, for true, southern style buttermilk biscuits. The book, which highlights staple cooking techniques taught by well seasoned masters, boasted one photo of baking soda leavened biscuits too beautiful to ignore.

So ignore it I did not. I woke up early. Tip toeing around the kitchen, defly pulling out mixing bowls and baking sheets, I had grand plans. I'd time the biscuits to be browning in the oven just as Russ would start to wake up...the scent of the baking buns tickling his nose and making him fall in love with me all over again. He'd wake up and ask, "are you baking something," and just at that moment the timer would ding and I'd pull out a tray of fluffy, buttery, breakfast. It was my turn for genius.

I pulled out the flour. I cut cold pieces of butter. I pulled out the salt, the sugar and the... Oh shoot. No baking powder!! Major roadblock! I panic. I fret. I feel a familiar Saturday morning grumble and pout spreading across my face. But I am determined. I flip madly through the pages of the cookbook and discover, a ha! Of course! Right there in fact on the very page I was reading...I can make my own baking powder!

Homemade recipe #1: Baking powder
1 part baking soda
2 parts cream of tartar

Refreshed, renewed, I press on. I rub the butter into the flour. I pull out the... Oh shoot shoot shoot. No buttermilk!! I remember that we are due for that weekend grocery store trip and I grumble a Charlie Brown grumble, envisioning and dark, angry curly cue swirling around over my head in frustration. Back to the books. Homemade buttermilk? Impossible. But...wait...Yes! Possible.

Homemade recipe #2: Buttermilk
1 cup whole milk
1 Tablespoon lemon juice

The mixture looked strange and curdled, but then that is exactly as it should be, and having made it through the recipe with everything else in stock, I can attest, it makes things taste as they should taste as well.

After lightly kneading, gently rolling and carefully cutting, I added one extra homemade touch I love to find an occasion for. A light sprinkle of vanilla sugar, made simply from storing leftover scraped vanilla bean pods in an airtight jar of granulated sugar, gives simple sweets that little kick of...mmm, this is tasty indeed.

And well, they were. No I did not prepare like a chef. No, the biscuits didn't wake Russ from his sleep but they reheated well, and frankly, would be quite delicious at any temperature. And I'm pretty sure he still loves me. I mean, I made breakfast. Homemade. From scratch.

Homemade recipe #3

Buttermilk Biscuits

adapted from a recipe in Alice Water's beautiful new cookbook, "In the Green Kitchen"

2 1/2 cups flour

2 1/4 teaspoons baking powder

1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt

1/4 cup plus 1 Tablespoon cold, unsalted butter, cut in small pieces

approximately 1 cup buttermilk

3 Tablespoons sugar

Cream to brush the tops

Vanilla sugar to sprinkle

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.

2. Whisk together flour, baking powder and salt.

3. Rub half of the butter into the mixture until it's crumbly. With the other half, press each piece into flat discs and toss in flour.

4. Make a well and pour the buttermilk into the mixture.

5. Stir just until the dry ingredients are fully incorporated with the milk.

6. On a well floured surface, knead the dough gently, only a few times, until the dough comes together.

7. Roll dough out to about a 1/2 inch thickness. Pierce the dough through the the tip of a fork, across the rolled out area.

8. Use a circle cutter, 2 1/2 to 3 inches wide, and press straight down, not turning, to cut biscuits.

9. Sprinkle with sugar and bake for 8-12 minutes, or until tops are lightly golden brown.

10. Hot out of the oven, brush tops lightly with cream and sprinkle again with sugar.

Yield: approximately 12 biscuits, plus scraps for snacks!! (re rolling scraps is not advised as kneading the dough again will make them tough and not nearly as delicious)

Cake and Ice Cream

2010-03-13T18:26:00.001-05:00

It is such a feeling to accomplish something you've been wanting to do for so long. Such a wonderful feeling! Now don't get too excited, there's still a long way to go, but last weekend my little cake venture took a big leap forward. Packing up the car, I trucked eight cakes, frosting, chocolate, spices, and nearly every kitchen tool I own from Brooklyn to New Haven, Connecticut, home to my friend/photography genius Sam. So ensued a cake photo-shoot extravaganza in preparation for my website-to-be. And I thought you might like a behind the scenes peek. Want to see?

Light and beautiful and sunny, we tore the apartment to pieces, finding just the right spot at just the right time of day to make the cakes look absolutely heaven sent (even if all the mess around them was anything but...).

Now, now, I said a peek. You'll get to see more as the project unfolds! I can't wait to share more.

And I won't leave you empty handed here today. In fact, I have another tidbit of news to share that is, for sweet teeth around the world, about as exciting as news can get... Last Monday, I came home to a brand new, beautiful, shiny, glorious and amazing ice cream maker! An absolute dream come true. I'm enthusiastic, you can tell. But why not be? Homemade ice cream is in itself like nothing else.

So of course I wasted no time in scrounging together anything we had in our kitchen to make the inaugural batch. A handful of cloves...a pinch of cinnamon...dark, thick maple syrup... The result, spiced maple ice cream that tasted like french toast and caramel and all things wintry and wonderful.

Ok, you caught me. I'm snacking on it right now. In fleece pj pants, using a take-out Chinese spoon because I'm avoiding the dirty dishes. But it's a cold and rainy Saturday night. Second to a hot summer day, the stuff that ice cream was made for!

In fact, I think I'm going to see about finishing up that cup right now.... Wishing you all a happy Saturday night, I'm signing off with love for accomplishments big and small, cake, and ice cream.

Spiced Maple Ice Cream

1 cup whole milk
1 pint heavy cream
12 whole cloves
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
2/3 cup grade B maple syrup
6 egg yolks

1. Bring the milk, cream, cloves and cinnamon to a simmer. Turn off heat, cover and let steep for 30 minutes.
2. In a separate pot, bring maple syrup to a boil. Let boil for about 5 minutes.
3. Turn heat off syrup, and slowly pour the cream mixture into the syrup (careful, the mixture will spatter!)
4. In a medium sized bowl, slowly whisk the maple and cream mixture into the egg yolks.
5. Return the tempered mixture to a pot on the stove. Over medium heat, stir constantly until mixture coats the back of a spoon.
6. Quickly pour mixture through a fine strainer into a clean bowl resting in an ice bath.
7. Refrigerate overnight and prepare next day according to your ice cream maker's instructions!

Yield: approx. 1 quart

It Doesn't Look Pretty

2010-02-23T20:45:00.000-05:00

I hate umbrellas in New York. I think they are misused. Tools to poke and jab, weapons rather than shields, excuses to walk blindly around the streets without a care who you are pushing into a puddle. All manners run straight down into the gutter when those darn city umbrellas open.

Today was a rainy, rainy, windy and wet day. So, in the name of manners and what's right in the world, I decided to don my rain boots and rain jacket, honorably leaving the umbrella at home. I returned tonight dripping, my jeans stuck to my frozen legs, frustratingly cursing both umbrellas, lack of umbrellas, and ultimately cold winter rain itself.

It was indeed a situation only remedied by a big, steaming bowl of hot soup.

Now, as much as I hate umbrellas I'm starting to love...crock pots. If my grumbling hasn't painted a picture of a grumpy old woman in a flannel nightie, then my love for crock pots may have just pushed me over the edge into tapered khakis, bifocals and a walker. But the truth is, when you don't have time to slowly stew veggies in a stock pot, a crock pot is just the thing! As if the morning knew just what the day had in store for my chilly umbrella-less-jean-clad legs, by the drizzle of morning light Russ started a mixture of white beans, split peas, chicken and spices, leaving it to slowly warm, stew and heat up until it sprawled a spicy trail down the hallway, meeting me upon returning home tonight.

And oh, it was delicious. Slightly spiced with curry and cumin, it was thick, stick-to-your-ribs, too-thick-to-be-soup soup. The best kind in my opinion. Really, really delicious. But...well, not so pretty.

I warned you. Not elegant, brightly colored, or classy-looking in any way. But hearty, warm, comforting and just the pairing for an ugly, rainy and not so pretty kind of day.

By the bottom of the bowl, my legs had warmed, my belly was full and my distaste for umbrellas had changed to the taste of shallots and beans, thyme and ground pepper. And you know, as I've mentioned before, one of the best qualities of soup is that it's just soup. Flavorful and at times deceivingly simple, it comes without bells and whistles. Just a bowl and a spoon. And bite by bite it warms you up, whittling away wet worries from the day.

Chance of rain? Umbrella or not, no matter how old or grumpy, and appearances aside, this little soup is just the thing to turn an ugly day into something lovely and tasty and in it's own simple soup-like way, sort of beautiful.

Split Pea and White Bean Soup with Chicken

1 pound green split peas
1 pound dry cannellini beans
2 large shallots, finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
1 pound chicken thighs, skinless, cut into pieces
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon curry powder
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
30 turns of a pepper mill
3 teaspoons kosher salt
2 quarts of vegetable or chicken stock
Asiago cheese for garnish

1. Stir ingredients together in a crock pot.
2. Cook on low for 5 hrs, and on high for 2 hrs, stirring occasionally for even cooking.
3. Serve! If you prefer a thinner soup, stir in a light white wine to achieve desired consistency.

Yield: 8 warm-you-up servings

Delicious

2010-02-17T23:22:00.000-05:00

The theme for my friend Josh's birthday party potluck was simple. "Delicious."

With that mission in mind, and in the spirit of birthdays as celebrations steeped richly in traditions of cake and ice cream and sweets in the name of you just being you, I decided to bring dessert. I immediately started to think of layers of cake holding up buttery frosting...but before I got carried away, I figured I should ask the birthday boy what he thought sounded, well, delicious.

"Josh," I said, "when you envision eating dessert at the end of a perfect birthday potluck, what are you eating?"

"Well," he pondered out loud, "I'm not a big fan of chocolate. And I like cheesecake, but I just had cheesecake last weekend, and I like apples, and fruit crisps, and things that are crunchy, and I always like caramel..."

So. Not cake and not exactly an exact answer. But birthday wishes should never go unfulfilled and dessert is not truly dessert if it is not indeed delicious, so I set my mind to thinking. A little cheesecake...apples...caramel...crunchy... Some mixing here and matching there, and before too long those ingredients spelled out a recipe for this:

Cheesecake cupcakes with oatmeal crisp crusts, sauteed cinnamon apples and apple cider caramel. Which, all together, spelled out this:

A mouthful of a name in description, we resorted to knighting the little creations, "Clayton Cups," after the honoree himself, though agreed the name didn't do the 3 bite-sized creations quite the justice they deserved (no offense Josh). But whatever the name, what these jumbly delights were was one big mouthful of tastiness! Creamy cheesecake was punched up with soft, spiced apples, the required element of crunch and the not to be forgotten, dark caramel fancied-up for the occasion with a hint of cider.

Bellies packed nearly full with the evenings perfectly delicious mish-mosh of captain crunch fried chicken, perogies, peach kugel and baked ziti, the apple crisp cheesecake-ettes were the perfect odd pairing to a good bottle of red wine and great company.

So not a seven layer cake, but a birthday done right all the same. I've always loved home cooking because, reminiscent of backyard mud pies and sandbox stews, no matter how strange or unexpected the ingredients you put together, it doesn't have to be about subtlety, complementing flavors, doing things right, or neatly or even that well. It's about having fun, making friends happy, stirring a bunch of things together in a pot and and sharing what you've stewed up. And sometimes, when life is good, and you're feeling pot-lucky on your birthday, everything comes out just, truly delicious.

Mini Apple Crisp Cheesecakes

1 recipe vanilla bean cheesecake

For the crust:
1/2 stick butter
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 cup oats
pinch of cinnamon
pinch of allspice

1. Combine sugar, oats, cinnamon and allspice. Cut in butter until mixture is crumbly.
2. Pat a thin layer of mixture into the bottom of cupcake liners. Bake at 350F for approx. 10 minutes, or until crisp.
3. Set aside.

For the apples:
2 Granny Smith apples
1 T butter
3 T brown sugar
3/4 t cinnamon

1. Peel apples and slice thinly. Cut each slice into thirds.
2. In a sautee pan, heat butter, sugar cinnamon and apples together until apples are soft, but still hold their shape.
3. Set aside.

For the caramel:
125 grams sugar
40 grams water
40 grams apple cider
1/2 can sweetened condensed milk
pinch of salt
1/4 t vanilla

1. Cook sugar and water over medium-high heat until golden brown.
2. Deglaze with cider.
3. Stir in condensed milk, salt and vanilla.
4. Let cool.

To assemble
Place three pieces of apple into each oatmeal crusted cupcake liner. Pour cheesecake mixture over apples, filling each liner 3/4 full. Using a piping bag, pipe* caramel ontop, in swirls, letters, dots or any shape that looks delicious. Bake at 250F, for approx 20 minutes, or until set.

*If you don't have piping bags on hand, fill a ziplock with caramel, twist it closed and cut a small hole in the corner of the bag. Voila; you are ready to pipe!!

Yield: 24 Clayton Cups

Where I've Been

2010-02-04T22:06:00.000-05:00

Well hi there.

Remember me? I hope so. Either way, I remember you and it feels good to be back. If I know you like I think I do, you are tapping your finger right now with that look in your eye which says, "Sooo. Kaitlin. Where you been, huh?" Ok my friends. We'll start with that.

Where have I been all this time? When I left you last there was blueberry jam on the stove and I was on my way to Maine. Well I made it there, and man oh man oh lobster and sea spray... It was a glorious time. At a campsite by the ocean Russ and I feasted on beer and oysters, more blueberries and smores every night. I ate my first live lobster, carrying it home on my lap squeemishly as it wriggled in a brown paper bag. I also ate my second live lobster and a number of lobster rolls, dressed in butter and piled between toasted white bread.

Back in New York, fall crept in and I turned another year older, celebrating my birthday with the annual tradition of an oversized breakfast at Clinton Street Baking Company: huge biscuits, a pile of eggs, thick sliced country ham and hot chocolate barely contained in a bowl of a mug.

Fall leaves and chilly winds accompanied a unique weekend trip which took me from city to farm. As a participant in Flying Pigs Farm's new program Farm Camp for Food Professionals, I gathered eggs, stomped around with heritage pigs, went maple sugar crazy at a sugar shack with syrup piled high on windowsills, sipped farm fresh, creamy milk and slaughtered a chicken. Yes. That's right. I killed a chicken.

One farm fresh-roasted chicken, a first coating of snow on city streets, 20 pounds of turkey, an ambitious pot of mashed potatoes, pie, latkes, Christmas cookies, a spice rubbed roast and two glasses of New Year's champagne later, I find myself catching up with you now in 2010.

Lately, I've been occupied with a project I'm really excited to share. It has always been a dream of mine to start a business of specialty cakes and well gosh darn it, I'm giving it a try. With a few projects under my belt I'm putting my whisk to work. Here's a peek at my most recent project, a 60th anniversary cake for a lovely Brooklyn couple, recently having renewed their vows over lemon curd and sweet vanilla bean cream frosting:

When I say I'm putting my whisk to work, what I really mean is that I've turned our apartment into a veritable workshop covered in sugar petals, cake forms, sketches, website plans, paper flowers, piping bags, cake scraps, and lots of hope.

I have a feeling this year is going to be great. Full of cake, stories and heaps of other grand things. I have a lot in store for your neglected bellies too. Paging through Julia Child's autobiography I plan to journey through a "boeuf bourginon" while we are in the height of stew weather. I have an enormous new flame colored dutch oven which is crying for a leg of lamb, red wine, figs and a dinner party. I have an oversized crate of eggs from my dear friends farm and an upcoming birthday for a certain cheesecake hungry friend we fed last year around this time.

So, I'm back. Thanks for missing me and hold on, because I'm feeling like if we plan the recipe just right, this year is going to be one heck of a feast.

Something Old, Something Blue

2009-08-22T18:49:00.001-04:00

I realize it may be premature for me to write about blueberries a week before I leave for a camping extravaganza in Maine, home of the best blueberries I've ever had to date (I'm remembering my first venture with pie crust in college, a wibbly-wobble-fantastic lattice top over a Maine blueberry filling)...but as I've had blue on the mind I think I'm going to go ahead and talk blueberries right now.

Historically it hasn't always been a love affair between me and blueberries. While I do remember picking sour little berries from a bush that grew wild in my childhood backyard, even then it was more the thrill of eating something off a branch than it was the flavor of the berry. A current fan, searching for an explanation as to why I've so long ignored blueberries, I think the answer is I just needed time. Strawberries are so sweet and beautiful, raspberries alluring and tartly distracting. I believe the truth is that each summer I've been inching towards blueberries but it hasn't been until just these past few months where I've finally been ready to sit down and have a one on one with the little blues.

A fresh, soft and bright pint of blueberries is a wonder I'm newly excited about. As you may remember I'm also newly excited this summer about jam. I look at fruit stands in the Greenmarkets around town and think, "Oo! Strawberry jam. Oh, raspberry jam. YES! blueberry jam!!" I know summer is an especially hot time of year to commit to standing in front of the stove top constantly stirring sugar and fruit as it cooks down. But it is also the ideal time to find ingredients for the best jams. So with a little sweat, and a big love for jam, I recently tied my hair back and set to the burners to whip up a batch with some market-fresh blueberries.

For something different I replaced a third of the sugar with light brown sugar. The result was a slightly warmer flavor but let's be real; it's really about the fruit and the fruit surely made itself known. Turning brilliant purple, and growing incredibly thick from the pectin in the berries, the finished product was truly mouthwatering; a proper challenge to strawberries and raspberries worldwide.

And just the thing to top off a dinner party cheesecake (a recipe you may remember from the winter, but summer-spiffed-up here with 1 tablespoon orange zest and about a teaspoon of cinnamon).

The result was a blue-finger lickin' good cake! The natural sweetness of the berries, brown-sugar enhanced over the slightly tart and warmly spiced cake is a combination I am excited to pass along to your own kitchens and dinner parties alike. And sure, you could use any berry you'd like and the recipe would work and be delicious. But with, well, I suppose a bit of a crush on blueberries at this point, I'm giddy to put them in the spotlight here.

So to long time blue fans, and young blueberry lovers, this jam is for you.

Brown Sugar Blueberry Jam

360 grams blueberries
100 grams brown sugar
150 grams granulated sugar

125 grams blueberries

125 grams blueberries

1. Over medium-high heat, let a medium sized sauce pan warm up, empty.
2. Once the pot is hot, add the first amount of blueberries and both sugars.
3. Cook, stirring constantly (with a heat-resistant spatula), until the blueberries cook down to a thick, jam like consistency. As it get thicker, the sugar will want to start caramelizing; if you see it turning brown on the bottom of the pot, take the pan off the heat, stir some more, and then throw it back on. Make sure you stir constantly! Use the spatula to scrape the bottom and the edges around the pan.
4. Once the blueberries are thick and you can almost smell them caramelizing, add the second amount of berries.
5. Stir until blueberries soften, and mixture returns to a boil.
6. Add the last measure, stirring for just a minute or two, until the mixture returns to a boil again.
7. Let cool in a heat resistant bowl...the jam will be really hot when it comes out of the pot!
8. Once cool, refrigerate (or eat).

Yield: a little over half a quart

*for the cheesecake recipe, go here. Do everything the same (though I'd use a regular graham crust rather than the pretzel version), and at the end add 1 tablespoon orange zest and 1 teaspoon cinnamon to combine.

CAKE.

2009-07-23T18:30:00.000-04:00

Wedding cake that is. My first one!

An fanciful idea 6 months ago quickly, this past month, become a reality. For my high school friend Rose (ie-posie, mop head and a long list of other old time nick names), I very excitedly assumed the role of wedding cake maker extraordinaire...though the extraordinaire was a gamble as the whole of the experience was new and challenging at every turn. New and challenging and wonderful, I should add. I feel like the occasion calls for fewer words this time around, and more pictures. Care to take a peek?

After a lot of eggs, butter and sugar, flour misting the air, chocolate to make frosting, some fondant and a lot of gum paste (sugar!) flowers, after the pink wore off my hands from dying frosting, after one long drive from New York, NY to State College, PA, air conditioning blasting, me white knuckled in the front seat hoping the cakes were okay back there in the trunk, pulling off at every other rest stop to check...we arrived at the day of the wedding, in the reception hall, ready to put it all together.

With the help of my expert assistant we cut dowels for support, placed cakes veeeery carefully, and attached flowers (at times strategically to cover those first-timer bumps and wiggles in the outer frosting). We chose to do this all in our fancy pants which means we are either natural born, hard core cakers, or a just a touch crazy.

White shirt and pink dress still white and light pink, we successfully put everything together just in time to scoot ourselves to the ceremony. It was beautiful and joyfully tear-filled, with a fine spritzing of good-luck rain hanging in the air around all the happy friends and family.

From rosie posie to Mrs. McLaughlin!

Back to the reception hall I paced around nervously in my sequined flats, waiting for the doors to open. Had the cakes survived the few hours past? Would they have collapsed into a pile of red velvet, chocolate frosted, top layer yellow cake mush?? Would they have melted and sagged into a sad sack of sweetness? I threw back a stiff, double gin and tonic while I waited for the verdict.

Finally, showtime. And folks, the show was great! Both cakes in tact, standing in the glow of little glass-cupped white candles...did I mention there was a grooms cake? A football field, by request of the bride for her forever PSU true fan, now hubbie.

I have to say, man oh man did I feel professional! But most of all, I was so proud and just so happy to be able to make my dear friend so pleased on her special day.

It was a great adventure from start to finish. Challenging at many points, though with a pay off priced so high I'd do it again in a second. Which I truly hope to do again soon (hear that Brooklyn brides? If you need cake, you let me know!)

I do...hope you enjoyed the show!

A Quiet Night with Cherry Cake

2009-06-30T21:13:00.000-04:00

When you find yourself at the cool end of a warm day, finished with work and settling onto your couch with a good movie and great company nearby, it is most certainly an occasion that calls for cake.

This fact is only further supported when you have the first of summer's cherries in your fridge, pink, red, and ruby...just waiting for some sugar.

I can personally attest to the fact that on a typical night it often requires great feats of strength to put down the chinese food take-out menu and make yourself something for dinner. Cake? On a weeknight? Who has the time?

Clatfoutis is your answer. Sounds French and fancy, yes. And well, French it is. But fancy? Not this cake. A classic dessert francais, typically baked with cherries though almost any fruit can be substituted, Clafoutis is almost like a custard, but golden brown on top and in this case packed with sweet and tart, brilliant, shiny cherries.

Like couch potatoes Russ and I spent Monday night wielded chopsticks, pitting cherries on the sofa, squirting pink juice on our arms and faces, thankful that our coffee table is already stained and that our carpet is dark...

During the first year of my time spent studying pastry, I took a class with one particularly snappy chef who was known to bring a tear to more than one sweet pastry-chef-in-the-making. Broad shouldered and angry eyebrowed, she never failed to make me chuckle on the days when she would scream, thick with the accent of rural Pennsylvania, "Class! Today we are going to attempt to make clah-FOO-die!"

No matter how you want to pronounce it, who can be angry when you are baking with a bowlful of these?

So. Why now is this dessert the answer? Flour and sugar stirred together, eggs and milk whisked in to combine, in less than a full sentence you are almost ready to put the cake in the oven. You don't even need to cut the cherries. And, in this particular recipe, like many others, there isn't a pat of butter to be found...so if you feel so inclined, pretend its not even dessert.

For this recipe I used muffin tins rather than the traditional round cake pan or skillet, creating mini clafoutis perfect for seconds. Or thirds. Or fourths...

(I just ran to the fridge and ate another one.)

On top of work and bills and meetings and errands, sometimes all it takes is a little cake to bring some well deserved quiet.

I will admit that baking the cake in the smaller muffin rounds created a darker edge than I'd have liked; make sure you keep an eye on the little guys so the outside doesn't burn! With this recipe they will souffle in the oven and sink a bit once they come out. It's okay. Taste one, you'll see.

If you aren't a cherry fan use sliced strawberries, peaches, blueberries or plums. All you need is a few minutes in your kitchen, a calm evening and an appetite for cake. Pick out a good movie, preheat the oven, and treat yourself to a little piece and quiet.

Cherry Clafoutis
adapted from The King Arthur Flour Company's Baking Companion

3/4 C flour
2/3 C sugar
3 eggs
1 1/4 C whole milk
1 1/4 t vanilla
2-3 cups pitted cherries, whole

1. Preheat the oven to 350F. Grease two muffin trays and set aside.
2. In a bowl whisk together flour and sugar.
3. In a separate bowl, whisk eggs until light and foamy.
4. Add milk and vanilla to eggs and whisk to combine.
5. Add egg mixture to flour in three additions, whisking to make sure there are no lumps!
6. Place 4 cherries into the cups of the greased muffin tray.
7. Fill 1/2 of each muffin cup with batter.
8. Bake for 25-30 minutes. A tester should come out of the cakes clean and the tops should just be turning slightly golden.

*An alternative to the muffin tins, as suggested by the cookbook authors, this recipe can be baked in a 9" cake pan for 40-45 min.

Yield:
approx. 20 miniature clah-FOO-dies!

An Hour Away

2009-06-02T21:07:00.001-04:00

Did we leave off somewhere with jam?

I almost can't remember, its been a set of those kind of weeks. Picking at leftovers in the fridge, ordering out...I hate to leave you for so long without a good snack. I really do. I had grand plans of coming back with a bang, a recipe for a gooey cake, or a magnificent new way to cook asparagus.

What I ended up with was a simple salad of spinach and tomatoes, and a decision that before ingenious chocolate cake needed to come a plain, simple get away. To clear the mind. And maybe to find a good eat somewhere out there too...

Only an hour away. The air was salty with a hint of sunscreen. On a quiet, slightly chilly Sunday, Fire Island was almost barren except for a handful of brave little girls in pink bathing suits, pockets of sandy horseshoe crab skeletons, a few stray runners and yes, also a good number of naked beach goers fishing, sleeping, tossing a frisbee and whatever else their chilly little behinds desired.

Strolling by all kinds, we wandered into the beach bum town of Kismet, complete with a village of uniquely individual houses with clever names carved into wood signs, no cars, one sweet shop and a hoppin' fish shack overlooking the pier. Starving and ready to eat anything, I had my first run in with clams on the half shell.

It went well.

Paired with iced tea, like the best part of chowder the firm little bites of seafood exploded with the flavors of a gourmet's take on seawater. I could have eaten at least a dozen more.

From empty clam shells we moved to soft shell crab sandwiches, served on crispy white bread toast just as it ought to be on the deck of a seafood pub blasting tunes from a neon jukebox inside. We got carried away with seriously fried onion rings and a big plate of fries...before I got to taking a picture of my sandwich for you I had eaten all of it.

So I took a picture of a pretty lighthouse instead.

I know, I know. Where's the toast? A lighthouse is no soft shell crab. But in their own way, they both leave you with a smile and sometimes, like going from Brooklyn to beach, something different is nice.

Feeling full and happy we started on the road home. I quickly fell asleep, into a coma of seafood and sandy toes, relaxed, slightly rosy from the sun and with a head full of wind swept, suncreeny crazy hair I never intended to share a picture of with anyone. (You'd thank me if you'd seen it.)

And now I'm back. There are strawberries at the market that are like nothing else. Tomatoes are popping up and sugar snap peas right beside. I've washed the sand from my feet and can just remember the salty taste of those clams...the hour away was needed and nice.

But it is good to be home. Better when there are strawberries around. And maybe it's time for that ingenious cake...

Enigma On Toast

2009-05-22T10:36:00.000-04:00

How is rhubarb like an avocado?

For just one tiny second, avert your thoughts from pies and strawberries and jam and cream, and think about this (just one second, I promise). We all know avocados are fruit, but generally not thought of as anything but a green veggie ideally paired with chips and a salted margarita. In the same way, rhubarb, technically a vegetable, is nestled in with pie pans and jam jars and all the sweet, fruity desserts of spring. A gardener's enigma: in a world of fruit parading as vegetables, is rhubarb the only vegetable playing dress up as fruit?

Just some fruit (or vegetable) for thought. And because disguise or not, it does seem that rhubarb belongs in sweet pie shells rather than salad bowls, lets get back to the sugar.

If you don't have time for cutting butter into pie dough, or you find your store shelves still waiting for summer strawberries...the answer is jam. Its quick, its sweet, and as you will see in a few short scrolls of your mouse, quite versatile in those moments requiring attention to sweet tooth needs (which can be very serious indeed).

From long, lanky stalks, rhubarb cut into little pieces turns to a confetti of pink and green, tart and tasty. Add a little sugar, a little heat, and one (heat resistant) spatula...

Jam baby!

Even if it weren't sweet and drool-inducingly delicious...not that I drooled..., this jam is soft and pink* and cheery. Vegetable? Good disguise indeed. I strongly believe that sometimes you need something lovely like this in your fridge, even just to look at while scanning the options. It is no coincidence then, I should note here too, that this simple recipe comes from a woman who I believe has mastered the art of using sweets to sweeten up more than the dessert hour, my favorite pastry chef Nancy Olson.

We've covered that this fruity vegetable is sneaky, pink, cheery and occasionally inducing of a lip smack or two... but is it all just for toast? Oh no. No my friends. Think ice cream. Stir it into your oatmeal. For a hot-like-summer spring day, just mix in a bit of the syrupy smooth part into a glass of tonic water for rhubarb soda.

And toast works too.

Fruit, vegetable... a little sugar and jam is the word. I suppose you could also call it a compote, but calling it jam makes its something you can eat for breakfast without flirting at dessert. And I think that's grand.

So go think biscuits, ice cream, ricotta, crisp sodas, toast, yogurt, cereal, shortcake...

*The color of your jam will depend on the color of the rhubarb you buy- if its a greener bunch, don't be discouraged if your jam turns out a little brownish. It will still taste great!!

Nancy Olson's Rhubarb Jam

360 grams rhubarb
250 grams sugar

125 grams rhubarb

125 grams rhubarb

1. Over medium-high heat, let a medium sized sauce pan warm up, empty.
2. Once the pot is hot, add the first amount of rhubarb and sugar.
3. Cook, stirring constantly, until the rhubarb cooks down to a thick, jam like consistency. As it get thicker, the sugar will want to start caramelizing; if you see it turning brown on the bottom of the pot, take the pan off the heat, stir some more, and then throw it back on. Make sure you stir constantly! Use the spatula to scrape the bottom and the edges around the pan.
4. Once the rhubarb is thick and you can almost smell it caramelizing, add the second amount of rhubarb.
5. Stir until rhubarb softens, and mixture returns to a boil.
6. Add the last measure, stirring for just a minute or two, until the mixture returns to a boil again.
7. Let cool in a heat resistant bowl...the jam will be really hot when it comes out of the pot!
8. Once cool, refrigerate (or eat).

Yield: a little over half a quart.

It's ALIVE!! A tale of soft shell crabs

2009-05-13T19:01:00.002-04:00

I tell you, times as of late have been scary in my kitchen.

First, it was the invasion. Coming out of that on the winning side with bread pudding leftovers for days, the coast seemed clear. At the Greenmarket beautiful piles of greens, towers of asparagus and the first bright pink stalks of rhubarb started to fill in around the ramp mounds. A curvy bunch of baby bok choy stole my heart and with the sun shining, my flip flops flopping the pavement, I headed home, unknowing all the way, to see what Russ had picked up from the fish market.

Part of me feels as though I should stop letting him go. If you recall the last thing he pulled from that brown paper fish bag... Well this time it was worse. Or better. Depending on if you asked me before or after I ate it.

We'd been planning on taking a stab at cooking soft shell crabs for a few weeks and gathering information on how to do it right along the way. Most reliable sources said, "Buy the ones that are still moving. If they don't move, don't bother." This advice was largely why I was responsible for picking up the produce. I'm an adventurous eater but much more so when the breading and batter and heat has been applied. I'm not sure how much movement I expected but when Russ pulled out the first crab, legs squirming violently in the air around his hand what I didn't expect to do was to scream like a girl.

Which I did. In response to my squimish squeeling he replied, "All you have to do is cut off their faces and rip out their gills." Unassumingly charming as he tickled their bellies, I silently wondered if there was an evil side to this man before me. Watching the poor little crabs tapping their frenzied little legs on the cutting board as the knife came down on their soft little shells... So violent.

But. So. Delicious. Once I successfully repressed the image of that one, still-twitching claw, covered in egg wash and cornmeal, not yet fried and not yet dead...I could let myself enjoy the explosively rich, velvety, salty and amazing flavor of the crabs. They were aboslutely as insanely delicious as the scene in my kitchen was perhaps insane during their preparation.

The steamed bok choy was light and good for the heart, but as the crabs sizzled in the pan all I really wanted was a plate piled high exclusively with soft shells. After I took this picture I added another one to my plate on the spot.

If you aren't so lucky to have a fresh fish market around the corner (or aren't so brave or don't have a crazy bearded butcher for a kitchen companion), you can make a delicious soft shell crab meal from fresh, non-moving crabs that have simply died in refrigeration; it happens quickly once the crabs are put on ice (you'll still have to clean them!). Just make sure you know where they came from and when they arrived in your store.

I know I've painted a gruesome picture here. But I promise I did it because I believe you can't make it through the season without having at least...6 crabs. They are highlight-of-your-week, worth-cutting-off-a-crabs-face scrumptious. And sometimes you need to see proof that you can make it through the other side to get there.

Well I'm on the other side. And I'm going back for more.

Cornmeal Battered Fried Soft Shell Crabs

5 Soft shell crabs
2 eggs
Cornmeal to coat
Sea salt to taste
Black pepper to taste
Fresh thyme, to taste

1. Using kitchen shears, snip off the eyes and mouth of the crab. (This will be about 1/8 of an inch behind the eyes, cutting straight across.)
2. Snip around the edge of the body, folding back the top of the shell. A fingerlike structure should be visible inside the body.
3. Either with scissors or with your fingers, remove this structure from both sides.
4. On the belly, pull back the flap, referred to as the apron, and snip it off as well.

For help with cleaning your crabs, check out this video.

5. The yellow gel-like substance you'll see in the crab can be clean out, or left to be eaten. Its edible, but it may make you feel better to clean it out.
6. Rinse crabs thoroughly under water. Pat dry.
7. Dip in egg wash.
8. Mix salt, pepper and thyme into cornmeal. Coat crabs with mixture.
9. Coat the bottom of a frying pan in a thin layer of olive oil. Heat.
10. Over medium heat, place crabs in pan. Cook on both sides until golden brown.

Yield:
5 crabs

Attack of the Ramps

2009-04-28T16:50:00.000-04:00

It could be a tag line on an illuminated poster of a B movie, a la horror genre.

"They came out of the fields. They invaded New York. They're green, they're alive, they're..."

Ramps! Horror turns to happy endings. With winter officially behind us, ramps are the earth's way of assuring us its spring. Giving us a pat on the back, saying, "Congratulations! You made it through winter. Now have a snack."

Also known as wild leeks, ramps are a garlicky, oniony, curvy, leafy, beautiful and delicious spring vegetable. Overflowing from every other booth in farmers markets around the city, ramps are here and here in number. Making the city a little greener and significantly more tasty. One of the best things about these little sprigs of tangly-rooted vegetables (aside from their flirty looks and scrumptious flavor), is that you can cook them almost any way you want. Sauteed, grilled, baked...

While it's still cool enough to turn on the oven in our cozy kitchen, we decided to use the bunch of ramps whisked away from the greener side of Union Square Park to make a savory bread pudding. Over lemon sodas we sliced crusty bread, infused sage into whole milk, and sliced our ramps, separating the white stalk from the bright green leaf, but using all parts in the pudding because...well, you can. So why not.

A few eggs, salt, pepper and some Grana Padano, deliciously salty cheese, and the pudding was only an hour at 350 degrees away from our bellies.

Now if you are reading this thinking, bread pudding, ew no thank you, that sounds worse than an alien invasion...I can empathize. There was a period in my life when the thought of squishy, wet bread sounded wholly and completely gross. But when you think of it as a moist, rich, sophisticated cousin to stuffing, soft, comforting, and in this case salty, with pockets of bright ramps... Aren't you tempted to try a bite of this?

I hope so. Once golden and steaming and crispy around the edges, we'll just say I was truly happy (down to the bottom of my stomach) for spring. Plus bread pudding is ideal for warming you up just enough to ward of the spring night chills. Throw ramps in the mix and nearly the whole pan will disappear before you realize it. That is, if your experience is anything similar to mine...

We ate the leftovers with eggs over-easy for lunch the next day. Eggs and ramps will not steer you wrong. I think some sausage added to the mix wouldn't hurt one bit either. Having fully succumbed to the ramp bite, we used a second bunch to saute and lay over pan fried salmon for dinner the next night.

If I sound ramp crazed, well, okay I might just be. But consider it may be an even crazier thing to let spring pass without giving into the ramp invasion. Remember, no matter what it may sound like, they aren't out to get you.

You should go out and get them.

Savory Ramp Bread Pudding

1 large loaf of crusty bread, cut into big pieces (enough to almost fill an 11 x 7 inch baking pan)
1 bunch of ramps
5 cups whole milk
15 leaves of sage
7 eggs
1 1/2 cups grated Grana Padano cheese (or anything hard and salty)
Salt
Pepper

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Grease an 11 x 7 inch baking pan.
2. Heat milk with sage, bringing it almost to a boil. Take it off the heat, cover with plastic wrap and let infuse for 5 min. Remove sage.
3. In a large bowl mix bread and milk. Let soak.
4. Cut roots off ramps. Slice the white part of the ramp into small pieces, cut the leaves into larger chunks. Reserve a few whole leaves for decorating the top of the pudding.
5. In a small bowl, whisk eggs together with white ramp pieces, salt and pepper.
6. Mix egg thoroughly into bread and milk.
7. Stir in 1 cup of grated cheese.
8. Spread pudding into pan.
9. Garnish the top with whole ramp leaves and the remaining 1/2 C cheese.
10. Bake for 1 hr and 10 minutes or until pudding is golden brown on top.

Yield:
approx 15 servings

Spats

2009-04-20T22:34:00.000-04:00

The highlight of my eating last week started in a dispute over soup. Gumbo to be specific. I don't recall how soup became the topic of conversation...but then again, why wouldn't it be. Soup is delicious and wonderful and I could muse about it all day long. So maybe I got a little worked up when I was sure gumbo was cooked with rice, and Russ resolute that is was served over it.

Technically speaking, I lost the tussle. But I was decided that gumbo was on for Monday dinner so the loss was of little consequence.

Waiting tables in my college days, I donned a white apron serving up gumbo and crawfish etouffee at a small, spicy little cajun/creole restaurant in Central Pennsylvania. Spats Cafe. What great, funny, delicious memories I have of that restaurant. Filling ice tea pitchers and polishing silverware in the morning, I'd watch the cooks stir big pots of dark roux under the waves of heat spilling off the flatop in the kitchen. Roux, a rich, slowly cooked combination of fat and flour is what makes gumbo gumbo. Up until this past week I'd never actually made it myself. So it wasn't just soup we were talking about for dinner. It was soup and a roux.

And the perfect occasion to try the contents of the peanut butter jar of homemade lard; rendered from pork fat by my genius-in-the-kitchen friend, and farmer, Anna.

It was a what's-in-the-pantry inspired gumbo, so for serious soupers, not your traditional mix. No peppers or okra. But smoked duck breast, red beans and rice (cooked in), carrots, kale, sage and thyme. Ok, the duck breast was an impulse buy at the grocery store. But a delicious addition to be sure.

With the soup simmering on a burner, I stirred the roux. The nutty, rich smell of the flour and fat cooking sent me back to those days of hot sauce and cornbread at Spats. Committing to that roux, stirring for about 30 minutes until it grew a walnut, chocolate brown, the smell and feel of it all sent my thoughts towards what else I could possibly come up with to put roux in...

But once mixed into the stock pot, it was clear that roux was made for gumbo. Gumbo for a roux.

For me, the peppery burn of the brown broth was seasoned with the flavor of Spats lunch breaks, slurping soup at that back table sprinkled with silverware wrapped in mardi gras beads.

For everyone else, it was a flavor that cooked with rice, or served over it, no matter. As long as there was enough for seconds, no arguments to be found.

*Don't forget that the Virtual Great American Bake Sale is still in progress. While your soup's on the stove, check out the recipes and share a little something before chowing down!

Wild Rice and Beans Gumbo

1 cup red beans
1 cup wild rice
6 medium carrots
1 bunch celery
1 large red onion
1 10" andouille sausage
1/2 pound smoked duck breast
1 pound chicken breast
5 large leaves of kale
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 bay leaves
1 rosemary sprig
1 T sage
1 T thyme
1 T sea salt
2 t cayenne pepper
lots of black pepper (50-60 turns of a peppermill)
3 qts chicken stock
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup fat (butter, lard, oil...)

1. Rehydrate beans according to directions on package.
2. Chop celery, carrots, garlic and onion.
3. Cube duck breast and cut andouille sausage into slices, then quarters.
4. Cube chicken. Season with salt, pepper and cayenne.
5. Cut kale into ribbons.
6. In the bottom of a large stockpot, over medium heat, add 1 T olive oil, duck breast, sausage, garlic and spices, and brown for a couple of minutes.
7. Add chicken, brown.
8. Add carrots, celery and onion. Sweat until onions are translucent.
9. Pour in stock.
10. Add rice and beans.
11. Bring to a boil, stirring occasionally.
12. Reduce to a simmer, let cook for 1- 1 1/2 hrs. Taste occasionally for seasoning.
13. In a small saucepot over medium heat, mix together flour and fat. Stir constantly to avoid burning; cook until roux is a nice dark brown. Note- use a heat resistant spatula or wooden spoon...mixture is HOT! Let roux cool to room temperature.
14. Very carefully add roux to the stockpot. Stir to incorporate.

Yield
15-20 servings

Something To Share

2009-04-13T00:00:00.007-04:00

My childhood food memories are some of the strongest so far. Waking up early for oversized sticky buns at the beach. Filling crinkly bags at the candy store after piano recitals. Shrimp with butter and bay seasoning. And cupcakes for school day birthdays.

Why the reminiscing? Because today kicks off Share Our Strength's virtual bake sale fundraiser. So first, some words from the organizer of the event, Kate Miller.

"Welcome to the Virtual Great American Bake Sale. 100% of the proceeds from the sale of these ebooks will go toward Share Our Strength's Great American Bake Sale program. Funds raised through Great American Bake Sale are donated to after-school and summer feeding programs--food programs that many kids depend on when school is not in session. Great American Bake Sale is a program of Share Our Strength, a national organization working to make sure no kid in America grows up hungry.

The ebooks are a compilation of recipes from submitters across the blogosphere and beyond. The ebooks are available for purchase based on any donation amount of the buyer's choosing."

Big thanks to Kate for organizing. Welcome hugs to new readers and noogie's to old. Now let's get down to baking.

What can you find inside the delicious pages of this year's e-cookbook? From this corner of the web, a hats off to special sweets in school; a recipe for my mom's chocolate chip cream cheese cupcakes. A cheese cake center decorated with the confetti of mini chocolate chips and draped in dark chocolate cake, it's just what a cupcake would wear to a big bash.

And this week is a big bash. At http://stolenmomentscooking.com/welcome-to-the-virtual-great-american-bake-sale/ you will find a list of all the other wonderful hosts who've created recipes to support Share Our Strength's important cause. Below you will find links for purchasing the entire collection of recipes at the cost of only what you want to donate to the event.

I still smile at the thought of smiley face cookies and apple pie with a perfect crumbly topping. Lemonade stands and chocolate chip cookies on chilly days at home. In hopes that more and more and more kids can grow up with sweet memories, browse the bake sake, stay awhile, have a snack and share your support!

Chocolate Chip Cream Cheese Cupcakes
(known to my mama as “Cream Cheese Surprise!”)

For the filling
8 oz cream cheese
1/3 C sugar
1/8 t salt
1 egg
6 oz mini chocolate chips

1. Beat cream cheese, sugar and salt.
2. Beat in egg until combined.
3. Mix in chocolate chips.

For the cupcake
3 C flour
2 C sugar
1 t salt
1 C cocoa powder
2 t baking soda
2 C water
¾ C oil
2 T vinegar
2 T vanilla

1. Whisk together flour, sugar, salt, cocoa powder and baking soda.
2. In a separate bowl, combine water, oil vinegar and vanilla.
3. Add wet ingredients to dry and stir to combine.
4. Into a lined muffin tray, fill cups ½ full with chocolate batter. Drop about 1 teaspoon of cream cheese filling on top of each cup of batter.
5. Bake cupcakes at 350 degrees for about 35 min.

Yield: 24+ cupcakes

The Complete 2009 VGABS Recipes Ebook

Features all 170 of the submitted recipes. Many of the recipes include pictures.

On the checkout page, manually change the amount (USD) field to your donation amount.

Shopping cart courtesy of E-Junkie.

Regaining Strength

2009-03-31T17:58:00.004-04:00

Folks, it is spring. Yes. It. Is. Spring!

And holy crab cakes, is that a good thing. This last two week stretch has been a doozy. A blast of serious winter chilliness, Russ with a case of bronchitis, and then a streak of plain, gray, rainy days.

For awhile our kitchen was still as we looked to really spicy pad thai from down the street and grilled cheese dipped in creamy soup. Then, a stirring. Cauliflower the color of movie theater popcorn.

And sweet, heart shaped beets.

On the last of the rainy days, when you could almost believe the suns efforts above the drizzle, matters called for a big batch of chocolate chip cookies. I put in two times as many chips just because it felt right.

Finally, last night over big bowls of chicken and wild rice soup, pink radishes and brilliant, soft carrots, it was clear that we were coming out of the snowy woods. We crunched on toasty, olive-oiled and salted bread and with every crusty chomp, every soupy slurp, I could feel myself finding that long longed for, spring strength.

Today it is sunny and cool. The Mister Softee truck just drove by clinking out it's tune. And while, as I'm just out of the end-of-winter-push and not quite ready with a recipe for you (though if that soup just looks too tasty email me and i'll happily scratch down a rough draft of the one-pot-make-it-up-as-you-go healing wonder!) I do have something I wanted to share.

With thoughts of picnics to come and ice cream truck jingles, I think it is the perfect time to turn a dreaming mind towards Share Our Strength's Great American Bake Sale. Share Our Strength is a wonderfully good hearted national organization whose goal is to fight childhood hunger in America. In their annual Bake Sale fundraiser, you can host as a baker, or support, as a snacker, and all the proceeds of your bake sale efforts go to after-school or summer eating programs in your area. OR...as a reader...you can look to this year's new virtual bake sale where you will find a recipe by yours truly! On April 13th, a post will be published on stolenmomentscooking.blogspot.com, with links to contributing bloggers and their favorite recipes for sweets. An e-cookbook will be available there too (as well as here), with all the recipes compiled for your use, at a price of whatever you'd like to donate to Share Our Strength.

Please do get in touch with me if you have questions. And if you're a blogger to whom this all sounds scrumptious, email virtualbakesale@gmail.com to get involved.

For it is spring my friends. It is time for pretty produce and cookies for kiddos. Stop back again soon for both.

The Challah That Lived

2009-03-18T22:58:00.000-04:00

Once upon a time...

There were eggs and there was flour. There were little packets of yeast and a sticky lidded jar of honey. There was also me, excited, clueless, venturing for the first time down the path of bread baking, a recipe for challah in hand, no idea what was ahead. I still remember that summer night in college when I opened the oven to see my first loaves of bread, enormous, melded into one insanely oversized version of challah wedged in between the baking racks. That night I sat with great friends on our old house's wooden porch, listening to bluegrass and pulling off big chunks of sweet bread long into the summer night.

I've learned a thing or two about bread since then. Most importantly, I think, that it is one of the best things to make for company. That first challah recipe made an appearance more than once in my college kitchen, provided familiar Sunday snacking during a year I spent with friends in France, and most recently, showed itself dressed up as french toast for breakfast hosted in my little corner of Brooklyn for neighbors, old and new.

While I will scream for any kind of loaf (save rye...I'm still working on that one), challah is where it's at in my heart. Streams of honey? Yes, yes please.

With more than one bread catastrophe under my belt, I will be one of the first to say, making bread is not easy. It doesn't fit neatly into the pages of a cookbook, isn't really composed of precise measurements or times or degrees. Bread has a life of its own. Like a person, you've got to pay it some attention, but also know when it needs some time alone. You can't control it, you can only work with it. But if you care for it, it will never disappoint.

So who has time to take care of a ball of flour?? Not many. There are some corners that just can't be cut, but to avoid leaving your bread out to grow angry and wild while you sun at the beach eating croissants and drinking petite bottles of pulpy orange soda...

...you may find it helpful to mix your dough, then refrigerate it overnight, letting it sit out to come back to room temperature the next day. Just the same, waking up early on a bright springy Saturday, mixing together your dough and pulling sheets back over your head to take a morning nap isn't a bad option either.

Yet another tricky element of challah specifically, is the braiding. Before I owned a chef's jacket and clunky black kitchen clogs, I just rolled three snakes and braided my bread like a pony tail. It works just fine. Braiding challah can be easy as pie or really quite difficult. If you are feeling adventurous, I think rather than reading the short, confusing, lemon of a novella that would be my explanation of the processes, go here instead to learn a 4-strand braid.

The recipe I still use is one that I found while searching online years ago. The title, "Mega Challah," caught my eye. It's author is Bob Evans, working from Ella Russell, working from Edward Epse Brown. I don't know Bob or Ella or Edward, but I imagine them to be jolly souls with good taste in the kitchen and quite the knack for kneading.

This time around I made one small change, adding about 1 cup of buckwheat in place of whole wheat flour, using white for the rest. As we milled around the kitchen, drinking coffee, finishing off bacon in it's pan of greasy glory, I grew a little nervous about the results...I have a bad habit of experimenting for company. Most of the time they come back. But when its the promise of homemade bread on the line, the stakes rise higher.

After the first few bites, the answer was great. Buckwheat + challah = yes, yes please. Topped with spiced stewed apples, bacon and freshly squeezed oj, the challah wins again.

And once again, in great company. Over juice and syrupy toast, we happily downed brunch, talking about paint colors for new walls, wisdom teeth, dogs, the crazy things we do for love, and Santa Clause.

Soon the last earthy buckwheat challah bites turned syrup mops, wiping plates clean. With one, truly mega challah remaining we wrapped up chunks of the second loaf for our friends as they headed out to finish the courses of their almost-spring-warm Sundays.

The end of the story is: you feed bread its flour and yeast, it feeds you soft, crust-enevloped delicious loaves of sliceable happiness. It may rise out of control. It may not rise enough. You may have a hot spot in your oven, say, and burn the bottom of one loaf. It's all part of the fun. It's a truly alive experience, something that starts with you and your dough, maybe ends with friends and a feast, and does usually, overall, end quite happily indeed.

Buckwheat Challah
adapted from this seriously Mega Challah recipe

WARNING! This is one of those just-hardly-a-recipe recipes. No, I didn't forget the measurement for flour...you've got to work with the dough in this one till it's just right (can you hear pastry chefs cursing and throwing pans!). I think it's fun to abandon scales every now and then. True bread lovers, you can do it! And I'm here for you if you have questions!!

1 T white sugar
1 T yeast (active yeast from those little packets in your grocery store!)
1 C water, warm, but not hot
1.5 oz butter, melted
3/4 C honey
5 eggs, plus a yolk for eggwash
1 C buckwheat flour
White flour

1. In a large bowl, mix together sugar, yeast and water.
2. Stir in white flour, enough to make mixture too stiff to stir with a spoon.
3. Meanwhile, whisk together eggs, honey and melted butter.
4. Add egg mixture to the flour and yeast, stirring and folding just until dough is broken up in the liquid (do not panic, it will look soupy and strange at this point!)
5. Stir in buckwheat flour.
6. Gradually add white flour until mixture can not be stirred any more.
7. On a well floured surface, with a bowl of a few cups of flour on hand, begin kneading the sticky dough, incorporating more flour in as needed.
8. Knead for awhile!!! In the end dough should be just slightly tacky, and smooth.
9. Turn dough into an oiled bowl, cover and let double in size. Or, if you'd prefer, stick it in the fridge, take it out the next morning and leave it in a warm spot until room temperature again (depending on where you live anywhere from 1 to 5 hours...or more!)
10. Divide the bread as needed to braid it as you'd like.
11. Egg wash the loaf.
12. Let sit for about 30 minutes.
13. Egg was the loaf again.
14. Bake for about 50 minutes at 350 degrees. Bread is done when the internal temperature reached 195 degrees.

Yield:
1 really large loaf

One Fish, Ooo...Fish

2009-03-10T21:50:00.001-04:00

I've been sitting here at my little white screen now for many a minute, trying to think of an eloquent, perhaps even witty way to say what needs to be said. Now, I've decided it may just be one of those things best simply blurted out. *(uncomfortable throat clear)* Before I became the food-loving, feasting omnivore that I am today, I'd have been described by some as...irrational. Ok, neurotic. I hinted at it in early entries here, but the truth is I haven't been completely honest with you about my past in the kitchen.

I wish I had tallied the number of peanut butter and honey sandwiches that saw me through elementary school. Or cereal bowls that served as breakfast, lunch, snack and dinner through all the numbered grades, splashing over into my college years. For the larger part of my life I was the pickiest of eaters. But it wasn't just that. My finicky attitude ran so rampant that there were certain foods that rather than a hand wave and a shake of the head, elicited a full body cringe at the thought of bringing them into my house. The list included (though was not limited to) cheese, dill pickles, and fish. Silver sided, slimy, fish with their eyeballs staring me down... Fishsticks, sure. But real, head-to-tail fish. Never.

I have come very far from those pickle-fear-filled days. And while I welcome a delicious, roasted fillet of fish, seeing the animal, whole and slick in my house, it is still something I haven't dared to stomach. That is until this fated Wednesday past.

Russ comes home bright eyed and excited. He is holding a bag.

"Just wait until I cook you dinner tonight," he promises. He reaches into the bag, revealing his grand plans.

Rainbow. Trout. I feel an immediate, involuntary compulsion to grab a box of cereal and run to the farthest corner of the apartment. Russ is confused. I fess up my fear of floppy, fin-on, fresh fish. He makes promises of butter and garlic, sea salt and rosemary, sage and white wine.

I say first things first.

Sipping my drink, blushing a hint, I make a firm commitment to squelch the outward display of food phobia. Inside, I allow myself to silently freak out, still wobbly in the gut.

But, as the herbs come out, and the fish heads comes off, I find myself growing increasingly able, and interested, in the show before me. Watching the process of that slithery animal becoming what I recognize as "food fish", I'm aware of my lack of connectedness to what I've consumed so readily in breaded sticks and sesame-crusted fillets on lunch salads. The knife gracefully splits the suddenly sweetly-shiny, silvery skin. Soft pats of butter sink down into the light pink sides. Sage and rosemary is ticker-tape on this seafood surprise party.

By the time the fish is slid into the oven I'm watching the clock, asking how long until we eat. Eyeing Russ saute maple syrup and thyme glazed butternut squash doesn't hurt the situation one bit.

Smelling the rich, sweet and wine-bathed fish roasting, my safety cereal box is long packed away into the pantry.

With some greens, syrup-sweetened squash and that surprising little fish on the plate, I think I may have just gotten past the breakers.

The fish, my friends, was awesome. Oh my gosh was it tasty. I ate a whole side and then went back for the other. I couldn't believe it. I ate a fish. A whole fish. I'm only writing in repetition because part of me still can't believe it. Pulling at little pin bones, in the end I found myself loving the dish and leaving only a pile of peeled skin to prove it was there at all.

So now you know. I feel good to have gotten that bit of my past aired out and off my chest. I feel even better about passing this recipe on to you. Stare that fish down and make this for dinner (ok, ok, if you're like me, have a glass of wine and have someone make it for you. Small steps.) Pull a surprise out of your shopping bag and let it surprise you. Let there be a place for peanut butter and cereal. But make room for a little fish too.

Herb Poached Rainbow Trout

2 whole, medium large rainbow trout, boned
2 cloves of finely chopped garlic
3 large sprigs of rosemary
1/2 t ground, dried sage
1 T butter
Fresh ground black pepper, to taste
Sea salt, to taste
1 1/2 T live oil
approx 1/2 C white wine

1. Remove heads and tails from fish, as well as any other non-fleshy material on the animal. Russ suggests cutting a little off the belly; because fatty-fish can store heavy metals in their bellies, and since you lose little from cutting there, it's a not-bad, healthy idea.
2. Open fish so skin is down, and flesh of both sides faces up.
2. Season the meat with sea salt and black pepper.
3. Sprinkle one side with garlic.
4. Add rosemary needles to one side of each fish.
5. Sprinkle sage evenly over opened fillets.
6. Distribute small pats of butter over one side of each fish.
7. Close the fish like a book.
8. In the bottom of a medium sized baking dish, drizzle oil to coat and place fish in pan.
9. Pour in white wine until it comes about half-way up the side of the fish (but not high enough to spill into the cut fillet! You may have to add more or less than the recipe suggests, depending on your dish and the size of your fish).
10. Bake at 375 degrees F for 15 min.
11. Test fish for doneness; you don't want to see any pink in the middle! However, note that it is ok to eat fish like this a little rare, and overcooked the fish will turn to mush. The cooked flesh of the fish will be creamy white rather than light pink.

Food and Thoughts and a Green Kitchen Tablecloth

2009-02-27T10:46:00.000-05:00

Food is a beautiful thing. As are strong, sweet memories. And, as it's turned out, so too are green cotton tablecloths.

Because I love food, stories, and most particularly the moment when they combine into one, I couldn't let this week pass without sharing a glimpse of the feast and tales of my folks recounted during the recent visit I made to my grandparents. Grammy and Jack; always sitting at that same soft, green, white-dotted tablecloth, my life is expertly seasoned with food memories from that household. My sister filling her cheeks with Easter candy while the grownups were downstairs. Cracking nuts onto napkins, shredding the shells to pieces and picking out only the almonds leaving Brazil nuts and chestnuts too hard in the bowl. Peanut butter waffles. Bacon anytime we wanted it.

We would spend most our visits collected around that tablecloth, eating, talking, snacking until the next meal and then eating more and talking our way through till bedtime. As the tablecloth stayed the same so too have some of the foods that over so many years now are both symbols of family, and triggers for classic memories-turned-stories by my grandparents. And of course there is always something new...

My grandfather eats butter on everything. Toast and pancakes, yes. But also cookies, pretzels, cake...you name it and before going down it gets a good slathering in butter. So of course our weekend started off with a tall glass of milk and a properly butter-frosted coffeecake muffin I'd brought from the city.

Which opened the marvelous flood gates for the stories to begin. We talked about cake. Then wedding cakes. Then tales of my grandmother's father, his candy business, his tools and time he spent carefully shaping flowers made of sugar for his own wedding cake creations. Then stories of family weddings. Then...have you ever seen a picture of your parents wedding cake? No?! Then photo albums seen for the first time, copies of wedding vows and the story of that hippie-cake of carob, brought to the wedding in a truck bed, an oversized creation of two hands reaching for each other...and a picture to match.

After coffeecakes and wedding talk we stayed at that table, drinking the required birch beer, eating the proper accompaniment of Chex mix, and listening to tales of my grandparents days on the Chesapeake Bay. From calm waters to wild storms, naps on deck and martinis in the cabin to rescues and rough waters, the stories filled the afternoon. Like a fine wine, the recounting of my grandparents younger days are best paired with a ham sandwich on sourdough, potato chips and a refill on that birch beer.

As night snuck in we settled into arm chairs and sofas, wrapped-up in afghans. Then, the standard offer of my grandfather's licorice. Strong, salty stuff. Never for me but happily a hit with Russ. Perhaps to wash it down, there is always, too, a light-blue wrappered stick of Black Jack teaberry gum.

The next morning begins the same. Butter on coffeecake. Cups of coffee. My cherished bowl of fruit loops (an indulgence I allow myself only at that green covered table). A refill on the cereal. From morning till dinner time it was stories from my grandfather's old diner. Advice on how selling iced-tea would make you your money back then. Frustration that a little glass is just too expensive these days. Recollections of sweet potato pie and arguments over the size of the dish the neighborhood diner's banana split comes in (hands creating spaces at least a foot long. I'm going to get one of those next time.)

After naps and more Chex mix, we end the visit with the ritual take-out visit to Nat's Pizza. We listen to the required telling of the time my dad and grandpa went in to see grease so thick on the floor it rose up through the plastic floor mats. We always laugh, then call to place our order.

Having finished off the birch beer we drink black cherry soda. It's a candlelit dinner of pepperoni, my grandfather opting for buttered gingersnaps as he steers clear from any food with "red stuff," (i.e. tomatoes).

The room is warm. Everything is delicious. While ruminating on the fairness of pooled tipping thus leading into tales of excellent servers from the past, namely Dakota Lil who carried a six-shooter on her apron, my grandparents described themselves as "not gourmet eaters". The truth is, at the heart, neither am I. Give me soda, a sandwich and chips, then pizza for dinner and as long as the company is strong, say, over that green table cloth, I am as happy as a girl can be.

A Cake to Hold a Candle To

2009-02-11T17:49:00.001-05:00

I love cheesecake.

I always have. One of the first desserts I ever made was a recipe of my mom's for chocolate chip cheesecake. It was written in green pen on a long, skinny strip of weathered paper, really two pieces taped together at a seam that was soft from folding and unfolding it's after dinner tale. The cake had an oreo crust and was sprinkled with tiny droplets of chocolate chips that rather than sinking into the cake, rested on top creating sweet, miniature patterns. In high school I'd make that cake for any occasion possible. For example, Saturdays. I still remember one in particular where I sat by a frosty winter window with my friend Al, noses pressed up against chilly panes, watching the cheesecake cool outside in the clearing we'd made in a snow bank.

So, needless to say, I could relate when my friend Josh requested a cheesecake for his birthday...a fantastic fiesta of a party with Mexican themed food, decoration, streamers and a pinata...why not make a cheesecake? I was giddy at the idea. Peanut butter and chocolate. Dark chocolate cinnamon. Those little mini chips that steered me so right so long ago.

Both feet in the candy aisle I learn, Josh doesn't like chocolate. Slight devastation. But my love cheesecake is true and a birthday is an occasion...specifically, as Josh would describe, one that deserves food so good, "you want to roll around in it." So I thought outside the chips and oreo crumbs. Something salty sounded right...say, a pretzel crust!

And with berries still a few months away, and apples a few months behind us...mango for the top.

With streamer-like ribbons of peel on the cutting board, tiny squares of diced mango sizzled in the sweetness of brown sugar, cinnamon, allspice and butter in a pan on the stove.

Russ and I carried a still warm cake, topping on the side, across the park to our friend's house. The cake cooled in the fridge while we ate rice and beans, chips and seven-layer dip, empanadas, quesadilla casserole...some number of margaritas and one smashed pinata later...

...it was cheesecake time. In the frenzy of spices and mango, vanilla beans in cheesecake, crushed salty pretzels, chile shaped pinatas and salt rimmed glasses, well, we forgot birthday candles. In my senior days I will still remain a firm believer that a birthday cake is just a cake without candles. And this was a cheesecake for a birthday fiesta. So.

We did what we had to. I suspect the bigger the candle, the more you get to wish for.

And for you dear readers and cake monkeys, whatever your occasion, my wish you for is that you try this cheesecake. It is good. SO good. I think it may be the most delicious recipe I've shared with you yet. And best of all, if mangos are your Josh's chocolate, this cake is the perfect blank canvas. Add chocolate chips. Fruit. Spices. Peanut butter. Make the crust graham or oreo. Make it something you want to roll around in.

But then eat it instead.

Vanilla Cheesecake with Mango Compote and a Crushed Pretzel Crust

adapted from Bon Appetit magazine

For crust:

1 C crushed salted pretzels

1/8 C melted butter

1 T sugar

For filling:

3 8oz packages of cream cheese

1 C sugar

1 vanilla bean, scraped

2 large eggs

3/4 C sour cream

For topping:

1 mango, peeled, cored and diced

2 T butter

3 T dark brown sugar

1/2 t cinnamon

a pinch of allspice

a splash of rum

1. For crust: mix crushed pretzels, butter and sugar together in bowl. Using the bottom of a jar, press the crumbs into the bottom of a 9" springform pan. Bake at 350F for about 12 minutes, until dry and golden brown.

2. For filling: whip cream cheese till fluffy. Beat in sugar. Mix in the seeds of one vanilla bean. Mix in eggs, one at a time. Stir in sour cream. Pour filling over crust and bake cheesecake in a water bath at 325F for approx. 1 hr, or until top is dry and slightly puffed.

3. For topping: Melt butter in a pan over medium heat. Add sugar, mix until dissolved. Add spices, rum and mango and cook until mango is tender.

Yield:

1 9" cake

Three Little Words

2009-02-02T17:41:00.001-05:00

With thoughts of love floating through chilly February days, I've decided this month is just the time to send valentine notes to feel good, favorite eats.

To kick it off I have three words (fit to print on a pastel conversation heart?): macaroni, cheese and...bacon.

With a sweet tooth the size of an elephant tusk, it only illustrates the power of this crispy, smoked treat that I would consider forgoing the traditional seasonal box of chocolates for a few strips of bacon to call my own (though more than a few would be preferable).

You may find it an additional surprise that I've put mac and cheese above a plethora of sticky, sugary, doughy delights...given my past aversion to cheese itself. But again, in the spirit of love, and having chosen food as my crush, I couldn't help it. Especially after finding an incredibly creamy, crunchy on top, rich and comforting recipe in a past issue of Gourmet magazine. Adding bacon and a touch of chopped chives, it was one of those recipes you can hardly stand to put time into making because all you can think about is fixing yourself a heaping hot serving to eat right then.

On Sunday night, over the phone I could hear Russ lift out of his seat when told he was coming home to mac and cheese. Stirring the thick sauce on the stovetop I got to thinking; who wouldn't sit a little taller on the ride to hot homemade macaroni? What is it about good ol' mac that makes us feel so great?

I have my suspicions. Rich cheese mixed up with curly little wheat noodles...and we are allowed to feel small again. You can take care of someone by putting a dish into the oven. You can be taken care of with a steamy bowl in your hands. Salty, smoky, soft and well, isn't that crunchy topping reason enough in itself?

I share recipes with you every week. I always hope they tickle and feed you well. But this one my friends, I know it will. I'm feeling bold, and I believe in the power of this simple little meal. It has big flavor. It feels good going down. It has just the right amount of bite and warmth to make you fall in love (perhaps again) with this classic favorite that loves you right back.

Swept up in the glow I tossed a handful of kale into the frying pan still coated in bacon fat, cooking it just until soft and bright green. Love makes you do crazy things. Crazy, delicious, wonderful things.

So make yourself some macaroni and make it cheesy. Sizzle up some bacon. Catch the love bug in the air and toss in some greens for good measure. And if that little candy heart asks the question, "be mine,"...say yes. And turn with a fork to your bowl of mac and cheese.

Whole Wheat Macaroni and Cheese...and Bacon

adapted from Gourmet magazine

For topping

1/4 stick butter

1 C unseasoned bread crumbs

3/4 C extra-sharp Cheddar, grated

1/4 C Parmigiano-Reggiano, grated

For sauce

1 stick unsalted butter

4 T flour

2 1/2 C milk (any % will do!)

3 C extra-sharp Cheddar, grated

1/4 C Parmigiano-Reggiano, grated

2 t salt

1/2 t pepper

8 oz whole wheat macaroni pasta

8 strips bacon

1 1/2 T chopped chives

1 C milk

1. To make the topping: melt butter and stir in bread crumbs and cheese until combined. Reserve.

2. Boil macaroni until al dente, drain. Reserve.

3. Cook bacon until slightly crispy. Chop into rough pieces. Reserve.

4. To make the sauce: melt butter in a medium saucepot. Whisk in flour and over medium heat continually whisk for 3 minutes. Stream in 2 1/2 C milk. Bring to a boil, whisking frequently. Return to a simmer and cook for 3 more minutes (still whisking often). Stir in cheese, salt and pepper, and mix until smooth.

5. In a large bowl combine cooked macaroni, sauce, bacon and chives.

6. In a buttered casserole dish, pour macaroni and sauce.

7. Cover the dish with reserved crumb topping.

8. Bake at 400 for 20-25 minutes, or until the top is golden brown and the edges of the pan are bubbling.

Yield

10 servings

Snow Gets In Your Eyes

2009-01-27T17:44:00.001-05:00

My legs are still achy.

Normally I take my sleepy Sundays to work on cooking up something curiously delicious for you. This week I traded sleep and snacks for skis, bought a sweet, funny little hat with a pom pom and ear flaps, and spent the day whizzing and whirring circles down a small mountain in Pennsylvania.

On the mountain I decided three things.

1. Ear flaps are amazing. I've been wearing my hat all throughout the much-more-stylish-than-I city of New York with a silly grin on to match.

2. There is no better place I can think of to drink hot chocolate than in wooden ski lodge.

And, sadly:

3. A day spent on the mountain = a day of generally terrible food.

Aside from that steamy cup of hot chocolate needed mid day to thaw out my 9-degrees-outside frozen cold toes, the lukewarm waffle fries and dry and, well...kind of crunchy ribs didn't make for much to talk about here.

So my kitchen is dark this week. But with my legs up on the couch (and a 60% chance of 2-4 inches of snow tonight) I've thought of something you may just like to try. Part of my little girl-world years ago included the stories of Laura Ingalls Wilder and her little house on the prairie. In one of my favorites stories she and her sister make snow candy; cooked molasses and brown sugar that they pour and drizzle into squiggles and swirls, which freeze hard in a pan of fresh snow.

Years ago my sister and I settled on stirring together maple syrup in bowls of white snow. I still think about that lovely idea of homemade candy cracking and coming alive in a wintry backyard.

So for you this week I did a little snooping around and found that recipe for snow candy. I have yet to try it myself. But in these gray and chilly days deep into the heart of winter, (and until I'm back on strong land legs again in the kitchen) you may just find this recipe a new reason to wish for snow days.

Or an excuse to buy yourself a hat, earflaps included.

Snow Candy

from Little House in the Big Woods

1 C molasses

1 C brown sugar

Fresh, clean, beautiful snow

1. In a medium pot, cook molasses and brown sugar together until a candy thermometer reads between 300 and 310 degrees F. (if you want you can test for the "hard crack" stage by dropping a spoonful of the hot syrup into a bowl of cold water. If when you take it out and try to bend it, it breaks, you've reached the right temp!)

2. Remove the syrup from the heat.

3. Using a wooden spoon, drizzle spoonfuls of the syrup over packed fresh snow. Once the syrup sets, remove it from the snow and lay on a paper towel to dry.

In The Inventing Room

2009-01-20T22:57:00.002-05:00

What if Willy-Wonka was a bar man? Fizzy lifting drinks on the rocks. Chocolate martinis and gold-ticket-schlager. In a city where you can get a brioche infused liquor with raisins, and rum mixed with pumpkin puree, the whir of starry New York night traffic almost hints that Slugworth has taken up as a cabbie.

There is some magic in mixing drinks. Grapes turn from summer snack to vintage treasure. Grain changes to amber. Green fairies spring from wet sugar cubes on silver spoons and champagne explodes a foamy geyser in a bottle. I look at a bar and see intriguing, shiny bottles...but in truth I'm a bit like Charlie. Cautious because I don't know how it all works. And yet, still wanting to take a sip.

Enter Russ, the Wonka of whiskey. With so many of you loving last season's fall harvest whiskey, the snowy days of January in Brooklyn have just shy of required that we venture into a new project. There is no need to check your chocolate bars folks, no shiny tickets required to see the latest creation from our inventing room: the Brooklyn Winter Rye.

The Three-Course Dinner Chewing Gum of rye whiskey. Substitute tomato soup with dried figs. Roast beef and baked potato with clove and ground allspice. Blueberry pie with wide, thin strips of orange zest. A jar is the gum wrapper...toss it in, seal it up and let the flavors infuse.

Ok so its not a meal exactly, but think of all that's going on inside one little jar! And there again, some magic; the rye is changing, improving, and all the time zest and spices and figs simply float, still, unassuming and delicious. Spiced fruit petrified inside that rye grain turned amber.

That amber will turn chocolate. The chocolate will turn licorice. It amazed me how dark and mysterious the whiskey looked by day three. Full of fig and spice that you could smell but not see.

So full of fig, so dark...well, as Violet turned violet from that blueberry pie, I was afraid a sip of the winter rye straight may have shriveled me up into a little dry fig. So I turned to my Wonka with eyes for a cocktail...

Gumball-red cranberries, powder-white fine sugar and a crust of sugar in the raw shortly yielded a rosey, whimsical little cocktail following in the tradition of "smash" drinks (traditionally a muddling of sugar and mint, in this case with berries instead). Roll out the red carpet! Do a somersault! The sweet and spicey and slightly tart drink is just the thing to lift you out of the snow and up off your feet.

From book pages where we read about cows that give chocolate milk and fizzy lemonade swimming pools, to our world with fanciful infusions, berry smashes and sugar crusted Wonka whiskey, cheers to you, bottoms up my friends!

Brooklyn Winter Rye

750 mL Rye whiskey (of your choice)
1 1/2 C dried black mission figs, chopped

1 T whole cloves

1 t ground allspice

1/3 of a large orange, zested (in large strips...easily done with a peeler!)

1. Add figs, cloves, allspice and orange zest to a large jar.

2. Pour rye into jar and seal.

3. On second day, remove orange zest. Reseal jar and gently turn over once to stir up contents.

4. Let rye sit for two more days.

5. On the fourth day, strain contents through a cheesecloth. Pour rye into clean container. Sip straight, add to cider, tea or substitute in your favorite whiskey drink! Or try something new, like say...

Winter Rye Smash

a cocktail

6-8 fresh cranberries

2 t superfine sugar

3 oz winter rye

Sugar in the raw for garnish

1. In the bottom of a shaker, muddle the cranberries and superfine sugar until berries are pulpy and have released their juice.

2. Add the winter rye and fill the shaker with ice. Shake vigorously.

3. Wet the rim of a serving glass with lime or lemon juice (water would work but something sticky is a little better!) and roll the rim in raw sugar to encrust.

4. Pour the contents of the shaker into the glass and say cheers to a warm-you-up winter smash.

Yield:

1 drink

Love In the Time of Cauliflower

2009-01-11T16:14:00.007-05:00

On a still snowy night in Brooklyn, a strange occurrence came to pass.

In a world full of chocolate cake and creamy pasta, fried potatoes and flaky croissants, on a particular chilly night this week I found myself wandering the kitchen, hungry for...cauliflower. Cauliflower and only cauliflower. I was disoriented. Admittedly with a mouthful of 98% sweet teeth, while I do like a helping of good veggies from time to time, cauliflower...this was complete untrodden territory. I didn't know where to start. But strange things happen on winter's nights, and when the wind brings change I always believe you best blow along with it.

So cauliflower it was. Trimming two large snowy heads the little florets emerged as a bowl full of air-popped popcorn ready to be buttered.

As my kitchen is regretfully a short walk and two subway stops away from the closest movie theater, what was a girl to do with this lot of white stalky veggies? Recently having read an article in Bon Appetit featuring a festival of latke variations, I recall a recipe for pureed cauliflower, patted into spiced cakes and fried like the classic potato dish.

"Hmm..." I muttered, twiddling my thumbs, eyeing the cauliflower.

As loopy and deliciously devilish as I was feeling in the flurry of this mysterious cauliflower craze, on that night fried didn't exactly strike me as the way to go. Less because of lots of oil and more because the spattering and spitting of frying intimidates me enough to generally opt for other, less splattery methods of cooking at home. For example, I'm quite partial to my oven, that being, coincidentally, exactly where I decided this cauliflower was headed.

Which led to the next question: frosting is to cake like _____ is to cauliflower. Recognizing that the cauliflower was going to need a finishing flourish, something to dress it up, make it pretty, something to seduce hungry stomachs away from juicy steaks and make them say under their breaths, "Hey, cauliflower...how you doin," I searched for the answer. Finally, I penciled in almonds.

I penciled in lemon, capers, and golden raisins*.

From the pan on the stovetop, a shimmering, sweet and nutty dressing to make the lovely baked cauliflower "latkes" indeed, loveable.

As the cauliflower baked on parchment in the oven, and the smell of the vinegary, golden raisin-sweet topping sizzled its way into the air, there was no mistaking it, I'd fallen hard for that odd, bumpy white flower of a food. I was crushing completely for cauliflower.

The final dish made me gasp, "Who knew that cauliflower could be so...beautiful!" An affair I'll remember, the latkes were especially nice paired with sausages and a leafy pile of steamed kale. They'd be delicious too with some good ol' red meat; indeed you could have your cauliflower and steak too.

If the old warning is true, that when making a face while the wind changes, take care for it might stick that way, well the wintry winds of cauliflower may just have left my face stuck in a oo-oo-oo that's good smile.

For strange things do happen, and delicious surprises often lie in the least expected vegetables.

Baked Cauliflower "Latkes"

adapted from Bon Appetit

*topping inspired by the cooking of Chef Anthony of Gramercy Tavern

For the latkes:

2 medium heads of cauliflower, trimmed to just the florets

2 cloves of garlic, minced

1 lemon, zested

salt and pepper to taste

3/4 C bread crumbs, unseasoned

3 eggs

For the topping:

2 T olive oil

3/4 C almonds, toasted, roughly chopped

1 T capers

1/2 C golden raisins, plumped

1/2 lemon, juiced

salt and pepper to taste

1. Boil 1/2 the cauliflower until tender. Finely chop the second half and reserve.

2. Drain and puree the boiled cauliflower with garlic, lemon zest salt and pepper until smooth. Stir in chopped cauliflower, bread crumbs and eggs forming a thick, chunky batter.

3. Drop heaping tablespoons of the batter onto a parchment lined baking sheet and gently flatten them to about 1/2 in thickness. Bake at 400 degrees for about 15 minutes, or until lightly golden brown on top.

4. For the topping, heat olive oil in a saute pan and add almonds, capers, raisins, lemon juice, salt and pepper until warmed.

5. Spoon topping over latkes and learn to love cauliflower!

Yield:

30 2 inch latkes

New Year, Old Favorite

2009-01-03T20:11:00.001-05:00

Hello from the top of 2009! I don't know about you, but the year ahead is looking pretty good from up here.

I hope you all had your fill of sugar cookies and sparkling bubbly because its time to get down and dirty. Vegetables folks. I did promise you a good, healthy, post-new year's dose and I suspect that starting the year with a recipe for cake would spoil many a fresh resolution. So we'll ease in. Say a pile of cheery sweet potatoes for a start?

Now that you have a hint of where we are going, let me take you back a few days. On the 31st I found myself ringing in 2009 with a hearty, feel-great feast of comfort pub food at a new favorite West Village bar, Wilfie and Nell's. Teetering on the high wire between 2008 and the new year my mind wandered, thinking about the comforts we bring with us from year to year. Digging into a steaming Shepherd's pie I smile, seeing I'm actually eating one of those very comforts: the tradition of meat pies dating back to a lost time as long ago as the Middle Ages and there I was scheming how to make it at home for you (okay, for me too. It was deelicious).

So let's start the new year with an old (old old old) favorite. I bring you, Sweet Potato and Hennepin Cottage Pie. All that stands between you and a steaming bowl of good-for-you pie is ground meat, a simple handful of veggies, and a dash of Hennepin, a Belgian beer with a yeasty, slightly gingery flavor. For our pie we used ground beef, red onion, peas, kabocha squash in place of carrots and of course mashed sweeties for the top crust.

A note on the Kabocha squash: as it turns out, the thick skin of the squash made it a bit rascally to render the way we'd intended so for future pies I'd suggest something with a thinner skin like a butternut or red kuri squash. Or plain and simple, sweet orange carrots.

A little browning of the meat, sweating of the onions, parboiling of the squash and mashing of the potatoes and you're nearing a pie of perfection.

Comfortable and quick. One of the best things about this pie (and maybe the key to its longevity) is that it's preparation allows for plenty of time to start your book club, send that letter to your old friend, be nicer to your mom, go to the gym more often...okay, so you should save some resolutions for before dinner.

Take comfort in the sweet steam rising from your bowl. And like your new years resolutions, make it your own; with any veggies, beef or lamb, your choice of beer, mashed potatoes sweet or plain (and maybe a little grated cheese...) I think this old favorite rings the right note for a delicious new year.

A happy new year to you all!

P.S. Don't worry, there will be cookies soon.

Sweet Potato and Hennepin Cottage Pie

3 medium sweet potatoes, peeled, chopped

2 T butter

1 pound ground beef

1 medium winter squash (ex. butternut or red kuri), peeled, chopped

1/2 c peas (frozen will do just fine)

1/2 red onion, finely chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

2 T sage, very finely chopped

2 T tarragon, very finely chopped

1 t fresh ground nutmeg

salt and pepper to taste

1 1/2 T flour

1 c Hennepin (or any beer that suits your taste...just avoid sweet and fruity)

1. Boil chopped sweet potatoes till soft enough to mash. Drain, mash and stir in butter. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Reserve.

2. Brown the ground beef. Reserve.

3. Sautee onions, garlic and spices until onions are slightly sweated. Reserve.

4. Par-boil the squash of your choice...let them soften but not to total mush.

5. In a large bowl, stir together meat, squash, and sauteed onions with spice. Stir in flour and beer. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

6. Pat mixture into a 9x9 in pan (or a pie dish).

7. Cover with mashed sweet potatoes.

8. Cook for about 15 minutes in a 375 degree F oven.

9. If you feel so inclined, remove from oven, grate cheese on sweet potatoes and place back in the oven for enough time to melt and brown cheese on top.

Yield

about 6-7 large servings

Holiday Blend

2008-12-21T00:21:00.001-05:00

I've been taken hostage by cookies and little baggies with string. Going homemade for the holidays, I've been sidetracked from my keyboard by baking sheets and treat boxes and gooey, sweet pounds of...well, now, since some certain family members may be grazing these pages I won't say what exactly, but I'll just say chocolate may or may not be involved.

My furious baking has also taken me away from recipes not involving excessive amounts of butter or cups packed with sugar. I'm starting to forget about vegetables. I promise we'll start the new year with a confettied parade of green leaves and baby tomatoes, but for now, let's just be sugar drunk for a little longer.

In addition to little white lights and the smell of pine, I've always been particularly fond of the holiday season as it is a widely celebrated excuse to eat sweets. Because the more the merrier is a true sentiment, and because the more friends, the more cookies you can bake, since we last chatted some of the best people in the Greenpoint area gathered in the name of great goodies; I baked, Russ sprinkled nutmeg on seriously frothy eggnog, and our friends snacked, pinning cloves into ribbon-tied oranges for a deliciously scented, affordable option in the way of ornaments.

Vanilla-sugar coated, soft molasses drops were the bat-sign of cookies shining bright on a starry Brooklyn night; everyone answered the call leaving crumbs of glittery sugar. One of my favorites, I promise you the smell of these baking is so warm and fantastic it actually feels good down to your toes.

Almost as good, that is, as it does to snack with your favorite sweeties. While there are certainly times that call of solitary ice cream consumption, and while there will always midnight snacks where you eat just one more of those brownies than you would have if someone were watching...the holidays remind me that I love food for the way it unites us, unwinds us, and gives us shiny moments to feel needed and be nourished.

I'm sure you are all packing wool socks and flannel pj's in preparation for your own holiday plans. I myself am heading to Michigan with Russ to seriously celebrate my love for snow (and family), so it may be a little while till we meet here again. But before we go, I'd like to give you one last snack; a childhood favorite of Russ's, try filling dried dates with peanut butter, finishing them off with a roll in white sugar:

If I could wrap them in a box for you I would. A sweet snack from me to you as I'm so truly glad you've all found your way to my little corner shop of a blog. And because I'm looking out for you, after the holidays, vegetables, I promise.

From the glow of eight candles to stars perched on tree tops, I wish you all warm sugary holidays. Safe travels! Eat up!

Peanut Butter-Stuffed Sugar Dates

Dried dates
Peanut butter
Granuated sugar

1. Cut a slit into the middle of a dried date.
2. Using knife, spread a bit of peanut butter into the date.
3. Roll in sugar.
4. Repeat until full.

Yield
your heart's desire

The Great Scone Experiment

2008-12-13T11:24:00.001-05:00

My apron is my lab coat. My kitchen, my lab. The experiment? Solving the equation for creating a perfect scone.

I've shared with you my deep feelings for breakfast. All things starchy and sweet in particular. However, in a sea of malted waffles and flapping jacks, I've always been particularly fascinated by what we call the scone. It's a chameleon in the pastry case. It's cakey, crumbly, dense...sweet then savory... almost always delicious but almost never the same.

How curious. I feel a call to experiment. In the name of science (and yes, because I love love love scones) I decide I will work in a cloud of flour to discover the perfect mix of butter and sugar, trying currants, chocolate chips, herbs and cheese, tirelessly seeking out the ratio for a scone that embodies true...scone-iness.

Trial 1. I start with cranberries:

And ginger. Hypothesizing that the shining example of a scone should have the ability to change with the times, I observe the times now call for holiday breakfasts complimented with scents of fresh pine and cold winter air. What better then, than ruby berries and warm spice.

But what about the meat of the scone? Whirling around from the cutting board, facing the drawing board...I quickly remember it's blank. With the number of scone recipes in the world as many as there are bakeries and breakfast buffets, I decide the most scientifically methodical decision is to spin the globe, close my eyes, and drop my finger.

It lands on a new cookbook in my collection, "The Sweeter Side of Amy's Bread". Cream scones to be exact. Alright I say. We're off.

Stirring together flour, spice, berries and brown sugar, a stream of heavy cream brings it all together in a gooey blob of a dough; as I mix it up to the morning croons of Otis Redding, I make an observation that thus far the recipe is simple enough to allow mixing and simultaneous shimmying. A check in the plus column.

On the table it's a bit of a sticky mess. Not unmanageable, just enough to get your hands dirty. The cold creamy dough coats my fingers like a spa treatment, breakfast style. Taking care to keep the dough fairly thick (the method reminds that the scones tend to spread significantly during baking), I slice six large triangles and send them into the oven. Then I wash my hands.

One mug of coffee and a few eager peeks into the oven later, the first run of the experiment nears it's close. Pulling the tray from the oven, pushing smart looking glasses up for a close look, I note the scones look soft, have spread slightly and smell, well, heavenly.

I too note my rumbling stomach and commence the final phase of testing. Tasting. The result?A success for cakey scone supporters. They are very light, slightly crumbly, very moist and happily, very tasty.

These winter wonderfuls are a good place to start. I ate two and wished there were more. But I wonder, should they have been firmer? Thicker? I ponder. Is there such a thing as a perfect scone or is a scone a scone because of it's shape-shifting sweetness? For the sake of research, and a little bit for my love of scones, the experiment shall continue.

Stay tuned. Until next time, I wish you cakey cranberry ginger scones, happy holiday breakfasts, a shimmy or two and lots of Otis Redding.

Cranberry Ginger Scones

adapted from The Sweeter Side of Amy's Bread

3 1/2 C flour

1 T plus 1 t baking powder

1 1/2 t salt

6 t ground ginger

1 C dark brown sugar

2 1/2 C fresh or frozen cranberries, chopped

2 2/3 C heavy cream

1 egg (for egg wash)

Turbinado sugar for sprinkling

1. Preheat oven to 400.

2. Whisk together flour, baking powder, salt and ginger. Stir in brown sugar until evenly distributed.

3. Stir in cranberries.

4. Make a well and pour in heavy cream. Stir with a wooden spoon or spatula until a soft dough is formed, strong enough to hold its shape without spreading. If the dough is too stiff you can add a little more cream.

5. Divide the dough evenly in two. Gently shape each piece into a disk about 2 inches thick. It will be VERY STICKY! Go with it, enjoy it.

6. Using a floured knife, cut each disk into six wedges.

7. Place six on a sheet tray leaving as much space around each as possible. Brush with egg wash (1 egg plus 1 t water), and sprinkle tops with turbinado sugar.

8. Bake at 400 for 7 minutes. Rotate pans, lower oven to 350, continue baking for 15 to 20 more minutes. Scones should be golden brown and firm to the touch. You can turn the oven down to 325 if your scones are browning too quickly.

9. Do a shimmy and eat a scone!

Yield

12 large scones

Soup: A Love List

2008-12-08T20:17:00.001-05:00

In an ode to love letters and grocery lists, here are 15 reasons (seasoned with one recipe) for which I am smitten with soup.

1. While it's not officially winter, it is officially cold. And soup, well, it's hot. It's the warm-cocoa-in-a-mug of nourishing meals.

2. Unlike cocoa, soup is further like tea; it knows no season. Or rather, it knows them all. While it warms in the winter it also glistens in the spring, satisfies in summer, soothes in the fall.

3. Soup is a white t-shirt and a slinky black dress. In a cup on a sick day, in a thermos for a quick lunch, in a white china bowl in a candlelit restaurant...it always looks good.

4. And what can't you put in it? Soup does not discriminate. Potatoes and ham. Coconut and chicken. Hazelnuts and mushrooms. Or, say...a bumpy pile of sunchokes.

5. Soup is easy. A handful of this, a sprinkle of that; add liquid and veggies, meat and seasonings, turn up the heat and you are your own chef; the soup's on.

6. Soup is comfortable. It is no hard shelled lobster. No fishy filet full of fragile bones. On a white tablecloth full of silvery silverware you can always find the soup spoon. A bowl feels good in your hands. A spoon, good between your lips.

7. Soup is sipable. Soup is slurpable.

8. It can be as simple or as complex as your time and tastebuds wish. Chicken and noodles or a melange of mysterious spices. If you're thinking sunchokes try shallots, sage, thyme and garlic.

9. Soup keeps you on your toes. It's thin and clear, smooth and thick, subtle and indulgent, chunky and nourishing. As many times as you've had it, it can continually surprise.

10. And continually change. You love clam chowder? A career could be made from tasting the varieties that simmer with people's secret ingredients.

11. So how wonderful is it then that chicken soup isn't always just chicken soup. Tomato bisque, not simply tomatoes and cream. A good soup is layered with flavors brewing just underneath the surface; to add some shazaam to your sunchoke soup, sautee andouille sausage with the seasonings before adding broth and veggies

12. And while it cooks, listen. Soup sizzles, hisses, beats and bubbles.

13. When its done, the more the merrier. No need to scrimp with soup; plunging a long spoon into a tall pot, it is satiating, even before the first bite, to know you're stirring a meal meant for feeding people you love.

14. Soup is the little dish that can. It stands alone as well as it complements a good salad, or teases before a feast. Try your sunchoke and sausage soup with a sandwich on crusty bread.

15. And best of all, soup has long arms. It leaves no one out and it squeezes tight. A fine she-crab bisque, or a campfire steak and potato stew, cabbage stock or broth with alphabet noodles, gumbo or puree of sunchokes, isn't soup something we all have in common?

Sunchoke Soup with Andouille Sausage

2 pounds sunchokes
1 medium to large link of andouille sausage*
8 medium sized shallots
3 cloves of garlic
4 springs of thyme, picked
1 T fresh sage, chopped
salt
pepper
2 T olive oil
2 qt chicken stock

*in a pinch, anything slightly spiced and smoked will do!

1. Peel and chop sunchokes. (don't let the bumps scare you...just peel right over them, and if you loose a little flesh, no big whoop)
2. Slice sausage into 1/2 inch medallions, then chop slices to quarter.
3. In the bottom of a large stock pot, over medium heat, pour olive oil and sautee sausage, shallots, thyme, sage and garlic plus salt and pepper to taste. Heat until shallots are sweated and translucent. And when peppering, remember your sausage packs a punch! Pepper with care.
4. Add sunchokes and heat together for 2 min, stirring to brown lightly.
5. Cover with stock. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and let cook for about 45 min (or until sunchokes are tender).
6. Remove from heat. Let cool for about 20-30 min.
7. In a blender, puree half of the soup. BE CAREFUL! Hot soup in a blender has a tendency to get rowdy and explode out the top due to the steam...to prevent this, leave a small hole between the body of the blender and the lid (facing away from you!) and cover the top with towels to shield your hands from hot soup.
8. Pour pureed soup back into pot, stir.
9. Reheat to taste and serve.

Yield
approx 6 entree sized, soup lover servings

Pretty Cups, Pounds of Chocolate

2008-12-03T17:27:00.001-05:00

What inspires creativity in the kitchen? Sweet potatoes from the farmer's market. A new cookbook. A rainy day. Cravings. Time. There are as many sources as there are ways to cook an egg. Not so long ago celebrating birthday number 27, I was given a set of beautiful, dreamy tea cups; in the time it takes to rip wrapping paper, inspiration!

It was clear to me that these little cups were meant for something special. Something as indulgent as the golden, spiraling, dotted flowers that circled their thin rims. Something as festive as the wintery-brilliant colors splashed on the saucers. Something rich enough to let one tiny cup get the job done.

For me, more often than from dishware, inspiration in the kitchen comes from taking a close look at what's around. On chilly days off from work, when you want to cook, but are also passionately committed to long underwear and slippers, creativity can be born from what's at hand in the pantry.

Today my eyes fall on one 11 pound box of dark chocolate.

I know this is not normal pantry fare. I often wish on eyelashes and birthday candles and clocks at 11:11 for everyone's pantries to be heavy with pounds of chocolate. Myself having made an investment some time ago figuring I'd benefit from chocolate on days just as today, this morning my special pantry provided just the idea for those special cups.

Hot chocolate. Dark, excessively thick, milky hot chocolate. Wheels still turning I see rosemary. Really rolling now I think caramel. In a whir I grab bowls and milk and pots and sugar.

Wait. Rosemary? I know having 11 pounds of chocolate in my cupboard may imply insanity but follow me on this one. In recent chats on navigating the path between sweet and savory Russ and I agreed that rosemary might indeed be a mighty little Magellan. Earthy, wintery, fresh...combined with warm, nutty and sweet...tingling with the spirit of adventure that comes from new plans in the kitchen I decided it was time to test the waters.

So the rosemary set sail into a caramel. Heating cream and steeping fresh rosemary needles in the pot I envision the herby caramel a cashmere scarf wrapped around scruffy, bearded cheeks; sweet and cozy with a hint of rustic wintry bite.

Slowly pouring the cream into a pot of caramelized hot sugar, the mixture froths wildly and fills the room with rich, herbal, sweet smelling steam. For the hot chocolate base, boiling milk poured into a bowl of little chocolate pebbles further enhances the merry mix of scents and steam that warm the kitchen, wafting and fogging up windows.

To finish the drink I whisk the caramel into the thin chocolate ganache. I dip a spoon into the bowl. Inside slippers my toes are tickled. My belly is happy. And while my box of chocolate is a few ounces lighter, the taste test proves the experiment well worth the cocoa butter. A fine, handsome drink for that dainty cup.

Maybe you don't have pounds of chocolate on hand. Maybe your cups are cracked or coffee stained. I have those too; don't worry about it. Let this recipe inspire you to try a little cup of something delicious. Let it give you some oohs and ahhs, some slippered-toe tickles, and maybe let it lead you to your next great kitchen discovery (if that's the rationalization of excessive pantry chocolate stashing, all the better...)

Rosemary Caramel Hot Chocolate

For the caramel:

1 1/2 C heavy cream

2 large sprigs of rosemary, picked (about 2 T)

1 C sugar

For the chocolate base:

12 oz. dark chocolate, chopped (about 2 C)

4 C milk

1. To make the caramel, first heat cream to a near boil. Take cream off the heat, stir in rosemary, cover and let steep for about 5 min.

2. Strain rosemary and reserve 1 C of cream.

3. In a small pot, mix sugar with water (enough to make sugar feel like heavy, wet sand. Don't stress...too much water won't hurt). On high heat, cook until sugar reaches a beautiful, amber brown.

4. Turn off heat. Immediately, slowly stream in 1 C of cream. Pour carefully- the mixture will foam up! Stir caramel until smooth.

5. To make the chocolate base, in a medium pot bring milk to a boil.

6. In a large bowl, pour hot milk over chocolate. Cover for 2 minutes without stirring.

7. Uncover, and whisk until mixture is smooth.

8. Whisk in the rosemary caramel.

Yield

approx 1 qt

Turkeys Travel Too

2008-11-28T23:05:00.008-05:00

I had planned on writing to you yesterday, but on the way to my computer I fell into a turkey and stuffing and sweet potatoes with toasted marshmallows coma, stretched out on the floor in front of my parent's fireplace, and fell asleep.

I've finally shaken my turkey stupor. But I'm not quite finished with the turkey talk yet. Now, now, before you turn around and run for fear of overdosing on any more Thanksgiving food let me set your groaning stomachs at ease; no turkey recipes, I promise. I know the day has come and gone but there is something I have to share with you before we truly call it a day.

This year I stumbled upon something special. An extraordinary turkey. A bird with a story.

Before the last Thursday of every year's November, we travel from our corners, all with the same destination: tables holding pounds of golden, crispy turkey. We come from Brooklyn, the west coast, just around the corner...all for the bird. But what about that bird? It travels too. All years before this I'd say our turkey came from the grocery store. Before the store? Hmm. Maybe I'd rather not know.

This year it was different. My turkey came from Kansas. It came from The Good Shepherd Turkey Ranch. It was farmed by Frank Reese Jr. Frank Reese Jr. has a mustache. This year I'm all in the know just from reading the package of my Heritage Turkey.

Heritage turkeys are ancestors of the industrial, Broad-breasted White turkey we find in our store coolers today. They can have a lineage as far stretching as 150 years back, and are raised on small farms in the heartland of the U.S. Domestic breeds, largely in danger of extinction as industrial farms pack chain groceries with heavy, antibiotic rich turkeys, to save the Heritage breeds farmer's would tell you we need to eat them.

For those in the east and the west, the north and the south, wondering...how? Heritage Foods USA. A business created by Patrick Martins, the founder of Slow Foods USA, Heritage Foods provides consumers with the Heritage breeds of turkey that need your ovens and gravy to stay alive. A connection between the small farmers and your holiday company, with a Heritage bird you are assured a vegetarian fed, free range turkey. A happy bird. You'll know where it came from, who raised it.

And I can tell you, you'll know it will taste delicious. Richer, full of flavor, and so mouthwateringly moist...

Best of all, it doesn't stop at turkey. You're full of turkey, I know. Heritage Foods USA also has pork, beef, lamb. Charcuterie. Even fruit preserves and snacks. All from regional producers (like Frank Jr.) who celebrate honest American traditions of farming and food production. Some have mustaches, some don't.

During a time when we travel to say thanks to our favorite people, I couldn't help but feel thankful for the traveling turkeys, that there are still healthy birds and people to plan their trips to our table.

I know you can't wait for Chinese take-out night. Pizza. Anything but more turkey (thank you for allowing me a few, possibly gratuitous post-Thanksgiving turkey photos!) I just couldn't let pass the opportunity to share with you my discovery in hopes it will excite you too.

And remember, your Christmas goose is just around the corner, your Hanukkah brisket not far behind...

Wishful Whiskeying: Part III, a conclusion and a cocktail

2008-11-23T23:30:00.003-05:00

The past four days here in Brooklyn have been cold. Really cold. Mittens and a hat and a scarf and you're still shivery cold. The consistency of four days in a row, I fear, means winter is close by. And that, my friends, means it's about time to finish up that fall whiskey.

Taking a taste on the fourth day of infusing it was agreed upon that the flavor was just right. The number of days had created a taste that was new and yet still with the definable feel and personality of straight bourbon. After all the pears and nuts and cinnamon sticks, was I finally headed towards the title of whiskey girl extraordinaire?

Before the clock struck cocktail hour there remained one final step. Time to strain. To do this we gathered a large rubber band, scissors and a few pieces of cheese cloth.

Folding the cheesecloth, creating layers to make a tight filter, we rubber banded the cloth over the jar lid and simply poured it from jar to spouted cup.

Warning: to those of you who look eagerly at the nutty mix of whiskey soaked spiced pears remaining at the bottom of the infusing jar...do not eat them. Do not do it. Yes, it was hard to throw away those remaining goodies, but thinking surely there was something that could be done with them I bit into a pear to knockout alcoholic, squish squashy results. The pears have done their work. Let them go.

And let yourself raise a glass! Pouring the bourbon into a clean bottle it was like positioning a trophy as I arranged it on a shelf in the kitchen. Admiring the amber mix a thought crossed my mind: it's wonderfully warming to take serious time creating something meant to be slowly savored.

And after waiting and wondering and wishing, how wonderful and warming is the first taste of the highly anticipated? With the wind whipping at the kitchen windows all the shivers now were only in excitement of the first sip.

Spicy, subtly sweet, toasty and tingling. I am a whisky girl for this.

I'm also still the pre-bourbon Kaitlin. I like rosy drinks. I haven't bought a red dress and while I am pleased with the fall harvest treat I'm not ready for a glass on the rocks. But the possibilities only start on ice. Inspired by the chilly weather and turkeys to be, Russ and I evolved the fall harvest bourbon into a crowd pleasing, company keeping holiday cocktail: hot-buttered cider bourbon, or what we like to call a "Baked Apple".

Straight, sweetened, dressed up or dressed in slippers, I hope you find just the way to make your bourbon your own. And that your bourbon finds you a little warmth in your week.

Baked Apple

hot-buttered fall harvest bourbon with cider

1/2 T butter

2 t brown sugar

3 oz (just less than half a cup) fall harvest bourbon

6 oz (3/4 of a cup) apple cider

1. Place butter, brown sugar and bourbon in a mug.

2. Heat cider until hot enough to melt butter.

3. Pour hot cider into the mug, whisking until sugar has dissolved and butter has melted.

4. Garnish with a cinnamon stick and serve hot.

Yield

one serving

Wholly Pumpkin

2008-11-17T10:16:00.001-05:00

In between all this talk of strong whiskey I feel the need for something wholesome. Namely, pie. Pumpkin pie. It is the season after all, and if we are really being honest, when is there a wrong time for pie?

I have many pie ambitions. I aspire to shape flawlessly crimped crusts. I will find the perfect recipe for both flaky and mealy dough (I happen to prefer a crumbly crust!) Among my many pie dreams is nestled a shamefully simple wish: to make a pumpkin pie from an actual pumpkin. How this has yet to be, I often ask ask myself. And while there will always be a place in my stomach for mom's Libby's canned pumpkin pie, I recently decided it was time to get back to basics and slice into a real, big, orange pumpkin.

Full of that enthusiasm you get from setting out to fulfill a lifelong quest, I pick two picture worthy, round and deeply orange sugar pumpkins from a big pile at my local grocery. Two, and not just the sufficient one, because...I get excited. Quest fulfilling enthusiasm is a powerful thing.

And speaking of powerful things, I'm sure all you pie people out there will confirm, once you start thinking about pie you can't compartmentalize that kind of want. It calls for instant gratification. Back in the kitchen, it's pie time.

To make pumpkin puree is a simple task. The largest challenge really lies in getting into the pumpkin itself. With a sharp knife, stabbing at the thick rind I felt ghoulish, a little like some form of vegetarian butcher. Then, shaking the ghoul and setting down the knife, breaking open the pumpkin, comes a beauty moment. Beauty moments are what I call those times when you, a true lover of food, think to yourself just how beautiful -- physically, colorfully, texturally -- food can be. When you think, "that grows, naturally...like that!" My fellow pie lovers, a beauty moment:

Scraping out the flesh I remember being a little girl, soaking my fingers into slimy, stringy pumpkin goo to pick out seeds for toasting on pumpkin carving night. I make sure to save the seeds from these sugar pumpkins to do the same.

Once clean, the halves go face down on parchment lined baking sheets and into a toasty 425-450 degree F oven. Working on the crust I'll admit, a near crisis ensues as I nearly forget about the precious beauty moment inspiring pumpkins. It's a mystery among many burn-prone bakers...how when things go into the oven simultaneously the mind goes out for a drink.

But I come to just in time. A small pumpkin should take about 40 minutes until the flesh is soft and the skin peels right off.

Once cool, the food processor comes out. A few pulses, a whir, a hum, and the pumpkin turns into a sweet, brilliant, glistening pumpkin-pie-dream-fulfilling puree.

The rest is just like mom makes. Eggs, cinnamon, allspice, sugar. Adding a little more spice than the recipe calls for I watch the mixture turn a deep, rich and warm brown. I pour it into the unbaked, not quite perfectly (yet) crimped crust. And into the oven it goes.

Coming out, I think, "My god I love pie!" Smelling it hot out of the oven I think it's a shame pumpkin pie tastes so much better chilled. Waiting for it to cool I think how surprisingly happy I now am to have a freezer full of excessive amounts of pumpkin puree (re: the pumpkin buying enthusiasm).

The result of the real pumpkin adventure? Worth it. Perhaps worth getting excited and buying two, making extra puree and having it on hand to keep for the next time...less messy, and quicker. But turning a pumpkin into a pie is a trick worth feeling enthusiastic about. The flavor is sweet, but in an organic way, more complex and rich. I didn't include a recipe for the pie because you can simply slip your puree into your own favorite pie recipe (I know pies can get very personal.) You will however find a seed suggestion...for something to eat while you are waiting for the pie to cool.

Spiced Vanilla Pumpkin Seeds

The cleaned seeds from 1 pumpkin

Melted butter to coat

Sugar to coat

1/2 vanilla bean, scraped

approx 1/2 t spice blend (or spice to taste)

Spice blend:

2 parts cinnamon

1 part nutmeg

1 part allspice

1/2 part cardamom

1. Toss seeds in melted butter.

2. Sprinkle with sugar and toss to coat.

3. Stir in the inside of vanilla bean and spice blend...add more or less spice according to your taste.

4. Spread evenly on a parchment lined baking sheet.

5. Bake at 350 degrees F until golden brown, stirring often.

Wishful Whiskeying: Part II, bourbon in the morning?

2008-11-14T18:27:00.012-05:00

In the past two days something has gone awry. Don't worry, the bourbon is tasting delicious. But...somehow instead of slipping on that red dress, I've found myself sipping from a shot glass in my robe and slippers.

Now, now. I'm just tasting. And while I'm not suggesting you complement your morning omelet with a strong drink (other than a good dark roast cup of joe), it's just been too exciting to wait until the sun goes down to taste the changes in the bourbon each day. Right away it grew cloudier as the pears rose to the top, the nuts settling to the bottom.

On day two it was softer...I sipped and when no whiskey face ensued I nearly fell out of my slippers. Today I could start to taste pear and the sugars from the fruit. Looking for a little more spice we added half of one cinnamon stick and another tablespoon size piece of ginger.

Remember, before you try your mix each day give the jar a slow turn upside down to gently stir it up. For now our jar is back on the shelf and tasting like it will only need a few more days worth of infusing. All the fun is in making it exactly how you like; mixing and waiting and sipping...even in your slippers.

Check back soon for the final report and a cocktail recipe suited for sleepy, post-Thanksgiving dinner night caps.

Wishful Whiskeying: Part I, an experiment in infusions

2008-11-12T10:45:00.029-05:00

It's bothered me on more than one occasion that I cannot drink whiskey. If I could have it my way I'd be the kind of girl that could sit down in a red dress at a bar, toss my hair carelessly and order, "Whiskey, neat." Sometimes I toss my hair, but now that I'm thinking about it, I don't even own a red dress. What happens when I try whiskey is that my face wrinkles into a prune, my mouth burns and I make a strange involuntary, "plecchh," sound while my tongue shoots out (all of this further reason for me to forgo whiskey, especially in public places). I hate to admit it, but with the exception of a good gin and tonic, I am in fact partial to pink drinks that fizz.

Maybe it's the change in the season approaching, or a little chilly weather restlessness, but I've recently rediscovered my want to be a whiskey girl. I look to my right hand man. I think what a happy coincidence he happens to make a living mixing up spirits at New York City's Gramercy Tavern. And even better, that he's recently plotted to bring his work home, gathering jars and fruit and spices to make original whiskey infusions. As bottles and shot glasses come out, our kitchen island transforms into a bar and I decide this experiment will be good for me (and hopefully you too).

So welcome to day one. The project is called Fall Harvest Bourbon; 750mL of Bourbon whiskey infused with pears, hazelnuts, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger.

As we peel pears and toast nuts I feel a bit like a kid making a mud stew with sticks and berries. It's a carefree way of cooking; chop it all up, and throw it in a jar. Smelling the toasty hazelnuts and the refreshing bite of the ginger we add, improving the planned ingredients a touch, I think this may be the kind of whiskey I can really get into.

And then my spiced pear dreaming is interrupted. With all the ingredients in the jar (save the alcohol), Russ pours a shot of the Buffalo Trace Bourbon. He pushes it towards me. "Here," he says. A reality check. I am not ready for this. Has he never seen my straight whiskey face? I panic. I wonder. I sigh. Only in the name of understanding the transformation from pre-infused to spicy sweet Bourbon do I hesitantly take a sip. No picture will follow of the face that ensued.

But it is a good start. Pouring the bourbon into the jar, I still feel the caramel, slightly musky and hot flavor burned into my mouth. I will know the difference when I taste it. And when will that be, I hear you thirstily ask? A general range is about three to five days, perhaps longer, though you should taste it every day to decide when it's reached the perfect point. Remember: this is the start of a few entries so don't feel lost and confused, we'll drink and work it out together.

Closing up the jar, we turn it over once, gently, then back to an upright position. It is set on a shelf to start it's transformation. A culinary science project of sorts, I stare at the amber mixture as if waiting for some sort of flashy chemical reaction to take place.

While it's no baking soda volcano, something is happening. I think about all the flavors melding and mixing and expect this project to be a serious step in my pursuit of an affinity for whiskey. Below you will find the recipe for our first go around, but note that it’s a recipe in development; check back soon for changes and taste tests.

With the Bourbon on the shelf for now, I think I might go shop around for a red dress.

Fall Harvest Bourbon
(a starting point)

750mL Bourbon
1 C pears, peeled, thickly sliced
1/2 C hazelnuts, toasted
1 cinnamon stick
1 tsp fresh nutmeg (1/2 tsp pre-ground nutmeg)
1 chunk ginger, about the size of a tablespoon

1. Put all ingredients in a large jar.
2. Pour alcohol over ingredients.
3. Seal jar. Gently turn over once.
4. Put the jar on a shelf...
5. Take a sip everyday and check back here while you wait and see!

For the Love of Breakfast

2008-11-08T21:46:00.021-05:00

If the stories I write to you are any representation of myself and my appetite, then it's about time we get around to breakfast. I love breakfast. I love, love, love breakfast. Pastries, pancakes, cinnamoned oatmeal and honey-flaked cereal...it was early in my life that I realized how near breakfast was to dessert and it's been close to my heart ever since.

I also swoon for the first meal of the day because as a rule, I wake up starving. I'm with a bagel and coffee no less that 15 minutes out of bed. Skipping breakfast is...an offensive thought. I could never do it. In fact, on sleepy weekends when others rise at noon, it's often my growling stomach that forces my lids up before the sun and moves my feet to swing out from under warm covers.

Take this morning for example. A wonderfully grey, rainy Saturday and I'm up by eight o'clock pondering what's good in the kitchen. Weekend mornings like this one, on the dry side of rain-drizzled windows, these are my favorite for they give you the time to make breakfast an event. Scones, waffles...a little flour and a dash of elbow grease yield the food you work through the week to get to.

Thumbing through the King Arthur Flour Baker's Companion I scanned for the perfect Saturday starch. Pancakes? No buttermilk in the fridge. Biscuits? No honey or jam. Reviewing the options, I could feel my hunger snowballing with every recipe read. Fifteen minutes down; a decision needed to be made, fast. I flipped the page. In the top left corner the heading read "Welsh Cakes." Welsh cakes? The thrilling, rare occurrence of a breakfast goodie just discovered! Described in italics as a cross between a pancake and a biscuit, the deal was sealed and the Welsh cakes were on.

I should note that my love for breakfast is deepened by the inherent comfort both of making and eating it. In the quiet hours of an early day there has always been something calming about noiselessly whisking together flour and sugar. And I know it may be wrong, but facing a white-canvased morning, I've never managed to feel guilty about anything I eat for breakfast.

So this morning I whisked quietly, stirring flour, sugar, nutmeg and allspice. Looking for a substitution for currants, I chose very thinly sliced bananas, the fruit that both my mother and Russ will claim a cure all in times of hunger, headaches, heartache, dehydration, sleeplessness and stomach bugs alike.

Now before I get to the griddle, allow me to bring something to light. Surely there are many kinds of cooks in the world (some with a love of breakfast, others, bananas). However, more specifically among the varieties there are those who are patient and methodical no matter the situation, and those who abandon focus and control while cooking when hungry. Please remember how much time must have passed at this point since I'd risen. I am not the first kind of cook.

Thus, there were two results of my nature in the kitchen this morning. One, I discovered that Welsh cake dough is delicious raw. Second, was the creation of a new method, much faster yet ultimately producing a cake more...rustic in appearance (below you'll find both approaches so you can personalize your morning cake). Ditching a process of chilling, rolling out and biscuit cutting perfectly thin, round cakes, I threw the bowl of dough in the freezer for five minutes, hand-patted thick cakes and flattened them on the griddle with a spatula. My stomach and I are working on patience in the face of sweet dough.

Whether you choose thin and lovely or thicker and slightly misshapen, I think you will find the result of your Welsh cakes a curl-up-on-the-couch-with-your-coffee classic. Firm enough to pick up but soft and tender inside, the cakes were warmly spiced, sugary and so pleasantly filling.

Sprinkle them with powdered sugar, drizzle them with syrup, cover them with jam or butter. And if you believe in the power of something other than bananas, say blueberries, crushed nuts or dried cranberries, trade out the banana, put in what you love.

Sneak into the early-morning quiet of your kitchen next weekend, heat up your griddle and try these sweet little breakfast cakes. And for you late sleepers, a tip from an early weekend riser; if everyone is still sleeping, no one will see you eat the dough.

Spiced Banana Welsh Cakes

adapted from The King Arthur Flour Baker's Companion

1 1/2 C all purpose flour

1/2 C sugar

1 t baking powder

1/2 t nutmeg

1/2 t allspice

1/8 t salt

1/2 C (1 stick) butter

1 banana

1 egg beaten, with enough milk added to equal 3/8 C

Method 1: Oh my god I need to eat RIGHT NOW.

1. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, nutmeg, allspice and salt.

2. Rub in butter with your hands until it is in coarse chunks, evenly distributed in the flour.

3. Thinly slice the banana, and stir into the dry ingredients.

4. Stir in egg and milk, creating a wet dough.

5. Put the dough in the freezer for 5-10 minutes.

6. Heat a griddle or frying pan, coat with butter.

7. With floured hands form a cake about 3 inches wide and 1/2 and inch thick, dropping it onto the griddle.

8. Cook until golden brown on one side, pressing down gently to spread as it cooks. Flip*, and cook until golden brown on the other side.

*it may be hard to flip cleanly, but hey, it will taste the same either way and you are hungry.

Method 2: I would like to impress my guests and will make these the pretty way.

1-4. See above.

5. Refrigerate dough for about 30 minutes or until not too sticky to roll out.

6. Working with one half of the dough at a time (reserving the rest in the fridge), roll out the dough to 1/4 inch.

7. Using a biscuit or circle cookie cutter, cut rounds (the size is up to your taste) from the dough.

8. Cook on griddle as instructed above.

Yield

approx 10 1/2 inch thick, 4 in wide (once pressed) rustic cakes

approx 20 1/4 inch thick, 4 in wide lovely looking cakes

A Secret and a Chicken

2008-11-04T16:23:00.000-05:00

I have a secret. Well, perhaps more of a guilty admission to make. Remember that Vermont apple wine I wrote of? Oaky and olive-ish? Well. The cold hard truth is that in reality it was...gross. There, I said it. Gross. It was oaky and olive-ish but also tart and vinegary. I wanted to like it, but I also wanted it to taste like a magically alcoholic cider that would warm one's toes on chilly nights. This drink, it was not.

In fairness, it was an interesting concoction. Maybe it wasn't meant for my glass but with three-quarters of a bottle looking lonely on my countertop I couldn't bring myself to pour it into the sink. Plus, I really did want to like this drink with such a nice title: apple wine, a drink that stirs cozy images of rustic winters. To drink or not to drink?

Perhaps neither. Enter, the chicken. To drink or...to poach! Resourceful and more than helpful in the kitchen, Russ considered the bottle then speculated; dry and savory, maybe the stovetop was just the home this wine was looking for. It was an interesting idea.

Now, before we go on, another admission: generally, I don't feel strongly for things poached. The concept of a poached food has always brought to mind images of squishy eggs and slimy salmon. But for the love of wine, on this particular night I decided to give poaching a go, if nothing else in the name of finding a way to like that rascally apple drink.

Enter fresh rosemary and sage. Enter garlic and onions. Enter bacon. All chopped up on a cutting board, I declare there is nothing like the scent of fresh herbs...drinking in the air around a bunch of fresh rosemary is like a green aperitif. And bacon, well the sheer suggestion of a thick slice, waiting to be cooked, waters the mouth and puts grumbles in the stomach.

Manning the tongs, staring that bottle of wine in the eye, Russ took on the chicken while I cared for a side- a bit of butternut squash risotto thanks to Gourmet (if you're looking at the recipe we omitted the arugula). With a pan, a bottle of olive oil and seasonings close by, it was a brush off the cutting board, a clip and toss of the tongs and voila, onions were sputtering and the bacon was on. I love the smell of onions cooking; it smells of the start of so many delicious possibilities.

Three juicy chicken breasts snuggled into the mix and it was time. Streaming wine into the pan the aroma grew full almost instantly. The heat, the herbs, the super-hero power of bacon...all smells pointed to yes, perhaps this merry melange was just what the bottle was meant for. The wine bubbled around the chicken, a woodsy smelling bath, herbs and wine and bird all cooking contently together.

We popped a lid on it, drank gin and tonics to our health, and for our health boiled a lovely, leafy pile of curly green kale (you're giving poaching a chance...now's the time, try boiled kale too!) Even if you don't like eating dark leafies, I always find that it at least feels good to cook them.

One cocktail down, a pot of kale drained and a heaping bowl of risotto steaming on the back burner, it was a happy kitchen...and, time to test the chicken. I reached for the lid... Lifted it up... Wafting, scented steam wrote the end of the story in fragrant loops through the air. The heavy, sharp flavor of the wine was the perfect backdrop for the earthy-herbed, salt and peppered, bacon-bettered chicken breasts. From gross to good god that smells great! Spooning all the goodies from the pan over the chicken, it was decided that the apple wine had led to a triumphant plate indeed.

And so I reconciled my feelings with that bottle. Tasty things come in tricky packages. Apple wine, things poached, even boiled greens (I'm serious...try them). A meal like this doesn't just feed your hunger, it makes you hungry to find the next surprising feast. I hope you like it.

And no more secrets here, I promise.

Apple Wine Poached Chicken

2 T olive oil

2 tsp fresh sage, finely chopped

2 sprigs fresh rosemary, picked

1/2 a medium sized red onion, roughly chopped

3 strips of bacon, chopped

1 clove garlic, thinly sliced

1/2 T butter

3 chicken breasts (roughly 1 1/2 pounds)

approx 1/2 bottle apple wine*

*if you can't find apple wine, a white wine such as a riesling will be equally delicious...add a 1/2 T or so of apple vinegar to imitate the fermented flavor of the apple wine.

1. In a medium frying pan, over medium heat, sautee sage, rosemary, onions, bacon, and garlic (with salt and pepper to your liking) in olive oil until onions begin to sweat.

2. In the same pan, sear chicken breasts on both sides.

3. Add butter and stream the wine over the chicken. You want the wine to come about half-way up the side of the chicken breasts (depending on the size of the pan you are using, you may use more or less than called for in the ingredient list).

4. Put a lid over the pan, lower the heat and let the wine simmer around the chicken for 15-20 min, or until chicken is cooked through.

What Happened In Vermont...

2008-11-01T12:58:00.021-04:00

Fleeing Brooklyn's, no-sign-of-fall, fall streets, I recently snuck up to the North East of Vermont in order to drink cider and properly kick through colored leaves with true autumn-ish abandon. I went to pick pumpkins, apples, to hike through Halloween-bare woods in the craggy mountains. And I did. I hiked and chomped on apples and everything was crisp and delicious and just as I'd hoped until something entirely unexpected happened.

It began here:

I'll explain. Close your eyes and picture the food that horrifies and disgusts you, so much, yet so irrationally you rarely admit your aversion. That thing for which you've perfected excuses why, "No thank you, you wouldn't care for any," at parties or dinners where everyone around you just loves it. Maybe it's chocolate, peaches, oysters. For me, it's cheese.

After a near 24-year stretch of complete and passionately committed aversion, I now so occasionally nibble at it, and only the mildest of what's out there at that, all the while still amazed that I am actually putting cheese into my body.

Which I hope now paints a new picture of that fated aisle.

"Let's get some cheese and wine," my travel partner and main squeeze, Russ, proposed as we grazed through a local food grocery in Burlington.

"Okay," I say. Just like that. It is entirely possible I was distracted by how nice he looked in plaid against the New England background. Whatever the glitch, before I knew it I was cradling three wedges in the crook of my arm while we stood in line to pay. I was holding cheese. I was going to spend an afternoon eating cheese.

Back at the B&B, beside a fire, with a crossword puzzle, some local honey and Vermont-produced apple wine, I sat in that cozy nook and my friends, did I eat cheese.

I started sensibly; a thick slice of Vermont Ayr, a raw cow's milk cheese produced on Crawford Family Farm. Milky, smooth and...sweet, I think to myself. Another slice with honey on top, then another with a piece of apple underneath. I felt no reason to stop there and, well, I was happily seizing that sense of adventure.

The next, an alpine cheese, Tarentaise, from Thistle Hill Farm. Yum yum. Made from the organic milk of happy grass-fed cows, it was firm with a slightly salty, very nutty and completely delicious soft flavor. At this point, an on-looker may have commented that I appeared to have gone wild. Though I will not admit it, it is said that I ate almost the entire little block right there, right then...

In between all the munching, we sipped on North River Winery's Northern Spy Dry Apple Wine; to me, a very novice sipper, the wine exploded oaky with strange and surprising olive flavors. Peculiar and somewhat tasty though not the easiest to drink, I kept on with the cheese.

The shocking finale, and perhaps especially helpful if you happen to be a cheese newbie and ready to face the great big bleu...spread the news, an amazing discovery. Our final choice, a blue cleverly named "Gore Dawn Zola," after one of the cheese makers at Green Mountain Blue Cheese Co., I ate, enjoyed and went back for seconds (it's true!) for the surprisingly mild and gently tangy blue striped cheese.

My stomach ached an hour later. I wondered, without the country air blowing leaves and a too-perfect crackling fireplace and a handsome man in plaid sitting beside me on a dark leather couch, would this ever happen again?

What happened in Vermont may stay in Vermont, though I did bring a few wedges home, just in case.

What's At The Bottom Of This Cup?

2008-10-30T22:34:00.006-04:00

Welcome readers! Snackers! Picky eaters and proud omnivores! True chefs and those who burn toast! I'm so glad you've found your way here to my corner of the web.

Sit down, get comfy. What can I offer you? I'd love to hand you a plate of molasses cookies, or ladle you soup from the stove. If for some sort of Wonka-web, I'd reach out and hand you a mug, dropping marshmallows into your thick cocoa.

So we'll talk food instead. If I were to brew you coffee, the grounds at the bottom may read that you've found a place where stories of daily life and food fancies mix into sometimes humorous, occasionally helpful, hopefully entertaining tales from my Brooklyn kitchen. If I steeped you a cup of tea, the leaves at the bottom would spell that you've found a place from which to take recipes that I hope will feed and please you as they do me. Along the course of my great scone adventure I want your ideas on what makes the ideal breakfast goodie. I hope that in your search for the perfect sick-day soup recipe I can help you find your happy bowl.

Curious, hungry, and ready to share stomach-rumbling yarns both long and short, cheers, courage; to cooking and cocoa and all things delicious.

Bottoms up!

A Curious Cupful

Something New

Homemade

Cake and Ice Cream

It Doesn't Look Pretty

Delicious

Where I've Been

Something Old, Something Blue

CAKE.

A Quiet Night with Cherry Cake

An Hour Away

Enigma On Toast

It's ALIVE!! A tale of soft shell crabs

Attack of the Ramps

Spats

Something To Share

The Complete 2009 VGABS Recipes EbookFeatures all 170 of the submitted recipes. Many of the recipes include pictures.On the checkout page, manually change the amount (USD) field to your donation amount.Shopping cart courtesy of E-Junkie.

Regaining Strength

The Challah That Lived

One Fish, Ooo...Fish

Food and Thoughts and a Green Kitchen Tablecloth

A Cake to Hold a Candle To

Three Little Words

Snow Gets In Your Eyes

In The Inventing Room

Love In the Time of Cauliflower

New Year, Old Favorite

Holiday Blend

The Great Scone Experiment

Soup: A Love List

Pretty Cups, Pounds of Chocolate

Turkeys Travel Too

Wishful Whiskeying: Part III, a conclusion and a cocktail

Wholly Pumpkin

Wishful Whiskeying: Part II, bourbon in the morning?

Wishful Whiskeying: Part I, an experiment in infusions

For the Love of Breakfast

A Secret and a Chicken

What Happened In Vermont...

What's At The Bottom Of This Cup?

The Complete 2009 VGABS Recipes Ebook

Features all 170 of the submitted recipes. Many of the recipes include pictures.

On the checkout page, manually change the amount (USD) field to your donation amount.

Shopping cart courtesy of E-Junkie.