23 posts tagged “food”

pies, that is (this is a family friendly blog after all!).

Over vacation I was reminded about the choices I make when I eat in two ways that inspired me to rethink things once I got home.  In addition to seeing the documentary Food Inc. I finally had a chance to read Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, Barbara Kingsolver's book on her own family's attempt to eat locally for a year.  It was a fantastic read, and inspired me to do what little I could to support local food and cook seasonally.  The latter isn't totally unfamiliar to me, as I did just that when I lived in Paris many moons ago. However, it's something I've become less accustomed to, as the produce specials at the local supermarkets don't always reflect the seasonality of Northern California, but that of South America (i.e. asparagus for $1.50 a pound in December) and other parts of the world.  

When a friend asked me to bring dessert to a July 4th BBQ this weekend, I immediately thought of brownies.  They're a great match for grilled food, and are eminently portable, which was key since we were planning on riding our bikes over.  Pies and fancy cakes couldn't handle the Tahoe bike paths (and my penchant for hitting potholes).

I have an enormous collection of brownie recipes, but there was one that I'd been wanting to try for awhile, a recipe from Dorie Greenspan for her chipster brownies.  Essentially these are cookie-topped brownies, because chocolate brownies aren't enough on their own.

I stayed pretty true to the recipe, though I did have to use butterscotch chips in the cookie batter as I ran out of chocolate chips, and omitted the cup of walnuts in deference to a friend's allergies.  That and there was a smidgen of whole wheat flour in the brownies in lieu of white flour. They still turned out pretty damn well though, if I say so myself 

My friends were sufficiently awed by the dessert.  I was too.  They're definitely a make-again recipe, though I'll likely cut them into smaller pieces, as they are very rich.

I'm not one to normally celebrate Cinco de Mayo, as I've always seen it as another drinking in the U.S. (a la St. Patrick's Day).  However, as part of the conversational Spanish class I'm taking at the local community college, we had a mini-celebration last week, and everyone had to bring a relevant dish.  I figured that there would be many bags of chips & jars of salsa, so I wanted to come up with something a bit more original.

Since I had given a presentation on Mexican chocolate the week before, I had two near full containers of Ibarra and Abuelita chocolate.  While the latter, a Nestle product, has a long list of non-organic sounding ingredients, the Ibarra is made of things you can pronounce (and actually tastes a bit nicer on its own).  With all this chocolate, I figured I could make brownies.  Most recipes I have call for cocoa, so I did some online research and found a scaled down version of the Barefoot Contessa's brownies that didn't require an enormous sheet pan. 

Despite trying to account for baking at elevation and the differences in using Mexican chocolate instead of unsweetened, the brownies came out more fudgelike than brownielike.  The altitude, crappy oven, copious amounts of butter, lack of flour & baking times might have affected the outcome.  So I quickly renamed them 'Mexican chocolate bites' and my classmates, none the wiser, devoured them. 

Mexican Chocolate Bites (adapted from the Barefoot Contessa)
2 sticks butter
6 ounces Ibarra chocolate
6 ounces unsweetened chocolate (I used Lindts 85% cocoa version, as I had no bakers chocolate)
3 eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup flour
1/2 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 350.  Place rack in center of oven, grease & flour a 9x13 inch pan.

Melt chocolate and butter in a heatproof bowl over a pot of simmering water.  Let cool slightly.  In a large bowl whisk eggs, vanilla & sugar.  Whisk chocolate mixture into egg mixture. 

In medium bowl blend flour, baking powder and salt.  Add to chocolate mixture.  Pour into pan and smooth to the edges.  Bake for 20-25 minutes until inserted toothpick comes out clear - do not overbake.  Allow to cool before cutting into squares.

The past few weeks I've been on a bit of a yogurt cake kick.  It was a cake recipe I used to rely upon during my chalet days, though back then I used a small french yogurt container as the measuring cup.  Back in the U.S. where yogurt containers are a bit larger, I found another version in the Chocolate & Zucchini cookbook (and a version of it is on Clotilde's blog).   N likes it because it's less sweet and dense than a typical cake, almost more like a very moist snack bread. 

While I've stuck to the basic recipe for the most part (which, by the way, is fabulous topped with fresh raspberries and a bit of plain yogurt), my penchant for tinkering has resulted in a few new variations, including the cocoa cake with chocolate chips and fresh pomegranate seeds pictured above.  Antioxidant cake, as I called it, was an enormous hit, and as soon as I see fresh pomegranates again, I'll be making it. 

After all, it could very well be the cure for my various ailments.

So the Joy of Cooking is not an infallible resource for me, as I learned this weekend.  The chocolate souffle's did not turn out, which I am blaming entirely on every one of those 6,200 feet above sea level.  While they were very chocolaty (thanks to my decadent use of a Lindt 85% bar since I had no baking chocolate), the Joy of Cooking recipe ended up being more akin to a well-cooked molten lava cake than anything else.  Tasty, but definitely not the fluffy souffle I was aiming for.

The meal was not all lost, however, as my attempt at a caramelized onion and Gorgonzola pizza turned out pretty tasty.  Very rich, even with a sparing use of Gorgonzola (Parmesan was also used to keep it cheesy).  That plus chocolate made for a very gourmand type of Hallmark holiday this weekend.

For Christmas, my aunt - who is far more artisanal than I'll ever be - sent us a giant wheel of homemade feta.  It's far creamier than any commercial feta I've had, with a mild briny flavor. While delicious on its own, I decided to start using it in recipes, including a lentil salad suggested by my mother (who also received a wheel of goodness).

The recipe I used was the result of me culling through lots of recipes online.  I opted for simplicity - a cup of dry lentils (rinsed, soaked & cooked separately), a cucumber, a red pepper, half a pint of organic cherry tomatoes, a cup (or so) of feta crumbled over the salad, topped with a simple lemon vinaigrette (juice, olive oil and a smidge of salt & pepper).


While I have plans to use the feta in a slew of other dishes, including a shrimp & tomato number that my mom's made numerous times, this lentil salad was tasty enough to make again very soon.  Even N, never a lentil fan, was scooping it onto tortilla chips. 

Ever since Trader Joe's stopped carrying tahini a few years ago, I've had to rely on my local health food store, which has affected the cost of making hummus.  I've learned to horde it, and get the most out of each jar.

So when our local Grocery Outlet had organic tahini for less than $2 a jar, I jumped on it. And then I realized after the fact that it had an expiration date.  Which meant that I'd either have to make and eat ALOT of hummus in the next few weeks or try to use it in other recipes.  So I made a tahini sauce for a greek themed chicken dinner one night, but that only requires a little bit.

Enter baking.  Tahini is sesame butter, so why not try cookies, using it instead of peanut butter?  A quick Intertubes search resulted in a few recipes, and I chose the easiest, which required letting the dough chill for an hour before baking.  Just enough time to update a few iPods and check my Twitter account.  Note that since I don't have edible gold dust or sesame seeds just lying around, I omitted that step.

And despite a wonky oven that smelled of smoke and cooks things unevenly, the cookies turned out great - nutty, not too sweet and with a buttery dough that melts in the mouth.  This is a recipe worth keeping.  Heck, I might consider making it even when I have to pay full price for tahini.

This week I was down in Santa Rosa for a tourism conference, and learned that it's an area known for many things beyond the prolific wine industry.  For one, did you know it was home to the woman who holds the world record for the longest BLT? Neither did I, but she recreated it for our conference the last night we were there, complete with artisanal hand-cured bacon, heirloom tomatoes and bread baked just for this by a local breadmaker.  There was much ceremony to the BLT build, including fanfare provided by local high school trumpeters, a 'Mayo Queen' from the area radio station (with a gold glitter spatula no less!), and lots of melodrama.

The result? Well, either it was the tempting look of the enormous sandwich, or the fantastic Rodney Strong meritage that I was lucky enough to taste (I'm learning that networking has its advantages), but I ate bacon for the first time in many years.  And you know something? That hand-cured artisanal local foodivore bacon was damn good.

Can't say whether I'll ever become a true bacon-vore, but while in Sonoma County, land of food, it would have been wrong not to try it.

The local farmer's market began last week and I finally made it there this morning.  While the bounty of heirloom tomatoes (a big 'feh' to salmonella fears) hasn't yet arrived, I did score some gorgeous cherries.  This market has always had a decidedly keeping it real flavor, with primarily local fruit and vegetable vendors, though the odd cheese seller and baker has made an appearance.  This year it seems the market's taking it up a notch.  There's a fishmonger, the crepe stand, a hot dog vendor (at 8 am?), soap, Indian food and pottery.   Something for everyone?