Wednesday, September 19, 2012
On haitus
Well hello there! Thanks for stopping by For the Love of Food. As you may have noticed, I don't have a new post for you (and haven't since, erm, May). I'm terribly sorry about that. By way of explanation, there's this: I am now a full time graduate student here, and I barely have enough time to cook these days, let alone write about it. But while you're here, allow me to direct you both to my Serious Eats posts as well as to my Recipe Index: there's plenty there to occupy you until I get back. Happy cooking!
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
All-purpose Sichuan stir-fry sauce
I make a lot of vegetable-heavy stir-frys, and my preferred method of seasoning them is with Sichuan condiments. Sometimes I just wing it, adding dashes of toasted sesame oil and rice wine as I go along, but lately I've been mixing up a quick, all-purpose sauce that I add to the vegetables at the very end of their cooking process, when they're already tender and just need to soak up some flavor. If I have extra, I simply transfer it to an airtight container where it will wait for me until I make my next stir-fry.
This sauce has all the flavor bases covered: it's full of rich umami from the soy; sweet from the brown sugar; sour from the vinegar; and hot from the spicy fermented bean paste. The potato starch (whose silky texture I prefer to gloppier cornstarch) thickens it up beautifully, creating a rich mouthfeel. Best of all, the sauce is neutral enough to go with pretty much any vegetable, although my favorite application for it is with eggplant.
To use, mix up the sauce, then fry your vegetables in a wok along with some aromatics: ginger, garlic, shallot, or whatever you prefer. You can add tofu, meat, anything you like in your stir-fry. About five minutes before everything is finished cooking, add the sauce, stir well to incorporate, lower the heat, cover, and simmer until the sauce is thick and glossy.
All-Purpose Sichuan Stir-Fry Sauce
Yields enough sauce for one large stir-fry or two smaller ones
*Note: visit your local Asian grocery before making this recipe: many of the ingredients are not available at the supermarket.
Ingredients:
2 tsp. Chinkiang vinegar
2 tbsp. Shaoxing rice wine
3 tbsp. dark soy sauce
1 tbsp. fermented broad bean chili paste
1 tbsp. toasted sesame oil
1 tbsp. brown sugar
1 tbsp. potato starch
Preparation:
Mix all ingredients in a small bowl, using a whisk to make sure everything is well combined.
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
Lunch, by way of India
Cauliflower is one of my very favorite vegetables, but somehow there's been a severe lack of cauliflower coverage on the site—in fact, not since my very first blog post over four years ago have I talked about this crucifer. Well, it's high time that's corrected.
My favorite way to prepare cauliflower is to roast it at a high temperature. If you're used to soggy, bland cauliflower, likely served steamed perhaps at some point in your childhood, then you wouldn't even recognize it roasted: it becomes golden, crisp-tender and incredibly rich in flavor, much like a roasted potato.
I usually go one of two routes when roasting my cauliflower: the Mediterranean, almost Provençal one, in which the cooked vegetable is tossed with capers and parsley and topped with toasted breadcrumbs; or the Indian one, in which the cauliflower is accented with warm, aromatic spices like cumin, coriander and mustard seed.
Cauliflower is an integral part of the cuisine in India, a country where over 30% of population is vegetarian. Aloo gobi, or potatoes and cauliflower in a curried stew, is probably the best-known such dish in this country, but other popular cauliflower dishes include cauliflower fritters and cauliflower and mung bean stew.
It's for that reason that I often turn to India when roasting this vegetable: simply tossing it in a mixture of dried spices, and sometimes throwing in some spicy chiles, before letting it get browned and toasty in a hot oven. That's what I did today; topped with yogurt and sprinkled with fresh cilantro, it made a tasty lunch.
Indian-Spiced Roasted Cauliflower
Serves 3 - 4 as a side dish
Ingredients:
1 head of cauliflower, cut into small florets
2 jalapeños or similar green chiles, seeds intact, halved lengthwise and sliced into thin half moons
2 tbsp. canola or vegetable oil
1 tsp. ground turmeric
1 tsp. whole cumin seeds
1 tsp. whole coriander seeds
Salt to taste, about 1 1/2 tsp.
Plain yogurt, for serving (optional)
Chopped fresh cilantro, for serving (optional)
Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 400°.
2. Combine all ingredients in large bowl and toss, coating all the cauliflower evenly with oil and spices. Turn out onto a large sheet tray and roast until cauliflower is tender and well-browned, about 20 - 25 minutes. Serve as is or topped with plain yogurt and chopped cilantro.
My favorite way to prepare cauliflower is to roast it at a high temperature. If you're used to soggy, bland cauliflower, likely served steamed perhaps at some point in your childhood, then you wouldn't even recognize it roasted: it becomes golden, crisp-tender and incredibly rich in flavor, much like a roasted potato.
I usually go one of two routes when roasting my cauliflower: the Mediterranean, almost Provençal one, in which the cooked vegetable is tossed with capers and parsley and topped with toasted breadcrumbs; or the Indian one, in which the cauliflower is accented with warm, aromatic spices like cumin, coriander and mustard seed.
Cauliflower is an integral part of the cuisine in India, a country where over 30% of population is vegetarian. Aloo gobi, or potatoes and cauliflower in a curried stew, is probably the best-known such dish in this country, but other popular cauliflower dishes include cauliflower fritters and cauliflower and mung bean stew.
It's for that reason that I often turn to India when roasting this vegetable: simply tossing it in a mixture of dried spices, and sometimes throwing in some spicy chiles, before letting it get browned and toasty in a hot oven. That's what I did today; topped with yogurt and sprinkled with fresh cilantro, it made a tasty lunch.
Indian-Spiced Roasted Cauliflower
Serves 3 - 4 as a side dish
Ingredients:
1 head of cauliflower, cut into small florets
2 jalapeños or similar green chiles, seeds intact, halved lengthwise and sliced into thin half moons
2 tbsp. canola or vegetable oil
1 tsp. ground turmeric
1 tsp. whole cumin seeds
1 tsp. whole coriander seeds
Salt to taste, about 1 1/2 tsp.
Plain yogurt, for serving (optional)
Chopped fresh cilantro, for serving (optional)
Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 400°.
2. Combine all ingredients in large bowl and toss, coating all the cauliflower evenly with oil and spices. Turn out onto a large sheet tray and roast until cauliflower is tender and well-browned, about 20 - 25 minutes. Serve as is or topped with plain yogurt and chopped cilantro.
Sunday, April 22, 2012
A mutt of a dish
Last week my friends Willy and Clemmy came over for an impromptu weeknight dinner. In deciding what to make, I established two things: one, that I hadn't cooked anything Mexican in a while, so that'd be the direction I'd take, and two, that I wanted to spend as little money as possible. A look in the fridge revealed a dire lack of produce, but in the freezer I found a stack of corn tortillas, as well as a small container of chipotles en adobo. Those items would help things along.
As I've mentioned many a time on the blog, my eating habits have changed a bit over the past few years, as I've become more interested in local, organic food: notably, I've been eating a lot less meat, and when it comes to cooking at home, I almost always prepare vegetarian dishes. When you have access to beautiful, fresh produce, it's easy to make a meal that's so flavorful that it simply doesn't need meat. Cooking almost exclusively with vegetables also keeps those grocery bills down, something that—as a perpetual unpaid intern living in New York City—is always at the forefront of my mind. So once I settled on Mexican with tortillas and chipotles, I started to think of what kind of meatless dish I could make, and that's when it came to me: chilaquiles. I hadn't eaten them in a long, long time, so they sounded good, and though they wouldn't be super quick to prepare, it would be a relatively easy process.
I'm no expert on what comprises traditional chilaquiles, but the versions I've eaten in New York tend to be made with crisp-fried corn tortillas or tortilla chips, blanketed with green or red salsa, layered with shredded meat, and finished off with a generous amount of melted cheese. Sometimes the chips remain crisp; sometimes they're soggy. I like both ways. What I came up with was a riff on these dishes, by no means the same in preparation but pretty similar in terms of flavor. In the interest of cutting down on prep time as well as keeping the end result a lot healthier, I decided not to fry my tortillas, but rather to crisp them up in a warm oven, then crumble them into manageable pieces before layering them in a baking dish with some homemade red salsa, shredded Jack cheese, and a mix of vegetables: a sort of Mexican lasagna, if you will.
First things first: the salsa roja. I made a simple one by roasting together some tomatoes, jalapeños, and onions, then blending them up in the food processor, along with the liquid they lot off in cooking as well as some chipotles en adobo and red wine vinegar.
I settled on a combination of sweet potatoes, black beans and green onions as my filling. I roasted up the sweet potatoes in the oven as I cooked the tomato mixture; the beans were just rinsed canned beans (soaked and cooked dried beans would be even better, if you have those on hand). To build the "lasagna," I started with a layer of salsa in the bottom of a glass baking dish, then a layer of the broken-up tortillas, then a scattering of vegetables:
That got covered in some more salsa, then a generous amount of shredded cheese. Then I started over again: tortillas, salsa, veggies, and cheese, until I ran out of ingredients: I got 3 layers in there, with the top one being just tortillas and cheese. That all got baked in the oven, wrapped in a protective layer of foil, until things were nice and hot and bubbly, when I removed the foil to brown the cheese to a burnished finish:
After a brief rest to allow everything to settle, I cut that bad boy up into generous pieces. My friends and I ate them topped with sour cream, sliced avocados, chopped cilantro, and a squeeze of fresh lime:
Mexican Chilaquiles with Sweet Potatoes and Black Beans
Serves 6 - 8
2. Combine tomato, onion, and jalapeño in a large bowl. Drizzle with 1 tbsp. vegetable oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Toss to coat, then turn into an oven-safe dish. Roast for about 30 minutes, or until tomatoes are soft and juicy and onions and peppers begin to brown.
3. Use the same large bowl to toss the sweet potatoes with 1 tbsp. oil and salt and pepper. Turn potatoes onto a baking sheet and roast for about 20 minutes, or until soft and well-browned. Remove all vegetables from oven and lower heat to 250°.
4. In the bowl of a blender or food processor, blend roasted vegetables and their liquid until smooth. Add chipotle, vinegar and salt and blend again. Check for seasoning, adding more vinegar or salt as needed. Set salsa aside.
5. Spread tortillas out in a single layer over several large baking sheets (you'll need about 15 small tortillas total). Bake in oven until crisp and slightly browned, about 20 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool. Increase oven temperature to 350°.
6. Assemble the chilaquiles: in the bottom of a large glass lasagna pan, spread a thin layer of salsa. Break 5 tortillas into large pieces and distribute over salsa. Sprinkle half the sweet potatoes, half the black beans and half the green onions over tortillas. Pour half of remaining salsa over vegetables, then sprinkle with one third of the Jack cheese. Repeat with 5 more tortillas, rest of vegetables, rest of salsa, and one more third of cheese. Finish with a top layer of 5 more tortillas and the rest of the shredded cheese.
7. Spray a large rectangular piece of aluminum foil with nonstick cooking spread and cover baking dish tightly. Place dish in oven and bake until chilaquiles are hot and the cheese has melted, about 25 minutes. Remove foil and bake until top layer of cheese is nicely browned, about 15 more minutes. Remove from oven and let rest about 15 minutes before cutting into 6 - 8 pieces. Serve with sour cream, avocado, cilantro and lime.
I'm no expert on what comprises traditional chilaquiles, but the versions I've eaten in New York tend to be made with crisp-fried corn tortillas or tortilla chips, blanketed with green or red salsa, layered with shredded meat, and finished off with a generous amount of melted cheese. Sometimes the chips remain crisp; sometimes they're soggy. I like both ways. What I came up with was a riff on these dishes, by no means the same in preparation but pretty similar in terms of flavor. In the interest of cutting down on prep time as well as keeping the end result a lot healthier, I decided not to fry my tortillas, but rather to crisp them up in a warm oven, then crumble them into manageable pieces before layering them in a baking dish with some homemade red salsa, shredded Jack cheese, and a mix of vegetables: a sort of Mexican lasagna, if you will.
First things first: the salsa roja. I made a simple one by roasting together some tomatoes, jalapeños, and onions, then blending them up in the food processor, along with the liquid they lot off in cooking as well as some chipotles en adobo and red wine vinegar.
I settled on a combination of sweet potatoes, black beans and green onions as my filling. I roasted up the sweet potatoes in the oven as I cooked the tomato mixture; the beans were just rinsed canned beans (soaked and cooked dried beans would be even better, if you have those on hand). To build the "lasagna," I started with a layer of salsa in the bottom of a glass baking dish, then a layer of the broken-up tortillas, then a scattering of vegetables:
That got covered in some more salsa, then a generous amount of shredded cheese. Then I started over again: tortillas, salsa, veggies, and cheese, until I ran out of ingredients: I got 3 layers in there, with the top one being just tortillas and cheese. That all got baked in the oven, wrapped in a protective layer of foil, until things were nice and hot and bubbly, when I removed the foil to brown the cheese to a burnished finish:
After a brief rest to allow everything to settle, I cut that bad boy up into generous pieces. My friends and I ate them topped with sour cream, sliced avocados, chopped cilantro, and a squeeze of fresh lime:
Mexican Chilaquiles with Sweet Potatoes and Black Beans
Serves 6 - 8
2 large or 3 medium tomatoes, cut
into large pieces
1 large onion, cut into quarters
2 jalapeños, stem removed, cut in
half lengthwise
About 2 tbsp. vegetable oil, divided
Salt
Pepper
1 tbsp. chipotles en adobo (both
peppers and sauce)
1 tbsp. red wine vinegar
1 package corn tortillas
1 large or two medium sweet potatoes,
rinsed and cut into a small dice
2 15.5 oz cans black beans, rinsed
and drained
3 - 4 green onions, white and green
parts, thinly sliced
8 oz. Monterey Jack cheese, shredded
(about 2 cups)
1 avocado, pitted and sliced
1 lime, cut into wedges
Sour cream, for serving
Chopped cilantro, for serving
Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 400°.
2. Combine tomato, onion, and jalapeño in a large bowl. Drizzle with 1 tbsp. vegetable oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Toss to coat, then turn into an oven-safe dish. Roast for about 30 minutes, or until tomatoes are soft and juicy and onions and peppers begin to brown.
3. Use the same large bowl to toss the sweet potatoes with 1 tbsp. oil and salt and pepper. Turn potatoes onto a baking sheet and roast for about 20 minutes, or until soft and well-browned. Remove all vegetables from oven and lower heat to 250°.
4. In the bowl of a blender or food processor, blend roasted vegetables and their liquid until smooth. Add chipotle, vinegar and salt and blend again. Check for seasoning, adding more vinegar or salt as needed. Set salsa aside.
5. Spread tortillas out in a single layer over several large baking sheets (you'll need about 15 small tortillas total). Bake in oven until crisp and slightly browned, about 20 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool. Increase oven temperature to 350°.
6. Assemble the chilaquiles: in the bottom of a large glass lasagna pan, spread a thin layer of salsa. Break 5 tortillas into large pieces and distribute over salsa. Sprinkle half the sweet potatoes, half the black beans and half the green onions over tortillas. Pour half of remaining salsa over vegetables, then sprinkle with one third of the Jack cheese. Repeat with 5 more tortillas, rest of vegetables, rest of salsa, and one more third of cheese. Finish with a top layer of 5 more tortillas and the rest of the shredded cheese.
7. Spray a large rectangular piece of aluminum foil with nonstick cooking spread and cover baking dish tightly. Place dish in oven and bake until chilaquiles are hot and the cheese has melted, about 25 minutes. Remove foil and bake until top layer of cheese is nicely browned, about 15 more minutes. Remove from oven and let rest about 15 minutes before cutting into 6 - 8 pieces. Serve with sour cream, avocado, cilantro and lime.
Monday, April 9, 2012
All of the quiche, none of the crust
Several weeks ago, my friends Willy and Jessica came over early(ish) on a Sunday morning to help me tackle a DIY project I'd been hoping to try for a while: making homemade almond milk (stay tuned for that post!). Gracious hostess that I am, I decided to feed my buddies something appropriately brunch-y as we readied ourselves to juice nuts. Now, you might notice a distinct lack of brunch recipes here on the blog, as, in general, I'm not a big fan of said meal: certainly not in restaurants, where the food tends to be overpriced and phoned in by some line cook while the chef takes the morning off, and not usually at home, either: my motor skills in the morning are up to the task of pouring a bowl of cereal or sliding some bread into the toaster oven, but nothing much more complicated than that, and especially not on a weekend morning, when I might have stayed out late the night before.
So I spent some time thinking about what people eat for brunch, and then I remembered: quiche! Now, quiche is not something I make all that often, but it's easy and tasty, so I figured it would fit the bill. Not wanting to fuss around with a crust, I decided to just do without. In this I drew some inspiration from my friend Patricia, who has lived in France for so long now that she's basically French, and therefore prepares quiche on a regular basis (not a myth—French people actually do make quiche all the time). Patricia makes delicious quiches, and they never have a crust. One thing they usually do have, though, is fish, in the form of tuna or salmon. Since I had a beautiful, wild-caught fillet of salmon in my freezer, I decided to thaw it out, poach it, and flake it into my quiche, along with some melted leeks:
To keep the filling moist and flavorful, I folded in some additional ingredients: chopped fresh dill, créme fraiche and Dijon mustard, then spread the mixture into the bottom of a greased pie plate:
Taking my cue from from France yet again, I prepared the quiche batter with a lot of dairy and not a lot of eggs. My usual instinct when making quiche would be to use many eggs, adding a bit of milk to stretch them, but I've noticed that French people always make quiche with a ton of milk, or créme fraiche, or both, and only a few eggs, and their quiches always come out phenomenally: exceptionally moist and tender, more like a custard than an omelet. And when you think about it, this approach makes sense: quiche, if not a poverty food, is certainly a classic use-up-the-leftovers dish: stick 'em in a pan, bind 'em together, and bake 'em. If the idea is to not draw too heavily upon everything else in the fridge, keeping the meal frugal and quick to prepare, then the French recipe is logical. So I did as the French do, and I have to say that although my quiche wasn't as exceptional as Patricia's (or my other French friend, Mathilde's) egg pie, it was still pretty darn good:
Salmon, Leek and Dill (Crustless) Quiche
Makes one quiche
Ingredients:
1 salmon fillet, about 4 oz.
Water
Fresh dill, with about 3 tbsp. finely chopped
1 large or 2 medium leeks, well cleaned of all grit, white and light green parts finely sliced into half moons and dark green tops set aside
Black peppercorns
3 tbsp. butter
1/2 c. plus 2 tbsp. créme fraiche or sour cream, divided
1 tbsp. Dijon mustard
Cooking spray or additional butter
3 eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 c. milk, preferably whole
Salt
Pepper
Preparation:
1. Preheat oven to 375°.
2. Poach the salmon: in a small saucepan, combine the salmon, some torn fresh dill, some torn dark green leek tops, a few black peppercorns, and about 1/2 tsp. salt, along with enough water to cover. Bring to a boil, then drop to a simmer. Simmer for six minutes, then turn off heat; four minutes later, remove fish and let cool. When cool, flake fish into small pieces and place in a large bowl.
3. Prepare the filling: in a large, heavy-bottomed skillet, melt butter over medium heat. Add sliced leeks and cook, stirring occasionally, until leeks are very soft and lightly browned, about 15 minutes. Add leeks to flaked salmon; add 2 tbsp. créme fraiche, the Dijon mustard and chopped dill, as well as salt and pepper to taste. Stir gently to combine, then spread evenly across the bottom a a glass pie dish, greased with spray or additional butter.
4. Prepare batter: combine eggs with remaining créme fraiche and all the milk, plus a generous amount of salt and pepper. Pour over filling and place in oven, baking quiche until it is puffed and browned on top, about 45 minutes.
So I spent some time thinking about what people eat for brunch, and then I remembered: quiche! Now, quiche is not something I make all that often, but it's easy and tasty, so I figured it would fit the bill. Not wanting to fuss around with a crust, I decided to just do without. In this I drew some inspiration from my friend Patricia, who has lived in France for so long now that she's basically French, and therefore prepares quiche on a regular basis (not a myth—French people actually do make quiche all the time). Patricia makes delicious quiches, and they never have a crust. One thing they usually do have, though, is fish, in the form of tuna or salmon. Since I had a beautiful, wild-caught fillet of salmon in my freezer, I decided to thaw it out, poach it, and flake it into my quiche, along with some melted leeks:
To keep the filling moist and flavorful, I folded in some additional ingredients: chopped fresh dill, créme fraiche and Dijon mustard, then spread the mixture into the bottom of a greased pie plate:
Taking my cue from from France yet again, I prepared the quiche batter with a lot of dairy and not a lot of eggs. My usual instinct when making quiche would be to use many eggs, adding a bit of milk to stretch them, but I've noticed that French people always make quiche with a ton of milk, or créme fraiche, or both, and only a few eggs, and their quiches always come out phenomenally: exceptionally moist and tender, more like a custard than an omelet. And when you think about it, this approach makes sense: quiche, if not a poverty food, is certainly a classic use-up-the-leftovers dish: stick 'em in a pan, bind 'em together, and bake 'em. If the idea is to not draw too heavily upon everything else in the fridge, keeping the meal frugal and quick to prepare, then the French recipe is logical. So I did as the French do, and I have to say that although my quiche wasn't as exceptional as Patricia's (or my other French friend, Mathilde's) egg pie, it was still pretty darn good:
Salmon, Leek and Dill (Crustless) Quiche
Makes one quiche
Ingredients:
1 salmon fillet, about 4 oz.
Water
Fresh dill, with about 3 tbsp. finely chopped
1 large or 2 medium leeks, well cleaned of all grit, white and light green parts finely sliced into half moons and dark green tops set aside
Black peppercorns
3 tbsp. butter
1/2 c. plus 2 tbsp. créme fraiche or sour cream, divided
1 tbsp. Dijon mustard
Cooking spray or additional butter
3 eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 c. milk, preferably whole
Salt
Pepper
Preparation:
1. Preheat oven to 375°.
2. Poach the salmon: in a small saucepan, combine the salmon, some torn fresh dill, some torn dark green leek tops, a few black peppercorns, and about 1/2 tsp. salt, along with enough water to cover. Bring to a boil, then drop to a simmer. Simmer for six minutes, then turn off heat; four minutes later, remove fish and let cool. When cool, flake fish into small pieces and place in a large bowl.
3. Prepare the filling: in a large, heavy-bottomed skillet, melt butter over medium heat. Add sliced leeks and cook, stirring occasionally, until leeks are very soft and lightly browned, about 15 minutes. Add leeks to flaked salmon; add 2 tbsp. créme fraiche, the Dijon mustard and chopped dill, as well as salt and pepper to taste. Stir gently to combine, then spread evenly across the bottom a a glass pie dish, greased with spray or additional butter.
4. Prepare batter: combine eggs with remaining créme fraiche and all the milk, plus a generous amount of salt and pepper. Pour over filling and place in oven, baking quiche until it is puffed and browned on top, about 45 minutes.
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
Kale, the belle of the ball
My relationship with kale started off rocky. I first encountered this lovely leafy green at the dinner table at my parents' house in Brooklyn, circa 1993, and it wasn't exactly a love at first sight type of situation. My mom, an excellent cook far ahead of her time in her utilization of healthy ingredients, particularly whole grains, was fond of serving plain steamed vegetables with nary a shake of salt. Hint: when feeding two young children, this is not a particularly sound method (sorry, Mom!). My brother and I hated the stinky, sulfuric pile of stringy greens so much that we would actually form them into little pills in our mouths and swallow them whole with a swift chug of orange juice, our beverage of choice at that time. It wasn't pleasant for anyone involved, and if my memory serves me correctly, my parents finally relented and ceased forcing us to eat steamed kale.
It seems, though, that my mother was prescient in her kale-eating ways, too. Kale is having its fifteen minutes of fame in the food world right now: it's all over restaurant menus in New York City (even in cocktails), and recipes for kale dishes are being featured prominently on food sites like Serious Eats: here's one recipe roundup and one drinks post featuring kale juice. (I'll note, however, that I haven't seen any recipes for plain steamed kale.)
Unlike my mom, I usually like to slick my green vegetables in a bit of fat, in the form of either oil or butter. It doesn't have to be much, but a little lipid goes a long way in rounding out the sharp edges in flavor that some greens have. Usually, I go the classic Italian route and sauté some garlic and red pepper flakes together, then add the greens and maybe a bit of chicken broth to help them break down. But when I received a bag of beautiful, tender baby kale leaves from my CSA last week, I knew I couldn't do the gorgeous produce the disservice of cooking it. Luckily, at my internship at Serious Eats, I had recently edited Kenji's post on one month of veganism, and had spotted a recipe for a marinated kale salad, something I had heard of but never tried. This was the perfect opportunity.
I started by tossing my greens in a marinade of salt and oil, and let that sit at room temperature for a couple of hours. The salt and oil start to break down the leaves--the salt, by drawing out their moisture, and the oil by cutting through their natural waxy, water-resistant coating. The kale becomes more tender and easier to eat, but because there's no heat involved, they retain a bit of their texture and crunch.
When I was ready to serve the kale, I shook on some red pepper flakes and squeezed half a lemon over everything. Because I was eating with friends, and there wasn't quite enough kale to go around to call it a side dish, I decided to divide it up over little garlic toasts, adding an extra drizzle of oil at the very end. I've come a long way from steamed kale, and I don't think I'm ever going back:
Marinated Kale on Garlic Toasts
Serves 4 - 6 as an appetizer
Ingredients:
1/4 - 1/2 lb. kale, rinsed and cut into ribbons (about 1/4 to 1/2 bunch)
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tbsp. olive oil, plus more for drizzling
Red pepper flakes
1/2 a lemon
Half a loaf of bread, cut into 8 -12 small slices
Garlic clove, peeled
Preparation:
1. At least one but preferably two hours before you want to eat, marinate the kale: toss kale with salt and 2 tbsp. olive and let sit at room temperature.
2. When ready to eat, preheat oven to 350°. Place bread on a baking sheet and drizzle with a small amount of oil. Bake until toasted and crispy, about 8 - 10 minutes. Remove from oven and rub each slice with the garlic clove.
3. Finish the kale salad: squeeze the half lemon over kale and add a shake of red pepper flakes. Stir to combine, then divide kale evenly among toasts. Drizzle with additional olive oil and serve.
It seems, though, that my mother was prescient in her kale-eating ways, too. Kale is having its fifteen minutes of fame in the food world right now: it's all over restaurant menus in New York City (even in cocktails), and recipes for kale dishes are being featured prominently on food sites like Serious Eats: here's one recipe roundup and one drinks post featuring kale juice. (I'll note, however, that I haven't seen any recipes for plain steamed kale.)
Unlike my mom, I usually like to slick my green vegetables in a bit of fat, in the form of either oil or butter. It doesn't have to be much, but a little lipid goes a long way in rounding out the sharp edges in flavor that some greens have. Usually, I go the classic Italian route and sauté some garlic and red pepper flakes together, then add the greens and maybe a bit of chicken broth to help them break down. But when I received a bag of beautiful, tender baby kale leaves from my CSA last week, I knew I couldn't do the gorgeous produce the disservice of cooking it. Luckily, at my internship at Serious Eats, I had recently edited Kenji's post on one month of veganism, and had spotted a recipe for a marinated kale salad, something I had heard of but never tried. This was the perfect opportunity.
I started by tossing my greens in a marinade of salt and oil, and let that sit at room temperature for a couple of hours. The salt and oil start to break down the leaves--the salt, by drawing out their moisture, and the oil by cutting through their natural waxy, water-resistant coating. The kale becomes more tender and easier to eat, but because there's no heat involved, they retain a bit of their texture and crunch.
When I was ready to serve the kale, I shook on some red pepper flakes and squeezed half a lemon over everything. Because I was eating with friends, and there wasn't quite enough kale to go around to call it a side dish, I decided to divide it up over little garlic toasts, adding an extra drizzle of oil at the very end. I've come a long way from steamed kale, and I don't think I'm ever going back:
Marinated Kale on Garlic Toasts
Serves 4 - 6 as an appetizer
Ingredients:
1/4 - 1/2 lb. kale, rinsed and cut into ribbons (about 1/4 to 1/2 bunch)
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tbsp. olive oil, plus more for drizzling
Red pepper flakes
1/2 a lemon
Half a loaf of bread, cut into 8 -12 small slices
Garlic clove, peeled
Preparation:
1. At least one but preferably two hours before you want to eat, marinate the kale: toss kale with salt and 2 tbsp. olive and let sit at room temperature.
2. When ready to eat, preheat oven to 350°. Place bread on a baking sheet and drizzle with a small amount of oil. Bake until toasted and crispy, about 8 - 10 minutes. Remove from oven and rub each slice with the garlic clove.
3. Finish the kale salad: squeeze the half lemon over kale and add a shake of red pepper flakes. Stir to combine, then divide kale evenly among toasts. Drizzle with additional olive oil and serve.
Saturday, March 17, 2012
Blog turns four, gets facelift
Happy birthday to For the Love of Food, who turns four years old on this day! I wanted to do something special for the blog for its big fourth, so I gave it a makeover: up top, you'll see a brand new banner, configured by my good friend Dave Manno (thanks, Dave!) I snapped the photo of those beautiful, sun-dappled radishes about a year ago at a market in Toulouse, France, and I think they do a swell job of communicating the type of food I'm into these days: simple, honest fare that relies more on the very best produce I can find, rather than on any kind of complicated techniques. I hope you like the new look!
I'm hoping to continue to improve upon the appearance of the blog; namely, by figuring out how to post bigger, more mouth-watering photos of my food, and by attending to a few small stylistic details. Stay tuned for those changes!
I'm hoping to continue to improve upon the appearance of the blog; namely, by figuring out how to post bigger, more mouth-watering photos of my food, and by attending to a few small stylistic details. Stay tuned for those changes!
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Chinatown, my love
Starting a couple of years ago after I read Fuchsia Dunlop's excellent food memoir Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper, then devoured her two beautiful cookbooks Land of Plenty and the Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook, I quickly became obsessed with Chinese cooking, and it's a trend that's continued--and grown--since then. I think Chinese food gets a bad rap--people say it's greasy, or bland, or makes them sick--and that's because they're thinking of the carelessly thrown together, cornstarch- and MSG-laden takeout on their nearest corner. It's simply not an opinion I understand, because true, artfully prepared Chinese food is so incredibly flavorful, bursting with spicy, salty accents and full of contrasting textures that, to my palate, at least, it's simply one of the best cuisines out there. (I should point out here that there isn't really one "Chinese cuisine"--as you may have heard, China is a big country, and there are many regional styles of food. I happen to be partial to the fiery cuisine of the Sichuan or Szechuan province, but then again I like any kind of well-made Chinese food.)
Although you might imagine them to be exotic or difficult, the Chinese recipes I've tried are actually quite easy. What they rely on is a well-stocked pantry: you need some basics such as different kinds of soy sauce, chile pastes, fermented vegetables, toasted sesame oil, etc., but once you have those items the actual preparations are quite simple. For the past few months I'd sort of fallen out of the habit of cooking Asian, and that was because during my last move, I misplaced my precious stash of special ingredients. When I started my internship at Serious Eats, whose offices are located in Manhattan's Chinatown, it was the perfect occasion to restock my cabinets.
Some staples I picked up recently included (from left): fermented broad bean chile paste; Chianking, or black, vinegar; Shaoxing cooking wine; and potato starch (whose silky texture and un-gloppiness I prefer to cornstarch). Don't you love the packaging? So colorful.
Once I had all my go-to ingredients, I put them to good use making a recipe by one of the Serious Eats editors, Kenji Lopez-Alt. Kenji's no slouch when it comes to perfecting recipes: in addition to years of restaurant experience, he's got a stint as editor at Cook's Illustrated under his belt. Having tasted some of the delicious dishes he's whipped up in our office kitchen, such as bok choy and black bean chow fun and tonkotsu ramen, I knew I could trust his recipe for braised eggplant and tofu in garlic sauce. The best tip I learned from this recipe was to steam the eggplant first: sometimes, eggplant takes a long time to break down and become soft and creamy, and getting it to do so often requires a lot of hot oil. The pre-steam allows the eggplant to soften before it gets incorporated into the stir-fry:
Next, I fried up some aromatics: garlic, ginger, scallions, and the preserved vegetables. This right here is why I love Chinese cooking: look at all the flavor packed in there! It doesn't really matter what you add next--that oil has so much going on, anything cooked in it is going to be good:
The steamed eggplant and some diced firm tofu get fried up in here, then cooked down with a richly flavored sauce made up of soy, vinegar, cooking wine, brown sugar and chile paste. Behold, the finished dish:
Braised Eggplant with Tofu in Garlic Sauce
Adapted slightly from seriouseats.com
Serves 4
*Note: visit your local Asian grocery before making this recipe: many of the ingredients are not available at the supermarket.
Ingredients:
- 4 small or 2 large Japanese/Asian eggplants, rinsed and cut into large chunks
- 3 tsp. Chianking vinegar
- 1/2 c. Shaoxing cooking wine
- 1 tbsp. potato starch
- 4 tbsp. soy sauce
- 2 tbsp. brown sugar
- 1 tbsp. fermented broad bean chile paste
- 1 tbsp. sesame oil
- 2 tbsp. vegetable oil
- 2 cloves of garlic, smashed and peeled, plus 4 more cloves, minced or thinly sliced
- A 1-inch nub ginger, peeled and minced or grated
- 3 scallions, thinly sliced, whites and greens separated
- 2 tbsp. Chinese preserved vegetables, minced
- 1 package firm tofu, excess water squeezed out, cut into medium chunks
- 3 tbsp. chopped cilantro
Preparation:
1. Place eggplant in a large bamboo steamer set over a wok filled with 2 inches of water. Bring to a boil over high heat, reduce to a simmer, cover steamer, and cook until eggplant is completely tender, about 15 minutes. Set aside. (If you don't have a bamboo steamer, you can use a steamer insert in a large pot of water.)
2. Make the sauce: in a bowl, combine vinegar, wine, potato starch, soy, brown sugar, chile paste and sesame. Whisk until completely smooth.
3. Wipe out wok. Add oil and whole garlic cloves and cook over medium heat, turning garlic occasionally, until it is browned and fragrant. Remove garlic and discard.
4. Turn heat to high and add minced garlic and ginger, scallion whites, and preserved vegetables. Cook, stirring, about one minute, then stir sauce to recombine, and add to wok. Add eggplant and tofu and stir gently to combine. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and cook, stirring occasionally until thick and glossy, about 10 minutes longer. Garnish with scallion greens and cilantro and serve immediately with white rice.
Although you might imagine them to be exotic or difficult, the Chinese recipes I've tried are actually quite easy. What they rely on is a well-stocked pantry: you need some basics such as different kinds of soy sauce, chile pastes, fermented vegetables, toasted sesame oil, etc., but once you have those items the actual preparations are quite simple. For the past few months I'd sort of fallen out of the habit of cooking Asian, and that was because during my last move, I misplaced my precious stash of special ingredients. When I started my internship at Serious Eats, whose offices are located in Manhattan's Chinatown, it was the perfect occasion to restock my cabinets.
Some staples I picked up recently included (from left): fermented broad bean chile paste; Chianking, or black, vinegar; Shaoxing cooking wine; and potato starch (whose silky texture and un-gloppiness I prefer to cornstarch). Don't you love the packaging? So colorful.
Speaking of great packaging, check out these preserved Szechuan vegetables. Drool and an enthusiastic thumb's-up? Now that's great advertising!
Once I had all my go-to ingredients, I put them to good use making a recipe by one of the Serious Eats editors, Kenji Lopez-Alt. Kenji's no slouch when it comes to perfecting recipes: in addition to years of restaurant experience, he's got a stint as editor at Cook's Illustrated under his belt. Having tasted some of the delicious dishes he's whipped up in our office kitchen, such as bok choy and black bean chow fun and tonkotsu ramen, I knew I could trust his recipe for braised eggplant and tofu in garlic sauce. The best tip I learned from this recipe was to steam the eggplant first: sometimes, eggplant takes a long time to break down and become soft and creamy, and getting it to do so often requires a lot of hot oil. The pre-steam allows the eggplant to soften before it gets incorporated into the stir-fry:
Next, I fried up some aromatics: garlic, ginger, scallions, and the preserved vegetables. This right here is why I love Chinese cooking: look at all the flavor packed in there! It doesn't really matter what you add next--that oil has so much going on, anything cooked in it is going to be good:
The steamed eggplant and some diced firm tofu get fried up in here, then cooked down with a richly flavored sauce made up of soy, vinegar, cooking wine, brown sugar and chile paste. Behold, the finished dish:
Braised Eggplant with Tofu in Garlic Sauce
Adapted slightly from seriouseats.com
Serves 4
*Note: visit your local Asian grocery before making this recipe: many of the ingredients are not available at the supermarket.
Ingredients:
- 4 small or 2 large Japanese/Asian eggplants, rinsed and cut into large chunks
- 3 tsp. Chianking vinegar
- 1/2 c. Shaoxing cooking wine
- 1 tbsp. potato starch
- 4 tbsp. soy sauce
- 2 tbsp. brown sugar
- 1 tbsp. fermented broad bean chile paste
- 1 tbsp. sesame oil
- 2 tbsp. vegetable oil
- 2 cloves of garlic, smashed and peeled, plus 4 more cloves, minced or thinly sliced
- A 1-inch nub ginger, peeled and minced or grated
- 3 scallions, thinly sliced, whites and greens separated
- 2 tbsp. Chinese preserved vegetables, minced
- 1 package firm tofu, excess water squeezed out, cut into medium chunks
- 3 tbsp. chopped cilantro
Preparation:
1. Place eggplant in a large bamboo steamer set over a wok filled with 2 inches of water. Bring to a boil over high heat, reduce to a simmer, cover steamer, and cook until eggplant is completely tender, about 15 minutes. Set aside. (If you don't have a bamboo steamer, you can use a steamer insert in a large pot of water.)
2. Make the sauce: in a bowl, combine vinegar, wine, potato starch, soy, brown sugar, chile paste and sesame. Whisk until completely smooth.
3. Wipe out wok. Add oil and whole garlic cloves and cook over medium heat, turning garlic occasionally, until it is browned and fragrant. Remove garlic and discard.
4. Turn heat to high and add minced garlic and ginger, scallion whites, and preserved vegetables. Cook, stirring, about one minute, then stir sauce to recombine, and add to wok. Add eggplant and tofu and stir gently to combine. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and cook, stirring occasionally until thick and glossy, about 10 minutes longer. Garnish with scallion greens and cilantro and serve immediately with white rice.
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
David Lebovitz's wild rice salad
As a member of a winter CSA share, there are certain vegetables I've had to welcome, en masse, into my home (and refrigerator) this season: namely, potatoes (sweet and white), carrots, and beets. Though root vegetables store well, I find it's best to dispatch them quickly, if I want to have room in my tiny kitchen for anything else. So after last week's CSA pickup, when I was saddled blessed with several pounds of each, I decided to immediately peel and roast them, which would not only concentrate their flavor but also significantly reduce their bulk. But what to do with them afterwards? I've already eaten a bazillion sweet potato fries this season, already prepared roasted beets tossed with yogurt, lime and scallions, already made a huge batch of carrot soup that lingers on in my freezer. As my cubed and seasoned veggies roasted away in the oven, the debate continued: where would they end up? Luckily, divine providence stepped in when I felt compelled to read one of my favorite blogs, that of master pastry chef David Lebovitz, who usually shares sweet recipes, but occasionally throws in a savory one. Blessedly, that day was one of those days.
Early in his career, David worked in the kitchen at Chez Panisse, so he knows his way around vegetables. The recipes he shares on his site hew closely to my own cooking style: heavy on the produce and whole grains, light on the meat. So it came as no surprise when his Wild Rice Salad with Lemon-Tahini Dressing immediately appealed to me. Not only had I recently purchased a big bag of wild rice at the Co-op, but my roasted vegetables would go perfectly in the dish, plus I had just opened a jar of tahini for a hummus-making endeavor.
Actually, speaking of hummus, what attracted me most to this recipe was how it sort of riffs on that classic Middle Eastern spread. The salad's dressing is made of lemon juice, tahini, olive oil, water and raw garlic: if you were to add some chickpeas, you'd have hummus. I love cooking with raw garlic. Growing up, my dad was allergic, so we almost never utilized the stuff, save for rare occasions when my mother--the cook of the household--felt compelled to make a smaller, separate garlic-free dish for my father, and a larger, garlic-heavy one for her, my brother and me. Think about it: a world of tomato sauces, soups, stews, meatballs, all without the beneficent touch of garlic. Sad, right? These days, I think I still cook with less garlic than most people, and to add raw garlic to something feels downright illicit. So this recipe, with its whole one clove of garlic, minced, was damn near a walk on the wild side for me.
I made a few small changes to the dish, the major one being that to further embrace the hummus theme (and because I still had some left over from the Great Garbanzo Soak of 2012), I added a few handfuls of cooked chickpeas. What results is a lovely salad: the wild rice dense and chewy, the roasted vegetables sweet and earthy, with brightness from the lemon and garlic. Not a bad lunch to eat for six days in a row, as I did:
Wild Rice and Roasted Vegetable Salad with Lemon-Tahini Dressing
Adapted from davidlebovitz.com
Serves 6 - 8 as a side dish
Ingredients:
- 1 c. wild rice, rinsed
- About 6 cups peeled and cubed root vegetables: I used a mix of sweet potatoes, beets, and carrots
- Olive oil
- Salt and pepper to taste
Early in his career, David worked in the kitchen at Chez Panisse, so he knows his way around vegetables. The recipes he shares on his site hew closely to my own cooking style: heavy on the produce and whole grains, light on the meat. So it came as no surprise when his Wild Rice Salad with Lemon-Tahini Dressing immediately appealed to me. Not only had I recently purchased a big bag of wild rice at the Co-op, but my roasted vegetables would go perfectly in the dish, plus I had just opened a jar of tahini for a hummus-making endeavor.
Actually, speaking of hummus, what attracted me most to this recipe was how it sort of riffs on that classic Middle Eastern spread. The salad's dressing is made of lemon juice, tahini, olive oil, water and raw garlic: if you were to add some chickpeas, you'd have hummus. I love cooking with raw garlic. Growing up, my dad was allergic, so we almost never utilized the stuff, save for rare occasions when my mother--the cook of the household--felt compelled to make a smaller, separate garlic-free dish for my father, and a larger, garlic-heavy one for her, my brother and me. Think about it: a world of tomato sauces, soups, stews, meatballs, all without the beneficent touch of garlic. Sad, right? These days, I think I still cook with less garlic than most people, and to add raw garlic to something feels downright illicit. So this recipe, with its whole one clove of garlic, minced, was damn near a walk on the wild side for me.
I made a few small changes to the dish, the major one being that to further embrace the hummus theme (and because I still had some left over from the Great Garbanzo Soak of 2012), I added a few handfuls of cooked chickpeas. What results is a lovely salad: the wild rice dense and chewy, the roasted vegetables sweet and earthy, with brightness from the lemon and garlic. Not a bad lunch to eat for six days in a row, as I did:
Wild Rice and Roasted Vegetable Salad with Lemon-Tahini Dressing
Adapted from davidlebovitz.com
Serves 6 - 8 as a side dish
Ingredients:
- 1 c. wild rice, rinsed
- About 6 cups peeled and cubed root vegetables: I used a mix of sweet potatoes, beets, and carrots
- Olive oil
- Salt and pepper to taste
- About a cup cooked chickpeas
- 3 to 4 scallions (white and green parts), finely chopped
- 1/2 c. fresh parsley, chopped
- 1/4 c. tahini
- Juice of 2 lemons
- 3 tbsp. warm water
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 1 tsp. soy sauce
- 1/4 c. olive oil
- Salt and pepper to taste
Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 425°. Toss the vegetables with 2 or 3 tbsp. of oil and plenty of salt and pepper. Spread on a large baking sheet (or 2) and cook until tender, about 40 minutes.
2. In the meantime, add wild rice to a medium pot and cover with lots of water. Add about a teaspoon of salt. Cover and bring to the boil then drop to a simmer and cook until rice is tender, about 40 minutes. Drain.
3. As rice and vegetables cool, make the dressing: in a medium bowl, combine the tahini, lemon juice and water, stirring briskly to smooth out the tahini. Whisk in soy sauce and olive oil, season, and taste.
4. When rice and vegetables are cool, combine in a bowl then stir in the chickpeas, scallions and parsley. Add the dressing and mix well. Note: the tahini dressing dries out in the fridge. If you're not eating all the salad at once, store salad mix and dressing in separate containers in the fridge and combine them before serving.
- 3 to 4 scallions (white and green parts), finely chopped
- 1/2 c. fresh parsley, chopped
- 1/4 c. tahini
- Juice of 2 lemons
- 3 tbsp. warm water
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 1 tsp. soy sauce
- 1/4 c. olive oil
- Salt and pepper to taste
Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 425°. Toss the vegetables with 2 or 3 tbsp. of oil and plenty of salt and pepper. Spread on a large baking sheet (or 2) and cook until tender, about 40 minutes.
2. In the meantime, add wild rice to a medium pot and cover with lots of water. Add about a teaspoon of salt. Cover and bring to the boil then drop to a simmer and cook until rice is tender, about 40 minutes. Drain.
3. As rice and vegetables cool, make the dressing: in a medium bowl, combine the tahini, lemon juice and water, stirring briskly to smooth out the tahini. Whisk in soy sauce and olive oil, season, and taste.
4. When rice and vegetables are cool, combine in a bowl then stir in the chickpeas, scallions and parsley. Add the dressing and mix well. Note: the tahini dressing dries out in the fridge. If you're not eating all the salad at once, store salad mix and dressing in separate containers in the fridge and combine them before serving.
Monday, February 13, 2012
More fun with chickpeas
My friend Mathilde's birthday was last Friday, and we had a small party to celebrate. As is usual, when we gather at Willy's house, food played a supporting starring role. As a sort of group effort, we all pitched in to make a big pot of tortilla soup with all the fixins, Willy made another ridiculously intricate and delicious layer cake, and I decided to contribute some hummus that I prepared at home earlier in the day. Inspired by my recent success cooking with dried, soaked chickpeas, I decided to go that route with my hummus, in lieu of canned garbanzos. I soaked and cooked some more chickpeas, then drained them, reserving the cooking liquid. I tipped most of the legumes into my food processor, keeping back about a cup of them, and made my standard hummus by adding garlic, tahini, lemon juice, olive oil and some of the cooking liquid. After tasting and adjusting the flavors to my liking, I let the food processor run for a long time, whipping the hummus into a dense, silky purée. The dried chickpeas contribute a better texture and a fuller flavor to the spread.
My favorite part about this dish, though, is what I decided to do with the remaining, whole chickpeas. Recalling a recent trip to Mimi's Hummus in Ditmas Park, where I ate a fava bean hummus garnished with some whole favas, I knew that I wanted some textural contrast in my hummus. So I marinated the remaining chickpeas in a mix of sambal oelek (my favorite all-purpose hot sauce--you can use sriracha, harissa, or whatever chile paste you prefer), olive oil, and chopped fresh cilantro and parsely. When I served the hummus, I made a well in the spread and lay the whole chickpeas in the middle. The super smooth hummus, broken up by the toothsome whole chickpeas, makes a winning legume-on-legume combination:
Hummus with Whole Marinated Chickpeas
Serves 8 - 10 as an appetizer
Ingredients:
- 1 1/2 c. dried chickpeas, soaked overnight then cooked for about 1 hour, or until soft, drained, cooking liquid reserved--or use about 3 c. canned
- 2 cloves garlic, smashed and peeled
- About 2 tbsp. tahini
- The juice of about 2 lemons
- About 4 tbsp. cooking liquid
- About 4 tbsp. olive oil, plus more for marinated chickpeas
- Salt, to taste
- About 1 tbsp. hot chile paste such as sambal oelek, sriracha, or harissa
- 1 - 2 tbsp. chopped fresh parsley, cilantro or both
Preparation:
1. Add all but about 3/4 c. chickpeas to bowl of a food processor. Add garlic and pulse to combine.
2. Add tahini, lemon juice and salt and turn machine on. As it is running, pour the cooking liquid and olive oil in through the spout on top. Check for seasoning, adjusting as needed, then leave machine running for about 3 minutes so that hummus becomes very smooth.
3. In the meantime, prepare the marinated chickpeas: combine them with the chile paste, about 1 tbsp. of additional oil, fresh herbs, and salt. If possible, let marinate for 30 minutes to an hour.
4. When ready to serve, spread hummus into a shallow bowl and create a well in the middle. Add marinated chickpeas, drizzle with additional olive oil, and serve.
My favorite part about this dish, though, is what I decided to do with the remaining, whole chickpeas. Recalling a recent trip to Mimi's Hummus in Ditmas Park, where I ate a fava bean hummus garnished with some whole favas, I knew that I wanted some textural contrast in my hummus. So I marinated the remaining chickpeas in a mix of sambal oelek (my favorite all-purpose hot sauce--you can use sriracha, harissa, or whatever chile paste you prefer), olive oil, and chopped fresh cilantro and parsely. When I served the hummus, I made a well in the spread and lay the whole chickpeas in the middle. The super smooth hummus, broken up by the toothsome whole chickpeas, makes a winning legume-on-legume combination:
Hummus with Whole Marinated Chickpeas
Serves 8 - 10 as an appetizer
Ingredients:
- 1 1/2 c. dried chickpeas, soaked overnight then cooked for about 1 hour, or until soft, drained, cooking liquid reserved--or use about 3 c. canned
- 2 cloves garlic, smashed and peeled
- About 2 tbsp. tahini
- The juice of about 2 lemons
- About 4 tbsp. cooking liquid
- About 4 tbsp. olive oil, plus more for marinated chickpeas
- Salt, to taste
- About 1 tbsp. hot chile paste such as sambal oelek, sriracha, or harissa
- 1 - 2 tbsp. chopped fresh parsley, cilantro or both
Preparation:
1. Add all but about 3/4 c. chickpeas to bowl of a food processor. Add garlic and pulse to combine.
2. Add tahini, lemon juice and salt and turn machine on. As it is running, pour the cooking liquid and olive oil in through the spout on top. Check for seasoning, adjusting as needed, then leave machine running for about 3 minutes so that hummus becomes very smooth.
3. In the meantime, prepare the marinated chickpeas: combine them with the chile paste, about 1 tbsp. of additional oil, fresh herbs, and salt. If possible, let marinate for 30 minutes to an hour.
4. When ready to serve, spread hummus into a shallow bowl and create a well in the middle. Add marinated chickpeas, drizzle with additional olive oil, and serve.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Claudia Roden's orange and almond cake
When you're as food-obsessed as I am, it makes sense to surround yourself with people on your wavelength, so it comes as no surprise that some of my closest friends also happen to be excellent cooks/bakers/snackers. My adventures in cooking with my pal Gideon have been widely chronicled on this site. Patricia, who sadly lives in France nowadays, is the queen of hosting potlucks, and Mathilde, who lives in New York but hails from Paris, is the master of the quiche and makes a mean crêpe, to boot. Just to mention France one more time, Bonnie and I founded a dinner club together with our friends in Toulouse last year, and I think it's safe to say that her dinners were the most heavily anticipated--she made a mapo dofu last Chinese New Year that blew my mind (and, to a certain extent, my tongue--those Sichuan peppercorns can be fiery!) Despite all these heavyweight contenders, I think it's actually my friend Willy who can go head to head with me in terms of food fixation. He and I cook together all the time, and when I need a culinary companion for a far-flung peregrination to Queens or deep south Brooklyn, he's usually game to make the trek with me.
Willy also happens to be an excellent baker. He's prepared my birthday cakes several times--this past year, it was a white layer cake filled with homemade raspberry jam and draped with homemade marzipan. His no-knead bread, which he makes routinely, puts mine to shame, and I've also tasted potato bread, rye bread, and Anadama bread that he's made. A few months ago, I was over at Willy's for lunch, and for dessert he served a beguiling orange and almond cake the likes of which I had never tasted: it had a ton of texture from the ground almonds, a powerful perfume from the oranges, and an underlying bitterness to complement its sweetness. What most attracted me about this cake, though, was the unusual way in which it was made: Willy told me that to make the batter, he boiled two whole oranges for hours, then ground them up, peels and all, to incorporate into the cake mix. That slight bitterness I tasted was coming from the orange pith. I loved the idea of this recipe, and I had to try it.
Several weeks later, I found the occasion to make it: I was attending a Rosh Hashanah dinner at my cousins' house in New Jersey, and I volunteered to bring a dessert. I picked up the ingredients I knew I would need, and then called Willy to confirm the method of preparation. As I simmered the oranges in boiling water, an intense, almost incense-like fragrance filled my apartment. I couldn't wait to taste this cake. When the oranges were ready, I puréed them in the food processor, then set them in the fridge to cool as I worked through the rest of the recipe: grinding the almonds, separating the eggs. Then I put the whole thing together, poured it into a pan, and slid it into the oven to bake.
All that work had made me hungry, so I peered into the fridge to see what I could make myself for lunch. And that's when I saw it: that bright, vivid, luscious-smelling orange purée, still cooling in my fridge. Very distinctly not baking in my cake. My heart fell. Who needs a plain old almond cake? I thought. It's been done!
When my boring, stupid almond cake emerged from the oven about 45 minutes later, I tried to salvage the situation. I mixed some of the orange purée with some water and sugar, in an attempt to make a glaze. I poked some holes in the still-warm cake and brushed on the glaze, hoping that it would imbue the cake with its citrusy freshness. And in the end, of course, the cake was fine--but it barely tasted of orange. It lacked that exotic quality that the cake I'd tasted at Willy's had in spades.
Luckily, I was able, through my haze of anger, to have the foresight to stick the rest of the unused orange purée in a container in the freezer, to be deployed at some other time. I finally got my chance this past weekend, when my brother hosted a cassoulet party at our parents' house. Bravely, I volunteered, yet again, to bring dessert. I went through all the same steps, but of course, this time I remembered to include that precious orange purée in my confection. I also adjusted the cooking time and temperature a little bit, remembering that while Willy's cake had a more crumbly texture, I was looking for a softer one in mine. And I'm happy to report that the end result was just as glorious I had hoped for all those many months ago when I first made the cake: moist, fragrant and vivid in color from the orange peel and egg yolks, this cake truly has the power to transport you to the Middle East.
Middle Eastern Orange and Almond Cake
Adapted slightly from this recipe
Makes one cake
Ingredients:
- 2 oranges
- 6 eggs, separated
- 1 1/2 c. ground almonds
- 1 c. sugar
- 1 tsp. baking powder
- 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
- 1/2 tsp. almond extract
- 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp. salt
Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 375°. Prepare a medium spring form pan: butter the bottom and sprinkle with additional almond meal.
2. Wash oranges thoroughly, place them in a pot, cover with water and boil for 2 hours. Remove from water, cut open and remove seeds, then purée in a food processor until completely smooth. Set aside.
3. Combine ground almonds, orange purée, egg yolks, sugar, baking powder, vanilla, almond extract, cinnamon, and salt in a large bowl, mixing well.
4. Whip egg whites to somewhere between soft and stiff peaks. Fold gently, in two batches, into the yolk mixture. Pour into prepared pan and bake for 45 minutes or until top is well browned but center still appears moist.
Willy also happens to be an excellent baker. He's prepared my birthday cakes several times--this past year, it was a white layer cake filled with homemade raspberry jam and draped with homemade marzipan. His no-knead bread, which he makes routinely, puts mine to shame, and I've also tasted potato bread, rye bread, and Anadama bread that he's made. A few months ago, I was over at Willy's for lunch, and for dessert he served a beguiling orange and almond cake the likes of which I had never tasted: it had a ton of texture from the ground almonds, a powerful perfume from the oranges, and an underlying bitterness to complement its sweetness. What most attracted me about this cake, though, was the unusual way in which it was made: Willy told me that to make the batter, he boiled two whole oranges for hours, then ground them up, peels and all, to incorporate into the cake mix. That slight bitterness I tasted was coming from the orange pith. I loved the idea of this recipe, and I had to try it.
Several weeks later, I found the occasion to make it: I was attending a Rosh Hashanah dinner at my cousins' house in New Jersey, and I volunteered to bring a dessert. I picked up the ingredients I knew I would need, and then called Willy to confirm the method of preparation. As I simmered the oranges in boiling water, an intense, almost incense-like fragrance filled my apartment. I couldn't wait to taste this cake. When the oranges were ready, I puréed them in the food processor, then set them in the fridge to cool as I worked through the rest of the recipe: grinding the almonds, separating the eggs. Then I put the whole thing together, poured it into a pan, and slid it into the oven to bake.
All that work had made me hungry, so I peered into the fridge to see what I could make myself for lunch. And that's when I saw it: that bright, vivid, luscious-smelling orange purée, still cooling in my fridge. Very distinctly not baking in my cake. My heart fell. Who needs a plain old almond cake? I thought. It's been done!
When my boring, stupid almond cake emerged from the oven about 45 minutes later, I tried to salvage the situation. I mixed some of the orange purée with some water and sugar, in an attempt to make a glaze. I poked some holes in the still-warm cake and brushed on the glaze, hoping that it would imbue the cake with its citrusy freshness. And in the end, of course, the cake was fine--but it barely tasted of orange. It lacked that exotic quality that the cake I'd tasted at Willy's had in spades.
Luckily, I was able, through my haze of anger, to have the foresight to stick the rest of the unused orange purée in a container in the freezer, to be deployed at some other time. I finally got my chance this past weekend, when my brother hosted a cassoulet party at our parents' house. Bravely, I volunteered, yet again, to bring dessert. I went through all the same steps, but of course, this time I remembered to include that precious orange purée in my confection. I also adjusted the cooking time and temperature a little bit, remembering that while Willy's cake had a more crumbly texture, I was looking for a softer one in mine. And I'm happy to report that the end result was just as glorious I had hoped for all those many months ago when I first made the cake: moist, fragrant and vivid in color from the orange peel and egg yolks, this cake truly has the power to transport you to the Middle East.
Middle Eastern Orange and Almond Cake
Adapted slightly from this recipe
Makes one cake
Ingredients:
- 2 oranges
- 6 eggs, separated
- 1 1/2 c. ground almonds
- 1 c. sugar
- 1 tsp. baking powder
- 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
- 1/2 tsp. almond extract
- 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp. salt
Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 375°. Prepare a medium spring form pan: butter the bottom and sprinkle with additional almond meal.
2. Wash oranges thoroughly, place them in a pot, cover with water and boil for 2 hours. Remove from water, cut open and remove seeds, then purée in a food processor until completely smooth. Set aside.
3. Combine ground almonds, orange purée, egg yolks, sugar, baking powder, vanilla, almond extract, cinnamon, and salt in a large bowl, mixing well.
4. Whip egg whites to somewhere between soft and stiff peaks. Fold gently, in two batches, into the yolk mixture. Pour into prepared pan and bake for 45 minutes or until top is well browned but center still appears moist.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
How to make almond flour
Got a recipe that calls for almond flour but all you've got in the pantry are whole, skin-on almonds? No problem. Or maybe all you have are blanched almonds? Even easier. If you've got a food processor, you've got almond flour. Well, almost.
For those in the skin-on camp, what you've got to do, is, well, blanch the almonds. Far from being a specialized process that can only occur in some mechanized factory, blanching and skinning almonds is a breeze. First, fill a pot with enough water to cover your almonds. Cover it and heat it to boiling. Drop in your almonds and set a timer for 45 seconds:
Drain the almonds and dump them out onto a towel:
When they're cool enough to handle, all you have to do is rub off the skins with your fingers. If you've ever shelled fresh beans like favas, the process is almost exactly the same: you sort of grip the almonds between your thumb and forefinger and push. It'll slide right out of its skin:
And now you've got a whole mess of pristine blanched almonds (or, if you started out with those, they'd look something like this):
When they've cooled completely, place them in the bowl of the food processor, fitted with the normal blade. Pulse until the almonds become flour. Don't overprocess, as this will result in (pale, inferior) almond butter!
So now that you've got almond flour, how will you use it? I used mine in this. Stay tuned for that post, up next!
For those in the skin-on camp, what you've got to do, is, well, blanch the almonds. Far from being a specialized process that can only occur in some mechanized factory, blanching and skinning almonds is a breeze. First, fill a pot with enough water to cover your almonds. Cover it and heat it to boiling. Drop in your almonds and set a timer for 45 seconds:
Drain the almonds and dump them out onto a towel:
When they're cool enough to handle, all you have to do is rub off the skins with your fingers. If you've ever shelled fresh beans like favas, the process is almost exactly the same: you sort of grip the almonds between your thumb and forefinger and push. It'll slide right out of its skin:
And now you've got a whole mess of pristine blanched almonds (or, if you started out with those, they'd look something like this):
When they've cooled completely, place them in the bowl of the food processor, fitted with the normal blade. Pulse until the almonds become flour. Don't overprocess, as this will result in (pale, inferior) almond butter!
So now that you've got almond flour, how will you use it? I used mine in this. Stay tuned for that post, up next!
Monday, January 30, 2012
A good soak
I may have become the shopper I've always wanted to be by making my purchases at the Co-op, but that doesn't necessarily make the me the cook I want to be. Let me explain: my increased access to ingredients like whole grains, healthy oils, organic produce and unprocessed foods--and the low prices for all of this bounty--has certainly led to my cupboards being filled to the bursting, but sometimes those things just find their way in there and stay, never getting the chance to show their stuff in my pots, or in my stomach.
Case in point: dried legumes. Having spent a fair amount of time working on organic farms, where the proprietors grow what they eat and store-bought foods don't often come into the picture, I've eaten some lovely dishes made with dried and soaked beans. And I've noticed that their flavor and texture is exponentially better than the canned stuff. And so when I joined the Co-op, I determined to never again pick up a can of Goya. From now on, I brazenly declared to myself, I will cook exclusively with dried beans! And I lined my shelves with chickpeas, kidney beans, and black eyed peas.
I'm sure you know where this is going. Those bags of beans sat in my cupboards, taunting me, ever since June. Turns out, canned beans are pretty darn convenient: no thinking ahead required. Right? A working farm, though an intensely active place, also has, in its own way, a slower pace than city life, and there's time built into the day to do things like soak some dried beans in water.
The thing is, I don't really even believe the above--that my life is just way too busy to think about my dinner more than an hour before I sit down to eat it. In fact, I do little but think about food and cooking all day long, so I believe I should be able to commit to preparing some beans a day ahead of time.
I had already been stewing over those chickpeas sitting in my kitchen cabinet when I spied a tasty-looking recipe for coconut-braised chickpeas over at the site of my new employer, Serious Eats. The dish sounded like it had some nice flavors going on--lemon, ginger and coconut--and I was keen to try it. The recipe actually called for canned chickpeas, but I would use dried--finally. I knew I would have all the time in the world to cook on Sunday, so on Saturday night, I filled a pot with those clattering little peas, and covered them in twice the amount of water. They'd be (nearly) ready for me when I needed them.
The next day, about an hour before I was ready to cook, I put the pot of chickpeas on the stove, added some salt, and simmered them, covered. Then, as I set to work on the recipe, I simply allowed the garbanzos to steam to toothy perfection before they got to cook for a second time in the dish's flavorful broth.
I used the recipe only as a starting point: though it sounded like a good base, I could tell it would need some punching up. The only spice it called for was ginger and an optional shaking of red pepper flakes, and for me, coconut milk cries out for a complex, heady mixture of aromatics. I also wanted to add some chopped carrot for added sweetness, and some cubed potatoes for some starch to help thicken the broth. The end result was sweet and fragrant, with the tender, creamy chickpeas providing a welcome contrast to the softness of the spinach and the potatoes. Eating it reaffirmed my conviction that cooking with dried legumes is just better. I won't be able to do it all the time--some nights, those ready-to-go Goya beans will still be attractive--but I definitely plan to try this more often. I may not normally possess the virtue of patience, but when it comes to good food, I'm happy to make an exception.
Coconut-Braised Chickpeas with Spinach and Lemon
Adapted (heavily) from seriouseats.com
Serves 4 - 6
Ingredients:
- About 8 ounces dried chickpeas, soaked overnight in 16 oz. water, or one 15-oz. can, drained
- 2 tbsp. vegetable oil
- 2 small (or 1 large) onions, peeled and finely chopped
- 1 carrot, peeled and thinly sliced
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 tbsp. grated ginger
- 1 large lemon, zested and juiced
- 1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes
- 1/2 tsp. curry powder
- 1/2 tsp. turmeric
- 1/2 tsp. ground coriander
- 3 medium waxy potatoes, scrubbed and cut into a medium dice
- One 14-oz. can coconut milk (I used light--I don't notice the difference)
- About 1 c. water
- 5 oz. baby spinach, rinsed
- Fish sauce (nam pla), to taste
- Salt
- About 1/2 c. unsweetened coconut flakes, toasted, for serving
- Chopped cilantro, for serving
- Cooked white rice, for serving
Preparation:
1. If using dried, soaked chickpeas: about one hour before starting to cook, transfer the chickpeas in soaking liquid to the stove. Add a pinch of salt, cover, and simmer for one hour. As you proceed, leave chickpeas covered.
2. Heat the oil in a large, heavy-bottomed pot (Dutch oven) over medium heat. Add the onions and carrot, stir, and when they begin to soften, add the garlic and ginger. Add the lemon zest and all the spices and cook, stirring, until onions are translucent and spices are toasted and fragrant.
3. Drain the chickpeas and add to the pot along with the potatoes. Add the coconut milk and water, cover, and bring to a simmer. Cook for 15 - 20 minutes, until potatoes are tender.
4. Uncover pot and taste broth. Add a few dashes of fish sauce, to taste, and salt. Add the spinach, cover again, and let wilt. Cook for about 5 more minutes.
5. Turn off heat and stir in lemon juice. Check again for seasoning. Serve over hot white rice, garnished with cilantro and coconut.
Case in point: dried legumes. Having spent a fair amount of time working on organic farms, where the proprietors grow what they eat and store-bought foods don't often come into the picture, I've eaten some lovely dishes made with dried and soaked beans. And I've noticed that their flavor and texture is exponentially better than the canned stuff. And so when I joined the Co-op, I determined to never again pick up a can of Goya. From now on, I brazenly declared to myself, I will cook exclusively with dried beans! And I lined my shelves with chickpeas, kidney beans, and black eyed peas.
I'm sure you know where this is going. Those bags of beans sat in my cupboards, taunting me, ever since June. Turns out, canned beans are pretty darn convenient: no thinking ahead required. Right? A working farm, though an intensely active place, also has, in its own way, a slower pace than city life, and there's time built into the day to do things like soak some dried beans in water.
The thing is, I don't really even believe the above--that my life is just way too busy to think about my dinner more than an hour before I sit down to eat it. In fact, I do little but think about food and cooking all day long, so I believe I should be able to commit to preparing some beans a day ahead of time.
I had already been stewing over those chickpeas sitting in my kitchen cabinet when I spied a tasty-looking recipe for coconut-braised chickpeas over at the site of my new employer, Serious Eats. The dish sounded like it had some nice flavors going on--lemon, ginger and coconut--and I was keen to try it. The recipe actually called for canned chickpeas, but I would use dried--finally. I knew I would have all the time in the world to cook on Sunday, so on Saturday night, I filled a pot with those clattering little peas, and covered them in twice the amount of water. They'd be (nearly) ready for me when I needed them.
The next day, about an hour before I was ready to cook, I put the pot of chickpeas on the stove, added some salt, and simmered them, covered. Then, as I set to work on the recipe, I simply allowed the garbanzos to steam to toothy perfection before they got to cook for a second time in the dish's flavorful broth.
I used the recipe only as a starting point: though it sounded like a good base, I could tell it would need some punching up. The only spice it called for was ginger and an optional shaking of red pepper flakes, and for me, coconut milk cries out for a complex, heady mixture of aromatics. I also wanted to add some chopped carrot for added sweetness, and some cubed potatoes for some starch to help thicken the broth. The end result was sweet and fragrant, with the tender, creamy chickpeas providing a welcome contrast to the softness of the spinach and the potatoes. Eating it reaffirmed my conviction that cooking with dried legumes is just better. I won't be able to do it all the time--some nights, those ready-to-go Goya beans will still be attractive--but I definitely plan to try this more often. I may not normally possess the virtue of patience, but when it comes to good food, I'm happy to make an exception.
Coconut-Braised Chickpeas with Spinach and Lemon
Adapted (heavily) from seriouseats.com
Serves 4 - 6
Ingredients:
- About 8 ounces dried chickpeas, soaked overnight in 16 oz. water, or one 15-oz. can, drained
- 2 tbsp. vegetable oil
- 2 small (or 1 large) onions, peeled and finely chopped
- 1 carrot, peeled and thinly sliced
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 tbsp. grated ginger
- 1 large lemon, zested and juiced
- 1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes
- 1/2 tsp. curry powder
- 1/2 tsp. turmeric
- 1/2 tsp. ground coriander
- 3 medium waxy potatoes, scrubbed and cut into a medium dice
- One 14-oz. can coconut milk (I used light--I don't notice the difference)
- About 1 c. water
- 5 oz. baby spinach, rinsed
- Fish sauce (nam pla), to taste
- Salt
- About 1/2 c. unsweetened coconut flakes, toasted, for serving
- Chopped cilantro, for serving
- Cooked white rice, for serving
Preparation:
1. If using dried, soaked chickpeas: about one hour before starting to cook, transfer the chickpeas in soaking liquid to the stove. Add a pinch of salt, cover, and simmer for one hour. As you proceed, leave chickpeas covered.
2. Heat the oil in a large, heavy-bottomed pot (Dutch oven) over medium heat. Add the onions and carrot, stir, and when they begin to soften, add the garlic and ginger. Add the lemon zest and all the spices and cook, stirring, until onions are translucent and spices are toasted and fragrant.
3. Drain the chickpeas and add to the pot along with the potatoes. Add the coconut milk and water, cover, and bring to a simmer. Cook for 15 - 20 minutes, until potatoes are tender.
4. Uncover pot and taste broth. Add a few dashes of fish sauce, to taste, and salt. Add the spinach, cover again, and let wilt. Cook for about 5 more minutes.
5. Turn off heat and stir in lemon juice. Check again for seasoning. Serve over hot white rice, garnished with cilantro and coconut.
Sunday, January 22, 2012
26 years + 1 complicated recipe
Earlier this month I turned 26 years old and over the weekend I celebrated with friends by throwing a somewhat belated birthday party. Over the past few years I've developed a tradition for my birthday: I invite over a ton of people and then stress myself out by committing to cooking them a huge dinner feast. It's an interesting way to fête my own birthday, I admit, but I'm mostly kidding about the stressful part: in fact, I enjoy making large, complicated meals. Years of producing food on a huge scale as a freelance caterer have made the feat of preparing a meal for 20 people seem like a piece of cake.
In the years that I've been writing on this blog, I've made pork, pork, and legumes for my birthday parties. This year, I wanted to try something different, something a little out of my comfort zone. I'm not as impoverished this year as I was last, so I could afford to buy and serve flesh, and I decided on something that most meat eaters deem commonplace, even mundane: chicken. You see, I've been eating mostly vegetarian for the past few months, and I found that the first thing to disappear from my diet with me hardly even noticing was chicken. It's always been my least favorite meat: I prefer proteins that pack a wallop of flavor, like pork, lamb, and game such as rabbit and venison. I simply find chicken dull, and before my party I honestly can't remember the last time I cooked or ate it. So, of course, that meant that I was sort of craving chicken, after all this time. But since it takes a lot to make chicken exciting, I wanted to impart as much flavor as possible to the meat. Here are some of the ingredients I used in the dish; can you guess what I made?
Not sure yet? Maybe this will clue you in:
Chocolate...? In a savory dish...? Why, it must be mole! Yes, for my birthday I prepared chicken mole poblano, meaning that the recipe comes from Puebla, in Mexico. You see, most people are familiar with mole poblano because of its inclusion of sweet chocolate, which most people wouldn't ordinarily associate with a spicy, savory dish. But in actuality the chocolate forms only a very small proportion of the ingredients, which also include (from top) three types of dried chiles; a spice blend made of whole toasted spices (sesame seeds, chile seeds, cloves, anise seeds, peppercorns, cloves, thyme, oregano, bay leaves, and cinnamon) which are then ground; fried almonds, peanuts, pumpkin seeds, and raisins; and fried bread and corn tortillas. Only at the very end of the hours-long cooking process is a small amount of chocolate and sugar stirred into the nearly-completed sauce.
Another misconception about mole is that poblano--the best-known type--is the only type. In fact, there are many many types of moles--really just a base sauce that meat is then cooked in--prepared all over Mexico, depending on the region and which ingredients are available there. Some other types include negro (black, includes similar ingredients to the poblano but adding dried prunes and ripe plantain); rojo (red, heavier on the tomatillos and also including not a small amount of rendered pork lard); amarillo (yellow, with ground cumin and corn flour); colorado ("colored," with fresh herbs); and verde (green, with fresh green chiles, cilantro, and green pumpkin seeds), among many other varieties. So...now you know. Tell your friends about mole.
I did, however, want to stick with the classic and widely recognized poblano version of this dish. Always served over chicken or turkey, this sauce is incredibly complex-tasting, thanks to its many ingredients. It's not an easy thing to make--it's very time consuming and demands a measure of organization and thoughtful planning--but neither is it as complicated as it might first appear when you read through the recipe. Very basically, you first create a spicy chile sauce made from the fried, then rehydrated and puréed dried chiles, and then you make a sweet sauce from the nuts, dried fruit, and floral spices. Only at the very end do you combine these two sauces and then reduce the result into a silky mixture that is both hot and sweet at the same time.
I talk a lot of game on this site about how I don't follow recipes, preferring instead to follow my muse wherever she might lead me and charting my own way as I go. It's a talent I'm proud of, because it's pretty much my only creative outlet: I don't play music, make art or write anything that's nonfiction. As important as that skill is to me, though, it's also immensely satisfying, once in a while, to cook from a recipe, particularly one that's foreign to me and that I probably wouldn't be able to riff on my own. The mole was a perfect example of such a dish. In the initial stages of the cooking process, I was kind of groping along blindly; I had an idea of where I needed to go, but I wasn't altogether sure how to get there. As I progressed, though, I began to see how everything would come together in the end. A recipe like this is really like a puzzle: you can taste the separate components (basically, the two "mother" sauces) as you go along, but even so, it will be incredibly difficult to imagine how they'll taste when they're finally wedded together. But when they are, they fit perfectly. A recipe that keeps even an experienced cook guessing until the very end? That's certainly my idea of birthday fun.
Chicken Mole Poblano
Adapted from Rick Bayless via Saveur
Serves 15 - 20
A few notes about this recipe. You'll need to visit a Mexican grocery store to get a number of the ingredients (the dried chiles, the Mexican chocolate, and possibly the tortillas). You'll need access to a few appliances: a spice/coffee grinder and, if you want to cut your labor load (as I did), a food processor. I condensed a few of the steps in Bayless's recipe to make things go a little faster. The amount of oil called for seems like a lot, but you'll need it all, because many of the ingredients get fried. You can pour off whatever seems like excess later on.
Ingredients:
- 12 dried ancho chiles
- 12 dried guajillo chiles
- 6 dried pasilla chiles
- 6 tbsp. sesame seeds
- 1 tsp. whole aniseed
- 1 tsp. black peppercorns
- 1⁄2 tsp. whole cloves
- 1 tsp. dried thyme
- 1⁄2 tsp. dried marjoram or oregano
- 3 dried bay leaves, crumbled
- 1 1⁄2" stick cinnamon, broken into pieces
- 2 cups canola oil
- 7 1⁄4 cups chicken or turkey stock
- 1⁄2 cup skin-on almonds
- 1⁄2 cup raw shelled peanuts
- 1⁄3 cup hulled pumpkin seeds
- 1⁄3 cup raisins
- 2 slices white bread
- 2 stale corn tortillas
- 10 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
- 2 medium onions, peeled and chopped
- 5 tomatillos, husked, rinsed, and halved
- 2 large tomato, quartered
- 12 whole chicken legs, skin removed and separated into thighs and drumsticks
- Kosher salt, to taste
- 1 cup finely chopped Mexican chocolate
- 4 tbsp. sugar, plus more to taste
- Tortillas, plain white rice and cilantro sprigs, for serving
Preparation:
1. Stem chiles and shake seeds into a bowl. Set chiles aside. Measure 4 tbsp. chile seeds (discard the rest) and 4 tbsp. sesame seeds into a small skillet set over medium heat. Toast seeds, swirling pan, for 2 minutes. Transfer to a spice grinder. Toast aniseed, peppercorns, and cloves; transfer to grinder along with thyme, marjoram, bay leaves, and cinnamon. Grind into a powder and transfer to a large bowl; set spice mixture aside.
7. Heat oven to 350°. Nestle chicken in mole sauce, dividing among oven-safe dishes if necessary. Bake, covered, for 2 hours. Remove from oven and sprinkle with remaining sesame seeds; serve with tortillas, white rice, and cilantro sprigs.
In the years that I've been writing on this blog, I've made pork, pork, and legumes for my birthday parties. This year, I wanted to try something different, something a little out of my comfort zone. I'm not as impoverished this year as I was last, so I could afford to buy and serve flesh, and I decided on something that most meat eaters deem commonplace, even mundane: chicken. You see, I've been eating mostly vegetarian for the past few months, and I found that the first thing to disappear from my diet with me hardly even noticing was chicken. It's always been my least favorite meat: I prefer proteins that pack a wallop of flavor, like pork, lamb, and game such as rabbit and venison. I simply find chicken dull, and before my party I honestly can't remember the last time I cooked or ate it. So, of course, that meant that I was sort of craving chicken, after all this time. But since it takes a lot to make chicken exciting, I wanted to impart as much flavor as possible to the meat. Here are some of the ingredients I used in the dish; can you guess what I made?
Not sure yet? Maybe this will clue you in:
Chocolate...? In a savory dish...? Why, it must be mole! Yes, for my birthday I prepared chicken mole poblano, meaning that the recipe comes from Puebla, in Mexico. You see, most people are familiar with mole poblano because of its inclusion of sweet chocolate, which most people wouldn't ordinarily associate with a spicy, savory dish. But in actuality the chocolate forms only a very small proportion of the ingredients, which also include (from top) three types of dried chiles; a spice blend made of whole toasted spices (sesame seeds, chile seeds, cloves, anise seeds, peppercorns, cloves, thyme, oregano, bay leaves, and cinnamon) which are then ground; fried almonds, peanuts, pumpkin seeds, and raisins; and fried bread and corn tortillas. Only at the very end of the hours-long cooking process is a small amount of chocolate and sugar stirred into the nearly-completed sauce.
Another misconception about mole is that poblano--the best-known type--is the only type. In fact, there are many many types of moles--really just a base sauce that meat is then cooked in--prepared all over Mexico, depending on the region and which ingredients are available there. Some other types include negro (black, includes similar ingredients to the poblano but adding dried prunes and ripe plantain); rojo (red, heavier on the tomatillos and also including not a small amount of rendered pork lard); amarillo (yellow, with ground cumin and corn flour); colorado ("colored," with fresh herbs); and verde (green, with fresh green chiles, cilantro, and green pumpkin seeds), among many other varieties. So...now you know. Tell your friends about mole.
I did, however, want to stick with the classic and widely recognized poblano version of this dish. Always served over chicken or turkey, this sauce is incredibly complex-tasting, thanks to its many ingredients. It's not an easy thing to make--it's very time consuming and demands a measure of organization and thoughtful planning--but neither is it as complicated as it might first appear when you read through the recipe. Very basically, you first create a spicy chile sauce made from the fried, then rehydrated and puréed dried chiles, and then you make a sweet sauce from the nuts, dried fruit, and floral spices. Only at the very end do you combine these two sauces and then reduce the result into a silky mixture that is both hot and sweet at the same time.
I talk a lot of game on this site about how I don't follow recipes, preferring instead to follow my muse wherever she might lead me and charting my own way as I go. It's a talent I'm proud of, because it's pretty much my only creative outlet: I don't play music, make art or write anything that's nonfiction. As important as that skill is to me, though, it's also immensely satisfying, once in a while, to cook from a recipe, particularly one that's foreign to me and that I probably wouldn't be able to riff on my own. The mole was a perfect example of such a dish. In the initial stages of the cooking process, I was kind of groping along blindly; I had an idea of where I needed to go, but I wasn't altogether sure how to get there. As I progressed, though, I began to see how everything would come together in the end. A recipe like this is really like a puzzle: you can taste the separate components (basically, the two "mother" sauces) as you go along, but even so, it will be incredibly difficult to imagine how they'll taste when they're finally wedded together. But when they are, they fit perfectly. A recipe that keeps even an experienced cook guessing until the very end? That's certainly my idea of birthday fun.
Chicken Mole Poblano
Adapted from Rick Bayless via Saveur
Serves 15 - 20
A few notes about this recipe. You'll need to visit a Mexican grocery store to get a number of the ingredients (the dried chiles, the Mexican chocolate, and possibly the tortillas). You'll need access to a few appliances: a spice/coffee grinder and, if you want to cut your labor load (as I did), a food processor. I condensed a few of the steps in Bayless's recipe to make things go a little faster. The amount of oil called for seems like a lot, but you'll need it all, because many of the ingredients get fried. You can pour off whatever seems like excess later on.
Ingredients:
- 12 dried ancho chiles
- 12 dried guajillo chiles
- 6 dried pasilla chiles
- 6 tbsp. sesame seeds
- 1 tsp. whole aniseed
- 1 tsp. black peppercorns
- 1⁄2 tsp. whole cloves
- 1 tsp. dried thyme
- 1⁄2 tsp. dried marjoram or oregano
- 3 dried bay leaves, crumbled
- 1 1⁄2" stick cinnamon, broken into pieces
- 2 cups canola oil
- 7 1⁄4 cups chicken or turkey stock
- 1⁄2 cup skin-on almonds
- 1⁄2 cup raw shelled peanuts
- 1⁄3 cup hulled pumpkin seeds
- 1⁄3 cup raisins
- 2 slices white bread
- 2 stale corn tortillas
- 10 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
- 2 medium onions, peeled and chopped
- 5 tomatillos, husked, rinsed, and halved
- 2 large tomato, quartered
- 12 whole chicken legs, skin removed and separated into thighs and drumsticks
- Kosher salt, to taste
- 1 cup finely chopped Mexican chocolate
- 4 tbsp. sugar, plus more to taste
- Tortillas, plain white rice and cilantro sprigs, for serving
Preparation:
1. Stem chiles and shake seeds into a bowl. Set chiles aside. Measure 4 tbsp. chile seeds (discard the rest) and 4 tbsp. sesame seeds into a small skillet set over medium heat. Toast seeds, swirling pan, for 2 minutes. Transfer to a spice grinder. Toast aniseed, peppercorns, and cloves; transfer to grinder along with thyme, marjoram, bay leaves, and cinnamon. Grind into a powder and transfer to a large bowl; set spice mixture aside.
2. Heat oil in an 8-quart Dutch oven set over medium heat. Working in small batches, add chiles and cook, turning, until toasted, about 20 seconds. Using a slotted spoon and reserving oil in skillet, transfer chiles to paper towels to drain. Transfer fried chiles to a large bowl; add boiling water to cover (about 4 cups). Let chiles steep for 30 minutes. Strain chiles, reserving soaking liquid.
3. Place the chiles, 3⁄4 cup soaking liquid, and 3⁄4 cup stock into the bowl of a food processor; blend until smooth. Set a sieve over a bowl and strain chile mixture, pushing it through sieve with a rubber spatula; discard solids. Rinse food processor; set chile purée aside.
4. Return pan with oil to medium heat. In quick succession, fry the almonds, then peanuts, then pumpkin seeds, then raisins until toasted, about 1 minute from the time you add the almonds. Transfer all ingredients to paper towels to drain. Return pan to medium heat and fry the bread, turning once, until golden brown, about 3 minutes; transfer to paper towels. Repeat with tortillas. Break bread and tortillas into small pieces and transfer to bowl, along with the almonds, peanuts, pumpkin seeds, raisins, and ground spice mixture; set aside.
5. Set a fine strainer over a large bowl. Strain oil and return it to Dutch oven. Remove 2 tbsp. of the oil and heat it in an 8” skillet set to medium-high. Place onions, garlic, tomatillos and tomatoes into the bowl of the food processor; pulse until finely chopped. Rinse food processor. Add mixture to skillet and cook, stirring, until mixture has softened and the liquid has evaporated, about 12 minutes. Transfer to bowl with spice mixture along with 2 1⁄2 cups stock. Blend onion/nut/spice mixture in food processor until smooth. Press through the strainer into a bowl; set purée aside.
6. Heat reserved Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Season chicken pieces with salt. Working in batches, brown each piece, turning once. Transfer chicken to a plate. Pour off all but 3 tbsp. of oil in Dutch oven and return to medium-high heat. Add chile purée; cook, stirring, until thick, 10–12 minutes. Add spice purée, reduce heat, and cook, stirring, for 30 minutes. Stir in 4 cups stock and chocolate; simmer, partially covered and stirring often, for 1 hour. Season mole sauce with salt and sugar to taste; remove from heat.
7. Heat oven to 350°. Nestle chicken in mole sauce, dividing among oven-safe dishes if necessary. Bake, covered, for 2 hours. Remove from oven and sprinkle with remaining sesame seeds; serve with tortillas, white rice, and cilantro sprigs.
Thursday, January 12, 2012
The kitchen sink of stuffed veggie recipes
Recently, while shopping at the Co-op, I noticed some beautiful-looking Delicata squashes, and decided to grab a couple. Though I had never cooked with them, I knew they were among my mom's favorite vegetables, and that she'd be able to recommend a good recipe. And I was right: when I queried her via email, she responded that she bakes them, stuffed with a mixture of cottage cheese, apples, and raisins, then tops them with Swiss cheese, which creates a browned, gooey crust. I liked her idea, but it sounded a little too sweet for me, so using that recipe as a base, I riffed my own version of a stuffing.
First, I sautéed chopped onions and apples in some olive oil, adding some minced garlic and dried thyme once the first ingredients began to break down. Once everything was well cooked, I took some nice clean kale, shredded it up and added it to the pan, covering it to allow the kale to steam. Once that mixture had cooled slightly, I added the rest of the stuffing ingredients: cottage cheese, eggs, breadcrumbs, and grated Parmesan cheese. I portioned this generously between my two halved, par-baked squashes, then topped with more Parmesan cheese, as, well, I didn't have any Swiss. If you wanted to get more decadent, you could add more breadcrumbs to the top along with the cheese, and dot everything with butter before sending it off to the oven. Even if you go that route, you'll still have a pretty virtuous, complete, vegetarian meal:
Baked Stuffed Delicata Squash
Serves 4
Ingredients:
2 medium to large Delicata squashes, halved and seeds removed
Olive oil
2 medium onions, peeled and finely chopped
2 medium apples, peeled and finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp. dried thyme
1/2 c. raisins
1 bunch of kale, rinsed, thick stems removed, and shredded
About 1 c. cottage cheese, any style
2 eggs
About 1/2 c. breadcrumbs
About 1/4 c. grated Parmesan cheese
Salt
Pepper
Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 350°. Lightly season the squash with salt and pepper, then bake for about 25 minutes or until flesh is slightly tender. (Make sure the squash halves sit flat on the baking pan. If they don't, use a vegetable peeler to trim a strip or two away from the bottom.)
2. Prepare the stuffing: in a large, heavy-bottomed pan, heat about 3 tbsp. olive oil over medium heat. Add the apples and onions; a few minutes later, stir in the garlic, raisins and thyme. Cook, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes.
3. Add the shredded kale and cook, stirring occasionally, until kale is mostly wilted, about 5 - 7 minutes. Turn off the heat, cover the pan, and allow mixture to cool slightly.
4. Add cottage cheese, eggs, breadcrumbs, Parmesan, and salt and pepper to taste. Mix well. Remove squash from oven and divide filling evenly among 4 halves. (If you have any leftover stuffing, bake it in a greased dish alongside.) Top squash with more Parmesan, or, if you prefer, Parmesan + breadcrumbs and some dots of butter.
5. Return to oven and bake until squash is tender and stuffing is nicely browned, about 25 more minutes. I served the squash with a brown rice pilaf and a beet salad.
First, I sautéed chopped onions and apples in some olive oil, adding some minced garlic and dried thyme once the first ingredients began to break down. Once everything was well cooked, I took some nice clean kale, shredded it up and added it to the pan, covering it to allow the kale to steam. Once that mixture had cooled slightly, I added the rest of the stuffing ingredients: cottage cheese, eggs, breadcrumbs, and grated Parmesan cheese. I portioned this generously between my two halved, par-baked squashes, then topped with more Parmesan cheese, as, well, I didn't have any Swiss. If you wanted to get more decadent, you could add more breadcrumbs to the top along with the cheese, and dot everything with butter before sending it off to the oven. Even if you go that route, you'll still have a pretty virtuous, complete, vegetarian meal:
Baked Stuffed Delicata Squash
Serves 4
Ingredients:
2 medium to large Delicata squashes, halved and seeds removed
Olive oil
2 medium onions, peeled and finely chopped
2 medium apples, peeled and finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp. dried thyme
1/2 c. raisins
1 bunch of kale, rinsed, thick stems removed, and shredded
About 1 c. cottage cheese, any style
2 eggs
About 1/2 c. breadcrumbs
About 1/4 c. grated Parmesan cheese
Salt
Pepper
Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 350°. Lightly season the squash with salt and pepper, then bake for about 25 minutes or until flesh is slightly tender. (Make sure the squash halves sit flat on the baking pan. If they don't, use a vegetable peeler to trim a strip or two away from the bottom.)
2. Prepare the stuffing: in a large, heavy-bottomed pan, heat about 3 tbsp. olive oil over medium heat. Add the apples and onions; a few minutes later, stir in the garlic, raisins and thyme. Cook, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes.
3. Add the shredded kale and cook, stirring occasionally, until kale is mostly wilted, about 5 - 7 minutes. Turn off the heat, cover the pan, and allow mixture to cool slightly.
4. Add cottage cheese, eggs, breadcrumbs, Parmesan, and salt and pepper to taste. Mix well. Remove squash from oven and divide filling evenly among 4 halves. (If you have any leftover stuffing, bake it in a greased dish alongside.) Top squash with more Parmesan, or, if you prefer, Parmesan + breadcrumbs and some dots of butter.
5. Return to oven and bake until squash is tender and stuffing is nicely browned, about 25 more minutes. I served the squash with a brown rice pilaf and a beet salad.
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