Illinois Food Love

So it's been a year since I used this blog, and it may be a year until I come back to it; that's all right. I've moved to Illinois for grad school and I'll be cooking for one more often than not, which means that I need some kind of external motivation to actually cook nice things. Taking pictures of my meals and discussing them on the internet fulfills this purpose for me. So here's my first real meal in IL, inspired by the purchase of about a half pound of new potatoes from the mid-week farmers' market here in Champaign.

Mustard Vinaigrette Potato Salad

1/2 lb. new red potatoes

1/4 onion, thinly sliced

heaping tbsp. chopped capers

1/4 cup finely chopped parsley

white vinegar

olive oil

grainy deli mustard

honey

salt & pepper

Leaving the skins on, cut potatoes into bite-sized chunks. Boil them in heavily salted water (it should have the salinity of sea water) until al-dente. Combine with onions, capers and parsley. Make a simple vinaigrette with equal parts olive oil and white wine vinegar, a nice dollop of mustard, a teaspoon or so of honey, and plenty of salt and pepper. Whisk to emulsify and adjust for taste. Stir into potatoes and allow to sit for a few minutes before serving, so the potatoes absorb the vinaigrette. Also, add more salt and pepper to the salad to taste.

Fresh Fruit Salsa

1/4 cup melon, diced (I like green melons such as honeydew, galia or haogen)

1/4 cup cucumber, diced

1/4 cup blueberries, cut in half

1/8 onion, finely diced

small handful cilantro, chopped

1/4 cup toasted sliced almonds

olive oil

lime juice

salt and pepper

Combine fruit, vegetables and cilantro. Drizzle lightly with olive oil and lime juice, add salt and pepper, and adjust these four seasonings to taste. Add the almonds when you serve this fresh salsa, because if you leave them in there, they will absorb the juices of the fruits and veggies and become soggy.

-

I like to serve salads like these with mixed greens or chiffonaded lettuce (greens are always more appealing when you cut them up small, in my opinion).

This would be great with a glass of white wine (what isn't?). I'm a big advocate of vinho verde, as I hate sweet white wines, and vinho is bubbly and dry. If you need more protein, just add some pieces of pan-fried or roasted chicken, or shrimp that has been sauteed or grilled. You can tell I revel in chopping up veggies and making vinaigrettes but don't care much about meat.

Until next time...will it be another year?

Raw Milk

So at long last, my raw milk connection came through (and no, it's not Avery's Branch for Richmonders in the know) and I'll be getting a gallon of bona fide raw milk every other week. I'm incredibly excited about this, and not just because of the known health benefits of raw milk. The real thrill in having access to raw milk is that I'll finally be able to make good yogurt. For some time now I've been mildly obsessed with fermented and live-culture foods, and I went through a phase about a year ago when I was making my own yogurt every week. Unfortunately, I had some mixed results (the yogurt didn't always solidify), which I've always blamed on the fact that I was using pasteurized milk. I'm not sure if this is true -- friends have suggested buying a more 'intense' yogurt from the Middle Eastern grocery store to assure an active culture, and also carefully sterilizing all the equipment -- but now I'll finally be able to test my theory!

Here's my process for making yogurt, and just a few tips for making it easier.

Get a medium-sized saucepan and put in either 1 or 2 quarts of milk. Use a candy thermometer or something similar to get a read on the temperature. Now heat the milk up to 180 degrees fahrenheit using a medium temperature setting so that it gradually heats without burning. I try to stir almost continuously anyway, because I hate the idea of having a burned taste in my yogurt. Once it reaches 180, take the pan off the heat and put it in a bowl of cold water. Now use the spoon to stir the water around the bowl and the milk itself alternately. This helps it cool down quickly, which will expedite the process for you -- the milk needs to get down to 110. Once you've got it there, put it in 1 or 2 Mason quart jars and add exactly 1 tablespoon of yogurt to each -- if you put too much, you'll get a watery, sour product. Stir them up. Now put on the lids and wrap the jars with dish towels, using string or rubber bands to hold them in place. This will help maintain the temperature of the yogurt so the bacteria can thrive. If it's cold, put the jars in your oven with the pilot light on. In warm weather, you should be able to just keep them on the counter. Now wait 8-10 hours. The yogurt should 'make' and be nice and solid. Don't disturb it too soon.

If you want a more detailed explanation of the process of making yogurt and why it works, check out the book Wild Fermentation. There's this whole fermentation subculture in the world of food and that book's author, Sandor Katz, is its fanatical cult leader.

Eating Local and Squash Carpaccio

So in the interim before I take possession of my new kitchen, I've occasionally been using other peoples' kitchens to cook. Recently I was inspired by Sur La Table's new cookbook, 'Eating Local -- The Cookbook Inspired by America's Farmers.' Normally I'm a little skeptical of cookbooks based on locavore/seasonal/ecological principles, not because I don't agree with these ideas, but because many locavore-oriented cookbooks are written by people who are not truly cooks at heart -- they are activists who also like to cook, and it shows in the recipes. Since I myself am just such a person (an activist who also likes to cook), I look for cookbooks that inspire me to become a better and more subtle cook.

When the farm I work for (Amy's Garden) was one of 10 small farms across the country profiled and referred to in this Eating Local cookbook, I was excited, but somewhat dubious about the quality of the recipes that would appear alongside all the pretty farm pictures. The book is, as many cookbooks today seem to be, just as much a coffee-table art book as it is a culinary resource. And that's great, because the pictures in it are absolutely lovely. For some reason, they make me excited to be working on a farm. As for the recipes...well, they're not bad. In fact, I actually kind of like them. They're cute and trendy and really fit with my cooking style, which means they don't cross seasonal boundaries, they specifically refer to and use many common market crops, and they're definitely not boring. So, with the first round of Zephyr squash on the table at the market and Eating Local under my arm, I actually went and cooked something.



This is my version of Eating Local's squash carpaccio. And yes, 'cooking' is a figurative term, since I didn't heat anything, but at this point in my culinary career, even this little salad is quite an accomplishment. I'll rewrite the recipe for you here since my version is diffferent than the one in the book.

2-3 medium-sized Zephyr yellow squash
1/4 bunch sorrel
walnuts
block of parmesan cheese
lemons
olive oil
salt and pepper
garlic

Cut the tops off the squash and peel off thin strips using a vegetable peeler. Mix up a nice vinaigrette with lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper and a clove of garlic. The proportions here aren't incredibly important, though I used a little less olive oil than I normally do, maybe just adding enough so that I had it in a 1:1 ratio with the lemon juice. Toss that vinaigrette with the squash strips. Toast walnuts and chop them coarsely, then add them as well. Chiffonade as much sorrel as you like, and toss that in. Now use that same vegetable peeler and add in nice thin pieces of parmesan. Add a little fresh-ground pepper when serving.

Kitchen Hate and a Long Line of Salads

Mesclun salad with toasted pecans, asparagus and homemade croutons.

I have missed cooking. The house I live in harbors a kitchen that I would describe as highly avoidable -- the stove is electric and glacially slow to heat, the oven burns without warning, counter space is nowhere to be found and the lighting is dim and yellow. There is also no dishwasher. My cooking creativity has flagged, and in the meager days of the spring season, I've given in to a long line of salads. This is not entirely a bad thing: a profusion of fresh greens can delight and satisfy. Though I long for the hiss of onions in a saute pan, I have now learned the art of gilding salads with substance, transforming them from snacks into meals. Here I present to you mix-and-match unconventional salad ideas for April.

Greens (choose one):
Tuscan Kale - My favorite. Dark blue-green crinkly leaves. If you stack them and chiffonade the way you would basil leaves, kale is easy and appealing to eat raw.
Red Russian Kale - Purple rib, light green leaf.
Arugula - Spicy tender leaves.
Mesclun Mix - Typically a blend of lettuce, kale, spinach and asian greens.

From the Market:
Beets - Roast or boil a few of them and remove the skins, then keep them in the refrigerator to chop and throw on a salad later.
Asparagus - Just diagonally slice raw asparagus spears.
Japanese turnips - They are sweet and delicious raw. Peel them if necessary, then slice thin.
Eggs - Boil them and then cut into quarters and artfully arrange on top of greens. Or fry one with plenty of salt and pepper, then and overlap it with the salad.
Crusty Bread - Tear into bite-sized pieces and toast with salt, pepper and olive oil.
Fennel - Slice extra-thin using a mandoline slicer. It has the texture of celery and a mild licorice flavor.
Apples - Try slicing them extra-thin like the fennel.

From the Store:
Red Quinoa - This takes about as long to cook as pasta does. Simmer for 10 minutes until al dente and strain.
Barley - Use quick cooking barley and it takes about the same time as quinoa. Delicious and chewy.
Currants - Like tiny little raisins.
Fourme d'Ambert - This is an expensive, intensely flavored bleu cheese...you only need a little bit to transform a salad.
Avocados - Choose a firm one and dice it.
Nuts - Try brazil nuts and pecans if you're stuck in a walnut or almond rut. Really, though, nuts always make a salad shine.

Vinaigrette (These are ideas for your salad dressing base, to be combined later with olive oil. Dress them up with spices, onions and garlic):
Red wine vinegar with dijon mustard
Balsamic vinegar
Lemon juice and white vinegar
Orange juice and honey
White wine vinegar and angostura bitters

Use discretion when pairing ingredients. Fourme d'Ambert marries beautifully with roasted beets and walnuts. Avocados, brazil nuts and apples are delicious. In all cases, remember that with each bite of the salad, there should be a small thrill, whether it's a crusty chunk of flavorful bread, a creamy piece of avocado or a sweet and chewy currant.

Sukiyaki Party!

Ever since my dad bought a small electric hot plate in his recent efforts to raise shiitake mushrooms, I've been itching to use it to make Japanese sukiyaki for my family at our usual Sunday night dinner gathering. Tonight was the night! I lived in Japan for two years studying Japanese and then teaching English at a high school on a small island south of Kobe. One of my favorite Japanese dinners was nabe, a family-style meal where meat, vegetables, tofu and mushrooms are cooked in a flavorful broth right at the table. Sukiyaki is a version of nabe that calls for extra-thin cut pieces of beef, a sweet-savory soy sauce broth and a small bowl with a beaten raw egg for dipping. I still fondly recall cold nights with one of my best friends, Eriko, and the rest of her family, eating nabe at their kitchen table up in the mountains of rural Japan. It's a dish that invokes togetherness and warmth and it's deceptively easy to make.


The fun of making nabe is that it is participatory. Everyone adds more ingredients as they are used up. I prepared a nice spread so that we could easily put more things in the broth while we were eating dinner. I loosely followed this recipe, so I opted for grass-fed flank steak cut extra thin, yakidofu (fried tofu), fresh firm tofu, green onions, napa cabbage, shiitake and enoki mushrooms, and shirataki noodles (described here as having a 'gelatinous' texture...I love gummy, slightly chewy things so I particularly enjoy these). I also put in a bit of kimchi, since I had found a jar of authentic korean-style kimchi. Kimchi is not traditionally part of sukiyaki recipes but it is sometimes included in other nabes and in my opinion nothing is better than that sour, spicy, living flavor of lacto-fermentation.

I heated the nabe pot right on the electric hot plate, then sauted some of the beef in a little oil to brown it and infuse the broth with that delicious flavor. I added the broth right after that first round of beef had cooked through. Here is the recipe for the broth:

1/3 cup soy sauce
3 tbsp sake
4 tbsp sugar
3/4 cup water

I doubled this recipe to make enough. Once the broth was simmering, we added the other ingredients and allowed them to cook. Then we prepared the most important part of the sukiyaki meal: the eggs. Each person cracks one egg in a small bowl and beats it with chopsticks, creating a yummy yellow dipping sauce for the pieces of the soup. Once everything was cooked through, we grabbed tofu, veggies and meat out of the hot pot with chopsticks and dipped them in the egg before slurping it up and enjoying that sweet-savory flavor. It may sound gross to coat your food in raw eggs, but I promise you, it is the best part of this dish. I recommend using farm-fresh organic eggs for this, so you will not have to worry about salmonella. As the ingredients were used up, everyone contributed to efforts to add more to the pot, and we all thoroughly enjoyed this delicious Japanese dinner.

My return to Asian cooking has been, at best, incredibly slow. After living in Japan and desperately missing cheese, bread, good wine and the density of American and European cooking, I needed a long break from the light, simple quality of Asian meals. Now I'm slowly re-learning what I once knew about Asian flavors. I'm looking forward to incorporating my best memories of Japan into the cooking I do this season, and this sukiyaki meal was a wonderful start. I encourage you to try it too -- the time for warm dishes is winding down and we're looking at the last few weeks of soups and other hearty recipes before asparagus season begins!

Borscht Salad

I am calling this one Borscht Salad because...well, it reminds me of borscht. The beets imbued the entire dish with a beautiful reddish-pink color, and the cannellini beans give it that dense, warm feeling that accompanies a cup of soup.

This salad is a follow-up recipe to the White Winter Salad, and it serves as a demonstration of how to strategize and use ingredients you already have on hand.

1/2 bulb fennel
1 gala apple
1/4 onion
1 bunch beets, greens removed
cannellini beans

red wine vinegar
sugar
mustard
salt, pepper
olive oil

fennel fronds

If you already made my previous salad, you should have extra cooked cannellini beans on hand. If you don't, start them first. Make sure to include seasonings in the water (bay leaf, garlic, onion, thyme). Meanwhile, set the oven to 400 and peel and cut up the beets (I cut each beet in half lenthwise then cut them again into thin half-circles). Toss them with olive oil, salt and pepper, then roast them until they are nice and tender. You could also boil or roast them whole, but roasting the individual slices makes them slightly chewier, lending a pleasant texture to the salad.

While the beets are roasting, slice the fennel, apple and onion paper thin with a mandoline slicer. Mix up the vinaigrette (my method: put about 1/8 to 1/4 cup of vinegar in a bowl, then add sugar until you've mellowed out the vinegar just enough. Add salt, pepper, vinegar, taste the mixture and adjust accordingly. Now add the olive oil while whisking so the mixture emusifies.) When everything is ready, combine it all in a bowl, adding as many beans as you think is necessary. The more you stir, the pinker the salad will become. Add fennel fronds as a garnish.

White Winter Salad

In recent weeks I have changed the way I operate in the kitchen. I used to be all about planning. I'd schedule the week's cooking all in advance, buying all the ingredients I needed in one fell weekend swoop. There was a sense of security in that cooking regimen, but also a feeling of limitation, banned as I was from letting the moment inspire me. This winter, it seems, has been all about letting go, and I have now abandoned my to-do list in favor of my internal compass, allowing myself to be pulled through the kitchen until I arrive at a sufficiently satisfying meal. The results so far have been delicious.

White Winter Salad

Cannellini beans
1 onion, diced
4 cloves garlic
Bay leaves
Dry thyme

1/2 bulb fennel
1 Granny Smith apple, peeled
1/2 daikon radish (daikons vary in size -- you will need about the same amount in volume as the apple or the fennel, since you'll want a 1-1-1 ratio of these three ingredients)
1/4 onion

Juice from 1/2 an orange
1 tsp ginger
1-2 cloves garlic
olive oil
dash red wine vinegar
salt, pepper

Fennel fronds

Dry beans take about an hour to an hour and a half to cook, so you will want to make them first. Cover in water and add 1 bay leaf, a bit of the dry thyme and two smashed garlic cloves. Simmer until beans are soft. Now slice the fennel, apple, daikon radish and onion nice and thin with a mandoline slicer. In another bowl, mix together the liquid ingredients except for olive oil. You should be adding just enough vinegar to give you a tangy taste in the back of your mouth. Add the olive oil while whisking in order to emulsify, putting in as much as you like. A 2-1 ratio is traditional for vinaigrette, but I don't think you need quite that much here. Toss dressing with the sliced ingredients and fennel fronds and allow them to marinate. Meanwhile, saute the diced onion in olive oil until nice and soft. Add garlic and saute for a couple minute more until aromatic. Then add in a good helping of cannellini beans and more olive oil and toss with onions and garlic until warm. Plate with orange slices!

Taking Stock -- Why I Cook.

We all come to cooking because we love to eat.

And consumption is truly the highest pleasure in the complex process that is the enjoyment of food. Much of the food world is centered around the pursuit of taste, encouraging us to encounter food only in its final stage, seasoned and plated as we move it into our mouths. I, too, participate in the fantasy of that last moment of a meal: propelling myself ever forward toward transcendant flavors and remembering fantastic meals with a painfully poignant nostalgia. But while theatrics on the plate may wow our palates and satisfy our stomachs, the truth is cooking, and indeed gardening, lives not in the meal itself, but within the dream of that first bite.

Dreaming that dream can be, and often is, more compelling than its ultimate fulfillment. And that's why I find myself in the kitchen again and again: because cooking feeds the spirit well before it fills the stomach.

As winter is nigh, today I find myself making soup stock, and there is nothing that embodies my "the path is the point" cooking philosophy better than a day of simmering stock. As I begin, I am always reminded of countless culinary pleasures that have nothing to do with taste.

My eyes delight in the picture of deep red and white soup bones peppered with halved root vegetables in oranges and browns set against a deep stainless steel roasting pan. The weight and size of the bones had promised a density of flavor as I placed them in the pan. The oven warms the air in our kitchen, which is, due to dated construction and shoddy insulation, the coldest room in the house. I put the bones in the oven to roast, hefting the pan carefully. Soon a delicious smell emanates from the kitchen, promising things to come. As the rest of the day takes place, the smell pervades every corner of the house, reminding me that the stove and the oven are pregnant with possibility.

I admit I am confronted by a kind of animal disillusionment when I remember there's only the preview of a meal there, instead of some delicious roast or a hearty soup. Still, I am patient. Meals in the cold months are full of root vegetables, warm and usually deeply satisfying -- and stock is all of these things, so I know it will lend depth to every dish I make. And besides, the onset of stock season balances the sudden shock of the freshly freezing cold mornings on the farm. When the stock is finally done, I cover it and allow the liquid to cool.

I'm already flipping glossy pages of cookbooks, planning out what I'm going to make, and more importantly how I'm going to eat it: it will likely become a bean and tuscan kale soup, heated on the stove and consumed on the front porch of the small house that currently serves as a makeshift hunting lodge in the center of the farm. My stock will always have both a story (beginning as leftover broccoli stems and bones from a once-cow) and a story-to-be (soup for hungry harvesters on a crisp fall day). These stories are why my spirit will always be full up when I finally leave the kitchen.

So cook with me sometime. Here are two home-cook recipes for making stock.

Vegetable

- Carrots
- Fennel Tops
- Potatoes (sweet or regular)
- Onions with skins intact
- A few garlic cloves
- Broccoli or cauliflower stems
- White or purple Japanese turnips, greens removed
- White peppercorns
- One or two bay leaves

Wait to make stock until you have a supply of past-prime vegetables, peels and stems. If most of your components are large, cut them into manageable chunks and roast, at 400 degrees, for half an hour or so. I don't recommend roasting if you are mainly using peels instead of the vegetables themselves -- just throw them in the pot instead. Smash the garlic cloves, with skins still on, and add them. Cover vegetables fully with water, and use extra, because some will cook away. Now simmer for one or two hours, occasionally tasting the stock. The color of the liquid will deepen to a golden brown and the taste will become rich and satisfying.

Beef

- A good amount of soup bones, say 3-4 pounds.
- One marrow bone.
- Potatoes (sweet or regular)
- Carrots
- Onions with skins intact
- White or purple Japanese turnips, greens removed
- White peppercorns
- Garlic
- Bay leaf

Search out bones at your local farmers' market: meat vendors often carry them and will be happy to unload them on you. Roast bones in a deep pan on 400 degrees for about half an hour. Add in potatoes, carrots, onions and turnips and roast for another half an hour. Now place contents of roasting pan in a stockpot and cover fully with water. Smash garlic cloves with skins on, and add along with white peppercorns and bay leaf. Simmer for 4-6 hours, adding more water if necessary to keep bones submerged. Skim off fat and foam and taste for doneness. A browner color should pervade beef stock in comparison with the lighter liquid yielded by vegetables. The liquid should be thick, beefy and delicious.