Blackberry Thyme Margarita

Photos by Corey Woodruff

A couple weeks ago, I was invited to preview the reimagined menu at The Grill at the Ritz-Carlton in St. Louis. The Grill chef, Damien Faure (who, incidentally, is married to Simone Faure of La Patisserie Chouquette) has designed a menu highlighted by "traditional as well as communal and shared plates [...] along with classic house-made desserts, signature beverage creations, and an innovative Infused Oil offering." Guests can personalize their menu selections with a variety of house-infused oils. Flavors include lemon verbena & avocado, black garlic & herb, bacon & porcini mushroom, purple basil & brandywine tomato, black truffle, and spring onion & chipotle.

Everything that I sampled was delicious. I tried the New Orleans-style BBQ shrimp & grits with grilled chorizo; Prince Edwards Island Mussels with lemongrass & Kaffir lime; grilled Medjool dates with bacon, Cambozola, & roasted hazelnuts; blackened steak & mushroom flatbread; Tuscan kale & hearts of palm salad with strawberries & goat cheese (one of my favorite dishes that night); hot smoked salmon with tomato coulis; center-cut filet; beer-can chicken (that's right...Chef Faure wanted to represent a "local" dish); grilled asparagus, roasted cauliflower, & twice-baked potato. Dessert was strawberry & white chocolate baked Alaska and profiteroles with hazelnut ice cream.

Yep. It was A LOT of food. I was a happy, happy girl.

Before dinner, we sampled a few of The Ritz signature cocktails.  Why am I not having cocktails at The Ritz Lobby Lounge on a regular basis? They have like a gillion kind of martinis. My favorite was the Blackberry Thyme Margarita: "Sauza Blue, Cointreau, Fresh Lime Juice, Muddled Thyme, House Made Blackberry Simple Syrup, Blackberries."

Here's my recreation:

Blackberry Thyme Margarita

Homemade Corned Beef

I've wanted to corn my own beef (hubba) for a few years, but it never seemed to work out. A couple years ago, I couldn't find pink salt anywhere local and didn't have time to order it online. Last year, I had curing salt on-hand but didn't plan enough time to brine the brisket before St. Patrick's Day.

This year, however, I planned ahead…I made the brine last Monday. I added the brisket on Tuesday, and I let that sucker sit for 5 days before our big Sunday dinner.

I had my doubts.

First, I worried that the meat wouldn't look right because I used curing salt instead of pink salt. I found conflicting opinions online about this…some people say the pink salt is what gives corned beef its red tint, while others maintain that it's the brining process that makes it red (and that the salt is pink so as not to confuse it with regular table salt). Curing salts are generally a mix of table salt, sodium nitrite and sometimes sodium nitrate, curing agents that also contribute to the development of color and flavor. Common types of curing salts are Prague powder #1 (94% salt and 6% sodium nitrite) and Prague powder #2 (which also includes sodium nitrate). I used Morton's Tender Quick (which contains salt, sodium nitrate, and sodium nitrite).

Secondly, I was worried about the texture. I thought it might not be as tender as corned beef should be. Brisket can be so tough. I normally cook corned beef in the crockpot all day, but decided to follow the recipe fully and braise the brined brisket on the stovetop for 3 hours.

Finally, I was worried that the homemade version wouldn't taste like the corned beef I knew. Like most people, I only cook corned beef once a year…and I buy one from the grocery store. I know they are not organic, locally-raised, pasture-fed, etc…but sometimes a once-a-year tradition supersedes all that. I figure, at least I wasn't using corned beef from a can like my mom used to.

But, I shouldn't have worried. The finished brisket looked good! While it wasn't red all the way through, there was a reddish tint around the edges. It was perfectly tender, and it tasted great! BETTER than the corned beefs past.

Beef corning success!

Homemade Corned Beef

recipe from Michael Ruhlman via Leite's Culinaria

Photo by Corey Woodruff

Smoked Eggplant Dip

photo by Corey Woodruff

A couple months ago, I was invited to dinner at The Mediterranean Grill in Chesterfield, Missouri. It's a little restaurant located in a strip mall near the airport. It's easy to miss, but I'm glad I had a reason to seek it out. Dinner was pretty spectacular, and the owners are two of the nicest people I've met.

Chef-owner Elie Harir is from Israel and makes nearly everything on the menu from scratch. I got to try a variety of items...including falafel balls, Moroccan cigars (meat-filled phyllo), hummus, carrot salad, beet salad, eggplant spread, tabouleh salad, matbocha (Moroccan salsa), Middle Eastern chopped vegetable salad, stuffed eggplant, and kabobs. [see photos after the jump]

My favorite dish was the eggplant spread, which tastes smokey and much more flavorful than any baba ganoush I've ever had. Elie said he grills the eggplants to get that flavor.

The truth is that I liked everything I sampled that evening, and I'm looking forward to going back for dinner soon.

Mussels with Lemon-Saffron Sauce

Photos by  Corey Woodruff

So far, 2014 is....fairly cold. We are bracing for some serious winter weather here in St. Louis, expecting up to 10 inches of snow and low temps of -9. The high on Monday is predicted to be zero. Brrrr.

I don't mind the arctic temperatures; I just hope my boiler can keep up. It's been fickle lately, refusing to ignite sometimes and letting the temperature in the house drop. A few weeks ago, the boiler was off all night and it was 40 degrees in the house when I woke up. Last night, it was off for several hours but kicked back on in the middle of the night...thankfully. I've had a repair guy out to check it, but it was--of course--working just fine when he was here & he couldn't find anything wrong with it. *sigh*

With such frigid forecasts, people tend to stock up on milk, eggs, and bread. Instead of making French toast, however, I made a big pot of steamed mussels with a piquant lemon-saffron sauce...perfect with crusty bread and a bottle of wine.

I highly suggest making this while you're snowed in tomorrow.

Strawberry Pie with Basil & Mint

Ahhhh....summer break. I've been out of school for two weeks now. So far, it's been a pretty happy-inducing/heart-mending vacation (which I desperately needed). I got the initial tattoo on my finger redesigned into a lotus flower ("Even amidst fierce flames the golden lotus can be planted"), saw Shakespeare's Twelfth Night performed in Forest Park (my favorite St. Louis summertime event), and bought a new VW Beetle (an early 40th birthday present to myself).

 

I've been spending my time enjoying leisurely breakfasts on the front porch, reading (finished two new novels about Scott & Zelda Fitzgerald), and cooking...working my way through the ever-growing stack of books on my nightstand and the never-ending list of recipes I want to try. This list includes most of the recipes on my new favorite food blog Yummy Books, where author/butcher/voracious reader Cara recreates dishes from various books. Food + literature = heaven!

I read through all of the posts on Yummy Books last week and decided to try the strawberry pie inspired by Steinbeck's East of Eden (one of my favorite authors). Cara's recipe is unique because she adds basil and mint to the strawberries. Brilliant. 

This isn't one of those strawberry pies in which the fruit is drowning in a thick, cloying syrup or gelatin. The fresh berries are simply mixed with sugar and herbs (I added some flour to thicken the juice as it baked instead of letting the berries macerate & then straining the juice out before filling the pie).

This is the first strawberry pie I've ever made AND the first time I've attempted a lattice top. The crust is way easier than I expected...and so pretty.

photo by Corey Woodruff

Strawberry Pie with Basil & Mint

adapted from Yummy Books

For the crust:
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 cup cold, unsalted butter (cut into tablespoons)
1/2 cup shortening
1/2 cup ice water

For the filling:
2 pounds ripe strawberries, hulled & quartered
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
zest of a small orange
5 fresh basil leaves, chopped
2 fresh mint leaves, chopped

1 egg, separated

• Preheat oven to 350.
• To make the crust: Mix the flour & sugar in a large bowl. Using your fingertips or a pastry blender, cut the butter & shortening into the flour until you have pea-sized pieces. Mix in the water, one tablespoon at a time, just until the dough holds together. Cut the dough into two equal pieces & form each into a disk. Wrap one in plastic wrap & chill. Roll the other disk out & fit into a 9-inch pie plate. Brush bottom crust with beaten egg white. Chill while you make the filling.
• To make the filling: Mix everything together. Pour into chilled pie plate, then return it to the refrigerator.
• To assemble the pie: Roll out the chilled disk of dough bigger than your pie plate. Cut into 12 strips. Place 6 strips, evenly spaced apart, on top of your pie. Fold every other strip in half over itself. Add another strip of dough across the top, folding the strips back into place. Repeat, alternating strips of dough, to form a lattice weave (see pictures below). Trim the strips & press the edges into the rim of the bottom crust. Brush top dough with beaten egg yolk.
• Bake for about 1 hour, until the crust is golden brown.

More fruity desserts:

Blackberry Sorbet

Buttermilk Panna Cotta with Red Berries

Cherry Rhubarb Cobbler 

Clementine Bars

Ginger Peach Galette

Lemon & Raspberry Cup Custards

No-bake Cherry Mascarpone Tart

Strawberry Fool

Cassoulet

According to Wall Street Journal writer Aleksandra Crapanzano:

"When Martha Stewart asked the founder of gourmet meat purveyor D'Artagnan about the hearty French dish of duck confit, garlic sausages and tarbais beans, Ariane Daguin responded in a thick Gascon accent that imparted culinary authority. 'Cassoulet,' she said, "it is not a recipe in France. It is a way to argue between villages.'"

Crapanzano goes on to explain cassoulet's history, a dish that originated with "white beans, garlic, pork shoulder, sausages, [and] stale breadcrumbs." The name cassoulet refers not to the recipe itself but to the dish it's assembled and baked in.

When my friend Steph and I decided to make a traditional cassoulet for Easter, I began my research with the source of all French food: Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Julia's "French Baked Beans" recipe is 6 pages long. In the introduction, she explains:

"As cassoulet is native to a relatively large region of France, each part of which has its own specialties, arguments about what should go into this famous dish seem based on local traditions. Toulousains insist that it must include among its meats preserved goose, confit d'oie, or it is not a real cassoulet. [...] Then there are those who declare the cassoulet was born in Castelnaudary, and originally contained only beans, pork, and sausages. A heretical few suggest the cassoulet was not a French invention at all, but an adaption from the Arab fava bean and mutton stew. And so on, with variations and dogmatisms rampant."

While a traditional cassoulet can be made with a variety of meats--duck, goose, pork, lamb--Julia says that "the important item is flavor, which comes largely from the liquid the beans and meats are cooked in." Her version is made with pork loin, lamb shoulder, unsmoked bacon & homemade sausage cakes.

In my cassoulet research, I also studied recipes from Michael Lewis (whose adaptation of Julia's recipe features duck confit, bacon, lamb bones, garlic-pork sausage & goose fat), Saveur (a tomatoey pork-extravaganza loaded with ham hocks, pork shoulder, pancetta, pork sausage & duck confit), Mark Bittman (which begins with a whole duck and finishes with bacon, lamb shoulder, seared duck breasts & garlicky sausage), Anthony Bourdain & Michael Ruhlman (a 3-day production layered with beans, pork sausage, more beans, pork belly, more beans, duck confit, and beans again with a caramelized onion & garlic puree between each layer), and Nigel Slater (his "unctuous meat and snowy white beans" version contains duck confit, pork shoulder, bacon & pork sausage with a breadcrumb crust that's stirred into the stew after an hour, then topped with more breadcrumbs & a drizzle of duck fat).

Slater writes:

"The perfect cassoulet is one that sends wave after garlicky wave of warmth from the end of your tongue to the tips of your toes. The beans are held in just the right amount of herby, tomatoey goo, the breadcrumb crust is crisp, and the first mouthful piping hot. It should contain haricot or broad beans, some fatty pork, garlicky sausages and a thick breadcrumb crust."

I pieced together aspects of a few different recipes to create my own Frankenoulet, but I used Crapsanzano's recipe from the Wall Street Journal (which she adapted from Thomas Keller's Bouchon Bistro) as my starting point...forgoing her step to reduce the bean cooking liquid, adding caramelised onions to her garlic confit puree, layering the cassoulet in Bourdain/Ruhlman fashion, and baking the assembled dish uncovered for a couple hours before adding the breadcrumb topping.

Steph and I made our cassoulet with (clockwise from bottom right) White Emergo beans (most recipes call for Tarbais beans, but Julia says that Great Northern beans work just as well), duck confit (thanks to Steph, who used a whole duck), fresh baguette breadcrumbs, olive oil used to make the confit (instead of using duck fat throughout the recipe), locally-made Bolognese sausage & pancetta, and caramelized onion & garlic confit puree.

Cassoulet isn't necessarily difficult to make; it just takes 3 days to prepare all the separate parts before baking the finished dish. Julia refers to this as "the order of battle." Day One: Make the duck confit (if you're making it instead of buying it) & soak the beans. Day Two: Cook the beans & make the garlic confit, then refrigerate overnight. Day Three: Finish the rest of the ingredients (make breadcrumbs, caramelize onions, cook pancetta & sausage), assemble the cassoulet & bake.

As Bittman says, "[...] cassoulet isn’t that demanding; it just takes time, and I’m here to say: You can do it."

And you CAN do it. WE did. So go do it already!

CASSOULET

For the beans:

1 1/2 pounds dried white beans
1 bay leaf
1 large garlic clove, peeled
6 peppercorns
1 sprig fresh thyme
1 onion, peeled and halved crosswise
1 carrot, peeled and halved crosswise
1 piece bacon skin or trimmings (about 2 ounces) *
4 quarts freshly-made chicken or duck stock

* I used the skin from the pancetta.

For the cassoulet:
2 tablespoons olive oil or duck fat
1 pound pancetta, diced into lardons
1 pound garlicky sausages
confit from 1 whole duck
1½ cups garlic confit puree (recipe below)

For the garlic confit puree:
2 heads of garlic, cloves separated & peeled
olive oil, as needed
2 onions, halved & sliced
salt & pepper
 
For the crumb topping:
3 tablespoons olive oil or duck fat
1 1/2 cups fresh breadcrumbs
3 tablespoons parsley, finely chopped
3 tablespoons thyme, finely chopped
salt & pepper


Day One

• Cover the beans with room temperature water and let sit overnight in a nonreactive bowl.

Day Two

• Drain the beans and discard the water. Transfer beans to a large pot. Add bay leaf, garlic clove, peppercorns, thyme, onion, carrot & bacon. Cover with stock. (The beans should be covered throughout the cooking process by about 1 inch of liquid.)

• Bring to a light simmer and cook over low heat, uncovered, until fully tender. This could more than 2 hours, depending on what kind of beans you are using. Start testing after 90 minutes. When they are just tender throughout, turn off the heat and let cool to room temperature. Refrigerate beans in their liquid overnight (cover the pot).  

• To make the garlic confit: Cut the root end off of the peeled garlic and place in a small saucepan. Add enough olive oil to cover the cloves by 1 inch. Set the pan over the lowest possible heat and cook gently. You should see very small bubbles in the oil but nothing that breaks the surface. If necessary, set the pan partially off the burner to achieve sufficiently gentle heat. Cook garlic, stirring occasionally, until cloves are completely tender when pierced with a knife, about 1 hour. Remove the pan from the heat and allow cloves to cool in the oil, about 1 hour. Then, pour the garlic and oil in a jar or covered bowl and refrigerate overnight. 

Day Three

• Drain the beans, discarding the vegetables and bacon but reserving the cooking stock. (If you used bacon fat or trimmings--not skin--save it to add to the garlic puree.)

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 

• To make the garlic confit puree: Caramelize the sliced onions (seasoned with salt & pepper) in a few tablespoons of the oil from the garlic confit. Puree the onion & the drained garlic cloves in a food processor or blender until smooth. Add some of the garlic oil if needed to make a smooth paste. (If you used bacon fat or trimmings in the beans, you can add it to the garlic puree as well.)

• Heat olive oil or duck fat in a skillet over medium-high heat and cook the pancetta until lightly browned but not crispy. Remove from the pan with a slotted spoon.

• In the same pan, brown the sausages. Remove from pan & set the aside. (If you don't want whole sausages in your cassoulet, let them cool a little bit and slice them into 1-inch pieces.)

• Start layering the ingredients in a large heavy-bottom dutch oven. Star with a layer of beans, then add the sausages, some of the garlic confit puree, another layer of beans, the pancetta & duck confit, more of the garlic puree, then the rest of the beans.  

•  Add the reserved bean cooking stock, enough to just barely cover the beans.

• Bake uncovered for two hours. The cassoulet should be moist but not soupy. Check the beans for doneness; they should be soft and creamy.

• Meanwhile, combine all of the ingredients for the crumb topping. Sprinkle the cassoulet with the crumbs. Bake an additional 15 minutes, or until the topping is evenly browned. (We increased the oven temperature to 400 for this step, then finished with a couple minutes under the broiler for a crunchy topping.)

• Behold your gorgeous creation and rejoice because you are now a culinary badass.

• Serve immediately.

Homemade Maple Granola

Last weekend, I got to meet Deb Perelman, creator of the infamous Smitten Kitchen blog.  Along with several other St. Louis food bloggers, I was invited to sit down and chat with Deb for an hour before a signing at a local bookstore. She was, to my delight, very down-to-earth and very awesome. 

Deb talked about her process for writing a cookbook and asked us about our own blogs. I was pretty giddy most of the hour as I sat there thinking "I like her!" Sure, her blog is beyond great...but I've met a few "famous" food bloggers and was disappointed to discover they were snobby and kind of bitchy. NOT DEB! She really is the kind of person you want to be friends with. And despite her blogging success, she really is just like us...someone who loves cooking and tinkering around in the kitchen. 

I took her new cookbook home, read it cover to cover that weekend, and make a long list of recipes I'd like to try. I do this with most cookbooks that I buy and usually end up with a dozen or so recipes on my list. For Deb's book, I listed over 40 recipes I want to make...several of which I starred to try very soon!

The first recipe I made was her maple granola, because I've never made granola before. It's easy to do...just mix everything in a bowl, spread it on a cookie sheet, and bake! This recipe is loaded with oats, walnuts, coconut, & dried cherries and flavored with maple & cinnamon.

Big Cluster Maple Granola

recipe from The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook

Clementine Bars

What do you do when you have a bowl full of sad-looking clementines going mushy on the counter? 

Make dessert. Duh.

Clementine Bars

recipe from Felt & Honey 

For the crust:

1 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/4 cup sugar
1 cup flour
pinch of kosher salt


For the filling:

3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 tablespoons flour
5 tablespoons clementine juice
zest of 2 clementines
2 eggs, at room temperature, beaten
Powdered sugar, for dusting

• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
• To make the crust: cream the butter & sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Combine the flour and salt and, with the mixer on low, add to the butter until just mixed. Dump the dough onto a well-floured board and gather into a ball. Flatten the dough with floured hands and press it into the bottom & slightly up the sides of a 13x4-inch rectangular removable bottom tart pan (or an 8-inch square baking dish). Chill.
• Bake the crust for 15 to 20 minutes, until very lightly browned. Let cool on a wire rack while you mix the filling.
• In another bowl, whisk together the sugar, baking powder, & flour. Whisk in the clementine juice, zest, & eggs and blend well. Pour the mixture over the baked crust & bake again until set, about 20-25 minutes, or until an inserted knife comes clean. Let cool on a wire rack.
• When cool, lightly dust with powdered sugar & cut into bars.

Apple Pie, American Gothic Style

Remember when I mentioned that I was reading Making Piece back in September? Well, there's more to that story...

At the end of the summer, Corey and I took a roadtrip to Des Moines for the Iowa State Fair (foods on sticks!). On the way there, we saw one of those brown tourist attraction roadside signs in the middle of Iowa for the American Gothic House. Here's how it went in my head:

Does that mean what I think it means? I dunno, what do you think it means? That's the house in Grant Wood's American Gothic painting? Could be, look it up. OH MY GOD, it IS the house. Go, go, take the next exit!!

Sure enough...there is was:

Just like in Wood's iconic painting:

At the little visitors' center across from the house, we got dressed up and took our own American Gothic photo:

We also learned that a woman named Beth Howard actually LIVES there. We were told that she rents the house from the state, runs a pie stand out of the house on the weekends (summers only), and writes a blog. It sounded vaguely familiar, so when we got back into the car I looked up her blog. Beth wrote the memoir Making Piece, which the Novel Cuisine book club class at Kitchen Conservatory had just read. I hadn't read the book yet myself, so I decided to get a copy as soon as I got home.

When I finished the book, I emailed the author about scheduling a pie-baking class. So, yesterday we drove 4 hours (one way) to Eldon, Iowa, with a group of our foodie/blogger friends to bake apple pies with Beth IN THE HOUSE.

Pumpkin Icebox Cheesecake

It seems as if the holidays are officially upon us. Thanksgiving is next week (already?), and I noticed today that Santa will be arriving at the mall on Saturday.

Ugh.

This year, I'll try to focus on the aspects I enjoy about the holidays...namely the food. And the booze.

Here is an easy, no-bake dessert that's perfectly acceptable for your upcoming holiday meals. It's quick to assemble & requires overnight refrigeration, so it's great for making the night before a dinner party or family gathering.

Pumpkin Icebox Cheesecake

16 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature

1/2 cup packed light brown sugar

1/2 cup sugar

15 ounces pure pumpkin puree (not pumpkin pie filling)

2 tablespoons heavy cream

1/8 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

28 graham cracker sheets

2 cups pecans, toasted & roughly chopped

• Beat the cream cheese and the sugars until smooth. Add pumpkin, half-and-half, salt, spices, & vanilla and beat until smooth and fluffy. 
• Lay enough graham crackers in a 9x9 inch pan to cover the bottom (break to fit if necessary). Spread a quarter of pumpkin mixture over the crackers. Layer 3 more times, ending with the pumpkin mixture*. Sprinkle with the pecans.
• Cover & chill overnight before serving. 

*The more layers this has, the better it is. So, spread the pumpkin on as thinly as possible, while still covering the graham crackers completely.

Green Curry Stew

I'd never made curry paste from scratch, so I tried this recipe recently. This makes a soupy kind of curry, perfect for serving over rice or rice noodles. Be careful not to cook the stew too long after adding the green vegetables, as they will start to gray if overcooked (as you can see in the photo). 

 

This is a fairly mild curry, but you can spice it up by adding more peppers to the paste (or using 3-4 serrano chiles instead of jalapenos) and adding more spicy to the finished stew.

Green Curry Stew

recipe adapted from Martha Stewart

serves 4-6

For the curry paste:

1 tablespoon whole coriander seeds

2 teaspoons ground cumin

1 teaspoon whole black peppercorns

1 teaspoon coarse salt

1 large jalapeno chile, seeded & sliced

1/2 cup fresh cilantro or parsley

zest of 1 lemon

3 large garlic cloves

2 green onions

2 tablespoons chopped & peeled fresh ginger
zest of 1 lime
juice of 2 limes

For the stew: 
2 ounces spinach (1 cup)
1 can (14 ounces) unsweetened regular coconut milk
1 can (14 ounces) unsweetened light coconut milk
1 cup chicken stock
1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1-inch pieces
1 medium zucchini, halved lengthwise and sliced 1-inch thick
2 cups broccoli florets
2 cups haricot verts, cut in half
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
Coarse salt and freshly ground pepper
3/4 cup fresh basil, chopped

• To make the curry paste: Blend all the ingredients in a blender or food processor. (Curry paste can be refrigerated for up to 2 weeks or frozen for up to 3 months.)
• To make the stew: Puree 5 tablespoons curry paste, the spinach, and 1 cup regular coconut milk in a blender until smooth. Reserve remaining curry paste for another use.
• Bring remaining regular coconut milk, the light coconut milk, and the stock to a boil in a medium Dutch oven or heavy stockpot. Reduce heat, stir in curry-spinach mixture, and simmer for 5 minutes. Add the chicken, zucchini, broccoli, & green beans and cook until chicken is cooked through & vegetables are slightly tender, about 10 minutes. Season with salt, pepper, & cayenne (if you want more heat). Remove from the heat & stir in the basil.
• Serve over cooked rice or noodles.

Better-Than-Sex French Silk Pie

In the middle of a rather trying work week, as I was reading the last 100 pages of Beth Howard’s memoir Making Piece, I was overwhelmed with a pie craving. All of Howard’s talk of the healing powers of pie finally got to me: I NEEDED to make pie. I was feeling a little sad (and angry) that evening, so I raided the kitchen for pie ingredients. A small bag of frozen strawberries wasn’t going to cut it, but I did have a can of pumpkin puree in the pantry...mixed with a couple eggs, some milk, sugar, and spices...and a pumpkin pie was in the oven in less than 30 minutes. The pie was an homage to the approaching autumn, which I am looking forward to after a miserably hot and dry summer. The golden pumpkin pie came out of the oven at 8:30 that night. I stayed up reading until it was cool enough to slice and eat.

And you know what? I felt better. There is definitely something to this pie therapy. As Howard says, "Pie may not cure cancer, but it could cure the blues."

But, I’ve always been smitten with pie. Even though I learned to make pie crust several years ago, I am still so happy every time I make a pie...to start off with a bunch of individual ingredients and end up with something that I made from scratch with my own hands, something that is an entity in and of itself, that is completely different from the pile of things I started out with. Flour, salt, butter, and water become a tender, flaky, golden crust. Fruit, sugar, and cornstarch become a sweet, sticky filling. It's a comfort to create something that makes people happy. The fact that it tastes good doesn't hurt either.

I get it, Beth. I really do. (And yes, we are on a first name basis now. More on that in a couple months. *wink*)

In fact, I get a lot of what Beth was feeling about life and love and loss. And sex. She talks about sex pretty frequently. Of course, sex and food are often closely linked in terms of satisfaction. Pie really is quite sexy (the words itself is sexy.....say it soft and slow..... p i e ). Also, ALL THE PUNS. See...?

Sweet Onion & Bacon Jam

My last day of school was May 22, so this weekend kicked off my three-month long summer break. Boo. Yah. 

These past three days were a great mix of music, drinks, friends, sunshine, relaxation, & food. So Much Food...fish tacos at Broadway Oyster Bar, shrimp boil at a friend's new apartment, and a BBQ at my boyfriend's house that offered 5 different meats...local burgers/brats/hot dogs, our own smoked sausage, and homemade bacon jam.

Let me tell you about that smoked sausage. Last weekend, I went over to Corey's house for dinner. "Whatcha doing?" I asked when I showed up. "Smoking a fatty," he replied.

Um. What? 

"Come here and look at my sausage," he insisted.

UM. WHAT?

I followed him to the backyard, skeptical of what I would find out there, not expecting to see an entire roll of breakfast sausage (unwrapped, of course) being smoked on the grill.

I was Leery. Concerned. Intrigued.

After a 2-hour slow cook over some applewood chips, Corey's sausage was damn delicious. Hubba.

(Sorry, I simply can't resist a good sausage joke!)

Anyway...try this sausage. Then chill it and slice it like summer sausage. You won't be sorry. TRUST ME. 

And then, make some bacon jam. It will be a hit. I promise. It was definitely a big hit at our BBQ yesterday. 

Serve it with crackers. Smear some on a burger. Try it for breakfast on toast with a fried egg. Keep a jar on the nightstand next to the bed. WHATEVER YOU WANT. I won't judge.

Just MAKE IT already.

Sweet Onion & Bacon Jam

recipe slightly adapted from Tim Grandinetti

via Sauce Magazine

Baked Cake Donuts with Chocolate Glaze

I bought a donut pan a while ago, like a year ago, with the intention of waking up many a Sunday morning and baking fresh donuts for breakfast...even though there's a little local bakery just up the block from my house. Yeah, well, that picture-perfect, Martha Stewart Sunday morning never happened...until recently. I finally made donuts for Easter brunch.

They were much easier than I expected...no harder than baking cupcakes, really. And now I have all these ideas for different donut flavors. I am particularly excited to try bacon donuts (add finely-chopped cooked bacon to the batter) with a maple glaze.

Wait. I know what you're thinking. Baked donuts? Yes, fried dough is so much better than baked. But, you see, I've always been partial to the cake donut. A vanilla cake donut with chocolate icing is always my first pick, followed closely by an old-fashioned fried sour cream donut. Long John's and jelly donuts? Nah, you can have those. Though, I'll take a custard-filled donut any day. In a pinch, I'll settle for the standard glazed.

Anyway, the recipe I used a few weeks ago gave me donuts that were a bit too dense. So, today I tried a recipe I found on Kitchen Heals Soul, which I liked much better. They were light & fluffy inside, and crispy outside.

Yeah, that's right...I baked donuts on a random Sunday for no particular reason. And I ate all 6 myself.

Baked Cake Donuts with Chocolate Glaze 

Citrus-Cured Salmon

Lately, I've had a serious craving for raw or smoked salmon. And, NO, I'm not pregnant. For weeks, though, I've wanted a toasted bagel with a thick schmear of cream cheese and thin slices of fresh salmon dotted with salty capers. I finally satisfied my craving over spring break last week by curing some salmon for a simple Easter brunch.

I've tried curing a couple things in the past (like wild duck breasts) with no success. It was always too salty in the end. THIS, however, turned out perfectly. It's so easy; you just have to plan ahead.

Any leftovers are a delicious addition to scrambled eggs or pasta. Yum.

Citrus-Cured Salmon

from Michael Ruhlman

1 cup kosher salt
1/2 cup sugar
1 tablespoon grated orange zest
1 tablespoon grated grapefruit zest
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
1 teaspoon lime zest
One 2- to 3-pound/1- to 1.5-kilogram skin-on salmon fillet, pin bones removed and very thin pieces of flesh trimmed

• In a small bowl, combine the salt and sugar and stir to distribute the sugar throughout the salt. In another small bowl, combine the citrus zests.
• On a work surface, lay a sheet of aluminum foil large enough to extend beyond the length of the salmon. Spread a third of the salt mixture in the center of the foil to serve as a bed for the salmon. Place the salmon skin-side down on the salt. Distribute the citrus zest evenly across the salmon. Pour the remaining salt mixture over the salmon. It should be covered. Fold the foil up to contain the salt. Place another sheet of foil over the salmon and crimp the sheets together firmly. The idea is to have a tight package in which the salt mixture is in contact with all surfaces of the salmon.
• Set the foil package on a baking sheet/tray. Set a pan or dish on top of the salmon and weight it down with a brick or a few cans. This will help press the water out of the salmon as it cures. Refrigerate the salmon for 24 hours.
• Unwrap the salmon and remove it from the cure, discarding the foil and the cure. Rinse the salmon and pat dry with paper towels. To remove the skin, place the salmon skin-side down on a cutting board. Holding a sharp, thin, flexible knife at about a 30-degree angle, cut between the flesh and the skin. When you can get a grip on the skin, pull it back and forth against the knife to separate it from the flesh. Set the salmon on a rack or on paper towels on a tray and refrigerate for 8 to 24 hours, to allow the salt concentration to equalize and to dry the salmon further. Wrap the salmon in parchment/baking paper and store in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.

NOTE: I used a 2-pound salmon fillet. I let the salmon cure for about 20 hours, then let it chill after I washed off the salt for only about 3 hours. The texture and salt concentration was fine.

Banana Cream Pie with Chocolate Crumb Crust

Here is another recipe from the Momfuku Milk Bar cookbook: a luscious, intense banana custard in a bittersweet chocolate crumb crust. It's the first banana cream pie I've ever made.

The easy part is that this pie doesn't need to be baked. The slightly difficult part is that it takes several steps to complete: making the crumb for the crust, mixing the actual crust, mixing & cooking the banana custard, whipping cream to fold into the cooled custard, THEN assembling the pie. But it was worth it.

Next time, I would make individual parfaits by layering the cooled chocolate crumbs with the banana filling & sliced bananas in small ramekins, topping each off with whipped cream and shaved chocolate.

 

Andouille & Corn Chowder

What can I say about this recipe? I mean, do you need a whole back story or quirky anecdote this time?  It's just soup, after all. Well, it's really good soup, good enough to share soup. Thick, rich, flavorful, spicy soup. Comforting soup. Pretty soup.

You know how when you say a word over and over and it starts to sound kinda weird? Yeah, that.

Soup.

Well, actually, this is chowder. Chow der, like saying "chew, duh." Chowder. Chowda.

Look at the word chowder for a while and tell me that doesn't look weird.

Now, look at this picture of the andouille & corn chowder that I made tonight and tell me that doesn't look delicious.

Stovetop Shrimp Boil

I made a small, simple dinner for Christmas Eve.
Behold:

 To begin, I boiled some tiny red potatoes in water seasoned with a Zatarain's Crawfish, Shrimp & Crab Boil packet. Beware: it's strong. It made me cough. A lot.

After the water came to a boil, I added chopped andouille sausage & corn on the cob.
 

After a few minutes, when the potatoes were tender & the corn was cooked, I added skin-on shrimp, turned off the heat & covered the pot for about 5 minutes, until the shrimp were cooked through.

I scooped everything into a serving dish & set it on the table with some lemon-garlic butter for dipping & big glasses of red wine.

It was a perfectly indulgent yet simply-prepared holiday meal.

Popcorn Ice Cream

A few weeks ago, my friend Stacy mentioned on Twitter that she had a bunch of egg yolks left after making macaroons for Easter & asked for suggestions on how to use them. My immediate answer was ICE CREAM! Stacy confessed that she'd never made ice cream, so I invited her (a few other foodies friends) over for an ice cream tutorial.

I wanted to try something new & thought that Popcorn Ice Cream over at Almost Bourdain sounded intriguing. We had to adapt the recipe though, since the original only calls for 1 egg and we had 6 yolks to use.

To make our batch of POPCORN flavored, we simply heated 1 1/4 cups EACH of whole milk & heavy cream with 1 cup sugar & a few big handfuls buttered popcorn (real popcorn with real butter, not that microwaved shit) in a medium saucepan until the sugar melted & the mixture just started to bubble.

Remove the pan from the heat & let the flavors infuse for 15-30 minutes. Then, strain the mixture through cheesecloth to remove the popcorn.

 

Meanwhile, whisk 6 egg yolks in a large bowl.

When the cream mixture is strained, slowly whisk it into the yolk to temper the eggs. Here, you are gently heating the egg yolks with the warm cream. GO SLOW. You don't want to scramble the eggs.

Return the mixture back the pan & heat over medium-low, stirring constantly, until the mixture is thick enough to coat the back of the spoon. As you stir, scrape the bottom & sides of the pan. Again, GO SLOW...if you heat the mixture too quickly, the eggs with curdle.

Strain the thickened custard into a clean bowl & chill until ready to freeze (we used an ice bath to bring the temperature down quickly). The key to making ice cream at home is to have your custard ice-cold before churning. When ready, churn in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's directions.

The finished ice cream was very yellow from the yolks, which was good because it looked like popcorn. It, surprisingly, tasted just like buttered popcorn, too. We ended up topping each bowl with a sprinkling of coarse salt & several kernels of popcorn for crunch. So interesting...but really quite good!

Thanks to my friend, the ultra-talented Corey Woodruff for taking pics at our little ice cream party!

Peanut Butter & Pumpkin Dog Treats

THANK YOU to everyone who's been voting for me in Project Food Blog. I didn't make it to round 4, but that's okay. I wasn't happy with my last post, so I wasn't surprised by the results. You see, I had people over on Saturday for my "luxury dinner party," drank too much champagne since I was celebrating my birthday, & woke up too late on Sunday (the day the post was due). I spend the entire day nursing a headache, editing pictures, and writing the post. I knew something was missing; it just didn't feel complete. But, since the deadline was looming, I submitted what I had. Of course, the next day I thought of a few other things I could have added to the post to make it better.

Nevertheless, I'd planned ahead just in case I did make it to the next round...which was a photo challenge. I actually made couscous-stuffed whole branzino last Monday, but I wasn't impressed with my photos or the recipe itself. So, I had an idea to make homemade dog treats and let my pups "help." My friend Corey was kind enough to take some photos while we were cooking.

Arlo

Don’t let his big brown eyes & floppy ears fool you; Arlo’s kind of a pain in the ass. In fact, right at this moment his barking his head off in my ear at nothing in particular. At least he’s not chewing something up. Like my shoes, FIVE pairs of which he’s already destroyed.