a kitchen of her own

Did I dream this book?

2011-11-28T14:54:00.000-08:00

Update: Metafilter found it. The Decadent Cookbook is found as well.

On first read this book, purchased from the dusty shelves of Community Thrift several years ago, appalled me. Chapter after chapter of recipes for things that should never be eaten. Women, rare birds. Wolves. Unspeakable things.

There were two male authors with obvious pseudonyms. It was published by a small press, a paperback. A wolf on the cover, with a green-skinned apple between it's teeth. It looked innocuous.

The conceit of this assumed work of fiction is that the authors sought ever more fantastic dining experiences, and they recorded their feast preparations.

What book you ask? No idea. Maybe the title contained "omnivore" and perhaps not. The clever pseudonyms have flown my grasp. It is not on the stack by my bed. Not on the three shelves of cookbooks, the ones I can'y bear to have too far from the kitchen table. Nor on the ceiling-tall shelf of books less-about-food, or on the built in shelf of books by the window with their spines protectively turned in. Not at the bottom of the stairs where I banished my books about museums and art and culture, and how those things inform community.

Where are you strange book? Not listed in my Goodreads. Not captured in photos of bookshelves. Added in and then apparently removed from lists of favorite books in online dating profiles. You inspired this dinner for 21 in my studio flat, and this one which sleeps 'til spring, and this one under the lemon tree, but I didn't give you a peep of credit.

Nary a trace of you on the Internet in searches of words and images and books. Amazon has not a whiff of you, Citations contains nothing. Omnivore Books and Kitchen Arts & Letters fail to have their bells rung, though both listened with great kindness to my increasingly unbelievable pursuit.

Do you yet exist, book? Did you ever? Are you lost on a beach, or in the seatpocket? Did I leave you in a cafe or on a nightstand? Who did I pack you off with? Who still needed convincing, after my wooing them with a thousand tiny dinner dishes? Whose nightstand are you on now?

An informal banquet

2011-02-23T12:33:00.000-08:00

This week I have made myself a challenge: for my birthday I'm planning a champagne potluck.

The bubbles isn't so challenging, but i was inspired by the rabbity Chinese new year when making invitations, which led to noticing a thin china plate with a red rim, and then sifting through every single dish at Goodwill to build a mismatched set. Chinese restaurant plates, heavy diner ware with red rims, celadon, ornate dragon plates. A heavy swath of polished cotton in blood red for the table, a dozen achingly fragile milk white Japanese teacups with saucers no larger than their lips, mismatched champagne coupes in cup sizes from A-DD. I showed the manager the giant pile and asked for a deal, then every piece was just 99 cents.

My bed is covered in cookbooks, and I'm thinking the menu needs to be French and Chinese. Harder than I thought it would be. Everything family style. Would love it to be of San Francisco and with now ingredients. Make pate with star anise? Buy Peking ducks to serve with biscuits and marmalade? Very orderly stacks of steamed asparagus and wild mushrooms? Congee with Smithfield ham? Wintermelon soup?

Chinese banquet menus are deadening to me, I think because I balk at the shark fin soup recipes. I love the flavor variety, the attention to presentation. In part, I'm using this as an excuse to explore what's intimidating and unfamiliar to me about Chinese cuisines. Recent experiences at Mission Chinese Food Shanghai Dumpling King have me thinking, and fading memories of Firecracker and Jai Yun make me want to play with ingredients and techniques.

Much inspired by the Fat Duck cookbook, but in a mildly grossed out way. Too weird, too fussy. I'm looking for a gentler cuisine.

A pile of clementines with leaves on seems just right. Maybe I need to be reading Simple Food and thinking Chinese ingredients.

Consulting:
Celebrating With Friends
The Modern Art of Chinese Cooking
Food & Wine Best of the Best Vol 12
Country Cooking of France
The Fat Duck Cookbook
The Picnic Book, Nika Hazelton
A Cook's Tour of San Francisco
Foods of the World: The Cooking of China
Pei Mei's Chinese Cookbook Volume II
The French Menu Cookbook, Richard Olney
La Bonne Cuisine
The Food of Asia (Periplus)

I'll get around to dragging down all the Julias, but I haven't yet. Thinking Charlie Trotter Vegetables might be of use too.

We are each whole ecosystems.

2010-06-22T15:11:00.001-07:00

A while ago, someone told me "I love you." For the first time. In an email.

I said this, approximately.

Thank you for your email. It's nice, and hard, to know more about how you feel. I don't really understand you motivations for sharing what you've said. Your words are both generous and prickly. One way I hear it is "I love you, but I'm not going to do anything about it for a number of reasons." Your letter feels like a confession, an admission. It seems like something you needed to tell yourself. What did you need me to hear?

I'm not like coral, my darling. I don't die when I am touched. Big pieces of me change all the time. Broad swaths of the reef of me have died a dozen times. Humans aren't as fragile as you think. We are each whole ecosystems of intent and passion, of hunger and desire and generosity. I don't think you're as fragile as you think either. I'm glad you understand so much about how your heart and time and body work, and I find all the rules you've crafted around it amusing and exasperating.

You will fall in some big love and learn a thousand things, and so shall I. And whole forests of me will die off a dozen more times, and there will be thirty more versions of me, and all of them always will have been the same. But stronger. All of this is good. Sometimes I might even make you dinner.

I love you means many things. It is nice to hear from you. I hear it with your generosity. I don't remember when, but you got tapped into my friend family (the family I choose) at some point. Thanks for being someone who inspires me, who makes me feel more alive, and who keeps me in touch with what's important to me. Seeing you, in whatever context, will always feel like coming home.

Be well, sweet you. Give yourself permission to go after the things you most desire. Leave off all the 'but' and 'and' and 'wish.' Chase what you most desire until your lungs, your everything, is screaming. I love you for your hunger and your generosity, and those true parts of you don't exist in a city or a body or year. They're invincible qualities.

Platinum and pinkening quince.

2010-03-20T15:58:00.001-07:00

Thanksgiving feels like a lifetime ago. Fava vines are now greening the back fence. The Meyer lemon tree bounty has me in a perpetual state of mild anxiety, afraid the splayed branches will fracture under the weight of the fruit. The herb boxes are repotted and lush. The dishes, silver and linens in the photo above are packed in newspaper, deep away. A pot of pinkening quince slices from that November day are long gone, eaten with sour yogurt for several post-feast lunches.

The landscape of my heart is changed, too. My drifts of cookbooks feel like dead weight. Dinner parties have grown few and far between. Was it winter? Was it stress? What stays on? What did I let slip?

My bed is now covered in same colors as last fall's harvest table. The tropical orange, Caribbean turquoise, tanzanite blue, and acid yellow linens that were on my bed burned too bright. The crazy quilts are packed away. Now my bed is made of platinum and pencil gray linen, pale textures of aquamarine and a dove gray felt wool blanket with worn satin bindings. I'm composing a story to embroider on the blanket. Maybe that story starts with Thanksgiving.

Rootbound.

2010-02-14T10:40:00.000-08:00

I woke at dawn. Mauve, foggy, longing to spin a paddle and drag myself through the waves. Pissed at engineers for their willful ignorance of human existence. For the cruel mythologies they write about life and communication. Ethics, gentlemen. Ethics. Your lives and the platforms you build should not be strangers. Where is the Hippocratic Oath of platform developers?

By ten, I was out of bed. Kimonoed. Down the stairs to finally fetch the Sunday paper.

Strong Ritual coffee in the press. Last of the brown sugar guava jam on toast. Languishing guavas out of their white paper sack and into the worn eggyolk yellow Le Creuset pot. Brown sugar guava jam for the new year. Sean Hayes is singing about true things.

I'm re-potting myself.

Makers Faire 2009: Homegrown Village

2009-05-29T20:23:00.000-07:00

This weekend, May 30-31, 2009, I'll be at my 4th Maker Faire, with a booth all of my own. I'll be testing out Kitchen Talk, a concept where I answer food questions. Here's how I described it:

As part of the Homegrown / FarmAid project, Rachel offers a know-it-all / reference librarian/ Car Talk style booth to answer any kitchen question participants raise. From marmalade to deglazing, from canning to grinding your own flour, this unabashed food nerd will answer all your DIY food questions and solve your "my yogurt tasted too sour" problems.

From knowledge gained from Top 10 restaurant kitchens, 30 feet of cookbooks, countless hours in the kitchen section of thrift stores, running the composting program at Burning Man, and getting fired from two bakeries, Rachel brings her DIY ethic to food.

No burning kitchen questions coming to mind? Ask about the most environmentally reasonable way to drink beer. Or how to whip up ceviche from scratch when you're stranded on a desert island. Or where to find fresh Montmorency cherries.

And I wrote up a new bio:

Rachel Weidinger loves saving the world, binder clips, canning jars, the ocean, and her tiny home in San Francisco. I am a marketing generalist with a fondness for the internet--especially social media. I have worked with nonprofits and social enterprises since 1998. When not writing or covering the walls with post-its, you can usually find me in my kitchen making marmalade or pies. My bookshelf has been sorted by color since 1999 and I read voraciously, no matter the hue of the spine. I am a partner in Stowe Boyd's /Ground project, on localism as a global movement.

Come visit me. I'll be demoing Third Date Eggs Saturday and Sunday at 11am, Apricots in Heavy Syrup Saturday at noon, and Preserved Meyer Lemons (and Naya's Eggs) Sunday at noon. Otherwise you can find me at the Kitchen Talk booth.

Fiddleheads in spring mud.

2009-05-05T10:01:00.000-07:00

One spring, I will host a dinner deep in the forest.

A dozen guests, formal attire, candles, white table cloth, old silverware. I'll serve wild boar and venison, fiddleheads and ramps, piles of buttery mushrooms. Our shoes will get muddy. It's possible that we'll sleep in the bushes.

Maybe I'll do this spring dinner with Iso Rabins.

Forty margaritas on a taco safari

2009-05-01T16:46:00.000-07:00

Recipe:
1.75 litres of Cazadores Gold
3.5 cups of Grand Marnier
2 quarts backyard Meyer lemon juice (about 30 pounds of lemons)
10lb ice.

Plus:
4 dozen half pint Mason jars in original boxes
One rolling suitcase, the sort that is the max size for fitting in an overhead bin
40 cocktail napkins

For Garnish:
One lemon
2 shallow lidded containers of rim stuff (one 1/2 c salt, pther 1/2 c sugar with 1 tsp fresh thyme mixed in).

Instructions: Mix liquids in Meyer lemon margarita cocktail recipe from above link.

Fill half pint 42 jars completely with ice. (Reserve remaining 6 jars, and bring with you. Pour margaritas into jars and screw on the lids.

Stack boxes of margaritas in suitcase with those 6 extra empty jars, one lemon, and 2 shallow lidded containers (one 1/2 c salt, other 1/2 c sugar with 1 tsp fresh thyme mixed in).

Throw suitcase in Zipcar, drive across town reeking of tequila, return Zipcar to lot by hotel, dash two blocks to hotel, scoop up 40 #09ntc peeps, shepherd them and the very heavy suitcase to Powell BART. Arrive at 16th St BART, brief Taco Safarists that we might get busted by cops, and head to street corner.

Photo: Virtual Safari

Pass out 6 empty jars rimmed with fresh lemon, and give those people instructions to dip jar in either salt or sugar, pour in freshly shaken ice margarita, and pass on now empty jar to new person with salt/sugar/pass on instructions.

Repeat until everyone is happy.

Photo: Virtual Safari

Made this week.

2009-04-13T18:20:00.000-07:00

Handkerchief pasta with fiddlehead ferns, morels and ramps (x2)
Panna cotta from @davidlebowitz
Lucca ravioli and meat sauce
Standing lamb rib roast and lamb shoulder with lavender salt over baby savoy, baby artichokes and baby carrots
Ricotta cheesecake with red walnut and matzoh meal crust and candied blood oranges
Stewed strawberries and rhubarb with matzoh strudel
3 batches @davidlebowitz Amaretti with varying ratios of apricot kernels:almonds
Flaming Cyanide Ice Balls (for the Flaming Dessert-Off, with Erin) Home canned Blendheim apricots, brandy, amaretti, and Erin's Meyer lemon ice cream and sorbet.
French breakfast radishes with sardine butter

I think spring is here. Report on amaretti findings to follow.

Concisely, a summary of all I know.

2009-01-25T23:36:00.000-08:00

‘If you are careful,’ Garp wrote, ‘if you use good ingredients, and you don’t take any shortcuts, then you can usually cook something very good. Sometimes it is the only worthwhile product you can salvage from a day; what you make to eat. With writing, I find, you can have all the right ingredients, give plenty of time and care, and still get nothing. Also true of love. Cooking, therefore, can keep a person who tries hard sane.’

John Irving, The World According to Garp (1978).

(With gratitude, via Stowe)

Greetings visitors from Beth's Blog & Fast Company

2009-01-22T14:04:00.000-08:00

This is my humble blog about a much beloved kitchen. If you're looking for more about how I rock nonprofit technology you might prefer:

/Ground - A project I'm involved with that keeps tabs on localism as a global movement.
Several upcoming conference presentations- Sustainable Food 2.0 at SXSWi, Evolution of Online Communities at NTC, Social Networking for Sharing Knowledge, Taking Action, for Fundraising at We Are Media.

If you made it to this blog it'll be abundantly clear that the way to my heart is indeed my stomach.

I twitter personally at @rachelannyes (mostly about food, and often about saving the world.)

Looking forward to meeting you...if you want to talk nonprofit tech email me, or catch me on Twitter.

{Wondering what the flutter is about? Lovely Beth wrote up a list of great women in nonprofit tech in Fast Company.}

Resources for learning about slow.

2009-01-06T12:33:00.000-08:00

Snipped from the Twitterverse...

agenthandy Asks:
what's good intro book/site 4 #slowfoodmvmt? some1 said they didn't want 2 go 2 Alemany due 2 not knowing if was "local" !!! View Tweet

rachelannyes Replies:
The Jungle Effect, Plenty, and Full Moon Feast have influenced how I think about food a lot this year. I find Carlo Petrini...View Tweet

..hard to read. Vandana Shiva's Manifesto on the Future of Food+Seed is concise, inspiring. Reading Andrews Slow Food Story now. 1 day ago · View Tweet

Finally, my very own dot com implosion.

2009-01-06T11:13:00.000-08:00

More on why I'm putting this in the dot com implosion pile. I think this is still a big ripple of the 1.0 bust. We'll see some more museums and cultural institutions fall in the next few years.

Epiphany.

2009-01-06T10:42:00.001-08:00

Last night on a whim a bought a Rosca de Reyes from Bakery la Mejor. No sign of baby Jesus yet. I'll update as tiny-things-baked-into-this-sweet-yeast-bread-ring developments emerge.

Temper, temper.

2008-12-10T12:59:00.000-08:00

A friend asks:

Am considering a cookie recipe printed in today's Chronicle food section which involves dipping baked cookies in chocolate melted with 1/2 T of shortening both to help the chocolate set and to prevent it from melting. Because of that, I presume that they don't mean butter. If you were employing this method, what shortening would you use?

My response:
I would omit that addition because it is silly, and follow some other instructions for--instead--tempering chocolate. There are more and less simple ways to temper chocolate, depending on your level of patience. Tempered chocolate sets well, doesn't bloom (the whitish surfacing of coco butter), and is the proper thing to do with dipped things you want to be pretty. Adding shortening or butter would mess up the balance the chocolate maker has already established in cocoa/fat/sugar. In Ohio, people add paraffin wax to the chocolate that buckeye candies are dipped in. This is beyond silly and--rather than eating wax--Ohioans should learn to temper chocolate.

Nerds.

2008-11-24T16:23:00.000-08:00

My crew has a Thanksgiving wiki. Here is what I contributed to the menu, a contribution I have edited eight times to date.

Rachel (Thanksgiving menu philosophy: We likely all have sentimental dishes. Bring that dish. I am apparently extra sentimental. Don't cook? Ask and we'll make it.)

Six Pies: Montmorency cherry pie, Walnut pie, Sweet potato pie, Shaker Lemon pie, Pumpkin pie, Ollalieberry pie
Four Sides: Farro with porcinis, Homemade applesauce, Roasted butternut squash with sage, Broccoli Gratin
One Bread: Parker House Rolls with Cranberry Butter from the NYT
Chestnuts to roast lazily afterward
Board games

All of this brings me great joy.

Earthly.

2008-11-21T13:49:00.000-08:00

Great fabrics from Cicadia Studio on Etsy.

Flounce.

2008-11-21T13:45:00.001-08:00

Smitten by this, and other lovelies on Etsy from Made With Love By Hannah.

Dreaming whilst drinking.

2008-11-21T10:26:00.000-08:00

A spoon I'd rather like to have.

Nesting.

2008-11-21T10:23:00.000-08:00

From Magdalena Bors, via Apartment Therapy

Televised.

2008-11-20T17:57:00.000-08:00

My friend Laurence had me as a guest on his SFGTV show: Building SF. The show was called A Kitchen of Her Own - Home Kitchen Design and Construction, and on it I demo the recipe for gougere from the Tartine Cookbook. We discuss the joys of kitchen remodels in San Francisco and how much I like butter.

Here's my version of the Elizabeth Pruett's original Tartine recipe:
1 1/4 C. milk (Elizabeth specifies nonfat, but with that much butter, who cares!)
10 Tbsp. unsalted butter

Coarse salt
1 C. flour
6 eggs
3/4 cup Gruyere cheese cut in 1/1" cubes, plus more for garnish
Some freshly ground black pepper
Some fresh thyme

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper; set aside. Place milk, butter, and 1 teaspoon salt in a saucepan over medium heat. Cook until butter has melted and mixture comes to a boil. Add flour; stir constantly until mixture is incorporated, about 3 minutes. You'll likely need to switch from a whisk to a wooden spoon during this process. Add 5 eggs, one at a time, making sure each is fully incorporated with a wooden spoon before adding the next. Mixture will be thick, smooth, and shiny. Stir in cheese, pepper, and thyme.

Using two table spoons, form rounds about 1 1/2 inches wide on prepared baking sheet, spacing each about 1 1/2 inches apart. In a small bowl, whisk together remaining egg and pinch of salt. Brush each pastry round with egg mixture and sprinkle with cheese.

Transfer baking sheet to oven and bake until puffed, golden brown, and light for their size, 15 to 25 minutes. Remove pastries from oven. Serve hot, warm, or at room temperature. and with lots of well chilled champagne. Preferably to a house full of people whilst wearing a party dress.

[Napa 2001] 4. learning to embroider

2008-10-24T12:25:00.000-07:00

I spent hours carefully stitching the outline of a fig leaf into a beautiful piece of linen, intending to stitch it up into a skirt. It would be more than a year before my sewing machine made the trek west, and the project still lays idle.

My fascination with the shape (and scent) of fig leaves remains. A month ago I stole fig leaves from a tree on First Street in Napa to wrap tender bits of halibut in, and steam. I served these in the starry dark of Naya's Napa backyard for Eileen's birthday.

Story four, in a series of 48.

[Napa 2001] 3. dark chocolate sandwiches on sourdough

2008-10-23T10:03:00.000-07:00

Despite working in a natural foods superstore and a thoughtful food co-op, I really hadn't sorted out chocolate until I moved to Napa. When I was 14 I spent a month is the USSR, shooting guns at the high school's rifle range in the basement, eating yeasty sweet cheese buns in the cafeteria, vaguely teaching English, eating ice cream in the snow in November, and meting dark chocolate in at spoon carefully held in the tension of a cup of hot black tea. Soviet chocolate had none of the grim waxiness of Hersheys, and I was smitten. Erin and I still love this chocolate trick, 19 years later.

There was breifly good bread in Columbus, Ohio, but the only good bakery had been shuttered in a flurry of financial disasters for several years before I moved to Napa.

So that summer, I lived in a perfect storm of the start-up stress of Copia, Acme sourdough baguettes and Scharffenberger chocolate. In this storm, I acquired one of my favorite sandwiches. Naya seemed to discover this same sandwich in the basement of Ritual.

Story three, in a series of 48.

Brilliant cocktail: the Sungold Zinger.

2008-08-08T13:49:00.000-07:00

Last night, when I met a friend for drinks at Range I was fully prepared to order my usual Junipero gin martini -up-with-grapefruit-twist. Yay for well stocked bars. I'd been thinking about it this twist for hours, how the whiff of citrus oil floats across the first sip.

The Range bartenders are amazing, and their specials menu is always worth a gander. You should never, ever go there though. You'll take up all the seats at my 'private' bar and I'll be sad. My fantasy martini never had a chance, as the special menu listed a Sungold Zinger. Perhaps you're not aware that it's Yellow Tomato Week at Rachel. I watched the bartender make them all night, enchanted. I also drank a glass of rosato, a bourbon-based Bit-O-Honey, some bitters, and a glass of champagne. I should have just drank four more Sungold Zingers.

Please make these at home and don't crowd up my neighborhood bar. Thanks.

Sungold Zinger
3-4 Sungold cherry tomatoes
Pinch of sea salt
2 tsp agave surup
2 oz 209 gin
Ice

In a shaker, muddle tomatoes with sea salt. Add agave syrup, gin, and enough ice to fill the shaker. Shake like crazy. Strain through a fine strainer into a martin glass and garnish with a Sungold.

Summertime chili.

2008-08-07T14:28:00.001-07:00

CIMG1608, originally uploaded by johnyo.

Last night I was challenged with a kitchen full of Alemany farmers market and Farm F resh to You peppers and tomatoes, but not wanting any of the usual things. I'm officially (after a zillion delicious variations) ratatouilled out. For now.

I also had three treasures: two cups of hand ground wheat flour from Eatwell Farms, four ears of sweet sweet corn and a pound of hand-hulled first-of-season fresh black eyed peas. I wanted chili, but it seemed too heavy for the sunny Mission day in San Francisco. What I had in mind was a brothy, fresh yellow chili and little savory sweetcorn pancakes.

Here is what I made...

Summertime Chili
Saute until soft in a large soup pot:
2 Tbs olive oil
2 tbs salt
2 leeks, diced
3 stalks celery, diced

Cook separately:
2 cups black eyed peas (dry or fresh, cook according to instructions)

Add to the soup pot:
8 c water
4-5 medium yellow heirloom tomatoes, diced
3 ears sweet corn, cut off the cob
3 c mixed color sweet peppers, cut into thin strips

Bring to a boil, add the cooked beans and:
2 pints mixed variety cherry tomatoes, halved

Return to a boil, adjust seasonings and serve with assorted toppings:
plain yogurt, guacamole, fresh cilantro, chipotle powder, grated cheese, pickled peppers and sweet corn pancakes (recipe follows.)

Sweetcorn Pancakes
1 cob sweet corn
2 Tbs butter

2 c whole wheat flour (hand ground is the most fun!)
2 c cornmeal
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder

2 c whole milk
3 eggs

Cut the corn from the cob and saute in rather too much butter. The butter will be the oil in the batter. Mix the dry ingredients in a quart Mason jar. Beat the eggs in a bowl, beat in the milk. Add the sauteed corn and extra butter to the milk mix. Pour the wet into the dry in the Mason jar, add the lid and shake gently. Add milk as necessary to your ideal pancake batter thickness...I prefer extra thin ones and used a total of three cups of milk in this recipe.

Cook in a skillet in a bit of butter.

These are equally delicious with piles of fresh blueberries, slathered in maple syrup.

Glowing.

2008-08-05T11:14:00.001-07:00

Lemon Tree Relume, originally uploaded by Andrew-Hyde.

To make these simple lanterns, we twisted wire around the lip of Mason jars, leaving a long tail. Then the tail got a little hook at the end so we could loop them over the branches. Thanks to all my delightful guests for jumping in & making the DIY party!

Three part Twitter recipe:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

Micro-localizing.

2008-07-30T07:11:00.000-07:00

Photo credit: Peter Dasilva/ NYT

Trevor of MyFarm, who is rather famous lately, was over yesterday for an assessment and soil testing for my future backyard food garden. Keeping in mind that my whole backyard is perhaps 20'x20', and that the vast majority of it is dominated by a Meyer lemon tree perhaps 16' in diameter, we're in for adventure. He was happy to hear that I was interested in making compost and a beehive part of the plan. Wondering if can grow radishes under my roses...

Ribbed.

2008-06-25T17:19:00.000-07:00

From the Fatted Calf's email newsletter this week:

Rules For Ribs

Remember, anyone can turn out a few racks of damn good ribs. You do not need a lot of special equipment, be of a specific gender or have a granddaddy from the hill country. Patience, desire and a heat source will do.

Rule 1:Formulating Your Meaty Plan You will want to have at least 3 ribs per person. Some people might only eat two while others are endowed with a gene that allows them to consume an entire rack in one sitting.

Rule 2: Don't Rush It If you allow yourself five hours of cooking time you won't be disappointed with tough, underdone ribs. Keep your grill/smoker at about 225 degrees.

Rule 3: Stack 'em up. Stack your ribs up to three high so that one's steaming in the middle at all times. This exposes all the slabs to different types of heat so that none is getting too much dry heat. Every half hour or so, rotate the bottom rack to the top, the middle to the bottom and the top to the center. Putting a small pan of water in the coals will help ensure moist deliciousness as well.

Rule 4: Create a distraction. You will not be able to keep enthusiastic guests from hovering, poking, prodding, offering unsolicited advice and second guessing your every move unless you distract them. A few Basque Coils and a little salumi set out ahead of time go a long way in keeping too many cooks out of your outdoor kitchen.

Sign up for the newsletter now, and know the meaty treats of the week.

I doubt this spiff little Lazzari box-o-charcoal will keep the heat on the ribs for 5 hours, but it sure is pretty. Via Treehugger.

Temptress.

2008-06-20T15:29:00.001-07:00

Quite tempted to buy this book by Skye Gyngell for it's cover. Quite.

Caramelles.

2008-06-20T15:02:00.001-07:00

Photo: Foodbeam

Um, yes. Yes I will use the newly thrifted, hand cranked Atlas pasta machine to make pasta wrappers for ricotta with basil and black olives. But I think I will put them in a caramellized onion/ butter sauce deglazed with lots of white wine & reduced.

Adapted by Foodbeam from Jamie Oliver's recipe.

Caramelle à la ricotta, au basilic et aux olives noires

serves 4

for the pasta dough
6 large organic eggs
600g tipo 00 flour (or any other fine flour)

Crack the eggs into a small bowl and mix with a fork.
Place the flour in a bowl, make a well in the centre and pour the eggs over. With the tips of your fingers, mix the eggs with flour until everything comes together. It is now time to knead the dough until soft and smooth. To do this, I usually divide the dough in four, mix each ball separately, and then combine the balls into a big one.
Wrap the ball in cling film and put in the fridge for at least half an hour – just enough time to make the filling!

for the filling
250g ricotta cheese
a pinch of grated nutmeg
a small handful of black olives, pitted and chopped
a handfuls of grated parmesan
sea salt and ground pepper
extra virgin olive oil

Separate the larger basil leaves from the smaller ones (that you will keep in a bowl of cold water for decoration). Finely chop the big basil leaves and put half of them in a bowl (the rest will be used in the sauce – see below) with the ricotta, grated nutmeg, olives and parmesan. Season with salt and pepper and add a splash of olive oil.

Roll the pasta dough, one small ball at a time and cut into 10×6cm rectangles Place a teaspoon of filling in the middle and brush lightly with water. Roll up and pinch hard to secure each end. Keep on a flour-dusted tray in the fridge until you need them. Repeat until all the dough/filling is used.

for the sauce
2 knobs of butter
olive oil
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and finely sliced
400g ripe tomatoes, peeled, halved, deseeded and roughly chopped
balsamic vinegar
a handful of grated parmesan

Gently heat the butter with a splash of olive oil in a saucepan. When the butter starts to foam, add your sliced garlic and the rest for your chopped basil. A minute later, add the tomatoes. Bring to the boil and simmer for five minutes, until softened. Taste and season with salt and pepper and a swig of balsamic vinegar.

Bring a large pot of salted water to the boil and add the caramelle. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes, until they begin to float, then carefully remove them to a colander using a slotted spoon. Add the caramelle to the sauce and gently toss. Sprinkle with a handful of grated parmesan, the shake around and cover for 30 seconds. Divide between plates and sprinkle with the drained basil leaves.

Sweet Italian.

2008-06-20T14:32:00.000-07:00

After a total yoga failure at lunch, I stopped by AG Ferrari in order to obtain a Pellagrino.

I bought 10 hardcandies from Pastiglie Leone, their Regal Torinos.

I've long been intrigued by the many colored wrappers, but only now tried to figure out the flavors I didn't know. And what a list of flavors it is! (I din't buy all of them, just a handful, so some will remain mysterious for now.)

Pomo cotogno- Quince (pale spring green wrapper)

Cedro-Cedar?

Susina-Plum (royal purple wrapper)

Pesca- (Google translate says ‘fishing’, but this is my favorite iced tea flavor) Peach (rosy peach wrapper)

Menta piemonte- Peppermint

Pera- Pear

Anisetta- Anise (sky blue wrapper)

Mandarino- Mandarin (pumpkin orange wrapper)

Arancia- Orange

Albicocca- Apricot (sunflower yellow wrapper)

Fragolina – Strawberry?

Ratafia- liqueur or cordial flavored with peach or cherry kernels

Ribes- Red currant? (red wrapper)

Tamarindo- Tamarind (reddish brown wrapper)

Fleischgeist.

2008-06-09T17:01:00.000-07:00

Meatpaper editors Sasha Wizansky & Amy Standen. Photo Credit: Juilio Duffoo, via The Kitchn

Snips from the latest Meatpaper Newsletter. Subscribe to the mag now!

* Save the date: July 20, 2008! We’re partnering with Gastronomica magazine for a summer issue launch party at Perbacco restaurant in San Francisco. Join us for tastings by chefs Staffan Terje of Perbacco, Chris Kronner of Serpentine and Slow Club, Leif Hedendal Vegetarian Cuisine, and more. Enjoy beverages from Verge Syrah, Trumer Pils, Bluecoat Gin, La Fee Absinthe, Rhum Clement, and others. Plus: live gypsy jazz by Gaucho. Stay tuned for details.

* Issue Four lands in bookstores and mailboxes mid-June. SUBSCRIBE NOW and you’ll be the first to find out about the global politics of chicken wings, animal cannibalism in the children’s books of Richard Scarry, plus the beefytini, weeniecello, and other adventures in mixology.

Restoring.

2008-06-09T16:47:00.000-07:00

Photo Credit: The Kitchn

More on this topic soon...thinking lots about local, Comfort Food Club, and my kitchen as studio.

Foraging.

2008-06-09T12:31:00.000-07:00

Photo credit: Forage Oakland

From Forage Oakland, who is trying to entice cherries: These are images from cherries from two trees in North Berkeley. I have hand delivered letters to the proprietors of these homes, and I hope to receive a response any day.

Those look like Montmorency cherries to me. Maybe they're just under-ripe Bings though. Suuuuper impressed by the Forage Oakland (and apparently Forage SF) effort. Sent this to them yesterday:

I have a large Meyer lemon tree in the Mission/ SF. Not really any lemons now, but there sure will be. Herbs in the backyard pots, happy to share small quantities with nearby neighbors.

Interested in stone fruit (especially plums and apricots) and unusual citrus varieties. Always willing to trade fruit for preserves.

Very happy to help you with the project. A google map of this stuff would be awesome. I'm a bit of a geek (my job is to help large nonprofits with internet strategy) and admittedly a food nerd...

Rachel
Lexington, SF

Will report on the much-anticipated outcome.

(Good) food on the interweb.

2008-06-08T22:01:00.000-07:00

Illustration: Hadley Hooper for the NYT

Harumph. The NYT has a round-up of local food access points. Just which local, exactly, is a bit ambiguous...I assume local meant NYC, but no. At the end of the article the author is placing a standing order with my beloved Farm Fresh To You. (Gold star for that.) I was surprised to read this on FFTY's web site today: "Currently over 800 families are participating in our family farm's CSA, Farm Fresh To You." I feel like I must know one eighth of their customers. I assumed they delivered thousands of boxes a week.

Michelle Slatalla did introduce me to Spud, which delivers in Seattle, SF, LA & Portland. They'll deliver Strauss glass bottle milk to my house. Distance feature is awesome. Clicking on Strauss shows "This supplier is located 52 miles from our San Francisco warehouse." Still, unless they'll deliver the big jars of A Bientot plain yogurt too, they're not the magical wonderland I'd hoped for. Hrm...bakery section notably missing Acme bread. Household section missing Mrs. Meyers.

Haney's asking a great question over on LinkedIn:
What online platform would work best to connect tens of thousands of individuals and organizations (for-profit and non-profit) in a long-term campaign to create a sustainable, non-exploitative food system in California?

Refrigerated.

2008-06-08T20:30:00.000-07:00

Photo: Phil Mansfield for The New York Times

Ms. Puett sees the refrigerator as just as valid a territory for thoughtful arrangement as any other part of the house. "It's a really fun game," she said. "It makes moving through the banalities of life stimulating."

Good heavens, J. Morgan Puett must be an interesting person. Ooooh...and her kitchen is a showcase for her vintage chemist's glassware.

Permalink to photos linked above: kitchen is #6, refrigerator is #9

{Via The Kitchn}

Trendy.

2008-05-28T14:57:00.000-07:00

If nothing else, I'm hip. I started making jam in 2004. I ate miracle fruit last year. I go on and on about authenticity.

hole.

2008-05-27T22:18:00.000-07:00

Tonight I won't start eating. Nothing will fill me. I could eat half a loaf of apple raisin bread pan- toasted in butter with cup after cup of heavy Eagle Brand sweet PG Tips. I could eat the frozen whole wheat penne with vodka sauce, scaling it with sharded slivers of hard Parmesan. Defrost the single cheddar squash tamale and wolf it down with spicy kim chi and the tiny vinegary yellow Brazilian peppers. I could stew and salt the collards. Steam the kale, dipping entire leaves in lemon tahini sauce.

I could eat the whole pound of earlobe-shaped artichoke pasta, with butter and backyard Meyer lemon zest. There are cold blocks of duck-rich cassoulet, memory-thick bean stew. There are freezer dessicated haricots verts, revivable with lemon and olive oil. Garlic sharp crackers. Irish oatmeal with plump raisins, custardy boiled dates, and toasted walnuts.

Freezer jars of applesauce to heat in the chocolate brown Le Creuset saucepan from my mother's wedding set, adding sugar and cinnamon to invoke my grandmother. Navel oranges from last week's box. A square pan of Droste brownies with pecans. The last of the milk and two pale blue green Auracana eggs with a block of Scharffenberger into chocolate pudding. A jar of sour cherries from Eastern Europe with half a carton of eggs fork whisked into a clafouti, finished with the big raw sugar crystals I carried home from Maui, on the trip with the pool and the plums.

I can eat jar after jar of apricot jam, starting with the tiny jar saved from the 2007 batch. I would think of Sylvia's line, "I eat men like air" as I emptied my pantry, my refrigerator, my freezer. I could eat my kitchen as easily as breathing, fueled by the tightness in my chest. It is the only thing that is how I hoped it would be, how I expected, that kitchen. All else I have accomplished falls short by my measure, who I had hoped to be and to become. I am emptied, and tonight I will not start eating because nothing in my kitchen will fill the hole.

[napa 2001] 2. peaches from our tree

2008-05-23T21:33:00.001-07:00

fragrant, originally uploaded by sassyradish.

In the summer of 2001 I was banned from making pies. This is the story of how that judgement came to be.

I was born across the alley from an apricot tree. A huge apricot tree in the backyard of a large brick Victorian with a turreted tower with a resident clan of hippies. Those apricots were my first food, and I remain fascinated and comforted by ripe apricots. As a kid, sometimes we still had access to that huge tree. At some point in my childhood, the monster was cut down. I would not encounter limitless access to seasonal fruit, except for semi-yearly apple orchard trips and hot days gorging in pick-your-own strawberry fields, until the summer of 2001. In the interim, my appetite for picking ripe fruit grew unchecked for 20 years.

Finding myself in baking ingredient paradise, I commenced with an unchecked pastry manufacturing orgy. Meyer lemon meringue pie (our own eggs! our own lemons!), a meringue-frosted tall cake decorated with tiny marzipan toys for a baby shower, a double-stacked plum upside down cake, blackberry pie, strawberry pie, blackberry crisp, peach cobbler, and an endless stream of peach pies. Eventually, K --who despises mushy foods as a category and consequently seems to loathe Thanksgiving, banned the making of pies. I still came home from work and, after a trip to the tree, sat at the oak kitchen table prepping peach slices for freezing. The juice ran in streams down my forearms, pooling at my elbows. It was heaven.

Thanksgiving 2002 I showed up at their house with 9 pies, including a still-controversial fresh pumpkin pie made apple pie-style. I figured I could get away with flaunting the pie-making ban. I'm not sure that I did.

Story two, in a series of 48.

anchor & hope

2008-05-09T12:10:00.000-07:00

Over a lovely lunch at shiny new Anchor & Hope (shared Ceviche with Lime & Coconut, butter-slathered Lobster Rolls with Old Bay Spiced Potato Chips) I had a restorative conversation with friends. We talked about Japanese baths, and community baths in general, L complaining strongly that Kabuki does it all wrong by enforcing silence. I shared my adoration for Cathedrals of the Flesh, a dead-on perfect gift from E. Doug and Steven stopped by the table, talking acoustics with our party.

One of us is headed to Paris, so I recounted my fall visit with E to the worn hammam at the mosque there, and the intense experience of being forcefully gommaged. It is indeed like being licked by a cat's tongue...a hand-sized one.

While in Paris, I 'borrowed' a lovely tiny guide to historic restaurants, Historic Restaurants of Paris. It was filled with gems and lovely turns of phrase. When a turn in the Jardin du Luxembourg slid into bolting from a downpour, we ducked out of the rain and into
Restaurant POLIDOR (41, rue Monsieur Le Prince, 75006 Paris). The banned napkin storage cabinet was indeed there, as was the Turkish toilet, in much too small of a room. We started out lunch alone, and by the time we paid the check the many communal tables were packed cozily with soggy refugees from the deluge. I often think of E's fragrant chicken with morels in cream sauce. Very often.

The fresh chips were so melt-in-my-mouth salty good that I took the unfinished remainder back to the boys at the office. As I walked the two blocks back to finish a stressful day, I noticed Anchor & Hope's hot mermaid (above) tastefully embossed on their paper takeout box. Well done.

[napa 2001] 1. plums from our tree

2008-04-30T17:49:00.000-07:00

Elephant heart plums, Slow Food USA

In the summer of 2001, I lived in a house surrounded by edible things for the first time in my life.

One of these things was plums, or rather, four of these things were plums. There was a small Italian prune plum tree, from which we plucked hard--almost juiceless--little oblong fruits with sharp pits.

And the other tree...that tree was magical. It was an amazing grafted concoction with three main branches, each a different variety. One branch was most favored, big-in-your-palm green-skinned monsters, crisp-skinned juicy with exploding fuschia flesh. Their bud-ends tapered, shaped like human hearts. I brought them to Copia for Jeff Dawson to identify, and he declared them Elephant Heart plums.

They changed my mind about plums, and I invented the double-stacked Elephant Heart Plum Upside-Down Cake to honor them. I'll add the recipe soon. Shocking pink layered with dense vanilla cake. I decorated the birthday cake platter with fresh baby fig leaves and pistachio marzipan figs the size of my little finger tip.

Story one, in a series of 48.

list from the summer of 2001, napa.

2008-04-30T12:20:00.000-07:00

Found yesterday written on a scrap of a pale moss green envelope, from a letter never sent from Vineyard Lane:

written in order to exercise my obsession with itty bitty letters, on finding nothing suitable to quote.

excellent things this summer:
1. plums from our tree
2. peaches from our tree
3. dark chocolate sandwiches on sourdough
4. learning to embroider
5. being terrified of snakes
6. not losing sunglasses
7. being adored at work
8. new blue shirt
9. sewing projects
10. cabernet
11. ping pong potluck
12. point reyes picnic
13. belle & sebastian at green apple
14. the sun
15. the sky
16. the ocean
17. golden gate bridge
18. chrissy field
19. starfish
20. the stars
21. living with chickens
22. blue pie plate
23. meyer lemon cake
24. plum upside-down cake
25. small peach pies
26. farmers market
27. aspen
28. stripy grosgrain ribbon
29. humboldt fog cheese
30. fig season, however breif
31. riding to yountville
32. the new blue danube
33. my white light bedroom
34. bob and nadia
35. david sedaris
36. oak knoll
37. grilled pork loin
38. getting stuck with abby
39. erin
40. letters
41. squarepusher
42. baby rattlesnake
43. courtyard at work
44. kara
45. green socks
46. julia child
47. jeffery steingarten
48. not being at school and learning anyway

The summer was idyllic, a surprise of riches. Today begins an irregular recollection on each of the 48 glories of the summer of 2001, and what part the 48 magical things play in my life today. {Update: I'll add links to the list as they're completed.} My dearest Naya, I hope your summer in Napa is as lovely as mine. It was the first long stretch I recall being truly happy in.

It's spring, bitches.

2008-03-15T19:01:00.000-07:00

From a heavy earthenware pitcher on my worn oak table orange tulips are leaning into the last afternoon sun. Their delicate yellow edges cup the light.

Recommended
The carmely crusts of two day old bread from Tartine, too sharp to bite until today.
Purple Haze, a goat cheese wrapped with lavender and fennel pollen
Cal del Solo Albarino

Please consume in a plain hot bath.

Team tiny pots

2008-03-14T18:35:00.000-07:00

to start
Still-warm country bread from Tartine
Purple Haze
Cowgirl's St Pats
Pt Reyes Blue
Tiny apple jam
Ca del Solo Albarino, Monterey, 2007

and then
Two mini cocottes, enameled in cobalt, of simple mushroom soup

and after
Pomegranate marinated leg of lamb, seared and baked at 350 to 140
Two 5" granite-wear frying pans of Farm Fresh To You potatoes au gratin
(simple, just in Strauss milk & salt)
Goisot Bourgogne, Cotes d'Auxerre, 2oo4

And then I was so happy I forgot to offer the Eluthera.

Compas Box: Eleuthera, 2002-2005
“Eleuthera” was our very first vatted malt. Typically it combined 15 year-old malt whisky from the village of Brora, aged in re-charred hogsheads, with 12 year-old malt from the village of Port Askaig. Jim Murray said of our first release: “Quite simply, one of the most complex and truly magnificent vatted malts of all time. A collector’s piece.” Sadly, when the 15 year-old malt we needed was no longer available aged in re-charred casks, we decided to retire “Eleuthera” rather than overhaul the recipe.

Next time, remind me, A.

Reunion dinner.

2008-02-26T21:52:00.001-08:00

Last night my little kitchen held six. The Queen of Fun was sick, and we missed her. The Prince of Intense was away at school, but I put in extra garlic for him anyway. And S fell off the boat. Otherwise, it was a most magical dinner reunion.

We started with L's crazy new cocktail.
1 shot Canadian Club
Dash Pernod
Dash Stirrings Blood Orange Bitters

Shake with ice, strain. Serve up, garnish with orange twist and a Ciliegie di Vignoa allo spirito.

Bridey brought a lusciously ripe hunk of Humboldt fog. L dished out little Dijoned stacks of salami and 4 year aged gouda. E called just as the artichokes were being served with little backyard Meyer lemon halves, and she scored a great parking spot.

We cleared off the artichoke petals, and I hefted the 14” cast iron skillet of crusty bubbling cassoulet out of the oven.

Simple Cassoulet
2 ½ cups flageolet beans (navy work too)
Bacon fat
2 large onions, diced
1 tsp. thyme
1 lb multi-colored carrots, hunked
1 ½ lbs duck confit
Salt
3 cups good breadcrumbs
¼ c (one stick) butter

Soak beans 4 hours, then cook 1 hour until edibly soft but not mushy. In a large (14”) cast iron skillet brown diced onions in bacon fat, add thyme. Add 2 cups water and the hunked carrots and simmer until the carrots are soft. Place the duck confit over the carrot/ onion mixture in the pan. Salt well. Melt butter, mix with breadcrumbs. Transfer beans into cast iron pan, reserving bean cooking liquid. Add bean liquid to almost cover the beans. Sprinkle on buttered breadcrumbs. Bake at in the middle of the oven at 350 for 2 hours, then move to the top of the oven and cook for an additional 30 minutes.

Serve with sliced cabbage sautéed in butter.

Erin brought a pear custard tart, and even baked it in the tart pan we lugged home from France.

I miss my grandma.

2008-02-26T14:39:00.000-08:00

A recipe directly in her voice:

Spaghetti Sauce

1 Tiny onion
Couple stalks celery
Couple of carrots, you don’t want a whole million. Big carrots.

Put in a spaghetti pan and simmer with a little water. Not big chunks. Cook for a while, at least half an hour. If the chunks are too big, get out your boat motor. Have you got one of those?

Add:
2 Big cans DiFretti crushed tomatoes
All kinds of like oregano
A little basil
Squash a couple cloves of garlic

Just cook that up. If you need more tomatoes, throw those in.

When it’s done, throw in Prego.

Wow do I adore my grandma.

Breakfast alone at 2

2008-02-23T15:37:00.000-08:00

Slept and slept today, woken with the rain lashing the windows, sounding like hail. And curled again to warmly sleep. Finally up, shocked to learn it’s after 2. Such thick cloudcover that my light-clock is confused.

T’s truffle-oil funky mushrooms last night reminded me of my preferred truffle oil vehicle, toad-in-a-hole and English-style baked beans, mild and sweet. I first ate it as an appetizer at Emmy’s Spaghetti Shack. Two days later it had entered my breakfast list permanently.

Emmy’s Breakfast

Baked Beans

1 Can Navy Beans
2 tsp. molasses
2 Tbsp brown sugar
2 Tbsp ketchup
1 tsp Dijon mustard

Combine in a saucepan, simmer 15-20 minutes.

Toad-in-a-Hole

(per person)
1 thick slice crusty white bread (I used Acme’s Sour Batard)
1 tasty egg
2 tsp butter

Remove most of the soft middle from the slice of bread. Place it in a frying pan of sizzling butter, and carefully crack the egg into the middle. Cook til the white is visibly whitened, and the edges toasty and flop, cooking the yellow to your desired egg state.

Serve the beans and toad drizzled with truffle oil.

Good: harney & sons bangkok green tea

2008-02-13T16:33:00.000-08:00

O, tea of suntan oil soaked, and sun-toasted bikini flesh I am happy you are back in my life. (Allegedly green tea flavored with coconut, ginger and lemongrass. I know you are green tea flavored with joy.) And thanks to dave, who gave me a lovely assortment of tea in a presentation box, unwittingly introducing me to the Bangkok long ago.

Girl's dinner: Abundance for four

2008-02-10T19:18:00.000-08:00

Abundance, originally uploaded by miss_rogue.

Radishes with fancy ass salt
4 year gouda and Sweet Grass Dairy tomme
Small pots of simple mushroom soup with tiny tarts of Humbolt Fog
Chicory with red & yellow beets, blood oranges, grapefruit, mint and olive oil
Tiny artichokes
Local halibut poached with leeks, fennel, lemon zets and young carrots
Cauliflower gratin
Bi-Rite chocolate ice cream with bergamot olive oil and fancy ass sea salt
Tea with silver spoons to melt dark chocolate in

Winter dinner for Erin

2008-02-07T19:19:00.000-08:00

Fizzy Lizzy Lone Star grapefruit greyhounds

Tiny pots of simple soup of wild mushrooms
Tiny tarts of French goat cheese, herbs and pink peppercorns
Beet and supremed orange salad
A lot of prosecco
Cauliflower gratin
Chocolate pudding served in vasoline glass custard cups that might be radioactive. Maybe

Monday dessert: Kumquats, assorted

2008-01-21T23:42:00.000-08:00

kumquats, originally uploaded by tofu666.

L made coq a vin, and the usual thousand side dishes. I made marzipan squares (fail), tiny cookies, and and individual marmalades from three types of Berkeley Bowl-sourced kumquats.

Lunch for a new dad.

2008-01-20T18:51:00.000-08:00

February 22: U-Pik Meyers, originally uploaded by gwen.

Pasta Shop lemon ravioli filled with lemon ricotta, simply tossed with rough-chopped backyard Meyer lemon (preserved) , and frozen peas warmed on olive oil. Golden pillows of joy, much tastier than the durian variety of the same name. Good to see T.

At Leslie's: An alledged potluck

2008-01-06T18:31:00.000-08:00

° p i s t a c h i o s °, originally uploaded by ° d i + m a r s °.

Leslie always cooks too much food, and a zillion courses. She's a dinner party rockstar. She apparently only invites brilliant and witty conversationalists. I know she didn't really mean it when she invited me over for a potluck. She did only cook one dish, but it had seven condiments. Piffle. Some break she took from being a culinary goddess. To show my loyalty and support of her pretend potluck I invented:

Dessert of Seven Tiny Things
One tiny scoop pistachio gelato
One tiny scoop (different) pistachio gelato
One tiny scoop pistachio ice cream
One tiny sandwich of pistachio-studded cookie with backyard apricot jam
One tiny sandwich of pine nut-studded cookie with Buddha's hand citron marmalade
Spoon of rose petal jam
Leaf-on clementine

Tiny Butter Cookies
(adapted from Maida Heater's Fruit Cake Icebox Cookies, Book of Great Cookies,1977 p 136)

1/2 lb. butter
1 C confectioner's sugar
1 egg
Zest from a lemon-sized citrus fruit (lemon or small orange, 2 clementines, 1/4 grapefruit)
2 1/2 C Flour
2 cups total dried fruits or nuts (For the dessert above I divided the dough in half and added 1 C pistachios to A, 1 C pine nuts to B. There were a christmas cookie in my family, made with dried papaya cut into 1/4 inch cubes and pistachios.)

Cream the butter, add sugar, cream it too. Add the egg, beat well. Add zest. Gradually add flour on low. Mix in the fruit and or nuts with your bare hands, and mean it. Grab out lumps the size of your fist, roll into snakes the diameter of a bratwurst. Roll up in waxed paper or parchment, twisting the ends. I prefer parchment, because I have turned into a maniac about material things and you can reuse it by baking the cookies on it. Refrigerate, or if you're in a hurry, toss them in the freezer. When hard (frozen is okay, but not required) slice them like coins 3/16 inch thick. (I know...specific. But 1/8 is too thin, and 1/4 too thick.)

Bake on parchment @ 350 degrees until very slightly toasty on the edges. Watch like a hawk, they'll burn in an instant. Impress the pants off your guests by serving them hot.

Mini gougere, goodbye 2007

2007-12-21T17:44:00.000-08:00

Made in an edition of two, a Tartine-based delight of cheesy poofs. Will post link, second edition was (ha!) for television.

Mini Gougere

Modified from Chef Elisabeth Prueitt’s recipe, published in the Tartine cookbook.

1 1/4 cups nonfat milk
10 tablespoons unsalted butter
Coarse salt
1 cup all-purpose flour
6 large eggs
3/4 cup grated Gruyere cheese, plus more for garnish

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper; set aside.

Place milk, butter, and 1 teaspoon salt in a large heavy-bottomed saucepan over medium heat. Cook until butter has melted and mixture comes to a boil. Add flour; stir constantly until mixture is smooth and begins to pull away from the sides of the pan, about 3 minutes.

Remove from heat and add 5 eggs, one at a time, making sure each is fully incorporated before adding the next. Mixture will be thick, smooth, and shiny. Stir in cheese.

Using two teaspoons, form rounds about 1 inches wide and ½ to ¾ inch high on prepared baking sheet, spacing each about 2 inches apart. In a small bowl, whisk together remaining egg and pinch of salt. Brush each pastry round with egg mixture and sprinkle with cheese. Also, you can forget to do this and do it half way through the baking process.

Transfer baking sheet to oven and bake until puffed, golden brown, and light for their size, 20-25 minutes.

Sugarfest.

2007-11-18T20:42:00.000-08:00

I just finished bringing these to temperature, except they were quince & Crimson Gold apple caramels. Thinking lots of my caramel-making grandfather. My mom would be proud, I used a fancy vat cultured butter from Sierra Nevada.

Plus a 16oz jar of poached quinces, two 24oz jars of poached Crimson Golds (o, the tarts!), and two 12oz jars of Crimson Gold jelly.

Distracted.

2007-11-18T19:52:00.000-08:00

Several hours ago I got up to find the name of a knife company. i just sat down again to eat the fennel and squash soup occupying one of four burners on my stove. The others are quince quarters poaching in simple syrup, Crimson Gold tiny apples poaching in future jelly, and apple/ quince trimmings getting made into pectin. Name of knife company? No idea.

Mussels at Fritz.

2007-11-18T17:14:00.001-08:00

Mussels, originally uploaded by ~Dezz~.

S and I had the most lovely date last night. I'm giddy about winter and Christmas, and went out in a green argyle sweater and red cable-knit scarf. We walked a few short blocks to the new Fritz. I've been to the new location three times. First for fries and wine after a draining day. Then Tuesday after dinner at L's I joined P & E, who I spotted in the posh window seat. I disappeared a Hoegarten and stole a few of their 'Delphi' mussels (feta, Kalamatas, garlic, oregano). S is working tons these days, so I'd been plotting a relaxing night. When I suggested mussels, he thought of a few lovely and schwank places to enjoy them. I was angling for the $11 mussels with $4.75 fries, enough for two to spilt.

When we arrived, the line was out the door. We zipped through it, so fast that we had to concur on which mussels and tasty fry dipping sauces at the register. We cozied up in the window on the white vinyl bed sofa, with a tray table across my lap. Fabulous people watching from our perch at the front. A large Fritz arrived with roasted pepper mayonnaise and wasabi mayonnaise, both of which could have been more flavored. We later returned for curry ketchup and Thai hot sauce ketchup. Spiennes Mussels came in Hoegarten (yay!) with fresh fennel, lemon zest, garlic and shallots. I drank a yummy white French wine which will remain unnamed, because it was too damn far away to read the name.

Eggs for Naya.

2007-11-18T16:32:00.000-08:00

Soft scrambled eggs with perhaps Jarrahdale squash cubes, a bit of preserved Meyer lemon and carmelized onions with thyme and sage. Applewood smoked bacon, Ritual coffee N brought, after staving off the empty belly with walnut toast and strawberry jam made yesterday. We followed this with hours of drinking tea and knitting. A magnificent Saturday.

Eggs for Naya

3 very small onions, sliced (about 2/3 C.)
Thyme
Sage
1 Tbs. butter
2 C. squash cubes, steamed
2 Tsp. minced preserved Meyer Lemon

6 eggs

1/4 C. cream

1 cup plain yogurt (I used Brown Cow lowfat)

Salt

Pepper

Carmelize onions in butter, while steaming squash. Adding thyme, sage, preserved lemon, salt and pepper to onions at finish. Turn heat to low. Drink some coffee.

Fork-whisk eggs, add cream, add yogurt. Whisk more, but don't worry about evenly incorporating the yogurt. Add egg mixture to pan of squash and seasoned onions. Cook over very low heat, flipping the edges into the middle and stirring gently. Drink more coffee. While the still-a-bit-runny eggs are cooking, put a lid on the pan and turn off the heat. Relax. Cook the bacon. Then eat the perfect eggs. Adding yogurt does a cheesy trick that I still don't fully understand, but adore.

Missed.

2007-11-16T18:04:00.000-08:00

Hello Creme of My (Your) Name and JBS and ioerror. Lovely to hear from you all. Smooches and coddled eggs.

Camellia.

2007-11-16T17:40:00.000-08:00

In Joigny I bought a secopnd and third bottle of Gris de Joigny at the farmers market from a cheese shop. I also bought a handfull of tiny thimbles of hard aged goat cheese. The were unforgettable. As in I think of them three times a day. So when I see California Crottins at the corner store, I always miss the thimbles, and apparently their "wrinkly, geotrichum candidum rinds." Last night S and I were walking home from the video store (Perfume and Black Tights) I stopped in to pick of packed lunch tidbits. I bought a gooey ripe Camellia, a soft goat cheese...overrripe by American standards.

I gooely cut it in two this morning, sending S away with half. Plus a pink lady apple, walnut bread, a hard boiled egg, tiny containers of salt and fresh ground pepper, a salad of arugula/ strawberries/Point Reyes blue, a tiny bottle of balsamic dressing, a clementine, and a tiny jar of Crimson Gold apple jelly. (I was regretting forgetting to pack a bar of Scarffenberger until I typed that list. What a lunch!) A linen napkin even, and rather nice cutlery like this. I took the other half of the cheese, a perfect pear and walnut bread.

I ate lunch first. The cheese was shockingly redolent of sweaty woman. Blink. Hooray for ripe cheese.

Black Tights.

2007-11-16T13:25:00.000-08:00

Yowzers. Cyd Charisse in Black Tights. I need more vertically striped corsets. They'd look great with my kitchen.

You want food porn?

2007-11-15T09:51:00.001-08:00

the complete sausage tree, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

Watch Julia make sausage in The French Chef with Julia Child: Disc 2, episode 4 (or 10, depending on how you're counting) "To Stuff a Sausage." She's as hands on as usual.

It's thoughtfully followed with the cold shower that is Tripes a la Mode. Ever see a whole cow's stomach? Large.

Winter rain salad.

2007-11-15T09:42:00.001-08:00

the radishes dreamt of being roses, originally uploaded by Splat Worldwide.

I recieve a magical box every other week. This week, I vowed to eat the most perishable things immediately--big red radishes and a funny bag of 4" assorted lettuce leaves. The dressing was a discovery.

Winter Dressing
1/4 cup Point Reyes Blue cheese, crumbled
1/2 cup plain yogurt (I used Brown Cow low fat)
Dash habanero hot sauce
1/2 tsp worchestershire sauce
Lots of fresh ground black pepper

Once, there was the most magical dinner.

2007-11-14T10:00:00.000-08:00

The crew of the Saint Vallerie staked in and tied down to a scandalously central bank in Auxerre, France at sunset. Seven of the crew disembarked to explore, and S and I sauteed aboard to transform cassoulet for two or three into dinner for nine. El Capitan suggested dining ashore. S surveyed the resources from the increasingly delightful foredeck.

We trundled the tables and every chair across to shore, pulled up the gangplanks, replaced them farther forward, and carried everything to the foredeck. Deeply short on chairs, we improvised benches out of gangplanks balanced on chairs. A sheet became the table cloth as I madly quartered and steamed strategically filling artichokes as a starter. Pressure-cooked haricots blancs had already power stewed in the pressure cooker with a mildly outrageous quantity of multicolored Joigny farmers market carrots and our meagre looking two legs/thighs of duck confit. The concoction was bubbling away in out one glass casserole in the tiny boat oven, crispy duck fatted crumbs toasting on top.

The dueling cathedrals created an unforgettable scene as the rest of the crew trouped home to steaming artichokes and white Burgundy. An utter victory. And in striped shirts.

Cracked.

2007-11-14T09:52:00.000-08:00

After 10 years of owning assorted Le Creuset, Dansk, etc. enamel pans, I've finally hurt one. My red Dansk saucepan with lovely wooden handle now has a crackled and cracked bottom, with bits flaking off everywhere. Replacable. The thinnker Dansk enamel is perhaps less tough than the Le Creuset?

Creme de Pissenlits, or Bridey Soup

2007-11-14T09:48:00.000-08:00

Bridey, Erin, S and I filled our bike baskets with greens from the edge of the canal, never picking more than one third of the leaves from a plant, per Bridey's foraging ethics.

Creme de Pissenlits(Cream of Dandelion Soup)

Modified from Madeleine Kamman's When French Women Cook (Ten Speed Press, 2002) to be made without blenders or strainers, and on a boat that had lots of carrots.

2 lbs. dandelion greens, trimmed, and washed
Salt
8 tbsp. butter
1 cup rich chicken stock
1 large onion, peeled and diced
3 small carrots, peeled, trimmed, and chopped
¼ cup flour
4 cups milk, hot
Freshly ground black pepper
1 cup heavy cream
1 tbsp. Dijon mustard
2 strips bacon, chopped and cooked crispily
Butter soaked, garlicky herbed croutons for garnish.

1. If using young dandelion greens, chop them and set aside. If using older, tougher greens, blanch them in a pot of boiling salted water, then cool them in a bowl of ice water. Drain them, squeezing out excess moisture, chop, and set aside.

2. Melt 4 tbsp. of the butter in a large heavy-bottomed pot over medium-high heat. Add dandelion greens and cook, stirring often, until moisture has evaporated, 15-20 minutes. Add stock and simmer, stirring often, until it has almost completely evaporated, about 15 minutes.

3. Melt remaining butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add onions and carrots and cook until onions are translucent, 8-10 minutes. Add flour and cook, stirring constantly, for 2 minutes. Remove pan from heat and gradually whisk in hot milk. Return pan to medium-low heat and cook sauce, stirring constantly, until thick, 25-30 minutes. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

4. Combine cream and mustard, then stir into soup. Heat soup over medium-low heat until hot (do not let soup boil; it will curdle). Crumble bacon into soup and adjust seasonings. Serve soup garnished with garlicky croutons.

Hark, the appled pies are singing.

2007-11-13T10:02:00.000-08:00

The winter, she is upon us. When first back from France, S bought me a dozen of the cutest tiny apples. I made them into two tiny tarts. Newly invented, the candied apple pie, in a larger version:

Candied Apple Pie
2 lbs. tiny apples (I used Crimson Golds, 1.5-2" in diameter)
2 cups white sugar
2 cups water
1 recipe pate sucre

Halve and seed the tiny apples, leaving the peels on. Boil in saucepan with sugar and water, mixing gently to insure all apples are candied. Do not burn or carmelize. Cook until the apples are cooked through but not mushy, ~20 minutes on medium heat.

Prepare the pate sucre in a short tart pan, 8-'10". The dough can just be pressed in, not rolled. Arrange the tiny apples on end in concentric circles. Drizzle 2 Tsp of the cooking liquid over the tart. Reserve the rest. Bake at 375 for 45 minutes, or until the crust is nicely toasted and the tops of rosy apples are lightly burnt, all French like. Serve with whipped cream.

The cooking liquid will be reduced to about 1 cup, and is likelt to magically transform into a luscious jelly. If not jelling properly, get out your candy thermometer and adjust.

Photo Credit:
the lure of the ice storm and the journey through st. cloud, Many Fires http://www.flickr.com/photos/manyfires/317596011/

Cherrybomb.

2007-02-13T20:06:00.000-08:00

A lovely night at the Sweetheart's Ball. Gabby Grenadine's new Cherrybomb hat!

Smitten.

2007-02-13T18:25:00.000-08:00

I cooked the first breakfast in my new kitchen today, first meal in the (stolen? abandoned.) well-seasoned cast iron pots I took from the old pad.

Niman Ranch applewood smoked bacon, gently scrambled eggs with thyme in Celles sur Belle butter, English muffins from Stonehenge in Berkeley with the December 2006 batch of Meyer lemon/ Ruby Red grapefruit marmalade and a French press of Ritual's Sumatra Mandheling.

It seemed well received.

New.

2007-02-05T12:27:00.000-08:00

On January 11, 2007 I signed the lease on a new apartment, one with a kitchen all to myself. After 5 years with three roommates on Washington, between Baker and Lyon in SF's Pacific Heights district, I was ready to decamp. And take all my kitchen stuff with me. My new home is in SF's Mission district, one short block from my office. Lexington Street is just two blocks long, a tree lined, quiet one-way lane of small Victorians. Mine is rather mundane mauve stucco outside, but perfect inside.

Up 18 thickly carpeted, zin-colored stairs, the first thing you see through the tiny entry is the kitchen. Blonde oak floored (!!), butter yellow tiled chair rail, white wood cabineted bliss. The window above the vintage sink looks out into a quiet backyard, completely shaded by a vast Meyer lemon tree. The Wedgewood stove is certainly an attractive feature to me.

I'm unpacking.