A highlight of our recent trip to Italy was a cooking class here. One of the highlights was the making of biscotti. This recipe is derived from the class recipe, but adapted to ingredients that are easier to source in the USA.
Sunday, August 4, 2024
Biscotti - Learned from a class in Tuscany
The piece of cod
We recently had a spectacular vacation in Italy. From time in Tuscany (cooking class being the highlight) to an amazing time in Naples. I must say that Naples is the most invigorating, exciting, exhausting, wild place I have ever been. And we only just scratched the surface.
Given where Naples sits, a great deal of the food comes from the Mediterranean. So we ate a lot of fish and other seafood. Of course the Neapolitan street food featured too, but this posting is about flavor intensity.
Cod is (of course) not a fish one would expect to see in Naples, but for this recipe, it works well. Other firm, white fsh would work even better, but I didn't really have time to get to the fish monger - so frozen cod it was. The fish isn't the star, however. The bold combination of flavors - capers, tomatoes, olives, oregano, olive oil all baked with the fish made for a delicious, quick, easy dinner.
Ingredients
Method
Sunday, August 27, 2023
Vichyssoise
This is probably not the most traditional vichssoise you will ever have, but it was pretty good! We served about 1/2 of it to a partof 6 and the rest we just dipped into as and when we felt like it. The major differences are:
- No onions - just leeks
- 1/2 chicken stock and 1/2 water
- Crunchy salt and chives to decorate
Ingredients
Method
Saturday, August 26, 2023
Rhubarb Passionfruit Fool
A fool is an English pudding (dessert for my US friends), consisting mostly of some kind of cooked fruit and whipped cream. A very simple idea. The 2 most common fools are rhubarb and gooseberry.
Rhubarb is incredibly sour and a little bitter, so it needs coaxing along. Also it gets very stringy. It needs to be cooked down with a sweetener of some kind. We have several syrups from Liber and Co. in Austin, so I thought it would be fun to try one of those with the rhubarb. And it was.
Ingredients
Method
Tuesday, July 4, 2023
A Mocktail Summer
Thos who know me know that Madame teaches in London in the summer. While she is away, I "play in the kitchen" experimenting, riffing on ideas that require time and are sometimes a bit messy. This year is no exception. There is enough research out there that suggests that in general alcohol is not terribly good for us. This is being impressed on us by our excellent physician. However, we do like to have a contemplative drink at the end of the day. Enter the mocktail. The trouble is that most of the exlixirs, bases, and other products that go into mocktails generally don't deliver for us. They are eother too inspid, too light, too sweet, too everything - except tasty.
So with the challenge set for the summer of 2023, I reached out to Mr. all things cocktail and flavor, J.M. Hirsch of Milk Street. A simple request, one might think. Cutting to the chase, he recommended that I at lkeast look at the book, "Zero", by the folks behind the amazing Chicago restaurant called Alinea. I swear they must all own stock in exotic ingredients. I ended up buing angelica root, black cardomom, verjus, lots of (really expensive) vanilla pods, gentian root, dried fruits of all kinds, pineapples - to use the bark, not the flesh, bananas for roasting, chamomile, juniper berries, glycerine, all of the above for making the "back bar" items.
The point of this book is really that when we are making the back bar items, we may want to think like a chef rather than like a bartender. In other words we want to find ways of making the base concoctions taste and feel really good. And then bring expert bar-tending, flavor blending skills to bear on making drinks that use these basic items. Well, suffice it to say, I am no expert, but the blending - once the back bar items were made is definitely a big part of the fun.
For me the key gas been not to attempt to recreate the specific taste of any spirit, but to acquire the feeling. So the "gin" substitute doesn't taste like gin, per-se. But when made into a cocktail with some lime juice and a sugar cube, one ends up with something that feels like a daiquiri.
I was much more interested in just making the back bar items, and then playing mixologist - and learned a few universal truths.
- Balance is critical
- Bitter
- Sweet
- Sour
- Salty
- Deep flavor is critical
- Herbs
- Barks
- Fruits
- Temperature is critical
- The drinks are best served cold
- But allow them to warm gradually to release their full potential
- Serving method is critical
- Shaken with ice, and strained into a coupe - a little dilution helps
- Over ice with a mixer - more refreshing, but with less complexity
- The gin replacement
- The American whiskey replacement
- The tequila replacement
- The orange liqueur replacement
- The bitter amaro replacemnt
- The Jamaican rum replacement
- The sweet vermouth replacement
Thursday, February 16, 2023
A "Quick" Vegetable gratin
Vegetable gratins are full of pitfalls. The vegetables cook unevenly, there is too much liquid so they end up sloppy, toppings are uneven..
So to overcome these we need to think about cooking in "layers" or stages. This recipe details the stages and techniques.
Ingredients
Method
Monday, February 13, 2023
Hassdelback or Hasselhack
Ingredients (for 10 people)
Method
This is the hack mentioned in the title. Most recipes suggest using wooden spoons, but they are too fiddly for me.
Thursday, February 9, 2023
Experiments with dough
I have long wondered about what happens when you make really high hydration doughs. Two events inspired me. One was the excellent cold "pizza" sold here in the Dallas area by Popolo Reds - a focaccia style bread with an intense red sauce topping. The other was an episode of Milk Street, where Christopher Kimball mae a "pizza" with a high hydration dough. Because I like to tinker, I though I would mess with some ideas and see what happens.
The key to all of this was using a very wet dough (anything up to 100% hydration) and working the dough hard. Because it almost a batter, rather than a normal bread dough, I decided to use the paddle beater in my stand mixer and not the dough hook.
I found that following the Milk Street version, the tomatoes really didn't cook enough, so I modified that recipe by roasting the cut tomatoes for 15 minutes before topping the dough and baking.
I ended up making 2 different kinds - both of which still need some tweaking for the toppings. But I am very happy with the technique. So thank you to Bob Shema and Christopher Kimball for the inspirations.
Ingredients - Dough
Method - Dough Preparation
Ingredients - Topping 1
Method - Topping1
Ingredients - Topping 2
Method - Topping 2
Bread with Yudane
My friend Stev Whorf has been on a bread making trail for several years now. He turned me on to Yudane. Previously Cooks Illustrated had demonstrated Tangzhong. The results sounded so good that I had to try them. And I loved the results. I actually used the Cooks Illustrated Tangzhong methos but with proportions that were closer to Yudane proportions.
The purpose of Tanghzong and Yudane is to allow the flour to absorb more water - resulting in a lighter, softer crumb. But I also wantd to bake this in a pan, and not freeform. Typically when making sandwich loaves, I use a 55% hydration (for every 100gm flour, 55% water). But for this I wanted to go up to about 70% hydration. If I bake a 70% hydration dough in a pan, it becomes too airy and loose.
Yudane is usually a 1:1 ratio of water to flour (100% hydration). Tanghzon is much wetter often as much as 1 part flour to 4 parts water (400%). So the trick is to figure out the ratios so that the final loaf is at 70%.
The easy way to do that is to weigh out the flour and water into their own containers (at the 70% hydration ratio), and then take the relevant amounts from each to make up the Yudane/Tangzhong. More in the description below.
Ingredients
Method
Extras
Friday, January 27, 2023
Cocktail Naming
I have been making a lot of cocktails lately. Mostly experimental - and some experiments are not as good as others. My inspiration comes from JM Hirsch and his excellent book, "Pour Me Another". Not so much for the specific recipes, but more of the minimalist mindset that Mr. Hirsch applies. And by minimalist, he really wants each componet to pull its own weight in the drink, and for no one flavor to aggressively overshadow the others. For example, citrus zests feauture when making sours, not the really heavy lemon juice acidity.
Since these cocktails were all new creations, or variations on existing drinks, we just had to have a cocktail naming party. 10 people, 4 cocktails to name, followed by dinner.
I batched the cocktails, and we had small tasting pours (followed by refills as necessary ?!
#1 Pucker-Up Kiss
Ingredients
Method
#2 Golden Sophia
Ingredients
#3 Pink Pleasure
Ingredients
Method
#4 Not Marianne
Ingredients
Method
Sunday, October 9, 2022
Ginger cake with ginger buttercream
It was Madame's birthday and we did a special event for people who could walk home. For once we had a party catered. And beautifully done it was by Sharon Hage. But I wanted to make the cake. After all, I can't help myself - meddling in the kitchen.
Madame's favorite flavors in a cake are ginger/spicy - almost ginger bread like. So I scoured recipe sources - including old handwritten recipes from my grandmother and mother. I came up with this (note, I weigh most ingredients and use metric measurements - except for the spices, and leavening):
Ingredients - Cake
Ingredients - Ginger Butter Cream
Method - Cake
Method - Butter Cream
Assembly
Saturday, September 17, 2022
Caramelized nectarine, pecan, and Feta salad
Instruction from Madame, "I need a salad to take to a ladies evening, please". These ladies like to eat, so just plucking a few leaves from our Gardyn (hydroponic veggie grower) and knocking up a qhick vinaigrette wasn't going to cut it. Hence this salad - a way to really boost up the flavor of the nectarines. The basic thought came from this recipe
Ingredients
Method
Tomato "Tarte Tatin"
This dish is taken (and only very modeslty adapted from America's Test Kitchen's recipe). It is the first recipe in the linked video here. I used more tomatoes than the recipe called for. And at my local store, the Romas were bigger than Elle used in the video. Also, I used the convection feature of my oven, so the first time the tomatoes were a little overcooked. But I have not made it half a dozen times, and I think it is a keeper.
The whole skillet (handle and all) will go into the oven, so make sure you use an oven safe one. Even though the dish has tomatoes, my carbon steel skillet is sufficiently seasoned that the mixture can go in to it.
Ingredients
Method
Sunday, September 11, 2022
Steamed White Fish
Some friends came over for dinner one evening and we co-cooked. He taught me a technique that I have since tried on my own - and I love it. It's a simple one pot dish using your choice of hrbs/spices and a firm non-oily white fish. I used red snapper for this version.
In the original dish we used Asian spicing - fenugreek seed, coriander, cumin, and turmeric. For this version, I used a fennel bulb, garlic, ginger, and aleppo pepper. So this is more about technique than recipe. I used the same technique both times.
Ingredients
Mix together the ginger, garlic, aleppo pepper and a little salt. Rub half of this mixture onto the fish and leave for about 15 minutes.
In a 10" skillet, heat the olive oil, and when hot add the remaining ginger/garlic paste and stir for a minute or so. Add the shallot/fennel and soften for about 5 minutes. Do not allow to brown.
Add the tomatoes and most of the tarragon to the pan, cover and allow to soften for 10 minutes over low heat. Layer the fish on top of the aromatics. Cover again, and steam on low heat for 8-10 minutes - depending on the size of the fish.
Serve over rice with tarragon leaves as a garnish, making sure that you scoop up some of the juice from the pan and drizzle over the fish.
Monday, December 27, 2021
Smoked turkey and green pea soup
If you are lucky enough to have a smoked turkey carcass lying around (or in our case friends who had one and didn't know what to do with it), you can make a terrific green pea soup with it. Just make sure that there is some meat on the carcass too.
Ingredients - Stock
Ingredients - Soup
Method - Stock
Method - Soup
Wednesday, August 11, 2021
Avocado ginger coconut soup
This is a recipe based on this month's Fine Cooking magazine. The result was very good, but I used too much lime juice, so it got the "We can serve this to people if you reduce the lime juice" accolade from Madame. The texture is very thick and creamy. It is best served cold - after being in the fridge overnight.
We had it for dinner one evening, and then I had it for lunch the next day - where I tweaked it to tne down the lime juice. The tweaks will be in the description at the end, not in the main recipe
Ingredients
Method
The Promised Tweaks
Thursday, February 11, 2021
Gougere Sandwiches
These are 2 words that don't often go together. We had a Covid-19 post vaccination celebration recently. The eppaetiver dish were small gougeres (about 2" in diameter). Gougeres are choux paste, cheesey puffs that are a dish from Burgundy. And, by the way, they go really well with white wines from the region.
I had made around 20 of these little delights, so of course there were left overs. Knowing that they go stale quickly, it became quite a dilemma as to what to do. And then it occurred to me, that they would make great sandwiches - small bites, obviously. But nonetheless, open them up, put some filling in them, reheat in the microwave for 15 seconds (if you want them warm), and voila, delicious sandwiches. - albeit small, so one has to eat a few.
Ingredients - Gougere
Method - Gougere
Sandwiches
Monday, February 1, 2021
Sous-Vide-Que
I didn't make up this term. It really is a thing. I figured it would be fun to try. I really like BBQ, especially the king if Texas BBQ, brisket. I am used to starting briskets late at night, leaving them in the smoker for 12-15 hours depending on size, thickness, etc. I am able to keep te smoking going because I use a Primo, the US brand of kamado style "grill". So proper BBQ pitmasters will look down their noses at a charcoal based, wood enhanced smoking apparatus, I can produce pretty decent BBQ quite consistently - without having yet another piece of equipment.
But I digree.
The Sous-Vide-Que technique changes the norms considerably. First off, the initial cooking is done low and slow sous-vide in a water bath.
the fat seam is not fully rendeerd. Cleary 150f was too low a temperature. Next time I will multi-temp the circulator. 115 for the first 12 hours and 165 for the remaining 12 hours. Shorter time, higher temperature. The lower temperature is the tenderizing temperature; the higher temperature is the "cooking" temperature.
The other downside for me is that I can't do a whole brisket. So I have to do it it in 2 passes. First the flat and then the point. Surprisingly the flat came out better - but that was, I suspect, because it has less fat in seams inside, so didn't need as much rendering.
Is this recognisable as Texas BBQ? No, not really. Is it good? Yes, but could be a lot better.
Ingredients
Method - Part 1, Sous Vide
Method - Part 2, Smoking
Tuesday, November 24, 2020
Arnabeet (Lebanese "Fried" Cauliflower)
We had this at a Lebanese themed dinner last week. It was so good that we just had to recreate it. Instead of frying it, we did it in the oven - a rocking hot oven at that.
The home version was (almost) as good as the version we had out. In this posting, I am going to describe what we did, and where we might make an adjustment.
Ingredients
Method
Thursday, October 15, 2020
Leftover Chuck
In this previous post, I described cooking a piece of beef chuck sous vide. We of course ended up with more than we could eat at a single sitting. So what to do next? I could consigne it to freezer bags, freeze it so that it could be dumped three years later, or better still could find creative uses for it.
It became a voyage of discovery with a really good outcome. The other key idea is that if you have hot potatoes, you can dress withem with a flavorfull vinaigrette style dressing, the potatoes absorb the dressing and become really flavorfull. So why not do it with carrots too?
Ingredients
Method
Tuesday, October 13, 2020
Beef Chuck Sous Vide
Our local meat market had a terrific deal on beef chuck again. This time I wanted to do something a bit different, so decided to use the circulator and cook it sous vide. Whenn cooked for long enough it becomes really tender, and because it has such good, beefy flavor, it ends up delicious. Served with a slightly sweet pan sauce, redolent with shallots and mushrooms, we had a major hit on our hands. The surprise ingredient here was creme de cassis - the French liqueur that is added to white wine to make a kir.
Ingredients
Method
Serving
Tuesday, October 6, 2020
Potstickers
This started innocently enough. I had dinner at a Chinese dumpling house with my friend Dave Gilbert instead of watching the "Presidential" debate. I was left with a hankering for some more. I like them so much. And my favorites are steam fried
As it happened, Madame had found an amazing deal on pork chops - we had some pan fried with an onion/apple side, another time we had some with a smoked paprika dusting - again pan fried but with apple, green beans, almonds garlic on the side. And still we had some left over - about 12 oz as it turned out.
I had also made a very hearty beef stew for a friend who is very ill. So had a chunk of salt pork too. Now all I needed were the wonton (gyoza) skins, kaffir lime, lemon grass, Napa cabbage, hot peppers, soy sauce, sesame oil, sake, ginger, and scallions As it happens all that I had to buy were the skins, scallions and the Napa cabbage. Everything else either grows in the garden or is a pantry staple.
Now I am generally lazy, so I was looking for a way to get everything to the size I wanted. The meat grinder (mincer) attachment to my stand mixer did the trick. Who knew that you could put the various ingredients in, and let it do the work?
Ingredients
Method
Ingredients - Dipping Sauce
Method - Dipping Sauce
Wednesday, September 16, 2020
Ginger Glazed Carrots
This is a kind of hybrid dish. Glazed carrots can be pretty good (as long as they aren't overly sweet). Ginger goes well with carrots too. So why not use crystallized ginger as the sweetening base for glazed carrots? So we did.
Ingredients
Method
Chicken Sheet Pan Dinner
We have been doing a lot of virtual wine tastings of late. Each of them takes about an hour, so our standard format is to have some nibbles while the virtual tasting is underway, and leave something unattended in the oven during the tasting itself. Because the duration of the tasting can vary - they are usually an hour, but they have been known to overrun, we want to make sure that the main dish can tolerate a bit longer in the oven than would be ideal.
Also, we don't want a mountain of dishes. It's bad enough having 4 wineglasses per person. Often the tasting will have at least one white or rose wine, and some reds. So, the dish must be versatile enough for that too. Enter chicken legs (thighs and drumsticks).
Ingredients
Method
Monday, September 7, 2020
Provencal onion tart
For a virtual wine event a week or so ago, I made several Provencal inspired dishes. The first was the tapenade that I referenced in previous post. This one is for an onion tart - made with an insane amount of onions. It ends up being a bit focaccia like.
Ingredients (The Dough)
Ingredients (Onion Mixture, and Assembly))
Method (The dough)
Method (Onion Mixture)
Method (Assembly and Cooking)
Monday, August 31, 2020
Tapenade
Classic tapenade isn't just about the olives. Capers play a major role too. The name comes from the Provencal word for capers (tapenas). In the version that I make, the capers get equal billing with the olives. That makes for a tarter version than we often see. But it works pretty well.
Ingredients
Method
Sunday, August 2, 2020
Gazpacho
Ingredients - these don't need to be terribly precise
Serving
Wednesday, May 13, 2020
Pineapple and Ancho marinade and sauce
Ingredients
Method
Sunday, May 10, 2020
When in Texas Make Salsa
I have clearly become acclimatised to Texas - my first thought was a salsa - perhaps to go on corn chips. After all we had some pasilla and ancho chili pepeppers lying around. They are both dries peppers, so needed to be toasted and then rehydrated. Some chipotle, cumin, garlic and the loquats and we might be onto something.
Ingredients
Method
Sunday, May 3, 2020
FauxFu
We were watching a cooking show and she idly said, what else could we use in this porl/miso soup - instead of the dreaded tofu. Well, we had some edd whites lying around, so I thought put them in icecibe trays and microwave them. So I did, and FauxFu was born.
She loved them.