Beets Me

Beets are a rather controversial vegetable. Along with Brussels sprouts, people love to hate beets. I was the Queen of Beet Haters until I ordered a roasted beet salad with burrata cheese at Herbsaint in New Orleans. Don't ask me why I ordered it; perhaps my culinary bravado was bolstered by a few glasses of Bordeaux. It was the perfect salad.

Beets have an impossible-to-describe earthy flavor. In the same way you can taste the sunshine that ripened a summer tomato, you can taste the dirt in which beets grow. I mean that in the best way possible. Since the epiphany in New Orleans, I've made a similar salad that fits as a starter for almost every meal.
Burrata cheese is a fresh, creamy cheese encased in mozzarella. It is sublime but a suitable substitute is any fresh chevre (goat cheese). The beauty of this salad is that the beets stain the cheese a vibrant, gorgeous fushia. I love to stack the slices of beets in between clumps of goat cheese and peppery leaves of lettuce.

Roasted Beet and Goat Cheese Salad
Serves 6

3 fresh beets, washed, trimmed of stem and greens
salt and pepper
6 handfuls of mixed spring greens
6 ounces of fresh goat cheese
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Wrap beets in a large rectangle of aluminum foil, making sure to seal top carefully. Place foil package seal side up on oven rack and roast for 45 to 60 minutes. Rinse beets and scrub skins off with a paper towel (the skins will slip off easily). Cut beets into wedges and divide greens, goat cheese and beets on 6 plates.

A Vintage Find

This week, while at an antique store, I picked up a 1956 edition of Better Crocker’s Picture Cook Book. I have a thing for vintage anything, but it was the yellowed pages and taped bindings that made me unable to put it down and leave. I knew, for fifty years, this book has been loved and used; it didn’t hurt that at ten dollars it was a good deal. I was especially intrigued by the claim on the inside cover page: “It’s A Cook Book With A Heart.” Modern cookbooks are mostly filled with recipes accompanied by spectacular pictures. This book is vastly different. The graphics are either stylized illustrations or grainy photos no bigger than a post card. The font is tiny; the words are magnificent. From a section on vegetables: “…Vegetables are like people. By treating them with sympathy and understanding, they give us their best in color, nutrients, and flavor” (421). I couldn’t help but read aloud the witticisms present on each page. Explanations of culinary terms made me laugh: canapés = “midget open faced sandwiches" (304). Despite the simplistic language, I quickly found this book held a weighty collection of meaningful recipes.

Because of the season, I flipped straight to the soup section. I was rewarded with a passage about pot au feu, a French beef stew: “All the flavors are extracted and blended during the long cooking while the kettle smiles and chuckles, but never laughs outright in a full rollicking boil” (409). Inspired, I flipped through to find directions for our dinner. Only a 1956 Betty Crocker cookbook would publish such culinary wisdom and then omit a recipe. I perused the soup recipes and found a recipe for turkey soup.

1956 Turkey Soup
Serves 6-8

Turkey soup is the quintessential end of the holidays. As the book states, it is the “curtain call of the holiday bird” (413). You can use a chicken, goose, turkey, or duck. The recipe in the book is pretty bare bones (pun intended), so I decided to add a few of my own additions.

1 bird carcass with plenty of meat
3 stalks celery, chopped
1 carrot, chopped
1 onion, diced
6 peppercorns
1 bay leaf
½ teaspoon chopped fresh thyme
1 teaspoon chopped fresh sage
8 ounces wide egg noodles
salt
pepper


Place carcass and peppercorns in a large soup pot. Cover with water. Simmer for 2 hours. Remove meat from carcass and set aside (discard bones). Strain stock. Add meat to stock in pot. Add celery, carrot, onion, bay, thyme and sage. Bring to boil and simmer for 30 minutes until vegetables are tender. Bring back to boil and add egg noodles. Cook for 15 minutes until noodles are cooked. Salt and pepper to taste. Serve.

On a final note, who wouldn’t want to take culinary advice from a book that claims butter "promotes growth" and "builds resistance to disease”(45)? I'm all for the nutritional advice.


Cited: Betty Crocker’s Picture Cook Book: Revised and Enlarged. 2nd Ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1956.

Pizza, Pizza!

There are few things in life better than great friends and fabulous food; in fact, as I try to come up with some, they all have to do with food. This past weekend the husband and I spent the night over on the other side of the Bay with our friends Scott and Elizabeth. The night began with debauchery, as all fabulous nights do, at the Redneck Riviera party in downtown Fairhope. There is a reason those photographs will not grace the pages of this blog: to protect the guilty in their redneck-iest getups. We drank beer and wine, and ate BBQ, in mullet wigs, cowboy boots, flannel shirts, and NASCAR t's.  It was a grand old time. After we determined the barbeque was just a snack, we ventured to an exquisite sushi restaurant, Master Joe's, and gorged on a variety of amazing rolls and gyoza. If I didn't love Fairhope before, I certainly did then.

After returning home to S&E's lovely house on the Bay, we continued our party on their pier while watching shooting stars and enjoying the cool fall weather. When we awoke the next morning, hazy from our fun the night before, nothing sounded better than grilling pizza.

There are a million reasons to make homemade pizza, including knowing it will be a thousand times better than anything you can carry out of a store. Grilling pizza is just turning it up a thousand more notches. True pizza, of the Napoli ilk, is thin and crisp, charred on the bottom and bubbled on top. It is covered in fresh, high quality ingredients like artichoke hearts, wild mushrooms, and folds of prosciutto, or mild italian sausage, pepperoni, roasted red peppers, and onions.

Pizza sauce

1 28-ounce can San Marzano whole tomatoes

16 leaves fresh basil
2 cloves garlic
2 tsp tomato paste
salt and pepper to taste

Puree all ingredients in a food processor.

Pizza Dough

3/4 cup warm water
1 envelope active dry yeast
1/4 cup whole wheat flour

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon sugar
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons olive oil

Combine the water, sugar and yeast in a cup and let proof for 5 minutes. We used a KitchenAid mixer, so in the mixing bowl, combine the flour and the salt. Add the yeast mixture and, using dough hook, mix until a soft dough forms. Knead on speed 2 for 2 minutes, adding more flour if necessary to form a smooth dough. Place in greased bowl, turning to grease top. Cover, let rise in warm place until doubled in bulk (about 1 hour). Punch dough down. Divide in half and roll each half out with a rolling pin. Grill one side until the dough is bubbling and browned, then flip, top with sauce and desired goodies, and grill until cheese is melted and sauce is bubbling.

The Oinker

3/4 cup mini pepperoni

1 roasted* red pepper, chopped

2 mild sausage link, grilled and sliced

1/2 cup pineapple chunks, cut into small pieces

4 slices onion, roasted with peppers

4 ounces fresh mozzarella, sliced

1/2 cup shredded fontina cheese

1/2 cup shredded mozzarella

salt

pepper

*We roasted the red pepper and onions on a baking sheet at 450 degrees until the pepper was charred. Then we placed it in a bag and steamed it until the skin fell off.

Adulterated Veggie

1 can artichoke hearts

1 roasted yellow pepper, chopped

2 slices proscuitto, sliced into thin strips

1 8-ounce package of assorted wild mushrooms, sauteed in olive oil

4 ounces fresh mozzarella, sliced

1/2 cup shredded fontina

1/2 cup shredded mozzarella

Roast, Pot Style

Pot roast has always been high on my list of top comfort foods, but before last night I had never actually prepared it myself. I didn't even know what cut of meat to use; that's how carnivorously uninformed I am. I grew up in a chicken family, and married a pork man. Luckily, the people at the meat farm did the work for me and plastered a large sticker proclaiming "POT ROAST" across the 2.5 pound hunk of boneless chuck. I love it when that happens.

I researched countless methods and recipes, from slow cookers to oven roasting to braising on the stove. When in doubt, braise. It is the best cooking method for tough cuts of meat. Plus, you can add all sorts of delicious things to the braising liquid, from red wine to fresh herbs to garlic and beyond. I prefer a combination of wine and broth, with lots of fresh thyme and garlic.
Before braising, it's best to lightly sear the meat to seal in juices and provide a little golden brown color. Parsnips, along with the carrots, provide a lightly sweet flavor to counteract the meatiness of the roast. For the mashed potatoes, use your favorite recipe. I mashed six or seven boiled fingerling potatoes with a fork, moistened them with a little butter and sour cream, and seasoned them with salt and pepper.

Pot Roast

Serves 8-10
2 tablespoons oil, divided
2-3 pound boneless chuck roast
1 onion, chopped
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 cup red wine
3 cups beef broth
4 sprigs of thyme, or assorted herbs such as rosemary or sage
1 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes with juice
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
salt and pepper to taste
4 carrots, peeled and cut into inch-long pieces
2 parsnips, peeled and cut into inch-long pieces
Chopped parsley for garnish
Mashed potatoes to accompany

Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in a large Dutch oven. Add the beef and brown on all sides and set aside. Heat the remaining oil in the same pan. Add the onions and saute until tender, about 5-7 minutes.Add the garlic and saute until fragrant, about a minute. Add the red wine and deglaze the pan (scraping all the browned bits and reducing slightly). Add the beef broth, thyme, tomatoes, Dijon mustard, salt and pepper and bring to a boil. Add the roast, cover and cook in a preheated 325F oven until fork tender, about 3 hours. Add the carrots and parsnips during the last 20 minutes of cooking. Shred or slice meat and serve on top of mashed potatoes with the carrots and parsnips alongside.

Chili time!

Because the nights are getting marginally cooler, I jumped the gun and made chili last night. It's still August, I know, August in Alabama; however, autumn is my favorite time of year, and around this time I have a hard time refraining from celebrating the impending arrival of cool weather and attractive foliage.

I busted out my beautiful, Le Creuset oval Dutch oven (in sunny Dijon) and set to work browning the meat. After coming in third place in a chili cookoff three years ago, I perfected my recipe. I'm not exactly the type to be content with third place. So I prepared enough different types of chili to practically host my own cookoff. My husband assures me I make the best chili in the world, although we differ on what exactly that entails. I like chili made with steak, where the meat shreds with a fork and melts in your mouth. My husband likes plain 'ol ground beef chili, with a little ground sausage mixed in for over the top flavor. I give in and make his ideal chili.

I'm sure he'd be content with meat and beans (thankfully he's not of the Texas beanless persuasion) but I have to have at least some vegetables. I chop a green bell pepper, a red bell pepper, and a yellow onion. They go into the pot and brown with the meat. I love it when sweet red peppers get sweeter the longer they cook, and the color is just too pretty. After the meat is fully cooked, I toss in a few cans of beans and diced tomatoes, some spices, and voila, it's chili time!

#2 Chili
Makes 10 servings

1 lb lean ground beef
1 roll hot pork sausage (I use Jimmy Dean's Reduced Fat)
1 yellow onion, chopped
1 red bell pepper, seeded and diced
1 green bell pepper, seeded and diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 can dark red kidney beans
1 can light red kidney beans
1 can black beans
2 cans diced tomatoes in juice
2 tablespoon chili powder
1 tablespoon Tony Chachere's Seasoning
1 tablespoon ground cumin
2-3 dashes hot sauce (I like Crystal Extra Hot)
salt and pepper to taste

In a large pot or Dutch oven, brown pork and beef over medium high heat. When meat is no longer pink, add chili powder, cumin, and seasoning. Stir and then add onion, garlic, red pepper and green pepper. Stir until peppers and onions are soft. Add undrained beans and tomatoes. Season with hot sauce and salt and pepper and let simmer for 1 1/2 to 2 hours until flavors are thoroughly combined. Serve with cornbread, shredded cheddar cheese, and chopped red onions, if desired.

Gazpacho, anyone?

The South is hot in the summer. Yes, it is a generally known fact, but it needs reiterating. The funny (no, hilarious) thing is that we're having a cold front at the moment, which means it's in the high 80's in the day, and "cools" down to the high 70's at night. I generally love hot weather, I wouldn't be here if I didn't, but the times I don't love it are when my husband locks the A/C in at 82. Yes, that's 82 degrees inside my house. Those times I'm talking about are the months of June, July and August.

So a girl has to take matters into her own hands. Instead of fighting over the thermostat, I've developed a few lovely recipes to cool me down from the inside out. Gazpacho is my current obsession. It's cool, fresh, and tastes like a summer garden. I love to garnish it with cooked crabmeat or shrimp, or just enjoy it on its own. I also make it because it never gets old to hear my husband ask if we're having "gestapo" for dinner.

Some people have an aversion to cold soup, simply because it is difficult to wrap your mind around a chilled version of something that is “supposed” to be hot. If you are a fan of regular tomato soup, or V8, you will find gazpacho to be simply a bowl of chilled tomato juice topped with all sorts of delectable goodies. The shrimp and onions are optional, simply because everyone has different tastes. Onions may be too pungent for some, and if you are entertaining vegetarians, the shrimp is easily omitted. The most important thing is to use high quality ingredients. The tomatoes must be ripe, red, and fragrant. Heirlooms would be fabulous for this recipe, but I'd stick with the red varieties for the color. I also find that avocado is a must, because the smooth texture contrasts wonderfully with the chunky cucumbers and peppers.

Chunky Gazpacho
Serves 4 as a main course

3 medium ripe tomatoes, chopped
2 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped

1/2 of an English cucumber, peeled, seeded and chopped

1/2 of a small red onion, chopped

1/2 of a red bell pepper, cored, seeded and chopped

2 cups V8

2 tablespoons red wine vinegar

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

Topping:
¼ cup chopped cucumber, peeled and seeded
¼ cup chopped red bell pepper
¼ cup chopped green bell pepper
¼ cup chopped avocado (about 1 half)

1/2 of a small jalapeno pepper, seeded and minced
¼ cup chopped red onion (optional)
4 large cooked shrimp with tails (optional)

Place all ingredients in a large bowl and toss. In a blender or food processor, mix a few cups at a time until just slightly chunky.*Add salt and pepper to taste. Chill in refrigerator for at least 2 hours. Ladle into four bowls. Mix all topping ingredients except for shrimp in a small bowl. Place a small mound of topping mixture on each bowl of gazpacho. Arrange one shrimp on top of each bowl. Serve with crusty bread with warm goat cheese spread (below).

*this was a recipe where I was ecstatic to use my KitchenAid immersion blender. It pureed the vegetables just enough without liquifying them, and took about half a second.

Warm Goat Cheese Spread
Serves 4 as an appetizer or a side

The crowning glory on this meal is actually the side dish, a warm goat cheese spread on a crusty baguette. The pairing of the cool, crisp vegetables and gooey, salty goat cheese is a match made in heaven. Even people who claim they dislike goat cheese can’t pass it up.

1 4 -ounce log of fresh goat cheese

2 tablespoons good quality extra-virgin olive oil

Freshly ground black pepper

1 French baguette, sliced

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix goat cheese and olive oil in a bowl and spread in a ramekin or a ceramic crock. Grind pepper over cheese mixture and bake in the oven until heated and creamy, about 8 minutes. Serve with bread.

Korean Tonight

I love visiting Mobile's international food markets. There's something to be said for being surrounded by hundreds of food items I have no idea how to prepare. I was faced with approximately eleven types of noodles; in characteristic style I chose the cheapest variety: $1.49 for 14.11 ounces of dried noodles. Upon closer inspection they were Korean sweet potato starch noodles, which I call glass noodles because of their sci-fi-like transparency. I also picked up a five pound bag of Jasmine rice, for $5. I can definitely jive with a dollar a pound. It reminds me of my monthly trips to the Garment District for smelly used clothing (also sold for a dollar a pound). It sounds gross but it was the 90's, so it was okay.

There was a recipe on the back of the bag of noodles. It was mostly not in English, but I could compile a list of ingredients that I would need to make jap chae, a Korean noodle specialty. It called for unspecified meat, mushrooms, spinach, onion, carrots, eggs, soy sauce, sesame oil, sugar, seasame seeds, and black pepper. I decided to add red bell pepper, because it is my favorite vegetable to stirfry. It gets sweet and tendercrisp all at the same time.

Jap Chae

Makes 6 main course servings, or dinner for 2 plus lots of spicy midnight leftovers

7 ounces dried Korean sweet potato noodles
2 boneless thin cut pork chops, sliced into strips
3 tablespoons sesame chile oil, divided
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
3/4 cup thinly sliced onions
2 carrots, cut into matchsticks
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
1 package fresh shitake mushrooms, caps sliced and stems discarded
1 package of fresh spinach
4 tablespoons soy sauce, divided
2 teaspoons sugar
1 tablespoon sesame seeds

Fill a large pot with water and boil. When water is boiling, add the noodles and cook for 5 minutes. Immediately drain and rinse with cold water. Drain again and toss with 1 tsp of the sesame oil. Use kitchen shears to cut noodles into shorter pieces, about 8 inches in length. Set aside.

In a separate pot heat water to a boil, add spinach. Boil spinach until cooked, about 2 minutes. Drain thoroughly. Add 2 tablespoons chile oil to spinach in a bowl and set aside.

Heat vegetable oil in a large skillet or wok. When the cooking oil is hot but not smoking, fry onions and carrots, until just softened, about 1 minute. Add the garlic. Add the pork and fry until pork is totally cooked through. Add the mushrooms, fry 30 seconds. Then add the spinach, soy sauce, sugar and the noodles. Fry 2-3 minutes until the noodles are reheated. Turn off heat, toss with the remaining sesame oil. Sprinkle sesame seeds on top of each serving.


Close-up of the noodles (sorry for the poor quality of the photo)