home > article > No Knead Bread Craze

Masher

No Knead Bread Craze

• by Laura, February 08, 2010
• Leave a comment

A few weeks ago, my friend a Lou told me to come over to his house with a bowl.  I showed up with the bowl and my nine-year-old son.  He said to my son, “Can you say your name?” And of course Simon said yes.  “Then you can bake this bread,” Lou said.  He’d been trying to get me to bake bread for years, and I just never got to it.  “Laura, listen to me.  This is nothing.  Soon the bakeries are gonna go out of business.”

Of course I’d heard of the “no knead bread phenomenon,” and the article in the New York Times that spawned endless email. 

He hardly needs any more publicity from me.  I’m only jumping on the bandwagon here out of my own sheer exuberance for this recipe.  It is a thrilling discovery.  Here’s how it works: 

You simply mix flour, yeast, salt, and water in an ordinary bowl, and cover it with plastic.  12 to 18 hours later you take it out and shape it.  Then two hours later you bake it in a heavy duty crock with a lid, which captures steam and emulates a brick oven.  Using this method, you can make bread every single day with little effort or cost.  Try it.  You’ll love it.

Here’s the link to the original New York Times article.

And here’s a link to a website that interprets the recipe step by step with photos and some helpful pointers (try to ignore the hideous ads about losing belly fat).

Here’s a link to Lahey’s book.

home > article > Two Days Left

Masher

Two Days Left

• by Nancy, February 08, 2010
• Leave a comment

home > article > Three Days Left

Masher

Three Days Left

• by Nancy, February 07, 2010
• Leave a comment

home > article > Sweets (But Only For Days that Start With The Letter S)

Masher

Sweets (But Only For Days that Start With The Letter S)

• by Nancy, February 07, 2010
• Leave a comment

I am a former pastry chef.  So I love to make these beautiful homemade sweets. But I feel compelled to write this post because I also keep my body healthful and thin (emphasis on the word healthful as I am sensitive to the unhealthful obsession that most women have to be slender.)

People always say to me “How can you be such an avid baker and not be fat?” It’s no mystery: because I exercise daily and don’t eat heavy sweets daily. I do eat my share of dark chocolate daily, but only a small amount and with the awareness that some dark chocolate is believed to be good for you (a development that when it was announced marked one of the happiest days of my life.)

I am also aware that Americans are generally overweight now and have many health problems from over-eating and from sweets in particular. So I would feel uncomfortable with having them too often since I really advocate them on special occasions, or as Michael Pollen, author of, Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual says, “No snacks, no seconds, no sweets, except on days that begin with the letter S.”

Pollen is quoted in a very informative article about these issues by Jane Brody for the New York Times. Read the full text here.

Do I indulge when I’m not supposed to, when I have a bad day, when I’m just in the mood for something over-the-top and it’s not the weekend? Yes, I do. Maybe you do too. Nobody’s a saint. Besides, being rigid is boring. But the goal is moderation. So all that said, I hope you do join me in making chocolate croissant for Sunday, Valentine’s Day. I plan on eating a whole one myself. 

see also: Thing of the Day - Last Dance with HoneyBell (Oranges, that is)

home > article > Four Days Left

Masher

Four Days Left

• by Nancy, February 06, 2010
• Leave a comment

home > article > Thing of the Day - Luc Tuymans

Masher

Thing of the Day - Luc Tuymans

• by Nancy, February 06, 2010
• Leave a comment

The Perfect Table Setting, Luc Tuymans, 2005

Luc Tuymans is from Belgium, now an Antwerp-based painter who is considered one of the most important of his generation (See the current issue of Art in America for an interview confirming this by Steel Stillman, so fresh from the press that it’s not online yet. I’ll provide a link when and if I can.) I feel compelled to share his painting, The Perfect Table Setting, above, as it slowly reveals, with repeated observation and contemplation, much about the artist’s intentions, much about contemporary representational painting, and for jellypress readers, much about how domestic imagery such as a table setting is more than meets the eye. 

Looking for images on the Web from the era of WWII and the Depression and the period following it for a new series of paintings in the early part of this decade, Tuymans’ came across a book for housewives from 1954 where he found a photograph supposedly illustrating the perfect table setting. For Tuymans, the image was linked to political, cultural and social issues at the time of being proper, and it echoed other proper forms of the past like ballroom dancing, another image in the series.

The table setting, composed and determined in the face of the darker side of life and in particular, the atrocities of war, is painted in muted tones and loose washes, suggesting with its departure from photographic realism, a more poetic and ambiguous reading than the photographic image would allow. Tuymans’ detractors think his use of hot-button current events is opportunistic. Steel asserts that Tuymans work “seduces visually as it intrigues intellectually” (page 76.) What do you think?

Other artists, such as Hanna von Goeler, have used the perfect table setting as imagery, in von Goeler’s case to contrast with the excesses of the OSS during wartime which she did in an installation of fine crystal and china interspersed with toy trains, photographs and other mementos lit to cast eerie shadows on the walls at Sloan Fine Art in January, 2009.

We’ve all stood over a table and tried to make it perfect at one time or another, yes? What were we hoping to communicate? A sense of calm in the midst of an imperfect world? An oasis of beauty to separate and elevate a special event from the humdrum of ordinary life?

Next time you’re laying out the good china, think about it.

see also: Thing of the Day - Cezanne

home > article > Five Days Left

Masher

Five Days Left

• by Nancy, February 05, 2010
• Leave a comment

home > article > The Rise and Fall of the Restaurant Review

Masher

The Rise and Fall of the Restaurant Review

• by Laura, February 05, 2010
• Leave a comment

Should restaurant reviews be fluff pieces or food porn? 

Should they read like interesting adventure stories with sensual descriptions? 

Should they be a factual service to the ordinary consumer? 

Should you take their word for it on Chowhound, or is the job best left to elite professionals?

Here is a wonderful article that addresses all this and more, including a terrific history of the restaurant review genre at The New York Times, from Craig Claiborne to Gail Greene, Ruth Reichl and the unanonymous Sam Sifton of present.  Loved this piece in the Columbia Journalism Review.

home > article > How To Make Chocolate Croissants Without Taking An Entire Day

Masher

How To Make Chocolate Croissants Without Taking An Entire Day

• by Nancy, February 04, 2010
• Leave a comment (4 so far)

I’ll say it like it is — so crappy — that’s what I think of my 12-year old son’s favorite chain grocery chocolate croissants, pictured above. Really look at them. Knowing that I am a former pastry chef, can you feel my pain? This for a child who dreams of visiting Paris one day, and for me, who opens the little box holding the engagement ring I stashed there since my divorce and thinks of hocking it for the trip . . . then puts it back thinking of more practical things like saving for college.

People are surprised when they ask what my favorite pastries are and I answer with ubiquitous things like croissant or eclairs. They don’t know how extraordinary these things are fresh and homemade. If they did, they would agree. So I am going to make chocolate croissants for my son for Valentines Day, and I’m going to show you how too.

Bakers and cooks are always telling people, “Oh, you can do this recipe ahead, or in small steps over the course of a few days,” but they never really explain this. Few people know what this means. It’s overwhelming. So this is a bake-with-me post. It’s no mystery and it’s not that hard. All you need is a guide and a little gumption.

Here’s the plan:

Get your ingredients before next Wednesday, February 10th.

We’ll make the dough next Thursday, February 11th and refrigerate it.

We’ll add the butter and learn to fold it in on Friday, February 12th.

Then Saturday, February 13th, we’ll roll out and shape the croissant.

If all goes well, we have them for brunch on Sunday morning, February 14th, Valentine’s Day.

I’m giving you this heads-up to get your ingredients.
Are you game? Good. Here’s your ingredient list:

2 cups flour
4 T. sugar
1 1/2 cups whole milk
1 1/2 envelopes of dry yeast
3 sticks sweet unsalted butter
extra flour for rolling
your favorite semi-sweet chocolate - the amount depends on how stuffed with chocolate you like your croissant. For me, I buy at least 8 ounces.
You also may want to have a quick-read thermometer handy unless you are good at guessing the temperature of warm milk by description (in this case it will need to be warm like a baby’s bottle - 105 degrees F.)

See you next week!

home > article > Thing of the Day - Last Dance with HoneyBell (Oranges, that is)

Masher

Thing of the Day - Last Dance with HoneyBell (Oranges, that is)

• by Nancy, February 03, 2010
• Leave a comment

Most of you know how much I love these oranges. Look at the dripping juice. Clean, thirst-quenching flavor. And that color! It rivals the vermilion oil paint, so dear and rare, that I portion out in tiny dabs because it’s so strong and hard to harness in a composition. I mentioned in a previous post that my sweet family sends me these oranges every year as a gift. No, that last statement is not true entirely: honeybells are not oranges at all. They’re a hybrid of a tangerine and a grapefruit, grown by grafting to sour orange root stock. The mystery of their origin is debated here and there. Some say their history reaches back in part over 3000 years ago to Southeast Asia. Others report they were the grafting project of a creative Florida farmer in the 1940’s. They’re here on jellypress again because if you’d like to try them, there’s still time to order them but not much. Today the company that sells them, Cushman’s, sent me this link to order them before they sing their “swan song.” Then they won’t be available until next year for a few short weeks as always. Fresh. Bright. Full of vitamin C. We could use that in the middle of a north-eastern winter, no?

home > article > Thing of the Day:  Sam’s

Masher

Thing of the Day:  Sam’s

• by Laura, February 02, 2010
• Leave a comment

Sam’s Food City, Patterson, CA
by Javie Ordaz

home > article > How Much Do You Spend a Month on Food?

Masher

How Much Do You Spend a Month on Food?

• by Laura, February 01, 2010
• Leave a comment

I recently was talking to someone who raised an eyebrow at our grocery bill.  I’ll confess it right here:  about $1,000 a month, at least.  Should I feel embarrassed of this?  We cook and eat at home quite a lot (really a lot), not to mention that I’ve got three guys in the house and we live in the greater NYC area.  To be honest, I’m not even sure if my $1,000 number is a completely accurate assessment--might it be more, like 1100?  If it is I don’t want to know it.  Let’s just say $1,000 a month.

I started looking into the cost of food just to see if this was so outrageous and if we were all a bunch of slothful greedy overeaters.  I was surprised to discover how little data seems to be available about what Americans actually spend on what they eat. Yet this is one area where the variance is enormous.

Instead of actual numbers, I found a prescriptive chart from the U.S.D.A. chart which offers guidelines for food costs ranging from “thrifty” and “low cost” to “moderate” and “liberal.” (Turns out my family is moderate, uh, mostly.)

Of course, the food evangelists’ big complaint about Americans is that they should spend more for better food, investing in fresh fruit and vegetables.  I don’t think they’d be happy with the menu items for the U.S.D.A.’s fictional $575-a-month “thrifty” family, which is the government’s baseline for minimally adequate nutrition.  For the same size family, a “liberal” food budget is $1140.  But consider why people chose (or must) save on food.  Food is the one area where people have some control.  Mortgage, car payments, etc. are fixed.  But food has a huge range in cost depending on where you shop, what you buy, and how much or how little you decide to invest in it. The thrifty family spends $565 less per month than the liberal one, and that adds up to a $33,000 difference over five years.  Wow. 

If you want to see where your food budget falls in the scheme of things.  Take a look here at the USDA food plans for November 2009.  Meanwhile, I’d like to find out what was in that $575 menu.

home > article > Not To Be Forgotten — Shepherd’s Pie

Masher

Not To Be Forgotten — Shepherd’s Pie

• by Nancy, January 30, 2010
• Leave a comment (1 so far)

Here it is, One Badass Shepherd’s Pie.  It all started, as jellypress readers know, when I announced my search for the kind of shepherd’s pie that a beloved nanny cooked for my family when I was a child. When I finally figured it out and brought it to a friend’s potluck 50th birthday party, party-goers were drawn to it like moths to porchlight and the entire pot’s contents was consumed in fifteen minutes flat, despite the availability of four other main dishes. 

It wasn’t too hard, to be truthful as most shepherd’s pies are made basically the same way: meat, either lamb or beef, is seared, then vegetables and herbs are added followed by a spoonful of flour and deglazing with wine, broth, or worcestershire sauce (and sometimes all three) while potatoes are mashed with butter and milk which are then used to top the stew. The whole pot gets baked until the bottom is bubbly and the top is browned. All I had to do was cull the recipes until I grokked the basic pattern, then used the flavors I love in stews to concoct the one that I remembered from childhood. You can read the old recipes we dug up along the way. 

I did make one unorthodox addition. Want to know what it is? Here’s the recipe:

One Badass Shepherd’s Pie
Note: The optional addition of celery root, though not traditional, adds a bright flavor to the mashed potatoes and the stew. Try it!

1 T. olive oil
2 pounds of boneless lamb stew meat, cut into one-inch pieces
1 large onion, chopped
4 cloves garlic, minced
3 stalks celery, chopped
5 carrots, peeled and sliced on the diagonal
1 pint mushrooms, cleaned and sliced
1 large shallot
salt and pepper to taste
1//2 t. dried thyme or 1 t. fresh thyme, chopped
1 T. all-purpose flour
1/2 cup red wine
1 cup beef broth, and more if necessary
1 T. tomato paste
1 T. worcestershire sauce
1 large celery root, peeled and cut into matchsticks (cut the root into slices, then stack them and slice into sticks) optional but recommended
6 medium yukon gold, or yellow baking potatoes (or your favorite potato for mashing)
4 T. sweet unsalted butter
1/2 cup or more milk (lowfat is fine, even skim, depending on how much fat you like in your mashed potatoes)
1/2 cup or more chicken stock
1 T. or more olive oil, enough to flavor potatoes
frozen or fresh peas, optional

1. Heat the olive oil in a large soup pot (preferably an ovenproof one) over medium-high heat. Add the meat and let it brown on all sides, stirring, about 5 - 6 minutes. Add the onion, garlic, celery, carrots, mushrooms, shallot and salt and pepper to taste, and thyme. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables begin to soften, about 10 minutes.
2. Add the flour and stir to combine. Let the mixture cook until it thickens and reduces, and the flour and meat juices begin to brown on the bottom of the pot. Don’t let it burn, but do let the flour and juices brown, stirring and scraping the bottom as needed. This is where the dark color and flavor of the gravy will begin to develop. When the juices reduce until the bottom of the pot has brown bits of flour and reduced sauce clinging to it, deglaze the pot with the wine, broth, tomato paste and worcestershire sauce. Scrape the bottom of the pot once the liquids are in there to incorporate all the brown bits on the bottom of the pot. Cover the pot, turn the heat to low, and let the stew cook about 15 minutes more, adding more broth as necessary to keep the mixture moistened. It should be the consistency of stew - liquid but not thin and soupy. Taste and adjust seasoning with salt and pepper.
3. Meanwhile, steam the potatoes and the celery root in a covered double boiler or covered in the microwave oven until they are tender when pierced with a fork. Set aside about 1 cup of the celery root to add to the stew. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a whisk or in a bowl with a masher, mash the potatoes and remaining celery root together, adding the butter, milk, chicken stock and olive oil until the potatoes are the consistency of buttercream frosting - able to hold their shape but not too thick and dry. The proportion of broth, oil, milk and butter in the potatoes is really up to you. For more healthful mash, add more broth and olive oil and use skim milk. Season with salt and pepper if desired. Press through a food mill if you have one and desire smooth mashed potatoes. Otherwise they will be chunky.
4. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Transfer the stew to an ovenproof container, add the reserved celery root, and the peas if using, and top it with the mashed potatoes, spreading the potatoes evenly with a spatula. Bake for 20 minutes until the stew is bubbly and the potatoes are browned. Serve immediately.

home > article > Thing of the Day - Cezanne

Artist's Notebook

Thing of the Day - Cezanne

• by Nancy, January 29, 2010
• Leave a comment

Paul Cezanne, Still Life with Apples and Peaches, 1905

As a woman and mother of a young child but part of the generation that has been given nearly every freedom to leave the house, why do I still feel a longing for the domestic space of the household and more than that, depictions of it like this Cezanne? What pull does it still exert upon me? Why such intense longing for the stability and beauty of traditional domestic space along with an equally intense desire to escape it? It is usually in paintings or poems that I find clues to ambiguity like this, and in particular, in this painting.

I had the pleasure of standing before this painting recently when it was included in a show at a local museum. Here is the glowing light emanating like sunlit honey from the dabbed and layered surfaces of the fruit. 

There are the planes of color, sometimes as many as four or five hues in every square inch, that speak of Cezanne’s revolutionary approach to defining form with color and his powerfully contemplative working method of taking over a hundred sittings to complete a painting. There is the poetic line, now ivory black, now deepest ultramarine, on its quest for unchartered territory, embedded in memory, mined from the subconscious. One line in particular held me captive: it is the one that strives to delineate the form of a peach but hovers slightly above it. In its empty arc I can feel Cezanne’s rebellion, his inclusion of the truth in all its contradictions — its ennobling beauty and leveling ugliness. Most of all I admire Cezanne’s refusal to color in this wayward line and take away even a fraction of the wide open space it fronts like a gateway constructed of the intimate body of small peachy flesh opening to its vast soul. A space that is most convincing of course, in its ability to allow for the truth of domestic space — it’s mess and drudgery as well as its beauty.

see also: Thing of the Day — Chardin

home > article > More on Shepherd’s Pie

Not to be Forgotten

More on Shepherd’s Pie

• by Laura, January 28, 2010
• Leave a comment

Vincent Van Gogh, Peasant Man and Woman Planting Potatoes, 1885

Shepherd’s pie is one of those old dishes that endure.  The recipe you see above is 150 years old and still so appealing, especially on a cold winter night. 

Nancy loved Shepherd’s Pie in her childhood and wants to retrieve it.  This weekend she’s going to test the first one, and soon she’ll share the results.

The origins of this rib-sticking dish go back to the great pie baking traditions of medieval England where meat was cooked with dried fruit spices

and fruit inside a “coffin” of pastry dough.  Pie was originally a form of food preservation before refrigeration. 

Enter the potato, brought back from the New World.  The possibilities were enormous for thickening stews and soups and adding heft.  In the following recipe, the great 18th century writer Hannah Glasse inches us toward Shepherd’s Pie by giving a recipe for a traditional spiced meat pie with pastry--plus potatoes. See it here:

“To Make a very fine Sweet lamb or Veal Pye.
Season your Lamb with Salt, Pepper, Cloves, Mace and Nutmeg, all beat fine, to your Palate. Cut your Lamb, or Veal, into little Pieces, make a good Puff-paste Crust, lay it into your Dish, then lay in your Meat, strew on it some stoned Raisins and Currans clean washed, and some Sugar; then lay on it some Forced-meat Balls made sweet, and in the Summer some Artichoke-bottoms boiled, and scalded Grapes in the Winter. Boil Spanish Potatoes cut in Pieces, candied Citron, candied Orange, and Lemon-peel, and three or four large Blades of Mace; put Butter on the Top, close up your Pye, and bake it. Have ready against it comes out of the Oven a Caudle [thick drink] made thus: Take a Pint of White Wine, and mix in the Yolks of three Eggs, stir it well together over the Fire, one way, all the time till it is thick; then take it off, stir in Sugar enough to sweeten it, and squeeze in the Juice of a Lemon; pour it hot into your Pye, and close it up again.Send it hot to table.” 
---The Art of Cookery Made Plain & Easy, Hannah Glasse [London:1747]Chapter VIII, “Of Pies.”

Not long after we begin to see recipes that do away with the pastry crust entirely in favor of potatoes.  What a smart idea. Less work and a much simpler (and lighter . . . maybe) repast. 

Click here for Nancy’s final version of modern Shepherd’s Pie you can make with success. 

see also: Calling All Recipe Detectives — Shepherd’s Pie

home > article > Calling All Recipe Detectives — Shepherd’s Pie

Not to be Forgotten

Calling All Recipe Detectives — Shepherd’s Pie

• by Nancy, January 27, 2010
• Leave a comment

Aelbert Cuyp, Seated Shepherd with Cows and Sheep in a Meadow, 1644
It’s the deep, dark of winter, and I crave a shepherd’s pie. Not any potato-topped casserole of stew, but the very one that steamed up the kitchen of my childhood, made by the Scottish nanny I wrote about in my last recipe detectives post. Her’s as I’ve mentioned, was a deep brown mix of meat and vegetables covered with a blanket of mashed potatoes three inches thick. Some of the shepherd’s pie recipes I’ve seen have potatoes on the bottom as well as the top, like a sweet pie with a filling, but the one I loved only had the potatoes on top. Cutting through the mashed potatoes was like slicing through perfect meringue. That was the trick of it; the mashed were light and rich but held their shape. The meat mixture beneath was somewhere between the reddish brown of burnt sienna and the cool darkness of burnt umber with dabs of orange carrots and green peas and celery mixed throughout. If you’ve got a lead, please use the comments link above to send it to me. In the meantime, you can find me trying to warm up by painting pictures lit with what I can capture of the elusive sun or wrapped up in a quilt looking up the history of this wonderful dish.

home > article > One Badass Cookie — Scottish Shortbread

Masher

One Badass Cookie — Scottish Shortbread

• by Nancy, January 26, 2010
• Leave a comment

Rarely does the first recipe I try for a certain type of cookie get the honor of being dubbed One Badass Cookie. (What’s a Badass Cookie? Click here.) Especially a cookie like this one that I remember from childhood and that has a taste memory tangled up with emotions and history, and in particular the emotion of love; in this case, for a beloved Scottish nanny who made quite the impression on me growing up. In any case, the recipe above, given to me by Laura when I started this search for One Badass Shortbread, was the first one I received. The scent of it baking made me think it was possibly the one. Warm from the oven, I pretty much knew it was, but when it cooled into a rich bar with an intense, head-filling flavor and a substantial crunch but no toughness, I knew for sure. I ate three of them immediately, and then packed the rest up to share with friends not because I’m so generous, but because if they remained in the house, I would have had to eat them all right then and there. Absolutely irresistible. Siren-song irresistible. That’s a warning. In any case, taste testers the next morning confirmed what I already knew — this is The One.

I would be delinquent in my duty as a baker however if I did not tell you that the recipe above is full of holes, the kind that only a baker with a combined memory of generations of bakers can fill in. To reach into that legacy, bequeathed to me by a legion of cookie mavens, and get the secrets that make it work along with an updated version (or should I say translation of old-recipe-ese), read on.

What you have basically is a recipe that requires the baker to fill in the details, particularly about types of ingredients, their temperatures, and their handling. An unspoken rule for the freshest, high quality ingredients always applies, as does working by hand when possible since most old baking recipes were made that way. I have a kitchen-aid mixer but I would not use it for this because I saw my Scottish nanny make it by hand and I know that the signature crunch of shortbread is partly a result of a judicious amount of hand-kneading to touch, just enough to give it the right structure, but not so much as to make the dough tough. And more importantly, if you mix by machine you will miss the singular pleasure of having this dough in your hands. The aroma is beautiful and the feel of it is quite lovely — a fragrant, floury, buttery mix that awakens an internal sense of earth and sky and sun and all that’s good that comes from it. Once you make it a few times you will know the texture the dough must have: pliable and firm but with no glue-y feel. If the dough becomes glue-like you have worked it too much. If it is mostly falling apart and dry, you have not worked it enough. Have a go at it and enjoy.

One Badass Scottish Shortbread
adapted from The Neighborhood Cookbook, 1914.
Note: The original recipe instructions and ingredients appear at left in italics, and the update is in parenthesis at right. Also this recipe is weighed, not measured, for accuracy. Invest in a good kitchen scale if you don’t already have one. They are kitchen workhorses that more than pay for themselves over time.)

Old recipe:
1 pound flour (update: 1 pound all-purpose unbleached flour)
one-half pound butter: (update: 2 sticks (1/2 pound) unsalted sweet butter, softened slightly to room temperature but not warm and greasy. This is very important. If the butter is too cold or too hot the recipe will not work. Be diligent about checking the butter until it is malleable but still cool and not shiny.)
six ounces sugar (update: 6 ounces of granulated white sugar.)

Method:
1. Work all together on a board. (update: This means combining all the ingredients at once in a large bowl or on a wooden pastry board. I find a bowl easier because it prevents spillage. Squeeze the dough through your fingers, taking fistfuls at a time. Press the dough into the bottom of the bowl trying to get all of it to stick together. Keep doing this until the dough holds together and picks up the remainder of any dry crumbs in the bottom of the bowl. It will not all come completely together but it will mostly adhere.)
2. When thoroughly mixed, press with the hand into cakes one half-inch thick; cut into shapes. (update: This means pressing the dough into disks, the kind you would roll out flat for cutting with cookie cutters. Alternatively, you can press the mixture into a 9” x 13” pan, flatten it by placing a piece of plastic wrap on top and smoothing over it until it is flat and even, then score it with a sharp knife into bars. This is what I did.)
3. Bake in a slow oven. (update: Bake at 300 degrees F. until the dough is light golden and cooked through, about 30 - 45 minutes. Turn the dough half-way through the baking time to prevent uneven browning. While the cookies are still hot from the oven, use a sharp paring knife to cut through the scored lines. Remove the cookies from the pan with a spatula and cool on a wire rack. Store in an airtight container.)

home > article > How to Find an Old Recipe

Masher

How to Find an Old Recipe

• by Laura, January 25, 2010
• Leave a comment

You meet some people who are lucky.  They are born to stable families that remain intact. Their parents live long healthy lives.  Mom and grandma were wonderful cooks. There was always enough to eat, as well as lots of love and attention.  They get handed down great family recipes, and for the rest of their lives food brings beautiful memories and associations. 

This is very nice.  And you know, sometimes it even really happens. 

But most people are not so lucky.  And the past is rarely so good.

Grandparents die young.  Lots of mothers don’t care at all about cooking.  And in the U.S.--because we are such a mobile fast moving culture--it is easy to loose all the threads of your personal history with one or two generations.  Lots of people learn to cook as adults. 

And so when people come to me and ask how they can find family recipes

that are lost forever because someone died or they had no close relatives who were cooks, I say there is no reason to give up.  Everyone has some kind of culinary heritage--even if it is one of hunger or great simplicity.  You may not get the exact thing your grandmother made. But so what. You can come close. 

I have lots of tips--from calling extraneous relatives, to going to the place your family came from.  But one of them is to go to old cookbooks of the era that interests you.  This is increasingly possible with online cookbook collections. 

Certainly one of the best online sources for early American cookbooks food history is the Feeding America Project that was started at the Michigan State University’s Library and Museum, led by the wonderful Jan Longone.  On Feeding America, you’ll find 75 important American cookbooks available page by page online.  This particular collection is better than most because you can search by recipe.  So for example, if you’re looking for sweet potato pie, you’ll find 8 recipes that appeared from 1869 to the beginning of the twentieth century.  These cookbooks range from poor to wealthy authors.  Go try it.  Click “Search the Collection.” Have fun. 

home > article > Calling All Recipe Detectives — The Search for One Badass Scottish Shortbread Part 2

Masher

Calling All Recipe Detectives — The Search for One Badass Scottish Shortbread Part 2

• by Nancy, January 24, 2010
• Leave a comment

This old range is for sale.
Being short on time, I’m going to be conducting my search for One Badass Shortbread by degrees (okay, pun intended, as you’ll soon realize.) Laura found a recipe for me to start with.  My first obstacle though was finding out what was meant by a “slow” oven. Quickly hopping onto Food Timeline and doing a search for oven temperatures, I found so much information that I realized I will ultimately have to, gulp, guess (if you know anything about the scientific, accurately-measuring baker’s mind, you will intuit why this is so difficult for me. And if you’re a baker too, you’re probably having a little sympathetic anxiety right about now.) In one old recipe, a slow oven is defined in parenthesis as being 325 degrees F. In another, however, a “moderately slow” oven is defined as 325 degrees F too. Scanning other recipes, I found even more disparity. Quick moderate? 325 degrees. Moderately slow in a different recipe than the first I mentioned? 350. Notes in the text specify slow ovens for drying out pastry and moderately hot for baking the center of the mixture by degrees (pun unacknowledged, BTW.) If you can help, send info to me by using the comments link under the title above. In the meantime, watch here for my, um, interpretations of open-ended suggestions for oven temperatures. You can quote me on that.

What is a Badass Cookie? Click here.

see also: Calling All Recipe Detectives — The Search for One Badass Scottish Shortbread

home > article > Thing of the Day - Food or Art?

Masher

Thing of the Day - Food or Art?

• by Nancy, January 21, 2010
• Leave a comment

There are presently more than 850 million people who do not have enough food to eat and 2.7 billion people living on less than $2 a day. Over the past 50 years, food aid has been one of the principal resources deployed in the effort to end hunger, and a number of donor countries, the United States prominent among them, have channeled billions of dollars’ worth of food to developing countries.
From the food aid website Bread for the World

The Wedding Feast, Sandro Botticelli, about 1567
Yesterday I was watching Food Network’s Food Challenge on TV while I ran on the treadmill. In this episode, titled “Rock & Roll,” according to info on Food Network’s website, “five pastry chefs compete for $10,000 in their mission to create the ultimate sugar showpiece that not only demonstrates a musical theme but is also capable of movement (rocking and rolling). The competition lasts seven hours and the contestants will face three judges.” I finished running before the show ended so I didn’t see the winner, but I couldn’t help thinking of the kind of food sculptures that have been made by chefs for centuries either for holidays - like the Mexican Day of the Dead sugar sculptures that originated in the fifteenth century, or for rituals such as wedding feasts. This quote from the Metropolitan Museum’s website information about weddings in the Italian Renaissance is especially amusing:

“The humanist Filippo Beroaldo reported that the 1487 wedding of Lucrezia d’Este and Giovanni Bentivoglio in Bologna featured giant sugar sculptures of castles, ships, people, and animals, and a flaming wheel of fireworks that accidentally ignited some of the wedding guests.”

While the Food Network chefs weren’t setting anyone on fire, I couldn’t help noticing
that the sculptures they were making, though of electric guitars and not castles or ships, were still elaborate representations in edible form of things from real life, however imaginatively arranged. It doesn’t seem that the art of making edible art has come very far in a few centuries and I wonder what is the hold on our imaginations of a craft that imitates life in food. Perhaps it is just a human attraction to magic and tricks and things that fool the eye in everything from trompe-lieol painting to t-shirts that are painted to look like they have three dimensional objects on top of them.

As an artist, I have a real problem with art that is made of food not intended for eating when so many on this earth are starving, but if the product is truly edible, then I can accept it as a reasonable thing to do. The most points in the Food Challenge competition is given for artistry, even over other attributes like difficulty. Our culture obviously values imagination, but much of the commercial food sculpture of today is only imaginative in its arrangement of objects while the objects themselves are photographically reproduced, rehashing basically the same strategy over and over. A counterpoint to this are fine artists who use food as a vehicle for communicating ideas about life and art. Janine Antoni comes to mind with her 1993 performative chocolate and soap sculpture “Lick and Lather” that deals with the love/hate relationship we have with our own image. And what does a shiny sugar electric guitar that garners ten thou in prize money say about us? I’m not sure I know for certain. But it’s interesting to ponder.


Janine Antoni, Lick and Lather, chocolate and soap, 1993

see also: Thing of the Day — Tino Sehgal

home > article > Pizza in NJ

Masher

Pizza in NJ

• by Laura, January 19, 2010
• Leave a comment (3 so far)

Photo by Jason Perlow

I was never one of those pizza-crazed people.  First of all, I’m a female always worried about keeping the calorie count down.  Secondly, there’s just so much bad pizza around.  And thirdly, pizza is a survival tactic for me as a working mom,--you could say I’ve abused it too much to love it.

But when NJ Monthly magazine asked me if I wanted to write a story on the “soul of New Jersey pizza,” I said yes because well, there are a lot harder ways to earn a buck, but also this was one assignment where I could take the kids along. 

Among my first stops:  The writing of Ed Levine:  (Pizza:  A Slice of Heaven) and his “Slice/Serious Eats” website (Serious Eats).

In addition to learning (with fascination) all about the depth of pizza--ingredients, history, techniques, and endless discussions about ovens and heat--I was amazed to hear again and again how emotional--almost whacky--people get about the subject, particularly about the pizza places of their youth.  I concluded that pizza in NJ is very much about memory.  There are so many joints here where the pizza is really just okay, but people tell you it’s awesome.  Why?  Well the reason is that it brings back memories. And the pizzamakers--particularly at old beloved taverns--take great pride in never changing a thing to cater to this nostalgia and sense of the past.  I listened with respect and duly noted all this, as an anthropologist might because, well, I wasn’t like that myself.  And I continued to drive around doing my research discovering wonderful out-of-the-way places like Santillo’s (take-out only) in Elizabeth and Grimaldi’s in the back-end of Hoboken.

A big source for my story was one of my Dad’s best friends, Mike D’Amico, who is a lifelong New Jersey Italian American and ardent pizzalogist.  He sent me in the right direction.  And he reminded me of Pizzatown USA in Elmwood Park--still decorated in its original 1958 decor, covered from top to bottom with American flags and red white and blue.  It has become a rather grim stretch of highway since 1958, but Uncle Sam is still up on the roof offering you a pie, ever reassuring the 1950s postwar population that Mussolini is really dead, and Italians can be trusted.  How to describe the inside?  Bizarre.  Totally cool. A bit of a dump....  All of the above.  I hadn’t been there in years.

When I took my family one November night, the pizza was ready in six minutes.  It came out of the oven, bubbling and oozing on the platter—a beautiful thing.  Thin crust, crunchy, light on the cheese and full of tomato sauce. 

The only place to sit was at a communal bench with another family. We settled down, and I stole a sip of my son’s birch beer.  Then a strange thing happened.  Some archeological layers shifted in my brain....  Suddenly, I could see my Dad in the 1970s, slamming the door of his pick up truck, walking up the cement path to our house, past green lawn and maple tree.  Pizzatown box in hand, a white bag of zepoles balanced on top.  The sight of pizza in that childhood life, back then in the era when mothers cooked every night, offered a small burst of joy.  Proust knew what he was talking about with those madeleine’s.  And if you were here with me I’d say that for you with a serious NJ accent. 

Here’s the story in full: NJ Monthly.  http://njmonthly.com/articles/restaurants/searching-for-the-soul-of-jersey-pizza.html

home > article > Of Honeybells and Blank Canvases

Artist's Notebook

Of Honeybells and Blank Canvases

• by Nancy, January 18, 2010
• Leave a comment

(CNN)—A campaign using text messages to raise money for the Red Cross has tallied more than $21 million for relief efforts in Haiti.
The electronic fundraiser, boosted in its early days by widespread posting on social-networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, has outstripped the organization’s expectations and is showing no signs of letting up, an official said Monday.
“It’s blown me away and it continues to,” said Wendy Harman, the director of social media for the Red Cross.

At the same time as my family sent me a big box of honeybell oranges I just happen to be in the middle of stretching canvases for a new series of paintings I will start this week. If you don’t know honeybells, they are unique among oranges. You shouldn’t really peel them as they are too juicy for that. Better to slice them with a sharp serrated knife and suck the juice and flesh right off the peel. The company that sells them coyly sends plastic bibs with them like the kind that people use when they eat lobster. Ice cold from the fridge they’re particularly refreshing.


Somehow they are linked with my blank canvases for me this year and all the new beginnings inherent in them. Also I’ve been thinking about color a lot, and how I would like to work with color in a different way than I used to - more for an emotional response than a literal one. I’ve also been thinking about light, and those oranges just seem to radiate that southern, warm light where they hie from. They’re so juicy and fresh, and so are the blank canvases, ripe with possibility. I look at the oranges and think of orange cake, of the deep orange of Indian silk pungent with incense, of Joni Mitchell singing “There was milk and toast and honey and a bowl of oranges, too, and the sun poured in like butterscotch and stuck to all my senses . . .” The blank canvases are intriguing to me because they remind me that the surface of a picture is flat, something that artists have been making art about for decades. No matter what we put on the surface - an illusion of depth or one that asserts the flatness - the canvas remains an object to be reckoned with. How mysterious it is that for centuries artists have been fascinated by this simple problem of arranging color, form and line on a plane that hangs on the wall.


My brushes, though well used, are all newly scrubbed and ready to go. All I have to do now is drop down, like a diver, below the surface of everyday life, to plumb the depths of the ideas that have been rolling around in my head for a month. Ideas about poetic, glowing color, about images that elude definition but rather hint at places or things, leaving room for the viewer to enter. I hope I can express it.


In the exuberance of an orange, clues reside . . . intense hue, light, inspiration.

home > article > Thing of the Day — Tino Sehgal

Masher

Thing of the Day — Tino Sehgal

• by Nancy, January 18, 2010
• Leave a comment

Inside this temple of objects, I refocus attention to human relations.

Tino Sehgal in response to an interviewer asking him where his intention lies as an artist who shows objectless, undocumented live pieces in museums and galleries.
As quoted in the New York Times Magazine
Sunday, January 17, 2010
“Art That Leaves Behind No Trace” by Arthur Lubow

Laura and I talked once about how we can spend days making meals - her homemade ravioli, my pies - and then it is consumed in minutes. It’s not that cooks and bakers resent the eaters who adore us and our food, it’s just something that points to the ephemeral nature of domestic arts. We cook, and the food is eaten. We clean and the house gets dirty again. Much of domestic work - what is traditionally known as “women’s work” - is unseen and unpaid, in essence, invisible except for brief moments. It was with this in mind that I read this article about the work of artist Tino Sehgal in yesterday’s Sunday New York Times Magazine. Sehgal’s work is meant to leave no trace. It is made from human beings who inhabit a space, interacting with viewers. I saw Sehgal’s “This Situation” when it was at the Marian Goodman Gallery in NYC. I remember thinking that it was brilliant how Sehgal brought up questions about the traditional manner of making art in the form of objects, among other issues. His work is not even documented because he does not believe in filling the world with more objects when there are already so many. Which is not to say that the work is not sold. This is where the controversy comes in. How are fine artists to survive if they are not allowed to make money without their motives being suspect? Is he a P.T. Barnum with a gimmick, as one of my artist friends thinks? Or is he a visionary who sees beyond materiality to the essence of experience and has the courage to provoke a necessary dialogue?

This objectless art composed of living beings seems to say, “Here I am. Soon I will be gone. Be present here in this moment with me - don’t take pictures, don’t videotape it, just be here - or you’ll miss it.” Isn’t this so much what life is about? This also brought up my own feelings about my chosen form of making art - painting. I do believe in paintings since the conversation that artists are having in paint seems hardly finished, and because paintings communicate something about human experience that I find simply cannot be expressed for me any other way. I have a deep longing and love for paintings that is intrinsic to my being. On the other hand, Sehgal has a point, and he has begun a fascinating dialogue. I’m not about to kick all the object-makers out of the room and stop painting myself, but I like having him at the party too. I hope he - and his pieces - keep talking. Sehgal’s work will be on view at the Guggenheim Museum January 29th - March 10th.

see also: Thing of the Day — Chardin

home > article > Out My Kitchen Window

Masher

Out My Kitchen Window

• by Nancy, January 17, 2010
• Leave a comment (1 so far)

Tuesday afternoon, Dr. Louise Ivers, an infectious disease specialist at Harvard Medical School, was at a meeting of the World Food Program in a United Nations building in Port-au-Prince when the earthquake hit. She escaped to the building’s driveway unharmed. Within minutes of her arrival 350 injured Haitians gathered in her driveway, looking for medical help.

Ivers was the only doctor.

“The only doc”
Posted: 10:21 AM ET
January 17, 2010
By Elizabeth Cohen
CNN Medical Senior Correspondent

Dr. Ivers with a Haitian patient, Staff photo Rose Lincoln/Harvard News Office
The tragic circumstances of the earthquake in Haiti has been on our minds lately and this powerful story of 48 hours in the life of one doctor who is trying to make a difference there touched me deeply. I want to share it with you. You can read the full article here. As I was reading it, I couldn’t help thinking that while I am researching the history of cookies for jellypress, these things are going on around me. Laura asked an important question in her previous post. What is our responsibility to the world as writers and artists? In the day to day business of raising a child, working for survival, keeping house, and making art, it’s natural for me to narrow my focus, keep my eyes down, usually focused on a kitchen counter where I am chopping herbs on a cutting board or mixing my palette in my studio for a painting. The beauty and security of these simple things can’t be ignored because they bring joy, and as Laura pointed out, speak to that which endures in the face of hardships. I can’t help asking myself however if I take enough time to look out my kitchen window at the broader horizon. Sometimes it just seems that there is this huge gap between the private and public spheres. In this painting, below, by Berthe Morisot, the division is marked by a balustrade. The world has changed a lot since she painted it. Women have since left home and made their way in the world. I wonder if we need to jump that balustrade more often. Posting more links here to current events suddenly seems urgent. Not instead of recipes, art and food history, but along with them. Sometimes I don’t know what is the best course of action to directly impact the problems around us. Perhaps awareness is the first step.


Berthe Morisot, On the Balcony, 1872
If you’d like to make a difference tomorrow, January 18th, and live near Montclair, NJ, you can attend a benefit concert for the Haiti Earthquake Relief Effort from 7 - 10pm at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation, 67 Church Street, Montclair, New Jersey, where the concert of Jazz House Kids will be free but with voluntary donations taken at the door. 100% of proceeds will go to Doctors Without Borders and The American Red Cross.

home > article > More on Scottish Shortbread

Masher

More on Scottish Shortbread

• by Nancy, January 16, 2010
• Leave a comment

To Make Short Bread
Take a peck of Flour, put three lb of Butter in amoung a little water, and let it melt, pout it in amoung your Flour, put in a Mutchkin of good Barm; when it is wrought divide it in three parts, roll out you cakes longer then broad, and gather from the sides with your Finger, cut down the Middle and job it on Top, then send it to the oven.
Mrs. McLintock’s Receipts for Cookery and Pastry-Work, 1736, available in reproduction.

The Milk Maid, Johannes Vermeer, 1858-60
In The Art and Mystery of Food, there is a comprehensive treatment on Scottish shortbread. Read it here. Laura found it while digging for authentic Scottish shortbread recipes and lore. The recipe included, above, intrigued me since I am hellbent on finding a recipe to post in my next One Badass Cookie column for the kind of shortbread I mentioned in the previous post. I was most surprised to see “barm” included - a kind of yeasty leavener made from ale. Yeast? In cookies? Ah, but shortbread, it seems, were not originally the cookies we call shortbread today.

A closer look at Laura’s sources point to the fact that like most old recipes, the origins of shortbread are deeply embedded in a way of life: the milk maids of fourteenth to seventeenth century Europe. Where there were dairy cows, there was cheese and butter. And in 1736, the year of the first documented Scottish cookbook Laura found, the word, short, in combination with the word, bread, or cake, was used as a verb rather than a noun. To “short” bread or cake, was in fact, to make it friable or full of what the English came to call “shortening,” in other words, to give it a tender crumb unlike the chewy, sturdy breads made before fat became a popular addition. And the word bread meant just that - bread, yeast risen, soft and sometimes full of citrus peel, spice and nuts - and not plain cookies.

The history of cookies as we know them is really the history of ovens. “Think about a wood burning oven and imagine baking cookies,” Laura told me, “It just doesn’t work opening the door every 12 minutes, right? It was done, but it really was not a practical part of every day life.” Unpredictable open hearths were used until the Civil War by all but the wealthy, and the development of trustworthy ovens was slow. 1910’s gas ovens gradually replaced coal, wood, and petroleum versions, followed by 1930’s electric ranges, both precipitating cookie recipe explosions. World War II’s rationing derailed bakers temporarily, but afterward, armed with abundant butter and sugar, bakers enjoyed a sky’s-the-limit enthusiasm for cookie invention that has yet to abate. 

Old recipes for short cakes and breads were made with ground oatmeal or rice flour. Notches in the dough symbolized the sun’s rays, and most of the early recipes yield cakes or breads that are round, and cut into triangles to serve. While the round shape is sometimes still specified in modern recipes, by the mid-nineteenth century the yeast and add-ins like nuts were gone, and our present-day shortbread cookies were conceived.

see also: Calling All Recipe Detectives — The Search for One Badass Scottish Shortbread

home > article > Calling All Recipe Detectives — The Search for One Badass Scottish Shortbread

Masher

Calling All Recipe Detectives — The Search for One Badass Scottish Shortbread

• by Nancy, January 15, 2010
• Leave a comment (4 so far)

I emailed Laura telling her that I wanted to find a shortbread recipe like the one I had as a child but that I had regretfully never learned to make. We’re all flawed. I was only eight years old, and didn’t fully appreciate the Scottish born nanny (and her handed-down recipes) who came to take care of us when my mother accompanied my father on business trips once or twice a year. She stayed briefly, a week or two at most. Her name was Mrs. Wanser. She was one of those story-book type of characters, bigger than life, who lives on in memory.  The bow-legs in their lace-up old lady shoes. The no-nonsense apron worn always and everywhere. The perfect accent. White bun. A gap-toothed smile and pink, flaring nostrils that conjured visions of miles of open, airy farmland and hard work. Her habit of calling us “brother” and “sister” instead of by our names, titles she insisted were as necessary as mother and father to convey respect. Certainly she treated us with more of it than we afforded her. We’d hide from her on the basement stairs, giggling uncontrollably as she called and called us. I have no idea now why it was so funny. We’d already driven off the other nannies. There were four of us, plus pets. You can imagine. She irked us with her old-fashioned rules of early bedtimes and mealtimes, cleaning to the point of obsession and bed sheets tucked in hospital corners so tight we had to struggle to get our feet under the blankets at night, but she was the one who stayed, gently and persistently teaching us grace and forgiveness with her shortbread and shepherd’s pie. I didn’t know this then of course. My mother impressed upon me her worth. Eventually I understood. When Mrs. Wanser gave me a pair of onyx earrings for my sixteenth birthday and I lost one when I wore them to the prom, I was heartbroken. It was all I had of her. When she died, I grieved.

Her shortbread I long for most. It was buttery but not greasy, with a velvet-smooth touch to the surface, and broke off in brick-like chunks from a honey-golden slab that was scored with lines for portioning. It had the kind of thought-erasing flavor notes that flooded your head from back to front. She made it from scratch of course, mixing it with her knobby, arthritic hands in a ceramic bowl on her lap. It worked up into a pliable dough that she patted into a rectangle, scored and baked slowly. Her shepherd’s pie had a blanket of mashed potatoes on it three inches thick over a deep brown mix of meat and vegetables. But I’ll get to that in another post. For now, I only want to find a shortbread that can conjure the taste memory I have of the one I loved then. If you can help, send a recipe to me. And check back soon for more on Scottish shortbread. Laura has been digging in old cookbooks online for the kind of recipes that Mrs. Wanser might have used herself as a young woman, and the things she found are fascinating and surprising, from the meaning of the word to its origins and ingredients. In the meantime I’m going to start with this recipe from The Historic American Cookbook Project. I’ll post the results soon.

see also: Calling All Gingerbread Detectives

home > article > More Thoughts on Catastrophe

Masher

More Thoughts on Catastrophe

• by Laura, January 13, 2010
• Leave a comment (4 so far)

Irene Nemirovsky
I have often asked myself how I can write about pasta and and matters of food while there are so many desperate and pressing issues in the world and people are suffering.  I ask myself, as a writer what is my responsibility?  I think about this all the time and struggle for resolution.  Today the news of Haiti’s earthquake raises the issue again along with the guilt of being safe while other people suffer so horribly.  My heart goes out to the people of Haiti who have suffered so terribly for so long.

Last year I read the beautiful unfinished novel by Irene Nemirovsky “Suite Francaise,” published 65 years after her death.  A Russian Jewish novelist living in France when the Germans were marching in during World War II.  As the campaign against Jews became clear, she understood she would soon die.  Before she was taken away she did two things: 1) arrange for her two daughters to be hidden and saved (they were) and 2) furiously write as fast as she could her ultimate novel.  It was to be a thousand pages long in several parts, yet she only finished a fraction of it before being taken to Auschwitz.  The events of the novel--documenting what she was witnessing as the Germans arrived--are incredibly sad and raise all the questions of human weakness and tragedy.  And yet her act of art, her act of writing on the brink of death was enormously optimistic.  She was a beautiful writer.

During this time, she kept notes where she mulled on her plans for this opus novel of hers.  She didn’t want to create a work that would be solely about the tragedies of World War II because she knew that ten years after the war, people wouldn’t want to think of the horrors any more.  What would endure and still matter in 2052, she asked, while writing in her notebook in the woods, waiting for her death.  And she answered herself:

“What lives on:

1.  Our human day-to-day lives
2.  Art
3.  God.”

I am so taken that someone amidst catastrophe and on the brink of death would understand that “our ordinary day-to-day lives” matter.  I suppose that when women write or paint about domestic life, they are addressing this enduring part of what it means to be human, and in this fact something deeply true.  And this helps me justify what I do.  Sometimes this in itself is art, and sometimes even a step toward what I imagine to be god. Still my questions remain not entirely resolved.

In the meantime what else is there to do but try to help those who suffer? 

If you’d like to help the victims of the quake, text “HAITI” to 90999 to donate $10 to Red Cross relief efforts in Haiti.

Unicef has also appealed urgently for emergency assistance. Visit this link to help.

You can also help immediately by donating to the Red Cross to assist the relief effort. Contribute online here, or

Or, you can donate $10 to be charged to your cell phone bill by texting “HAITI” to “90999.”

home > article > Is It True?

Masher

Is It True?

• by Laura, January 13, 2010
• Leave a comment

I asked my husband.  “How can it be that Haiti would suffer yet so much more?  The poverty and wars and corruption and hurricanes and now this unbelievable catastrophic earthquake?”

He replied, “Yes, life can be so hard.  It’s impossible for us to imagine that these people could suffer so much.  And then there’s the tragedy that most Americans won’t care.”

Is it true? 

home > article > Dining Room Table On The Garden

Masher

Dining Room Table On The Garden

• by Nancy, January 12, 2010
• Leave a comment

Pierre Bonnard, Dining Room Table On the Garden, 1934-35
Pierre Bonnard, painter, lover of poetry, did most of the work emblematic of his mature style in his late fifties. It was during this time period that he moved with his wife, Marthe, whom you can barely see on the margins of the painting above if you look closely, to their house in the countryside of France. Out of the city, away from the noise and blur, he could contemplate the quiet domestic scenes flooded with color and light that fascinated him. I’ve been thinking a lot about color and light in my own paintings, coming to the conclusion lately that it is light and an unusual use of color - one that invites a poetic reading rather than a literal one - that most interests me. I’ve been looking at color everywhere, not only in painting, but in life all around me.


This tart I find particularly glorious. Look at the deep blue and gold and rose of those baked berries. There’s nothing else quite like that.


This is what I was thinking about when I painted this picture of the purple beans I grew in my backyard one summer. As I continue painting I would like to paint my emotional response to my subject; the essence of the thing and not the thing itself. It’s a process that I’ve only begun. Bonnard is quoted as saying that he wanted to portray the moment of walking into a room for the first time. If you turn from your computer and look behind you into your life, what do you see? A dining room table, a freshly baked tart, a handful of beans? Or is it the quality of the light and the colors it illuminates that will remain in memory long after everything else is gone?

home > article > Gnocchi alla Romana

Not to be Forgotten

Gnocchi alla Romana

• by Laura, January 11, 2010
• Leave a comment

Fried Cream Wheat from the Ancient Romans

Accipies similam, coques in aqua calida ita ut durrissimam pultem facias, deinde in patellam expandis.  Cum refrizerit, concidis quasi culdia et frigis in oleo optimo.  Levas, perfundis mel, piper aspergis et inferes.  Melius feceris, si lac pro aqua miseris. 

Take flour [semolina], cook in hot water so that it becomes a very firm polenta, then spread it on a plate.  When it has cooled, cut it as for sweet cakes and fry in oil of the finest qualty.  Remove, pour honey over, sprinkle with pepper, and serve.  You will do even better if you use milk instead of water. 

The De re coquinaria of Apicius

as found in A Taste of Ancient Rome, by Ilaria Gozzini Giacosa, Translated by Anna Herkolotz

You probably haven’t read Latin in a while, so I included the English translation.

What you have here is “polenta” made with semolina and fried.  How intriguing that it’s covered with a combination of honey and pepper. Today we think of polenta as cornmeal mush.  But before corn reached Europe from the Americas, polenta was a sort of porridge that could be made with various grains or even chestnut.  This comes from the De re Coquinaria, attributed to a gourmand named Apicius who lived in ancient Rome during the first century A.D. (though he alone did not solely write it).  When you read through the recipes for cabbage and vinegar sauces, porridges and roasted pigeons, so much seems to be missing that would seem to be “Italian” food: No tomatoes, potatoes, hot peppers, corn, and even pasta as we know it.  This is because what we know today as “Mediterranean cuisine” is very much rooted in the Middle Ages, not the Romans.

Which gets you thinking about the endlessly deep story of Italy and its food and language--ever changing and so deep.  All these ruminations because I had such a wonderful time last night with a large group of Italians and Italian Americans in Princeton.  I was there to do a talk about Genoese food and my ravioli memoir at a culture center called Dorothea’s House.  This is a very special place with a huge following.  Check it out if you live anywhere close. 

It’s very strange how writing is such a solitary experience and requires years of loneliness, yet because of the world we live in, the book is published, and a writer must become a public person.  Sometimes it is very difficult (and at times terribly embarrassing).  Other times you can’t believe how lucky you are to meet such wonderful people.  Last night was one of those wonderful times and I’m sure it was the warmth of the people, who share long bonds to Italian history and culture.

There was a reception and pot luck following, where I even tasted some pesto that made me feel as though i was in Genoa.  But the dish that left a huge impression was Gnocchi alla Romana..  I’d never had it before.  It was little cookie sized circles of polenta baked to crisp brown in layers on a dish.

Now, this is a simple dish mind you.  A warm starchy comfort food.  Yet it was a revelation.  I cannot explain how wonderful it tasted to me and how I immediately wanted to make it my own.  Of course emotions always color our taste buds.  So perhaps it was the night.  But I don’t think so.  I’m pretty sure it was the dish, which did not at all seem like “gnocchi.” But that’s Italy for you.  The same word can mean one thing in one region and something completely different in another.  You’ll never figure it all out. 

I consulted with my hero Marcella Hazan who gives a recipe for basically the same thing, which she calls “Baked Semolina Gnocchi” in her Classic Italian Cookbook, explaining that the dish can be traced back to Ancient Rome, where it was fried and covered with honey.  Which is why I turned all geeky this morning, hunting through Apicius , as though I don’t have articles due and a family to care for and many other deadlines. Semolina is a universe.  But we wont go there now. 

Luckily I met a woman named Linda at the event last night who is a dear friend of the cook responsible for slaying me and the whole recipe is already posted on her fabulous blog Ciaochowlinda.com, which all Italian food enthusiasts would want to know. And so I send you into her good hands. Notice the cool layering technique and how it all bakes together.  Let me know if you make this dish and if you agree that it is a brilliant piece of simplicity. 

home > article > Sunday Morning

Masher

Sunday Morning

• by Nancy, January 10, 2010
• Leave a comment (1 so far)

It’s a sunny Sunday morning, cold and bright. The furnace turned itself off in the middle of the night so I padded downstairs bundled up in a sweatshirt on top of p.j.’s and thick socks. Max was still sleeping. Bits of flour and dough were still on the table from the night before.


We made cinnamon buns from a recipe called “Overnight Sticky Buns” on Cooks Illustrated. I quietly got them out and put them near the radiator to warm once I got the furnace started again. Made a pot of coffee. Read email. Perused lists of grants for artists online. Trolled for a recipe for split pea soup for tonight’s dinner. Put the buns on the pizza stone to bake. Marked the pea soup recipe I chose finally with the green satin ribbon attached to my cookbook.


All I had to say was “Warm cinnamon buns,” and Max was down the stairs and at the kitchen counter in a moment. Good mornng.

home > article > Thing of the Day — Fennel Pollen

Masher

Thing of the Day — Fennel Pollen

• by Nancy, January 09, 2010
• Leave a comment

This is what happened: I got Sara Jenkins’ cookbook, Olives and Oranges, which you can read all about by clicking the link at the end of this post. In it, I found a recipe for a loved one who has a childhood fondness for oyster stuffing. But what was this ingredient I spied in the recipe? Fennel pollen. At first I thought I had read it wrong, and that it must have read fennel powder. But no. It said pollen, and that I might find it at Il Buco in Manhattan. “Wild fennel pollen can turn a simple dish into something truly spectacular,” writes Jenkins. So I tracked it down like a sorceress in pursuit of a new potion and was delighted with the corked glass vial and its rustic paper tag tied on with coarse string and handwritten in Italian. The seedy, powdery stuff inside, gathered by hand from the flowers, is a delicate soft sage green color that speaks of leaf and blossom.The real delight, however, was revealed when I lifted the cork. A perfumed aroma wafted out with such strength I was taken off guard for a moment. The scent is kind of like holding a very pungent anise and fennel scented flower right under your nose. Imagine this, then imagine you are in the garden surrounded by hundreds of these flowers. This stuff is strong and beautiful, and when spread on vegetables or poultry and roasted, it intensifies and delivers an intoxicating flavor. Read more about it here. Try it. It’s a splurge but worth it. And if you can’t get to Manhattan, you can buy it online here.

see also: Why I Love Olives and Oranges

home > article > Vasilopita

Masher

Vasilopita

• by Nancy, January 08, 2010
• Leave a comment (1 so far)

How could I, an avid baker, artist, and lover of all things with a global connection and a long thread into the past, have gone my whole life without hearing about a Greek New Year’s holiday that is celebrated with a buttery cake, and not only that, but with a prize for good luck hidden inside? Here is a photo of my friend, colleague, fellow mom and musician Erasmia with her Vasilopita (which I am told can be a cake, bread or even pie) half-eaten by a crew of celebrants. It’s delicious and surprisingly light, and more than that, carries with it tales and traditions that reach back into ancient memory and history. The tradition of the vasilopita celebrates St. Basil, who made good on his promise to the impoverished of Caesarea that he would make their greedy emperor repent and give back all the coins, heirlooms and jewelry he had demanded from them to pay excessive taxes. Since the task was daunting to return everything to the rightful owners, the story goes that all the treasures were baked into a cake that was then sliced up and shared among the people. The miracle is that supposedly each family received a slice of cake that contained exactly the treasures they had contributed. In commemoration today, a foil-wrapped coin is baked into the cake and the person who receives it has good luck for the year to come. St. Basil is also credited with generosity in the community, having set up an orphanage and hospital during his lifetime.


Mastiha
I was intrigued also by old recipes for the cake, which contain Old World ingredients, mahlepi (crushed, powdered sour cherry pits with a fruity taste) and mastiha (a jewel-like aromatic resin) I had never heard of, but which Erasmia says are still available at cool specialty shops. She wrote to me, “I didn’t know that mastihashop opened in Soho last year!” You can also get this ingredient as a liqueur. About the taste she writes, ”This is the mastiha that I remember as a child – I see now that it is mastic with sugar and corn syrup.  It’s easy to find, any Greek shop will have it (such as The Greek Store in Kenilworth, New Jersey.) As kids, we did not like the gum so much.” Erasmia also told me about how difficult it can be, as with most old recipes from other cultures, to get exact measurements. She writes, ”This blog shows pictures of the almonds decorating the top, and the recipe includes brandy, which was an important ingredient in my mom’s version. (I have to ask her to give it to me sometime – it’s in a very very old Greek cookbook (my grandmother’s) and the language is a little dated, so I don’t understand measurements, etc.” Erasmia’s version comes from a 1957 cookbook, which she shared with Jellypress.

Vasilopeta – Cretan New Year Cake
adapted from a cookbook called “Popular Greek Recipes”, which was first published in 1957 by The Ladies of Philoptochos Society at Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church in Charleston, South Carolina. (Buy it here.)

1 cup butter
½ cup vegetable oil
2 ½ cups sugar
7 eggs, separated
1 teaspoon almond extract, optional
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
¼ cup sugar
3 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup yogurt
1 cup crushed almonds, slightly toasted, optional

*(Erasmia’s additions: orange zest from one orange; ½ cup orange juice)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.  Toast almonds in oven in pan with 1 teaspoon melted butter for 5 minutes, or until slightly amber in color – stir often.

Cream butter and oil with sugar for 10 minutes. Add egg yolks and flavorings, beating until fluffy - *here, Erasmia also added orange zest and orange juice.  Sift dry ingredients and add to batter alternately with yogurt.  Fold in the crushed almonds.  Beat the egg whites with salt until foamy.  Gradually add ¼ cup sugar and continue beating until a stiff meringue forms.  Carefully add to cake batter, blending lightly.  Pour into greased and floured baking pan, about 16” by 11” or a round 14” pan. Drop a sterilized coin into the batter, and decorate the top with slivers of almonds. Bake in oven at 325 for 35 – 40 minutes.

*(I put it into a 9 by 13 glass pan, but it was a little deeper, and needed to bake longer.  Probably the recipe demands a bigger but shallower pan.)

home > article > Why I Love Olives and Oranges

Masher

Why I Love Olives and Oranges

• by Nancy, January 07, 2010
• Leave a comment

I don’t want to complain endlessly about how the food world exasperates me sometimes because it is mostly overrun with poser celebrity chefs hamming it up like culinary clowns on their gimmicky TV shows featuring soulless recipes, more entertainment than substance. I’d rather turn my readers on to something real that makes me happy and this is one of those things. Every once in a while there comes along a great cook, and even better when that cook is possessed of a genuine and generous spirit and reaches out to share her gift. Such is Sara Jenkins, daughter of the food authority Nancy Harmon Jenkins. I met Sara at a party thrown by Saveur magazine where I was tagging along with Laura who had recently written for them. Lucky me. Not only was the party food exceptional and the company welcoming, but I was fortunate enough to be waiting on the buffet line next to Sara. We struck up a conversation during which she told me about her new cookbook with co-author Mindy Fox, Olives & Oranges: Recipes & Flavor Secrets from Italy, Spain, Cyprus & Beyond (Houghton Mifflin 2008). pictured above, and her restaurant, Porchetta, in downtown Manhattan. I was so impressed with Sara’s down-to-earth, modest demeanor and intriguing descriptions of her food and restaurant that I bought her cookbook online, sight unseen and hiked into the city to Porchetta as soon as I was able. Why do I love both so much? Sara has the kind of sensibility that knows what the word flavor means. The Mediterranean-styled recipes, of substantial soups, salads, entrees and sweets, yield dishes with flavors that are intensely nuanced and complex without being in the least difficult. She’s almost like a painter in the way she assembles a palette of flavors that meld beautifully. Her roast chicken, stuffed under the skin with sage, garlic and lemon peel, which was chosen for Saveur’s top 100 issue last year, is one of my favorites. Her tiny restaurant, practically a hole in the wall but with a clean, modern allure, is a treat if you love all things homey and rustic. You can read an interview with Sara here. And if you’re anywhere near NYC and you’re dreaming of a hot bowl of good soup, a crusty slice of fresh bread, melt-in-your-mouth pork, soulful beans, greens, and an exemplary biscotti, visit Porchetta.

home > article > Thing of the Day — Klee

Masher

Thing of the Day — Klee

• by Nancy, January 06, 2010
• Leave a comment

Around the Fish, 1926
Paul Klee
Today I was reading a book about Paul Klee, another of my favorite artists. His work related so beautifully to my last post, below, that I decided to share this painting and quote of his:
“It is not my task to reproduce appearances . . . for that there is the photographic plate. I want to reach the heart. In this way, we learn to look beyond the surface and get to the roots of things.”

see also: Thing of the Day — Chardin

home > article > Thing of the Day — Chardin

Masher

Thing of the Day — Chardin

• by Nancy, January 05, 2010
• Leave a comment

Jean Baptiste Simeon Chardin
“Still Life with Fish and a Copper Pot”
This is one of my favorite artists, the eighteenth century master of all things humble and home. The color especially resonates right now in the midst of the bleak beauty of another north-east winter. On the kitchen counter: the makings of a good dish, and more than that, the light of inspiration. Laura and I subtitled Jellypress “Old recipes, modern life.” Mostly people assume that this means we are bringing the old recipes with us into modern life, such as when I baked challah with my son who I wish to teach a connection to his ancestry and their old foodways. Laura and I talk about wanting to shed some of this goody-two-shoes image of being the dutiful daughters of the kitchen. So sometimes “old recipes, modern life” means breaking tradition, leaving the old recipes behind if that’s what’s necessary to move forward. This is what I’m thinking about a lot now in my painting, and especially when I look at the Chardin, which I cherish for its light and economy, but know that I can’t paint like that now. To bring that old recipe entire into the present would be to deny the present time, to look backward instead of forward. It also would be to deny the viewer the opportunity to enter the painting imaginatively, and it would deny the forward movement of painting from the moment it came into its own after the invention of photography.


This is what I was thinking about when I painted myself recently, a self-portrait from this photograph my son took of my back. I knew I couldn’t just copy it in the manner of Chardin, or any other old master, even though I am trained as a realist painter, fluent in the art of illusion. I wanted something more. Something like what Virginia Woolf wrote in her memoir A Sketch of the Past: “If I were a painter . . . I should make a picture . . . of things that were semi-transparent; I should make curved shapes showing the light through but not giving a clear outline. Everything would be large and dim . . .”


Instead I painted it like this. I hope you understand. It has, hopefully, the light of inspiration.

see also: Old recipe: Modern Child

home > article > A Good Night’s Dinner

Masher

A Good Night’s Dinner

• by Nancy, January 04, 2010
• Leave a comment

My son: if you read our posts often, you know he’s 12 and that I am a working single mom, a painter with a full-time gig. So some nights, anxious to get back into my studio, all I can manage is to coach him to get his homework done and microwave a bowl of canned soup for us. Tonight was different. My copy of the Gourmet Today cookbook arrived in the mail and leafing through it I got inspired. Here’s the homey plate of pork with balsamic glaze I made from it. I threw in carrots and substituted onions for the shallots (sorry, Ruth) To the book’s credit, it was easy and worked perfectly. Then I made my tried and true healthful mashed potatoes with lowfat milk and chicken stock and finished it with a little butter and salt. Admonished the delighted child, “Take human bites.” And plenty to be packed into lunch boxes tomorrow. 

home > article > Thing of the Day — My French Press

Masher

Thing of the Day — My French Press

• by Nancy, January 04, 2010
• Leave a comment

I love my new French Press coffee maker. Here’s a photo of it pre-plunge. A lot of people have the glass ones, but I read recently about how the stainless ones keep the coffee hot longer. Yes they do. Ten minutes after plunging (and I know this since I am always rushing around in the morning and never quite getting to pour the coffee) it’s still piping hot. I went looking for old coffee recipes to post with this photo and came across cool ones for coffee cake on The Old Foodie. Back then, they baked in a hearth which was an overwhelming amount of work, and even though it’s wonderful to fire up my stove in a second rather than chop wood and work for hours with a tinder box to get a fire going, I still fantasize about how nice it would be to have a toasty hearth in my kitchen on a frosty ‘morn like this. It’s 32 degrees here in the east today and what they call “feels like 17.” Brrrr. Feeling pretty grateful for that hot cup of Joe just about now.

home > article > (Fabulous) Thing of the Day — Sea Salt Chocolate

Masher

(Fabulous) Thing of the Day — Sea Salt Chocolate

• by Nancy, January 03, 2010
• Leave a comment

I’m having a love affair with specialty chocolates made with sea salt. This craving for sweet plus salty has been on chefs’ minds a lot recently, and one of the results are some incredible chocolates. If you are trying to cut back on all that’s sweet this January, as I hear some people are, you might find it satisfying to have a chunk of dark chocolate after a meal instead of cookies or cake. Works for me. Here’s two of my current obsessions: Hawaiian sea salt and burnt caramel chocolate from Chocopologie and Butter Toffee Infused with Welsh Sea Salt in chocolate from Chocolat Moderne. My son bought me these for my birthday. Aw! Ain’t that sweet?

see also: Thing of the Day — Black Walnut Shortbread

home > article > Thing of the Day — Black Walnut Shortbread

Masher

Thing of the Day — Black Walnut Shortbread

• by Nancy, January 02, 2010
• Leave a comment

Laura says she’s over all the holiday sweets. Not me. I never can tire of baking and sweet things, but that’s because I’ve got a baker’s soul, generations deep, and an athlete’s psyche, out on the street taking a run or riding my bike every day to compensate. So, with all due respect for the January buzz urging moderation in eating, here’s a photo of the black walnut shortbread I just baked. Black walnuts in particular are an obsession of mine. I wrote about them in my book Walking On Walnuts which is much more about old recipes and modern life, just like jellypress, than it is about walnuts. My favorite black walnut recipe comes from Sarah Belk, who wrote the fabulous cookbook Around the Southern Table. These cookies are like pecan sandies in texture, but in flavor, worlds beyond the ordinary. If you’ve never tasted a black walnut, do. They’re more intense, more darkly rich and more flavorful than other nuts, and though they need tempering with other ingredients to render them palatable to most people, they are sublime in that way that food lovers crave: singular, unrivaled, challenging to the adventurous. Their toughness to crack has made them legendary (there are stories of trucks being backed over them in order to open them, but I can’t confirm that . . .) Read about and buy them here. So I know it’s officially Get-in-Shape-and-Eat-Light January, but if you still want something sweet once in a while, try this recipe:

Black Walnut Squares
Adapted from Around the Southern Table by Sarah Belk, Simon and Schuster, 1991
Note: Sarah’s original recipe uses buckwheat flour but I used all white all-purpose flour. If you try the buckwheat, let me know. I can’t wait to get some and try it again.

Makes 16 squares

1/2 cup California walnuts
1/2 cup black walnuts
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 cup buckwheat flour (or all-purpose flour)
1/4 t. salt
6 T. cold, unsalted butter cut into small pieces
1 T. grated lemon zest
1 T. brandy (I used dark rum)
confectioner’s sugar to shake on after baking, if desired.

1. Preheat oven 300 degrees F.
2. In a blender or food processor, process nuts and sugar until finely ground. Add flour(s) and salt and process until just mixed. Add butter and process until crumbly. Add lemon zest and brandy (or rum) and pulse until mixture just holds together. Pat the dough into a flat cake, wrap and chill at least 2 hours (or alternatively chill in freezer for 30 minutes but be careful not to freeze too long.)
3. Fit the dough evenly into a nonstick or lightly buttered 8 inch by 8 inch baking pan. Using a sharp knife, score the dough into 16 bars. Bake for about 45 minutes, checking the pan and rotating it halfway through baking time to ensure even browning. When golden, remove from oven and while still warm, score over the lines you made earlier to separate the bars. Remove them from pan with a narrow, flexible spatula. Cool on a rack. Sprinkle with confectioner’s sugar before serving.

see also: Thing Of The Day — Fresh Dough

home > article > One Badass Gingerbread Cake — Happy New Year

Masher

One Badass Gingerbread Cake — Happy New Year

• by Nancy, December 31, 2009
• Leave a comment (4 so far)

Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a winner. The search for the perfect gingerbread is over, and here is the winning recipe - a combination of an Edna Lewis recipe my sister sent to me, and “Grandmom Lindner’s Gingerbread” I found in a book. I am proud this New Year’s Eve to bring to you, yes indeed, One Badass Gingerbread. Here’s to a great 2010 for us all. And if you want, you can do what I have been doing for years. Make your list of the things you wish, dream and hope for in the coming year. Print it on a bright colored 3 x 5 card and hang it in sight somewhere in your home. Watch your dreams come true. And in the meantime, if you love to bake and love gingerbread, here’s the most badass of the badass gingerbreads:

One Badass Gingerbread

Makes one 9-inch square pan, or one 8-inch square pan.Thickness of cake will vary accordingly.

Adapted from “The Gift of Southern Cooking,” by Edna Lewis and Scott Peacock (Random House, 2003)
Time: About 1 hour

Note: regular and robust molasses, specified below, are the types of the brand “Grandma’s” molasses, found in most supermarkets. Any dark molasses can be substituted, however keep in mind that blackstrap molasses, if you choose it, is much darker and much more bitter than the molasses that was used in the tests for this recipe.

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, more for pan
2 cups all-purpose flour, more for pan
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 t. ground allspice
1/4 t. ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
3/4 cup Grandma’s “regular” molasses (1 1/2 cups altogether of one type of molasses may be substituted instead of 3/4 cup of two different kinds.)
3/4 cup Grandma’s “robust” molasses
Freshly whipped cream, for serving.

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter and flour an 8-by-8-by-2-inch or a 9-by-9-by-2-inch baking pan (watch baking times if you use a larger pan as the gingerbread will bake more quickly and come out a bit more thin). Combine flour, baking soda and baking powder into a large mixing bowl. Blend in spices and salt and whisk with a wire whisk.
2. In a small pan, bring 1 cup water to a boil. Melt 1/2 cup butter in it, then whisk water into flour mixture. Beat eggs and add to mixture, along with molasses. Whisk until well blended. Pour into pan.
3. Bake for 35 to 45 minutes or until a skewer plunged into center comes out with no trace of raw batter. Interior will be moist. When pan is cooler, but still very warm, wrap entire pan with plastic wrap, then cool it further while wrapped. Unwrap, then serve warm or room temperature with freshly whipped cream.
Yield: 6 to 8 servings.
Note: This cake is also delicious the day after it is baked. The spices meld and the texture gets even more like a steamed pudding.

Laura’s note:  I have made this cake serveral times now and have this to offer:  You can substitute half the butter for canola oil if you wish.  And if you don’t like the strong taste of molasses, you can also replace half the molasses with brown sugar.  It is excellent.

see also: One Badass Cookie - Ginger Molasses Cookie

home > article > Thing Of The Day — Fresh Dough

Masher

Thing Of The Day — Fresh Dough

• by Nancy, December 29, 2009
• Leave a comment

When I’ve had it with the holiday pressure and rush, this is one of the places I like to go: into my kitchen, up to my elbows in dough.

they dreamed of following in out of the light
to hear step after step

the heart of bread
to be sustained by its dark breath
and emerge

to find themselves alone
before a wheat field
raising its radiance to the moon.
Excerpted from “Bread” by W. S. Merwin, 1993.

see also: Thing of the Day

home > article > Calling All Gingerbread Detectives — Post-Christmas Update

Masher

Calling All Gingerbread Detectives — Post-Christmas Update

• by Nancy, December 26, 2009
• Leave a comment (1 so far)

I just sent my boyfriend off to work with two giant foil-wrapped pieces of fresh gingerbread cake. How lucky is he to be the significant other of the obsessed baker-blogger? It’s day three of the search for perfect gingerbread and even though there’s still work to do to find the one true recipe, it sure was nice to have a plate of fresh gingerbread with warm lemon sauce for Christmas dinner dessert, whatever its shortcomings. You’d think I’d get tired of baking and tasting the stuff but I still can’t get enough. Good thing I’m on the stationary bike every day. Update: We have tried four recipes so far and procured the chefs’ molasses of choice, Steen’s Pure Cane Syrup, plus several jars of different types of molasses found at most supermarkets, among them “Grandma’s Original” and “Plantation Blackstrap.” We’ve also been out there on the ‘net looking around, and were not surprised to find that this holdiay gingerbread obsession is shared by a lot of us food bloggers. And we are happy to announce that we have a contender! The promising recipe, found by my sister, Janet, as I mentioned in my previous post, is pictured on the left: Edna Lewis’ Dark Molasses Gingerbread, adapted from The Gift of Southern Cooking, by Edna Lewis and Scott Peacock (Random House, 2003.) On the right is a very good, well-spiced but lighter version from Home Cooking: A Writer in the Kitchen by the late Laurie Colwin (Harper Perennial, 2000.). So what do we do now? 

We take Edna’s recipe, which has the moist, dark, intensity of the Mennonite recipe we love but lacks its generous spices, and add more spice in the proportions found in one of the first recipes we found, “Grandmom Lindner’s Favorite Gingerbread Cake” (which can be found in our first post calling for all gingerbread detectives.) We’ll also try a different molasses in Edna’s recipe since she specifies only that the molasses be “dark” and does not clarify whether that means “regular,” “robust,” or “blackstrap.” The proportion we used of 1 cup Steen’s (which is a delicious sweet syrup by the way somewhere between dark corn syrup and regular molasses) and 1/2 cup blackstrap gave us the desired color and texture but left a more bitter aftertaste than desired. We’re hoping that 1 cup of “Grandma’s regular” and 1/2 cup Steen’s might do the trick. Stay tuned! When we find it, the ultimate gingerbread recipe will be posted in a new One Badass Cookie column soon. And if you’re reading this and you’ve got a tip or recipe for us to help us on our way, use the comments link above to let us know.

home > article > Calling All Gingerbread Detectives — Christmas Update

Masher

Calling All Gingerbread Detectives — Christmas Update

• by Nancy, December 25, 2009
• Leave a comment

Merry Christmas Jellypress! Thank you to all our readers who roamed Sherlock-Holmes-style to help us find the dark gingerbread of our dreams. Here’s a picture of one find, Steen’s Pure Cane Syrup, which is from what we understand, the chef’s choice ingredient for any recipe yielding something dark and rich and made with molasses. I shlepped through the slushy sidewalks of Manhattan to get this can at Dean & Deluca but you can also order it online. We are about to test two or three variations of recipes sent to us, some with blackstrap molasses, some with Steen’s. One recipe comes from the late beloved food writer and chef Laurie Colwin and the other is this New York Times recipe sent to me by my beloved sister, Janet. May the baking commence! More pix and updates soon. Thank you again to all who replied and Happy Holiday. We’ve got snow here in the northeast and it’s very pretty and peaceful this morning. Hope it’s a wonderful day for all.

see also: Calling All Gingerbread Detectives

home > article > Calling All Gingerbread Detectives

Masher

Calling All Gingerbread Detectives

• by Nancy, December 22, 2009
• Leave a comment (3 so far)

Just look at it. It’s the Holy Grail of gingerbread. The benchmark. The bar, raised really, really high. Moist. Dark. Intensely flavored. It’s the gingerbread I bought from the Mennonites’ bakery stand at the Reading Terminal Market when I lived in Philly this summer. The bonneted one wouldn’t give me the recipe. So I’m sending out an S.O.S. to all our jellypress readers. I must find a recipe for this wonderful stuff.  I found two that seemed promising. I made both. Here’s a picture of them:


On the left: “Grandma Lindner’s Favorite Gingerbread Cake” from Gingerbread (Andrews McMeel, 2009) which required 13 ingredients and exacting, time-consuming steps. On the right: “Molasses Cake” from The Amish Cook’s Baking Book(Chronicle, 2009) which was ready to bake in a minute, all seven ingredients mixed at once in one bowl. Nope. Neither one is the one. Not dark enough. Not fragrant enough. Not intense enough. Not . . . well, it. Can you help? If you can, use the comments link above to send me a recipe or a lead to a recipe and I will pursue it and make it. Send in your best, and watch for future posts to see how the search unfolds. To be continued . . .and in the meantime, if you like a plain molasses cake, perfect for children especially, or a lighter version of spice-y gingerbread that is delicious in its own right, here’s the recipes for the ones I made:

Grandmom Lindner’s Favorite Gingerbread Cake
adapted from Gingerbread by Jennifer Lindner McGlinn (Chronicle, 2009)
makes 1 8-cup bundt
2 1/2 cups cake flour
1 t. baking soda
1 1/2 t. ground ginger
1 t. ground cinnamon
1/4 t. allspice
1/4 t. cloves
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, room temperature
1/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
1 cup molasses (I used original but you could try robust or blackstrap)
1 t. vanilla extract
1 egg
1 cup hot water
1. Preheat oven 350 degrees. Butter the cake pan and set aside.
2. Whisk together dry ingredients. Cream butter with brown sugar until fluffy. Beat egg and add a little at a time. (If the mixture curdles, set the bowl over a pot of simmering water and melt some of the butter. Then whisk in the egg until it’s smooth and shiny.) Add vanilla.
3. Combine hot water and molasses. Add molasses and flour to mixture by alternating wet and dry ingredients (begin with 1/3 of flour mixture, then half of molasses/water, then 1/3 more of flour, then 1/2 of water/molasses, then the rest of the flour.) Do not overmix. The batter will be very wet and thin.
4. Pour into prepared pan and bake until a skewer inserted in the center comes out clean, about 30 - 45 mins.

Molasses Cake
adapted from The Amish Cook’s Baking Book by Lorina Eicher with Kevin Williams (Andrews McMeel, 2009.)
Makes one 9 x 13 inch cake
2 cups all purpose unbleached flour
3/4 cups molasses
1/4 cup sugar
2 t. baking soda
1 egg
1/2 cup buttermilk or sour milk
1/2 cup hot water
1. Preheat oven 350 degrees. Butter the cake pan and set aside.
2. In a large bowl, combine all ingredients. Do not overmix. Bake until a skewer inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean, about 40 minutes.

home > article > Old recipe: Modern Child

Masher

Old recipe: Modern Child

• by Nancy, December 12, 2009
• Leave a comment (5 so far)

I made him. It’s Chanukkah after all. Of course he said “no” first. He’s twelve going on seventeen and none of this is cool anymore. Guitars are cool. So are purple high-top sneakers. And video games that block me out. But baking with Mom? “Okay if I have to . . . “ He adored all the fuss as a small child but now that he’s wearing a man’s size ten shoe, he’s forgotten. He’s forgotten a lot of things. How to effuse. How to hold Mom’s hand in public.  How to answer questions about his day in more than one syllable. “What did your music teacher say about your concert last night?” “Good.” “That’s all after months of preparing? Just ‘good’?” “Yeah. No. What?” Each night, I worry over the backpack spilled on the floor, the messy school folder. When I look closer, though, I see everything is fine. He has even taken out the garbage and emptied the dishwasher as I requested. Reading by his side while he shoots imaginary aliens with a digital shooter, I’m suddenly amazed at his profile. The toddler’s softness replaced by handsome angles, the unruly copper curls, once so embarrassing they had to be hidden under hats, now worn loose and free. At the counter, leaning over the flour, he was patient, mixing, whisking, measuring. Doing it for me. A kindness. I reminded him how to form the braid. Hand over hand, too big yet for the still-catching-up wrists, he gently lifted each rope of shining dough and placed it just so. And when it was done, he smiled. Such radiance. Over this magical, simple thing, this sweet and homey bread. Happy Hanukkah.

home > article > Food and Eating in Genoa:  Once Again

Masher

Food and Eating in Genoa:  Once Again

• by Laura, November 23, 2009
• Leave a comment (2 so far)

I just returned from Genoa for an ever-so brief week there.  My soul and belly were filled by pesto and my heart verklempt at the sight of “Little Village” aka Camogli with its trompe l’oeil painted facades, black stone beach, and looming Portofino Mountain.  The last time I’d been there was with my boys (oh so grown now) when I was researching my memoir The Lost Ravioli Recipes of Hoboken, questing about for a lost family recipe and trying to get my story straight. 

This visit, was for a different mission.  (More on that later.) But in the meantime, here’s a glimpse:

Camogli first.  Local fishermen (of the Camogli Fishing Cooperative) still go out with little boats and use traditional netting methods. 

Salted anchovies are popular in Liguria.  You see the fresh silvery ones in bins at the market and on the plate, as here at a place called La Rotunda (also in Camogli). 

At La Rotunda, I also sampled a tiny little local fish called rossetti,, smaller than your fingernail, and this excellent octopus salad with potato.  (Oh why oh why do I have to drive half an hour to find good octopus?)

Next stop:  Da o Vittorio, a very old trattoria in Recco--my great grandparents’ town.  Here is the famous Recco style focaccia.  It comes out on the huge round platter.  I caught this photo just as the last two slices were cut and plated.  Recco style focaccia is basically two thin slices of dough baked with hot melting crescenza or strachino cheese between.

See any red sauce yet? 

If Genoese food were to have a single color, it would green, green from all the vegetables and herbs.  Here are fritters that were perfect--made from an herb-specked leavened dough, deep fried, not greasy in the least, and salted.

So much Genoese cuisine:  gathered greens, mushrooms and chestnuts....  comes from the hills and mountains.  Here is the view from Enrichetta’s house an hour north of Genoa.  (You loyal readers may remember her from Lost Ravioli.  She is the mother of my friend Sergio Rossi..  Enrichetta is eighty years old and a former professional cook.

Gnocchi fly off her magic hands in a whir.  She made a large batch in twenty minutes.

After a lunch, Enrichetta brought out some rose petal liqueur that she’d made last summer.  I almost fainted.  Does anyone in the USA makes rose petal liqueur?  If so I want to know about it. 

Vegetable pies called torte (torta for one) are very popular in Liguria.  These--photographed in the seaside town Chiavari--look a lot like the kind my family has always made.  “Bietole” means chard.

One of my favorite meals ever:  a bowl of Genoese style minestrone at Trattoria Arvigo in a town about 40 minutes north of Genoa in a town called Cremeno.

And of course the thing the Genoese are most famous for:  pesto.  I wore earrings to match.

home > article > Purple Inspiration

Masher

Purple Inspiration

• by Laura, October 29, 2009

1.  Wash and slice your little eggplant in half.  Salt it now if you like. 

2.  Heat lots of olive oil in the pan until it is very hot but not smoking.  When is it hot enough?  When you put a wooden spoon in and the oil sizzles

3.  Fry the eggplant on one side until it is golden.  Salt it now if you didn’t before.

4.  Turn with a spatula and fry the other side.  Salt again. 

If your garden is in full sun as mine is, it keeps going into November--even here in the Northeast of NJ.  The herbs are fading but still quite serviceable.  And our broccoli keeps pushing hard.  Every day I still eat at least one cherry tomato.  But the end is near.

Two small eggplant plants gave us an unremitting amount of fruit.  There’s still some out there, and frost will come any night now.  Time to collect and cook.  This is a lovely way. 

home > article > One Badass Cookie — Taiglach for the Jewish High Holidays

Masher

One Badass Cookie — Taiglach for the Jewish High Holidays

• by Nancy, September 20, 2009

Now there’s a sight for sore eyes. Isn’t it gorgeous? This is my Great-Grandma Esther Hanna’s taiglach — kind of like caramel ginger walnut bar cookies — that I made for Rosh Hashannah, the Jewish New Year. I live for this stuff and so does most of my family. Just the smell of it cooking brings back . . . okay, I’m getting sentimental here but bear with me . . . my mother’s kitchen in all its glory. Pot lids rattlin’, my Mom in her flowered apron walking on a bag of walnuts instead of chopping them with a knife, as readers of my book will know “so the pieces are small, but not too small . . .”, the dramatic moment when she dipped her hands in ice water to handle the piping hot caramel, all of it. If you don’t know taiglach, I truly believe you are missing out on one of the most Badass of the Badass cookies. I will warn you that it is only for experienced bakers. Lots of directions that say “to taste” or “by feel” and so on, but it’s worth the effort. Once you do it, however the reward is huge. You’ll have entered the collective memory of generations of bakers, and you’ll carry them with you each time you go to bake. That’s a powerful lot of bakin’ hoodoo. So if you’re game, and want to serve something really wonderful after the fast on Yom Kippur next week, read on for the recipe, a link to a cool variation with hazelnuts and almonds, the Badass Cookie tip of the week, and a chance to win Nancy’s book . . . “Shana Tovah!” (Happy New Year.)

Great Grandma Esther Hanna’s Taiglach
from Walking On Walnuts by Nancy Ring, Bantam 1996.
Makes approximately 2 dozen 2-inch square bars.

4 extra large eggs, separated
4 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 level teaspoon ground ginger (for dough)
approximately 1 1/2 to 2 cups all purpose flour
12 ounces honey (need not be expensive grade)
1 teaspoon ground ginger (for syrup) plus extra for sprinkling
1/2 cup sugar
6 ounce bag of shelled walnuts
6 or 7 vanilla wafer cookies

Prepare the dough balls:
1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
2. Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper and set aside.
2. Beat together yolks, oil and 1 teaspoon of the ginger.
3. Beat egg whites until they form stiff peaks.
4. Fold egg whites into yolk mixture.
5. Add flour to egg mixture, 1/2 cup at a time, folding until a sticky dough forms that can be handled with floured hands.
6. Flour a board, and sprinkle the dough with extra flour. Pull off medium size pieces of dough one at a time, and elongate each piece by rolling with palms and fingers to the size of a thick jumbo pencil, at least 5/8 inch wide. Flour a knife and cut dough logs into marble size pieces about 3/4 inches long. Gently place each piece of dough on the baking sheet. Space the dough 1/2 inch apart.
7. Bake 8 to 10 minutes, until dough is golden, puffed up, and dry inside. Cool.
Prepare the syrup:
1. After dough cools, pour honey, remaining teaspoon of ginger, and sugar into a medium-size soup pot, stir, and bring to a boil.
Cook the taiglach:
1. Wrap walnut bag in a towel and walk on it briefly to get small pieces. Add baked dough and walnuts to hot honey syrup and stir to coat. Cook walnut/taiglach mixture over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally from the bottom of the mixture up, 15 minutes or more. Mixture will bubble. Taiglach is done when it is dark golden brown.
Form the taiglach:
1. Have a clean, unpolished natural wood board ready, and the extra ginger. Put ice water in a bowl and set nearby. Rub cold water on wooden board in a light film.
2. When taiglach is ready, scrape taiglach from pot onto wet surface. Taiglach is extremely hot and must be handled quickly before it sets. Put hands into ice water until they are wet and cold. Push taiglach down while returning hands to ice as necessary, until a rectangle is formed, approximately 1 inch thick. Any size rectangle is fine. Square off the corners. Sprinkle with more ground ginger while hot, to taste. 3. Cover with wax paper lightly and let cool until solid, in a cool, shady place, no sun.
Finish the taiglach:
1. Crush vanilla wafers between sheets of wax paper with a rolling pin.
2. Cut cooled taiglach into bars. Dip bottoms of bars into cookie crumbs and store in a cool, dry place in an airtight container. Do not refrigerate. Yields approximately two dozen two-inch squares.

Badass Cookie Tip of the Week: When working with caramel, use your nose as much as your eyes to determine when it is done. If it smells like sweet caramel, it is caramel. If it starts to smell burnt, it’s getting too dark.

Like the idea of taiglach but not so crazy about walnuts. Epicurious has a great variation with hazelnuts and almonds.

Do you have a Badass Cookie recipe for Laura and Nancy? If so, send it to us. If it’s Badass enough we’ll post it as a reader’s recipe and you’ll win a copy of Nancy’s Book, Walking On Walnuts.

see also: One Badass Cookie - Ginger Molasses Cookie

home > article > Happy Labor Day

Masher

Happy Labor Day

• by Nancy, September 06, 2009

Look what I baked this morning. I’m spending Labor Day with my beloved cousin Jeff and decided to bring this for dessert. It’s a recipe I cut from Mark Bittman’s “Minimalist” column in the New York Times a few years back and it’s been a favorite ever since. It’s the perfect way to celebrate Labor Day and say goodbye to summer fruit, which is still in abundance for a few more weeks, especially the coveted last peaches of September. You can also make this with pears and apples when the north winds really start to blow. For the recipe and a link to Mark Bittman’s wonderful blog, read on. Happy Labor Day. Enjoy.

Free-Form Fruit Tart
Adapted from Mark Bittman Bitten: Mark Bittman on Food
Makes one tart, approximately 8 servings.
1 1/8 cups (about 5 ounces) all-purpose flour, plus some to dust work surface
1/2 t. salt
2 T. sugar, plus extra for sugaring fruit if desired.
10 T. cold unsalted butter, cut into pats and frozen (keep 2T. separate for melting and brushing on tart before baking)
1 egg yolk
2 T. ice water
1 egg white, for brushing dough before baking.
turbinado sugar or other large crystal sugar, optional, for sprinkling on dough before baking
2 cups pitted peeled and sliced ripe stone fruit and/or berries, like peaches, plums or nectarines (or use apples or pears in Fall)
confectioner’s sugar, whipped cream or ice cream, optional.

1. Combine flour, salt and sugar in a food processor; pulse once or twice. Add 8 T. of the butter and turn on machine; process until butter and flour are blended and mixture looks like cornmeal, about 10 seconds. Add egg yolk and 2 T. ice water and pulse machine on and off a couple of times. Dough may look dry; do not add extra water until you remove and gather mixture into a ball. It should come together nicely when you press it together in your hands. If the dough is still too dry to stick together, then add more ice water, a little at a time. Wrap in plasic, flatten into a disk, and freeze dough for 15 minutes ) or refrigerate for 30 minutes or more) to ease rolling. (You can also refrigerate for a day or two, or freeze for a week or so.)
2. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Roll crust out on a board sprinkled with flour or sprinkle it lightly with flour and roll between two sheets of waxed paper (a good method for beginners.) Roll dough to 1/4 inch thickness; it need not be perfectly round. Put it directly on a baking sheet covered with parchment paper or with a nonstick baking pad, or greased. Melt remaining 2 T. of butter.
3. Toss fruit with sugar to taste if desired. You may bake the fruit without sugar if you wish. Cover round of dough with fruit, leaving about a 1 1/2 inch border all around. Fold up edges of crust around fruit, pinching together. Cover just outer rim of fruit. Brush exposed dough with egg white and sprinkle with large-crystal sugar such as turbinado, if using. Brush melted butter onto fruit. Bake until crust is golden brown and fruit bubbly, about 20 - 30 minutes. Turn tray half way through baking to ensure even browning.
4. Remove from oven and cool on a rack; serve warm or at room temperature, dusted with confectioner’s sugar (if you did not add sugar to fruit) or topped with ice cream or whipped cream.

home > article > Perfection Salad

Antique Recipe Road Show

Perfection Salad

• by Laura, August 26, 2009

Q.

I’m looking for a jello recipe that my then 90 year old aunt once served with our main course.  The molded dish was not sweet and would be sliced and a chunk was placed on your plate instead of spooning out portions.  It was made with lime jello and included shredded cabbage and possibly shredded carrots and vinegar.  I think it also contained sour cream. I am unable to find anything like it from current jello recipe books and on-line.  No other relatives have a copy of the recipe but remember it from childhood.  Sound familiar? I would appreciate any help in finding this recipe.  Thank You.
--CJ

A.

Hi, CJ.  Yes I know what this is.  It’s Perfection Salad, of course and

a beloved American classic from the Gelatine Hall of Fame. 

A bit of history.  Gelatine dishes (also called jellies and aspics) were long ago made through a slow process of boiling a calf’s foot.  Because of the labor involved, it was a serious dish.  However, In the late 1800s, along came the Knox Gelatine company started making gelatine in an easy-to-use powdered form that made a once labor-intensive dish very easy and accessible to ordinary women.  Recipe writers and home cooks developed a huge array of molded gelatines--both sweet and savory and started calling them “salads.” I’d be remiss if I didn’t tell you that the wonderful Laura Shapiro wrote a great book called “The Perfection Salad:  Women and Cooking at the Turn of the Century,” in which she describes the era’s passion for technology and tidy, dainty food for the white middle class.  In her view, these salads were “decorative” food.  Hence: items like cabbage and vegetables suspended in gel that could be sliced.  It was considered a very modern and dainty dish.  But really, it was just the beginning of gelatine history. 

(I’ve always taken a special interest in gelatine, as my grandmother worked in the Knox rival JELL-O company’s Hoboken factory--but that’s another Hoboken tale.)

As to your own family recipe, well, the original perfection salad was probably invented in 1904, made with plain gelatine that was flavored with some lemon juice. It was quite popular.  Later versions feature lime gelatine like the one you recall, but of course there are many many variations out there.  This one I’m sharing comes from my little “Knox Gelatine:  Dainty Dishes for Dainty People,” a 1931 edition.  It has a complicated ending note for serving the gelatine cut up in pepper “molds.” Totally unnecessary.  Just use a mold like the photo, or whatever shape you wish. 

Perfection Salad
(12 Servings--For 6 Servings use half of recipe)_

2 level tablespoonfuls Knox-Sparkling Gleatine

1/2 cup cold water
2 cups boiling water
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup mild vinegar
2 tblespoonfuls lemon juice
1 teaspoonful salt
1 cup cabbage, finely shredded
2 cups celery, cut in small pieces
2 pimentos, cut in small pieces or
1/4 cup sweet red or green peppers

Soak gelatine in col water about five minutes.  Add boiling water, sugar, vinegar, lemon juice and salt.  When mixture begins to stiffen, add remaining ingredients.  Turn into wet mold, and chill.  Remove to bed of lettuce or endive.  Garnish with mayonnaise dressing, or cut salad in cubes, and serve in cases made of red or green peppers or turn into molds lined with canned pimentos.  A delicious salad to serve with cold sliced chicken, veal, or other meat. 

home > article > Julie & Julia & Me

Masher

Julie & Julia & Me

• by Laura, August 09, 2009

I didn’t think I’d like it.  I really didn’t.

I mean, there was enough hype to near convince me that I wouldn’t.  I don’t like hype.  Come on:  a huge puff piece in the NYT 10 days before the movie was even released?

I’d always admired Julie Powell’s chutzpah and clever idea to blog her way a year of cooking over 500 recipes in Julia Child’s “Mastering the Art of French Cooking.” It resulted in a big New York Times story by Amanda H.  And then, naturally a book deal.  And though I wished Julie well, I had no interest. 

But I saw the food movie tonight.  And I didn’t like it.  I loved it. 

Loved it. And though I know my inner skeptic will kick in later, I’m going to write this blog post and indulge my exuberance right now

Meryl Streep infuses Julia with so much joy and inner beauty that I found myself crying during the cooking scenes.  The scenes of Julia’s pure sensual joy over food and cooking it, her undaunted devotion--helped me remember why I spent more than 10 years of my life so fascinated with food. 

But I am certain it was also the beauty of Julia, shining through Meryl Streep’s performance that got me: the great six-foot two Julia, gamer, adventurer, bon vivant, comic and artist of her own life who didn’t go to cooking school until she was 37 and didn’t publish her first book until she as 49.  There’s been so much fake glamour around food the last twenty years.  This movie was, most amazingly, actually about cooking.  Cooking!  Imagine that.  Cooking in your tiny kitchen.  Cooking because you want to actually learn the hard skills of the craft.  Cooking through failure, like when the chicken slides out on the floor and all the stuffing falls out so that you fall down and cry.  Cooking to make something so beautiful that people gather around, transformed by the beauty of it for an ephemeral moment. 

And then there’s the love and passion of a good man to help make a woman even greater.... Let me say no more.  There--now I’ve contributed to the hype and I’m okay with that.  And so, like every review of this movie, I’ll close mine by invoking Julia:  Bon appetit!

home > article > Front Yard Vegetable Garden Redux

Masher

Front Yard Vegetable Garden Redux

• by Laura, July 22, 2009

String Beans From the Garden

1.  Send your son out with a colander and ask him to collect all the string beans.  Send him back when he doesn’t come in with enough.

2.  Wash string beans and snip off the tip of the tiny bit of the end with the stem.

3.  Steam in an inch of water that is well salted.  Let them cook until they get soft but not mushy.  Drain and shock in a bowl of ice water.

4.  Dress in good olive oil and vinegar.  Add more salt if you like.  That’s all. 

Okay, so I know that every time you hear the hoopla about the vegetable garden on the White House Lawn, you think to yourself “Oh Michelle.  That’s so last year.  I saw it on Jellypress in 2008”

Well, it is… And we’re back with our front yard garden.  And once again it’s beautiful, attracting honeybees by the dozens.  We are growing broccoli, lots of tomatoes, cucumbers, herbs and chives, peppers, too, and more.  Here are the Japanese eggplant.  I was astonished by how beautiful the plant is.  Such an ornament for the yard with its purple flowers and stems and glossy fruit.

This year’s new addition: David is growing potatoes in this special potato bin. 

Quite the ridiculous yuppie invention, eh?  You plant the spuds in the the container only partially filled with soil.  When the greens sprout, you cover them with more soil.  A week later, when they force themselves through again, you bury them again.  Add more soil.  This happens successively.  Each time the green leaves surface you bury them in soil, and the theory is that it forces more tubers to grow.  We’ll see.  Of course, people do this in garbage cans and spare tires.  But this is so much more attractive.  I’m sure Michelle will want one too. 

home > article > Grill-master and Artist H. John Thompson Serves Evocative Feast

Artist's Notebook

Grill-master and Artist H. John Thompson Serves Evocative Feast

• by Nancy, July 12, 2009

Artist H. John Thompson
JELLYPRESS WAS ON THE SCENE Wednesday July 8th at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia for the opening of “Dave and Jim” an installation and performance piece by my good friend and fellow painter, H. John Thompson. Inside his evocative construction of embellished chain link fencing surrounding two living yards of grass, University graduate students and faculty gathered around to share potluck summer fare as John manned the grill. For more photos, John’s fascinating concept for his piece and a taste of what it’s like to eat charcoal-roasted corn and hot dogs inside a work of art, read on.

If you are an art world watcher, you may be aware of some artists who are creating installation pieces that incorporate performance such as the making of food in an environment. Rirkrit Tiravanija, the Thai artist who brings life to galleries (literally) by cooking for and alongside gallery-goers is one of these. For John, sharing food inside his installation piece was an interesting way to bring the university community together.


The piece itself draws from quintessential suburban fenced yards for inspiration. John’s idea was to lift this suburban aesthetic from its usual environment and insert it into the prominent urban landscape of busy Broad Street. “It’s a one-time suburban utopia in an urban landscape,” says Carol Moore, an artist and U Arts professor.


John rocked the grill. By the way, his love of good food was nurtured by his grandfather, Art Sketchley, of Sketchley’s Bakery, 316 Bustleton Pike, Feasterville, PA, (215-357-8765) where John’s art studio resides a floor below the bustling pastry shop.


Here’s the scene pre-party where you can see John’s carefully made construction. John, from a long line of master carpenters, is a painter who visualizes his constructions as paintings.


Here’s the yard where a table was placed for participants.


In full swing . . .

The view from the piece looking down Broad Street where you can really see the wonderful contrast between the suburban-styled installation and the urban scene beyond
.

Badass Ginger Cookies homemade by yours truly alongside a well-known American dessert icon, another study in contrasts.
If you’re in Philly this summer, look for John’s installation at Hamilton Hall, corner of Pine Street and South Broad Street. File under: Just Too Cool.Got an inquiry or comment for John? He’d love to hear from you. Email him at hjohnthompsonworks@google.com
All artwork pictured in the photographs are protected by copyright law. “Dave and Jim” copyright 2009, H. John Thompson.
To check out another great artist who uses food in her art, check out fifth generation cook Nicole Peyrafitte at her fabulous blog: http://nicolepeyrafitte.com/blog/

home > article > Kitchen Art — Red Pepper Orange

Masher

Kitchen Art — Red Pepper Orange

• by Nancy, June 30, 2009

Can you find the red pepper and the orange in this new oil sketch of mine? Hint: the bird shape is lifted from a very famous Manet painting . . . 

home > article > Kitchen Art — Artichoke

Artist's Notebook

Kitchen Art — Artichoke

• by Nancy, June 12, 2009

“Artichoke" Oil on panel, 16” x 20” 2009
Here is my new painting, another in a series that are all part of a conversation I’m having with 17th century Dutch and Flemish still life painting. The initial inspiration for this one came when I found this gorgeous artichoke at market with its astonishing color. I knew immediately that I had to paint it. 

see also: Kitchen Art — Nancy’s New Work

home > article > Kitchen Art — Nancy’s New Work

Artist's Notebook

Kitchen Art — Nancy’s New Work

• by Nancy, May 28, 2009

Here is my new oil painting, “Leap.” I did it after spending time with the Caulfield and Zurbaran paintings I’ve posted here before. If you’ve been following this thread, you’ll recognize that lemon in my painting.


This one’s called “Dark Side.” More coming soon. Enjoy.

see also: Kitchen Art — Patrick Caulfield

home > article > Can Wonder Bread Feed the Masses?

Masher

Can Wonder Bread Feed the Masses?

• by Laura, May 14, 2009

In the food world, there has been a huge movement in the last thirty years calling for a rejection of mass produced industrial foods and a return to Oldways--and by this I mean home cooking, authenticity, farmer’s markets, beauty, small scale production, organic, and vegetable gardens at the backdoor (even Michelle Obama has joined).  Some have called it a Food Revolution, and unless you have been living in a cave for two decades you know what I’m talking about. 

Well, there is another side to the argument.  And I can’t recommend enough this fascinating video by Louise Fresco--food and agriculture expert associated with the U.N., who uses the metaphors of Wonder Bread vs artisan whole grain handmade loaf to argue that the foodie nostalgists have completely misunderstood the value of technology, pesticides, and mass production to end poverty and feed the hungry in the developing world. 

For some people, this is blasphemy--akin to suggesting that there is no god.  I wish people on both sides of this argument would be less passionate and listen to one another. 

I suggest watching this video with a very open mind.  It’s 18 minutes long so get comfortable.  Well worth every minute.

home > article > One Badass Cookie - Lavender Rosewater Cookies

Masher

One Badass Cookie - Lavender Rosewater Cookies

• by Nancy, May 09, 2009

Shhhh. Don’t tell anyone, but this is one of my Mother’s Day presents and I already know what’s in it. That’s because I made it and wrapped it myself. (Giggle.) Doesn’t it look pretty? It’s some of the lavender rosewater cookies that I baked with a group of children to help them make Mother’s Day gifts for their moms, and I made sure to bake extra because these are just too good. When we wrapped up the gifts, I wrapped the ones for me and my colleagues too. If you don’t know this recipe or have never eaten these cookies, you are in for a treat. This dough is so fragrant that raw or baked, it fills the room with a gorgeous scent. One child came into the room where they were being made and exclaimed out loud, “Wow! This room smells amazing! What is it?” When one of my colleagues tasted them she actually whispered to me (so that the children couldn’t hear,) “This is orgasmic.” A cookie that can perfume an entire room and bliss out the taster. Now that’s One Badass Cookie. And perfect for the mom in your life too if you need a last minute gift just about now. Or one to honor yourself. Read on for the recipe, a photo of the beauties in this package, and the Badass Cookie Tip of the Week.

Here they are. The combination of rosewater and lavender in these cookies is beyond delicious, romantic and intoxicating.These are the type of cookies called “crisps” that are rich and buttery, crispy at the edges and soft in the middle. The dough will be sticky. It’s fine to make the dough the day before and refrigerate it until you need it, or freeze it in logs to bake off at a later time. For a lavender rosewater cookie recipe that will delight the vegan mom, try the one on the funny and offbeat blog, Feldman Sisters Brutal Cupcakes.
Badass Cookie Tip of the Week: To create the lacy effect of frosting in the photo, dip a fork into the icing and gently let the icing drip from the fork onto the cookies, moving the fork quickly to make long thin lines rather than blobs of icing. (The kids did the frosting in the photo, so they are a little blobby, but kids love to do this so I say put aside perfection for fun whenever you get the chance!) Place the cookies on a parchment paper covered sheetpan first to make clean-up easy. Let them air-dry.

Recipe:
Rosewater Lavender Cookies
Makes approximately 6 dozen 3” cookies. Recipe may be divided into smaller batches if you like.
1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) salted butter (yes, salted. This is unusual for a cookie dough but it makes all the difference in taste in this case.)
3 cups sugar
6 eggs
3 t. lavender, crushed (available in the spice section of most supermarkets or gourmet shops.)
4 1/2 cups all purpose flour
6 t. baking powder
3/4 t. salt
2 pounds confectioner’s sugar, for icing
rosewater to taste, for icing
water, enough to moisten sugar, for icing

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Line several cookie sheets with parchment paper, nonstick pads or grease them and set them aside.
2. Cream butter and sugar in a large bowl.
3. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Do not add the next egg until the previous one is completely incorporated.
4. Add lavender and stir well.
5. Add flour, baking powder, and salt and mix only until incorporated. Do not overwork the dough.
6. Drop by heaping teaspoons onto cookie sheets. If using refrigerated dough that was made ahead, break off small pieces and flatten each slightly with fingers dipped in a little water or with the back of a spoon dipped in a little water to keep the sticky dough from sticking to fingers or spoon. Bake for about 10 minutes until edges are crispy and cookies are lightly brown. Cool several minutes on the sheetpans, and when cookies can be lifted without ruining their shape, transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
7. Prepare icing: Mix 2 pounds powdered sugar with enough water to make a spreadable glaze (about the consistency of thin stirred yogurt.) Add rose water to taste. Spread icing onto cookies or use a fork to create a lacy effect as explained in the Badass Cookie Tip of the Week above. Add more water or more sugar if needed to get the frosting the right consistency for either spreading or flowing from the fork. Let icing air dry, then store in an airtight container.

If you have a Badass Cookie Recipe, send it to Laura and Nancy using the comments link above and we’ll test it. If it’s Badass enough, we’ll post it as a reader’s recipe in a future One Badass Cookie post and you’ll win a prize of Nancy’s book Walking On Walnuts.

see also: One Badass Cookie - Ginger Molasses Cookie

home > article > Sicilian Gnocchi

Hands On

Sicilian Gnocchi

• by Laura, May 03, 2009

We have been getting some stunning “Hands On” submissions lately.  This, photo comes from Marisa in Australia who has roots in Sicily and Trieste.  (An interesting life, huh?) Thank you Marisa for sending these photos of Niluzza threading pasta. 

My Siciilian relatives live in Ragusa (south-eastern region of Sicily) and my zia Niluzza makes a lot of pasta in a variety of shapes and sizes, especially when I visit her from Melbourne, Australia.

My relatives in Ragusa make causuneddi (Sicilian) but these gnocchi or gnocchetti shaped pasta (in Italian) are known by different names in other regions of Sicily – gnocculi, gnucchiteddi, cavati, caviateddi (in Sicilian). All have an indentation in the centre to ensure even cooking. Some are rigati (have ridges on the surface) and some are lisci (smooth).

The photographs
The first photograph shows zia Niluzza’s special pasta-shaping device (it looks like a loom). It belonged to her grandmother (my great grandmother) and as you can appreciate it is very unique and rare. Small, fine strips of pasta (40mm) are rolled onto a long fine reed and by rolling the reed on the device, she makes grooves on each piece of dough. The small shapes of pasta are then released – the reed, allows them to slide off easily.

In the second photograph you meet some of the members from different generations of the same family. Life still seems to be the same in Sicily when it comes to doing things together and usually all of the women and children contribute to the shaping of pasta. My relatives make these very quickly and I am always embarrassed when I offer to help because even the youngest members of the family shape them faster than I can. It is just practice.

Check out Marisa’s blog http://allthingssicilianandmore.blogspot.com/

Thank you Marisa!

home > article > Kitchen Art — Patrick Caulfield

Masher

Kitchen Art — Patrick Caulfield

• by Nancy, April 30, 2009

The English painter, Patrick Caulfield (1936 - 2005) painted this wonderful canvas in 1999 titled “Hemingway Never Ate Here.” I love the irreverence and humor of his Pop Art style, and especially this one with its reply to Zurbaran and his rose benighted teacup that speaks so eloquently in the painting that appeared here in the last Kitchen Art column. Hmmm, wonder if I could continue this conversation in a painting of my own . . . in the meantime, here’s another piece of Caulfield’s, “Still Life: Autumn Fashion.”

see also: Kitchen Art — Zurbaran

home > article > Wild Ramps (aka leeks) You Can Find Online

Masher

Wild Ramps (aka leeks) You Can Find Online

• by Laura, April 21, 2009

A bunch of wild ramps (aka the wild leek of the forest floor, beloved in Apalachia)
A few slices of bacon
Some potatoes cleaned ad sliced thin.

Salt and pepper.
Use your judgment and taste preference on all these qualities.

1.  Wash the ramps, taking care to remove any grit or dirt.  Pat dry and cut away the stem and white parts. Cut into two-inch pieces.

2.  Fry bacon until crisp and fat is rendered. (If you’re worried about clogging the families arteries like I am, pour off most of the bacon fat so you’ve got the bare minimum you need for flavor then replace it when enough olive oil to fry your potatoes. If no member of your family has high cholesterol, then by all means skip this step and have fun frying your potatoes in bacon fat.) Remove bacon and set aside.

3.  As if it isn’t obvious now, add your potatoes.  Add some salt--a little or a lot.  As you see here, I pulled down my iron skillet, which I hadn’t used for a long time.  Gosh you forget what a beautiful job it does browning potatoes so quick and perfectly.

4.  When potatoes are getting there, add ramps.  Enjoy the fragrance as they soften.  Add more salt as needed. And some pepper, too.

5.  Cook this until potatoes are brown and ramps are soft and delicious.  Now break up the bacon into bite size pieces and return to pan.  Cook a little more.  You’ll know when it’s done. 

Last year, a friend gave me a bunch of wild ramps she’d gathered from the forest floor in Upstate New York State.  This was my first encounter with the beautiful wild leek of Appalachia fame. You can click and read my post from back then, and find out all about the history of ramps and coalminers in West Virginia and their annual community ramp suppers, and folklorist Mary Hufford’s work with the people of Big Coal River Valley. A beautiful story.

But I’m writing about ramps again now because I’ve decided to hereby anoint them as the official Earth Day Dish of America if someone hasn’t already.  There are many reasons for this.  First of all, ramps have had their forests and land threatened by mining and development.  But also, what could be a better Earth Day vegetable than a wild onion?  A green creature of the forest. The first sign of spring and hope. 

There’s about one week left to order farmed ramps directly from West Virginia, as the season runs through April there.  Here’s a great source where you can buy as little as a one-pound bag.  And no, they aren’t cheap.  If you think it is not very “earth day” to use up fossil fuel to have them shipped here just to satisfy your gourmet fetish, well, the cool thing about the Ramp Farm in Richmond West, Virginia, is that they will also sell you seeds, so you can even try to grow them yourself if you have the right conditions:  moist ground, filtered light---like a forest.

If you want WILD ramps, you can order them from D’artagnan, which is presently sourcing them from West Virginia.  But will continue to follow the harvest as it moves northward through spring.  These are sold only in “chef quantity"--a 5 pound bad--for a steep $94.  I say find three friends to share them with.  They stay well in the fridge for more than a week.  Mine have lasted as long as two weeks.

Now, about that Appalachian style recipe up there.  I just can’t give precise measurements for such a down to earth dish.  I just cooked the things and enjoyed them. 

Happy Earth Day.

home > article > Turkish Woman and her Outdoor Oven

Hands On

Turkish Woman and her Outdoor Oven

• by Laura, April 20, 2009

“Turkish Woman and her Outdoor Oven,” photo by Holly Chase; all rights reserved.  Location: Mugla Province, Aegean Coast--a village to the Northwest of Bodrum.

home > article > Kitchen Art — Zurbaran

Masher

Kitchen Art — Zurbaran

• by Nancy, April 16, 2009

“mystic intensity combined with physical paint and an ordinary fruit . . .  quiet.  overwhelming.” Peter Schjeldahl for the New Yorker, April 6, 2009.

I paint pictures. That said, I’ve been thinking a lot about painting and not the pictures. A painting is so much more than the image depicted. It’s also about the artist’s intention, the reality of the painted surface itself. It’s about the way the artist has referred to other paintings by picking up threads from the past and making decisions to continue or break from those threads. It’s about, more than anything, well, paint. This painting, one of my favorites, is now on view at the Frick in NYC. It was painted in 1633 by Francisco de Zurbaran (Spanish 1598 - 1664.) Laura sent me this link to a podcast about this painting by the art critic Peter Schjeldahl for the New Yorker who talks about all these things and more. It’s probably one of the best ways to spend ten minutes of your life as you have your morning coffee or tea, not the least to hear Schjeldahl’s take on why this painting and many others is akin to the experience of having a loaded gun pointed in your face. You’ll also be privy to a surprising fact about Schjeldahl’s education in art. Have a listen, see through Zubaran’s eyes, and if you’re really inspired hike on over to the Frick, where, as Schjeldahl points out, nothing beats seeing a painting, made of the “real stuff” of paint, firsthand.

see also: My Kitchen Door

home > article > Easter Pie or Pizza Rustica

Antique Recipe Road Show

Easter Pie or Pizza Rustica

• by Laura, April 09, 2009

Question:

My sister and I have been searching for a recipe for Easter Pie that my grandmother used to make at Easter time. The versions that we have found are not the same like she made. Her Easter Pie was made with ham, hard boiled eggs, chunks of cheese and pasta. We have used other recipes and included the food items she used but there is something missing and we just can’t seem to replicate her recipe. I wish I had written it down like so many other of her recipes that I watched her make as a young girl.  My grandmother told me her parents were gypsies who lived in the hills above Salerno and tended goats.

--Sara

Sara.  Wow about the gypsies. 

My Ligurian ancestors made “Torta Pasqualina,” which translates literally as “Easter Pie.” But this not the answer you’re looking for because your family comes from Salerno, which is in the Campania region to the south.  I am certain you are referring to a very different dish that goes by many similar names such as pizza rustica or pizza chiena.  Chiena means “filled” in dialect.  So it is a stuffed pizza.  Italian Americans changed the word from chiena to gain.  So it is often be called pizza gain. Whatever the name, I think this is more or less the same as your Easter pie--an incredibly decadent thing, filled with cheeses and meat and eggs.  It ends the fasting of lent with joy and celebration of Easter. 

In searching for this recipe for you, I found an interesting little book online called ”> The story of a year, many years ago. It appears to be a very personal account of life in Salerno int he 60s or 70s, and includes recipes.  I emailed the author, Marco Ferraiolo, and asked about your Easter Pie.  He graciously wrote as follows (my rough translation):

“I believe the pie you’re looking for from the hills around Salerno is a “Tortano,” which is a pie/brioche traditional to the Campania region, prepared for Easter, and made with a bread dough, kneaded with lard, pork cracklings, pepper, pecorino cheese, salame, eggs.” He describes a method of making it with many layers of pastry surrounding the filling.

In various incarnations, vegetable pies, or torte, exist all over Italy, and it will be difficult to find your exact recipe.  There is no one recipe.  They vary from region to village, to family.

That said, in Arthur Schwartz’s wonderful Naples at Table:  Cooking in Campania, he gives a terrific recipe for “savory Easter ricotta pie,” of which he writes:  Pizza Rustica, an open, lattice-topped or fully enclosed pastry filled with ricotta, diced cheeses, and various preserved pork products, is also called pizza ripiena (stuffed pie) or in dialect, pizza chiena--from which comes the frequently used Italian American name pizza gain. Follow the jump to the end of this story for his recipe. 

Also a bit more digging revealed this wonderful Italian-American woman’s description of her family’s Pizza Chiena, on her blog Egg And Soldier. 

Nick Malgieri gives a recipe too, although his pizza chiena is baked in a bigger rectangular pan

I haven’t given you much time have I?  One day till Easter. 

Well, if you live around New York, another option is to buy it at the Arthur Avenue market.

But if not, well, then here’s one more recipe:

Arthur Schwart’z version:

For the dough

1 1/2 teaspoons dried yeast
1/2 cup warm water
3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons lard
3 eggs lightly beaten

For the filling

3 ounces soppressata, cut into 1/8 inch dice
3 ounces prosciutto, cut into 1/8 inch dice
3 ounces cooked ham, cut into 1/4 inch dice
3 sweet Italian sausages, boiled, skinned, and finely chopped (reserve the sausage cooking water),
8 ounces whole milk mozzarella, cut into 1/4 inch dice
2 ounces dried sausage with hot pepper (pepperoni)
peeled and cut into 1/8 inch dice
3 eggs lightly beaten
3 1/4 cups whole milk ricotta
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano or pecorino or a combination
3/4 cup finely cut parsley
4 hard cooked eggs:  2 coarsely chopped, 2 sliced
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Plus:  1 egg lightly beaten, as a wash.

To make the pastry:

1.  In a small bowl or cup, dissolve the yeast in the water.  Set aside.

2.  In a large bowl, stir together the flour, sugar, and salt.  Pinch the lard into the flour to distribute it evenly.  with a wooden spoon, stir in the eggs and dissolved yeast until a dough forms.  Still in the bowl, knead the dough, sprinkling lightly with flour to make it less sticky.

3.  Turn the dough out onto a floured board and continue to knead, adding flour a little at a time, even by the teaspoonful, until the dough is very smooth and silky, about 8 minutes.  Dust lightly with flour, place in a bowl, cover with a clean dishtowel, and let the dough rise until doubled in bulk, at least an hour.  Punch down and let rise a second time. 

To make the filling:

4.  In a large bowl, combine all the ingredients except the 2 sliced eggs and the egg wash, and blend very well, stirring in about 1/2 cup of the sausage boiling water.  It’s a thick filling.

To assemble and bake:

5.  Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

6.  Punch down the dough and divide into four equal pieces to make top and bottom crusts for two 10-inch, preferrably glass pie plates.

7.  On a lightly floured board, roll out a quarter of the dough into a 14- to 15-inch circle.  (It is very elastic dough and this takes some effort.) It should be thin and large enough to fit the bottom and sides of the plate.  Carefully drape the dough into the dish.

8.  Fill with half the filling.  Top with slices of 1 hard-cooked egg.

9.  roll out another quarter of dough to an 11-inch circle, large enough to cover the pie plate.  Cut off the excess dough, then roll the edges of the top and bottom crusts together, pinching well to seal.  Cut four slits in the center of the top crust, then brush with a beaten egg.

10.  Make a second pie with the remaining pastry, filling, and sliced hard-cooked egg.

11.  Bake for 50 minutes to an hour.  After 30 minutes, if the top is browning well, cover it with foil, shiny side out, to prevent it from burning.  Let cool on a rack for 10 minutes, then remove from the pie plate and cool to room temperature.  The pie may be eaten soon after it cools completely, but it can be kept, well-wrapped, int he refrigerator.  It should keep well for several days. 

home > article > Corzetti

Masher

Corzetti

• by Laura, March 30, 2009

I made a lovely visit up to Providence, Rhode Island a few weeks ago.  It’s a great small city with a lively old Italian neighborhood and lots of interesting people there doing great things with food.  I trekked up there for the fun of doing a local television show about “the diversity of Italian food” (an impossibly huge topic) with Alan Constantino--owner of the great Venda Ravioli shop--and Mary Ann Esposito, the legendary host of PBS’s Ciao Italia of the longest running cooking show in America.  It was great fun.  We began with the old question “Is there such a thing as Italian food?” Before we knew it the time was up.  I began to think I’d like to do a ten-hour documentary.  Then maybe we’d go beyond scratching the surface. 

Anyway, I wanted to bring Mary Ann a gift of something from Liguria of course.  So I made corzetti--these round circles of pasta, which are like large coins, imprinted with a design-- essentailly a culinary woodcut.  You need a special wooden carved stamp to make them.  Here they are drying on my porch.

Corzetti are very typical of Liguria and also of Provence, France, which is not surprising as the two regions share a long culinary history

.  Crozetti also appear in the earliest know Italian cookbook--Il Liber Coquina, from Naples, and written in Latin--associated with the Angevin Court of the 13th century.  Now of course food history always acts as a detective’s tale.  One door leads to many more.  I could go on and on about this book Il Liber from Naples, with its French connections.  But I’ll stop right here and save that for another day.  Back to Genoese corzetti.... 

The Genoese have two versions.  One is from the Val Polcevera and is made in a figure 8 (yes, completely different shape and same name).  The other is the type made with the stamp, which, over history became designed with insignias and coats of arms for a given family. 

My friend Sergio Rossi--food historian in Genoa and ever my adviser in such matters--wrote me that corzetti also share a history with orichiette in the South of Italy.  And he has a very special way of proving it.

Sergio has spent time studying the ways of the Tabarchi Genoese on the small island of San Pietro off the coast of Sardinia.  This is an insular community descended from fishermen who left Liguria in the 16th century and settled on an island near Tunisia.  Because of their isolation, they kept extraordinary connections to their Ligurian cultural roots and still speak a variation of Genoese dialect (with other influences) and have kept many old recipes.  For a scholar of Genoese food (such as Sergio is), this is like finding a tiime capsule.  He is writing a book about these people and sent me a photo of their corzetti--ancient style--in a very old fashioned oblong, not round, shape and yes--clearly ressembling orecchiette.

Please visit Sergio’s website which is written in italian.  But even if you don’t read the language, you’ll enjoy seeing his photos... http://www.civiltaforchetta.it/ (And visit here for his visit to the extraordinary Tabarchi culture.  http://www.civiltaforchetta.it/cucinatabarchina.htm)

As soon as you make corzetti, you realize that this is not every day food.  It is time consuming and impractical. You must stamp each, one by one.  First you cut out the circle with one side of the stamp.  Then you imprint each side.  The result, however is beautiful.

I made these with a simple pasta dough.  (For one pound of pasta:  2 cups flour, 1 egg, a little water, salt, and olive oil makes about a pound), but the recipes I’ve found often call for more egg yolk--this makes sense for a special rich dish. 

Of course the trick is to find a corzetti stamp.  Not so easy.  You can go to the medieval district in Genoa or to a guy named Franco Casoni in Chiavari (though each time I went the shop was closed.) Or you can order them online from Corti Brothers or or A.G. Ferrari Foods. 

But what a beautiful dish they are.  In Liguria, they are often served with a simple sauce of oil, marjoram, and pignoli.  But I have also had them there with a walnut sauce.  My oldest Genoese cookbooks (by Ratto father and son from the 19th century) recomms corzetti dressed with a sugo of veal or beef.  I may make them for Easter as a first course. 

home > article > Kitchen Art - Glass

Masher

Kitchen Art - Glass

• by Nancy, March 23, 2009

“Presence and Absence” oil on panel, copyright Nancy Gail Ring 2009
Here is one of my new paintings. More to come .  . .

see also: Kitchen Art

home > article > Brown Bread and a Trip to Ballycotton

Not to be Forgotten

Brown Bread and a Trip to Ballycotton

• by Laura, March 17, 2009

I made my first trip to Ireland last September.  I was quite taken with a number of things--the rocky coves by the ocean, the low-hanging sky, big bales of hay piled in fields and all the quirky bustle of Cork City.  But way at the top of my list of favorites was brown bread.  I found it everywhere, usually in a basket with other breads served at dinner, but also at breakfast, and in shops.  The best of them were wholesome, slightly sweet, nutty, and moist.  A wonderful staple of daily life.  When my friend Elizabeth and I visited her cousin Bridget, I pointed to the brown bread she’d offered us with tea and asked, “Do you make this often?” She laughed at me and said something like “My husband would kill me if I didn’t.”

The brown bread you see above was shot at Ballymaloe, a very famous guesthouse and estate, with 350 acres of farms, grounds, and gardens, run by the Allen Family.  Ballymaloe is an otherwordly type of place.  Here’s Rory Allen with the mandolin, leading the Saturday music happening--a remarkable event, where people sit in a drawing room and sing and drink and gosh, somehow all these people know the words to these old Irish songs. 

Darina and Tim Allen run the cooking school, and they are well known as leaders in the Irish cooking movement of recent years.  This brown bread recipe, however, comes from Myrtle Allen.  Her Ballymaloe cookbook, now 25 years old, is from the previous generation and has a wonderful older voice.  Make this bread today, tomorrow, or anytime.  It’s healthy, inexpensive, and very down to earth.  Did I mention easy?  It requires no kneading and only one rise. 

And for those who love Ireland, here’s little tour of the nearby fishing village Ballycotton. 

I stopped into a tiny grocery store and based on the shelves, it seemed quite a few people are still baking brown bread (see the “wholemeal” or wheat flour) and soda bread at home.  But there were also several ready made for sale.  I picked one up and brought it to the cash register.  While I was taking out my money to pay, I asked the man behind the counter where it had come from.  His answer: “Me mum.” Good enough for me.

home > article > One Badass Cookie, I mean, Irish Soda Bread - Happy St. Patrick’s Day

Masher

One Badass Cookie, I mean, Irish Soda Bread - Happy St. Patrick’s Day

• by Nancy, March 15, 2009

One Badass Cookie is making a bread today in honor of St. Patrick’s Day. This comes from my mentor and fellow artist Eileen Neff, who visited friends in Ireland recently. She remembers the delicious smell and taste of this Irish Soda Bread comforting her as it baked in her friend, Susan Tiger’s wind-swept cottage during a storm so fierce the wind was forcing the rain that overflowed the roads to run uphill. A bread good enough to quell fear. That’s One Badass Bread. Since there’s a lot of controversy about Irish Soda Bread these days, I was thrilled to get this recipe, a community recipe from County Mayo that is the simple authentic type of soda bread and not the wonderful but sweet, butter-laden, raisin studded version we Americans mostly know. Such a find: fabulous homemade bread practically as good as the time-consuming yeast-risen kind in little more than an hour. Wow. For the recipe, the Badass baking tip of the week, the skinny on how buttermilk and baking soda make this bread rise like crazy and more photos, read on.

Badass Baking Tip of the Week: When measuring flour for bread or any recipe with flour, lift the flour into the cup instead of scooping it, be careful not to shake the cup, then level off the top with your fingers or a knife. This will prevent heavy, dry baked goods resulting from too much flour getting into the cup measure.
Susan Tiger’s Irish Soda Bread, County Mayo, Ireland
Makes one large round loaf
4 cups whole wheat flour
2 cups all-purpose white flour
1 1/2 t. salt
I heaping t. baking soda
2 cups buttermilk, or enough to make a sticky but not wet dough
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or with a nonstick pad.
2. Combine dry ingredients and mix to combine. Add buttermilk. Stir with a wooden spoon until the dough comes together. Add more buttermilk if needed to make a sticky dough that is not wet.
3. Form into a round loaf, place on the sheetpan and bake for 1 hour or until the bottom of the bread sounds hollow when tapped. Cool on a wire rack. Serve warm or at room temperature.


Just another Sunday morning in the Badass Kitchen. I bought myself flowers today. St. Pat’s day always signals Spring to me.The buttermilk is important to this recipe by the way, as it produces a chemical reaction with the baking soda that makes the bread rise like crazy.


Here’s the dough all ready to go. This is an unsweetened bread like a wonderful whole wheat bread. If you are looking for sweet Irish Soda versions, this isn’t it, but if you appreciate a rustic homemade loaf with a crusty, caramelized crust and homey taste, this is your bread. For a sweeter version that is not far from the original, try the one from fellow bloggers Tea & Cookies.


Okay, can I just say, “Yum!”

If you have a Badass Baked Good recipe for Laura and Nancy, send it to us and we’ll test it. If it’s badass enough, we’ll post it as a reader’s recipe on Jellypress and you’ll win a prize of Nancy’s book, Walking On Walnuts.

see also: One Badass Cookie - Chocolate Chip Cookies

home > article > How To Make Prosciutto in Your Garage

Masher

How To Make Prosciutto in Your Garage

• by Laura, March 13, 2009

Here.  Want a taste of prosciutto? 

Nancy and I took a photo field trip recently to visit my friend Lou who personally cures his own pig leg and turns it into prosciutto as good as anything I’ve had in Italy. 

For those of you who have read my book or followed this blog, you know which Lou I’m talking about. Lou the mentor and pasta maker.  Lou the cooking hero.  Lou the nothing-is-too-hard-for-me-to-conquer in the kitchen--yes, that guy.  Here we are in his garage.  Though I prefer the term outbuilding because there are no cars here, only a smoker, and curing meat, and garden or carpentry projects….  Sort of like Appalachia.  Or…. Saint Agata. 

Ah Saint Agata....  Say hello to Lou’s cousin just outside Naples.  What’s she got over her head?  Those are prosciutti, covered in netting to keep away flies. This photo was taken by Lou’s brother Joseph on their visit in the late 1990s to the emerald green village of his clan.  I am certain it worked in his mind for years.  If they could do it, why couldn’t he?  He figured out how to make fresh sausage long ago, and then later dry cured soprassata and capicola. 

But prosciutto—that was his Everest.

This past winter, we celebrated his success.  Here is his baby, shot by Nancy, in Lou’s wine cellar here—a small temperature controlled room he built in his basement. 

With one successful first batch behind him (the process took a full year), he started another batch.  So we’re going to track his (er… his ham’s) progress for you here on Jellypress.

It began in February with two 25 pound legs.  These are going to take more than a year to cure.  And they’ll need a lot of salt to draw out the liquid.  Last year Lou put all kinds of weights on them to help press out the liquid.  But this year, he devised a new system using a crank machine normally used for pressing wine from grapes.  He’s very pleased.

He flips the ham over every couple of days and turns the winch just little tighter.  Quite rapidly, the ham gets so flat, it’s hard to believe.  Soon, there is no more blood running off.  It stays pressed in salt for more than 2 weeks. 

Okay, that’s enough for now.  We’ll return here soon.  In the meantime, let’s go back into the kitchen for a taste last year’s batch.

Oh and have a taste of soprassata too. 

Here’s to enough salty spicy sweet pork to last a very long time.  And here’s the Lou and his cousin in Saint Agata.

home > article > One Badass Cookie - French Butter Cookies

Masher

One Badass Cookie - French Butter Cookies

• by Nancy, March 07, 2009

This is my maternal grandmother, Rachel, circa 1960’s as you can tell from her “flip” and Nehru collar. She was one of the original Badass Cookies in my family. We called her Rae. She was a baker. I write that with a deep respect for her skill. Nowhere in her repertoire, however, was there a cooked egg yolk in a cookie dough, which I read recently in Cook’s Illustrated is the secret ingredient to achieving the coveted and fabulous sandy texture of French butter cookies, otherwise known as sablée (which means sandy in French by the way for those who are not fluent in the lingo. And that would include me, nu?) In all fairness, Rae didn’t bake any French cookies. We are Eastern European. Grandma taught us some Badass Rugelach and Babka (which I will get to in these Badass posts, promise!) but for sablée I had to go to pastry school in NYC, known at the time as Peter Kump’s but now known by its hip initials I.C.E. There I got my favorite recipe for sablée from the cookbook author and baker (again I write this word with a deep respect) Nick Malgieri who spearheaded Peter Kump’s back then. Those were good, but I still missed that particularly wonderful sandy mouthfeel of authentic French butter cookies, which I’d eaten in France as a teenager and like everyone else who has ever had them, never forgot. Could it be that Cook’s Illustrated had really and truly found the key to this incredible texture? I had to try it.

At first I thought, what a lot of trouble to go to for sandy texture. But Cook’s Illustrated’s recipe made the process quick and easy. First you put the eggs (I made two to have enough for another chocolate dough too) in your pot and cover them with an inch of water. Bring the water to a boil. Then take the pot off the heat, cover it and let it sit ten minutes. No time lost there. Meanwhile you can be measuring out your other ingredients.


When the ten minutes waiting time is up, you transfer the eggs with a slotted spoon to a bowl of ice water. There they sit for five more minutes. Then you peel them and grab out the yolks. Cooks says to discard the white but if you love egg whites as I do, just gobble it up. They’re really good for you.


Now here’s the only part that takes a minute or two extra but is super easy and well worth it. Push the yolk through a fine strainer.


And it works. I was in a kind of heaven crunching these. You will be too. Isn’t it wonderful to satisfy a craving you’ve had since you were a kid? Apparently I am slow on the uptake however as other bloggers, like Cookie Madness, have used this technique in cookie recipes galore including chocolate chip. Go on, try it. And if you do, let us know what you think.
Badass Cookie Tip of the Week: Double your sablée recipe and freeze half to use later as a fabulous French tart dough too.
You can substitute the cooked yolk in any sablée recipe, but here’s my favorite one with the hard cooked yolk included.This is adapted from Nick Malgieri’s incredible book, Nick Malgieri’s Perfect Pastry:
French Butter Cookies (sablée)
Makes approximately 3 dozen cookies.
1 stick butter, softened but not greasy
1/4 cup sugar
1 t. vanilla extract, optional
1 hard cooked yolk
1/4 t. salt
1 1/4 cups cake flour
1. Follow directions for cooking and prepping the egg yolk in the text and photos above and set aside. Cream the butter with the sugar. Add vanilla extract if using. Add yolk and mix well.
2. Add salt to flour and add dry ingredients all at once to the butter mixture. Combine gently. Do not over-mix. Gather dough into a ball, wrap in plastic, flatten into a disk and refrigerate until firm enough to roll, at least a half hour or more.
3. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Roll dough out on a lightly floured surface until about 1/4 inch thick. Cut into shapes with cookie cutters or a glass. Place on parchment paper or nonstick pad covered or greased cookie sheets. Bake until golden brown, about 10 - 15 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool. May be stored in an airtight container for up to ten days.


That’s my Papa Max, Rae’s hubby. Never forget to kiss the cook.

If you have a cookie recipe for Laura and Nancy that you think is pretty badass, send it to us and we’ll test it. If it’s badass enough, we’ll post it as a reader’s recipe and you’ll win a prize of Nancy’s book Walking on Walnuts .

see also: One Badass Cookie - Chocolate Chip Cookies

home > article > Are Your Tomatoes Picked By Slave Laborers?

Masher

Are Your Tomatoes Picked By Slave Laborers?

• by Laura, February 26, 2009

I read an article in the last week that I can’t get off my mind, and obviously I’m not alone as the link is spreading among food bloggers.  I’m going to add to the chorus.

This article was by Barry Estabrook in Gourmet about tomato pickers in Immokalee, Florida (tomato capital of America) who describes illegal immigrants come from Mexico or Central America a working 10 hour days and earning 45 cents for every 32 lb bucket of tomatoes they pick--jobs which most Americans simply won’t do.  You can click on this slide show and get a glimpse. 

From Eastabrook:

“In Florida’s Immokalee tomato fields, slavery, squalid living conditions are symptoms of system that exploits immigrants so supermarkets can sell winter tomatoes and fast-food outlets can add them to sandwiches. In 12 years, officials have freed 1,000-plus workers.”

A thousand people freed from slavery in Florida over the last dozen years?  All so we can have tasteless pink tomatoes out of season?  The article tells us that if we eat a tomato this winter, chances are that it was picked by someone living in slave conditions.  Estabrook recounts stories of
workers who get their lives threatened if they try to leave work camps. 

Rather than righteously cogitate any further, I want to send you directly to the CIW--Coalition of Immokalee Workers--which has done a wonderful job over the last years. Rather than force a boycott, they work hard negotiating with large food companies such as Subway sandwich company, fast food chains, and Whole Foods, trying to get them to sign agreements that they wont buy tomatoes that were picked with abusive labor practices.  You can visit their website, find more information, photos of conditions, and “take action” suggestions, such as easy forms you can download for letters to companies and elected officials.  http://ciw-online.org Here are some photos from CWI giving a glimpse.  Please take a moment to have a look.  The link to Estabrook’s article is below.

Here, again, the Barry Estabrook article.  I think it’s a great story and so glad that Gourmet did it. 

www.gourmet.com/

home > article > Onion, luminous flask

Masher

Onion, luminous flask

• by Laura, February 19, 2009

Nope.  No photo here.

You see, my Nikon digital camera (only a couple years old) is shot to hell, and it’s really cramping my blogging style.  But I’m getting annoyed at my dependence on the photo.  As a writer I love words.  Why aren’t they enough?  Do readers always need the encouragement of the image, the entertainment?  Well not today dear friends. 

Nancy frequently tells me that modern photography and digital life overwhelm us visually--but we don’t really see or think because the images are pre-defined and closed.  There is no place for the human to enter.  She’s spoken to me a lot about the open-ness of Pierre Bonnard’s exhibit currently at the Met in New York .  I hope Nancy will share some of her insights on this amazing show with so many food images.  Painting is a tonic for modern life.

For the same reasons, literature is too--with its open gestures and suggestions, the room it leaves us for imagination.  That’s why today, I’m posting Pablo Neruda’s poem “Ode to an Onion.”

I dare you to read it aloud (in English or, even better, the original Spanish, which follows).  And then I challenge you--any of you out there--to send a photo of an onion that rivals this.  Here goes:

Ode to an Onion

Onion,
luminous flask,
your beauty formed
petal by petal,
crystal scales expanded you
and in the secrecy of the dark earth
your belly grew round with dew.

Under the earth
the miracle
happened
and when your clumsy
green stem appeared,
and your leaves were born
like swords
in the garden,
the earth heaped up her power
showing your naked transparency,
and as the remote sea
in lifting the breasts of Aphrodite
duplicating the magnolia,
so did the earth
make you,
onion
clear as a planet
and destined
to shine,
constant constellation,
round rose of water,
upon
the table
of the poor.

You make us cry without hurting us.
I have praised everything that exists,
but to me, onion, you are
more beautiful than a bird
of dazzling feathers,
heavenly globe, platinum goblet,
unmoving dance
of the snowy anemone

and the fragrance of the earth lives
in your crystalline nature.

Oda a la cebolla

Cebolla,
luminosa redoma,
pétalo a pétalo
se formó tu hermosura,
escamas de crystal te acrecentaron
y en el secreto de la tierra oscura
se redondeó tu vientre de rocío.
Bajo la tierra
fue el milagro
y cuando apareció
tu torpe tallo verde,
y nacieron
tus hojas como espadas en el huerto,
la tierra acumuló su poderío
mostrando tu desnuda transparencia,
y como en Afrodita el mar remoto
duplicó la magnolia
levantando sus senos,
la tierra
así te hizo,
cebolla,
clara como un planeta,
y destinada ,
a relucir ,
constelación constante,
redonda rosa de agua,
sobre
la mesa
de las pobres gentes.

Nos hiciste llorar sin afligirnos.
Yo cuanto existe celebré, cebolla,
pero para mi eres
más hermosa que un ave
de plumas cegadoras
eres para mis ojos
globo celeste, copa de platino,
baile inmóvil
de anémona nevada

y vive la fragancia de la tierra
en tu naturaleza cristalina.

home > article > Green Granny’s Leftovers

Not to be Forgotten

Green Granny’s Leftovers

• by Laura, February 19, 2009

Frugality is the buzz word these days.  So I’m sharing a recipe from my favorite frugal housewife of all time, Lydia Maria Child.  (For modernized version of this recipe, follow the jump.) She was a novelist and abolitionist, but she wrote cookbooks to pay the bills.  She came to her power during the “New Republic,” when Americans believed they’d need to be thrifty and virtuous to survive as a new nation.  Lydia offers ideas for using up heart and lungs of cow, pigsfeet, tripe, and all the rest of those budget cuts.  To pull off these dishes required some skillful cooking, good techniques, and often the use of herbs from the garden or wine.  Lydia was also a fabulous gardener, pickle-er, and philosopher.  She believed women should be educated.  But she didn’t want them to let good food go to waste.  What’s interesting is that her real passion was the abolition of slavery.  And when she wrote about it, she was blacklisted and fired from her magazine job.  Society at that time was more interested in its women being frugal--fussing with leftover scraps--than being vocal about issues like equality. 

Well all those battles were long ago fought.  And the ideas of frugality were ultimately swept aside and then brought back again--during wars and depressions--as needed--times such as now.

In the food world of recent years, the basic M.O. of our cooking “teachers,” —and by this I mean celeb chefs, food writers, and food show hosts—has been to tell us we must use the VERY best quality ingredients we can possibly find--whether imported porcini from Italy or the sweetest grass fed lamb.  In this way, doing good shopping (say at the farmer’s market or Whole Foods) sure enough leads to a delicious dish.  The only problem is that sometimes I think this is not really cooking, but shopping.  Consider the simplest meal--wild salmon at seventeen bucks a pound, and, say, organic greens steamed and tossed with sea salt and expensive olive oil… roasted yukon gold potatoes with rosemary....  You don’t need to do much to these ingredients to create a good meal for four.  You just need to plunk down about $27 bucks at Whole Foods.  This adds up for a family. 

But most people have limited and merely average ingredients. You need a lot more skill to turn ordinary materials into a good meal.  Herein are the TRUE COOKS, in my opinion.  And all the more if you can pull it off 6 or 7 nights a week.  But of course this sort of ordinary cooking has been less interesting during the last couple decades when we simply buy instead.

These days, I find it a little funny to watch

everyone from Martha Stewart to the New York Times Dining In/Dining Out frantically retool for the recession with cost-cutting recipes after a decade of shop-your-way-to-gastronomy approach.  Okay, perhaps I’m exagerating a bit to make my point.  But I think you get it. 

Bread Pudding, Modern Version

6 to 8 ounces of a dense stale bread, cubed or crumbled, (quantity depends on density of your bread)
enough milk to cover
2 to 3 eggs
1/2 to 3/4 cup sugar depending on your preference
1 cinnamon or rosewater or ginger or any other spice mixture that goes with the bread or “additions” you might choose.

Possible additions:  1 cup chopped apples or pears (reduce bread slightly), or 1/2 cup chocolate chips, or 1/2 cup raisins

1) Butter a deep dish pie plate or other appropriate baking dish.  Preheat oven to 350.
2) Soak bread in milk until soft but not disintegrated.  (A dense bread can sit overnight.)
3) Beat eggs and sugar until well blended.  Add and any “additions” if you are using them.  Combine all well and pour into the buttered pie plate.
4) Bake 1/2 hour or until golden and the center is ever so slightly jiggly (overcooking with dry it). 

If you want to see someone actually make a bread pudding,, Oxfam has obviously teamed up with this interesting woman named Barbara who put out videos to “help people save money and live better.” Here she demonstrates.  Can’t say it looks that brilliant when you see it done.  But on the other hand, if you’ve got the the skill to use spice and know how to handle a pudding so that it doesn’t dry out or curdle, well then it could be quite good. 

home > article > Chocolate and the Art of Tiernan Alexander

Artist's Notebook

Chocolate and the Art of Tiernan Alexander

• by Nancy, February 05, 2009

“Chocolate Pot” ceramic, copyright 2008 Tiernan Alexander.
Photo credit: Tiernan Alexander.
Brrr, it’s definitely hot chocolate time in the east. Here is a beautiful contemporary interpretation of a traditional Mayan chocolate pot, the kind once used to serve hot chocolate, by my friend the ceramic artist Tiernan Alexander. I love the way Tiernan has referenced the aged surface and gourd-shaped bodies of ancient chocolate pots without copying them. The deliberate imperfections in her vessel are almost painterly and eloquently evoke a sense of history and the passage of time. I caught up with Tiernan recently for an interview and asked her about why she made the pot and her interest in ancient hot chocolate vessels. And got her favorite old recipe for hot chocolate.
Jellypress: Tiernan, what made you want to reinterpret an ancient chocolate pot?
TA: Chocolate had an incredible history in Central and South America. There are ritual and traditional pots made from ceramics, coconut shells, wood, and gourds. These days you see the gourd shaped pots used mostly with South American Yerba Mate tea, but I have also seen the little gourd pots and dippers used at chocolate and atole stands in the streets. (Atole is a cornflour based drink that is often combined with chocolate into a thick hot drink called Champurrada.)


Jellypress: You told us that you took the above photo at a spring festival where they were serving a fruit drink, but that in winter, hot chocolate is served in a similar way. Tell us more about your experience buying hot chocolate and how they serve it.

TA: In winter there are a number of street vendors selling chocolate and atole both at regular markets and at festivals. Huge open tubs of fragrant liquid are whipped into a rich lather using a wooden whisk that looks more like a spinning spindle than what we think of as a whisk. The women running the stands will often dip it out using either painted coconut bowls, carved wooden ladles or hardened gourd-ladles. Often if you are going to drink your chocolate there at the stand you can have your drink in a shallow painted bowl rather than a styrofoam cup. The bowl is then rinsed and put back into service for the next customer.
Jellypress: What touched you as an artist about this ritual and its presence at the markets?
TA:The atmosphere that surrounds the stands with their vats of creamy comfort, the grandmothers in their beautiful aprons spinning their hands together around the spindle whisk, their encouraging demeanor seems less that of a business and more of a personal relationship.
Jellypress: Do you have a great old recipe to share with us?
TA: Yes. It’s for Champurrada or Chocolate Atole.
1/2 cup masa harina
3 cups water
3 cups milk
1 cup brown sugar (piloncillo)
3 oz unsweetened chocolate
Heat the water to boiling and then add the masa. Lower the heat and stir
constantly until the masa and water thicken together. Add the brown sugar
(or piloncillo if you can get it). After the sugar is incorporated add the
milk and continue heating without boiling while adding the chocolate (it is
easiest to add it if you break it up or grate the chocolate. Whisk it up
until there is a thick foam on top.


Jellypress: What a great picture of you! Thanks Tiernan. All this talk of hot chocolate is making us crave one. We gotta get over to the Hot Chocolate Festival at City Bakery in NYC that they’re raving about on Paris Breakfasts blog. In the meantime, where can we see more of your art and learn more about you, Tiernan?
TA: Thank you, Jellypress! Come visit me at my website http://www.ekrg.com/tiernan/

home > article > Under the Orange Tree with my Sister

Masher

Under the Orange Tree with my Sister

• by Laura, February 04, 2009

I went to Florida last weekend to visit my parents who moved there a year ago.  My mom had recently had a hip operation, and it was hard on them both, so I went hoping to bring some cheer.  We had a lot of laughs, but on the last day it was hard to say goodbye. 

The weather was about 60 degrees, and the climate and quality of sunlight was astounding to me arriving from New Jersey, where we’ve had the coldest winter I can remember in a long time and so much snow.  This tree is in the backyard of my sister Lisa and her husband Kayhan.  They live near my parents.  One of my favorite moments of the weekend was stopping by their wonderful house (with two palm trees bent together in the shape of a heart out front--I kid you not) and finding their orange tree in full bloom in the back.  I’ve visited before, but never this time of year when the citrus are in season.  Here are Lisa and I together. 

Notice my hand clutching a bag.  I came home with my suitcase filled with these oranges and a bunch of Meyer lemons too.  They blew me away--full of flavor and juice, full of brightness.  Thank you Lisa and Kayhan!

home > article > Thing of the Day - Nancy’s Art Featured in the Montclair Times

Masher

Thing of the Day - Nancy’s Art Featured in the Montclair Times

• by Nancy, January 30, 2009

If you haven’t had time yet to see my art exhibit including lots of jellypress art at Orbis Bistro in Montclair, there’s still time, and you can read all about it here. 

home > article > My First Sea Urchin

Not to be Forgotten

My First Sea Urchin

• by Laura, January 26, 2009

I’ve never been one for the “look-at-all-the-fabulous-food-I-get-to-eat” approach to food writing.  Many of my lunches are quick affairs--a melted cheese or salad eaten hastily at the kitchen counter.  I’m a working girl and the deadlines call me back to my office.

However, somehow my life took an interesting twist recently when Lou brought me into the circle of the lunch club.  It’s a quiet under-the-radar group that meets very occasionally.  Perhaps I’ll reveal more in time.  Or perhaps not. (I’m worried, in fact, that even this post may jeopardize my good standing.) It occurs during the off hours of a certain beautiful restaurant in town, hosted by a beautiful chef and attended by some wonderful cooks who bring gifts.  Okay, that’s all I’m saying. Except that recently, at one of these lunches, I had the good fortune to taste my very first sea urchin. 

Those who, like I, have lived their lives in sad ignorance of the sea urchin can see in the photo above that it is a spiny creature.  Beneath those porcupinelike bristles is a shellfish, and you have to crack through underneath and then use a spoon to scoop out just a tiny sweet dollop of meat, which in this case (should I tell you this?--oh, okay) is the sex organs. 

But really--just think of it as a cousin of the oyster.  It has the salty fresh liquor of the sea.  A great delicacy nowadays, though Lou tells me he ate them as a kid in Queens when his family had little money and his Italian mother was accustomed to using all aspects of fish that other people threw away.  I’ve been looking around for a Chinese recipe for sea urchin, or a Japanese recipe.  Something old.  No luck so far.

Anyway, it’s been more than a week since my first encounter with the first sea urchin.  I took its body home and have been letting it dry out on the porch.  I keep wondering why it made such a big impression on me.  My childhood had very little of the natural world, except our visits to the ocean at the New Jersey shore, where we were always happy in the salt and sand and bright light reflecting off the water, and I wonder if that’s why I love the taste of all things of the ocean?  In her “A Book of Middle Eastern Food” (1970), I think Claudia Roden captures this feeling of humans coming to the sea and its creatures with a sense of joy.  Just beautiful. 

“Hunting for ritza (sea urchins) is a favourite pastime in Alexandria. It is a pleasure to swim out to the rocks, dive into the sea and discover hosts of dark purple and black, spiky jewel-like balls clinging fast to the rocks, a triumph to wrench them away, and a delight to cut a piece off the top, squeeze a little lemon over the soft, salmon-coloured flesh, scoop it out with some bread, and savour the subtle iodized taste, lulled by the rhythm of the sea.”

home > article > Nancy’s Solo Art Exhibit

Masher

Nancy’s Solo Art Exhibit

• by Nancy, January 19, 2009

Say congrats, because I’m having a show of my artwork, including lots of the pieces that grace Jellypress. Here’s a photo of me standing in front of the original banner painting hanging in the exhibit. Pretty exciting. And this exhibit is especially delicious because you can see all my kitchen and food-themed pieces as well as eat some wonderful food.  It’s at one of my favorite restaurants in New Jersey, Orbis Bistro at 128 Watchung Avenue, Montclair. The exhibit will up for a month, January 20th through February 20th, and you can see it Tuesday through Sunday evenings (call for rez 973-746-7641) and enjoy some fabulous food too. It’s run by an accomplished and highly talented chef, Nancy Caballes - yep, two Nancys, double the fun. Laura introduced me to Nancy, and it was a real meeting of the minds.


Here’s the warm dining room (it’s got fabulous floor to ceiling windows) at Orbis with some of my work hanging. Orbis Bistro opened in December 1998 in a storefront at the corner of Watchung Avenue and North Fullerton in Montclair.  Nancy confessed a love of cupcakes to me, and so of course I had to bake some for her. Check ‘em out - my tried and true Silver Palate Cookbook carrot cake recipe baked as cupcakes with Martha Stewart mascarpone frosting:


When I gave them to Nancy she literally jumped up and down with joy shouting “Cupcakes! Cupcakes! Cupcakes!” My sentiments exactly. We saved some room for them after we lunched on some of Nancy C’s over-the-top delicious Panko bread crumb coated chicken cutlets and green salad.


Orbis is worth the trip whether you’re near or far. So come on out, brave the cold, see some art, splurge on a painting or drawing to take home if you’re so inclined or simply enjoy the beautiful atmosphere of food like art — and art of food. 

home > article > My Kitchen Door

Masher

My Kitchen Door

• by Nancy, January 16, 2009

Here is a new painting I did of the door that leads into my kitchen from the back yard. Portal. Boundary. The painting has such a sense of place that I often feel it looks more like the kitchen door than the real door. It’s the entry we use most in our house. If you are family or friend, if you belong here, you’re coming in the back straight into the kitchen. That’s the place, after all, where we live.

home > article > One Badass Cookie — Snowball Cookies

Masher

One Badass Cookie — Snowball Cookies

• by Nancy, January 12, 2009

Here I am with my snowblower which refuses to start at the moment, and my reward for all the shoveling I had to do as a consequence — this week’s One Badass Cookie, my Great Aunt Dotty’s Snowball Cookies. There are certain desserts that my ex, a chef, and I used to refer to as “secret weapons.” These were the ones that we baked off in big batches and then froze to pull out on those days when we couldn’t stand eating another healthful thing. The snowball cookies fit in that category which made a lot of sense if you think about it since real snowballs are weapons too. Speaking of which, my eleven-year-old son got me smack on the ear with a big icy one last night. Mom didn’t have much of a sense of humor about it. The snowball cookies are great though, but if you want to make them, baker beware. They are proven irresistible. Once you start, you cannot, I repeat, cannot stop eating them. A cookie that comes with a warning — now that’s One Badass Cookie. Read on for the One Badass Cookie Tip of the Week, the recipe, and more photos of these sugar-frosted walnut packed gems.

One Badass Cookie Tip of the Week: As a general guideline, toast nuts that will be incorporated into a dough or batter, but leave nuts that garnish unbaked goods raw so they will not burn when put in the oven to bake. To toast most nuts, place them on a cookie sheet in a 350 degree oven until lightly browned and fragrant, about 5 - 10 minutes. Best rule of thumb to tell when they are perfectly done? Your nose. When they smell yummy, they’re ready.
Great Aunt Dotty’s Snowball Cookies
Makes about two dozen 1 1/2 inch diameter cookies.
1/2 lb. (2 sticks) sweet, unsalted butter
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups flour, sifted
2 cups chopped walnuts or pecans, toasted and cooled.
confectioner’s sugar, enough for dredging baked cookies.
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper or nonstick pads and set aside.
2. Cream butter and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment or by hand.  Add vanilla extract.  Add flour all at once and mix only until incorporated then add nuts. Do not over mix the dough.
3. Pick up small pieces of dough and roll into balls.  Place on cookie sheet about an inch apart.
4. Bake for 10 minutes or more until light brown.  Remove from oven and while stilll warm roll in powdered sugar.


If you toast nuts on parchment paper covered sheetpans, it makes it easy to slide the nuts onto a wire rack to cool faster than on the hot sheetpan.


If the dough gets too soft to roll the balls, place it in the refrigerator for a while until it is firmer.


Warm and toasty looking, straight from the oven. Mmmmm.


Dredge the cookies in the powdered sugar right away while they are warm so it melts the sugar a little on the surface of the cookies and makes a soft, sweet crust.

Got a great cookie recipe for Nancy and Laura? Send it in to us using the “post a comment” links and we’ll test it. If it’s badass enough, we’ll post it as a reader’s recipe on One Badass Cookie and you’ll win a prize of Nancy’s book.

see also: One Badass Cookie - Chocolate Chip Cookies

home > article > Thing of the Day

Masher

Thing of the Day

• by Nancy, January 10, 2009

Laura wrote in her last Thing of the Day post about her kids’ toys strewn around her kitchen and often landing in the cooking pot. So here’s my whimsical little kitchen troll who inhabits my counters, and a poem to go with her (with sincere apologies to the fabulous W. S. Merwin.)
So . . . that was the way it was, and in the fragrant light
that came in at the window, she was standing
still, that way, seeing nothing but the light
just the empty kitchen, with the smell of the over-ripe banana . . .

see also: Thing of the Day

home > article > We Love Feedback

Hands On

We Love Feedback

• by Laura, January 09, 2009

How great it is when I get feedback on a story or recipe.  I always initially cringe with some apprehension.  Did I get it right?  Did it work?  (Self doubt never entirely goes away, does it?)

Well, I’ve been really happy because t he pandolce story I wrote in December got some wonderful responses.  Why this particular story?  Don’t know.  Perhaps because the idea of natural leaven has a certain magic to it--the wild yeast around us, the idea of a lump of living dough that gets passed down from one generation to the next--"mother yeast.” It’s just such an old technique.  Or maybe it was simply that love so many of us have for Italy. 

Ken Albala sent me this wonderful post from his blog about how he read my pandolce story in Saveur, and it inspired him him to make his own pandoro with a starter--and no recipe. The results look gorgeous, and he makes it so easy.  Check it out. (Ken is an award winning writer and food scholar who tells me he plans to build a backyard bread baking oven this summer--and plans to do it all by hand.) You can see his story and pandoro picture here. 
http://kenalbala.blogspot.com/2008/12/pandoro.html
Valerie Tassa from San Francisco initially wrote me asking where she could find fresh citron--not so easy in the U.S., but she triumphed, and found these, which she candied


to make this gorgeous thing,
.

and yes, she is a ravioli fan, too, and boy was I touched to find out she made Tessie and Adalgisa’s recipe from my book.  Gosh. 

home > article > Thing of the Day

Masher

Thing of the Day

• by Nancy, January 06, 2009

My ex-boyfriend, who broke my heart, mailed me something inconsequential that I left in his apartment along with a chatty little card. I found his coffee in the freezer. Did I send it to him with a chatty little card? No, I served it to my new beau.
He said, “I thought you only drank decaf. Why do you have real coffee?”
“To serve to you,” I replied.

see also: Thing of the Day

home > article > One Badass Cookie — Raisin Cookies

Masher

One Badass Cookie — Raisin Cookies

• by Nancy, January 05, 2009

Photo credit: My son, Max, one badass photographer

One Badass Cookie is proud to present its first Reader’s Recipe of the New Year! Congratulations to my friend, Michele Kishita of Philadelphia, Pa. for sending in her mother’s Raisin Cookies. Michele told me that her mother baked these cookies during Michele’s childhood and that they were so delicious she craved them all her life. Though her mother left her the recipe, Michele rarely bakes and hadn’t had the cookies in years. When I mentioned this to my own mother, she gasped in surprise. “Do you know?” she told me, “Those are one of my favorite childhood cookies too and I lost the recipe. I’ve been looking for it for thirty years.” So Michele dug out her mother’s original recipe, pictured below, and I started baking. I was thrilled to send a big container of the finished cookies to both Michele and my mom. A taste that lasts a lifetime — now that’s One Badass Cookie! I also found this link to a sister cookie that sounds fabulous too for those who like a bit of spice and zest with their raisins. Read on for the updated version of Michele’s recipe, more photos and the Badass Cookie Tip of the Week. Does it work? You bet your badass it does!




I like to use an old jelly jar to cut out round cookies.

One Badass Cookie Tip of the Week:Brush cookies with egg white before baking for a shiny, professional looking finish. Sprinkle the egg white with sugar to add sweetness and crunch if desired.
Raisin Filled Cookies
Makes approximately three dozen 2 to 3 inch diameter cookies depending on size.
Note: Allow time to cook and cool filling mixture ahead of time.
For filling:
2 1/2 cups raisins
1 1/2 cups sugar or to taste
2 cups water
6 T. flour
For dough:
1 cup shortening (you may substitute butter but the original texture and taste of the cookie will be changed.)
2 cups white granulated sugar
3 eggs
1 t. vanilla extract
1 cup whole milk
1 t. baking soda
4 t. baking powder
1 t. salt
Egg yolk for sealing dough before baking, and egg white for brushing top of cookies if desired.
7 cups all purpose flour (or 6 cups for making drop cookies without filling if desired.)
1. Combine all filling ingredients in a heavy bottomed saucepan and cook until the sugar is dissolved and the mixture thickens. Allow to cool.
2. Beat shortening and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, or by hand with a wooden spoon, until creamy and fully incorporated. Add eggs slowly a little at a time, mixing well between additions.
3. Combine vanilla extract and milk and set aside. Combine dry ingredients and set aside. Using lowest speed on mixer or gently by hand, add dries to shortening mixture in three additions alternating with liquid, beginning and ending with flour (1/3 of flour, then 1/2 of milk, then 1/3 of flour, then the rest of the milk, then the last 1/3 of flour.) Do not overbeat.
4. Divide dough into three disks, cover in plastic wrap and refrigerate until chilled enough to roll out.
5. When dough and filling are ready, preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper, nonstick pads, or grease sheets and set aside.
6. Roll out dough 1/4 inch thick and use a round 2 or 3 inch cutter to cut dough. On 1/2 of the cookie rounds, place a large dollop of filling. Brush egg yolk or water around edge of cookie dough to help seal it, then place a plain cookie round on top and press to seal. Cut a slit in the top dough to allow steam to escape and brush cookie with egg white if desired. Continue until all the dough has been rolled, filled and seal. Place cookies on prepared sheet pans and bake for approximately 15 minutes or more until golden top and bottom. If you double your sheetpans under the cookies and rotate pans during baking top to bottom and back to front it will help ensure even baking. Cool on wire racks and store in an airtight container.


Leave a little margin of cookie dough around the filling so that the top dough can have enough room to seal properly.


Cutting a thin slit like this in the top of filled cookies helps steam escape but keeps the filling from burning or drying out.


Oh baby.


Here is Michele and her brother in a photo she sent me next to the cookies I made for her. How fun is this?

Got a cookie recipe badass enough for One Badass Cookie? Send it to us and we’ll test it. If it’s badass enough we’ll post it as a reader’s recipe and you’ll win a prize of Nancy’s book.

home > article > Thing of the Day

Masher

Thing of the Day

• by Laura, January 03, 2009

Toys in the Kitchen

Stuffed guys on the kitchen counter again,
furry ones, just below those
spoons dangling on the hook
and ready, for measuring
coffee.
Graphic novel --little boxes of outrageous behavior-- and
plastic wrestler dudes entangled.
Dried up garlic bits,
origami lotus flower,
transformer in vehicular form.
I am old to this game, thirteen years now,
and the little one nearly 8.
Tonight, a Lego warrior came
so close to the frying pan.
I knew it would come to this someday. 
When I was done, I just threw him and let
his pair of ragged claws scuttle across the crumbs.

home > article > Champagne Cocktail from 1862

Not to be Forgotten

Champagne Cocktail from 1862

• by Laura, December 30, 2008

What Is it About Bubbles?

Nancy called me all excited about her bubbly recipes--bubbly as in the champagne granite and champagne truffles she found from her wild young days as a pastry chef in NYC. 

“Laura can you do a “Not to Be Forgotten Recipe” for champagne? And can you write a few lines and be a little deep, okay?

Sheesh.  I’m still recovering from ravioli. 

This recipe for champagne cocktail comes from the 1862 Bar-Tender’s Guide, book, which many experts say is the very first cocktail book ever published. It will come as no surprise to most of you that Americans first gave the world the invention (if you can call it such) of the cocktail.  You can’t imagine the French adding sugar and ice and bitters to their beloved sparkling wine from the Champagne region of France, now can you?  That said, this sure does seem very simple and fun, and I’m curious, just so long as the bubbles are still there.

Which brings me back to the champagne itself and its most important element:  those bubbles, which get created after the wine is already made and then bottled.  The trick is that a little yeast gets added to each bottle creating a second fermentation process. The yeast gets to work, eating up sugars and creating alcohol and gas--trapped inside the bottles.  After a short time, the yeast dies away, but the fizz remains. Voila.  Bubbles.

“What is it about bubbles?” I asked Nancy.  “Why do we like them so much?  And why on New Year’s Eve?”

“Because, bubbles are ephemeral,” she replied.  “They represent that we are only beautiful and young once.  Then it all pops . . . like a bubble.”

And then she sent me to this beautiful painting by Clara Peeters, a 17th century Flemish still life painter, who, using a convention of the era, painted an actual bubble into the air about her head in her self portrait.  Take a look. 

The bubble is to the right of her face against the back wall. The gold and coins scattered on the table are symbols of material wealth--not to be compared with spiritual wealth. She holds a watch to remind us that time is passing.  And the flowers also suggest fleeting beauty.

“Check it out,” said Nancy.  “Her strong forearms a and ruddy hands give her away. She’s an artist, not a pretty doll. The expression is serious. This is an artist posing herself and allowing us to gaze at her as an object in order to make her point.  Very brave.”

So I say here’s wishing you some fun though ephemeral bubbles for New Years Eve, and more enduring happiness for 2009.  And here’s to Clara too, brave painter. 

Happy New Year.  Now go get the champagne.  Be ready.  The fun has already started. 

see also: Bubbly Recipes

home > article > New Year’s Suckling Pig

Masher

New Year’s Suckling Pig

• by Nancy, December 30, 2008

Laura told me this morning as we were chatting on the phone that the Victorians loved to use pigs as a symbol of good luck and prosperity on their New Year’s cards and decorations (yes, this is really what we talk about which gives you an idea how jellypress was conceived . . .) Anyway, it makes sense, doesn’t it? If you had a pig, you had something to eat. These photos are just in from my brother, Bruce, an attorney and photographer, fresh from a recent trip to Madrid. These people are serious about their pigs.


This photo is a scan Bruce did of the restaurant Botin’s post card. Seems they made the Guinness Book of World Records for being the world’s oldest restaurant. Got a suckling pig anecdote? We’d love to hear from you. Happy New Year.

Photo credit: Bruce Ring

Photo credit: Bruce Ring

Photo credit: Bruce Ring

Photo credit: Bruce Ring

home > article > Bubbly Recipes

Masher

Bubbly Recipes

• by Nancy, December 30, 2008

We love Jean-Baptiste-Simeon Chardin’s Soap Bubble painting and our easy bubbly New Year’s recipes. Let us know if you try them.


Champagne truffles, rolled in cocoa and ready for their close-up.

Champagne Truffles

Makes about 60 truffles
1 pound bittersweet chocolate
3/4 cup heavy cream or creme fraiche
1/2 cup champagne
6 T. unsalted sweet butter, softened
For dipping:
1 pound semisweet chocolate
2 cups unsweetened cocoa
1. Cut 1 pound chocolate into small pieces and place in a small bowl. Melt chocolate over simmering water or in a microwave oven. Set aside until ready to use.
2. Scald the cream and champagne and pour over the chocolate. Whisk until smooth.
3. Mix in the soft butter and pour the mixture onto a sheetpan covered with parchment paper or a nonstick pad. Refrigerate until you can form balls with the mixture.
4. Roll small balls of chocolate. Keep them cold.
5. Melt the other pound of chocolate. Temper the chocolate (don’t know how? Let David Lebovitz show you.) When all the balls are rolled, put some of the melted chocolate into the palm of your hand. Roll a truffle in your palm, letting it roll off your finger tips back onto the sheetpan. Continue until all balls are coated with chocolate. Chill. When chilled and dry to touch, roll in cocoa powder. Keep stored in cocoa powder in the freezer or refrigerator.

home > article > The Best Christmas Ravioli

Masher

The Best Christmas Ravioli

• by Laura, December 19, 2008

Well, it’s ravioli time, isn’t it.  Christmas is next week.  And we working women of the modern era, well, we like to have ours done about now and stocked away in the freezer.
I made mine this past Sunday with my sister Andrea, who came over eager to help. 

So now while I’m in the ravioli spirit is a good time to tell you all that The Lost Ravioli Recipes of Hoboken: A Search for Food and Family has recently come out in paperback. 

I really like this cover and—and hope the book will continue to reach people, as that’s what every author wishes for.  In this new edition, there is a reader’s guide at the end of the book, and I will be making myself available in 2009 for book group invitations, mainly by phone but also the occasional in person visit.  You can find out more, including my contact info, at www.lostravioli.com.

Back to ravioli….

This year, there was not a lot of torture over raw or cooked meat, as you can see in these photos of braising beef, veal, and pork. 

There were all sorts of aromatics involved and the house smelled beautiful for two days. 

I did NOT get all worried about the cream cheese, either.  I added a package of it.  Since my book came out a year ago, I can’t tell you how many Genoese descendants have told me they use cream cheese. In light of everything and I publicly apologize for my former snobbery

and ask forgiveness.

As to rolling pin versus pasta machine?  I used a machine this year simply because my board is now officially sagging and the pin is not meeting the surface.  Very unpleasant. Until I get a new board, I’m using the machine.  Well, actually, this is Andrea using the machine. 

It might sound like all is resolved and peaceful.  But some things never change.  Of course I had to make a last minute run to Lou’s house for some extra 00 flour.  What can I say?

Since The Lost Ravioli Recipes first came out in hardcover a year ago, a lot of things have happened.

For one thing, hundreds of Italian Americans have written to me or come to my author events to tell me about their families and their recipes, and their yearnings—whether for family or Italy, or some other form connection and continuity they can’t quite explain.  I have been so honored and humbled to hear of the things people do for love and ravioli.

Some of my favorites:  Bob (Schenone) Cole and his family in Philadelphia whose recipe matched mine just about exactly and told me his mother knew my great grandmother Adalgiza.  A musician named Georgeanne who began with “I was a generation closer,” to describe her own Italian American twilight and shared an incredible tale about her own life.  Then there was the NJ woman who wrote, “I don’t know where to begin,” and sent me a photo of herself sitting on a bench with a bunch of old Italian women in her ancestors town.  She didn’t understand it—why was she always drawn back there?

I also made some videos of pasta rolling which have gotten a lot of response, such as this one on youtube, which over 4,000 people have watched.  I feel very shy about this, video because I’m not exactly Rachel Ray here.  But I am really touched by all the comments.  So here’s the link. . 

Writing a book about your own life changes your life. I guess that was my intention but I could never have expected some of the things, such as how over the last year, I slowly felt a burden lifted from my shoulders.  Something I can’t explain. But I discovered I no longer feel as needful of my own past.  Strange and oddly liberating.  I’m far less often pummeled by memories.  I am more in the present.

Finally, since the book came out, a number of readers have asked me how my sister is doing.  They ask about her health and tell me they worry about her.  For those who don’t know, the book included details about our strained relationship and her illness.  Well, she is doing just fine.  She has found that a radical diet of eating very non-inflammatory foods is helpful and reduces pain. But we still hope for the medical community to come up with some solutions for this condition she has, which is called adhesive disease, and millions of people suffer from it.

My relationship with Andrea continues to be good two years after writing my closing chapter.  there have been no blow ups, no problems.  We are friends, or maybe just sisters, as sisters should be.  I don’t know if this would have ever happened if I didn’t write the book.  When she read it she told me “I never thought you understood.  Now I know you did.” I’d say that this was the best thing that ever came out of all my writing years.

Andrea even leans on my shoulder once in the while, as a younger sister might.  Her husband took this picture on Sunday, and honestly it just breaks me up. 

Here’s the filling we made. We will eat these on Christmas.  I owe a debt to many many people for this recipe.  I say grazie mille and buone feste

Ravioli Christmas 2008

For the Dough
6 cups flour, preferably 3 cups being 00 Italian style flour and half , about 3 cups being a higher gluten all purpose flour such as King Arthur’s.
3 eggs plus one yolk
1 tablespoon salt
2 teaspoons olive oil
enough water to make the dough elastic

For the filling:
1 bunch of borage (about 2/3 pound) or substitute spinach and/or escarole, boiled until tender, squeezed dry
½ cup olive oil
2/3 pound veal shoulder, or veal stew meat
1 pound beef, the type you would use for pot roast, such as chuck, trimmed of extra fat, or bottom round, or top round roasts, which are leaner but still braise well.
2 cloves garlic
1 stem of fresh rosemary or 1 teaspoon dried
2 bay leaves
1 cup dry white table wine
1 carrot, minced extremely fine
1 rib of celery, minced extremely fine
1 onion, sliced thinly
3 or 4 pieces of dried porcini, rinsed and reconstituted in warm water 30 minutes (reserve the water)
6 cups marinara sauce already made
1 tablespoon butter
½ pound pork, shoulder cut, trimmed of extra fat
2 teaspoons pignoli
1 4 oz package of Filadelfia cream cheese in silver foil
1 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano
1 large piece (about three-inches from an Italian loaf) of stale white bread, soaked in warm milk
salt
pepper
nutmeg to taste
1 teaspoon of marjoram, minced
2 egg, plus 2 yolks

1. Make the dough and set aside covered in plastic.  I’m assuming you know how to do this. 

2.  Boil the borage (or whichever greens you are using) five minutes in salted water.  Let cool.

3.  Heat the olive oil in a terracotta casserole or large heavy stainless steel pot.  Add the veal and beef along with 1 clove garlic, rosemary, and 1 bay leaf.  Brown the meat.

4.  Add ½ cup of the white wine.  When the wine evaporates, add carrot, celery, onion and mushroom.  Cook with pot uncovered until vegetables are softened.  Add a little hot water as necessary, to keep vegetables from scorching. 

5.  Put a cover on the pot, lower the flame to a very slow heat.  Check the veal in 20 to 30 minutes.  When cooked tender, remove the veal and put aside. The time will depend greatly on the size and cut of your meat.

6.  Add six cups of tomato sauce to the pot with the beef in it.  Continue to cook the beef on a slow heat until falling apart and tender.  This can easily take two and a half more hours , depending on the size and quality of your meat.  It will be tough for a long while.  When it is finally fork tender remove meat.  Save this sauce, which is one method for making tocco, Genoese for sugo or gravy.  You will use it to dress your ravioli on Christmas Day.

7.  Put the butter in a separate smaller pot.  Add the pork, salt, pinoli, a bay leaf, a clove of garlic.  Add one two or three tablespoons of white wine and put a cover on the pot.  Turn heat down to low.  Cook until tender and soft.  This may take an hour or more, depending on your meat and how high your heat is. 

8.  When all the meat is cool, set up your meat grinder and fit it with a fine mandrill.  Set a big bowl underneath.

9.  Trim the fat off the meat and put it through the grinder.  Add the reserved pignoli and a little of the flavorful fat and wine from the bottom of the pork pot. 

10. Put your greens through the food grinder, followed by the soaked bread.

11.  Okay now, go and whip up that that room-temperature cream cheese (with a mixer) and add it into your bowl of filling. 

12.  Put the parmigiano, marjoram, nutmeg, pepper, and salt directly into the bowl and stir with a wooden spoon so that all is VERY well mixed.

13.  Taste.  Correct seasoning.  Do you need more salt, pepper, cheese?  If your mixture tastes dry you may wish to add some of your reserved porcini broth or marinara.

14.  Add egg.  Mix everything.  Your filling is now ready. 

15.  If you are using a machine, roll out dough with your machine to the second to last setting.  Spread filling on a half a sheet of dough.  Do this thinly and evenly.  Put the other half on top like a lid, then run over this with a checkered ravioli rolling pin.  Finally, use a ravioli cutter to cut across the squares.

16.  Let the ravioli dry a half hour on cookie sheets dusted with flour or cornmeal.  Turn the over and let the other sides dry.  (Yes, I’m serious.) Or put the tray directly in the freezer.  Now go ahead and do the other 200.  When the ravioli in the freezer are frozen solid, transfer to plaster bags and seal shut. 

17.  When ready to serve, put the ravioli in fiercely boiling salted water.  Cook 3 minutes if your ravioli is fresh and 5 or 6 minutes if it is frozen.  Taste to be sure.

18.  Gently scoop out the ravioli with a large slotted ravioli lifter--or pour carefully into a colander, so the ravioli don’t break.  Serve in a large bowl with the tucco—the red Genoese sauce you made earlier.  Or use whatever tomato sauce you prefer.  Sprinkle with grated Parmigiano-Reggiano.

For more details and information, see home > article > One Badass Cookie - Wrapping Up Baked Goods as Gifts

Masher

One Badass Cookie - Wrapping Up Baked Goods as Gifts

• by Nancy, December 19, 2008

Too bad an empty box does not have the same allure as it did when we were two years old. I guess I’ll have to fill them with cookies before I mail them out! Read on for One Badass Cookie’s inexpensive yet beautiful way to package baked goods for gifts (and with some recycling too!) These boxes cost about 89 cents each, or, you can do what I did, which was ask my local CVS manager if I could just have the one on the right after they had unpacked and left it in a pile on the floor of the store. Lucky find! And free . . . That’s one badass way to snag a deal.

Lined boxes are not that much fun either without the cookies, but I like to line mine with waxed paper first to keep the buttery cookies from staining the boxes.


For mailing I wrap the individual kinds of cookies in inexpensive clear cellophane bags (acid free and archival ones double for me as wrappings for my handmade art cards too) and tie with curling ribbons, available at most discount stores for about a buck a package. Individual bags like this helps keep the cookies fresh enroute. If you’re not mailing them, you can just stack them in pretty rows inside the waxed paper lined boxes. I sometimes stick gifts in with the cookies, like pix of my son or in the one on the right, a Zagat guide. Here are the boxes loaded up ready for their outer wrapping.


Don’t these look great? A dramatic and beautiful presentation from recycled boxes, inexpensive waxed paper, ordinary curling ribbon, stickers, and clear cellophane wrapping paper, and on the box on the right, a recycled greeting card for a tag (just cut off the front of greeting cards you get and punch a hole in the top - it’s as easy as that to save money and the planet.)

Got a badass cookie recipe or baking tip for Laura and Nancy? Send it to us, we’ll test it out and if it’s badass enough, we’ll post it as a reader’s recipe or tip and you’ll win a prize of Nancy’s book.

see also: One Badass Cookie - Ginger Molasses Cookie

home > article > A Christmas Bread Called Pandolce

Masher

A Christmas Bread Called Pandolce

• by Laura, December 17, 2008

I have an article in this month’s SAVEUR magazine.  It’s all about pandolce, the holiday feast bread from Liguria--and the bread my great grandmother made long ago.  I hope you all go out and get it because Saveur is a wonderful magazine. And the photos--such as the one above by Penny De Los Santos--are beautiful. In the meantime, since they don’t have the article available online, I’ll tell you a little about it.  It’s the story of how last year at Christmas time, I went to a little town called Savignone north of Genoa to learn how to make a very very special pandolce with a 6th generation baker named Adriano and his wife Harriet.  This is Savignone.

Adriano and his father built a little cabin with wood burning oven inside it, and this is where Adriano gave the lesson.  Here we are in their little 12 x 12 cabin.  This is Harriet and Adriano.  And these are all the ingredients they had ready on the table when we arrived:  flour, sugar, butter, raisins, candied orange peel, and pignoli.

But the most important ingredient of all was this stuff called lieveto madre, or “mother leaven"--sometimes also called wild yeast.  This is basically a form of sour dough that has been continually “kept going” for more than 100 years in Adriano’s family.  It is a naturally fermented product--of the sort that people once used before there was instant dry active yeast.  It’s more work to care for and feed it, but serious bakers love the stuff as it produces a far better tasting bread with a webby crumb. 

(After I returned home, I started my own leaven at home so I could make my own bread.  All you need is flour, water, and a little pinneapple juice--plus all the natural and wild bacteria in the air of your house. )

Here’s Adriano kneading all the ingredients--very hard work by hand. 

And these are the pandolce all formed and ready to rest overnight.

The next day, Adriano made a fire in this oven and then, when it subsided, swept out the coals and put the pandolce inside.  Then he shut the door.

This is what came out.  It was a beautiful thing. 

Adriano and Harriet will soon be opening a place in the mountains where they will bake bread and eventually offer bed and breakfast stays, perhaps some baking lessons too.  I will keep you posted on this wonderful couple

Now here are the recipes.  What I ABSOLUTELY MUST TELL YOU (and this is all explained in the article) is that there are two kinds of pandolce:  “basso,” which means low and is crumbly like a scone, and “alto” which means high and is the yeasted bread. 

Adriano’s basso recipe is extremely easy and you can put it together basically in an hour.  His alto recipe is another matter and requires a bit of natural leaven.  I’ve put it here for the gamers and true bakers.  It’s worth the effort.  Meanwhile, for those with less time to spare, the kitchen editors at Saveur magazine created an adaptation of pandolce alto using dry active yeast.  Warning:  Adriano’s recipes are still in “Italian,” meaning: you must use a kitchen scale and weigh everything in grams.  Good luck!

Adriano’s Pandolce Basso
Easy to make and delicious, produces three large breads. 

500 gr cake flour
500 gr bread flour
38 gr baking powder
8 gr salt
400 gr soft butter
340 gr sugar
1 egg
1 yolk
330 gr warm milk
2T orange blossom water
3 T fennel seeds that have been soaked twenty minutes in hot water and drained
700 gr best raisins you can find,
200 gr candied orange peel, best quality
100 gr candied citron, best quality
110 gr pinoli

*******************************************************************
1.  Heat the oven to between 325 and 350 degrees.  Combine dry ingredients.

2 Using a mixer, thoroughly beat the butter and sugar together.  Add the egg, yolk, milk, orange blossom water, and fennel seeds. The mixture will be very wet.  That’s okay.

3.  Mix in the flour slowly until you have a sticky dough. 

4.  Work the fruit into the dough in batches using your hands either in the bowl or on a flat work surface.  First add the raisins, then the candied fruit, then the nuts.  Make sure all are distributed evenly. 

5.  Cut into three or four equal pieces, depending on whether you want large or small pandolce.  Form into flat spheres like a dome, no more than 2 inches tall.  Using a razor blade or a very sharp non-serrated knife, slash a cross on the top, not very deep.  Lay on parchment paper on double cookie sheets.  Bake 40 to 45 minutes in the center of the oven or until a stick comes out clean.  Check the pandolce midway.  If it is getting too dark, cover with foil to prevent burning. 

Saveur Magazine’s Interpretation of for Adriano’s Pandolce Alto

Adriano’s Pandolce Alto
Made With Natural Leaven

Ingredients

180 gr water
150 gr sugar
500 gr bread flour
120 gr natural leaven* (taken from the recipe below)
190 gr butter
380 gr high quality raisins
190 gr candied orange peel
50 gr pignoli

1.  Refresh your leaven three times over the course of ten to eleven hours.  You can use Adriano’s schedule as follows: 

At 8:30 am:  take 120 grams of leaven and add 80 grams flour and 40 water. Knead until mixed.  Cover and let sit.

At 12:30, repeat the refreshment.  You will now have 240 grams of leaven.  Add 160 flour and 80 water.  Knead.  Cover and let sit.

At 4:30 repeat again.  You will now have 480 grams of leaven.  Refresh with 320 grams flour and 160 grams of water.  Knead, cover, and let sit.

2.  At 7 pm, or whenever the third refreshment is complete and leaven has doubled for the third time, mix sugar into water until it is dissolved.  If you are using a heavy-duty stand up mixer with a dough hook, put flour in the mixer bowl.  If you are doing this by hand, spread out your flour in a circle on a clean work surface.  Gradually pour the sugared water in the center and use your other hand to slowly work it in until you have a pasty dough. 

3.  Measure out 570 grams of leaven.  Reserve the rest.  Knead leaven into dough until thorough incorporated.

4.  Add butter.  If you are using a mixer do this on low speed and be patient.  It will take a while for the butter to mix in.  Knead on a low speed for 20 minutes. If you are working by hand, flatten out your dough into a rectangle.  Put butter in center, and fold over.  Begin kneading until butter is incorporated.  Knead for a total of 40 minutes or until the dough is silky.  It may take up to an hour.

5.  Add raisins, then fruit and nuts.  Do this by hand as a mixer will break the raisins.  Lay out your dough on a work surface and flatten it into a rectangle about 1 ½ inches thick.  Lay your raisins in the center and wrap the dough around them. Begin kneading. It will take time to incorporate all of this. As raisins fall out, just put them back in.

6.  Let rest for five minutes.  Then flatten out the dough again and cut into three equal pieces—use a scale to be sure.  Each bread will weigh about 700 grams.  Now, form each pandolce into a small ball about four inches tall.  Place on parchment paper and let rise, uncovered, in a warm place (ideally 20 degrees) overnight, or until the breads rise by 35 to 40 percent in size.  This will take least 12 hours—but as many as 16 hours or even more.  A skin will form. 

7.  Just before baking, use a razor blade or the point of a very sharp non-serrated knife, to make a triangle in top center.  Inspect your breads.  Tuck in any raisins that are hanging too far out to avoid burning.  Put breads in a preheated oven for 45 minutes at 170 centigrade (between 325 and 350 fahrenheit), on double cookie sheets in the center of the oven.  Check halfway.  If it is beginning to get too dark, cover lightly with tin foil. 

8.  Do not even think of cutting this for four hours. 

When well wrapped in plastic, both pandolce alto and basso last for three months. 

Making Your Own Natural Leaven

You may not have access to Adriano’s hundred-year-old yeast, but you can begin one on your own.  It will take a couple of weeks to get ready along, along with a good amount of patience for the process fermentation, which is inexact and varies from kitchen to kitchen.  A digital kitchen scale is a must have.

My first efforts resulted in moldy leaven that smelled really hideous.  Luckily, I found a coach.  Peter Reinhart, master baker, leaven expert, and author of The Bread Baker’s Apprentice and Whole Grain Breads “>The Bread Baker’s Apprentice and Whole Grain Breads was willing.  (If you are any kind of serious baker you must have these books.)Peter tweaked my leaven recipe and coached me on.  His secret was to use some pineapple juice.  The acids prevent mold.  And also to stir it every day to move those acids through the leaven.  When I got my it to rise cheered me on.  “You go girl,” he wrote.  “Now make the bread”

Natural Leaven

100 grams organic pineapple juice (the acids work well to prevent mold)
200 grams high gluten flour or bread flour
70 grams water

1.  Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl with a spoon, your hands, or with a stand up mixer. Cover and let ferment at a temperature of 75 degrees (ideally).  This process could take anywhere from 5 to 10 days depending on your environment.  It is very important that you stir the mixture once or twice a day, especially during the first three days. 

2.  Wait.  Nothing much will happen the first few days.  But then you will see your leaven bubble as natural fermentation occurs and yeasts build.  When it doubles or when it has sat for 8 days (whichever comes first), you have the beginnings of your own mother yeast.  It is fragile and must be fed. 

3.  Feed your yeast every day until it is strong enough to use.  After that, you will need to do this only once a week.  Here’s the method:

Weigh your dough.  Add two thirds of its weight in flour (use bread flour or high gluten flour) and one-third of its weight in water.  This is Adriano’s hydration formula.  For example:

For every 150 grams of leaven
add
100 grams flour
50 grams water

Knead.  If it is too sticky to handle, add a little more flour.  Cover and leave out and wait.  When it doubles in size, put it in the refrigerator covered tightly until the next day when you feed it again.  As the yeast grows stronger, the rising time will accelerate.  When your dough is able to double in about three hours, then it is strong enough to for use in pandolce or other breads.  When you are not using it, keep it in your refrigerator. 

Note:  feel free to adjust the feeding formula if your dough is too sticky or too dry.  It should be moist and springy.  It will get better and develop more flavor and character over time.

home > article > Real Old Biscotti

Not to be Forgotten

Real Old Biscotti

• by Laura, December 16, 2008

To make little morsels, that is “mostaccioli” in the Milan style

Take fifteen fresh eggs and beat them in a casserole and pass through the sieve with two and a half pounds of sugar fine and powdered, and half an ounce of raw aniseed or partly crushed (aniseed) and a grain or two of fine musk, and put with this two pounds and a half of flour and beat everything for three quarters of an hour, so that it becomes like the pasta for fritters and let it rest for a quarter hour and rebeat it another time.  Then one takes a sheet of paper put into a “lucerne” and greased, or a ‘tortiere’ with wafers beneath that have not been bathed in such a way (not greased) and then put this paste into the ‘lucerne’ or ‘tortiere’ (specific pan types) until it is not higher than the thickness of a finger and immediately powder with sugar and put it into the oven that is hot, or the tart pan, and cook it like a tart and when this pasta is cooked (not wet) and will in all lose the humidity and it will be enough cooked, that is like a tender focaccia, pull out the ‘lucerne’ or ‘tortiere’ and immediately cut with a large thin knife, cut in slices as large as two fingers, and as long as one pleases, and put them in the oven with pieces of paper beneath the biscuits, turn them enough, ensure that the oven is not as hot as the one above (second baking is at a lower temp than first), and when they are well dried, pull them out and save them because they are always better the second day than the first and they will keep for a month in their perfection. 

--Bartolomeo Scappi, 1570
The Opera of Bartolomeo Scappi (1570): L’arte et prudenza d’un maestro Cuoco (The Art and Craft of a Master Cook)

Translation, 2003 by Lady Helewyse de Birkestad, CW. 

Ever since Nancy posted her gorgeous biscotti recipe last week in her badass column, I have been thinking about the history of biscotti and cookies in general.  It’s really only during the last 150 or so years, after the arrival of the stove, that cookie baking became so common place among regular people.  Before then, baking was more complicated because you had to do it in your brick or stone (or mud/adobe) oven.  Not to mention that sugar was expensive, so sweets were reserved for special occassions unless, of course you were rich. 

I am posting this beautiful photo so you folks can see what what I mean. 

This image comes from the Tacuinum Sanitatas, an Arab medical manual from the 11th century.  On baking day, you would build your fire inside the oven, building heat into the walls and floor.  Then you’d sweep put all the coals and ashes and put your bread inside and quickly shut the door to seal in the heat.  Not long after, the oven temperature would start falling. 

Now… back to biscotti.  The name really refers to a technique, not any recipe.  It means “twice cooked”.  You bake a loaf.  Then you take it out of the oven and slice it into pieces (or “morsels” as Scappi says), then bake these a second time at a lower temperature until they become hard and dry.  Now you can see that the invention of biscotti clearly has everything to do with this falling heat of the brick oven.  And by the way....why would you bake these things to death?  Preservation for sure.  With all the moisture gone, they’d last long.  Important before the age of zip lock plastic bags.  I think of biscotti as belonging to the same family of hardtack and many other dried foods that could go on long journeys at sea.

The old recipe above comes from the extraordinary Bartolomeo Scappi (c. 1500-1577) a great chef of the Italian Renaissance who was a personal cook to two popes.  He may call his biscotti “little morsels” but by whatever name, these are the real deal--twice cooked.  And while we’re with Bartolomeo, here’s an

engraving from his book showing a kitchen of the era.  Pretty cool, huh?  I am not sure--but wonder if that’s the baking oven is on the way back left wall.  Note all the various cooking tools about and the hearth in the back. 

The term went to France as biscuit--and then to England.  Over time biscotti took many directions in many countries and were enhanced variously with sugar and egg and butter. 

As to the delicious biscotti we know and love today...if you go nosing around for “authentic” Italian recipes you’ll quickly come across the very famous biscotti de Prato, which come from the city in Tuscany of the same name.  They are intended to be dunked in wine or coffee and look like this .  These are a wonderful every day sort of luxury, while Nancy’s version are more rich and intensely flavored, a perfect choice Christmas. These are the ones I’m making.

Finally, to get you thinking about baking the old way, here’s a photo of a wood burning oven that belongs to a baker friend in Liguria.  Gorgeous, isn’t it?  More on this soon.

home > article > Citron for Christmas Breads and Fruitcakes

Antique Recipe Road Show

Citron for Christmas Breads and Fruitcakes

• by Laura, December 12, 2008

Is citron grown and sold in the u.s? I’ve candied orange,lemon, grapefruit,and tangerine for panetone and lebkuchen,because store bought is so full of garbage. I’d also like to do citron but have not found any.

--Valerie Tassa

Valerie, I share your feeling about candied fruit here in the U.S. being really awful—sort of like sugary wax.  And while maybe with a lot of money and shipping from a gourmet company you CAN find good quality candied orange or lemon peel, it is especially difficult to locate citron, which is so little appreciated in the U.S.

For those not familiar...citron is of course the citrus fruit.  Its candied peel goes into various fruit cakes for the holiday.  You can see it pictured above with some candied orange peel.  This photo is from last winter when I bought these in the Mercato Orientale in Genoa, where the fruit goes by the name of cedro.  You can see just by looking at it this this has nothing to do with the hideous chunks of food colored stuff at the supermarket.  Nancy, wouldn’t you love to paint this?

Here are some more photos of candied fruits—many varieties—in the beloved Pietro Romanengo shop in Genoa.  They were in a huge basket on the counter, a feature of the Christmas Season.

For more on citron, here’s a nice blog post by Susie Wyshak’s blog called artisanfooddiscoveries.  She does a great job on the citron and even includes a youtube video of John Kirkpatrick’s Lindcove Farm, which I believe is the only one in America that grows citron.  nuttyfig.com

Unfortunately, Americans think of fruit cakes as kind of a joke--though in recent years, there has been some efforts to revive them.  Not sure how that’s going when there’s so much chocolate around.  I think that there are just lots of people who don’t like candied fruit peel.  That’s cool.  But I wonder if those people have just never tasted any of decent quality.  When it’s good, candied fruit peel is delicate and tastes intensely of the fruit . . . not wax.  It is primo “not to be forgotten” territory, a technique invented so as not to waste even a fruit rind--a precious source of flavor, and really quite a brilliant use of sugar. 

Candied fruit has deep roots in ancient Jewish, Arab, and Christian tradition. Persians and Arabs were known for their advanced technique with sugar and candying not just fruit but flowers.  This technique was introduced to Europe around the Middle Ages.  Jews use citron --etrog-- for their fall holiday Sukkot.  And then, many of the famous Christmas breads--from Tuscany’s panforte to English fruit cake and German stolen--come from the east-west trade of the Middle Ages. 

Okay, Valerie, now to your question.  I don’t know where you live, but you can find fresh citron in the markets in California this time of year.  Here’s a market that sells citron.  Maybe you can call and ask them to ship some to you.  http://www.berkeleybowl.com

I also put in a phone call to John Kirkpatrick, the citron farmer.  I’ll let you know if I hear anything.

If you can’t get some fresh citron, perhaps these markets will probably ship you something of higher quality in the already-candied product: Both Kalustyans and Corti Brothers are known for their imports of high quality, and both sell citron.
http://www.kalustyans.com and www.cortibros.biz/. Note that Corti doesn’t have citron listed in their online catalog, but they have it on their shelves, so call.

Please let us know how you make out.  And send us pictures!  We’ll post them!

Next week, I’m going to post a story of my own holiday candied-fruit bread called pandolce.

Stay tuned.

home > article > Ways of Seeing

Masher

Ways of Seeing

• by Nancy, December 10, 2008

Dining table near and far . . .
Here is another photo in the series I started to challenge the conventions I use over and over in my painting. This is the hand-me-down table in my dining room where we’ll be spending a lot of time soon for the holidays. A quiet moment pictured here before the guests and platters arrive.

see also: Ways of Seeing

home > article > One Badass Cookie--Biscotti

Masher

One Badass Cookie--Biscotti

• by Nancy, December 06, 2008

My niece, Molly, with the Badass Biscotti she made from my recipe. Thanks Molly!
Photo credit: My brother, Bruce Ring, one more badass photographer. Thanks Bruce! To see more of his photos, click here.

One Badass Cookie is up and running for the holidays. We’ve got lots of recipes for you in the next few weeks so check back often. So what’s a badass cookie? Click here to see the first badass cookie post for the answer. This week’s cookie is Badass Biscotti made with almonds, pistachios, cornmeal and anise. It’s a buttery, crunchy, intensely flavored recipe I learned when I was a pastry chef, and one of the reasons I like it so much is because it’s made in a big quantity and can fill lots and lots of gift baskets. It keeps beautifully too which makes it perfect for mailing or baking ahead for parties. They’re also great for dunking! When Molly made it recently, her dad (my brother, Bruce) told me that he was enjoying a cup of coffee when the first batch was done. Molly, too impatient to wait to make her own cup of coffee for dunking, reached across the table and dunked her biscotti into his cup, splashing a trail of coffee drips and crumbs across him and the table before he could protest. Too delicious to wait for a cup of joe to brew! That’s one badass cookie. Read on for the recipe, and for the Badass Cookie Tip of the Week. Does it work? You bet your badass it does.

Badass Cookie Tip of the Week: When measuring dry ingredients for cookie dough or any baking recipe, measure by lifting the ingredient with a spoon or with hands and dropping it gently into the cup measure rather than scooping it and shaking the cup measure to level it. Scooping and shaking compresses the dry ingredient and more of it will end up in the cup than you need, resulting in heavy or overly sweet dough. To level dry ingredients in a measuring cup, use a knife or your finger rather than shaking the cup.


Photo credit: Bruce Ring

Badass Biscotti
Note: This 3 pounds 1 1/2 T. flour recipe may be doubled and even doubled again for a maximum of 12 pounds, 6 ounces of flour, yielding 500 cookies. Directions are given in the recipe for handling the large quantity of dough. It is well worth the time and trouble if you need a lot of cookies for gifts or an event. It’s best to have a kitchen scale for this recipe as the flour is weighed, not measured with cups, and the dough itself must be weighed out into chunks to bake off.
Yields 125 cookies, depending on thickness
3 pounds plus 1 1/2 T. of all-purpose unbleached flour
5 1/4 cups sugar
1/4 cup plus 2 T. anise seed
1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
1 T. baking powder
2 t. salt
1 pound (4 sticks) butter, room temperature
8 eggs
1/2 cup annisette liqueur or other anise flavored liqueur
2 cups whole roasted, blanched almonds
1 cup chopped roasted blanched almonds
1 cup whole pistachios
1. Measure all dry ingredients except nuts into the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with a paddle attachment or in a large mixing bowl to mix by hand. Crack eggs, stir to combine and set aside. Measure the annisette and set aside. Roast and measure the nuts and set aside.
2. With the mixer on low speed, or gently by hand, add pieces of softened butter little by little to dry ingredients without pausing between additions, and then drizzle in annisette. The minute the dough begins to hold together, add nuts in the same manner. Stop the machine the second all the nuts are in the dough. Do not over mix. Most stand mixers will accommodate a dough containing up to four cups of flour easily. If making a large quantity of dough, use a large (at least 20 cup capacity) mixing bowl to make the dough, or make in 4-cups-flour batches, dividing up the other ingredients proportionately. Then mix all the dough together at the end.
3. Transfer the dough to a sheetpan and refrigerate it wrapped in plastic wrap overnight or for several hours.
4. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Remove dough from the refrigerator and weigh out in 1 1/2 pound chunks for 1/2 size 11” x 17” sheet pans (3 pound chunks for full size sheet pans.) Allow dough to stand at room temperature until it is kneadable, not too soft. Roll chunks into logs, about an inch short of the length of the sheetpans. Place on parchment paper covered pans, nonstick pad coated pans, or greased pans.  Put two logs on each 1/2 sheet pan, or 3 logs per full sheet pan, evenly spaced. Double sheetpans under the logs to prevent burning.
5. Bake logs approximately 30 minutes or until the dough is set and the top of the log is medium golden brown, not light. Cool on a rack completely before moving on to the next step. Note: For convection ovens, bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes, then turn and rotate the sheetpans in the oven front to back and top to bottom. Then set oven temperature to 325 degrees and bake 10 minutes more until done.
6. When logs are cool, slice with a serrated knife with a sawing motion as thinly as possible without breakage. Place them again on doubled sheetpans covered with parchment, nonstick pads or greased, lying flat and end to end. Rebake them at 325 degrees about 10 - 15 minutes until even light golden brown and cookies feel firm and dry to the touch. Cool on racks, store in airtight containers. Will keep several weeks. Do not refrigerate.



Photo credit: Bruce Ring
Mmmmm, I like my biscotti buttery but I have seen recipes for biscotti with olive oil instead. This one looks good for those olive oil fans out there.
Do you have a Badass Cookie recipe for Nancy and Laura? Send it to us using the comments link above and we’ll test it. If it’s badass enough, we’ll post it as a Reader’s Recipe in future One Badass Cookie posts and you’ll win a copy of Nancy’s book.

see also: One Badass Cookie - Ginger Molasses Cookie

home > article > French Creams (and a little Candy History)

Antique Recipe Road Show

French Creams (and a little Candy History)

• by Nancy, December 01, 2008

Q: Hi Laura and Nancy, Thanks for the lovely blog. Do you have a recipe for French Creams? For a short while we could get real French creams imported from Britain here (Toronto, Canada). Now the candies are more like corn candy shaped like French Creams.  Thanks Pat

Dear Pat,
You’re in luck, as Laura did turn up a recipe for French creams, and I found a bit of candy history that includes a nod to the French for their superior candy making skills. Did you know that India was amongst the first cultures to refine sugar-cane to sugar around 3000 B.C? The Persians and Arabs also excelled at candy making.  During the Middle ages when trade between Europe and the Arab world intensified, sugar and candy found their way to the ports of Europe. 

Columbus planted sugar cane in the Caribbean.  But of course the story of sugar and candy is deeply connected to slavery, and trade.  It’s a complex one. Sugar is also very much a story of class.  Sweetened and refined foods were once considered marks of civilization.  Sugar was scarce and candy scarcer for the Medieval rich who paid dearly for it and in fact, sugar remained a luxury until very recently as I’m sure you know.  Here’s a recipe for French creams from the White House Cook Book, 1887.  Please let us know if you try it.

i>FRENCH CREAM CANDY. Put four cupfuls of white sugar and one cupful of water into a bright tin pan on the range and let it boil without stirring for ten minutes. If it looks somewhat thick, test it by letting some drop from the spoon, and if it threads, remove the pan to the table. Take out a small spoonful, and rub it against the side of a cake bowl; if it becomes creamy, and will roll into a ball between the fingers, pour the whole into the bowl. When cool enough to bear your finger in it, take it in your lap, stir or beat it with a large spoon, or pudding-stick. It will soon begin to look like cream, and then grow stiffer until you find it necessary to take your hands and work it like bread dough. If it is not boiled enough to cream, set it back upon the range and let it remain one or two minutes, or as long as is necessary, taking care not to cook it too much. Add the flavoring as soon as it begins to cool. This is the foundation of all French creams. It can be made into rolls, and sliced off, or packed in plates and cut into small cubes, or made into any shape imitating French candies. A pretty form is made by coloring some of the cream pink, taking a piece about as large as a hazel nut, and crowding an almond meat half way into one side, till it looks like a bursting kernel. In working, should the cream get too cold, warm it. To be successful in making this cream, several points are to be remembered; when the boiled sugar is cool enough to beat, if it looks rough and has turned to sugar, it is because it has been boiled too much, or has been stirred. If, after it is beaten, it does not look like lard or thick cream, and is sandy or sugary instead, it is because you did not let it get cool enough before beating. It is not boiled enough if it does not harden so as to work like dough, and should not stick to the hands; in this case put it back into the pan with an ounce of hot water, and cook over just enough, by testing in water as above. After it is turned into the bowl to cool, it should look clear as jelly. Practice and patience will make perfect.

home > article > One Badass Cookie - Cookies for a Crowd

Masher

One Badass Cookie - Cookies for a Crowd

• by Nancy, November 30, 2008

Photo Credit: my son, Max, one badass photographer
Time for another post for One Badass Cookie. This week, since the holidays are in full swing, I thought you’d like to see how to present your badass cookies for a crowd. As I noted in the first One Badass Cookie post, these cookies can stand in for any fancier dessert and make a great gift and an impression. So read on for this week’s practical advice on how to present cookies for a crowd, and the Badass Cookie Tip of the Week. Does it work? You bet your badass it does.

Here’s my favorite way to bring cookies for a crowd to any party or holiday dinner. Trust me, you walk in with this, and it will elicit as many oohs and ahs as any fancy cake or pie, and maybe more, from children and adults alike. And one of the nicest things about it is that everybody pretty much gets their favorite, as there is a variety to choose from. It may look like a lot of work, but if you make lots of dough for each recipe in the weeks prior to your event, you can freeze the doughs in logs and then just slice them off and bake them on the day or day before you need them. Look for directions for freezing logs of dough, or for any portion of the recipes here that can be made ahead in all One Badass Cookie recipes.


Here’s my Badass Oatmeal Raisin Cookie recipe in a log that I froze last week. (To get this recipe, check back in the coming weeks when I’ll be posting more badass cookie recipes or scroll down to find the previous weeks’ recipes, Badass Chocolate Chip Cookies, Badass Ginger Molasses Cookies, and Badass Lemon Bar Cookies.) To freeze dough logs, simply take the dough from the mixing bowl once it is finished, and lay it onto a long sheet of plastic wrap. If the dough is soft, you may want to refrigerate it first to get it firm enough to shape. Alternatively, you can also use wet hands to shape logs, shape logs once they are wrapped up in the plastic, or loosely wrap a soft log, freeze it for thirty minutes or so and then take it out of the freezer to further shape it. Whatever you do, you will end up with a log like this, perfect for slicing into thick slices and baking off when you need it.


This is a shot of my favorite cookie basket. I got mine at Zabar’s. I like to line it with a nice cloth napkin in a coordinating color, but you can also use a sheet of waxed paper. Watch for another One Badass Cookie post coming soon that will show you lots of great ways to package cookies for gifts too.


Badass Cookie Tip of the Week: Double your sheetpans to ensure that the bottoms of the cookies don’t burn before the tops are done.

Got a Badass cookie recipe for Nancy and Laura? Send it to us and we’ll test it. If it’s badass enough, we’ll post it as a reader’s recipe and you’ll win a prize of Nancy’s book.

see also: One Badass Cookie - Ginger Molasses Cookie

home > article > Thanksgiving morning . . . Whew!

Masher

Thanksgiving morning . . . Whew!

• by Nancy, November 27, 2008

Been baking all morning and last night. Dessert for 18 people at my cousins’. Final tally: one black mission fig and lemon apple pie, one caramel banana bread pudding, brownies, chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal dried cranberry and raisin cookies, ginger molasses cookies, and a coconut custard pie. I’m DONE! All I have left to do is bake off the ginger cookies, make whipped cream and toast coconut for the pie and finish slicing the lemon bars. Oh, did I mention the lemon bars?? Okay back to real life on Friday . . . 

home > article > Beautiful Sweet Potato and Pie for Thanksgiving

Not to be Forgotten

Beautiful Sweet Potato and Pie for Thanksgiving

• by Laura, November 25, 2008

Sweet Potato Pie

Two pounds of potatoes will make two pies. Boil the potatoes soft; peel and mash fine through a colander while hot; one tablespoonful of butter to be mashed in with the potato. Take five eggs and beat the yelks [yolks] and whites separate and add one gill [one half cup] of milk; sweeten to taste; squeeze the juice of one orange, and grate one half of the peel into the liquid. One half teaspoonful of salt in the potatoes. Have only one crust and that at the bottom of the plate. Bake quickly.

-- ABBY FISHER, What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Southern Cooking, 1881
reprint with afterward by Karen Hess

Detail from a new painting by Nancy.

I’ve written about this recipe before.  But I love it so much I’m going to do it again.  Sometimes I wonder why people are continually searching for new recipes when so many great old ones already exist.  This sweet potato pie not only works perfectly well, but also comes with an amazing story.

It comes from Abby Fisher, who was a slave and probably the first one (that we know of anyway) to have published a cookbook.  According to food historian Karen Hess, she was born in South Carolina during the 1830s and probably cooked in the big house of the master--perhaps one of those baronial plantation homes owned by French Huguenots not far from Charleston.  In 1870, she had survived slavery and the Civil War, when she and her family tset out for the West in search of a better life.  In a covered wagon filled with children and their lives’ possessions, they took the overland trail, making a pit stop in Missouri where Abby gave birth. In California, she and her husband set up a pickle-and-preserve business, which was obviously so good that Abby became locally famous, winning awards for her cooking and the esteem of several white ladies who helped her publish this cookbook, though she could not read or write to do it herself.

Imagine.  From slavery to cross country migration.  To small business owner.  To cookbook author.  What a woman.  So with this great story of human accomplishment in mind, I’m making Sweet Potato Pie this Thanksgiving. I hope you will too.  I’ll post a photo when mine is done...sometime within the next 24 hours.

Okay:  click the jump for the modernized version.  This is an easy, single crust pie.  You wont regret it.

For One 9-inch Pie:

First the crust.  Use your favorite.  Or try mine:

1/8 cup all purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
8 T very cold, unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
A small bowl of ice water

1.  Sift flour, sugar, and salt together (or just mix well).

2.  Work quickly to add your butter to flour so it breaks up into little pea sized balls--without melting.  You can use your hands, a fork, or pastry blender. I prefer the food processor and process for 10 to 15 seconds until the mixture seems to have a cornmeal texture.

3.  Place it in a bowl and sprinkle 3 tablespoons of ice water lightly about the dough and start to pull it together.  Your goal is to gather it up in a ball in your hands.  If too dry, add more of the water, perhaps up to 4 or 5 tablespoons, but as little as possible. Shape dough into a flat round disk.  Wrap in plastic and put your dough in the freezer 10 minutes or the fridge for a half hour or longer if you’ve got the time.

4.  Roll dough on a floured surface.  Start in middle and roll outward.  Roll so it is VERY thin, otherwise your bottom will remain raw. 

5.  When you have your circle of thin dough, take your pie plate, invert and lay down on the dough.  Use wheel or knife to cut out a circle about two inches wider in circumference than your pie dish.  Then gently lift and place into the actual dish. Make pretty edges by crimping with your fingers or indenting all around with the tines of a fork. 

Filling for one pie

1 ½ pounds sweet potatoes
1 tablespoon butter
¼ teaspoon salt
½ cup milk
juice of 1 small orange
grated outer rind (do not go down to the white) of half small orange
brown sugar to taste, from ½ to ¾ cup depending on your palate and the sweetness of your potatoes
2 large eggs, yolks and whites separated

1.  Bake or microwave the sweet potatoes and while still hot, mash them well with a fork or electric beater until very smooth. 

2.  Immediately add salt, butter, milk orange juice and rind.  Mix well.  Add ½ cup sugar and taste.  Add more if desired.

3.  Add egg yolks.  Then whisk or beat whites until they are fluffy and fold into mixture.  (You can decide how much effort you wish to put into this.  If you beat them to a real fluff you will have a lighter pie.)

4.  Fill pie crust with mixture and bake in 400 degree oven for 45 minutes.  Check half way.  If crust is getting too dark, cover with tin foil to prevent burning.  You will probably need to take this step for at least the last 15 minutes.

Tell a friend about this article: