Linzer Heart cookies

from The Silver Palate cookbook (only modified slightly). Must be made every Valentine's day, along with whatever raw meat pink wheat flour cookies Monika chooses.

¾ pound butter, softened
1¾ c. confectioner's sugar, divided
1 egg
2 c. unbleached all-purpose flour, sifted
1 c. cornstarch
2 c. grated almonds
½ c. red raspberry preserves

Cream butter and 1 c. of the sugar until light and fluffy. Add egg and mix well. Sift together flour and cornstarch; add to creamed mixture and blend well. Mix in almonds thoroughly. Gather dough into a ball, wrap in wax paper, and chill for 4 to 6 hours.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Roll dough out to ¼-inch thickness between sheets of parchment paper. Using heart-shaped cookie cutters, cut out cookies, leaving ¼-inch space between each one. Peel the excess dough from around them, and re-wrap and refrigerate or freeze to be rolled out again in a few minutes. Slide cookies, still on parchment, onto a baking sheet. Bake cookies for 10-15 minutes, or until evenly and very lightly browned. Remove and cool on a wire rack.

Spread the bottom halves of the cookies lightly with raspberry preserves, and top each one with a remaining cookie. (This is especially nice if your cookie lids have inner heart-shaped holes in the middle for the preserves to show through.) Place confectioner's sugar in a sifter and dust cookie tops with it.

Who me, fixated on all things Linzer?

Pork tenderloin

Pork and dried fruit is a nice combination.  We like this recipe, but it is a fair bit of work with both the compote and a cream sauce.  Tonight I made a simpler roast pork tenderloin with fruit compote, and it was good.  The only thing against it was that we could only find one of those pre-brined tenderloins at the store, and it was too salty and had an overtone of artificial flavor.  Fresh pork tenderloins are much better (and you're not paying for the 30% brine by weight!).

Scheherazade Casserole

From the original Moosewood Cookbook.

¾ cup raw soybeans, soaked in lots of water for at least 4 hours (or canned, drained and rinsed)
1 c. raw bulghur, soaked 15 minutes in 1 c. boiling water
2 medium bell peppers, chopped (they say green, I use red or yellow)
4 medium-sized fresh tomatoes, chopped
1½ c. chopped onion
2 cloves garlic, crushed
¼ c. freshly-chopped parsley
3 T. tomato paste
1 tsp. ground cumin
1 tsp. basil
salt, pepper, tobasco to taste
1½ c. crubled feta

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Place soaked soybeans in the blender with 1½ cups water (could cut down by ¼ cup or so). Puree. Combine pureed soybeans and soaked bulghur.

Saute the onions and garlic in a little olive oil, lightly salted. When soft, add peppers and saute 5 more minutes. Combine all ingredients except feta. Place in a large buttered casserole; sprinkle feta on top. Bake one hour at 375 degrees, covered for the first 45 minutes and uncovered for the last 15.

Szechwan-style eggplant

Tried this from Gourmet, via epicurious, and liked it.

• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• a 1 1/4-pound eggplant, peeled if desired and cut into 1/2-inch cubes (about 6 cups)
• 1 teaspoon cornstarch
• 1/2 cup chicken broth
• 1 teaspoon minced garlic
• 1 tablespoon minced peeled fresh gingerroot
• 2 to 3 teaspoons Szechwan chili paste*, or to taste
• 1 teaspoon hoisin sauce*
• 1 tablespoon rice vinegar* or white-wine vinegar
• 1 tablespoon dry Sherry
• 3 scallions, sliced thin
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon firmly packed light brown sugar
• 1 red bell pepper, minced
• 1/2 teaspoon Oriental sesame oil, or to taste

In a wok or large skillet heat the vegetable oil over high heat until it is hot but not smoking and in it stir-fry the eggplant over moderately high heat for 3 to 5 minutes, or until it is tender and browned. Transfer the eggplant with a slotted spoon to paper towels to drain.

In a small bowl dissolve the cornstarch in the broth. To the wok add the garlic, the gingerroot, the chili paste, the hoisin sauce, the vinegar, and the Sherry and stir-fry the mixture for 30 seconds. Add the scallions and stir-fry the mixture for 30 seconds. Add the soy sauce, the brown sugar, the cornstarch mixture, stirred, the bell pepper, and the eggplant and stir-fry the mixture for 1 minute, or until the eggplant has absorbed most of the liquid. Remove the wok from the heat, add the sesame oil and salt and pepper to taste, and toss the mixture well. The eggplant mixture may be made 1 day in advance and kept covered and chilled.

They suggest serving it with pita wedges, but I just made it as a side with lemongrass chicken and rice.

Bagna cauda

Bagna cauda has been on my radar screen since it was in the New York Times a few months ago.  I hadn't gotten around to making it, but then I saw a recipe in Nigel Slater's Real Fast Food.  It's more olive oil than butter, compared with Craig Claiborn's recipe which was two parts butter to one part oil.  I made a half recipe, which was a lot for two of us.  I'm sure that the buttery version would be good too, but I liked the olive oil-dominated recipe.  It wasn't too fishy from the anchovies, but they give it a nice savory umami flavor.

Broccoli with Bagna Cauda

6 tbl. butter
1 cup olive oil
8 cloves garlic,minced
12 anchovy fillets, rinsed and dried
1 lb. broccoli

Melt the butter in a small saucepan.  Add the garlic and cook over a gentle heat for 2-3 minutes.  It must not brown and turn bitter.  Add the anchovies, which will virtually dissolve with a bit of stirring.  Pour in the olive oil slowly, stirring all the time.  Simmer, not boil, for 10 minutes.  Blanche the broccoli in boiling water for a couple of minutes; keep it crisp.  Serve the sauce hot. in a bowl, stirring it up  with the drained sprigs of broccoli each time you dip them in.  Soak up the remaining sauce with hunks of bread.

Pizza Crust

Pizza is something I've always wanted to be better at.  Over the past year or so I think I've improved quite a bit.  I like Chicago style pizza as well, but this one is a nice crisp thin crust.  The most important thing is to have a good pizza stone, and also helpful is to have a peel that you can use to slide your raw pizza onto the stone.  The other secret is, I think, to knead the dough long enough to really be elastic.  The recipe I use is based on Alton Brown's, but as is often the case with his recipes, you do have to be careful.  The one that's easiest to find online has way too much sugar and salt.  There are two errors in the recipe from I'm Just Here for More Food, which I've corrected in my version below.  The flour in the book's recipe was off by a factor of two, and it called for a children's aspirin instead of vitamin C (I skip it completely).

Pizza Dough

1¼ cups warm water
2½ tsp. salt
1 tsp. sugar
4 cups (454 g) flour
2½ tsp. yeast

Mix the ingredients in a stand mixer with dough hook, then knead on 4 (out of 10) for 5 minutes.  Work the dough into a ball, put in a bowl lightly greased with olive oil, cover with a towel and put it in a warm place, until it doubles in size, about 1 hour.

Divide the dough in half, then work one half into a pizza crust, them place on a pizza peel dusted with cornmeal or semolina.  (The other half can be refrigerated for a few days or frozen if you don't need both.)  Top and slide onto a preheated pizza stone in a 550° F oven.  Keep an eye on it, it should be done in 5-6 minutes.

My biggest remaining problem is that the cheese starts to burn before the crust is completely done.  What I've done the last couple times is take it out and turn the oven off when the cheese gets done, then after having the first piece, if it could use a little more time, slide the rest back on the pizza stone for a few minutes.  That tends to get more cheese & sauce on the pizza stone than usual, making it harder to clean.  Next time I think I'll try 500° F for slightly longer.

Chicken with Orange and Black Olives

This is a really nice sauce for chicken.  We made it with chicken thighs and served it with bulgar, as suggested in the original.

Chicken with Orange and Black Olives

2 tbl. olive oil
4 tbl. butter
2 whole chicken legs
1 cup chicken stock
1 tsp. dried thyme
12 black olives, pitted
1 orange, cut in half then thinly sliced
1 tbl. chopped parsley
salt and pepper

Heat the oil and half the butter in a shallow pan. Brown the chicken peices until golden brown on both sides, then add the stock. Stir in the thyme, olives and orange slices. Cover and simmer gently for 20 minutes.

Check chicken is cooked—when pierced with the point of a knife the juices should run clear—then remove the meat to a warm serving plate.  Taste the sauce, add parsley, and season with pepper and very carefully, if at all, with salt. Turn up the heat and reduce the liquid by bubbling down to cup, then whisk in the remaining butter.  The sauce will be shiny and slightly thickened when it is ready.  Plate the chicken pieces and pour over the sauce.  Serve with a starchy accessory such as wide noodles or potatoes.

Nigel Slater, Real Fast Food

Lemon-Ricotta Hotcakes

Shelley and Russ made the best pancakes I think I've ever tasted this morning!  They made Lemon-Ricotta Hotcakes from Hell's Kitchen in Minneapolis.  I think we haven't had enough variety in our pancake making, we'll definitely have to add this to our repertoire.

Cooking with Julia

My most-used Christmas present so far is a copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, which is popular this year because of the movie Julie & Julia.  I can't believe we didn't have a copy for this long.

We started out with a cheese souffle, and then a béarnaise sauce for roast beef, with individual vanilla soufflés with chocolate crème anglaise for dessert.  Last night was our most ambitious project, making homard aux aromates (lobster steamed in wine with herb sauce) for 10.  The sauce was excellent, and not overpowering for the lobsters (also good on mashed potatoes).  I also liked splitting the lobster before serving, it makes it a lot easier to eat at the table, although there is still some claw cracking to do.

We've been through a lot of eggs and butter already.  I don't have any ambition to make every recipe in the book like some other blogs, but I'm looking forward to trying more out.

Roast turkey

There are many ways to roast a turkey.  I'm sure there are a number of ways to get good results.  There are also many different kinds of turkey, which react differently to different methods.  We had a 19.3 lb. fresh turkey from Ashley Farms.  I was reading up before Thanksgiving on the recipes I'd used before, and other advice on the web.  There are a number of decisions to make: to stuff or not to stuff?  To baste or not to baste?  To truss or not to truss?  Cover it with cheesecloth?  High temperature or low temperature, or high and then low?  Some recipes may be suitable for an injected supermarket turkey but not a natural bird.

The main methods I considered were from the Joy of Cooking (1975 edition), which has you put the bird into a 450°F oven and immediately turn it down to 350°; Barbara Kafka's high temperature recipe which has it at 500° F the entire time; and Alton Brown's brined roast turkey which starts at 500° for 30 minutes before being reduced to 350°.  The other common method, to keep it at 325° the entire cooking time, is also mentioned in the Joy of Cooking, where it is said to be foolproof and "has been rumored to entail much less shrinkage", but that the flavor is superior when starting with high heat.

I decided to go with 450°F for 30 minutes, then turn the oven down to 350°, unstuffed and untrussed.  The Joy of Cooking says 13-15 minutes per pound, but since I would keep the oven hot a bit longer and was aiming for a lower temperature (the USDA recommendation is now 165°F interior temperature, it used to be 180°F), I was ready for it to be a bit shorter than that.  I wasn't prepared for how fast it went.

Since I had just acquired a remote temperature probe, I recorded the internal temperature at irregular intervals throughout the cooking.  It turned out to have been done in just over 2 hours, about 6½ minutes per pound!  I then had to keep it warm for a couple hours and warm it up before serving.  It was very good, though, tender and juicy with a nice skin.

This is not something I do often enough to do systematic experiments, but here is the time series data for this trial:

Cranberry Chutney with Tart Green Apple

Getting ready for Thanksgiving, and thinking about recipes.  This is an old favorite we've used since the mid-90s.  I don't have the original source, but it's likely that I got it from The Boston Globe.

Cranberry Chutney with Tart Green Apple

Makes 1 quart.

¾ lb. cranberries, fresh
1½ lb. peeled, cored, chopped tart green apples
¼ cup chopped onions
2 tsp. minced ginger
½ cup cider vinegar
1 cup granulated white sugar
¼ tsp. salt
⅛ tsp. cayenne pepper powder
1½ cup sliced celery

Combine all ingredients but the celery in a 3-quart pot.  Over high heat, bring the mixture to a boil.  Reduce heat to medium and simmer, uncovered, until mixture is thick (15 to 20 minutes).  Stir occasionally to prevent sticking.  Add the celery and cook 5 more minutes.

Serve while still warm.

Keeps several weeks in the refrigerator.

Poppy seed muffins

As Alton Brown would say, these aren't really muffins, they're cupcakes.  But they're good.  It's a very runny batter, like a cake batter instead of muffin batter.  I didn't realize what a huge recipe I was making until I was already too far along to back out, so I made a dozen muffins and two small loaves.  The glaze is nice, but so sweet that I wish I had backed off on the sugar in the muffins themselves.

Poppy Seed Muffins

3 eggs
2½ cups white sugar
1⅛ cups vegetable oil
1½ cups milk
1½ teaspoons salt
1½ teaspoons baking powder
1½ tablespoons poppy seeds
1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
1½ teaspoons almond extract
3 cups all-purpose flour
¾ cup white sugar
¼ cup orange juice [I used lemon juice]
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
½ teaspoon almond extract
2 teaspoons butter, melted

1. Beat together the eggs, 2½ cups white sugar and vegetable oil. Add in milk, salt, baking powder, poppy seeds, vanilla, almond flavoring, and flour. Mix well.
2. Bake in paper lined muffin cups (filled ¾ full or 3 small greased loaf pans) at 350° F (175° C) for 15-20 minutes for muffins and 50-60 minutes for loaves. The tops should be browned and a toothpick inserted in the center should come out clean.
3. Remove muffins as soon as you can while still warm/hot and dunk tops into glaze. Turn right side up and cool on a cookie rack. With loaves just pour the glaze evenly over the three loaves while still in pans. Let cool to a warm temp. and remove from pans. Yes, it is a little messy but it is really good.
4. To Make Glaze: In a saucepan over low heat, combine ¾ cup sugar, orange juice, ½ teaspoon vanilla, ½ teaspoon almond flavoring and 2 teaspoons melted butter. Warm in pan until the sugar is dissolved. Pour over loaf pans or dunk muffin tops into glaze when cooled to room temperature. (Omit the glaze altogether if you don't like the mess.) 

Allrecipes.com

Final week

This is our final batch of farm vegetables for the year.  Right now, that's OK with me as far as arugula, radicchio and radishes go, and we have enough sweet potatoes to last a while, but we will miss the rest of it until next spring.

• Arugula
• Beets
• Broccoli
• Carrots
• Kohlrabi
• Lettuce
• 12 sweet potatoes (only 6¼ lbs., less than half last week)
• Radicchio
• Rutabaga
• Scallions
• Turnips

A metric ton of sweet potatoes

OK, only 6.13 kg (13½ lbs.)  There was a whole extra bag of 19 sweet potatoes outside the box this week.  Luckily, they keep.

• Arugula
• Beets
• Carrots
• Cauliflower
• Kohlrabi
• Leeks
• Lettuce
• Radicchio
• Sweet potatoes    
• Rutabaga
• Spinach

Daikon and carrot pickles

Using a recipe from the NY Times and a recipe from Epicurious, I made some daikon and carrot pickles tonight. Very simple and good. The daikon is still a little bitter, but the sugar and salt helps cut that.

2 medium carrots, peeled and cut into 2 inch matchsticks
2 medium daikons, peeled and cut into 2 inch matchsticks
½ cup rice vinegar
2 tsp. + ¼ cup sugar
1 tsp. salt

Sprinkle the vegetables with salt and 2 tsp. sugar.  Let sit for 10 minutes, then drain, rinse, and drain again.  Dissolve the ¼ cup sugar in the rice vinegar, and pour over vegetables.  It's good right away, better after it sits for a while.

The Pickle Guys

I had no idea there was a pickle district in Manhattan!  A story on NPR tonight about The Pickle Guys made me want to go there sometime soon.

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Winter squash risotto

1 butternut or acorn squash
½ cup olive oil
1 medium sweet onion, diced
2 large cloves garlic
2 cups arborio rice
6 cups chicken stock (or 3 cups homemade, 3 cups water)
1 cup dry white wine
½ cup grated parmesan
4 T. salted butter
salt and pepper to taste
more parmesan to grate on top

Cut the squash in half and clean out, then roast on an oiled baking sheet until very soft. Scrape out flesh. Mash roughly with fork. Start stock (or stock and water) heating in medium size pan; bring to a simmer and hold it there throughout. Heat olive oil over medium heat, then saute onion and garlic until soft. Add the rice and stir to coat while heating for approximately 1 minute. Add the wine, stirring constantly until the liquid is absorbed. Add the simmering stock, 1-2 cups at a time, stirring frequently and letting the excess liquid be absorbed with each addition, like any risotto. When most of the liquid of the final addition has been absorbed, add the squash, stirring until it is heated through and lumps are broken up. When the risotto is the desired consistency, stir in cheese, butter, and salt and pepper to taste. Serve immediately with more cheese on top.

Linzertorte

From the recipe by Stephanie Jaworski at Joy of Baking.com. I used store bought ground almonds and hazelnuts, and measured most of this by weight. I also used store bought raspberry preserves, and salted butter, and all of it worked well. Some recipes have some cocoa powder in the crust; maybe next time.

1 cup (150 g) ground almonds
½ cup (57 g) ground hazelnuts
1½ cups (210 g) all purpose flour
⅔ cup (135 g) white sugar
zest of one large lemon
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/8 tsp. ground cloves
¼ tsp. salt
½ tsp. baking powder
14 T. (195 g) cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
2 large egg yolks
1 tsp. vanilla extract
one cup raspberry preserves
confectioner's sugar for dusting

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Butter a 10 inch tart pan or springform pan. Place the nuts, flour, sugar, lemon zest, cinnamon, cloves, salt and baking powder in a food processor, and process until well blended. Add the butter and pulse until the mixture looks like fine crumbs. Add the egg yolks and vanilla extract and pulse until dough just begins to come together. Gather the dough in a ball and divide into two pieces, one slightly larger than the other. Wrap the smaller ball of dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate.

Take the larger ball of dough, and press into the bottom and up the sides of the tart pan (or approximately 1 inch up the sides of a springform pan). Spread the raspberry preserves over the bottom of the crust. Remove the smaller ball of dough from the refrigerator and roll it between two pieces of waxed paper, into a rectangle about 10 x 6 inches. With a sharp knife or fluted pastry cutter, cut the dough into 10 ½ inch wide strips. Gently transfer the strips to the tart pan, without trying to weave them. Trim the edges of the strips in the tart pan. Take the leftover scraps of dough, rolll them into a long rope approximately ¼ inch thick, and place the rope/pieces around the outer edge of the tart where the strips meet the bottom crust, pressing in the edges and sealing. Bake for 30-35 minutes or until golden brown. Cook on a rack before unmolding. Keeps well cooled overnight in the refrigerator; dust with powdered sugar before serving.

Betsy Zimm's Cream of Carrot Soup

In the depths of Lyme disease despair one time, I drove over to meet Sarah in Minneapolis and stayed a few days. Betsy made this soup. I've no idea if it's a regular recipe of hers, but that's how I forever think of it. I also have no idea where the recipe came from.

1 cup chopped white of leek
2 large yellow onions, chopped
4 T. butter
~2 lb. sweet carrots, peeled and thinly sliced
3 cups water
3 cups vegetable broth
5 T. uncooked white rice
pinch of sugar
1 tsp. salt
½ tsp. crushed dried thyme
1 small bay leaf
pinch of cayenne
1½cups milk
⅓ cup cream
dash of nutmeg

Saute onions and leeks in butter until golden. Add carrots, water, broth, rice, sugar, salt, thyme, bay leaf, and cayenne. Cover and simmer approximately 40 minutes, or until carrots and rice are completely mushy soft. Remove bay leaf. Puree in blender or food processor until velvety smooth. Can be refrigerated or frozen here.

Return to saucepan, stir in milk, cream and nutmeg, and heat through, stirring gently. Correct seasoning with pinch of salt or nutmeg. Sprinkle each serving with chopped fresh chives. Makes 8 to 10 generous servings.

Now that we are getting cauliflower and arugula att the same time, we can make one of our favorite salads. There is also carrot soup and gumbo on the slate for this week.

• Arugula
• Beets
• Broccoli
• Carrots
• Cauliflower
• Chard
• Kohlrabi
• Leeks
• Radicchio
• Rutabaga
• Turnips