A Year in the Kitchen

No, this is not a doughnut.

2008-07-18T11:05:00.002-07:00

It's a 1.5-pound ring of bread, and my, is it delicious!

First, let me say that I know we sound like a broken record, here. But we can't stop expounding on the virtues of The Bread Bible. It's the most spectacular baking book either of us has ever come upon. Sometime, we'll pick up other books (and we have our eyes on a few), but until then: Bread Bible!

So, we've both been itching to make this for a while: a simple bread, straight dough method, only one rise, cute shape. And best of all? Three ounces of chopped prosciutto baked right in. Oh, and the top? Glazed with bacon fat.

It turned out beautifully and tasted amazing. We took it over to a small gathering and, between the five of us, polished off the entire thing. We hope to make this bread again soon, perhaps for a cocktail party. Next time, we're going to try making a braid instead of a ring.

Happily, Rose has published the recipe on her web site, so you all can go out and try it right away. Let us know what you think!

The Need to Knead

2008-07-18T10:46:00.003-07:00

Almost No-Knead Bread

We made this almost no-knead bread using the Cook's Illustrated method. When the now-famous Minimalist column with Lahey's bread was first published, we scurried to the kitchen and excitedly tried it out—and made a rather unsuccessful loaf. Since then, we've been baking the occasional loaf of bread the old-fashioned way, and have hit with success every time. But the other day, Jen got the urge to try again. So much hype! What were we missing out on? We have heard high praise for the CI method and gave their recipe a whirl. And it turned out a decent loaf of bread, yes. But, in the end, it's not that much less effort than just making traditional bread. We have a Kitchen Aid, so kneading is a snap. Otherwise, even the biggest bread projects are mostly inactive time (rising/proofing/resting). And the taste of this bread does not quite measure up, I'd say. This recipe will likely stick around, but the search continues for a good everyday bread.

Operation: Zero Meals Out update

2008-07-18T10:32:00.002-07:00

Soba noodle lunch

The first half of the month has been great to us. We are really taking the opportunity, with this new program, to be more creative in the kitchen. We've wasted very little—missed two pieces of stone fruit, but otherwise all has been eaten. We're trying to repurpose foods (leftovers, scraps) as much as possible, but have also taken time to test a couple of new recipes. This week, we even skipped the bread aisle and made our own. After all, we have plenty of water, flour, yeast and time.

Highlights this round included the soba noodle lunch you see here (soba noodles, tofu, carrots and zucchini, lightly dressed with rice vinegar, mirin, soy sauce, miso and sriracha); salmon cakes with herb potatoes and homemade tartar sauce (mayo, mustard, chopped dill pickles and some lemon zest) and more of Lee's yummy potato soup.

The doc complimented me yesterday on keeping my pregnancy weight gain in check and we have saved lots of money (which we can now gleefully turn around and spend on cute baby clothes).

Truthfully: I feel a little foolish that two people who love cooking (and cooking together) as much as Lee and me had such inconsistent cooking and eating habits. This experiment—even just a couple weeks in—has been eye-opening for us both. We're planning to stick closer to home for meals, even after the month is through.

The first week of Operation: Zero Meals Out

2008-07-10T13:10:00.010-07:00

Our first week got off to a great start. Lee kicked off the week by grilling a heritage chicken from Whole Foods. For a while, I had a real aversion to chicken, but luckily that time has passed. The chicken with potatoes and veggies made for a great meal and yielded plenty of leftovers. We used part of leftovers for chicken quesadillas. I also made this chicken and rice dish:

I used a pretty standard risotto method - rice sauteed in a little fat (I used bacon drippings, because it was handy), a splash of white wine and then slow additions of chicken stock. When the rice was almost there, I threw in a generous amount of chicken and some frozen peas. I finished the dish with some amazing Italian hard cheese (a cousin of parmigiano) we picked up from our favorite cheese shop during a recent visit to Chicago and a touch of heavy cream. It came out well. The flavor was helped along quite a bit by the heritage bird and bacon drippings. If I weren't pregnant, I'd have started the risotto with some aromatics, but garlic and onion are bothering my stomach these days.We spent July 4 at a barbecue organized by some local Obama supporters. It was potluck; I made some sweet tea and Lee made tandoori chicken. Our guideline for the chicken was Madhur Jaffrey's excellent book, Indian Cooking, but the recipe was modified a bit for my dietary needs (and because we decided to grill instead of bake). Here's how we did it:

Tandoori-Style Chicken

serves 15 or so

3 whole chickens, cut into ten pieces each (cut each breast in half)

1 lemon

1.5 family-size cartons of plain, whole-milk yogurt

1/2 medium onion, peeled and roughly chopped

1 clove of garlic, peeled

2 inches of fresh ginger, peeled and roughly chopped

6 tsp garam masala

First, cut up your chickens and remove the skin from all but the wings (not worth the hassle). Sprinkle the pieces with salt and squeeze a lemon over them. Let the chicken hang out while you combine all of the other ingredients in a food processor; you'll probably have to do it in batches. Strain the sauce through a fine-mesh strainer and into a large bowl (we used one with a 4-qt. capacity). Add the chicken pieces to the bowl, making sure all pieces are covered by the sauce, and refrigerate for at least 6 and up to 24 hours (the longer the better).

Grill the chicken over direct high heat for about six minutes per side, basting with the leftover sauce as needed. You'll get a nice char and the chicken inside will be cooked through, yet moist. It's absolutely heavenly--my favorite thing we've ever made on the grill.

Lee made stock with the chicken scraps and used the rest of the onion and a couple pounds of potatoes to make potato soup. We made a simple dinner of that one night (a green salad and some zucchini fritters on the side) and lunch the next day was vichyssoise. The soup he made (adapted from a recipe by Julia Child) is the base of many other interesting soups, and we're thinking of making a weekly habit of barbecuing a whole chicken and making soup with the scraps (more on that, perhaps, next week).

Our breakfasts have been pretty standard (we usually ate breakfast at the house, anyway): cold cereal, steel oats, fruit/yogurt, etc. But one morning I was in the mood to bake blueberry muffins. I used a new recipe from Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Bread Bible. I truly cannot recommend this book highly enough. The muffins were the best Lee and I had ever tasted. They were moist without being cakey, delicate rather than heavy, and not too sweet. A sprinkling of salt and lemon zest upped the sophistication. Best of all, they were still delicious the next day. I have definitely found my new muffin recipe (sorry, Bittman).

I also made a simple frittata using Trader Joe's Potato Medley. I simply sauteed two cups of the veggies (along with some more zucchini; we have a ton right now) in a cast iron skillet with a tablespoon of butter. When the potatoes were soft, I added six whipped eggs and popped the whole thing in the oven at 350 for ten minutes or so. That provided two light meals for each of us.

There were a few veggies burgers, bean and cheese burritos, and sandwiches in the mix, to be sure, but that's not terribly unusual for us, especially in the summer. And overall, I've been happy to see how much we've prepared from scratch--especially considering we both spend the whole day at home (I'm a student and Lee telecommutes) and it's dead hot in Tucson right now!

Our July Experiment.

2008-07-10T12:44:00.004-07:00

A recent conversation at Serious Eats got us thinking about how often we eat restaurant meals. Thanks to our budget-tracking software, I was able to analyze our dining habits, both by frequency and cost. Taking the average from January through June, we found that we ate out about 20 times per month. Let's just say we weren't exactly thrilled with the report, even though the results weren't surprising. With the pregnancy, I've had a tough time figuring out meals. My cravings change on a whim, and I'm constantly navigating the maze of dietary advice (aside from the usual restrictions, there are all sorts of little things: I'm advised not to eat any acidic foods to counteract my third trimester heartburn, but should eat lots of acidic foods to counteract this horrible metallic taste in my mouth. Etc.).

Now that I'm in T3, the cravings have started to subside and the other physical challenges are making the prospect of dining out more difficult. Also, my stomach has gotten smaller to make room for baby, so I'm not eating full-sized meals these days anyway. So, Lee and I decided not to eat any meals out for the entire month of July. As in, zero.

So far, it's going well. We have not cheated at all; we have not thrown out any wasted produce or leftovers; and we have saved 66% on food expenses compared to the first half of last month. Lee and I figure it takes about a month to make a new habit, and we're hoping this one sticks.

We won't post on everything we make this month, but I'll hit a few of the highlights and share our strategies for making the most of what we've got.

No more delivery

2008-06-23T13:52:00.002-07:00

Pizza

So, we had to bow out of Tuesdays with Dorie. Nothing against the group, but we started coming up with our own ideas for weekly projects, and our plans weren't compatible with that group's weekly baking schedule.

One of our first projects was to make pizza. Lee used to make it, and we were convinced that we could make it at home again, not to mention better than he had before. The crust came from Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Bread Bible, and it is fantastic and fantastically easy. You can let it rise for just an hour or overnight, if you can anticipate the craving. The crust is thin but fluffy and is best for a simple, one-topping pizza. Come to think of it, we have some pepperoni in the house, in the same drawer as a big hunk of mozzarella. Perfect.

Tuesday with Rose, Mark, and James

2008-04-29T14:16:00.003-07:00

matzo

Usually about this time, we're mulling over the results of our entry for Tuesdays with Dorie. This weekend, however, the cake baking clashed with Passover. So instead of baking with Dorie, Lee did a little baking with Rose (Levy Beranbaum, that is).

With a recipe from The Bread Bible, Lee made a batch of fresh matzot for our Saturday seder. He also cooked a beef brisket in the Mark Bittman style. And Jen tackled her first ever potato gratin using James Peterson's Essentials of Cooking as a guide.

We'll be back to Dorie next week with a peanut butter torte, as chosen by Ugg Smell Food.

Matzo Crack

2008-04-25T16:25:00.003-07:00

matzo crack
Originally uploaded by Ricestein

Lee cribbed this one from David Lebovitz's blog (see: here), and it is completely addictive. Lee has a terrific sweet tooth, but pregnant Jen prefers her snacks savory. And yet, the salty-sweet combination (caramel, bittersweet chocolate, sea salt, and toasted almonds) hooked us both.

Matzo, you have won our hearts.

TWD: Carrot Cake!

2008-04-21T17:58:00.005-07:00

Success! Well, mostly. This week's TWD challenge, by Amanda of Slow Like Honey, was for Bill's Big Carrot Cake. I'd been intrigued by this one since I first brought home Dorie Greenspan's book. I love a big, beautiful cake and I've never made a carrot cake at home, although it's one of my favorites.

We baked the three-layer cake in 9-inch rounds, as suggested by the recipe. I checked the oven temperature with an oven thermometer to ensure that the heat was right. I left the cakes in the oven, undisturbed, until it was time to check for doneness. And still, the cakes sank. Just a few mm right in the center, but when we stacked them three-high, the sink was more apparent. This also happened with my 1-2-3-4 cake! What gives?

The taste, however, was extraordinary. We omitted the coconut (I can't stand it) and used walnuts and golden raisins as filler alongside the carrots. With the cream cheese frosting, the final product was delicate and moist and very rich. We served it to friends with homemade vanilla ice cream and iced coffee (this is Tucson, after all). More photos here.

I can't wait to make one of these for my mother's birthday. Carrot cake is her favorite, and this may be the best balance of richness/tenderness I've ever tasted in one.

Matzo Brei Pancakes

2008-04-21T09:18:00.002-07:00

Matzo Brei

Every year, Lee's dad makes a delicious scrambled egg and matzo dish called matzo brei. I had it for the first/only time during our first Passover together in 2006.

This morning, I decided to try my hand at making matzo brei for Lee. While looking for a recipe, I began reading about all of the different matzo brei variations on Mark Bittman's blog. It seems that matzo brei is like stuffing/dressing: every family has their own way of doing it, and people are fiercely loyal to the matzo brei of their youth.

In light of this, I decided not to emulate Bill's splendid recipe (especially without him here to guide me!), instead trying something totally new. Lucky for me, Lee is always on board for experimentation.

One of the comments on Bittman's blog seemed intriguing, and I decided to adapt that gentleman's recipe. Thanks, Bruce Kleinman!

Start by breaking three sheets of matzo into 1/4" to 1/2" pieces. Pile your matzo into a colander and rinse them under hot water for five seconds. Squeeze out the excess water.

In a mixing bowl, combine two eggs, 2 tablespoons of milk, and a pinch of kosher salt. Add the matzos to the egg mixture.

Heat up a large cast iron skillet with 2 tablespoons of butter (I know! but you'll need it). When the foam starts to subside, drop spoonsful of the matzo/egg mixture into the pan, forming dollar-sized pancakes. Go ahead and smush them a little with the spatula while they're cooking: that will help them hold together. After a minute or so, flip your matzocakes. Transfer the finished product to a plate and eat with a drizzle of maple syrup.

This recipe made eight small pancakes, a good serving for two (or three, if you add some fruit alongside). They taste rather like French toast, but with a distinctive matzo flavor. You could add some finely diced shallot or green onion and eat them as a savory dish, too, but I liked them sweet. We might make these again before the week is out.

Happy Passover!

Homemade Vanilla

2008-04-18T07:01:00.002-07:00

Homemade Vanilla

The last time Lee and I ran out of vanilla extract, we decided to try making our own, rather than buy another bottle. The results were fantastic; the effort minimal. Here's how we did it.

Take one vanilla bean. Slice it open and scrape the seeds into a bottle (we used a 10-oz tonic bottle). Add the bean, too. Fill the bottle most of the way with a high-quality vodka (we used Tito's) and top off with a little dark rum (we used a 1 oz. sampler bottle of Mount Gay). The liquid will still be pretty clear, at that point.

The extract needs two months to work its magic. Every week, give the bottle a little shake; otherwise, just leave it be. At the end of two months, the liquid will be a beautiful amber-brown and you will have on your hands a bottle of very high quality vanilla.

TWD: Marshmallows

2008-04-14T19:43:00.011-07:00

Lee and I have joined an online baking club, where we'll be cooking our way through Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan. This week's recipe, chosen by Judy's Gross Eats, was for marshmallows.

It's very interesting to join a club like this: the recipes are chosen by a different club member each week, and it's liberating to have someone else select which recipe we have to try. I've been wanting to practice my baking skills more, and this is a great way to do it.

I'll confess that I don't know if I ever would have made homemade marshmallows if not for this TWD challenge (although Lee has been curious about them; he's more of the candy guy around here), and I certainly wouldn't have tried them in April, where (in Tucson) hot chocolate season is over. But I'm definitely glad I did; it was good candy practice and we had pretty successful results.

Lee, as I mentioned, is the main candy maker around here, and he is the one who made these; I just helped. But since he's out of town, I'll write on our behalf.

The recipe was pretty simple: basically, a meringue with gelatin and flavoring. We whipped some egg whites and added the sugar syrup and gelatin. At this point, they smelled disgusting, slightly meaty (gelatin). But with addition of our homemade vanilla, voila! The mixture was transformed into the sweet-smelling marshmallows we know and love.

Next, we poured them into a lined, cornstarch-dusted baking sheet and let them rest for three hours. Getting them out was definitely the trickiest part. They looked like perfect little marshmallows on the top, but the undersides were a little chewed up from being scraped from the pan. Also, our pan might have been a bit too large, because they looked more like little duvets than little pillows.

But they tasted like fresh, melt-in-your mouth vanilla marshmallows. I think we'll be making this again, with a few adjustments to the lining method/pan size, come winter.

Cake Friday: Olive Oil & Rosemary Cake with Orange Confit

2008-04-13T16:22:00.003-07:00

Olive Oil & Rosemary Cake with Orange Confit

We've had the Babbo cookbook since it was released and for six years it has moved with us. That's three states and probably a dozen apartments. But have we cooked from it? I'm embarrassed to say no. We've been making a serious effort to either use or retire the cookbooks we've collected, so last week, we dusted off Babbo and quickly found the Olive Oil & Rosemary cake. It was love at first sight: a sweet and savory pound cake with six ingredients. The only item we needed to buy was the fresh rosemary and it was on.

The cake was incredibly simple to make, and the end result was moist and flavorful. It was dessert-like but not too sweet (which had its down side: we each ate two slices). We apologize, Mr. Batali. More recipes from Babbo will be made soon.

To accompany the cake, Lee made orange confit from a recipe we found on an old NYT Minimalist video. Here's how it works:

Take four whole oranges and blanch them in a dutch oven of water for 30 seconds. Dump the water and do the same thing again. Then quarter the oranges and put them in the pot with two cups of sugar and enough fresh water to cover. Keep the whole thing at a low simmer (just a stray bubble here and there) for eight hours. You might need to add a little extra water from time to time, to keep the oranges covered. When eight hours is up, you can take the oranges out and let them rest, covered and at room temperature, overnight. The next day, arrange the oranges in the bottom of the dutch oven with two cups of sugar and enough water to cover (again). Keep it at a simmer for eight hours (again). Let them rest over night. The third day: orange slices, sugar, water, simmer. The oranges are quite delicate by the end. They're soft enough to cut and eat with a fork (rind and all); the flavor is kind of related to that of marmalade, albeit with a fuller orange flavor.

We're definitely making this one again.

Lemon & Asparagus Risotto

2008-04-11T13:42:00.003-07:00

Lemon & Asparagus Risotto

This lemon and asparagus risotto, from Alice Waters' The Art of Simple Cooking, was like springtime in a bowl. The only ingredients are rice, one lemon (zest and juice), 1/2 c dry white wine, chicken stock, a finely minced small onion and a couple tablespoons of butter.

Even Lee, who has lukewarm feelings about asparagus (at best) loved it! I think it would also be delightful with fresh peas. Alice Waters also suggested a pancetta and potato version, which would be nice for brunch.

Cake Friday and news.

2008-04-11T13:35:00.003-07:00

1-2-3-4 Cake with Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

A Year in the Kitchen has been quiet lately; my apologies. We have been busy with a new project around here... Jen is pregnant! We are expecting our tiny sous chef on September 27.

For the past couple of months, cooking has been limited, to say the least. This is mostly due to morning sickness. Jen hasn't had many cravings (potatoes, icy-cold foods and some chocolate, but that isn't too unusual) but has many aversions: namely chicken and fish. Now that we're safely into trimester two and the nausea has subsided, we're back in the kitchen baking up treats and trying new vegetarian dishes.

To celebrate, we've instituted a new tradition: Cake Friday! We kicked things off last week with 1-2-3-4 Cake, a classic yellow cake from Alice Waters' The Art of Simple Food. It was relatively easy to make and delicious--very moist, very rich. We used farmers' market fresh eggs and homemade vanilla. We also used her recipe for buttercream frosting, adding in a little bittersweet chocolate at the end. Yum!

Homemade Doughnuts

2008-03-11T13:38:00.000-07:00

Frying Doughnuts

We used a recipe in Baking Illustrated for these homemade buttermilk doughnuts. It was pretty simple, and we were able to control the shape pretty well by using a drinking glass and a small water bottle to make the holes. Baking Illustrated recommended frying these in Crisco, but I think that if we had them to do again, I'd use peanut oil. They weren't greasy, but the Crisco weirded me out.

Shallow-poached fish

2008-02-16T08:37:00.002-07:00

This winter, we eased into a pretty simple pattern.

Each week we roasted a bird (mostly chicken) that we ate from for a few days and used to make stock. We've got four cups of stock left in the freezer, with room for plenty more.

Also, at least once a week, I've been poaching fish. Until this year, I really didn't understand poaching, at least not poaching at its best. But after reading The Art of Simple Food, I'm converted.

Poaching has got to be the simplest way to cook and flavor fish. And I'm talking about the shallow poach, which requires little liquid and even less effort.

Basically, you put in enough water to go halfway up the fish (I usually put the fish into the pan to measure, then take it out). I usually add my seasonings here, so they steep for a long time. I might add rosemary or thyme, sliced lemon, a clove of garlic cut in half, and maybe a few drops of sherry vinegar. Sometimes, we use wine, but the vinegar adds a lot of texture.

Heat the water until it begins to boil, then turn the heat all the way down. You want constant heat, but no bubbles. When the water's settled, place the fish back in.

Here's where things get really cool. With poaching, you can actually see the food get cooked. Of course, you can always watch the food cook, but the fish begins to cook as soon as it touches the water. It's amazing to watch, in part because the water is perfectly still, so nothing else is happening.

Then after three or five minutes (depending on the thickness of the cut), you flip it. Another three or five minutes, and it's done. You'll know because it looks the same as all other cooked fish in the end. And for sauce, you can swirl a little butter into the remaining poaching liquid. I swear, it doesn't get any easier.

Baked Eggs

2008-01-20T18:01:00.001-07:00

outside, inside
Originally uploaded by Ricestein

Baked eggs are my new favorite thing. Picture it: a lightly buttered ramekin. A few ingredients that complement eggs (here - feta and spinach, but we've also laid down just a bit of diced pancetta with ribbons of basil) and the egg cracked on top. Off into a 350-degree oven for about half an hour and voila! They're like tiny quiches, without all the fat. And easier to make for a brunch (or for house guests) than, say, individual omelettes, yet so much nicer than a box of doughnuts.

What's better than homemade eggplant parmesan?

2008-01-20T17:44:00.001-07:00

eggplant parmesan in Emile Henry baking dish

Eggplant parmesan with a clementine clafoutis for dessert. Eaten with good friends, of course.

Pasta alla Puttanesca

2008-01-20T17:42:00.001-07:00

puttanesca
Originally uploaded by Ricestein

Lee and I have discovered pasta puttanesca at home. Here's the recipe: saute some garlic in a bit of olive oil until soft. Stir in minced anchovies (I just used one) and a pinch of red chili flakes. Add canned tomatoes along with some chopped olives (we used kalamatas) and capers. We ate ours over linguine.

Tepary beans

2008-01-20T17:38:00.001-07:00

tepary bean stew

Tepary beans are Arizonan heirloom beans with a nutty, meaty flavor.

We soaked a bag of teparies acquired from Native Seeds/SEARCH and used half for a vegetable tepary soup (just added carrots, green beans, broccoli and other veggies on-hand, plus a bit of chili powder and cumin) and made fresh baked beans with the other half.

The beans have great flavor, kind of lentil-cum-pinto. They added immense flavor to the soup and an earthiness to the baked beans. In both cases, the beans held together well after the long cooking time.

Mini Madelines

2008-01-20T17:30:00.001-07:00

mini madeleine

We recently made a batch of mini madelines using Dorie Greenspan's basic madeline recipe (from her most recent cookbook, Baking: From My Home to Yours). The batter is mixed and then must rest overnight. The next day, gently scoop just half a teaspoon or so of batter into each tiny mold. The results were light, cakey and lemony. We'll definitely make these again (although I think I'd like a larger madeline mold--we have only one mini-mold and getting through the batter took several batches!

Scones

2008-01-20T17:20:00.001-07:00

measuring cups

Our friend Tonya recently gave us the wonderful Rose Bakery cookbook, Breakfast Lunch Tea. Filled with recipes for brunchy treats, we kicked things off with their classic scone recipe. As we put the put the recipe together, I continually asked Lee: how is this different from a baking powder biscuit? It's essentially the same, albeit lightly sweetened (we did not mix any fruit or nuts into this first batch). The upside? We ate them with both breakfast and dinner.

Pull-apart dinner rolls

2008-01-02T15:26:00.001-07:00

Pull-apart dinner rolls

I made these dinner rolls from The Bread Bible, which was a Christmas gift from my mother. They were laborious--a sponge starter, three rises, shaping, hand-dipping into butter, and, at long last, a quick spin in the oven. But they were worth it. A fine crust on top, tender and flavorful inside. And they made the whole house smell fantastic.

Somebody get this woman a bread box!

2008-01-02T15:17:00.001-07:00

Spelt honey bread

Sometimes it's difficult to get out of one's head and, as a writer, I spend an inordinate amount of time playing around with all the muck, good or bad, that hangs out therein. Normally, that's not a problem--it's what I signed up for, after all. But I've been working through a rough couple of weeks, personally speaking. I lost two people who were very important to me. One was 92, the other 30. So I've been trying to keep my hands busy with something other than typing, which, for me, means baking.

Today I baked some spelt honey bread, taken from December's Food & Wine. Here's the recipe, in a nutshell:

Honey Spelt Bread

adapted from a recipe by Lionel Vatinet in Food & Wine

4 1/2 cups whole-wheat spelt flour, plus more for dusting
2 teaspoons sea salt
2 teaspoons of active dry yeast
1 3/4 cups of cool (70-degree) water
2 tablespoons honey

Basically, it's just a matter of kneading (just a minute or two in a stand mixer), rising, punching, folding and laying into a loaf pan, rising, dusting with flour, and baking at 450 for 35 minutes. Lee and I each ate a slice fresh from the oven with butter and jam.