Buttermilk and Avocado Smoothie

Do you have a horror story about getting your wisdom teeth removed? I just got my two top widsom teeth extracted, as they say, and I was really not looking forward to it, obviously. I'm one of those people who for some strange reason won't listen to sound advice about getting their teeth removed. As a teenager and twenty-something I was told time and time again to get my wisdom teeth removed. Ever the conspiracy theorist, I would refuse, thinking the dentist was requesting my first-born. "You will never get my wisdom teeth," I hissed. Well, years later, now that my forty-year-old teeth are nice and fused to my jaw, I actually had to get them out because they were hurting. So, I'll spare you the details of mine, it went rather quickly, and my recovery has been quick. If you want to share your pain, please go ahead in the comments, by all means!

I got my teeth removed on Thursday. I had to fast ALL day, which is tantamount to torture for me. Particularly because I spend my days with a 2 1/2 year old who grazes on snacks around the clock. Then I was in a Vicodin funk because as much as I like to be anesthetized, that stuff makes my stomach turn so much that it's not worth it. Of course, one of the things you turn to during these times are smoothies. (No straws! Watch out for seeds and rice! Dry socket lurks!) I'd been meaning to branch out to buttermilk smoothies for a while now, and here was my chance.

Buttermilk is something I now have on hand all the time, as it's about the easiest cultured milk product you can make, even easier than crème fraîche. And maybe a little better for you and just as helpful. I bake with buttermilk all the time. I'm so glad that Annette at Sustainable Eats turned me on to it. Another fan of buttermilk is Kate from Hip Girls Guide to Homemaking (who, I just noticed, is having a Baking Illustrated book giveaway right now, btw!). She knows that baking with buttermilk is a wondrous thing. Like buttermilk cake, for example!

There was a nice, ripe avocado on hand, and I thought: avocado smoothie! The syrup I used was from making candied citrus, so it was a mix of oranges and lemons. What was so surprising to me was how whipped buttermilk became after a minute in the blender. It was so lush and creamy, it was almost like pudding, but still drinkable. I'm pondering the pudding idea--maybe I'll add a banana to thicken it. But I do know I'll have another buttermilk smoothie! I had never thought of drinking buttermilk, even though many folks do it. Now I'm a believer.

1/2 avocado
1 cup cultured buttermilk
2-3 tablespoons of lemon syrup (a nice substitute would be agave nectar or honey)

Put it in a blender and whoosh. It's time for dinner!

Smoothie plus garden catalog = winter heaven.

Savory Buttermilk Bread Pudding

I've been singing the praises of buttermilk for a while now (see here), and it looks like buttermilk is finally getting it's due. I see it soon getting pantry status, as it is in my house during the winter months. Buttermilk does take a back seat during the warmer months because I don't do as much baking. And just like soups and stews, I get so excited to see it back in rotation after its long absence. So much so, that at the moment I have an over-abundance and have needed to make something every day with it. Which is not that hard: pancakes on Sunday, Irish soda bread on Monday, and this for dinner on Tuesday. This made a lot, so you get leftovers the next day. It would be a great addition to a holiday meal.

The above was a mix of challah rolls and a cheddar-jalepeno sourdough loaf. I love buying day-old bread! The extra cheese and spicy pepper were a good foil to the sweet challah and kale. I think it goes without saying that creativity is welcomed in this dish. Varying the types of bread or vegetables will be a welcome change in your dinners.

If you are serving this as a main dish, you might want to go luxe and drizzle some extra virgin olive oil on top, with some extra fresh cracked pepper, as you plate it up. I served it alongside steamed romanesco broccoli. It was an amazing meal!

Savory Buttermilk Bread Pudding
yields one 3-quart casserole (although I used a 2-qt. and a 1 qt.)

1 large onion, diced
1 large clove garlic, smashed
1 head of kale (red winter kale), de-stemmed and chopped finely
1 teaspoon salt

4 eggs
2 cups buttermilk
1 cup milk

4 ounces of feta
pepper to taste
1/4 cup grated parmesan

Day old bread, cut in 1 inch cubes, about 8 cups (cheddar-jalepeno sourdough and challah rolls)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Sauté the onion and garlic in olive oil until golden.
2. Add the kale in large handfuls, mixing to coat with the oil. I like to add a little water to steam the kale down, or if you just washed it, the water clinging to the curls will help this. Add the salt when it has wilted down.
3. In a separate bowl beat the buttermilk, milk and eggs together.
4. With the bread cubes in another separate large bowl, add the hot vegetable mixture and toss gently, adding pepper to taste.
5. Add feta and toss gently.
6. Add egg-milk mixture. Toss gently and let sit for 15 minutes to an hour.
7. Put in a buttered glass or porcelain casserole dish, sprinkle generously with grated cheese and bake in 350 degree oven for about 45-50 minutes, until it has puffed out, has golden edges and feels firm when you gently rest your palm on it.

Buttermilk

A few days back, I was talking about buttermilk and got a great comment that stuck in my mind. It was from Annette at Sustainable Eats, who is a font of make-it-yourself information, a source of local food inspiration, and must not sit down for any other second than to post her very consistent blog posts. This woman lives on a city plot in Seattle, where she has chickens, an orchard, and has 144 different kinds of seeds in the ground, but who's counting? You should go an visit her so you can catch one of her latest posts on smoking some meats. Lordy, she is smoking the good stuff!

Anyhoo, in response to my lament that buttermilk was expensive, she said, why don't you make it? And then gave me the directions for it: "Save 1/4 cup of that starter, add to 1 cup milk in a jar on the counter covered with paper towel until it sets up then refrigerate. In a week take 1/4 of that and make a new batch if you haven't used it all yet. If you need more use that same ratio the night before you need it." Well, the other day I went ahead and did it. I left the mixture on the counter over night not really knowing what to expect. How long do I let this sit? I anxiously posted on Annette's Facebook page, needing first-time buttermilk-making hand-holding. I made it through the night and in the morning looked at my jar: thick and goopy, it looked like thick buttermilk or thin yogurt. I'm sort of excited about it. How easy was that? Here's a page that explains making buttermilk in detail for those of you looking to expand your buttermilk horizons.

In other news, the chickens are really doing well! They are up to four eggs a day, which is plenty for this little family and deserving friends. They are still very shy though, unless it's snack time when I bring them little goodies. Then they get all bold. But they seem to stay indoors mostly, even though they have an outdoor run that's a pretty decent size, so there aren't many pictures of them. I haven't started letting them free-range, but intend to. Our friends are having a fox issue at the moment, and I can't help but to think that predators are still really hungry these last cold days. I'll wait until it gets a little warmer out, and a little greener.

I ate the Big Egg the other day and it was indeed a double. It was really two whole eggs, not just two little yolks like you sometimes see. I had it for breakfast, scrambled. Mmm, big egg.

Buttermilk Cake

Since I've made buttermilk I haven't gone without it. It ends up going in a lot more things than I thought and makes all my baked goods more tender. The other day it was summertime hot, and we had dinner outside at a friend's house. I brought over this strawberry buttermilk cake and we served it with fresh whipped cream.

I had been meaning to make this for awhile; there was a version of it in Bon Appetit over the winter. Then I saw it, this time a version from Gourmet, on The Kitchenette, made with blackberries. It was time. I adapted both versions and came up with my own, made with olive oil, which I like to bake with. Nothing against butter, it's just that it's always that much easier! And I like to think it's healthier, which may or may not be the case.

1 cup of flour

1/2 teaspoon soda

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup olive oil

1/2 cup buttermilk

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 egg

A cup of fruit, more or less depending on your tastes or you can leave it out, add spices, be creative and use what you have!

Mix wet and add to dry. Drop fruit (sliced strawberries, whole berries--you get the idea) on top of the batter. It will sink a little; no worries. Bake in 350 degree oven for 25 to 30 minutes. I used a 10 inch spring form pan, and it seemed to be better on the 25 minute side.

This cake was so easy and delicious that when my in-laws came to visit this weekend, I decided to make it again, this time with the brandied apricots that I've had in the fridge sitting in a shot of their brandy. I pulled the apricots and arranged them on the batter, which I had added vanilla sugar and extract to. Then I downed the last bit of brandy. Waste not, want not! We finished it for breakfast the next day.

Buttermilk Muffins with Rhubarb Jam Centers

I have yet to write about the two wonderful rhubarb jams I recently made, and by the time I do it'll be too late. In the meantime, I am posting this quick recipe for these very tender, not-too-sweet muffins. I used some rhubarb jam from last year for the filling. It was made with Pomona's pectin, so it was firm and thus, perfect for this little filled muffin idea. Filling muffins is certainly not a new idea, but it is staunchly a good one! Try muffins made with buttermilk; they are so soft. If you don't have buttermilk, use yogurt instead. And of course, any firm jam will do.

Doesn't this little muffin look sleepy?

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

2 cups of AP flour
1 teaspoon of baking powder
1 teaspoon of baking soda
1/2 cup of sugar  (I used sugar with a vanilla bean scraped into it, otherwise add 1 tsp. of vanilla or use real vanilla seeds scraped from the pod)

Mix these dry ingredients.

Then mix in a separate bowl:

1 cup of buttermilk
1 large egg
1/4 cup of vegetable oil

Have on hand a half-pint of jam.

Add the wet mixture to the dry. Mix quickly, but well. Using a well-greased muffin tin, scoop a tablespoonful of batter into each of the twelve spots. Then, using a teaspoon, gently place a small dollop of jam in each spoonful of batter, making a well with the back of the spoon. Then, using the tablespoon, put a scoop of batter on top of each muffin, trying as best you can to cover the jam up. Bake for about twenty minutes, but keep an eye on them after sixteen or so minutes. They should be golden brown, and if any jam escaped (you hope not, but it happens) it will be bubbling.

Marmalade Quick Bread

When March rolls around and buttermilk goes on sale I always get it. I bake a lot with yogurt, because I always have it on hand for so many uses. I've really got to start making my own. Buttermilk is a little less useful in my household. I hate that I can't drink it straight, for example, but I think some people can or do. Which is repulsive, personally. It's also somewhat expensive, comparatively. But I do love baking with it. So, I've been fiddling around with a few recipes and also keeping in mind the many jars of jelly in the fridge that I have to use in some way. In that spirit, I made Marmalade Bread.

The marmalade I had on deck was a tangerine microwaved version with vanilla that had set a little too firm, and the chunks of peel were like soft candy. I warmed it up a bit so it would mix well in this batter. The resulting bread was a gorgeous yellow, flecked with orange bits and vanilla flecks. It is a lightly sweet bread, fluffy and soft, and perfect for a mid-morning snack. The recipe has only two tablespoons of sugar in it, plus the jam. I didn't feel too bad having a second slice! And either did the baby.

Preheat to 375. Grease a square 8x8 pan.

1 2/3 all purpose flour

2 T sugar

1 t baking powder

1/2 t baking soda

1/2 t salt

1 egg

2/3 cup buttermilk

1/4 cup light olive oil

1/2 to 3/4 cup of jam or marmalade

Mix wet and add to dry. Batter will be sticky. Bake for thirty minutes or until golden brown.

April Fools' Fool

I swear I didn't do this on purpose. Last night I took some blueberries out of the freezer. I then curled up on the couch reading Deborah Madison's Seasonal Fruit Desserts and Beyond Nose to Tail by Fergus Henderson and Justin Piers Gellatly (both great books).  I was inspired by a few recipes to make a fool, which is basically lightly cooked fruit folded with whipped cream. The simplest thing ever. And one of the most delicious.

Now a bit of snow was predicted for today, so this morning I was figuring on how to make the whipped cream without heavy cream. Ha! I didn't feel like going out. The cockamamie idea I had for whipped cream was based on my buttermilk smoothie, and how thick it was. (I've been obsessed with buttermilk, lately, of all things.) I put a cup of buttermilk plus a half cup of low fat yogurt in the blender with some confectioners sugar and lemon syrup. Once that was well whipped I let it strain, separating the whey from the solids. (By the whey, (ugh, sorry!) there's a great post on the many uses of whey right here.) The result was a soft, very light and almost foamy cream. You know, I'm just telling you this because I found it interesting. It was really good, but I'm not sure if I'd do it again. It was an interesting experiment. Sane people can always use plain yogurt or even better Greek yogurt. Or how about plain old whipped cream?

So, half way through the day I realized it was April 1st. And I was making a fool. And it was snowing, for crying out loud! All very silly indeed.

Preserving Cream

A few months back I was gifted a half-gallon of cream. Which to me is a thrill that borders on the obscene. I can drink heavy cream straight. I don't do that, but I could. It's a little disgusting. Maybe it's because you don't get cream too often. Maybe it makes you a little crazy.

One time, way back in college, a friend of mine and I were back home kicking around one night at her parent's house. Maybe it was around the holidays. It was cold. As we were skulking around, we happened upon a couple of cases of milk sitting outside a school. Must have been an early delivery, as it was about 10 p.m. We noticed there were quarts of heavy cream. Somehow, to us scruffy college kids taking a quart seemed like a good idea. Our idea was to go home and make whipped cream and put it on hot chocolate. Seems innocent enough, right? Her parents were sleeping so we thought it was a good idea to whip said cream closed up in the bathroom, so we would be quieter. Her mom didn't think it was such a good idea when she came downstairs, totally perplexed as to what that noise was in the bathroom. I'll never forget her face when she opened the door, standing there in her slippers and robe, to find us huddled over a bowl of whipped cream.

College exploits aside, last week I was gifted another half gallon of cream. A friend in the food industry gave it to me, as it was about to expire. No worries here, said I. I would just have to move fast. There are a great many uses for cream, and here are some ways to keep it around a little longer. All of these ideas can also be found in the Joy of Cooking, which is what I referenced, or on the internet. Of course, one of the ways to enjoy cream is whipped and dolloped onto nice hot cups of cocoa.

Freeze it: Did you know you can freeze cream? Freeze in ice cube trays. Once frozen, pop them out and keep them in a ziploc bag, and pull one out when a gravy needs a rich finishing touch. You cannot whip heavy cream once it's been frozen, but you can freeze whipped cream. Whip it up, then freeze it in dollops on a tray covered with a sheet of parchment paper.

Butter: First off, you could easily make butter of the whole thing in a short period of time. You need a jar and some good pogoing music. It's a serious workout to do it by hand, but if you plan to eat all that butter, then it's probably not a bad idea. I put 1 1/2 cups of cream in a large jar (you want to make sure there's room for shaking--no more than 2/3 full) and shook it till my arm was sore. And then some. It took about a half-hour.

My toddler was very amused by my jumping around. Just when you think you're arm is about to fall off and that all you've made is thick weird whipped cream, thunk! all the fat comes together and the "buttermilk" separates from it. It's the simplest bit of alchemy, and very satisfying. If you're into that kind of thing. And it makes gorgeous butter that you can then freeze. But, even better, bake some bread and slather it on. Oh, that was good. And the buttermilk is quite tasty. Use it like regular milk. I did. Is that weird? Don't answer that.

Crème Fraîche: A dollop of this will make anything better: oatmeal, pasta, borscht. Pie, pudding, fruit preserves. You name it. It will be better. All you do is gently heat a cup of cream to 80 degrees (it happens quickly, use a thermometer!), then add it and two tablespoonfuls of buttermilk (the cultured kind, not what came out of your butter, sadly) to a jar, shake it up good, and let it sit in a warm place from 24 to 48 hours until it sets up nicely. You can use this as the culture for your next batch, if you have one. This should last in the fridge for two weeks. Maybe longer. Maybe shorter. Depends on how you feel about putting it on everything.

Ice Cream: Now, shouldn't it be "iced cream"? I made vanilla ice cream, and it was outrageously good. I think I used about 2 1/2 cups of cream. I had to supplement with milk because the half-gallon was kicked! And still it is the creamiest ice cream I've ever had. Could it be those super fresh eggs from my chickens? It starts with a simple custard, which then sits in the fridge, and then gets the ice cream machine. I don't make ice cream that often, but when I do, I am so happy!

Pot de Créme: This is also a good way to use up those tasty eggs! And is this the cutest thing ever?? Pot de créme served up in a 4 ounce canning jar. I have joined the cute-foods-in-canning-jars craze. But seriously, I had broken all my pudding cups (how? I don't know) and didn't know where all the pot de créme was going to go. And I got this great idea, and my eyebrow went up, and the rest is history. Maybe it would have been cuter if I served them at a party, instead of eating them all by myself, but...Every time I'd eat one, I'd think: so cute!

Here are some things I didn't make, but will next time:

Sour Cream One step easier than crème fraîche. Creme fraiche tolerates cooking at higher temperatures better, and is a bit nuttier than tangy sour cream. You can also whip crème fraîche, but not sour cream.

Cream Cheese You will need rennet.

Clotted Cream While it cultures make jam. Then some scones. Then have high tea.

I'm sure there are many other good ideas out there. I didn't even hit on cheese making. If you have any other ways to preserve cream, please leave me a comment below!

Orzo and Chickpea Soup and Buttermilk Crackling Cornbread

I wanted to just write about this soup, which is very good, but the pictures I took were pretty bad. To be fair, the cornbread was a revelation, but it was a recipe from Joy of Cooking that I didn't change a bit.  I put the soup photos here just to illustrate what it looked like, but I'm aware that they are not pretty shots. I would like to absolve myself here by saying I'm not a photographer! I don't practice it, and I don't try to get better at it; not proud of that fact, rather just stating it. I never stage shots, I just take them when it seems right. At most I take about ten photos of a thing, usually it's just a few. I wish I were more focused (ha, ha) but I'm not. I really admire all my friends who take photography seriously and get better at it every day. I am trying to learn how to practice things and get better at them. It's a fault of mine that I don't. I fly into things with good intentions, and end up being a little sloppy about them because I've got twenty things like it going on.

I do, however, enjoy practicing cooking every day, and I'd say I always get better at it. (That doesn't mean I don't still make lots of mistakes!) Yesterday, I was working in the yard---finally!! I transplanted some trees, chopped some gnarly poison ivy vines, and cleared the perennial garden--and something obvious dawned on me, as I thought about all the things I like to do. In my life, I've gotten sidetracked by enjoying doing so many different things. There were so many things I wanted to be and to do! A musician, songwriter, photographer, writer, photo editor, film maker, actor--the list goes on. There were things in that list that I got good at, and worked really hard at, but they didn't seem to really take off. I was thinking yesterday as I raked--such good meditation--that in order to be good at something, you must not only put the work in, but really, you should enjoy the work involved. Obvious, right? Isn't it funny how something so obvious can suddenly seem so clear to you? Forcing yourself to put in the work that you don't truly enjoy to get to an end that you desire, well, that's just not going to work. At least not for me. 

Recently, I started to unclutter my life: getting rid of things that have been piling up, not being used. Another facet of this de-cluttering is to remove the doing of activities that might be better left to others. I'm trying very hard at streamlining my life, and to not desire to do things that might dilute the other things in my life. For example, I recently gave my chickens to my neighbor. I miss the chickens, but they took up brain space (and money) that perhaps gave me less time to spend on my garden and fruit trees. I still get great eggs, but now I am focusing on treating my trees a little better. I also sold my serger (a finishing sewing machine). I decided: you know what? I'm not a sewer! I like the idea of making something I dream up, but I'm not good at it!! I don't want to put in the work. So I retired the idea of being a sewer. I kept my old Singer for small jobs--hemming and the like--but I allowed myself to let go of making ambitious quilts or a clothing line. 

You catch my drift here? It doesn't mean that I'm putting down my guitar or camera, but you know the saying "Jack of all trades, master of none?" 

What I'm focusing on these days: the freezer and the larder. Using things up, although we still have a few months before true bounty is upon us, is one of my priorities. A couple of true gems I made this year were pesto, oven roasted tomatoes and salt pork. Pesto and oven roasted tomatoes have been standbys for years, the salt pork is new. Instead of freezing all the back fat I got from our half-hog for sausages, I made it into salt pork, cubed it, and froze it in ziploc bags. It has proven indispensable. But the best thing I have made with it is this buttermilk crackling cornbread. Oh, my. This fresh out of the oven with syrup and (redundant) butter was heaven. It was equally good the next morning, and aside this soup. (The recipe for the cornbread is in a link below, if you don't have Joy of Cooking. Let me know if it doesn't come up; it was a preview of the book.)

 Orzo and Chickpea Soup

Can you tell me when people started thinking that soup had to be the consistency of pudding? Whenever I stop in a diner and have soup, it's gloppy and horrible. Why?? This is a hearty soup with a nice broth. The way it should be. Soup, to me, isn't a science but an amalgamation of some good things in the fridge. It always starts with good stock. The ingredients here are just a guideline. Soup loves creativity and turning leftovers into gold.

A few cloves of garlic
1 onion
6 or so white mushrooms
2 carrots
Salt, Pepper, dried Italian herbs
6 cups of stock, chicken or vegetable
1 cup of roasted tomatoes
1 tablespoon of pesto
1 can of chickpeas
1/3 cup of orzo
About a 1/2 cup of chopped fresh parsley

1. Saute one medium onion and a few cloves of garlic, diced up, in good olive oil.

2. Add some veggies, here I finely diced some mushrooms and added a few carrots, peeled and left in big spears.

3. Add salt, pepper, some dried Italian herbs.

4. Slowly add about six cups of room temperature chicken stock, letting it heat up before you add more.

5. Add about a cup of oven roasted tomatoes. It doesn't matter if they are frozen or not. I chose to leave them whole, but you can coarsely chop them too.

6. A heaping spoonful of pesto. Mix it in.

7. A can of chickpeas. (I like keeping a can or two of beans around to put together a quick meal.)

8. Have the soup simmering for about fifteen minutes to let everything mingle. Then add about a 1/3 cup of orzo. Let it continue to simmer on low to cook the pasta.

9. Add a bunch of chopped fresh parsley.

10. Serve with this cornbread. (Joy of Cooking, Buttermilk Crackling Cornbread, page 778.) And have any leftovers toasted with butter and maple syrup!

Blue Cheese Buttermilk Fondue

Oh, yeah, that's what I'm talking about. I had some friends over for a visit recently, and as usual, I made a decadent fat-filled meal. I didn't try to, it just happened. At one point we had a wine tasting with our cheese plate, replete with pickled tarragon green beans and quince-rosemary jam. We also gathered forces to replicate a dish that we used to love back when we all worked together at a restaurant in NYC. It was a blue cheese fondue made with Maytag blue cheese, topped with caramelized shallots and rosemary oil. It was SO good. I didn't write down what I did, so this isn't an actual recipe. If you make it, know that you are on your own. I needed to get down what I could though, so I could make this again one day. I thought it was easy to make (but there were three of us!), and you could have the shallots and oil made before hand.

4 ounces of Maytag blue cheese
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup dry white wine

Combine all in a sturdy saucepan that has been rubbed with a clove of garlic. Keep on low heat and whisk until smooth. It can be bubbling slowly, but don't let it boil.

This is where we got confused: should we add cornstarch, like many recipes recommend? Well, it was really thin without it, so I poured in a slurry (love that word!) of

1 tablespoon of cornstarch and
2 tablespoons of quince brandy (so. good.)

Pour in the mixed cornstarch and brandy (that's the slurry!) and mix constantly until it thickens, which will be about five minutes. The cornstarch was totally the right way to go. It made the perfect dipping consistency. I've tried to make this fondue before, and I am sure that not adding cornstarch was the reason it was never fully successful.

Pour into a shallow dish, top with shallots and a fat drizzle of rosemary oil. Get some wine, some bread, and dig in! If you eat enough, I swear you won't get a hangover. You will, however, need to eat brown rice for some days after to clear your arteries.

Caramelized Shallots - Slice 3 large shallots thinly and saute in a cast iron pan coated thinly in olive oil. Cook until caramelized, which took us about 45 minutes.

Rosemary Oil - lightly warm a cup of oil (I used olive oil, but you could use canola--I might do that next time so the rosemary flavor/scent doesn't compete with the olive) with a big sprig of fresh rosemary. Don't let it boil or even bubble. Once hot for ten minutes, you can just let it steep in the pan for about a half hour. Strain for use. This stuff is good to have on hand, especially to finish soups.

Cabbage Gratin

It was a dreary and rainy Halloween. But I really didn't mind. I had the oven on with this gratin in it. Dinner was pork chops, tomato-apple chutney and this crispy topped goodness. There was apple cider (will it be hot, spiced or with rum? see below to find out what we did!*) and a lot of candy. This year we trick-or-treated in our own home. My son, who is now in kindergarten, was given the choice to go out to our friend's house to trick or treat like we've done for the past few years, or stay home. He picked home, and home it was.

It's funny how it takes you a while to really know who your kids is. I mean, you've always known, of course, but at this age they can talk and make choices, and they might even know themselves a bit more. I always find that my son knows himself so much better than I do. So I try to listen. After a few years of taking him out for trick or treating (and I'm not hugely into Halloween, but I thought that's just what you do, right?) he can finally tell me, "No, I'd rather stay home." So, we stayed in: put on the Monster Mash, carved another pumpkin, lit some candles, and yes, ate some candy! I got a huge bowl of all different kinds of candies, and we had our own trick or treating fun knocking on the porch door and then going to the front door for more. We had so much fun!!

This gratin was real winter time fare. So hearty! I used this recipe from the NY Times as a guideline. While I was searching for a recipe, I found this one that looks promising, as well, which had cornmeal and dijon mustard in it.

Cabbage Gratin
adapted from this recipe from the NY Times

1 head of cabbage, sliced
1/2 cup water
olive oil
1 medium onion, diced
2 large cloves of garlic, smashed
salt

2 eggs, beaten
1 cup brown rice
1 cup buttermilk
handful of chopped flat leaf parsley
3/4 cup (or .25 pound) shredded gruyere cheese
grated parmesan cheese
nutritional yeast flakes

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 3 quart glass dish. (It will fit in a 2-quart dish if you squish it in like I did, but I will now be shopping for a 3-quart dish.)

Saute onion and garlic in olive oil. Add cabbage and slowly wilt, adding the water as needed so there's just wilting and no browning.

In a separate bowl, mix the eggs with the rice, buttermilk, parsely and 1/2 cup of the gruyere. When the cabbage is looking good (to me this means a mix of really wilt, almost yellow-y cabbage, and some still crisp, bright chartreuse) add it to the egg mixture and toss gently. Put the mix in your prepared pan, and sprinkle with the rest of the gruyere, a liberal amount of parmesan, and the nutritional yeast flakes.

Bake for about 40 to 50 minutes, until browned and bubbly.

NOTE: This makes a large amount of gratin. It's great for a group, but it also works well in leftovers. We had it the next night fried up in the cast iron skillet, for a crispy hash that was served with some bratwurst and mustard. Then I used to riff on this recipe for Italian Cabbage Bread Soup. Instead of the veg and cheese, I layered this gratin on the bread. It came out really very good!

I hope you had a Happy Halloween!



*Note: We ended up having hot toddies. They were SO good. Heat two cups of apple cider with a cinnamon stick (a little orange zest would be good, but I forgot it!) When it's just simmering, turn off the heat and add 3 ounces of applejack and one ounce of the King's Ginger. Throw in some crystallized ginger, pour in a Liberty mason jar mug and cheers!

Baby Bread Redux

Every week I make at least one loaf of what I call "baby bread." This quick bread is, well, quick, and easy, so a little guy can help. It's also healthy but tasty, with a slight sweetness. It's a perfect snack upon wake up from a nap, or a mid-morning bite after a romp outside. The great thing is the versatility of these breads. The one above was made with pureed sweet potatoes, beets and carrots. The batter was a bright, technicolor pink! I had pressure cooked a small dice of these root vegetables for the little guy, but he decided not to be interested in them. So, I pureed them. Still not interested. Baking them in a bread did the trick, and made the loaf naturally sweet and moist. Like baking with applesauce. I'm sure you could interchange any number of vegetables or fruits and get a satisfactory result.

3 cups of flour (2 cups wheat and 1 cup all purpose)

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup buttermilk or yogurt

1 cup vegetable puree (beets, sweet potatoes, carrots, in this case)

1/4 cup agave

Mix wet and add to dry. Bake at 350 degrees for about 50 minutes. I used a square 8x8 inch pan.

Flower interlude: aren't grape hyacinths special? I never planted a one, and they are scattered all over my lawn, probably thanks to the squirrels. They are so intricate! And the neighbors wonder why I don't cut my lawn. There's too many nice things growing in there!

Now here's a sturdy baby bread. Peanut butter bread! Slathered with jelly, this is my kind of snack. I used vanilla sugar, too, so when it was baking it smelled like Reese's Pieces, which I have a thing for. I was going to make peanut butter granola cookies. But I saw via Twitter this from Foodista, an anonymous recipe that I adapted to my tastes and needs. The hook was peanut butter bread with jelly. Of course I was sold. There's the random beauty that is Twitter.

2 cups flour

1/2 cup sugar

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup peanut butter

1/4 cup oil (I wonder if this is even necessary, but did it anyway)

1 cup buttermilk (milk or yogurt would do fine)

2 eggs

In my slapdash fashion, I mixed wet and added to dry, folding the peanut butter in at the end. Bake at 350 for about 50 minutes. I use a square 8x8 inch pan.

Buttermilk Bread

I must admit how pleased I am when my kid says he's hungry and asks for toast with jam and says, "Make sure it's that bread you made!!" I don't really bake much over the summer, and so just yesterday I finally baked off some loaves. I was indifferent to the idea initially, but once the bread came out of the oven it clicked in me as it does every year: oh, this is so worth it! This buttermilk bread recipe came from Laurel's Kitchen Bread Book, which is one of my favorite bread books.

This picture below was my Friday night still life. And the reason why I didn't post yesterday. I'm amazed that now that I have time (my son is in kindergarten--there's so much time now!) I can't get my act together and post everyday. But when he was home with me all the time, somehow I did. I think it's because this blog was all I had to make me feel like a human being, and I kept this space sacred as a place where I could hold onto my identity. Now it's not so pressing, which is nice. So, last night there was warm bread, and some red wine, and a fire going in the wood stove and I thought: you know what? It totally doesn't matter if I throw something up on the blog. And I promptly watched some terrible show on Netflix, then fell asleep. It wasn't heroic, but it felt nice.

Quick Fruit-Filled Coffee Cake

Blueberry coffee cake? Who turns that down?

I think I mentioned my stem to blossom-end philosophy last year during Tigress' Can Jam. I love using up everything I can, and that means that when I make juice or jelly or do something that leaves me with fruit pulp I invariably find a way to use it. This cake was born of that compulsion. It's incredibly quick and easy, and not too sweet; a great every day cake. One that you can leave out for a few days--it stays moist and if heated up for just a few minutes and you have a tasty treat.

I used rhubarb pulp from making rhubarb juice for the cake pictured below. It's color is a tad dull, but tasted great. The blueberry was leftover from syrup making. I really couldn't leave that goodness to waste. Spread over a thick batter and covered up with crunchy crumbles, and no one's the wiser. Saved from the compost!

Combine:

1 1/2 c. AP flour
1/2 cup of sugar
1 teaspoon of baking powder
1 teaspoon of baking soda
1/4 teaspoon of salt

Mix in a separate bowl:

1 cup of buttermilk
2 large eggs

Add the dry to the wet until just smooth. Don't over mix. Pour into a greased 10-inch spring form pan, and smooth the top. Spread about two cups (give or take) of fruit pulp over the batter. Cover with streusel topping. Bake at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes.

Streusel topping:

4 tablespoons of butter (oil works too)
1/4 cup of slivered almonds
1/2 cup of whole rolled oats
1/2 cup of sugar

Note: I do not sweeten the fruit, but you may want to depending on your tastes or the tartness of your fruit. The blueberries didn't need any extra sweetener, but for the rhubarb I sprinkled sugar on the layer of fruit before adding the streusel.

I love that this recipe only uses a few ingredients. If you don't have buttermilk, go ahead and use yogurt!

If you want to step it up and get fancy, head on over to these two amazing takes on a recipe for Rhubarb Kuchen:

Cakewalk: Rhubarb Kuchen
Tigress in a Jam: Rhubarb Krack

Dull, but tasty, rhubarb.

Parsnip, Potato and Winter Squash Soup

I'm not the best sewer, but for some reason I love sewing paraphernalia. A while back, I inherited quite a bit of it from my grandmother-in-law, and in combing through it, I was touched by her depression-era compulsion to save every last bit, because everything either mattered, or one day might matter. What most struck me was short lengths of thread wrapped around pieces of card stock, or my favorite, an old rolled up Winston cigarette pack. Buckles, buttons and hooks complete the picture of a life spent making do.

Making do is a beautiful and necessary thing. Making do, to me at least, doesn't mean that everything is patched together, falling apart or made of inferior things. Making do is finding the use in everything. It's entirely noble, in my mind, and especially in times like these, most important.

I especially love this theory applied to meals. That is, when something that might be called a left over is magically turned into something special and worthwhile on it's own. Not only am I not the only one who does this, but people have been doing this since they've been cooking. It's how many amazing dishes came to be. And it's how most restaurants are run. What do we need to cook? is what I often ask myself.

Along with sewing stuff, I like to collect cookbooks. The other day my son pulled this one out of the bookshelf, and I thought I'd page through it to see if there was anything good pertaining to cooking with soup. Well, there wasn't. But it's still got that kitchy je ne sais quoi, doesn't it? 

Here's an example of how a soup I made one night turned into several other meals. Leave me a comment---I'd love to hear how you do this.

Parsnip, Potato and Winter Squash Soup


This made enough for dinner one night, and two quarts for the fridge. One quart provided Turkey Cottage Pie the next night, and the other quart stayed refrigerated until I made the pancakes and muffins a full five days later. 

2 cups roasted pureed winter squash*
3 large boiled potatoes, in chunks
2 large boiled parsnips, in chunks

1 medium onion, diced

Saute onion in olive oil until soft and golden. Add parnsnips and potatoes. Mix in squash until just heated. Add 6-8 cups of water, 2 at a time. Wait until the soup is simmering to add the next two cups of water. Let cook at high simmer for fifteen minutes. Puree with immersion blender. Add salt to taste, but keep in mind you are using the soup for other things. Add more salt at the table if necessary.

Serve with a drizzle of rosemary olive oil, and good bread.

* I used a winter squash I grew but forgot the name of. Butternut is fine. Peel, remove seeds, chop to chunks, and roast on a lightly oiled baking tray at 400 degrees until tender when pierced with a fork. Purée when cool.


Turkey Cottage Pie

I'm using the term Cottage Pie loosely. Not the fanciest dish, but a good hearty meal for a mid-week dinner.

Saute one diced onion, add ground turkey (about a pound), add frozen mixed vegetables, cook through.  Put into a buttered 13 x 9 glass baking dish, cover with two cups of soup, which after a night in the fridge, thickened considerably. Dot with butter, sprinkle with grated cheese and/or bread crumbs, bake at 400 degrees for about thirty minutes.

Root Vegetable Pancakes

1 1/2 cups AP flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
pinch of salt

1 1/2 cups buttermilk (yogurt is also fine)
2 eggs
3 tablespoons vegetable oil or melted butter
1/2 cup of Parsnip, Potato and Winter Squash soup (or a similar smooth soup)

Mix dry ingredients, then add the mixed wet ingredients. Let sit for about fifteen minutes. Cook pancakes as you usually do. I find that pancakes that have added ingredients always take a little longer to fully cook. I keep my griddle a little less hot, and make sure to let the pancakes cook a bit longer. An undercooked pancake is very unappetizing. I add no sugar to my pancake batter, but instead top them with butter and maple syrup.

Cheddar and Rosemary Muffins


These muffins are dense and filling, and make a great side dish to a meal, or a quick lunch. 

2 cups of AP flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
pinch of salt

1 cup buttermilk (yogurt is also fine)
1 cup Parsnip, Potato and Winter Squash soup (or a similar smooth soup)
1/4 of a pound of grated cheese, cheddar or gouda are good choices
1 teaspoon of dried rosemary
1 egg
1/3 cup of olive oil

Mix your flours and powders thoroughly. And the same with rest of the ingredients in a separate bowl. Add the wet to the dry in a few brisk strokes. Pour into a 12-muffin tin greased well with olive oil. Bake at 400 degrees for 25-30 minutes. When you take them out of the oven, they will look glorious and puffy. But, like a soufflé, they will deflate a bit. However, they still look charming and taste great.

Wintry Mix

Today I finished sugaring the Meyer lemon peels I candied, and I started making the next batch of candied peels, those being sour oranges. I almost gave up on them for being too bitter, but the fourth dip in boiling water did the trick and most of the bitterness is gone. But not all! I must say, I do prefer the Meyer candies--they are so sweet and lovely, I was snacking on them constantly. The sour oranges I am seeing as more of a cocktail garnish, not really a sweet. They have a bit of a bite. I might even just can them in their syrup, instead of drying them. We'll see where I am when they are done with their sugar baths.

What kind of day did I have today? Well, the above picture looks so tranquil, doesn't it? I'm sugaring candy while my docile child plays. What a lovely image. But it's really not what happened. It happened for about ten minutes, which was dreamy, and then it abruptly ended. That's why I love all these kitchen tasks that take days and barely any attention. I can put the candy away and be there for the incessant question: "what's next" which will one day very soon turn into, "I'm bored!" 

Advent-ageous.

We did get an advent calendar today from a friend of ours. Lucky us! It has toys instead of candy, which I like a lot. Advent calendars are a lot harder to explain to a four year old than you would think, but he was very patient when I explained we didn't open it until tomorrow, and even then it's only one door a day. Patience is a virtue, as they say.

White whole wheat buttermilk pancakes.

We made some pancakes. And chocolate chip cookies. They are required on a frozen day filled with little flurries buzzing down from a gray forbidding sky. I used coconut oil in the chocolate chip cookies for the first time. That is the ticket, I want you to know. Coconut oil in any kind of chocolate-y dessert is a good thing in my book. Then you can tell yourself it's good for you!

Toasted buckwheat is kasha. 

Lest you think all we eat are sugary treats, I did toast these buckwheat groats to make a recipe from Food in Jars' cookbook. Well, I guess it was for granola, so maybe I don't eat anything healthy. Actually, now that I think of it, I had breakfast all day long today. Steel cut oats with maple syrup for breakfast, the rest of the oats with parmesan cheese and pepper for lunch--oh, wait, I had turkey noodle soup for dinner. There's something not breakfast-y. Whew!

In the afternoon, we had a pre-cookie tea party which ended up with a broken teacup. This is what happens when you use real glass (and nice vintage ones, at that) for tea cups for a four year old boy. I knew what I was up against. In this picture, I was setting up a shot in which life would look so easy and wonderful: some tea, some cookies, a cozy kitchen. My little fantasy turned into a crying boy and a harried woman vacuuming the grimy floor, making sure no slivers of glass remained to cut little (or big or feline) feet.

The cozy life of a stay at home mom looks pretty idyllic from the outside, doesn't it? But really you go a little insane from the incessant tedium. The pretty tea parties belie broken cups, the endless trains make you a little crazy, and cold days are your nemesis. That's why you see so many of those crazy craft blogs by mommies who are trying to fill a freaking day! I sometimes find myself wondering how some people do it: three kids and not a day goes by without gorgeous pictures documenting it all. I guess humans like the glossy ideal or the train wreck, and the in between dailies aren't often as appealing, whether you are taking the pictures or viewing them. And that's the beauty of photos. A snapshot of a train set looks so inviting, but five hours of it can crush your soul, and leave you a gasping for a few minutes of frosty outside air. 

But then you come back in and breathe in the warmth, and it's all okay again.

Soup Season

A rich broth with udon and pork.

Eat more soup! When the cold weather comes around my house, soup season begins. It's, in most cases, the quickest, cheapest, and healthiest thing for breakfast, lunch or and/or dinner.

The soup above came about from some extreme frugality. A bag of bones came with my half-pig order. Because the freezer was so full, I immediately made some stock from the meaty bones. I roasted the bones until browned, picked the meat off them, and then made the stock with the bones. With two large quart containers of wiggly stock in the fridge and a pint of picked roasted meat, I was armored against the new war on winter. One night, craving a pho-ish kind of dish, I poured one of the quarts into my soup pot, and added a good pour of tamari, and some fish sauce. No spices, instead, once boiling I threw in some sliced scallions and dried udon noodles. While this was happening, the shredded leftover meat sizzled in a hot cast iron pan, making it crispy and chewy. A bowl, some broth and noodles, topped with that sticky meat: and it was just what was needed for dinner. Taking all of fifteen minutes. Soup!!

Roasted butternut and celery root soup, with savory bread pudding.

Then, there's this one: a soup that turned into a meal, and then the meal turned back into the soup. A full circle, if you will. Roasted celeriac and butternut squash, pureed and married to turkey stock (I'm pretty sure there wasn't even an onion in this) turned into a velvety soup topped with rosemary olive oil. (Here's my plug for a Vitamix: I love immersion blenders, to be sure, but it really has nothing on the velvet-making power of the Vitamix.)

The next day, I had a leftover baguette (which always makes me happy--I buy more than I need because the benefits of day old bread are many) that I wanted to make into a savory bread pudding. I used the leftover soup, buttermilk, some cheese and eggs--the standard bread pudding mixture--and within less than an hour (that's mostly baking time) I had a main course to be served aside a salad. Seemingly healthy, but I made a warm bacon dressing for the salad. Oops.

Fish chowder.

And fish chowder. May a winter never go by without fish chowder. And to think that dark thought is not so far-fetched! Sad, but true. Aside from the fish, this is a "pantry essential dish," like many other soups. That is, you can make it with what you have in the house. An onion, bay leaf, a potato, butter and some milk. This is a traditional New England-style chowder. (Say it! Chowdah!) to be sure. There are a million variations. And we will get to them. It's only December. We have plenty of time.

p.s. I feel compelled to apologize for the shoddy pictures; when I am about to eat my concentration goes out the window!

Yogurt

After a couple of years of making yogurt, I finally feel the groove. I tried all sorts of ways to find that sweet temperature that yogurt cultures need to thrive, finicky little things that they are. I've evolved from mason jars sitting in a little Playmate cooler filled with warm water to using a yogurt warmer that you plug in.

My yogurt "maker" is a Cosmopolitan Yogurt Maker by Salton. I bought it in a thrift shop for $4. I see on eBay it's vintage! What's funny is that for years I was collecting these little white glasses that I thought were antique milk glass, but when I bought the yogurt maker, I found that all along I had been collecting yogurt warmer jars. I still love them, and actually they are more useful to me now. If I ever break one, I have back up. For the record, the Cosmopolitan is a champ, although I do start plug it in when I start heating the milk. It needs some time to warm up, like most things born in the seventies.

I've found that my favorite yogurt is thick and tangy. The texture I like is achieved by whisking a little milk powder in the milk before heating it. The tangy part comes from a long sitting period: 24 hours. I used to always pull the yogurt at 8 hours, until a friend, who makes excellent yogurt, tipped me off. It also firms up a little more, and I hear tell is necessary if you use yogurt as a starter and you don't buy cultures, which is what I do.

Yogurt was on my mind today because, like buttermilk, I start making it again when the temperatures plunge, and I'm back inside. It seems silly, because yogurt seems like such a summertime thing, right? But summer is so busy, I find I have to let go of some things to make room for others. I'm glad to have these things back in my life!

Yogurt with Cray-pas. Don't you love Cray-pas?

Frosty Morning

I joined the Instagram world, did you know? This morning was super cold and frost was fractal-ing everywhere. It was hard to keep my eyes on the road when I kept on wanting to stare at the back window, which was covered in a gorgeous white sparkly pattern. I took this photograph in an effort to capture the frost that was crisping every golden blade of grass, every sawgrass plume, every stiff cattail and every platinum-filled silky milkweed pod. I believe I failed, but the filter made the image pretty nonetheless.

So, today I am making creamy mushroom soup and buttermilk squash muffins with a fire blazing downstairs wondering this: why did I say I was going to do this write every day thing!? Ha! I'll have you know that I am laughing as I write this. Maybe a little crazily. I was busy today (and VOTED today, did you?) and really right now I'd like to go downstairs and watch Blues Clues with my son down in our cozy TV room by the fire. But what am I doing? Writing in the coldest room in the house. Hmm.

Here's where I want to note this: the hard part is the good part! (The lazy part of me is utterly unconvinced, btw.) I'm finding my way, and that is never easy. And to find your self you must suffer some doldrums, some chaff, if you will. Like yesterday's post. I was so unhappy with it. I was trying to finish rendering some leaf lard (came out perfectly--snowy white!) and make sure to call a dear friend, and so I patched together bits from the morning with the evening. I sent it off into the ether-verse! Who cares anyways, says I!

So, in an effort at quantity I am going to forego quality. Does that make any sense at all? Right now it is. I'm forging ahead, unashamed at the scattered quality of my posting.

Guanciale Jam

There's been a lot of posts on charcuterie alternated with fruity preserve-y stuff, and so I figured I'd combine the two!

No, not really, but this is a meat "jam." I had some guanciale sitting around and had this idea for a spreadable meat, like 'nduja. Or, probably closer in style to bacon marmalade. Last year bacon marmalade was everywhere--do a search and a bunch of things come up. I sort of used those recipes as a guideline, and I wish I hadn't because the flavoring for guanciale should have been more subtle than for bacon. If I ever do it again, I would use white wine vinegar and fresh herbs, maybe honey.

I diced my small stash of cured jowl and sauteed it until brown and crispy. Poured off the excess fat to use later. Placed the meat to the side. Put one chopped onion in the hot pan that was still lightly greased, and cooked until soft and browned. I added some brown sugar and cider vinegar. I cooked it all down for a while, added water when it got dry. When it looked right to me, which was about twenty minutes, I took it off the heat and let it cool. When cool, into the processor it went to be whizzed down into a smooth-ish paste.

This little jar of gold has been coming in handy with the huge amount of kales and chard I have. A spoonful in a hot cast iron pan is the perfect accompaniment to hearty greens. I also had some Charcutepalooza Canadian bacon on hand, a small chunk, and chopped that into the pan as well. Add a little whey, if you have it, to simmer it all down....

It's also good on biscuits. These were made with lard (that I got from the generous Lisa Mack of Mack Hill Farms) with buttermilk and sourdough starter. It was slightly decadent to say the least! That was a really fine breakfast.