Team Pork Rides Again

Having made delicious celeriac skordalia to accompany the ass-kicking steak, I naturally wanted to eat more of it. Team Pork worked so well the last time I thought I'd give them another shot. Called them up to the big show. Sent a bus ticket. Made a phone call. Talked their folks into letting them skip college.

I cut nice big slabs of bacon and browned them in a skillet. Poached the sausage to firm it up prior to slicing and browning so the pieces would hold their shape. Worked fantastically, I'm a goddamn genius. I diced a small apple and half an onion and cooked them along with the team. I also cooked a couple of tomatoes in the skillet to serve as a garnish, and they browned nicely in the rendered fat.

I started the plates with a base of celeriac puree, added Team Pork, the tomatoes and some fat leaves of basil and mint from the alley. The alley has been kicking ass lately. Italian basil is producing leaves as big as a shoe and both Thai basil and mint plants are going buck wild. The pepper plants are healthy and heavy with budding peppers, but we won't have any to harvest for a few weeks yet.

The plate was coming together but looked a little under-dressed, so I made an aoli to spiff it up a little. I pureed a clove of garlic with the microplane and emulsified it with an egg yolk, some sesame oil, freshly grated horseradish, rice vinegar, Siracha, salt and pepper. It came out a nice subtle orange color, and when I drizzled it on the plate with some olive oil, the colors made the whole plate look better. The garlic in the celeriac skordalia was still pretty strong, but the peppery spice in the aoili made a nice contrast.

The Electrons made the playoffs again, and unless the league starts testing for alcohol before games we're probably looking at the makings of a dynasty. This summer is developing a nice head of steam for both the Electrons and Team Pork.

Zucchini Kale Lasagna

It's bound to happen at one point this summer.  You get a rediculously large zucchini and wonder what you're going to do with it.  Or, perhaps you grab it right up and think immediately of zucchini bread or zucchini lasagna.

I'm sure you can guess which camp I fell into?  :)  Layers of zucchini alternating with a ricotta and kale mixture, smothered in a tasty marinara sauce, this lasagna was a delicious twist on tradition!!

Zucchini & Kale Lasagna
Recipe by Shannon
Serves 4

I had leftover zucchini and a bit of filling, so I made some rollatini with the extra components.  A tablespoon or two spread along a zucchini slab, rolled up and put in a small casserole with some sauce and baked along with the lasagna!

1 huge zucchini (or 2 regular-sized ones)
1 head of kale (use however much you'll enjoy), washed and destemmed
olive oil
1 lg clove garlic, minced
salt and freshly ground pepper
8oz ricotta cheese
1 egg
1/2t garlic powder
1/2t dried oregano
1/2t dried basil
dash of red pepper flakes (or more, to taste)
Your favorite sauce (I used jarred)
Parmesan cheese
Fresh basil, for topping

Preheat the oven to 375deg.

Cut off the ends of the zucchini and slice lengthwise into ~1/4" thick slabs (a mandoline would be nice to use here, if you have it, but I just used a chef's knife).  Cover 1-2 cookie sheets with paper towels and lay zucchini in a single layer over them.  Sprinkle with coarse sea salt and set aside.

Heat 1-2T extra virgin olive oil in a large saute pan over medium heat.  Roughly chop kale and add to heated oil.  Saute for ~5min or so.  You can also add a splash of water (carefully!!) and cover it with a lid to steam the kale a bit and get it to cook a bit quicker.  Add garlic and continue to cook until all the kale has started to wilt.  Remove from heat and set aside.

For the filling, add ricotta, egg and spices (garlic powder, oregano, basil) to a large bowl.  Mix well, then add the cooled kale mixture and mix again. Set aside until you're ready to assemble the lasagna (can be prepared ahead of time and refrigerated until you're ready to use).

Check on your zucchini, you should see large beads of water on the zucchini as the salt draws out some moisture. Blot it with a paper towel to remove this moisture before preparing the lasagna.

In a 9" sq pan, add enough sauce to cover the bottom of the dish.  Start layering zucchini, followed by kale/ricotta, then sauce.  Repeat until you've reached the top of your baking dish or used up your zucchini/filling.  Bake, covered in foil, for 35min.  Remove foil, top with your desired amount of Parmesan cheese and broil 5-10min, until cheese has melted nicely and its bubbling around the edges.  Remove from the oven and let cool for 5-10min before trying to cut.  Top with fresh basil when serving!

How do you like your lasagna?

Summer's Perfect Dessert: Vanilla Rice Custard with Raisins

Because our house and backyard are shaded by three large trees, we make it through summer's hottest days without air conditioning. It helps that a cooling ocean breeze comes our way in the afternoon.

Eating outside on the deck is a great way to beat the heat. Easy-to-make dishes, relying heavily on salads and grilled vegetables, fish and meat are the way to go. No need to suffer inside in front of the stove when there's a barbecue outside.

Shopping at our local farmers markets--Pacific Palisades on Sundays and Santa Monica on Wednesdays--keeps us happy, with freshly picked fruits and vegetables.

Carrots full of sweetness and crunch, cherry tomatoes that dive bomb your mouth with sweet-acidic juice, flat and spicy leaves of arugula tossed in salads dressed simply with a reduced balsamic vinaigrette dressing, split lobsters on the grill topped with caramelized onions, bread crumbs and butter, Italian sausages poked with a fork to release the steaming juices as they grill on the barbecue....

Sooner or later, the meal comes to an end but before that happens, a closer needs to make an appearance.

Dessert.

The simpler the better, in my mind. Summer is no time for heavy confections. Perfectly ripe grapes or peaches and nectarines bursting with flavor. Figs so sweet you imagine wasps can sense their sweetness from miles around. Grilled fruit. Ice cold melons. Simple sorbets.

For a dinner last week, I prepared an easy-to-make vanilla custard with raisins. For variety I used both regular and golden raisins with a few dried cranberries thrown in.

Serve the custard at room temperature or slightly warmed (250 degrees for 10 minutes).

For a festive addition, try serving the custard with a variety of toppings: bowls of heavy cream, ice cream, whipped cream (there's a theme here) and fresh berries--whichever ones are ripe and sweet--blueberries, strawberries, raspberries or blackberries.

Vanilla Rice Custard with Raisins

Yield: 6

Preparation Time: 15 minutes

Cooking Time: 45-60 minutes

Ingredients

2 eggs
1/2 cup white sugar
1 cup cream
2 tablespoons raisins
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups cooked rice
2 tablespoons raw whole almonds

Method

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Put the almonds on a baking sheet and roast in the oven for 15 minutes.  Remove, let cool and roughly chop. Set aside.

Beat together the eggs and sugar until well-blended. Add the raisins, cream and vanilla. Let the raisins soak in the custard for an hour or overnight.

Use any kind of rice you like. Add the rice and chopped almonds to the custard-raisin mixture. Pour into an oven proof bowl.

I like to use a shallow baking dish so there is more of the delicious crust that forms around the edge of the dish.  The shallower baking dish, the shorter the cooking time. And, conversely, the deeper the baking dish, the longer the cooking time.

Create a water bath by putting 1" of water into a baking dish 4" larger than the baking dish you are using the for the custard. Put the baking dish into the water bath and into the oven.

Cook until the custard sets or doesn't jiggle if the baking dish is shaken.

Rotate every 30 minutes for even cooking. If the top of the custard is getting too brown before setting, gently lay a sheet of aluminum foil over the top.

Serve with ice cream, whipped cream or fresh fruit.

Variations

Instead of one kind of raisin, use golden as well as dark raisins.

Instead of all raisins, use dried cranberries or any other dried fruit, roughly chopped.

Instead of almonds, use whatever roasted nuts you prefer.

Add a touch of cayenne powder for a hint of heat.

Sweet Corn Ice Cream (CSA Week 6)

When I picked up this week's share, I was pretty excited, and if you look closely, you'll see why...

The first early corn!!!  I mean, I love everything from the fresh peas and kale down to the cucumber and squash, but corn is special.  :)

Call me crazy, but I've wanted to make corn ice cream for well over a year now, so I decided I would do it before it got to be too late again.  There are many versions out there, but none of them seemed to fit exactly what I wanted to do so this is my version.

Sweet Corn Ice Cream
Yield ~2c

I opted to leave the corn in the ice cream to give it some texture, but it becomes a little chewy and is not something everyone will enjoy.  If you're not sure, I'd strain the mixture and top it with some corn kernals if you'd like.  Or perhaps some caramel sauce...  caramel corn ice cream?

2 ears of corn
1 can lite coconut milk
1/3c evaporated cane juice (or granulated sugar)
seeds of 1/2 vanilla bean
pinch of sea salt
1/4c milk (I used almond milk)
1T arrowroot

Cut the corn kernals from both ears of corn and add the kernals (I got 1 1/2c) and cob to a medium saucepan.  Add sugar, vanilla bean and pour in coconut milk.  Turn heat to medium low and cook to boiling, stirring occasionally to make sure the sugar dissolves.  Turn off heat and let the cobs steep for awhile, ~1hr or so.

Remove the cobs and transfer mixture to a blender.  Add a pinch of sea salt and blend well.  Strain, if desired, to remove corn pieces and store in an airtight container in the fridge until mixture is well chilled.

Churn in an ice cream maker according to manufacturer's directions.

I might just have to put corn in some more desserts this summer ;)  But first I'll indulge straight off the cob!!


Have you ever tried corn ice cream, or any other crazy dish with corn??

Law and Order

"In the criminal justice system, the people are represented by two separate yet equally important groups: the police who investigate crime and the district attorneys who prosecute the offenders. These are their stories."

In the first-time dating arena, the participants are apt to forget two critical yet often overlooked flaws: that we mask the truth about ourselves, and turn a blind eye to the incompatibilities of others. These will emerge later.




Bottoms Up, Optimists.

Fuck it, I'm Fixing a Steak

On my last trip to Paulina Market I spotted some beautifully marbled strip steaks and instantly nabbed them. There were six of the little beauties and I got four just in time, as one of the butchers then emerged from the back and set the other two aside, I'll assume for himself but maybe a favorite client. These steaks were fantastic looking. Three inches thick, ruby red meat capped with sturdy ivory (not yellow) fat, and veins of it running through the meat like a great Nile delta of flavor. This is what I talk about when I talk about steak. I had the butcher wrap two of the steaks separately so I could freeze them, intending to deal with the other two as soon as I got home.

Most of the red meat I've eaten recently has been grilled by Tim Mydhiett in his back yard. He masters a beautiful ceramic egg barbecue oven and tends to rub things on his meat* before sticking it in there*. Lately he has been using a rub of finely-ground espresso, salt, pepper and sumac, and it has been exceptional every time I've had it. I generally dry age beef a few weeks in the fridge before cooking it, but the rub is a pretty good approach for meat being cooked without aging. I wondered if I could incorporate some of the flavors of the rub into the aging process to make the meat even more flavorful, so I set up a little experiment. I intended to cook two steaks, one rubbed and grilled immediately and one rubbed and aged prior to cooking. I made the rub of espresso, salt, black pepper, cinnamon, mustard powder, turmeric, chile de arbol and cardamom seeds ground together in a mortar and pestle, and coated the steaks with it. I didn't have any sumac so I used the other spices for a whiff of the exotic. Yma Sumac was a Nice Jewish girl from the Bronx named Amy Camus anyway.**

As fortune would have it, the Myddiette-Hunter household was planning a dinner of grilled meats and ice cream, so I had an opportunity to try my rub a-la-minute. I say they were planning, but really I called and suggested they make such plans. Sue me.

The grilled steak was excellent, and proved the merit of grabbing good meat the moment you spot it.* Cinnamon by itself doesn't play particularly well on beef, bringing to mind the watery horror that is Cincinnati chili, but when made into a kind of masala with hot pepper and other strong flavors it does wonders. Tim has been working on his ice cream chops and fuck me he makes some delicious shit. He made a pearl green mint-basil-pepper ice cream and a ruby red sorbet of raspberry, cherry and lime juice with some way back mint that both blew my mind. Complex and satisfying, they made me lust after one of those countertop freezers and Tim's ninja skills.

So the first part of the experiment was a rousing success. Meat cooked over fire is delicious, even if you put coffee on it. After sleeping off the effects of the meal I settled into a normal life while the other steak rested and matured in the fridge. When aging beef in this manner there are a couple of things to be aware of. You need to keep the meat elevated so air can get all around it or you risk anaerobic activity and potentially lethal poisoning of yourself and guests. I do this by arranging a couple of skewers or chopsticks on a plate in a grid pattern to make a little rick, and resting the steak on top of it. You need to rotate the steaks a couple of times a month so the juices redistribute and you don't end up with rawhide leather on one end and mush on the other. You need a kitchen towel or something under the meat to absorb the condensation and sweat runoff, and you need to change it frequently or your fridge will smell like a corpse. It will smell like a corpse anyway, I just put that in there so when your fridge smells like a corpse you won't freak out, you'll just change the towel and let the steak do its thing. One of the things it does is smell like a corpse.

Time passed, I learned some things about myself and other people and had a couple laughs. I got a haircut, then a trim of the same haircut and finally a trim of the trimmed haircut. I noticed my eyebrows are still pretty bushy, but have a lot more grey in them than I remembered. I wondered if men go bald in their eyebrows like they do on their heads. There's basically no baldness in my family line. My father, his father and my maternal grandfather all went to their graves with full heads of black hair. I never thought to check their eyebrows. For the better part of a month, I basically forgot I had a beautiful steak in the fridge waiting for me to cook it.

Then out of the blue one evening I was struck with the desire to eat a big fucking steak, and remembered that I had just such a thing waiting in my fridge, smelling like a corpse covered in coffee, and resolved to cook the son of a bitch and eat it. It was big enough that I could feed Heather with some of it and still stuff myself with the remains.

I love eating mashed potatoes with steak, but earlier in the week I had bought a giant celeriac bulb and thought it would make a nice accompanying dish, since mashed potatoes weren't JP. I sweated half a sweet onion and some garlic in olive oil, then added the celeriac and a small apple, both peeled and diced into half-inch cubes, and enough salted water to simmer them. While they were cooking I tended to the steak.

If cooked indoors, I prefer the finish of broiled steaks to any other method of cooking, but I've found that a thick, cold steak cooked under the broiler generally stays cold in the center, and that can make for an unpleasant sensation in the mouth. I have taken to starting the steak in a skillet, then finishing it under the broiler, and the meat comes out nicely rare. I cooked this beauty just like that, with a couple of minutes on top of the stove in olive oil, then another three or four under the screaming hot broiler on each face. I slid a couple of halved tomatoes into the skillet for both episodes of the cooking process to serve alongside the steak.

When the steak was done, I removed it from the skillet and let it rest on the cutting board. This step is critical for aged beef because the peripheral meat can easily dry out if served hot from the fire. I used the resting period to finish the celeriac. I buzzed the contents of the pot (celeriac, apples and onions) with the stick blender until smooth and tasted it. It was good, but I was a little concerned that the strong flavors of the steak would overwhelm it and it would end up being just a kind of neutral matter on the plate. I decided to make the puree into a kind of skordalia by adding some strong olive oil and a couple cloves of fresh garlic. That turned out to be a really good idea. I plated the puree and was about to nestle the tomatoes in it when I remembered that the alley basil had recently bulked up, so I ran out into the alley and grabbed some fat leaves to set the tomatoes on. Little leaf boats. Adorable. I cut the steak into pieces, laid them into the celeriac and drizzled olive oil over them. A little cracked pepper and sea salt and the plate was done.

This meal was exactly what I needed to break the rice-and-greens monotony of the JP diet. A big fucking steak, colored purple and red by the aging process, seared and crackly on the outside, stinking like bleu cheese in a wet sock, on a pillow of savory puree that stung my eyes with its garlic breath. The fat had dried into a kind of cheese, and when I bit through the crust of seared rub and beef essence it bathed my tongue in an unctuous, marrow-like butter. Even the tomatoes were terrific, hot, astringent and wet, they acted like both a salad and steak sauce. I horked the whole plate into my gut like I was trying to impress somebody and lay down on the couch feeling like a fucking emperor. I was asleep in minutes.

Did the rub make any difference in the aged steak? Hell I don't know. A thick, quality steak like this with a couple of weeks dry age on it is so incredibly good you could probably empty out Dave's shop vac on it and it would still rule.

*You heard me.

**No she wasn't.

Vegetable Pilaf with Prosciutto Ribbons and Egg Yolk

The difference between what I would call a pilaf or a risotto is almost the difference between a salad and a soup. Risotto is served pretty wet, with the starch and liquid elements creating a kind of sauce that binds the rice, and risotto can hold its own as an entree. Pilaf has distinct grains and usually accompanies something else. Heather was hungry, but I didn't want to tie myself up in the kitchen for half an hour making a risotto, so I decided to split the difference and make a pilaf with some extra crap on it that would be substantial enough to serve as a meal.

I started by making a sofrito of onions, garlic and carrot and sweating it in some olive oil. Then I added the rice, vegetable stock (did I mention I made stock? It's awesome) and a mashed chipotle pepper and brought it to a boil. Once the stock was boiling, I dunked a plum tomato in it for a few seconds, then retrieved, peeled and chopped it. If you add fresh tomato at the beginning of cooking something like this it mutes the bright flavor and the skin tends to slough off, turning nice tomato pieces into a rubbery rude confetti with bits of mush. I wanted the tomato to be a fresh element, so I reserved it to add at the end of cooking.

Dropping the tomato into the stock immediately lowered the temperature to a simmer, so when I took it out I lowered the fire to compensate and keep the rice at a steady light simmer. I let the rice go for about 12 minutes, then shut it off and let it rest with the lid on until finished, which only takes a couple of minutes. I stirred the diced tomato and reserved juice into the rice and plated it, plopping an egg yolk in the middle of the rice. The hot rice denatures the yolk slightly, changing it from a runny liquid to a capsule of creamy, rich sauce, which I imagined Heather stirring into the rice after making a flattering "ooh" sound. She probably didn't make the sound, but imagining it is what keeps me going some times.

We had some very nice imported prosciutto from Paulina Market, so I cut a slice of it into ribbons and draped them over the pilaf, then sprinkled some chopped alley parsley and alley mint over the whole plate. A quick drizzle of olive oil, some fresh cracked pepper and crunchy sea salt and the plate was done. The rice itself had much of the flavor of the stock and sofrito, the yolk made itself into a rich sauce, the prosciutto was prosciutto and therefore awesome, and the herbs, tomato, olive oil and pepper added a bright vegetal top note.

I made two plates, one for Heather and one for me, and when I stirred the egg yolk into the rice I made a little "ooh" sound, in imitation of the sound I imagined Heather would make when she did the same. This bit of business allowed me the satisfaction of inducing an "ooh," even if it was a self-satisfied one and not the genuine article. I'm too old to care about such distinctions and sometimes I just "ooh" at my own food. Fuck it, nobody's listening.

What Kind of Person is Google?

If we had the power to turn search engines into people, what kind of person would we shake hands with if Google turned biological? IMO, he'd be that guy who sits off to the side of the party, close to the door but away from the kitchen. When people ask "Where can I put my coat?" or "Is this beer cold?" he answers immediately without looking up from his smartphone. An Android, natch. He's dismissively inclined, dispatching we unclever mortals without even a smile.

Google IS a male. He LIKES direct questions, and issues direct answers in response, taking a kind of smug satisfaction in being right. Right is a relative concept in Cyber. Mr Google has no filter for the crass, nor discernment for subtleties of certain kinds of search terms. In that way, he's like a savant - knowledgeable without being smart. Like an immature male. Master Google rather than Mister Google?

And I wonder about his name. Master Google isn't Andrew or Tom or Stavros. He's not Shamal or Riccardo, and he's definitely not a Buddy. I'm tempted to call him Neil. As in Neil Armstrong, another emotionless numbers-butt who did amazing things but looks like a stiff in a bar. Master Neil Google.

I don't know.

What I DO know is that we need a female Google. Girl Google is a more emotionally-grounded and nuanced Google who tends more towards asking how you feel about the answer. We should call it Booble. Miss Booble is the girl-next-door who won the scholarship to a fancy university and ended up turning her pep into $600 per share. Miss B is probably hosting the party. She's catered amazingly - including Inuit appropriate snacks for her friends from Far North Canada - and gets to talk meaningfully with all her guests.

Miss B is totally the girl every man wants, but she is oddly attracted to the moody loner in the corner engrossed in his phone. He's short and cool. He's achingly aloof. He ignores all but her most direct questions. And she wants him with all her being.





Bottoms Up, Searchers.

Vegetable Crazy

The thing about having a CSA is that you get a lot of veggies.  Every week.  And while I like to come up with creative things to do or try out recipes that have been on my list for awhile, sometimes time and motivation are lacking.

Enter:  the stir fry.  Or is it just simply sauteed vegetables?  I don't know the difference.  Coming back from a weekend out of town I had 3 peppers, onions, corn,  CSA zucchini and swiss chard.  After chopping everything up, dinner came together in a snap.  Heat up some oil in a large pan/wok, add veggies based on their cooking time (peppers and onions first, then zucchini, then swiss chard, garlic and corn), some herbs/seasonings (this time there was white pepper, thyme, and fresh basil), and cannellini beans for some staying power and dinner's on the table! Delicious, full of flavor, and even pretty to look at ;)

Another one of my favorite things to do with vegetables is to roast them.  (No surprise there!)  This time I roasted carrots, zucchini and summer squash from my CSA with onions, eggplant, and green pepper.  While those were in the oven I cooked up some wheat berries.  When the veggies and wheat berries were done, I tossed those with some pecorino toscano and enjoyed it for lunch!

The bottom line is that you can use whatever you hand in order to create a delicious, nutritious meal!  Any myriad of vegetables will work in either preparation, can be combined with your favorite grain, vary up the protein you use, and try different cheeses!   The possibilities are endless :)

Sausage Dumplings in Gravy

I had a blowout on my hands. A band was scheduled to do a one-day session, during which they intended to record and overdub three songs, an ambitious amount of work to do in a day even under normal circumstances. Over the course of a couple hours at the start of the day, two tape machines and the air conditioning unit for studio A all took a dump. Given that we were short-staffed, moving a third tape machine in from the second floor would take a long-ass time and the studio was getting uncomfortably warm, so the band decided to pull the plug. I felt awful about the studio letting the band down, so I offered them an additional day on the house so they would have enough time to get done what they wanted without feeling rushed. The whole thing put me in a rotten mood, and by the time everyone split it was early evening, so I decided to invent something for dinner to take my mind off it. I had been thinking about boiled dumplings, and wondered if I could enrobe something in a dumpling dough to make a more complex, less stodgy dish.

Don't get me wrong, I love plain dumplings in soup or stew, but I wanted something less solid, and with surprises inside. We still had a couple of fresh bratwurst from Paulina Market, and sausage is a pretty good surprise*. Instead of mixing uncased sausage into a forcemeat filling, I decided to cut the sausage into little nuggets and surround them with minced vegetables inside the dumplings. To firm them up prior to cutting into portions, I put them in a pot of cold water and turned on the fire. While they were coming up to temperature, I made the vegetable portion of the filling.

I had made lunch for Heather to take to work the day before, some little rice paper parcels full of mixed greens, which I decorated by including some colorful herbs, vegetables and apple. I only needed a half-dozen slices of apple for her lunch, so I sliced and dressed the rest of the apple for future use. I made a vinaigrette of rice vinegar, mustard, sesame oil and some left-over steak rub containing ground espresso coffee, yellow curry powder, salt, pepper and ground chile de arbol, and coated the apple slices with it. After marinating overnight, they were slightly pickled and chutney-like. I diced the apple slices fine, and did the same with some slices of carrot, ginger, red pepper and plum tomato, then mixed them all together with the residual apple dressing and a couple of mashed garlic cloves.

The sausages had come up to a simmer, which was enough to make them firm, so I took them out of the water and let them rest and stabilize until time to make the dumplings and turned my attention to the dough.

Since rice flour has virtually no gluten (the rice flour marked "glutenous" is actually a nearly pure starch useful primarily as a gelling agent), I needed to bind the dough with something to keep it together. Normally I'd use eggs, but the fat in the yolk tends to weaken the dough. The interior of these dumplings was going to be lumpy and wanted a pretty sturdy casing, so I used a couple of egg whites instead, mixing them into a mixture of rice flour and brown rice flour. This also had the effect of keeping the dough a pure white. When the dough had come together I let it rest for a moment while I cut the sausages into inch-long segments.

For each dumpling, I patted the dough into a circle, then filled the middle with a spoonful of the vegetables and a sausage nugget, then pleated the dough closed and rolled everything together into a smooth ball between my hands. The dough was barely holding together, and if I tried anything more decorative it was likely to tear or puncture. I placed the dumplings in simmering salted water and let them bob around until done. The hot water cooked the egg whites and stabilized the shape so the dumplings were sturdy enough to manipulate once they came up to temperature.

While the dumplings were poaching I made the gravy. I started by putting the remaining vegetable compote in a skillet with some olive oil, and when everything had caramelized slightly I added some vegetable stock and some leftover saffron rice. Once everything was cooked soft, I ran a stick blender through it. The rice thickened the gravy without the pasty effect a refined starch can leave in your mouth. After seating the dumpling in the gravy I dotted the bowl with some Siracha for spice and color, snipped some nori shreds over the bowl with scissors and scattered some black volcanic sea salt. I was happy with the result.

The next night I made another gravy for the remaining dumplings using apple, tomato and onion, but the leftover rice was gone, so I used a roasted red pepper to provide body instead, and the gravy came out a nice deep red color. I made a quick mayonnaise with olive oil, mustard and fresh horseradish, and dotted the sauce with that in a kind of photo-negative mimic of the Siracha.

I got so wrapped up in making the dumplings I totally forgot I was in a rotten mood. I hear that's why alcoholics drink booze. I hope I don't have a problem.

*Really? That's where we're going with this?

Mama's Got a Squeezebox

Hope Solo pic credit.

My best information is that women are split between vaginal orgasmobabes and clitoral orgasmobabes. Unevenly split, as it turns out, for a pretty obvious reason: the vagina is not a pleasure centre, whereas the clitoris is.

A brief cruise around my trusted sources (my hairstylist, the supermarket checkout lady this morning) tells us that roughly two-thirds of women need some kind of clitoral love to orgasm. Vaginal orgasm alone is a less visited corner of the sex cave, which is not to say we can't light a candle and go find some. It seems that it's a bit of a squeeze and not so much upside to the journey.

There is, naturally enough, a wrinkle, and it is the G-spot. That's an upside wrinkle by the way. Given the right stimulation, the mighty Grafenburg is the key to vaginal Oh! But given its usual position, can be difficult-ish to engage. (With the penis, that is. Hand-jobs are a different tub of gelato.)

Vaginal elasticity being what it is, there are lots of fun ways to find lady-pleasure. I'm writing here more to blokes than the sheilas - one would hope that chicks already know how to get themselves off. Because I'm entirely representative of most men, I can tell you that we love the challenge of helping you find that beautiful butt-quivering, leg shaking, hip thrusting, pussy-pouting, full-throttle climax. They're awesome! Perhaps we like finding them inside you because ours are so relatively easy to come by.

In any case, guys, be aware that until you find otherwise, the little man in the boat is key to the nuclear reactor...but beyond that, mixing a little G-spot exploration with appropriate partner positioning (downward dog, anyone?) can make her day. And, as you and I know, ours, too.





Bottoms Up, G-Spotters.

A G-Post from long ago. Still good, unless female anatomy has changed.

Parcels

Since she started up with the JP, I have been trying not just to make dinner for Heather, but some kind of portable lunch when possible so she doesn't have to go off script if she gets hungry at work. I know what she likes, but sometimes it's hard to make something portable. Tupperware tubs of soup can be hard to reheat or serve from, and a lot of what I make is only really presentable when served hot. The one solution has been spring rolls, but mercy, how many damn spring rolls can a girl eat without feeling put upon. It was time to try something new to keep the spark alive.* Hyachacha.

I like the effect of bitter greens being tempered by a sour dressing or tart fruit, so I decided to make some little rice paper parcels with greens and a savory dressing, but I shuddered at the thought of Heather confronting a drab hockey puck of cooked greens staring up at her from a plastic tub. Hulk Smash mint out in the alley had come into flower, and I thought I could use the buds and leaves to add some visual interest, with a slice of apple framing them inside a contrasting background.

The Greens were pretty standard. I wilted kale and leeks with some sliced garlic in some bacon fat and a splash of vegetable stock, and once they were cooked I mixed in some fresh basil, mint and parsley leaves from the alley. While the greens were cooling down I made the dressing. The dressing was also pretty standard, some sesame oil, Siracha, chopped garlic and hot mustard whisked together into a quick vinaigrette. The hot elements contrasted nicely with the cool herbs and the acid complimented the bitterness of the greens, making the effect savory and complex rather than rude.

Also drank a shot of the pot liquor. Fuck me delicious. Somebody's gonna make a fortune off pot liquor.

For each parcel I soaked a square rice paper sheet in hot water and laid it out on a damp kitchen towel like a baseball diamond, then arranged a mint bud or other leaf and a slice of golden apple as decorations, occasionally accenting them with some shaved carrot strips or sliced tomato, then mounded the greens on the apple slice and doused them with the dressing. When bound up in the rice paper the visual effect was gauzy and muted, which had the rather nice effect of making the parcels seem less clinical, less like botanical specimens.

Look, I know this is a kind of trick. It's basically a spring roll in a different shape, and the decorations don't really change the eating experience, but cut me a little slack here. I'm trying to make it so Heather doesn't get bored or have to hide in her office eating some mud-colored putty while everybody else is whooping it up with pizzas and caramel macchiati.** 

That's what they do there. They whoop it up.

*Attributed to unspecified woman, possibly an actress.

**Macchiatos

Potato Green Bean Salad (CSA Week 5)

Another week and what, are those peas?!?  And green beans!?!  (And carrots and spinach and chard oh my).  Week 5 of Marshalls Fenway Farm CSA certainly did not disappoint!

All the spinach I've been getting (and the humidity) has driven quite the smoothie kick, so you won't likely see it in any recipes soon.  If you haven't tried it yet, you must.  Start with a small handful in your favorite blend and you won't taste it, promise (right Kerstin?)!  This one contained almond milk, protein powder, cucumber (peeled), spinach, 1/2 frozen banana and some strawberries if I remember correctly.  Delish :)

Green Smoothie, glass from Lancaster Brewing Co

I've never been a fan of potato salad, in fact I've probably mentioned it before.  But when Rebecca made Deb's Potato Arugula Salad over the 4th of July, it was a big hit.  Filled with lots of green veggies and tossed with a light dressing, this was anything but your traditional potato salad.

purple potatoes make me smile :)

When I saw the green beans and peas in my CSA, the salad came immediately into mind, except with a few different twists.  More vegetables came to the party, and a little protein was added to make it more of a meal.  This is a perfect light lunch or dinner for the summer, perhaps bring it to the beach or park for a picnic!  It was also delicious over the course of the next few days, so don't hesitate to make it ahead of time.

Potato Green Bean Salad
adapted from Smitten Kitchen
Serves 4 (as a main dish salad)

1lb fresh peas, shelled (~1c peas, could also use frozen)
1lb green beans, trimmed and cut into ~1" pieces
1 1/2lbs fingerling potatoes, sliced into ~1/2" rounds
1lb chicken breasts, poached  and cut into bite-size pieces (tofu would work well here too)
5oz arugula
2oz walnuts, lightly toasted
kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
3T mild vinegar (I used champagne vinegar)
3T greek yogurt
1 1/2t dijon mustard
3/4t coarse salt
3T extra virgin olive oil

Bring a large pot of water to a boil.  While that's heating up, prepare an ice bath in a large bowl.  Add a pinch of salt and the green beans to the boiling water.  Cook for 2-3min, then add the shelled peas and cook another minute more.  Using a slotted spoon, transfer the beans and peas to the ice bath.

Add potatoes to the boiling water and cook for ~10min, until the rounds are fork tender and not falling apart.  Pour potatoes into a colander to drain, as well as the beans and peas.  Set aside.

In a very large bowl (or better yet, split it into two bowls so you don't spill everything onto your counter), add arugula, potatoes, beans, peas and chicken.  Season with 1/2t salt and 1/4t pepper and toss to combine.

For the dressing, whisk together vinegar, yogurt, dijon and salt.  Continue whisking as you add the oil, then drizzle over salad.  Toss salad again and serve!  Or transfer to containers to store in the fridge until you're leaving for the beach/park/work :)

Do you have a go-to summer salad? 

Lessons from my Cat

Pic credit.

Pain is so closely related to pleasure that we sometimes lose track of where one morphs into the other. Hormones, I guess, all those interesting wee chemicals our bodies live and die by create this intriguing dichotomy.

During sex, with the taught pleasure string and the altered pain threshold, pain and pleasure can even be reversed. In the cool calm of a Sunday morning, HOW WEIRD IS THAT?

Not really so weird, as long as we understand that a good flogging is excellent for one's wellbeing. Alright, so maybe just a light flogging, between consenting adults, with all the usual precautions. Gawd, I can't even make a small joke about the pleasures of a little S&M play without safety caveats. What have our sex lives become now that the Safety Nazis and PC Police are in the corner watching us act out our fantasies?

Oh, did I mention to ALWAYS use a safeword?

Anyway, my cat teaches me much about the nature of women. Cats have claws. Cats, when happy, knead those claws into one's flesh. It's a classic pleasure and pain scenario: my sweet tortoiseshell purrs and punctures my skin. She's in ecstasy, and I'm...happy she's happy. But OUCH, those things are sharp!

Remember, women have claws, too. Thank goodness.





Bottoms Up, Felines!

Squash & Potato Gratin (CSA Week 4)

Let's pretend that I'm on top of things and these were the veggies I got from Marshall's Fenway Farm CSA last week, k?  ;)    

And while we're at it, let's pretend that you see summer squash in the above photo, because the recipe I'm sharing today is one for a summer squash and potato gratin.  It was CSA squash that I used, so I'm calling it good :)

This recipe is so simple, I didn't expect much of it.  But perhaps that is why it tasted so amazing.  I'm certainly glad I didn't pass it over, and I urge you not too, either.  Especially if you're starting to get a bounty of summer squash right now!!  It's a perfect summer side dish, and even reheats well!

Summer Squash & Potato Gratin
slightly adapted from The Kitch'n

2 med summer squash
3-4 sm-med red potatoes
1/2 onion
1 lg garlic clove, minced
3T olive oil (I eye-balled this amount)
4oz goat cheese
kosher salt
freshly ground pepper
1/4c milk (I used almond milk)
1/3c freshly grated Parmesan
fresh basil

Preheat oven to 400deg.

Thinly slice the summer squash, potatoes and onion using a mandoline or chef's knife.  You're aiming for ~1/8" or less.  Add these vegetables to a large bowl with the minced garlic.  Toss with olive oil.

Spray an 8" square baking dish with nonstick spray.  Spread ~1/3 of the vegetables in the baking dish, then season with salt and pepper.  Crumble half the goat cheese over the vegetables.  Repeat with 1/3 of the vegetables, seasoning and goat cheese.  Top off with the last of the vegetables and season with salt and pepper.

Pour milk over the dish and then top with parmesan.  Cover with foil and bake for 30min.  Uncover, than bake 15-20min more, until the top browns.  Sprinkle with thinly sliced basil before serving (use as much or as little as you'd like, we definitely preferred more than the 1T suggested!).


If you're looking for other summer squash recipes, here are some that I remember fondly :)

Summer Squash & Basil Cornbread
Summer Squash Soup
Sauteed Squash
Summer Squash Cupcakes
Summer Squash & Onions in Brown Sugar (I never posted this, but it was delicious!)


Any other ideas for delicious summer squash??

Huevos con Papas sin Papas

One of Heather's favorite breakfasts has long been huevos con papas. Growing up, she had close family friends who made them for her, and I'm certain it appeals to her because it's both delicious and nostalgic. She can usually put away four or five of these breakfast tacos, stuffed with fried potatoes and eggs, usually with some onion, sometimes chorizo, and always with cilantro, jalapeño and lime juice for flavor. While she's on the JP, I strive to make her meals as appealing as her favorites from the regular world, and I decided to try to make a breakfast that was evocative of huevos con papas, but without the forbidden lime juice and potatoes. I have my doubts about tortillas as well. They seem far too bread-like to be permissible, but from the crude rules we operate by (taken from memory of a single conversation over 15 years ago), they've always been fair game. To be on the safe side, and because we didn't have any tortillas in the house, I decided to use spring roll wrappers instead.

I started by making a sofrito of onion, garlic, fennel and diced linguisa, which were all cooked together in olive oil until the linguisa had rendered a little fat and color and the vegetables were soft and giving, with a hint of caramelization. While that was underway I prepared the eggs. I beat three eggs and some sesame oil, lightened with a little vegetable stock, until they were absolutely smooth, then I added chopped parsley and fennel fronds, salt, pepper and some Mexican oregano, crushed. When the vegetables were ready, I folded the eggs into the skillet, moving them around until just shy of being set. Eggs keep cooking for a couple of minutes after they come off the heat, so I always take them off while shiny and slightly wet.

Instead of potatoes, I used slices of avocado to support the eggs inside the spring roll, wrapping them together with some cilantro, scallions, crunchy sea salt and juilienne of ginger and jalapeño. When cooked conventionally, the potatoes would be soft and rich, having absorbed considerable olive oil or butter, and the buttery, smooth avocado was a pretty good potato proxy. The visual effect was a little drab, but when served with some salsa the whole dish looked okay. The salsa came out of a jar, and I'm sure it had some non-JP elements, but fuck it, we're not ninjas.

The linguisa was a nice alternative to chorizo, which can be a little greasy and loose, and the overall effect was solidly tasty. It wasn't really that much like huevos con papas, but it was pretty good. Pretty good. That's what we're shooting for folks, pretty good.

A Surprise in Nearby Palms: Latin American Cuisine at La Cocina del Gagaguey

Speeding down Venice Blvd. heading to the 405, it's easy to miss La Cocina del Cagaguey. 

Open for less than a year, La Cocina is tucked away in the back corner of El Camaguey Meat Market (10925 Venice Blvd, Palms, between College and Midvale; a mile east of the 405). Much more than a butcher shop, El Camaguey has a wide selection of packaged goods, beverages and produce that are Latin American favorites.

Strictly for take-out, La Cocina del Cagaguey has an extensive menu of Latin American dishes, some familiar like arroz con pollo (rice with chicken), some like encendido (braised oxtail) sound exotic.

Call ahead (310/839-4037) and Ilonka Garcia, chef and owner, will have your order ready for you by the time you park in front.

As she sauteed fresh green tomatillos in a giant cast iron skillet, she explained, "The market started out being mostly for Cubans and Spaniards, but over time expanded for a larger clientel. Now you can find food that appeals to Brazilians, Peruvians, Argentianians, Venuzalians, Mexicans."

She learned her craft cooking for Cuban, Dominican and Puerto Rican chefs.  When she was thinking about opening the cafe, she explained, “I was in between cooking Cuban or Puerto Rican dishes. I knew someone would get upset whichever way I went, so I decided to cook them all."

Coming from the Dominican Republic, the three islands have many cooking similarities. All use grilled onions and cook with beef, chicken and pork.

But she doesn't limit herself to island cooking.

“A little bit of something for everybody. Colombian tamales and empanadas use cornmeal. Every country has their own version of empanadas. They’re all different. Dominican empanadas are fried, using a special dough that doesn’t absorb the oil so they are crisp without being soggy. The empanadas are filled with beef or cheese.”

Venuzalians like the ropa veja (shredded beef), which I tasted. The tender, moist meat had lots of succulent flavor, kicked up a notch by her fiery, vinegary jalapeno salsa--which has almost no tomatoes just finely minced red onions, jalapenos and cilantro leaves.

Asked about which dishes are her most popular, she looked at the photographs of the dishes on the wall above her head and went through the list. The shrimp salad, chuleta encebollada (pork chops with grilled onions), fried plantains, camarones al ajilo (shrimp in garlic sauce), camarones en salsa de coco (shrimp on coconut sauce), alcapurrias (stuffed fritters) and mofongo con chicharon y ajo(mashed plantains with crispy, fried pork rind and garlic) are all good.

The bacalao con papas (salt cod with potatoes) is also very popular. She makes fried chicken, but with "small pieces with batter so the flavor goes into each bite.”

The portions are large and priced affordably. The two dozen entrees are priced between $7 and $11. The appetizers and side orders cost from $1.50 each for the empanadas and bulgur meat pies to $7 for the fried chicken and fried green plantain dumplings.

The daily special, including a generous helping of rice and beans is an amazing bargain at $5.99 + tax.

Every day she makes a different kind of rice and beans. She likes making arroz con gandules (yellow rice with pigeon beans). The pigeon beans are like lentils, she told me, but different. “Sometimes I make black eyed beans, white, black, garbanzo, and, another day, lentils. I change the beans daily. It’s an adventure to see what kind of bean I have.”

Even when a bean is popular, like the pigeon beans, she'll change to another bean the next day.  “I get to choose. I hate to get stuck with one item.”

Recently she was reviewed in the LA Times by Bill Esparza on April 7: The Find: La Cocina del Camaguery with the result that she's been even busier than usual.

During the short time I was at the cafe, a constant stream of customers came in to pick up their orders. While some cooks can hardly wait to get out of the kitchen, not Ilonka.

“There’s always something going on here. I like a lot of invention in my kitchen". She and her helper cook all day long because she says food tastes better if you make it in small batches.

All of her meat, poultry and sausages come from the meat market behind her. All of the meat is fresh, never frozen. Because the customers come from different Latin American countries, they want their meat  cut differently. That's no problem. The butcher will give you whatever cut you like.

Even difficult to find Brazilian picanha.

The sausages are made in the market with the exception of the morcilla Argentina. They have even started making chicken chorizo.

She takes a break from sauteing the green tomatillos to describe the recipe. “I almost burn them, then add them along with garlic and cilantro and puree them and then add to braised pork ribs which have been cooking for two hours. After I add the tomatillo puree, I only cook the ribs another twenty minutes. I like the smoky bitterness of the tomatillo.”

In addition to the fresh cooked rice, she cooks her beans, whichever kind, "so they are creamy, with onions and two peppers [red and green], garlic and a lot of love. We cook with a lot of love here.”

And it shows.