Pinçage

I haven't written for five months. But no biggie, I guess, it's not like this is a real blog with readers and a book contract as the happy ending. Plus, I can't keep up the cheerful bloggy tone. What have I been doing for the last five months? I started another blog, Portland Walk, that involved making Google maps of my walks. Then I sprained my ankle and couldn't go on any long walks for a while. And then I got a job as a technical writer, but being me, what with job preoccupation plus my need for copious down time and looking for a house and such, I haven't kept up with the blogging. But I do miss having an easy internet-reachable reference of my favorite recipes.

Here's something I sort of tried (and would like to try again, when the time is ripe):

Pinçage

Francis Lam gives recipes for mirepoix and pinçage on salon.com, in one of the most strangely written food pieces I've ever read. But I thought that the pinçage (a flavorful brown paste or mush made from long-cooked onion, carrot, and celery in oil) would make a good instant vegetable broth. I love to have broth on hand for soup, but am loathe to buy boxed vegetable broth at the grocery store, because the decent brands are quite expensive and you need several boxes to make a big pot of soup. Bouillon cubes, while cheaper, aren't very good. And making homemade broth is time consuming. I wouldn't mind making an enormous batch and freezing it, but don't have the freezer space to keep very much. Frozen pinçage paste could be the solution to my broth problem.

I made a half-assed version of the pinçage one day, keeping the flame too high, and leaving out the tomato paste, and it was good! I can no longer remember what kind of soup I used it for, but remember feeling satisfied with the experiment. Because my pinçage was lazy, the soup had bits of blackened vegetables floating in it, but flavor was excellent. One day, I'll make a big batch of pinçage just as Lam directs, and see if it makes a good instant vegetable broth.

Francis Lam made a guest appearance in Orangette's Spilled Milk podcast on peas.

Alicia Silverstone's pears

On one of my many recent flights between Portland and Chicago, I bought Natural Health magazine. After reading it I got rid of it somehow, and have been pining over it ever since. There were recipes I wanted to try! And it had a photo spread starring a woman from America's Next Top Model a few seasons back. What was her name? Pru? Something like that. She called herself "Blaxican," i.e., half black, half Mexican. I loved her! She should have won. But better than winning, she now seems to have an active modeling career.

Anyway, she was wearing a very cute sweater. I even looked it up online, and found that it was affordable. I can no longer remember the brand, though. I was also interested in an article about Alicia Silverstone and her new cookbook, which included a pear recipe I wanted to try. I did find it online, but not easily, because Natural Health's website doesn't offer current editorial content in any way, shape, or form. I think that's bad, but what do I know?

Here is the article. See, Natural Health? Hoarding editorial content doesn't protect it, and it angers your readers! Be more like Vegetarian Times.

I changed this recipe a lot, so be sure to check the original if you want the full Alicia Silverstone experience.

Candied Ginger Pears

1/2 cup toasted almonds, ground or finely chopped
2 tablespoons maple syrup
3 large or 4 small pears, halved and core scooped out
1 1/2 cups pear juice
1 inch piece ginger root, grated or minced
Pinch of fine sea salt
2 tablespoons tapioca flour mixed with a little bit of pear juice
juice of 1/2 a lemon
zest of 1 lemon
ice cream, optional

1. Mix almonds with maple syrup. Set aside.

2. Arrange the pears in a deep skillet, cut sides up. Add the pear or apple juice to the pan along with the ginger and salt. Cover the pan, bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to medium, and simmer for 7 to 10 minutes, or until the pear halves are soft. Using a slotted spoon so most of the cooking liquid drains, transfer the pears to a serving platter, reserving the liquid. Fill the hollow of each pear with some of the almond mixture.

3. Stir the diluted tapioca starch into the reserved cooking liquid, and heat for 3 to 5 minutes, stirring constantly, until the sauce thickens. If it gets too thick, add more pear juice. Remove from the heat, and stir in the lemon juice and zest. Pour the sauce over the pears, and serve. Nice with a scoop of ice cream.

Quinoa Casserole

My talented and beautiful friend Joelle made this casserole when we were visiting her recently. I've made it 3 times in the past few weeks.

3-4 cups cooked quinoa
2 cups grated cheddar cheese, preferrably sharp cheddar
3-4 eggs, beaten
1-2 T. soy sauce
2 bunches kale, cleaned, destemmed, and chopped
glug of olive oil
several chopped cloves of garlic

Preheat oven to 350°.

Heat some olive oil in a large heavy-bottomed pot. Saute the garlic over medium heat until fragrant and golden. Add kale and stir quickly for a minute or two, until bright green, wilted, and tender. Add a splash of water if the kale seems dry or is sticking to the bottom of the pot. Salt and pepper to taste. Let kale cool slightly.

In a big bowl, mix quinoa with cooled kale and 1 c. cheese. Taste, and add 1-2 T. soy sauce. You may need more or less depending on how much you salted the kale and how salty your cheddar is. After seasoning is corrected, mix thoroughly with beaten eggs.

Spread mixture into a large casserole dish. Top with remaining cheese. Bake for 30-40 minutes, until cheese is bubbly and starting to brown.

I also tried this with finely chopped raw broccoli instead of kale, and nutritional yeast in place of part of the cheese mixed into the casserole. Still good, but not AS good. I'd like to do a Tex-Mex version of this, with salsa, black beans, bell pepper, and so forth.

I never actually measure any of the ingredients, but that's the beauty of a casserole.

another birthday cake

I made another birthday cake, this time for Mike, using a similar recipe to "yellow cake with chocolate frosting" just below. This time, I filled the cake with seedless raspberry preserves, and used a different frosting recipe, courtesy Martha Stewart. Overall the cake was really good, but I wasn't 100% into the frosting. I'm not a frosting lover, though; so often buttercream-style frosting is too fatty, too sugary, too much. This frosting contains three sticks of butter, and nearly a pound of chocolate! Now that's decadent.

I would have tried a ganache, but Mike liked the sound of a buttercream. Actually, Martha S.'s ganache recipe sounds a little flabby too. Two and a half cups is a lot of heavy cream. Maybe a chocolate glaze is the ticket.

Really, what I want to try is a 7-minute frosting, light and fluffy. I've never tried it before, but it seems completely unlike a fat-based frosting. Maybe a chocolate cake, with heaps of feather-light vanilla icing. . . .

Still, a tasty cake. I'm going on and on about the issue of frosting, but it was lovely and delicious, and I'm coming to rely on the yellow cake recipe below. It's a keeper. Happy Birthday Mike! I love making birthday cakes.

yellow cake with chocolate frosting

For a recent birthday, I made a yellow cake with chocolate icing. It needed to be dairy and soy free to accomodate food allergies, so I adapted this recipe, Moist Yellow Cake on epicurious.com. It turned out so good. I'm still thinking about it. Because I replaced butter and buttermilk with coconut milk, it has a slight coconut taste, but that's all to the good.

3 cups (330 g) cake flour
1 tablebspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 can coconut milk, thoroughly chilled in refrigerator
2 cups (454 g) granulated sugar
5 large eggs
2 teaspoon vanilla extract
rice milk, or other milk
1 T. white vinegar or apple cider vinegar or lemon juice

1. Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C). Grease and line with parchment paper two 8x2-inch (20x5-cm) round cake pans. Set aside.

2. In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt.

3. Open the can of coconut milk. Drain and reserve the watery liquid, and scoop the solid coconut oil into a measuring cup. You should have one cup of solid oil. With electric beater, beat the coconut oil until light and creamy in a large bowl. Stop and scrape the bowl. It will get very airy and light--even more so than butter. I was amazed at how well this worked.

4.Add the sugar, 1/4 cup at a time, beating 1 minute after each addition. Scrape the sides of the bowl occasionally. Add the eggs one at a time.

5. Measure your reserved coconut water, and add rice milk to equal one cup. Stir in vinegar and vanilla. Add the dry ingredients alternately with the milk. Mix just until incorporated. Scrape the sides of the bowl and mix for 15 seconds longer.

6. Spoon the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top with a knife. Lift up the pan with the batter, and let it drop onto the counter top to burst any air bubbles, allowing the batter to settle.

7.Center the pans onto the lower third of the oven and let bake 45 to 50 minutes or until the cake is lightly brown on top and comes away from the sides of the pan and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Then, I iced it with frosting based on Billy's Chocolate Buttercream, from MarthaStewart.com, adapted to be dairy free and more chocolatey.

1 cup Earth Balance soy-free margarine (comes in a tub)
6 ounces semisweet chocolate, melted and cooled (I used Enjoy Life brand, which is dairy and soy free)
1.5 tablespoons rice milk
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2.5 cups confectioners' sugar
several tablespoons sifted cocoa powder, optional

In a big bowl with electric mixer, beat margarine until smooth and creamy, 2 to 3 minutes. With mixer on low speed, add chocolate until just combined. Add milk, vanilla, and sugar; mix on medium until well combined. For extra chocolateyness, add cocoa powder by the tablespoonfull as desired.

My final frosting was a bit stiff--it didn't spread 100% smoothly. Probably the added cocoa powder, not in the original recipe, was to blame. It tasted terrific, though, and without it the icing was very light brown. I thought it needed extra chocolate punch.

This was enough icing for a double-layer cake, but you might want to make a bigger batch for a triple layer cake or if you want lavish icing.

Also decorated the cake with a quick chocolate ganache--3 tablespoons rice milk, boiled in microwave in glass measuring cup. Add 1/3 c. chocolate chips, mix until all melted, cool a few minutes, then place in ziploc bag with a sharp edge. You can then snip off the edge and use it like an icing bag.

Trio of orange vegetables soup

This soup that i threw together last night turned out so good I want to jot down the recipe before I forget it.

2 T. olive oil
1 large onion, roughly chopped
2 large leeks, cleaned and roughly chopped
4 large carrots, peeled and roughly chopped
4 stalks celery, roughly chopped
1 large sweet potato, peeled and chopped into large pieces
1.5 cups pumpkin puree (1 small can)
2 sticks fresh rosemary, leaves stripped and chopped
salt and pepper to taste
6 cups water (or vegetable broth)
2 T. white balsamic vinegar
1/4 c. heavy cream, optional (or coconut milk, or 2 T. butter)

Heat olive oil in large soup pot over medium to medium high heat. Saute onion with a sprinkling of salt for a few minutes, then add leeks. Stir frequently until slightly softened and browned. Add carrots, rosemary, and celery and saute a few minutes more. Add sweet potato, 6 c. water, and pumpkin (or more water, if this doesn't seem like enough). Bring to boil, and simmer until vegetables are soft, about half an hour. Turn off heat and puree with an immersion blender until smooth, but not too smooth. There should be some texture and small pieces of vegetables in the soup. If too thick, add a bit more water. Add salt, pepper, and vinegar to taste. Stir in cream, coconut milk, or butter if desired.

I added the heavy cream as an experiment, since i have some left over from thanksgiving. Even a small amount of cream adds a lot of rich flavor. But the soup is very good without also. A little butter or coconut milk would have the same effect. A topping of sour cream or plain yogurt would be nice as well.

Thanksgiving

Here's what we had for Thanksgiving dinner this year:

Mushroom and Farro Pie

Smashed Potatoes with Roasted Garlic Gravy

Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Rosemary and Sage

Galicky Kale

Pumpkin Tart with Anise-Seed Crust

Haagen-Daz Five Brown Sugar Ice Cream



Mostly the same menu we had at our Thanksgiving dinner last year.