tortured pear

Tortured.

We've all felt that way at one time or another. Right?

It's not that I'm feeling particularly tortured myself. Well, maybe just enough to write this post in response to a conversation with someone who accused me (specifically) and modern cooking (in general) of torturing food.

"Why all the manipulation? Why torture food? Why make cooking so complicated? You take a solid, turn it into a liquid, then make it solid again. Why denature something just to make it look natural?

They were valid questions— certainly ones I've heard before— and they were asked out of genuine curiosity. But they were designed to provoke a defense, so she looked a little letdown when I nodded in agreement and told her that she was absolutely right.

But I wasn't letting her off that easy— I pointed to the sandwich that she was eating during our conversation and told her that it was a very tortured thing indeed. In explanation, I took her along the path that put it in her hand. I think I used words like thrashed, crushed, pulverized, whipped, beaten, fermented, and intense heat. And that was just addressing the bread. I started in on the pastrami, cheese, and mustard, but stopped short because she was looking a little tortured herself.

Regardless of what we put in our mouths, its inception was to rob something of its vital force. All food was once alive. Is it more honorable to pluck food directly from its habitat and eat it raw, letting our teeth grind and pulverize it into something that can be digested, or to use our wit and skill to render it delicious and magnificent? Isn't that a decision we must all make for ourselves?

Cooking is violent. We casually violate food with knives and fire and think nothing of it. Is chopping less of a crime than juicing? Poaching less brutal than sous-vide? In an alternate universe where the plant and animal kingdoms ruled, wouldn't we all be accused of torture?
To cook is to transform. When we claim to cook simply, we deny the complicated processes that we initiate and fail to acknowledge the everyday miracles that take place in our kitchens. A loaf of bread, a bottle of wine, a pound of butter are wonderfully complex things.
We coax,manipulate, torture, because it makes food better; more palatable and enjoyable.

If we could just cook and let cook, maybe we could all relax, explore, and enjoy.
And stop feeling so tortured.

rooibos- poached pear
tonka bean brioche
candied bitter orange
smoked bourbon buttermilk

consuming passion

heart fortune cookies

There is some room to play with the flavor of these cookies— the oil, juice, and extract can be varied according to your desired flavor profile and the sugar can be infused with strongly-scented products such as herbs, vanilla beans, citrus peel, or rose petals.

❤cookie batter:
2 egg whites
46g sweet almond oil
13g beet juice
4g raspberry extract
100g sugar
67g AP flour
6g cornstarch
red food coloring

Place the egg whites, oil, juice, and extract in a medium bowl and whisk lightly to incorporate. Sift the sugar, flour, and cornstarch together and add to wet ingredients. Stir with a wooden spoon until batter is smooth. Add food coloring to desired shade and blend well.

❤stencil:
cookie template
thick sheet of acetate or plastic
X-acto knife or sharp blade
slips of paper printed with fortunes, folded in half

trace cookie template onto acetate or plastic. Cut out center with an X-acto knife or sharp blade.

❤to make cookies:
Preheat oven to 163C/325F. Place stencil on silpat or parcment-lined baking sheet. Spoon about a Tablespoon of batter onto center of stencil cutout. With a small offset spatula, spread the batter thinly and evenly to completely fill cutout in stencil. Carefully lift stencil and rinse and pat dry for next use. If you have experience with shaping hot tuiles, you can bake up to 4 cookies at a time— beginners should start with one. Place baking sheet in the oven and check after 4 minutes. The surface should be glossy but not wet to the touch and the edges should be just starting to brown. Remove baking sheet from oven and carefully (they're hot!) but quickly (they must be worked hot) peel cookie off of silpat and flip it top side down. Place a folded fortune in the center of the cookie. Lift pointed edge that is nearest to you and fold up and over to meet and align with other pointed edge, enclosing the fortune. Lift the cookie with the points facing up, pinching them together and lightly drape the folded bottom edge over the rim of a cup or bowl to create the crease that will form the top of the heart. Hold the cookie in place over the rim until it hardens while working the sides together so that they meet and close. The cookie must be shaped while it is hot and flexible— if it hardens too quickly, it can be returned to the oven for 1-2 minutes to soften. Place cookies in a muffin tin to hold their shape until they cool.

mortadella kohlrabi pistachio

Kohlrabi is unique among vegetables in that the edible part is actually a swollen stem. The leaves, which are commonly eaten in parts of India, are often removed in US markets. On the few occasions that I've grown kohlrabi, I've found the leaves to be similar in texture and flavor to kale, collards and other cruciferous greens. This vegetable is really about the stem.

Always look for small kohlrabi, as large ones can be pithy. Once the thin skins are removed, the crisp, creamy-white orbs can be enjoyed cooked or raw. Sliced thin, they make excellent quick pickles.

Lately, I've taken to replacing the water in a pickle solution with fruit juice when I want a bit of sweetness. Apple juice works well, but white grape juice doesn't darken the pickle as much.

kohlrabi quick pickle

250g cider vinegar
4.5g kosher salt
200g white grape juice
2.5g pink peppercorns
8 allspice berries
2 bay leaves
5 small kohlrabi

Combine vinegar and salt in saucepan. Heat until salt is dissolved. Remove from heat and stir in grape juice and spices. Let cool completely. Meanwhile, peel the kohlrabi and slice thinly with a knife or a mandoline. Place kohlrabi in a clean jar or bowl and pour cooled brine over top. Stir to separate slices. Set aside, covered, in refrigerator. Pickles can be consumed after 2 hours, but are better after 4. There is little difference in flavor if kept for longer than 4 hours, but they will continue to soften.

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I've always thought of mortadella as bologna's refined older sister and the hotdog as their skinny younger brother. Indeed, they all belong to a family of cured sausages that utilize meat paste.

This dish came together while exploring various textures of mortadella that started with thin, silky slices wrapped around a light mousse of liquid mortadella and gelatin. When whipped, the gelatin gives the mousse structure without added fat and a clean mouthmelt. For the third texture: crispy pan fried mortadella strips. The fourth was added when I heated a dollop of the mousse in a hot pan and watched it spread and form a lacy wafer. Brittle and crisp, the wafers add textural interest with a bacony flavor.

Mortadellaravioli

mortadella mousse

This versatile mousse can be used as a dip for crudites or spread on toasted brioche. Here, it's used to fill thin slices of mortadella ravioli-style and made into lace wafers by thinly spreading dollops on a nonstick skillet and cooking over medium-high heat until water evaporates and they harden.

90g mortadella, cubed
93g hot water
12g tepid water
2g gelatin

Place mortadella and hot water in high speed blender and blend for 5 minutes, or until mortadella is liquified. Place tepid water in microwavable bowl and sprinkle gelatin over top. Let bloom for 3 minutes, then stir and heat in microwave in 30-second increments, until gelatin is completely dissolved. Add to mixture in blender and blend briefly to incorporate. Pour mixture out into a large bowl and allow to cool to room temperature. Half-fill a larger bowl with ice and cold water to make an ice bath. Set bowl with mousse mixture inside ice bath and beat with a hand-held electric mixer until mixture lightens in color and texture and holds its shape.

mortadella mousse ravioli
pan fried mortadella
mortadella lace
kohlrabi pickle
raw pistachio pesto

raw pistachios

Little pleasures come from finding familiar things in unfamiliar forms. These discoveries become new folders in the catalogue of flavor and texture.

flowering teas

I woke up to snow again today; anathema to the three feet that's already on the ground. I spent the morning looking through seed catalogues; at technicolor pictures of lush vegetables and cheerful flowers, dreaming of the exuberance of summer. "If you plant us", they seem to say, "it will come."

Despite their promise, I know summer will eventually come. And though it's far too soon to look for signs; in winter, hope springs eternal.

I first discovered flowering teas at Pike Place Market in Seattle nearly 4 years ago and have been collecting them since. Sometimes called blooming tea, or art tea, the bundled balls are made of select white tea leaves (unfermented Camellia senesis) bound together with silk thread. Inside, they hide flowers— lily, jasmine, chrysanthemum, carnation, calendula— delicately stitched to the leaves. When dropped into hot water, they slowly unfurl to reveal their hidden beauty; burlesque in a tea cup.

The tea is not the finest or most complex that I've tasted, but on a day like today, watching something bloom before my eyes is visual therapy.

instant ginger tea

Ginger root is an indispensable ingredient in my kitchen, but you won't find any in my refrigerator. Like the world outside my door, it is in a state of deep freeze.
Freezing fresh ginger root not only preserves it (no more tossing out shriveled, forgotten nobs), it makes it user friendly. Good riddance to the days of scrubbing it against a porcelain grater, then picking out the stringy fibers. Now, when I want fresh ginger flavor, I quickly microplane the frozen rhizome directly on food; the gratings (fibers and all) are as fine as snow, and the rest goes back in the freezer. When I want fresh ginger juice, I pull a nob or two from the freezer and let it thaw. The softened rhizome can then be easily squeezed and readily releases its juice.

Ginger has long been known to possess many health benefits that range from settling an upset tummy to fighting off colds and flu— the reason why I routinely drink ginger tea in winter. I used to have a ritual of squeezing thawed ginger into hot water, then stirring in honey, but that changed when I found these packets of ginger-honey crystals at an Asian market. I've tried other ginger teas, but found they lacked the mouth-numbing fieriness that I love about fresh ginger. These crystals don't; they contain only three ingredients: cane sugar, honey, and ginger, and they dissolve instantly in hot or cold liquids. Sometimes I forego the liquid entirely and eat them out of hand, but today, with the snow piling up outside, I'm going for the comfort of tea.

While surfing around the internet this morning, looking for ideas for the ginger-honey crystals, I found this article at Salon.com by Francis Lam about spicy ginger ale that made me wish my hot tea was cold and fizzy. I stopped buying soda when the boys came along, but every once in awhile I crave the carbonation. For those occasions, I keep CO2 cartridges on hand. Thanks to the ginger-honey crystals and a soda siphon, I was able to enjoy an instant glass of sweet, spicy ginger ale without trudging through the snow.

All this tea and soda got me thinking about a hot carbonated tea. I tried putting hot ginger honey tea through a soda siphon, but the bubbles dissipated before I was halfway through the cup. Before giving up, I thought of asking the Twitterverse for help. Jeffrey Stoneberger (@Eatmecookme) came to the rescue— carbonate a cold drink, then heat in microwave. After doing it his way (which, he said, is how they do it at Husk Restaurant in Charleston), I sat down to my third ginger-honey beverage of the day. This one, though, was the most enjoyable of all, as it offered hot soothing comfort with the giddiness of carbonation. The only problem: do I call it carbonated tea or hot soda?

sticky toffee foie pudding

I remember the moment I fell in love with textiles. I was studying fashion design at Parsons when the draping instructor suggested I attend an exhibit of 18th century textiles at the Met. I wasn't entirely sure that I wanted to see a bunch of dusty old fabrics. "Go", she said. "they will inspire you."

Coming out of a lifetime of denim, polyester, and cotton jersey, I was hopelessly unprepared for the opulence of that exhibit. Printed chintzes, sumptuous velvet brocades, luxe silk damasks, allegorical Toile de Jouy, gossamer laces—each one a masterpiece of fiber and thread. Collectively, they told a story of a pre-industrial era of impeccable craftsmanship and a soignee world of extravagance and luxury. I had no desire to possess them, I wanted only to bask in their splendor.
I was, indeed, inspired.

If ever there was to be an exhibit of Pure Luxury, foie gras would make a salient display. The luxury of foie is not in its price, though considerable, but in the sensual experience of consuming it. I've always found it's velvety mouthfeel and resonant flavor to be more hedonistically aligned with a rich dessert.

Among other things, studying fashion instilled in me an awareness of trends and the cycles of design; most are just revivals of old elements made new for modern taste. Looking through a book of medieval cookery, I was struck by how many savory dishes were made sweet with honey and fruits. Now, it seems, the dessert cycle has leaned towards the savory— adding salt, savory herbs, vegetables and animal. The latter— lest we forget— includes eggs, butter and cream. How to take it to the next step? Are we ready for fish, flesh, or offal even, in our dessert? Maybe we'll never be ready for candied kidneys, but in regards to foie gras, I can only wonder "what took so long?".

Brandy-soaked cubes of foie, embedded in moist cakes redolent of dates and muscavado, an arabesque of sticky sweet brandy-spiked sauce— it is the stuff of baroque fairy tales; a decadence fit for kings and queens— the gustatory equivalent of brocade pillows and damask sheets.

sticky toffee foie pudding
red currant jelly ice cream
sugared red currants

sticky toffee foie pudding
serves 6

40g foie gras, cleaned of veins
130g Tuaca or brandy
60g dates, roughly chopped
86g reserved Tuaca or brandy from soaking foie
56g unsalted butter at room temperature
55g muscovado sugar
97g eggs
84g flour
4g baking soda
6g baking powder

sauce:
78g muscovado sugar
1.5g salt
175g heavy cream
25g butter
30g reserved Tuaca or brandy from soaking foie

Cut foie with a heated knife into 6 cubes, each measuring 1.25cm x 1.25 cm x 2cm and place in small bowl. Pour Tuaca or brandy over foie to submerge (use more if needed). Set aside to marinate for 2 hours. Strain through a fine sieve, reserving brandy for cake and sauce.
Heat 86g of reserved brandy in a small saucepan to 43C/110F. Add dates and cook over very low heat for 5 minutes. Remove pan from heat, cover, and set aside for 10-15 minutes to soften dates. Stir the dates and brandy vigorously with a wooden spoon until they break up and the mixture looks like a chunky puree. Set aside to cool.
Preheat oven to 176C/350F. Grease 6 small dariole molds. Cream the butter and sugar with an electric mixer fitted with paddle attachment on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add the eggs and beat for 2 minutes, then add the date/brandy puree and beat for 1 minute. Sift together the dry ingredients and add to mixer. Beat for 1-2 minutes, or just until incorporated.
Spoon batter into each of greased molds until half full. Place a cube of marinated foie in each of the molds, then cover with remaining batter until molds are nearly full. Place filled molds in a baking dish, spacing them 5cm apart. Pour boiling water into baking dish until it comes halfway up the sides of the molds. Immediately cover tightly with foil and place in oven. Bake for 12 minutes or until the top of the cake springs back when pressed. Remove cakes from water bath, cover loosely with foil to keep warm while making sauce.
To make sauce: Place all ingredients except brandy in a medium saucepan. Set over medium heat and whisk while cooking until thick and smooth, about 4- 5 minutes. Remove from heat and whisk in 30g of reserved brandy until smooth and silky.
To serve: Unmold the warm cakes and dip each one in the sauce, rolling around until well coated. Transfer each to serving plate and carefully spoon a small amount of sauce over the top, letting it drip down the sides. Serve warm.

jelly ice cream

"His ideal of dessert is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich." She offered that as an explanation right after she said there would be no birthday cake.

"Maybe ice cream and cookies… something we can stick some candles in."

So I set out to make a special birthday dessert for someone who doesn't like cake, but likes peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and, apparently, ice cream and cookies. Easy, I thought, I'll make peanut butter cookies and grape ice cream sandwiches. As luck would have it, I had a concord grape puree in my freezer that would serve as the base for the ice cream. And I had a recipe for killer peanut butter cookies that I had refined over the years and recently tweaked to include miso. But you know what they say about the best laid plans…

Unpacking in the client's kitchen, I had a sudden vision of the grape ice cream… still sitting in my freezer at home! I wanted to panic but there was no time. My schedule was tight even before I was asked to move dinner up a half hour.

As I began preparing dinner, my attention turned to a replacement for the ice cream. With a kitchen full of professional appliances, but no cooks in the house, I knew there was little chance of finding an ice cream maker tucked away in a cupboard. I had plenty of cream, but nothing for a flavor base or sugar. A search through the kitchen produced neither, but I did find three jars of grape jelly. I assessed the situation: no equipment to churn— but I had cream and a sweetened flavor base. A plan was quickly put in place: melt the jelly, blend in the cream, freeze in a shallow tray, whisk often, hope for the best, and pray that I wasn't turning into Sandra Lee. I got the base in the freezer just as the first guests arrived. They were hungry. And impatient. And I had to focus on dinner.

It wasn't until dinner was on the table and I returned to the kitchen that I remembered the neglected ice cream base. I opened the freezer expecting to find a solid block of grape-flavored ice crystals. To my surprise (and relief) it yielded easily to a spoon and out came a scoop of creamy smooth ice cream!

Since then, I've made this ice cream several times with both commercial and homemade jellies. I've tried churning it in an ice cream machine to test the difference. It was slightly creamier, but not dramatically so. I've even kept it uncovered(!) in the freezer for 4 days with no loss of texture or ice crystal build up. I believe this works because jelly is largely invert sugar and pectin, a combination with a high freezing point that stabilizes texture by preventing it from freezing solid and forming ice crystals.

While it may not be the most refined of ice creams, it comes together with only two ingredients and minimal effort. That alone (and that it saved my ass) is worth adding it to my emergency food kit.

stupid-simple jelly ice cream

measure by weight:
7 parts jelly
10 parts heavy cream

Melt the jelly until it is completely fluid. Add the heavy cream, a little at a time, while whisking. Pass through sieve into a bowl or container. Freeze thoroughly.

peanut butter miso cookies

Some time ago, I mentioned adding miso to peanut butter cookies on twitter. I received a number of requests for the recipe/ratios, which I promised to post.

You wouldn't know that it's miso that makes these cookies special unless you were privy, but you'll notice the difference in the rounded flavor. Sweets that are nuanced with savory and salty are always a winning combination in my book.

peanut butter miso cookies

makes 24 7.5cm/3" cookies

106g unsalted butter, at room temperature
130g peanut butter
40g shiro miso (light miso)
88g dark brown sugar (preferably muscavado)
80g granulated sugar
8g glucose
53g egg
5g baking soda
10g boiling water
175g all-purpose flour

Place the butter, peanut butter, miso, brown sugar, granulated sugar, and glucose in a mixer bowl. Beat the ingredients with the paddle attachment at medium speed until light and creamy. Add the egg and beat just until incorporated. In a small bowl, dissolve the baking soda in the boiling water and add to the mixer bowl along with the flour. Mix on low speed for 2 minutes until all of the ingredients are well combined.
Preheat oven to 163C/325F, or 157C/315F if using convection. Using a 3.80cm/1.5" scoop, lay out level scoops of dough on a silpat or parchment-lined baking sheet, leaving about 5cm/2" between cookies to allow for spreading. Chill cookies for 20 minutes to firm dough. Scoops of raw dough can also be frozen for future cookie cravings, then packed into ziplocks. Remove cookies from refrigerator and press with the tines of a fork in a cross-hatch pattern, if desired. Bake for 10 minutes for a softer cookie, or 12 for a crisper cookie.

Miso and peanut butter are so similar in appearance and texture that I'm surprised I haven't made the connection before. In addition to improving a classic cookie, the peanut butter-miso connection captured my imagination for another product: peanut miso.

Most people don't realize that peanuts are in fact legumes. Culinarily, we use them like nuts, but botanically they belong to the plant family Leguminosae, or Fabaceae, and are more closely related to peas and beans. This connection begs the question: if miso is made from soybeans, can it also be made from other beans?

I do know that [I] can't make miso from citrus rinds, though I gave it a good try. During the 10 month fermentation, I had hopes of transforming all sorts of products by fermenting with Aspergillus oryzae(koji mold), the fungus used in the production of miso, soy sauce, and sake. In my haste to make a new product, I failed to follow two fundamental tenets: understanding of product and process, and groundwork. Had I started with a time-honored traditional soybean miso, I would've had a map for when it was on course and where it veered off. Had I done my research, I would have understood that pectin-rich citrus pericarps were not an inviting environment for the enzymatic reaction that koji forms with protein.

Still, I'm hopeful and excited about roasted peanut miso.
And spicy black bean miso.
And fermented hummus.
But first— I'll start with the basics.

a new beginning

"Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow;
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true."
~Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Wishing you a delicious New Year.

Cheers,
Linda

new beginning
makes 8 drinks

Tuaca is a brandy-based Italian liqueur, subtly flavored with citrus and vanilla. Infusing it with the perfumed zest of buddha's hand citron gives it another dimension of flavor.
This is a drink to linger over, to enjoy the layers of flavor as the bay-infused eggnog sphere melts into the liqueur— a perfect libation to contemplate a new year and a new beginning.

150g heavy cream
2g fresh bay leaves
.15g fresh grated nutmeg
2 egg yolks
5g sugar
30g mascarpone

350g Tuaca
15g buddha's hand citron zest strips
50g Patron XO Cafe

frozen eggnog spheres: Place the heavy cream in a small pan and bring to a simmer. Add the bay leaves and nutmeg, stir and cover. Set aside for 20 minutes to infuse. Remove bay leaves and bring back to a simmer. Whip the egg yolks with the sugar on high speed in a mixer bowl with the whisk attachment until light in color and slightly thickened. Slowly drizzle in the hot infused cream while whisking on low. Stir in the mascarpone. Pour eggnog into 8 sphere molds and freeze until solid.

citron-infused Tuaca: Place the Tuaca and citron zest in a .5 Litre iSi whip canister. Screw on the lid and charge with 1 N2O cartridge. Swirl the contents gently for 1 minute. Discharge gas quickly, remove lid and set aside for 15 minutes.

To serve: Place a frozen eggnog sphere in the bottom of each of 8 glasses. Strain infused Tuaca into a cocktail shaker filled with ice. Add XO Cafe. Shake vigorously and strain over the eggnog spheres. Serve immediately.