Stale Bread

The Slow Food Snail au pain- that's a lot of stale bread!

With the Picky Eater out of the house our level of bread consumption has been significantly reduced, but that hardly deters the grocery shopper from picking up a loaf or two a week. For someone who grew up on Wonder Bread, casually choosing between Acme, Semifreddi, Grace Bakery or La Brea at any of the local food emporiums seems equivalent to gathering gold nuggets that are just strewn on the ground.

While we used to have a manageable quota of leftover bread, mainly pesky baguettes, getting hard and dry, we have now worked ourselves into crisis mode- with stern orders for "no more bread!" shouted every time I go out the door. (Not a very effective deterrent.)

So, what can be done? Enter several delightful ways to deal with your stale bread, dependent only on what else you have floating around the kitchen, and the limit you want to put on your caloric consumption. For the minimalist there are what we call garlic croutons- easy to make and so yummy to eat that they disappear like proverbial hotcakes at our house:

Garlic Croutons (more accurately described as 'Garlic Toasts')

12  Baguette size 1/2"-thick slices of bread, pieces from large loaves should be cut in half or thirds
2-4 Tb olive oil
2-4 Tb butter
1-2 cloves garlic
(Can you tell that this is an improvisational recipe?)

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Press the garlic through a garlic press into a microwavable 1 or 2 cup measuring cup or bowl. Add the olive oil and butter. Heat 30 seconds or so, until the butter is melted.

Use a pastry brush to brush both sides of the cut bread with the garlic mixture, and place them on a cookie sheet. Bake for 5-7 minutes on one side, turn the croutons over and bake them on the other side for about the same length of time- they will brown on the underside.

Cool at least slightly before eating, although at our house they magically evaporate in minutes. If you have any left, eat them with salad, soup, almost anything. Best eaten the same day they are made- the Picky Eater's dad says that if you're a fan of cold pizza for breakfast, then you'll like day old croutons.

Variation: For an extra special treat you could sprinkle the tops with grated parmesan and run them under the broiler until the cheese melts and browns- Yum!!

French Toast
Always the first line of offense with stale bread, at least during those long lost happy Sundays when the Picky Eater ate something besides Nutz over Chocolate Luna bars for breakfast.

We usually just punt on this, but here's a real recipe, with a few additions, from Marion Cunningham's 1979 edition of The Fanny Farmer Cookbook.


3 eggs
2 Tb sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp cinnamon
1 c. milk
6 slices of stale bread- anything except something savory
1-2 Tb butter
Maple syrup

Beat the first six ingredients together in a shallow bowl- a pie pan works well. Soak each piece of bread in the egg mixture, turning once.

Heat 1 Tb of butter in a skillet over medium heat. Cram as many slices of egg soaked bread in the pan as possible. Cook, browning on each side and making sure that the bread slices are no longer soggy. If the bread is browning too much before the inside is cooked, turn down the heat. Add butter as needed for additional batches of bread.

Serve with maple syrup. Serves 3 + people, depending upon their appetites.

As an alternative to guard duty at the stove, you can make Baked French Toast, but it tastes best if assembled the night before you want to bake it. So, which is it- advance planning or standing facing the stove? Baked French Toast is also a good strategy if you're making French Toast for more than two or three people- no cooking shifts & everyone gets to eat together.

Baked French Toast
Retrieved from Epicurious.com, an anno domini 2000 Gourmet recipe, also with alterations.

8-10 1"-thick slices of stale French bread or challah
1/4 c. butter, softened
3 eggs
1 2/3 c. milk
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. vanilla
3 Tb brown sugar

Butter a 9"x13" baking dish. Generously butter one side of each slice of bread and arrange them in the baking dish, squeezing to fit.

Whisk together the eggs, milk, salt, vanilla, and cinnamon. Pour the egg mixture over the bread. Cover and refrigerate until the bread has absorbed the egg mixture, at least one hour or overnight.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees and remove the casserole from the refrigerator while the oven is heating.

Sprinkle the bread with the brown sugar. Bake, uncovered in the middle of the oven until the bread is puffed and the top is golden, about 30-45 minutes.
Serve immediately with syrup or jam.

Panzanella
 I spend a lot of my life feeling guilty because I don't really like lettuce salads unless they are full of good stuff like blue cheese and nuts, and doused in vinaigrette. So, it has been a mental relief (and a boon to my stale bread supply) to stuff myself on bread based Italian Panzanella salads, and at least feel like I'm getting some vegetables down my gullet while also satisfying my lifelong love affair with carbs.

The basic ingredients for Panzanella are stale bread, fresh tomatoes, onions, olive oil, and vinegar. This base is enhanced with fresh herbs like basil or parsley, and whatever else is hanging around your refrigerator or cupboard. Purists say that the tomatoes should be vine ripened; but, trust me, while I would never use canned tomatoes or those sad specimens that you see in the store in January, you can make a perfectly respectable Panzanella with less than stellar tomatoes.


America's Test Kitchen also went through their usual gyrations to determine how to make Panzanella properly. They focused on making sure that the bread was nice and hard by toasting it in the oven, and then letting the salad sit for at least 10 minutes before serving so that the bread cubes could absorb the tomato juices. Now, it is true that I have been know to toast and even singe fresh bread to dry it out for Panzanella, I don't really have the moral fortitude to let it sit before I eat it. In fact one of the aspects I really like is the random flavors of the bread cubes- some are still crunchy, some are soaked in balsamic vinegar  or olive oil, and the ones at the bottom of the bowl are always totally soggy.

Anyway, enough pontification. Here's a rough recipe:

For one or two people

2-3 slices dry country style bread, cut in big cubes
4 medium or larger ripe tomatoes, cored and cubed
2 green onions or one shallot or 1/4 of a red onion, finely chopped
1 c. cubed hothouse cucumber (or other vegetable)
6 basil leaves, snipped or shredded or chopped fresh parsley, or 1/4 tsp. dried Mediterranean herb mixture
1-2 Tb balsamic vinegar
2-3 Tb olive oil
Salt & pepper to taste

Put the bread in a bowl and then add the vegetables and herbs. Combine gently with a rubber spatula. Drizzle on the olive oil and vinegar and gently toss to mix. Make sure to add enough olive oil to flavor everything. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

These salads are incredibly flexible. During what the Picky Eater calls my "obsession" with Panzanella this summer (it has been my main meal at least 3-4 times a week for the last six weeks) I have added these items to the basic salad:
cucumber, shelled edamane, sausage chunks, shrimp, tuna, olives, goat cheese, bell peppers, garbanzos, roast chicken, hard-boiled eggs, red onion, etc.

The other night I used some stale rosemary/onion Pizza Bianca that my cooking buddy Roberto made last weekend. It was totally yummy, and even easier than usual, because I didn't have to chop any onion!!

Really traditional contadini recipes (sorry, I was just dying to use that word) call for thick slices of bread to be soaked in water, squeezed and crumbled into the salad bowl. Try this method if it appeals to you.

Now, doesn't it feel good to have one less small cross to bear in life? The stale bread quandary solved!!

From the Archives #2: The Picky Eater's Guide to Eating in the Southwest (well, New Mexico)

Note: My mom is still slaving over the PaRiS Guide; so here's the rest of the old article about restaurants in New Mexico.

You could make a lot of guacamole in this mortar!

A few years back we went to Santa Fe and Taos in New Mexico for a vacation. It was my second visit there, so I knew there were some restaurants that would be okay for me. I was sort of worried that my parents might want to try someplace new. And, of course they did. So, here’s my diary of a few places to eat in New Mexico if you eat like me:

Meal #1: The Frontier (Albuquerque)
Rolled off the plane and into a PT Cruiser – not exactly my parents’ style. Wheeled over to the Frontier for lunch, a restaurant my mom found on the “Road Food” website. My parents eat enchiladas and burritos smothered in sauce. I eat garlic French fries. I resisted trying one of the homemade tortillas until my parents practically shoved it down my throat. It turned out to be pretty good – soft, fresh, and bland.
My mom ordered one of the Frontier’s world famous cinnamon rolls to share with me. It was huge, but swimming in something that tasted suspiciously like margarine. The John Wayne portraits and quasi-Native American décor were funky.

Meal #2: Café Pasqual’s (Santa Fe)
It was snowing when we got downtown. We had some time to kill, so my mom found the bead shop off the Plaza that I liked the last time we were in Santa Fe. My dad bought me a string of pearls for a pre-birthday birthday gift. We still had time to kill before our reservation, the shops were closed, and it was too cold to walk around, so my mom suggested that we get a drink in the bar at the La Fonda Hotel. This was weird, because my mom almost never drinks. I had a bad feeling about this.

The bar, called the “La Fiesta Lounge,” was warm and dimly lit. There was someone playing the guitar in the corner. The walls were painted with murals of old Santa Fe. If it hadn’t been a bar, I might have liked it. My dad ordered a beer, which is no big deal, but my mom ordered a Margarita! I refused to have anything, and just sat and glared at my mom, watching for signs of drunkenness. She just seemed to get a little more cheerful. Finally it was time for us to go to Café Pasqual’s.

Even though we had a reservation, we had to wait for our table in the crowded little entry. Usually people just stand outside on the corner until their table is ready, but with the snow getting heavier, everyone was crammed inside. Our table was definitely worth waiting for. Pasqual’s has two levels, and we were on the top one, which is like a balcony overlooking the main floor. They have lots of papel picados, which are Mexican paper cuttings, and other bizarre Southwestern-ish things for decorations.
My parents both got the “Plato Supremo,” a Chile Relleno, Chicken Mole Enchilada, Napo's Tamal, and Cilantro Rice for $27.00. I thought it all looked suspiciously spicy and slimy, especially the tamale wrapped in banana leaves, but they had their plates cleaned in a jiffy. I had the garlic mashed potatoes, which I had last time, and knew would be great. My parents made me get some sautéed sugar snap peas, which also turned out to be pretty good. We were all too stuffed to have dessert. And the waiter forgot to bring my dad his beer, which was fine with me, since it would have been his 2nd one of the evening.

Peppers & tomatoes
at the Santa Fe Farmers' Market

Meal (really a snack) #3: Santa Fe Farmers’ Market
If you go to Santa Fe, try to be there on Saturday, so that you can go to the Farmers’ Market. It is one of the best. There is a lot of handcrafted merchandise that I really like, like soaps with herbs, and things made with beeswax. Of course, they also sell food there, and we really liked the Mediterranean flatbreads that came in both sweet and savory flavors. There’s a bakery that only sells at the market, and I am prepared to certify that they make the best challah in the Western United States. Trust me, I know what I’m talking about, because at home I eat about half a loaf of Campbell Baking Company challah a week.

Meal #4: The Trading Post Café (Taos)
We drove to Taos so that my mom and I could go to our favorite yarn store, La Lana. I like to spin fiber, and my mom likes to buy yarn. It seems like she buys yarn more than she knits with! After La Lana, we went to the Trading Post Café for lunch. I really liked it when we were there two years ago, and it was just as good this time.

They have great fresh bread there, which is very important for me; because that means I can always make a meal out of the bread if I don’t like what I ordered. My parents took a long time to decide on what they wanted, because the waiter told them a huge list of specials of the day, and mom had trouble remembering them. She finally ordered corn chowder with cilantro oil, and a plate of seashells with shrimp and scallops in them that were sitting on a pile of tortilla chips. She also got salsa and guacamole. She must have liked it, because she shared the soup with my dad, but she wouldn’t share the seashells. My dad got a big salad with disgusting looking pink pieces of salmon spread all over it.
I got plain pasta with butter. I think they make their own pasta there, because it reminds me of the great pasta they used to have at Stokes Adobe restaurant in Monterey (CA). After all the bread and pasta and seafood and salad, we were too stuffed to have dessert.

After lunch, my mom dragged us to her favorite place in Taos, next to La Lana, the Millicent Rogers Museum. It’s in an adobe house way out of town. The lady who lived there, Millicent Rogers, was an heiress and a famous fashion plate in New York. When she moved to Taos, she started buying Native American crafts, especially jewelry, like crazy. In fact, the claim is that she, all by herself, revitalized the Southwestern Native American craft market. In her house, you can see some of her collection – pottery, rugs, religious folk art, etc. I always enjoy the rugs, because I’m interested in weaving; and am amazed by all her silver and turquoise necklaces and bracelets. After that we drove back to Santa Fe along the windy road that goes through Chimayo.

Meal #4 Tecolote Café (Santa Fe)
I probably shouldn’t even be mentioning this restaurant, because I drew the line with my mom and refused to eat breakfast here. So, she went by herself and came back raving about the atole ́ pin ̃on pancakes (that’s blue corn and pinenuts for the non-Spanish speakers). I was happy to have a good old chocolate yogurt and some stale baguette, and to keep her from dragging me there for another meal, which is what she wanted to do.

Now, if you ask me where my favorite place to get food in New Mexico is, I would answer, in a second, the Whole Foods store in Santa Fe. They have a counter where I could get fresh udon noodles to take out, and I even figured out that I could ask the guy to leave off the spinach, so I got just what I wanted, plain noodles and broth. Plus, they have chocolate crackle cookies that are almost as good as my mom’s, and fresh baguettes. My mom likes to get the New Mexican style dishes like quesadillas and chili-rub tri-tip, and the salads. There was even a lady making homemade tamales on the weekend. They have everything I like there, so it felt almost like home, which is what I like when I travel, at least as far as food goes!

Food outlets mentioned:
Café Pasquals’ – 121 Don Gaspar, Santa Fe. 505-983-9340. Serves breakfast, lunch, & dinner.
Frontier Café – 2400 Central Ave. SE, Albuquerque. 505-266-0550. Open 24 hours.
La Fiesta Lounge (in the La Fonda Hotel) – 100 E. San Francisco Street, Santa Fe. 505- 982-5511. Live music every night.
Santa Fe Farmers’ Market (in the Railyard) –1607 Paseo De Peralta # 1 Tues. & Sat 7 am -12: pm; Thurs. 4-7 pm.
Tecolote Café – 1203 Cerrillos Road, Santa Fe. 505-988-1362. Serves breakfast & lunch.
Trading Post Café – 4179 NM 68 at NM 518, Rancho de Taos. 505-758-5089. Serves lunch & dinner. Whole Foods Market – 753 Cerrillos Road, Santa Fe. 505-992-1700.

The Metamorphosis of the Picky Eater

This is a terrible admission to make, sort of like revealing "who done it" in a mystery story, but sometimes a thought grabs hold of you and it won't let go. The secret I am about to reveal came as rather a shock to the Picky Eater's dad and I - somehow over the last year, unbeknownst to us, the Picky Eater came out as a foodie!! It all started with her repeated readings of Anthony Bourdain's scandalous Kitchen Confidential and Bill Buford's Heat, the latter a heady mixture of tales from the depths of Mario Batali's NYC restaurant kitchen mixed with musings on Italian culinary history and recountings of internships learning the arts of pasta making and butchery in rural Italy.

Bolstered by years of watching America's Test Kitchen and vintage Julia Child episodes on PBS, the Picky Eater quietly started experimenting in the kitchen- a few sauteed shallots with her frozen peas, couscous cooked in tomato soup, some attempts at risotto. Then she started marking recipes in cookbooks with post-it notes. Before we knew it, there were piles of paper thin handmade pasta sitting on every open surface (granted there aren't too many of those in my kitchen), and requests for porcini mushrooms and sun dried tomatoes. Then she spent the summer making crepes and sauteed mushrooms for her friends, and generally bossing them around in the kitchen.

When asked about her evolution, the Picky Eater responded, "Well, with parents like you, wasn't it inevitable?" WE CERTAINLY DIDN'T THINK SO!! Her dad and I were convinced that once she left home her diet would consist entirely of bananas, Luna bars, baguettes, box macaroni and cheese, and 1% milk.

Handcrafted Butternut Squash Ravioli-
they taste as good as they look!

But, the Picky Eater, being who she is, has her own idiosyncratic style. Ingredients are confined to the narrow list of foods she likes, of course. Recipes are consulted, but never faithfully followed. Her mother's slavish care to have the exact ingredients a recipe asks for and careful measurements are met with ridicule. Ruefully, it must be admitted that her improvisational cooking is usually pretty successful. (But, of course, she hasn't tried baking a cake that way!)

So, without further ado, I present two of the Picky Eater Gourmet's standout recipes and one baking improvisation of her mother's (just to prove that she can do it!):


Butternut Squash Ravioli with Honey and Sage

For the pasta:
¾ cup semolina flour
1 ¼ cup All-purpose flour
3 eggs
½ Tb olive oil
Dash of salt

For the filling:
1 medium butternut squash
1 Tb oil
2 Tb butter
½ cup parmesan
½ cup bread crumbs
salt and pepper

For the sauce:
3 Tb butter
2 Tb honey
5 small sage leaves, cut into strips

1. Halve the squash and remove the seeds and the stringy stuff around them.
2. Rub the cut sides with oil and place the squash cut side down on a baking sheet.
3. Bake for 30-45 minutes or until soft.
4.  Scoop out 2 cups squash and beat with butter, parmesan and bread crumbs.  Flavor with salt and pepper to taste and set aside.
5.  Make the pasta dough my combining all the ingredients and kneading until it is flexible but not sticky.  If you need to add more water or flour do so.  If you have another pasta recipe you use that is probably fine.  Let sit for 45 min at the minimum, but longer is better.  Place it under plastic wrap to keep from drying out.
6. Roll out by hand or using a pasta machine.  I used the 2nd thinnest setting on our machine.

7.  Lay out dough strip and place filling along half it’s length.  I used 1 teaspoon per ravioli, with a 2” ravioli stamp.
8.  Fold over the strip of dough and stamp out the ravioli.  Press the edges dough to ensure they are closed.
9.  If there’s a wait between making the ravioli and cooking them, flour a baking sheet and place them in the fridge.  Be sure you flour the sheet or the ravioli will stick.
10.  Start heating a pot of water for the ravioli.  Put the butter in a skillet over medium heat.
11.  Once the butter is hot and bubbling, add the sage.  Wait until the sage begins to give off a strong aroma and add the honey.  Cook over medium heat until the ravioli is done.  If the honey begins to smell burnt add a little pasta water.
12.  When the water comes to a boil add salt and the ravioli and cook for 4-5 minutes or until the pasta casing is tender.  Remove with a slotted spoon, toss with honey and serve.

Adapted by Callie from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison.

Lavender Honey Ice Cream
This was one recipe where the Picky Eater measured her ingredients.

3 cups whipping cream
1 cup half-and-half
1 sprig lavender
9 large egg yolks
1 cup lavender honey

Makes 1 quart. Make the custard a day ahead.

Heat the cream and half-and-half to boiling in a saucepan with the sprig of lavender, and let steep 1 hour. remove the lavender and reheat the cream to boiling.

Whisk the egg yolks until completely blended. Then whisk in 1 cup of the hot cream, then whisk in the rest of the cream. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until thick enough to coat the back of a spoon, 3-5 minutes. Do not boil (unless you want lavender flavored scrambled eggs.)

Strain the custard into a mixing bowl and place immediately in a larger bowl filled with ice water. Heat the honey over low heat until liquified, then stir into the custard. Chill the custard overnight in the refrigerator. Freeze in an ice cream maker, following the manufacturer's instructions.

From The Mediterranean Kitchen by Joyce Goldstein.

Garnish your lavender honey ice cream with...
Crystalized Lavender

Lavender blossoms
1 –2 egg whites
1 cup finely granulated white sugar
Tiny, clean, artist’s brush
Cup of cool water
Wax or parchment paper for drying the flowers
Paper or cotton towels


1. Cut the nicest blossoms you can find at their peak of bloom, taking care to keep enough stem on them to allow you to hold them easily (3 to 4 inches).

2. Use only unsprayed flowers.

3. After picking the blossoms, gently – but thoroughly – wash them in cool water to remove every single speck of dirt, dust or unexpected life form.

4. Dry gently with absorbent paper or cotton towels and place each stem in a glass of cool water, until you are ready to frost the flowers.

5. Beat the egg whites with a whisk or fork, until they have lost their original heavy texture and become a bit frothy.

6. Place the sugar in a soup bowl - this will be used to dip the flowers.

7. Taking a single flower at a time, use the tiny brush to gently – but completely – coat the entire flower blossom, one petal at a time. Do NOT immerse the blossom in the egg white, as it causes the flower to take-up too much egg white. It will then not harden properly.

8. Dip the egg-washed blossom into the sugar, taking care to get the sugar onto each petal. Gently shake off any excess sugar.

9. Place the blossom on wax paper – or parchment paper – and snip the flower blossom off its stem-holder.

10. Allow the blossom to completely dry and harden.

11. Store in an airtight container – they will keep for weeks.

Adapted from Suite 101

Chief Cook & Bottle Washer Improvisation-
Polenta Cake with Olive Oil, Chocolate and Dried Fruit
adapted from Ready for Dessert by David Lebovitz

1/2 c unsalted butter (or substitute), softened, plus more to grease the cake pan
3/4 c polenta or cornmeal, plus 2 Tb
1 c flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 c mild olive oil
5 large eggs
2 large egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/3 c sugar
1 c chopped good quality chocolate
2/3 c dried cherries
2/3 c golden raisins

Chocolate glaze:

2 tablespoons water
2 tablespoons light corn syrup
1/3 cup sugar
3 ounces semi- or bittersweet chocolate, chopped

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Grease a 10 cup bundt or kugelhopf pan with a tablespoon or so of butter and sprinkle on the extra polenta.

Stir the flour, polenta, baking powder, and salt together in a small bowl. Set aside. In a second bowl, whisk together the olive oil, eggs, egg yolks, and vanilla.

Use a mixer to beat the 1/2 cup butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Slowly dribble in the egg mixture and beat until completely incorporated. Hand stir in the flour and cornmeal mixture until just mixed and then stir in the chocolate, cherries and raisins.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake in the upper center of the oven until the cake has pulled away from the sides of the pan, is firm on top, and a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean. Cool in the pan on a rack for 15 minutes, and then invert the cake on the rack to cool completely.  Makes 10-12 servings.

Polenta Cake on left, with Devils Slide cookies, and Ginger Cake

Chocolate glaze (from Chowhound)
When the cake is cool, drizzle on this glaze (work quickly):
In a small saucepan, bring the water, corn syrup and sugar to a simmer over low heat. Stir until the sugar is completely dissolved. Remove from heat and add the chocolate, swirling pan to submerge it in hot syrup. Whisk the mixture until smooth. Pour the warm glaze over cake and drizzle it down the sides- you will only have a couple minutes to work with it before it sets up.

From the Archives- Introducing The Picky Eater

Note from the Picky Eater: My mom is working hard (or maybe hardly working) on "The Picky Eater's Guide to PaRiS, and decided to use this old article she ghost wrote for me  when I was thirteen. This entry is the introduction, and she will post the rest later. Looking back on my younger years, I have to admit that I used to be much more of a pain about eating then, when I mainly ate white food, and wouldn't even try tomatoes or mushrooms.

So, onward, dear reader-


My parents say that I’m a picky eater. I like to think of myself as a “particular” eater – I’m particular about what I like to eat, and I only like to eat particular things, like pasta with garlic sauce, and there are particular things, like hamburgers, that I would never eat! (I’ve been a vegetarian since birth.)

Although I’m just thirteen, stories about my picky-ness are already part of the family mythology. Like the time, when I was six, that I ate the best French fries of my life at the Auberge d’Ill, a Michelin three star restaurant, in Alsace. Or when, in Tours, France, my mom couldn’t figure out how to tell the waiter that I wanted the pasta with butter that was on the menu, but to hold the salmon that came on top. After he brought it twice with the salmon still there, my dad just ate it, and I ate the pasta underneath. Or the way I have, for the last six years, eaten two Brown Cow full fat chocolate yogurts and two Luna Nutz –Over-Chocolate bars every day of my life.

Which looks most palatable- cheese, spinach or corn? NOT!!

Every once in a while my parents try to get me to eat something new. My dad thinks that I will be more receptive if he makes it into a game, and so he likes to stage "taste-offs." Here's a photo of a souffle "taste-off" that they tried a few years back- a homemade cheese souffle vs. Stauffer's frozen spinach and corn souffles. Needless to say, I haven't tasted any of them since.

My parents like to travel, mostly to France or the Southwestern United States. I like to travel too, except I can’t help but feel nervous about the food. Like lots of people who travel, my parents like to try interesting restaurants in the places they visit. The question is always whether or not these “interesting” restaurants will have anything for ME to eat. During the day, while we’re walking around, we always stop to look at the menus posted outside the restaurants that we pass. We try to keep track of the ones I might be willing to try. Restaurants that I will be willing to try have to serve one of these things: pasta with butter, French fries, crepes, mashed potatoes, Mexican rice, or plain udon noodles, and if they don't I just prefer to starve. Then my parents are REALLY SORRY!!

Recently we went to Santa Fe and Taos in New Mexico for a vacation. In the next post I will give you the low down on some reasonable restaurant choices (nothing hot & spicy) for picky eaters in New Mexico.

College Dining Hall Protest in the Offing??!

Just minutes after I stated that the Picky Eater had no complaints about the food service at her college she reported the removal of fresh mushrooms from the dining hall salad bar. The question is what will she do about it? Will she follow in the footsteps of generations of college students and found a "Committee Against the Removal of Healthy Offerings from the Dining Hall Dietary Choices?" Present a letter of protest and a list of demands to the Food Service Administration? Boycott the dining hall? Distribute leaflets advocating a sit-in around the salad bar? What price the cost of culinary choice?

It does bring back memories for her dear old mom, seen in this photo from the spring of 1969 in Berkeley amongst her fellow rabble rousing (well, some of them, at least) dormmates.

Tomato Festa

The Picky Eater appears to be happily installed at college with no complaints (so far) about the cuisine. She did evidence a certain degree of envy on a recent Skype call when informed that the tomato crop had come in and that we were in the midst of a "Tomato Festa." The momentum (mine) flagged after about three days, but hope springs eternal that it will revive this weekend. We certainly have a bumper crop this year- cherry, yellow, and huge beefsteaks. What, no Roma pomodoros? Sadly, they suffer some sort of wilt in our garden, and have been banished forever.

1st tomatoes, the start of a lifelong love affair!

The Daddy (his preferred title) has been growing tomatoes annually since the Picky Eater was a toddler. (See adorable picture of the P.E. with her 1st tomato crop.) All in all it's wonderful, but as often with the Picky Eater there's a complication- the fresh full bodied taste of homegrown tomato sauce has put her off most anything made from a can, even when it is heavily doctored up. So, by and large, with one huge exception which will feature in another post, the Picky Eater rejects tomato sauce out of season, eschewing the pallid stuff you get from Mexican tomatoes in January.

And then there is the basil. Basil can easily overwhelm. Just one plant, which is probably as much as you actually need over a season if you are not of the preserving persuasion (and I am not!), seems too risky; but the inevitable three or four plants make what at the time seems like a lifetime supply. And, while a touch of basil is divine, the obligation to use it all, every day in everything savory for three or four months, is not.

Just one last word about basil before I move on. The best way to use it right off the plant is to snip some leaves, rinse and dry. Then remove up to about four leaves at a time, stack them, fold the stack in half lengthwise and snip thin strips with a pair of kitchen scissors.

Hopefully I haven't over-billed the so-called "Tomato Festa," which consisted of me cooking a series of tomato dishes meal after meal for about 2 1/2 days. The results do offer some recipes worth sharing. Initially it started with pizza. Pizza with a fresh tomato topping, naturellement. What, use canned tomato sauce? Mais, non! So, I began with an unbelievably easy and yummy sauce from Vegetable Harvest by Patricia Wells:


Rustic Oven-Roasted Tomato Sauce
"Garden-fresh" (her words, not mine; farmers' market tomatoes would be fine) tomatoes
Salt
Oregano (dried)

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Core and halve the tomatoes horizontally. Put them cut side up in a baking pan lined with aluminum foil. (I didn't use any foil and it was a mess.) Sprinkle generously with salt and oregano. Roast until the tomatoes are very soft, about 40 minutes. When cool, puree the contents of the baking pan in a food processor until smooth. Can fester in the refrigerator about one week, or in the freezer for six months.
I am planning to throw another batch in the oven as soon as I finish here.

I will not burden you with the pizza recipe. Despite detouring to Sur la Table for an Emile Henri baking stone, and using the delicious sauce, fresh tomatoes, smoked and plain mozzarella, basil, and proscuitto, it had limited success due to crust issues which I hope have been resolved. But, the photo looks like something right out of Bon Appetit, doesn't it?

To compliment the pizza, I put together a corn and tomato salad. In a rush, I was franticly looking for the recipe, which I was sure was in Deborah Madison's Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. Not finding it, I went ahead on my own, and didn't locate the recipe until the next day- mainly because it turned out that her version was for a hot pasta! Just goes to show the versatility of veggies.

Fresh Corn and Tomato Salad
2 ears fresh corn
3-4 largish tomatoes
2 scallions or 1/2 small red onion
1 jalapeno pepper
2 Tb chopped cilantro
1 Tb slivered basil
olive oil
salt/pepper

Cut the corn kernels off the cob and dump in a medium size bowl. Core and dice the tomatoes in large chunks and add to the corn. Chop and add the onion, jalapeno (watch your eyes and wash your hands after handling), and cilantro. Stir together and douse lightly with olive oil, salt, and pepper. Serves 2-3.
We decided to forego adding anything acidic to the dressing, but a Tb or two of lime juice might be nice if you have it lying around.

Just took a look at the Picky Eater's Facebook page. She claims that she has joined a cult of naked girls- I think that it's time to stick my head in the sand! Boy, I'm feeling way too sedate. Back to tomatoes.

Later in the week I threw together a batch of Julia Child's Provencal stuffed tomatoes. (Mastering the Art ... , vol. 1, but also usually found in any respectable French cookbook.) They are quick, yummy, and a great way to use up stale bread, in addition to your extra tomatoes.

Tomates a la Provencale (excuse the lack of punctuation, too lazy to figure out how to insert it)
for 6 people

6 large, firm (3" diameter) tomatoes
salt/pepper
2 cloves mashed garlic
3 Tb minced scallions or shallots
4 Tb minced fresh basil & parsley or just parsley (I used just basil)
1/4 tsp dried thyme
1/4 tsp. salt
pinch of pepper
1/4 c. olive oil
3/4 c. or more fine dry bread crumbs (Julia calls for 1/2 cup, but I really like to mound the filling)
A shallow, oiled roasting pan to hold the tomatoes in one layer

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees

Core the tomatoes and cut in half through the middle. Poke and squeeze out the seeds and juice. Sprinkle the tomato halves with salt and pepper. Stir together all the other ingredients except the baking pan (haha!!) Stuff portions of the filling into the tomatoes, filling the crevices and pressing down a nice mound on top. Arrange them in the baking pan without crowding. Bake on an upper rack for 10-15 minutes, until the tomatoes are tender but haven't collapsed and the filling is browned on top. (If it isn't browned, briefly run under the broiler before serving.

These are delicious with grilled meats and good leftover, either warm or cold.
Disclaimer: This recipe text was reworded from the original.

Tomato discussion to be continued with a recipe for my current obsession- Panzanella. Stay tuned.