A Surfeit of Burgundies

For decades Dr. Hal has frequently declared, "My wife only drinks good Burgundies." He's got that right, but the truth of the matter is that his dictum applies to food as well as wine. And so, a recent craving for gooey, cheesy gougeres led me to a most pleasant imaginary sojourn in the province of Bourgogne which resulted in a somewhat extravagant dinner in the Burgundian style accompanied by a pair of outstanding vintage wines from the wine cellar that's really a walk-in temperature controlled insulated plywood box in the garage.

I have been to Burgundy twice, the first time on a wonderful bike trip circa 1979, and the second time on my first "grandes vacances" with Dr. Hal in 1989. Needless to say, I'm ready to go back any time! While the basic bones of Burgundy, the hills and vineyards, look very much like the Napa valley, only in Burgundy do you turn a corner to encounter a medieval chateau (real not faux) or a priceless Northern Renaissance altarpiece tucked away in an old hospital. But at the moment I was just touring inside my head, and it was time to hit the road!

My first stop on this culinary journey was a 1957 guide to the foods of France- Bouquet de France: An Epicurian Tour of the French Provinces authored by the founder and long-time editor-in-chief of Gourmet magazine, Samuel Chamberlain. Mr. Chamberlain also illustrated this impressive tome, which I picked up in Caliban's, a used bookstore in Pittsburgh. It once belonged to a lady named Joan M. Kaplan, whose name is stamped on the cover in gold. Mrs. Kaplan, wherever you may be, please know that your book has found a happy home! While I thoroughly enjoyed reading about the fantastic meals awaiting anyone touring Burgundy by car (I imagine a sporty little two seater roadster), the recipes were not too appealing.

So, I moved on to Mireille Johnston's The Cuisine of the Rose: Classical French Cooking from Burgundy and Lyonnais (1982). I considered attempting some classic Burgundian dishes- Escargots Bourguignonne ( I don't think so!), Jambon Persille, Coeurs a la Creme, Coq au Vin. Thinking about these recipes helped shape my preliminary menu, but with a vegan dinner guest coming, I had to move away from the preponderance of butter, cream, and cheese which seemed to be listed as ingredients for every recipe. As Dr. Hal volunteered to devise his own Boeuf Bourguignon, I was left to round out the meal to my own, and our vegan guest's satisfaction.

The results of further rifling through my collection of French cookbooks was this
Menu -
Les Gougères
Grill-Braised Boeuf Bourguignon
Potatoes Savoyarde
Beans Maitre d'Hotel
Salade au Chou
Mousse Au Chocolate

Wines-
- 1999 Vincent Girardin Corton-Charlemagne Grand Cru, Cote de Beaune (white)
The white was really very good, even after 14 years.
- 1997 Domaine Chandon de Briailles Corton-Bressandes Grand Cru, Cote de Beaune (red)
The red, while good, had faded some and would have been better a few years ago.
Sadly, both of these are now really too expensive to contemplate purchasing, the curse of very small production and a worldwide market. (Commentary by Dr. Hal)

Les Gougères
I can remember the first time I ever ate a gougere. It was from a bakery in Beaune, as big as my fist, crisp and brown on the outside, unctuously egg-y and cheese-y within.

1 1/2 c. whole milk + 1/4 c. for brushing the puff tops
1/2 c. butter
1 1/3 c. flour salt
Tabasco
pinch nutmeg
6 eggs
1 Tb Dijon mustard
2 1/2 c. coarsely grated Swiss (i.e. gruyere) cheese

Preheat the oven to 425°.

Heat the milk and butter together until the butter is melted. Remove from the heat and add the flour all at once. Cook for about 2 minutes – until the mixture forms a ball and comes away from the sides of the pan.

Off the heat, beat in the salt, a few drops of Tabasco and the nutmeg. Beat in the eggs two at a time, making sure each two are completely blended before added the next ones. Stir in two cups of the cheese and the mustard.

Butter a cookie sheet or line it with parchment paper. Form heaping teaspoonsful of dough about 3 inches apart. Brush the tops with milk and put a bit of grated cheese on top.

Bake about 20 minutes, do not open the oven door during this time. They are done when they look puffed and golden brown. Serve warm. Makes about 30 puffs.

Grill-Braised Boeuf Bourguignon a la Dr. Hal
In the first French Chef episode, circa 1963, Julia Child makes a Boeuf Bourguignon, and you may recall that it is featured as a daunting recipe in the movie Julie and Julia.  Boeuf Bourguignon is actually a pretty simple recipe- you brown the beef, braise it in red wine, add onions and mushrooms, thicken the sauce, and serve.

It seemed like another candidate for the grill-braised approach, which I have written about for short ribs.  The idea is to grill the meat first over high heat, giving it a serious browning without added fat.  next the meat is braised in a covered BBQ, oven, or on the stovetop, the sauce is thickened, accompaniments are added, and it is then served.

The French Chef recipe uses salt pork or bacon for lardons in the stew.  They are rendered first and their fat is used to brown the meat.  The grilling does not require additional fat, but some pork product is needed to enrich the flavor.  A  smoked pork chop,weighing about ½ lb, makes a fine substitution.  Though smoked, the flavor is very subtle and does not overwhelm the recipe.  The original recipe also calls for 18-24 small fresh white onions, which must be individually peeled.  This is by far the most tedious aspect of the recipe and is replaced here by frozen onions, which are great.

While certainly in Burgundy a Pinot Noir would be used for the cooking wine, I don’t think this is the best choice, as a suitably hearty Pinot would be quite expensive.  An alternative choice would be a fairly big Zinfandel or something in the Rhone wine family, a Syrah or Grenache based wine.  This matches better to the heartier flavors from the grilling and they are not priced as dearly.

Thus we have for the meats:
½ lb smoked pork chop
3 lbs boneless beef chuck
¾ bottle of hearty red wine
1 can beef broth
1 ½ Tb tomato paste
3 cloves mashed garlic
1 bay leaf
½ tsp thyme
salt and pepper

Cut the beef chuck into strips about 1.5” wide and 1-1.5”thick.  These will be grilled then cut into individual chunks for the stew.  Try to make the cuts when possible along the natural edges of the muscle, and cut away any extra fat or silver skin.  Salt and pepper the meat and grill it  over high heat for a couple of minutes on each side, or until the surface is significantly browned.  Try to brown as many sides as possible.  When done, transfer the meat to a cutting board and finish cutting it into individual chunks, around 1-1.5”.

Cut the pork off the bone into lardons about ¾ -1” long by ¼”x ¼”.  Brown these using a bit of oil in the pot that is going to be used to braise the stew, I use a large cast iron pot, but any heavy covered casserole, large enough to hold the ingredients, will be fine.  I suspect that an enameled pot is probably traditional.

Add the grilled meat, the wine (about ¾ of a bottle or so, leave yourself a glass), and the other ingredients to the pot.  The idea is to have the combined braising liquid to almost cover the meat.  Bring the stew to a simmer on the stovetop. It can then be cooked on top of the stove over low heat or in the oven at 325 degrees for 2-3 hours, until the meat is very tender but not completely falling apart.  The temperature needs to be regulated so that the braising liquid is just at a moderate simmer, with some steam bubbles evident.

Preparing the onions and mushrooms.
1 lb white mushrooms
½ Tb olive oil
1 ½ Tb butter
¼ tsp salt

1 package (14 oz) frozen small onions
1 Tb butter
about 3 Tb water
½ tsp salt

Clean and cut the mushrooms into halves or quarters depending on their size.  Heat the butter and oil in a large sauté pan until the butter begins to stop foaming, then add the mushrooms and salt.  Continue over medium high heat until the mushrooms are browned and most of the moisture has evaporated.  Set aside.

Put the frozen onions, along with the butter and water, in a sauté pan and heat until boiling.  Cover the pan so that the onions can steam until mostly thawed, about 3-4 minutes.  Remove the cover and let the remaining water evaporate, then continue sautéing over medium heat until the onions start to brown, about another 5-10 minutes total.  Set aside.

When the meat is done, remove it to a separate bowl.  If there is a significant amount of extra fat in the broth, it can be skimmed off, but this is not really necessary.  If there seems to be too much liquid and its flavor seems thin, it can be reduced over medium high heat to make a richer sauce.  If there seems to be too little liquid, extra beef stock can be added.

Boeuf Bourguignon components- onions, meat, sauce & mushrooms

Thickening the sauce.
3 Tb butter
3 Tb flour

Cream the butter and flour together in a small bowl with a rubber spatula or a fork.  Heat just the braising liquid in the pot to the simmer.  Whisk a few spoonfuls of hot braising liquid into the butter-flour paste until all lumps are gone, then gradually add the mixture to the pot of braising liquid.  Whisk the sauce until the thickener is fully combined and the sauce has thickened.  Add the meat, onions, and mushrooms and bring the stew back to the simmer, stirring occasionally. Correct the seasoning, adding salt and pepper to taste.

The stew is ready to serve or it can be reheated later.  It can also be cooled, refrigerated and reheated in a day or two with no ill effects.  It can also be eaten cold from the refrigerator for breakfast, again with no ill effects.

Vegan-esque Stove-Top Potatoes Savoyarde
Adapted from The Way to Cook by Julia Child
I've had bad luck with these layered potato gratins- even when I parboiled the potatoes in advance my gratins always seemed to end up soupy and raw. This delicious specimen turned out to be an exception to the rule, it was perfect!. To please our vegan dinner companion I used olive oil, vegetable broth, and left his portion sans cheese. Made me feel like a chef reborn!

3 cups thinly sliced onions
2 Tb olive oil
2 1/2 lbs. boiling potatoes
2 cups vegetable broth
big pinch of dried herbs de provence or a mixture of dried basil, thyme, and oregano
1 large clove of garlic, pureed
Optional: 1 1/2 cups grated Swiss cheese

Over medium heat saute the onions in the olive oil in a non-stick frying pan large enough to ultimately hold all the onions and potatoes. Stir occasionally and cook until they are limp and tender, about 10 minutes or so. Remove the onions to a bowl.

While the onions are cooking, peel the potatoes and cut them into slices 1/8" thick. To avoid brown ugly potatoes, drop the slices into a bowl of cold water as you do them.

Add one cup of vegetable broth, the dried herbs, and the pureed garlic to the frying pan and bring it to a boil. Add the potatoes and onions, making rough layers as you do. Season well with salt and pepper and add enough broth to come two thirds of the way up the potatoes-onion mixture. Cover the pan and simmer for 15-20 minutes, watching to make sure that the liquid doesn't boil over, or until the potatoes are tender and the broth is almost all absorbed.

Just before serving, reheat the potatoes on medium-low and sprinkle some or all of the top with the Swiss cheese. Put the pan under the broiler, about 4-5 inches from the element, and broil until the cheese is nicely browned.
Serves 6

Beans Maitre d'Hotel
You can make this tasty bean dish with your own home cooked or canned beans. I had some exotic Rancho Gordo "Vallarta" beans festering in the cupboard that were begging to be cooked. Described as "Super rich heirloom bean originally from Jalisco, Mexico, now a favorite among Napa's best chefs." You could use any bean that you have festering - Julia C. suggests black beans, Great Northerns, navy beans, cannellini, pinto, etc. Find detailed instructions for cooking beans in my post Cassoulet & Company.

3 cups cooked beans or two cans of your beans of choice
2 large cloves of garlic, pureed
3 Tb olive oil
1/4 - 1/2 tsp fresh lemon juice
handful of fresh chopped parsley and/or other green herbs (basil, oregano, thyme)
salt & pepper

If using canned beans, drain them in a colander, rinse with hot water, and drain. Briefly saute the garlic in the olive oil in a saucepan. Fold in the beans, let them heat through, and gently stir in the lemon juice and salt and pepper to taste. Just before serving toss in the chopped parsley or herb mixture. Serves 4-6.

Salade au Chou
An improvised mix of Napa cabbage, Japanese watermelon radishes, roasted cauliflower, and Dijon mustard vinaigrette

Mousse Au Chocolate Ambassade d'Auvergne
Adapted from Bistro Cooking by Patricia Wells.                                                                                   The Ambassade d'Auvergne is an old time Paris restaurant that specializes in the cuisine of it's namesake region, the Auvergne, which is located to the southwest of Burgundy. Pardon the liberty taken here, but this mousse is like eating the world's most delicious chocolate bar, but even better, because it's nice and creamy too. I was trepidatious about adding the orange liqueur because I don't like my chocolate flavors interfered with, but found that the small amount of liqueur served to intensify them without tasting "orange-y."

8 oz. bittersweet good quality chocolate (Lindt, etc.), broken into pieces
3 Tb orange liqueur (Grand Marnièr or Cointreau)
2 tsp. vanilla extract
8 Tb (4 oz) unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
8 large egg yolks
1/2 c. sugar
5 large egg whites

Place the chocolate, orange liqueur, and vanilla in the top of a double boiler over simmering water. Stir until melted. Remove from the heat and stir in the butter, and allow to cool until lukewarm. The mixture may seem to "seize up" at the beginning, but will smooth out as you continue to mix the butter in.

Love that ribbon!

Combine the egg yolks and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer and beat, gradually increasing the mixer speed to medium high, until thick and pale yellow, and form the "ribbon." (Whites are stiff enough to make a ribbon trail from the beater that holds its shape.- See photograph.) Be patient, this can take a while. Next beat in the chocolate mixture while it is still warm. If necessary (only one mixer bowl), transfer the chocolate-egg yolk mixture to a large mixing bowl.

Wash and dry the stand mixer bowl until totally clean and dry, otherwise the egg whites won't whip properly. Place the egg whites in the clean mixer bowl. Beat the whites until they are stiff but not dry.

Stir one-third of the beaten egg whites into the chocolate mixture to lighten it. Gently fold in the remaining egg whites. Do this slowly and patiently. Do not overmix, but be sure that the mixture is well blended.

Pour the mousse into a large serving bowl (1 1/2-2 quart capacity). A plain white soufflé dish looks "very French." Cover tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerate the mousse for at least 6 hours before serving. Makes 8-10 servings.

Have a rugelach (arugula?)

We had an entertaining homophonic episode at dinner the other night. Confusion ensued when our diners were exhorted to "eat a rugelach" which was misinterpreted to mean "eat arugula," understandable given that the Picky Eater had made an arugula salad for dinner and I was serving my great grandmother's nut strudels aka rugelach, for dessert.

Have a rugelach!

Either choice was a good option, depending upon the number of calories one wanted to ingest. The rugelach are devilishly addictive, and it's easy to consume half a dozen (circa 900 calories) in the blink of an eye. The salad of greens, roasted cauliflower, pomegranate seeds, and pecans had fewer calories naturally, plus the bonus of more staying power, less fat, good flavor, and tons of nutrients. While the Picky Eater may have the will power to eschew the rugelach, I had to content myself with the compromise of eating some of both (not at the same time!)

Or, arugala

Start with the salad-
Arugula Salad with Roasted Cauliflower et al.
I like my salads heavy on the solids and light on the greens, but it's your salad and your call......

4-6 cups mixed arugula & baby spinach, washed, dried & stemmed
1 small head of cauliflower
1 cup whole pecans
1 cup fresh pomegranate seeds
1/4 c olive oil
Salt & pepper

Dressing:
2:1 ratio of olive oil & lemon juice (or a light balsamic or champagne vinegar). (I used 1/3 cup oil to 3 Tb of balsamic vinegar.)

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Toast the pecans in a roasting pan for about five minutes, until just turning. Put the nuts aside to cool, then chop them into good sized chunks. Keep the oven on for the cauliflower.

Wash the cauliflower and cut it into bite-size florets. Wipe out the roasting pan that you used for the pecans and toss the cauliflower in it with the 1/4 cup olive oil and a generous amount of salt & pepper. Bake for 20-25 minutes until just tender and nicely browned, checking and tossing every ten minutes or so. Remove from the roasting pan and allow the cauliflower to cool.

Just before serving whisk the olive oil and citrus or vinegar together until emulsified.

Toss the greens, cauliflower, nuts, and pomegranate seeds together with the viniagrette. Add salt & pepper to taste.

Serves 4 or one Picky Eater.

And finish with "a rugelach:"
Like many family recipe's, my great grandmother Pesse's rugelach come with a story attached to them. An acquaintance, Mrs. Friedman,  refused to share her Hungarian strudel dough recipe, and as an immigrant from the Ukraine, my great grandmother was unfamiliar with it. The secretive lady always  made her strudels when she had company coming, and so Pesse went visiting a few days before her friend expected out-of-town guests. Pesse chatted with her and watched her make the cookies, then went right home, made a batch herself, and they took their rightful place as a legendary family dessert!

Sour cream pastry rolled paper thin and topped with jelly, nuts, cinnamon sugar.- ready to roll.
 Blurry photo looks like it belongs in my mother's 1952 vintage Gourmet Cookbook!

Pesse Zeff’s Nut Strudels
Be sure to make the dough the day before you want to bake.

5 c. flour
1 lb. butter, cut into 1” cubes
3 egg yolks
2 c. sour cream
1 t. vanilla
1 TB baking powder
1 TB sugar

Filling:
Jelly (fruit or orange marmalade)
Nuts, finely chopped
2 c. sugar mixed with
2 t. cinnamon

Sift the dry ingredients together in a large bowl. Cut the butter in with a pastry knife until the pieces are the size of large peas. Mix in the cream, egg yolks, and vanilla. Form the dough into a flat disk, wrap it in plastic wrap, and refrigerate overnight.

Cut the dough into 8 equal portions. Roll each piece until very thin (almost like paper!) on a large piece of parchment paper or a floured board. On one long side only, spread a thin line of jelly about 2” wide. Sprinkle the entire surface of the dough with nuts and cinnamon sugar.

Starting at the jelly strip end, gently roll the pastry into a neat loaf, folding in the side edges after you make the first fold over the jelly.

Place on an ungreased cookie sheet, and prick the top of each roll well with a fork, to allow steam to escape during baking. Sprinkle the tops of the loaves with more cinnamon sugar.

Bake in a 350° oven for 20-25 minutes, until lightly browned. Cut into 1” slices on the diagonal. Use a very sharp knife to avoid cracking. These freeze well if they make it to that far.

Makes about 8 dozen.

Omit the sugar and vanilla and you can use this dough for appetizer strudels with a mushroom duxelle filling and grated cheese scattered on the dough. Bake as directed with a some grated cheese added on top during the last 10 minutes of baking.

Ta-Da!! The Perfect Hard-boiled Egg

Undeniably perfect!!

While my immediate family members may scoff, managing to consistently boil the perfect egg, pristine in its bright white & yellow purity counts as quite an achievement in my book, especially after decades of trials and tribulations in the hard boiled egg department. Any egg boiler, experienced professional or neophyte knows the signs of a badly boiled egg- the bumpy exterior from challenges while peeling and the dull lemon colored yolk with a dark grey-green shadow rim, both of which make an egg unacceptable for stuffing and beg to be chopped for egg salad with a smidgen of curry as a color brightener.

May I speak of egg boiling disasters? The worst in my personal experience took place in my early catering days, three dozen of the ugliest stuffed eggs I've ever seen, two frantic cooks, and one very dissatisfied customer. A bomb all around that put me off hard-boiled eggs for years. (And my husband, less than enamored of stuffed eggs, wishes that the attitude had been permanent!) Then there are the Passover seders with bowls of peeled eggs in salted water, naked and looking like they had been birthed through barbed wire. Double yuck.

And do what or whom do I owe my new found success? None other than the goddess of compulsive cooks everywhere, Mme. Julia Child, whose instructions I had passed over for many a year because they included suggestions like pricking each egg before boiling (sure to crack open for me), boiling them a 2nd time for precisely 10 seconds, and chilling them in ice twice- first for 2 minutes and then again for 20 minutes. Sounds like way too much work for me! But, I finally caught on to her basic cooking method, and that, plus another truc, are the secrets to my success-

Brown eggs! they always speak to me of Old MacDonald and all things fresh and wholesome,
no matter how long they have been in the refrigerator.

#1- Sorry to say it, but you cannot in my experience successfully boil fresh eggs. According to internet experts(?) they must be at least two weeks old to avoid peeling problems. Another reason to always have a dozen extra eggs stashed in the back of the refrigerator!

#2- My official recipe
Place your eggs in a saucepan and cover them with 1" of cold water. Bring to a boil over high heat. As soon as the water is at a rolling boil, cover the pan and pull it off the heat. Let the eggs sit covered for exactly 17 minutes (better set your timer!) After the 17 minutes is up, immediately drain off the hot water and run cold water over the eggs for several minutes. You can even drop a few ice cubes into the pan as well. While the cold water is running, crack the eggs in several places, which allows the water to somewhat permeate the infamous "inner membrane," source of many an egg peeling woe. After about 10 minutes in ice water, peel and use your eggs. If you need to store them for later use, cover them in cold water and refrigerate, peeled or unpeeled.

Now that you have these perfectly delightful hard-boiled eggs, it's time to do something with them. My choice is always a creamy salad with crunchy veggies, some mayo and yogurt, and a bit of tang. Tang? Where do you get the tang? How about a batch of Smitten kitchen's pickled celery (no cooking required) and some pickled carrots, courtesy of David Lebovitz.

Pickled Celery
This is my new secret weapon to perk up any and all of the various kitchen sink salads I concoct for the odd lunch or dinner from whatever is festering in the fridge.

1/2 cup white wine vinegar
1/2 cup water
4 teaspoons Kosher salt (you can go up to 1 tablespoon if using the lighter weight Diamond brand; here’s why)
1 Tb teaspoons granulated sugar
4 stalks celery, trimmed, diced tiny

Combine the vinegar, water, Kosher salt and sugar in a jar and shake it until the salt and sugar dissolve. Add the diced celery to the jar, cover it and place in the fridge for at least 30 minutes, ideally one hour and up to one week.
Makes about one cup.

Pickled Carrots 
Makes one pint

1 pound (450 g) carrots, peeled
1 1/4 cups (310 ml) water
1 cup (280 ml) cider vinegar
1/4 cup (50 g) sugar
2 garlic cloves, lightly-crushed
1 1/2 teaspoons fennel, dill, or anise seeds
1 1/2 tablespoons coarse salt
2 bay leaves

Cut the carrots into sticks approximately the size of your fourth finger. Bring a medium-sized pot of lightly-salted water to a boil. (Use a non-reactive pot.)

When the water boils, drop the carrots in and simmer for one minute. Pour into a colander and rinse under cold water. Drain thoroughly.

In the same pot, heat the remaining ingredients. Once it begins to boil, reduce the heat and simmer for two minutes.

Remove from heat and add the carrot sticks. Cool until room temperature, then put into jars and chill.

Carrot sticks should be made at least one day in advance, and will keep for up to four weeks in the refrigerator.

Delicious Egg Salad

Egg salad on toast with pickled carrots. What a lunch!

4 large eggs
1 heaped teaspoon Dijon
2 teaspoons minced shallot, scallion or red onion
2 Tb pickled celery (or more, to taste)
2 tablespoons mayonnaise or  plain yogurt
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Optional additions: Chopped parsley, minced olives, 1/2 tsp. curry powder, fresh chopped celery

Peel the eggs, chop them, and place in a medium bowl. Add the pickled celery, Dijon mustard, shallot, mayo or yogurt, salt and pepper, and any of the optional additions. Mix gently.  Season to taste with salt and pepper. Serve on toasted whole grain bread, if you have it.

Pickled celery and eggs also make excellent additions to potato salad, whether of the American or French variety. Here are two of my favorite recipes-

Family Potato Salad
This recipe is from my Great Aunt Margaret, graduate of UCSF Medical School Class of 1924. My mother lived Aunt Margaret and Uncle Maurice Zeff, while she went to school at UC Berkeley during WWII. Aunt Margaret taught her to marinate the potatoes while they were still warm. (That’s the secret to the recipe!)

5 lbs. boiling potatoes
olive oil to taste
wine vinegar to taste
1 red onion, minced (or 1 bunch scallions)
4 stalks celery, diced
8 eggs, hardboiled, peeled & diced
1/4 c. parsley, minced
2 Tb Dijon mustard
1 c. mayonnaise (Best Foods)
salt & pepper to taste

Boil the potatoes until tender. Let cool slightly and peel, if desired. Roughly slice or cube into a large bowl. Sprinkle generously with olive oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper. Toss gently to distribute seasonings. Cool completely

Add the remaining ingredients and toss to mix. Correct the seasoning and add more mayonnaise if desired.
Refrigerate before serving.  Serves 12-16.

A Salade Nicoise with sugar snap peas. I know, you're asking
"Where did she get those tomatoes so early in the season?" Oh, the joys of living in California!

French Potato Salad
5 lbs. boiling potatoes
olive oil to taste
wine vinegar to taste
salt & pepper
1 bunch scallions, minced
1/2 c. chopped parsley

Mustard Vinaigrette
2 Tb Dijon mustard
1 t. salt
1/3 c. lemon juice
1 1/2 c. olive oil

Boil the potatoes until tender. Let cool slightly and peel, if desired. Roughly slice or cube into a large bowl. Sprinkle generously with olive oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper.
Toss gently to distribute seasonings. Cool completely

Make the vinaigrette: Whisk mustard, salt, and lemon juice together; then gradually whisk in the olive oil, until thoroughly combined.

Gently mix the parsley and chopped scallions with the potatoes, then drizzle on the vinaigrette and gently mix again with a spatula. Correct the seasoning.

Use this potato salad as the base for Salade Niçoise: arrange it on a lettuce-lined platter with steamed green beans, tomatoes, hardboiled eggs, olives, tuna, and, if you like, capers and anchovies.
From The Way to Cook by Julia Child

Salad Days

"...My salad days, When I was green in judgment, cold in blood..."
                            Cleopatra,  Antony & Cleopatra Act One by WIlliam Shakespeare (1606)

While The Picky Eater is happy to inform me fairly frequently that my "salad days" are over, and I might have to reluctantly admit that is true, recently it seems like my days of eating salad have just begun. For many years I had a hardcore aversion to lettuce for several reasons- as a caterer many aeons ago I had to wash pounds and pounds of it, tedious even for someone  who loves splashing around in the water and ranked scrubbing the kitchen sink as one of her favorite childhood activities, right after washing her hands, and because lettuce tastes pretty blah when it isn't swathed in a yummy fat based dressing, which guilt induced me to avoid. Recently it seems that I have come to grips with both these objections and am eating salad on a regular basis. I quite like the mixed green melanges now widely available, albeit swathed in mustardy vinaigrette and garnished with nuts and goat cheese, which more than compensates for lettuce's (to me) lackluster flavor.

While I am only a recent convert to the delights of lettuce, I have always been a big fan of main course salads that employ other vehicles for salad dressing. Without lettuce, they last for days, and make a quick leftover lunch or dinner.

I prefer a high ratio of veggie additives to base greens, but feel free to add more as desired. And here, without further ado, are several of my favorites: **

Hard to make even a delicious salad look attractive!

Ramen Chinese Chicken Salad
Serves 4-6
A tried and true recipe that multiplies easily to feed a crowd. My friend Julie and I have made this in bulk for up to sixty people.

3 c. shredded cooked chicken (leftover or 2-3 poached chicken breasts, see poaching directions below)
5 green onions, trimmed and thinly sliced, including some of the green tops
1 cucumber
1/2 head Napa cabbage (save the other half for the Mexican Cabbage Salad)
2 packages Ramen soup mix, any flavor
1 1/2 c. raw almonds
1/4 cup chopped cilantro

Optional additions of choice, use 1-2 cups total: diced celery, shredded carrots, sliced mushrooms, radishes or water chestnuts

Those noodles much beloved by hungry college students put to a higher use.

Soy Sauce Dressing (adapted from Barbara Tropp's The Modern Art of Chinese Cooking)

3 1/2 Tb sesame oil
3 1/2 Tb soy sauce
1 1/2 Tb balsamic vinegar
2 Tb sugar
2 t. salt
1 1/2 t. hot chili oil

If using uncooked chicken breasts, poach them using my variant on a Chinese technique from Barbara Tropp:
Poached Chicken Breasts
2-3 chicken breast halves (boned, skinned, boneless, skinless, whatever)
14 oz can chicken stock
quarter size piece of fresh ginger, peeled
1 whole green onion, trimmed and cut into three pieces

Place the chicken breasts  in a small, heavy pot and add the broth and enough water to cover them by 2 inches. Make sure that the chicken is completely submerged. Smash the ginger and green onion pieces with the side of a cleaver or chef's knife and add to the pot. Bring the broth to a boil over high heat. Turn off the heat, cover the pot, and let the chicken sit in the poaching liquid for 2 hours. Remove the chicken breasts, refrigerate, and shred when needed to use.

Making the salad

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Spread the nuts on a rimmed cookies sheet and toast in the oven until nicely browned and crunchy, about 6-8 minutes. Do not over bake or they will burn and taste nasty. Coarsely chop the nuts and put them in a large salad bowl. Add the shredded chicken and green onions.

Quarter the cucumber and cut it into thin slices, and shred the cabbage by cutting the head in half vertically down the middle, making horizontal and vertical cuts about 2" apart in it like dicing an onion, then lay it flat on the cutting board and thinly slice it. Add both vegetables to the salad bowl. Crumble the Ramen noodles into the salad bowl and discard the seasoning packets. Add the cilantro and any of the optional additions that you are using. Toss everything together.

Make the dressing in a 1 or 2 cup measuring cup and whisk diligently until it is homogeneous. Pour the dressing over the salad, being sure to scrape out the residual sugar crystals, and toss well. The noodles will soften as the salad sits after dressing. A nice balance of crunchy and soggy is met if you tossed the salad about one hour before serving it.

Mexican Cabbage Salad
Serves 4-6

Our favorite Mexican restaurant in Modesto, La Morenita, serves a dish of cabbage slaw as a condiment with your chips and salsa which I can't eat enough of. Recently I started poking around to see if I could find an equivalent recipe on the web. A little judicious surfing produced three recipes, including one from Jamie Oliver and one from Mark Bittman, that I amalgamated into one super scrumptious, spicy, and tangy coleslaw. Not a meal in and of itself unless you have sworn off carbs and most proteins, like one anonymous Picky Eater of my acquaintance, who actually would find this recipe "too spicy."

There is something very satisfying about the process
of shredding cabbage, especially for these salads.

1/2  head of cabbage, thinly sliced
2 carrots, peeled & coarsely grated
1 small bunch of radishes (about 10), trimmed and thinly sliced
1 colorful bell pepper- red, yellow or orange, diced
1 small red onion, quartered & thinly sliced
2 jalapeno peppers, seeded and finely diced
1/2 pint cherry tomatoes or 2-3 plum tomatoes, finely diced
1/4 c. chopped cilantro

Dressing:
2 heaping tsp. of Dijon mustard
zest of one lime
2 Tb fresh lime juice (about what you get from 1 juicy lime)
1 clove garlic put through a press or finely chopped
1/3 c. olive oil
Salt & pepper to taste

Optional: Crispy Tortilla Strips
These are a delicious topping for Mexican salads and chilis. Quick, easy, and low fat.
4 fresh corn tortillas
Preheat the oven to 350F. Cut the tortillas into thin strips and place on a cookie sheet. Toast the tortilla strips in the oven until they are crisp- about 5 minutes.

Gently combine all the prepared vegetables together in a large salad bowl. Mix all the dressing ingredients except the olive oil together, then whisk in the oil. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Pour over the salad and gently stir with a rubber spatula to coat all the vegetables. Eat as a side dish with crispy tortilla strips. Would be good with grilled or roasted meats, spicy beans, quesadillas, etc.

Last, but not least, an Italian style white bean & tuna salad, an amalgamation of three (!) recipes from the cookbook Trattoria by Patricia Wells. The Daddy gave me an unexpected compliment on this salad's "distinct oil profile without the usual strong acidic viniagrette aspect," and then proceeded to tell me that he probably liked it because he was hungry while waiting for the roast to finish cooking. That's the sort of feedback that I just live for.

Italian Bean Salad with (or without) Tuna
Serves 4-6

For the beans
12 oz dried cannellini (white) beans

1 rib celery, broken in 1/2
3 cloves garlic, smashed
1 bay leaf
or, if pressed for time, use 2 14 oz. cans of cooked Italian cannellini beans.. (but the flavor won't be as good!)

For the salad
1/4 cup olive oil
2 Tb balsamic vinegar
3 stalks of celery, diced
1 cup stuffed olives (I like them stuffed with sun-dried tomatoes), cut in rounds
1/4 cup green onions, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
1/4 cup Italian parsley, chopped
1 can Italian tuna packed in olive oil
salt & pepper to taste

Preparing & cooking the beans


You can use the "quick soak" method to pre-soak the beans. Put the beans in a large pot and cover with at least 2 inches of water. Bring the beans to a boil over medium heat. Turn the heat off and let the pot sit until the water cools down, about one hour.

Strain the beans from the soaking water. Put the beans in a large pot and cover generously with water. Add the onion, celery, garlic, and bay leaf. Bring the pot to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat and simmer until all the beans are soft, about 1 hour. Add more water if it reduces too much.

Drain the beans, and place in a large bowl while still warm. Toss with the olive oil and balsamic vinegar and some salt. Cool to room temperature.

Gently add all the remaining ingredients except the tuna to the beans. Taste for additional salt, pepper, and a tad more olive oil and vinegar to taste. Turn into a low, flattish serving dish, like a gratin dish.

Drain the olive oil and crumble on top of the beans. Serve & enjoy!

While researching (if you can call it that) this post, I came across a newish book by Patricia Wells- Salad As a Meal: Healthy Main-Dish Salads for Every Season. I look forward to reporting on the contents, although while I am a big fan (the polenta croutons look very enticing!), I do despair that she has lived in Paris/Provence too long when she asks for trout eggs, halibut cheeks, and ultra-fresh eggs for her recipes.

** Quoting Shakespeare appears to have brought out my most pompous voice. Sorry!!

For the Love of Peanut Butter

The Picky Eater reports that she has resumed her romance with peanut butter. The current object of her affections is Butterscotch Peanut Butter purchased at Kauffman's in the Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia. She stores it in the tea pantry down the hall in the dorm, takes it to the dining hall to slather on her morning bagel, and dips in for a spoonful or two when she's feeling peckish.


The Picky Eater is so fond of Kauffman's peanut butter that she took the time to send me a link to their online sales site. Sadly, butterscotch only appears to be available in situ, but the Picky Eater is confident that I will enjoy the honey roasted or chocolate flavors equally as well. Just in case all this talk has you craving fresh ground peanut butter, here's the website link:

http://www.kauffmansfruitfarm.com/standard/store/grid1.aspx?id=%20%20159

Due to a well-meaning, but misguided mother, the Picky Eater lost her taste (burn out) for PB & J school lunch sandwiches in second grade. Thereafter followed the chocolate lunch years- a container of Brown Cow full fat chocolate yogurt for breakfast and lunch almost every day for about eight years, rather like eating pudding two meals a day. Foolishly, Brown Cow downscaled their packaging and the thin foil tops caused one too many chocolate yogurt leaks in the backpack, and that was the end of that revenue stream. While PB & J never really took hold again as a school lunch staple, it did slowly creep back into her diet during the high school years. She and her dad are both happy to eat it spread on whatever bread product is lying around. The Picky Eater, as would be expected, is selective in her choice of jelly/jams; she opts for Bonne Maman Wild Blueberry, while her dad, with the exception of orange marmalade, uses whatever jar is almost empty. This is what Bonne Maman has to say about its Wild Blueberry Preserves:

"The distinctive allure of wild blueberries in a velvety-sweet gel creates an entirely delightful and robust blueberry experience."

Nice to think that there are childhood comfort foods that last a lifetime.

Musings on Peanut Butter
Writing about peanut butter naturally leads to a lot of thinking about peanut butter, which in my case took two directions- "Where did it come from?" and "What should I cook with it?" For the answer to the first question I consulted Harold McGee's 1st (1984) and 2nd (2004) editions of On Food and Cooking: the Science and Lore of the Kitchen. In the first edition Mr. McGee tells us that over half the peanuts used in the United States are made into peanut butter which is mostly eaten by children. The 2nd edition adds that peanut butter was developed around 1890 in either St. Louis or Battle Creek, Michigan (by the same Kelloggs of Rice Krispies fame), and how it is processed, including the addition of 3-5% hydrogenated shortening in commercial brands like Skippy to prevent oil separation.

There are other considerations when it comes to peanut butter -  smooth or chunky?, hydrogenated or natural? The first is just a matter of preference, with most children, it seems to me, coming down on the side of smooth. With the latter one must pick one's poison -  bad-for-you hydrogenated oils or the aggravation of peanut oil dripping down the sides of the jar and slopped on the kitchen counter, leaving behind a dry, unspreadable mass in the jar.
Our 1975 edition of Joy of Cooking warns against the limited nutritional value of commercial peanut butters which do not contain the protein rich germ of the nut due to its propensity to taste bitter and turn rancid. Joy recommends making your own at home:
Homemade Peanut Butter
In a blender or food processor combine 1 cup of fresh roasted or salted skinned peanuts, 1 1/2 - 2 Tb flavorless vegetable oil, and 1/2 tsp salt. Process until as smooth as desired. refrigerate and use within 2 weeks.

Cooking with Peanut Butter
Peanut butter's strong and distinctive flavor puts some limitations on it's use in cooking. Anything you make with peanut butter is absolutely going to taste like peanut butter with a few other flavorings on the side. So, recipes tend to blend it with other strong flavors- both sweet and savory- chocolate, garlic, red pepper, vinegar, soy sauce. Truth be told, around our house most peanut butter is consumed au natural. One recipe that I have made in large, i.e. 20 pound, quantities is this ...

Thai Noodle Salad

12 oz. linguine
4 Tb Asian sesame oil
8 green onions, chopped
5 garlic cloves, minced
1 Tb minced peeled fresh ginger
1/4 c. honey
1/4 c. creamy peanut butter
1/4 c. soy sauce
3 Tb unseasoned rice vinegar
1 1/2 Tb chili-garlic sauce
Additions (your choice):
2 c. mung bean sprouts
1 c. finely shredded carrots
1 thinly sliced red or yellow bell pepper chunks
1/2 English cucumber, sliced into 1/4' x 1" pieces
1 c. sugar snap peas, sliced into 1" pieces
Chopped cilantro to garnish

Cook the pasta in large pot of boiling salted water until tender but still firm to bite. Drain. Transfer the pasta to large bowl, and add 3 tablespoons sesame oil and toss to coat.

Heat the remaining 1 tablespoon oil in heavy large skillet over medium-high heat. Add 6 green onions, garlic, and ginger; sauté until onions soften, about 2 minutes. Add honey, peanut butter, soy sauce, vinegar, and chili-garlic sauce; whisk to blend. Simmer sauce 1 minute. Cool to room temperature. Pour over pasta and toss to coat. Add additional vegetables of choice and mix well, or mound with vegetables on a platter (see photo.) Sprinkle with the remaining green onions and chopped cilantro if desired. Makes 8 side-dish servings.

Cookies!!

Always willing to experiment in the name of a good cause, I devoted a day to trying a few new peanut butter recipes. First, the obvious- Peanut butter cookies. After comparing recipes in America's Test Kitchen's The New Best Recipe, David Lebovitz's Ready for Dessert, Maida Heatter's Book of Great Desserts, The Village Baker's Wife by Gayle and Joe Ortiz, and on Martha Stewart's eponymous website, I decided to modify the already tweaked-to-death ATK recipe with some suggestions from David Lebovitz, and this is the result:

Left to right: Chocolate chip, plain and peanut butter and jelly, and M&M peanut butter cookies.
Our taste testers voted the chocolate chip version "best of show."

Peanut Butter Cookies 
(with variations- Chocolate Chip or M&M Peanut Butter Cookies or Peanut Butter and Jelly Thumbprints)
note: This cookie dough should be refrigerated at least 2 hours before baking.
Makes about 36 cookies

2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp.baking powder
1 tsp. salt
8 oz. (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup brown sugar, packed
1 cup white sugar, plus extra for baking
1 cup crunchy peanut butter (ATK recommends a commercial hydrogenated brand- just this once!)
2 lg. eggs
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup salted, dry-roasted peanuts, ground to resemble breadcrumbs
Optional: 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips, or 1 1/2 cups M&M's, or for Peanut Butter and Jelly Thumbprints - 1/2 cup strawberry (or flavor of choice) jam (should be thick)

Stir the flour, baking soda and powder, and salt together in a bowl and set aside.

Beat the butter and sugars together until light and fluffy. Beat in the peanut butter, then the eggs one at a time, and the vanilla. Stir in the flour mixture and then the ground peanuts, both until just incorporated, along with the chocolate chips or M&M's, if using.

Refrigerate the dough for two hours or overnight.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, and arrange the racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven. Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper. Put about 1/2 cup of sugar in a wide, shallow bowl.

Pinch off pieces of dough and roll them into one inch balls. Drop the cookie balls into the sugar, and shake them around to cover in sugar. Place them about 3 inches apart on the cookie sheets. If making plain peanut butter cookies,  flatten each slightly and make a crosshatch pattern with the back of the tines of a fork.

Bake, about 15-18 minutes, rotating the cookie sheets halfway through baking, until the cookies are brown around the edges but still look uncooked in the middle (to maintain their chewiness). When the cookies seem firm enough to handle, move them to wire racks to cool.

For Peanut Butter and Jelly Thumbprints, bake the cookies until they look puffy, about 10 minutes. Remove the cookie sheets from the oven and make an indentation in the center of each cookie with the handle end of a wooden spoon. Bake about 5-8 minutes more, until the edges are golden, and cool as directed above.

When the cookies are completely cool, heat the jam in a small saucepan, stirring until it has just softened, about 30 seconds. Spoon about 1/2 tsp of jam into the center of each cookie. Store in a single layer for up to one week.

Peanut Butter Makes a Meal
With a veggie noodle salad and a dessert, it made sense to make a meal of it. Hence, a recipe for...

Beef and Chicken Satay Skewers

1 lb. boneless beef (my household meat expert recommends sirloin or chuck- we used London Broil and it was a little tough)
2 whole boneless, skinless chicken breasts
7" wooden skewers
Double recipe of teriyaki marinade (recipe below)
Satay peanut sauce (recipe below)

Prepare the marinade. Slice the beef against the grain into 1/4" wide strips and place it in a container with 1/2 of the marinade. Cover and refrigerate for at least three hours or overnight.

Slice the chicken breasts lengthwise into long thin strips. Place them in a second container with the remainder of the marinade. Also cover and refrigerate for three hours or overnight.
Soak the skewers in water while the meat is marinating.

When ready to cook, preheat the broiler with the oven rack about 5" from the heating element. Thread the meats on the skewers and lay the skewers on the slotted upper rack of a foil lined broiling pan,  placing the blunt ends of the skewers along the outside edge of the rack. Brush the meat with the marinade. Broil the skewers for about 7 minutes, turn them, baste with marinade and broil on the second side for 5-7 minutes, until the meat is browned on the edges and cooked through (the beef should be medium rare inside). Cooking time may vary depending upon your oven.

One pound of meat makes about 8 skewers. Serve with peanut satay sauce.

Teriyaki Marinade

6 scallions, chopped

1/2 c. soy sauce 

5 cloves garlic, crushed

2 Tb oil 

2 Tb brown sugar

2 Tb sherry 

1 Tb sesame oil   

pepper 

Optional additions: 2 Tb cilantro, chopped, 1 tsp. ground cumin (best with the beef) and/or 1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes

 Combine the marinade ingredients in a bowl. Add meat or chicken and marinate several hours or overnight. Use for boneless chicken breasts, chicken pieces, or beef. After marinating, the meat can be grilled, broiled, or baked. Brush the meat with marinade during cooking. 

Makes enough for 1 lb. of meat.   

Peanut Satay Sauce

This is a nice medley of flavors that doesn't allow the peanut butter to predominate. And, a yummy way to enjoy peanut butter without having it stick to the roof of your mouth!

Adapted from a Martha Stewart cold noodle recipe.

1 large clove of garlic

a 3/4" piece of ginger

1 Tb (or more to taste) chile sauce

7 Tb smooth peanut butter

3 Tb sugar

4 Tb vegetable oil (not olive)

2 Tb rice vinegar or the juice of one lime (whichever you have in the cupboard)

4 Tb water

Peel and halve both the garlic and the ginger. Process them together in a food processor until finely chopped. Add the remaining ingredients and pulse until smooth. Additional water can be added for a thinner sauce.

What's your favorite peanut butter? Or favorite peanut butter recipe? Send in your nominations and they will be published in a future blog. Best recipe entry will win a PDF copy of An Edible Life: Memories and Recipes.