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by BS

Extreme Simmer: The SousVide Supreme

So after hearing me bitch for the last two years about how everyone on Top Chef gets to sous vide but I don’t, someone finally decided to throw me a bone. The folks over at SousVide Supreme, the first legit sous vide machine aimed at home cooks, sent me over one of their $450 contraptions to test out for a few weeks. Woo-hoo!

For those who need a recap: sous vide cooking involves vacuum sealing ingredients in plastic bags with this neat little contraption:

That’s actually the most fun part, watching all the air get sucked right out of the bag. Then you submerse the bag in a thermal hot water bath that’s designed to remain at an exact pre-set temperature, down to the degree:

by gansie

I Mention Rachael Ray in this Post

The Jewish calendar is lunar and therefore Passover can land anywhere between the end of March to the end of April. My birthday is at the end of March, my mom’s birthday is at the beginning of April and my sister’s birthday is at the end of April so it’s a always a hold your breath moment to find out who’s birthday will take place during this dreaded no-bread, no-cake, no-ice cream, no-soft pretzel eight day stretch.

This year it’s so early that this spring themed holiday can’t feature the season’s produce. We usually serve asparagus, but this year we still had to rely on winter’s hold overs. I’m a bit tired of winter squash, as is the rest of the Northeast, I’m sure.

With Passover, though, I wanted to think of something slightly new. Maybe not in flavor, but in form.

in Cheese / Holiday / Recipe / Veggie 2 comments

by gansie

Feeding a Grease Monster

I have friends (plus baby) coming to town this weekend. It was just the push I needed to finally get to the store this year. Yea, that’s right. I haven’t been food shopping since 2009. 80P and I have been out of town, sick and lazy. I think 80 has grabbed some eggs, cereal and milk, but really – that’s it.

I grabbed some weekend snacks: tortilla chips, ruffled potato chips, avocado, feta and mozzarella. I’ve heard their one year old, Jack, loves polly-o string cheese. All I could find was a chunk of mozz, so I’m hoping if I cut it into cylinders, Jack will dig it.

Also in my cart, with no real reason: plantains, Kabocha squash, cilantro, mangoes, lemons and limes and other canned staples (beans, coconut milk, pickles, olives).

I got home and still had no clue what to make. I turned to The Flavor Bible, checked out mango’s flavor friends, but didn’t have the right ingredients. Making room for that on the shelf I saw a new cookbook – Alicia Silverstone‘s The Kind Diet.

The first few chapters detail the horrendous factory farming practices of our country. I skipped those pages because I’m still struggling to finish Eating Animals, which actually makes me never want to eat anything ever again.

Then a recipe calling for Kabocha squash, and barely any other ingredients, found me. Alicia directed her loving fans to simply boil the peeled and cubed squash (4 cups squash to 3 1/2 cups water), add salt, bring to a boil, cover and simmer for 10, add more salt, simmer some more, mash til smooth, finish with chopped parsley. Now simple sounds good to me, especially when I have to spend the rest of the night scrubbing the floors for a one year old’s visit.

But a soup only flavored with salt. I have a food blog. I must do better than that. I started off healthful – adding lime juice then crushed red pepper flakes and I subbed cilantro for the parsley. But 80. Oh 80. My grease loving boyfriend. How could he be enticed to sup on soup for dinner?

in Recipe / Veggie 2 comments

by gansie

If You Can Pattypan, I Can Too

Following in Maids’ complete awe of pattypans, I’ve made some purchases myself. And in the vein of imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, I’ve now started preparing pattypans the same way. And holy crap. When Maids decided on roasting and stuffing her squashes I had no idea how soft and melty it would be.

I’ve been dining alone for the past few days. 80P is taking advantage of his school boy summer and left me to work and cook by myself.

Now, I know that cooking for one doesn’t appeal to everyone; I think it’s a fantastic opportunity. Hell, its become a book. It’s freeing and indulgent and sloppy and selfish. And it’s the three year old in all of us. I want this and I want it now. Luckily for my figure, I happen to crave seasonal vegetables.

in Cheese / Eggs / Recipe / Veggie 3 comments

by Maids

Return of the Pattypan

There she was… gleaming and yellow in the morning sun, delicately curved, coyly beckoning at the bottom of the squash crate…. Who could resist her? The rest of the farmers’ market bounty blurred around her scalloped edge. I was completely enchanted. In a word: transfixed.

in Recipe / Veggie 6 comments

by Maids

The Taste of Bursting Sunshine

One of the palates I attempt to cater to is that of Romeo, my bf. Romeo is a rather demanding discerning eater. He doesn’t like it when I add diced garlic to a dish. Romeo prefers garlic minced with the pampered chef garlic press that lives in our kitchen (which, to be honest, is hands-down the best garlic press I have ever used, lemme tell you). I comply with this demand suggestion. Romeo prefers his meals more gently spiced than I like mine. (To be fair some like it hot, and some like it hotter still, and I represent a dot somewhere near the hot-hot-hot end of the bland-to-razzle dazzle spicy continuum. This I admit.) I’ve tried to tone down the hotness for Romeo’s wimpy sensitive taste buds, and with occasional exceptions, I usually succeed in a palatable compromise for the both of us.

There is one thing that Romeo had asked for since I first took on the position of his chef-in-chief (or “kitchen dictator” as Romeo insists on calling me) that for a while absolutely bewildered me: “flying saucer squashes.”

The conversation we had on several occasions always went something like this:

Maids: Do you want anything from the store?

Romeo (smiling and excited): Yes. Bring me the flying-saucer-squashes so we can use them in a curry. They taste like bursts of sunshine.

Maids (genuinely curious): What do you mean?

Romeo (short temper spent, yelling now): Buy those little yellow flying saucer squashes at the grocery store so we can put them in curry and they’ll taste like sunshine!

Maids: I don’t know what you mean by flying saucer squashes! Are they thin skinned or thick skinned? Summer or winter?

Romeo (frustrated and stamping both feet): They’re summer squashes that look like baby flying saucers and taste like sunshine! God!

I know he’s adorable, but that wasn’t much to go on, right? Especially since I’d never before encountered flying saucer-like squashes. I knew, however, that I needed to address Romeo’s unrequited craving for a summer squash that looked like a flying saucer and tasted like sunshine.

Recently, after over a year and a half of being unable to fulfill this request, I had a follow-up investigatory conversation with with Edouble and Miked (who have been feeding Romeo for far longer than I). Edouble filled me in: these squashes, for which both Edouble and Romeo have a special affinity, are commonly known as sunburst squashes. They are small and round with scalloped tops and they are usually available only in the summer season.

More research yielded further knowledge: the pattypan squash (A.K.A. white squash/button squash/sunburst squash) comes in yellow, white, and green colors, is most tender when immature, and is often served fried, curried, and stuffed. It sounded delicious, and I was on a mission to make a curry with the pattypan as the M.V.I. (Most Valuable Ingredient 😉 thanx ES commenter “LC”) of the dish.

My successful search for the pattypans and the recipe for the Pattypan Vegetable Thai Curry after the jump…

in Personal / Recipe / Veggie 17 comments

by gansie

In Praise of Global Warming

In years past, many farmers’ market regulars couldn’t wait for October’s bounty. By then, they had their fill of roasted eggplant, grilled zucchini, and caprice salad—the foods that transform summer’s heat into a satiable experience. When a chill hit the air, seasonal cooks would normally turn to hearty greens and silky winter squashes. But a change in the earth’s climate has altered kitchen plans, forcing many cooks to find new uses for the abundance of summer crops creeping into autumn.

“Go global warming!” shouts Jaci Arnold, the self-described “biatch” of Richfield Farm in Manchester, Md., while selling produce at the Mount Pleasant Farmers’ Market. Somehow, heirloom tomatoes have found their way to 17th and Lamont Streets, NW in mid-October. “We should have had a frost by this time,” Arnold says. “Everyone complains about global warming, but they’re still happy to have a tomato in October.” Although she doesn’t cook extravagantly, Arnold has heard some pretty strange ways people use up the never-ending warm-weather vegetables, most notably a yellow squash ice cream. In fact, funky desserts seem to be the standard among this particular group of farmers and sellers in Mount Pleasant.

Zachary Lester, owner of Tree And Leaf farm in Loudon County, Va., transforms his quick-to-wilt purple basil, Thai basil, and Italian basil into an herbaceous ice cream. Robert Audia, of Carroll County’s Audia’s Farms, says his wife upped the ante at this year’s annual squash festival by presenting a squash cheesecake. Tia Sumler of Truck Patch Farms in New Windsor, Md., meanwhile, suggests a labor-intensive tomato granita: She blends a few tomatoes, sugar, and cherry bomb hot peppers until smooth; places it in the freezer; and every 30 minutes (for a few hours) scrapes and stirs the mixture to create an icy, crystallized treat. Sumler acknowledges it’s a pain in the ass, but “If you’re home anyway, it’s well worth it,” she says.

in Veggie 4 comments