You know it's fresh and organic when...

Farmers' markets are mostly closed this time of year, so we get our produce from a nonprofit cooperative grocery, People's Co-Op. Besides free yoga, excellent prices on bulk goods, and other benefits, we love this place because everything in the store is all-natural and organic.

One of the quirks to eating the way we do is that sometimes a funny thing happens. You go to the store and get your groceries - in January, that includes a lot of kale, an incredibly nutritious green that is sweetest and most delicious during the coldest weather - and stick it in the fridge when you get home. A couple days later, you're starting to cook and you pull out some kale, only to discover that somebody else got a head start on your dinner.



The Very Hungry Caterpillar went right on eating kale in the bowl we keep for vegetable scraps, and then once the bowl was full, he went out with those veggie scraps to the chickens. Snack and be snacked!

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Charcutepalooza Kickoff: Duck Prosciutto!

This year I'm joining somewhere between 50-100 (depending on who I see on Twitter) in a project called Charcutepalooza: A Year of Charcuterie.

Charcuterie, for those who may be unfamiliar with it, is a French term for the art of meat preservation. It covers such time-honored processes as smoking, salting, and curing, resulting in everything from bacon to terrine to confit. Typically it involves pork (there goes that Jewish guilt again), but it doesn't always.

We're taking on a different meat preservation project every month to, as blogger Mrs. Wheelbarrow puts it, "celebrate the appropriate, thoughtful consumption of meat with a year long exploration of the age old craft of charcuterie."

This month our first project was duck breast prosciutto (an Italian term for ham). The recipe comes, as all our recipes will, from Mark Ruhlman's gorgeous book Charcuterie: The Craft of Salting, Smoking, and Curing.

Today's the day for everyone's prosciutto posts, but unfortunately mine isn't quite ready yet. The butcher was out of duck breasts (partially my fault, as we had duck breast for our Christmas dinner) and I had to wait while he ordered me one. Once I got it though, I was surprised by how easy the recipe was. I split the duck breast and buried the two halves in salt overnight...



...then I seasoned them with white pepper and spices. One of the breasts has been sprinkled with black smoked sea salt for a hint of smokey flavor, while the other I seasoned with juniper for an Oregonian twist. Keith helped me tie them up in cheesecloth, where they're now hanging in the garage.



It's been fun so far to follow everyone else participating. Twitter has been bursting with off-color jokes about hanging breasts, husbands protecting our breasts, etc.; a few gung-ho kitchen goddesses are finished already and have been sharing delicious stories of snacks and dinners based on their duck breast prosciutto.

Mine still has a few more days to hang, but so far the temperatures and humidity have been just right for it in the garage. I'm surprised meat preservation isn't more popular, if it's always this easy. Salt and time do all the work! And when I'm done, I'll have two pounds of lucious home-cured prosciutto to use in a thousand different ways.

I just checked out prices for good duck prosciutto and found it going for four times the price of my duck breasts and salt. Somehow, frugality and a renewed contact with thoughtful, time-honored preservation methods make the thought of this prosciutto even more delicious.

I can't wait to try it.



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We Got Crabs.

That joke never gets old, does it?

I don't usually do shellfish as a general rule. I like it - well, some of it - but I've got this combination of Jewish obligation and Catholic guilt that makes me feel like I'm doing something perverted whenever I eat shrimp. So I steer clear and give in only when I know it's going to be worth it.

I knew it would be worth it at the farmers' market a few weeks ago. It was the week before Christmas, the last market of the season before they close up for three whole months, and the vendors were doing their best to unload whatever they had left. Keith and I had done our shopping and were trudging back to the car when we passed a couple of fishmongers who were advertising local Dungeness crabs for $3 a pound. We bought two huge fresh crabs for under $5.

When we got home, we were busy with a lot of Christmas preparations, so we stuck the crabs in the freezer. A couple days ago, Keith was itching to cook them up, so he did. I was way too intimidated to do it myself - but no longer. It was quite easy, just a little messy but worth it. Last night we were at the grocery store and Keith found a tub of Dungeness crab meat for $25; he figures it contained about the same amount of meat as we got from these two crabs. We only had to work a little for it - but then, that was fun too, sitting down at the table to crack the legs and dig out the meat while nibbling little bites of risotto.

I made the risotto while Keith cooked the crabs. It's a pretty simple one, but I added the minced peel and some juice from my salt-preserved Meyer lemons, and I also stirred in some fresh parsley and a three-year aged parmesan Keith picked up in southern Oregon. I didn't have any good chicken stock to work with, and I complained that the risotto was bland before I added the lemon and parsley... but once they were in, wow! What a difference. It went great with the crab.

So well, in fact, that the next morning I combined the leftover risotto, leftover crab meat, and an egg, and then I melted the leftover clarified butter and fried up little crab-risotto patties for breakfast.



Sometimes guilty pleasures can be the very best kind.

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Baby, It's Cold Outside!

Before I start laying out my plans for 2011, I have to share the last day of 2010. The morning of New Year's Eve found me selling pie again, as I whipped up some salted lavender caramel tarts for a friend who stopped by to pick them up for her family's New Year's dinner. It was a gorgeous day, if a frighteningly cold one - I don't think it got above freezing that day at all - and I wanted to get out, so Keith and I bundled our coats and scarves into the car and headed for Mt. Hood.



We didn't go all the way to the top of the mountain, since we had to chain up pretty early on. Three feet of fresh snow had recently fallen, and the sun was shining on a perfect New Year's Eve, so we parked as soon as we could to frolic in the thigh-deep snow.



I'm still Southern enough that snow REALLY excites me. I've traveled a lot and lived in a variety of places, but I've never lived in a snowy area, and even in Portland snow is a rarity. So the chance to get up to the mountain and see all the lovely firs in the glittering snow, well, that always makes for a pretty awesome day. We spent most of the afternoon snow tubing and had a fabulous time while getting in some exercise.



Once off the mountain, we made a spontaneous decision to drop by Lauro, our favorite special-occasion restaurant, for a fabulous dinner, and then we crossed the street to Pix Patisserie for dessert. We had a bottle of champagne someone had given us for Xmas, and the plan was to take it to the top of Mt. Tabor to toast the New Year under the trees while overlooking the Portland skyline, but it was about 20° F with a sharp biting wind, so we went on home to a warm crackling fire instead.

So now I'm finally getting a chance to sit down and have my New Year's assessment of the year before and year to come - well, I'm still in the middle of it, but it took me a couple days into the year to find the time to start! This year is already off to a busy beginning, and it's loaded with new projects.

I'm figuring out my sewing machine, for one thing; I've made some curtains and tote bags, and am currently working on a more complex project that was supposed to be a Christmas present for a friend but may wind up being a "friendship present" in another week or two. (Oops.) Once I finish this one, I'm going to make myself a couple of girly aprons and then ease myself into clothing (my ultimate goal) with a simple wrap skirt or two. So far sewing is a lot like cooking; my early blundering attempts are kind of cute in their incompetence, and I can tell this will be easy once I get in a lot more practice.

In other news, just to see how crazy I can make myself with project-juggling, I decided to go ahead with an idea I entertained over the summer. Over at my newest blog, Dinner With the World, I'll be documenting my attempt to learn more about my global neighbors and the unique variations of global cuisine as I cook a meal from every country in the world in one year. This should be a pretty interesting read, since I'll be juggling unfamiliar ingredients, a nominal commitment to kosher restrictions, and an effort to stick to seasonal Oregonian produce.

Oh yeah, and I'll also be juggling a business startup. After cultivating a dream of entrepreneurship for most of my life, it's finally time to make it happen. I'm currently saving up for a unique twist on Portland's food cart phenomenon, and have already begun selling my butter-flaky pies to friends and coworkers. By spring, I hope to be out there in the world, slinging pie to the masses. Learn more over at PortlandPiecycle.com (website operable, but still under construction).

Meanwhile, I'll be participating in Charcutepalooza 2011, a multiblog project wherein we'll all revive the lost arts of meat preservation. It's a logical next step after slaughtering chickens last year (and we're actually raising meat birds for real this summer!), and an especially hilarious development for this former PETA member and 12-year vegetarian. We're tackling one meat project per month, with the first up being duck proscuitto. I checked out Michael Ruhlman's book on Charcuterie from the library and can't wait to get started!

I'm also hoping to revamp this blog a bit, improve my photography and rework the design, but that's going to have to wait a few more weeks at least. It also looks as though I may be cowriting a cookbook later in the year - stay tuned for more on that project.

And of course, novels and screenplays await completion, along with the mountain of books I still need to read.

With a to-do list like this one, who needs resolutions?

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Boxing Day

I slept late today and, besides making a big breakfast for Keith and his dad, I've accomplished almost nothing. It's great.

Yesterday's Christmas Dinner was so fabulous I just have to share a picture of it:



That's pan-seared duck breast with red wine and cherry sauce, artichoke hearts au gratin (with gruyere cheese), kohlrabi-fennel salad with capers in a lemon-Dijon vinaigrette, rosemary roasted root vegetables, and steamed broccoli with garlic, butter, and olive oil.

And for dessert, a lightly orangey cranberry pie, served with homemade egg nog ice cream:



Keith and I made dinner together and had a great time, while his dad and a couple of our friends hung out in the kitchen chatting. We played music and had an enjoyable day that culminated in a delicious feast, then ended on movies and a nice hard sleep. Really, isn't that what Christmas is all about?

I'll be back to posting soon, especially as I tackle sewing and some other new projects in the coming year. But first, I'm going to digest all this food and spend today at the arcade goofing off. I've earned it!

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Breakfast of Champions

Keith and I have both been GO-GO-GO for the last week, since we put off our holiday prep until the last minute, and now we're playing catch-up. One thing we have noticed is a tendency to get pretty tired if we don't eat balanced meals. This sounds like a no-brainer, but when you're baking and sampling and tasting stuff all day, you forget to eat real food and it all wreaks havoc on your blood sugar. So we've been trying to start each day off right with a balanced breakfast.

This breakfast is another of my favorites; I have it a lot when I'm home alone, though Keith likes it too. It feels like a fully-balanced meal, which it is, but it's simple to make and fits soothingly into a single bowl. It goes very nicely with coffee, and keeps me happy until lunchtime so I don't get any snack attacks. I call it the Breakfast of Champions because it really does make me feel all energized and healthy, and then I go on to a productive morning whenever I have it!

I'm not entirely sure, but I think I was inspired to come up with this recipe once when I was craving the cheese grits of my homeland; polenta, the yellow-corn version of hominy grits, is easier to come by in these parts, and it makes this recipe taste so gloriously Italian. If you don't see polenta or grits (NOT INSTANT! NEVER INSTANT!) in the store, then the coarsest cornmeal you can find will do.

And don't be put off by the directions - it looks like a lot of steps, but it comes together in the time it takes your partner to have a leisurely shower.

BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS
Serves 2

2 cups water or broth
½ cup polenta/grits/coarse-ground cornmeal
¼ cup crumbled bleu cheese or parmesan
½ Tbsp butter
¼ tsp salt
1 Tbsp olive oil
1 ½ cups chopped kale or spinach
1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 Tbsp water
¼ cup spaghetti/pizza sauce
2 eggs
¼ cup pine nuts

Pour 2 cups water or broth into a medium-size pot and bring to a gentle boil. Once it simmers, whisk the polenta in with a fork. Cover, turn the heat down to low, and simmer for 5-10 minutes, stirring once or twice as it cooks. If it finishes before you're done with the rest of it all,

Meanwhile, heat 1 Tbsp olive oil in a skillet, and add the kale or spinach. Saute 1-2 minutes, then add the balsamic vinegar and 2 Tbsp water. Continue to cook until the greens are bright and wilted (this will just be a few seconds for spinach, but it'll be another minute or two for kale). Add the spaghetti sauce and continue to cook until heated through.

Transfer the kale mixture to a plate and rinse out the skillet, or get another skillet. Cook the eggs however you like them - I like mine scrambled, Keith likes his fried, and sometime I want to try this with a poached egg because I think that sauce effect would be nice in this dish. Set aside.

Stir the cheese, butter, and salt into the polenta until melted throughout. Divide evenly into bowls, then top each serving with an egg and half the kale-sauce mixture. Sprinkle with pine nuts and serve immediately with hot coffee or tea.

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It's Thyme for Gorgonzola Latkes!

It's starting to feel, not just like December, but like the holiday season. It's the doing nice things for people and getting them back in return, accompanied by good food and wintry weather. Like today, for example.

Last night was the last night of Chanukah, so I had a couple of friends over for latkes. I had sweet potato latkes spiced with cumin, served with homemade applesauce and sour cream, with a spinach-tangerine salad on the side. We sipped amazing pear martinis and enjoyed warm, fresh-baked cranberry-apple pie with a ginger hazelnut crumble topping - a la mode, of course!

It was a lovely evening, and I baked an extra pie for the guy at the coffee shop, who's been a huge help as I sit there for hours every other day working on my business plan for my startup. This morning, I got an idea for gorgonzola latkes with fresh thyme, and I remembered him saying how much he liked latkes, so I whipped up a batch of the new recipe and plated them up with applesauce and sour cream. Miraculously, the latkes remained reasonably crisp and the pie held up as I walked the whole spread up to the coffee shop, where I was greeted with an enthusiastically appreciative reception and an enormous peppermint mocha.

Of course I ate a few of the gorgonzola-thyme latkes myself, and they're MIGHTY tasty. They might be my favorite latke recipe from now on. Try it yourself and see what you think - it doesn't have to be Chanukah for you to enjoy the miracle of oil!

THYME FOR GORGONZOLA LATKES
Serves 4

3 medium-sized Russet potatoes
½ a small onion
½ cup crumbled gorgonzola cheese
1 egg
1 sprig fresh thyme
3 Tbsp flour or matzo meal
1 tsp salt
1 tsp garlic powder (optional)
½ tsp paprika
½ tsp baking soda
Dash of black pepper
Peanut oil (or veg or canola) for frying

Peel the potatoes, dropping each one into a bowl of water as you finish peeling it to keep it from discoloring. Pat the potatoes dry and grate them with the coarse side of a box grater, or run them through the food processor - you want them very coarsely grated, not minced. Working quickly, pile the grated potatoes into a colander lined with a towel, and squeeze repeatedly until you get as much moisture out of the potatoes as you possibly can.

Transfer the dry grated potatoes to a large bowl, and grate in the onion. Stir in the gorgonzola, egg, and thyme leaves.

In a separate bowl, combine the matzo meal (which is MUCH better for this than flour), salt, garlic powder, paprika, baking soda, and pepper. Whisk so it's evenly blended, then add it to the potato mixture and mix well. Set aside so the matzo meal can soak up the remaining liquid while you heat the fry oil; turn the oven on to about 250 F.

Pour the oil into a heavy skillet, so the bottom is covered by a quarter-inch or so. Heat over high heat until a small piece of potato sizzles vigorously when you drop it in. Scoop up the latke mix between a spoon and your palm, about two tablespoons' worth, and roll it into a rough ball shape so it holds together; drop that into the oil and flatten it with the back of your spoon. (Make sure the middle is quite flat so the inside cooks through.) Fry for a few minutes until the sides start to look golden-brown, then flip to cook the other side, and drain on a plate lined with paper towels. Depending on the size of your skillet, you should be able to do 2-3 latkes at a time.

As you work, pop the drained latkes into a dish in the oven so they stay warm and crisp until you're ready to serve with sour cream and applesauce. A fruity saiad with a vinaigrette complements the latkes very nicely!

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Quiche: Delicious and Nutritious, and Dairy-Free!

Here's me on the last day of the Naturally Frugal Challenge, squeaking in my big entry at the last minute. But I have a decent excuse, besides the business and travel I've been up to this month! See, the idea of the contest is to come up with an all-natural, in-season entree (no problem there) without using dairy (eeeeep!).

I knew my entry would have to be a pie of some kind. So of course I set myself the ultimate challenge - can I make quiche without milk, including soymilk or almond milk, which might count as processed foods?

My first attempt, while edible and not too bad, was not a winning contest entry. Simply leaving the milk out of the quiche doesn't work, since the milk is what fluffs up the eggs and produces that light, melt-in-your-mouth texture. What did work, on my last attempt, was separating the eggs and beating the whites separately. Air is even lighter than milk, and it will fluff your quiche beautifully with only one extra step!

Also in the first attempt, I tried to make the quiche gluten-free and wholegrain by making a crust out of brown rice and eggs. It was decent, and I could've made it work, but it made the whole dish a bit heavy on the egg front, and to be honest I like a nice pie crust under my quiche. I do make an excellent gluten-free pie crust (the recipe is at my other blog), which has butter, but this time I used my regular whole wheat crust and tried it with coconut oil. It worked beautifully. You use whichever homemade, whole wheat or gluten-free pie crust you like for this one.

The result of all this experimentation was the Ultimate Autumn Quiche. A variety of seasonal ingredients play off each other so that each bite is a unique experience; sometimes it's fruity, sometimes it's warm and toasty, sometimes it's complex and spicy. The ingredients may look sweet, and it does have a pumpkin pie texture to it, but the eggs, spices, nuts, and arugula just perfectly balance the cranberry and apple. I will definitely make this for company at the first opportunity!

THE ULTIMATE AUTUMN QUICHE

1 frozen homemade pie shell
1 cup pumpkin puree
3 eggs, separated
¼ cup natural or homemade applesauce, unsweetened
2 Tbsp nutritional yeast (optional)
1 Tbsp maple syrup
1 tsp Dijon mustard
½ tsp salt
½ tsp ginger
¼ tsp nutmeg
⅛ tsp paprika
1 cup arugula, chopped
½ cup dried cranberries
¼ coarsely-chopped hazelnuts or pecans
1 Tbsp finely-chopped hazelnuts or pecans

Preheat the oven to 400 F. Leave the pie shell in the freezer for now.

Combine the pumpkin, egg yolks, and applesauce in a large mixing bowl and whisk thoroughly to blend. Add the nutritional yeast - you don't have to use it if you can't find it, but it does add a nice cheesy dimension - as well as the maple syrup, mustard, and spices. Whisk again until it's all evenly blended.

One at a time, stir in the arugula, dried cranberries, and coarsely-chopped nuts. Set aside.

In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form. Gently fold into the pumpkin mixture. Retrieve the pie shell from the freezer and carefully pour in the filling; sprinkle the finely-chopped nuts over the top.

Bake at 400 F for 10 minutes, then turn the oven down to 350 F and continue baking another 25-30 minutes, or until a knife inserted into the center comes out clean. Let cool for at least 15 minutes before serving.

Suggestion: If you have to have meat in your entree, this is an excellent use for leftover Thanksgiving turkey. Just add ½ cup diced turkey when you add the arugula, cranberries, and nuts!

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Spiced Pumpkin Oatmeal

This is not just a breakfast post; it's also an attempt to win a gorgeous set of holiday bakeware as part of the Naturally Frugal Challenge blog event!

After all the indulgence of Thanksgiving weekend, it was time for a healthy and nutritious breakfast. But it was also a lazy Sunday morning. We wanted something rich and delicious, and we didn't mind waiting half an hour for it. Enter steelcut oats.

But not just any oatmeal - this is fall, after all, when the fireplace crackles all morning and we watch the rain beating down the last of our garden. So it had to be a pumpkin oatmeal, warm and spicy with a nutritional boost from one of nature's healthiest veggies. Top it with some toasted nuts and dried fruit, and you have a decadent breakfast (or, what the hey, dinner!) that's actually good for you.

SPICED PUMPKIN OATMEAL
serves 4

4 cups water
2 Tbsp coconut oil (or butter)
1 cup steelcut oats
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp cloves
1/2 cup pumpkin puree
1/3 cup almond milk (or any milk)
Maple syrup to taste
Toppings of your choice (see note)

Heat the water in a kettle or pot until it boils.

Meanwhile, melt the coconut oil in a separate pot over medium heat, and stir in the oats. Toast the oats for a minute or so, then add the spices and continue to toast until it all smells warm and fragrant. Pour in 4 cups boiling water. Stir, cover, and turn the heat down to medium-low. Let it simmer 15 minutes.

Take the lid off and mix in the pumpkin until evenly blended in with the oats. Add the almond milk and continue cooking, uncovered, for another 5-10 minutes or until the oats are creamy and rich and excess liquid has cooked out. Serve it up in individual bowls and top with maple syrup, plus the toppings of your choice.

Topping Ideas: Dried cranberries, currants, or raisins; toasted nuts of any kind; all-natural or homemade applesauce; apple butter or pumpkin butter; a spoonful of jam; toasted coconut; fresh chopped apples or other fruit; candied ginger... use your imagination. And if you have a great topping idea, please share it in the comments!

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Just in Time for Thanksgiving: Boozy Sweet Potatoes!

Stay tuned, y'all, apparently I'm in a generous mood because I'm sharing all my greatest hits this week.

My boozy sweet potatoes are probably my most popular recipe. I've been making them for every Thanksgiving, and almost every Christmas, for about ten years now and I've never had any leftovers the next day.

Don't worry about the name; the alcohol cooks out, but it leaves a strong flavor behind. What that flavor is, is up to you. I nearly always use rum, and occasionally spiced rum, but every once in awhile I substitute brandy instead and it's still good. I think I prefer the rum flavor, personally - it's stronger - but if you have brandy on hand, use it, because it's delicious.

BOOZY SWEET POTATOES

2 to 3 lbs sweet potatoes
½ cup maple syrup, brown sugar, or honey
2 eggs
⅓ cup milk
1 Tbsp vanilla
½ cup melted butter
⅓ cup dark rum or brandy
1 cup brown sugar
½ cup flour
⅓ cup melted butter
½ cup finely chopped nuts (optional)

Peel and chop sweet potatoes, and place into a large pot. Cover with water, bring to a boil, and simmer until sweet potatoes are soft enough to cut in half with a fork. Drain the sweet potatoes and transfer to a large mixing bowl.

Preheat the oven to 350 F.

Use an electric mixer or a potato masher to thoroughly mash the sweet potatoes until they're smooth. One at a time, mix in the maple syrup, eggs, milk, vanilla, ½ cup melted butter, and rum/brandy. Once thoroughly mixed, pour into a casserole dish (*see note).

In a separate bowl, mix brown sugar, flour, melted butter, and nuts if using. Using your fingers to break it up, sprinkle this mixture in small chunks over the top of the sweet potato mixture, covering the surface as much as possible. Bake for 30-45 minutes or until the streusel topping has browned into a soft crust. Let cool for at least half an hour before serving; it'll be best if you give it a few hours to come to room temperature.

Bring this one to a potluck - it travels really well!

*Note: You can use any size casserole dish here and it'll be fine. If you use a 9x13 or similarly large one, double the streusel topping. If you use a smaller one, the potatoes will be a little deeper and hence cook a bit longer, which is fine. It's really hard to screw this one up.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!

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Outta' Town Banana Muffins

(Apologies for the pic - I had coffee on the brain at 5:30 a.m.)

'Tis the season for holiday travel! We got a jump on the season yesterday, when Keith got a quick job in L.A. and I decided to join him just to get out of town for a couple of days. So yesterday we hit the road about 5:45 a.m. and hauled our exhausted selves into Redondo Beach just after 11 p.m. Of course there was a nasty weather system which drifted south along with us, so we spent most of the day wrestling rain, snow, and high winds, and just for good measure another storm blew into Redondo in the wee hours of the morning, waking us up with a chilly bath from the window.

But it's sunny now, and we're well-rested, and we're also well-nourished. We do this road trip thing fairly regularly, and I'm a seasoned road tripper in my own right, having crossed two continents all by my lonesome on several occasions. So I've learned a lot about travel, especially the fact that there is precious little to eat out there by the highway.

Oh sure, there's a fast food joint at every exit, and the gas stations are loaded with candy and chips. But c'mon, when you're spending an entire day with one eye on that swerving semi and the other on that cop in the rearview, you need FOOD. Something that's not going to drop you into a bloated coma ten minutes after you eat it; something that's not going to gas your travel companions out of the car. And even if you're flying (though I can't imagine why you would nowadays), you still need inexpensive fortification to get you through the journey in good health and cheer.

So pack a bag. Yesterday on our trip, I brought some cashews, cheese, sliced carrots and kohlrabi, two refillable water bottles, and a batch of these rich, moist banana muffins. I think I can safely say I'll be bringing these muffins on every trip from now on. They're the perfect road snack - easy to eat one-handed, a little sweet but not sugary, with whole grains to keep you full longer than a sugared white-flour muffin would, a dose of protein from nuts and eggs, and a rich soft texture that makes them feel like a treat. They travel well and don't dry out (actually, they get more moist as they sit).

Bring them on your next road trip, flight, train trip, or walk around the neighborhood. Don't forget the coffee.

OUTTA' TOWN BANANA MUFFINS

2 large bananas, very ripe (soft spots okay!)
1/2 cup pure maple syrup or honey
1/4 cup applesauce
2 eggs
1 Tbsp vanilla
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup rolled oats
1/4 cup flax meal
1/4 cup ground nuts or nut flour* (see note)
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup dried cranberries, blueberries, strawberries, or raisins

* Note: You can buy almond flour, hazelnut flour, etc. But it's a lot cheaper to just get whatever nuts you like (pecans are cheap) and grind them yourself; they don't have to be as finely ground as a flour, a coarser grind is just fine. Just toss them into the blender or food processor for a minute.

Preheat the oven to 350 F and line a 12-cup muffin tin with paper liners.

Break up the bananas and toss them in the food processor or blender. Add the maple syrup (or honey), applesauce, eggs, and vanilla; whiz it all up until smooth (a few banana chunks are fine).

In a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients except for the fruit, and whisk together with a fork until evenly blended. Pour in the wet mixture and stir gently, just until blended - don't overmix. Fold in the dried fruit and spoon into the muffin cups, filling to the top. Bake for 25 minutes or until done. Leave them in the pan to cool on a wire rack, then wrap individually or just throw them all into one gallon-size bag like I did.

These last for a few days outside the fridge, and can also be frozen for later.

Safe travels!

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Incredible Autumn Risotto

When I'm feeling contemplative or morose, or when I just need some "me-time," I make risotto. There's something about that peaceful stirring and watching, ladling and absorbing, that makes the kitchen experience very zen for me. Risotto has an undeserved reputation for being difficult and time-consuming. It isn't! It does require your rapt attention, but only for 30-40 minutes, and that time can be a peaceful respite from whatever's going on.

And at the end, you have the ultimate comfort food.

This one I made last night was particularly incredible, loaded with apples, chanterelle mushrooms, turkey bacon, and gorgonzola cheese. The different flavors played off each other so well, and gave the dish a variety of textures to offset the lovely creaminess we all love in a risotto.

I failed to get a picture because Keith and I devoured it as soon as it was ready. Oh well, risotto isn't all that photogenic anyway. But it sure is delicious! I offer this recipe now in case anyone else needs a few minutes of kitchen P&Q and a warm autumn comfort dish.

INCREDIBLE AUTUMN RISOTTO
(serves 2-4, depending on your side dishes)

2 strips turkey bacon (or pork, if that's your thing)
4 cups good-quality chicken or vegetable broth
3 Tbsp butter, divided
1/4 cup minced onion
1/4 cup finely-sliced mushrooms* (about 1.5-2 oz, see note)
1 cup apple, peeled and finely diced
1 cup arborio rice
1/3 cup white wine
Scant 1/4 cup gorgonzola or bleu cheese
1/4 tsp nutmeg
Salt to taste

*Note: Use the best mushrooms you can get. I got a good deal on chanterelles, which are normally pretty expensive but you only need a couple ounces so you can splurge. If you can't get a few chanterelles, then go for shiitakes or baby bellas, just don't use the cheap white ones - and for the love of G-d, don't use canned! Good mushrooms will really make a difference here.

Fry the bacon in a deep, heavy dry skillet until mostly cooked on both sides. While it's frying, add broth to a medium-sized saucepan and bring it to a low boil. Once it's boiling, cover it and lower the heat so it stays at a nice low simmer.

When the bacon is done, drain it and wipe out the skillet if necessary (it won't be necessary with turkey, it will be with pork). Chop the bacon into little pieces and set aside.

Turn the heat under the skillet to medium-low and melt 2 Tbsp butter in it; add the onion and saute until the onion begins to soften. Add the bacon and mushrooms, and continue to saute for another minute or two, until the mushrooms soften a little; add the apple and the rice, and saute another minute or two. Pour in the wine and stir until the wine is mostly absorbed.

Now we get into that peaceful risotto action. Ladle in about a half-cup of the simmering broth (I use a soup ladle), then stir slowly until the rice absorbs it. Ladle in another half-cup of broth, and stir until it's absorbed. Continue in this fashion until you're out of broth; this will take about half an hour. Pour yourself a glass of the white wine you just used and sip it while you stand and stir. Play a little music. Think about life. Enjoy your peace.

When you're out of broth, the rice should be cooked through and your risotto should look nice and creamy. If you still need to cook a little more, use water or more white wine (a half-cup at a time, just like the broth) until the rice is done.

When it's ready, add the remaining tablespoon of butter, the grated or crumbled cheese, a little salt, and the nutmeg. Stir until it's all melted and blended together, then serve immediately. You'll probably want a light salad or a little something green to go on the side, so hopefully you already made it, or had someone else make it.

Enjoy your bliss, preferably with some fuzzy socks and a crackling fire.

Strawberry Harvest, Round 2

Strawberries are pretty much done this season, I know. But if you haven't already, it's not too late to harvest the leaves!

You can start picking strawberry leaves in the spring and throughout the summer; the younger, tender leaves have the best flavor. But if you're like me and you forgot or didn't know, you can still get a harvest in before the frost kills off the plants. Just take some scissors out to the garden and clip off just the leaves. Make sure to leave some behind so the plant can sustain itself - don't pick it bare! - and don't take the leaves with mold or spots on them. Of course it goes without saying that you should not be harvesting leaves that've been sprayed with pesticides, chemical fertilizers, or other poisons.

Once you've got a bowlful, bring 'em inside. Run a few inches of cool water in the sink, and rinse the leaves carefully, using your fingers to go over each one and remove all the dirt, grit, little bugs, etc. Once they're all clean, you can use them right away or dry them for winter. To dry them, either spread them out in your dehydrator or spread them in a dark, dry place with plenty of circulation. Once dried, store them in a Ziploc baggie in the pantry or somewhere dark. Make sure they are fully dried. Fresh is okay and fully dried is okay, but when only partially dried, the leaves are toxic!

To use the strawberry leaves, make a tea. You can put a tablespoon of the dried leaves (or a bunch of fresh leaves) into a cup and top it off with boiling water, letting it steep for 15-20 minutes. Or, for maximum health benefits, put one tablespoon dried leaves per cup of boiling water in a jar, and let it steep overnight. You can drink this cold the next day, or reheat it if you like. A bit of raw honey boosts the health value and also makes it a little sweeter.

So why do you want to do this? Well, strawberry leaf tea is pretty tasty. But it's also packed to the gills with vitamins and minerals, including vitamin C, iron, and calcium - making it an ideal tonic for just about everyone, especially pregnant women and nursing mamas (for the latter, it's also said to boost milk production). It soothes the digestive system and works as an excellent natural remedy for indigestion and diarrhea, and some use it as a mild remedy for arthritis and eczema.

Flu season is right around the corner, which means that anything packed with vitamin C is a good idea to boost your immune system. Once it freezes here, I'll be harvesting rosehips and drying citrus peels too, for even more powerful C-food.

Isn't it cool how nature gives you what you need, right when you need it?

Autumn Approaching...

Yeahhh, it's autumn. It was a chilly and rainy night, so Keith stopped off and restocked us on pellets, and now there's a nice warm fire to doze in front of. Roxy's breaking it in already.

It feels like summer just started. Sigh... usually I welcome autumn with open arms as my favorite season, but dangit, I haven't even canned tomatoes yet. My tomato vines are covered with green fruit and yellow flowers; I still have squash flowering and I JUST harvested the first of my pattypan squash! We really got gypped on summer this year. Oh well. Next year should be better.

This winter is supposed to be cold and snowy. I hope so. We missed that last year too - the east coast was freezing under several feet of snow while I was outside in a hoodie and flip-flops. Crazy wacky climate antics!

It's almost Yom Kippur, so to all my fellow Jews, G'mar Tova Chatimah - may we be sealed for a good year.

Midnight Meeting

I keep thinking of things to blog about, and then I get busy. I have a lot of irons in the fire these days, but I need to get better about blogging more than once a week. Because I have a lot to share here and I hate when I forget and miss it. Like last night, for instance.

Last night I had occasion to be walking home from the bus stop just after midnight. Our neighborhood is well-lit and very quiet, and I was strolling along under the streetlights, bouncing my backpack, enjoying the soft silence around my steps crunching in the gravel. And then a dark shape streaked across the street, from one driveway into another.

"That wasn't a cat," I thought. I watched the place where the shape had gone, and guessed I knew what it was.

As I got closer, I saw that I was right. The opossum had climbed to the top of a low chain-link fence, and he was watching me approach. It felt like no one else around was awake, just him and me, and I felt drawn to him for a better look. I've never seen a live opossum up close. The driveway sloped down slightly, so that when I got to him, he was just above my eye level, his head turned back the way I had come.

I could've touched him - I didn't, of course, but I could have. I could see the fingerprint pattern in his thick rat-tail, the coarseness of his wiry fur, white and mussed. Then, slowly, he turned his head and looked at me. A drop fell from his nose as he fixed his eyes on mine. His face denied fear; he was not afraid of me. He just watched and waited to see what I would do.

For another long moment, I stood there in a stranger's driveway, one of my neighbors and yet a person I don't know, while this opossum and I shared a mutual acknowledgement. He looked old, but tough; he was a survivor. Before this moment, I'd only known opossums as dirty roadkill, but this guy was alive in a way that most of the animals I've encountered are not. He was wild, and he knew where he was going and what he'd do when he got there, and he was simply waiting for me to leave him to it.

So I did. With a respectful nod, I went on toward home. He watched me go, but when I was a few houses away, I looked back and he was gone.

Labor Day

Whew, it's been a canning week! And freezing, too. I've put up enough rhubarb for three or four pies, I've pickled peaches, I've pickled beets, I put up ginger-beet relish, I made mozzarella cheese, I made bread, I made biscuits, I blanched and froze 20 ears of corn (some on the cob, some cut off), and I pickled 20 pounds of cucumbers. I now have ten quart jars and sixteen pint jars full of pickles - half kosher dills, and half bread-and-butter. They're cheerfully pickling away on my kitchen table at the moment.

Yesterday was interesting; Keith and I took a break from canning to help a friend of a friend cull her chicken flock. She had several old biddies who weren't laying eggs anymore, and there were more chickens than her coop could handle, so some of them had to go. This was the first time any of us had seen inside an older hen, and let me tell you, it's NOTHING like the inside of a little one! It was an egg machine in there! Dozens and dozens of yolks in varying sizes, a big veiny egg sac, just some very complex works.

I always kind of thought the egg was a byproduct and they just made one at a time, but I have a whole new respect for my laying hens now. The female chicken is built to make eggs, and lots of them. I'll always remember seeing all those yolks, some full sized and some smaller than a dime.

Today I'm giving the house a much-needed scrubbing and then making some pizza dough and biscuits for the freezer. Maybe a pie crust or two, as well. I also need to stew the aforementioned hen. She's too old to roast (her meat will be all chewy), but she'll be full of flavor and make an excellent stock when simmered for six hours or so with some veggie scraps. I like to reduce my chicken stock until it's thick and strong, then put it into ice cube trays and freeze it. I load the chicken stock ice cubes into a big freezer bag and throw one or two of them into almost anything - pasta water, risotto, gravy, whatever. It's a handy way to keep it.

So happy Labor Day to all who labor. I'm right there with you today!

Happy Times

Apropos of nothing: Here's a baby zucchini in my garden.

Apparently, I post on Sundays now. I keep meaning to post more often but man, I am SLAMMED! With work, and writing, and cooking, and of course, canning.

I'm up early today to put up some salsa verde before I go to work, and then we're heading to Sauvie Island for a 10 lb bag of pickling cucumbers to go with my 10 lb bag of beets. Half the beets are going to be pickled, and half will become beet relish. I also want to pickle some carrots, after nibbling some spicy pickled carrots yesterday...

Ahh, yesterday. Nearly a perfect day! We started out at the farmers' market for a nice long breakfast and some lingering shopping. I treated myself to a cup of lucious French press coffee, and a transcendent caprese salad - juicy, candy-sweet cherry tomatoes, halved and mixed with fresh mozzarella, fresh basil, and torn chunks of a gloriously salty crusted baguette, all tossed with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Unholy.

After we loaded up on fresh produce - OH MY G-D, the tomatoes are FINALLY in at a reasonable price! - we took a little walk downtown and browsed through Powell's Books, the world's largest independent bookstore, and then I went to work. Decent day there, and when Keith picked me up, we headed up to Mt. Tabor (Portland's volcano) for a brief hike; we left Mt. Tabor for The Moon & Sixpence, our favorite British pub, for dinner over the newspaper and the crossword. And then we saw the new Todd Solondz movie, Life During Wartime, which I've eagerly anticipated for over a year. All told, a fabulous day.

Does mean I have to catch up on the canning though, and I've also got some extra cream I skimmed off our raw milk, so tonight I'll be whipping up some butter. Now's when I miss having a food processor - it's so easier to make butter with one - but I'll get by.

Gotta love a weekend that is this pleasant AND enjoyable.

Yes, I Can! (A Lot.)

I have a hunch that very soon, I'm going to have enough grapes to share a few.

We need to get some carboys and get ready to make some white wine, I think!

I've been canning like it's 1899 these days. More corn salsa, some more peach salsa coming up... I've also put up blackberry jam, ginger-blackberry chutney (which is really too thin and runny to be called a chutney, but it'll taste good poured over baked brie at the dinner gathering I'm having tonight), some cherries in wine, and more.

We've been picking blackberries almost every day, since they're growing wild and abundantly all over the neighborhood; on Wednesday we went up to Sauvie Island to pick blackberries and lie on the beach for awhile. It was a nice break from work and cooking, but the canning work continues. Every time I get caught up, we go to the farmers' market or find a blackberry bush, and I'm off again.

I'm hoping to get started on pickles and tomatoes this week. I recently learned that the FDA, in their infinite... uh, wisdom, requires all tomatoes and tomato sauces to be canned with BPA in the can lining. Even the organic ones. As a woman who's hoping for pregnancy, I'd rather steer clear of BPA when I can, so that means I need to put up tons of tomatoes now because I use the heck out of canned tomatoes in the winter! Thank you, FDA, for giving me still more busywork. You never fail to impress me with the deepest depths of your competence.

And the pickles. Ahh, pickles. I'm currently looking at a 10 lb bag of beets we got for $9 on Sauvie Island, which is destined to become beet pickles and beet relish. And the pickling cucumbers are coming in, so I'll be putting up some dills as well as bread and butter pickles, which Keith has requested since we sampled some awesome bread and butter pickles at the farmers' market.

I had wondered just a month or two ago if canning season would come at all. Hilarious.

Peach Summer

This is the summer of peaches.

Last summer was all about cherries, due to the snowstorm we had the winter before. We dehydrated cherries, we ate them fresh, we canned them and froze them. We stayed up into the morning on nights too hot to sleep, pitting and slicing cherries until our hands dripped with a Shakespearean stain. And by winter, when they were gone, we wished we'd put away more cherries.

There wasn't a bumper crop of cherries this spring, although we've had our share of fresh ones, so juicy from our excess rain that they burst bloody in our mouths. I preserved some in spiced brandy - they'll be ready around Thanksgiving or Christmas - and I got some more today that I'll preserve in red wine with orange and cloves. But this summer, we're mostly about the peaches.

It started a couple of weeks ago when I won a free flat of them in a contest: "Tell us a little-known peach fact, and the best one wins a flat!" My peach fact, which I learned from The Little House Cookbook, is indeed an interesting one - back in nineteenth-century America, before tropical vanilla became widespread, peach leaves were often used as the standard flavoring for custards, pies, and other desserts.

That tidbit launched a love affair with Baird Family Orchards peaches. We blew through that first flat in two days and are halfway through our second one; as we picked up our box of peaches from the Baird stand at the farmers' market yesterday, Keith mused, "I think I found my brand." Yeah, I grew up in the South, but I can't recall ever having such juicy, succulent peaches in my entire life. You could get high just sniffing them like glue.

Keith took a bite yesterday, moaned, and sighed, "This is the kind of fruit that launches wars."

So sure, we've eaten them fresh, drenching our shirts, slurping from our fingers as our elbows grow sticky. But I'm saving some too. I combined them with some of the hot peppers from my dad's garden, several different kinds, with a bit of lime, garlic, and cumin, in a sweet-firey peach salsa that I wanted to call "Atlanta Is Burning."

Others went into a frozen pie filling with marionberries, tapioca, and a bit of cinnamon and cardamom; that'll be delicious later in winter. Later I'll be preserving some in brandy for our waffle brunches, and I'm sure I'll think of more ways to keep them, because these peaches inspire hoarding.

Soon, when it's thirty-four degrees outside in the drizzling rain, dark at 4 pm, perhaps one day I'll open a jar, or bake up a pie. And then we'll remember the summer we spent dripping peach juice and sweat. Already it's a warm baking memory.

Chicken Processing (Warning: Bloody)

Don't read this post or look at the pictures if you're squeamish!

On Sunday, we processed five of the seven chicks that were hatched in our garage back in April. One was too small to be worth killing, and the other was a Thank You gift to Dawn, the woman who brought her two kids into town to show us how to do this. (She preferred a live pullet to lay eggs, so that one also lived.) It only took us a couple of hours to completely process all five birds, but it most certainly made for an interesting day.

I was a bit anxious in the morning, worried about how it would go. We went to breakfast with some friends of ours, but first I whipped up a pie crust, and when we got home from breakfast I channeled my anxiety into a strawberry-rhubarb pie. It was just coming out of the oven when it was time to get our day started, so it cooled in the kitchen as we worked outside.



This is the killing cone, which we borrowed from the Urban Farm Store for free and hung on the fence. Underneath it are two gut buckets - one for the feathers and guts, and another to catch the feathers and heads during processing. We had planned to slit the birds' throats in two places, which is what Joel Salatin and some others recommend, but beheading turned out to be much easier. You can behead a chicken with a filet knife, or a paring knife! I had no idea!

We were joined not only by Dawn and her kids (who seemed to have a healthy respect for the process, but were not the least bit squeamish about it), but also by our friend Kelley, who has been primarily a pesco-vegetarian for many years and whose toddler daughter had never eaten meat before. Kelley also has egg-laying hens and has been debating whether to raise meat birds next summer, so this whole process was kind of a trial run for both of us to see if we could handle it. While we waited for Dawn to arrive, we sipped beer and wondered if we would pass out or scream.

Then it was time.

Dawn's teenage son processed the first bird, and then we did the rest, though Keith had to do all the killing of the other four (Kelley and I weren't quite ready for that yet). It was easier to get ready than I thought it would be; you simply hold up the chicken by its feet, and after a couple seconds of flapping around, the blood goes to its head and it loses consciousness. Then you slide it headfirst into the cone, so that it's neatly contained and the neck is easily accessible.



Then, you take your filet knife (or paring knife) and in one quick stroke - THWACK.



Now you leave the chicken there for a couple of minutes to bleed out. This is pretty quick and a lot less gory than I anticipated. There is a surprisingly small amount of blood in a chicken (and thank goodness for that). When it's done, you take your headless chicken, as Kelley does here...



...and dip it in some hot water for a second or two. This makes plucking a lot easier. Despite the blood and guts, I think the plucking was my least favorite part - most of the big feathers just come off in handfuls, but then you have to pick off all the little pinfeathers, the fluffy ones around the legs, and the soft hairy ones on the roosters, and you have to do it without ripping the skin. Two of them, we tore the skin and decided to take Dawn's advice and just skin them. It's a lot easier but you don't get the delicious chicken skin that way. So most of them, we plucked.



Ready for butchering now? This is when you cut off the feet, neck, and oil gland, and trim the wings. Here's Keith and Kelley double-teaming this process, while I helpfully snap pictures.



Now it just looks like meat! This is when you eviscerate them, cutting around the vent and scooping the guts out. Most of the innards come out easily in one scoop with your hand, but you do have to dig around in there for the trachea and esophagus, and you have to use your nails to pry the lungs off the ribcage. Those lungs really stick! And they're so very tiny, just about the size of a man's thumbnail. Hard to believe they can crow and cackle as loudly as they do, with those teeny little lungs.

If I were true to my heritage and the spirit of this process, I'd have saved the livers and hearts to fry up or cook into stock. But this is me, and I don't like organ meats. So they went into the gut bucket with the rest of the guts.



Rinse out the bird, take a good look to make sure you got everything out...



...wrap the bird in a plastic bag, and you're done!

It all went really quickly. Neither of us passed out; we handled the whole thing really well, despite not being ready for the killing ourselves. Keith did the killing just fine. There was one unpleasant moment when he hit the bone of one chicken and took two or three loud squawking strokes to decapitate it, but generally we all performed quite well and didn't let the carnage get to us.



(I do have a picture of the inside of that bucket. I decided against posting it. I also have some video footage, which I also haven't posted, but if y'all express an interest in seeing it, then I'll upload it for you.)

When all five birds were processed, Kelley took hers and went home to her family. Keith got the deck cleaned up...



...while I got started on dinner. Remember the Cuckoo Maran rooster, in the foreground of Saturday's picture? He woke me up on Sunday morning crowing enthusiastically, and on Sunday evening I rubbed him all over with schmaltz, sprinkled him with salt, and stuffed his cavity with salted lemons, fresh herbs, and elephant garlic. I roasted him up, made a lucious gravy with the pan juices, and served him with hot potato salad and that amazing gravy.



Kelley made beer can chicken with hers that night, outside in her lovely yard.



The verdict? Obviously the chickens were tiny, as these aren't bred for modern meat production and they take more than a year to reach full-size. Next year, we may get meat birds that grow faster. Each bird made multiple meals for our two families, though, so we can't complain about size.

The meat itself was quite chewy; I later learned that it's better to refrigerate the birds for 24-48 hours after processing to relax the meat. (Rigor mortis makes for chewy muscle!) So the next ones I cook should be much better. Despite the chewy texture, the flavor was incredible. We've got a running joke in our culture about the taste of chicken, or rather the lack thereof, but this chicken had a distinct and delicious flavor that must be what caused our ancestors to domesticate this bird in the first place. Think of the best European chicken stock you've ever had, then solidify that flavor into meat. I really enjoyed it.

On Tuesday I took the leftover carcass from my roasted chicken, all the lemons and garlic that were in it, some veggie trimmings and fresh herbs, and the chicken necks from Processing Day, and I made stock. I now have quite a lot of really awesome stock that I can use for a long time to come. And I still have two more chickens in the freezer!

So I feel pretty good about Sunday's work. It was deeply spiritual in a very earthy way; this is what eating meat is supposed to be like. I wonder if a lot of our social disconnect with murder and violence is rooted in this detachment from the death we eat. Factory birds, drugged and diseased, dismembered by machines and wrapped in plastic at the supermarket... Yeah, I can now say I consider that to be far more barbaric than the natural way. I have finally looked my meat in the face and taken responsibility for it, and I found it to be a positive and uplifting experience.

And that strawberry-rhubarb pie I channeled all my earlier stress into? I am pleased to say it didn't taste like stress at all. Once dinner was done and the kitchen cleaned, that pie tasted a well-earned reward for a good day's work (or a couple of days, if you count the day that Kelley and I spent picking and freezing the strawberries last month).



(I just noticed how many of my happy blog posts end in pie!)