03.16.10
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Great Balls o’ Lamb

Greek-Style Braised Lamb Meatballs

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Brother Tom is in the food service industry so he gets all the trade publications. He sent me a bunch of meatball recipes from Restaurant and Institutions Magazine (what a melodious name!) and asked me to give this one a test drive as I had served goat meatballs when he last visited. Carol is a lamb lover, so this was very appropriate. I got the ground lamb from Marin Sun Farms at the Farmers Market. Lucky it’s almost spring; hothouse tomatoes and mint are available at the Market, as well.

Apropos of many restaurant recipes… this has lots of ingredients in small quantities. I guess a restaurant always has cooked rice, lamb broth, fresh mint and dill on hand. I had to break out the rice cooker and make a batch for the three tablespoons and buy a whole bunch of mint for two tablespoons. One tablespoon of dill? Fahgeddaboutit. I used one teaspoon dried dill. Lamb broth? Nope, I used demi-glace gold. Also — oops — I put all the olives in the balls instead of reserving some for garnish. No matter. The baking time seemed right… balls browned; gravy bubbly and thick. Yum.

The labor was worth it as the balls were very good and very rich. I served them in a bowl with the gravy, chopped tomato and garnish as noted. C thought I should serve over rice or noodles. Maybe, but they were good straight, accompanied by a fine, big salad and good bread.

All was not lost, as I mixed up the leftover rice, salad, and garnish to make a rice salad for lunch the next day.

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For this recipe – for all recipes as far as I’m concerned – it’s really important to get your mise en place together before starting. For the balls themselves, everything goes into one bowl and gets mixed up, but the sauce ingredients come into play one or two at a time. Here are breadcrumbs, herbs, spices in the big bowl. Lurking beneath them are the bread cubes and cream. Chopped olives and the famous three tablespoons of rice are in the smaller bowl.

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I’m starting to make the balls. Pinch off a batch of lamb mixture and roll between your palms. It helps to wet your hands from time to time between balls. Continue reading →

03.12.10
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Noodle Chicken Salad

Asian noodles and sauce meet local vegetables and chicken.

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I’ve made a number of noodle salads over the years – love ‘em – but I don’t have a clear favorite. For summer the cucumber orange version is good, but that’s for summer. It’s February and I have some leftover (LO) roast chicken just waiting to be made into a noodle salad. I thought I’d break down my noodle salad recipes and maybe invent a new way to go.

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THE NOODLES
What I have on hand right now is:
Eden Organic Udon whole grain – thin, flat noodles – from Big Apple, a mostly Asian grocery in Polk Gulch.w_nb_somen copy
Dynasty Maifun Rice Sticks – from Big Apple – these are good. Come 3 “pads” in a 6 ounce package. Figure one pad per person.
Somen Noodles: (Available at Whole Food) These thin white noodles, made of wheat, are related to udon noodles but are noticeably thinner — a delicate wisp of a noodle that still manages to retain a distinct texture and delicious taste. They are divided — within the cellophane packaging itself — into neat little bundles, each bound with a ribbon. I’ve used these in the soup-like dishes, Noodle Beef and Noodle Chicken.
And of course, if I’m in the mood, I can make some noodles in the Udon shape.

THE SAUCE
The Asian sauces use the following ingredients – not all at once:

rice vinegar (not seasoned)
cider vinegar
Chinese black vinegar
Asian fish sauce
vegetable oil
sesame oil
chile sesame oil
chile sauce, like sriracha
soy sauce
tamari sauce
oyster sauce
lime juice
fresh orange juice
sake
garlic, minced
grated fresh ginger
sugar
salt Continue reading →

02.11.10
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French Grind

Rustic French Meatloaf using a hand grinder

Why would anyone want to hand-grind their own meat for a meatloaf? A fair question. For one thing, I have a hand-crank meat grinder — Silex No Clamp Chopper ca. 1959. When Carol’s grandmother died, it went to Carol’s mom’s basement where it lived until Carol claimed it. That was sometime in the seventies, but we gave it little use until recently when I rediscovered ham loaf.

I am an avid maker of meatloaf, meatballs and ham loaf. It’s common to buy ground beef or pork, turkey or chicken, even veal from your butcher, and that works fine for meatballs and meatloaf or most other ground meat preparations. For ham, it is a different matter. Ground ham is not readily available, so you ask your butcher to grind your ham, or grind it yourself. I learned that the ham I grind myself has a more coarse texture than that ground by the butcher. I like that much better. Why not try the hand-grinder for a meatloaf called “rustic” made with pork and veal? Why indeed; I got some pork and veal stew meat and went to work.

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To demonstrate the swell meat grinder and some other handy kitchen tools, I selected a recipe from the April, 2009 Gourmet Magazine: Rustic French Meatloaf, using veal, pork, chicken livers and your usual meatloaf things. I alternated pieces of pork and veal… presto, instant mixing.

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Here’s the grinder broken down. Pretty simple… the auger pushes the meat through the holes in the extruder and the meat is cut by the propeller shaped blade. I love the weight and the hefty feel of this grinder, and it is extremely easy to clean. Continue reading →

02.01.10
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The Whole Donut

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Chris Costentino, the chef of Incanto, in a poll of local chefs and public figures, said his favorite way to eat bacon was the Maple Glazed Bacon Apple Donut from Dynamo Donuts. High praise indeed, since Incanto has a philosophy of featuring the whole pig and every part of the pig.

That was enough for me.

Sunday morning, I usually get up early and go someplace beautiful in the city to sit and write in my journal. So this Sunday, I headed for 24th street and Dynamo Donuts. Word had it that they open early and you better get there early to bring home the bacon. By 8:15 I was on 24th Street and finally found the inconspicuous storefront at 8:30. Closed; Sunday hours 9am to whatever. I wrote for a while in my journal and at nine found a place to park on Hawthorne, a nearby side street.

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When I got to Dynamo, there was already a 12 to 15-person line. No matter… it was nice and sunny and how long could it take, so I settled at the end of the line. A few minutes later, I felt a hand gripping my left shoulder and heard, “Uncle Marc!”

It was nephew Matt with Andrea, his intended (in June). How weird is that? Matt lives in the lower Haight, I live on Russian Hill and here we are on the wrong end of 24th Street early on Sunday morning. Matt and Andrea had been to Dynamo a few times, but not as a regular thing. We chatted about their upcoming wedding and Carol’s and my upcoming 50th anniversary and it was my time at the window.

I knew what I wanted, but took the time to read the description:

Maple Glazed Bacon Apple Donut
Studded with bacon and apples, sautéed bacon fat maple glaze and crispy bacon.

I ordered, paid my three bucks, bade goodbye and made my way home.

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Back home, we ate and savored the donuts. The donut itself is light but with substance… sort of a cross between a Krispy Kream and a cake donut. Yum. And of course the glaze has enough bacon and apple and fat and sugar to add a decadent wonderfulness. [Excuse the Sunday morning table littered with the Sunday paper and grocery list in progress.]

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I ate mine with a cored and peeled pear, a nice counterpoint to the rich glazed donut.

We’re not really donut people. Back in the days of our first living in SF, we discovered Bob’s Donuts on Polk Street down around Clay. For a while, it was a Sunday ritual for me to go to Bob’s early, pick out a selection of goodies – Glazed Old Fashioned, both regular and chocolate; Apple Fritters, Elephant Ears, Chocolate Eclairs, Cheese Danish and so on – to start off our Sunday. Starting the day with a sugar high was a good thing for a while, but then we found the Marin Farmers Market, a way better Sunday alternative. Later, a SF Farmers Market started in the middle of the Embarcadero in front of the Ferry Building on Saturdays and our weekend lives were changed… for better health.

Oh, I’ll go back to Dynamo for the Maple Glazed Bacon Apple Donut or perhaps one of their other delights, just not very soon or very often.

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01.27.10
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Country Rope Sausage

A few years ago, Carol’s folks gave us a gift pack of ham and sausages from Burgers’ Smokehouse. Good stuff. We’ve ordered from them a few times… always ham – oddly, it’s hard to find good country ham in San Francisco – and something we haven’t tried. This time it was Country Rope Sausage.

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The rope sausage comes in three flavors, mild, medium and hot… I chose the mild to start with and followed the package directions to cook.

“Preheat skillet to 300 degrees. Add 1/4 cup oil and 1 lb. Burgers Rope Sausage. Cover and brown for approximately 8 minutes. Turn and brown an additional 8 minutes. Reduce heat to 250 degrees. Add 1 cup water. Cover and cook for approximately 8 minutes. Turn and cook for an additional 8 minutes or until done. Use meat drippings for milk gravy or fried eggs.”

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I figured medium heat would be about 300 degrees for my cast iron skillet, and my oil of choice was olive oil since I would be using the drippings for a vegetable saute.

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For my vegetable saute, I peeled and sliced one green pepper, one onion and half a large bulb of fennel. I added thyme to the mix and when the vegetables were almost tender, added some white wine to finish.

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The sausage is a medium fine grind and turned out perfectly browned, moist and tasty. The vegetable saute was a superb accompaniment.

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Damn fine brunch, but I got to thinking I ought to be feeling a twinge of guilt.

That morning, I attended a talk by Michael Pollan on his book Food Rules. I’m a big fan and have read most of his other books. One of the basic tenants of his philosophy is knowing where your food comes from. Well, this sausage came from Burgers’ Smokehouse in California, Missouri. But where do they get their meat? Their web site is all about their smokehouse and marketing… no mention of where and how their pork is raised.

They do say,

“By 1956 Mr. Burger was producing around 5,000 hams annually so he curtailed his farming activities to devote more time to the ham business. An expansion program was outlined. On July 23, 1956, the company became the first country cured meat company in the United States to receive Federal Inspection.

The family-owned corporation now comprises more than 305,545 square feet and is still located on the original site. Interestingly enough, that first little 1952 building remains a part of the existing plant complex. At the present time, the company produces 750,000 hams, bacon, sausage and a dozen other specialty meats.”

With trepidation, I sent them an email and asked the question.

Subject: a question about your products
From: Marcus Rector
Date: January 25, 2010 10:43:42 AM PST
To: service@smokehouse.com

A few years ago, we were given a gift pack of ham and sausage from Burgers’ Smokehouse. Good stuff. We’ve ordered from you two or three times a year since then. Oddly, it’s hard to find good smoked ham in San Francisco.

I buy nearly all my meat at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market in San Francisco, so I know where it comes from and how it is raised. Where does the pork that you process in your smokehouse come from and how it is raised?

Sincerely,
Marcus Rector

From: service@smokehouse.com
Subject: Re: [Bulk] a question about your products
Date: January 25, 2010 1:38:57 PM PST
To: Marcus Rector

Our pork come from commercial producers in our state or from surrounding
states such as Iowa and Kansas.  All our meat products are USDA inspected
and first quality.
Thank you for the inquiry,
Edwena Shock
Customer Service for the Smokehouse

I have to reason that if their pork was free range, grass fed, heritage breed or any of that, they would say so. By buying from them I am indirectly supporting industrial feed lots. But their pork products are so good… they really know how to handle their spices and curing. Their ingredients are certainly straightforward: pork (including hams, loins and tenderloins), water, salt, seasoning (spices), sugar, monosodium glutamate.

So a nice brunch turns into a moral dilemma. I buy mostly local, and foods that are in season locally, but I’m not a fanatic. And is buying from Burgers’ Smokehouse any different than buying meat from Safeway?

Good sausages are certainly available at the Farmers Market, but not like these. And as I said, I haven’t found good country ham in San Francisco. So I will continue looking for that stuff at the market, continue to support the meat merchants at the market and rationalize my paltry one or two purchases a year from Burgers.

01.22.10
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Cauliflower Friday

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I got the email notice that the Mariquita “Truck Farm” was coming to town on Thursday.

“I’ll have orange cauliflower, fennel, butterball potatoes, and bay leaf wreaths: all by pre order only! Orange cauliflower? This is a variety that is a nice orange color, and it stays orange when cooked. We harvest it truly fresh, so it’s sweet when cooked. The leaves are great too! just like a kale. really. Cook them up!”

What a great opportunity to go on a cooking binge, but only ten pounds, not like the 40 pound tomato binges of the summer. I was glad to order, and the price was right, 10 pounds for $12.

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What to do with it? A couple soups, some kind of pickled, something on the stove as a vegetable and something with the leaves. I rounded up some cauliflower recipes and adapted some other recipes to use cauliflower.

Leek and Cauliflower Soup — I adapted this from a favorite potato leek soup recipe by Jacques Pepin.

Pickled Cauliflower, adapted from Market’s House Made Pickles from the Market Restaurant in St. Helena.

Roasted Cauliflower Soup — I had made this before with white cauliflower. It’s from Anne’s Food blog, Stockholm, Sweden. OK, another soup, but quite different, and it uses up a lot of cauliflower.

Sauteed Braised Cauliflower adapted from Sauteed Braised Broccoli Romanesco from The Victory Garden Cookbook by Marian Morash via Mariquita Farms newsletter.

And finally, Braised Cauliflower Leaves. — I just made this up as I went along, based on the many greens I had cooked over the years. Continue reading →

01.12.10
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Sausage Soup

with leek, potato, green chard

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Perusing the cooked sausage area at Whole Food, looking for something appealing, I spotted the Fra’Mani Classic Italian Sausage. I respect Paul Bertolli from his years as the chef at Oliveto in Oakland, his book, Cooking by Hand and the many Fra’Mani salumi I have sampled; but I didn’t much like this sausage. I first ate one steamed and fried, with mustard on a bun. It seemed chunky and tough prepared that way. The sausage is ground very coarse, so there are sizable chunks of meat and fat. Taste 10, texture 3, sez I, paraphrasing the song from A Chorus Line. I tried another sausage cubed and hashed with potatoes and celery. Same deal. Cubed in soup… same.

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Then I noticed a recipe on the back of the label – Leek, Potato, Green Chard and Fra’Mani Classic Italian Sausage Soup; a rather verbose, but descriptive title. For this, the sausage is sliced thin. I gave that a try. Excellent. Sliced thin, the chunks of meat are broken down and the chunks of fat melt into the soup. What an amazing transformation. I guess I’ll be back for more.

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Winter soups with leeks, potatoes and greens are not uncommon, and the addition of the tasty cured sausage is welcome. My addition of the goose stock; oh my… it’s like buttah, smooth and velvety.

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Fra’Mani Classic Italian Sausage Soup
from Chef Bertolli (on the back of label)
makes about 2 quarts

2 tablespoons xv olive oil
1 large leek, diced (2c)
1 1/2 pounds whole red potatoes, peeled
1 large bunch green chard, leaves and stems sliced into 1/2 inch pieces
2 1/2 teaspoons salt
6 ounces Fra’Mani Classic Italian Sausage sliced into 1/8 inch pieces
7 cups hot chicken broth [I used 4 cups homemade goose stock and 2 cups chicken stock.]
Ground pepper
Parmigiano Reggiano cheese

Warm the olive oil in a heavy bottom soup pot. Add the leeks and cook over medium heat for 4-5 minutes, stirring often until softened.

Add the chard, potatoes, salt and sausage. Raise the heat and wilt the chard. Once wilted, add the chicken broth. Simmer the soup for 30 minutes.

Using a potato masher, crush the potatoes so as to slightly thicken the soup.

Serve in hot bowls with freshly ground black pepper and abundant Parmigiano Reggiano cheese.

That was so good. I looked at the label more carefully, seeking more.

“Serving suggestions: Serve with boiled Italian cannellini beans seasoned with onions and sage. Slice thinly and use as a pizza topping. Chop finely and simmer with soffritto and tomatoes for ragu. For additional recipes from Chef Bertolli, visit http://www.framani.com.”

01.12.10
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Natasza Salad

beets and more

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Visiting son Brian in Reno, we were treated to a fine meal of grilled fish and what I will call “Natasza Salad.” It is a traditional Ukraine salad of beets, carrots, potatoes and celery and was prepared by Brian’s friend Natasza from Kiev. It was simple and delicious, so naturally, I wrote down how to make it:
“Roast and dice beets, dice and steam carrots, potatoes and celery, dice cornichons. Combine and toss with oil and vinegar.”

I got around to making it for dinner yesterday as root vegetables are prevalent this time of year. I love beets and get a few about every week at the Farmers. Though I find red beets incredibly beautiful, I’ve taken to buying golden beets lately; they taste the same and don’t bleed, so they’re great for salads.
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Carol asked me to get celery root (celeriac) a couple of weeks ago. She does that, saying she wants to make this or that. It’s time to use it or lose it, so I substituted celeriac for the celery. I didn’t have quantities, so I decided to start with a small and a medium beet and match the other ingredients to that.

2 beets cubed – slightly more than a cup
1 cup diced carrots
1 cup diced Carola potatoes
1 cup diced celeriac
5 cornichons sliced thick
Sea salt and freshly ground pepper
1 head lil gem lettuce, leaves separated

Steam carrots, potatoes, celeriac for 5 minutes. While hot, toss with beets. Fold in cornichons. Dress with vinegar and olive oil.

Arrange lil gem leaves on a plate and spoon salad on to the leaves.

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Notes:
Dressing – I used a traditional mix of 1 part red wine vinegar to 3 parts xv olive oil — olio nuovo in this case. This salad needed more acid. Next time, I’ll use 1 part vinegar, 1 part cornichon juice, 3 parts oil.

Cornichons – 5 cornichons yield less than 1/4 cup. Needs double that amount.

Served with leftover ham loaf, sliced and fried in butter.

Good. Yum.

12.26.09
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Flounder with Mustard

w_rayes_stackSon Eric and Alison in Maine sent six jars of Raye’s mustard for Christmas. They swear by this mustard. Of course those Mainers stick together.

Being grateful, I fired off an email thank you which precipitated a lively dialog.

Me — So the catcher sez to the pitcher, he sez, “Nice pitch, but put some mustard on it!” We now have no lack of mustard.
Thanks!

E — You are welcome. Not sure if we’d sent you Rayes before. But it’s still my favorite mustard in the world. I sent it ahead of Xmas so you could plan for some mustard-centric courses for Christmas dinner.


Me — Do you have suggestions for mustard centric dishes?

E — How about Fra Mani sausages n stuff? Especially some Boudin Blanc for Xmas?  Knockwurst? How about smoked salmon for the sweeter mustard? How about corned beef? Ham and cheese sandwiches?


Me — I was thinking something exotic like a mustard crusted roast or something.

E — Use your weak west coast mustard for crusts. Use this mustard when you want to take a flavor and turn it up to 11…


Well, it was getting close to dinnertime. I had some nice flounder fillets and jars and jars of mustard. In spite of his advice, I Googled “mustard crusted” and got all kinds of results for salmon, pork, beef and so on. I took the concept of a couple of the salmon dishes and started dinner. It surely wouldn’t take long.

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I started by putting the fillets on parchment paper on the Countertop Convection Oven baking sheet, oiled them up and sprinkled them with salt, pepper and herbs d’ Provence. Preheated the CCO to 375°F on regular bake.

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Next, I generously slathered on Raye’s Brown Ginger mustard and sprinkled fresh bread crumbs over the fish. That went in the oven for about 10 minutes until the flounder was tender and lovely.  It wasn’t crusted so much as dressed with the mustard.

I served the flounder with lard fried fingerling potatoes and sauteed cauliflower leaves.

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Yum.

12.10.09
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Barndiva Revisited

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Oh yes, and maybe for the enth time. We happened upon it in April of 2006, having read about it in a New York Times story on Healdsburg Restaurants by Frank J. Prial. I wrote about it then, and again in April of this year when we made our semi-annualish trip to Simi Winery to pick up our wine “shipments.”

I belong to five wine clubs — a self imposed limit — Simi, Cline, Bonny Doon, Navarro and Mahoney. I’ve been in many others over the years, but settled on these because I consistently like their wines. The good part; they send bottles of their choice periodically at substantial discounts. The discounts also apply for re-order. The bad part; they send bottles of their choice periodically. I choose to pick up the wines at Cline, a short trip, I save the shipping cost and use it as an excuse to stock up on their California Zinfandel and Syrah; tremendous values, with the discount. Simi, on the other hand, makes an excuse to go to Healdsburg — and Barndiva — a couple times a year.

The last weekend in May, Simi had their garden cafe open to members for their Wine and Pizza Forage.

Here’s my journal entry for that trip:
Saturday afternoon, we went to Simi for their members only Wine and Pizza Forage. Turns out they have a lovely; lower patio off of their party room. For $25 we got pizzas of our choice made in their brick oven, and all the wine we dare drink. They were pouring Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon 1993, 1999, 2001, a 2000 Reserve Zinfandel and a 2005 Reserve Chardonnay. They had a few bottles of each left, priced at $100 — $70 for us on this day only. Great wine, but… great wine is even better when its free. Continue reading →