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This dressing goes with the Fennel and Blood Orange Salad. If blood oranges aren’t in season, use another orange. The use of fennel oil and orange blossom water add depth of flavor and emphasis to the salad ingredients. Using orange blossom water this way is inspired by Moroccan cuisine where it is sometimes drizzled on a dish at the last moment to add aroma. If you do not have this or the fennel oil, don’t worry, the dressing will still be quite good.
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This sauce was designed around a wine from Santa Cruz Mountain Vineyard’s second label Quinta Cruz. This is a label that produces only wines from Portugal and Spain. The wine is Graciano, and is a wine that is savory first, then fruity. To me, the flavor profile is oil cured olives, oregano and marjoram, then a shovelful of really good farm dirt, finishing with blueberries. Now, this is my opinion but I am sticking with it. If you cannot find a wine from these grapes I suggest using a petite sirah.
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This sauce is meant to go with a carrot custard, but would be wonderful with duck, chicken, or pork. Use with panna cotta or other desserts as well. You can make it sweeter by adding sugar or agave to it, as the sugar in the recipe here is just enough to wake up certain flavors in the berries. You could add liqueur to the sauce to sweeten it as well*. This will also intensify the berry flavor. If you want a perfectly smooth sauce, pureé all the berries instead of three-quarters as called for in the recipe.
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While researching blueberry vinegar I realized that there are pretty much two schools of thought. One school always cooks the berries and then strains it soon after, and the vinegar is almost always sweetened. Then there are those who don’t mind waiting, and are kind of purists. These are the ones that just mix berries and vinegar and proceed to wait a few days. One recipe even did both! Either way, it is really easy to make your own blueberry vinegar.
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This is the sort of thing that can be thrown together with help from the pantry and leftovers, and is just right for a cold evening or lunch time. Or, if like me you are tired of cereal or omelets for breakfast, fire this up and add a couple poached or basted eggs on top and enjoy. You can also skip the eggs and have a piece of toast spread with some soft goat cheese smoked olive oil and you have a complete protein breakfast.
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One of the things I like to do in the kitchen is make vegetable dishes using the same method as I would a meat dish. In this instance, I was thinking of a pot roast done with Chantenay carrots instead of chuck roast. I love Chantenay carrots, especially when they get bigger. The stubby shape with the larger diameter makes them perfect for trimming into larger shapes that take a longer cooking yielding a deep flavor. For the potatoes, you want a waxy potato that will hold it’s shape when cooked, and the Bintje is great for this.
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This was a dish that occurred from a Tour du Fridge one year. I have done this using large artichokes as well as small ones. For the large ones, I trimmed everything away from the heart (saving the leaves and steaming them until done, and then eat them as you would from a whole artichoke) and cut it into cubes. For small artichokes I just followed the basic prep as in the recipe for Braised Baby Artichokes on the site right up to the cutting them into sixths. Either way works for this recipe. The potatoes and artichokes are a wonderful combination of flavors.
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This recipe makes a simple dish with that has plenty of flavor. If you wish to, adding some chopped lacinato kale adds color to the dish and contrast to the flavors, all of which meet under the aromatic umbrella of the garlic chives. This recipe is set to yield a “dry” dish, but if you wish, you can use more stock and have the carrots in a broth, adding little pasta shapes or Israeli couscous or grains if it pleases you.
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Although any pretty much any carrot will work, big Chantenay carrots are great here. Chantenay become sweeter and seem to be tenderer as they get larger, and for slow cooking, as in this recipe, they are perfect. The nuts added at the end add crunchy contrast to the tender vegetables, and the nutty flavor adds depth to the dish.
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INGREDIENTS:
2 cups cooked cranberry beans (see recipe for “Basic Braised Shelling Beans” on site) 1 bunch collard greens, stemmed and shredded 1/8th inch, washed 2-3 “spring” onions (1 cup) sliced thinly into shreds 3 cloves garlic, minced ¼ cup diced ham, or a 1-inch chunk from the end of a prosciutto (Some delis will save these for you if you ask. They are excellent for seasoning dishes such as this.) slashed with a few deep cutsContinue reading »
One day I read about how some Southern cook did her beans, and had to try it. I was so happy I did. This method produces meltingly tender beans that are sweet and have a full bean flavor, but the beans hold their shape. Just remember, patience is a virtue! Don’t keep checking the pot, stirring it, or otherwise messing with it. And you can’t hurry it. But it really is worth the wait.
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Slowly braising Romano beans renders them meltingly tender, but they retain their shape and pick up a sweet and nutty quality. The other vegetables in the dish become silky and the chard adds depth and earthiness. Bacon always goes well with beans and greens, but if you prefer not to use it, substitute some sweet smoked paprika.
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Slow cooking the Romano beans brings out the sweetness of the bean and leaves them meltingly tender without getting that furry feeling that over cooking these beans in water can yield. The scallions add the bass line to this dish, and the sweetness of the fennel adds top end. Once this dish gets going, resist the urge to stir it, or even open it, for at least 30 minutes.
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This is a Provençal inspired recipe with a twist. Some people find that summer squash has a subtly bitter flavor, which is unpleasant for them. This recipe plays that flavor up, and also counters it, by using caramelized sugar on the surface of the cuts on the squash. Caramelized sugar has both a bitter quality and sweetness, as do the squash. Costata Romanesco, Cousa, and tromboncini squash (look for this unusual squash at markets) all have firmer flesh than zucchini or crookneck, and can be seared and browned without getting mushy as quickly the latter. If using a mélange of these, add the zucchini and crooknecks later than the rest. These squash also pick up an almond-like nutty flavor when caramelized.
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There are many versions of this salad, but the universal constant seems to be old bread and tomatoes and onions. I figure this salad grew out of the “cucina povera” canon, where waste, want not was the theme. Before Columbus, tomatoes were not part of this dish, but they certainly are now. This is a great way to use up older bread, but if you can’t wait, just rip up the bread early in the day and let it sit out a few hours, or throw it in the oven on low. I have also grilled or fried the bread for variation. Again, this is where a fixed-blade slicer can speed things up.
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Persillade is a condiment or topping, the most basic version of which is a mixture of chopped flat leaf parsley (persil in French) and garlic. Different iterations feature vinegar, different herbs, pepper flakes or powder. Anchovy often shows up in Provençal versions. Look for it in French, Cajun, Quebecois, and other French influenced foods, as well as Greek cuisine. Adding lemon (or other citrus) zest turns it into gremolata, the traditional topping of osso bucco, which are slices of lamb shank slow cooked and topped at service with aromatic gremolata. This is a variant that includes toasted bread crumbs that add a nutty quality, as well as crunch to a dish, and mitigates the powerful flavors of garlic and lots of parsley.
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A favorite breakfast of mine is sautéed greens served on thick toast with poached or fried eggs on top. The yolk coating the greens and the crisp chewy toast makes for a great combination. There is a myriad variations on this theme, but the eggs and greens are the baseline. This is often made with leftover greens or potatoes. If you are not a fan of poached eggs, you could skip the potatoes, or simply cut the potatoes into small enough cubes that they will cook through while you fry them. Although it looks like a long recipe, it goes quickly.
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These are great straight out of the refrigerator, or make for a great salad, which is what they were first made for.
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