Sad, Drunk, and Hungry

What’s the easiest way to make pesto? Bung everything - basil, garlic, pine nuts, parmesan, salt, pepper - in a food processor and whiz it.

So Sprout made the first fresh pesto of the year by hand. The flavor is pretty much the same as the machine version, but the texture is grainier.

Is it worth it? Not all the time, but it’s good for special occasions when you want to show how homey you are.

A landmark weekend for April 25 - - 7. We haven’t seen this kind of snow for ten years or more.  And in spring, well, that’s 30 years or more.

It’s been snowing for 24 hours, is up to 3 feet deep in places, and we’re going nowhere until Monday.  We are snowed in to the knees.

We saw the storm coming, so on Friday, after classes, we stopped for food.  And on Friday night, we had Beef and Chestnut pie, with the snow coming down and a new season of Dr Who on Sci-Fi.

Beef, Beer, and Chestnut Pie
Feeds: 4-6
Time to cook: Approx 2 hours
Oven temperature: Gas mark 4-5,180ÜC, 350ÜF

Ingredients
Lean beef braising steak cubes
Red onion
Chestnuts
Bitter Ale
Brown sugar
Wholegrain mustard
Gravy granules
Bay leaf
Puff pastry
Egg

Make, place 450g (1lb) lean beef braising steak cubes, 1 red onion, cut into quarters, and 225g (8oz) vacuum packed whole peeled chestnuts into a deep pie or casserole dish. Mix together 600ml (1pt) bitter, 5ml (1tsp) brown sugar, 5ml (1tsp) wholegrain mustard and 15ml (1tbsp) gravy granules, pour over the meat. Add 1 bay leaf and stir together.

Roll out 450g (1lb) puff pastry, large enough to cover the pie dish. Damp the edges of the dish with water and then place the pastry over the pie dish, trim the edges and press down to seal. Cut a small slit on the top to allow the steam to escape. Glaze the pastry with beaten egg and bake for 2 hours. Once the pastry has risen and is golden (after 30 minutes) cover with foil to prevent burning.

Eat, serve with creamy mustard flavoured mashed potatoes, additional gravy and braised apple and red cabbage.

We used a bottle of an American bitter ale, and served up the pie with sprouts boiled up with a few chestnuts.

Yum.

In the morning, the grill was out of commission.  Snowed in, really.  Hot dogs were off the menu.

With the snow at 20 inches, we were reduced to having the rest of the pie on Saturday evening.

But there’s more Dr. Who on BBCAmerica, and barring that, Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (UK, 1960) on DVD.

Storm Wine

We recommend a Cline  Ancient Vin Zin 2005, and a nice pair of snowshoes.  Both go well with an up-to-the-knee walk in the snow.  Inexpensive and  worth every inch when the drive is under 2 feet of snow and you’re going no where.

This evening I would like to tell about my chicken soup of last week. The thing I want to convey is HOW I made it rather than giving any particular list of ingredients. With this method, the cook is totally free to choose whatever looks good or whatever is available in the fridge, or both. The main point I want to make is: Roast everything first, then dump it all in a pot with water and simmer it for an hour. Add some pasta 15 minutes before dinner, and it’s a done deal. The broth will astound you with its richness; roasted, then stewed veg really retain texture and taste.

I roasted onions, garlic, carrots, asparagus, mushrooms,and parsnips nestled around cut up chicken parts. Throw garlic in whole and then squeeze the baked cloves into the soup as you put it on to simmer. Pull chicken meat off the bones before returning it to the pot with the roasted veg and water.

Oven: 325º. Time: 1 hour. Simmer the soup for 30-45 minutes

Well, okay, they really aren’t authentic scones, they are more honestly, triangular cinnamon biscuits, but that wouldn’t work for an attention grabbing title. I woke up this morning knowing it was way way below zero outside. I’m not sure how many people will understand this, but the first thing I thought of was needing to eat sweet, spicy little biscuits for breakfast. I tiptoed out of the bedroom as my spouse slept. I started a pot of freshly ground tanzanian peaberry , and as it brewed, I prepared the scones, and got them in the oven. I went downstairs to stoke up a nice fire, and by the time that was done, the scones were fragrant and ready to come out of the oven. My husband shuffled out of the bedroom, as if on cue. The the smells from the kitchen combined were about as intoxicating as you would want to be at 8:00 in the morning. We descended the stairs together, took our chairs by the fire, put our feet up, and had a cozy, spicy breakfast.

Recipe for Cinnamon “Scones”

Mix together:
2 c. whole wheat pastry flour
½ c. plain wheat bran
1/3 c. confectioner’s sugar
½ tsp. salt
1 1/2  tbsp. baking powder
1 tsp. cinnamon

Cut in:
¼ c. butter

Whisk together:

2/3 c. cinnamon chips
2 eggs
1/3c. heavy cream or buttermilk

Combine and gently stir the whisked egg mixture into the dry ingredients, after butter has been thoroughly cut in. Pat into a 10” round tart pan, lined with plastic wrap using wetted fingertips. Invert the dough disc onto a flat surface and remove the plastic wrap. Cut into 12 triangular pieces, as you would a pie. Brush with lightly beaten whole egg. Sprinkle lightly with granulated sugar (demererra sugar works really well). Gently transfer the dough triangles to a lightly greased cookie sheet, with points toward the middle of the baking sheet. Bake at 400º for 10-12 minutes. I like to use half size cokie sheets, six scones to a sheet. It seems to help them bake evenly. Serve warm with coffee or tea.

Addendum: Recently on my  birthday, I needed a morning treat, so I tried this variation. I think you’ll love it.

Orange Cinnamon Scones

Everything is the same, except:  reduce the buttermilk/cream by a tablespoon or two and  you are going to remove the zest from one whole orange. Make sure it is chopped finely. Then take 2/3 of the zest and add it to the dough during mixing. Finish peeling the orange, and chop half of the pulp finely, and add that to the dough as well. Form and bake as directed.

Glaze: Melt some butter, add the remaining 1/3 of the chopped orange zest, and squeeze some juice from the remaining orange half. Pop the squeezed pulp into your mouth for a treat.  Add powdered sugar, until you get a heavy glaze, suitable for piping. Put this in a cake icing decorator, or a plastic bag with tip cut off, and when scones are well cooled  make a zig zag of icing over the top of each scone.

This should get you started…there are endless variations I can imagine with this recipe. Its such a nice break from the ho hum everyday breakfast muffin. Flan

I was really dubious about trying tandoori turkey - especially to serve to others - but Sprout’s invitation cornered me.

We were going to have a second International Time Zone New Years. The idea is to start celebrating New Years about 5:00 pm CDT - that’s 11:00 pm GMT - and then lift another glass for every time zone across the Atlantic - until we tire out. It’s not that we ever expect to make it to midnight locally. A group of 48+s generally can’t party beyond 9:00 pm unless something really important is going on - like a political caucus. Or fireworks.

But we weren’t up to A Big Party, so Sprout decided to have a New Year’s dinner party for eight instead.

We had a 12 lb organic turkey from the co-op circa Thanksgiving, and Sprout emailed invitations  asking for requests on how to prepare it. Turns out everyone wanted International. I’m not sure how, but international soon became Indian.

I searched for recipes. I had heard of tandoori turkey but always thought it was more of a joke than anything. Tandoori is, by what I know, done with small birds, whole, skinned, marinated for a day, then skewered and quickly roasted in a very hot tandoori oven.

A turkey is not small, is a pain to skin, and even with a convection oven, not something you can skewer whole and roast quickly. The weather would be warm (20 F, with not a lot of snow), so I could do it over coals or on the propane grill, if necessary … but would it really be necessary?

Finally, I fell back to my well-used, turmeric-stained copy of Madhur Jaffrey’s Indian Cooking for a basic tandoori chicken recipe, sans the food coloring.

I cut up the turkey like a chicken, separating thighs and drumsticks, boning the breast, and dividing each breast into two. Skinned everything. Turkey legs are stringy with tendons, so I held them back with the wings and back for a pre-New Year’s Eve roasting and post-New Year’s soup. Slashed the thighs and breast, prepped them with lemon juice and salt, then put them all together in the yogurt / ginger / spice marinade for 24 hours.

Come New Year’s Eve afternoon, I made a carrot salad and started a chana dal. I also decided to serve the tandoori in a sauce and so turned the page in Madhur and got things ready to make up a butter sauce (Makkhani murghi). By this time, the turkey in its marinade was looking more like a lot of small chickens, so I was optimistic that the tandoori would work. If not, no big deal. We had a basket of good wine, champagne, some nice breads, rice - and fireworks.

We also have a convection oven that will melt lead. When it came time to roast the turkey, I drove it up to 550 F convection roast - as high as it would go. I spread the turkey parts on a pre-heated foil-lined heavy baking sheet. Roasting took about 10 minutes on one side, and 7 on the other. Some of the smaller pieces came out a little early; the thighs a little later. I went for some charring on the edges. If the color wasn’t authentic, the charring would be.

I put the roasted turkey in a big serving bowl, finished off the butter sauce, poured it over the turkey, and served.

And it worked. I had kept the tandoori pretty mild for guests, but it really came close to Paddington Standard in flavor and texture. Still more turkey than chicken, but happy food all around.

And we stayed up until 12:30 am, after fireworks.

Maus highly recommends

• Pentadue Old Patch Red 2005
• Cline Ancient Vine Zinfandel Contra Costa County 2005
• Morgan 2005 Pinot Noir
• Cline Cashmere 2005
• McClaren Vale Footbolt Shiraz 2005
• Rosenblum Cellars Vintners Cuvee xxix
• Penley Estate Hyland Coonwarra Shiraz 2004

There was a Bogle Zin and and three others which we polished off on New Year’s Eve with dinner and after.

Nancy’s pears are so amazingly fragrant, dense and refreshing, not too sweet, just right for the end to a rich meal.

• 1 bottle Shiraz or Red Zin wine (about 3 c)
• 2 c. water
• 1 c. sugar
• 4 star anise
• 8 med Bosc pears with stems

1. In 5 to 6 qt. pan, heat wine, water, sugar and star anise just to boiling on high, stirring to dissolve sugar.
2. Meanwhile, peel pears, leaving stems on. Core pears through blossom end.
3. Place pears in wine mixture, heat to boiling. Cover and simmer on low 10 to 15 minutes until pears are tender but still hold their shape, turning occasionally.
4. Remove pears to platter;discard star anise (I saved and used to garnish platter). Heat wine mixture to boiling on high. Cook 20 minutes, uncovered to thicken liquid and reduce to 1- 1/2 cups.
5. Cover pears and syrup separatly; refrigerate 6 hours or up to 3 days. To serve, spoon syrup over pears.

Also can be served with whipped cream.

It’s been months since we posted, and months since I tried baking another cake. But what is Christmas without a nice piece of cake? I decided to take Chris’s advice and made Dundee Cake.

Dundee cake is a traditional Christmas alternative to English Christmas Cake, which is much fruitier, and hides under marzipan and royal icing. Christmas  cake is nice but very heavy and can bring on a toothache in a heartbeat. The main appeal of Christmas cake is the moistness - and the alcohol which keeps the cake moist. Back in the day, we would make a Christmas cake months ahead and pour a whole miniature brandy, whisky, or rum over the cake every two weeks until it was time to ice it. The cake itself was really pickled by the time it was ready to ice, and when you ate it, the alcohol was so strong it burned a little.

All Dundee cake recipes are alike, though some involve a little whisky in the batter, but I can’t see the point. The whisky disappears in baking. This recipe is from Delia Online with a couple of changes: I hate candied peel so I swapped it for tart dried cherries; and I soaked the fruit in far more brandy and rum than I thought possible for the fruit to soak up, in order to make the cake nice and moist. It didn’t. Instead, the fruit was so swollen I had to double the base recipe, and I had already doubled the recipe… Perhaps this is a clue as to why my cakes are less than stellar.

But I have to say that the cake as I made it isn’t bad at all - just in need of moisture. Still, a good dose of Tobermory single malt over the top of the cake - and a shot to wash it down - sends the cake to the kind of re-hab it deserves.

Endive says: Call it an Amy Winehouse Re-Hab cake.

Sprout had some printing to do in Bigville, so we took the opportunity to visit LynnAndSteve, old eating and drinking friends from St Cloud and locally. Steve did a New Year’s Eve lobster bisque for the millennium that is still being talked about.

But I had an afternoon to kill in NE Minneapolis. So I visited the Modern Café for lunch. Moules Frites was on the menu. My last French course was 20 years ago, and I thought, “Fried idiots”? “Molded Fries”?

The dish turns out to be mussels in a tomato stew with celery, garlic, and andouille sausage, with a huge plate of freshly cut thin fries. Delicate. Tempered. Popular, even common. Perfect for the middle of my day, a meal too involved to make for lunch at home. Excellent.

The Modern is a comfortable cafe: 40s style, as simple and understated in design as their web page. And the service was excellent: prompt, by a friendly, casual waiter, with none of that patronizing, “And how is everything tasting?” crap 30 seconds into the meal.

And the local food mags like it.

Then, in the late evening, during a pause in the printing, we all headed to Nalapak Indian restaurant, 4900 NE block on Central Avenue. I’m a meat eater, and I still have memories of TVP and bland overcooked lentils; and of a St. Cloud vegitarian restaurant back in 1986 that equated good eating with the non-use of spices. So I tend to shy away from the all-vegetarian places like Nalapak.

But Nalapak was a vegetarian epiphany.

Absolutely no ambiance. A little like an Episcopal church basement, but with higher ceilings. Formica tables and a line of booths with wobbly tables (which one of the waits/chefs shimmed up for the four of us). A quiet side room for Special Occasions. No color scheme to speak of: piss yellow and mustard, perhaps.

But two of the tvs were tuned to the cricket (East India Test), and the other two were showing a Bollywood film - all with the sound down. Most of the clientèle were East Indian: some in traditional dress, some more western. Moms and dads, groups of friends, A couple of first dates (overdressed but cute), and an extended family celebration in the Special Occasions room.

The wait wore a men’s pinstripe suit and dark shirt, which suited her, and recommended wisely. Four of us shared Paneer Pakora, Chappati, Poori Aloo, Channa Masala, Dal Palak, Vegetable Korma … We just ordered for diversity.

The best Indian food I ever had was nearly 30 years ago at The Standard Cafe, on the Paddington end of Westbourne Grove, London. It was 1979. We were all young and thin and students on tight budgets.

Punk was dead, but The Clash, The Specials, Kate Bush, Ian Dury, and XTC were working. Notting Hill meant Portobello Road, which meant cheap used clothes, squats, kabobs, pubs, and roots reggae. The punk aesthetic was still alive and well, so you could buy most of your wardrobe at Portobello Road Market for five quid - as long as your wardrobe was second hand and consisted of a collarless shirt, ragged tweed sport jacket, red leather Italian shoes, white silk flyer’s scarf, and a greatcoat from Carnaby St 10 years before.

Since then, I’ve been trying to come even close to the Indian food here at home that I had after closing time at The Standard. But Nalapek was one step beyond Paddington Standard.

I don’t even recall the wine. A shiraz. We should have had lager, really. But in this particular case, the food outshone the drink.

I’m on currently working on Victoria Sandwich number three. So far the cake rises… falls

.

Makes a great strawberry flan case.

The theory in this house has been so far is that the problem is in the pan. The recipe calls for “2 loose bottomed 20cm/8in sandwich tins, 4 cm deep” which is about a inch and a half deep spring form pan for those un the US. I can’t find one in the stores so I’m using regular spring form pans.  I’m doubting that theory now.

I also switched to the method where you weigh your eggs first and use equal amounts of flour and sugar, and after having read about why cakes fall I now think the original recipe might have been right.

But for goodness sake, this is supposed to be the cake you can make when you’re 11 years old.