Participatory Book Blogging

Rae over at Bunnyfoot writes a rather insouciant blog I've been enjoying a lot lately, and she invited me to participate in another (aarrgh! dreaded word coming up) meme. Here goes.

total number of cookbooks i've owned: This is embarrassing. I have two bookcases' worth of cookbooks. (But I can explain! My mom recently gave me scads of her old books, and for a couple of years I was a food editor for a newspaper so I got zillions of freebies, many of which I sold to Green Apple Books in SF -- and Rae, I wonder if you bought any of them.)

last cookbook i bought: I bought these two on the same day just weeks before we moved, so they're still in a box in the garage but I can't wait to get my hands on them.
"Wild Fermentation: The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-Culture Foods" by Sandor Ellix Katz, Sally Fallon
"The Whole Beast: Nose to Tail Eating" by Fergus Henderson

five cookbooks that mean a lot to me:


which five people would you most like to see fill this out in their blog?
Well, I'd like to ask M.F.K. Fisher, Richard Olney, Waverly Root, Elizabeth David and Mrs. Beeton, but they're all dead...

Green Goopy Sloopy Soup

You're gonna have to take my word on this, because I didn't get a photo, but the other day I actually made a cream-of-vegetable soup that wasn't green. It was a pureed carrot soup with onion, coconut milk, ginger and other yummy flavors. And the week before that I made a deep-red gazpacho with Cherokee Purple tomatoes and beautiful bits of golden bell pepper.
But for the most part, my soups for the past couple of years have been pale green: asparagus, avocado, artichoke (ooh, I love the "A" vegetables).
Today's was inspired by Fran McCullough's recipe from "The Good Fat Cookbook" -- highly recommended, both for its recipes and for its thorough research on lipids. It was a lovely chilled creation of grated cucumbers, a bit of grated onion, melded with buttermilk and a little sour cream, seasoned with a touch of Dijon mustard, salt, pepper and (eek!) a pinch of sugar. In my usual zeal to get the soup as green and velvety as possible, I mooshed a ripe avocado into it. Man, that was a really filling lunch.
Here's something else to nourish you: Go visit Senator Ted Kennedy's Web site and join him in trying to pound some sense into the pitiful cranium of our reality-deprived president. Tasty.

OK, I'll Bite

Delicious Days has launched another meme ("meme," that overused word -- sheesh, gives me the screaming meemees). And yet, I'm happy to play. Here goes:

What is your first memory of baking/cooking on your own?
I had a copy of the original spiral-bound Betty Crocker's Cookbook for Boys and Girls, published in 1957. So I must have been about seven. (No! She's GOT to be wrong! She's only 29! OK, now she's lying for sure.) And I remember concocting that stupid Raggedy Ann "salad" made of a canned peach half for the body, some carrot curls for hair (am I remembering this right?) and celery sticks for legs and arms. I can't remember what the head was made from, although I think there were raisins for eyes. Eek. But it was a good book -- I learned a lot.

Who had the most influence on your cooking?
Totally my mom. She was a midwestern innocent catapulted into the exotic world of international cuisine when she married my Navy pilot dad. Early on she acquired a taste for sashimi, avocados, Major Grey's chutney. And as my dad's career increased in diplomatic importance, she was more and more required to host fabulous, drop-dead dinner parties. I became her galley slave, happily peeling, mincing, marinating and broiling .

Do you have an old photo as “evidence” of an early exposure to the culinary world and would you like to share it?
I'm working on it. If my dad can find it and scan it -- well, it's pretty cute. OK, here it is (and yes, that's chocolate -- I remember).

Mageiricophobia - do you suffer from any cooking phobia, a dish that makes your palms sweat?
I love to buy sparkling fresh fish. And then once I get it home, I stash it in the fridge for far too many days. As time wears on, I become dreadfully afraid to cook it at all, and it usually gets chucked.

What would be your most valued or used kitchen gadgets and/or what was the biggest letdown?
I'm wild about my Benriner, a Japanese plastic mandoline. I'm even happier with my butcher's glove, so I can safely shred vegetables while keeping my flesh attached to my hand.
Not so happy with the stupid herb roller: a dumb little device with about six sharp wheels that are supposed to make quick work of a bunch of parsley. All the chopped leaves stuck to the wheels. Bleh.

Name some funny or weird food combinations/dishes you really like - and probably no one else!
I got two for ya:
1) Saltines spread with peanut butter and mayonnaise.
2) Nacho Cheesier Doritos dunked in chive cottage cheese, followed by a bite of Greek peperoncini. Beer chaser mandatory.

What are the three eatables or dishes you simply don’t want to live without?
Oh, gosh. Perfect strawberries. Osetra caviar. Tomatoes. (Can I add olive oil? OK, then, just tomatoes. Wait: Bacon!)

Any question you missed in this meme, that you would have loved to answer? Well then, feel free to add one!
Sure: Do you love truffles? (Pig truffles, not chocolate truffles.)
YES.

Three quickies:
Your favorite ice-cream…
No, thanks.

You will probably never eat…
Frog legs.

Your own signature dish…
Y'know... Just about any soup. 'Specially vegetable soups. Cream of vegetable soups.

Utensa-palooza

Sam Breach over at Becks & Posh has issued a challenge to all food bloggers: Name the one splurge kitchen appliance you couldn't live without.
Well, I've given it a lot of thought. A lot.
You can have your Miele this, your Gaggenau that and your Thermador whatever-the-heck else... but I wouldn't be able to go near my kitchen if it weren't for my dishwasher.
I'm not kidding. Is this a familiar sight?

It was a daily nightmare in my 60-year-old "original charm" (i.e., no modern amenities, not even a garbage disposal) kitchen, before we fled the egregious upscalification of Mill Valley a few months ago. Standing over a sinkful of dirty dishes really gave my aging back a serious case of the twinges, and sometimes things, er, piled up.
So we escaped to a not-quite-so-old (heh -- 30 years) condo where the dishwasher in this "new" place is probably also 30 years old, but hey, it works, and it lets me cook. No more accumulations of moldy bowls, crusty plates or greasy spatulas. And best of all, no cluttered counters. I don't need to show you a picture; you know what your dishwasher looks like.
Yes, occasionally I have to give the old girl a little assist with this perky pink adjunct:
But my days are vastly improved. So enjoy your KitchenAid, Bosch, Wolf -- all fine and dandy, but only if the dishes are clean.
Oh, and one more thing. My favorite cheap kitchen item has to be the 1.5-quart slow cooker, $10 at Walgreens. It's good for beans, greens, grits -- anything soupy and stewy. I even made a cake in it once, although now I'm devoted to my super-duper dual-fuel convection oven... But that's another story.

Curds and Turds

We've got painters in the kitchen today, so it was catch-as-catch-can for lunch.
Beloved husband and co-cook caught a batch of Cheese Curds from A&W. The best I can say about Cheese Curds from A&W is that they're Wisconsin white cheddar curds, i.e., genuine cheese. The worst I can say is they've been breaded and fried. The mediocre-est I can say is that the cheese itself is pretty tasty -- and it's the real thing: immature cheese lumps that actually squeak when you bite them, even though in this case they're kinda melty and greasy.

We were unable to finish them all, this little box of about four ounces at most. Maybe we'll use the rest as doggie treats. (Oh, you haven't met Bean Sprout yet. Yes, that's his real name. He's a regular circus dog. Probably go nuts for the curds. I expect him to leap over tall buildings at a single bound. More on that later.)
Anyway, I'd like to invite Karl Rove to visit his local A&W for a batch of fried cheese curds. With any luck, his mouth will glue shut and we won't have to hear the likes of his lies ever again.
Wish, wish.

Meat

I remember when the number of dead Americans in Iraq reached 500. "Wow," I thought, "That's a lot of people. I wouldn't be able to have a party for that many people in my house." It wasn't a particularly small house, but that was the way I thought about the casualty number.
Now that more than 1,700 Americans have died in Iraq for no clear reason, a similar thought came to me the other day. Only now, I live in a condo roughly 1,700 square feet in size. It wouldn't be much of a party, and I'd have to clear out every stick of furniture and maybe even knock down some walls -- but if every man and woman stood shoulder-to-shoulder and pressed closely spine-to-sternum, I might be able to squeeze that number of people in my house. But no more.
It's a very bad feeling.
Here's a wonderful pork tenderloin we grilled Sunday. The meat comes from Bryan's in Corte Madera. Those are baby eggplants from the farmers' market in the bowl, and the glass holds a mustardy-buttery-maple syrupy sauce I whipped together on a whim.
To your health.

Oh Cripes, I'm a Vegan!

lemon
Posted by: horsecow on Buzznet

Just for today, I mean. In fact, I intend to smear my face with more duck fat tonight, and maybe even some bacon, so not to worry.
Anyway, I knocked a couple of Meyer lemons off the treelet yesterday. They were so ripe they practically jumped into my hands. What to do with perfect home-grown lemons?
Well, let's see: I had just simmered up a delicious pot of vegetable broth made with stems, peels, scrapings and salvages of items I didn't want to waste. I made too many jugs of it to freeze them all, so I had a container of fresh veggie broth to use up pronto.
And I had half a carton of leftover Chinese take-out rice. And a ripe avocado.
So I blended the avocado with a little broth until really smooth, and dumped it into a pot to heat up with the rice, the rest of the broth, and the juice of one beautiful, fragrant, juicy lemon (plus salt and pepper). Presto: Avocadolemono soup! Hold the egg. It was unctuous, slightly tart, chewy with bits of rice -- and a startling pistachio green. I'll spare you the photo.
However, I must show you what to do with the squeezed out rinds of home-grown Meyer lemons. Make preserved lemons!
You know whenever you see a recipe that calls for preserved lemon, it usually tells you to use the rind only, and to discard the pulp? And you ask yourself, "Then why did I waste all that juice and pulp to make this batch?" The solution is to just save the juicy bits of lemon rind and layer them in a jar with generous sprinkles of kosher salt. Let them sit around for a few hours to mingle and ooze, and then cover them with olive oil. A few more days, covered, on the countertop, and then into the fridge they go.
Meanwhile, let's all invite Chris Wallace to go happily poop on himself. No soup for you!

I'm Mad and I Eat Meat

No, it's not all tomatoes and peas, all the time. Here's the evidence of a tasty rib dinner I enjoyed a few evenings ago. Couldn't get to the camera any sooner: too busy grunting over my sauce-smeared plate.
When we moved to this condo, we were afraid we'd never be able to smoke spareribs again, for fear of stink-bombing our neighbors.
But! Beloved husband and co-cook developed a quick and relatively clean method for darn-near duplicating the effects of 20 pounds of pork languishing six hours in a big ol' Brinkman water smoker -- in a little Weber Smoky Joe on the patio!
Briefly:
1) Cut up a rack of pork spareribs into four pieces. Not beef. Not baby-back. Just one slab. We used Niman Ranch -- humanely raised and slaughtered, and really yummy. Marinate in a mixture of more beer, less white vinegar, flavored with Worcestershire and Tabasco. Dump all this in a sealable bag and toss in the fridge for a day or two.
2) Build a small charcoal fire. When it's ready, add a handful of soaked wood chips -- finger-sized, not huge lumps. Arrange the ribs on the grill and put the lid on, vent holes open.
3) Turn ribs often, moving them away from the hottest coals, until the smoke dies down and the meat is mahogany colored -- but not entirely cooked. Put the lid back on each time. This only takes 20-30 minutes.
4) Finish the ribs in a LOW oven (260 F), in a foil-covered roasting pan with a sprinkle of water for a couple of hours, until they are pull-apart tender.
5) Only now may you apply BBQ sauce.
6) Do not invite neighbors over. They'll never know.

And It's Still Only June

C'mon, show me what you got. You got ripe tomatoes in your garden yet?
I do.
Caught me completely by surprise, because beloved husband and co-cook will tell you I spend WAY too much time out on the patio babying those babies. And yet, all of a sudden, today I discovered not one, but two ripe Sungolds I swear weren't there yesterday.
I should let you farmers in on a little secret of mine. It's called MaxSea, the world's most potent pixie dust. I learned about it last summer when a neighbor took care of my plants for a week while we vacationed. When we returned, the plants were so lush and healthy, I thought she'd gone out and bought all new ones. Nope, it was this magic potion. (Their Web site, maxsea.biz, is not up and running yet, so good luck finding some. I got mine at Sloat Gardens.)
Hmm. Do you think I could make a meal out of two cherry tomatoes? 'Scuse me, I'm going to go find out.

I Get a Round

Posted by: horsecow

I Get a Round
The peas are still coming in to the farmers' market, and we're taking full advantage of them. I also found some brand-new baby Yukon Gold potatoes, so small the vendor calls them "marbles." Look at them compared with the tiny pearl onions in this dish of round, tender edibles. The dark bits are itty-bitty morels. The whole mess was gently sauteed in duck fat, my new favorite grease.
Cooking is so much fun, it's a wonder more people aren't into it. I worry that the farmers' market has become a mere curiosity for some people, an urban field trip. While beloved husband and co-cook was buying the peas, a couple of women stood next to him marveling at the odd green pods -- clearly something they'd never laid eyes on before.
"What are they?" asked one.
"Peas," said BH&CC, opening a pod to show her the contents.
"What do you do with them?" she wondered aloud.
True story.

Grow Your Own

Posted by: horsecow

Grow Your Own
The job report for May was dismal. But! On the other hand, unemployment is down, so something must be going right -- right?
Nah. It's just because I've used up all my unemployment benefits, like so many other people I know whose jobs were, um, "disappeared," my beloved co-cook and husband included. We're simply not on the rolls of the unemployed anymore, so the numbers magically have gone down.
Lucky us, though. We decided to call this "retirement," and to spend way too much time puttering in the garden.
The tomatoes are looking good, but are still green, so we're still buying red cherry tomatoes at the market. However, our first harvest of the spring made it to the table today (and it will make many more appearances).
Feast your eyes on home-grown microgreens. These are ordinary red radish sprouts, probably less than a week old. Beloved co-cook and husband crafted this salad in about five minutes, and right after lunch he went out on the patio and planted more radish seeds for next week's salad.
The seeds were ten cents a packet, and each packet should grow hundreds of sprouts.
Who needs employment?