The Zombie Preparedness Guide

Officially Granola

2011-03-23T17:28:00.000-07:00

Yikes. Sewing is hard. Or, rather, sewing is time consuming when most of your free time is in half-hour chunks. Still, I have been working hard on the next installment of these sewing lessons. In the meantime, here's a snack break!

Mmmmmm.... cherry cordials! I made these last Sunday in a fit of sweet craving, using a jar of brandied cherries that was slowly going bad in the fridge. The results were so delicious that my housemates inhaled them - all 30 of them - before the day ended on Monday. These photos represent the last five survivors still left standing when I came home from work that day, and I am sad to report that they swiftly met their end. Fortunately, they're easy to make (yes, I know I say that about everything).

The recipe is from Saveur, and they got it from Peter Greweling’s Chocolates and Confections, and it's a winner. You can make these with store bought Marascino cherries of course (which aren't actual Marascino cherries, I just learned! Oh, the years of lies and deception!), but if you can get your hands on something of a higher quality I would highly recommend it. My brandied cherries were amateur at best, but they still took this little sweet leaps and bounds beyond the Shirley Temple tasting cordials you sometimes find in stores.

If you're in more a healthy mood, I'd like to remind you that cherries are fruit. If you're still not quite buying that, I've also recently come into a super duper granola recipe. I've been having this for breakfast - no milk, no yogurt, just straight granola - for almost two weeks now.

I've resisted making granola for some time, partly because most of the store bought varieties have been too sweet for my taste. This granola is only slightly sweet, with a nice kick of sea salt at the end of the spoonful. It straddles the line nicely between sweet treat and salty snack, and sneaks in a "I'm healthy too!" when you weren't looking.

I've also resisted making granola because, well, that seemed like some line in the sand into irrevocable hippie-dom that I was hesitant to cross. But, frankly, I'm a bike commuter who has a backyard full of chickens and a basement full of canned goods. That ship sailed a long time ago, methinks.

Anyway, enjoy these recipes! I am sewing my little heart out in preparation for an upcoming trip to Florida, so as soon as my projects start taking any respectable shape I will fill you in.

Homemade Granola

Ingredients:

2 cups rolled oats
1 cup rolled barley
1 cup raw pepitas (pumpkin seeds)

1 cup raw sunflower seeds
1 cup unsweetened coconut

1 vanilla bean, seeded
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 tsp sea salt salt
1/2 cup maple syrup

1/4 cup vegetable oil

Heat oven to 275°F. In a large bowl, mix together all ingredients. Spread evenly on parchment-lined baking sheet and bake for about an hour, stirring every 20 minutes, until granola is golden brown. Remove from oven and allow to cool.

Ok I Got The Sewing Machine To Work Now What Do I Do

2011-03-01T13:53:00.000-08:00

Welcome to lesson two of my series on sewing basics! In this lesson, I'm going to go through the ins and outs of operating a sewing machine. This is a really handy skill to learn, particularly if you are interested in being able to make basic repairs and alterations to your clothes.

To start with, you will need some basic supplies. A sewing machine, to start with, but also a sharp pair of scissors (ideally, fabric scissors), an iron, a seam ripper, and thread of your choice. And, naturally, some clothing that you wish to sew or alter. For the sake of this post, I decided to take in the sides of a flannel shirt I got recently from Goodwill. Because, you know, we all still wear flannel up here in the Northwest.

Alright, once you have your item of clothing, it's time to break out the iron. Now, I have to be honest here and add that I am morally opposed to ironing in general. I absolutely hate ironing. It just seems like a giant waste of time to me. I go to great lengths to avoid ironing, such as taking clothes into the shower with me to "steam" and whatnot. In fact, I hate ironing so much that I have engineered almost my entire wardrobe to be iron-free. Which explains why I end up getting most of my business clothes from REI. But the point I am trying to make here is that even though the passion with which I hate ironing matches the fire of a thousand suns, it does serve a useful purpose when sewing. Ironing your seams to that they lay flat and even is one of the essentials to successful sewing. Trust me, for years I tried to sew without ironing, and it sucks. It sucks really hard, and the 5 minutes that you save by forgoing the iron is more than made up for by the hours and hours spent ripping out seams. So, benefit from my experience on this one and suck it up. Break out the iron.

Once you've ironed your seams, use some short pins to map out where you want to sew. This serves the dual purpose of holding your piece together and guiding your hands as you feed it through the sewing machine. Again, out of haste I have tried to forgo this step. Sometimes it worked out. Sometimes it was disastrous. Let's just say the potential for messing things up, big time, is greatly increased by not pinning. Use your own judgment.

One your piece is pinned, guide it under the metal foot of the machine. To help facilitate this, the foot should be in the "up" position, usually accomplished by lifting a little lever at the back of the machine.

Also, take a moment to notice the little metal teeth underneath the foot. When you press down on the foot pedal to make the sewing machine sew, these teeth also move, effectively moving your piece along at a pace appropriate for your stitch. A lot of times, beginners feel that they need to pull their piece through the machine. This actually can cause some problems, like uneven stitches and broken needles. When sewing, just remember to use a light hand and let the machine do the work. Also, the ruler guides on the sides are quite helpful, particularly if you are making a straight seam.

So, back to your project. Once you have it in place, lower the metal foot to press it against the teeth. Again, take note of this step, because it's one that beginners often miss.

Make sure the machine is plugged in and turned on.

Now that everything is in place, you're ready to begin sewing. Select your stitch type and length, and then lower the needle a couple of times by hand to make sure everything is working right. In order to help lock your seam in place, it's also a good idea to do a few stitches in reverse as well. You do this by pressing down on the "reverse" lever (remember the first lesson?), and go over your first few stitches again. This will help keep the ends of your seam from unraveling. If you're good to go, then slowly press down on the foot pedal to start sewing.

As you go, remove the straight pins. When you need to stop the machine, it's best to stop it with the needle in the downward position and inserted into the fabric, so that your seam remains true and straight and doesn't get yanked in a jagged line.

Once you've reached the end of your seam, do a few reverse stitches, lift up the foot, pull the piece out, and cut the threads. Hooray! Successful sewing.

Before we get too self congratulatory though, remember to try on your piece to make sure that everything went according to plan. If it didn't, don't beat yourself up - this is where the seam ripper comes in handy. But always remember to try on your piece before cutting away extra fabric.

And you're done! Time to go out and sport your fabulously fitted new clothes, perfect for catching some runaway chickens.

What Is A Sewing Machine And How The Hell Do I Work One

2011-02-15T21:33:00.000-08:00

Ohhhhkay, as promised, I have right here the first installment of Maria's Slapdash Sewing School. I thought I would start us out with the most feared and mysterious creature of the sewing world - the sewing machine.

I've found that by far the greatest impediment most people face to teaching themselves how to sew is approaching the actual sewing machine. Unless you are familiar with these strange beasts - and understand that they are more scared of us than we are of them - they can seem frightening indeed.

Unfortunately, I am no expert on how to operate a sewing machine. Mostly I just fiddle with knobs and levers and see what happens. But, most of the time that works out pretty well for me, so let's give it a go, shall we?

Behold! The sewing machine!

Marvel in its vintage charm. Don't you just adore that DMV shade of beige? I know I do.

The good news for you beginners out there is that used sewing machines can be bought relatively cheaply, and the older they are the better they generally work. A good rule of thumb is that if it's fugly and heavier than a sack of hammers, you've got a winner.

So, now that introductions have been made, let's take a closer look.

Hey, look at all those thingies! Are they ancient hieroglyphics? The secret formula to Coke? We may never know! What I have deduced, through years of painstaking archeological research, is that the symbols around the knob correspond to different stitch types. The knob with the red dot and the exclamation point (!) will switch you between the red and the white variations on the stitch types. Somewhere else, there is a knob that will determine stitch length. So, let's break that down a little.

Why different stitch types? This is treading dangerously into unknown territory for me, but I'll give it a go. The most fundamental, basic reason for this is that different fabrics do different things when confronted with a sewing machine. As a basic rule of thumb, you use a straight stitch for rigid, non-stretchy fabrics. It looks something like this:

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

As another basic rule of thumb, you use a zig-zaggy stitch for stretchy fabrics. Why? Because a zig-zaggy stitch will stretch when the fabric stretches. It looks something like this:

VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV

The rest of the stitches are there for other reasons. I'm sure they are good reasons. I'm sure you can do all sorts of magical things with those stitches. Oh, the things those stitches can do! What? No, I can't tell you. Not because I have no idea, I just wouldn't want to ruin the surprise. Moving on.

Let's not forget stitch length! This is a little more arbitrary a choice. The smaller the stitch length, the tighter and stronger your seam will be. However, be warned: the smaller the stitch length, the harder and more frustrating it is to rip out the mistakes that you will inevitably make. This can be a nightmare, especially if its 2 am and you are ripping out an entire pants seam worth of stitches the size of sand grains. I have been there, my friends. Choose wisely.

Taking a better look, we can see that there's that knob for stitch length, right down below that hieroglyphic decoder ring thingie.

Also, take note of the little lever that says "Reverse." When you press this doodad down, it makes the machine stitch in reverse. Take note of this, because this will come in handy later.

Okay! Now we're ready to start threading the machine. This is a relatively simple concept that for some reason varies somewhat wildly from machine to machine (at least in my humble experience). But, if you understand the basic concept, you can saddle up any machine without too much trouble.

Threading a sewing machine involves passing the thread through a series of loops and holes designed to keep an even line of thread moving through the needle with minimum drag and torque. This generally means that there are no less than twenty seven twists, turns, loops, and holes that this thread passes through before ultimately arriving at the needle (don't panic - that was sarcasm).

You can see a couple of them here:

And this is what it looks like from the top.

The main point being, I believe, to line up the thread properly so that once it does get to the needle, it passes through with minimal resistance.

After passing through the first couple of loops, you generally bring the thread down and around this knob thing, tucking it squarely behind a third metal loop.

Here we come to perhaps the most important loop of all. The far left loop in this picture is attached to the motion of the needle, meaning it moves up and down as the needle does. By passing the thread through this loop, you're letting it do the work of pulling thread off the spool. Without it, this work falls on the needle, and the needle will usually snap under that kind of torque.

This is what the system is starting to look like. Take note of the tiny, seemingly inconsequential loop at the very bottom of the picture.

Ok, now we've come to the needle! Thread that bad boy.

Now that our threading journey has come to an end, it's time to think about the bobbin. This is another seemingly simple endeavor that seems to change to a surprising degree from machine to machine. Again, let's go over the basic concept.

The bobbin is just basically some thread on a really small spool. It connects with the thread on top to create a seam. It can be the same color as the thread on top, or a different color, depending on your preference.

Check out this neat graphic on how it all works:

Credit for this graphic is from who-knows-where, but you can find it here and here and here.

Now that we possess the magical knowledge of how a bobbin works, we need to understand how to load the actual damned bobbin. Each sewing machine has a different system for doing this (vertical! horizontal! clockwise! topwise!) so I leave it to your sleuthing skills to work that one out. But it's not brain surgery. Google it with the name and model of your sewing machine if you have to.

Once the bobbin is loaded, lower and raise the threaded needle once by turning it by hand. This is usually accomplished with a knob on the opposite side of the machine. If done properly, this will bring a loop of the bobbin thread to the surface, where you can pull it out fully like so:

Ta-daa! You have tamed the savage sewing machine. Next lesson, we will learn what to actually do, now that you've come this far....

There Will Be Blood... Most Likely

2011-02-03T10:56:00.000-08:00

In response to my last post, many of my friends and family expressed a desire to learn some sewing basics. Which, is exactly what I am qualified to teach - sewing basics. I'm not a great sewer, and mostly I just make things up as I go along. But I do know how to hem a pair of pants, do some basic repairs, sew on patches, and whip up basic things like t-shirts. And, now that I have a real job and some free time on my hands, one of my goals is to get a little more ambitious with my sewing. So I thought this would be a great opportunity to start a little series on sewing basics.

Here's a rough lesson plan:

- What is a sewing machine and how the hell to do work one

- Ok I got the sewing machine to work now what do I do

- Basic repairs, patches, hemming

- How to make your own pattern

- T-shirts, tank tops

- How to be a pretty pretty princess

I'm going to keep things as simple as possible, and I beg you - if you are an experienced sewer and are reading my blog, please don't hunt me down and slap me across the face for the haphazard way in which I intend to go about this.

First lesson coming up!

Some New Relationships

2011-01-24T18:02:00.000-08:00

Oh my. It's nearly the end of January. It's been a full month since I last posted. Where has the time gone?

I can tell you where it's gone. Into the misty gray ether that is a Seattle January.

Don't get me wrong - I actually love January in Seattle. I'm from Chicago originally, so I will take gray skies, mild temperatures, and soothing humidity over the cornea splitting cold and nosebleed inducing dry that is a Chicago winter. But January here in the NW is not a time for productivity. It is a time for taking naps and reading books and re-watching "The Hangover" while drinking hot toddies. It is a time for making scones and waffles and drinking as much warm, strong coffee as your body will reasonably permit. Which is more or less what I've been doing this last month.

So, ok, everyone deserves a little break from the blogosphere from time to time. But this weekend I spied the first magnolia blossoms on the trees. In a couple of weeks, daffodils will be in the markets. Spring is getting ready to happen, and it's time for me to get in gear too.

And actually I have been doing some crafty, foodie things lately, it's just that when I get home at 5 it's already too dark to take pictures of them. And then by the time the weekend comes, I've usually eaten them all.

Fortunately, most of the recipes I've been experimenting with are not of my own invention but are freely available from other blogs. I've been on a whole grain kick lately, partly because I enrolled in a "Healthy Challenge" at work and partly because I have a vacation in April that I would really, really like to be able to wear a bikini for. I've accepted that eliminating bread products from my life would be akin to water boarding, so I've simply resolved to eliminate as much white flour as possible while still maintaining maximum deliciousness.

Some notable successes are the whole wheat chocolate chip cookies from Orangette, orange and oat scones from 101 Cookbooks, and the six seed soda bread, also from 101 Cookbooks. So, if you're so inclined, I would recommend any or all of these recipes. Their whole grain wholesomeness has been a bright, shiny spot of deliciousness in the dun colored fog of a Seattle winter.

It's not that white flour and I can't be friends. I just think we should see other people right now.

It was this new sense of culinary singledom that I stumbled upon what is now my new favorite bakery, the Flying Apron in Fremont. It's vegan, gluten-free, and organic, which sounds terrible, just terrible, but they make it work. Last Sunday I had a frosted cinnamon roll made with brown rice flour that just took my breath away. I've been thinking about it ever since. I have seriously considered breaking the three-day rule and calling it up and asking it out again.

But perhaps the most important change right now is that I have decided to broaden the scope of this blog a bit. I fully realize that it's almost entirely about FOOD, because FOOD is mostly what I think about, each and every day. However, it was never my intention to be a food blogger. It's just that making food is just what I happen to be doing most of the time, and so it was easy enough to put it on the blog.

So here's the deal. I'm polling friends, colleagues, relatives, or anyone else that will stop and talk to me what they would really like to learn how to do. I, for one, would really like to learn how to field dress a deer, but that will have to wait for hunting season to become a reality. But, if anyone out there has any ideas for DIY skills they would like to learn, I vow right here and now to go to the ends of the earth (or Ballard, whichever) to figure out how to accomplish them and blog the results.

So, what would you like to learn how to do? Message me in the comments, shoot me an email, or just come over and tell me.

Deal? Deal.

Ahead Of The Curve

2010-12-22T12:23:00.001-08:00

Haha, beat ya to it, New York Times!

In case you were wondering, the Holiday Skill Share was awesome. I got everything on my wish list, including $150 worth of third-wave coffee for free.

Booyah.

Holy Sprinkles!

2010-12-19T13:19:00.000-08:00

(To the tune of the Batman song)

NahNah NahNah NahNah NahNah Cookies! cookies! COOKIES!

That's about how I've felt this past week, ever since I engaged in my annual cookie baking binge. I spent most of last Friday, all of Saturday, and a good chunk of Sunday pounding out dozens of holiday cookies, and have spent the rest of the week funneling them out of my kitchen by way of mail, hand, and mouth. Because it's Christmas, and because I am me, I decided to kick this year's cookie making up a notch. On tap were the usual standbys - pignoli and cuccidati - but I also wanted to experiment with some new cookies.

Also, I wasn't super thrilled with last year's cuccidati, and wanted to see if I couldn't improve the recipe a bit. Sometime this summer, amidst boxes and boxes of surplus apricots and cherries, I got the brainwave to try and make a Pacific Northwest inspired cuccidati. I would replace the raisins with dried apricots, the candied citron with dried cherries and citrus zest, and the almonds with local hazelnuts. And I also vowed to splurge on some good, local honey, instead of the cheap Trader Joes honey I went with last year.

And I have to say that I was super pleased with how everything turned out. The new cookie experiments were a nice challenge, and I particularly liked how the baci di dama cookies turned out. The pignoli were, as always, delicious. And I even tried my hand at some homemade almond marshmallows, which I can say firsthand are just tops in a cup of hot chocolate.

But I was most pleased with how the cuccidati came out. I was expecting something that resembled the classic cuccidati, maybe came off as a close cousin to the real thing, but I was surprised at how the figs, cherries, and apricots harmonized into a cohesive whole. It also helped that, thanks to the Holiday Skillshare, I was able to snag some hand-harvested local honey. This honey was amazing, I should add - dark, thick, and sweet, almost like molasses. The only honey I've ever seen that resembles it was the dark coffee honey from Costa Rica. I used it generously in the cookies, and I really think it made all the difference.

I'm posting these recipes in the hopes that you might experiment with making some cookies in the coming week. Nothing says Christmas like cookies, and these are packed full of love. And figs. Figs and love.

NahNah NahNah NahNah NahNah COOKIES!

Cuccidati

For the filling:
1 cup dried dark cherries
2 cups dried unsulfured apricots

1 package dried figs (8 oz)
1 cup of Marsala wine

1 cup honey
1 1/2 tsp orange zest1

tsp lemon zest
1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp ground cloves
1/2 cup hazelnuts, toasted and chopped

For the dough:
4 cups all purpose flour
1 cup sugar
1 Tbs baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2 inch cubes
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 cup milk
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
1 tsp orange zest

For the icing:
1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 - 2 Tbs fresh orange juice
nonpareil sprinkles

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Soak the cherries, apricots, and figs in 2/3 cup Marsala wine to soften. When most of the fluid has been absorbed, process the fruits in a meat grinder or a food processor until they form a smooth paste. Add 1/2 cup honey, orange zest, lemon zest, cinnamon, cloves, and chopped hazelnuts. Mix until smooth. Add more honey and Marsala, to taste, until the filling has the consistency of thick jam. The filling will keep up to a week if kept covered and refrigerated.

Mix together the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Add the butter and blend together with a pastry blender or in a food processor until the mixture resembles coarse meal with small, pea-sized lumps of butter. By hand, add the eggs, milk, vanilla and zest, and mix together gently until a soft dough forms. Do not overmix. Wrap in tin foil or plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least 8 hours.

Roll out the chilled dough into a long rectangle, about 4 inches wide. In the center of the dough, create a line of filling about an inch thick. Roll the dough around the filling to create a tube, then cut with a sharp knife into slices about an inch and a half wide. Place on a cookie sheet and bake at 350 degrees F for 25-30 minutes, or until the crust is golden.

Make the icing by combining the powdered sugar with vanilla and orange juice until smooth, adding more juice or water if neccessary. Dip the tops of the cookies until covered in in icing, then sprinkle with nonpareils and lay out to dry.

Makes about 4 dozen.

Pignoli

Ingredients:
2 (8-oz) cans almond paste (not the kind in the tube)
1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 large egg whites
2 tablespoons mild honey
1 cup pine nuts

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Pulse almond paste in a food processor until broken up into small bits, then add confectioners sugar and salt and continue to pulse until finely ground, about 1 minute. Beat together almond mixture, egg whites, and honey in electric mixer at medium-high speed until smooth, about 5 minutes (batter will be very thick).

Using wet hands, roll the batter into small balls about an inch in size. Roll the tops of the balls in pine nuts, then place on a silicone baking mat or parchment lined baking sheet.

Bake cookies at 350 degrees F until golden, 12 to 15 minutes total. Be careful not to overbake! These cookies go from done to overdone in about 30 seconds, so keep an eye out. It is preferable to err on the side of underdone; overdone cookies will be almost too tough to eat.

Let cookies cool before removing from silicone or parchment paper. Makes about 3 1/2 dozen.

Tetu

For the dough:
4 large eggs
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
3 1/2 cups flour
4 tsp baking powder
1 cup sugar
4 tsp cocoa powder
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp ground cloves
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 cup ground, toasted almonds (almonds may be toasted on a stove and ground in a food processor)
4 shots espresso (regular or decaf)

For the icing:
1 cup powdered sugar
1 - 3 tsp Marsala wine
1/2 tsp ground cloves

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Add sugar, eggs, and butter into a bowl and blend until smooth. Add vanilla, toasted almonds, and espresso and mix. Combine dry ingredients in a bowl, then incorporate slowly into the wet mixture. Once batter is well incorporated, roll into meatball sized balls and space evenly on a cookie sheet. Bake at 350 degrees F for 20-25 minutes.

To make the icing, mix together powdered sugar, Marsala, and cloves to make a thin icing, adding more wine if necessary. Drizzle over cooled cookies.

Makes about 2 dozen.

Taralli al Limone

For the dough:
4 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1/4 lb unsalted butter, softened
4 medium eggs
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
pinch of salt
zest of 1 lemon
juice of 1 lemon

For the icing:
1 cup confectioners sugar
juice of 2 lemons
water, if necessary

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Combine sugar, butter, and eggs in a bowl until well mixed. Gently add remaining ingredients until well mixed, being careful not to overmix. Knead the dough gently until all the ingredients are incorporated, then wrap in plastic wrap or foil and refrigerate for at least one hour.

When dough has chilled, remove from the refrigerator and form small balls, about the size of a quarter. Using your hands or a nonstick mat, roll the balls into ropes about 4 inches long. Twist the ropes so that the ends overlap, then place on a cookie sheet.

Bake at 350 degrees F for about 15 minutes, until cookies are firm but not browned. Remove from cookie sheet and let cool. Prepare the icing by mixing the powdered sugar with the wet ingredients, then spoon over the cooled cookies until coated.

Cookies will be crisp when they first come out of the oven, but will soften the next day into a tender biscuit.

Makes three dozen.

Baci di Dama

For the dough:
1 cup toasted and ground almonds (hazelnuts also work well)
1 cup sugar
1 cup softened butter
2 cups flour
1 egg yolk
1 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt

For the filling:

2 oz dark chocolate
1 oz butter

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Mix the softened butter with the sugar, egg yolk, and almonds until smooth. Gradually add wet ingredients until well mixed. Roll the dough into small balls, about the size of marbles. The smaller the balls are, they better they hold their shape, so don't be tempted to make them too large. Place balls on a cookie sheet and bake at 350 degrees F for 10-15 minutes, until lightly golden. Let cookies cool.

While cookies are cooling, prepare the chocolate filling by heating the chocolate and butter in a double boiler until melted. Dip the flat side of one cookie in the chocolate, then sandwich it with another cookie. Let cookies cool.

Makes about three dozen sandwich cookies.

Almond Marshmallows

Ingredients:
3 packages unflavored gelatin
1 cup ice cold water, divided
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 cup light corn syrup
1/4 tsp salt
1-2 tsp almond extract (or any other flavoring)
1/4 cup confectioners' sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
Nonstick spray
Candy thermometer

Place the gelatin into the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, along with 1/2 cup of the water. In a small saucepan combine the remaining 1/2 cup water, sugar, corn syrup and salt. Place over medium heat, clip the candy thermometer to the pan, and cook until the mixture reaches 240 degrees F, approximately 10-12 minutes. Once the mixture reaches this temperature, immediately remove from the heat.

Turn the mixer on low speed and, while running, slowly pour the sugar syrup down the side of the bowl into the gelatin mixture. Once you have added all of the syrup, increase the speed to high. Continue to whip until the mixture becomes very thick and is lukewarm, approximately 12 to 15 minutes. Add the almond extract during the last minute of whipping. While the mixture is whipping prepare the pan.

Combine the confectioners' sugar and cornstarch in a small bowl. Lightly spray a 13 by 9-inch metal baking pan with nonstick cooking spray. Add the sugar and cornstarch mixture and move around to completely coat the bottom and sides of the pan. Return the remaining mixture to the bowl for later use.

When ready, pour the mixture into the prepared pan, using a lightly oiled spatula for spreading evenly into the pan. Dust the top with enough of the remaining sugar and cornstarch mixture to lightly cover. Reserve the rest for later. Allow the marshmallows to sit uncovered for at least 4 hours and up to overnight.

Turn the marshmallows out onto a cutting board and cut into 1-inch squares using a pizza wheel dusted with the confectioners' sugar mixture. Once cut, lightly dust all sides of each marshmallow with the remaining mixture, using additional if necessary. Store in an airtight container for up to 3 weeks.

Makes 2 dozen large marshmallows.

Are You Referring To Alchemy?

2010-12-12T14:40:00.000-08:00

This is where the extra apples go, the ones left over from the farmer's market that we didn't eat in time.

Old apples + chickens = fresh eggs.

This feels like cheating.

How To Field Dress A Pumpkin

2010-11-20T13:32:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving is fast approaching, and for me that primarily means one thing: pumpkin pie. I have very strong feelings about pumpkin pie. Done correctly, the velvety smooth texture and earthy flavor of pumpkin pie just makes me melt. Especially if it's served with a dollop of maple whipped cream. Sigh.

However, a badly done pumpkin pie makes me angry. Very angry. As in She-Hulk rip through my clothes in rage angry. And you wouldn't like me when I'm angry.

I'm not quite sure what drives me to such passionate extremes when it comes to pumpkin pie. Other than the fact, perhaps, that I am just naturally inclined toward passionate extremes. But I think there's also something special, something transcendent about pumpkin pie. You either love it or you hate it. It is the quintessential emblem of Thanksgiving, at least in my cultural lexicon. It comes loaded with emotions and memories before it's even out of the oven.

This time of year, I find myself gravitating towards sugar pumpkins like a planet orbiting small, orange moons. I just can't help myself. I've picked up four already, and considering that a good sugar pumpkin will yield about two small pies, I don't know what I think I'm going to do with eight pumpkin pies. They're just so bright and orange and cheery, and I can't quite resist the idea of a pumpkin pie all neatly packaged up and ready to use. Kind of like canning, only nature does all the work.

Which is a completely ridiculous presumption, because processing a sugar pumpkin into a pie actually does require quite a bit of work. And in the end, the result is delicious... and not quite the same. Most canned pumpkin is not actually pumpkin at all, but squash, which means my Thanksgiving memories are all tangled up with squash pie. That said, processing a pumpkin is a skill worth knowing, and I suspect that over time the authentic version of pumpkin pie will grow in my affections. Homemade pasta sauce tasted weird to me the first time I tried it over Prego, but now I can't go back. I suspect a similar fate awaits me here.

So, here's a nifty zombie skill for you - processing a sugar pumpkin!

To start with, select a nice sugar pumpkin or two. I would recommend organic if you can, and I find that the sugar pumpkins I get at the farmers market are far, far superior to the ones you can get at Trader Joes. There's also a lot of variability among sugar pumpkins - I have had ones with flesh that ranges from deep orange to sunny yellow, so I would ask your friendly pumpkin vendor what they recommend.

Next, rinse the pumpkins well and chop them into quarters, removing the stems. Scoop out the seeds with a spoon. You can save these if you like, and toast them in the oven for a nice snack.

Then place the quartered pumpkins in a large pot, and fill with enough water to cover them completely. Cover the pot, and bring to a boil. Let the pumpkins simmer until the flesh is soft and can easily be pierced with a fork, with a similar consistency to a well done potato. The time this takes can range depending on your pumpkins, but around half and hour is a good estimate.

Once the pumpkins are cooked, drain the water and let them cool. Once they've cooled, the skin will peel off easily. Remove the skin, and place the cooked pumpkin in a bowl. Mash with a potato masher or a stick blender until smooth.

Now, here's a neat little tip - I've found that fresh pumpkin tends to be a little watery compared to the canned variety. So after I've processed it into puree, I pour the pumpkin onto a mesh strainer and let it sit undisturbed for a couple of hours. A lot of the extra fluid will drain off, and you'll get a denser, more flavorful puree.

And after that, it's ready to go! You can substitute it for canned pumpkin in any recipe you choose. But in case you're not ready to make the switch to real pumpkin pie, I've included a recipe here for pumpkin cake with brown butter frosting. Guaranteed not to make you angry.

Pumpkin Cake With Brown Butter Frosting

For the cake:
1/2 cup butter, softened
2 cups cake flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground ginger
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar
2 eggs
3/4 cup pumpkin puree
1/4 cup milk

For the brown butter frosting:
8 Tbs butter
2 cups powdered sugar
2 tsp vanilla
milk, about 1/4 cup

Butter and flour two eight inch cake pans. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Cream the butter and brown sugar together until smooth, then add the eggs, pumpkin, and milk on low speed. Blend until well incorporated. In a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients, then add slowly to the wet ingredients until well mixed.

Pour batter into cake pans, and bake until a knife inserted in the middle comes out clean, about 20-25 minutes. Remove the cakes from their pans and let cool.

In a small saucepan, melt the butter on high heat until it begins to brown. Remove from heat, and strain through a mesh strainer lined with a paper towel to filter out most of the brown sediment. Combine the hot butter with the powdered sugar and vanilla, whisking until smooth. Add milk if necessary to achieve a somewhat thin consistency, then spread immediately on the cooled cakes. The frosting will harden once the butter cools.

Holiday Skill Share!

2010-11-15T13:53:00.000-08:00

The ramp up to the holiday gift giving season is perhaps my favorite time of year, for several reasons. To start with, I get to indulge in plenty of list-making, and I love list-making. It's so strangely satisfying, like Q-tipping your brain.

But this time of year is also a great excuse to give creativity full reign, to make grand plans and ambitious projects. This can be a dangerous thing, at times. Not all of my oh-so-clever do-it-yourself holiday gift giving ideas turn out so well. I've been over my successes and failures before, so if you're interested take a peek. But this year I've decided to focus my creativity laser beam on a new area of my life - social networking.

You see, there are several things I would like to do or obtain regarding this year's gifts, things which I prefer not to pay actual money for. And it struck me that, in Seattle at least, I have a truly massive extended network of handy, crafty, resourceful people. Just to name a few off the top of my head, I have friends that can build a motorcycle, field dress a deer, tan their own leather, can, pickle, and jam like nobody's business, build a boat, captain a boat, sew the sails for a boat, knit, crochet, paint, draw, sculpt, and write, raise their own bees, build a cabinet, build a crib, quilt a blanket, graft a tree, brew beer, make cheese, and bake bread. And I'm sure there are hundreds of other hidden, secret skills that I don't even know about.

So, I put together a little project and invited my friends. The concept is simple. There's a Google spreadsheet, and on it you list your name and location, as well as the skills/goods/services you require this holiday season. Then, you list the skills/goods/services you are willing to exchange for the things you need. For example, I am not a very good knitter, so I would love to commission a skilled and speedy knitter for some small projects. In return, I am offering my whole range of zombie survival skills.

It's a Holiday Skill Share! If you want in, just let me know and I can add you to the invite. The more people join, the sweeter the hookups get.

Share a skill. Damn the Man.

Bringing Sexy (Pie) Back

2010-10-28T12:52:00.000-07:00

It's October, and it seems fall has dug in for good in Seattle. Sunday a big storm blew in from the coast with torrential rain and gale force winds, and I spent an entertaining afternoon at the Ballard Farmers Market trying to keep from lifting off my feet, flying nun-style. Riding into work Monday morning was an invigorating and harrowing journey, as I tried my best to not be blown into oncoming traffic on Eastlake, all the while looking like a burnt marshmallow in my black white and orange rain gear.

It seems we weren't the only ones hit with the wind and rain, though. What's up, Midwest? Still gotcha roofs on?

The upshot, for me at least, is that sales were slim at best at the market on Sunday, and I came away with the very last of this year's plums. My passion for plums has been well documented, so I won't get too lengthy about it here. But I couldn't let the season pass without a few last moments of glory. Plums are the Indian summer of fruits. They're the last stone fruit, lingering after the peaches and nectarines have given up the ghost, and their sweet-tart crimson flesh reminds me that summer will come again, eventually. Even if I do have to spend the next nine months looking like this guy:

So here are my three favorite plum recipes - a pie, a cake, and a sauce. All excellent remedies for the Stay-Puft-Marshmallow-Man blues.

Plum and Cherry Pie, aka "Sexy Pie"

This recipe is not my own. I just want to say that straight up, because it's really good, and I don't want to claim genius where genius isn't due. That said, I can't exactly remember where this recipe first originated, only that it wasn't with me. I do remember that my mother made this first, on a cool fall evening, and it was magic. This pie inspired some of my first canning experiments, and I made this pie for one of the very first dates I had with Kyle. It may or may not have cemented our relationship. It is affectionately known in my circle of friends as "sexy pie."

Ingredients:
5 large plums
1/4 cup dried cherries, chopped
1 Tbs orange liqueur
1/2 cup sugar
1 Tbs flour
A pat of butter

1 pie crust

Slice the plums in half, removing the pits, and place in a medium bowl. Combine with chopped dried cherries, sugar, flour, and orange liqueur, and let rest for half an hour.

In the meantime, roll out one pie crust and place on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper or a silicone baking sheet. In a pinch, a glass pie pan will work as well. Spoon the plum filling into the center of the crust, then fold the edges in. Drop a pat of butter into the center.

Bake at 400 degrees until crust is flaky and golden, about 20-25 minutes.

Plum and Cardamom Cake

This recipe is also not my own; at least, not fully. It's more or less a mashup between this cake and this tart, courtesy of Orangette, with some alterations of my own design.

Credit aside, I really love this cake. It's just right for snacking and nibbling, and the sweet-tart-buttery balance is nice and understated. And what is it about cardamom? It's like the cool side of the pillow of the spice world.

For the cake:

1 cup flour, plus extra for the pan
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1 egg, lightly beaten
5 Tbs cold unsalted butter, plus extra for the pan
pinch of salt
1/2 tsp cardamom
3-4 large plums

For the glaze:
2 large plums, chopped
1/2 cup water
1 tsp lemon juice
3 Tbs sugar
1 tsp vanilla

Butter and flour a cake or tart pan, and set aside.

In a food processor, combine flour, sugar, cardamom, and baking powder, and pulse briefly to mix. Add the butter, and pulse again until the mixture resembles coarse meal. Transfer to a mixing bowl, and add the lightly beaten egg. Incorporate lightly by hand until mixture starts to stick together, then press lightly into the bottom of the buttered and floured pan using wet fingertips.

Slice the plums into wedges, and arrange in a fan pattern on the top of the dough.

Bake for 45 minutes at 350 degrees F. While the cake is baking, prepare the glaze. Add the chopped plums, water, sugar, and lemon juice to a small saucepan, and bring to a low simmer. Cook until plums have softened and the fluid has reduced slightly. Remove from heat, and process in a food processor or with a stick blender until smooth. Add the vanilla.

Once the cake has been in the oven for 45 minutes, remove briefly and add the glaze, spreading it smoothly over the top, then bake for another 15 minutes at 350 degrees F.

Remove from oven, and let cool before serving.

Plum and Ginger Barbecue Sauce

This recipe, finally, is my own. It's something of a work in progress, meaning I completely made it up and may tweak it a little down the road. As it stands, it's a nice savory sauce with just a hint of sweetness. It goes great on pork.

Ingredients:

12 large plum, sliced and pitted
1/3 cup red wine vinegar
1/3 cup water
1 tsp lemon juice
1 Tbs minced ginger
1 Tbs tamarind paste
1 cup chopped shallots
pinch salt
4 Tbs honey
1 Tbs brown sugar
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

Combine plums, vinegar, water, lemon juice, ginger, tamarind paste, and shallots in a saucepan over low heat. Bring to a gentle simmer, and heat until plums soften and break down, about half an hour. Remove from heat, and process with a food processor or stick blender until smooth. Return to heat, add honey, salt, brown sugar, and cayenne pepper, and heat gently until sauce achieves desired consistency.

Makes a little under 1 quart of sauce.

Naan Believer

2010-10-21T20:01:00.000-07:00

The bread journey continues.

And for me, any journey worth having - of any sort, ever - includes naan bread. There's something about it's creamy, chewy, buttery texture that just makes me go all starry-eyed. Naan bread is romantic. It's meant for spicy, sweaty meals eaten with your hands. It makes me want to break into colorful song and dance just thinking about it. Naan. It will make you believe in love.

Naan Bread
Makes about three large flatbreads

Ingredients:
2 cups bread flour
1 teaspoon active dry yeast
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
2 tablespoons of oil
2 1/2 tablespoons plain yogurt
2/3 cup lukewarm water
Butter for grilling
Flour for dusting

In a mixing bowl with a bread hook attachment, add the yeast and warm water and let sit for 10 minutes until foamy. In other bowl, whisk together the bread flour, salt, sugar, oil, and yogurt. Add the flour mixture to the yeast and water, and mix on low speed with the bread hook for about 10 minutes to make a soft, smooth dough. Cover, and let sit in a warm place until doubled in size, from 1-3 hours.

Once bread has doubled, pinch off tennis-ball sized pieces and roll out flat on a floured surface either with a rolling pin or with your hands. The center should be thinner than the edges. Butter a griddle or a cast-iron skillet and grill the naan until browned on both sides.

Serve warm.

Fist-Punching Good

2010-10-20T18:13:00.000-07:00

I'm recently back from two weeks of traveling in which I spanned the entire continental US, reaching two oceans, three coasts, and several far-flung relatives. It was a busy two weeks, but it was an even busier two days leading up to that two weeks. The short weekend I had before I left found me moving into a new place, wrapping up a job, starting and finishing a painting for a friend, and more or less coaxing my rowdy mutt of a life into something of a "Sit! Stay!" position before I left. I also worked my other two jobs those days. Tuesday morning found me boarding a plane with 1.5 hours of sleep and half of a plum and cherry pie in my bag to get me through the day.

I'm telling you all this, because I want you to understand the importance of the fact that within this weekend, I took the time to process twenty pounds of plums into plum jam.

Ridiculous? Perhaps. But have you ever had plum jam? Fresh, homemade plum jam? It's good. It's really really good. It's so godammed good that I want to punch my fist through a wall every time I taste it. It's so good, it's worth boarding a cross-continental flight on 1.5 hours of sleep, content in the knowledge that there are a dozen or so jars of ruby colored sweet-tart jam waiting for you at home.

To further validate the utter deliciousness of plum jam, I should also tell you that these twenty pounds of plums were not given to me for free. No my friends, these plums were bought. With money. Real US currency money. For a produce penny-pincher like me, that's saying something.

But plum jam is so good, that I couldn't bear the thought of going a year without it. It's so good, most days I don't bother to spread it on anything, and instead eat it by the spoonful out of the jar. Like today. With this spoonful of jam right here. Which I ate promptly after I finished taking this picture.

Plum Jam

This jam is so naturally thick, you can go without pectin if you like. I like to add a little pectin myself because it keeps the jam from separating over time.

Whole plums, pitted and halved but with skins on
Water
Sugar
Pectin, optional (as always, low-sugar or no-sugar needed pectin is recommended)

Place the pitted and halved plums in a large pot, and add just enough water to keep the plums from burning on the stove. Turn the burner on low, and gently heat until the plums soften. Bring slowly to a boil, simmering gently until the plums start to break down. With a stick blender or a food processor, process the plums until they are smooth. Put back on the stove, and add sugar until the jam reaches the desired sweetness. Turn the heat off and add fruit pectin if desired, according to the package instructions. Ladle into half-pint jars, and process in a boiling water bath for 15 minutes.

Zombie Virus Goes WiFi

2010-10-10T05:51:00.000-07:00

Whoa, check it out - the Internet has been infected with a zombie virus!

This is amazing, partly because I myself experienced the WiFi zombie virus not five days ago! I was sitting in New York's JFK airport, attempting to connect to the Internet, and there it was: "Free Public WiFi." Naturally I clicked on it, although owning a Mac may have saved my proverbial skin. Since I don't run Windows, and based on the information from the NPR story, I can assume I remain uninfected.

Damn. That's one close brush with zombification!

Almost Booze Time... Almost

2010-09-24T14:19:00.001-07:00

I've got a lengthy post coming up about brewing your own hard cider, but I can't quite post it yet. The contents are fermenting, literally, and I need to wait a little longer to see how things turn out. In the meantime, here are some of the New York Times' best articles on canning and preserving. Enjoy!

Take That, Food Pyramid

2010-09-14T15:49:00.000-07:00

One thing I have discovered in my many canning adventures is that you can almost never have too many pickles. However, when I say "pickles" I am not just referring to sweet and dill cucumber pickles. You can have too many cucumber pickles, or at least theoretically you can. I have not yet reached my limit, but I assume it exists. But pickles in the broader, truer sense of the word - you can never have too many of those.

How can I make so bold a claim? Well, for starters, pickles are just about the perfect snack food. You can make them salty or sweet or spicy, or all three at once. Plus, they're vegetables - so whatever your weakness happens to be, you can indulge while still feeling pretty good about yourself.

Myself, I have a weakness for the salty. I love me the pie and all, but when it comes to a late night snack I am all about the salty. Lately, I've been trying to broaden my spicy tolerance as well. So it's no surprise that these pickles made my hit list this year - dilly beans, and spicy carrot pickles.

These are old standbys of mine, but I made a few alterations this year. Since I was well stocked on refrigerator dill pickles, I got a little more experimental with my dilly beans. I added a spicy pepper and a tablespoon of cayenne powder to each jar, and they look like they are smoldering from the inside. I have a feeling they are going to make the perfect football-watching snack. As for the spicy carrot pickles, I kept the recipe the same (why mess with a great thing?) and just made a whole effin' lot of them. I ditched the little half-pint jars and am now putting away full quarts of these babies. So. Good.

I've posted the spicy carrot pickle recipe before, so I'm just going to link back to the original post. As for the dilly beans, I thought I had posted these before... but I hadn't. What a strange oversight - one which must be corrected. These pickles can be doctored up in any number of ways - cayenne pepper, ginger, wasabi - so feel free to get wacky.

Spicy Carrot Pickles

Dilly Beans

Ingredients:
Green Beans
Dill
Garlic cloves
Hot peppers
Cayenne powder
White vinegar
Pickling salt

Snap the ends off the green beans, and pack them tightly into quart sized mason jars. Add sprigs of dill, garlic cloves, hot pepper, and cayenne to taste. For my dilly beans, I added one hot pepper and 1 Tbs of cayenne - but feel free to experiment.

Make a brine consisting of 4 cups water, 4 cups vinegar, and 1/4 cup pickling salt. This should be enough for 2-3 jars of dilly beans. Bring the brine to a boil, then ladle into the jars. Process in a boiling water bath for 10 minutes.

Bloobs Rule

2010-09-14T14:29:00.000-07:00

Now that Pasta Sauce Weekend 2010 is behind me, I have some catching up to do on my posting. A couple of canning projects snuck in there under the radar that I haven't posted on, most notably blueberry jam, dilly beans, and spicy carrot pickles.

Let's start with blueberry jam, because blueberries are almost at the end of their season and now is definitely the time to pick them up. I have recently learned to love blueberries; like strawberries, I never really appreciated what a good blueberry was until I moved out the the Pacific Northwest. My childhood memories of blueberries were pretty humdrum - they were blue, they were sometimes sweet, sometimes puckeringly tart, and they went mushy pretty quickly. But fresh, local blueberries are just absolute bliss. They're like little bombs of blueberry joy, and I can eat them by the bucketfull.

A couple of weekends ago, I had the good fortune to accompany my friend Rosemary on a secret blueberry reconaissance mission. She had found a secret spot on an overgrown patch of public land, and was generous enough to let me come along. We had to bushwack our way through blackberry stands with gloves and hedge clippers, but our reward was an aged and abandoned old farmstead. There were apple, plum, and pear trees that had been planted long ago and which still bore fruit. Further along, we found a long row of cultivated blueberry bushes, bushes that had clearly been planted with the intention of harvesting.

The afternoon was enlivened by the arrival of one of the strange but seemingly harmless neighbors that border the park; he greeted us by showing up with a bucket, a ladder, and an ecstatically barking dog. He was also drunk as a skunk. But he seemed to want nothing more than to pick blueberries himself, and chat the ears off two young women who were quietly and in tandem keeping an eye on the hedge clippers. Further hijinks ensued when said neighbor came crashing down off his ladder and through the blueberry bush to land face-first in the soft loamy soil. Being drunk and limber, he was unharmed, though Rosemary and I did give him a wider berth after that.

Eventually, we realized that we were picking more berries than we could reasonably bushwack back out of the park, so we called it a day. I came away with a couple of nice bucketfuls of berries and visions of blueberry jam.

Blueberries lend themselves naturally to freezing, and I did pack away a couple of bags in the freezer for use in muffins and pancakes. But blueberry jam is my new favorite thing, and it also happens to be just about the easiest jam you'll ever make. It's great on toast, baked in a cookie, or swirled in yogurt. I have been known to eat it straight out of the jar. What can I say? I'm a bloob person.

Blueberry Jam

Eight pints of blueberries
4 cups water
4 cups sugar
Juice and zest of one lemon
Fruit pectin *

* when buying fruit pectin, always buy the no-sugar needed varieties. My favorite is Pomona's Universal Fruit Pectin, but others will work. Regular fruit pectin will only set with high amounts of sugar.

Rinse and stem the blueberries, then place them in a pot. Add water, sugar, lemon zest, and lemon juice, then bring to a boil. Once berries have reached boiling temperature, simmer gently for a few minutes. Remove from heat, add fruit pectin, and then ladle into pint jars.

Can in a hot water bath for 15 minutes.

Kerr Jars of Fire

2010-09-07T18:48:00.000-07:00

Attention readers: in order to truly appreciate the epic nature of this post, I highly recommend clicking this link. Thank you.

(bah bah bah bah bum bum bum bum)

Oh yes.

Pasta Sauce Weekend 2010 has come to a close. And I think we've all learned a lot from this experience. We're a little bit older, a little bit wiser, and little bit more sleep deprived from tending a hot stove until 1:30 in the morning on a Monday night.

But it was worth it.

Why? Was it because I can now officially say I have canned my body weight in pasta sauce? No.

Was it because I spent Labor Day elbow deep in tomatoes for a solid eighteen hours? No.

Was it because I now have 52 jars of pasta sauce resting in my pantry, which is enough for every week of the year? NO.

It was worth it because I have officially rounded the bend of the canning season, with spectacular success. This was my canning marathon. This was my gold medal race. And it's done.

Now, I don't necessarily recommend commissioning 1oo lbs of tomatoes from your friendly farmer's market vendor unless you really love pasta sauce. But I do really love pasta sauce, and to all the friends and family who have already asked me or are thinking of asking me: yes, I know exactly what I am going to do with all those jars. I am going to eat them. All of them. I commissioned 100 lbs of tomatoes because I am completely capable of eating my own body weight in pasta sauce. So go make your own.

With that in mind, here is this year's sauce recipe, scaled down to a humane 20 lbs. But please, remember to stretch before canning any marathons.

Homemade Pasta Sauce
Makes approximately 10 quarts

Ingredients:
20 lbs tomatoes
3 large onions
2 heads of garlic
2 small cans tomato paste
3 Tbs red wine vinegar
3 Tbs balsamic vinegar
1 1/2 cups sugar *
3/4 cups salt *
1 Tbs red chili flakes
Olive oil
Fresh basil, if desired

* the amount of salt and sugar you will need will vary by the kinds of tomatoes you buy, so start with smaller amounts. Generally, you want a 2:1 ratio of salt to sugar.

Blanch the tomatoes by dipping them in boiling water for 2-3 minutes, until the skins split.

Remove the skins and cut out the stem portion. Chop the tomatoes by hand, in a food processor, or with a stick blender (the stick blender is my preference). Simmer on low heat, stirring occasionally.

While the tomatoes are simmering, chop up the onions and garlic and simmer in olive oil until translucent. Add to the simmering tomatoes, and continue to reduce until the excess water has boiled off and it begins to look like sauce. Add the vinegars, salt, sugar, tomato paste, and red chili flakes. Simmer some more, stirring constantly.

When the pasta sauce is so tasty that you keep sampling it, you know it's done.

Ladle into quart sized mason jars, leaving 1" head space. Can in a hot water bath for twenty five minutes.

My Kind Of Worship. The Delicious Kind.

2010-08-31T22:11:00.000-07:00

So a while back, I posted on the disappearance of the beloved bread dumpster, and of my new found conviction to start making my own bread. I figured out a pretty decent white sandwich bread recipe, but haven't posted any bread-related updates since. You all probably thought I had forgotten about bread, didn't you? Didn't you?

Well shame on you. I have been thinking about bread quite a bit, which has led me to an inevitable conclusion: bread is a tricky, specific science. Now, in case you hadn't noticed, my recipes tend to be an exercise in improvisation; they tend to go something like "mash up fruit, add some sugar, maybe some lemon juice." This is just how I cook. I take great liberties with tasting my food as I make it, and for the most part this works out for me. But baking in general, and bread in particular, is a whole different ballgame. You can't just pull a baking loaf out of the oven, cut a slice, see how it's coming, and then add some more yeast or flour or whatever. It's like a chess match where you have to carefully line up all your pieces in advance before you make your final move.

Which is all just a really long winded way of saying I don't know what the hell I'm doing, so I went out and bought a book.

This book, in fact - The Bread Bible. Last year I was given The Pie and Pastry Bible as a gift, and I was so pleased with the author's approach that I figured I would go ahead and try her book on bread.

The first recipe I wanted to try was for pretzels. I made this choice because:

a.) I love pretzels

b.) they are really easy to make
c.) as an added bonus to being a soap maker, I happen to have a lot of extra lye lying around.

You see, the secret to a really good pretzel is a lye wash. You can make them without it of course, but you won't get that same dark, tender crust. The recipe I followed suggested using an egg wash to subsitute for lye if you don't want to make that commitment, but I would highly recommend giving it a shot. If you can find it, lye is quite cheap, and nothing is quite so satisfying as the perfect pretzel.

As an added bonus, the leftover lye wash is just fantastic for clearing out clogged drains. The perfect pretzel, and a free flowing shower drain? It's a win-win. In fact, it would be hard for me to imagine a more blissful experience than enjoying one of these pretzels while taking a hot shower.

Hmm. Give me a moment with that thought.

Aaaaaand I'm back.

Homemade Super Pretzels
Makes two large pretzels

I've tweaked this recipe a little from the one that appears in The Bread Bible, so feel free to try out both variations. I think my variation lends itself a little better to large pretzels and pretzel loaves, but to each his own.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups bread flour

3/4 tsp instant yeast

1 1/8 tsp salt

1/2 cup warm water

1 Tbs melted butter, plus more for buttering a cookie sheet

Large grained sea salt

For the lye wash:

1 tsp lye

1 cup cold water

In a mixing bowl, whisk together flour and yeast, then gently whisk in salt (the yeast and salt should avoid direct contact as much as possible). Attach a dough hook to the mixer, and set on a low speed. Slowly add the warm water and melted butter. The dough should be stiff and fairly dry, and it should take several minutes to incorportate completely. If the dough is too dry, add a little bit more water. Let the dough mix at low speed for about seven minutes.

While the dough is mixing, lightly butter a cookie sheet.

When the dough has finished, remove from mixing bowl and divide into two pieces. Knead briefly, then shape into two balls. Roll the balls lightly on the buttered cookie sheet to gently coat in butter, place back on the cookie sheet, then set in a warm place to rise for 1 hour.

After the hour is done, roll each dough ball out into a long rope. This must be done fairly quickly, because the more you handle the dough the more it will want to spring back into a ball. Twist the rope into a pretzel shape, then place back on the buttered cookie sheet. Alternately, you can mold the dough out into a football shaped loaf, or any other shape you desire.

Let the dough rise for another half hour, then place in the refrigerator for an hour to stiffen.

When the dough is chilled, mix your lye bath. Pick a non-reactive container - glass or stainless steel. You must be very careful to never touch lye with your bare skin, as even a single grain will burn. I recommend thick rubber gloves, the kind you might use for washing dishes. Mix 1 tsp of lye with 1 cup of cold water. DO NOT USE HOT WATER. This is because once lye comes into contact with water, a chemical reaction ensues that releases a lot of heat - if the water is already hot, it might boil. Once the water and lye are mixed, set aside and let cool a bit.

When you're ready, take the pretzels out of the fridge. Dip them into the lye bath (the gloves come in handy here again - also, stainless steel tongs will work), coating every side, and place immediately back on the cookie sheet. Sprinkle with sea salt while they are still wet, then immediately place in an oven which has been heated to 400 degree F.

Bake for about 13-18 minutes, depending on the size and thickness of your pretzels. They are ready when they have a caramel-colored crust.

They are best served warm. Or in the shower.

The First One's Free

2010-08-31T17:20:00.001-07:00

Well, with "summer" officially drawing to a close here in Seattle, I've got a lot of posting to do. First, let's start with refrigerator pickles.

Pickling cukes are in season right now. Go get some! Right now! NO REALLY RIGHT NOW. They are impossible to find once the season is over, and people have been so into canning and pickling this year that they are flying off the stands.

Plus, refrigerator pickles are just about the easiest thing ever to make. If you are intimidated about starting down this whole canning path, refrigerator pickles are your gateway drug. They are simple, quick, almost fail proof, and one taste and you'll be hooked.

So go ahead. Try them.

All it takes is some salt, vinegar, cucumbers, dill, and a garlic clove or two. And, if we're being honest, a chunk of refrigerator space. Now, I've tried many ways to make dill pickles last at room temperature. But I really am a fan of that salty, briny crunch that you can only get from refrigerator pickles. Also, I am a fan of not poisoning my friends through botulism. So suck it up and clean out the fridge. These are so delicious that they probably won't be taking up space for very long.

Refrigerator Pickles

Ingredients:
Roughly 5 lbs pickling cucumbers, give or take
3 cups white vinegar
3 cups water
1/4 pickling salt
Garlic cloves
Fresh dill (I like the kind that has gone into bloom)

Bring the water, vinegar, and salt to a boil, then remove from heat and let cool slightly.

Wash the cucumbers thoroughly, then slice length wise into spears, cutting off any stems or blossoms. Pack into quart mason jars with a sprig of dill and a couple of garlic cloves.

Pour the cooled brine solution over the cucumbers, filling to the top. Screw lids on top, and place immediately in the fridge.

Let the pickles cure for about a month before eating.

Spoiler Alert

2010-08-19T15:50:00.000-07:00

It started innocently enough. All I wanted to do, all I had planned to do, was go to the Wednesday Wallingford farmer's market and pick up some cucumbers. I had modest plans to make some refrigerator dill pickles, and pickling cucumbers are in the peak of their season. I ended up stopping to chat for a while, one thing led to another, and I ended up bringing home a couple pounds of pickling cucumbers as planned, but also three pounds of dark cherries, a flat of blueberries, and forty pounds of apricots.

Sigh.

I think it's pretty obvious by now what my mortal weakness is. If I am ever in a super hero battle for humanity, all my nemesis has to do is wave a crate of ripe produce in front of me and threaten to throw it away. I would be putty in his nefarious hands.

So, my apologies to my family and friends: you will be getting canned goods as gifts this year. Fortunately for me, most of my friends seem to be moving in together or getting married, so I have some good excuses for gift giving. But I can't promise these won't turn up during other major holidays such as Christmas, New Years, Boxing Day, Arbor Day, Flag Day, and National Watermelon Day. Consider yourself warned.

Goddamn You Presidents Of The United States Of America

2010-08-10T22:00:00.000-07:00

Millions of peaches.

Peaches for me.

Millions of peaches.

Peaches for free.

You know, I always hated that song. But I can't find a more apt description of last weekend than that, and it's been running through my head on a fairly continous (-ly annoying) loop.

What happened, you might ask, so inspire such musical musings? The Saturday Puyallup Farmer's Market, is what. I usually only work the Sunday Ballard Farmer's Market, but last weekend I agreed to fill in for someone and work both days. It made for a busy weekend, but nice. I actually enjoyed getting out of the city for a bit, and the Puyallup Farmer's Market couldn't be more different than Ballard. The Ballard market has the feel of an open-air Whole Foods - everything is organic and local, there are booths selling gourmet kombucha and soy-based candles, and the crowd is more or less the Whole Foods set. Which is mostly a completely pleasant experience, but can occasionally be irritating. Such as when customers harangue us about whether chemicals have at any time in the history of the world been in contact with our soil.

So it was an interesting change of pace to head over to the Puyallup market. Instead of soy-based candles and raw-food bars, vendors were selling quilt raffle tickets and things fried on sticks. We didn't get a single question about whether our food was organic, local, or even ours - apparently, many of the "farmers" at the Puyallup market just buy wholesale produce from large distributors and re-package it as fresh from the farm. But despite that last eye-opener, I enjoyed myself quite a bit. This market reminded me of markets back in the Midwest, and there was an entirely different crowd for people watching.

But I'll cut to the chase. The day ended with three full boxes of over-ripe peaches, boxes which were gifted to me in exchange for some sort of pie product in return. Just for reference, that's approximately sixty pounds of peaches. Just for further reference, I myself weigh approximately one hundred pounds. So, essentially I took home 60% of my body weight in peaches.

I would also like to state that these were cling peaches, not freestones. So even if they weren't a couple of hours from mush, they would be no good for canning. I sliced up a good box and a half and froze them for later use in pies, but that still left me with a good twenty or so pounds of peaches to use up.

I managed to rope my housemate Mary into taking some for the purposes of making peach salsa, and I put together a giant peach cobbler for Sunday dessert. But what to do with the rest?

The idea actually came to me from a friend, who suggested I temper my blackberry picking addiction by making these. Beautifully crafted, individual pies in mason jars is a great idea - if you're making five. I however, came back from the store with thirty six mason jars and two hours of spare time. My solution was individual, single serving peach cobblers. It's way easier and cheaper than making pie, and you can crank these out in no time. All I had to do was slice up the peaches in a big bowl, add sugar, flour, vanilla, and a splash of whiskey, spoon them into the jars, and drop a big buttermilk biscuit on top. Screw on the lids, pop them in the freezer, and blamo! Single serving peach cobblers.

Suh-weet.

Single Serving Peach Cobblers

Makes 12

For the filling:

8 - 12 peaches, pitted and sliced (will depend on size of peaches - adjust accordingly)
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup flour
1 tsp vanilla
1 Tbs whiskey
Half pint wide-mouth mason jars

Buttermilk biscuits (from Epicurious):

3 cups all purpose flour
2 tablespoons sugar
4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup (1 1/2sticks) chilled unsalted butter, cut into 1/4-inch pieces
1 cup buttermilk

Slice up the peaches in a bowl, letting the juice settle to the bottom. When all the peaches are sliced, spoon them into the mason jars, letting the juice remain in the bowl. Add sugar, flour, vanilla, and a dash of whiskey to the juice, mixing to create a sweet paste. Spoon the paste over the peaches.

To make the biscuits, whisk flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and baking soda in large bowl. Cut up the butter into dry ingredients and mix with forks or a pastry blender until mixture resembles coarse meal. Add buttermilk and stir until evenly moistened.

Drop biscuits into the mason jars, leaving enough room to fasten the lid. Freeze immediately. When ready to eat, preheat the oven to 375 degrees and bake until the biscuit is golden brown.

She Hits Because She Hates

2010-08-02T21:30:00.000-07:00

I have a confession. I'm not exactly sure how to say this, so I'll just come out with it. I kind of love Martha Stewart.

Wait, don't leave! I can explain. You see, I love the real Martha Stewart, not the television and magazine persona. I love that there's crazy-eyed murderbeast lurking just beneath that glassy smile. I love that if Martha Stewart and I got into a fist fight, she would totally kick my ass. I love that she has built a billion-dollar empire out of being an obsessive-compulsive basket case. What can I say? I feel like in some small way, we're kindred souls. I want to take Martha Stewart out to tea, pat her on the hand, tell her I understand, then go drink Irish car bombs together and throw water balloons at Oprah's house.

If and when the zombie apocalypse comes, I want to be on team Martha Stewart.

So imagine my delight when I was perusing the Martha Stewart website and came across this recipe. Old Bachelor's Jam seems innocent enough at first glance, until you realize Martha has pumped a full shot of hard liquor into each and every jar. This is awesome, not only because it's a recipe for booze-soaked jam, but it also confirms my suspicion that beneath that waspy exterior, Martha has the spirit and soul of a surly, drunken sailor.

Considering that the blackberry bush outside my house is still producing, and I still feel compelled to make things with said berries (I stopped myself at twenty-nine jars of pie filling), and I relish any opportunity to add booze to a recipe, I decided to give Old Bachelor's Jam a shot. My version was kind of a poor man's Old Bachelor's Jam (which just feels like a redundant description), stripped down to include just blackberries, sugar, and booze.

I debated the booze selection for some time, weighing between taste, alcohol content, and affordability. There are many options; my housemate Mary, who joined me for an evening of jamming, chose Chambord for her OBJ. Chambord is a sweet, raspberry and currant flavored liqueur that went wonderfully with the blackberries. I wanted something with a little stronger alcohol content and more of a punch, so I chose Applejack, a slightly sweet whiskey style liquor made from fermented cider.

Fast forward a couple of hours and some tipsy jam-tasting, and I now have twenty-three half-pint jars of blackberry Old Bachelor's Jam, or Booze Jam for short. And I can tell you, it packs quite a punch. Considering a half-pint jar is about the size of a cocktail glass, and there's a full shot of Applejack in each one... I've essentially made the equivalent of a jam cocktail.

The breakfast of champions.

I like to think Martha would be pleased with my efforts. Momentarily, at least, until she punches me in the teeth for making unneccesary eye contact. Oh, Martha. I love you so.

It's Called Enabling

2010-07-18T18:45:00.000-07:00

Earlier on this year, through an intricate process of networking, pleading, and otherwise harassing, I managed to land myself a gig working the Sunday farmer's market in Ballard. This meant, among other things, that I am now working a total of three jobs - one full time, two part time - six days a week. But the upshot is that I get paid to hang around and talk to people about fruit. And eat fruit. And then take home a bunch of fruit at the end of the day.

Needless to say, this has provided some interesting fuel for my canning addiction. I get access to all my usual standbys, either through direct supply or bartering - asparagus for pickling, peaches and plums for pies, tomatoes for sauce - but it also means I am presented with some unforeseen opportunities. Such as a whole box of over-ripe apricots.

Now, I've never done much with apricots in the past. But I can't let good, fresh produce go to waste, especially when it's offered to me for free. So I toted home my box of little orange gems, not entirely sure what their fate was to be. I have more than enough jam for the year, and I wasn't so sure I could make a successful apricot pie filling. My solution?

Apricot sauce.

I wanted to make something versatile, something that I could spoon onto french toast, ice cream, or roasted chicken, and I think I found a recipe that worked. Judging by the fact that I made an entire meal out of licking the ladle clean, it's at least tasty.

Such is the way of life. I didn't plan for apricots this season, but now that they've arrived I can't seem to stop glancing at my little jars of sauce with excitement and satisfaction. They're my favorite item on my canning shelf - at least until the next unexpected opportunity comes along.

Apricot Sauce

Ingredients:

Apricots
Honey
Lime Juice
Sugar
Cayenne Pepper

Halve the apricots and remove stones, then place them in a large pyrex baking dish. Generously drizzle with honey, then roast at 425 for 30-40 minutes.

Remove apricots and honey from pyrex dish, using a spatula to get all the juice, and place in a large saucepan. On low heat, bring to a gentle simmer, stirring constantly. Add sugar, lime juice, and cayenne pepper to taste. A small amount of cayenne will give you a sweet and tangy sauce, a larger dose will give you a spicier sauce - it's your choice. For my recipe, I was generous with the lime juice and added only about a teaspoon of cayenne.

When apricot sauce is thick, blend until smooth with either a stick blender or a food processor.

Ladle the sauce into pint jars, leaving 1/2 headspace. Can in a boiling water bath for 15 minutes.

Berry Thievery

2010-07-13T13:44:00.001-07:00

It has been well documented on this blog that I am an avid urban "forager." I am using quotes there (both literal and figurative - I am making air quotes with my fingers as I type this), because really, I think that's just a trendy moniker for stealing. I am not ashamed of my fruit stealing, because I have a certain code of ethics about it. I only steal fruit that will otherwise be wasted or gone unpicked. Cherries from the very tops of the trees, or plums that are falling off the tree at the back of the parking lot behind Phinney Market. You know, that kind of thing. Naturally, this year has been no exception.

Recently, our across the street neighbor sold all his worldly possessions and moved onto his boat. We have a good relationship with this neighbor - I bring him pies, and in exchange he lets me pick blackberries off his hedge, and apples from his tree in the fall. But now he was up in Everett on his boat, which is outside of my pie home delivery radius.

It had also not escaped my attention that said neighbor had a nice raspberry patch sprawling along the far side of his yard. I had received the verbal go-ahead to pick whatever I wanted, but again that was last year, when pies were part of the equation.

Ultimately though, I realized that pie or no pie, nobody was coming along to pick berries from an empty house.

Nobody. Except me.

What can I say? I am very fond of raspberries. I cannot bear to see them go to waste. Never mind that I gave the realtor a nasty shock when she found me crouched in the yard, colander full of berries, smiling and waving. In true Seattle passive aggressive fashion, she simply backed out of the driveway, pulled around the corner, and waited for me to leave without exchanging a word. Ah well. More raspberries for me then.

And thanks to a south facing hedge and a few days that topped in the 80's, I was also able to harvest the first batch of blackberries. I have great ambitions for this year's blackberry harvest, so I am hoping to pack away half a dozen jars of blackberry pie filling every week for the next month or so. It was a great start.

Raspberry Jam

Ingredients:

Fresh raspberries
Lemon juice
Sugar to taste
Fruit pectin

Smash the raspberries together with sugar, lemon juice, and fruit pectin. Cook on very low heat until the berries begin to melt together and have the consistency of jam. Pack into jars leaving 1/2 inch headspace, and process in a boiling water bath for 10 minutes.

Blackberry Pie Filling

Ingredients:

Blackberries
Sugar syrup
White vinegar
Tapioca pearls

Pack blackberries into quart sized mason jars, smashing them down with a wooden spoon as you go. Fill to almost 2/3 full, then add 2 Tbs tapioca pearls per jar.

To make sugar syrup, combine sugar and water in a 1:1 ratio (in other words, one cup sugar for every cup water) and bring to a boil. Add a dash of white vinegar.

Fill the jars to within 1 inch of the top with sugar syrup. Using a wooden spoon or chopstick, mix the syrup in with the berries. Top off the jars with more sugar syrup, leaving 1/2 inch headspace.

Process in a boiling water bath for 20 minutes.

DIY Pad Thai

2010-06-30T14:09:00.000-07:00

It is no secret to my friends and family that I love Pad Thai. Every time we go out to eat at a Thai place - and I mean EVERY time - I inevitably end up ordering Pad Thai. It's not that I don't like other Thai dishes. It's just that I love Pad Thai so much. I've received a certain amount of gentle ribbing for this, but the taste buds want what the taste buds want.

So, imagine my surprise when I found myself in a Thai restaurant in Bellingham, staring at a menu that enigmatically offered me two options:

Pad Thai

Pad Thai (Thai style)

Whaaa?? My mind broke a little in that moment. Two Pad Thai's? What to do?

I ordered the Pad Thai (Thai style). I took the red pill. I went down that rabbit hole.

Turns out, what I had been blithely enjoying as Pad Thai was more or less the equivalent of putting ketchup on spaghetti. Pad Thai as most restaurants serve it is a less than authentic version involving tomato paste. Pad Thai (Thai style) is a more intense, brinier version made with fish sauce and no tomato and is SO. MUCH. BETTER.

Of course, now I was ruined from Pad Thai (not Thai style). And since driving the hour and a half to Bellingham every time I had a Pad Thai fix was not a very efficient plan, I realized with grim determination that I would have to learn to make this myself.

The internet was suspiciously unhelpful in this regard. Suspiciously.

Eventually though, after much experimenting, I believe I have replicated the magic Thai style Pad Thai recipe. But proceed with caution! This recipe doesn't quite taste like the restaurant version. It's tangier, brinier, with more of a kick. It's also addictingly good. Right now, I am thinking about getting my next fix. So be warned: if you love restaurant Pad Thai, you might not like this. Or, you will love it so much that you will be forever ruined from Pad Thai (whatever style). Which has been my bittersweet fate.

Pad Thai (Thai style)

This recipe is for a single serving, so multiply as necessary

Ingredients:

Pad Thai rice noodles
1-2 eggs
Chopped cabbage
Slivered carrots (or spicy carrot pickles)
Green onions
Bean sprouts
Chopped peanuts
Meat or tofu of choice (optional)
Garlic or ginger (optional)
Vegetable oil
Chili powder to taste

For the sauce:
1 Tbs tamarind paste (the really thick kind)
1 Tbs fish sauce * (see note)
1 Tbs rice wine vinegar
3 Tbs sugar
1 cup water

* Not all fish sauces are created equal, it seems. My favorite is this brand, but if that's not available then go with what you've got.

To start, bring a pot of water to boil on the stove. While the water is heating, cook the meat or tofu of your choice in a large skillet. Remove from skillet and set aside; in the same pan , combine the ingredients for the sauce and heat gently, stirring.

In a small skillet, cook the eggs into an omelet, then set aside.

When the water comes to a boil, remove from heat and let cool briefly. Add the rice noodles for a short time, 1-3 minutes, just until they become flexible. Drain the noodles, then add to the skillet with the sauce. Toss in the cabbage, carrots, and green onions (but not the eggs!).

Simmer gently on low heat, turning the noodles so that they cook evenly. When the noodles are tender, remove immediately from the heat and drizzle with vegetable oil to keep them from getting gummy.

Add the meat/tofu, eggs, and bean sprouts, and sprinkle with chopped peanuts. Serve with a lime wedge.

Never look back.

She Was Always A Loner....

2010-06-30T13:48:00.001-07:00

Canning season is officially in full swing! This may not come as news to you, if you happen to live in a region where June is actually warm. But summer has been long and slow in coming this year to the Pac Northwest. It should be here any minute. Aaaaannnyyy minute.

But at least some things are thriving, notably strawberries and rhubarb. I had the good fortune to sample some of the best strawberries I have ever tasted this year, and the even better fortune of being gifted an entire flat of them. I was so excited that I made Kyle hold them in his lap on the ride home, like a puppy.

A quick digression - it was not until this year that I fully, truly understood that strawberries are supposed to be sweet. And red, all the way through. And, truth be told, small. The only strawberries we would reliably get in the Midwest were beefy, tart monsters from California that lost their redness and sweetness halfway through.

But I have to say, strawberries in the Pac Northwest this year have been an entirely different animal. A sweet, juicy, crimson animal. Consider myself schooled.

But of course, such a delicate, tender berry is not meant to last very long. So my canning season this year was marked by a burst of red, and what must have been a strange sight to my roommates - coming home to find me in the kitchen, knife in hand, covered in a viscous red juice.

But there were no casualties this time, only delicious delicious creations. Both of which, turns out, are just about as simple as can be.

Strawberry Rhubarb Jam

Ingredients:

Strawberries

Rhubarb

Sugar

Some lemon juice if you feel like it

Cut up the strawberries and rhubarb, put them in a pot. Add some sugar. Wait a half hour or so to let the sugar leech some of the moisture out of the rhubarb, then set on very low heat. Once things begin to soften, you will need to stir to keep from burning. Cook as long as you see fit, add as much sugar as you see fit. Maybe some lemon juice. Taste liberally.

Can in a hot water bath for 15-20 minutes.

Strawberry Freezer Jam

Ingredients:

Strawberries

Sugar

Fruit Pectin

Remove the stems from the strawberries, then combine with sugar and fruit pectin in a bowl. Mash with a potato masher until everything looks jammy. Taste liberally. Put in jars, then put the jars in the freezer. Thaw only when you're ready to eat it.

And So It Came To Pass

2010-06-30T13:42:00.000-07:00

Ok, so JP's comment is getting a little more eerie, now that there's actually a hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico, muddling up what's left to muddle in an already botched cleanup effort.

We just need a simulataneous nuke/lightning strike, and we're good to go.

The Meaning of Smote

2010-06-16T13:24:00.000-07:00

Oh my god, it actually happened.

I don't know if any of you check my comments section, but after my post on the nuking the BP oil spill, reader JP left a cheeky comment about lightning striking the spill and unleashing a fiery, radioactive apocalypse upon New Orleans.

Which apparently isn't so far from the truth.

It seems that yesterday lightning struck one of the BP drill ships trying to contain the spill, and briefly ignited the ship on fire, halting containment operations.

This is getting pretty Old Testament, if you ask me. If BP executives start getting boils and sores, then I think it's time to build a wooden boat and head for high ground.

Canning School For Dudes

2010-06-12T13:10:00.000-07:00

So a while back, Kyle mentioned that some guys from his boatbuilding school might be interested in learning how to can. I had been mulling over the idea of teaching some of my guy friends how to can for some time, so I jumped at the opportunity. Overall, I find that men are much more interested in canning right now than women. I think the heavy sense of domesticity canning evokes still gives some women the heebie jeebies - you know, slaving over a hot stove and all that. But in general I find that men are intrigued at the idea, and I was curious to see how this trial run might go.

I'm not sure how the guys felt about it, but I had a blast. We started the day at the U District farmers market, picked up some goodies, headed back to the kitchen, and dug into some samples from last year's goods. Then we got to work on making pickled asparagus spears, spicy carrot pickles, and strawberry rhubarb jam.

Midway through, we took a break and ate some pie, from filling I had put up from last season.

By noon, we had half a dozen jars each bubbling away on the stove, and we took another break to sample my homemade pasta sauce. By the time we wrapped up at 12:45, the guys had a neat little stash of pickles and jam, and I snuck a jar of crabapple butter into each of their boxes (I have to get rid of those somehow).

And Waffles Shall Be Had By All

2010-06-08T18:19:00.001-07:00

Sometimes friends come into your life, and sometimes they go. Hopefully, that parting is a joyous one, the kind where you'll be sure to meet again. And sometimes that parting requires a homemade tote bag and pillow in the shape of a waffle. Because nothing says "until we meet again" quite like a waffle.

Summer Reading Assignments

2010-06-08T13:12:00.000-07:00

No time for a lengthy update, so here's a nice gem from the New York Times today: a detailed book list for the best of DIY cooking. Apparently, there's been a run on books about preserving, pickling, and curing, as well as general farm-to-table type stuff, and the Times has collected the cream of the crop. Check it out!

Stanley Kubrick Would Have Had A Field Day With This

2010-06-04T13:25:00.000-07:00

So, unless you've had your head underwater for the last 47 days, you are probably aware that there is a massive envrionmental disaster happening in the Gulf of Mexico. And, truth be told, even if you did have your head underwater you would probably be aware of the disturbingly large oil slick above you. You know, the one that can be seen from space.

If this wasn't so tragic, then BP's botched attempts to deal with this disaster might be kind of funny. I mean, really, they're just making this up as they go along. Which is fine if you're a high school sophomore hastily scribbling a lab report on the back of a roll of paper towels, but rather inappropriate when you're a multi-national corporation that holds the health and safety of millions of people and countless ecosystems in its hand. It's pretty apparent that they had no feasable plan in place for dealing with a disaster of this magnitude. And hey, you know, I've been there. I've burned my share of pot roast before a dinner party and have had to improvise on the spot. But me burning a pot roast did not result in the economic devastation of a region already addled by natural disaster and poverty, as well as the possible extinction of dozens of marine species. So I'm not really inclined to be sympathetic to BP at this point.

As of today's posting, it looks like maybe, maybe they've stemmed some of the flow. But I couldn't let this event pass without pointing out a particularly notable contingency plan. Notable in the fact that it is completely and frighteningly insane. I'm pretty sure this suggestion originated on the Internet, probably the blogosphere, but it apparently got such an enthusiastic response that government officials had to officially declare it "crazy."

What is this, of which I speak? Nuking the oil well.

This is just about the stupidest thing I've heard since people suggested we nuke hurricanes as a way to prevent Katrina-type disasters. I mean, can we back up a minute here and all agree that we're trying to prevent an environmental disaster? Yes, nuking the oil well would probably be an effective way of sealing it off. It would also be an effective way of killing just about everything within a few hundred miles, and potentially contaminating the entirety of the world's oceans. Remember that thing called the Gulf Stream? You know, the giant underwater current that flows through the Gulf of Mexico, across the Altantic towards Africa, up the European coast, across the Atlantic again, and down the Eastern seaboard? That's the giant stirring spoon in the cup of coffee we call our oceans. So please don't drop some toxic, radioactive sugar in my coffee. It's oily enough already.

Anyway, I do have faith that America, well at least the Obama administration, is not going to nuke the oil spill. But it does trouble me that people might actually consider this as a viable solution to this problem...

Here's Jonny!

2010-05-25T19:04:00.000-07:00

So my friend Jonny Ursin (see picture, below) has generously offered to write a guest post on how to make your own granola! It's delicious, easy, and iconic. Thanks Jonny!

Homemade Granola!

Ingredients:
2 cups oatmeal
1/4 – 1/2 cup honey*
1/4 - 1/2 cup brown sugar
4 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 bag of spiced tea or 1 heaping tablespoon of loose**
2/3 cups of your favorite nuts***
2/3 cups raisins or other small dried fruit (optional)

Tools:
Parchment paper****
Baking pan
Spatula
Large fan
Small bowl
Large mixing bowl
Measuring cups
Watch or other time piece with a second hand

Directions:

1) Start by preheating the oven to 375 and getting all necessary ingredients and tools out (see figure 1).

Figure 1

2) Now in a large mixing bowl mix together the dry ingredients, after doing this add the oil and for easy pourability and mixability microwave the honey. It is an amazing coincidence that the time it takes to quickly put away all the dry ingredients is the exact amount of time the honey needs to be microwaved. After cleaning up a bit take the honey out of the microwave, pour it on top of the oaty mixture and mix everything up until it looks evenly distributed.

3) Now place down the parchment paper on the baking sheet and evenly spread the uncooked granola (see figure 2). Place the pan in the oven and without pause set your time piece for seven minutes!

Figure 2

4) At seven minutes you will take the granola out of the oven. Give the granola a good stir try and get all the brown crispy parts that have stuck to the parchment paper up. If you miss any these parts they will end up getting burned later. Place the granola back in the oven and set your time piece for five minutes.

5) At five minutes you will need to check the granola regularly. This is where granola making crosses the line from science to art. You need to follow the granola and your intuition. Good granola is browned over like a perfect campfire marshmallow, you may need to stir it again, maybe not. But keep an eye on it because like that marshmallow it can burn in an instant. One good way for beginners to make granola is to double the recipe. It slows down the cooking process allowing for a larger margin of error but the added thickness will also leave some chunks of granola unbrowned.

* This recipe is for a nice flavorful granola, focusing on the textures, the spices, and the oatiness of it all. Doubling the honey and brown sugar will turn this recipe into what is known as a dessert granola. One time I made two identical batches of granola except for the level of sweetness. I was disgusted with how much more popular the sweet stuff was. I am not much of a sweet tooth and I will take this opportunity to be a snob about it.

** Good teas to think about are Market Spice Tea which is infused with cinnamon and orange extract, or chai teas which have lots of spices, be crazy and experiment, you can also substitute tea for 1 teaspoon vanilla extract and 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon or whatever spice you might love.

*** You can use almost any kind of nut but whole almonds won’t bake - too much volume for too little surface area - so if you love almonds get sliced or slivered almonds. Likewise large nuts like whole pecans or hazelnuts can easily be crushed down to pea-size chunks.

**** I’ve been using the same sheet of parchment paper for about six months now. I lovingly fold it up and place it back into the wrap drawer. The parchment paper will get oily with repeated use and eventually parts of it will crack and break at the folds which is when it is time to rip a new piece of parchment paper from the carton.

Going To The Birds

2010-05-24T21:12:00.001-07:00

A while back I promised to post some results from my egg tempera experiments, and I finally feel good enough about the results to put them up on the Interwebs for all to see and scrutinize.

In case you missed that post, egg tempera is my latest art experiment, and it signals a major medium change from what I've usually worked with. But something about egg tempera really appeals to me - maybe it's the ancient tradition, maybe it's the soft, semi-gloss texture, or maybe it's just because it is so 'effin DIY.

I mean, really - creating art worthy paint out of powder and egg yolk? It makes me feel like tapping some trees for syrup and whittling a shotgun from a piece of driftwood.

And while I am doing this on a small scale (really, really small), apparently this overall concept can be used for making vast quantities of paint. Like interior house paint. I have no idea where anyone would get that many eggs, but assuming you live in the company of 60 or so egg laying chickens and have a real bone to pick with Home Depot, this could be an attractive option.

I thought of posting a tutorial, but really this website does it pretty well, and it saves me the trouble. So if you want to learn, just check them out. They also have a nice list of what pigments are safe and what pigments are toxic.

Anyway, here is a photo of one of my latest pieces:

In an interesting twist, I can't seem to stop painting sparrows. I have about 6 paintings so far, and have at least another 5 in the works, so I can only assume that given enough time and eggs I will completely blanket my walls in a flock of tiny, gilded sparrows. I've set up another blog to talk about my art, so I won't wax too long about it here. But my nephews already know me as Crazy Aunt Maria, so I can only speculate what creating a sparrow army is going to do to boost my street cred on that one.

Food ForWannaRideBikes?

2010-05-18T13:58:00.000-07:00

I was randomly trolling CNN yesterday, which is unusual because I rarely check their website as I find the layout kind of headache-inducing. But I had a few minutes to kill, and I wound up stumbling across this article. Apparently, there is a significant correlation between certain pesticide residues in food and development of ADHD in children.

This article didn't give me the specifics of who conducted this study, only that it was published in Pediatrics, but it seems legit. I would like to see what researchers were involved, and where they come from, but a Google Scholar search didn't turn up the article either. So I'll have to hunt this one down the old fashioned way.

But it does make food for thought, or rather food for scattered, hyperactive thought.

Short And Sweet

2010-05-16T20:56:00.000-07:00

Breakfast pies.

Why didn't I think of this sooner?

So. Much. Crabapple.

2010-05-12T20:37:00.000-07:00

So it is swiftly becoming summer, with rather shocking rapidity. It's mid-May, already? Yikes.

This means, among other things, that I damn well better get moving on eating all the canned goods I still have stashed away from last year. I can't seem to help it - I'm a hoarder. Every year, I make enough canned goods to feed a family of four, and then meticulously ration them out to myself as if I truly am hiding out from the zombie apocalypse. A cursory glance at my canning cupboard revealed four quarts of pasta sauce, a smattering of blueberry jam, dilly beans, carrot pickles, twelve jars of pie filling, and two dozen jars EACH of crabapple jelly and crabapple butter.

Anyone out there want some crabapple jelly or crabapple butter? I think I have some to spare. Maybe.

However, even if you don't have a small nation's worth of canned goods lurking in your pantry, it is officially pie season. Yes, that's right - pie season. Pie season opens with rhubarb in the spring and ends with pumpkin in the fall, and this year's opening shots have officially been fired. With that in mind, I thought I would post an addendum to my all-butter pie crust recipe. I have had the long winter months to tweak this, and I feel like I've made some nice improvements. Be warned: this crust has so much butter that it tends to "weep" butter when you bake it, which will in turn smoke out your whole kitchen unless you place a cookie sheet underneath the pie. But trust me, the smoke inhalation is so totally worth it.

Maria's All-Butter Pie Crust (Improved)

Ingredients:

1 cup butter, cold (2 sticks)
2 1/2 cups flour
pinch of salt
pinch of sugar
ice water

Immediately after removing the butter from the fridge, cut it up and add it to a medium sized bowl. Add in the flour, salt, and sugar, and break the butter up using two forks or a pastry blender.

Here is important step #1: Don't overmix the butter! Just break it up into smallish chunks, about the size of peas.

Slowly add ice water, and mix by hand until the dough just sticks together. Loosely form into ball, then immediately wrap in wax paper or tin foil, and put in the fridge.

Important step #2: Let the dough chill completely, through and through, before working with it again. The idea behind this is to keep the butter cold at all times, thus preventing it from overmixing with the flour. If you overmix the butter, you'll end up with a shortbread cookie, not pie crust.

Once the dough is completely chilled, break it into two halves and roll out on a floured surface. Don't freak out if you can see little butter pockets in the crust - those will turn out to be magic later. There will be enough dough for a top and a bottom crust. Bake as soon as possible to avoid warming the dough.

I would recommend baking at about 400 F.

And remember that cookie sheet!

Not Opening Up That Can Of Worms, So To Speak

2010-04-26T15:17:00.000-07:00

So I may have mentioned that I recently returned from a fishing trip to Belize. The trip was amazing - turquoise blue seas, warm windy nights, and some really exciting fishing. I have a hard time explaining this to people who are not accustomed to fly fishing, as they generally have the impression that fishing is just plunking a hook in the water and waiting for a fish to come by, i.e. boring. But fly fishing in general is a whole different animal, and fly fishing for bonefish was like a whole other planet.

I'm sure there are writers out there who can describe it with more poetry than I, so I won't labor too long at this. But fishing for bonefish is the closet thing to hunting I have ever done or probably will ever do. It takes incredible skill, patience, and local knowledge, and you can literally spend whole days stalking these fish across the shallow tidal flats. If and when you finally do get one on the line, they'll take you out 200 feet and then some in the time it takes your brain to register "Fish."

However, this is not a blog about fly fishing, and I'm pretty sure at least half of my dozen or so readers have no idea what the hell I'm talking about. So I've been searching these last couple of weeks to find some way to tie in my fishing experience in Belize with my bloggermathing here.

What consistently came to mind was a certain bit of legislation that just got passed in Belize, restricting all bonefish, tarpon, and permit fishing as catch-and-release only. Now, I get in debates about catch-and-release now and then, mostly with friends who have experienced fishing as a rather dull, uneventful sport. To them, the one and only payoff of fishing is having a tasty meal at the end of the day, to which I tell them that they're just not doing the right kind of fishing. But I digress. I am wholeheartedly in support of catch-and-release fishing, and to those of you to whom this seems illogical or unsporting, remember that the ultimate goal of the catch-and-release fisherman is not to catch the biggest fish or the most fish, but to leave no trace. In other words, to catch a fish and release it with absolutely no harm done to the fish - this is the supreme goal of catch-and-release fishing. If you have a hard time understanding where the fun is in that, just come down to Belize with me and I'll show you.

So you can imagine that I was delighted to hear that Belize passed this kind of legislation. I've clocked some time in Latin America, and just like the US, it's not always so great about protecting its natural treasures. So it's great to hear that these wonderful fish are likely to be around much, much longer.

Couple that with this article from the New York Times about the Glover's Reef preserve in Belize, and I'm feeling downright hopeful. It's a tricky balance, weighing the rights of people to fish their ancestral homelands with the realities of today's changing world, but it looks like Belize is at least making a go of it. In the end, protecting these resources will pay off - for everybody.

Going Medieval

2010-04-25T18:57:00.000-07:00

Spring cleaning.

Yes, it's that time of year when the sun breaks through the winter gloom, the air becomes warmed with the first breath of summer, the trees and flowers are in bloom, and I realize what a holy mess I have let my life become over the winter months.

This happens to a greater or lesser degree every year, but it just so happens that this year has been an extraordinarily busy one for me and I let many things go unattended. Fortunately for me, I find myself being extraordinarily unemployed. So between polishing up my resume and brushing up on my interview skills, I've been able to spend a good chunk of my time prying the proverbial toe jam out of my life.

For example, my house and, rather specifically, my room was recently visited by a host of black flies. Not a few mind you, not even several dozen. We have no idea where they came from, but our first real sunny day in Seattle brought a biblical swarm of black flies into our house and they just couldn't get enough of my room. I like to think they appreciated my color sense and keen decorating style, but I suspect it has more to do with my proximity to the dead rats in our walls. Either way, I now have a whole lot of dead black flies that I have to vacuum out of my room, our upstairs hallway, and the linen closet. Good times.

In addition to vacuuming up the dead, I've also taken this time to clean out my closet, burn my OChem notes, and organize my art supplies. One of the projects I am really looking forward to now that I have some free time is painting again. My art career got put on the backburner for a while when I was in school, but now I am itching to get back to my brushes. I've even set a zombie-worthy goal for myself: learn how to paint in egg tempera.

What is egg tempera, you say? It's one of the oldest forms of painting, used most notably by Medieval and Renaissance painters. The concept is pretty simple. You take some egg yolks, mix them with dry pigment, and ta-daa! Really nifty paint. Turns out egg yolks will give you a thick, creamy paint that dries with a semi-gloss finish similar to oil paints. The downside is that it dries almost instantly and you generally have a limited color palette. You can buy dry pigment in just about all colors, but you wouldn't want to - generally the reds, purples, and greens are highly toxic. Clay based colors, whites, and charcoal blacks are non-toxic, as well as ultramarine blue. So working with egg tempera takes some imagination and a certain lowering of color expectations. But I like the process of mixing my own paint, and I've been enjoying the preliminary results.

Spring cleaning is also a great time to take stock of your summer DIY plans. I'm not planting a garden this year, mostly because I wasn't sure where I was going to be come August, so instead I am going to sit out a round and enjoy the bounty of the farmer's markets. Which means I need to get prepped for the canning season: take stock of my Mason jars, get some new lids and rims, and dust off my giant canning pots. Rhubarb is already coming into season, which means the first batch of jam, cobblers, and fresh pies.

Just the thing to wash away that dead rat smell.

Erin Go Blah

2010-03-31T20:59:00.000-07:00

I am back from a brief but much needed vacation, and I have plenty to post about. Let's start with the New York Times food section this week.

Man, the food writers were really on the ball. I opened the print copy of Tuesday's paper to find it loaded with gems. The first one: the local food movement in Ireland.

As someone of Irish descent, I fully FULLY support the idea of Irish people getting some better ideas about food. I mean, really, it's about goddamned time. You can only live on potatoes and misery for so long. And it strikes a nice familiar chord here with the Pacific Northwest. Ireland's climate is quite similar to what we get here in Seattle, and it was interesting to note that a lot of the foodstuffs are similar too: salmon, rhubarb, berries, apples, dark leafy greens and the like.

But what I find so great about this article, other than it supports the growing local and seasonal food movement, is that it highlights that there really isn't any reason for an entire nation to eat terrible food. This is a conversation I've had with my relatives many a time, mostly after we've stomached an Irish-American meal (which, I can tell you, is even worse than just straight Irish food. Imagine combining the worst of Irish cuisine with Betty Crocker, and well... words fail). I mean, Ireland has soil, and water, and sunshine, and all the good things you need to make at least some form of agriculture work. So it's affirming to know that, yes! It is possible. You just have to kick out those nasty British aristocrats, take back your farmable land, and tadaa! Sustainable agriculture.

Moving on, we have even more coverage of local food issues, this time regarding the shortage of small slaughterhouses equipped to process small amounts of locally raised animals. This is an interesting problem, but overall a great one to have. As people continue to move away from CAFOs and industrial agriculture, we're going to be facing issues like this. But that's great. It means that the demand for local meat is greater than our ability to supply it, and I would rather be in that position than the other way around.

There's also a nice little bit about Jamie Oliver's new show, highlighting how truly terrible school lunches have become, as well as a bit about Congress' efforts at food reform. I haven't seen the show, but frankly I'm delighted that Congress is trying to do something about the salisbury steak issue.

Finally, we have a delicious tonic to the bile-watering picture above: pasta with breadcrumbs and sardines! I love this recipe for so many reasons. For starters, it's the perfect recession/zombie attack recipe, being almost completely composed of non-perishables. It's also a very cost effective way to get some healthy protein. And finally, it gives me a palatable way to consume sardines, which is just about the only fish that's A-Ok to eat if you're concerned about heavy metal intake.

So, kudos to the New York Times this week!

More posts are coming soon, so stay tuned....

When Sea Levels Attack

2010-03-09T09:27:00.000-08:00

You know, just a couple of days ago I was trolling the internet for some sort of map illustrating the effects of global climate change on sea levels. Why? Morbid curiosity and procrastination. But I'm also interested in knowing which cities are going to get the axe first. Uncharacteristically, the internet was most unhelpful in this pursuit.

Then my friend Bevin posted this link, which is a fascinating collection of green-related graphics. Included in the set (which is worth a look, by the way) is this gem:

The biggest shocker for me? Next to Venice, Los Angeles will be the first to go. I don't generally think of Los Angeles as being on par with Venice and Amsterdam in terms of sea level apocalypse risk, but apparently this is so. Which has kind of a beautiful irony to it, if you think about it. I lived in LA for some time, and I can tell you that that city is probably contributing to global climate change more than any other city on Earth, per capita at least. The bright side? I hear that fake boobs float...

Hate To Say I Told You So...

2010-03-08T14:06:00.000-08:00

... but OH MY GOD I TOLD YOU SO.

(ahem)

That is all.

It's A Righteous Emulsifier

2010-03-07T21:23:00.001-08:00

It's great to have friends who know you well enough to know when you'll get a kick out of something. Which is why I was tickled pink when my friend Derek (pictured above, second from left, holding carrots) sent me this article on sweetened condensed milk.

I've been trying to find a way to seamlessly incorporate this into the theme of my blog, but really I am just posting this because I like it. Maybe it's the brightly hued Jello cubes, maybe its the thought of key lime pie in March, or maybe its the memories of my first experience with dulce de leche (Paraguay, the summer of '99, eaten on just about everything), but this article just makes me smile.

Thanks Derek!

Take That, Tim Burton

2010-03-04T14:58:00.000-08:00

Hmm, here's a slightly darker twist on the white rabbit - raising, butchering, and eating them.

It's funny, I was just having a discussion about this the other day. I have no qualms about eating rabbit, but I believe that butchering them is beyond me. I think I have it in me to kill a chicken, or a fish. I killed a stone crab with my bare hands a few summers ago, and although my shrieks of terror gave me away as a novice, I followed through, and we had crab for dinner. So far I've been a strict catch-and-release fisherman, but if I came across an invasive species from a safe body of water I think I could bring myself to gut a fish. And I've been mentally preparing myself for the day I will have to kill a chicken. I lust after fresh eggs and a coop of my own, but that also means taking responsibility for killing a hen should the need arise.

But... bunnies. Unless we really do have a zombie apocalypse and I must pull out all the stops in order to feed myself and mine, I think I'll leave bunnies to the professionals.

I Love Bread... But Not In That Way

2010-02-27T22:05:00.000-08:00

Oh. Woe is me. The bread dumpster is no more.

For those of you not in the know, what I refer to as the bread dumpster was actually three dumpsters behind Seattle's Essential Baking Company, dumpsters reserved exclusively for day old bread. Which meant, if you got there at the right moment, you could help yourself to half a dozen loaves of artisan bread, still soft, fresh, and in their wrappings. More than once I found myself skulking behind the corner some early morning, waiting for the delivery truck to empty it's newly expired contents into the waiting dumpsters. Usually there were half a dozen twenty and thirty somethings skulking around with me, waiting to descend upon our spoils like ants to an ice cream cone.

The bread dumpster has been a something of an underground landmark for Seattle's hipster, fregan, and just plain poor set. As in, you're not really someone in Seattle unless you've been to the bread dumpster.

The bread dumpster also received a certain measure of notoriety when it was recently featured in Seattle's Hump! festival. Again, for those of you not in the know, Hump! is Seattle's amateur porn festival. I will spare you the details of the bread dumpster's role in said festival, but needless to say we checked those loaves a lot more closely after that. But we never stopped going, because damn that bread was good. And free.

Notice the past tense.

As of this week, the bread dumpster vanished into somewhere in south Seattle, and is reportedly being kept under lock and key. Which means no more free artisan bread, for me or for anyone else.

Which left me with a conundrum. Where was I to get bread now?

You might think the answer is pretty obvious (ANYWHERE. You can get bread ANYWHERE.) However, I must admit that I am something of a bread snob. Wait, revise that, I am something of a carbohydrate snob, because I'm also a snob about pasta. You see, carbs are just about my favorite thing in the whole world. If offered the choice between a plate of pasta and a slice of decadent chocolate cake, I would take the pasta without hesitation. In grade school, when my teachers would reward us with ice cream parties, I would ask if we could have pasta parties instead. Seriously. No, really, I'm not even exaggerating on that one.

So as you can imagine, I eat a lot of bread and pasta. And when you eat that much of something, you start to develop a certain palate for it. For example, even when I have to scrape change from between the couch cushions to go grocery shopping, I can't bring myself to buy crappy pasta. Some people can't taste the difference, some people don't care, but not me.

I feel much the same way about bread. I like just about all kinds of bread, provided that it's fresh, chemical and preservative free, and made with hearty wholesome ingredients. Which rules out about 98% of the bread I might find in grocery stores.

What is it with our nation and terrible bread? Plenty of other places have excellent traditions and customs concerning bread, but we seemed to have dropped the ball on this one. I mean, when was the last time you saw an actual neighborhood bakery? You know, one that sells fresh bread daily? I can think of plenty of places that would sell me scones, or muffins, or donuts. But the only places that seem to make fresh bread anymore are boutique bakeries (like Essential Baking Company) that want to charge me $6 a loaf.

Bread is just about the cheapest thing you can make, so I find it slightly preposterous and somewhat offensive that bakeries have to charge $6 a loaf just to stay in the business of bread. The real culprit in this price scheme is us - we're just not a culture that is accustomed to buying (and consuming) fresh bread on a daily basis. So, right now most people have a choice between convenient, crappy grocery store bread, or fancy, expensive, make-a-special trip-to-get-it boutique bread.

But good bread, like good coffee, is simply a matter of quality ingredients prepared with skill and care. We seem to be catching on that there's no good reason to drink crappy coffee (I'll save my rant about Dunkin' Donuts "coffee" for later), but we haven't exactly caught on that there's no good reason to eat crappy bread (shove it, Dr. Atkins).

Which brings me to my dilemma. Where was I going to get decent bread?

The answer, at least for now, seems to be my oven. Yes, I do believe that the cheapest, simplest, and most economical way for me to get fresh, tasty bread - short of buying some bolt cutters and heading down to south Seattle - is to bake it myself.

So over the coming weeks I will be experimenting with some bread making techniques. There are four loaves that I want to be able to accomplish: a simple white sandwich bread, an Italian style rustic loaf, mini baguettes, and challah. Those four loaves should just about cover my bread needs, and if I can master them then I can rest easy.

First on tap: white sandwich bread.

I did some experimenting with different recipes, and after some fiddling I came up with this one. It makes a nice, hearty white sandwich bread, perfect for toast with jam or a BLT. This is also a very simple recipe as bread goes, and you can have a warm loaf on your table less than three hours after starting the whole process.

White Sandwich Bread

1 package dry yeast
2 cups warm water
1 Tbs dark brown sugar
1 Tbs salt
5 3/4 cup bread flour (bread flour, not all-purpose flour)
2 Tbs olive oil, plus more for oiling the pan

In a mixing bowl, empty the package of dry yeast into the two cups warm water. Let the yeast bloom for about 5 minutes, then dissolve sugar and salt in the water. Add flour and olive oil, and mix with a dough hook on low speed until a smooth, consistent dough has formed.Continue to mix on low speed, about 5-10 minutes total, then transfer dough to a clean working surface.

Knead the dough with the palm of your hand, pressing into the center and then folding the edges over themselves, for a few minutes. Shape the dough into an oval shaped loaf, and place in a large, oiled loaf pan (9x5 inches works well).

Cover the pan with a clean dish towel and set in a warm place to rise (such as the top of the fridge, or a sunny spot). Let the dough rise for about an hour and a half, until doubled in size.

Once the dough has risen, punch it back down with your fist. While keeping the dough in the oiled pan, fold the edges over themselves and turn the seam to the bottom of the pan, so that a smooth surface remains at the top. Cover the dough with the towel and let it rise for an additional half hour.

Preheat an oven to 400 degrees. If you have a pizza stone, it's not a bad idea to pop that in the oven too.

Once the dough has risen, cut a deep slit in the top. Bake in the oven at 400 degrees for 45 minutes, or until the bread sounds "hollow" when you tap it with a wooden spoon (this takes some trial and error).

Eat warm, with plenty of butter and jam.

Bulking Up

2010-02-22T08:09:00.000-08:00

Being poor has it's benefits, sometimes. In a strange cause-and-effect relationship, I find that I tend to eat better - healthier and more responsibly - when my bank account is thin. I can attribute part of this trend to having clocked just enough time in Latin America to learn to love rice and beans. Rice and beans, especially when you buy them dried in bulk, make just about the cheapest complete protein you can get. And when you simmer them with onions, olive oil, and a healthy dash of sweet cayenne pepper, they're tasty enough to eat three times a day. So tasty, that you forget that they're also really good for you.

I can attribute the rest of this healthy eating trend to that fact that when I'm poor, I don't impulse shop nearly as often, which means I come home with fewer tubs of raw cookie dough than I might otherwise (fewer, but not none).

Once I got back on my rice and beans kick, I got to wondering what else I could cook from bulk, dried goods. So since the holidays I've been trying to cook as much as possible from the bulk section, with some interesting results. I salvaged some leftover ham slices into a yellow pea and ham soup (delicious!), created a hummus-style spread from white beans (weird!), and of course have been eating a lot of beans and rice (the cayenne pepper is essential). So far, my favorite recipe was an improvised brown rice pudding, which I also converted to a quinoa pudding, with tasty results.

The biggest change to my diet, however, has been my consumption of meat. To the best of my ability, I have been eating only responsible meat from my local co-op, which translates to expensive. Which means I have had to shift my attitude and treat meat more as a condiment than a main course. Which, I hear, is actually a healthy approach, although a decidedly anti-American one. But I've been enjoying the experimentation, and it's put me back in touch with some of my great-grandmother's Depression-era recipes, from a time when meat was also expensive and in short supply.

With that in mind, I thought it might be nice to share a couple of my most recent food experiments along with a cost-per-serving breakdown. These three recipes are not my great-grandmother's, but I think she'd be proud anyway.

The recipe for pasta with bolognese sauce is actually courtesy of my Dad. It's excellent, and has several Recession-time benefits. For starters, it calls for beef shanks, which are an inexpensive cut of meat if you can find them. If you can't find them, don't fret - you can substitute some some other cut of beef so long as there are some bones and fat in there somewhere; for example, for the dish I made in the photos I used a combination of short ribs, pot roast, and lamb necks, as the only place in Seattle that carries beef shanks anymore is Uwajimaya. Secondly, the after braising them for a couple of hours you are left with a stock that makes the most amazing soup base. Which leads me to the second recipe - beef and barley soup, made with the stock left over from the bolognese sauce. Finally, I've included a recipe for brown rice/quinoa pudding. It's a hearty, healthy dessert that has the added benefit of being a completely passable breakfast.

Pasta with Bolognese Sauce
Total cost per serving: $4.53 (a little pricey, but you make up for it with the barley soup)

For the meat:
3 bone-in beef shanks or equivalent cut of meat, with bone ($13)
olive oil ($1)
1 diced white onion ($.75)
white wine (Charles Shaw is fine, $3)
1 large can chicken stock ($4)
salt ($.05)
pepper ($.05)

Salt and pepper the shanks. Brown them on each flat side in hot olive oil in deep pot. Remove shanks, set aside. Sauté diced onion until translucent. Deglaze with 1/4 cup white wine. Put shanks back in. Add the chicken stock plus the can's worth of water, making sure that there is enough fluid to cover the meat.

Cover the pot. Braise on the lowest heat for three hours. Check periodically to make sure the liquid hasn't burned off.

When meat is fork tender, remove from the stove, and set aside to cool. Save the stock! You will need it later, and it makes great soup.

For the Sauce:
The meat
1 onion, finely chopped ($.75)
2 celery stalks, finely chopped ($.40)
1 medium carrot, finely chopped ($.30)
1 garlic clove, thinly sliced ($.10)
olive oil ($.50)
1 small (6 oz) can tomato paste ($.90)
1 medium can tomatoes, diced or crushed ($1.25)
1/4 cup milk ($1.00)
1/2 cup dry white wine (the Charles Shaw from above)
fresh rosemary, to taste
stock from cooking the meat
salt ($.05)
black pepper ($.05)

Remove every bit of meat from the beef shanks (saving the bones for a good dog) and coarsely chop. Cook onions, celery, carrot, and garlic in olive oil in a heavy pot over moderate heat, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 5 minutes.

Add meat, and cook about 5 minutes.

Stir in tomato paste, tomatoes, milk, wine, and about 1/2 cup stock and gently simmer, covered. Salt and pepper to taste. You may choose to add more stock, depending on the consistency of the sauce. Cook until thickened, about 45 minutes. Add fresh rosemary.

Best if served with pappardelle, but other pasta shapes will work.

Makes about 6 servings.

Beef and Barley Soup
Total cost per serving: $1.15

stock from bolognese sauce ($0)
2 onions ($1.50)
olive oil ($.30)
2 carrots ($.60)
1 1/2 cup barley ($1.50)
3/4 pound beef, cut into 1 inch cubes ($4.00)
1 cup plus a dash of red wine ($1.00)
1/2 tsp mild cayenne pepper ($.10)
1/4 cup flour, give or take ($.20)

Coarsely chop onions and sauté in olive oil on low heat. Add a dash of red wine, and continue to cook on low heat until the onions carmelize. Add onions and barley to stock, add an equal amount of water, and bring to a boil. While stock is boiling, brown the beef cubes in olive oil on high heat. Once beef is browned, add it as well as the chopped carrots and red wine to the stock. Season with cayenne pepper, and salt if needed. Cook until barley is tender and beef is cooked through. Thicken with flour if desired. Serves eight.

Brown Rice/Quinoa Pudding
Total cost per serving: $1.19

This dish, made with brown rice, has an earthy, hearty flavor that complements nicely with the sweetness. Made with quinoa, it has a nutty flavor almost like peanut butter. Either way, it's delicious both as a breakfast and a dessert.

2 cups cooked brown rice/quinoa ($.50)
2 cups whole milk ($1.25)
1 egg yolk ($.25)
1/2 cup sugar ($.25)
1 tsp vanilla ($.50)
1/4 tsp cinnamon ($.25)
1/4 cup golden raisins ($1.25)
1/4 cup chopped walnuts ($.50)

Combine all the ingredients in a saucepan over medium heat, making sure to whisk the egg yolk in throughly. Bring to a low boil, stirring constantly, until pudding is thick and creamy. Serve warm or chilled. Serves 4.

Raising the White Flag

2010-02-04T16:11:00.000-08:00

Well, interestingly enough, National Pie Day also turned out to be the very day my oven decided to die. The stove top still works, but the oven refuses to turn on even with the most polite coaxing and gentle caressing. I think this can mean only one thing - I have officially worn out my oven through my excessive pie making, to the point where it staged a hari kari style suicide on the eve of a truly epic pie making event, throwing itself on its own electric sword.

So, not as many pies got baked as should have, but not to worry! Random acts of pie-ness will be dealt, just not actually on National Pie Day. I did manage to borrow an oven and pop out two pies before the day was over - a peach pie I had frozen from last summer, and a new experimental plum and cranberry pie. This last one turned out quite nicely; unfortunately, as these pies came out of the oven at 10 pm and were promptly whisked away to a party, no images exist to document their short, delicious lives. Rest assured, though, that the plum and cranberry pie will be repeated, with full illustrations.

However, before my oven put up the white flag I did some baking of note that I think is worth sharing. A few weekends ago I managed to get away for a brief weekend vacation, and I brought along with me two recipes that I was itching to try. The first is for homemade cinnamon rolls. The recipe is taken mostly from Alton Brown, but with a few modifications.

Homemade Cinnamon Rolls

For the dough:

4 large egg yolks, plus 1 whole egg, room temperature
1/3 cup sugar
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and still warm
3/4 cup buttermilk, room temperature
3 1/2 cups all purpose flour, plus more for dusting
1 package instant dry yeast
1 1/4 teaspoons salt

For the filling:

1 cup packed dark brown sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon
a pinch of salt
1 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

For the icing:

1/4 cup softened cream cheese
3 tablespoons milk
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

In a mixing bowl, whisk together eggs, sugar, butter, and buttermilk. Transfer to a mixer with a dough hook, and add flour, yeast, and salt. Knead on low speed for 5-10 minutes, until the dough begins to clear the side of the bowl, adding more flour if necessary. Dough should be soft but not sticky. Transfer dough to a lightly oiled bowl, and toss to coat the dough. Cover, and let double in volume, about 2 to 2 1/2 hours.

For the filling, combine the brown sugar, cinnamon and salt in a medium bowl. Set aside until ready to use.

Butter a 9 by 13-inch glass baking dish. On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough into a rectangle, about 18 by 24 inches. Brush the dough with the the melted butter, leaving 1/2-inch border along the top edge. Sprinkle the filling mixture over the dough. Beginning with the long edge nearest you, roll the dough into a tight cylinder. Firmly pinch the seam to seal and roll the cylinder seam side down. Gently squeeze the cylinder to create even thickness. Slice the cylinder into 1 1/2-inch rolls to make 12 rolls. Arrange rolls in the buttered baking dish, and let continue to rise for another half hour.

Cover, and place in the fridge overnight. In the morning, take the rolls out of the fridge and let them warm to room temperature. Preheat an oven to 350 degrees F, and bake for approximately 30 minutes or until golden brown.

While the rolls are cooling, make the icing by whisking the cream cheese until creamy. Add the milk and whisk until combined. Sift in the powdered sugar, and whisk until smooth. Spread over the rolls and serve immediately.

The second recipe that turned out to be quite tasty was for pizza dough. This one was also borrowed from Alton Brown, with modifications.

Pizza Dough

2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon olive oil
3/4 cup warm water
2 cups bread flour
1 teaspoon instant yeast
2 teaspoons olive oil

Place the sugar, salt, olive oil, water, flour, and yeast into a mixing bowl

Using a dough hook, start the mixer on low and mix until the dough just comes together, forming a ball. Knead for 15 minutes on medium speed.

Tear off a small piece of dough and flatten into a disc. Stretch the dough until thin. Hold it up to the light and look to see if the baker's windowpane, or taut membrane, has formed. If the dough tears before it forms, knead the dough for an additional 5 to 10 minutes.

Roll the pizza dough into a smooth ball on the countertop. Place into a stainless steel or glass bowl. Add 2 teaspoons of olive oil to the bowl and toss to coat. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight, or freeze the dough for later use.

When you are ready to use the dough, remove from the refrigerator and set the dough in a warm place. Let the dough rise until at least doubled in volume.

When dough has risen, split it into two balls. Stretch the dough into a round disc, with the edges thicker than the middle.

Brush the rim of the pizza with olive oil. Dress with toppings of your choice. Bake at 500 degrees for about 8 minutes or until golden brown at the edges.

Random Acts of Pie-ness

2010-01-22T13:49:00.001-08:00

Goodness, I had no idea - this Saturday, January 23rd is National Pie Day! I also had no idea that there's an American Pie Council. Um, can I be a member of that board? I have a feeling those meetings would be sweet and delicious.

At any rate, I feel morally bound to commemorate this holiday. Fortunately for me, I have both a birthday party and a going away to Alaska party to attend on Saturday, and rest assured pies will be brought to both.

However, is that really enough? I'm a pretty big pie advocate, after all. Is there any way for me to spread some extra pie-love tomorrow? I'm thinking something along the lines of random acts of pie-ness. I did this to my neighbor a few months ago, when I showed up unexpectedly on his doorstep with a blackberry pie. What I didn't know what that his wife was dying of cancer at the time, and the gift of a homemade pie was especially welcome. Which, in retrospect, helps explain why he got all misty eyed when I gave him the pie (I'm not that good of a pie maker, after all).

So yes, I think I'll be participating in some random acts of pie-ness tomorrow, distributing pies where they are particularly needed. I challenge you pie-makers out there to do the same! Pies are the pastry equivalent of a hug, and I'm willing to bet that there's someone in your life who needs a pie right now.

Help To Haiti

2010-01-20T20:06:00.000-08:00

Yikes! How January is slipping away. I feel like I'm still getting over New Year's, and here it is the end of the month. I had several postings planned, but they've kind of gotten away from me. Here's a quick gem: pink slime!

If you think that sounds disgusting, it is. Mmm.... ammonia soaked beef. It's urine-tastic.

But on to more important matters. It's currently Day 9 in Haiti, post-earthquake. When the first reports of the devastation hit, I realized I knew little to nothing about the economic and political situation in Haiti. I picked up a copy of Mountains Beyond Mountains and have been reading it ever since. It's been a nice primer for understanding a little bit about Haiti, and some of the things Dr. Farmer was saying seem eerily prophetic, given the current situation. Reading this book now is a little like watching the setup to a disaster movie, one where you already know the ending. The battered roads, the disorganized government, the crushing poverty, a populace already on the brink of famine - all of these are carefully laid like pieces in some horrible chess game. If you'd like to know a little more about Dr. Farmer and his organization, Partners For Health, here's their website. It has a letter from Farmer about the best ways to donate right now, which is of course better advice than I can give.

Regretsy

2010-01-08T14:17:00.000-08:00

Well, it's about time someone took Etsy down a notch or two. As someone who has made some unsuccessful and unwelcome handmade gifts in my life, I can only look at this and cringe with the shame of recognition. Still, any site that makes fun of all those ridiculous needle-felted creatures is a'OK by me....

The Dodo's Revenge

2010-01-07T11:22:00.001-08:00

Two interesting articles in the New York Times food section this week, one about a project preserving heritage breeds of livestock on a sprawling estate in Rhode Island and the other about Seattle's culinary claim to fame. Oddly enough, these articles were placed side by side in the print edition of the newspaper.

Why is that odd? Let me elaborate.

First, let's start with the good: the SVF Foundation's project to preserve heritage and heirloom breeds of livestock. Their take on it is an interesting one, and one that could only be financed by an eccentric lady with old money (which this is). Up until now, most projects dedicated to preserving these breeds have taken the old school approach; that is, they eat them. More specifically, the raise, breed, and then eat them, thus ensuring the continuation of a particular gene pool. The SVF project takes this to a new level by raising, breeding, and cryogenically freezing the embryos of these breeds.

Quick side note - is anyone else amused that this project is funded by an heiress to the Campbell Soup fortune? Who also goes by the nickname Dodo? The joke possibilities here are almost endless. Blue Andalusian Chicken Noodle Soup anyone? The Dodo tries to save species from extinction! And so on.

But I digress. This article caught my eye because I have actually been thinking about this issue recently. I just finished reading Michael Pollan's The Botany of Desire, and what particularly caught my eye was his description of the Irish Potato Famin e. Essentially, the Irish (and most of Europe, in fact) had planted a single variety of potato. I guess someone, somewhere decided that this potato was just the bee's knees and no other potato would do. This worked for a while until a nasty little pathogen came along, to which this particular variety of potato had no resistance. Almost overnight, the entire potato crop (including potatoes in storage) turned to rotten mush. This was bad for Europe but devastating in Ireland, where almost no other crops were grown. Millions died of starvation.

What really intrigued me about this event, however, is that we've set ourselves up for a repeat of this scenario here in the US. Take your pick - almost all of the corn, poultry, and cattle raised in the US are of a single breed. If that wasn't limiting enough, these single breeds often descend from just a handful of original plants or animals. Even the article agrees with me on this:

"For all their efficiency and high output, modern livestock breeds have become a weak, inbred bunch, Dr. Saperstein said. Fifty years ago there were a half-dozen popular dairy breeds in this country. But today, according to Lindsey Worden of Holstein Association USA, an organization representing farmers and breeders, the country’s 8.6 million Holstein cows make up 93 percent of America’s dairy herd. Fewer than 20 champion bulls are responsible for half the genes in today’s Holsteins."

That's pretty alarming. The article continues with:

"As an example of how vulnerable our milk supply is, Dr. Saperstein points to a heat wave in California in 2006 in which some 16,500 Holsteins died, despite farmers’ efforts to save them with cooling mists of water and fans. In contrast, the Pineywoods cattle in SVF’s collection were introduced into the forests of the South by Spaniards in the 1500s specifically because they tolerated heat. In all likelihood, the hardy animals would have survived the heat wave."

It's truly amazing the ways in which we've depleted the genetic diversity of our food crops in recent decades. Pretty much any crop you can think of - apples, corn, tomatoes, beef - has consistently been whittled down in diversity by modern agribusiness. This makes sense from a business perspective - if you control those 20 champion bulls, then you control the entire beef industry - but it doesn't make much sense from a survival point of view.

This is why it's even more important to take matters into your own hands. It's super easy to turn this system on it's head - all you have to do is make an effort to eat locally and responsibly. Fresh, heritage meats are increasingly available at farmer's markets. At Seattle's University District farmer's market, for example, I can get my hands on heritage breeds of goat, lamb, grass-fed beef, and wooly pig, all prepared in any manner of delicious ways, not to mention fresh eggs, milk, cheese, and yogurt. Heritage breeds tend to be flavorful and robust, and have the added benefit of survival skills and healthy DNA, which equates to fewer illnesses and antibiotics in your food.

It's also completely reasonable to start growing your own heritage food crops. This takes a certain shift in thinking - I will likely never be able to grow a heritage tomato here in the damp, cool Pacific Northwest. But other crops like potatoes, peas, lettuces, and brassicas (kale, cabbage, broccoli, etc) grow here with reckless abandon. When it comes to these plants, there's no reason I can't plant heritage breeds in place of roid'ed out genetically modified ones.

Even growing a single heritage crop can make a huge difference. Even if you never actually eat or harvest that crop, and instead leave it to it's own devices in some corner of your yard, you are still enabling the survival of those genes. They might come in handy someday.

Ok, now onto the bad: apparently teriaki has become Seattle's culinary calling card. According to this New York Times article, it is by leaps and bounds the most pervasive and popular Seattle food.

Sigh. Teriaki? Really? Rhode Island is busy ensuring the survival of our species, and the best we can do is teriaki? Seattle has access to some of the freshest and most delicious seafood in the world, not to mention outstanding local wines, cheeses, and beer. And yet, it seems that we have nothing better to appease our palates with than rubbery, overcooked chicken from God-knows-where smothered in teriaki sauce and served over imported white rice.

I mean, don't get me wrong - I think teriaki has it's place. I think it's great as a junk-food indulgence or late night hangover food. But as an enduring culinary legacy? I mean, couldn't we at least do sushi or something?

Oh well. Maybe if Dodo is successful we'll be having some heritage blue Andalusian chicken teriaki, and that at least will be an improvement.

I Ferment, Therefore I Am... An Angry Spaghetti Squid!

2009-12-29T20:28:00.000-08:00

Ah, the holidays. A time for reflection, for family, for HOLY CRAP THANK GOD THEY ARE OVER.

(Awkward silence)

Yeah, so this year was a doozy. Between some insanely hard finals, applying to grad school, and being so desperately poor that I actually composed a meal out of the stray pasta noodles I dug out of the back of my cupboard, this was a stressful few weeks. Add the Christmas holiday and a few dozen handmade presents on top of that, and well things got pretty rough. However, like many of the nightmarish periods of my life, I like to look back on this as a character building experience (what kind of character I am building remains in question). At any rate, I think I learned some valuable lessons this year.

Here are some of the highlights:

1. I have no idea how to make a quilt; however, sometimes it can be a great thing to completely disregard this and make one anyway. Your parents will probably still tell you they like it.

2. Handmade pasta is harder than you'd think. In particular, if not dried properly it will start to ferment and rise like bread even though you never added any yeast. If said fermenting pasta is also flavored with squid ink, then the ensuing fragrant, bubbling mass may actually be a sentient life form.

3. Some things can't be rushed. Specifically, a watercolor painting that you've labored on for several weeks and still isn't done on Christmas eve and then you ruin the bottom two inches by not letting it dry completely and have to cut them off with an scissors and now the painting has some really weird proportions.

4. Watching an all-day marathon of The Deadliest Catch while sewing footie pajamas for your friends will really make you feel like you know what it's like to be an Alaskan crab fisherman. But you don't.

5. When really crunched for time, it's best to convince your friends that they really like making cookies and they should come over and help and that this is really fun guys!

6. Jet lag + drastic climate change + unfamiliar bed + anxieties about getting all these gifts made = a weeks worth of nearly sleepless nights. Which makes for a really interesting Christmas night dinner, especially when you grandfather asks about setting you up with some strange dude and you blurt out DEAR GOD NO ARE YOU TRYING TO KILL ME.

(Awkward silence)

So yeah. The holidays can be a stressful time of year. But I regret nothing! A good ass kicking, every now and then, is a healthy thing. And in the end, things turned out ok. Finals were fine, I got those grad school apps in, and I managed to show up on my parents doorstep with something other than a macaroni necklace (although pasta was involved in the gift giving). I really do believe that the holidays are about telling those you love that you love them, in whatever language you possess. For me, that language is in the making of things and, if needed, wrestling with a reanimated and angry squid life form.

That Extra Fat Lining Around Your Heart Is Just To Keep It Warm

2009-12-16T12:20:00.000-08:00

Ah, nothing like some validation to boost the ego before the holidays. I was skimming my Grist email today when this caught my eye - apparently high fructose syrup is not only bad for you, it's really bad for you. The article is written in a rather editorial style, and I haven't checked all the references, but apparently some new research suggests that there is something special about high fructose syrup that makes us even fatter and more prone to diseases like diabetes than regular cane sugar.

Which is something that I've believed for quite some time, although with only anecdotal evidence. Namely, I've noticed that food made from natural wholesome ingredients like butter, flour, sugar, and fresh fruit seems to wreak much less havoc on my body than a Diet Coke. Granted, it's quite easy to get up on my soapbox about this kind of thing, but I think the basic premise is a good one. If it's made by nature, i.e. plants or bees or animals, then it's probably ok in moderation. If it takes an industrial factory to create it into being (I'm looking at you, Crisco) then my spider sense starts to tingle.

Anyway, I'll step down off the soapbox for now, because I can't reach my bag of cookies from up there...

Is That A Bunch Of Cookies Down Your Pants, Or Are You Just Happy To See Me?

2009-12-15T20:14:00.000-08:00

So, I actually laughed out loud when I read this New York Times article about cookies. More specifically, the article documents a certain wedding tradition in Pittsburgh, which mandates that the reception is not complete unless there's a stunning array of homemade cookies for the guests. What made me laugh is that the author ponders the origins of such a tradition, stating that "many people credit Italian and Eastern European immigrants," but that the origins remain unclear.

Well, I can say with almost complete certainty that's it's Italian, especially considering how the author later describes the behavior of the guests as they stuffed extra cookies into spare napkins, plates, and baggies brought from home. This is a near perfect rendition of the meleé that went down at my cousin Jenny's wedding when they brought out the cookie tray. My otherwise petite, genteel, and slow-moving relatives were on those cookies like white on rice. More than a few came away from that table with treats stuffed into pockets, sleeves, and napkins.

Which is a neat little segue into the fruits of this past weekend's cookie making extravaganza! Not surprisingly, Italian cookies were on tap. I am happy to report that the cookie extravaganza was a success, largely thanks to my friend Tessa H, who lent me her meat grinder, and my other friends, who showed up just in time to help me churn out ten dozen Cucidati.

The first cookie I made that day was Pignoli, a subtle and intoxicating cookie made with almond paste and pine nuts. There are several recipes out there for Pignoli, and several different interpretations of the cookie, but I prefer the kind that are crispy on the outside and almost gooey on the inside. It makes for a really surprising treat if you've never had one before, and the delicate crunch of the pine nuts adds the perfect complement.

Pignoli also turned out to be surprisingly easy to make. There's no flour in this recipe; the dough is simply almond paste mixed with powdered sugar, egg whites, and a little bit of honey. With the help of my Cuisinart, it took about 5 minutes to make. From then on, it's simply a matter of forming the dough into little balls, rolling the tops in pine nuts, and baking. A Silpat baking mat or some other ultra-nonstick surface is essential, though, because these little guys love to stick to the cookie sheet.

The Cucidati were naturally more time consuming. My family hasn't made these for quite a few years, and there seems to be various versions of recipes floating around, so I hobbled one together from three different sources. Overall, I kept the filling simple: dried figs, golden raisins, candied citron, almonds, a bit of dark chocolate, honey to tie it all together, and a splash of orange liqueur to bring out the flavors. Scanning some recipes online provided an overwhelming array of variations on this theme, but I really like the mix I put together. It was sweet without being cloying, the contrast in textures between the fig and almonds is quite nice, and there's just enough chocolate to add a depth of flavor without being noticeably chocolate.

As for the overall effect, my taste-testing audience seemed quite surprised. My favorite comment was something along the lines of, "Wow, this is like the original energy bar. If I was on a hike, I'd want a bunch of these with me." Which is interesting; this may be the first time in history anyone had referred to Cucidati as a health food. But once he said it, I had to admit it was true - figs, fruit, and nuts, with a little bit of chocolate and honey, wrapped up in a wholesome crust. Not the worst thing you could be eating, that's for sure (all comments about my prodigious use of butter can be made privately, thank you very much).

All in all, I was pleased. The only real hiccup in the day, and this is a pretty minor one, is that from the Cucidati recipe I followed I ended up with twice as much filling as I needed. Had the day been longer (and I had more butter) we could have pumped out twenty dozen cookies. That seemed a bit excessive, though, and I did have finals to study for after all. So I just put the extra filling into some plastic containers in the freezer, where it will be ready-made for next year. Not a bad deal.

And then, of course, there was the packaging and mailing of the cookies off the relatives, because I don't want to think about what my family would do to me if they found out I made cookies without giving them some. After all, I have learned a valuable lesson from those cookie-filled weddings: God save you if you get between an Italian and her cookies.

Pignoli Cookies

I took this recipe straight from the Epicurious site, not having a family recipe of my own. This is a good one, though, and I'm glad I went with it.

2 (8-oz) cans almond paste (not the kind in the tube)
1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 large egg whites
2 tablespoons mild honey
1 cup pine nuts

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Pulse almond paste in a food processor until broken up into small bits, then add confectioners sugar and salt and continue to pulse until finely ground, about 1 minute.

Beat together almond mixture, egg whites, and honey in electric mixer at medium-high speed until smooth, about 5 minutes (batter will be very thick).

Using wet hands, roll the batter into small balls about an inch in size. Roll the tops of the balls in pine nuts, then place on a silicone baking mat or parchment lined baking sheet.

Bake cookies until golden, 12 to 15 minutes total. Be careful not to overbake! These cookies go from done to overdone in about 30 seconds, so keep an eye out. It is preferable to err on the side of underdone; overdone cookies will be almost too tough to eat.

Let cookies cool before removing from silicone or parchment paper. Makes about 3 1/2 dozen.

Cucidati

I've adjusted this recipe to reflect appropriate portions of filling and crust; however, if you would like to make twice as much filling to save for next year (not altogether a bad idea, considering the work investment), be my guest.

Filling:

3 14 oz. packages dried figs
1/2 cup golden raisins
1/4 lb candied citron
1/4 lb dark chocolate
1/2 lb almonds, chopped
8 oz. honey
Gran Marnier or other orange liqueur

Dough:

3 lbs flour (about 12 cups)
3/4 lb shortening or butter
1/2 cup sugar
3/4 cup water
3 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
1 tsp salt

To prepare the filling:

Grind figs, raisins, and citron in a meat or food grinder, using the coarse grind disk. You may also grind the almonds in the food grinder, although a food processor works better for finely chopping them. Mix figs, raisins, citron, and almonds together until well incorporated. Add 8 oz of honey to the mixture, stirring until smooth. Melt the dark chocolate in a double boiler or in a microwave, and blend into the mixture. Add a few splashes of Gran Marnier.

To prepare the dough:

In a large bowl, mix flour with shortening/butter until crumbly. Melt the sugar in water, and add slowly to the dough, either mixing by hand or with an electric mixer with a dough hook. Add eggs, vanilla, and salt, continuing to mix until dough adheres to itself. Dough should be thick and able to hold its shape as a ball.

Final preparation:

Break off pieces of the dough and roll into long, narrow sheets about 4 inches wide and the thickness of pie crust. Place a line of filling along the center of sheet. Roll one side of the dough over to the other, creating a tube of filling surrounded by dough. With a sharp knife, cut the tube into slices about 1 1/2 - 2 inches wide. Place these cookies on a sheet about 1 inch apart and bake at 375 for about 15 minutes, or until lightly golden in color. If desired, you may make a simple frosting from powdered sugar and milk, drizzle it over the cookies, and sprinkle on nonpareils for decoration.

Makes about 10 dozen cookies.

They Know Me Well

2009-12-14T10:16:00.000-08:00

So as it would happen, I had this article forwarded to me independently by two different people in my life - my friend Derek, and my dad. It's a quirky little piece from the New York Times in which a graduate student at Carleton University in Ottowa built some mathematical models to forecast different outcomes of a zombie outbreak. The basic breakdown is that we're all dead or undead within about a week and a half unless there's a major and instantaneous retaliation on our part. But it's good to know that people, including Derek and my dad, are staying vigilant...

I'm Voting For The Spontaneous Chicken Combustion Prevention Society

2009-12-11T22:08:00.000-08:00

Wow, looks like the good folks over at CakeWrecks are schooling us, hard-core, about the spirit of the holiday season. Good for them! I highly recommend checking this out if you're stressing about the holidays, got the winter blues, or have utterly lost faith in humanity. It might help a little with all three...

Giving New Meaning To The Phrase, "This Makes Me Sick."

2009-12-04T11:05:00.000-08:00

Wow. I was scrolling through the New York Times today and this article caught my eye. Apparently, there is a vaccine in development that could reduce the incidence of E.Coli in feedlot beef. This vaccine would be given directly to the cows to prevent them from developing E.Coli in their digestive tracts. Of course, research and development of a vaccine alone costs millions of dollars. And even after that is done, the manufacture and production of a vaccine is expensive - this article cites that it could cost up to $10 a cow. So all in all, the cost to consumers for this vaccine would be huge, although I am guessing indirect. I'm willing to wager a Coke that if this vaccine proves successful, most of it will be underwritten by subsidies to the beef industry, subsidies that we would indirectly pay via taxes. On the order of hundreds of millions of dollars.

Or, you could just buy some nice grass fed beef and eliminate the problem altogether, considering that the whole E.Coli issue was created by us deciding we should feed corn to a cow.

But hey, whatever floats your boat.

All I Want For Christmas Is Three Hundred Tiny Bunnies

2009-11-22T22:13:00.000-08:00

The holidays (whichever you happen to celebrate) are almost here! That means it's a good time to start thinking about what kind of gifts you want to make or purchase. Gift-giving DIY style takes some advance planning and time management, but the payoff is all the sweeter because of it. So here's some handy tips to get you through the holiday gift-making season without completely losing your mind.

For starters, if you're short on time or skills, Etsy is always an excellent resource. Everything on there is handmade, and while some of it can be kind of silly (I will never quite understand the need to purchase tiny needle felted creatures), some of it is truly amazing. Plus, Etsy is kind enough to publish gift giving guides which offer handy suggestions on various themes (Gifts for Dad, Geek Gifts, etc). Even better, you can still feel good about your purchases at the end of the day. Yes, you spent money - but that money will go directly to a skilled artist or craftsman. Instead of, say, Target executives.

Etsy is also a great place to look for inspiration for gifts you make yourself. Take, for example, these Mason jar organizers, which are all the rage on Etsy right now.

These things are ridiculously easy to make. All you need is an old board, a couple of items from your local hardware store, and some old Mason jars. You can find old Mason jars at estate sales for practically nothing, and you can probably find some cool old boards in a dumpster somewhere.

Or, you can make a nifty earring organizer, another hot Etsy item. I made one for myself, and it cost me about $4. I just bought an old frame from Goodwill and a little bit of screen from the hardware store (they sell it by the foot). Again, ridiculously easy.

Etsy is also a good place to find some unique kitting patterns. You can order them with just a click, and the patterns are usually emailed to you within 24 hours. I found a really cool mitten pattern this way, and if you know how to knit it can be a great way to get a unique and original item for about $5.

If you know how to sew, you can buy patterns online and have them shipped directly to your house. Sometimes, you can even download these patterns for free. Maybe your friends would all appreciate a hand sewn Snuggie. I mean, who wouldn't love that?

And, of course, you can always try your hand at some homemade soap. There's a bit of a learning curve involved, but the upshot is that you'll never have to buy shampoo again. I was doing some calculating in the shower this evening, and realized that in the last 12 months I've saved at least $15o in shampoo and conditioner. Not huge by any means, but enough of a payoff to make learning the skill worth it, at least for me.

Finally, there is always the gift of time. Chances are you have some skill that is useful to someone. Whether it's pruning trees for your grandma or making and freezing a month's worth of meals for a busy mom, there's probably something you can do with your time and your hands that someone would really appreciate. And I'm not talking about some lame "Good for One Backrub" certificates. If you're going to give yourself as a gift, you better make it good. As in, "Hey you saved me hours and hours of tedious labor" good.

Coooookies

2009-11-18T10:57:00.001-08:00

So, it's been a couple of weeks since I've posted - my apologies. Suffice to say, I've had a couple of good reasons, some of which being a rousing case of H1N1 and a ridiculously stressful OChem test. You know a test is a doozy when a student actually has to be evacuated from the lecture hall by EMT's. No joke, she was directly behind me. And nothing is quite as distracting as the professor, midway through the exam, announcing to the class, "Don't be distracted by the medical emergency in the back!" Riiight.

I suspect that it was all an elaborately staged plot to give the class a more pronounced curve.

Anyhoo, I was going to post some doom and gloom about some new stuff they're finding in our food, but I think I'll hold off on that one for a while. Instead, here's a post about cookies!

Cookies! Hooray!

Nothing says holidays to me more than cookies. And since I'm reaching all-time new levels of broke and penniless this year, I have a feeling that many a stocking stuffer is going to consist of a package of homemade cookies. So, in an attempt to not be completely lame, I am going to attempt the most elaborate and delicious cookies I can manage! The two that most readily come to mind are Cucidati and Pignoli, my two favorite Italian cookies.

Cucidati, pictured below, are delicious fig-filled cookies that remind me of the holidays like nothing else. They are the original inspiration for the Fig Newton, although their deep fig flavor, spiked with a hint of citrus, anise, and dark chocolate, is anything but Newton-like. Like most old-world treats, they take the better part of a day to prepare, and you'll need a meat grinder. Significant time investment plus heavy machinery? Sounds right up my alley! Seriously though, if you're looking for a festive and unique cookie, this is it. I can pretty much guarantee that you won't find these at Costco.

The second cookie attempt is going to be Pignoli, another Italian treat. Crunchy on the outside, sweet and gooey on the inside, they're an addictive combo of pine nuts and almond paste. I've never actually made them before, but I'm feeling ambitious.

I'll post the recipes as soon as I can get the family recipe for Cucidati from my mom. For the pignoli, I'm just going to Google it and see what happens. Should be interesting.

This all is really just a segue into what I intended to post about, which is that the holidays are coming up! If you are a DIYer like myself, now is the time to be seriously considering those holiday projects. Cookies are going to be just one part of my gift-giving strategy, and if you're planning on DIYing it this year, I would recommend planning out your schedule now. Need ideas? I'll be posting on some easy DIY gift ideas soon, so stay tuned!

Apocalypse Now... No, Now!... Wait, Now!

2009-10-30T21:32:00.000-07:00

So I've spent the better part of my Friday night doing Organic Chemistry, so naturally my thoughts have turned to the living dead. Specifically, I have been thinking about zombies. Even more specifically, I have been thinking about the lushly illustrated "Zombies: A Record of the Year of Infection," sent to me by a dear friend, and which I was using as a motivational tool to get me through OChem (I let myself pore over a page of illustrations for every page of the OChem workbook).

Now, many other people, including friends, family, and significant others, have asked me what the big deal is with zombies. Why are people so into them? What is behind their meteoric rise in popularity in the last decade? And do I really think rotting, reanimated flesh is... neat? After reading "Zombies," I think I've formulated a few theories.

You see, every era has its own version of the apocalypse. And, usually, these different versions of the end-of-days have roots in the political and social concerns of the time. For example, the early to mid twentieth century saw a surge in popularity of the notion of alien invasion - think Orson Welles 1938 War of the Worlds, or all those cheesy early 50's movies about alien attacks. I don't believe it's a coincidence that at this very time, the world was at the dawn of the space age. The late 60's and early 70's saw a surge in pop culture references about mutant attacks - just as the world was coming to understand, and fear, nuclear power. The 80's and early 90's were mostly about Cold War type annihilation - one country or another pushing the button and sending us into WWIII - think James Bond, or all those Soviet-based spy movies. The late 90's enjoyed a brief period of renewed religious vigor centering on the year 2000, as well as a marked increase in the Evangelical and conservative Christian movements. And the 00's (that looks weird) have been marked by an increase in the popularity of zombies.

This is our era's version of the apocalypse - the mythical, improbable, sometimes magical metaphor that we funnel our anxieties and fears into. And what, exactly, do we fear right now? Well, let's take a look at some of the books and movies to come out in recent years. To start with, perhaps my favorite zombie book is "World War Z" by Max Brooks (Mel Brook's son). In "World War Z," the source of the zombie break is a zombie virus of unknown pathology. What makes this story really compelling, though, is that the outbreak of this long-dormant virus originates in China as a result of the environmental chaos and destruction brought about by the 3 Gorges Dam.

So, let's see... a viral outbreak, of poorly understood pathology, originating in China? Does maybe this look familiar? Or this?

Okay, moving on, let's take a look at the book I just finished, "Zombies: A Record of the Year of Infection." In this one, the origin of the zombie outbreak is... wait for it... the industrial food system! Specifically, a flavor-enhancing additive engineered by a large industrial food corporation (think Phillip Morris, or Monsanto). Which makes for a compelling theory as to why zombies appear to have the compulsion to bite and chew even though they cannot digest (must... have more... of that flavor-enhanced brain! It's like a party... in my undead mouth....). The book doesn't elaborate too deeply on exactly what happened, only that people would spontaneously develop symptoms and die when too much of this additive built up in their system. If you think stuff like chemical additives, the industrial food system, and GMO's aren't scary as hell, well then you clearly don't read my blog very often.

Most other zombie stories of recent origin, such as "28 Days Later," center on one of two premises - messing with nature, or a mysterious outbreak that becomes a global pandemic due to overpopulation and a globalized economy. Both of which, I have to say, are fairly legitimate concerns. We are indeed messing with nature. A lot. Right now, I am working in a lab that is helping to engineer genetically modified algae to use a a biofuel source. However, if this algae were to get out into the ocean and outcompete native species, it could very well destroy the marine ecosystem of the entire world. As my lab supervisor simply stated, "This is more dangerous than nuclear power." Now, the lab is also doing its darndest to engineer this algae to be poor competitors in the wild. But all it takes is some irresponsible or shortsighted science to bring about worldwide destruction. And as for the global economy, just take a look at the H1N1 scare. People aren't freaked out about this virus because of what it is - they are freaked out about what it could be. As it stands, H1N1 is not that virulent a strain of influenza. But considering that an infected, but as yet asymptomatic person, could board a plane in London, infect half a dozen passengers, and be on the streets of New York within the span of six hours, people are right to be cautious. If we ever did face a truly deadly disease, it would be almost impossible to contain it.

Hopefully, you can see the parallels between the concerns of our decade and zombie mythology. Some rather unimaginative people read my blog and think that I actually believe in zombies. Which is ridiculous. As a reality, I would sooner believe in the tooth fairy. But as a metaphor, well, I think zombies pretty neatly sum up the concerns and anxieties this era is facing. I am sure, in another five to ten years, we'll have moved on to another thing. The notion of zombie attacks will seem as preposterous as alien invasion or mutant uprisings. But, until then, I'll keep polishing my imaginary sawed-off shotgun.

Human vs. Zombies vs. Chem Lab

2009-10-15T09:43:00.000-07:00

So, apparently I had overlooked a certain phenomenon gripping college campuses, this phenomenon being Humans vs. Zombies. Overlooked, that is, until yesterday when I walked into my Chemistry lab to find it infected with three zombies. One was a fully mature, bite-ready zombie, and the other two (including my lab partner) were in the process of changing over (and thus not yet infectious).

This is awesome. I want in.

Unfortunately, I technically don't qualify as a "student" according to the University of Washington, so I don't get to participate in nifty things like "student activities" or "registering for classes." My academic life at the UW has mostly consisted of me getting to school early every day so I can sit outside the Chem department office and plead, once again, for them to let me into OChem. But I digress.

I fully support zombie preparedness drills. As of yesterday, there were over 600 students engaged in Zombies vs. Humans at the UW.

Want to learn more? Here is the official site, and here is the Wikipedia entry. Prepare yourselves!

Another One Bites The Dust

2009-10-13T17:02:00.000-07:00

Sigh. Looks like it's the end of hamburgers for me, at least until I can afford grass fed beef. Well, at least there's still buffalo burgers.

Oh Zombie Virus, What Will You Get Into Next?

2009-10-12T10:35:00.000-07:00

Hmm, it seems it's a big day for zombie outbreaks. The link for today's zombie outbreak has been taken down, but here's the link to the original outbreak from 2005.

Before you go get the shotgun, however, read this.

It seems like that zombie virus is quite versatile, jumping from H1N1 to malaria as a carrier. Watch out!

Crabapples: The New Hardcore Local

2009-10-08T09:12:00.000-07:00

This is a great little opinion piece from the New York Times, about harvest time in the Yakima Valley. The author makes several great points, such as our inborn need to connect with the land:

"A restorative of sorts is at hand this time of year. Barely 1 percent of all Americans work the land year-round as farmers, but still something in us needs a harvest. Every now and then, we have to see our food, if only to preserve the illusion that this good earth can keep us well."

... as well as some of the innate contradictions of locally grown food:

"But this image is somewhat illusory. The Yakima Valley is a miracle of manipulation. It would grow little but sage and scrub brush without its network of irrigation ditches and pipes, draining water off the Cascades.

And these fruit types: many of them were hatched in labs. In this valley, even a hobbyist can play Apple God with grafts of genetically superior species. That fresh-picked fruit may look as local as Mount Adams, but apples originated in Kazakhstan. The only one native to the United States is the crab apple.

Still, at harvest time, the roadsides of this valley are full of people trying to get closer to the consumer, with food that has a story behind it. Despite the travails of the Great Recession, organic fruit and vegetable sales were up 37 percent last year, showing the consumer has a similar desire to connect."

I think these are excellent points. As someone who is clearly a proponent of local food, I will heartily admit that the idea is not without its contradictions. But for me, the impetus that keeps me going is not that I believe locally eating as it's currently available is the answer to everything, but a more positive step in a better direction.

I would also like to point out that I am a wholehearted supporter of North America's native apple, the crabapple.

Experimental Pie

2009-10-07T22:08:00.000-07:00

So a few months ago, I noticed that our neighbor across the street had a particularly lush blackberry hedge lining his fence. So lush was this hedge that fruit bearing vines spilled over onto the sidewalk with juicy recklessness. The temptation was too great to resist. Surreptitiously, I snuck over with a colander or two to grab a share of this bounty, always staying on the sidewalk side of the fence. At first, I was quite cautious (having not met this particular neighbor), but my blackberry habit soon escalated. I needed greater fixes, and so became more bold in my endeavors. I still stayed on the appropriate side of the fence, but I found myself reaching closer and closer to his property line.

Turns out, I need not have worried. Said neighbor came over one day, having noticed my blackberry trysts, with a bag of fresh picked raspberries and an invitation to come over into his yard to pick blackberries - as long I wouldn't mind sending a blackberry pie his way. Deal! I'm always looking for excuses to make a pie for someone, and if I get a couple of buckets of blackberries out of the arrangement, so much the better.

However, my summer kind of got away from me, and sometime last week I realized I had yet to bake our kindly neighbor his pie. I quickly amended this oversight, dipping into the dozen or so jars of blackberry pie filling I put away. As soon as the pie was out of the oven, I trotted it across the street and presented it to our surprised but grateful looking neighbor.

Apparently, the pie was a success, because the next day he came over again and said that his apple tree was full of fruit just waiting to be picked, and I was welcome to it if I wouldn't mind making another pie out of the deal. I certainly don't mind making pies, but not all apples are pie-worthy. Some of them turn to applesauce almost as soon as you bake them, and you can't just tell by looking at them. The only real way is to bake an experimental pie and see.

So that's what I did. I snuck over and plucked a single good sized apple from the tree and spirited it back to my kitchen. That apple, along with some leftover crust dough I had in the freezer (I never throw away pie crust dough trimmings, for this reason), combined to make a perfect single-serving pie. As it turns out, these apples held up alright in a pie. Not quite as amazing as those Red Cortlands, but certainly good enough to make a decent pie.

Single Serving Experimental Pie

1 large apple, peeled, cored, and sliced
1 tsp real maple syrup
1 Tbs sugar, more or less depending on tartness of the apple
1 Tbs flour
a pinch of cinnamon

Mix together in a bowl. Next, line a small pyrex dish with pie crust, add apple slices, and cover with another layer of pie crust. Bake at 375 for about 30-40 minutes.

Need a recipe for pie crust? This is one I invented myself! It won't let you down.

Maria's All-Butter Pie Crust

2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, cold
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
a pinch of salt
sugar to taste
ice water

Cut up the cold butter into chunks. In a bowl, mix together butter, salt, sugar, and both kinds of flour until course and crumbly. You can do this with two forks, a pastry cutter, or a food processor. Slowly add ice water until dough sticks together. Wrap in wax paper and let chill for an hour, or place in the freezer to use later.

Not Everything Revolves Around New York

2009-10-05T10:43:00.000-07:00

Haha, this article by the New York Times is eerily reminiscent of my recent backpacking post. However, I would like to point out some important differences. For starters, I at least had the sense not to try and tackle the full Wonderland Trail. I mean, are you kidding? Even experienced Washington backpackers will heartily admit that the Wonderland Trail is not an easy hike. And to attempt the whole damn thing? That's something I would like to do, one day, but only after years of building up some credible backpacking experience. Over the entirety of the 93 mile loop you end up ascending a cumulative total of 22,000 feet. Yes, that's right, 22,000 feet. To give a little perspective, Mt. Everest is 29,000 feet, starting from sea level. Granted, you don't need O2 tanks or anything, but it's still a lot of up and down. So I kind of feel like this dude deserved to fail on that one.

Secondly, I would like to point out that I, at least, finished my hike instead of wimping out and going to a hotel.

And thirdly, I could really care less about the fashion implications of my backpacking outfit.

Pickles and Pumpkins

2009-09-30T18:43:00.000-07:00

Ah, canning season is almost over. The last of the peaches are hitting the market, the tomatoes are dwindling, and I've had to put plastic wrap on my old, drafty windows to keep out the cold. Fall is here!

If you're still hankering to do some putting away before the winter hits, there are still some options. Carrots are still in season, and this year I made a fresh batch of spicy carrot pickles. Remember this post, way back in the day? Well, I took some better photos of these bright, crispy pickles, and looking at them makes my mouth water. These pickles go great in Pad Thai, curries, or any other Asian influenced dish. Or you can just eat them out of the jar, as I do. Want the recipe? Click here!

It's also still possible to find pickling cucumbers in the market, although their numbers are dwindling fast. You may be wondering why I have posted recipes for carrot, green bean, asparagus, and watermelon rind pickles, but have not posted anything regarding what most people universally assume is the one and only pickle - cucumber pickles. That's because, ironically, cucumber pickles have proved to be the most vexing. The cucumber is a delicate vegetable, and I've had a hell of a time making pickles out of them that are crisp, tasty, and USDA sanctioned. Dill pickles in particular are giving me the slip. I've been able to get good flavor, but with kinda mushy results. However, I have had repeated success with sweet bread and butter pickles. They've turned out crisp and tangy with just enough crunch. Here's the recipe if you want to give it a shot:

Sweet Bread and Butter Pickles

10 lbs pickling cucumbers
2-3 large yellow onions
1 gallon cold water mixed with 1/2 cup pickling salt (brine)
6 cups cider vinegar
4 cups sugar
3 Tbs white mustard seeds
2 tsp celery seeds
2 tsp ground tumeric

Chop cucumbers into 1/4 to 1/2 inch slices. Slice onions into rings, as thin as possible. Place cucumbers and onions in a bowl or kettle and pour in brine. Let stand 12-24 hours.

Next, drain brine and rinse cucumbers and onions. Dry them on a towel, pressing as much water as possible off of them. Then mix vinegar, sugar, mustard seeds, celery seeds, and tumeric in a pot or kettle and bring to a boil. Add cucumber and onion and return to a boil, boiling uncovered for 1 minute. Immediately remove from heat.

Pack pickles into jars, filling to within 1/4" of the top. Pour in hot pickling juice, leaving 1/4" head space. Poke the wooden handle of a spoon or a pair of wooden chopsticks into the jars to release air bubbles. Clean rims of jars, and screw on the lids.

Process for 10 minutes in a boiling water bath. Let pickles cure for about a month before eating them.

Also, apples are at the height of their season right now! Even though school has started back up again, I will have to make some time to put away homemade applesauce, and maybe even freeze some apple slices for pies. Apples are one of my new favorite things, ever since heirloom varieties began hitting the markets again. I had no idea just how diverse apples are, but truly they are an American heritage. A few weeks ago, I made a pie from Red Cortland apples that just blew my mind. The pie was good, but what I was most impressed with was the way the Red Cortland's held their shape and size after an hour in the oven. There was none of the dreaded pie collapse that often happens with store bought apples. Now that heirloom apples are coming back into vogue, you can find a delicious apple for every purpose - pie making, apple butter, eating, applesauce, baking, etc.

And finally, it's swiftly becoming pumpkin season! I look forward to this time of year more than any other, simply because I have a socially acceptable reason to bake and consume as much pumpkin products as I could possibly want. The other night, I tried my hand at making pumpkin pie from scratch - in other words, from a real sugar pumpkin. It wasn't all that much work (compared to the other stuff I do), and the results were quite tasty, although markedly different from what I think of as pumpkin pie. The flavor was milder and, for lack of a better descriptor, juicier, but it didn't have what I consider to be "classic" pumpkin pie flavor. Personally, I have no problem using store bought canned pumpkin, but I do have a problem wasting food and we had a perfectly good sugar pumpkin in our possession. So if you happen upon one as well and don't want such a beautiful vegetable to go to waste, by all means make a pie out of it (actually, make two pies, because that's about how much pulp you'll get). But for the rest of the time, here's a truly stellar pumpkin muffin recipe passed down to me from my chef friend Megan. These are truly amazing muffins, and differ from most other pumpkin themed pastries in that they are not at all dense. They're light, fluffy, and have a wonderful texture. I would have pictures of them... except we ate them all too fast for me to get my camera out. They're that good.

Fluffy Pumpkin Muffins

1 stick plus 2 Tbs unsalted butter, melted
1 cup pumpkin
1/2 cup sour cream or plain unsweetened yogurt
2 eggs
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
spices to taste, such as cinnamon or cardamom
2 cups cake flour (not all purpose)
1 cup sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Sift together dry ingredients into a bowl. Mix together pumpkin, eggs, sour cream, vanilla, and melted butter (butter should NOT be hot) in another bowl. Gently combine wet and dry ingredients with a spatula. Spoon into buttered muffin tins. Bake until top is firm and lightly browned, about 15-20 minutes.

Makes 12 muffins. Enjoy!

Delicious Secrets Revealed!

2009-09-15T13:43:00.001-07:00

Homemade pasta sauce.

Yes folks, the time is here.

This is THE MOMENT to think about making your own cache of homemade pasta sauce. The weekend is coming, and the tomato harvest is at its peak.

I debated for some time whether to include my secret family recipe, because such a thing is, generally speaking, secret. However, I finally concluded that good food begets good food - the more people realize that store bought pasta sauce in no way compares to homemade, the more they will venture out to the farmer's markets and make their own. So I share this recipe with you, my friends, in the interest of a healthy global food system. Trust me, it's that good.

I'm afraid I don't have photos of my pasta sauce canning day to post with this entry, as I am visiting family in Chicago and am otherwise isolated from my laptop, but I will paste them in as soon as I get home. In the meantime, please enjoy this picture of a man swimming in a giant pile of tomatoes.

So, back to the sauce. This recipe is perhaps the most-time consuming of the canning recipes I have posted. But again, I truly believe it's worth it, and I have evidence to back me up. People have offered to buy shares of my tomato purchase in exchange for a portion of the jars.

So here's how you get started. First, check out your local farmer's market for the best prices on paste tomatoes. You want to be looking for Roma or plum style tomatoes - steer clear of the slicing tomatoes. A 25 lb box will give you about 12 quarts of tomato sauce.

You will also want to pick up a bag of onions, a head of garlic, salt, sugar, vinegar (balsamic or red wine) and plenty of olive oil, as well as a big pot, a smaller saucepan, and several large bowls.

So first things first. Coarsely chop up all your onions and the whole head of garlic. Place these in a bowl and set aside.

Next, you are going to skin your tomatoes. To do this, fill the saucepan halfway up with water and bring to a boil. Next to it, fill a bowl with water and ice cubes. When the water in the pan reaches a rolling boil, drop in five or six tomatoes. Watch carefully, and in 1 to 2 minutes (sometimes as little as 30 seconds) the skins will start to split. At this point, pull the tomatoes out one by one and place them in the ice water. If you have a really stubborn tomato that, even after a few minutes in the boiling water still refuses to split its skin, you can pierce it with a knife and put it in the ice water. Continue this method with all of your tomatoes, replacing the ice water periodically.

Once you are done, the tomatoes should be cool and the skins should slip right off. Toss the skins, and cut out the center stem part with a knife. Place the whole, skinned tomatoes in a bowl.

Next, heat a generous portion of olive oil in your big pot. Simmer the onions and garlic until the onions are translucent, then remove from the heat.

Now it is time to chop your tomatoes. I highly recommend using a Cuisinart or some equivalent device for this step. It will give you a nice fine chop, and save you a ton of time. If you go the Cuisinart route, simply place five or six skinned tomatoes in at a time, chop coarsely (do NOT puree, you want some texture in your sauce), then empty directly into your large pot. Repeat until all your tomatoes are chopped. If you choose to chop by hand, do so as finely as possible.

One side note - some old recipes call for removing the seeds from the tomatoes in order to make sauce. DO NOT DO THIS. Recent studies have found that most of the good tomato flavor actually resides in the little gel coating around the seeds.

Back to the sauce, once all your ingredients are in the pot return to the heat and let simmer gently for at least an hour. Stir regularly.

So here is where the secret stuff comes in. There are two little known secrets to making a good pasta sauce, and I share them with you only because you are beautiful special people and I know you will use this information for the betterment of the world. The first secret is sugar. Yes, sugar! A good pasta sauce needs a healthy dose of sugar to neutralize the acidic taste of the tomatoes. It's hard for me to tell you exactly how much, because I've always made this by taste, but I would say for a 25 lb batch of tomatoes I would add 6 Tbs of sugar. Maybe more.

The next secret is, shockingly enough, salt. The secret isn't so much the ingredient itself, but the quantity. You will want to use a lot of salt, way more than normal people generally believe is appropriate. I would start with 6 Tbs, and then add some more. You want the salty and the sweet to balance so that the sauce is neither of these, but that indescribable savory. Fiddle a bit, but overall don't be afraid of salt.

EDIT: I recreated this recipe a few weeks after this initial posting, and the ratio of salt to sugar was 8 Tbs salt, 6 Tbs sugar. This of course will vary depending on your batch of tomatoes, but hopefully this will serve as a ballpark figure.

Add another 1/2 cup of balsamic or red wine vinegar. This is important because most tomatoes these days are "low acid," which means you need to add a healthy dose of vinegar for your sauce to be safe to can.

Fiddle some more, adding more sugar if the sauce tastes too acidic, adding more salt if the sauce tastes either too sweet or too bland. You know the sauce is done when you can't stop sampling it.

The canning is straightforward. Fill into quart jars and process for 25 minutes in a boiling water canner, let cool, and make sure the jars have sealed tight.

Often, you'll have a little sauce left over at the bottom of your pot. I've often ladled this out and eaten it by the spoonful. This, in my mind, is the hallmark of a good sauce - if you can eat it alone, no pasta, no bread, just a bowlful of sauce. Doing this with Prego sauce, for example, is a nauseating thought. That would be like having a bowlful of ketchup. But I have had friends and roommates clamor for the dregs of my saucemaking, eagerly spooning up each and every last bit. This homemade sauce of yours will taste fresh, bright, and savory - much closer to a crisp summer salad than a bowlful of ketchup.

How Not To Survive A Zombie Attack

2009-09-08T21:09:00.000-07:00

So, I've come to realize that most of the content of this blog is focused on nifty things I can do. Hey look at me, I'm making pickles! I'm making my own soap! I'm making bike panniers out of giant mayonnaise buckets!

In light of this, I thought I would take this opportunity to focus on something I cannot do. That thing is wilderness survival.

I cannot do this. Not even at all.

This not-so-shocking fact was put into sharp relief thanks to a recent backpacking trip I took in the Cascades. You see, you have to understand one simple fact. I am in no way what you might consider "athletic." Or "coordinated." Or "able to walk across a flat surface without tripping and smashing my face."

No joke. One time, in junior high, I gave myself a pretty sizeable head injury by charging headlong into a metal pole. Why? No good reason. I was simply walking up the stairwell to my next class and missed the door.

So you can maybe begin to see my problem with wilderness survival.

That's why when, a few weeks ago, Kyle cheerfully suggested a backpacking trip to the mountains, I sensed impending doom. Backpacking is a sport that I am particularly disabled at. The main reason is that I am what most people would refer to as "tiny" (see also: petite, scrawny, and if you are a flight attendant, fourteen and unable to fly alone). To put this another way, a fifty pound pack on a hundred pound girl is a way different thing than a fifty pound pack on a two hundred pound dude. Couple that with my remarkable clumsiness and utter lack of athletic skill, and well... you have a pretty good recipe for bear bait.

But I was game to try. Because, despite my lack of athletic prowess, I do love the outdoors and I do love exercise. I am a big fan of both, and I do my best to stay in shape. I am a bike commuter, I run when I get the chance, I love to swim, and I've even done a mini triathlon. I actually quite enjoy sports - I just suck at them. Spectacularly.

Nevertheless, Kyle's relentless optimism had me convinced. I was pet-sitting a dog named Kip while my friend Jessi was out of town, but nevermind! Off we went, with Kip the dog in tow. We stopped in at a ranger station and found an ideal looking loop near Glacier Peak. Thirty miles, only one large ascent, and it allowed dogs. Sold!

By the time we got to the trailhead, even the dog was excited. Woohoo wilderness! We got everything packed into our bags, Kyle helped lift mine onto my shoulders... and my legs nearly buckled to the ground. You see, we had gone grocery shopping for the trip late at night when we both hadn't had dinner, and we had about twice as much food as any of us could reasonably eat (except maybe Kip). I staggered upright again, and for the first time had a significant moment of panic. Thirty miles?

We only had six miles to do that day, but it felt like it took us forever. We managed it though, and I felt consoled that we would be consuming some of that weight at dinner. Kip, however, was ecstatic. Wilderness! Squirrels! No leash! He bounded like a forest sprite the whole six miles, and barely slept that night from distraction.

The next day we faced a 2500 foot ascent at a steep grade. Our packs weren't really that much lighter. But I did it, although at a snail's pace. Kyle was a good sport about it though, and patiently waited for me to catch up. Kip was a little less ecstatic - 2500 feet in three miles seemed a little much for him, even without carrying his own food. But somewhere around 2 pm we made it to the top - huzzah! - looking forward to a nice, leisurely lunch.

At which point we noticed the dark, looming clouds. And the booming thunder in the distance. And the driving rain that began to fall. The forecast had been for clear skies, but these were not clear skies at all! After spending all morning trudging up the ridge, we sure as hell weren't going to just turn around. We had only one choice as we saw it - make a break for it and try and reach the next campsite.

We got about a mile before we had to ditch our packs and run downhill to avoid getting struck by lightning.

Fortunately, Kip kept his cool, because I'm not sure what we would have done if we had been soaking, cold, and had a panicked dog on our hands. The storm seemed to pass, and we decided to just set up camp at the next good spot, which turned out to be a windy ridge with views on all sides. The rain let up too, so we were able to strip off our wet clothes and get dry.

This is when we noticed Kip shivering. Kip has something of a nasty shedding problem (think handfuls of fur with every stroke) so as a goodwill gesture to me Jessi had him shaved before she left. This didn't make much of a difference cosmetically - he looked pretty much the same - but apparently it had a big difference on his ability to stay warm. We had a fleece doggie jacket for him, but this was soaked and apparently not very effective. We took Kip into the tent, toweled him off, and let him curl up on our Thermarests. Still shivering. I covered him with my T-shirt, my fleece, and my rain shell. Still shivering. We spooned him a little. Still shivering. Finally, resigned to the fact that everything I owned was going to smell like wet dog, we layered on top of Kip my T-shirt, fleece, and entire sleeping bag. Kip looked up at us miserably as if to say, "This is a pretty long walk, guys. Can we go home now?" But he stopped shivering.

Until we went to bed. In the cool of the night, Kyle and I had to take turns spooning Kip into our sleeping bags to keep him warm. Which was fine, until Kip got gassy. Which he did. Spectacularly.

Fortunately, the morning dawned clear and warm, and we were blessed with good weather for our third day. It was a long hike, as we had not made it as far as planned the day before, but we had clear weather and breathtaking views of glaciers and meadows and mountain peaks. And all the wild blueberries you could eat! Blueberries everywhere. I decided blueberries were my new favorite thing. Kip learned to walk faithfully behind Kyle but in front of me, stopping and waiting in the trail if I got too far behind. The spring was definitely gone from his step (this is a REALLY long walk, guys), but when the sun was out he seemed warm enough. By the end of the day, we were exhausted but rewarded with a campsite next to a deep, clear blue mountain lake. I was feeling pretty smug about the whole wilderness thing.

As the sun set, Kip began shivering again. Kyle and I suspected he was putting us on a little, particularly because he would stop shivering whenever he couldn't see us watching him. I think he just wanted to spoon with Kyle again. But we were unperturbed. The skies that evening were clear, the wind calm. Offhandedly, Kyle asked if we should put the rain fly on the tent. "Sure," I said, glancing at Kip, "it will keep us warmer."

And it did indeed. Especially when a hellbender of a thunderstorm woke us up at 1 am. Around 4 am the tent began to leak. By 6 am our sleeping bags were wet and our packs were soaked. And Kip wasn't the only one shivering anymore.

Finally, around 7 am we had a break in the rain. We had another choice - stay in the leaky tent and slowly drown, or make a break for it. We had 12 miles to the car, with a 2500 foot descent. We both had rain jackets, but neither of us had brought rain pants. If we got caught in the rain, we would get wet. Very wet. But we would probably make it to the car. We glanced at Kip, already shivering. Somewhat annoyed, I asked "What kind of dog are you? You're supposed to be keeping us warm." Kip just farted in response.

We made a break for it. The rain held off just long enough for us to break camp - a blessing - but by the time we were on the trail we were soaked. We didn't even pause for breakfast. On the way out of the campsite we passed a miserable couple whose tent pole had simply snapped in the middle of the night, drenching them. They were trying to set up a tarp so they could light their camp stove. We booked it the hell out of there.

The hike was misty, foggy, and would have been beautiful in an eerie way if we weren't fighting hypothermia. Our socks were completely waterlogged, our pants drenched. The wild blueberry plants became low-lying water sprayers, drenching our legs with every step. I decided blueberries were now my least favorite thing.

We hiked seven miles in four hours, not even pausing for food or water. For once, Kyle didn't have to wait too much for me to catch up - fear of hypothermia seemed to be the magic trick. We managed to share a Clif bar and a string cheese purely because I could dig those out of Kyle's pack in about 5 seconds, but other than that we stopped for nothing. Water squished out of my shoes with every step. We feared for poor Kip.

At around mile seven, we reached the 2500 foot descent. I was in high spirits as we began the climb down, but those deteriorated pretty soon. Maybe it was because I didn't have proper hiking boots, maybe it was because our packs were still pretty heavy (maple syrup? what were we thinking?), or maybe it was because I am closer to thirty than to twenty, but my knees felt like they were about to shatter. Halfway through, I was shuffling down the hill like a ninety-year-old grandma, my kneecaps feeling like glass ornaments. Wilderness my ass.

As my spirits sunk, however, Kyle's seemed to raise. He bounded ahead of me, whistling jaunty tunes, stopping here and then to identify a mushroom or examine the rings in a fallen log. He would exclaim things like, "What a beautiful day to be in the forest!" This of course made me want to punch him in the face.

At least Kip was on my side. He had definitely had enough. Where on the first day we had to shout to keep him within sight of us, now he was definitely lagging. When I would catch up with him and Kyle, Kip would look at me pleadingly as if to say, "The tall guy keeps making me walk. Can't you make him stop?"

But there was no stopping, not yet. After about 2 hours of hobbling down the mountain, we finally felt like we were reaching the end. We could hear water from the river, and soon enough we heard voices. Those voices turned out to be three trail workers, who all turned to look at us when we approached.

"Just a heads up," one of them said, "there's bees over there." He pointed to a space between him and the other trail workers. Kyle and I paused for a moment, to see if there would be some follow up information. Apparently there was not. The trail workers just stood silently, like trolls guarding our passage off the mountain. Well, we sure as hell weren't turning back, and considering we were both still soaked the idea of just hanging out while someone did something about the bee problem seemed less than appealing.

It seemed that in order to get to warmth and safety, we were going to have to pass through a cloud of angry bees. Awesome!

Kyle and Kip went first, and managed to dart through the bee swarm without injury. I followed next, going slowly at first but picking up the pace a little when several bees managed to lodge themselves in my hair. Swatting, I dashed down the trail. Unfortunately, Kyle had paused to chat with the other trail workers, leaving me stuck behind him with angry bees in my hair.

"Kyle, move!" I shrieked. "I'm standing in bees!"

Fortunately, we were near the end. My knees were hurting so badly at this point that I was near tears, but I managed to hold it together as we passed another trail crew. At last we reached the river, and the bottom of the trail! Kyle turned and beamed at me, opening his arms for a hug.

My mindset, however, was more "wounded racoon" than "celebratory human." I managed not to savage his hand, but just barely.

We had only two more miles of relatively flat trail to go before we reached the car. Considering we had gone ten miles already, I thought these last two would be cake. Unfortunately, my legs no longer seemed to be working properly. I tottered down the trail, looking like some sort of Monty Python sketch.

At last, we reached the car! I unceremoniously dumped my things in the back, opened up a bag of pretzels, and blasted the heater. Nature shmature.

On the drive home, after a celebratory stop at Wendy's for fries and drinks, Kyle and I decided that hot soup and a funny movie were what we needed to put the day's harrowing journey into perspective. This required a stop at the grocery store, which was good because I had a feeling I would need some Ibuprofen.

True enough. As it turns out, in the short period of inactivity in the car, my knees had completely locked up and refused to bend at all. I discovered this in the parking lot of the QFC, where I fell out of my seat in an attempt to exit the car. Kyle had to walk me across the parking lot, me hobbling the whole way like I was nine and a half months pregnant.

On our way in, the homeless man selling Real Change looked at me and asked, "Are you ok? You don't look so good."

"Thanks! I'm fine!" I said as I tin-soldier marched my way inside.

It took me about ten minutes to make it as far as the soup aisle, and I had to tell Kyle I would catch up with him at the register. I managed to grab some Ibuprofen as well, although I feared I was a little late.

On the way back out of the store, the same homeless man looked me up and down skeptically. "Hey, you want some of these?" he asked, producing a bottle of giant pills that I can only assume were some sort of horse tranquilizer.

"No thanks!" I replied, holding up my Ibuprofen. "I've already got some."

He shook the bottle at me. "Yeah, but these are the good ones," he said, winking.

"Uh, yeah..." I muttered as I hobbled away, doing my best to look like a normal, functioning human. So much for wilderness survival.

So I can tell you one thing. If the zombies do attack, you can probably bet that my survival strategy does not entail heading into the mountains. I'll be holed up in my house with my pickles and pie, thank you very much.

Summer Of (Tomato) Love

2009-09-04T17:36:00.000-07:00

September.

The tomato month.

September is actually a month of many things, but for me it will always be tomato month. These next few weeks will be the tomato's brilliant swan song. They will burst into the markets like a slowly exploding firework, in sparkling hues of red and orange and gold. And then, just like that, they'll be gone.

Needless to say, I will be prowling the markets for these bright embers, packing as many as I can afford into jars of smoldering pasta sauce. If you think I'm taking this analogy too far, just open one of these jars in, say, February. The burst of taste and smell and memory that those little jars bring is nothing less than explosive.

So I will be doing a post shortly on how to make ten, twenty, thirty jars of tomato sauce. But until then, I thought it would be appropriate to take a little trip back in time, to the summer I first learned to can.

It all began with tomatoes.

It was 2006, and I had just come out of my first full winter in Chicago since high school. I had also just come out of my first year of grad school. I felt battered, depleted, and miserable from both. Crazy thoughts tend to incubate out of such unhappiness, and I was swimming in them.

Fortunately, a series of events conspired to keep me from running off to join the circus. The first was in June when I realized a booming farmer's market had opened up just steps from my apartment. After a cold, snowy winter that had deposited a filmy layer of salt and gray upon everything, this farmer's market was like an audacious wildflower popping up through the sidewalk cracks. I was there every Tuesday, haunting the stalls like some mad groupie.

The second was that my dad offered my some part-time work doing manual labor around the house - cleaning out the gutters, repairing some drywall, trimming hedges, and so on. I loved it, and it afforded me ample opportunity to be outdoors enjoying the bright, hot Midwest summer.

And the third was that I didn't have air conditioning.

Summertime in Chicago is like wintertime in Chicago, only the complete inverse. Where winter in Chicago makes you feel freeze-dried, summer is the magical elixir that pops you back to the bright shining plum you once were. And this particular summer really outdid itself.

I often have a hard time describing Midwest summers to people on the West Coast, partially because summer here is so different. In Seattle, for instance, summer means clear, rainless skies, dry brown grass, and a few brief months to enjoy the outdoors before it gets soggy again. But summer in the Midwest is a wet, green, intensely hot and humid riot of life. Everything is getting busy growing, greening, or getting it on. And did I mention it's intensely hot and humid?

To not have air conditioning at all meant that my apartment that summer was one long, sustained sweat lodge. For the first time in memory, I took to taking cold showers, ice cold showers, just so that I could have a moment in my day where I wasn't sweating profusely. Sleeping was tricky. Physical proximity to another human being while attempting said sleeping was just an impossibility.

I found myself swimming in Lake Michigan at all hours of the night, sometimes in my swimsuit, sometimes fully clothed. It was so humid, it didn't make much difference.

And, truly, I loved every minute of it. I loved sweating through the days, swimming at night, and being able to fall asleep with the windows open. The heat had a way of amplifying the scent of anything I cooked, so I could come home from the farmer's market and pump my apartment full of the most delicious, potent scents imaginable. After a long season of lectures, artificial lighting, and recycled air, it felt great to be alive again.

Then September came, and I could sense my summer ending. The heat broke, and suddenly people were able to sleep comfortably at night. I nearly panicked. I was not looking forward to the end of my delicious, visceral, tactile existence. The second year of grad school loomed in front of me like a dark cloud. I desperately searched for some way to prolong my summertime.

This is where the farmer's market really stepped in. Our riot of a summer had produced a bumper crop of tomatoes, so many that the vendors could hardly give them away. I found one vendor in particular who was selling crates of slightly bruised Roma tomatoes for a dollar a pound. Mix that with a healthy dose of desperation, and...

Click.

I decided to try and can enough sauce to get me through nine months. Nine months until summer would return for real. Having learned how to make pasta sauce at age 10 (and subsequently having been ruined off store-bought sauce ever since), the cooking itself was not such a daunting task. But I had never canned before.

Learning how required some borrowed books and a lot of trial and error. But I managed it - by the end of the tomato season, I had canned a dozen quarts of pasta sauce. Carefully rationed (I eat a LOT of pasta), I managed to make my stash last until summer returned. And it worked. Every time I opened one of those jars, I was brought back ever so briefly to the bright, fragrant summertime. And there was something wonderful about seeing those bright, glowing jars in my pantry in January. They were like a personal sunlamp, chasing away the gray winter blues.

You can probably guess the likely progression. I was hooked. Now, I can all sorts of things - spicy green beans, sweet pickles, watermelon rinds. But for me, it's still about the tomato, about holding on to that bright, fragrant moment of summer. So if you're looking at the calendar right now and silently panicking, I would recommend going down to the farmer's market, picking out your favorite thing, and finding a delicious way to turn it into your own personal sunlamp. It might forever change your life.

Fingernail Pickles

2009-08-25T20:50:00.000-07:00

So I'll share a little secret with you. You know watermelon rinds? That white, bitter meat at the end of that delicious ruby watermelon slice? Guess what! You can make pickles from them. Sweet, spicy, tender pickles. And while you're standing over the stove, stirring said pickles, your roommates will look at you even more like you've completely lost your gourd.

"You're eating what?"

I've gotten quite familiar with that look. It's one thing to make jam - almost everyone enjoys jam of some sort, and you can kind of cloak jamming under the organic, local, no-high-fructose-corn-syrup banner. "Hey," you can say, "I'm just doing my part as a responsible citizen." People generally don't think it's all that strange to be making jam. You start to get those sideways looks once you diverge into pie filling and cucumber pickles. These are not exactly necessary items, and people tend to wonder why you are spending so much time making things that can be easily purchased at a store (or, in my case, they will wonder how much pie one person can possibly consume). But let me tell you, once you start making watermelon rind pickles, people will look at you like you've straight up snapped the tether. You might as well be canning fingernail clippings.

So be warned. This recipe is only for the truly committed canner. Not because it's hard - it's really not that tricky - but because once you've crossed the line into watermelon rind pickles, you will forever be that person who puts weird shit into jars.

However, I believe the stigma is worth the reward. So few people make watermelon rind pickles these days, every jar feels like a precious antique. It's definitely a throwback to a different time, and after spending a good chunk of your morning hunched over the carcass of a watermelon, carefully slicing out your pickle meat, you more fully appreciate the saying, "Waste not, want not." You can sometimes buy these pickles in the store - for $6 a 4 oz jar. At that rate, I have approximately $84 of pickles resting on my kitchen counter right now, all from a single watermelon. These things make the best gifts, precisely because they are so rare and unusual.

So, if you're ready to make the commitment into full-fledged canner, dive right in. Just beware - there's no going back.

Watermelon Rind Pickles

The first part is pure joy - purchase, and consume, a large delicious watermelon. I recommend going to a farmer's market and asking the vendor for the variety with the thickest rind, as thin-skinned melons are all the rage these days.

Then, you need to separate the rind from both the leftover melon and the skin. There should be no red or green parts left on your rind. Dice this rind into 1" chunks, and place them in a pot or a plastic bucket. Then, combine 1/4 cup pickling salt with 1 gallon room temperature water, and pour it over your diced rind. Let this sit for 12-24 hours.

Once the rind has soaked, pour out the brine and rinse the rind under cold water. Fill a pot with 1 gallon of water, and bring to a boil. When water is boiling, add the rind and simmer for about 5 minutes, until the rind is tender. Remove from heat and drain the rind again.

Next, prepare your syrup.

Syrup ingredients:
2.5 cups water
2.5 cups apple cider vinegar
10 cups sugar (yes, really)
Pickling spice
One lemon, sliced
1 cinnamon stick
2 spicy chiles, such as cayenne
Sliced fresh ginger

Tie the spices into a spice bag, including the cinnamon and lemon. Combine all these in a pot and bring to a boil. Let simmer on low heat for about 15 minutes, to give the spices a chance to steep. Remove the spices, and add the rind. Bring up to a boil, and simmer for 10-15 minutes, until the rind in clear and sparkling.

Then, ladle the rind and syrup into 1/2 pint jars, process in a boiling water canner for 10 minutes, and let cure for about a month before eating. These pickles go great with pork and other roasted meats. Enjoy, and don't let those sideways glances get to you.

Crabapple Picking Is Not Code For Anything, Thank You Sir

2009-08-20T13:21:00.000-07:00

Yes friends, it has arrived: urban foraging season.

Depending on where you live, this may or may not be the perfect time to do some urban foraging. If you live in the Northwest, the answer is YES IT IS THE PERFECT TIME TO URBAN FORAGE. If you live elsewhere, well, I can't really say, but now is definitely a good time to start thinking about it.

Right now, fruit is ripening all over the city of Seattle, just right for the picking. Figs, apples, plums, pears, you name it. My favorite? Crabapples!

Most people my age have no idea what a crabapple is, much less that you can eat them. Back when I lived in Chicago, I found a secret grove of crabapple trees right next to the Lincoln Park Zoo, on the corner of Fullerton. Delighted, I spent an afternoon filling several grocery bags full. It was an interesting experience. Young families, on their way to or from the zoo, paused to watch with curiosity and sometimes bewilderment. The more outgoing of these would ask, with varying degrees of tact, what the hell I was doing. Most people thought these small, bright pink fruits I was picking were some sort of cherry. But the older people, my parents age and above, would stop and look at the trees wistfully and exclaim something like, "Oh! Crabapples! I haven't had those for years." Either way, it was an incredible conversation starter. I even got asked out on a date, by some young man who apparently thought me picking crabapples was some sort of code for "I'm not wearing underwear." But don't let that deter you.

I'm guessing that long ago, that grove was planted by some clever Chicagoan who, like me, marched out to pick a secret harvest of crabapples every summer. In all liklihood, that grove is only still there because you can't build condos on park property. People have apparently forgotten about crabapples.

Which is a shame, because they make some of the most delicous jelly and jam you'll ever taste. The beauty of crabapples is that they are naturally tart, VERY tart, so you can make a jelly to exacting standards of sweetness. I like tart things, so I only add a little bit of sugar to mine. What I end up with is a bright magenta colored jelly that has a flavor somewhere between green apples and rhubarb.

I generally make two things out of my foraged crabapples - crabapple jelly and crabapple butter. The jelly is ridiculously easy to make. Simply fill a pot with washed, whole crabapples, add enough water just to cover them, and then boil until the crabapples split their skins. Then filter out the pulp using a strainer and then cheesecloth, and set the pulp aside for later use. You'll end up with a vibrant, delicious smelling, tart juice from which you can make jelly. Just add sugar to taste, fruit pectin (I recommend Pomona's Universal Fruit Pectin because it works with low-sugar recipes), and ta-daa! Jelly. The most beautiful jelly you'll ever see.

Crabapple butter is more involved, but worth it. Take the leftover pulp and puree it in a food processor. Then press the pulp through a mesh strainer. This way, the skin and seeds and tough bits get filtered out, and you're left with a smooth, rich pulp. Put in a pot, add sugar to taste, and heat until simmering. Ta-daa! Crabapple butter.

I would highly recommend scouting out your neighborhood for some fruiting crabapple trees. Be warned - there are several types of crabapples, and the most common type produces tiny, inedible crabapples. They are about the size of blueberries and are useless. Why people plant these trees, when the fruiting ones are just as pretty, is beyond me. At any rate, you want to look for the trees that have bright, deep pink apples about the size of plums. The best places to look are old parks, college campuses, or other places that likely were planted about 50-60 years ago and haven't been re-landscaped since.

Happy hunting!

Crabapple Jelly

Ingredients:
Crabapples, rinsed
Water, enough to cover the crabapples
Sugar to taste
Fruit pectin*
Jelly jars

*almost all of my recipes are going to be low sugar, so conventional fruit pectin won't work. Pomona's Universal Fruit Pectin is the best, but you can go with any of the "no sugar needed" fruit pectin options. Just make sure they haven't added artificial sweetener to the ingredients.

Add the crabapples to a large pot, fill with enough water to just cover them, and bring to a gentle boil. After a few minutes of boiling, the crabapples will split their skins. Remove from heat, then strain the pulp out using any combination of strainers, jelly bags, or cheescloths as you see fit. The more you strain your juice, the clearer and more sparkling it will be as a jelly. Reserve the pulp for crabapple butter.

The juice will be quite tart, so add sugar to taste. A tip for beginners - everything tastes sweeter when it's hot. I don't know why this is, but it's true. So when taste-testing, cool a bit of jelly on a spoon or a plate before making your final assessment.

When juice has been sweetened, add fruit pectin according to package instructions.

Ladle into jelly jars, and process in a boiling water canner for 15 minutes.

Crabapple Butter

Ingredients:
Crabapple pulp
Sugar to taste
Red wine vinegar
Fruit pectin (optional)
Half-pint or jelly jars

Take the pulp you saved from your crabapple jelly, and process in a food processor until smooth. Then filter through a fine strainer or jelly bag (cheescloth won't work as well - it will filter out too much of the good stuff). This part takes a while, but is completely necessary unless you are planning to remove all the seeds and stems by hand.

Once you have a smooth, thick pulp, bring to a simmer over low heat, stirring constantly. Add sugar to taste, and a few splashes of red wine vinegar. If you desire a thicker spread, add fruit pectin.

Ladle into half pint or jelly jars, and process in a boiling water bath for 15 minutes.

Tomato Insurance

2009-08-13T15:32:00.000-07:00

Here's an interesting article from the New York Times, sent to me by my dad, about tomato gardening. Apparently, I'm not the only one who struggles to grow tomatoes, and the article highlights some of the unique challenges of growing food in the Northeast. In particular, it was interesting to read how a tomato blight has devastated most of the local tomato crop this year, partially brought on by home gardeners. It's a pretty compelling argument for NOT buying your plants from Home Depot, as well as for starting as much as possible from seed. I particularly liked this part:

"There’s another lesson here for the home gardener. When you start a garden, no matter how small, you become part of an agricultural network that binds you to other farmers and gardeners. Airborne late blight spores are a perfect illustration of agriculture’s web-like connections. The tomato plant on the windowsill, the backyard garden and the industrial tomato farm are, to be a bit reductive about it, one very large farm. As we begin to grow more of our own food, we need to reacquaint ourselves with plant pathology and understand that what we grow, and how we grow it, affects everyone else."

Hmm, this reminds me of a tidbit I heard when grass-fed beef was first hitting the market. In case you were not aware, grass is the natural diet of cattle but almost all industrially raised beef is fed corn. The reasons are complex and totally effed up, but that's another rant. The point here is that when ranchers first began returning to grass feeding their cattle, they faced an interesting conundrum - they had forgotten how to grow grass. Or to be less hyperbolic, ranchers had forgotten the delicate art of properly pasturing their cattle so as to maintain a healthy, sustainable grassland.

So it seems like we're facing a similar dilemma at this stage in our return to home gardening. Most of our grandparents probably knew how to grow a pretty good home garden, and chances are they bought their seeds and starts from a local nursery. Those seeds and starts would have been varieties that had been climate and taste tested for generations. Now, however, most of those varieties are lost, and I'm not just talking about heirloom plants. I can't even get a thick-rinded melon these days for making watermelon rind pickles - everything I find in grocery stores and seed catalogs are homogenous, thin-skinned melons. More importantly, so much of the knowledge and know-how of how to grow some simple food crops has all but vanished. This article, for example, talks about tomato blight. I probably wouldn't recognize tomato blight if I was staring it in the face, and this isn't exactly my first summer trying to grow a garden.

Home gardening, like canning or pickling, is yet another old-timey skill that has almost been lost to the ages. And just like I've had to stumble my way through learning and sharing these skills, so are most of us stumbling our way through learning how to grow our own food.

But it's an important skill to learn, and not just because we need to be constantly vigilant about zombie attacks. To quote again:

"Healthy, natural systems abhor uniformity — just as a healthy society does. We need, then, to look to a system of food and agriculture that values and mimics natural diversity. The five-acre monoculture of tomato plants next door might be local, but it’s really no different from the 200-acre one across the country: both have sacrificed the ecological insurance that comes with biodiversity."

Love Note To Butter

2009-08-12T12:00:00.001-07:00

I have plenty of things to post, but unfortunately I have a Physics test in less than 24 hours so they will have to wait a bit. However, one of my favorite bloggers, Kate Lebo, just penned a wonderful post on pie! I am linking it here for your reading enjoyment. Interestingly enough, it seems we have both, simultaneously and independent of each other, come up with identical recipes for all-butter pie crust. I am a big fan of all-butter pie crusts, because have you ever looked at a can of vegetable shortening? It's some of the most unhealthy and unnatural stuff you can buy, and the "natural" variety that you can get in grocery stores is actually palm oil. Remember my soap-making post months back about the evils of palm oil? Well, I'm not putting it in my soap and I'm sure as hell not putting it in my pie.

Butter, however, is a gift from the gods. Enjoy!

I Shall Be Known As Noncombustia!

2009-08-03T22:33:00.000-07:00

Here is another article from my favorite environmental news source, Grist, about how significant levels of flame-retardants have made their way into our food system, particularly in poultry. Apparently, vegetarians have 23-27 percent less flame retardant in their bodies than do meat eaters.

This is the kind of news that makes me vomit a little bit in my mouth. Apparently, I can use that vomit as a handy replacement for the household fire extinguisher.

Granted, spontaneous chicken combustion is a real, serious threat folks. How many chickens have we already lost to SCC? Too many. Clearly, we should be pumping our poultry full of as many flame retardants as possible, if only to stem the epidemic of charred chickens.

And yet, something doesn't quite sit well with me about this. Hey! Maybe it's this handy fact:

"A growing body of research in laboratory animals has linked PBDE exposure to an array of adverse health effects including thyroid hormone disruption, permanent learning and memory impairment, behavioral changes, hearing deficits, delayed puberty onset, decreased sperm count, fetal malformations and, possibly, cancer. Research in animals shows that exposure to brominated fire retardants in-utero or during infancy leads to more significant harm than exposure during adulthood, and at much lower levels."

Awesome. This is the stuff that made me become a vegetarian, years ago. Alas, it was an ill-fated adventure - I really do enjoy eating meat. But must it come with a side of polybrominated diphenyl ether?

I mean, I guess the upshot is that maybe if I eat enough of this contaminated chicken, my body will develop some comic book hero type flame resistant powers. I will be able to walk into a building of burning vegetarians, unscathed! Somehow I think I would have to eat a lot of chicken for that to happen. In the meantime, I'll just have to settle for my delayed puberty, infertility, and mental retardation.

From Tomato To Enviro-Rant In Sixty Seconds Or Less

2009-08-02T13:01:00.001-07:00

This is exactly how I feel about tomatoes.

"Briefly, I am content with impeccable fresh tomatoes and an intensely flavored, effortless, and fresh sauce. That contentment quickly subsides and every glorious tomato I pass by at the farmer’s market looks like a missed opportunity to preserve the pleasure for when the bounty ends. Lives get busy; summer vacations draw us away from our gardens and our kitchens; and yet, the seasons roll on. Before we know it, the seemingly endless supply of tomatoes will start to dwindle whether or not we’ve made time to capture these nuanced flavors for enjoyment beyond the dog days of summer. Months without a taste of the dark & smoky Cherokee Purple, the bright yellow Kellogg’s Breakfast, or the zippy striped Green Zebra seems unbearable and, thankfully, unnecessary."

Oh, this article makes me feel nostalgic for the times when I lived in a tomato-friendly climate. I remember well those Midwest farmer's markets that boomed with tomatoes of every shape and color. It was so easy then to convince a vendor to sell me a box of slightly bruised Romas for fifty cents a pound. Vendors here look at me like I'm crazy when I ask about "surplus" tomatoes - every single one here is like a shiny, red jewel.

Although, Seattle might be getting closer to a tomato friendly climate than we think. I mean, 102 degrees anyone? This week has been unusual, to say the least. Although, I must admit I am a little disappointed in my fellow Seattle-ites. Everyone here likes to claim how green a city Seattle is, how we have one of the smallest carbon footprints of any major city in the US. Yet, as soon as the weather gets a little bit uncomfortable, people line up overnight at Home Depot to snag an AC unit. For shame, Seattle! You can't live through a couple of days of heat without becoming a carbon-emitting, freon-dumping monster? To quote one resident:

"Geno Garcia, 40, a Boeing machinist, headed straight for Sears in Seattle early Wednesday when the family's air conditioning unit broke down. 'We could have lived without it, but it would have been uncomfortable,' he said, as he stood in line with about 100 others who bought air conditioners."

Awesome. I'm glad that our environmental ethic melts away as soon as we get "uncomfortable." Granted, I am biased. You don't see me living without heat in the winter. I run pretty cold, so 102 degrees feels pretty comfortable to me. But I have good cause to hate air conditioning. On a whole, it's a lot more toxic than heating on account of it releases Freon into the envrionment in addition to being energy intensive. It also, ironically, increases the liklihood of heat-related illnesses such as heat exhaustion because it prevents your body from becoming acclimatized to the heat.

I realize I'm on a pretty high horse right now - people die from heat, just as they die from cold. But you should also realize that Seattle has a hundred eco-friendly ways to cool down. We are surrounded on three sides by water. There are more delicious ice creams shops here than you can swing a cat at (Molly Moon's has had a line thirty people deep all week). Lake Washington is open to the public to swim and cool down in. And I don't think there's anything wrong with a few carefully chosen air conditioned facilities - cooling centers, libraries, and the like. It's just the individual AC units that really get my goat.

So, it looks like I can manage to take a frothy article about the joys of tomatoes and turn it into an environmentally charged rant in about two paragraphs. Well, that's a nice feather in my cap.