The ‘Glad to be Alive’ Breakfast

Out here, we have a common turn of phrase when it comes to Breakfast on weekends. It’s a time to reconnect, to eat fresh, simple foods that engage the taste buds. The simplest of these foods, a tomato, sliced thinly, in a shallow bowl, with a touch of sea salt, is typical. After a few minutes, liquid leaves the tomato, mixes somewhat with the salt, and provides a flavor that will be remembered all day.

These are weekend foods meant for slower days, when a person can take the time to sit, engage in conversation and savor the flavor of life. It’s also very different from the normal daily breakfast around here.

Another simple recipe: borne out of boredom, also used on occasion is a curried hash brown potato

[spoiler]2 medium potatoes, cut to a 1/2 inch dice.

1 tablespoon curry powder

1 teaspoon garlic powder

Soy sauce, tamari, or Braggs liquid aminos, to taste.[/spoiler]

Mix the potato with the garlic and curry powders. The potato can be skin on, or off, depending on your personal preference. We like them on. Cover and microwave on high for 5 minutes, until the potatoes have softened. Pan fry the potatoes, until lightly browned. Then season with whichever liquid you chose above. Braggs will give a less salty flavor than the others, and is what we use, but soy or tamari sauce will work well. Serve immediately. A complete meal with this might be an egg, the tomatoes, as above, plain yogurt, and your choice of beverage, which in our house is a latte, from recently roasted beans. Serves 2, but the multiples of this recipe are easy to do, since everything is a whole number.

In the ‘glad to be alive’ breakfast, yogurt is almost universal. It’s a source of calcium, works well to absorb any flavor that escapes onto the plate, and helps to add beneficial fauna to the body, and just seems to taste good. Other parts of it come and go, and as the days and weeks go on, new recipes will appear in the ‘Glad to be Alive’ breakfast category.

by senrik Posted on 18 August ’09
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The death of home cooking

We had a realization of the worst kind yesterday. We perused Ruhlman’s blog, and saw an older article on the death of home cooking. So far, we’ve hesitated to speak of specific things, for fear of alienating you. We didn’t want to talk of ‘Julie and Julia’, because much of what was to be said, has already been said, by people like Bourdain and Ruhlman, people much more versed in the professional food world than anyone at Diarrhea of a foodie.

But ultimately, it’s all related, because as Ruhlman points out, Julia Child didn’t come from nowhere. She came from the world of making French cuisine accessible to the home chef. Think of the cultural context. It’s no accident that, she began her teaching career at the birth of the supermarket and the TV dinner. It would seem, at least in hindsight, to be a rejection of the role of processed prepackaged meals. In Julia’s world, food tasted better when we cooked it ourselves, and she was right. Food in a box generally lacked the freshness of home cooked food, and were packed with preservatives, used to enhance the shelf-life, but as far as we knew, did nothing else. It was part of a new era, where no one had to cook.

The point of this is to bring us back to the present. In a world of food shows, heck, entire food networks, gourmet food shops, you’d imagine that a large amount of people, more than half of American households, actually cook their own meals. This was our experience growing up, and while it occasionally lacked inspiration, or desire, it was at least generally free of nasty additives, and tasted like real food. Unfortunately, the reality is that our experience is not the norm. The sad truth is that on average, only 36% of the average American’s meals are eaten in the house. That includes the food that is ordered for delivery, whether it’s Pizza, Fried Chicken, Chinese take-out, or food in a box (our short hand for all foods that are prepackaged, made to be simple: open box, bang into oven or microwave, and heat).

We ignored the signs when a relative moved into an apartment that had no oven. We ignored and ridiculed the fast food advertisements, showing ‘mom’ picking up food from the take-out joint on the way home from work, and then the children cheer for the brand-name food in a box. We ignored the ready supply of shows where chefs walk into someone’s house, is appalled by all the food in boxes, and finds a way to cook something real, and genuine.

And yet, food blogs flourish, food shows increase in popularity, food magazines become glitzier, and in all of them, photos and videos enough to make anyone drool. And yet the rate of adoption of people to the food in a box increases. Do we entertain with food porn as if it is a lost love, never to have?

‘Julie and Julia’ represents a nadir in what Mrs. Child would have liked, a woman imitating another, who has in essence never cooked. We are not professional chefs here, but we like to cook, we like to eat, and we like the interaction of food to heat, to ingredients, and finally to our mouths, when we eat it, along with whatever else we are consuming. To others, it’s nutrition, but to us, it’s an act of love.

Calling food nutrition is evil. It takes a part of culture, full of life, vibrancy and emotion, and takes away everything genuine about it, and in return, we get what, exactly? Cookie cutter meals for our cookie cutter lives? Lives that lose a little value when our culture comes from a box (whether it’s food, TV, corporatized radio, or to some extent, a computer, it’s still a nameless, faceless, culture-less box). The mere fact that it comes from a box makes it safe for consumption, at least as far as corporate America is concerned. To them it means that we are part of American culture, full of disposable boxes, disposable culture, and disposable lives, all the products of the lowest bid, and marked for maximum yield (of dollars). That’s what works for them, but people are, or perhaps they should be better than that. Perhaps we should expect more than a box, and perhaps we should expect more of ourselves. The problem with Julie and Julia, is that it puts it all in a box, without the dignity of love. In food, love comes easy, it’s the change in the food, the care you put into it, and the changes to the recipe to suit your own tastes, things that will never happen in a box.

Ultimately as Ruhlmann points out, we make food policy with what we purchase, because companies make what we are willing to buy, and if we don’t buy it, they will stop making it. Except when the box makers want to manipulate the market, that’s the way it works.

Cook a meal from scratch some day, and you’ll taste the difference.

by senrik Posted on 17 August ’09
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At the shrine of the pig.

At Salumi
At Salumi

We were on line at Salumi, and yes, it takes a good twenty minutes to get in and get your order in, even if you have the presence of mind to order via email before. Truly this is the altar of the pig, with the almost entirely handmade artisan salumis, from the standard copa and cota, to the more exotic molé (with mexican spices and chocolate), and the Marco Polo, a salami with flavors of lemongrass and asian spices.

Yes, we were chastened by the people there for not ordering ahead of time, and no, we were not ordering sandwiches, but whole pieces of cured meat. so there was weighing and the like involved, so we didn’t exactly speed the line along…

The most interesting part of the experience were the pigs, large amounts of pig figurines, That, and the poem near the door:

Make room at the trough

 

For the noble pig knows

That the more you share

The less likely you are to be eaten.

Both for pigs and for people too, at least to us.

 

by senrik Posted on 5 August ’09
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Poulet en Confit (Chicken Confit)

Ok, you probably think senrik has become a hypocrite? Confit? Isn’t that the height of pretense? I mean, its French, its fine dining, isn’t that everything your blog is not supposed to be?

Well, not exactly. Before it was high cuisine, it was a method of preserving waterfowl in the south of France. In the hot climate of the Mediterranean, the process of preserving game in its own oil is quite useful. In the days before refrigeration, it meant that food could be stored for many days, weeks, even months. For people who cannot let food go bad, for fear of survival, it’s a godsend. Based on that, confit is not pretentious, it’s what’s for dinner for at least part of the year.

Then there are the health issues involved with the confit process. In essence, we are poaching something in oil, cooking it very low and very slow, and traditionally, in its own fat. For something like duck, this could represent something rather high in cholesterol, and certainly high in calories. Because we are using chicken in this situation, there will not be enough fat in the bird to handle the confit process properly, so we are adding oil. In this case, Extra virgin olive oil.

Suddenly alarm bells go off… as they should….”Cook in Extra virgin olive oil? are you joking? Won’t the oil degrade into something really bad for you?” The short answer to that is “no”. The long answer is that because we are cooking at an oven temperature below 200 degrees Fahrenheit, below the boiling temperature of water, and well below the smoke point of even olive oil, there is no dangerous degradation of the oil.

Finally, the confit in this recipe is used as an ingredient in other foods, not eaten as is. Of the ingredients in it, only the salt mix is not really reusable. The oil can be reused for a number of confits, used in pasta, or any other thing that you want to us olive oil for.

The oil in the confit can be reused, many times. Eventually, the oil will accumulate too much salt, and will eventually need to be tossed. If you are using the oil in other dishes, however, you will need to replace that oil, which should keep the salt level on the oil down, and the flavor up.

Its worth noting that while there were many recipes for the traditional Provence confit, using duck and duck fat, there is precious little on the Internet for one done in chicken. Research also indicates that the process done on chicken is not considered a real Confit, but rather done in the confit style, hence the name which translates into ‘Chicken in the confit style’. [spoiler show="Show Ingredients" hide="Hide Ingredients"]

 

1 Large chicken (5 pounds) or equivalent in chicken parts

3 Cups kosher salt

3 bay leaves

3 tablespoons garlic

1 teaspoons whole allspice

1 tablespoon whole peppercorn

4 cloves

3 juniper berries

1 teaspoons each, of thyme, oregano, rosemary

4 or more cups olive oil [/spoiler]

Make the spiced curing rub. While some would say that there is no difference between using a coffee grinder and a mortar / pestle mixture, the difference is as plain as sliced vs. pounded. Pounding tends to break down cell walls and brings out the flavors better than the sliced food mills.

It is acceptable to use a coffee grinder to reduce the size of the pieces for final maceration in a mortar and pestle, but doing it all in a food process may reduce the result to a paste, which is not what anyone is looking for.

Crush the bay leaves in your hand, and add them to the peppercorn, allspice, juniper and clove. grind to a fine powder, finer than sand but not quite dust.  Remove them from the mortar and add the garlic and herbs and crush to a paste. Add them to the crushed spices, and add the salt. It will clump at first, but using your hands to work the mixture into something resembling consistency, it will eventually become dry and the clumps will be removed.

 

Cut up the chicken into large pieces. (we cut ours into legs, thighs, wings, then butterflied the torso and cut it up into six pieces). place the salt mix into the bottom of a pan, then coat each piece with a liberal amount of salt, working into every crevice. cover the chicken and put into the refrigerator, 18-24 hours.

20090801_0145.JPG

After the refrigerator time, preheat your oven to its lowest setting. This might be 200 degrees, or less, the lower the better, as long as it still heats. Wipe the chicken of the salt, but do not rinse. Place the chicken in a tightly fitting pot. place the oil into the pot until it just covers the chicken parts. Cover the pot and put it in the oven, 6-8 hours. You will notice no smell, but when the meat begins to come of  the bone, it is ready. Allow it to cool to room temperature.

 

It is now ready to eat, to use in other foods, or simply to store for later. Per the research for this, it was noted that letting it rest 5 or so days allows the dish to mature in taste. The flavor will be intense, with the texture of perfectly food fish, and a buttery finish to the palate.

Stay tuned, for several dishes based on this very confit.

20090802_0144.JPG

by senrik Posted on 2 August ’09
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‘Organic’ debate goes on, naturally

So, is Certified Organic always better than the non-certified equivalent? There are many who would say ‘not so fast’. They talk about some of the reasons being the cost of certification, the amount of paperwork, or the muddy waters as to what are ‘proper’ organic additives. More of this debate is contained at the following:

‘Organic’ debate goes on, naturally – Los Angeles Times.

Still, your best bet is to know the places where your food comes from. The problem with this approach is that it takes a lot of time, and even farmers change after a while, so it involves constant vigilance. Farmer’s Markets are useful, if expensive, but in many places, Farmer’s Markets are less than frequent. Out here, in the particular place in the woods where this blog is written, the Farmer’s Market is open a few hours on Saturdays (it closes at 1 pm) and is only open April – October. And while local supermarkets have a good supply of Certified Organics, it limits one to available fruits. I know that would put us in the realm of heresy to the Alice Waters disciples. But while they preach to a noble goal, it becomes hopelessly difficult.

by senrik Posted on 29 July ’09
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Scandinavian Style Nut Butter Balls

These are really easy to make, evilly good. So, why ‘evilly’? It could have something to do with all the fat and oil in the recipe (1 1/2 sticks of butter and Coconut oil, or, 2 sticks of butter, your choice). They are crumbly, and fill the mouth with nutty goodness. In this version, we give two separate versions: One with powdered sugar outside, and one without. The big difference between the two is the amount of sugar that gets added to the dough mixture. (obviously there is less sugar inside when the outside is coated with powdered sugar. (the Powdered version also looks nicer, as you will see later).

Makes about 37 balls.

[spoiler effect="blind" show="Show Ingredients, without powdered sugar" hide="Hide Ingredients, without powdered sugar"]

1 cup of peanuts

1 1/2 (12 tablespoons) stick of butter + 4 tablespoons coconut oil

-or-

2 sticks (16 tablespoons) of butter

3/4 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons vanilla

1 teaspoon almond extract

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 cup shredded coconut

(optional) 1 cup raisins

[/spoiler]
[spoiler effect="blind" show="Show Ingredients with powdered sugar" hide="Hide Ingredients with powdered sugar"]

1 cup of peanuts

1 1/2 (12 tablespoons) stick of butter + 4 tablespoons coconut oil

-or-

2 sticks (16 tablespoons) of butter

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons vanilla

1 teaspoon almond extract

2 cups all purpose flour

1 cup shredded coconut

(optional) 1 cup raisins

2 cups powdered sugar

[/spoiler]

peanut.jpgGrind the nuts with a nut grinder, with a nut grinder, or, if you like to do it the old way, like we do, grind it in a mortar and pestle. The nuts should be broken down, like it is shown on the thumbnail to the left. When it is ready, it will almost be peanut butter. Best bet is to do the grinding in small enough amounts so that it doesn’t fly out of the mortar. Measure out one cup (8 oz.) of the ground peanuts.

whippedButter.jpgIn a medium bowl, beat the butter until it is smooth and creamy. Do not melt the butter. We found that the best way to make this whipped butter is to cut the butter into small chunks while still cold and whip them in a stand mixer until smooth (as shown on the right), but this can certainly be done by hand. In a mixer, this can take 30 seconds.
ButterSugar.JPGOnce the butter has been whipped, add the sugar, salt, vanilla and almond extract, and continue to whip, for 2 minutes or so, until the ingredients are well incorporated, and the mixture is again smooth and fluffy, as seen on the left.
cookiedough.jpgIf using a mixer, this is the time to stop. Using a wooden spoon, stir in the nuts, followed by the raisins (if you are adding them), the coconut and coconut oil (if you are using it), and finally the flour. When the flour is added, you might need to start to knead this by hand. Knead gently, and try to do this quickly. If it takes more than a minute, put it into the refrigerator for a few minutes, so that the butter does not melt. In the end, it should be mixed evenly.
uncookedCookieBalls.JPG Start your oven, set to bake at about 350 degrees F, and adjust an oven rack into the center of the oven. Set up a cookie sheet with waxed paper or a silicon liner. Using a melon baller, scoop a small ball, larger than a marble, but smaller than a golf ball, and work it with your hands into a round shape. try not to work it too much, so as not to melt the butter. Place the balls about an inch or two apart.
cookedCookieBalls.JPGBake 20 to 25 minutes until the balls are lightly browned. The balls will puff a little while baking. If preparing with powdered sugar, put the powdered sugar into a paper bag. When the balls leave the oven, take them, half at a time, and place them into the bag, close the bag and shake them, getting the balls coated with the powdered sugar. Remove the balls from the sugar and allow to cool on a drying rack. Repeat this with the rest of the balls while we are still hot.
Store in an airtight compartment, and eat sparingly, as they are quite fattening.

cookieporn.jpg
by senrik Posted on 25 July ’09
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Cured and hot smoked salmon

We did a little research on the origins of this dish, and discovered nothing quite like it, but a whole genre of variations.
From European Jews comes Lox, a brined, generally Atlantic Salmon, cold-smoked and sliced thinly. The variation of this is Nova, similar to Lox, but with a thinner brine. Both variations use cold smoke: a technique where smoke is created in one chamber, cooled, and piped into a second chamber, away from the heat. It typically calls for the temperature of the smoke to be less than 90 degrees F, when it hits the flesh to be smoked. This is an expensive proposition unless someone jury-rigs something up, and then it takes a lot of time and constant vigilance.

A second way things are done is the Norwegian gravlax, again an Atlantic Salmon, covered in salt, and spices (typically Juniper is one of the spices). This is then placed under some weight. This variation is not smoked, the salt crust cures it.

Out in the Pacific Northwest, the Native Americans used a practice similar to Gravlax, but they would hot smoke the salmon until it became hard, like jerky. Hot smoking, is what happens in ‘low and slow’ barbeque, where you let the food cook and smoke under indirect heat. The smoke is hot, so ultimately the food is fully cooked when it leave the barbeque. Typically, the Natives would butterfly the salmon, and smoke it butterflied.

What we will do in this recipe is to mix it all together, with a spice and salt crusting, followed by smoking. Unlike the natives however, we only smoke the fish until it’s flaky.

A note on selection: We typically use the fattest of salmon for this, this is, for us, generally a sockeye salmon, originating from the Copper or Yukon rivers of Alaska. You will so just fine with most salmon (at least taste-wise), so let your regional selection, and personal choice prevail.

Likewise: the wood used in smoking is important. Don’t use anything but real untreated hardwood. Plywood, and fiberboard use glues, which do not taste good when burned. Softwoods, like fir and pine, have resins, when burned, leave a bad-tasting tar. And many pressure treated woods contain arsenic, which is poisonous when used in this manner. We typically use either cedar or alder, which enhance the flavor of salmon. You might be able to find this as scrap wood at your local home depot, and it’s no crime to use it (at least one brand of lump charcoal uses lumberyard waste like this as source wood for their lump).

This dish is probably safe to eat even after a week in the refrigerator. We say probably, because, typically nothing of the fish is left after 2 days, as it gets eaten quickly.

Note: this dish has a preparation time of two days, mostly unattended, so if you are making it for a backyard event, plan ahead.
[spoiler effect="phase" show="Show ingredient list" hide="Hide ingredient list"]1/2 cup kosher salt
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon pink salt
1 teaspoon ground pepper
1 teaspoon ground allspice
1 teaspoon ground bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon ground clove
1/2 teaspoon ground mace

1 1/2 pound salmon fillet, with skin, but pinbones removed
1 1/2 tablespoon rum[/spoiler]

1. The cure:
Mix all dry ingredients. Find a container large enough for the salmon. It should be tight-fitting. Place half of the dry mix evenly in the container. Place the salmon, skin side down, into the container, and put the rest of the dry mix on the fish. Sprinkle the rum on top, apply plastic wrap, and apply about four pounds of weight. Refrigerate this for a day and a half. A large amount of liquid will escape from the fish, and the fish will firm up.

After about a day and a half, take the fish and rinse off the salt and spices with water. Dry the fish with a dry towel or paper, and leave it for a few hours. What we are looking for is a pellicle to form. A pellicle is a thin, slightly sticky film. The pellicle will attract the smoke, and the stickiness will allow the smoke to adhere to the fish.

2. Smoke
Prep the barbeque: we are looking for a low indirect heat. On our barbeque, 200 degrees F is about as low as if gets without some help. To help lower the temperature further, we have to cool things down some more. What we use to do this is a pan full of ice under the fish, on the cold side of the barbeque. This will allow us to smoke the salmon longer than expected, without the risk of the salmon overcooking. The salmon will cook, skin side down, and smoke for two hours. After an hour, remove the water in the ice tray, and replace with more ice.

Once it’s flaky, remove and serve. The best things we know of with this are: copper river barbeque sauce (the subject of a future SmokedSalmon.jpgblog), grilled veggies, and rice. The skin is easily removed, if you’d like to serve this as cuisine, or leave the skin on and eat the salmon with the skin as food.

Now that it is here, time to eat. This is best served with a Copper River Barbeque sauce (a topic for a future blog post), grilled zucchini, wine, beer, either rice or whole grain bread. (I once had something similar to a Boston brown bread with it), and good company. Life gets no better than this.

Try this sometime, and savor the bounty of the sea, and the great foods that come from it.

by senrik Posted on 22 July ’09
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Welcome to the new blog.

Right now, we are still cleaning the dust, painting the walls and pinning the drapes. We haven’t really opened yet, and yet, a blog looks awfully unusual with no content.

For now, there will be little in this blog, until we have decided on themes, designs, and we’ve started to develop things more. So stay tuned, and soon enough, content will arrive.

by senrik Posted on 19 July ’09
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