Memorial Day Reminisences

I went to my mother’s gravesite in Mankato yesterday to pay respects and put flowers there. She has been gone from this earth for 4 years but lived here for 95 and a half. The trip was a time-travel phenomenon from beginning to end. Trying to explain it to Zig in the car on the way back was difficult and fell short of the real feelings that I experienced; my perspective on so many things has changed.

First of all, the city of Mankato has changed, but it still feels like a familiar, almost a hometown for me. No, I never lived in Mankato, or North Mankato where my grandmother actually lived and where my mother grew up; but I spent so many summers and holidays there that its aura is of familiarity. The landmarks of crossing the bridge from North Mankato to Mankato, which I did almost everyday when I was there in the summer seem almost right, but the changes have obliterated many of the landmarks. The old railroad station that was on the Mankato side and the large, luxury hotel are gone. Gone is the through-traffic Front Street where Brett’s Department store, Woolworths Five and Dime, the Candy Kitchen and Martin and Hoer’s Jewelry Store where Grandma worked. Nevertheless, the smell and feel of the downtown is still there for me in my mind’s eye.

The shade tree-lined residential streets remain with their old, but well-kept homes as do the stone churches and the “newer” section on the south side (not so new any more). But the river is almost unrecognizable. I loved to walk down the sandy road beside my grandma’s house to the river’s edge and watch the lazy pools of bubbles from the carp and turtles, with waterfowl gliding along from time to time. Throwing stones into the river and trying to skip the flat ones was an hour’s entertainment. It was a lazy, hazy day of summer. Now the highway activity is the background and there are no stone-throwing places to stand in the town anymore. So sad.

My mother lived long enough to see most of these changes and I know that it saddened her as well, but she really did have a wonderful attitude toward life that I wish I had inherited. She was the original Pollyanna—she was glad, glad, glad: to be alive, to have every new day. Of course she had her ups and downs and I haven’t forgotten some of her less wonderful qualities—but who cares? What I really think of when I think of her is a woman who was intelligent, curious, talented, sweet and loving and who enjoyed life to the fullest. She made fun out of everything. It was a quality that she evidently shared with her grandmother. I never knew my great-grandmother, but that was the overriding comment that everyone made about her—she made fun out of everything.

My mother taught me a lot about the Mankato area. When she was young, it was still safe to roam the woods and hills and caves that surrounded the valley town and roam she did. She had three brothers who took her many places. She loved to tell the story of how she learned to swim. She and her brothers were wandering on the outskirts of town when a band of gypsies appeared on the road. The four children were just crossing a bridge and since the rumors were that gypsies liked to steal little girl children, her oldest brother tossed her blithely off the bridge into the stream below and ordered her to swim. She was about 5 and didn’t know how to swim—but she was so angry at her brother that she began kicking and flailing and—all of a sudden—swimming!

Graduation Party Fare

Every year there is the usual round of graduation parties—fun and important—but very often very similar, especially in the food department. Your graduate isn’t ordinary, though—so have a graduation buffet magna cum laude—with high honors!!

I really got my start in special-occasion cooking when I and all my friends were doing graduation open-house buffets for our children. I was willing and in demand to do parties for all my friends as well as for my own four children. However, we all travelled in the same circles, so each party needed a fresh face. Realizing that decorations would be similar and the food would need to be popular with grandparents, parents and teens; I set out to find some special menus. Also, I couldn’t forget budget and time considerations.

Here is a buffet that has everything and is truly deserving of high honors—but let your graduate and guests be the judges. There are quite a few variations to this buffet so that you can fill in blanks and change a few of the dishes as well as the ingredients in some of the dishes.

Deviled Eggs
Miniature hamburgers
Pulled pork sandwiches
Chicken salad on baby bagels
Sweet Potato Salad
Couscous Salad
Graduation cake
Diploma Cookies
Wild-berry Sangria (non-alcoholic)

Everyone loves deviled eggs and you may have your own special recipe, but I think the simpler the better. This one is easy and has few ingredients:

Deviled Eggs

10 large hard-boiled eggs, peeled, halved lengthwise
½ cup chopped fresh chives
1/3 cup mayonnaise
1 tsp. Dijon mustard

Scoop yolks out of eggs; place in work bowl of food processor with 2 Tbsp. chives, mayonnaise and mustard. Season with salt and pepper. Process until smooth. Mound, filling in egg halves and sprinkle with remaining chives. Arrange on platter. (Can be made 6 hours ahead. Cover loosely and chill.)

Chicken Salad on Baby Bagels (makes 8—use multiples of recipe as desired)

1 large skinless-boneless chicken breast, poached and diced small (about 2 cups)
½ cup creamy peanut butter
2 Tbsp. freshly squeezed lemon juice
½ cup chopped fresh cilantro
2 Tbsp Teriyaki sauce
2 tsp. Thai garlic-chile sauce
¼ cup toasted pine nuts

Toss together all ingredients. Pile on mini bagel bottoms and place tops and press gently.

Sweet Potato Salad

Dressing

¼ cup olive oil
2 Tbsp. pure maple syrup
2 Tbsp orange juice
2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
1 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
2 tsp. minced peeled fresh ginger
½ tsp. ground cinnamon
¼ tsp ground nutmeg

½ cup mayonnaise

Salad

6 pounds sweet potatoes, peeled, cut into ¾-inch cubes
1 cup chopped green onions
1 cup chopped fresh Italian parsley
1 cup pecans, toasted, coarsely chopped
½ cup dried apricots, chopped
½ cup raisins

For Dressing: Whisk all ingredients except mayonnaise in small bowl. Season dressing to taste with salt and pepper.

For Salad: Steam sweet potatoes in batches until just tender, about 10 minutes per batch. Transfer to large bowl. Cool to room temperature. Add green onions, parsley, pecans, apricots and raisins. Pour dressing over; toss gently to blend. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Refrigerate for 2 hours before serving. Right before serving, fold in mayonnaise, gently. Serve immediately. (Can sit for 1 hour at room temperature.)

Couscous Salad with Dates and Almonds

2 cups water
½ tsp. salt
1 10-oz. box couscous

½ cup olive oil
6 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
1 Tbsp grated lemon peel
1 tsp. ground cardamom
1 15-to-16-ounce can garbanzo beans, drained
½ cup chopped pitted dates
½ cup slivered almonds, toasted
½ cup minced fresh cilantro
¼ cup minced green onions.
Fresh cilantro sprigs

Bring 2 cups water and ½ tsp. salt to boil in medium saucepan. Add couscous; stir 30 seconds. Remove from heat. Cover and let stand 5 minutes. Fluff with fork. Transfer to large bowl to cool. Whisk olive oil, lemon juice, lemon peel and cardamom to blend in small bowl. Drizzle over couscous. Mix in garbanzo beans, dates, almonds, minced cilantro and green onions. Season with salt and pepper. Let stand at room temperature at least 1 hour and up to 2 hours. Garnish with cilantro sprigs right before serving, if desired.

Diploma Cookies

5 Tbsp. butter, room temperature
1 cup powdered sugar
2 large egg whites
½ tsp. vanilla extract
½ cup plus 2 Tbsp. all purpose flour

In bowl of electric mixer, beat 3 tablespoons butter and sugar until coarse meal forms. Beat in egg whites, 1 at a time, then vanilla. Add flour and beat until well blended. Melt remaining 2 Tbsp. butter in small saucepan over low heat. Mix warm butter into batter. Position rack in center of oven and preheat to 350 degrees F. Lightly butter 2 nonstick baking sheets (or spray regular sheets with vegetable spray.) Spoon 1 heaping teaspoonful batter for each cookie onto sheets, spacing 4 inches apart. Using a small offset spatula or back of spoon, spread batter for each cookie to very thin 4-inch round. Bake cookies on 1 sheet until ¾ inch of edge is golden brown, about 5 minutes. Run thin flexible spatula under edge of 1 cookie to loosen and remove from sheet. Working quickly while cookies are still warm and flexible, roll 1 cookie around handle of wooden spoon into cylinder. Slide cookie onto work surface. Shape remaining cookies into cylinders, returning sheet to oven briefly to soften cookies if necessary. Bake cookies on second sheet while first baking sheet cools. Repeat with remaining batter, using cool baking sheet each time. Cool rolled cookies completely on cooling rack. Tie with narrow ribbon to resemble diplomas.

Wild-berry Sangria (Serves about 24)

8 cups water
8 wild-berry tea bags
2 cups sugar
4 1-pint baskets strawberries, hulled
2 750ml bottles chilled sparkling apple cider
6 kiwis, peeled, cut into ½-inch cubes
4 cups ice cubes

Bring 4 cups water to boil in large saucepan. Add tea bags; cover and let steep 10 minutes. Discard tea bags. Add sugar to hot tea; stir until dissolved. Stir in remaining 4 cups water. Chill tea until cold, about 3 hours. Puree 2 baskets strawberries in processor. Slice remaining 2 baskets strawberries. Place pureed and sliced berries in large pitcher, punch bowl or two pitchers. Add tea and all remaining ingredients. Stir and serve.

Cook’s Tips:

Deviled egg mixture can be put into pastry bag and piped into egg whites.

Small hamburger buns can be purchased at many supermarkets and bakeries or made from Rhodes frozen roll dough. If using Rhodes, thaw and cut Texas size rolls in two. Shape into balls, put into pan, ½ inch apart. Let rise; brush 1 whole egg, beaten, over the tops and bake according to directions. When making small hamburgers, put a dab of mayo, a squirt of catsup, mustard and a slice of dill pickle on each one.

Graduation Cake

Make 1 Duncan Hines white cake mix for each sheet according to package directions but put into a 15x10x2” pan instead of a 9x13x2”. Bake 4 minutes less than 9x13 instructions on box or until cake tests done. Cool for 5 minutes. Carefully turn out onto sturdy base covered with foil or doily. When thoroughly cool, frost with cream cheese frosting, saving about ¾ cup frosting; set aside. Tint 3/4 cup frosting with purple food coloring.

Cream Cheese Frosting
1 8-oz pkg. cream cheese, softened
½ cup butter, softened
2 tsp. vanilla (if you don’t want an ivory color, use white vanilla)
6 cups sifted powdered sugar

Beat cream cheese, butter and vanilla with electric mixer until light and fluffy. Gradually add powdered sugar, 2 cups at a time, to reach spreading consistency.

Frost cake, piping edges with decorative shell tip or leaving plain and running a purple grosgrain ribbon all around sides of cake. Use purple frosting to write graduate’s name, congratulations, the year, etc. on cake. Place one diploma cookie on bottom right corner of cake and mortar board on top left.

To make mortar board: Melt ½ cup dark chocolate chips (such as Ghirardelli 60% Bittersweet chocolate chips) in microwave using 50% power for 30 seconds. Stir. If chocolate doesn’t stir into smoothness, microwave at 10 second intervals until it is just melted. Add ½ tsp. vegetable oil and microwave for 10 seconds more. Pour half of chocolate onto baking sheet and tilt until it is 1/8 inch thick. Pour the rest of the chocolate into small deep bowl (such as a custard cup). Put baking sheet into refrigerator for 5 minutes. Dip one end of small balloon (blown up) into chocolate in custard cup and set in refrigerator on a plate. Remove baking sheet and score chocolate into 3 ½” square. Refrigerate until set. Burst balloon with a sharp object (such as a pin) and pull balloon away from chocolate. This is the head cup. Place it in left top corner of cake. Next, remove 3 ½" square with wide-bladed spatula and with a bit of frosting as glue, set it on the head cup. Using the same frosting-glue, put a stem-on maraschino cherry in center of mortar board for tassel.

If your cake will be outside in hot weather, this chocolate mortar board will melt. In that case, you can make one from phyllo pastry, using four phyllo layers, with melted butter brushed on each sheet between layers. Cut out 3 ½ “squares and bake about 7 minutes
at 350 degrees. Use the rest of the squares to make Napoleons!

The Sangria can be embellished with white wine for adults.

Setting up your party:

Use the colors of the graduate’s school. I learned from a recent graduate from Red Wing High School that in addition to the purple and white colors (which I knew)—red is an official color as well. Purple and white flowers, tablecloth and balloons can be punched up with red napkins and tableware, ribbons, and other small accents. Adorn your table with splashy bouquets of garden flowers, if possible. Greenery is also very festive and beautiful and more available for everyone.

Memorial Day weekend officially launches the barbeque season even though some of us started awhile back and some barbeque all year long. (I am not one of them.) Actually, grilling is one of the few cooking skills that I leave up to the male side of the family.

Steak, hamburgers, brats, hot dogs, and chicken are the usual fare. There are built in difficulties with fish on the grill—unless you have a basket to keep the fish from falling through the grids. And it’s becoming more common to do lots of veggies—and even desserts. I decided this year, to come up with a different menu while still sticking to the traditional favorite foods and flavors.

My first choice is to do a beef brisket on the grill—known in the South as “barbeque”. Brisket is one of my favorites because it’s relatively inexpensive, almost waste-free and has a lot of flavor. It needs a long, slow cooking and can be wrapped in foil, put on the grill and left for a long time, allowing me to turn my attention to the dishes done in the kitchen.

Going through my files, I found a lot of brisket recipes—and I had one in my personal file that I really love, but when I opened to the letter from the editor page in my June issue of Bon Appetit, the answer was clear. Editor-in-chief Barbara Fairchild gave old favorite recipes from past issues and mentioned a recipe by Jinx Morgan—a favorite cook. I went to my file, found the magazine, bought a brisket and made it—a great hit!

The rest of the menu follows the Southern Barbeque theme so y’all join me and invite your family and friends to join you for this barbeque feast:

Lazy Texas Brisket with Broncbuster’s Barbecue Sauce
Foiled Peppers and Potatoes
Sweet Potato Biscuits
Green Salad
Texas Cake

Lazy Texas Brisket with Broncbuster’s Barbecue Sauce

1 large garlic clove, minced
1 4-5 lb. beef brisket
1 Tbsp chili powder
1 tsp. paprika
1 tsp. salt
One-half tsp. ground cumin
One-half tsp. dried sage, crumbled
One-half tsp. sugar
One-half tsp. ground oregano
One-fourth tsp. ground red pepper
One-fourth tsp. freshly ground pepper

Start coals and when gray ashes appear, spread out around edges, leaving bare a rectangle about 5” x 10” in the center. (Use a lot of coals). Rub garlic into both sides of brisket. Combine remaining seasonings and mix well. Rub into brisket. Set brisket fat side up on a large double piece of heavy-duty foil and wrap tightly. Place about 8 inches from coals directly over the bare rectangle and grill with hood closed about 4 hours, carefully turning the brisket package every hour. Be sure you’ve wrapped it really tight so that the juices don’t leak when you turn it, or it may dry and burn.

Broncbuster’s Barbecue Sauce

Makes 2 cups

2 Tbsp. butter
1 medium onion, chopped
One-half cup water
One-half cup prepared chili sauce
One-half cup catsup
One-fourth cup cider vinegar
2 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
2 Tbsp. brown sugar
2 Tbsp. Worcestershire sauce
1 Tbsp. molasses
2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. dry mustard
One-half tsp. freshly ground pepper
One-half tsp. paprika

Melt butter in large skillet over medium-low heat. Add onion. Cover and cook until translucent, about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Blend in remaining ingredients. Bring sauce to boil. Reduce heat and simmer gently, uncovered, 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Serve at room temperature.

Grilled Peppers and Potatoes

3 large red peppers
3 large green peppers
3 medium onions
3 medium potatoes (1 lb)
One-half lb. mushrooms
One-fourth cup olive oil
2 garlic cloves, minced or crushed
One-fourth cup water
2 Tbsp. red wine vinegar
1 tsp. chicken flavored instant bouillon
Three-fourths tsp. salt
One-half tsp. basil

About one and one-half hours before serving: Cut peppers into half-inch strips. Cut onions into quarters. Cut potatoes into half-inch slices. If mushrooms are large, cut into halves or quarters. In large skillet over medium heat, cook peppers, onions, potatoes, mushrooms and garlic in hot olive oil until lightly browned, stirring often. Stir in water and remaining ingredients. Spoon carefully onto double layers of heavy-duty foil, sealing very well. Place packet over hot coals about 6-8 inches from heat. With hood closed, cook for 1 hour, turning twice. Check after 30 minutes that vegetables are not burning. Remove when tender.

This is delicious served with Sweet potato biscuits.

One and three-fourths cups flour
2 Tbsp light brown sugar
1 Tbsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
One-half tsp. baking soda
6 Tbsp. butter
Three-fourths cup chilled sweet potato puree (recipe follows)
One-third cup buttermilk

In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and baking soda. With a pastry blender, cut in butter, until mixture resembles small peas.
In a small bowl, whisk together puree and buttermilk. Stir quickly into flour mixture until combined. (Do not overmix).

Turn out onto lightly floured surface and knead very gently until dough comes together but is still slightly lumpy, five or six times. Shape into a disk and pat to 1” thickness. With a floured 2-inch biscuit cutter, cut out. Do not reuse scraps more than once.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees, with rack on lower shelf. Butter an 8-inch cake pan. Arrange biscuits snugly in pan. Brush with half Tbsp. melted butter. Bake until golden, rotating once; 20 to 24 minutes.


Sweet Potato Puree

Peel and cut 3 large sweet potatoes into 2-inch chunks. In large saucepan, cover potatoes with water, bring to a boil and cook until tender, 15-20 minutes. Drain, puree in food processor with one-fourth cup each milk and orange juice, 2 Tbsp. melted butter and 2 tsp. minced fresh ginger.

If you don’t already have the recipe for Texas Sheet Cake, here it is;

2 sticks butter
1 cup water
4 Tbsp. unsweetened cocoa
2 cups flour
2 cups sugar
One-half tsp. salt
1 tsp. soda
One-half cup sour cream
2 eggs

Boil butter and water and cocoa. Sift together the dry ingredients. Add to dry ingredients sour cream and eggs. Mix in boiled cocoa mixture. Bake in jelly-roll pan at 350 degrees for 25 minutes.

Icing:
Bring to boil: 6 Tbsp. milk
1 stick butter
4 Tbsp. cocoa

Add: 4 cups powdered sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
1 cup chopped nuts
Ice while warm; let cool and cut into squares

Key Lime Pie

One of my favorite things to do on a trip is to research the food specialty of the area and order it in every restaurant of that area to find the “perfect” specimen. The first time I ever did that was in the Florida Keys. Of course, that area is famous for their Key Lime Pie. It amazed me how many different versions of this pie were being served in the Keys—especially since it is a pretty straight-forward recipe. Or so I thought.

First of all, you have to use real Key Lime juice. This is a pain in the neck because they are so much smaller than the more common Persian lime that it takes a lot more limes and a lot more elbow grease to juice these small fruits. I have an electric juicer (reamer) that helps, though it is designed for larger fruit and is a bit tricky to work with these limes. Bottled Key Lime juice is available in some markets, but fresh is definitely better.

The next controversy concerning the perfect recipe is long method versus the short method. The long method is made with fruit juice, sugar and cornstarch, and then cooked to thicken the filling. The short method uses sweetened condensed milk to thicken and does not require any stove-top cooking—perfect in this unseasonable hot weather.

Then, of course, is the matter of the crust. Graham cracker crust is the one I found used most commonly, but a standard pastry crust is used as well and occasionally a chocolate or vanilla cookie crust. The latter is not really “authentic” but makes a deliciously different pie.

Finally, a controversy exists on the topping. Most of the pies I tasted had whipped cream or meringue on top. The one I thought was best on my trip uses a mixture. Try them all—they’re all delicious!

The First Prize Key West Lime Pie

1 ½ cups graham-cracker crumbs (about 10 cracker sheets)
¾ cup sugar, divided
6 Tbsp. butter, melted and cooled
1/8 tsp. salt
1 14-oz can sweetened condensed milk
4 large eggs, separated
¾ cup fresh Key-lime juice (approximately 20 limes)
¾ cup heavy cream

Heat oven to 375. In food processor process graham crackers until fine; with motor running, add 3 Tbsp. sugar, butter and salt. Process for 10 seconds. Press into pie plate sprayed with Pam; bake until lightly browned, about 12 minutes. Cool completely. Reduce oven temperature to 325. In mixing bowl, combine condensed milk, yolks and lime juice. Pour into crust. Return pie to oven and bake until center is set, 15 to 17 minutes. Cool completely. In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat egg whites with ¼ tsp. cream of tartar until frothy. Gradually add remaining sugar and beat until stiff glossy peaks form. Place cream in a chilled bowl; beat until soft peaks form. Gently whisk a third of the cream into meringue. Using a rubber spatula, fold in the remaining cream. Top pie with meringue mixture; freeze just until topping is firm enough to slice.

Long Method Key Lime Pie

Baked 9” pie shell
1/3 cup cornstarch
1 ½ cup sugar
¼ tsp. salt
1 ½ cups water
3 egg yolks, beaten
¼ cup fresh lime juice
1 Tbsp. grated lime peel
Few drops green food color
Meringue with 3 egg whites

Combine cornstarch, sugar and salt in saucepan; gradually add water, stirring until smooth. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly and boil 1 minute. Remove from heat and quickly add one half the hot mixture to the egg yolks, mixing well. Return to the hot mixture, blending thoroughly. Bring the mixture to a boil, stirring over medium heat. Boil 1 minute longer. Remove from heat; stir in lime juice and peel and food color to make filling a delicate green. Pour into cool pie shell at once. Completely cover with meringue (use a standard recipe). Bake in moderate oven (350), 12 to 15 minutes or until meringue is golden. Cool on wire rack at least 1 hour and chill until serving time.

A really short cut pie, but still delicious:

Short-Cut Lime Pie

Baked 8” pie shell
1 (15 oz) can sweetened condensed milk
1 tsp. grated lime peel
1/3 cup lime juice
1 drop green food color
2 egg yolks
Meringue using 2 egg whites

Combined sweetened condensed milk, lime peel and juice and food color; blend until smooth and thick. Stir in egg yolks and blend well. Pour into pastry shell and top with meringue. Bake in moderate oven (350) 12 to 15 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool away from drafts 2 to 3 hours on countertop and chill in refrigerator for at least 1 hour. before cutting.

"Summertime" Starts This Weekend

Summertime starts this weekend—as far as the official outdoor living goes. I want to take advantage of the easy and fresh food of summer and that includes lots of fresh salads and vegetables. Veggies have gained a reputation for the healthiest food around and terrific for slimming down—besides they taste wonderful. But if they’re so good, why do so many people balk at the idea of these great healthy foods?

The answer is that they may be “supertasters.” The same phytonutrients that make them so good for you are what cause some people to hate them. One in four people are born with thousands of extra taste buds which enable them to detect all the tastes—sweet, sour, salty and bitter—more intensely than the other 75% of people. These people often report that cabbage tastes musty; broccoli, bitter; beets, dirty; spinach, metallic.

Here’s a test that experts say will identify you as a supertaster: punch a hole with a hole-punch in a one-inch-square piece of waxed paper. Take a cotton swab and dip into a bit of blue food coloring and dab it on your tongue. Place the waxed paper over the blue area of your tongue and count the pink circles in the hole that you punched out. If you see more than 25 pink circles, you’re a supertaster.

If you have one or more of these special tasters in your family, you might want to try some of these ways to prepare vegetables that will make converts of even the fussiest eaters—because they’re designed to mask the very taste in the veggies that they don’t like. Those of us that are ordinary tasters can revel in these dishes, too, and finally give vegetables their rightful place on the dinner table.

Cabbage can cut your risk of breast, lung and colon cancers thanks to the isothiocyanates that make it taste “cabbagy.” To mask its pungent taste, mix it with fruit and strong spices like caraway or cloves.

Spaghetti with Red Cabbage

1 small head red cabbage
1 Tbsp olive oil
1 small onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1 cup apple juice
½ cup raisins (either golden or regular)
½ tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. ground cloves
8 ounces spaghetti (thin or regular)

Cook spaghetti in boiling water according to package directions, cooking until al dente. In a nonstick skillet, heat oil over medium heat. Add onion and cook until translucent (about 7 minutes). Add garlic and cook 1 minute, stirring. Stir in cabbage, apple juice, raisins, cloves and salt. Cover and cook 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Reserving ¼ cup pasta cooking water; drain pasta. Stir pasta into cabbage mixture in skillet; add cooking water if mixture seems dry.

Beets are often one of those vegetables that you either hate or love. I love them, Zig hates them. He says they taste like dirt. I say they have a rich, earthy flavor. This raw presentation was a compromise—I thought it was good, he thought it was definitely edible. If you have a beet hater, give this a try.

Shredded Beet Salad

1 pound beets, peeled
3 stalks celery, thinly sliced
½ cup pitted dates, chopped
3 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
Salt and freshly ground pepper
1 tsp. sugar

Cut beets into quarters. In food processor with shredding blade, shred beets; transfer to large bowl. Stir in celery, dates, lemon juice ¼ tsp each salt and pepper.
Can be covered and refrigerated for up to 4 hours, or served immediately

Brussels sprouts are arguably the most hated vegetable on the planet—or is it broccoli? My brother-in-law was diagnosed with cancer and was put on a diet high in vegetables, with Brussels sprouts on the top of the must-eat list. He hated the sulphuric, bitter taste and asked me if I knew how to cook them to make them edible. Here’s the advice I sent: cook them until barely tender in a small amount of water with ½ tsp. sugar added to it. But I came across this recipe that really does the trick as well.

Sesame Ginger Brussels Sprouts

2 10-oz pkgs. fresh Brussels sprouts
2 Tbsp low-sodium soy sauce
2 tsp. grated, peeled fresh ginger
1 tsp. dark sesame oil
1 Tbsp. olive oil
1 large onion, cut in half and thinly sliced
2 Tbsp. water

Trim stems and any yellow leaves from Brussels sprouts. Cut each sprout lengthwise into quarters. In cup stir together soy sauce, grated ginger and sesame oil. Meanwhile in skillet, heat olive oil over medium heat until hot. Add onion and cook about 5 minutes or until it begins to soften, stirring occasionally. Increase heat to medium-high; add Brussels sprouts and water; cover and cook about 5 minutes or until sprouts are beginning to soften and brown, stirring once. Remove cover from skillet and cook about 5 minutes longer or until sprouts are tender-crisp, stirring frequently. Remove skillet from heat and stir in soy sauce mixture.

Memorial Day

When I was growing up Memorial Day (Decoration Day we called it then) began with an old-fashioned parade; mostly service clubs and veterans’ groups in uniform, carrying flags or playing brass instruments. It ended in our centralized park with special programs featuring a reading of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address and other (for me then, long and boring) speeches.

Memorial Day originated during the Civil War when Southern women gathered bouquets of flowers to scatter over the graves of soldiers, honoring the Northern dead alongside their own. It is believed that one of those women, Cassandra Oliver Moncure, pressed to have a special day appointed for honoring the soldiers of the Civil War. In 1868, General John A. Logan named May 30 as that day.

Now we celebrate on the Monday closest to that date and we have expanded the honoring to all our dead by decorating their graves with flowers and flags. And since so many of us live long distances from our dead ancestors and family, many just look at Memorial Day as the “gateway to summer” holiday; going on picnics, grilling out, and going “up north” to open our cabins.

No matter whether you are opening a cabin, grilling in the backyard, playing softball or carrying flowers to the cemetery, the day will include some special food. Our family picnic when I was young always included some, if not all, of the following foods: potato salad, coleslaw, baked beans, Jell-O salad, cake, bars, cookies, deviled eggs, macaroni salad, ham or turkey (or both), buns, pickles, relishes, fruit salad, lemonade and coffee.

I have an updated menu to use this weekend; one that is both easy on the cook and deliciously different while still bowing to tradition. If you are going to be somewhere without cooking equipment, this can be made ahead and packed very easily.

Memorial Day Cookout/Picnic

Deviled Eggs
Shish Kebabs with Garlic Sauce
Rice and Peppers Salad
Fruit Medley
Lemon Bars


Deviled Eggs
Makes 12
6 eggs
1 tsp. vinegar
4 Tbsp. good-quality mayonnaise (like Hellman’s)
1 tsp. prepared Dijon mustard
Dash of curry powder
Salt and freshly ground pepper

Place eggs in saucepan and cover by ½ inch of cold water. Add vinegar to water. Bring to a boil over high heat. Immediately reduce heat so the water barely bubbles and continues to cook, uncovered, for 10 minutes. Remove from the heat, drain, and place the eggs under cold, running water to stop cooking. When cool enough to handle, peel. Cut a small piece of the tips of the eggs off to create a flat surface for the egg to stand on. Cut each egg in half horizontally. Lift out the yolks and press through a sieve into a bowl, or use food processor. Blend in mayonnaise and mustard, curry powder, salt and pepper. Place egg white halves in an empty egg carton and spoon a portion of the egg yolk mixture into each indentation. Garnish with pimiento, chopped pistachios, chopped green or ripe olives or small cocktail pickled onion and diced green pepper. Chill in carton (cover eggs with sheet of plastic wrap before closing lid of carton). Serve on a plate or transport in carton.

Shish Kebabs with Garlic Sauce

2 pounds beef sirloin tip or boneless leg of lamb
2 green peppers
2 red peppers
1 very large onion
½ cup good quality olive oil
2 large cloves garlic, minced
1 lemon, halved

Sauce:
1 8-oz carton plain yogurt (full fat or low fat)
1 cup good quality mayonnaise
2 cloves garlic
½ lemon

Put all ingredients in blender or processor and blend until consistency of very thick cream. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Cut beef sirloin or boneless leg of lamb into 1-1/2-inch cubes. Seed and de-vein peppers, peel onions and cut peppers and onions into 1-1/2 inch pieces. Put meat and vegetables in shallow container. Mix olive oil, minced garlic and the juice from ½ lemon together and pour over meat and vegetables. Refrigerate for 4 hours to overnight.

Prepare coals. String meat and vegetables on Shish Kebab skewers, alternating meat and veggies. When coals are ready, place skewers on grill and grill for 10-15 minutes, turning skewers frequently. Serve Shish Kebabs in warmed pita halves with sauce poured over, or on plate with pita wedges. 6-8 serving

Rice and Peppers Salad

2 cups water
½ tsp. salt
1 cup Basmati or long grain rice
3 Tbsp olive oil
½ cup pine nuts
1 red pepper
1 yellow pepper
1 Tbsp cider vinegar

Bring water to boil in medium saucepan and add salt and rice. Stir and bring back to boil. Reduce heat to low and cook, uncovered, for 15 to 20 minutes. Cover and turn heat off. Leave covered on stove for 20 minutes.
Place oil in frying pan over medium-high heat. When hot, add pine nuts. Cook for 1-2 minutes until lightly golden brown. Lift out with slotted spoon and set aside. Stir in diced red and yellow peppers. Reduce heat to medium and gently sauté the vegetables 5 or 6 minutes until tender. Add the vinegar and cook 2-3 minutes, until vinegar has evaporated. Gently stir the cooked rice into the vegetable mixture and transfer everything to a serving dish. Cover and store in the refrigerator. 6 servings.

Picnic Season Has Begun

Eating out usually means restaurants but I think eating outside is an even better choice. The picnic season has begun and it is my favorite eating style. The dictionary definition—an outing with food, eaten in the open—doesn’t include that special state of mind: the carefree, spontaneous mood. I would elaborate on the dictionary definition and say a good picnic is a respite from the ordinary, an escape from routine, a time for adventurous feasting. A very special delight, except that somebody has to prepare everything, right? Well, maybe not if you’ve prepared ahead.

Picnics can be divided into different categories: picnics to take on the road, picnics for the backyard or porch, cook-outs, boat picnics, party picnics, picnics for two.
As soon as the weather starts being reliable, I pack my picnic basket and keep it at the ready. Now, you can stage a very elaborate feast which would entail a lot more than this basket holds, but that takes planning, cooking, inviting, etc. That’s a great way to entertain, but for our purposes here this basket is packed for two people to have a regular meal at the drop of a hat (of course, yours could be for any number).

I have an old-fashioned picnic hamper that has a top that lifts on each side of center and no insulation. In addition, I have several insulated bags that will fit into that rather large hamper. Thermoses are nice. A cooler would work; paper bags work; you don’t have to have fancy equipment. But whatever you use, keep staples inside it.

Napkins
Paper plates or plastic plates
Plastic or regular flatware
Cups--Styrofoam or plastic
A tablecloth and clips to clip it onto a picnic table
Salt and pepper
A roll of aluminum foil
A few paper towels
A few zip-lock plastic bags
Moistened towelettes

You may think of other “must-have” items, but this list is a good beginning.

The food for this type of picnic should be easily assembled and prepared from foods in the freezer, refrigerator, and on the kitchen shelves. Keeping your freezer stocked with prepared sandwiches, fried chicken and other goodies is the key to convenient but tasty dishes. Of course, you can stop at local delis, sandwich shops, or even the deli section of the supermarket to supply the meal, but you can have a real feast by doing a bit of footwork ahead of time. This is a favorite menu:

Fried Chicken
3-bean salad
Coleslaw
Biscuits
Pecan cookies

My favorite fried chicken recipe is delicious either hot or cold. I got it from a Creole woman friend I met in married student housing on an Oklahoma campus in the late ‘60’s. She was from New Orleans and taught me to cook Creole style. The actual directions for this chicken start with “Put the chicken in the batter before church and it will be ready to fry when you get home.”

Janice Howard’s Real Southern Fried Chicken:

1 Frying Chicken, cut up
1-2 cups flour
1 Tbsp. salt
1 tsp. freshly ground pepper
One-half tsp. paprika
One-half tsp. garlic powder (or use garlic salt and reduce salt by one quarter tsp.)
2 eggs
2 cups half-and-half
Canola oil for frying (about 2 cups)

Two to three hours before frying: Put chicken parts in a mixture of half-and-half and beaten eggs in shallow glass baking pan large enough to hold chicken in one layer. Refrigerate two or three hours.

Prepare Chicken to fry: Put flour and seasonings into zip-lock bag. Add 2 pieces of chicken at a time to bag and shake well. Put on cooling rack to dry. When all pieces of chicken are coated, leave on rack for 10 minutes. Shake pieces of chicken in flour mixture again, adding more flour if necessary.
To fry: Preheat oil on medium heat in 10 or 12-inch cast-iron skillet (can use any very heavy skillet) until bread cube turns brown in 1 minute. Put pieces of chicken into skillet, largest pieces first. Make sure oil is at medium heat. Oil should come half way up chicken pieces; if not, add more oil. Fry 5 minutes (without covering), turn, fry 5 minutes more. Add small pieces to skillet, being careful not to crowd chicken. Fry 10 minutes; turn all pieces, fry 10 minutes more. Drain on paper towels. Serve immediately or cool, wrap and freeze. Bring to room temperature before eating if frozen.

Three-bean salad needs to marinate to be good, so make it a day ahead and refrigerate. Coleslaw usually improves with at least an hour or two before eating.

Now all you need is a great spot, someone to join you and a nice day. June should provide the latter.

Crepes

You can do anything with crepes. These thin pancakes are not really a pancake in the traditional sense, because they do not rise and get fluffy. They have no leavening except eggs, which gives a very thin, flat batter cake. However, they are the vehicles for a great
many dishes, both savory and sweet and are ridiculously easy to make. Unlike other dough-wraps such as tortillas, wonton skins or thin pasta, crepes have no gluten development and so are extremely tender.

Fortunately, you do not need any special equipment to make superb crepes. A French crepe pan is nice to have, as is an electric crepe maker but any small frying pan will work if it is thoroughly cleaned, rinsed and seasoned first. One way to season a pan for making crepes is to heat it until just hot to the touch, rub it with canola oil or spray with Pam and let it stand overnight. Once you have made crepes and discovered their simplicity and versatility, you may want to dedicate a small pan for this use only as you would a pan especially for omelets. I actually own an electric crepe maker given to me by my mother-in-law years ago. I will always be grateful to her because at the time I thought it very frivolous and one more thing to find space to store, but because of my curiosity about cooking, I used it. Wow! It makes wonderful crepes very quickly and is so small it isn’t hard to store anyway. Mine is made by Oster, but I haven’t seen one in a store in years, so I don’t know if they are available any more or not.

The only warning on making crepes is—make extra dough the first time and give yourself some room to practice. You may make a few limp or misshapen crepes until you get the hang of it and they will taste as good as the perfectly shaped, perfectly browned crepes you will soon be making.

Crepes freeze beautifully. They take up very little space in your freezer and defrost in minutes, giving you the makings of an endless number of dishes including a great way to use leftovers creatively. To top off the list of qualities, the most delicate and delicious crepes have only 20 calories apiece.

Basic Crepe Recipe

1½ cups flour
1 tsp. sugar
One-fourth tsp. salt
3 eggs
1½ cups milk
2 Tbsp. melted butter, cooled or oil

Mixing by hand:
Sift the dry ingredients into a bowl. Break the eggs into another bowl and mix until yolks and whites are blended. Make a hole in the middle of the dry ingredients and pour in beaten eggs. Stir the flour mixture into the eggs little by little. Add liquid a spoonful at a time and mix it in thoroughly before adding more. When the mixture becomes easy to work (when about half of the liquid has been used) the remainder can be added in two portions. Add melted butter. Mix again; cover and set aside for at least an hour. Mixture can be held in the refrigerator overnight.

Mixing with electric mixer:
Beat eggs about a minute at medium speed. Add half the dry ingredients and mix until smooth, then add the remaining dry ingredients. Add melted butter or oil and beat again. Cover and set aside from 1 to 6 hours. Can be held overnight in the refrigerator.

Mixing with a Blender (this is the fastest, easiest way):
The liquids and eggs should go into the blender first, including butter or oil; then the dry ingredients. Blend for 1 minute, then turn off motor and with a rubber spatula, push down flour that has not been blended and blend again for a minute. If necessary repeat until the mixture is well blended. Cover and set aside for 1 to 6 hours at room temperature; can be held overnight in the refrigerator.

Preheat pan and brush with melted butter. Stir batter and make sure it is the consistency of heavy cream. If too thick, add a little more liquid. Use a measure that gives you 1-1/2 Tbsp. batter for a 5-inch pan and 2 Tbsp for a 6-inch pan. When the butter is hot and bubbling but not brown, lift pan off heat and pour in the batter. Quickly tilt the pan so that the batter swirls around and covers the bottom of the pan. If you haven’t used enough and there are holes, pour in more. If you pour in too much the excess can be poured back. The batter that clings to the side of the pan as a result can be cut off after the crepe is cooked. Return pan to heat. If the burner is hot enough and the right amount of batter has been used, the crepe will take about one minute to brown. Using a round-ended table knife or your fingers, pick up the edge of the crepe and check for browning. Turn the heat up or down if the crepe is cooking too slow or too fast. Shake the pan to be sure the crepe does not stick and then lift up an edge and turn it over. The reverse side will take about a half minute to cook. It will not be as evenly brown as the first side and is always turned inside for the filling.

Immediately pour in more batter and continue cooking until all the batter is used. Add butter or oil only when pan looks dry, perhaps every second or third crepe. As each crepe is cooked, turn out on a clean dish towel or paper towel. If crepes are to be used immediately, stack them on a warm plate and keep them in warm oven until all are made. If they are to be kept awhile, stack them after they have cooled with waxed paper between each and keep covered so they do not dry out. If they are to be frozen, wrap the stacked layers in freezer wrap, aluminum foil or plastic bags and freeze immediately.

Your first crepe may stick to the pan and tear when you try to turn it. It may be because the pan is not well seasoned. Heat takes time to settle and the first crepes may not be as perfect as later ones. Be patient. If your crepes have a scrambled appearance on the first side, the heat was too high when they were poured in. If they do not brown in a minute or so, the heat is too low. If they are not yet set on top when they are browned on the bottom, too much batter was used. If crepes are too thin on the edges, the batter was swirled too thinly there. However you can clip or snip the edges.

Here are two wonderful and easy crepe recipes to start you off:

Crepes with Chicken and Mushrooms

2-1/2 cups cooked chicken or turkey
4 Tbsp. butter
1 onion, chopped
1 pound mushrooms, chopped
2 Tbsp sherry
3 cups Mornay sauce
Salt and pepper
14-16 5-inch crepes
½ cup grated cheese for topping

Cut the chicken or turkey into bite-size pieces. Heat butter in large skillet and sauté onion until clear. Add mushrooms and cook for 2 or 3 minutes, then add chicken or turkey and sherry and stir to combine with butter and juices. Add one cup of Mornay sauce and stir and cook over low heat until sauce thickens. Cool slightly. Put a spoonful or two of filling down the center of each crepe. Roll and turn seam side down and place in a buttered baking dish. Pour the other two cups of Mornay sauce over the filled crepes and sprinkle with grated cheese. Bake for 15 minutes at 375 deg. This freezes well. Defrost completely then bake the same as freshly made.

Mornay Sauce
3 Tbsp butter
3 Tbsp. flour
2 cups milk or stock
1½ cup half and half
Salt and pepper to taste
6 Tbsp. white wine
3 egg yolks
3 Tbsp. Parmesan cheese, grated

Melt butter, add flour and stir with a wooden spoon until well mixed and bubbly, but do not let mixture brown. Heat milk or stock and half and half to simmer point (can use microwave). Remove bubbling flour and butter from heat, pour in all the boiling liquid at once and stir vigorously. Return to heat and simmer for ten or fifteen minutes, stirring to prevent scorching. Add wine and then add one-fourth cup hot mixture to egg yolks, stirring while adding. Add egg yolk mixture back to sauce, then add cheese. Cook until thick and bubbly.

Apricot Crepes

12 6-inch crepes
3 cups dried apricots, chopped and soaked overnight
One-third cup sugar
1 lemon
2 egg whites
One-fourth cup sugar
1 Tbsp. slivered almonds

Keep crepes warm while preparing filling. In a medium-size saucepan, combine apricots with just enough water to cover. Add sugar. Simmer, stirring occasionally, until fruit is soft. Puree in food processor or blender. Grate zest from lemon; squeeze lemon juice. Add zest and juice to apricot puree.
Preheat oven to 375 deg. Spoon a little of the puree on each crepe. Fold crepes in quarters and arrange in a single layer in a shallow heatproof dish. Cover with foil. Bake 30 minutes. Beat egg whites until stiff; gradually beat in sugar. Remove crepes from oven and discard foil. Preheat broiler. Spoon meringue over crepes; sprinkle with almonds. Broil until lightly browned, about 2 minutes. Serves 4.

The Art of Garnishing

Everyone knows we eat with our eyes. Making food beautiful is the crowning touch of the true cook. The French who are so renowned for their food finesse are the masters of this area of cooking too. To the French, garnishing is known as “garde manger” which literally means food storage area; the garde manger room was usually located next to the main kitchen in a cool area with chilling facilities; therefore that area was reserved for making garnishes since they may have shriveled or melted in a warmer place. Many fine French restaurants actually have “garde manger” chefs who do nothing but the food decorating. In recent years, however, most chefs and home cooks have greatly simplified the art of garnishing, moving from very ornate and complex creations to the fresh and natural look. Let’s look at the trends in garnishing over the last decades.

Going through my “Bon Appetit” magazines which go back to the 70’s I could find some very distinct differences. In the seventies styles were very clunky and earthy both in clothing and in food styling. Even the dishes were artisan pottery in browns and earth tones. What a switch from the dainty formality of the ‘40s and ‘50s. The garnishes followed suit. Sauces were always on top of the food they were complementing. Another feature of the decade was animal forms for garnish such as carved fruits and vegetables made into apple birds and porcupines with almond needles. Earthy colors, even in fruits, were popular with an emphasis on natural grains and vegetables. Gourds and wheat blades would grace the table. Parsley was still the ubiquitous garnish. Food was almost always symmetrically arranged. Even though the composed salad had been replaced by the tossed variety, some arranging of condiments or egg slices in an artful and symmetrical pattern was still in vogue.

The Eighties ushered in the “painted food” era such as chocolate piping in ornate shapes and even architectural elements to grace cakes and small desserts. Putting the sauce down on the plate first then adding the food began showing up in upscale restaurants. Spiraling—using sauces of contrasting colors, making a ring of the second color on a bed of the first, then drawing a toothpick through to create a spider-web design—was suddenly popular. Herbs other than parsley began showing up—a sage leaf or a sprig of rosemary. However, it was often a single leaf or a tiny sprig either centered on the food or placed on the side of the plate. Forms made from soft flat cookies, shaped over custard cups to form a small cookie-bowl, tortillas shaped over bowls to form a base for Taco Salad (a wildly popular entrée in the ‘80s) and noodle baskets began to appear everywhere. Symmetry was still the rule.

Although the tiny baby vegetable showed up in the eighties, it really took off in the ‘90s. Leaving the top on baby carrots, cutting them short and paring them became the most common vegetable garnish followed only by the julienne multi-colored bundle on the plate. The chunkiness was at last completely gone replaced by a much more formal style in both china and table settings. Sculptured food appeared again—but in a far more vertical form. Desserts towered from the plate in interesting angles and finally we lost the perfect symmetry. Basil bunches and cilantro had replaced the parsley. The plate became a canvas and on most plates white space was balanced with the food with very few foods touching each other. Wedding cakes no longer were a mass of scrolls and frosting flowers but were decorated with vines, fruit, and fresh flowers. Cascading was the new fashion. Slicing meats on a diagonal and fanning the slices out became the proper service.

The new millennium really did bring changes in garnishing and service style. Two things come immediately to mind: flowers and vegetable blossoms on the plates (all edible of course) and the spattered plate. You know what I mean; either chopped herbs or even dots of sauce all over a very large dinner plate is being seen in every restaurant—lamentably as far as I am concerned. I really think this is a gimmick and looks very messy and unappetizing. It is an extension of the plate-as-canvas concept that started in the ‘90s. Minimalism is also fashionable perhaps both as an aesthetic element and as a way of counteracting the rampant obesity of our American society.
June 2003 “Bon Appetit” has an article on Colin Cowie, an author of cookbooks and entertaining guides (Dinner After Dark) in which he says, “Casual elegance should be your mantra. Elegant doesn’t always equal formal.”

Overall, the garnishing today is much simpler and more sophisticated. The messy plate aside, dinner in a first-class restaurant looks beautiful and you can duplicate the beautiful look quite simply at home. Use only edible garnishes; never try to be too cute or coy. Keep it simple, fresh and colorful. Complement your table settings with your garnishing. Try something different and funky once in a while. Remember that we really do eat with our eyes first.

Chocolate---fast!

A while back a friend sent me a recipe by e-mail for a Dangerous Chocolate Cake in a Mug. A very interesting recipe; “dangerous” because you are only 5 minutes away from chocolate cake. We tried the cake-in-a-mug recipe which was done in the microwave—and found it edible, but not great. That started me thinking about how fast most recipes made with America’s favorite food are to make.

For one thing, the microwave is very chocolate-friendly. I gave up melting baking chocolate in the top of a double boiler years ago. Yes, it’s true that if you over-cook the chocolate or get even a drop of water in it while it’s cooking, it will seize up and be very difficult to revive. But the microwave method that I use keeps you right near the microwave, checking and stirring every 30 seconds. It has always worked great for me.

But for actually baking the entire recipe in the microwave—I say you’re better off to take a few more minutes and bake it in the oven. The prep is short for many chocolate recipes and the results greatly more satisfactory in the conventional oven. I must admit, though, it was fun to watch the mug cake cook in the microwave; it rose up over the rim about 2-3 inches, but didn’t overflow. It did result in a chocolaty tasting cake, but the texture was far too spongy for me.

I greatly prefer my old-time Whacky Cake recipe. You may have made a version of this cake and called it any number of names, among them Dump Cake and Mix-It-Quick cake. Whatever you call it, here is an easy recipe that always turns out great.

Whacky Cake

1 ½ cups sifted flour
3 Tbsp. cocoa (not Dutch process)
1 tsp. soda
1 cup sugar
½ tsp. salt
5 Tbsp. cooking oil
1 Tbsp vinegar
1 tsp. vanilla
1 Cup cold water

Spray a 9x9x2” square baking pan with vegetable spray (Pam). Sift flour, cocoa, soda, sugar and salt together right into the pan. Make 3 indentations in the mixture with the back of a large spoon. Into one, pour the oil, one vinegar and one vanilla. Next, pour the cold water over it all and beat and blend with a spoon or large fork until it’s nearly smooth and flour is not visible. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Sprinkle with powdered sugar or frost with your favorite frosting.

(Note: I tried this batter in the mug, too—and it was better than my original e-mailed recipe, but still had the spongy characteristic. If you want to try it, spray the mug with Pam and fill mug half full of batter. Microwave 2-3 minutes until top is not wet).

It was lauded as the best news of the year when chocolate was declared a health food. The darker the chocolate, the more of the antioxidants that make it healthy you get, calorie for calorie. If you pair it with other health foods, such as walnuts (or any nuts) or dried fruits such as raisins or dates, you can really feel virtuous eating it (in moderation). Here are some holiday treats that rate right up there with broccoli and spinach (well, maybe).

Walnut Brownies

½ cup butter
1 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs
2 1-oz. squares baking chocolate, melted
½ cup flour
½ cup walnuts, chopped coarsely

Cream butter, sugar and vanilla in mixer. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Blend in chocolate. Stir in flour and nuts. Bake in sprayed 8x8x2” square pan at 325 degrees for 30-35 minutes. Sprinkle with sifted powdered sugar.

Oatmeal Date Raisin Cookies
¾ cup flour
½ cup cocoa powder
1 tsp. baking soda
½ tsp. salt
1 cup butter, softened
¾ cup packed brown sugar
¾ cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
2 ¼ cups old-fashioned oats
½ cup raisins
½ cup pitted dates, cut into small pieces
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Heat oven to 350. Combine flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt in a bowl; set aside. In large bowl of mixer, beat butter and both kinds of sugar until creamy. Beat in eggs and vanilla. On low speed, beat in flour mixture, then stir in oats, raisins, dates and chocolate chips. Using a spring-type scoop or large tablespoon, drop onto lightly greased baking sheets 2 inches apart. Bake for 10-12 minutes. Check for over-browning. Cool on sheets for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire racks to finish cooling. Makes 32-40 cookies.

Here’s one more quick and easy way to have your chocolate fix:

Easy Mocha Mousse

½ lb. bittersweet or semi-sweet chocolate, broken into small pieces
½ cup double-strength coffee
3 Tbsp. crème de cacao
2 tsp. instant coffee
2 cups heavy cream
½ cup sugar

Melt chocolate in small saucepan with coffee. Cool, then stir in crème de cacao and dry coffee. Whip cream, add sugar and continue to beat until soft peaks form. Fold in chocolate and turn into a soufflé dish. Cover securely with foil and freeze. Makes 6 servings.

Perhaps you can see the possibilities for the above recipe. You could use crème de menthe in place of the crème de cocao. You could refrigerate the mousse instead of freezing and you could definitely turn it into individual dessert dishes instead of a large soufflé dish.

If you would like the 5-minute chocolate cake-in-a-mug recipe, e-mail me.

Red Wings

There is a lot of talk about fresh whole, unprocessed foods these days. It’s hard to disagree with the premise that fresh is best, but sometimes it isn’t actually the case.

The advent of commercially frozen foods, like its predecessor, canned foods, has changed the way America eats and most cookbooks on the subject of freezing foods are about the management of home freezing. But how many of us ever use our freezers for anything but storing the frozen items we buy in the supermarket?

The frozen food industry really excels in produce and whole foods. It is critical that the frozen food, in order to retain its high quality and nutrition, be wrapped properly and flash frozen. Home freezing sometimes falls short in these critical areas. Knowing which frozen foods to buy for best quality and good economy is imperative.

There are a lot of myths surrounding frozen foods that have gone around and may confuse you. I know that I always worried about re-freezing foods once they had thawed or even partially thawed. As long as the frozen product is still cold to the touch, about 40 degrees, it can be refrozen with perfect safety. Some things lose some quality when re-frozen, particularly seafood and fruit and they should be used after defrosting. The safety of all other refrozen foods is not an issue as long as you follow the above temperature guide.

Another lesser-known fact is that once defrosted, if left in the refrigerator, most frozen foods will last quite awhile. After thawing, frozen foods are no more and probably not less perishable than they would have been before they were frozen; therefore, it is not imperative that you rush home from the grocery store to get all frozen foods in the freezer unless it is 120 degrees in your car.

Finally, did you know that it is not necessary or even desirable to thaw all meats before cooking? You can cook them frozen and taste tests (done at Columbia University and University of Montana) have actually shown that many meats cooked from the frozen state were preferred to those that had been previously thawed. That surprised me! The cooking method is exactly the same as usual except the cooking time is roughly twice as long.

Frozen fish and seafood is my favorite supermarket buy. I love really fresh fish, but here in Red Wing, unless you’re a fisherman, truly fresh fish is hard to come by. Commercially frozen fish is flash frozen immediately after catching and, if done by a reputable company, makes them as fresh as possible. Obviously whole fish would have an advantage over fillets, but all are very, very fresh. Here is an especially good recipe that takes advantage of low-cost and low calorie fish.

De-lite-ful Fillet of Fish

1 pound frozen fish fillets (such as cod, flounder, haddock, Pollack or tilapia)
2 Tbsp. canola oil
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
¼ pound fresh mushrooms, sliced
1 clove fresh garlic, minced
½ tsp. salt
½ tsp. grated lemon rind
¼ tsp. dill weed
1-14 ½ ounce can diced tomatoes.
1 ½ Tbsp. flour
1 Tbsp. lemon juice
1 Tbsp. snipped parsley

Thaw fish in refrigerator. Blot dry with a paper towel. Heat oil in large skillet and add onion, mushrooms and minced garlic. Cook over low heat until lightly browned, about 3 minutes. Arrange fillets over mushrooms. Sprinkle fish with salt, lemon rind and dill weed. Add tomatoes. Cover and cook over medium heat for 10 minutes or until fish flakes easily. Remove fillets to platter and keep warm. Blend flour and lemon juice. Stir into tomato mixture in pan. Cook, stirring, until smooth and bubbling. Pour over fish and sprinkle with parsley. 4 servings at 250 calories per serving.

Another of my favorite products purchased frozen is chicken wings or drummettes. Here is a recipe that may make Red Wing as famous as Buffalo.

Red Wing Red Wings

3 pounds frozen chicken wings
1 cup light soy sauce
1 cup water
¾ cup dark brown sugar
1 large clove garlic, minced
½-inch chunk ginger root
4 Tbsp. (1/4 cup) Thai Sweet Chile Sauce
2 Tbsp. vinegar
½ cup catsup
1 tsp. red food coloring
Tabasco or other hot pepper sauce to taste

Defrost wings. Bring all remaining ingredients to boil in large saucepan. Simmer for 20 minutes. Meantime, parboil chicken wings in simmering water for 20 minutes. Remove wings and place on shallow baking pan. Pour sauce over wings and bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes more or until tender and glazed.

Kiwifruit

The kiwifruit or kiwi is a relative newcomer to the American table. Discovered in China in 1847 by an English botanist, it is now grown mainly in New Zealand. It was originally known as a Chinese gooseberry, but became so popular in New Zealand that it was named for its resemblance to the plumage of the Kiwi bird, native to New Zealand. Americans found its lovely green fruit with small, edible black seeds akin to strawberries and melon (some say pineapple as well) delightful and took to it immediately.

One kiwi delivers double the vitamin C of an orange and as much potassium as a banana. Now that they are grown in California, the opposing seasons in two hemispheres provide us with year-round availability. And the price has been fairly stable during this rising-price period. They are generally $.33-.45 per kiwi; I found them for $.28 this week.

The kiwi is one of the few fruits that become sweeter after picking. They are perfect for eating when they give slightly when touched but are not wrinkled or bruised. You can store ripe kiwis in the refrigerator for up to two weeks. If you bring some home that aren’t ripe yet, ripen them in a brown paper bag with an apple or banana; but watch carefully as they are mushy when over-ripe.

Everyone loves a kiwi cut in half crosswise and spooned out of the skin as an eat-in-hand food, but it is becoming very popular as an add-in to fruit salads and as a garnishing fruit. Now there are more and more recipes showing up on line and in cookbooks and cooking magazines for unusual combinations. Here are a few to try:

Strawberry-Kiwi Salad with Basil (Cooking Light, April 2001)

¼ cup half-and-half
2 Tbsp. white balsamic vinegar
1 Tbsp. sugar
¼ tsp. salt
3 peeled kiwifruit, each cut into 6 wedges
2 cups quartered strawberries (about 1 pint)
2 Tbsp finely chopped fresh basil

Combine first 4 ingredients in a bowl. Add kiwifruit and strawberries; toss well. Cover and chill for 1 hour. Stir in basil just before serving.
Yield: 4 servings of ¾ cup; 90 calories

With the summer fruits coming into the market, this next recipe really appealed to me as a garnish for our breakfast plates.

Watermelon-and-Kiwi Skewers with Starry Strawberry Cream (Cooking Light, July 2000)

¾ cup sliced strawberries
½ cup vanilla low-fat yogurt
1 Tbsp. 1/3-less-fat cream cheese
1 tsp. fresh lemon juice
½ tsp. powdered sugar
24 (1/2-inch) watermelon balls
2 kiwifruit, each peeled and cut into 12 pieces

Place first 5 ingredients in a blender; process until smooth. Cover and chill. Thread 1 watermelon piece and 1 kiwi-fruit piece onto each of 24 skewers. Serve with sauce.

Calories: 40 per serving; serving size: 3 skewers and 2 Tbsp sauce.


Here’s a fast and Easy dessert that makes a lot—again a great recipe for our inn—and you if you’re serving a large group.

Makes 12 tartlets

Lemon Tartlets with Pineapple and Kiwi (Health, September 2005)

Lemon Curd Filling:
6 Tbsp. fat-free sweetened condensed milk
2 large egg yolks
2 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
1 ½ tsp. grated lemon zest
24 mini pastry shells such as Clearbrook Farms Mini Sweet Tart Shells
1 sliced peeled kiwifruit
½ cup finely chopped pineapple

Preheat oven to 325. In a medium bowl, combine condensed milk, egg yolks, lemon juice and lemon zest with a whisk until blended. Place shells on baking sheets. Fill a zip-top plastic bag with lemon mixture. Snip off one of the bottom corners and fill pastry shells to ¾ full. Bake 7 minutes or until filling is set. Remove from oven and let cool. Top tartlets evenly with the kiwi and pineapple. Loosely cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until served.

If you’re entertaining a back-yard barbeque—why not use a tropical theme and serve these for starters?

Kiwi Colada (Coastal Living, November, 2006)

1 ½ cups small ice cubes or crushed ice
3 Tbsp. light rum
3 Tbsp Midori liqueur
¼ cup cream of coconut
2 kiwifruit, peeled
¼ cup pineapple juice
2 Tbsp. whipping cream
Kiwi slices

Process ice and next 6 ingredients in a blender until smooth. Garnish with kiwi slices, if desired. Makes 2 ½ cups

The favorite way to serve kiwis in New Zealand is in a meringue baked until crisp, filled with sweetened whipped cream and topped with peeled and thinly sliced kiwi fruit.

Meringues

3 large egg whites, room temperature
½ tsp cream of tartar
Pinch of salt
1 ¼ tsp vanilla extract
¾ cup sugar

Position rack in center of oven and preheat to 275. Using 3-inch diameter cardboard round or 3-inch cookie cutter, trace 6 circles on parchment sheet, spacing evenly. Invert parchment onto baking sheet. Using electric mixer, beat whites in large bowl at medium speed until frothy. Add cream of tartar and salt and beat to soft peaks. Add vanilla and beat to blend. Increase speed to high. Add sugar 2 Tbsp. at a time and beat until stiff and shiny. Spoon meringue into pastry bag fitted with plain ½-inch tip. Dab some meringue under corners of parchment to anchor paper to baking sheet. Starting in center of one traced circle, pipe meringue in spiral pattern to fill circle. Pipe 2 layers of meringue atop edge of circle to form sides. Repeat with remaining circles to form 6 meringues. Bake about 35 minutes. Turn off heat and let dry in closed oven 1 hour. Cool completely at room temperature. Store airtight at room temperature for up to 2 days.

Food in Literature

The single most-asked question I get about cooking is, upon learning of my extensive cookbook collection, “Why do you have so many cookbooks? Do you cook out of all of them?” The answer is definitely “no,” but still, I do read them—all of them.

Cookbooks are not the only source of literary food, however; fiction is also a great vehicle for food writing. Let’s face it, people eat. And eating is a subject of great interest even to those who purport not to like it. Perhaps they are even more interested in food—that’s a whole other subject. But to those of us who love to eat and find a deep connection between meals or dishes of our lives and the feelings surrounding those events, books with food descriptions or recipes are delicious reading.

Take this excerpt from Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder:

“He stopped just a minute in the pantry door. Mother was straining the milk, at the far end of the long pantry; her back was toward him. The shelves on both sides were loaded with good things to eat. Big yellow cheeses were stacked there, and large brown cakes of maple sugar, and there were crusty loaves of fresh-baked bread, and four large cakes, and one whole shelf full of pies. One of the pies was cut, and a little piece of crust was temptingly broken off; it would never be missed.”

Farmer Boy was my oldest son’s favorite childhood book—he read it time and time again. I can envision his young, growing boy hunger which almost, but not quite, matched Almanzo’s. It makes me smile and transports me back to those days when I fed three hungry boys.

Another writer of juvenile fiction, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings who wrote The Yearling and an adult autobiography called Cross Creek, cemented her place as one of the finest regional writers to emerge during the 1930s. In Cross Creek she wrote a chapter called “Our Daily Bread” that proved so popular with readers that she published a cookbook: Cross Creek Cookery. It has been called “not a cookbook in the traditional manner, but…a mouth-watering, evocative, and charmingly conversational discussion of cooking at Cross Creek” (Rawlings, Cookery, back cover).

The preface of the cookery book has an overview listing of “Cross Creek Menus.” A breakfast of “orange juice, very small crisp-fried Orange Lake bream, grits, cornmeal muffins, kumquat marmalade, strong coffee and Dora’s (Dora was Rawlings’s jersey cow) cream: and “camp dinners” consisting of “fried fresh-caught Orange lake fish (bream, perch, or bass), hush puppies, cole slaw, coffee and …lemon pie.”

The title of the final passage of Cross Creek Cookery is based on a Biblical text, Proverbs 15:17, “Better is a dinner of herbs where love is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith.” The section revolves around a discussion of Rawlings’s philosophy of cooking and eating. There are two elements necessary, she says, for “successful and happy gatherings at table.” The first involves the food that, “whether simple or elaborate, must be carefully prepared, willingly prepared, imaginatively prepared” (217). With food and guests in place, one can begin the process of pursuing sustenance and fellowship. Here is the way Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings suggests it should go:

The breaking together of bread, the sharing of salt is too ancient a symbol of friendliness to be profaned. At the moment of dining, the assembled group stands for a little while as a safe unit, under a safe roof, against the perils and enmities of the world. The group will break up and scatter, later. For this short time, let them eat, drink and be merry. (217)—Cooking By The Book: Food in Literature and Culture by Mary Anne Schofield.

All this talk of pie makes me hunger for that old-fashioned favorite of mine—make this the long way—it’s worth it.

Lemon Meringue Pie

1 ½ cups sugar
3 Tbsp cornstarch
3 Tbsp. flour
¼ tsp. salt
1 ½ cups hot water

3 slightly beaten egg yolks
1 Tbsp butter
½ tsp grated lemon peel
1/3 cup lemon juice
1 9-inch baked pastry shell, cooled
Never-fail meringue (recipe follows)

In saucepan, mix 1 ½ cups sugar, cornstarch, flour and salt. Gradually add hot water, stirring constantly. Cook and stir over moderately high heat till mixture comes to boiling. Reduce heat; cook and stir 2 minutes longer. Remove from heat.

Stir a moderate amount of hot mixture into egg yolks, then return to hot mixture. Bring to boiling and cook 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Add butter and lemon peel. Slowly add lemon juice mixing well. Pour into pastry shell. Spread meringue over filling; seal to edge. Bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool before cutting.

Never-fail meringue

2 Tbsp sugar
1 Tbsp cornstarch
½ cup water

Combine and cook on stovetop or microwave until thick.

3 egg whites
1/8 tsp. salt
6 Tbsp sugar

Beat eggs until soft peaks form. Add salt and sugar gradually and beat until stiff. Combine with cooled cornstarch mixture.

Fruits and Veggies

Opening to my homepage on my computer one morning, one of the headlines was “Cancer cures.” I opened it, interested to see if something new had happened since I went to bed the night before. It turned out to be an article written about stress-busting and diet. Most agree that stress is related to cancer and we have been inundated with the role that fruits and vegetables play in prevention and, perhaps to some degree, recovery. Maybe the headline was a bit sensational but the article on diet really made a lot of sense.

Summer is the perfect opportunity to put this sage advice into practice and do it with spectacular taste. Take advantage of every farmer’s market, roadside stand and specialty produce store you find or, better yet, grow your own vegetables. It’s not too late to sow a few lettuces in a container or the edge of a small garden. It really looks pretty, and is so much better than store-bought. You can sow it a second or third time after harvesting and before the lettuce bolts or you can sow it every two or three weeks, trying different types or re-sowing your favorites. Lettuce does best in cool weather, so the midsummer sowing may not produce a great crop but you never know. I have been successful as often as not even with July sowings.

Vow to make Salads and other light dishes the centerpiece of every meal with meat or seafood as a secondary ingredient instead of the other way around. Side benefits are ease of preparation, little or no cooking, fun experimentation, and a slimmer figure (?) in addition to improved health.

Two cookbooks I plan to put into yeoman service for this project: Cold Soups, Warm Salads by Irene Rothschild has also been the inspiration for many opening courses for summertime breakfasts at our inn, such as Strawberry Rhubarb Soup. I include the recipe here for you and it has been very popular. The other, Salad Suppers by Andrea Chesman is new to me and I have only tried one or two recipes to share with you but they were great and there are so many others that sound marvelous.

The first is from Rothschild’s book and uses popular Thai flavors. Seasonings are available in supermarkets.

Grilled Chicken, Thai Style (serves 4)

About 1 pound chicken breasts, boned and skinned
1 Tbsp. butter
1 Tbsp. brown sugar or raw sugar
Four and one-half Tbsp. Thai fish sauce (Nam Pla)
2 garlic cloves, minced
6 Tbsp, freshly squeezed lime juice
2 tsp minced and seeded jalapeno or Serrano peppers
One and one-half Tbsp. chopped cilantro
Boston or loose leaf lettuce leaves
Alfalfa sprouts
Flowering red kale, if available, or radicchio or red leaf lettuce
Cherry tomatoes, scored cucumber slices, and scallion flowers, for garnish (chive blossoms would work)

Grill the chicken or sauté in butter in a hot skillet, 3 to 4 minutes on each side, until tender. Remove and keep warm in a 200 deg. oven or cover with foil. Pour off the excess fat from the pan and add the brown sugar, fish sauce, garlic, lime juice, hot peppers, and cilantro. Blend and heat through.
Arrange the lettuce in the center of four serving plates. Place the sprouts on one side and kale on the other side. Artfully place the tomatoes, cucumber slices, and chive blossoms for the garnish. Slice the chicken breasts crosswise on the diagonal leaving it connected at one end. Slide onto the lettuce and spoon the sauce over.

From Salad Suppers comes this wonderful salad, made in less than 20 minutes.

Tuscany Tuna Salad with White Beans (makes 4 servings)

1 6 or 7 ounce can water-packed tuna, drained and flaked
4 scallions, chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
One-half cup chopped fresh basil
2 Tbsp. capers, drained
4 Tbsp. red wine vinegar
1 Tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil or herb flavored oil
2 Tbsp. defatted chicken broth
1 5-oz. can cannelloni beans, rinsed and drained
Salt and pepper
12 cups torn mixed salad greens
4 Italian plum tomatoes, chopped

In a large salad bowl, combine the tuna, scallions, garlic, basil, capers, vinegar, oil and broth. Toss to mix. Gently fold in the beans. Season with salt and pepper to taste. (The salad can be refrigerated for up to 4 hours at this point.)

Just before serving, add the greens and the tomatoes to the tuna mixture, toss and serve.

If you want a change from salad, you can toss the first ingredients with hot linguine instead of the mixed salad greens.

If you have rhubarb in your garden still, a great recipe follows:

1 and one-half pounds rhubarb, trimmed and rinsed
2 cups water
Dash of salt
10 Tsp., honey
2 pints strawberries
One-half cup red Zinfandel wine (or other hearty dry red)
One-half cup orange juice
Crème Fraiche (sour cream and lightly sweetened whipped cream)

Cut the rhubarb into 1-inch pieces. Put in a pot with the water and salt and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook, covered, until tender, about 20 minutes. Stir in the honey. Let cool slightly and pour into a food processor or blender (I use an immersion hand blender). Rinse the strawberries and remove the hulls. Cut in half and add to the food processor, reserving a few for garnish. Blend until pureed. Remove to a bowl. Stir in the wine and orange juice. Chill until ready to serve. Slice reserved strawberries. Serve with dollops of crème fraiche and garnish with strawberry slices.

Here’s to a healthy and delicious summer.

Tuscany

More and more of the health food literature is emphasizing the Mediterranean diet as heart healthy and delicious. Numerous studies have shown that those people who follow such a diet have fewer incidences of heart disease and stroke and some new studies have shown a link between monounsaturated fats and a lower incidence of cancer. The greatest news of all is that this diet is delicious.

Americans have long had a love affair with Italian food and Italy is perhaps the epitome of the Mediterranean diet. And of all the regions of Italy that we associate with good food, it is Tuscany.

I have a good friend who went on a cooking-school vacation in Tuscany and couldn’t stop talking about the food. She really didn’t have words to describe it, she said. And no wonder. Tuscany is the magical region that is the home of crostini, biscotti, pecorino, pappardelle and panforte; not to mention olives and olive oil.

Enjoying every day and finding a way to celebrate even the mundane days of the week, especially gathering, preparing and sharing food is a goal that I share with the Tuscans. And the Tuscans could almost be credited with inventing “natural” foods—as they are the heart of their cuisine. By natural, I mean fresh, local, unprocessed foods prepared and eaten in as natural a way as possible and welcomed at its “natural” prime. A continuing pleasure cycle that follows the seasons is an art in Tuscany.

Here is a typical Tuscan Spring Menu (Some recipes from Bon Appetit May 2000)

Antipasti

Spinach and Ricotta Gnocchi

Chicken with White Wine and Mushrooms
Asparagus and Parmesan Puddings

Panna Cotta with Strawberry-Vin Santo Sauce


Spinach and Ricotta Gnocchi (Makes 8)

8 First Course Servings

4 6-ounce packages ready-to-use baby spinach leaves
2 cups whole-milk ricotta cheese
1 Cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
½ cup flour
2 large egg yolks
½ tsp salt
½ tsp ground black pepper
Generous pinch of freshly ground nutmeg

¼ cup butter, melted

Cook spinach in large pot of boiling salted water just until wilted, stirring occasionally, about 2 minutes. Drain. Squeeze out liquid. Chop spinach. Mix spinach, ricotta, ½ cup Parmesan, ½ cup flour, egg yolks, salt, pepper and nutmeg in bowl until slightly sticky dough forms. Dust baking sheet with flour. Working in batches and using floured hands, roll ¼ cup dough on floured work surface to form 5-inch-long rope. Cut rope into 1-inch pieces. Roll each piece between palms to form oval. Transfer gnocchi to prepared baking sheet. Repeat rolling, cutting and shaping with remaining dough. Working in batches, add gnocchi to pot of boiling salted water; cook until gnocchi rise to surface. Cook 4 minutes longer. Using slotted spoon, remove gnocchi from water; drain. Place in serving dish. Pour butter over gnocchi; toss. Sprinkle with ½ cup Parmesan. Season with salt and pepper.

Chicken with White Wine and Mushrooms (8 servings)

8 chicken breast halves with skin and bone
Flour
½ cup olive oil
1 1/3 cup chopped onion
2/3 cup chopped carrot
2/3 cup chopped celery
4 Tbsp chopped Italian parsley
4 large garlic cloves, chopped
2 pounds mushrooms, sliced
2 14 ½ ounce cans diced tomatoes in juice
2 cups dry white wine

Sprinkle chicken with salt and pepper; dust with flour. Heat oil in heavy large skillet over medium-high heat. Add chicken, skin side down and sauté until brown, about 5 minutes. Turn chicken over and sauté 3 minutes. Transfer chicken to bowl. Add onion, carrot, celery, parsley and garlic to skillet; sauté 2 minutes. Add mushrooms and sauté until starting to brown, about 10 minutes. Add tomatoes with juices and wine. Boil sauce until slightly thickened, about 10 minutes. Return chicken to sauce. Cover skillet, reduce heat to medium and simmer until chicken is cooked through and tender, about 15 minutes. Transfer chicken and sauce to plates and serve.

Asparagus and Parmesan Puddings

½ cup fresh breadcrumbs made from Italian bread with crust cut off
2 pounds asparagus, trimmed
2 Tbsp. butter
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese (about 3 ounces)
½ cup whole-milk ricotta cheese
¼ cup flour
4 large eggs

Butter 8 ¾-cup custard cups; coat with breadcrumbs. Cut off asparagus tips. Cook tips in large pot of boiling salted water until crisp-tender, about 3 minutes. Drain; reserve tips and 1 cup cooking liquid. Coarsely chop asparagus stalks. Melt butter in large skillet over medium heat. Add onion; sauté until tender, about 6 minutes. Add stalks; sauté until crisp-tender, about 5 minutes. Add reserved asparagus cooking liquid. Cover; simmer until stalks are tender, about 12 minutes. Uncover; cook until liquid is absorbed, stirring often, about 5 minutes. Transfer to food processor; puree. Add Parmesan, ricotta and flour. Using on/off turns, process just until blended. Season with salt and pepper. Whisk eggs in bowl to blend. Add asparagus puree; whisk to blend. Stir in all but 16 asparagus tips. Divide custard among cups. Place cups in roasting pan. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Pour hot water into pan to come 1 inch up sides of cups. Bake puddings until set, about 35 minutes. Let stand 10 minutes. Invert onto plates. Garnish with asparagus tips.


Panna Cotta with Strawberry-Vin Santo Sauce (10 servings)

¼ cup cold water
4 tsp unflavored gelatin
4 cups whipping cream
1 cup sugar
1 Tbsp honey
¼ tsp vanilla extract
1 Tbsp Vin Santo (An Italian dessert wine available at some liquor stores) or Muscat wine or cream Sherry
2 cups pine nuts
Strawberry-Vin Santo Sauce (see recipe)
Additional pine nuts

Pour ¼ cup water into metal bowl; sprinkle gelatin over. Let stand until gelatin softens, about 10 minutes. Set bowl in saucepan of simmering water. Stir just until gelatin dissolves, about 1 minute. Combine cream, sugar, honey and vanilla in heavy large saucepan. Bring to boil, stirring until sugar dissolves. Remove from heat. Add gelatin mixture and Vin Santo; whisk until well blended. Divide 2 cups pine nuts among ten ¾-cup custard cups. Divide cream mixture among cups. Chill overnight. Set cups in small bowl of warm water to loosen panna cotta, about 20 seconds each. Run small knife between panna cotta and custard cups. Invert panna cotta onto plates. Spoon sauce over. Sprinkle with additional pine nuts; serve.

Strawberry-Vin Santo Sauce (makes 2 cups)

1 pound fresh strawberries, hulled and quartered
1/3 cup sugar
2 Tbsp Vin Santo
¼ tsp vanilla
¼ tsp (packed grated lemon peel

Puree strawberries in processor. Transfer puree to heavy saucepan. Mix in sugar, Vin Santo, vanilla and lemon peel. Simmer over medium-low heat until sauce is reduced to 2 cups, about 15 minutes. Cool.

Syttende Mai

May seems to be a good month for ethnic festivals; last week I wrote about Cinco de Mayo, the Mexican celebration and now it is time for the Norwegian festival named, appropriately, Syttende Mai, which means “May 17”. This date marks the anniversary of the Norwegian Declaration of Independence from Sweden in 1814. This area of the Midwest has the largest population of Norwegian extraction in the U.S. and both Norwegian and non-Norwegian enjoy celebrating the day together. A three day event is held in Stoughton, Wisconsin every year and here in Red Wing there are often celebrations in the churches and by the Sons of Norway.

Besides the authentic and handsome costumes, demonstrations of the rosemaling art, dances and troll hunts, the festival must, of course, include food. I consulted with our own resident Norwegian “expert” Lois Christenson who told me that two of the staple foods cooked and served at a Syttende Mai festival are the open-faced sandwiches which are a staple of all the Scandinavian countries, meatballs and the myriad delicious butter cookies—which are always present, although particularly so at Christmas. Also ever-present are cakes and pastries of all types—the Scandinavian sweet tooth being well known. The celebratory cake known as kransekaka—a tall tower of baked marzipan rings, decorated with white sugar icing and Norwegian flags—and blotkake—a sumptuous sponge cake, layered with fruit and whipped cream are two of the best.

Of course, fish of some kind and lefse are part of any Norwegian feast, and often the rich, cream porridge, rommegraut, is served as well. If you’re not familiar with rommegraut, it is a “porridge” made of extra-heavy sweet cream (approximately 35 percent butterfat), combined with a little flour, warm milk, salt, sugar and some fresh lemon juice. The ingredients are cooked for several hours and stirred with a whisk or wooden spoon. If the cream is raw, the butterfat will rise to the surface of the mixture and is periodically spooned off into a bowl and served on top of the pudding. Even if you can’t get raw cream, however, a good rommegraut will result. Then you must melt butter and pour over each serving, on top of which you sprinkle sugar and cinnamon.

Reading about Norwegian culture, I was constantly reminded of the harsh, cold climate and the mountainous terrain. The people seem to thrive on it and are ardent sportsmen, getting to work as early as Americans, eating a quick lunch and arriving home as early as possible in order to take the family hiking, sailing or skiing. And yet the hardships of their countryside have never prevented Norwegians from enjoying food—and their feasts and festivities are equal to any.

In honor of Syttende Mai I gathered my first rhubarb and made Rabarbragrot, a delicious compote that my grandmother (who was not Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, or Finnish but whose neighborhood was) made for me when I was a child.

Rhubarb Compote

2 cups water
¾ cup sugar
1 ½ pounds rhubarb, washed, scraped and cut into ½-inch pieces (about 4 cups)
½ tsp. vanilla
3 Tbsp. cornstarch
1/3 cup cold water

Dissolve the sugar in the water in a non-reactive saucepan and bring to a boil. Add the rhubarb and reduce the heat to low. Simmer, uncovered for 20 to 30 minutes until rhubarb is tender. Remove from heat and add vanilla
Mix cornstarch with cold water and mix to a paste. Gradually stir it into the rhubarb and bring it to a boil, stirring constantly. Simmer from 3-5 minutes. Chill. Serve plain or with sweetened whipped cream.

Cream Cake

5 egg yolks
½ cup cold water
1 ½ cups sugar
½ tsp. vanilla
½ tsp. lemon extract
¼ tsp almond extract
1 ½ cups cake flour
¼ tsp. salt
¾ tsp. cream of tartar
5 egg whites

Amaretto liqueur
2 pints sweetened, crushed strawberries
2 cups heavy cream, whipped and sweetened with ¼ cup sugar

Beat egg yolks until thick and lemon colored. Add water and continue beating until very thick. Gradually add sugar, then extracts. Fold in flour sifted with salt, a little at a time. Beat egg whites until foamy. Add cream of tartar and beat until they form moist glossy peaks. Fold into egg yolk mixture. Bake in a 10-inch springform pan or an ungreased tube pan. Bake one hour at 325 degrees. Loosen sides of pan when cool.

When cool, slice cake horizontally in half. Sprinkle about 2 Tbsp. Amaretto liqueur on one layer. Cover layer with half the whipped cream. Put half the strawberries over the cream. Cover with other layer of cake. Put remaining whipped cream and strawberries over the top layer. If the pan you baked the cake in did not have a hole in the center, cut the cake like a wedding cake, leaving a circle of cake in the center.

Portuguese Food

Several years ago I was in the Tampa Bay area of Florida enjoying a beautiful 80-degree day while on a two week vacation. It was a vacation, even though we house sat while our son and his new wife went on their honeymoon cruise.

Our daughter and her boyfriend were there as well. Jaoa Ferreira is from the Azores and, while there, treated us to his native Portuguese cooking. Jaoa and Nick (the groom) went fishing a few days before the wedding and brought back some Blue Gill and some Mackerel. It would have been difficult to do anything wrong to those fillets, as wonderfully fresh as they were, but Joao sautéed them lightly in olive oil and served them with a wonderful sauce or refogado.

It is often said that one knows when he is in a Portuguese home by the aroma of refogado that fills the kitchen. Refogado is both the product and the technique of a universal base for sauce, comparable to the Creole roux. Basically it is comprised of sautéed onions in olive oil with one or all of the following: garlic, bay leaf, paprika or tomatoes.

Portuguese cooking is really simple; basic meats, poultry and fish most often marinated and served with dipping sauces. The spices are the hallmark that distinguishes Portuguese food from other cuisines; in particular Spanish. The Portuguese were explorers looking for spices to trade and in so doing brought home and used exotic flavorings long before other European countries did. Although a close neighbor of Spain on the Iberian Peninsula, Portuguese cooking has spices and herbs and taste combinations that would be astonishing to most Spanish palates. The list is long but the most common are cinnamon, cumin, nutmeg, paprika, red pepper paste (Massa de Pimentao), black and white pepper, saffron and coarse sea salt—usually more than our American taste would dictate. Other ingredients that are frequently used are tomatoes, vinegar and wine.

The traditional spice combination is an herb and spice paste made with garlic mashed and blended with coarse salt, crumbled bay leaf, sweet red pepper paste, parsley, olive oil and freshly ground pepper. The Massa de Pimentao is a paste of sweet red peppers cured in coarse salt. If you can’t find it at a specialty store, you can use paprika.

All of the fresh catch did not get eaten at that first fish meal, so Joao treated us to a very traditional Portuguese dish, fish cakes with dipping sauce called Molhanga or Molhu cru (raw sauce). It is a common marinade and dipping sauce sometimes poured over both fish and boiled potatoes if they are served. Joao used no recipe and had to make do with utensils and ingredients in his host’s kitchen but the results were wonderful and can be made easily by any of us; however the fish itself will be hard to duplicate in Red Wing or anyplace in the Midwest. Nevertheless, I believe you’ll really enjoy the Portuguese version of fish cakes:

2 cups (approximately) cooked fish, flaked
2 Tbsp. parsley (flat leaf, if possible), chopped coarsely
1 large potato, peeled, cooked and mashed with a fork to a puree
1 large garlic clove, minced
3 Tbsp. finely chopped onion
¼ cup Port wine
2 eggs
Pinch of nutmeg
Salt and white pepper to taste

Heat vegetable oil in deep saucepan about 4 inches deep for frying. Mix together the rest of the ingredients. Shape with 2 spoons into oval croquettes and deep fry until crisp and golden. Drain on paper towels and keep warm while making Molhanga.

Molhanga
1 tsp. cumin seed or ¼ tsp. cumin powder
6 cloves garlic, finely chopped
½ tsp. coarse salt
¾ tsp. paprika
¼ tsp sugar
1 tsp hot pepper sauce (such as Tabasco)
3 Tbsp. finely chopped parsley (flat leaf)
1 Tbsp. olive oil (or can use leftover oil from frying fish)
¼ cup water
¾ cup wine vinegar

Using mortar and pestle or blender, combine cumin, garlic, salt, paprika, pepper and sugar. Follow with hot pepper sauce and parsley. Transfer to bowl. Stir in water and vinegar and whisk in olive oil. Pour over cooked fish or serve on the side for dipping.

Our starters were simple—just right to whet our appetites for the main course—grapes and bruschetta. The vegetables served on the side were very simply prepared and delicious. Fresh sliced cucumbers with coarse salt and vinegar; grated carrots with olive oil, salt and pepper and a touch of sugar. What a wonderful meal.