Day 193: The Great Scape

I used my broiler for the first time today, or I think it was the first time. I tend to remember the events that lead to my apartment filling with smoke. The Thanksgiving turkey, generously massaged with butter as instructed by Ms. Paula Deen. The Christmas ham, glazed too soon. Today's slices of bread, left under the broiler for about five minutes, which was apparently about three minutes too long.

Why was I broiling bread, you might ask? Good question. I needed something on which to spread the pesto I had made: five different varieties in all. Why did I make so much pesto? Because I recently became acquainted with a new form of vegetation: the garlic scape.


Here's your botany lesson for the day. The garlic scape, a lovely, twirly veggie, is the shoot of the garlic plant, which, if left uncut, will turn into a head of garlic. If cut, you can use it in a variety of dishes, most commonly pestos, and the plant will grow another scape, which you can then allow to turn into grown-up garlic, giving your plant double productivity. It's a pretty good deal, all around.


Here are the five pestos I made (all garlic scapes were chopped whole, though some recipes call for using only the stems; I didn't want to be wasteful and it all smelled nice and garlicky):

#1
1/2 cup chopped garlic scapes
1/4 cup toasted almonds
1/2 cup grated Parmesan
1/2 cup olive oil
salt & pepper
Blend first three ingredients in food processor; trickle in olive oil; season to taste.

#2
1/2 cup chopped garlic scapes
1/4 cup toasted walnuts
1/2 cup grated Parmesan
1/2 cup olive oil
salt & pepper
Blend first three ingredients in food processor; trickle in olive oil; season to taste.

#3
1/4 cup chopped garlic scapes
1/4 cup chopped fresh basil
1/4 cup toasted walnuts
1/2 cup grated Parmesan
1/2 cup olive oil
salt & pepper
Blend first four ingredients in food processor; trickle in olive oil; season to taste.

#4
2 tbsp toasted almonds
1/4 cup toasted walnuts
1/2 cup chopped garlic scapes
1 cup chopped basil
1/2 cup plus 2 tbsp grated Parmesan
1/2 cup olive oil
salt
Blend first five ingredients in food processor; trickle in olive oil; season to taste

#5
See Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Soupe au Pistou; substitute garlic scapes for garlic cloves.

This variety of pestos (probably pesti in Italian) made for an interesting dinner. Five pieces of bread, five pesti. Number one was one of my favorites, the driest though they all use the same amount of oil (the almonds were drier than the walnuts and seemed to absorb more liquid). It was sharp and clear and clearly garlicky. Number two was very similar, but the walnuts gave it a less bright, more earthy flavor. Number three was Ian's favorite, the easiest to eat and the most similar to your standard pesto. Number four was sort of muddy (by which I mean confused, not tasting like dirt) in flavor, probably owing to too many ingredients, but still tasty. Number five was delicious and tomatoey, very similar to what we put in our soup last night.

I would make all of these again, most frequently numbers one and three. I will definitely buy more garlic scapes next spring (they have a short season) and try them in as many ways as I can.

Day 192: Soupe au Pistou

Tonight, I made a beautiful dish, the recipe for which I got out of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, which I'll be doing my best to cook my way through over the next who-knows-how-long. The translation Julia provides beneath the title Soupe au Pistou is "Provencal Vegetable Soup with Garlic, Basil and Herbs" (no Oxford comma for Mrs. Child). She then explains that, "The pistou itself, like the Italian pesta, is a sauce made of garlic, basil, tomato and cheese, and is just as good on spaghetti as it is in this rich vegetable soup." That made sense, and I plan to make a big batch of the pistou tomorrow to use some more of my fresh basil and to either spread on my homemade bread or use as pasta sauce or even mix into some ground turkey for pistou burgers.

It was quite leisurely preparing the soup. I put the Billie Holiday station on Pandora and started chopping the carrots, potatoes and onions (only half of what Julia asks for, since I didn't need to serve 6 to 8 people; half the recipe made a full meal for tonight's dinner and tomorrow's lunch). Then those needed a full forty minutes to boil, which seemed a bit excessive to me, but if forty minutes the recipe said, forty minutes the recipe got. This also helped me get my navy beans boiled, as I had thought I had canned white beans but apparently did not. While all that was bubbling away, I had quite a bit of time to cut my green beans (diced, according to the recipe, so I cut them in about inch pieces like they are in the can, which is so not stylish now that it made me smile) and break the spaghetti and crumble the bread (a lot of starches go into this soup, which makes it a satisfying meal unto itself) and also to make the pistou (though Julia outlines how to do it by hand, I dumped everything in the food processor, because I could). I also had time to write a letter to a friend and straighten up the house before my husband got home.

The soup, once all boiled together and mixed with the pistou, was beautiful and salty and oily and luxurious. I served some crisped bread with it, and a few slices of local cheese I'd gotten at the farmer's market (Brush Creek Creamery's Farmstead Cheese, Brush Creek Select). It was lovely to eat, definitely something I'll be making again, and completely vegetarian, which I like, especially when we've had meat at lunch (Ian came home on his lunch break and I heated up leftover pork loin). This was not a challenging meal for me, but a good way to ease into Mastering the Art of French Cooking as I try to cook my way through it and teach myself to be the best cook I can be. I was diligent and read the entire recipe twice before starting. Thankfully, this wasn't a variation on anything so I only had to read one recipe.

Day 190: Rhubarb, Rhubarb, Rhubarb

Do you know what background actors say to each other when they're supposed to look like they're talking without being heard? "Rhubarb rhubarb rhubarb. Watermelon. Rhubarb." Which is why, when a director wants more silent chatter in the background, she'll say, "More rhubarb!" She's giving direction, not asking for pie.

Rhubarb is an interesting plant. It's a vegetable, but it's generally treated as/combined with a fruit because of how tart it is. Strawberry rhubarb pie is probably its most famous incarnation. The strawberries are sweet, the rhubarb is tart, and everything balances nicely. Or so I've been told. I don't think I've ever had strawberry rhubarb pie. Until tonight, I'm pretty sure I'd never had rhubarb.

This Wednesday, at my local "fresh food market," I bought a bunch of rhubarb, weighing in at about two pounds. Tonight, I prepared rhubarb two ways: a rhubarb peach cobbler (recipe courtesy of Alton Brown and my husband's Good Eats 2 cookbook) and a rhubarb glazed pork loin (recipe courtesy of my red-and-white checkered Better Homes and Gardens cookbook).

I've never made a cobbler before, but I figured it couldn't be too hard. I've made fruit filling (this one was peach, rhubarb, lime juice, sugar, corn starch, and salt), and I've made pie dough (this one contained lemon zest, making it nicely fragrant). Unfortunately, flour is a finicky thing. I wasn't paying good attention. By the time I'd added five of the nine suggested tablespoons of water, my dough was already goopy. I added more flour, but it still didn't firm up the way I would have liked. So I improvised. I threw the whole mess into the freezer, which helped a little. Thankfully, the bottom layer of dough doesn't need to be pristine. The top layer is supposed to cover all the fruit, it seems, so I tried spreading my dough (with wet hands) on my Silpat, and then inverting it onto the pile of fruit in the pan. It still didn't want to come off nicely. So, as the name would suggest, my dessert is a little cobbled together. But still, it's delicious. So tangy and sweet and creamy, with a nice bit of pastry and a nice bit of fruit, which I served with vanilla ice cream. So incredibly good.

The main course was also delicious and smelled so good while it was cooking. The rhubarb glaze involved cooking chopped rhubarb in fruit juice concentrate until the rhubarb turned to mush, then mixing that with a corn starch slurry, dijon mustard, honey, and wine vinegar (I chose red, though the recipe didn't specify). The recipe didn't give a lot of instruction on how to roast the pork loin for maximum deliciousness, but thankfully I've watched enough cooking shows to know that I should season it well and sear it on the stove before throwing it in the oven. I then used the juices to cook some super colorful rainbow chard that we bought at the farmer's market this morning, plus I did my super creamy, super low-cal mashed potatoes (boil potatoes and garlic, drain, mash in low fat sour cream and buttermilk, plus salt and pepper). All together it was a lovely meal.

This meal required some food knowledge, some of which I had (like making a corn starch slurry instead of adding the corn starch and water separately) and some of which I maybe didn't (like how far to cook the chard--I may have gone too far). Since I am currently unemployed and any jobs that wouldn't make me tear out my fingernails look like they won't be available to me, I'm trying to figure out my life until we finally finally finally move out of this college town. I'm going freelance with the writing and editing, for one, though I know that won't earn a ton of money. But what to do with the rest of the time? One thing: I can teach myself how to cook. I have several good cookbooks to cook my way through, ones that explain the history and science of food, and carefully guide the cook through techniques. This might get in the way of my persistent plans for weight loss, though I can practice some self control. I also want to brush up on my French, my guitar playing, and keep up a fairly rigorous exercise routine (partially to combat the food I'll be cooking). So you'll start seeing posts marked "Cooking School" soon, in which I describe my efforts at mastering certain cooking techniques. It should be fun. I'm looking forward to it.

Day 186: Grape Expectations

When I was a kid, my dad liked to eat certain foods while watching TV: mostly peanuts, whose shells he would deposit in a plastic grocery bag, but also grapes. I mostly remember him eating green grapes, but I know there were red grapes, too. I was a bit of a snack mooch (I always liked to quote the old Disney TV show The Torkelsons: Whatcha got there, Boarder Hodges?) and I liked to hope or pretend that I would grow up to have Dad's amazing twig-thin metabolism (which, of course, I didn't) and be able to snack in front of the TV every day, which at the time seemed like the height of luxury.

On grape nights, though, it was not so luxurious. For one reason or another, I never took a shine to grapes. Maybe it's because they were fruit (in the kid thesaurus, synonymous with yuck). As I got older, I pinpointed it to a textural issue: I didn't like food that exploded in your mouth (which seemed to be the main reason most people liked grapes). I took to peeling them, for a time, which proved too laborious. Often, the red grapes tasted a little rotten (what most people would call too sweet, but I associated sweetness with processed sugar, not plant matter) and the green grapes were a little too tart. So grapes were marginal.

Of course, then I married a grape eater. A thrifty grape eater. A man who buys fruit seasonally, which generally means at its cheapest, which means that though I want Granny Smith apples year-round, he goes for things like grapes, most recently black grapes, which I had never (to my recollection) tasted before.

Here's how Ian described black grapes after eating a handful: not as sweet as red, not as tart as green. Part of me thought, Wow, they must not have any flavor. But than I tried them and realized that these are the ideal grapes. They're like grape juice grapes, the flavor the candies are modeled after. I've eaten cups of them, without any coercion, just for an afternoon snack. I bet you could make a savory sauce from them and serve it with meat (maybe black grapes and wine, with some spice in there). I bet they would be good in salad. Maybe a black grape granita. Or simply straight off the vine.

Day 179: Ricciarelli

If I were to cook my way through a cookbook, recipe by recipe, my first choice would probably be How to Be a Domestic Goddess by Nigella Lawson. It's not as comprehensive a cookbook as The Joy of Cooking (I actually don't own a copy) or Mastering the Art of French Cooking (which would probably be my second choice), but let's face it: all those baked goods! And there's something warm and inviting about Nigella that I've always wanted to embody, but somehow I always come off as more rigid than inviting, more cerebral than warm. When attempting to show others I care about them through food, I tend to screw it up. The food doesn't come out right (even if I've made it right a hundred times before) or I get too scheduled and feel like I'm forcing guests to come to the table or I just choose the wrong menu for my guests' tastes in food and atmosphere. I've found a few reliable party recipes but no recipe for becoming Nigella. That's probably because I'm Laura. As much as I might fight against it, I'm Laura down to my bones.

Anyway. In order to cook my way through How to Be a Domestic Goddess, I would have to develop an incredible metabolism/amazing restraint. I would probably have to send my husband to work with cookies or cake or scones almost every day. His coworkers would get positively fat, or else I would. But every once in a while, I take it out and try something. Tomorrow, Ian's work is having a charity bake sale, so I jumped on the opportunity to cook. I made a batch of my standard Better Homes and Gardens peanut butter cookies, and a batch of ricciarelli, an Italian almond meringue cookie, courtesy of Nigella.

I don't think my ricciarelli came out right. Not perfectly, anyway. I had more almonds than the recipe called for, and I ground them pretty finely, but even though I ended up putting all of my almonds into the mix, I didn't achieve the "hard paste" the recipe called for. More of a goopy paste. So I couldn't form mine into the beautiful little diamonds pictured, but I could put the batter into a pastry bag (or Ziploc with the corner cut out--whatever) and pipe little circles onto my parchment paper (I tried diamonds but they didn't hold their shape). I'm thinking that maybe I had too much egg white; I used local, organic eggs, whose size are not as regulated as the grocery store variety. But I would not be deterred. I sprinkled them with powdered sugar and put them in the laundry room to dry overnight, as directed (I always feel like I'm making something fancy when it takes a lot of waiting). I baked them at 250 for about 30 minutes (preheated the oven before hopping into the shower, baked them while primping) and dusted them with powdered sugar again.

The cookies came out nicely, I think, if not perfectly. They are stiff and hold their shape well, but when bitten into they are both chewy and crunchy and highly textural. Sweet, but not too sweet. The raw batter tasted much more almond-y than the final product, but that was to be expected. I think these cookies would be ideal on a breezy afternoon, with a cappuccino and a fantastic view.

Day 178: Abba-Zaba

I recently read Steve Almond's book, Candyfreak, which was a very exciting read for me. I mean, it's about candy! You see, Steve Almond, a self-proclaimed candyfreak, got a taste of candy factory euphoria and set out to visit as many candy factories as would let him in. Not many said yes (the kind of candy competition you see in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, with spies and trade secrets and such, is not fiction), but of those that did, one was the Annabelle candy factory, producers of my all-time favorite candy bar: the Big Hunk.




Annabelle also produces the Abba-Zaba, a candy bar I thought I'd sampled until I read Candyfreak and read its description: taffy, stuffed with peanut butter. I guess I'd simply seen a lot of Abba-Zabas in my day. They are usually merchandised next to the Big Hunk, after all. So today, while feeling completely bowled over by allergies (or maybe I'm getting sick, I don't know), I bit into one. I've got to tell you, it's pretty strange.

Who thought to put peanut butter inside taffy? I'm not saying it was bad. It was just something I would never have imagined. If it were nougat, like the Big Hunk, it would make a little more sense to me. But it does seem to be vanilla taffy, which is pretty close to the Big Hunk's chewy nougat. It took me a long time to eat, and the most interesting part was when the peanut butter oozed out from between the layers of taffy. Texturally strange, but satisfying. I think that's what I loved about it, and why I tend toward old-timey, off-beat candy. A Snickers is completely boring to me. The country's favorite candy bar isn't really on my radar. Maybe because I've had too many of them in my lifetime, I don't know. Maybe because they're too easy to eat and thus too quickly gone.

Day 174: Spring Cleaning

I've been trying to clean out my cupboards and freezer this week, and so I've decided to skip grocery shopping for the time being and make do with what I have hanging around. So tonight's dinner consisted of a lovely filet mignon, leftover from a box of steaks my mother-in-law sent a while back, canned green beans that I doctored as well as I could (my husband must be responsible for their presence in our cupboard because I can't recall ever wanting to buy canned green beans), and a rice concoction made with wild rice mix, butter, onion, garlic, frozen spinach, and some crumbled feta that's been in our fridge just short of too long. I was surprised to find that it turned out to be a pretty good meal. Even the green beans were okay, since I sauteed some garlic and heated them up in that, plus I added some kosher salt. Plus, they helped me practice my food tossing. You know--mixing things in a pan just by flipping the pan's contents over on themselves. I've been using a method Julia Child recommends in Mastering the Art of French Cooking for learning to flip omelettes: I put a handful of navy beans (also something that needed to be used from my cupboard--score!) in a sautee pan and I've been practicing flipping them. According to Julia,

A simple-minded but perfect way to master the movement is to practice outdoors with half a cupful of dried beans. As soon as you are able to make them flip themselves in a group, you have the right feeling; but the actual omelette-making gesture is sharper and rougher.

So I practiced with the green beans, too, since I didn't mind if I lost them (I generally hate canned green beans) but I found that I'm getting good at this. Anyway. Here's the recipe for the rice, which I'm counting as my thing I've never had before for today.

1/2 cup wild rice mix
1 tablespoon butter
1/2 medium yellow onion, diced
1 clove garlic, minced
1 can chicken broth
1 box frozen chopped spinach, drained and squeezed to remove excess moisture
1/4 cup feta cheese (though more would be good, too)
kosher salt, to taste

Sautee the onion in the butter until translucent; add garlic and sautee about one minute longer. Add wild rice mix and sautee about two minutes, until it starts to smell nutty. Add chicken broth and bring to boil; reduce to simmer and cover; cook until broth is mostly absorbed (time will differ depending on rice mix; mine took about 40 min). Stir in spinach and cook until water is completely absorbed. Add feta and stir until spinach is heated through and cheese is distributed. Taste for seasoning. Enjoy!

Day 172: Lingonberry

When I bring home souvenirs, I usually bring home food. Which means that my main souvenir from Disney World came from the little shop outside "Norway" in the Epcot World Showcase, though it's actually Swedish in origin: lingonberry preserves.

I did bring this stuff home with the intention of having it as a thing-I've-never-had-before, but I didn't think I'd be having it so soon. I've been cleaning out my pantry, freezer, and fridge, and I'd planned to finally eat an old Lean Cuisine with salmon pasta for lunch, but butterfingers that I am, I dropped it on the kitchen floor and, incidentally, my foot. Thankfully, I was not burned. Also thankfully, I got to try my preserves, which otherwise might have sat on the shelf for quite a while, which would have been tragic because they are delicious.

I can only describe lingonberry preserves as mild, but that doesn't mean they were flavorless. Sweet, a little tangy. Just perfect, really. I often feel assaulted by the sweetness or sourness or seedy texture of preserves, but the lingonberry did not offend on any account. I had them on plain white bread with a little butter underneath.

Apparently, lingonberries are also called "cowberries," which I find slightly less appetizing and far less exotic. They're also known as mountain cranberries, though they really don't seem to have any of the extreme flavor I associate with cranberries, though what I picked up from Wikipedia is that they are quite tart, thus the reason for making them into jam instead of just eating them raw. They've got good Vitamin C, A, and B, and their seeds even contain Omega-3 fatty acids. So, wow! My lunch-in-a-pinch turned out to be great tasting and great for me.

Day 171: Playing Ketchup

Today, I tried something I don't think I ever could have conceived of: banana sauce, and not in a dessert-type way. This stuff is more akin to ketchup, and I assumed at first that it must have tomatoes in it because it is red. (Why is it red? It's naturally brownish--most likely from the oxidized bananas and spices--and it just looks better if it's dyed red.) And basically, it is a little like ketchup. I tried it on a hot dog. It's sweeter than ketchup, and maybe a little thicker with more watery runoff, but it's still tart and tangy like ketchup and it worked well with my lunch.

Apparently, banana sauce is popular in the Philippines, and has its origins around WWII when tomatoes were in short supply. The answer? Make ketchup with bananas! Pretty ingenious, really. Except somehow, this stuff didn't stick (Nutella has a similar story, but it's hugely popular, though I do believe it fell out of popularity in the US for a long time and was most likely brought back by the foodie boom). It's pretty good. You can't expect it to be just like Heinz, but it doesn't need to be. It's a perfectly good sauce of its own merits.

You should try it. You can find it at Cost Plus World Market (a major supplier of things I have yet to try).

Day 168: A Trip to Morocco

On our second day in Epcot, we made reservations at the Moroccan restaurant in the World Showcase. It was an incredibly hot morning, super muggy (as it will be in Orlando in the summer), and I was very cranky. I was beginning to tire of having to sidestep dozens of people everywhere we went, of being nearly run over by strollers, of being clobbered by passers-by without so much as an apology (Ian and I each suffered several blows from strangers who either sideswiped us or elbowed us and didn't even acknowledge it), and I almost asked if we could just go back to the hotel room and cancel our dinner reservation. But, knowing I shouldn't make such decisions while cranky, Ian and I went into the air conditioning and sat down for a while, and of course, my mood improved. We kept our reservation and walked into the restaurant at the appointed time, where a belly dancer performed and all the male staff wore fezzes. Our busboy (who did an amazing job and made up by far for our more surly waiter) even placed his fez on Ian's head and took our picture (see below).

Since we'd spent a few days eating new things and I had yet to venture toward any seafood, I decided to take a risk. I ordered the fish tagine (above). I'd always wanted to try a tagine, and I figured if I didn't like it, I could trade with Ian, who ordered the lamb cous cous. I actually expected his to be the superior dish, but when I got mine, I was blown away. So many spices and olives and vegetables, and the fish was delicious and tender. It definitely tasted like fish, but all the other flavors complemented it so perfectly, no other meat could have been better. Ian ended up being jealous of my order (as he often is), since his dish was lacking in sauce and was literally just a piece of lamb and some plain cous cous. He did, however, order the traditional mint tea that I thought was pretty darn good.

I think this might have been the best meal we had on this trip. Or--the best meal I had. Ian had better. He tends to have bad luck when ordering in restaurants. And somehow, I tend to choose well. One of these days, I'll have to try to make a fish tagine of my own. And it gives me an excuse to buy a tagine, like this one, if only it could be cheaper:

Day 162: Just Ducky

I have long understood duck confit to be one of those magical foodstuffs that can lift those who eat it to ecstatic heights. I remember hearing some chef or other say that if you put duck confit on the plate, you win--no matter what you pair it with, it's just that good. An exaggeration, I'm sure. But last night, when Ian and I went to Sante in Spokane (at last! we've been meaning to go since I started school here two years ago and it had to be our last chance to go before we finally made reservations) I finally got to see what the fuss is about. (As you can see, I couldn't wait for Ian to take the picture--we're those cool people who take pictures of their food in restaurants, though thankfully it was light enough not to need a flash--to take my first bite.)

If you don't know, duck confit is prepared in a very special way. It is made with the leg of a duck, salt-cured, and then poached in the animal's own fat. Many of you probably know that duck fat is culinary gold. There are lots of fats out there that, once rendered, might be worth throwing away--they taste good, but they are saturated fats after all, and we Americans are, as I understand it, concerned about that. But duck fat is one of those flavorful things that makes you say, who cares? Health schmealth.

Anyway, Sante served their duck confit with spaetzle (also a first for me--yum), asparagus, morels (marinated in something sweet--I would tell you exactly what but I forgot to write it down and their menu isn't updated on their website since they cook seasonally--but morels were also a delicious first for me) and some sort of cream sauce (I feel quite remiss in not being able to tell you exactly what--you'll just have to go to Sante and see, I suppose). It was one of those unforgettable meals. We also had the bresaola plate to start, which had bread, cheese, cured beef, apple, and some homemade strawberry preserves--all lovely. For dessert: vanilla creme brulee (is there anything better than creme brulee?) and cappuccino. All around, a fantastic meal.

Day 148: Peachy Keen

My mother has a beautiful book called Culinaria Italy, part cookbook, part culinary history. It's big and heavy and it contains so many recipes I would like to try. We flipped through it yesterday, looking for something to make for dinner that I'd never had before. There were so many options, so many beautiful pictures and recipes to be perused, that we spent longer looking at the book than expected, cutting into the time we thought we had to prepare dinner. So in the end, we went to the store and bought pizza fixings. For the crust we used a really lovely flatbread, and we made one margherita pizza and one with Italian sausage.

I love a good trip to the grocery store, especially when visiting California, where the selection of foods is often larger and nicely diverse. This time, while selecting a bunch of root-on basil (it keeps a lot longer than cut basil, when you keep the root end in a glass of water), we actually ran into the man who grows the stuff, a man from Archi's Acres, who was quite happy to see us purchasing his product. He told us about his program for hiring vets who suffer from PTSD, which seemed pretty appropriate considering it's Memorial Day weekend. He was a lovely, friendly man, and his basil is excellent.

Back home, we put the pizzas together, but since I'd obviously had pizza before (though not the type of flatbread we used for the crust... I should have written down the name and now the wrappers are out in the trash barrel), I had to have something else. For that purpose, we bought a bottle of prosecco and some white peaches. It was a simple recipe we found in Mom's Italian book: bellinis. For those of you who don't know, a bellini is a drink that originated at Harry's Bar in Venice, Italy--one of the most famous restaurants I can think of. Unfortunately, I've never been there despite the fact that I have been to Venice. When I was there, I was nineteen, had no money, and had never heard of the place. I spent hours searching for a particular gelato shop the travel guide recommended, but it would never have occurred to me to look for a famous bar. Famous bar? I would have said. Ppppbbbbthhh. Ah, to be young.

Anyway, I've heard of Harry's Bar now, and I've always wanted to try a bellini, so I pureed some peaches. Unfortunately, I didn't read the recipe closely enough and I peeled them, which I wasn't supposed to do, which explains why my bellini (pictured above) is not particularly pink. I also don't think the peaches were in perfect condition, and I don't think I got my puree smooth enough. It was still tasty, though. I almost wish I'd just bought a can of Kern's peach nectar--that was the original plan, but they didn't have any at the store we visited and I didn't feel like going to another, plus I thought real peaches would make a better drink. Maybe they did. I don't know.

Next time I have a bellini, I will probably trust a bartender. Maybe the next time I have a bellini it will be at Harry's Bar in Venice. For those of you who would like to try it at home, here's the recipe:

(Serves 1)

Scant 1/4 cup ice cold puree of unpeeled white peaches
2/3 cup chilled prosecco

Place the puree in a chilled glass. Top with prosecco, stir quickly, serve immediately.

Day 145: In Purgatory

Today, the hubby came home for lunch and I made him a dish I've been curious about for a while: Eggs in Purgatory. It's a pretty basic dish: eggs cooked in pasta sauce. That doesn't mean, to a certain extent, that I didn't screw it up. It also doesn't mean that the outcome wasn't good.

You see, I put in too much pasta sauce. The most basic recipe I could find said heat up one cup pasta sauce, crack in two eggs, cover and cook until whites set. Okay. I remembered most of that. I just didn't remember the proportions. So I dumped in a whole jar of sauce (2 1/2 cups) and cracked four eggs onto that, which meant they had more of a tomatoey jacuzzi than was intended--not too much more, but more. It was actually a little scary to watch them as they cooked, with the sauce bubbling up through the whites--it was more like eggs in hell.

But then they started to look like poached eggs, and I grated some parmesan on top and served them.

This was a first for me in a couple of ways. First, I've never had eggs in purgatory. But more importantly, I've never had an egg cooked to this particular level: solid whites, partially runny yolks. It was a little scary. This was probably one of the best ways I could have started, though, since I could sort of hide my yolks in the sauce. Wimpy, I know, but you've got to start somewhere, right? So one day, when I have my first eggs benedict, I won't be afraid of the yolks.

Day 143: Home Remedies

I've seen people marvel at the fact that ginger ale is made with real ginger. They can't believe it because ginger ale really tastes nothing like ginger. These people haven't tried ginger beer.

If you like ginger like I do, you'll find this stuff delicious.

I know, it seems like semantics: ale vs beer. Splitting hairs and whatnot. But the beer is an entirely different brew. If you don't like the spice and particular earthiness of ginger, you will not like this stuff. If you don't like candied ginger, you might not want to pick it up. But if you have a stomachache, this stuff is a good idea.

You know. Because ginger helps with nausea. It's funny, because people drink ginger ale for their tummies, and they think it's the same as lemon lime, so they drink lemon lime for their tummies, too. Maybe the carbonation helps, too, for certain tummy troubles, but it's the ginger that's the active ingredient. Personally, I always have something gingery before I get on a plane, and usually I pack some ginger snaps, as well. Flying to and from Thanksgiving and Christmas is the best for me, because ginger snacks are in no short supply. I will bring candied ginger, too--I would bring ginger ale (or, now, ginger beer) except for that whole no-liquids-or-gels thing.

If you don't believe me about the ginger vs nausea thing (mainly associated with motion sickness), check out this episode of Mythbusters. Grant tries out various cures, pukes a lot, and then--the ginger kicks in.

Day 110: Liver & Onions

My mother is in town, so I thought I would take the opportunity to try one of her favorite dishes that always repulsed me: liver & onions. And really, I thought it would be easy. My mother and I are alike in many ways. I thought I would have grown into a taste for beef liver. I was so, so wrong.

I started out brave. I rinsed the liver, patted it dry, coated and cooked it myself. Mom said she would do it, but I had to brave letting my fingers connect with the slimy, bloody, deep-red flesh of it. I had looked at several liver recipes, some involving breading, some plain. In general, it was advised to cook the liver lightly, so that it was still pink in the middle. I figured, since by coating the liver pieces in milk the milk turned pink, that wouldn't be too hard. I cooked the onions first, then coated the liver in milk and seasoned flour, and fried it in the same oil in which I fried the onions. I got every piece nice and brown on both sides, then returned the onions to the pan to reheat, then served it with a baked potato and salad. I was feeling good. It was just a little piece of meat.

A bite of liver & onions, according to Mom, has to have some liver, some onion, and some ketchup (the ketchup can't be cold--we let it come to room temperature). I followed these directions and popped it all into my mouth, chewed, savored. At first, I tasted the coating and the oil and the onion and the ketchup. It was vaguely meaty. It was fine. The liver was fairly juicy and tender, which I hadn't expected.

But then.

All of a sudden, the liver flavor hit me. And when I say it hit me, I mean it punched me in the face. I literally jumped out of my chair, as if by doing so I could escape it, and let out a wail that seemed to make Mom and Ian think I had burned my tongue. The best I can describe it, it tasted like coagulated blood, or what I would expect coagulated blood to taste like. It smelled like the butcher's shop, that off-putting aroma that makes me want to get out of there as quickly as I can. For the first time in this entire experiment, I spat my food out.

Ian then refused to taste it. My mother, the liver champion, went in for a bite. It wasn't long before her face also morphed into confusion and pain. She managed to swallow hers, but then promptly grabbed the pieces of liver and threw them back in the pan. Liver, she said, must require that you cook the crap out of it. Which makes sense, really. It's kind of a diner food, and I associate diners with rubbery pieces of meat and puddles of grease. Anyway, Mom recooked it, and she dished it up. Ian took some this time, and I waited for Mom to take the first bite.

It was fine, she said. Ian tried it, too. It tasted like liver, he said. I wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not, but he ate his small piece and then took a little more. So I took another bite: liver, onion, ketchup. Again, it was fine at first. Again, though to a lesser degree, that bloody taste bit me. I managed to swallow this time, but only with the aid of a mouthful of diet 7-Up.

Maybe I'm getting hard-headed, but this is one I do not want to defeat. It is the worst flavor I think I've ever had in my mouth. And I have back-up. When I bought the liver, I was informed by the clerk that she had never sold liver before today, and that the other woman who bought liver today was buying it for her cats. I fed my cat a bit of liver and she sniffed it, licked it, chewed a little, and left, shaking each of her paws as she walked away. So guess what. I don't have to like liver. It was hard enough for me to find in the first place. I doubt I will ever have to deal with it in real life. And if I do, I'll make sure I have a full glass of liquid to wash it all down.

Day 107: Thou Shalt Love the Tentacle

Those of you who are cool nerds totally get the title of this post. But this really has nothing to do with a giant tentacled creature from an alternate universe. It has to do with a much smaller tentacled creature from this one.

I speak, ladies and gentlemen, of the octopus.

Last night, I went to a restaurant called Italia in Browne's Addition, Spokane. I went with my husband and my mom (yay!!! she's in town!!!), and for an appetizer, I ordered the octopus. It came in a lovely composed salad. It was charred, with parsley, long pieces of lemon zest, some sort of lovely sauce, etc. I'm not sure what all was there. But though it was a hesitant start, it was a really lovely dish. Really, if you hadn't told me it was octopus, I would have thought it was overcooked chicken. It mostly tasted smokey, and it was only a little chewy.

But that's not the only octopus I had. Or maybe it was squid. You see, my mom ordered the seafood risotto for her main course, and it came with two little sets of tentacles. They looked really gross. We were sort of afraid of them. So naturally, we ate them. We had to count it down (1...2...3!) and get them in our mouths without thinking about it. But then, they were nice. Kind of sweet. Slightly briney. Nothing intimidating at all. To reference Futurama one more time... "the challenger's ugly food has taught us that even hideous things can be sweet on the inside." Thanks, Morbo.

Day 101: The Breaking of the Seafood Aversion

My new issue of Food Network Magazine came yesterday, and one of the recipes was an herb soup with crab (that's the crab in the middle of that picture--plus homemade croutons and a lemon oil drizzle). So today, I made it for dinner.

But first, I went to the grocery store with my husband, and we saw something that made me shudder in a way that made me knew it would work for my resolution: clam dip. So we bought it, plus some potato chips for dipping.

Ian had the first bite of the clam dip. He said, "Ooh, clammy!" Then I had my first bite and I thought, clammy? Really? I even had him describe to me how he would define "clammy" or, you know, the taste of clams. He said salty, fresh, like the ocean. And I had to admit that was true. I even went for a little chunk of clam but I still didn't taste it. It was salty, fresh, sweat, sea-like. But clammy? I wasn't sure about that.

And then I realized, I was associating "clammy" or "seafoody" (which was Ian's initial definition of "clammy" but I got a little frustrated with that lack of specificity) with BAD. And despite how gross it sounded, this clam dip was decidedly not bad. I actually liked it. I mean, I had to force myself to stop eating it.

So then, I made the herb soup for dinner. A nice pile of crab in the middle. And it was...good. Really good. To the point where it didn't taste "seafoody" or "crabby" to me anymore. It didn't have even a remote bit of fishy flavor. And you know why? I'm used to it! I think the seafood aversion has been broken!

This is exciting. I've had quite a few seafood dishes over the last 3 1/3 months, and while I've found some of them enjoyable and some of them at least palatable, I think I'm to the point where the fishy flavor is no longer a negative. I mean, I haven't had crustaceans straight out of their shells or fish that I've personally filleted--I do credit a large part of my seafood aversion to memories of whole trout cooking over a fire when I was little, skin curling and eyes fogging in the heat--but dude! Dude! I know why people are always saying things aren't fishy when I thought they were. They were used to it. Kind of like when you wear a perfume regularly, you can't smell yourself.

Hallelujah!

Day Ninety-Four: The Weirdest Food I've Ever Loved

Tonight, I brought out the sugar-free Jell-O cookbook once more. The interesting thing about this cookbook is that it contains both sweet and savory recipes. Which made me think, ew. Which made me think, I should eat this. Seems like spurious logic, I know. But that's what this project has brought me to.

I had to share this dish with my husband, so I did not try the most disgusting sounding dishes (one involving tuna, the other involving carrots and raisins) but I still chose something that sounded fairly repulsive: a three-pepper gelatin salad, with a base of lemon Jell-O, with three colors of bell pepper and some green onion stirred in.

The mold (as you can see in the picture) did not come out perfectly. Maybe I unmolded it too soon, I don't know. But it was Jell-O and peppers and onion, so that part was accomplished. And I have to say, as I scooped into it, I was a little bit scared. I took my first bite tentatively. And at first, I must say, I was disgusted.

But then I took the second bite.

Guess what, people? Three-pepper Jell-O salad is AWESOME! I suddenly understand why they ate these weird jiggly concoctions in the sixties. Lemon is a flavor that often appears in savory dishes and the peppers are pretty sweet, so it all gels together nicely. The texture provides some pretty nice contrast, too: a little jiggle, a little crunch. I know. It sounds crazy. But here's the recipe, because I think you should try it!

8 oz lemon gelatin
2 cups boiling water
1 1/2 cups cold water (as I write this, I see where I went wrong... I used 2 cups because that's what's on the package)
2 tbsp lemon juice
2 cups chopped bell peppers (a combo of red, yellow, and green)
2 tbsp sliced green onions

Dissolve gelatin in boiling water; stir in cold water and lemon juice; chill until slightly thickened.
Stir in peppers and green onions; pour into a 5-cup mold (spray with Pam first); chill until firm, about 4 hours; unmold.

Enjoy!

Day Seventy-Seven: Attack of the Not-So-Giant Squid

Tonight, I am in Bellevue, WA, which is close to Seattle, WA. To usher in Spring Break, we're spending some touristy time on the west side of the state, an area where many foodies agree you can find the best seafood in the world. Tomorrow I will truly dive into my seafood (ha ha--dive)--I might even have more than one kind. But tonight, at an Indian restaurant near the hotel, I had my very first fried calamari. And it was pretty darn good.

I think this calamari experience was actually pretty unique. The breading was spicy (would you expect anything else from an Indian restaurant?) and I could taste the egg in the batter, which was interesting. But I had several pieces (four, I think), all of which were rather large, and one of which was batter-free (I peeled it off). It took a long time to chew, but it was actually pretty enjoyable. Which is totally not what I expected from fried squid. But I guess it's a pattern I'm developing. If I think it's going to be grodie, it's going to be delish.

So now I'm curious about other squid dishes. I'm curious about squid ink, too. (I bet squid ink risotto is pretty cool.) I actually kind of enjoyed the chewiness of the squid--it forced me to savor it. And it wasn't a wimpy kind of chewy, nor was it tough. It wasn't fishy but it did taste like seafood. It was much milder than I would have expected, and yet flavorful. A plateful of contradictions, I guess.

Day Sixty-Eight: Taking my Lumps

I'm having another one of those moments. You know, the ones where I think, How stupid was I as a kid?

I have to come to young Laura's defense--a little. She had some lumpy tapioca as a kid. Her little teeth experienced sticky, gluey, chewy bits of pudding, and she decided tapioca was out. It didn't matter how sweet and creamy it was otherwise. There were other sweet and creamy things. A child's world is full of them. So she shunned tapioca and never looked back.

Grown-up Laura is filled with remorse. She had a little cup of tapioca this morning, and saw the light. She is currently exercising all her willpower not to eat any more.