RSS feeds are a good thing, and the feed from “Serious Eats”: brings me great food ideas and recipes every day. This one is a new favorite: Grilled Chicken Thighs with Roasted Grape Tomatoes, explaining the origin of capers, both sizes. We had the roasted grape tomatoes tonight with turkey burgers. Easy and well worth a try.
(more…)
We just finished a late dinner, mostly of fresh vegetables from our garden and from Stu’s. I grilled zucchini, squash and peppers from our combined gardens, an onion from the store, seasoned with no more than olive oil, and served that with some steamed green beans, sliced tomatoes from our garden, and an ear of sweet corn from the market. This last – corn from the store – is heresy to the sweet corn purists who race from the fieled with the freshly picked ears so none of the sugar can turn to starch, but even so, it was sweet corny goodness.
My moans, though, were for the tomatoes from my garden. That’s why I planted it, to taste that sweet, slightly acidy, slightly tart fresh tomato flavor. These fresh ripe garden tomatoes are almost a beverage themselves, there’s so much water in them.
Just consider me well-fed and cosmicly grateful.
Metafilter had a great post on the best times of year to do or buy things: best times to travel to Dublin or Africa, best places to break up with someone, and more, including What’s In Season? from KQED.
What’s in season now is our garden: plenty of tomatoes, especially cherry tomatoes, so next year one more regular tomato plant and one fewer cherry tomato. The classic tomato sandwich deserves a plug here: thick tomato slices, optional thin slices of red onion, plenty off mayo and salt and pepper… aaaaahh.
The two yellow bell pepper plants have done okay, but they’re getting bugs in them. Have to let them ripen on the counter more. Ellen’s three basil plants are insane, so we’ll have pesto from the freezer often during the winter. Our neighbor Stu’s garden is going well too; lots of squash and cukes. Tomorrow I’ll see if the cantaloupe he gave me is good.
This year is my first successful garden. Makes me happy.
A Food Timline, which seems to have explanations for when what food was discovered/exploited/domesticated.
Ivan Day’s Historic Food, with sections on several types of food throughout the ages, including this interesting and in places digestively dubious page on English puddings.
I’m becoming a big fan of The Minimalist. His latest column, For the Love of a Good Burger, covers important information on a subject most of us think we know:
In a world where “burger†most often means a thin piece of meat whose flavor is overwhelmed by ketchup, mustard, pickle or onion, it doesn’t take much effort to make a better one. In fact, it’s almost as easy to cook a really great burger as it is to cook a mediocre one.
I am sincerely looking forward to following his directions.
Mark Bittman writes, in yesterday’s New York Times Travel Section, of his assessment of The Best Steak Frites in Paris. It isn’t, of course, only about the potatoes but about the steaks (or rib roasts or fried boneless pig’s feet) that go with, and justify, the frites. As a fairly avid carnivore myself, this is well worthy filing away as a reference for next time we go to Paris.
Ellen and I are in the Air France arrivals lounge after a remarkably good flight. Business class is all it’s cracked up to be. The French keyboard on this iMac is quite different from the American layout. Odd. I hve to use the shift key to type a period, the a and q keys are switched, and other peculiarities.
Updates will be rare, as internet access is not assured for the rest of the trip. Count on many photos, however, when we get home, and exhaustive reports about food and wine (and hangovers, probably).
A bientot.
I really like Mark Bittman, “The Minimalist” food columnist for the New York Times. Today’s column, Overindulge? Snack on This is about Welsh Rarebit, a fancied-up version of cheese toast. He offers a recipe that sounds very good, requiring mustard, cayenne, and dark beer in addition to the cheese. Mmmmmm.
This reminds me of the staple late-evening dish of Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin, their hallowed “toasted cheese,” ably described and beautifully placed in context by Anne Chotzinoff Grossman and Lisa Grossman Thomas in their Lobscouse and Spotted Dog: Which It’s a Gastronomic Companion to the Aubrey-Maturing Novels, a volume that will greatly enhance your enjoyment of the series.
I also recall Dream of a Rarebit Fiend by Winsor McKay. They were cautionary tales warning against overindulgence. Hah.
Shoot First, Eat Later | Food & Wine
Here, a user-friendly guide to taking perfect food photographs, from great cameras to simple techniques (use your water glass as a tripod!)
I like taking pictures of food.
I wish I’d thought of 30 Days of Pork. Proof that bacon is a starter meat that leads to harder uses of pork. I also wish I’d thought of Serious Eats. I need to take my serious eating to a whole new level.
Making Light pointed to this (and gave credit for it as well).
The Times’ Sunday Travel section on how to spend a quick, intense visit to Paris , including a Friday evening dash through the Louvre, Moroccan food, Baudelaire’s grave and finding great costumes at the flea market.
“THE chief danger about Paris,†T. S. Eliot wrote to a friend, “is that it is such a strong stimulant.†That wasn’t merely the overcaffeinated ramblings of a Left Bank cafe habitué. Few cities thrill visitors with such a beguiling multiplicity of personalities. There is the devout Paris of Notre Dame’s Gothic solemnity, and the naughty Paris of Pigalle’s red-light bars. Sophisticated Paris radiates from the vaulted galleries of the Louvre and the gilded Opéra Garnier, while bohemian Paris emerges in the art galleries of the Marais and gritty rock ’n’ roll nightclubs. For every Gallic gastronomic temple, there’s an Asian, African or Middle Eastern restaurant brimming with exotic flavors. And for every Jean Paul Gaultier, there’s a fledgling fashion student opening his first boutique. In the words of Henry Miller, another American drawn to Paris’s manifold pleasures, lofty and low: “To know Paris is to know a great deal.â€
I fully realize the Paris I’m expecting will not be the Paris I actually see, and that’s perfect.
This week Mark Bittman, the NYT’s Minimalist, offers For the Uninitiated, a Pancake Primer. I want some butter and maple syrup now.
I particularly like the idea of adding ricotta, which he recommends. I’ve always liked bananas and pecans in pancakes, and blueberrys. Frozen fruit works well in a pancakes, so you can have them any time. I remember after spending the night at my friend Chris Hicklin’s house, I was shocked when he put sour cream on his pancakes and then syrup. I was grossed out, but much more by the unfamiliarity than by the flavors. I wish my calorie count could allow that now. So, have pancakes and if you can find it, real maple syrup.
Home sick today from work and poking around the web, I followed a link to cautions about pickpockets abroad. A search for Paris pickpocket led to Virtual Tourist, a site with thousands of members worldwide sharing their experiences. After learning not to leave my bags unattended, to keep my hand on my wallet in the Metro, and avoind people trying to help remove daubs of condiments or pigeon crap from my clothes, I came across Paris Restaurant Tips by BeatChick I’m enjoying her first-hand recommendations for places to go and see and dine. Virtual Tourist is a large site full of first-hand accounts from real enthusiasts; it doesn’t seem slick or too packaged.
I’m getting excited about going.
Mark Bittman, the New York Times’ Minimalist food writer, raves about baker Jim Lahey’s easy, slow bread recipe.
This looks fabulous. Little yeast, almost no kneading, gives a loaf Mark Bittman raves about. It just takes about 18 hours to rise, and you bake it in a pot. Hmmmm.
The Minimalist gives a handful of recipes: Eggs Take Their Place at the Dinner Table. At right is their shot of eggs poached in wine with homemade croutons. I’ve always loved eggs for dinner, but usually as breakfast for dinner, over easy with bacon and toast and so on, or sometimes a nice omelette. This article has some ideas that are novel to me, and some very tasty-looking recipes.
Plenty of company; Janine and Bryan and Alysse and Sean, and Wilma and Ed, and Debbie, and Pete and Nana, and the four of us, all for the birthdays of Jack and Nana and me. Good food, lots of stories and presents and Ellen made tiramisu. It was really good.
From the NY Times, 28 June 2006
Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 2-inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and minced
1 large shallot, peeled and sliced
2 English cucumbers, peeled, halved lengthwise and sliced ¼-inch thick
Salt and freshly ground white pepper
2½ pounds king salmon fillet, skinned, pin bones removed
½ cup chardonnay
1 lemon
½ cup crème fraîche
1 tablespoon minced chives.
1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees. Melt butter over low heat in a skillet. Add ginger and shallot and sauté briefly, until softened. Add cucumbers, season with salt and pepper and sauté until almost translucent. Spread in a baking dish large enough to hold salmon. Do not wash skillet.
2. Place salmon on cucumbers. Pour chardonnay around salmon. Season with salt and pepper and sprinkle with juice of half the lemon. Cover with a sheet of parchment or wax paper. Place in oven and cook 45 minutes for medium rare, 50 to 55 minutes for more well-cooked. Because fish is slow-roasted, it will remain quite red in center.
3. Transfer salmon to a large platter with a rim. Transfer cucumber mixture to skillet and cook down for 5 minutes. Stir in crème fraîche and cook until sauce is consistency of heavy cream. Season with salt, pepper and remaining lemon juice. Pour mixture around fish. Sprinkle fish with chives and serve.
6 servings.
And, um damn this sounds good.
The New York Times, In Search of a Pan That Lets Cooks Forget About Teflon. How did they know I was looking for just such a replacement…? We’ve got a handful of them now, including a roasting pan, and now I realize they were not good investmenst, nor good gifts to ask for. High heat is apparently not good for the pan or the people using them, so it’s no more non-stick pans. Next will be to replace – eventually – the pretty and easy-to-clean glass cooktop with one that works better with heavy pans like Le Creuset (i.e. gas).
Liquid City: Just Add Dixie Cups, in which Corina Zappia of the Village Voice recommends picnic wines. Via Robot Wisdom.
I hope some of the Top 100 summer wines listed in the Times of London Online are available here in Atlanta.