flower power

If we were to divide the world into edible and non-edible, into which category would flowers fall?  My eyes, grateful for their beauty and elegance, say the latter, generally speaking, but I have to make an exception for squash blossoms.  Orange, green, yellow, ephemeral and delicate, the blossoms taste like zucchini, but milder, sweeter.  They are a rarity as well; supermarkets don't sell them because they'll wilt within a few hours. This summer, I've found them at the weekend farmers' market, sold by only one vendor, so keep your eyes open for the flowers.

It's an unexpected bliss, discovering a treat like this: eaten just hours after the gathering, the flowers radiate a nuanced, delectable taste of the earth and the sun.  The blossoms can be eaten raw with a little olive oil and sea salt, baked into eggs, paired with cheese, the possibilities are endless.  A classic, however, is stuffing them with cheese and frying them, and this is my spin on the recipe.  Enjoy!

to start:
8 squash blossoms
Olive oil for frying

filling:
1/4 cup ricotta cheese (or other curd based cheese)
handful of shredded basil leaves
1/2 egg
teaspoon of melted butter
pinch of sea salt

batter:
2 generous tablespoons flour
other 1/2 of the egg
3 oz medium temperature water
small pinch of sea salt

*Note: for a heavier batter and texture, add more flour so that it has a sticky, thick consistency.  The current proportion will give a very light batter that allows the squash blossom flavor to shine through.

1. To make the filling, melt the butter. As the butter melts, crack the egg, separating about half each into two different bowls.  Put one bowl to the side, as you'll be using it for the batter.  Swirl the butter and egg together, and then add the ricotta, basil, and salt.

2. Grab the bowl you put aside.  Mix in the flour and salt, then the water.  The batter should be more liquid then sticky for a lighter taste, and stickier if you'd like a heavier batter.  Keep both bowls within arms reach.

3. Heat a generous covering of olive oil in a frying pan on the stove.

4. As the oil heats, prepare the blossoms.  Open the delicate petals, reach inside the blossom and pull out the stamen (the mini-matchstick inside the flower).

Hand model credit goes to an accommodating (ie hungry) gentleman

5.  Stuff about a teaspoon of the filling inside the blossom, put the petals back in place over the stuffing, and twist the petals together at the top so that the flower stays together.  Dip the cheese stuffed blossom in the batter, then gently place it in the now hot frying pan.

6. After about 2 minutes on one side, flip the blossom over to the other side.  Cook about 2 more minutes.

7. Drain blossoms on paper towel, and then pop directly in your mouth.

a girl, an egg, and a whisk

The first time I made mayonnaise, it was breathtaking. Creamy, fluffy, pale yellow, perfectly salted, and scarfed up within 10 minutes. I dreamed about this mayonnaise, the delicacy and deliciousness, prideful in my amateur chef-ly skill of completing a complex sauce with ease.

The next time I made mayonnaise, it was a disaster. Slimy links of yellow swirling around with olive oil that would simply not mix.  I tried to fix the broken mayonnaise, plumbing the internet for tips and tricks. Boiling water didn’t work. Neither did an extra egg yolk. I threw the sloppy mess out, glum and tummy-sad.

My personality doesn’t really allow for failure, however, so I got back on the proverbial horse and tried again a few weeks later.  Same deal.  A gross liquid that wouldn’t turn into solid no matter how hard I whisked and what sad eyes I gave it.  There was a good deal more anger this time, possibly a little foot stomp, and a minor tantrum in the egg yolk’s general direction.  I threw the sodden thing in the sink.

Everyone knows third time is the charm.  Except when it isn’t. The third time was the worst failure yet, a smelly, slimy, sloppy mess that was watered with tears of frustration. I was doomed to never make mayonnaise again, time to hang up my imaginary chef's cap.

Fast forward several weeks, and I was reading a cookbook that mentioned emulsions, an act of forcing two liquids together to form a more solid cream. Drops of oil and vinegar, substances that traditionally do not mix, are forced to co-mingle, improving one another. In mayonnaise, the egg absorbs and further improves the goodness of the mix, turning it into a creamy spread.

Understanding a thing from the molecule up lights a spark of pleasure and confidence in my gut, and in this case, it sparked me on to one more mayonnaise attempt. This time, I mixed the mustard (which is made with vinegar) and the egg yolk first, instead of adding it after I'd tried to mix egg and oil. I painstakingly poured the oil droplets as slowly as my wrist allowed, while whisking gently and steadily with my other hand, transfixing the oil and vinegar molecules into a more solid state.  And this time, the mayonnaise behaved, following the principles of science and nature and taste. Pure triumph and a happy stomach on the complete satisfaction of successful creation.

And my very simple recipe follows. 


NOTE:

Organic, free range eggs are the best for this recipe – the yolks are more muscular, whisk in to the olive oil much better, are a bright orange-yellow, and (in my opinion) have a richer taste.  Since you’ll be eating these raw, high quality eggs are a necessity.

SERVING SUGGESTION:

The mayonnaise is very pretty with its mustard seed dotting, and I like to serve it with roasted vegetables, particularly sweet and white potatoes. Doubling the recipe is definitely possible, but the oil to yolk ratio will vary.

1/2 tablespoon whole grain mustard

Pinch of salt

Egg yolk

1/3  to 1/2 cup of olive (or canola) oil

Step 1:

Take the egg out of the fridge and allow it to come to room temperature, also allowing the bowl and whisk to come to room temperature.  The egg is easier to whisk if it's not super cold out of the fridge. It’s still possible to go from fridge to mayo, but to be completely foolproof, let the temperature rise a bit (approximately 45 minutes out of the fridge, depending, of course, on your kitchen's temperature).

Step 2: 
Plop the mustard, salt, and egg yolk in the bowl. Begin mixing gently. When the yolk and mustard become more solid than their original state (about 10-15 seconds), start pouring in the olive oil in a very steady, slow dripping trickle. Do not stop whisking. The amount of oil needed really does vary by egg, but once you see the solid forming, you can add a little more oil, but the egg-oil combination will become oily goop if you add too much. It should take about 1-2 minutes, depending on the moodiness of the egg, the quality of the oil, the time of day, etc. Mayonnaise is finicky. 

Two steps. That’s it. And once you've had homemade, you'll never go back! The taste, the color, the simple ingredient list, the absence of possibly harmful chemicals (google calcium disodium EDTA...) - all are good reasons to be a believer in the homemade alternative. 

the Boo Radley next door

Boo Radley lives next door.  And he gardens.


One of the selling points of my urban apartment was that our soon-to-be-bedroom overlooked the scraggly patch of grass and one sturdy tree that our real estate agent optimistically termed "the garden." It appeared untended, weeds in pots, nothing coming to fruition in the pale early May sunshine.  The back gate had a broken lock, there were remnants of trash, and I looked forward to putting up light-and-sound blocking curtains.  But when we moved in in late July, our "garden-view" was a leafy greenery of tomatoes, brave flowers, and pungent herbs, and the curtains remained in the box.


I've looked out at the garden countless times, wondering who tended it.  At first, I thought it was the realty company.  Upon further dealings with my misers-known-as-landlords, images of my landlord paying for apartment-ly improvements, such as a working buzzer or a kindly gardener, become laughable.  A tenant then, I presumed, but a tenant that I never saw.  No one had ever appeared in the garden to tend to the crops; they seemed to grow magically, rural accidents staking out their urban property.


Until today.  I still don't know his name.  I'd seen him sitting peacefully on a bench across the street from my building, smoking a pipe, arms contentedly crossed.  He'll nod to me, occasionally, as I come in after work, and after almost a year of the occasional head bob, we've progressed to shy smiles and a raise of the hand. 


I was sitting in the garden with my gent, sipping red wine and reading an intoxicating combination of The Omnivore's Dilemna and Julie and Julia.  We were getting up to leave when Boo came in, filled a watering can, and started on his crops.  I smiled tentatively, but he was engrossed in his work, coaxing leaves and fruits and flowers out of the old pots in our backyard.  


But I couldn't leave.  I'd seen Boo, seen him tending the garden unseen, and I had to thank him.  


"You make this garden, this backyard such a beautiful place."

He stared up at me, a little startled I think.  People sometimes ignore old ones, or the funnily dressed; maybe he hadn't heard a voice in a while.


"Thank you."


And with those two words, Boo came to life, piling my hands full of tomatoes, thyme, rosemary, and three kinds of basil, as much as I could carry, after I told him I loved to cook.  He told us about his life working for "Sam" (the government, we got, after a wink and a joke about working for his "uncle"), and asked timidly about ours, why we were Philadelphians and what we were doing in his city. 


Smiles and thanks and ten minutes later, I'm inside, gratefully smelling basil and so touched by this unassuming urban farmer, a man who showed us the best place to cut the herbs so that they'll keep growing, and encouraged us to come and take of the plants, as the taking will only lead to more growth.  A lesson in life, I think, as well as a lesson for my hopelessly black thumb.  Giving out what the plant will take, sharing your small wealth of smells and tastes will only multiply into more for everyone.  It's unselfish to the extreme, shyly growing sustenance for everyone in the apartment building, slipping away unnoticed and leaving behind a climbing, brimming tomato vine as the only evidence of your presence.


Thank you, Boo, for gardening the small things, tending to your quiet, green realm, and looking out for us "kids" on Spruce Street.

come to my table

My love of food is an established fact. Look into my eyes as I'm describing homemade mayonnaise, or kohlrabi, or dark chocolate with sea salt, and you'll realize that I'm a fanatic, a taste-sensationist, an enthusiastic eater and judger of texture, flavor, composition.


Food vividly dots my memories as well, as do the experiences that coincide with them. An Oreo cookie the day my sister was born. Eating chewy alligator in South Carolina with lemonade that gave me a sore throat. Drinking a glass of whole milk after only having non-fat in the house, and thinking I'd just drunk pure, heavenly cream. Trying steak tartare just before my 23rd birthday at a swanky bar with one of my best friends, sensing I was finally a grown-up. A terrible beer on the first date with my dear man.


But it isn't just the act of masticating my food that puts a twinkle in my eye. It's the essence of the culture of the table. The simple act of eating something delicious is only the first part of the overall sensation of shared experience, connecting with food and voices as spoons dip into the bowl of berries or forks devour the chicken. 


The intimacy of breaking off a hunk of the same piece of bread, twirling pasta on to your plate, slurping the chocolate off the spoon, looking up to see a friend covered in sticky barbeque sauce. Friendship is made up of these little intimacies, verbal and non-verbal, and the table is an immediate source of closeness, of pleasure. It's a level playing field, stocked with an abundance of food, dishes, and smiling faces, an arena that satisfies our desire for sustenance of the mind and body. 


Sharing food, sharing ideas, sharing a space creates a bond, a joint memory that lasts a lifetime. I am beyond lucky in friends, in love, in family, and everyone I've ever shared a meal with. As the years before have been, I hope the years to come will be filled with gathering at the table.  Thank you all for the birthday wishes, and may we meet at the table soon!

an abundance of squash

Sunday's farmers market was overflowing with squash.  Heaped high in wicker baskets, green and yellow beauties tumbled over each other in a gorgeous, edible-gem display one table after another.  I couldn't resist.  There were lovely yellow summer squash, an unreal shade of intense buttercup; curved gourd shapes, a paler yellow with cool green bottoms; and a basket of pattypan squash, green, yellow, and adorable.  

Besides making mouth-watering pictures, squash make mouth-watering dishes, and dinner last night featured the "pattypan" squash, stuffed with other farmers market finds.  The pattypan looks like a trippy overgrown acorn, and can be yellow or green in color, although I chose the yellow beauties. The squash has a summery taste, refreshing with a hint of sweetness when cooked. 

Ingredients:


6 pattypan squash


2 spring onions, or 1 medium sweet onion


3 garlic scapes (pictured at right), or 2 cloves of garlic


2/3 lb ground pork, or other ground meat


2-3 sprigs rosemary
2-3 sprigs thyme


olive oil
butter


salt and pepper to taste




1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. 


2. Wash and pat dry the squash. Cut off the top about one-third of the way down the squash so that you create a "body" and a "hat" out of the yellow beauts.

3. Scoop out the soft insides to create a squash shell cup, and reserve the flesh and seeds in a bowl. Place the squash shell in a baking dish, sprinkle with sea salt, and dot a smidgeon of butter on the bottom. Place the tops in the pan as well, dust with salt, and then into the oven they go. Set a timer for 45 minutes, and get ready to make the filling.

4. Chop up the spring onions and garlic scapes (the head through about 2/3 of the stem) into bite-sized pieces. Start a saute pan over medium low heat with a dab of butter and several drops of olive oil, adding the onion once the butter-oil combination is melted and hot. Give the onion about 5 minutes to get translucent, then add the scapes, cooking for about 5 more minutes.


5. The smells in the kitchen will be hunger-inducing at this point, so add the ground pork into your onion-scape mix, and cook for another 10 minutes, or until the pork is browned.


6. As the pork cooks, chop up about a cup of the squash innards, and throw them in the mix once the pork is brown. Add the rosemary, thyme, salt and pepper, and cook another few minutes.  Let the mixture rest as the shells cook.


7. Timer beeping? Time to take the shells out of the oven, and fill them up with the pork mixture, trying to fill the shell up to the very top, or even a little bit beyond. Turn the oven to a broil, take the tops out of the baking dish and put them onto a plate, and then stick the stuffed squash back in the oven for 10 minutes.

8. Pull the baking dish out, and let the squash cool for a few minutes.  Top the shells with their caps, and serve!






This is a good recipe for entertaining, as the built-in serving dish of squash shell is edible, scrumptious, and eye-pleasingly presentable. The squash has a mellow sweetness that absorbs the woodsy herbs and pork for a thoroughly satisfying, juicy taste.

Attack of the Kohlrabi!

It was staring up at me. A bulbous, purple root mass with thin piping attaching giant purple-flecked leaves. "What IS that?" I whispered.  The farmer's market vendor smiled and said, "Kohlrabi."  The name itself, strange and smooth, rolled around my tongue as the more pressing question burst forth: "How do you EAT that?"  The vendor shrugged, said her dad ate it raw, but I could roast it, and, intimidation setting in, I did not buy the purple things.

The next day, at my regular farmers market, kohlrabi stalked me; every stall showed its wares, purple and green, taunting me in my helpless, unknowing state.  I gave in and bought it, assuming that I could search for recipes on the internet. There were a few recipes, some pictures on Huffington Post (unfortunately posted after my kohlrabi-recipe search), and a recipe or two on foodnetwork, but nothing that grabbed my attention.

Which led me to embark on a three-week journey of kohlrabi experiments as I slowly fell for this bizarre looking plant.  The recipes below are a range from fairly simple summer salad to a more complicated stewed kohlrabi suitable for some of the unseasonably cool days we've had this June.  But most of all, the thing to love is the flavor of kohlrabi, a funky mix of radish and cabbage flavors with a smooth, crisp texture.

Kohlrabi Summer Salad

Ingredients:

1 kohlrabi bulb

1 apple

1/2 cup walnuts or almonds

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 teaspoon cinnamon

sea salt to taste

1. Slice the kohlrabi in half. Cut side down, start thinly slicing the bulb.  Once that's all sliced up, do the same to your apple.

2. Add all the ingredients, toss, and serve.

How simple is that?  Fresh, crispy, crunchy, sweet, salty, colorful... and did I mention, healthful? It doesn't get much better (or easier) than this.

Kohlrabi Wedges

Ingredients:

1 kohlrabi bulb

1-2 sprigs of rosemary

1 tablespoon of olive oil

1 teaspoon paprika (or more, if you like the smoky flavor)

sea salt to taste

1. Preheat your oven to 425 farenheit.

2. Slice the kohlrabi into wedges, just like in the above salad.

3. Toss the kohlrabi with the oil, rosemary, sea salt, and paprika.

4. Lay it out on a baking sheet, and cook for 40 minutes.

The kohlrabi will be fork-tender, juicy, translucent, and surprisingly sweet. Munch these like potato wedges, but pat yourself on the back for avoiding the starchiness and calories of potatoes.

Stewed Kohlrabi

Ingredients:

1 kohlrabi bulb

1 small onion

1/2 cup raisins

1 tablespoon olive oil

1/2 teaspoon butter

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 cup of chicken (or vegetable) broth

sea salt to taste

1.  Medium dice the onion and kohlrabi (pieces should be about the size and shape of a large-ish lego piece). 

2. Mid-dice, start warming up a saute pan with the olive oil and butter, and toss the onions on when you've finished chopping (keep the heat low so you don't burn the onions).

3. After the onions get fragrant and translucent, add the kohlrabi, turn the heat to medium, and cook for about 15-20 minutes, until the kohlrabi starts to get a little soft when you poke it with a knife.

4. Add the spices, stir to coat the pieces of onion and kohlrabi, and let it cook 3-4 minutes more.

5. Add the broth and raisins, cover the pot, and let the kohlrabi stew for 10 minutes, until it melts when you touch it.

This dish is a little more complex, but yields a deep, warm, satisfying flavor, especially on a cool evening. 

So when you see these futuristic vegetables, don't be scared! At $2.75 for 3-4 bulbs at the Philadelphia farmer's markets, kohlrabi is a delicious, easy-to-please steal.


What do you like to do with your kohlrabi?

how much is that strawberry in the window?

I've had an epiphany, and it involves strawberries.

A dear foodie friend and lending-library-compatriot gave me Barbara Kingsolver's "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle," and I am a forever changed foodie.  Kingsolver writes about her year of eating locally, consuming only vegetables, fruit, meat, and dairy products that were created either in her garden or produced in the garden, dairy, or chicken farm of a neighbor. There were notable exceptions - coffee, for instance, as well as flour to make their own bread - but other than that, the family was locavore all the way.  Throughout the book, Kingsolver, her daughter, and her husband make compelling arguments about the economic, health, and environmental benefits of eating locally, and the arguments were still rattling around my brain when I was looking for fruit in my local Whole Foods. 

"Organic!" the label stated, all the way from... California?  Really, that's where my neighborhood Whole Foods gets its strawberries? I looked around, seeing the majority of produce from Mexico, California, Florida, and North Carolina, and I felt my epiphany arriving in slow waves of realization.  Somewhere in the further reaches of my skull, I had to have realized that not all food was in its prime growing season all the time, but seeing all the organic, Californian produce made me realize that I must be putting quite a bit of strain on the ozone with my globavore buying spree. The synapses in my brain were sparking, and I wondered... how much does it actually cost the environment to send strawberries from California to my home market?

A nifty site, http://www.gasbuddy.com/Trip_Calculator.aspx, helped me out with the question. I picked Salinas, CA, as lots of strawberries come from that area (it's on the southwestern coast of California, a hotspot for strawberry growing).  After a little research, it seems that a freight truck, on average, gets 6 miles for highway and city driving. Into the calculator those numbers went, linked with the starting and ending points... and we get 13, 821 pounds of greenhouse gasses belched in to the environment with one truck trip.  This doesn't even take into account that the truck is refrigerated, which spits yet more carbon dioxide into the air, or the fact that strawberries are held in a large, refrigerated warehouse for up to 24 hours before they're shipped (yet more noxious gasses offered into the universe).  If we calculate, then, the strawberries at my farmer's market, which were from Lawrenceville, NJ, and keep the truck the same (for variable stability), then we add 162 pounds of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere. That, of course, does not take into account that the vehicle used for transport by our local farmers was significantly smaller, gets better and more efficient gas mileage, and probably used coolers instead of a refrigerated vehicle to get the strawberries to market.

13, 821 pounds of greenhouse gas for my California strawberries, and 162 pounds for the Lawrenceville ones.   The trip from Lawrenceville is the obvious carbon footprint conscious choice, costing the environment approximately 83 times LESS pounds of greenhouse gas, or about 0.02% of the carbon emission of the sly California strawberry.  

0.02% of the carbon emission.  Shock waves were now coursing fully through my body. I had no idea my penchant for fruit was gassing up the ozone, that I had a little extra responsibility in the hot-as-hell, 90 degree May weekend, followed by the cool June 65 degree afternoon of global warming.

And where do I go from here? I'd like to promise that I'll never be a globavore again, but I know that's a promise I'll break when I drink my coffee (grown in warmer climates halfway around the world) in about 30 minutes. I'm not one for grand pronouncements or extreme action, so the most sensible plan I've lit upon is to try to eat as much local produce as I can: the farmers market today was awash in garlics, onions, lettuce greens, kale, and some iridescent Swiss Chard that I'd almost rather admire than cook. In addition to the bounteous local produce, I can eat as much locally grown, pasture-fed meat and dairy as possible, and start reducing the very large footprint that I've already carved into the earth.  I'm repentant, excited, and vaguely in awe of the interconnectivity of life, in that my local strawberry binge will do a very small part of keeping the earth a happier, healthier place.