Spring has Arrived

We went to the Farmer’s Market like we do every Saturday. Picked up some asparagus, fingerling potatoes, salad greens, and rhubarb.

We grabbed the puppies and were off to visit my parents. The weather was perfect. A great day. Wednesday and Schuman had soooo much fun running around and jumping in the muddy swamp that sits near the house that they had to get baths before they could come inside.

Now, I’ve never been a rhubarb fan. Probably because I’ve always been such a picky eater, and wouldn’t branch out and try new things. Well…

Today was The Day of Rhubarb. Joe made a Rhubarb Upside-down Cake [Recipe below], and my mom made a Rhubarb Pie. Both were glorious.

AND dinner was just as fabulous. Herbed chicken, grilled asparagus, steamed and statued potatoes, micro-green salad, and sourdough bread from Eugene City Bakery.

We also had a chance to watch Juno again. My parents hadn’t seen it yet. I’m going to try and watch it with the commentary before we have to return it. It is such a great movie!

A day well spent.

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Off Season

Spring Pasta! Sometime I just have a craving. I know it’s not Spring, and I really do try and be the best locavore I can be. However - when I have an intense urge for VEGETABLES and not sweets I must give in! As you can tell I’ve done a lot of baking lately. Cookies galore. Green Beans have been on my mind for weeks. I feel so much better now.

Pasta Primavera is pretty versatile - whatever you have on hand, whatever you want. Mix and match. More ideas and options at the bottom. [click to continue...]

Squeeze Me

Everyone needs a sweet treat! Lemon and Poppy seeds are one of my favorite combinations! [click to continue...]

Merry Ex-Mas!

I hope you all had a wonderful Holiday, whatever it was that you celebrated. Coming back from a four day weekend is hard! But, I’m finally back in the swing of things, and have a chance to update the blog. I’m lucky enough to have had a great and mostly relaxing vacation. Spending most of my time in the kitchen at my parents house baking. I was very excited to try out a new-to-me recipe for marshmallows. I’ve never tried marshmallows before, and was slightly intimidated. I was inspired by Alexis Stewart of Whatever Radio who made the coconut version for Christmas. The original recipe is here on epicurious as was published in Gourmet (Dec 07).

They were so much easier than I though they would be, and tasted fabulous. I did however learn a few things. Sugar soaks back into them if you aren’t careful and you’ll end up with a sugary sticky mess. (Though it’s still a tasty mess). Mistakes were made, but learning and experimenting is half of the fun - the other half would of course be eating them. I made a coconut/vanilla batch, and a plain vanilla batch. The coconut ones are perfect for eating just as is, they are a great treat. The vanilla were dropped in hot cocoa!! [click to continue...]

Craving!

One part boredom, plus ne part left over chips, plus two parts hunger equals Butterscotch Chip Cookies. I’ve wanted to try Alexis Stewart’s Brown-Sugar Chocolate-Chip Cookies for as long as I’ve know about it. They are supposed to be flatter and less cakey than normal chocolate chip cookies.

After using all the chocolate chips in the house, and having half a bag left of butterscotch chips, I just had to make them. You can find the recipe here. NOTE: The image shown on the website is in actuality not the actual recipe (per Alexis Stewart on Whatever Radio)

I halved it as 50 cookies is quite a lot! Plus I didn’t have enough chips. After baking the first batch I saw that I made the drops too large, and there wasn’t enough flour in the batter. I added about 4 tablespoons more flour and reduced the size and voila! Yummy golden brown buttery goodness.

Simmer!

Tonight I made soup. Warm delicious soup. I was inspired by VeganYumYum’s post today about Minestrone.

Overall the seasoning turned out great. I did add a touch too much salt, but I’m getting better. I’m really happy. I made a White Bean & Vegetable Soup. Of course, again, I couldn’t find a recipe that I could use directly from the book. I didn’t have all the ingredients in stock. (I used all the onions in the house for the tart on Monday, among other missing ingredients.) I took some ideas from this White Bean and Vegetable Soup Recipe and the Tuscan Bean and Farro Soup from Chez Panisse Vegetables.

I rummaged around in the fridge, freezer, and pantry and found what I could. The following is the concoction that I made tonight. This kind of soup is very flexible and you can add any type of bean or vegetable you want. I would have loved to add some celery or leeks, (or onions!). [click to continue...]

Let’s Get Baking!

Baking an Onion and Potato Tart. I don’t know what got into me. I had fun yesterday making cookies and we’ve had these onions sitting on the counter forever! Joe was doing dishes when I got home so the kitchen was nice and clean for me to make a mess Sorry, hon.

I dried the dishes and got to it.

First thing was finding a Pâte Brisée recipe. Pâte Brisée is just basic pie dough. I say Pâte Brisée because I think it makes me look fancy. teehee. First, the recipe in Joe’s school book was for 5lbs of dough! I didn’t want to convert it. The one in Chez Panisse Desserts was a little too complicated, and I didn’t want to think that hard. Plus the pages kept turning on me and I didn’t want to get the cook book holder down. So I decided on an adapted recipe from a Season Baking Class hand out by Julie Fether. (I did have to half it, the exact recipe I used tonight below) I adapted it to fit my own style.

Pâte Brisée
enough for one 11″ tart, plus extra

1 cup AP Flour
1 1/2 cup Whole Wheat Pastry Flour
1/2 tsp. salt
2/3~3/4 cup cold water
8 oz. cold butter

Sift flour, add salt. Cube cold butter. Working quickly use your finger tips to work the butter into the flour until you reach an oatmeal/cornmeal consistency. Don’t over work the butter as it will melt. Cold flakes of butter = Flaky dough. If needed you can toss the mixture back in the fridge.

Quickly and all at once, add the water and mix until incorporated. Always err on the side of less water. It’s easier to add water than take it out.

Once the dough has gathered, turn it out on a lightly floured surface and knead it gently. Don’t overwork the dough. There should still be “marbled” butter batches visible. Once the dough is smooth and firm shape it into a disc and wrap it in plastic, chill completely.

Lasts 3-4 days; 2 months in freezer.
Take the dough out a few minutes before working with it. Always work with a cold dough. If it begins to warm up too much, toss it back in the fridge.

Once I had the dough made and in the fridge I moved on to the filling. I was searching for Caramelized Onion Tarts in our cook books and online. This is the one I based my recipe on. There are many many variations all over the place. The filling isn’t an exact science - mix and match fillings and spices to your hearts content. Experiment! [click to continue...]