Jammin, Take Two

The last jar of jam is almost gone, and I still haven't written about it!  So let me tell you, before the sweet taste is gone and forgotten, what the big deal is with homemade jam.

First off, it's yet another excuse for a trip to the farmer's market.  Thursday was misty so the market wasn't as bumpin' as it no doubt will become on the imminent hot summer evenings, but the die-hards were there, including all the farmers, who no doubt don't even notice a little mosquito piss.  Table after table were laden with greens and carrots (and turnips, and radishes, and snow peas, and...) and I began to get a little nervous-- was there any fruit to be had this early in the season?  And then, at the end of the lot, there it lay, the strawberry tent.  Strawberry flats, stacked into piles and pyramids, and two young farmer-cum-hawkers weighing and sacking the fruit and taking money just as fast as their dirt-stained hands could move.  And all the while Portlanders flocked around the first fresh fruit of the year, like zombies deprived of human flesh.

At $3.50 a basket though, and $35 a flat, I must say I was a bit taken aback by the price.  Do these rates sound normal?  I must say, I'm going to have to do a little price comparing next time I'm at the store.

Well, I bought four baskets-- about two pounds, once you take the tops off.  That's fourteen dollars worth of jam, not including the cost of sugar and lemon.  This better be good.  The berries were promising, though.  Small, but not too small (large enough to work with, but not those gargantuan, hydroponic blandberries from Safeway).  Ripe, but not too ripe.  And fragrant.  I dispensed one berry to each of us in the car on the way home.  Yum.  Summer is here.

So, wash, hull and slice right into a big skillet.  Squeeze half a lemon or so over the strawberries-- I had a Meyer lemon left over from the starvation cleanse!  Add about one cup of sugar per lb. of fruit.  Well, that's what I've been told, at any rate.  I ran out of white sugar, I didn't really feel like dousing my pure, sweet berries with two whole cups of sugar, so I put what I had of white sugar (a half a cup), and an equal amount of brown sugar.  I hoped for the best.

Then fill a medium-sized bowl with ice water, and set a smaller bowl within the water (but don't let any water seep in).  I'll tell you what this is for in a minute.

Stir up the fruit, lemon juice, and sugar.  Bring it to a boil.  Then turn the heat as low as you can, but keep it simmering well enough for the liquid to reduce.  The recipe I went from says it takes five minutes for the berries and liquid to cook down.  This is bull.  It took twenty minutes at least, and about five tests.

To test it for readiness, spoon about a half teaspoon of the liquid into the by-now-very-cold bowl.  Let it sit for 30 seconds.  Tilt the bowl.  If the liquid runs very slowly then your jam is done.  If it runs fast, it's not done yet.  Keep the heat on, and keep stirring.  Important reminder: stir it a LOT!  The pundits tell me that if you burn the sugary fruit, you'll never get rid of the taste.

This recipe does not require the whole rigamarole of pectin, sterilized jars, and vacuum-sealing.  This jam will not keep outside of the fridge, and in the fridge it'll last you up to two weeks.  But it's a good way to start your career as a jam-maker because it's easy and simple.  You can get complex and start canning for winter later.

And boy, was it delicious!!!  My berries yielded three small jelly-jars-worth of jam, plus enough for one bagel toasted with butter.  It was a bit runny (perhaps because I cut back on the sugar?  Didn't cook it long enough?), but hell, it soaks into the bagel better that way.  Now that I think of it, this stuff would be stellar on pancakes.  Also, I realized in retrospect that I sliced the berries pretty thick, because it was very chunky.  My younger self would have sneered at such enormous morsels of soggy fruit (I used to go for the fruit-free purple sugar gel known as grape jelly back when my palette was less cultivated), but I now know the error of my ways.  Now, I say, bring me the chunkiest jam you got. 

 

The final verdict?  Easy and fantastic.  If you try this, you'll definitely be enjoying your breakfasts this summer.  You might even re-instate a few times the wonderful childhood tradition of "breakfast for dinner."

Grace.

Holy Empanada!

O, mi Pambiche.  Portland's best Cuban restaurant, and possibly one of its best restaurants in any genre, fed us dinner tonight.  At about 73 degrees, it was a real scorcher in P-town today, and, biking home from work Adam and I had the lightning bolt of inspiration to heighten the sense of summer and visit the vivid green, purple and yellow building that houses Pambiche.  During the nine months of the year that it's miserable outside, the two long rows of tables lining the sidewalks lie frustratingly empty, cutting the capacity of the restaurant to a mere fraction of what it could be in the warm weather.  The reason I say frustrating is that the turnout for fantastic Cuban food remains unvaryingly high throughout the year, causing the wait for one of the five or so tables inside to stretch, at times, to an hour and a half.  But this evening, the colorful picnic tables were abuzz with scantily clad and sufficiently hip Portlanders, who, like us, thought some empanadas and sangria were pretty much essential on a Saturday like this.  With more places to sit, we sat easily.

Sangria.  Two options, white or red.  I chose white because I had just biked from the Pearl and needed refreshment, as well as intoxicant, and didn't figure red wine would be as cooling.  I chose well.  My strapping Cubano server brought a full pint glass of something that looked like lemonade, only bedecked with such equatorial produce as a large sprig of mint, a lime, and a sugar cane stalk.  I grunted and started chomping on my sugar cane with rather less than ladylike formality, and then slurped down a fruity, wine-y, tropical vacation in a glass that, upon closed eyes, brought forth visions of silly-blue seas and white rocky beaches with an unclothed Javier Bardem sprawled...

Ok, ahem, so we orded the Puerro Empanada-- I guess you could describe it as the Latin version of a calzone, only deep fried for that extra buttery flakiness.  The Puerro was filled with a creamy, heavenly leek and cheese mixture and came adorned with a juicy beet salad (and these guys aren't afraid to mix beet greens with the ruby roots-- a wise move, in my view) and four thick-sliced, deep-fried plantains.  And then we got the Pescado con Coco-- a piece of white fish (that I felt could have been bigger, but maybe I'm thinking from the American perspective, where one serving of  restaurant food here could feed a developing country's family for a week) that was stewed in this creamy coconut sauce, flavored with peppers, onions, herbs and spices.  Mio Dio, it was near perfect.  Black beans and rice on the side.  At $7.75 for the Empanada, and $9.50 for the fish, it was a sweet, sweet deal.

I've been there three times now, and haven't yet ordered dessert, though I swear I will next time.  They have one of those cases filled with such things that make you press your nose against the glass in wonder.  Individual-sized pineapple-upside-down cakes with toasted coconut siding, three-tiered Tres Leches cakes, enormous chocolate rectangles named Aleman (presumably, after their resemblance to German chocolate cake), and other treats too ornate and amazing to recall right now.

There will probably almost always be a wait at Pambiche, and they deserve it.  But if you time your visit wisely, you don't need to do time for your plantains.  Just head out around five on a warm afternoon-- the rush is an hour or so away, and all the tables are open and turnover is high.  That sangria is meant to be drunk outside anyway.

Jammin!

Ok so this post is supposed to be about making jam-- my first jam ever!-- but I have to take a second to brag about the everything-but-the-kitchen-sink dinner I just made.  Check it:

So as both a Virgo and an ISTJ (I recently took the Meyers Briggs test for work), I tend to plan somewhat compulsively.  Culinarily speaking, this means I start to think about dinner while I'm munching on breakfast, at least as far as the skeletal ingredients are concerned.  I knew I wanted to use a withering leek I had leftover from potato leek soup last week, and I wanted to find a way to incorporate that with a gorgeous bunch of chard bought yesterday at the farmer's market.  Perhaps some rice? and, Don't I have some leftover arborio somewhere on the cupboard?  I let that stew during the rest of my shift.

But then I got home and opened the cupboard and said despite myself, Ooh!  (While I did it, I realized that that is one of the great pleasures of my life, opening the cupboard, seeing something perfect, and saying, Ooh!  That's sort of what this whole dinner was like.)  There lay some pasta my grandma Neenie loves and buys from Trader Joe's, and bestowed upon me the other night (I think I inherited from her the notion that presenting your host with a package of good pasta is a perfectly respectable alternative to a bouquet of flowers, or bottle of chardonnay): spinach and chive linguine.  Even better than rice!  So I got that boiling while I sauteed some garlic, the leek, and a few minutes later, the chard.

Then the poking began.  I will admit that a shot of tequila and the new Breeders album fueled my recklessness.  I looked in the fridge, way into  the back, past the tower of salsa tubs and crusty hummus (gonna throw it out one of these days) and Adam's perennially empty gallon of soy milk and found... CREAM.  Oh jees, I thought, there goes my food awareness.  Though I was fully aware that cream would make the dish much much better.  Then I pushed the dry goods around on the cupboard.  Hm!  Sunflower seeeds!  Better save those for a garnish.  Wouldn't want them to get soggy.

And, apropos of my recent herb-mania, I traipsed out to the garden and snipped off some oregano, basil and parsley and chopped them all up coarsely.  Then I mixed the whole shebang together-- veggies, pasta, cream, a tad more olive oil (ok and a little butter), s&p, and then sprinkled some sunflower seeds and a few shards of smoked white cheddar.  My LORD it was heavenly.  Probably the best non-recipe'd dish ever.

Well, this post was meant to be about jam, and yet it's turned out to be a rock n' roll inspired pasta dish.  Ah well.  We write about what moves us.  Jam tomorrow, I promise.

Good Gracious.  

Food Tip #1-- Herby Samwidges

On a whim today I decided to dress up my sandwich.  I had some leftover salmon that I had breaded and baked the other night to rather unglamorous results, so I wasn't too thrilled about eating it for lunch.  Not only had it been only so-so, but now it was two days old, too.  But: waste not, spend not too much money.  So I toasted some bread-- good, Italian Como from our local bakery-- and went out to the garden to pick some lettuce.  While I was out there, the basil fluttered in the wind and I worried that if I didn't pick any soon it would bolt.  So I snapped a few leaves off, and as an afterthought, also grabbed a few leaves of the wild oregano, growing enormously right in the middle of our lawn.  I slathered one slice of bread with mayo, and nestled the herbs in it.  Then lettuce, salmon (microwaved just to room temp), and a thin smear of sweet, hot mustard on the other slice.  Oh my lord, it was good.  Crusty bread, meaty fish, crunchy lettuce, salty mayo, and a hint of sweet from the mustard.  And then, after chewing for a second, the fresh punch of flavor from the basil and oregano.  I'm definitely doing that again.

Onward

Well, as you one or two faithful readers may have noticed-- the fast ended.  At the end of Day 3 my head was pounding, and the terrible irony did not escape me that I'm already a sufferer of headaches-- a 48 hour headache, voluntarily self-afflicted was not something I needed in my life.  What I did need was food.  I ate-- a grilled cheese sandwich.  Probably not the best choice and a serious stomachache afterward confirmed it, but my carb and dairy withdrawal was acute by that point.  So I gobbled down my sandwich in shame and depression and my headache was gone.  Instantly.  It seemed to be a good choice.

I rationalized and regretted my decision by turns, and told myself that I would eat sparsely and ideally, all vegan, till the fast period would have been over.  I did, for a few days, but I think that last night marked a turning point.  A returning point, I should say, to fattier and happier times.  After an afternoon lifting and sorting through boxes in the basement, it was evident that a veggie burger and a couple beers were in order, and so I traipsed down to the Oaks Bottom Pub.  The fact that Oaks Bottom is famous for its "totchos," a large platter of nachos, only with Tater Tots instead of tortilla chips lying beneath the heap of cheese, beans, sour cream, jalapenos, etc, should indicate just about where this place falls on the health-o-meter.  I ordered my own favorite: a veggie burger with blue cheese and sauteed mushrooms, a side of tots, and a pint of Proletariat Red.  It hit the spot.  I hadn't eaten cheese since my lapse, and had abstained from anything deep-fried for even longer than that.  I told myself, if I keep the consumption of deep-frieds to a minimum, I think-- I hope-- I should be ok.

So anyway.  I think I've escaped the guilt and shame of eating by now-- the fast would be over tomorrow anyway, so by then I'll really be out of the woods.  But, guilt can be productive (and how would my parents get their occasional birthday gifts if it weren't?), and my awareness of what I eat has gone up drastically.  A couple days after I quit the fast I decided to spend the day sugar free.  At work of course someone brought in several tubs of cookies, and after lunch (when I find myself craving sugar the most) I nearly bit off all my fingernails instead of going for the cookies.  A nasty tasting alternative, I tell you.  And later that night after I finished dinner, I let myself have a half a cantelope for dessert.  It was really good.  But it wasn't enough.  I wanted to-- literally, mind you-- go in to the kitchen and snack on a spoonful of sugar.  Wow.  That is a serious addiction.  

I suppose this strange, obsessive relationship about food will continue.  So I'll just write about it.  That's what turns someone from a neurotic into an expert, isn't it?  Just look at Freud, and Philip Roth.

Grace.    

Day Three

Well there's no way of putting this delicately, so I'll say it outright.  This morning I woke up filled with hate.  My headache was still taunting me from behind my left eyeball, and I resented the notion of getting up to drink a nalgene bottle's worth of salt water, and then proceed to starve myself only if all I was going to get out of it was pain and anger.  

I walked to the kitchen and stared at a frying pan soaking in the sink with somebody else's egg, cheese, and grease particles clinging to the sides.  I gagged.  Repulsive.  

Ok, so I guess it's not food that I want.  At least not fried eggs.  So, I made a deal with myself.  1.  If I wake up with a headache tomorrow, then it's not worth it, and I'll quit.  Anyone who has spent 24 hours with a headache will probably agree with me on that one.  2.  Today I'm taking a day off of the SWF.  The authors of this cleanse say that if it is not possible to take the salt water (and today, for me, it is not), then drink a cup of smooth move tea in the morning as well as at night.  So, I poured a cup of my laxative tea, which actually is quite good, and turned to my heap of lemons.  As I chopped and squeezed, I became more resigned, perhaps slightly accustomed even, to the routine.  I knew from looking at the egg nasties in the sink that I didn't need to eat.  I just didn't feel good.  

When we do something that doesn't feel good, we stop.  Why am I continuing on?  My answer still continues to be, I don't know.  I mean, when we exercise we continue when it hurts.  When we're trying to meet a deadline, we don't quit working even though it sucks.  So, I'll stick to my deal.  Today I'll persevere.  If I wake to a headache tomorrow, I'm having a piece of toast.

But now, two glasses of lemonade later, I'm sitting on the front porch.  It's 70 degrees out and my headache is barely noticeable.  Adam just weeded the garden and we're going to go to the nursery for plants.  I'm not hungry, and I feel happy.

Could my anger and repulsion have just been part of the mass exodus of toxins from my body?  God that would be great.  But I suspect that that is a whole other de-toxing cleanse of its own.  One that takes a lifetime of effort.

Grace.

Day Two

I woke up this morning with what felt like a terrible hangover.  Headache behind my left eyeball, sore muscles.  Same exact kinds of pain I feel when I've tied one on the night before.  What the hell?  I felt so great yesterday.  It has lasted all day, and even now I'm squinting painfully at the computer screen.

I slept till 10am this morning, took a long nap around lunchtime, and now it's 10:30pm and I'm exhausted.  I will try and drink my whole cup of Smooth Move before I fall asleep, but I'm not counting on it...

Grace.

Day One- Part Two

Now it's bedtime.  I feel great, really.  Walking home earlier-- from tai chi class, I admit.  I know, I know; I fast, I do tai chi.  Just pass the patchouli-- anyway, when I was walking down my street, I felt so... I don't know.  Elevated.  Everything is so green right now.  And when I walked up my front steps, I felt so strongly that I love my house.  Simple things that felt very important.

A big ol' glass of lemonade for dinner and a cup of Smooth Move.  I'm not full and I'm not hungry.  I'm realizing that I have a very profound relationship to food.  More on that later.

Grace. 

Day One

I lay in bed this morning, trying to go back to sleep, but my mind kept returning to the dreaded SWF.  I had read that some people couldn't even hold down the nasty stuff, and I was worried that I might be one of them.  What worried me even more was that I would be able-- just barely able-- to keep down 32 oz. of warm salt water and that I would therefore be committed to drinking it every morning for the next ten days.

It's not as bad as I expected.  At the behest of the experts I invested in a five dollar jar of French Celtic uniodized sea salt.  French Celtic?  Hm.  Well wherever it's from, the salt is lovely.  Two nights ago my friend Berkeley made some fantastic zucchini, sliced, drizzled in olive oil and parmesan, and stuck under the broiler, and the fancy salt we sprinkled on it was noticeably more delicious than the usual Morton stuff.  Mmm... I'm definitely making that zucchini when this is over...

Anyway.

I chugged down my French Celtic seawater with nary a gag, but with plenty a scrunched nose, and began to chop and squeeze my lemons and limes.  It's a three-citrus cocktail, all organic: conventional lemons, Meyer lemons, and limes.  I stirred in my maple syrup and cayenne pepper, and suspected by the dark maroon hue of the resulting lemonade that I had put in too much pepper.  My first sip confirmed it, and as the day progresses, the spicy lemonade is only getting spicier as the cayenne pepper soaks and spreads through the solution.  I suspect that my last cups this evening will have transformed into a kind of lemonade/hot-sauce cross-pollination.

More later.

A Clean Slate- Day Zero on the Master Cleanse

What better way to start a food blog, than to begin it the day before a fast?  Well, there are probably lots of better ways.  I could be spending an inheritance eating my way through the Mediterranean, or sleeping on the beaches of Thailand and consuming the bounties of its cities.  I could even trawl through my own hometown, one food cart after the next-- though that one's been done, and done well.  So have Southeast Asia and the Mediterranean been sufficiently scoured for delectables by all the culinary pundits (and bloggers-- see the latest issue of bon appetit.  They are the nouveau journalistes, I tell ya).  But have any food devotees ever written about eating nothing at all?  

So let me begin my written homage to food with an empty stomach, a blank canvas.  The program is called the Master Cleanse.  I know, it sounds cultish.  It does seem to have quite a following.  It's also known as the Lemonade Diet, because that is what you drink, almost exclusively.  And this ain't no Minute Maid: think more along the lines of fresh-squeezed organic lemons and limes, water, maple syrup, and cayenne pepper.  Sound good?  Add to that stark menu two pints of salt water in the morning, and laxative tea at night, and the lemonade starts to sound a lot better, doesn't it!  

It's a cleansing and de-toxing regimen.  Supposedly, for the first several days, the feelings of pain, hunger, nausea, fatigue are just the toxins making their way out of the body, and then (again, supposedly) after that one feels great.  No hunger, lots of energy, supreme mental clarity.  It's also meant to take a figurative scrub brush to your intestinal tract.  The veterans of this cleanse tell me that, even after being on the fast for a week or more, they are still having bowel movements as large as if it were the day after Thanksgiving.  Wow.  What is in my intestines, and how long has it been there??  

So why, you may ask?  What, precisely, am I thinking when I voluntarily limit my intake to "lemonade," salt water, and Smooth Move for nigh on two weeks?  And my answer is, I don't really know!  If it's even remotely possible that there is months' or years' worth of food and "toxins" residing in my colon, then I definitely want it out.  I look forward for an excuse not to drink alcohol for ten days.  I won't deny that the potential for losing a few pounds before tank top season has crossed my mind.  But mostly I'm just curious.  If mental clarity is a possibility, I definitely want to check that out.  And if a mental wig-out it turns out to be, then so be it.  That'll be interesting too.

The Last Supper: A bagel toasted with cheese, a salad, a glass of white wine.  I thought about getting a burrito for my last hurrah, but it somehow didn't seem appropriate.  Tomorrow is Day One!  First item of the day: the saltwater flush.  I have a feeling I'll be referring to it often.  So let it now be known as my dear friend, SWF.

Grace.