The Pear That Found Itself

Once upon a time there were two enormous Comice Pears.  Well, for that matter, there is a whole bag of them, but suspecting their ripeness, I only started with two.  I washed and sliced them in preparation for the next vodka infusion.  But as I sliced, my suspicions were confirmed-- they were too crisp, and not sweet enough.  And so I needed to think of another plan.    

I thought of my beloved radio show, The Splendid Table, and the advice given on it last week to a caller who had to figure out what to do with his bumper crop of pears.  The infinitely knowledgeable host Lynn Rosetto-Kaspar suggested a roast.  Sprinkle the sliced pears in olive oil, sugar, cinnamon, and rosemary (pestled to avoid crunch) and spread out in a casserole.  Roast in a hot (450) oven until brown, bubbly, and carmelized.  

The result was gorgeous, rich, and delicious.  But what to do with them?  Was I to eat them plain?  While eating one slice was decadent, I couldn't foresee that I wouldn't be wholly taking advantage of the flavors eating them unaccompanied.  And so I whipped up a coffee cake, the recipe for which belonged to my great-grandmother.  Instead of chopped walnuts or pecans for the topping, I toasted and chopped some almonds instead.  Also, in went the pears (chopped).

The cake, as you can see, is beautiful, and better yet, it tastes great.  The sweet, smoky roasted pears provide the perfect mushiness to counterbalance the crunchy nuts, and to moisten the dense cake.  I knew these pears were destined for something great-- and to think, I had planned for them something as lowly as vodka!  (The pears' brothers and sisters, however, still ripening in a bag on the counter, won't be so lucky.)

Looking Sharp

Dear Mary and Mike,

Your wonderful birthday present-- a Chef's Choice Diamond Hone Knife Sharpener-- arrived in the mail yesterday.  Thank you!  I was so excited that I plugged it in, and after a cursory reading of the directions (which I wouldn't normally do, but it seemed worthwhile in the interest of my knives), proceeded to sharpen every knife in the house.  It worked beautifully!  Knives that I had given up for worthless were slicing my test apple into paper-thin slivers.  

The occasional addition of a luxury item to the kitchen is so exciting-- it feels like the breakthrough of an industry, like the invention of the cotton-gin or the printing press-- because my food improves exponentially.  Some recent breakthroughs in Megan's Kitchen, Inc.: a food processor (I can't believe I used to rely on a blender!!), a mortar and pestle (ah, the flavors of crushed herbs!!), and now, a knife sharpener (chopping is fun again!).  To carry on with my industrial metaphor, I thank you for your investment.  As a stockholder, I'm sure you'll be very pleased with the dividends (when you come to visit and eat my cooking).  In the meantime, rest assured that your son and I eat very well.

Love, Megan.  

Pizza My Heart

I think the food that I crave most often is pizza.  Then margaritas, then Thai food.  In that order.  Luckily, the #1 craving is extremely easy and delicious to make at home.  Even easier than margaritas, if you can believe it (all that business about lime juice and triple sec in perfect proportion to tequila-- it's a mystery).  And if you make your own crust and sauce, the tastier it'll  be.  But don't get intimidated, because you can segment your tasks, and when it comes time to actually bake and eat it, you'll be satisfied in minutes flat.  So, here's how to make pizza in five easy steps, steps which do not necessarily need to be completed in proximity to one another.

1.  Dough.  This is the hard part, if you can call it hard.  If you haven't worked with yeast, or kneaded dough, it may intimidate.  But look at it this way.  If you've always wanted to learn how to make bread, perhaps pizza dough is the best way to start because a) you only let it rise once and b) it makes no difference how ugly it is-- you'll be slathering it with toppings.  So:

Pour a packet of yeast into a measuring cup (the large Pyrex kinds with a handle and spout are best, so you've got room to spare).  Without yet filling the measuring cup, get the hot water going with your finger under it until you reach a temperature comparable to that of a hot tub or bath.  Fill the measuring cup to 1 1/3 cups.  Let sit under the stove light, or even in the oven with the light on for five-ten minutes so that the yeast will re-awaken.  Meanwhile, measure 4 cups flour (feel free to substitute half with wheat), 2 Tbsp. veg or olive oil, and 1 tsp. salt into a bowl.  When the yeast/water is foamy and bubbly, add to the flour mixture.  Mix well with your hands, and turn out onto a floured surface.  Knead for ten minutes (you'll work up a sweat).  Cover with a damp cloth and let rise for two hours.  I usually stick my rising dough back in the oven with the light on, and hey, if you need to get ready for work, give it as much time as you can; in my case, an hour.  When you're flying out the door, stick the dough in an air tight plastic bag and throw it in the fridge.

2.  Sauce.  So easy.  Roughly slice, chop, or crush as many garlic cloves as you desire.  Let sizzle lightly in a Tbsp. olive oil for a minute or two.  Add a can of chopped tomatoes.  Season to taste with your favorite herbs (some of my faves: a touch of rosemary, liberal oregano, basil, a touch of cinnamon, salt, pepper, red pepper flakes).  Be sure and add a teaspoon or two of sugar.  This cuts the acidity.  Pour the lot into the blender and blend.  Some may prefer to leave it chunky, but I don't want to interfere with the toppings.

3.  Prepping the dough.  You'll want to take it out of the fridge a fair while before it's time to bake; I'd say a half an hour or so.  If you're planning on baking soon, set the dough (still in the bag, or on a pan) on top of the stove while it pre-heats (to 400 degrees).  This'll soften the dough more quickly.  When it gets malleable, squish and push and squeege the dough outward on a cookie sheet that has been greased or sprinkled with cornmeal until its big and flat-- no thicker than a quarter inch.  I only put this as its own step because it takes a while for the dough to soften after being cold.

4.  Toppings!  This is the best part.  First off, get fontina cheese instead of mozzarella.  I read this once for a lasagna recipe and I will never, ever go back.  Fontina is to a Moonstruck Chocolate truffle as mozzarella is to the waxy, tasteless chocolates you find in an advent calendar.  Trust me on this one.  But as for the rest of your toppings, the sky is truly the limit.  See how many old things in the back of your fridge or cupboards you can use up for a topping.  Canned pineapple?  Pine nuts?  Basil from the garden?  Some mushrooms on the verge of funkiness?  Maybe even some fruit?  I've heard some intriguing things about the combo of pears and blue cheese.  Have it your way.  My own concoction pictured here consists of onions, red bell pepper, kalamata olives, sundried tomatoes, fresh tomatoes, red pepper flakes, and parmesan.

5.  Bake.  I'm bad at giving times.  People like their food different ways.  But here's what to look for: bubbling cheese that's just beginning to brown.  Fifteen, maybe eighteen minutes.  Then it's done.  Remove from oven.  Let cool if you can bear it.  Enjoy.  You deserve it: you built it from scratch! 

Day Two-- Infusions

Coming along nicely, eh?  The fruit is surrendering its color and life-force to the vodka in holy self-sacrifice, and meantime, the vodka is becoming a rich, peachy and, I hate to say it, Jolly Rancher-like color.  Maybe tonight I'll try some.  Lord knows, working at a community college during the first week of fall term, I'll need it.

Merry Peaches!

Well, the cat's out of the bag.  People, this is going to be your Christmas present.  I just couldn't keep it a secret!!  I had to chronicle it for the blog!  I can't help it, it's becoming an obsession, this blog!  I must describe in detail every culinary project I undertake.  So now you know, family and friends, you're getting infused vodka for Christmas.

While riding through orchards the other day and telling myself for the three thousandth time this summer that I really need to learn how to start canning soon, I tried to come up with some other way to preserve the heaven-sent fruit that comes from my area.  What are the ways to stave off bacteria?  I re-counted my options in my head: well there's lowering the temperature to bacteria-shunning levels.  But nobody wants a bag of frozen peaches, not to mention that by the time they arrive in the mail, they'd be a soggy, moldy mess.  There's drying.  This is not a bad idea at all, and I might well try this next year, especially because my co-worker gave me a great recipe for Peach Leather, where you puree your fruit and spread it in sheets and dry it in the sun.  And when it's done, you roll it up like a Fruit Rollup!  Yum.  Anyway, there's salting, like what people used to do with pork and bison on the ol' Western Frontier.  But salted peaches?  Uh, no.  Pickling and canning: yes, I do intend to teach myself that process.  Next summer.  And what does that leave?  Spirits!

So I followed some very simple directions found on the internet: I cleaned and sliced the LAST (I'm not kidding, the very last) peaches that Rasmussen Farms had to offer this year, dropped them in some cute old Mason Jars, and covered them with vodka.  Eh voila!  I'm going to give them four days and then we'll see what they taste like, so I'll keep you posted.  I'm also going to do some pears, who, unlike peaches, are right at the beginning of their season-- so much so I need to let mine ripen for a few days.  But I shall keep you apprised, as always, for the chronicle of infusions. 

Dog River

As you may or may not know, I love coffee shops.  They are the neighborhood point of convergence for a certain type of person that I don't think I can describe, but I can tell you that I am certainly one of them.  Coffee shops embody either leisure or work, but if it's work you must do there, then it's leisurely work, punctuated by sips of tea and long looks at the other patrons and out the window.  When I was a senior in college, I walked to the Cafe Abir in the Western Addition neighborhood of San Francisco every day and wrote my senior thesis almost in its entirety at one of their corner wooden tables.  (Out of curiosity by the way, I just re-read the first few paragraphs of that paper-- on Henry James-- and thoroughly embarrassed myself.)

In July, as Adam and I hauled our pets and possessions east of Portland, the land of great (if hip and expensive) coffee shops, I wondered somewhat frantically if there would be a decent spot for me to rest, caffeinate, and people-watch in Hood River.  I jubilantly noticed a good-looking place just a couple blocks from our new house, but after a few visits met with extraordinarily high prices ($2.50 for a day-old muffin), the non-existence of iced tea (in July), and a spotty wireless internet connection, it was clear that my search had to continue.

Enter Dog River Coffee.  Even the name is fantastic.  Our first couple weeks in Hood River I had no job and our house had no internet, so Dog River quickly became an everyday destination.  And the baristas quickly acknowledged it: "What, no beer today?" they'd ask, or "Iced-tea-no-lemon, right?"  There were actually lots of locals here, too, unlike that other place.  As they say, if you're looking for good Chinese food, go where Chinese people eat.

The prices are downright cheap: $1.40 for an iced tea, and I couldn't tell you on the coffee, but my friends and family don't seem to complain.  Their food selection is ok: a few sweet breads like banana, zuchini, and chocolate-- enough to tide you over.  Plus bagels, a muffin every now and then, and some homemade energy bar-looking thing.  But they do have a local beer or two on tap, so should you find yourself still camping at your table around five o'clock, you can make the transition of beverages as easily as you please. 

I thought I'd be contenting myself with maybe one good restaurant and one good coffee shop here in our Pop. 6,000 town, but it turns out, Hood Riverites like to eat and drink well.  I am so pleased.  And there will be more to come on the merchants of food and wine, I assure you. 

    

WOW BEANS

This recipe title, WOW BEANS, takes its inspiration from another food product enjoyed by some friends of mine.  It's called Yum Sauce.  A pre-packaged, all-purpose sauce that you can find on the shelves of most health food stores, Yum Sauce has adherents who would lay down their lives on its behalf.  I myself find it to be a thinly disguised replica of Vegemite.  So, if you're Australian and like yeast-paste in a jar, then you might have a response to Yum Sauce somewhere along the lines of "Yum."  If not, I wouldn't heavily recommend Yum Sauce.  But I will recommend WOW BEANS.

Also known as: Green Beans with Crisp Shallots, Chile & Mint

(Yes, Chile AND Mint!)

1 1/2 lbs. green beans

2/3 c. oil

6 oz. (5 medium) shallots, sliced and separated into rings

1 small, fresh Thai or Serrano chile, thinly sliced (red chile flakes will also do)

1/2 tsp. salt, or to taste

1/2 c. chopped fresh mint

Heat oil till hot but not smoking.  Fry shallots until golden brown.  Remove with a slotted spoon and dry on a paper towel.  Note: do not leave unattended!  The transition from raw to golden brown in frying shallots occurs in the blink of an eye.  And trust me: you WANT your crispy shallots (you may even start making them in large batches and eating them in lieu of potato chips).

Discard all but 1 Tbsp. of oil, cook chile about 2 minutes.  Add beans, salt, and stir till cooked.  Remove from heat and toss with mint.  Garnish with shallots.

Optional: In the interest of time, you can briefly blanch, boil, or steam the beans before finishing them in the saute pan.  If you cringe at the thought of another pot to wash, just cook them with the oil and chile, though it'll take a while longer.

You'll take one bite, and I guarantee the first word out of your mouth will be: WOW!

Who Needs Deli Meat??

Pesto: A Recipe in Photos

Ingredients:

-A large capacity mortar and pestle (at least 2 cups) *thanks, Dad!*

-Clean basil leaves

-Garlic

-Olive oil

-Parmesan Cheese

-Pine Nuts

-Salt

Note: Did you know that "pesto" and "pestle" come from the same Latin word, meaning "to crush?"  Makes you think twice about the role of the food processor in the art of pesto.

Megan and the Giant Peach

Not long ago my future in-laws were in town.  Adam and I had still not decided on a wedding venue, so we thought his family might like to come along to scout a site with us.  Driving to the bed and breakfast whose website looked appealing, we got a bit lost.  Not very lost-- we knew it was close-- so we pulled into a diner parking lot to ask.  As soon as we stopped, Adam hopped out and said, "Be right back."  Mike, Adam's dad, and I gasped.  "My son!"  Mike cried. "Asking for directions?!  Has he lost his manhood?  He's been kidnapped and replaced with a stranger!"  I myself was shocked too; in the nearly four years we've known each other, I've never once seen Adam ask for directions.  But, it turns out, we had nothing to fear-- Adam's testosterone levels were normal.  At the front door of the diner, Adam veered left and went behind the building.  "It's probably back here somewhere," he called to us.  His mom, Mary, exhaling the universal sound of exasperation, got out to get directions herself.  Inside of thirty seconds she was back in the car with the information we needed, while Adam was still bushwacking through story-high blackberry bushes out back.  "Oh, phew!" Sighed Mike, "Thank goodness.  I thought we lost him."

Though I was laughing my head off at the time, I was thinking of this incident yesterday, with significantly less laughter.  It's very difficult to laugh when you're riding your bike down a broken glass-riddled highway shoulder with semis roaring past.  "Are you sure this is the right way?"  I called.  I was determined to not lose my cool.  He was sure, he said, but we might as well consult the map.  We pulled over and looked at the really cool book my mom gave us, containing lots of road biking routes in the Columbia Gorge area.  We had gone the wrong way; we were supposed to cross the freeway, not turn onto it.  So instead of turning back to the road we were meant to turn onto in the first place, Adam said, "Let's just turn on to this road here.  I'm sure it'll join up with the path."  I hemmed.  "Just trust me," he said.

Twenty minutes later, I was pushing my seventies-era, VERY heavy road bike up the steepest hill I've seen since leaving San Francisco.  As sweat poured down my face, and my breathing verged on asthma, I repeated the loving-kindness mantra in my mind.  Twenty minutes after THAT, I was still pushing my bike up the hill.  Adam by now was off his bike and pushing too.

But twenty minutes later still we had come to Panorama Point, the true starting point of the loop.  As I caught my breath and guzzled water, this is what I beheld.      

Do you see what appears to be a green furry carpeting lining the valley floor?  Those are the hundreds of fruit orchards that keep us all in good fruit supply all summer long.  One of those orchards down there, in fact, was to supply what would turn out to be one of the best lunches I've ever eaten.

The one nice thing about pushing your bike up an enormous hill is that you get to ride down it.  As we barreled down the hill and continued to pedal easily through the flat countryside, we passed green fields, idyllic orchards, a few white steepled churches, and charming farmhouses, many with For Sale signs that we eyed enviously.  We just could not believe this beautiful place.  We live here, we said out loud more than once.

As we approached one of the many signs proclaiming the presence of "Fresh Fruit" Adam suggested we turn in and get something to eat.  After our earlier navigational debacle I actually had the fleeting impulse to say, "No, let's just stay on the path.  I don't want to backtrack anymore."  But I was tired and hungry and my goal was fun, not disputes.  We turned into the Rasmussen Family Farm parking lot and kicked down our kickstands.

The fruits and veggies they had for sale were plentiful, cheap, and gorgeous.  Luscious bell peppers, plums, squash, shallots, basil, the season's first apples.  But the peaches were clearly the stars that day.  We were drawn to the peach table by scent alone.  I didn't write down all the varieties-- I should have-- but there were probably five different kinds, all downy and round, and colored that indescribable blending hue of reddish orange.  Adam and I pressed a few for ripeness and discovered that all of them were perfect, and ready to be eaten NOW.  We each chose two enormous peaches, the size of small grapefruits.  One dollar each.

Outside we sat on some wagons and bit in.  The peaches exploded all over our faces and we leaned forward to let tributaries of juice spill to the grass.  They were perfect: sweet and fleshy but so juicy we half drank, half chewed them.  We were full after one, but couldn't resist a second go-around.  Fortunately, before I devoured mine, Adam got a couple shots of me with my peaches.  

Later, back on the road, Adam said, "I'm stuck on that peach.  I'm still biting into it, you know?"  Mmm, yes.  A man after my own heart.  I guess I'll follow him anywhere. 

 

Great and Easy Dinner, Mon'

I've got one of those old black and white composition notebooks devoted to recipes from all places-- written in by friends and family, printed out from websites, torn out of magazines.  I've even got an old index card that belonged to my great-grandmother, containing a recipe for chocolate fudge.  Some of the recipes are old standbys, but most, alas, have never been made by me.  Here is a recipe that I printed out from the NYTimes website sometime last year, taped to one of the pages of my recipe book, and finally made for the first time last night.  I love it when recipes make the transition from "never made" to "beloved!"

For this recipe, make sure you've got an ovenproof pot.  It'd be a good side dish, but it shines in its own right.

Jamaican Rice and Beans

-2 Tbs. evoo

-1 med. onion, finely chopped

-1 bell pepper, preferably red or yellow, stemmed, seeded, and finely chopped

-1 fresh or dried chili, like jalapeno or serrano, stemmed, seeded and minced (Note: I didn't have this so I used a couple pinches each of chile powder and smoked paprika)

-1 Tbs. minced garlic

-1 1/2 c. cooked kidney or other red beans, drained and rinsed (this equals one 15 oz. can)

-1 1/2 c. rice

-1 can coconut milk

-1 tsp. fresh thyme OR 1/2 tsp. dried thyme

-s/p

-1/2 c. fresh parsley or cilantro (I highly recommend the cilantro)

1.  Preheat oven to 350.  Put oil in ovenproof pot over medium heat.  Add onion, bell pepper, chili and garlic.  Cook, stirring occasionally, until onion is soft, about five minutes.  Add beans and enough water to barely cover.  Bring to a boil, then turn off heat.  Use an immersion blender, potato masher, or pastry cutter to semipuree beans in pot (leave half unpureed).

2.  Stir in rice, cocunut milk, 1/2 cup water, thyme, and don't be afraid to douse in salt and pepper.  Cover pot.  Bake until liquid is absorbed and rice is tender, 30-50 minutes (sorry I can't be more definitive on this-- the recipe says 20 to 30, but it took me 50).  Taste and adjust seasoning.  Garnish with parsley or cilantro.