I wonder who came up with the idea of clover leaf rolls? A playful young hausfrau, rolling little balls of dough and dropping them into muffin tins? A busy baker, snipping off a roll of dough with scissors? No matter how they came by, clover leaf rolls are as fun to make as they are to eat!
Adapted from this fabulous recipe over at Jugalbandi. You can make this recipe without a sourdough starter, too. I skipped the garlic and the sundried tomatoes, and added a generous handful of fresh chopped sage and oregano from my tiny herb garden. Half the recipe makes 6 average sized rolls.
Herbed sourdough rolls go to the Wild Yeast blog for the weekly YeastSpotting.
A peasant salad from Tuscany, made with stale leftover bread. Add tomatoes, basil, olive oil, let the flavors seep in to the bread, and devour. Simple food at its best.
Recipe adapted from that bacon lovin' geek, Alton Brown. :)
Ingredients:
- 4 cups bread, left out overnight, cut into cubes (try to use a dense bread that won't turn to mush when it touches liquid- sourdoughs work well)
- 2 cups halved cherry tomatoes
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 2 cups chopped heirloom tomatoes
- 2 cups chopped cucumber (peel and remove seeds if using big fat ones)
- 1 tbsp finely minced red onion
- 1/4 cup red wine vinegar
- salt and pepper to taste
- a handful of torn basil leaves
Toast the bread lightly on a griddle. Sear the halved grape tomatoes in 1 tablespoon of oil, cut side down, until caramelized.
Combine red wine vinegar, salt and pepper in a bowl, slowly whisk in 2 tbsp olive oil in a thin stream until emulsified.
Combine all tomatoes, bread, onion and cucumber and dress with vinaigrette, toss well, garnish with basil and serve.
The best part in this salad is undoubtedly the bread- it soaks up all the sweet-sour-tomato flavor and becomes juicy and luscious and fabulous. My last advice- use lots of bread. :D
One of the most wonderful things about our city is the farmer's market. It is located on a portion of the rail yards property originally
developed by the New York Central Railroad Company in the late 1800's. The only remaining building was originally a transfer dock and
warehouse for the railroad.
In the 1990s, the city decided to convert it into an indoor-outdoor farmer's market. The old building now houses a gourmet grocery shop, a wine and cheese shop, a chocolate shop and an Italian restaurant. The outdoor market is populated by farms from all over the state, bringing in plants, produce, herbs and flowers in season. There is always a stall selling delicious homemade icecream. I can't think of a better place to buy weekend groceries, including gorgeous tomatoes.
The
Mortgage Lifter tomato was developed during the Great Depression in Logan, West
Virginia by a radiator repairman, M.C. "Radiator Charlie" Byles. He made a successful cross of four
of the largest tomatoes he could find - German Johnson, Beefsteak, an
Italian variety, and an English variety. Radiator Charlie sold the
first seedlings of his new tomato in the 1940's for one dollar each. With these sales,
Charlie managed to pay off his $6,000 mortgage in only six years, and
so the tomato was named Mortgage Lifter. This large, meaty, mild-flavored tomato has few seeds and is the perfect sandwich tomato.
(From www.montilcellocatelog.org)
A twitter friend, who just happens to be a fabulous quilter, sent me a lovely quilted tablecloth recently. The quilt smells and looks and feels so good, I've been using it as a throw instead, keeping my feet warm when I do my couch potato impersonations.
I want to send her something I made, but I have no idea what she likes. This is where online friendships suck. You may know a lot about one aspect of someone's life and nothing about the other.
Playing it safe, I decided to make these spring saffron shortbread cookies which I found on Mango Power Girl's blog. The cookies are lightly flavored with saffron, cardamom and nuts, making them Indian enough to satisfy me and American enough to please her (I hope!).
I mostly followed the original recipe, cutting back the butter to 1.5 sticks and skipping the icing, adding the cardamom to the cookie dough itself. I also used walnuts instead of pistachios coz I love them in cookies!
Only after making the cookies did I think about packaging. How do you mail crumbly shortbread cookies? After much trolling of the local megamart, I settled for a tin of peanuts, emptied, washed and re-papered. The packing took much more time than the actual making of cookies- there is a lesson in here somewhere. :)
Adapted from the wonderfully named CheapHealthyGood blog, who adapted it from Nick at Serious Eats who adapted it from Epicurious.
Yeah, its that good.
What you need:
1 cup nonfat evaporated milk
3 cups light vegetable stock
1 cup polenta
1 teaspoon oil
4 ounces cremini mushrooms, chopped
1 garlic clove, minced
1 tablespoon fresh thyme, chopped
1/2 tablespoon grated lemon zest
1 tablespoons butter
1/3 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
Salt and pepper to taste
- Add the evaporated milk, stock, polenta, salt and pepper to a large pot over medium heat. (Be careful with the salt, the stock and the parmesan will both have salt as well.) Bring to a simmer, whisking constantly, then reduce the heat to medium-low and cook for 25-30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the mixture is thick and creamy.
- Heat the oil in a large skillet. Add the sliced mushrooms to the pan. Cook, stirring occasionally, for a minute or so. Add the kale, garlic, and saute until the kale turns bright green and wilts. Turn off the heat and add the thyme and lemon zest. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
- Add the butter and parmesan to the pot with the polenta. Stir until combined. Spoon some of the polenta onto a plate and then top with the mushroom and kale. Serve warm.
Even though we made it on a Saturday, this is a great weeknight recipe. Easy and soul satisfying. The writers at CheapHealthyGood even wrote an ode to the recipe. Go read. :)
The queen of fruits. I'd never seen one, until today, at the International store. It was quite expensive, as befitting a member of the royal family, but I couldn't resist bringing one home.
Having partaken of one, all I can say is that the hype is well-deserved.
The fruit is a symphony of color and flavor. The rich red-purple coat when removed reveals plump white arils. Pop one in your mouth and it explodes on the tongue, belying its pure whiteness with a rainbow of flavors- mango, pineapple, lychee- I stopped counting and let myself go.
Excuse me while I go breathe into a paper bag. If you find a mangosteen on the way, grab it!
p.s. This has got to go to Click- bi-colour.
From Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian. A wonderful cookbook with an amazing breadth of recipes.
Ms. Jaffrey says to use unwashed risotto rice to get at all the starch- a shocking idea for a compulsive food washer like me! A good risotto, she says, is adult 'nursery food', with an assertive density, and a decided bite. Never undercooked, but firm and creamy, like well-cooked pasta.
I took a leap of faith and followed the instructions, down to the unwashed rice. The end result was a gorgeous risotto- simple, creamy, perfect.
Ingredients:
4 cups light vegetable stock ( I used one stock cube dissolved in 4 cups hot water)
3 tbsp olive oil ( I used one tbsp)
1 tbsp pine nuts
1/2 small onion, finely chopped ( I did not use it)
1 tbsp golden raisins
10 oz fresh spinach, washed, dried, chopped
1 cup unwashed risotto rice
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 cup grated Parmigiano Reggiano
1 tbsp unsalted butter, diced
Heat the stock and keep it hot over low heat.
Pour the oil in a large, heavy saute pan. ( I used a dutch oven.) When hot, add the pine nuts. Fry them until golden brown. Remove.
Now add the onion to the oil. Fry it for a minute, and add the raisins. Stir a few times and add the spinach. Fry for a few minutes, and add the rice and cinnamon. Fry for another minute.
Pour in a ladleful of stock. Turn the heat to medium and keep stirring. As the stock gets absorbed, keep adding another ladleful and stirring. Keep doing it until all the stock is gone, for at least 22 minutes.
Add and stir in the cheese and butter, until well mixed. Taste and season with salt and pepper. Turn off the heat. Let the risotto rest for a minute, then serve with pine nuts sprinkled on top.
