Catchup! (AN OVERDUE POST ON ROMESCO)

 

 

Romesco is a smokey condiment of the Spanish influence that can be made lots of ways and most often incorporates some kind of red pepper. It beautifully accompanies food from grilled meats to poached eggs to any raw or roasted vegetables you choose. It is an especially perfect topping for straight vegetables because it adds a touch of decadence to otherwise square stuff; roasted cauliflower, salt boiled potatoes, grilled spring onions, for example.

I do not consider my cooking very decadent. I was raised eating all kinds of tofu and later went to a vegan culinary school (even though I am an equal opportunity eater). Especially on this website, I have geared my recipes towards scoring healthy points, being quick/easy and most importantly towards being ‘damn delicious ways to eat stuff that is good for you’. That’s the mission.

When this blog was formed in the year two thousand and something, I was in the thick of cooking for clients who wanted to eat just right. For many years I didn’t often use bacon and heaps of butter or drench things in cream or deep fry. Don’t get me wrong, these are obviously awesome ways to cook and once in a while extremely useful but I tried not to lean on them, finding other ways to develop flavor and richness.

Now I am back on the restaurant scene. I do not work in a health-food place and I am given the opportunity to roll out lots of small plates with big flavor, no holds barred. I can stretch my style of cooking a little further into the naughty department. Frying* has been my favorite lately. Getting a crisp crust on lamb patties, putting an extra crunch on nuts or, as you will see here, cooking some garlic slices in oil until they are like little golden nuggets. And though this particular recipe for Romesco is, in fact, vegan, lately I am having lots of fun smearing my somewhat austere culinary upbringing with a little bit of pork fat.

ROMESCO THIS WAY

7 cloves of garlic, sliced (plus one whole clove)

4 chunks of bread, about 1 cup

2 whole tomatoes, canned or fresh, chopped

1 tablespoon smoked paprika (pimenton)

2 red bell peppers, roasted

40 blanched almonds*

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

3 tablespoons of the best sherry vinegar you have

5 jarred piquillo peppers

1-2 teaspoons kosher salt

black pepper to taste

pinch cayenne

oil for frying (canola is fine)

In a small skillet, pour enough frying oil so that it is about an inch deep. Warm it up and toss in one slice of the garlic. When it begins to bubble around the edges, remove from the oil and add the rest of the garlic slices (reserving one clove), stirring frequently until golden.

Remove garlic with a slotted spoon and place on a paper towel. Add bread chunks to the oil and fry on both sides until crisp, remove from skillet onto paper towel.

Discard all but a few tablespoons of oil from the skillet, heat it up again and sauté the chopped tomatoes for a few minutes. Add the smoked paprika and a teaspoon of salt to the skillet and stir to combine with the tomatoes. Cook until fragrant, about 3 minutes.

Now that all of the components are prepped, time for the easy part.

Place the fried garlic, the raw garlic clove, the bread, the tomato mixture, roasted peppers, almonds, olive oil, sherry vinegar, piquillos, remaining teaspoon of salt, some black pepper and a pinch of cayenne into the bowl of a food processor and puree until smooth.

Check for seasoning and adjust. Also adjust the consistency with more oil or vinegar to thin and more bread or almonds to thicken.

Roasted asparagus waiting patiently for romesco and a soft boiled egg…

 

 

 

 

* When I was a culinary student I once got roped into a call for one of the competitive cooking shows…I don’t remember which. When asked about one of my special skills in the kitchen I reluctantly replied, “I can fry”.

** Any almonds would work, roasted, salted, etc. To blanch raw almonds, plunge them in boiling water for 1 minute and drain. When cool enough to touch, slip the skins off… but do it before the skins dry or else it becomes difficult.

 

Disguise. (SWEET/SAVORY TURMERIC POPCORN)

For some reason I had always meant to make popcorn on the stovetop but never really got around to it. And because of this I refused to wrap my head around the unbelievable simplicity of making it.

Then someone offered me money to make lots and lots of popcorn and, here I am, ready to tell you all about how awesome the results of this quick and easy snack can be. The other upside (what’s the upside?), you can make it as decadent as you want with peanut butter, sugar, chocolate, caramel, etc. or you can cram a whole bunch of healthy stuff on it like coconut oil, flax, nutritional yeast, matcha or turmeric, which is my fave because the color is righteous.

Turmeric is being hailed as such an impressive superfood, I keep a bottle of it handy, working it in where I can. Popcorn is a healthy snack itself, when prepared in the latter of above-mentioned styles. I think it is great anytime but especially before dinner when you have hungry family meowing around the kitchen but the meal is not quite ready… that bright yellow can really distract!

I use a pretty foolproof popcorn-making technique and I am sorry I can not give proper cred where it is due. I saw it once and never turned back. The topping is my invention…but also foggy. Here’s the gist:

SWEET/SAVORY TURMERIC POPCORN

1/3 cup popcorn kernels

2 tablespoons cooking oil

2-3 tablespoons butter or oil

1/3 cup maple syrup

pinch cumin

1 tablespoon turmeric

dash of cayenne

salt to taste

• Heat a large pot over a medium flame with 2 tablespoons of cooking oil and 3 kernels of popcorn inside. Place well-fitting lid on the pot and listen for the 3 pops.
• When you hear them, add the rest of the kernels to the pot, put the lid back on and remove from the heat. Count to 30.
• Replace to pot on the flame and, keeping the lid on tight, shake the pot a bit. Listen for lots of popping noise. Continue with some light shakes until the popping sound slows down considerably or has practically stopped.
• Dump the popcorn into a large bowl. Set aside.
• Heat the remaining ingredients; butter or oil, maple, cumin, turmeric, cayenne, salt in a small pot and stir, combining thoroughly. Adjust to taste! Make it sweet, salty or spicy as you like.
• Pour the maple mixture over the popcorn and toss well to coat.

A little lesson. (FARMERS MISO SOUP)

I am a miso lover. I need to have miso soup at least once a week, usually as the precursor to some sushi even though that feels like the lazy way out. Miso paste in general has so much more potential than a few cubes of tofu and some lonely sails of seaweed. By learning a few different (easy!) ways to use it, miso can be a staple in your fridge forever and ever. You, as the owner of a high-quality tub of miso, can reap the many health benefits for just as long.

Since it’s a fermented food, it is important is to avoid boiling miso. High heat will harm the living enzymes that make this a genuine superfood as it will also dull the unique flavors. Use miso to ‘finish’ dishes that you have created rather than adding it when there is still cooking to be done.

Miso to-do list:

-Mix into softened butter to make ‘miso butter’, the best topping for seafood ever.

-Mix with minced garlic and chili paste as a condiment for grilled meat.

-Whisk into salad dressing or marinades.

-Just miso solo in a bit of simple broth.

-I’ve seen people use it in pesto as a substitute for parmesan but…

Below is a hearty soup recipe that uses a bunch of fantastic end-of-summer vegetables, but any mixture of veg would work. Once the soup is off of the stove, dunk a measuring cup into the broth, scooping out about one cup of hot liquid. Drop a few spoonfuls of miso into measuring cup and whisk/stir until it is dissolved. Pour the miso mixture back into the soup pot and adjust to taste. You can simply repeat this process until you have reached the desired amount of umami.

Try potatoes, sweet potatoes, turnips, parsnips, cabbage, spinach and/or noodles. This recipe can be as elaborate or as simple as you’d like, the main thing is hot (not boiling) liquid*, dissolve miso, enjoy.

FARMERS MISO SOUP

(serves 4-6)

2 quarts stock or water

1/2 cup onion, chopped

1 kohlrabi, peeled and cubed into small chunks

1 celery rib, thinly sliced crosswise

1 cup chopped kale leaves

1 garlic clove, minced

1/2 pound tofu, cut into small cubes

2 tablespoons soy sauce

1 splash of rice vinegar

a few red pepper flakes

1/4 cup wakame seaweed, soaked in cold water until softened

1/4 cup miso paste (any color)

1/2 carrot

1 inch ginger

chopped chives to garnish

• Place the stock in a large pot and bring to a gentle boil. Add onion, kohlrabi and celery. Simmer about 10 minutes. 
• Add kale, garlic and tofu. Cook until all vegetables are tender, about 10 more minutes.
• Remove from heat. Stir in soy sauce, vinegar and red pepper to season. Taste and adjust. Add wakame.
• Take one cup of stock out of the pot and place in a bowl or measuring cup. Whisk miso into the hot broth and pour it back into the soup. Taste and adjust.
• Ladle soup into bowls and using a fine grater (preferably a microplane), grate some carrot and ginger into each soup and sprinkle with chives to garnish.
• When reheating the soup, warm it but don’t boil. I’ll say it again.

*Make your own stock! I love stock making.

https://upchefcreek.wordpress.com/2011/02/22/elaborations-veggie-dashi/

https://upchefcreek.wordpress.com/2013/04/19/balancing-it-out-alkalizing-broth-2/

Tofu gets un-white. (DRY SAUTE TOFU)

What could be more boring than talking about tofu? I am sitting here at my computer thinking, ‘it’s white’. But I am also a little burnt right now. Not fully burnt, just sort of golden and a little crispy. If you would like your tofu to have similar qualities without sticking all over the barbecue grill and without globs and globs of frying oil, I propose a dry saute. You will need one block of firm or extra firm tofu to start.

A few keys to success! First, slice the tofu. I usually cut the block into two or three thinner slabs. Keep in mind the final shape you want the tofu pieces to have… and you can leave the block in its whole form if you want to. Next, press the tofu. Place the tofu slabs on paper towels between two sheet pans. I place something a little heavy on top of that like the tea kettle or a few cans of beer or something. You will see water  in the bottom pan being absorbed by the paper towels. Leave that to happen while you prep other ingredients. Thirty minutes? One hour?  All good. Once drained, Place the slabs into a non-stick or cast iron skillet. Do not add oil or butter or any of the things you were taught to do. Don’t do it.

Then let the heat do the work until the desired color is achieved. Flip, repeat. It helps to press down on the tofu in the pan every now and then with a spatula to help the remaining water sneak out and get that colorized color going on. Makes a nice texture on the outside, stays soft and bitey in the middle. Cut into shapes and proceed with your regular tofu repertoire. Marinate, stir-fry, throw it in a soup.

Tiny bowls!

Useful as hell. (VEGETABLE GRILL PAN)

Grilling is the carnivore’s dream. Firing up the backyard bbq is a perfectly acceptable reason to cook up two, three, even four animals at a time. And I am totally down with that. But this post is to champion the underdog: vegetables. In support of vegetables everywhere, it could not be easier to add them to your grilling repertoire than with a good old vegetable grilling pan. Just prep your veggie (or fruit!) selection, drop it into the pan and place over the flame. You can shake it around, you can keep it still, but don’t take it off until charred to your preferred shade of black. I am not one for extraneous gadgets and all-around extra ‘stuff’ but the vegetable grill pan is a real summertime pal.

Zucchini, pineapple, jalapeno and shallots. Just chop into bite sized pieces and toss into the grill pan. When done add basil and lime, s + p.

Blackened Brussels with orange zest vinaigrette.

Experimenting es bueno.