For all you food dorks like me out there

Alinea at Home has a post about tips for designing her new kitchen which I skimmed through but then caught a very interesting food nugget at the bottom. Harvard School of Applied Engineering and Science does a class on the science of cooking. As in let's make a mathematical formula that can empirically explain how egg proteins denature (read that as "cook") when certain levels of heat are applied. Blah, blah, blah. Okay that part is not really interesting to us chemical/mathematical mortals but the next link was! They have guest lecturers from molecular gastronomy restaurants! Alinea is a molecular gastronomic restaurant so they had Grant Achatz (the chef/owner) come speak on what he does. His food gets critized for being too un-food like and he has some crazy combinations on the same plate. In the video though he goes through the thought process on how he arrives at the finished product.

Grant Explains It All

Pork chops, sherry, and dates

For the last three Turkey Days I have been evolving a squash, date, and walnut dish that inevitably leads me to have excess dates on hand. The only dish I have in my culinary arsenal is wrapping them in bacon, drizzling with honey, and roasting them into succulent nuggets of pristine gastronomic delight. And while that is a solid way to consume said dates, it just doesn't feed the masses. This year however I am putting an end to that silliness.

I plunked around in my cookbooks and came up with a date and Madeira wine recipe for guinea fowl in The Zuni Cafe Cookbook. I am fresh out of guinea fowl and Madeira, but I do have some sherry on hand. Hey, they're both fortified wines right? I also have some pork chops from Windy Hill Farms in the freezer as well. Close enough in my book.

So like most other protein with pan sauce recipes we start by getting the pan hot and then getting a nice brown on the chops and fond in the pan. When I flipped the chops I also buried a couple of cloves and bay leaves under them and put the pan in a 350F oven. After 8 minutes or so (really I have no idea how long, but "8 minutes or so" sounds much better then the truth) the pan came out of the oven and the chops removed to a plate to rest. I feel slightly tempted to make a very bad pun about the chops being tired from jumping around in the pan, because saute translates into jumped. But I won't do that.

Now we move on to the pan sauce part. I put a couple pieces (half inch by one inch) of orange zest and half a cup of Sherry into the hot pan and deglazed the fond (repetition technique here, I am embedding fond into your subconscious) using the zest as a sort of organic scrubby pad. This also does a nice job of distributing the oils in the zest throughout the dish. The same idea as wiping a martini glass rim with a twist. Once this boiled a bit I added some turkey stock, chopped dates, and a few small pieces of cinnamon stick and let it all reduce down. Once the sauce came together I plated it all up and we dined.

Three things:
1) I used turkey stock because we just had Turkey Day and the carcass was used to make stock. If you didn't do this or make soup with it then shame on you. *finger waggling*

2) The original reason why I had dates in the first place is for a squash, walnut, date dish. I needed sides to go with the chops so we had sauteed onions and arugula in a walnut vinaigrette and roasted butternut squash.

3) In all honesty this came out okay. Not superb or tear-inducing. I admit I was neglectful of the sauce. I should have reduced the wine down more before adding the stock, and the seasoning was underdone. Next time...

Quickie food notes

Once again Michael Ruhlman has a great post on small gadgets that make a huge difference in the kitchen. Just like most things in life the same goes for cooking; the proper tools make it that much more fun/easy.

Ruhlman's blog

Yankee magazine also did a really neat article on a small town in Northern-ish Vermont called Wolcott. It is how the town has gone green/self-sustainable/locally sourced/etc and is succeeding at it.

Wolcott Vermont in Yankee magazine

Why turkey is like Chinese take-out

Turkey Day has come and passed, tummies have been stuffed, and pants un-done to make room for more pie. It is great to sit down and know that an amazingly high percentage of the rest of our country is doing the same thing with basically the same food on the same day. Pretty uniting, eh?
I have decided that turkey is magical. Magical in the same way that Chinese take-out containers are; you know the white ones that rice comes in? Yeah, the little box that makes you disappointed that "that was all you got" somehow spills forth enough rice to feed a small third world country. Don't know how they do it, but its magic for sure. Turkey's magic is still food-based but it comes in the form of enticing you even deeper into the pits of gluttony. It isn't malevolent, but simply wants to share all it's tryptophanic delights with you and it only has a day or two to accomplish this.

This is actually the answer to the question that we all mutter/curse/whine at some point on Turkey Day: "Why did I eat so much?" Turkey magic. Duh!

For me personally the magic while at the table is pretty standard, but its later that the juice (or perhaps gravy is more appropriate in this situation) really gets poured on. The turkey is still on the counter or tented under foil in the fridge. Purely wonderful elves have done the dishes and family/guests are spread throughout the house making very odd digestion noises, sometimes no so quietly. And then you hear this quiet voice in your ear, that little knock-knock on your psyche. Come eat me. Next thing you know someone walks into the kitchen and catches you chomping madly with both hands actually in the fridge ripping chunks of cold meat from the carcass. Your shoulders are probably hunched, feet spread for balance, and one eye is open wider than the other. You might be taking the time to salt the turkey before consuming but really you are throwing pinches of salt in your mouth and mixing a la minute.

Nine guests and a twenty-three pound bird equals turkey sandwiches for days and days. And the beauty is that only three ingredients are required: turkey, bread, and mayo. Sure there are an almost infinite number of possibilities (squash makes an awesome spread) but let's not fall into the trap of over-complicating matters. Simple is perfect and it keeps the magic alive.

Radishes (and not the dried wafer salad version either!)

I am pretty sure that most, and I mean all, of us have mainly been exposed to radishes in only one form; sliced rounds on a salad. Occasionally they will be fresh, peppery, and crunchy, but the usual state of despair is dessicated, rubbery, and devoid of any flavor that you actually want to have in your mouth. I like the concept of the radish, but once I start consuming I get dubious as to why I was all excited. Don't get me wrong, I like the taste, but it seems like they should just be better.

*The lights dim, a single spot light hits the corner of the stage, and in enters the hero of our story, the Pan Braised Radish*

It never occurred to me to actually apply some heat to these little guys until I came across a recipe that did precisely just that. These are good! Wife Zube ate her first one and sorta did a double-take at the unexpected deliciousness. And another cool aspect of this is that start to finish is about 15 minutes with little attention needed. This is helpful for all you ADHD suffering cooks out there.

We had these hot as a side dish for our main meal, but I am thinking cooled down these buggers could make a cool amuse/canape/something fun to snack on.

After rinsing and trimming the root/green ends the basic goal is to make them all about the same size. Same size means equal cooking time and Grandpa doesn't get stuck with a rock hard radish in his dentures. The general dimensions vary but I would suggest taking your smallest one and halving it unless your smallest one is big then quarter it. If it is huge the 1/6th it... I'm not being that helpful here, eh? Just make them all somewhat similar. Okay...moving on.

For two eaters you most likely have 8-10 radishes cut into appropriate sized bits and now you'll need a shallot finely minced. Into a hot saute pan with a bit of oil/butter go the shallots and sweat them for a minute or so. Medium to med-high heat we don't want to scorch of shallots here. The radishes should mostly lay in a single layer and not have to compete for prime real estate in the pan. Add in the radishes (as a side note I keep starting to type turnip instead of radish) and a tablespoon of butter, or more if you are feeling naughty. Next into the mix add either chicken stock or water. Add stock/water until the radishes are half submerged (or half not submerged for you optimists out there) and simmer gently until the liquid is mostly evaporated. At this point you get to eat one to check for doneness. I recommend adding too little liquid at first and then putting more in if needed. Once the radishes are glazed in the stock/water/butter glaze shake a dash or two of red wine vinegar and chuck a small pinch of sugar in. Swirl your raddies around and let the pungent, nose-hair burning vinegar smell die down a bit. Taste to make sure you likey and serve!

Today's disconcerting thought

A friend of mine now works for a small bio-diesel plant and there primary source of oil is restaurants. They have been approaching restaurants and offering to buy their used fryolater oil in order to convert it into bio-diesel. This is taking the oil (in almost every case) away from a massive international company. This company certainly did nothing as "green", eco-friendly, or in anyway constructive. Nope, they take the used, nasty, burnt oil, filter it, and then sell it to the beef industry. Where it goes into cattle feed. And then you eat it.
Once again, please take the time to find a locally raised beef, chicken, and pork supplier. Also, as I have mentioned in the past, Hannaford Nature's Place sticker seems to be sourced from more responsible farms. A couple extra dollars spent will help a local business out and give you a much superior product.

What I should have said was...

...see you in a couple of months. My name is Zube and I am a bad summer cook. That is my confession (and I don't like olives!). Sure I marinade, grill, and all that, but there really isn't any of my soul in it. My summer cooking tends to be more mechanical than passionate, more necessity than pleasure. It is absurdly ironic that when I want to cook the least, I have the largest plethora of produce available. But that is how it is.

It isn't that I didn't eat well during the summer, but rather I ate differently. Fast and furious grilling, quick salads, and lots of marinades/vinaigrettes filled the summer months. Wife Zube made me a burger one day that made a tear fall from my eye and I had a garlic-herb-dijon, hickory-smoked prime rib at Cape Cod that made me dance a jig! (And I have totally stolen that recipe and used it at work and home.)

That being said it is the end of October, fond has sat dormant for almost 5 months, and I am cookin' again! And it feels goooooood. Yesterday I had the house to myself and spent hours prepping for a small dinner party that night. Going through the quiet mechanics of chopping, peeling, roasting, etc. just puts me at ease and sorta re-establishes my being. Sounds cheesy (we did have goat cheese...) and it is, but we all have our thing that recharges our battery. Mine happens to be standing in a kitchen for a couple of hours. Sue me.

A couple of days ago Wife Zube and I realized that we both had Thursday off and that we hadn't had anyone over for awhile. Text message sent, dinner party guest list established. What to cook? Well, in the recent past I had been politely reminded by Wife Zube that I pretty much always make some form of chicken, potato, and veg for the incoming couple. So instead we took it to Fancy Town:

Second Course (first one was camera shy)
Roasted beets and sweet potatoes with watercress, goat cheese, and walnut vinaigrette


Third Course
Spaghetti squash, scallops, red curry, and fresh basil


Fourth Course
Seared duck breast, brussel sprouts, and creamy dijon-garlic sauce


Fifth Course
Braised pork shortrib, glazed purple turnips and carrots


It is good to be back. Part of the side effect of this blog is that it pushes me to make new/different things or else face the consequences of a really boring blog. This is going to be a good winter for food, I can almost taste it.