A Blithe PALATE

Seasonal Eating Depression

S.E.D.

I suffer from it year round, living here.  Welcome to my Seasonal Eating Depression.  It occurs when I long to be conscientious and eat locally and seasonally.  You know what constitutes seasonal 'availability' here in Georgia in March?

Carrots, greens and strawberries.

That's it.  You know what just SOUTHERN California gets?  

Artichokes, Asparagus, Avocado, Beets, Blood Orange, Broccoli, Cabbage, Carrots , Cauliflower, Celery, Chard , Collards, Dates (Medjool), Grapefruit, Green Onion, Green Peas, Kale, Kohlrabi, Kumquats, Lemons, Lettuce, Mushroom, Mustard, Navel Orange, Passion Fruit, Spinach, Strawberries, Tangelos, Tangerines, Turnips. 

This doesn't consider the northern part of the state.  They get:  Almonds, Apples, Artichokes , Arugula, Asian Greens , Asian Pears, Asparagus, Avocado, Beans, Beets, Bok Choy, Broccoli, Brussels Sprouts, Cabbage, Cardoons, Carrots, Cauliflower, Chard, Cherimoyas, Collards, Cress, Dandelion/Chicory Greens, Dates, Endive, Fennel, Garlic, Gourds, Grapefruit, Green Garlic, Guava, Herbs, Horseradish, Kale , Kiwi, Kumquats, Leeks, Lemons, Lettuces, Limes, Mandarins, Mushrooms, Nettles, Olives, Onions, Oranges, Parsnips, Pistachios, Pumelos, Potatoes, Radish, Rapini , Rutabaga, Scallions, Spinach, Strawberries , Tangerines, Tomatoes, Turnips, Walnuts.  Closer to us, Florida also gets an unfair wealth of produce. 

Wanna cry with me?

Our little town has a farmer's market that runs every weekend from June through October.  We always go to support the local farmers.  Sure, the herbs are lovely to pick up fresh; but the produce they offer is your run of the mill bell peppers, beefsteak tomatoes, some bok choy and chard.  Our local farmers very seldom veer from what is familiar to the denizens; which makes perfect sense.  Why grow produce on expensive land that no one recognizes much less eat?  I don't begrudge them their livelihood in growing and bringing vegetables and fruits that their local customers want.

The grocery store offers a little more variety, but not by much; and with produce prices up almost 30 percent in the last few months, I'm not inclined to continue paying for vegetables and fruits that were grown in Chile and Argentina.  And I'm still stunned that my grocery store, in Georgia, home state of peaches, stocks peaches from other states and other countries.

But with what does that leave me?  Not a lot of choices.  I yearn for heirloom tomatoes.  I crave Seascape strawberries.  I want English peas in the spring to make  mint pea soup.  I'm getting sick of paying $4.99 for a bag of fresh herbs at the grocery store.  I would love a cutting garden for fresh flowers -- tulips are my second favorite flowers and Gerbera daisies make me swoon.

What this means, of course, is that I have to do this myself.

And I am the owner of a garden featuring six large beds with built-in, in-ground sprinklers, all within the confines of a white picket fence, courtesy of the previous homeowner.  I haven't got much in the way of an excuse not to grow my own fruits, vegetables, herbs and flowers.  When we first moved to the house, I planted Roma tomatoes, peppers and herbs.  Subsequent years found me traveling or too lazy to make an effort.  But with my friend Amanda's recent return to Georgia, I found a renewed inspiration, and a partner with whom to tend the garden.

The rosemary bush has taken over its box as have the thyme and sage.  The recent addition of curly and flat leaf parsley completes the Simon and Garfunkel song; and I reintroduced basil.  I also decided to try my hand at germinating seeds - and stunningly, they took -- so chives and Thai basil will enter the herb boxes next.  Our tomatoes from Laurel's Heirloom Tomatoes will be arriving soon:  we have Green Zebra, and Goose Creeks and Laurel herself is selecting some varieties that will flourish in our climate.  Seascape strawberries have been ordered from Raintree Nursery.  We are also planning to add blueberries and corns; it's too late for carrots this season but we'll add heirloom carrots to the garden for next March:  purplish Dragon carrots, yellow Amarillos and the Atomic Reds.  I'm thinking about artichokes, cabbages, melons and oh the list is just endless, isn't it? 

I'm hopeful that by this time next year, my S.E.D. will have been transformed into a nice little O.C.G. (obsessive compulsive gardening).  Wish me luck.

Invitation to Brunch...

Stephanie and I are co-hosting a new edition Cookbook Spotlight on April 17 with Gale Gand’s new book. 

You may remember from the last few Cookbook Spotlights that food bloggers select recipes from the same cookbook, make the dish, and blog about it.  We follow with a round up of everyone's choices and pictures.  It’s always fun and interesting to me to see what different people pick to cook or bake from the same book.

This go-round we’ve been offered a chance to cook from Gale’s new book, Gale Gand’s Brunch!

I have an extra book and would like to invite one reader to participate.

If you would like to join this food blogging event, please send me an email at ablithepalate (AT) gmail (DOT) com with your snail mail address by noon EST on Friday, March 27.  I’ll have Puggle randomly select one person to join us.  If you don’t have a food blog but would like to participate, I’ll be happy to post your blog entry here.  

Look for the event on April 17 and the round up on April 20!
 

Beef and Guinness Stew, Redux

I forgot it was St. Patrick's Day today or I would have been better prepared.  I was a little sleep-deprived:  I was on calls with colleagues in India until 2:30 am EDT, Pug was having sleep issues in between calls, and I only managed sleep between 4:30 and 7:30, when 12 week old Hoss woke, ready to play.  Then, it was time for the day job.

It's probably a good thing I don't need much sleep.  It's probably also a good thing that my sense of humor isn't tied to adequate shut eye.

Hubby called me at 4:30 and said, "Did you get my voicemail?"  No.  What voicemail?  "I left you a voicemail at 9 o'clock this morning!  It's St. Patrick's Day!"  Yes.  I remembered when I was at the grocery store an hour earlier and the  clerk pinched me for not wearing green.  Did she know how close she was to physical harm?  Oh, and I'm making chicken for dinner.  "But it's St. Patrick's Day!"  Yes, and?  "Listen to the voicemail."  Click.

I dialled voicemail.

I kid you not, this is what Hubby had the temerity to leave as a message:  "Woman of the house!  Guinness stew tonight or be prepared for a beating!"

Moments like these, I'm convinced God has a sense of humor, or is a preservationist.  How else to explain Hubby's lack of survival instinct?  How else to explain the extra cuteness which saves him from certain death?  He's watched "The Quiet Man" one too many times (Sean refers to his wife as "woman of the house" when ordering her to fetch him something in one notable scene; and in the scene where Sean drags Mary Kate back to their home, a local village woman helpfully offers him a stick with which to beat his recalcitrant wife.  They don't make movies like this anymore.).

How on EARTH am I to make a beef and Guinness stew in less than 2 hours with another grocery run required?  The trick, it appears, is to find beautifully marbled boneless chuck roast, cut the meat into relatively small pieces and pray hard.  But surprisingly, everything came together in less than 90 minutes and the meat was decidedly tender. 

Unlike last year's stew, I modified the recipe and decided not to discard the vegetables; having soaked in Guinness and beef stock for almost an hour, the leeks and mirepoix were incredibly flavorful and it seemed terrible to be wasteful so I simply added the sauteed bacon, mushrooms and shallots to the casserole.  Once again accompanied by mashed potatoes (Pug asked for rice with his stew instead of potatoes, having never fallen in love with Mommy's preferred starch), a more than lovely stew.  Of course, it would have been perfect had it been cold, rainy and misty outside instead of sunny and dry.  Or maybe because it was so achingly gorgeous outside (and the stew so delectably steeped with Guinness and stock), I could laugh off Hubby's lunatic voicemail.

That's me:  Woman of the House.

Red Velvet Hell, Part Three

When my friend Dave was five years old, he was traveling with his family through the Grand Canyon.  Whilst at a rest stop, Dave went about his business, then flushed the urinal, which promptly exploded, spraying him mercilessly with water while he screamed in terror.  Relaying the story thirty-some years later, Dave noted, "Even now when I flush, I still jump back and flinch."

Such is it for me and red velvet cake.  There's a reason the post is entitled "Red Velvet Hell." Red velvet cake is my own personal kryptonite.  In its presence, I wilt.  I die.

My experience three years ago was so traumatizing that for some time, when I saw red velvet cake, when I heard someone talking about it, when I even thought about it,  my heart would race and my skin would go clammy.  I would have visions of my four failed baking attempts --in a single day.  I remembered being curled on the ground wondering what to do about producing a red velvet wedding cake twelve hours hence. I would recall crying over broken, exploded bits of red cake fluff.

My friend Jenn, who had been roped into taste testing twelve different recipes of red velvet cake, was likewise haunted -- subsequently she was able to discern within a few bites if a red velvet cake had been made with butter, Crisco or oil.

The bride for whom I made the cake did not know about the horror for years until recently when she met up with another friend of mine who had been present through the whole trauma and my friend, upon being introduced to the woman, exclaimed, "OH!  You're the red velvet cake bride!" 

Maybe it was the distance lent by intervening years; the haze of post traumatic cake syndrome where you forget how awful it was.  Whatever the case, for Pug's birthday party, which fell on Valentine's Day, I got this idea to make vanilla cupcakes for the kids and red velvet cupcakes for the adults.

What the @#$%^&*( was I thinking?

I've had Vivian's cake; it is delicious.  It is a perfect red velvet cake.  But I must accept it is not a perfect recipe for me.

Using her recipe once again yielded disaster, late night heart palpitations and a resoundingly blue vocabulary, the likes of which can only be indulged when Pug is not around to repeat in his newly parrot-like state.  The fact is, I think I'm cursed by this recipe.  Either Vivian has omitted a step, an ingredient, or I'm just incompetent when it comes to her red velvet cake. 

The first batch came out of the oven so light and airy in texture that they exploded into bits when I attempted to upend them on to a baking rack.  You know that sinking feeling when it's ten-thirty p.m. and your time is limited because Pug's younger brother (oh, yes, the newly born 11-week old Hoss, whom I will post about another time...) is about to wake up any minute and you've got to have forty cupcakes ready the next morning?  Yeah, that feeling.

The second batch fared no better, Crayola-red in color instead of that wine dark color created by the cocoa, and surprisingly frail and withered looking.  They didn't pulverize when I popped them out on to the baking rack to cool  But when I went to peel off a cupcake paper, half the cupcake went with the paper.  The cupcake was so hole-y on the inside that had I been making French bread instead of cupcakes, I would have been elated. 

The problem I have with this cake recipe is that it goes for lightness and airiness at the expense of texture and substance.  Having made my baking bed and determined to lie in it, I chucked her recipe and began scouring the cookbook arsenal and Internet for red velvet cake recipes.

After reading through some twenty or so recipes, I began formulating my own version.  I wanted a strong, moist cake, not an ethereal puff cloud.  That meant banishing the White Lily flour and sifting just once.  I also wanted a stronger chocolate flavor so I used the good cocoa -- Dagoba, rather than Hershey's -- and lots of it.  I also can't stand the idea of Crisco so I used good rich European butter (Plugra) which is more butterfat than water.  I'm still trying to figure out the vinegar since I really couldn't taste it in the final batter, but it was a required ingredient in nearly every recipe, so why screw with something that clearly has provenance?  The final result was a rich, dark red, moist, balanced and more importantly - yummy red velvet cupcake with that distinct cocoa aftertaste.

I still have some tweaks to work out, and am intrigued enough to try again...but not so soon.  Even though the cupcakes came out lovely and got rave reviews...some wounds run really deep.  Shudder.

Popovers

Popovers remind me of my cousin Wendy, and of one of the sweetest periods in my life, when I was living and working in San Francisco.

It was a strange time:  at once unsettled and upended, yet bearing inexorably towards a very pragmatic end.  I was commuting between San Francisco and New York with stopovers in the south to see Hubby, who at the time was The Fiancé.  As we were to be married in Napa, being in San Francisco made it easier to make runs into wine country to plan and tweak the wedding. 

I have very fond, very happy memories of being in San Francisco and not a day goes by that I do not miss being there.  The city offered so much and strikes a chord in me that no other city before or since has been able replicate.  If Paris is feckless and spirited and London my soul's home and haven, then San Francisco is indelibly magical, misty and foggy, all romance and sensory overload in one sophisticated package.  I have so many beautiful wonderful memories associated with this city; of exploring it with Hubby; of eating in so many spectacular restaurants; of hanging out with beloved family; of traversing its streets with friends and engaging in earnest conversation.

Most of my time when I lived in the city was spent in Wendy's company.  I was staying at her home in Sunnyside which was high on a hill and had a great view.  One of my favorite escapades involved looking at the long, unmoving line of traffic on I-280 from her balcony and deciding not to go to work until later that afternoon.  We elected instead to settle in on the couch and watch The Haiku Tunnel.  Then too there was the night we went salsa dancing because I decided I wanted to learn how to dance and Thursday night was Salsa night at a local club.  I don't know why I torture myself (or others) with this continued desire to learn how to dance.  I lack timing and I have no rhythm to speak of; a dance instructor was once rendered speechless by my inability to wiggle my hips ("But you're a woman!  It should be natural for your hips to sway!").  But it didn't stop me from having fun at my own expense.  Late night forays out having drinks and talking about everything under the sun.  Exploring the city from top to bottom.  And food.  Oy, if there was a food run to be made, there we were.  Crepes, lengua tacos, chocolates, sushi, In'N'Out burgers;  cooking in San Francisco was like a slice of heaven:  farmer's markets, high end grocery stores stacked with every conceivable odd item -- whatever you wanted, there you could find it.  Whatever there was to be consumed, there was my cousinly cohort accompanying me or cooking with me.

One particular excursion found us in Union Square searching for wedding dresses.  After a morning of trying on dresses and doing mental wedding gymnastics, we considered where to eat; and Wendy said decisively, "Neiman Marcus.  We need to go have their popovers."  And indeed we did:  with strawberry butter, the ginormous popovers were airy and delicate.  It was the first time I'd ever had popovers; and until this past Saturday, the last time. That was five years ago.

Another cousin has been posting pictures of her baking mania to her facebook page recently and one photo reminded me of popovers; and suddenly I was consumed with the memory of how those Neiman Marcus popovers tasted and how nice it would be to have a Saturday brunch with popovers and strawberry butter.  I hunted down the Neiman Marcus recipe, which is terribly fussy:  everything needs to be at room temperature before mixing and even then the batter needs to rest for an hour.  It can't be made the night before so requires a just-in-time approach, which doesn't make it convenient.  But oh, when those popovers came out of the oven, spilling out in soufflé-ish domes, the smell brought me back to that day in the city with my cousin and it was worth the hassle.  And smeared with strawberry butter, I could almost pretend for one moment that I was back in San Francisco with Wendy -- and maybe I was.

Will work for chocolate

A project I'm working on needed some serious graphic design layout work.  I called my friend Dani in a panic and she said, 'No problem!  I have just the guy for you -- and he'll do it for an affordable price!"

Affordable price = chocolate.

I'm serious.  The guy said he'd work for chocolate.

I have a rough estimate of what his work would cost on the open market -- so do I buy an equivalent amount in chocolate?  It's a sure bet that your run of the mill, pedestrian stuff is not considered appropriate currency; but somehow buying a block of Callebaut or Valrhona seems so prosaic.  Clearly quality should exceed quantity? 

Should I buy chocolates enlivened  by beautiful transfer sheet designs?  Or go for straight chocolate?  You could pay me with Naga chocolate bars or Manon Blancs all day long but maybe he's more of a purist.  Do varietal chocolate bars have the same caché as a truffle?  Should I make my own?  It's been a while since I've made chocolate truffles.  Which reminds me that Jenn's baby shower next week will require some sort of delicious little favor goodie and a chocolate truffle is probably the way to go.  I could make some for her baby shower and have some to send to Pierre?

I totally get being paid in chocolate.

But for Heaven's sake I have no idea how to pay in chocolate.  Anyone know the proper exchange rate of cacao to dollars?