Taste of Cambridge

Sorry for the month-plus hiatus, folks. As you might know, I have a new job, which is taking up a lot of my time. Summer also seems to have arrived and I’m kind of excited to get out and enjoy the nice weather for the 15 minutes that it’s here.

Anyway, my new job is in Camridge, a foreign land that I know practically nothing about, food-wise. Sure, I’ve been to East Coast Grill and Elephant Walk, but I have no idea what to do with myself when lunchtime rolls around or after work when I’m craving something quick alongside a cocktail. So when Taste of Cambridge rolled around, I was excited to go. Afterall, what better way to discover new haunts than to have the opportunity to try a bunch all at once. Granted, this is just a sampling, but I think you can get a good idea of what a place is like based on what they decide to offer up at an event like this.

By the time I arrived, things were in full swing. An army of grills were smoking and people were crowded around drinking beers, taking pictures and snapping up little plates of this and that.

Since I’ve just returned from eating my way through New Mexico, I set a few ground rules for myself. First, I’d only eat things that I hadn’t tried before; things that looked unique and that might lure me to a particular restaurant. Chocolate chip cookies, pizza and ribs were out. Second, I’d focus on the food, not the abundant drinks. Yes, Harpoon is a tasty beer, but I’m pretty sure it tastes the same at TOC as it does any place else and I didn’t want to waste precious stomach space.

The event was spread out over two courtyards at the Charles Hotel. I wandered around, sampling this and that, taking notes when something was particularly good. It was a hot day and gazpacho/cold soup seemed to be a favorite: Legal Seafoods had shrimp gazpacho while Ten Tables offered up a zucchini-basil soup and Cragie on Main had a Rhubarb and Hibiscus Tea Soup with buttermilk foam. The latter was a refreshing twist, cool and slightly sweet, but not overly so. The buttermilk foam offered some savoriness to the dish, while rhubarb lent a satisfying crunch.

I nibbled on a lamb sausage slider from Harvest and a veggie burger from Red Line.  But my favorite was a rather simple grilled bread topped with arugula, fresh fig and prosciutto from Bambara. The bread was chewy and crispy at the same time, imparting a bit of smokiness from the grill. Arugula cut the sweetness of the fig, while the saltiness of the meat offset the bitter greens. I could have made a meal of just that. I only indulged in one dessert: rhubarb and strawberry crisp from Henrietta’s Table. Served in a corn husk and topped with whipped cream, it burst with flavors of summer.

I have to admit there was a lot I didn’t try. With the hot and humid weather, I couldn’t stomach the idea of trying much from any of the Indian restaurants there (and I LOVE Indian food) likewise with the falafel. Grafton Street’s grilled corn, while looking delicious, also didn’t make the cut, mostly because it seemed messy and my hands were full, but also because it looked very similar to something I’ve eaten umpteen times at Toro.

I left TOC feeling that I’d accomplished what I set out for. My belly was full and I had a few new restaurants on my list of places to try. I’m not sure I could have asked for much more.

Unlikely pairings

We here in The Musing Bouche household aren’t huge pasta-eaters. We’ll have it on occasion, but the fact is that we despise jarred sauce and boxed noodles too much for pasta to ever be a quick meal (mac n’ cheese, however, is another story).  When we do have pasta,  I usually try and keep it simple- some butter and truffled cheese, anchovies or simple tomato sauce. What can I say? I don’t have a drop of Italian in me.

That said, a few weeks ago, Chicky and I were messing around with some pheasants. Wanting something flavorful, but simple, Chicky suggested that we copy one of our favorite dishes at Tapeo- the Cordoniz de Castilla, a broiled herb and garlic quail stuffed with grapes and bacon. (Side note: this dish is also on the menu at Tapeo’s sister restaurant Dali in Cambridge.) Pheasants are rather larger than quail though, and after stuffing and cooking the birds, we found ourselves with substantially more bacony-garlicky-grapey goodness than you get in the tapa-sized version. It was, however, delicious, cooking down into a lovely brown sauce that was sweet and salty at the same time.

It wasn’t long before I wanted some more of that sauce. Without a game bird on hand, I decided to make it and serve it over homemade peppered pappardelle. It was very nearly perfect. The oil from the bacon (and a little extra olive oil) soaks up the grape and garlic flavors and coats the pasta, ensuring that every bite is delicious. It is dead simple to make, and would probably liven up boxed noodles enough to be worth making as a “quick” meal.  I also imagine this would be good over roast (skin on) chicken thighs.

We’ll call this one “Pasta Castilla” after the quail dish at Tapeo.
Serves 4

4 TB olive oil
1/2 lb bacon, sliced into lardons
1 head of garlic, peeled and separated into cloves
10 oz grapes, sliced in half

Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan over medium heat. Add bacon and stir. When the bacon started to go limp and sweat its fat, add the garlic. Reduce heat to medium-low and cook, stirring occasionally until the garlic starts to turn brown and caramelize. Add the grapes and stir to combine. Cook until garlic is browned through and grapes are limp.

Serve over pasta or chicken or whatever else you think would be tasty.

Knife skills

I’ve learned a few things in my time in a kitchen. I can braise meat and separate an egg, knead dough and make preserves. And yet, somehow, I’ve escaped ever learning to properly handle the most basic of kitchen accoutrements: the knife.

This usually becomes evident during dinner parties when I’m frantically trying to mince this or slice that and end up a bleeding mess reaching for a dishtowel to stanch the blood pouring from my digits. Quite frankly, I’m amazed by the fact that I’ve never required stitches.

A few months ago I decided that enough was enough. If I’m going to play cook, I must stop lacerating myself and start lacerating my food in a way that makes it look like I didn’t use a weed wacker.

After a bit of research I settled on taking a class at the Boston Center for Adult Education. I had a few reasons for doing this: first, I was unemployed when I signed up and hence was looking for something that wasn’t too expensive; second, I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to commit to a long-term culinary school type class spanning several weeks (as it turns out, I couldn’t); and lastly, I happen to live down the street from the BCAE. Their new facility on Arlington Street is quite nice, boasting two professional kitchens, lots of light and ample work space. I figured it would be best to get my feet wet at the BCAE and then see how far I wanted to take this knife thing.

I arrived at the class a few minutes late last week- everyone already had a cutting board and a knife set up on their stainless steel work table. As I set my space up, I learned my first little trick- putting a wet paper towel under the cutting board to keep it from slipping.

My instructor was Lars Liebisch, a German-trained chef whose accent somehow made the class much more entertaining (He opened the class asking us, “What’s the first thing you do when you cut yourself?” Answer: Count your fingers.)  After learning about the three basic kinds of knives and what they’re good for and Lars set us to work practicing, though not nearly as much as I would have liked.

Remember the scene in Julie & Julia when Meryl Streep goes to culinary school and has to cut piles of onions? And then remember when Paul finds her weeping before a mound of onions almost as tall as she is and she cries, “You should have seen the way those men looked at me!” Well, that’s what I thought knife skills class would be like. In reality, it was like a few stalks of celery, a couple onions, some leaves and a potato. So, while I learned some new techniques, I need to practice, practice, practice. Sounds like I’ll be making some salads soon, eh?

Anyway, a few gems of wisdom from class:

- Don’t hold a chef’s knife by its handle, rather hold the blade with your thumb and forefinger.

- When cutting, you want to pull the knife through the food, not simply push down.

- Keep your knives sharp.

-  Avoid moving food around the cutting board with the blade- use the back of the knife to do that.

-  To transfer minced food from a knife to a bowl, don’t push your finger down the blade. Instead, hold the blade over the bowl and then pull it back keeping your finger in place. Far less mess.

- When dicing, you want to slice the vegetable, then cut into strips and then dice, Start by creating the largest/longest slices you can (ie slicing a potato lengthwise, rather than crosswise.)

Knife skills part two is tomorrow. We’ll deal with meat and fruit there. Stay tuned.

Kale salad

Confession: I’m becoming rather obsessed with kale. I get edgy if there’s none in the fridge and last week I audibly bristled when I saw it being used as a garnish on the salad bar at Lambert’s Rainbow Fruit in Dorchester-  it seemed like such a waste of a good green!

While braising is popular and the kale chip bandwagon seems to be going at full-speed (guilty here), lately I’ve been enjoying kale in its purest state: raw. Yes, you read that right. I know the idea of eating that tough green leaf probably doesn’t sound that appealing, it wouldn’t have been appealing to me if I hadn’t gone to Gennaro when I was in New York a few months ago and learned the secret to excellent kale salad.

Really, it’s quite simple: slice the kale as thinly as possible. This tempers the texture, leaving you with the leaf’s hearty flavor and crunch. And since the leaves are so um, durable, they stand up really well to dressings.

Since there’s roughly 211 miles between my apartment and Gennaro, I’ve had to recreate the salad at home. I like this recipe because it’s so simple and makes me feel like I’m eating healthily, even if I’m having it alongside a steak and potatoes au gratin. Still, should I find myself on the Upper West Side, I’ll be hitting up Gennaro again.

What’s your favorite way/place to enjoy a kale salad?

Kale Salad
serves 2

4-6 medium-sized kale leaves (you want 3 to 4 cups chopped)
5 Tb best-quality olive oil
5 Tb balsamic vinegar
3 Tb sugar
1 Tb grainy mustard
1/4 cup toasted pecan pieces
1/4 cup craisins

In a small bowl whisk together the vinegar, olive oil, sugar and mustard. Set aside. Wash the kale and cut off the tough stem where the leaf ends. Slice the leaf crosswise as thinly as possible. Place in a medium to large-sized salad bowl and add dressing, tossing well. Add pecans and craisins. Toss well and serve.

Birdseed bars

I’ve been exercising a lot lately, which partially accounts for lack of blogs I suppose. At least three days a week I’m up at 6:15 and at the gym for 7 a.m. “bootcamp.” It kicks my butt, which is pretty much what I need.

They say that you shouldn’t work out on an empty stomach, and in my case I’ve learned from experience that I have to have some sugar in me beforehand. Otherwise, dizziness and fainting ensue, and I really don’t enjoy being that girl. So I try to grab something on the way out, usually a bar of some sort (Luna, Lara, whatever…) I also try and grab something afterwards and on occasion I need something to tide me over between meals…. the result is that I can end up spending $10-$15 a week on “bars.”

So I was kind of excited when Deb at Smitten Kitchen posted a recipe for thick, chewy granola bars that she’d adapted from the King Arthur’s Flour site. I tried them the way they were, and they were fantastic, but not entirely to my liking. So I tinkered with the recipe, cut out the corn syrup, switched to brown sugar and reduced the butter. I also added more peanut butter and experimented with adding mashed bananas… and after much trial and error I think I’ve got it. These are reasonably healthy: they’ve got a dose of sugar for quick energy at the beginning of your workout, but lots of nuts (ie protein) to sustain you through a 90 minute bike ride or yoga class or whatever. I wouldn’t call them low-fat, but they’re full of good fats and whole grains and since you make them yourself, you know exactly what’s in there.

These are a cinch to make: about 10 minutes of mixing ingredients, 40 minutes of baking and then a few hours of letting them sit on the counter and cool. Chicky and I call them birdseed bars cause with all the nuts and seeds that’s kind of what they look like. But they taste much better- I think. I’ve never actually eaten birdseed. Anyway…

Birdseed bars:
Makes 12-16 depending on how you cut them.

1 2/3 cups quick oats
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp cinnamon
2-3 cups dried nuts/fruit (I always use three cups and enjoy a combination of pepitas, sliced almonds, flax seeds, sunflower seeds, chocolate chips, shredded coconut and wheat bran. Feel free to use whatever you like or have in your cabinet)
1/2 cup natural peanut butter (put in the microwave for 15 seconds to soften it up)
4 Tb melted butter (you can also substitute a mashed banana here, or halve the water and the butter and use a banana)
1/4 cup honey, maple syrup or agave nectar
4 Tb water

Preheat oven to 350.

Mix the dry ingredients together in a large bowl and stir well. Add the wet ingredients and mix well. The mixture should be the consistency of mud. Spray a 9×9 pan with cooking spray and line with a sheet of parchment paper that comes up two opposing sides of the pan. Pour in your bar mixture and press firmly and evenly  into place with the back of a spoon.

Bake for 40-50 minutes until the edges are just golden brown. Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely. You can let them cool in the pan or pull up the edges of the parchment to remove the whole panful of bars, which will cool them faster. Once they are completely cool, use a serrated knife to cut bars of your desired size. (Note: The bars will crumble if you try to cut them before they’re completely cool. If you have issues, try putting the pan in the fridge for a half hour or so.)

Store in an airtight container, or in the fridge.

For my bar crazy friends, Carrots N’ Cake also has a few “bar” recipes that I have yet to try, but that you also might like. Go here and here and here.

Using your noodle

I’m not one for kitchen gadgets, I’ve never understood things like can colanders or battery powered corkscrews and for years, I was sure that my $30 hand mixer was all I needed to get things done. That is until last year, when some relatives were getting ready to move to Singapore and offered up their KitchenAid mixer. OMG! This thing has revolutionized my baking, mostly because I don’t mind actually beating together butter and sugar “until light and fluffy” or mixing eggs “until they stand in stiff peaks.” In past a past life this would have resulted in something akin to tennis elbow… now I just turn the KitchenAid on and let it do its thing.

Said relatives also threw in some pasta rolling accessories, which have largely sat idle in my cupboard for the past year. That is until about a month ago when a friend of Chicky’s brought us some ground venison. Chicky decided to make a venison Bolognese, and I was determined to find a pasta worthy of that special sauce. Pappardelle happens to be a favorite of mine, so I  looked at the pasta attachments, did some cookbook research and decided to go for it.

I started with Jamie Oliver’s basic pasta recipe- a pound of flour and five eggs. I threw the stuff into the mixer, attached the dough hook and in minutes I had dough.

The dough had to chill an hour, and then I cut in into pieces about the size of my hand and passed them through the pasta roller attachment on my KitchenAid. Twenty minutes later, pretty much every surface in my kitchen was covered in fresh cut pappardelle. (You may want to set up a drying area/rack ahead of time. And no, your clothes drying rack is not a good idea. Trust me.)

While the first recipe was good, I thought the pasta could use some more oomph… the noodles were a bit bland and got kind of poofy when I cooked them for the recommended six minutes. So, I adapted another Jamie Oliver recipe that called for two eggs and five egg yolks (I saved the whites and used them in an omlet after my workout the next morning). My flour was a bit off in this recipe: I started with a pound and then had to add a bit more because the dough was substantially wetter. I also added a bit of salt, to offset the egg flavor. This noodle was much better, more flavorful and stuck together better when cooked. One you’ve mastered basic pasta, the possibilities are endless- Oliver suggests adding beets or spinach. Lemon zest and cracked pepper sound good to me. Or perhaps some black olives. Or sun-dried tomatoes. Or… well, like I said, endless.

Cake!

Where have I been? No, I didn’t fall into a ricotta-induced coma…

A few of you might have seen a Tweet or Facebook update a few weeks ago about my plans to bake some cakes. Well, bake I did… many. That’s them up there, as well as a couple of trifles and some bread puddings. (The cakes were for a St. Patrick’s Day breakfast here in Boston… a favor for some friends.)

To be honest, the friends asked for desserts. Why I honed in on cakes, I’m not exactly sure. I think it’s because there’s something so satisfying about making them: all that work and in the end you have this gorgeous frosting-clad structure. Truth be told, I’m not one to brag about my baking skills. That’s actually one of the reasons I decided to take on this challenge: I wanted to improve the consistency of my cake baking skills, to really understand what goes on when you bake cakes. Too many times I’ve committed to making cakes for birthdays or parties and then had to bake two of them because I messed the first one up. I messed up a few this this time, which is why I made the trifles… no one can see the mistakes!

In the end I had eight cakes:

- Chocolate grasshopper (chocolate with mint frosting)
- Orange creamsicle (vanilla with creamy orange frosting)
- Chocolate with cream cheese frosting
- Vanilla with caramel frosting
- Chocolate with caramel frosting
- Coconut
- And two Boston cream pies

I dug deep into the family archives for a few of these: namely the Boston cream pie and the caramel frosting. The cream in the Boston cream pie recipe is a custard that’s been handed down by AT LEAST five generations of women in my family (interestingly, all along the matrilineal line). And the caramel frosting recipe came straight from my grandma’s kitchen in North Carolina. (Sorry, I don’t think I can share those, but if you really want them let me know. I might make an exception.)

Perhaps the most useful resource was The Grit cookbook. I’ve had this baby for several years: a friend turned me onto it for their killer salad dressing recipe back when I was living in Orlando. I honestly never thought that a vegetarian cookbook would become one of my staples, but when I was thinking that I wasn’t thinking about cakes being vegetarian. And they do have some absolutely fantastic layer cake ideas.

However, I didn’t have as much luck with putting The Grit’s cakes into practice as I would have liked. They seemed too light and delicate; they broke too easily. So while I used their frosting ideas, I turned to other resources for the cakes, namely The America’s Test Kitchen Baking book (much thanks to @cavecibum for pointing me to it in my recent cookbook buying binge!) and (I’m almost embarrassed to admit) Martha Stewart.

I used the America’s Test Kitchen recipe for my chocolate cake, which entailed making a kind of chocolate pudding and then combining that with the egg/sugar mixture and the flour/baking powder one. I got turned onto the Martha Stewart recipe that I used for my vanilla cakes while searching for a red velvet cake recipe. I ultimately decided against that and went for a coconut layer cake instead. I liked the way that the yellow cake layers came out that I decided to use them for all my “vanilla” cakes. (Oh and seriously, try that coconut cake recipe. It’s KILLER. Like crack.)

I tried to break up the baking: one afternoon for vanilla cakes, one afternoon for chocolate ones, one day of making frosting and assembling the cakes and one morning of making bread puddings and trifles. It went pretty well, my kitchen looked only moderately disastrous and I was just marginally covered in flour, eggs and custards. Most importantly though, the cakes were a hit and I’m fairly certain that the next time I commit to baking a cake I’ll only have to do it once.

Little Miss Muffett

Haha, that’s what I felt like making Five Minute Ricotta last night. But omg it was so easy and the results so astounding, I may never buy the pre-packaged stuff ever again!

I got turned onto this recipe from a tweet by Ruth Reichl (Twitter is both cool and scary… on one hand it makes it seem like the former Gourmet editor and I are like super close, swapping recipes and the such. “Oh yeah, I got this recipe from Ruth.” Until I have to admit that “I follow her” and then I just sound like a stalker. Anyway…)

Back to ricotta! So yeah, it’s super easy. And though I’m the kind of person who shuns cooking in a microwave (mine primarily heats water for tea), somehow using a microwave in this instance seems ok. Perhaps it was this tidbit on the Serious Eats’ Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Ricotta article: “Unlike a stovetop, which heats the milk only from the bottom, a microwave heats the milk evenly from all sides, preventing both burnt-on milk proteins, and the chance of a dangerous boil-over.”

See, using my microwave isn’t just quicker, it’s also smarter!

Ready to try it yourself? Here’s what to do: Take three cups of fresh, whole milk and put them in a microwave safe glass container (I used a mason jar). Add a pinch of salt and three tablespoons of vinegar. Put in the microwave for two to four minutes, until bubbles just start to form on the edges of the milk. You’ll actually be able to see the curds and whey separate… if they haven’t done that, put it in for another 30 seconds or so. Then, remove the container from the microwave and pour the mixture through some cheese cloth (or coffee filters or food-safe paper towels). You can drain a short period of time for creamy ricotta or overnight for something thicker.

Oh and if you don’t have white vinegar, buttermilk or lemon juice will also work.

chain reaction

There are many things I love the internet for. It allows me to read the newspaper without walking down four flights of stairs to pick it up off the front step, answers almost any question I have about the universe (thanks, Google!) and lets me keep up on the latest episodes of The Colbert Report even though I don’t have a TV. But I think the thing I love most about the Internet is how it’s changed the way I eat, exposing me to new recipes and restaurants I never would have found on my own.

Case in point: Last week I was perusing Twitter when something written by CarrotsNCake caught my eye. The tweet included a link to her blog and 15 minutes later, I was still reading (What can I say? She writes well and her fitness goals are similar to mine!). Anyway, in a few posts she raved about these kale chips she’d made, basically saying, “Kale Chips Rule!” Now, I don’t believe everything I read on the internet, but I happen to like kale a lot. And the idea of kale baked into a crunchy chip sounded pretty good, and pretty healthy, which is a bonus for me these days.

The next day I came home from the market armed with kale. I put in on a baking sheet with some cooking spray, sprinkled it with sea salt and olive oil and popped into a 350 degree oven for 20 minutes. WOW! It was indeed crunchy like a potato chip, but with this intense kale flavor… The closest thing I can think of comparing it to is a sheet of nori (which I also happen to love eating like potato chips).

I had some people over that night and put out a plate of kale chips for people to nibble on- they disappeared like Bud Lights at a Sox game. I was kind of surprised. I mean, I know I have a rather adventurous palate, but I didn’t think kale chips would be so popular. I also told a friend about this recipe find- she promptly tried her hand at them and sent me a text, “Kale Chips Rock!”

What I love about this story (and getting back to my original point) is that the recipe Tina over at Carrots ‘N Cake originally posted is from allrecipes.com. She shared them with her many readers, including me, and now I’m passing it on to you all, who might in turn tell someone else. It’s a little internet chain reaction that’s left us all slightly better off.

Pimento Cheese

I don’t know that I’ll ever forget the first time I ever saw pimento cheese. I was a northern bred 11-year-old, in North Carolina for my first extended stay. I was going to camp and when lunch rolled around I expected tuna, or chicken salad or cold cuts. Instead, I got pimento cheese- a combination of sharp orange cheddar, mayonnaise, Tabasco sauce and diced pimentos (those little red things that come inside martini olives). It was heaven. And unlike so many childhood favorites like Kool-Aid and Ring Dings, this one still tastes good.

Southerners have an intimate relationship with this stuff, the recipe for which varies from family to family. But get much north of Tennessee and pimento cheese gets as rare as red dirt and Nehi. I remember as an adolescent being so blown away pimento cheese that it was one of the first things I showed my mom when I got home. But she didn’t share my affinity for “cheese salad,” so the sandwich became a summer treat. After I stopped going to camp, I forgot about the stuff for years.

I got a hankering for it a few days ago, and was delighted to find pimentos in the pickle aisle at my grocery store- though I have no idea what else you use them for (any suggestions? Please leave ‘em in the comment section!). I had people over for dinner that night and they were pretty blown away, which is awesome, cause this stuff is really easy to make.

The thing about pimento cheese is that it’s versatile. You can slap it between to pieces of white bread for a quick lunch or tea sandwich. Or put a bowl of it out with crackers and veggies and let it act as a dip. The Varsity in Atlanta serves it on hotdogs and cheese burgers. This week, I slathered it on thin slices of bread and popped them in the oven just long enough to get melty and delicious. Then this morning, I mixed it into an omelet. Go ahead, give it a try.

Pimento Cheese:

1 lb grated sharp orange cheese
2 oz diced pimentos (half of a 4 oz jar)
Mayonnaise (low-fat is ok)
A few dashes Tabasco sauce (or your favorite hot sauce)

Mix the pimetos and cheese in a bowl and add enough mayonnaise to keep it all together (so it’s the consistency of chicken salad). Add a few dashes of Tabasco, a sprinkle of black pepper and you’re good to go.