Passover Lunches 2011

Passover (in Hebrew, Pesach) is every foodie's nightmare and paradise. Celebrating the exodus of the Israelite people from slavery in Egypt, this holiday comes with biblical restrictions on food, namely, the elimination of all wheat, barley, oats, spelt, and rye from a Jew's possession and diet (with the sole exception of matzot, which is required eating).

Beyond these 5 species comes a plethora of other forbidden foods. Some are cultural (by way of Ashkenazic tradition) and some are the result of food additives derived from the biblically and culturally prohibited foods. The latter never ceases to impress upon me the sinister lack of transparency in the processed food market. When dried fruit, frozen fish fillets, and butter are not kosher for Passover, you really have to wonder.

In any case, I did a lot of cooking during Pesach, seeing as how I could use nothing I'd prepared and frozen before Passover in my non-Passover-ready kitchen. Unfortunately, there was much hectic haste over the holiday, so these are the only foods that I photographed:

Spicy Southwestern Quinoa Salad

Homemade Trail Mix

Cheese Latkes

A Birthday Tea

The Gastronomist Economist's Fabulous Pink Lady Cake

This past Saturday was the Gastronomist Economist's birthday, and we celebrated on Sunday with an afternoon tea. The GE made her own cake, which was a fabulous confection featuring cake layers made with strawberry puree swathed in rich buttercream.

Planning the tea party was a lot of fun in itself. Tea party food should be individualized, tidy, and require no utensils. Bonus points for bento-esque cuteness. Keeping these principles in mind, the GE and I settled on the following menu:

Honey Almond Granola

Why buy cereal when you can make a tastier, cheaper, heartier version at home? This batch has dried blueberries, cherries, and cranberries in addition to pumpkin seeds, almonds, and 7-grain rolled flakes.

Pasta with Lentils

Still working on the Feburary backlog.

Quick, easy recipe from Mark Bittman. Basically, cook brown lentils with onions, carrots, and tomatoes and toss with pasta.

Sailor Jacks

I like baking a large batch of muffins, and freezing them so I can pack one each day for a snack at work. This particular muffin recipe is courtesy of King Arthur's Whole Grain Baking and is supposed to be a variation of an Oregon speciality called a Sailor Jack.

I skipped the lemon glaze I was supposed to drizzle on the bottoms of these muffins, but they were sweet enough with a deep molasses flavor punctuated by raisins. 

Mah Poh Tofu + Steamed Broccolini

Although I made this for dinner back in Feburary, I just made it again for Shabbat dinner last week. So.

This recipe comes from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything Vegetarian. Bittman swaps crisply browned tempeh crumbles for the traditional pork. The dish is saucy, savory, and perfectly complemented by steamed brown jasmine rice and a simply steamed green. Below is the broccolini that came in my farm box back in February; last week I had baby bok choy.

Yeasted Meringue Coffee Cake: Daring Bakers March 2011 Challenge

 

The March 2011 Daring Baker’s Challenge was hosted by Ria of Ria’s Collection and Jamie of Life’s a Feast. Ria and Jamie challenged The Daring Bakers to bake a yeasted Meringue Coffee Cake.

February Daring Bakers' Challenge: Panna Cotta & Florentine Cookies

The February 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Mallory from A Sofa in the Kitchen. She chose to challenge everyone to make Panna Cotta from a Giada De Laurentiis recipe and Nestle Florentine Cookies.

Winter Stew with Sunchokes

My latest farmbox brought with it sunchokes, carrots, and celery, which sounded to me like the basis for a tasty winter stew. Deborah Madison provides an earthy recipe with herbs and red wine and suggests that the addition of a pastry lid would be a fine one.

Maple Sweetened Carrot Cupcakes

Mini Maple Carrot Cupcakes

My friend's daughter just turned two, and it seemed like a fitting occasion for making Martha Stewart's Maple-Sweetened Carrot Cupcakes. The recipe, found in Martha Stewart's Cupcakes, is introduced with the proposition that it be served at the birthday party of a baby or young child because a) it has no refined sugar, and b) adults will like it.

Vegetable Tempura



The wrong way to serve tempura.



Saturday night, the Gastronomist Economist and I convened for our monthly cooking session. I planned to make cupcakes for a birthday party, so I let the GE pick our dinner menu. "Let's make tempura!" she said.

I am a deep-frying newbie, having only received a deep fry thermometer a few months before. (The thermometer made its debut at Hanukkah, when I made apple fritters.) I continue to be astonished at how quickly food cooks in its hot oil bath and how delectably crisp and tender it becomes.

Daring Bakers' Challenge: January 2011

The January 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge is hosted by Astheroshe from the Blog, accro. Astheroshe chose Joconde imprime /entremets as the challenge for the month. Her challenge recipe is based on recipe from Chef John O, from The International Culinary School in Atlanta, Georgia USA.

Enchanted Broccoli Dome... er, Heap

The evening of Wednesday, January 19 marked the beginning of Tu B'Shevat, the new year of the trees.
Tu B'Shevat originally marked a new year for the purpose of calculating the age of trees for tithing but now serves as a way to celebrate the gifts of the natural world in general and trees in particular.

In the 16th century, Kabbalists created a seder for Tu B'Shevat modeled after the seder for Pesach that offers a means for discussing and contemplating the spiritual aspects of the day.

Mark Bittman Inspires a Stir-Fry

Tuesday, I ran across this article by Mark Bittman, which urges people to cook more food at home. (Amen!) Anticipating the protest "but, I don't know how to cook!", Bittman suggests that knowing three simple recipes is enough to get anyone making delicious and nutritious meals in no time at all. The three recipes?

1. a stir-fry
2. a chopped salad
3. rice and lentils

The article wasn't really a revelation for someone devoted to the art of inconvenience, but it did make me think: "Mmm. I could really go for a stir fry right now."

So, I did.

Kale and White Bean Stew and "Semi-Homemade with Inconvenience"

When I receive kale in my farm box, I usually make kale pie (from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything Vegetarian). For some reason, I don't feel the love for kale that I do for Swiss chard, which I've come to prefer even over spinach. But stick that kale in a lovely biscuity crust made with whole-milk yogurt and mayonnaise, and I can eat it every day.

Others who share my dislike of kale seem to find it edible roasted into chips, but when I received kale in my last box, I decided to try the stew smittenkitchen posted that week. Not surprisingly, smittenkitchen swapped out the kale from the original recipe for chard, so I just swapped it back.

Spanish Souffle Cake

A.k.a: Frittata in a Bundt Pan. I made this dish for a New Year's brunch because, you have to admit, it looks spectacular. With red bell peppers, kalamata olives, artichoke hearts, and a handful of cheddar, it also tastes great. The recipe comes from Earthbound Farms' cookbook Food to Live By.

The one trouble I keep having with the recipe is that no matter how well I butter the pan, the frittata ends up sticking, leaving large chunks (often the entire middle section) stuck inside. Since the presentation is the point of baking a frittata in a bundt pan, I'm tempted to give it up as a lost cause. However, I think the problem may lie in my particular pan, which has sharp edges and a deeply fluted interior. I think I'll give the recipe one more chance in a rounder, less cathedral-like mold. Either that, or I'm going to have to come up with something good to put in the middle to hide the carnage.

Chorizo-Spinach Sopes



Chorizo-Spinach Sopes. As you can see, I so anxious to sink my teeth in that I forgot to take the photo.
Better late than never!


Saturday night, my pan-pal the Gastronomist Economist and I made a dinner using recipes from Terry Hope Romero's Viva Vegan!, a cookbook with vegan latin food recipes. Rather than taking meaty Latin recipes and swapping in beans for the pork, Romero offers several recipes for home-made seitan. Unlike any seitan recipes I've seen before, the recipes include both chickpea flour and nutritional yeast in the gluten flour mix. While I avoid commercial meat substitutes (too much sodium and way too many unpronounceable ingredients), I was intrigued by Romero's seitan preparation.

Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

Needing to use up some delicious dark chocolate frosting that was languishing in my freezer, I made a batch of Martha Stewart's Chocolate Chip Cupcakes.

Here they are, fresh out of the oven. I also made a batch of minis, but this recipe doesn't really lend itself to mini-cupcakes; the chocolate chips in the batter overwhelm the small bites.

An Abundance of Apples

For some reason, my mother amasses large quantities of food that she then needs to foist on me. Recently, my mother bequeathed pounds and pounds of apples to me. Since I already have quite enough eating apples from my Full Circle Farms box, I began using apples in every recipe I could.

First, I made applesauce.