Cucumbersome » food

The Flavor Bible

britt — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 19:16:11 +0000

You must think I’m crazy. Figs and cilantro? It’s true. We made a very unscientific study of the pairing last night at dinner, and it is absolutely true. I don’t have a picture to show because, well, it wasn’t much to look at. My fig-stuffed chicken breasts fell apart in the cutting process due to my overzealous stuffing, but it was delicious. I cooked it in a pan with a creamy tomato sauce and threw on some cilantro at the end. The very best part was getting a bite of tender fig with a sprig of cilantro.
This is one of the “flavor affinities” found in my new favorite cookbook. Although it’s not so much a cookbook as an index. You just look up an ingredient and it lists all the foods that harmonize with that ingredient, including flavor trios like the one pictured above. The ideas found in the book have been based on the work of some of the most innovative chefs around, so while you see the classic combinations listed, there are also more challenging and interesting ideas.
For example, lets look at the flavor affinities for scallops. Scallops + almonds + cauliflower. Scallops + apples + tarragon. Scallops + basil + grapefruit. Scallops + bay leaf + vanilla. Scallops + fennel + orange + rosemary. Drooling yet? There are lots more. Beside that, there are tips from chefs and some of the dishes they serve. Like Maine Diver Scallops Grilled with Ruby Grapefruit, Spring Potatoes, and Basil (from Daniel Humm of the restaurant Eleven Madison Park in NYC).

It’s incredibly inspiring. Ryan and I love to cook together, but neither one of us is very interested in recipes. We just want the idea behind the dish. It’s good to know that when you deglaze a steak pan with bourbon and drizzle it over the meat, it’s exquisite. Or that if you mix basil and lemon with gin, it’s heavenly. I highly, highly recommend this book.
The Flavor Bible: The Essential Guide to Culinary Creativity, Based on the Wisdom of America’s Most Imaginative Chefs by Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg. Buy it on Amazon:

Sparkling Americano

britt — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 00:45:08 +0000

Ryan is an espresso fiend (he even has a site devoted to two of his favorite things: logo design and coffee). In the last few years, he has gone from chugging brewed coffee with cream and sugar, to drinking dry cappuccinos, to sipping plain ristretto shots of premium espresso. Are we coffee snobs? Yes, unappologetically so.
I, however, can rarely handle straight espresso. A couple years ago we heard about someone making a sparkling americano at a barista competition (yes, there is such a thing). So we have played with the idea and come up with something that I think is really delightful, and so refreshing in the heat of summer.
Pull one shot of good quality espresso for each glass you’ll be making. We used the Epic Espresso blend by 49th Parallel which works beautifully here. While the espresso is hot, stir in half a teaspoon of agave nectar (or more if you are a sugar fiend).You could really use any sweetener, but we found that honey overpowered the espresso. Agave nectar also has a much better glycemic profile than refined sugars, which means you are less likely to have a sugar crash after drinking this. Pour the sweetened espresso into a martini shaker with plenty of ice. Shake well. This quickly chills the espresso and creates a nice foam “crema”. Pour espresso into a tall glass with ice and top with sparkling water.
Alternately, if you don’t have an espresso machine at home, you could order this at a cafe. Just buy a small bottle of sparkling water and ask for a shot of espresso with a little sweetener in a glass with lots of ice. I hope you enjoy it. (We also recently made coffee smoothies with almond milk and berries. It was… strange. That one definitely needs some work.)

Scallop Ceviche

britt — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 17:04:19 +0000

On Friday night we had such a delicious scallop ceviche that I just have to share. It was my first time making it, but I’ve had it many times before. Sometimes I find that the lime in ceviche is overpowering, so I used the juice of one orange along with two limes. It was much more mellow, but still so fresh. I threw in some ripe mango, chile peppers and fresh cilantro. The scallops were sliced as thin as I could, so they “cooked” very quickly. It only sat for about ten minutes. We ate it with slices of toasted baguette and thin slices of avocado. So good. And I didn’t even have to turn on the stove or oven in our hot, hot apartment.
I got the idea from this list of 101 meals that can be made in ten minutes, which is a must-read. These are my kind of recipes – given in one sentence. Sometimes I just want the idea behind the dish, not exact quantities and timing, and these are really fantastic ideas.

Bin 941 at Home

britt — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 20:14:26 +0000

Before we moved to Vancouver I was a bit of a wuss about seafood. Especially shellfish. But we live within walking distance of the market at Granville Island. Within the first couple weeks of living here, we started bringing home beautiful tuna steaks. And frequenting a restaurant called Bin 941 for their fantastic mussels.
This weekend was another milestone in my acceptance of all things seafood. We bought fresh mussels and attempted to recreate a Bin 941 experience at home. I think it might have been better. Bin is charmingly tiny and loud, but sometimes you don’t want to sit with strangers who force you to take their leftover fries, you know? And sometimes you want to really fill up on mussels and have lots of fresh baguette to sop up the broth with.
We originally were thinking of making some sort of white wine broth, very traditional. But I clumsily tripped and smashed the wine bottle on the sidewalk. Very suave, I know. So we decided to make a coconut milk broth instead. I’m very glad it worked out that way.
I used this recipe as a general guideline but made quite a few changes. I omitted the ginger, and added some garlic, fresh chile peppers and kaffir lime leaves. And we let the broth simmer for a half hour. I think it helped the flavors really meld. And we toasted slices of a baguette (from Terra Breads) and rubbed them with a garlic clove.
I haven’t been sharing many recipes lately, but this was the probably the best meal I have ever made. For five dollars a pound, we might just be buying more in the next couple days before it gets too hot and they’re no good anymore. Maybe we’ll try to recreate Bin’s mussels in white ale with orange segments. Tonight, maybe?

Vegan Yum Yum

britt — Thu, 21 May 2009 21:31:21 +0000

These miniature napoleons with eggplant creme have been taunting me. As have most of the recipes on Vegan Yum Yum. Today we had the crash potatoes, and I’m dying to make the eggplant and pinenut rolled lasagna. Looks like a trip to the Granville Island market is in my future.

Photo by Lolo, of Vegan Yum Yum

Ginger Ale-ment

britt — Wed, 06 May 2009 16:11:41 +0000

Sorry for the lack of posts here. I’ve been feeling kind of awful – washing down gravol with ginger ale, that sort of thing. (And no, I’m not pregant.) But I have learned something very important that I will share with you. Are you ready for this?
There are different kinds of ginger ale.
Maybe this isn’t so shocking to you, but I had no idea.
Admittedly, my knowledge of soft drinks and sparkling beverages in general is limited to the tonic water I drink with gin and lime. I have found Canada Dry and Schweppes ginger ales to be big doses of sugar with very little effect on my nausea. A few days ago, I tried to make my own ginger ale by boiling down some fresh ginger and water sweetened with agave nectar and adding it to sparkling water. It didn’t really work. In researching how to quickly make a ginger ale-like drink, I came across an a “recipe” that called for mixing cola with sprite (Ta-da! It’s the color of ginger ale!). Not really what I had in mind.
In any case, I do recommend these four ginger ales that are significantly more gingery and less sugary:

Santa Cruz Organic Ginger Ale, here. Although these are all good, this one is my favorite. It is pleasantly spicey and incredibly soothing.
Bottle Green Lemongrass & Ginger Sparkling Pressé , here
Blue Sky Jamaican Ginger Ale, here
Boylan Bottleworks Ginger Ale, here

Any of the above make an ideal gift for an ill loved one. I would know, as Ryan has been buying me samplings of each. So sweet!
For those of you with little or no interest in ginger ales (if that’s even possible!), I will have some more interesting, less nausea-related posts up over the next few days.

Meme: Wabi-Sabi

britt — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 19:09:16 +0000

(Photo: Tonya Goodwin, via Poetic Home)

Ryan and I are book hoarders. Our shelves are filling up fast. As part of our recovery plan, we finally signed up for library cards last night. One book that jumped out at me was The Wabi-Sabi House – The Japanese Art of Imperfect Beauty by Robyn Griggs Lawrence. I had never heard the term “wabi-sabi” before. Then today I saw this article on apartment therapy. Apparently the magazine Sköna Hem just did a feature on the concept a few months ago.
Wabi has to do with humility and simplicity while sabi refers to beauty in the natural flow of time. It is “underplayed and modest, the kind of quiet, undeclared beauty that waits patiently to be discovered”.
It’s a whole philosophy and way of life. This may seem incredibly shallow, but I’m just happy that I never have to use the phrase “shabby-chic” ever again.
Check it out on Amazon:

Sandwich Time

britt — Thu, 01 May 2008 15:57:24 +0000

During the renovations, we didn’t eat well at all. We frequented A&W (it’s one of the only fast food places here), which is a very sad thing. No one should frequent A&W. Mostly we would grab a bacon ~~and~~ n’ egger (on a wheat bun, with tomato) in the morning. One morning, shortly after we had moved in, I was rushing around to get ready and grumbling about how I wasn’t going to have time for breakfast and I was craving a bacon n’ egger.
Ryan surprised me with a delicious toasted sandwich with a fried egg and tomato. It was so good.
Since then, we have perfected the breakfast sandwich. In our minds, anyway.
We buy kalamata olive bread. At first we could only get it at Safeway but the other stores must have missed our business because they soon started to offer olive breads too. When toasted, it has the best crunch to it. We spread a smidge of mayo (real mayo – don’t give me any of that “salad dressing”) and then layer on a fried egg, two slices of calabrese salami (good and spicy) and a couple thin slices of tomato. And a little salt and pepper.
Best. Breakfast. Ever.
We had it this morning for the first time in a while (thus the passionate description). I decided that I would make a second one and take a picture to post here.
But, um, a dog took it.

Tiramisu!

britt — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:26:44 +0000

The onesies that we made for Paul and Gen went over quite well at the shower, especially the tiramisu one. So I made up a few more and listed them on etsy (See link in sidebar).

In honor of this new listing, I want to present the tiramisu recipe that inspired the onesie.
This recipe is from the Surreal Gourmet show on the Food Network. He layers it into a tea cup and melts chocolate on top and lets it harden in the fridge to make it look like a cup of coffee. Our coffee cups are very, um, utilitarian and not conducive to delicious looking dessert presentation so I made mine in martini glasses and chose to sprinkle the top with cocoa instead of the melted chocolate. One less pot to clean, you know? Anyway, Ryan said it was the best tiramisu he ever had. And it was ridiculously easy so I will definitely make it again. The mascarpone and kahlua made it a little pricey, but worth it.

Cup O’ Tiramisu

3/4 cups espresso
1/4 cup Kahlua
16 x ladyfingers
3 x egg yolks
4 tbsp sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup mascarpone cheese
1/4 lb. dark chocolate, chopped into tiny bits

Directions:

In a small bowl, mix espresso and Kahlua. Dip ladyfingers in the liquid, hold for 5 seconds, then reserve on a plate
In a mixmaster, or with a whisk, beat egg yolks, sugar and vanilla until ribbons form. Fold in mascarpone. Reserve.
In each of 4 coffee cups place 2 soaked ladyfingers in the bottom. Then add 2 tablespoons of mascarpone mixture. Add 2 more ladyfingers and another layer of mascarpone. The last layer should be approximately 1/2 inch below the rim of the cup. Smooth the top layer with the back of a spoon. Refrigerate for 15 minutes.
In a bowl over simmering water, melt chocolate. Pour a 1/8-inch layer of chocolate over the top layer of the mascarpone mixture and return to refrigerator for another hour so that the chocolate hardens.

(from the Surreal Gourmet)

Blue Dot Test

britt — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 22:03:56 +0000

Have you ever wondered why some people like bland, unseasoned food? Ryan and I err on the side of overspicing. We love rich espresso, dark chocolate, kalamata olives, aged white cheddar, garlic, chili peppers, curry, and dry red wine. This, we just discovered, is because we are non-tasters.
The book Harmony on the Palate, which is primarily about wine pairings, has a test you can take to find out if you are a non-taster (25% of the population), a medium-taster (50%) or a super-taster (25%). Essentially, our perception of taste is based on how many taste buds we have. Super-tasters have more taste buds than medium- and non-tasters. To a super-taster, the things Ryan and I like to eat are too intense.

The test is simple: Place one of those ring stickers used to reinforce the holes in binder paper on your tongue, near the front but not on the tip. Then use a q-tip to put a drop of blue food coloring inside the circle. Then you need a magnifying mirror (or a mirror and a magnifying glass) and look at your tongue. Pink dots appear through the blue dye. These are the fungiform papillae that contain taste buds. So you just count up how many of the pink dots you can see inside the circle. More than 35 means you’re a super-taster, 15-35 means you’re a medium taster, and less than 15 makes you a non-taster. I had about 10 which makes me a non-taster. You get a nice blue dot on your tongue when you take the test, which is a nice bonus.
So I guess this means that we can’t call people wusses for not being able to handle spicy foods because genetically, they just have more taste buds. And besides, the name “super-taster” makes them kind of sound like a hero so I wouldn’t mess with them.
The book also explains the proper way to have a wine tasting – the science behind the swish, the spit and all the other pretentious wine snobbery. I really like the wine aroma wheel. Ryan is effortlessly descriptive (see his description of my raw sushi in this post) but I need some prompting and the wheel helps. “This wine is mushroomy with a little yoghurt and the essence of cut green grass” for example. Good recipes, too. Makes a great wedding gift (that’s how we got it).
Is it too early for a glass of the red now?