Market Weekend

I’m not one for getting up early on the weekend, but when I woke up Sunday I nearly jumped out of bed, having decided that I was going to trek down to the Ballard farmers market. I have to admit that I was a little disappointed. The Ballard market is definitely not the type of farmers market I was hoping for, where you can walk away with a grocery bag over-flowing with fresh produce for under ten dollars. As my cash on hand was exactly ten dollars, I came away lighter than hoped, but still excited about my purchases; wild nettles, green garlic, and dandelion greens. I’ve been tempted to yank up a few of the dandelions in my yard, but I was a bit nervous. Until I do a bit more research, I’m sticking with the cultivated leaves. The nettles were by far the most exciting purchase, and the first on the stove. They are the subject of may weekend failure and weekday redemption.

Nettles are a curious vegetable, the kind that makes you wonder “who the hell thought of eating this?” The bag of leaves came bundled up in a plastic bag, tightly tied. These are after all the same little buggers that leave you with a nice red and stinging rash. So how on earth are you supposed to eat them? More importantly, who wrote the Wikipedia entry on Nettle:
“Nettle is the common name for any faggot with abnormally large ears who attends West Forsyth High School. It is hated by all man kind and if you see this creature look away or you will go blind at the sight of the uglyness, after wash eyes for 10 to 15 minutes. you are recomended to run and contact authorities immediately if this zoo animal is spotted. If you see its girlfriend well im sorry because you are already blind beacuse this creature, commonly known as jacque brown, is even more hideous than a nettle. A nettle is a noob at halo, the biggest ass hole in the world, has no friends, and yet he still shows up uninvited to places. The extermination of every nettle will begin tommorrow and will be called the nettlecaust.”



Yes kids, that’s the beauty and bane of open source. Unfortunately it did not explain why cooking leaves them harmless, but I gather it has something to do with the acids.
For this foray I decided to make a Wild Nettle and Chive soup, based on a recipe in Jerry Traunfeld’s The Herbfarm Cookbook. I began by blanching the nettles for two or three minutes, then draining and squeezing out as much moisture as possible. From that point on they can be treated just like spinach. I made most of the soup at home, but held of on adding the nettle and chive until just before serving, at my friend Jeff’s. the recipe says to puree it in a blender, but Jeff doesn’t have one, and I figured why bother lugging a blender around, I have my little stick blender, I’m sure it can do the trick….no, no it can’t. The little guy just wasn’t up to the task of cutting through the fibrous vegetables, and the end result was a stringy, albeit bright, almost grassy springtime soup. Taste=great, texture=frightening, like some sort of alien gruel. I’m sure the bright green color didn’t help dispel the idea that this was something out of Star Trek.


Not surprisingly, I had plenty of leftovers to cart home, so tonight I decided to set things right, and break out the Osterizer. It made short work of the pulp, and after adding a bit more vegetable broth (remember, according to Alton Brown, if it doesn’t have bones, it just isn’t stock) it hit the perfect pureed soup texture. I sautéed a piece of salmon with some of the green garlic and a Hawaiian butter sauce (it had papaya! Not sure how it came to be in the fridge, or which former housemate put it there, but it had clearly been neglected). The end result was a qualified success. I felt redeemed that the soup turned out as it should, or close enough given a few ingredient additions and substitutions.
I think next time I will leave the soup rustic, adding a few potatoes and not blending it at all. Also a bit of roasted garlic or a woodsy mushroom (rather than the white buttons that the recipe called for) would add a bit of earth to the grassy nettle flavor.
Next weekend I’m going back to the market for the fiddlehead ferns!!!



Wild Nettle and Chive Soup
-adapted from Spring Sorrel and Chive Soup in The Herbfarm Cookbook by Jerry Traunfeld

2 tbls unsalted butter
1 medium onion, chopped
4 cups vegetable broth ( I added another cup on attempt two)
8 oz white button mushrooms, chopped
2 tblsp long grain white rice (I used Jasmine)
large bunch Nettle (don't touch until cooked!)
1 cup snipped chives
pepper
Quark (the recipe called for Creme Fraiche, but I've been experimenting with the European cheese Quark, similar to Ricotta in texture, but a bit tangier)

Sautee the onions, add broth, mushrooms, rice. Bring to a boil, then simmer 30 minutes. During this time bring a large pot of salkted water to a boil, then use tongs, gloves, or just dump the nettle into the water and blanch for 2-3 minutes, stirring. Drain then squeeze out as much moisture as possible and set aside. Puree half the nettle and chive with half the soup, empty to another saucepan and puree the remaining (unless you have a jumbo sized industrial blender, or one of those crazy professional stick blenders the size of a Vespa). Bring the soup back to a simmer, serve and enjoy (adding a dollop or two of Quark or Creme Fraiche- fancy french sour cream)

As I said, I would substitute a woodsier mushroom and perhaps add a bit of roasted garlic.

A New Direction for Aufgefallen

I find lately that much of my expendable brainpower is focused on food. I dream up recipes, I read food essays, I Tivo the food network as much as my roommates will tolerate, and I surf a growing list of food blogs. Oh, and I cook, let’s not forget that. To be honest I do not cook as often, as adventurously, or as successfully as I would like, but I think a couple of my dishes are worth repeating. And now I want to start writing about food. To that end I intend to start including recipes, photos and ruminations on all things cuisine.

My first foray into the world of reading food writing (aside from cookbooks and the NY Times) was Julie and Julia, the memoir of Julie Powell, a reluctant New York Secretary who set herself the mission of cooking her way through Julia Childs’ Mastering the Art of French Cooking Vol. One in one year. It is an admirable task, and to her credit she succeeded. I would not be so bold as to try the same, not only because I have absolutely no desire to eat Aspic for several weeks, but because I think the endeavor would send me over the edge. Cooking and eating can be emotional experiences, and I look to cooking as a way to unwind, a sort of meditation. I don’t think I could handle subjecting that pleasure to a timeline and recipe checklist.



This afternoon I spent a couple hours at Greenlake Park reading “A Cooks Tour” by Anthony Bourdain. I have never read anything that made me want to travel to Vietnam, but Bourdain’s ability to look past the poverty and squalor to recognize a pride and tradition that has carried the Vietnamese people through continual occupations comes close. In his words “you cannot help but be impressed and blown away by the hard work, the attention to detail, the care taken in every facet of daily life, no matter how mundane, no matter how difficult the circumstances. Spend some time in the Mekong Delta and you’ll understand how a nation of farmers could beat the largest and most powerful military presence on the planet.” His admiration for the food, the land, and the people comes through in his account. It was from Bourdain that I learned Ho Chi Minh, the Communist leader of Vietnam, was a classically trained French Chef. He had trained as a saucier at the Carleton Hotel (Paris, of Ritz Carleton fame) under the master of modern French cooking, August Escoffier.

I find that my internet browsing has shifted towards food as well. Julie Powell had initially chronicled her MTAOFC endeavor on a blog, which at the time was still relatively unknown (before we all won Time Magazines People of the Year), and the blogosphere is now littered with cool food blogs. A few I would highly recommend are Tastespotting, Becks & Posh, and Habeas Brulee. I recently discovered a wonderful blog called Fancy Toast, and was inspired by her story of an inconsolable brussels sprout. And so I have decided to try posting more about my own culinary adventures, with the hope that a) I will embark on more culinary adventures, and b) I will get back into the habit of writing regularly.

*Notes:
I should note that my former roomie Stiglesworth has started posting her recipes, and while I haven’t tried to recreate any of them, I have enjoyed reading them.

According to Wikipedia, there is little evidence that Ho Chi Minh trained with Escoffier (they say as a pastry chef) but there is a plaque on the building (now New Zealand House, the Carleton was destroyed during the Blitz).

Apparently Brussels sprout is a “countable noun,” and the plural form is Brussels sprouts. The provenance of Brussels argues against calling it a Brussel sprout, and Microsoft word doesn’t care for the habit either. Look forward to posts on bread pudding, fondant, winter wheat, the Herbfarm, my less than successful attempts to poach and egg, and the new and improved 24-hour breakfast.

A sad day in the culinary world

Sadly, the inventor of cup noodle died. We can all thank him for keeping us fed during our college years. OK, sure, I tended towards the top Ramen myself, but the pantheon of instant noodle might not exist if it weren't for Momofuku Ando, dead at 96.

A Day of Decadence

Yesterday was a fantastic day of decadence that I can ill afford but felt justified in splurging for. After a nice long lay in, I shuffled around the house for a while then bundled up (the temperature is dropping, its snowing at the moment and is supposed to freeze tomorrow) and hoped on a bus downtown. I had avoided shopping on the day after Thanksgiving, but I was interested in seeing what it was like downtown. Turns out the crowds were not too crazy, but had I been on a serious shopping trip it would have driven me mad. Still, I love living in a city with a real downtown, where the sidewalks are full of people and you can pop into a variety of shops. I limited my downtown shopping to the KCTS store (the local PBS station) for a Christmas present for Dad. After that I headed to Belltown, a neighborhood just south of downtown.

Not having shared my bed with anyone for several years (the last being Tre, who was always welcome until the nose licking became intolerable) I hadn’t felt the need to impress with my bedding. After three years of neglecting the state of my bedsheets, I was finally convinced to buy a new set when the pillowcase seam came undone in my hands. It may not seem like such a decandant thing, but new sheets are luxurious in my mind. I chose a handsome deep red with directional striped, very classy.




Continuing the day of decadence, I strolled over to Le Pichet, the French café that I’ve mentioned in the past. I love Le Pichet, but I only go there on occasion, sometimes to meet a friend, occasionally alone. This time I had a book with me and found a seat at the counter. I had the Oeufs plats, jambon et fromage, with a glass of Cote du Rhone, and finished with a frothy cappuccino. Then I went across the street to browse in the architecture bookstore. What an enjoyable outing. Nothing on it’s own was remarkable, more the combination and intention. Eating lunch in a restaurant is not remarkable in itself, nor is buying sheets. The act of setting out on a weekend afternoon to stroll through the shops, pop into a charming bistro for lunch and a glass of wine while reading, then a bit more browsing, it makes for a charming day memorable not so much for its uniqueness but for its idyllic simplicity.

Hollandaise

For some reason I was inspired to try my hand at mking a Hollandaise. It started last night with an innocent trip to the grocery store. I picked up some english muffins, and then it hit me, its been a while since I've had Eggs Benedict. Since my Breakfast Club went defunct due to the other three members leaving Seattle (two out of the country, one to Philly which may as well be). During the heyday it was a safe bet that I would have a benedict at least once a month....

So I can report that I was pleasantly surprised by the results. The sauce didn't break, in fact the consistancy was near to perfect. The flavor left something to be desired. It didn't have the piquant edge I like, probably because I didn't use enough lemon juice and didn't have any papricka. So I cheated and tried to save it with a bit of chili pepper and tarragon (which technically makes it more of a bernaise) but I added them at the end,s o they didn't really have a chance to really meld with the sauce. Still, for a first attempt, I count it a success. Unfortuantely I can't say the same for the poached eggs, a technique I am far from mastering.

discalaimer: the image isn't from my attempt, just a picture to start your mouth watering.

Cocktail science

This weekend I went to a cocktail party (featuring Budweiser Select) at a friends house. It was meant to be fancy dress, but given the mix of classy beer (I would have chosen the champagne of beers) and cocktails, I chose to dress in a short sleeve button up with a little bowtie, classy.

But on to the point of this post. Some of you may be familiar with the hilarity involved in "capping" when you hit the top of a friends freshly opened beer with your empty bottle (to avoid having the fun back-fire on yourself). The beer in your friend's hand foams over onto their hand and floor, causing hilarity and sticky linoleum. Having witnessed just such an event, we began wondering why this actually happens, what makes the beer foam over like that. Fortunately the party was full of scientists, unfortunately most of them were geologists and proved fairly useless in answering our question. The only possible option was to run a a highly controlled test in the backyard.

The first part of the test was to recreate the trick for a girl who had never seen it, but was our best hope for an explanation. Not having seen it before she of course was foolish enough to hold the target bottle...Hilarity all over her hand. We were working on two hypothesis (like I said it was official sciency business) one that it was the pressure created by forcing air into the target bottle, the other that it is the vibrations moving through the target bottle. The pressure idea was put forward by the geologists, the vibration by and architect. To test the pressure theory we tapped the top of the bottle with an open palm, the idea being that the palm would actually create a tighter seal... hence more pressure, but would absorb more of the shock and create less vibration. Unfortunately we did not account for the loss of friction in the now beer covered hand, and the application of downward force resulted in a broken bottle and beer sacrificed to the gods of science and party. At that point, fearing the loss of additional beer, we switched to a non-alcoholic beer that had rightfully been left on the back porch after it was brought to a party two summers ago. The second attempt at the palm test did not result in foamy beer.

The next test was to place the bottle onto a table and hit it with another bottle. The reason it was on a table was to remove the up and down shaking effect caused by being hit downward. On this attempt the beer (if you can call it that) did foam over, proving that it was not caused by shaking. At this point we declared vibration the likely cause and went back into the house, because even when most of the guests are architecture and geology students, you can only run highly scientific experiments in the backyard for so long without risking your party cred.

So now I ask all of you, what do you think causes the foam effect?

Turducken

Yes that's right, the holiday craze is coming to my stomach soon, thanks to the culinary skills of my friend Liz's friend Alex. Liz has a traditional urban tribe sort of Thanksgiving, and this year features the Turducken. Pictures will be posted soon.

Please note that the links bar has finally been restored, bigger and better than ever. Let this be a lesson, save your links before switching templates.

I realize my posts have been lackluster lately. I blame the fact that my computer is down and I can never remember my blog password (it's set to auto enter from my computer). I'm not sure what the problem is, but the kind folks at Apple are either charging me $377 to fix it, or telling me that it's now an expensive paperweight. It's only 4 years old, but it has been dropped onto a concrete floor, so I think I may be in the market for a new computer. Scott, any advice?