At least my friends liked it.....

Unbeknown to me, there are more than one species of pine nut....who knew? From continent to continent they vary slightly in taste, texture and chemical makeup. And only very recently (since about 2001) has a syndrome known as "pine mouth" come to light.

I personally think it should be called "crap mouth" as damn near everything you eat tastes like crap. But that's just me.

It doesn't matter if it is sweet, salty, fatty or bland. Once in your mouth the food takes on a flavor that I can only describe as a handful of pine needles combined with the pith (white bitter part) of an orange. It's seriously enough to make you not want to eat anything.

Which for me, sucks.

Seriously.

I researched the web and found that it can last from just a few days after eating them, to up to 2 weeks. It eventually goes away, but there is little you can do about it. Some acidic foods can minimize the effects so I thought I would try some citrus juice at work. I grabbed some OJ out of the fridge and it was pretty good, although I am not much of a juice person.

When I got home I figured it couldn't hurt to add vodka to my OJ and see what happened (since wine tasted like ca ca, boo hoo!). And you know what?

It tasted pretty damn good!

I was cooking dinner for my friends that evening and had the whole menu planned out....my citrus and salt baby back ribs, German potato salad and orange bread pudding for dessert. (Friend was bringing salad....no worries, we got our veggies!) Naturally while making the potato salad I had to test the bacon to see if my taste buds were really THAT effed up (please God, no!). And fortunately I found the second thing that didn't taste like poop....bacon.

Go figure.

So I am thinking.....how can I survive on bacon and screwdrivers for up to 2 weeks????

As it turns out, probably pretty well if I didn't have to work or drive.

I made dinner half sloshed on vodka (as I rarely drink it and had no lunch to speak of) and my friends assured me that it was delicious. They even went back for seconds, so I know I did OK. I think it tasted OK, but am pretty sure my taste buds were worn out from the vodka, so I'll have to take their word for it!

The German Potato Salad recipe is from my Nana, labeled on a recipe card, "My" German Potato Salad. It is everything I remember of her...warm, a little sweet, a little tart and very sassy.

Nana's German Potato Salad

6 Cups Red Potatoes, Cooked and sliced in to 1/4" slices

3 Scallions, sliced thin

6 Slices of Bacon (or more if you are feeling the need)

3 Hard Boiled Eggs, 2 chopped, 1 sliced for garnish

1/3 cup Water

2/3 cup White Vinegar

1/4 cup Sugar

2 T Flour

Salt & Pepper

*Optional

1/4 tsp Dry Mustard

1/4 tsp Celery Seed

Fry the bacon until crisp and reserve 3 T of the fat, chop the rest of the bacon and set aside.

Mix sliced potatoes, scallions, chopped egg and bacon together in a bowl.

In a small pan, mix together the rest of the ingredients and cook slowly until the dressing is thickened, season to taste with salt & pepper. Pour over potatoes and mix thoroughly. Put in whatever serving bowl you plan on using and garnish with the sliced egg.

This should be served relatively warm, I left it in the stove while I was cooking everything else and it was the perfect temperature. You can also microwave it briefly if it isn't warm enough.

A fairy tale recipe

Once upon a time (1997 ish) in a land far far away (Los Angeles) a young and beautiful but very unmotivated girl (me) decided that instead of working as a waitress and dancing away her life in the trendy LA clubs she would go back to college (for the 3rd time) and expand on the skills as a cook that her evil mother (not really, it just makes the story sound better) had forced on her since she was a poor underprivileged child (again, fabrication to make the story more interesting). And finally one day she would become famous and cook like Julia Child on TV. And she would live happily ever after with a fat paycheck and lots of friends and admirers who not only loved her cooking but her sparkling personality.

So off to Santa Barbara did she go with dreams of being a chef fluttering about in her brain. Chop, dice, slice and plate....stir and saute and everyone would be so amazed by her skills that the years of schooling (bad word...hate school) would fly by.

Yeah frigging right.

She did chop dice and slice....and she scrubbed pots, pans, floors and grills, took apart ovens and hoods to clean and fix them and most of all learned that she wasn't as special as she thought she was. There were in the first 6 months, 60 students with the same dream. And some of them were as good as the girl (but not very many), some were worse and some were just there to waste time and space.

For the most part, the ones that stuck bonded and became friends although there were a few in the crowd that were just no fun at all and were not invited to any of the reindeer games held at East Beach, the Ranch or the Flintstone house. (Those are the ones that do not read this blog). The ones that bonded not only learned to work together, but to cook together and became a bit of a yin/yang. (you know....you pick up where I leave off....I'll fill in where you aren't able blah blah blah).

After 12 years and a separation of many many miles (Seattle to Ventura) the girl found that the bond forged all those many many years ago had not been broken and that it was just as perfect cooking with of of her lovely friends this weekend as it was so long ago at the kitchen in the ranch house on Highway 150.

After a yummy lunch in Montecito (where lovely friends Daddy paid, bonus!) and several glasses of delicious wine, they put on their thinking caps when presented with a gift of fresh Alaska halibut from the friends brother who also happened to bring organic carrots and greens from the family ranch.

Brother requested Halibut chowder, but the recipe called for too much cream, milk and butter for the girls (they were constantly watching their girlish figures of course) so they opted to do what they do best and NOT follow the recipe.

In to the pot went 1 chopped onion and some olive oil which they stirred until it was soft and browned. They added 3 cloves of garlic (which was not nearly enough for the friends VERY Italian Daddy but oh well....), 2 large shredded carrots and 3 small russet potatoes which were peeled and diced in to 1/4 inch chunks.

In to the pot went about 10oz of chopped tomatoes (canned...but fresh would work too!) and 16oz of chicken broth (you could use fish stock if you had it). Meanwhile the girls were enjoying glasses of Daddy's wine, for he has a nice cellar and a good palate and someone has to drink it, right?

Stir, stir, stir....boil bubble toil and trouble....chop up the fresh Kale (about 1 bunch if you were to get from the grocery store) that Aunt Sandy & Uncle Roland brought in to little shreds and toss it in to the pot. They then poured another glass of wine and let the stew simmer until the potatoes were nice and tender.

More liquid was needed after while (not wine silly...they had plenty of that!) so they added about another cup or so of chicken broth to the pot and then took some liquid out and mixed it with the roux (butter + flour, cooked just a bit) on the side and blended that back in to the soup to thicken it.

About  2# of fresh halibut was trimmed and chopped with care (even though the girl was questioned by Dad to see if she knew what she was doing, Ha!!) in to 1# chunks and set aside for introduction at the last minute so as not to overcook and get rubbery.

A touch of heavy cream, salt and pepper and then the halibut which was cooked ever so gently in the chowder until it was just done.

Crusty bread and a bottle of Carhartt Vineyard Pinot Noir and they all lived happily ever after! (Especially after a second helping of chowder for all!)

And maybe they were happier after a bottle of Byron Pinot Noir for the girls after a very long and trying day...but who's counting????

The End

Christmas Aliens

Sometimes it is rough writing this blog.....not so much for the lack of recipes or lack of cooking that I do, but more for the inspiration and funny or interesting stories that I use to deliver the recipes. Sometimes it takes me a few days to come up with something and other nights I am hit with my creative muse right in the middle of cooking and am able to write and cook simultaneously.

This week I KNEW I wanted to share with you a cooking adventure and recipe but was on the fence about how to deliver it until I got an email from a dear friend who was unfortunately accosted by aliens this last week and narrowly escaped if only by the grace of my cooking.

I was in possession of 6 whole days off from work this last week and used the first two to make confections galore. You might remember Toffee Claus from last year....she is well and alive and despite the crummy weather, made enough toffee for about 30 gift bags.

Also included were the very well received Almond Florentine Cookies from last year, which I didn't make nearly enough of this year (lesson learned), dark chocolate bark with dried fruits, hazelnuts and sea salt and my new favorite......Peppermint Patties and Dark Sunshine bites.

So without further adieu, the email read as follows:

Hi Jen,

Thank you so much for the holiday sweets. I have a little problem....You won't believe it!

I was on my way home from work last night with my bag of treats (yes, I had sampled). I made a quick stop at the grocery store and when I opened my door an alien was trying to abduct me! When I thought of all the things of value that I had with me, I offered up my most valuable prize which was my treats. He happily took the treats and left me alone! Whew, thanks to you, I am safe....but the real problem lies in the fact that the bag was addressed to "Mike and Heidi" and since Mike is out of town with the boys, until Thursday, he will miss out on the yummy treats! Possibly if you have some extras Mike can have his own bag of yummy treats sometime and we will guard them from the aliens :)

Lots of Love,

Heidi

Seriously???? Even if I was out of treats I would have made more....not only because these are a couple of my favorite people, but also....aliens????? How awesome is that????

So I fixed up a goodie bag for Mike and the kids and handed it off today.....I hope that his daughter saw it home safely because after 20 pounds of sugar, 7 pounds of powdered sugar, 12 pounds of butter, 10 pounds of chocolate, 8 pounds of nuts, 2 pounds of dried fruit, 20 hours of cooking, 10 hours of wrapping and packaging and another 2 days of delivering, Ms. Toffee Claus is done for the season.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, I hope that your season is as blessed as mine with wonderful family, fabulous friends and always good food.

Peppermint Patties

From Gourmet Magazine, December 2007

With alternate option for Orange flavored, which I called Dark Sunshine bites

2 1/2 cups confectioners sugar (less than 1 pound), divided
1 1/2 tablespoons light corn syrup
1 1/2 tablespoons water
1/2 teaspoon pure peppermint extract
1 tablespoon vegetable shortening

10 ounces 70%-cacao bittersweet chocolate

Make filling:

Beat 2 1/4 cups confectioners sugar with corn syrup, water, peppermint extract, shortening, and a pinch of salt using an electric mixer (with paddle attachment if using a stand mixer) at medium speed until just combined. Knead on a work surface dusted with remaining 1/4 cup confectioners sugar until smooth. Roll out between sheets of parchment paper on a large baking sheet into a 7- to 8-inch round (less than 1/4 inch thick). Freeze until firm, about 15 minutes. Remove top sheet of paper and sprinkle round with confectioners sugar. Replace top sheet, then flip round over and repeat sprinkling on other side.

Cut out as many rounds as possible with cutter, transferring to a parchment-lined baking sheet. Freeze until firm, at least 10 minutes. Meanwhile, gather scraps, re-roll, and freeze, then cut out more rounds, freezing them.

Temper chocolate and coat filling:

Melt three fourths of chocolate in a metal bowl set over a saucepan of barely simmering water. Remove bowl from pan and add remaining chocolate, stirring until smooth. Cool until thermometer inserted at least 1/2 inch into chocolate registers 80°F.

Return water in pan to a boil and remove from heat. Set bowl with cooled chocolate over pan and reheat, stirring, until thermometer registers 88 to 91°F. Remove bowl from pan.

Balance 1 peppermint round on a fork and submerge in melted chocolate, letting excess drip off and scraping back of fork against rim of bowl if necessary, then return patty to sheet (to make decorative ridges on patty, immediately set bottom of fork briefly on top of patty, then lift fork straight up). Coat remaining rounds, rewarming chocolate to 88 to 91°F as necessary. Let patties stand until chocolate is set, about 1 hour.

A few notes/variations:

For the Dark Sunshine Bites I used the zest from 1 orange and substituted Orange Extract

Garnish for the Peppermint Patties for us was crushed Peppermint Sticks

Garnish for the Dark Sunshine bites was bits of Candied Orange Peel

Make sure the filling is well frozen before dipping in the chocolate!

Don't roll any thinner than 1/4 inch, otherwise they tend to droop when you are coating them with chocolate.

Feel free to use small cookie cutters for fun shapes, but avoid shapes that have skinny forms like candy canes or snowflakes as those tend to break easier. Rounds/ornaments were great, trees, bells, light bulbs and even the gingerbread men worked well.....we only lost a few angel wings in the process.

As you get towards the end of the filling, feel free to roll it in to little balls and dip those in chocolate, they are delicious no matter what shape they are in.

Bits and pieces

I love little bites....hors d' oeuvres, appetizers and canapes, tapas and mezze and even petit fours when I am craving sweets. Nothing pleases me more than a meal made up of bunches of fun little bites where I can taste all manner of things in one meal without overeating. I also love going out to dinner with people who like to share too. Ordering four different starters, salads and entrees and then passing them around to taste pleases me to no end. Stingy diners...don't bother going out with me, I am a sharer. :)

So when asked to bring something to a friends house for dinner, I went with the appetizer course and pretty much went a little crazy in the kitchen creating a mezze platter.

Bacon wrapped dates stuffed with Gorgonzola cheese....sweet and hot cherry peppers stuffed with prosciutto & jack cheese....garlic and oven dried tomato sauteed mushrooms....homemade hummus with oven dried tomatoes and artichoke pesto dip with smoked potato chips.

So many good little bites that it's hard to know where to start. So I will start with the bacon since it is my favorite food group. :)

The first couple recipes can be made for 2 people or 200 people, just make as many as you need. The dips make about 2 cups each....and you can make as many of the potatoes as you want.

Bacon Wrapped Dates Stuffed with Gorgonzola

The bacon wrapped dates are a favorite of mine, we make them at work and everyone goes nuts over the sweet/salty/savory combination. They are heavy though and I recommend only eating one or two to save your rear end from resembling the Goodyear blimp. For every slice of bacon, you'll need 2 dates and about a teaspoon of bleu cheese. Cut the slice of bacon in half and par cook it in a pan (slowly)until it is soft. Slice the dates lengthwise and take the pit out, keeping the date intact. Stuff a slice of bleu or Gorgonzola cheese in there and smash the date shut. Wrap the bacon around it and secure with a toothpick. Bake at 350 for about 20 minutes or until the bacon is crisp.

Cherry Peppers Stuffed with Cheese & Prosciutto

You can go a couple different routes on the cherry peppers...You can buy the Mezzeta brand from any old grocery store and they are a little more spicy/savory, this time I tried the brand from Trader Joe's and they are more of a spicy/sweet with the spicy kicking in at the very end. Either way they are delicious! Cut a small chunk of cheese and wrap it with a skinny slice of prosciutto and stuff it in the pepper. My mom likes to use Asiago or a saltier cheese, I happened to have Jack in the house so that's what got used! It is also nice to stuff a little sage leaf in there as well...adds an earthiness that is a great counterpart to the sharper flavors of the pepper & cheese.

Garlic & Oven Dried Tomato Sauteed Mushrooms

I used 1 container of mushrooms for this recipe, about 8 oz. Press 3 large cloves of garlic in to a pan with 1 T olive oil and saute over low heat for about 5 minutes. Add the mushrooms and toss to coat. Cook for another 5 minutes or so. Add about 2 T white wine (glug glug) and 2 T minced oven or sun dried tomatoes packed in olive oil (if using dried, reconstitute them in hot water and pat dry before mincing). Add 1 tsp thyme and salt to taste. Cook for about 15-20 minutes until mushrooms are cooked through.

Oven Dried Tomato Hummus

Hummus is one of those things that you can tweak 7 ways from Sunday in terms of flavor...your base recipe is 1 can of drained garbanzo beans, some garlic (can be raw, smoked or roasted), a squeeze of lemon juice and enough olive oil to get it to the texture you want. Just throw your ingredients in the food processor and turn it on....add goodies like oven or sun dried tomatoes (in olive oil or reconstituted-use less olive oil in the main part of the recipe if using ones in OO), drained artichokes, basil or ready made pesto. Season it to taste with salt and serve with pita crisps, crackers or fresh veggies.

Artichoke Pesto Dip
OK....this recipe stemmed from a new book Mama got me and I tweaked it just a bit and OMG did it turn out good...Seriously a keeper!

1 can of artichoke hearts, drained

3 cloves smoked garlic

2 T Pesto (from the nice lady @ Ojai Farmers Market)

1 T Olive Oil

2 oz Goats cheese

Salt & Pepper to taste

Blend everything in the food processor until smooth. Serve with smoked potato chips.

Yep...I said smoked potato chips.

I have told you before that one of the best gadgets I own is my cooktop smoker and I ain't lyin'. My Mom has done smoked potatoes before as a side dish, but they are thick cut, crispy on the outside and creamy on the inside...I was looking for something that would serve as a vessel for my fabulous artichoke dip. And these little guys fit the bill perfectly.

So I sliced the little Dutch Yellow potatoes thin...like you would if you were doing scalloped potatoes. I tossed them with a little olive oil and a couple good shakes of kosher salt. Then I smoked them on low/med for 20 minutes with maple wood chips. Take them out and lay them on a sheet pan and bake them in the oven for about 30 minutes at 350.

These were so good that I did it again for dinner with my parents on Monday, I am pretty sure my Pops ate about half of them in 2.5 seconds standing over the counter so that counts as a winner in my book.

Ignoring instructions

As I might have mentioned before, my Dad is the best dad ever. For multiple reasons, but specifically this week for growing a pumpkin patch solely so he could have a pumpkin carving party.

Bear in mind, I have no kids and am an only child so all the kids must come from other areas of our lives....my friends kids, grand kids of friends and friends of the grand kids. We managed to round up a very respectable crowd of families to go hunt in the pumpkin patch for their preferred pumpkin.

Including the "oldest" 5 year old in the group, Pam, who had to have her wine while picking out her pumpkin.

The kids drew, cut and scooped out their pumpkins and made a very wide variety of scary, cute and gross pumpkins to display for us. The adults, of course, supervised as we do so well.

Some favorites are:

Vomiting pumpkin by Trevor

Carnivorous pumpkin by yours truly....The kids liked it so much that not only did I make two of them I also sent them home with the kiddos.

And then of course we had to have dinner, right? So mom vacillated between things like BBQ chicken and a few other easy and crowd friendly menus and finally settled on pulled pork sandwiches and Cole slaw with sloppy Joe's for the kids. Perfect dinner...easy to make ahead and keep in a crock pot!

When I left work on Sunday and was getting ready to head up to the house I called as I almost always do to make sure she doesn't need anything last minute. On a random impulse I asked if she had arranged for dessert.

As mentioned a week or so ago, my mom does not bake. Nor does she crave dessert like so many people do. So when I asked her if she had anything planned, she said no, she had bought some Halloween candy and put it in a bucket. "It should be enough for the kids and the big kids" she stated. Yeah right.

I ignored her. As did two of our other friends who not only have sweet tooth's, but are also great cooks. Terry made graveyard cupcakes with gummy worms coming out of them and Telva did up her chocolate chip cookies. Me? I got home and in 20 minutes I whipped up a batch of Raspberry Blondie's. And at the end of the night there was barely a crumb of all three desserts left.

Picture brown sugar and butter with a little flour wrapped around fresh raspberries and you might come close. But not quite until you get the crunchy crust and the gooey inside will you get the full scope of this dessert.

So damn simple, but at the end of the night when all that was left was one sorry little corner piece I was feeling pretty darn good about my dessert and about the fact that I had ignored my mom's instructions! Especially when people started asking for the recipe....

Raspberry Blondies

2/3 Cup Butter, softened
1 Cup Brown Sugar
1 Cup White Sugar
2 Eggs
2 tsp Vanilla
2 Cups Flour
1 tsp Baking Soda
1/4 tsp Baking Powder
1 tsp Salt
1/2 Pint Fresh Raspberries

Cream the butter & sugar together until well blended. Add eggs & vanilla and beat well. Add all dry ingredients in and mix thoroughly. Grease a 9x13 pan and spread the batter in the pan, it will be a bit thick. Dot the top with the raspberries, no need to push them in, the batter will "swallow" them during cooking.

Bake at 350 for 35 minutes. Cool before cutting & serving.
  

Are you ready for random?

Some things mom and I have learned in the last few days.....

Duck fat makes a very good toe moisturizer.

Frying clams inside makes for a very slippery kitchen floor. (flip flop removal recommended)

A bushel of cherry tomatoes can be converted in to only a couple pint jars with time, heat  and patience.

Peeling apples goes much faster with two people.

My Grandma Kenton has peeled well over 24,000 apples in her lifetime for apple pie.

An extra glass of wine helps dull the pain of having to clean up after a cooking extravaganza.

After two days of chopping dicing, peeling, slicing, browning, frying, mixing, blending, seasoning, baking, rendering and packaging we have made multiple meals for ourselves and others. And damn it we had fun doing it. :)

Between the two (three when Grandma helped me peel the apples) of us we made Duck Confit (to share for the future), Chicken & Dumpling Soup (for my Bapa), Fried Razor Clams from Washington (for dinner), Oven Dried Tomatoes (to can, for the future), Mustard Braised Rabbit (for dinner-don't judge, it is freaking fantastic) and two Apple Cranberry Crisps (one for us, one for our friends).

Last week my Dad was up in the Lockwood Valley area quail hunting with a buddy and came across an apple tree with the apples falling off, littering the ground. Not being one to ever waste anything he promptly asked the owner of the property if he could liberate them. He then instructed me that I was to make something tasty with them. Once again, Dad brought me home something tasty....I do love that man!

As I am not much of a pie crust girl (more of a tart...hee hee), I went back to one of my favorite standbys for almost any fruit. The very American Crisp. Super easy to make and so perfect with less than 10 ingredients. You can tweak it any which way to suit your tastes with different spices or flavorings, different fruit, cornmeal or oatmeal instead of flour. To be really honest, they are kind of hard to mess up as long as you have the general proportions correct. The following recipe has a great autumn feel to it, the appples are still a little crisp and the cranberries add just the right amount of tart.

Apple & Dried Cranberry Crisp

From Gourmet Magazine, 1993

1 cup dried cranberries

1 cinnamon stick

1 cup water

2/3 cup all-purpose flour

2/3 cup firmly packed light brown sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

3/4 stick (6 tablespoons) unsalted butter, cut into bits

9 McIntosh apples (about 3 pounds)

In a small saucepan simmer the cranberries, the cinnamon stick, and the water for 10 minutes. Drain the cranberries and remove the cinnamon stick. In a small bowl blend the flour, the brown sugar, the salt, and the butter until the mixture resembles coarse meal and toss the mixture well. Peel, core, and slice the apples thin and in a buttered 9- by 13-inch glass dish toss them with the cranberries. Sprinkle the brown sugar mixture over the fruit and bake the crisp in a preheated 400°F. oven for 25 minutes, or until the apples are tender and the topping is golden.

She don't do dough

 My mom is a lot of things and talented in the kitchen is really close to the top of the list. She routinely makes awesome meals for my Dad, for me, for friends and for family. She tackles every ethnic background from Mexican to Italian, Thai, Moroccan and Americana and manages not to just make it edible, but most often incredible.

But everyone has an Achilles heel and my moms self admitted weakness is baking.

She has at least 3 recipes for "no fail pie dough", recipes for cookies, cakes and brownies and probably hasn't made any of them for 20+ years.  She has a kind of fear of baking mainly because of the exact-ness of the process. If she can't adjust as she goes, tweak seasonings or salt, substitute accordingly based upon what she has on hand she is equivalent to a frustrated artist. In her very own words "She don't do dough".

After a trip to Santa Fe with girlfriends wrapped around cooking and killer restaurants my Mom came home with new cookbooks and recipes and enthusiasm for southwestern cooking.

I came over tonight to find her with beautiful stuffed chiles, guajillo chile & pumpkin seed sauce, a beautiful salad and enough blue corn gnocchi to feed a family of 20.

With flour smeared on her cheek and a touch of self righteousness to her tone, she told me the tale of making blue corn gnocchi that started a few hours prior to my arrival. She read the recipe a few times to make sure she had all the ingredients and understood the steps. Followed the instructions to a tee.....And still wound up with dough too wet to make gnocchi. She then consulted other cookbooks for advice and adjusted as needed until the dough "felt" right and finally found she had the right consistency. When she found the right consistency, she also found she had enough gnocchi dough for about 20 people instead of for just the three of us.

So while getting recipes from well known restaurant chef's is a fun thing, be forewarned, the recipes may not always turn out as well as what you get in the restaurant. Perhaps the potatoes weren't dry enough. The eggs a smidge to large. The fog in Ventura made the dough too wet....it could have been any number of things that made the dough not quite right the first go-round.

In the end we enjoyed the stuffed chiles, gnocchi and sauce immensely.Tomorrow, she will freeze the 4 pounds of leftover gnocchi for future use.

And I have a beautiful picture in my head of Mom with flour on her face and defiance in her eyes because, damn it, she conquered the dough.