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Randomness Uncategorized

our csa from eatwell farms

We’ve been a member of the Eatwell Farms Community Supported Agriculture program for several months now and we couldn’t be happier! The produce is amazing, the variety inspiring and we’ve been forced to experiment. So many great recipes have been born out of “tricky” ingredients. Another awesome thing about eating with the seasons is how excited we get about new produce as it comes into season. We haven’t had strawberries since last July and that makes the first spring strawberries absolutely amazing! Perfectly sweet-tart, a deep red all the way through, and they go bad in about a day – that’s how you know they’re the real deal.

In this week’s box we received: strawberries, navel oranges, marjoram, parsley, lemons, sugar snap peas, green garlic, spring onions, stir-fry mix, radishes and carrots. Yum!

If you are interested in joining a CSA, please visit Local Harvest to find one in your area.

Happy Spring!

-Emily

Categories
Recipes

easy noodle soup

This soup is satisfying and only takes about 30 minutes to make. If you have homemade stock, use it. The flavor of the broth is important to this soup since all the other ingredients take on that flavor. If you don’t have homemade stock, buy a flavorful chicken stock. Swanson’s Natural Goodness and Kitchen Basics are good bets.

Easy Noodle Soup

1 quart chicken stock, we used Jordan’s homemade stock. Lucky us!
1 cup mushrooms, quartered
1 cup broccoli floretts
1/2 cup baby carrots
8 oz udon noodles, or spaghetti if you don’t have udon
ginger, garlic, soy sauce, chili flake
Trader Joe’s pork dumplings, optional

Pour the stock into a large pot. Boil the stock. Add some grated ginger, sliced garlic and a pinch of chili flakes. Season the broth with soy sauce. Add the carrots.  Once the carrots have cooked for about 5 minutes, add the mushrooms and the pasta. Cook for another 5 – 7 minutes. Add the broccoli. Cook for about 3 minutes. Add the dumplings. Cook for another 2 – 3 minutes. Serve with a squeeze of lime juice and siracha if you like extra heat.

-Emily

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Recipes

baking therapy: buttermilk corn muffins

These muffins were an experiment. I had some extra buttermilk left over from last week’s chicken and waffles and figured I should use it before it went bad. I’m sure glad I decided to experiment. The muffins were fluffy on the inside, crunchy on the outside and perfectly corn-y. We paired them with a grilled pork chop and a salad of arugula, radish and goat cheese.

Buttermilk Corn Muffins
1/2 cup corn meal
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
3 T sugar
1 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
1 large egg
2/3 cup buttermilk
2 T butter, melted

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Butter and flour 6 cups in a muffin tin or line with paper liners. Mix the dry ingredients in a large bowl.  Mix the wet ingredients in a small bowl. Combine the wet with the dry ingredients in the large bowl. Mix just to combine. Spoon into the prepared muffin tin. Dust the tops with a additional cornmeal for an extra crunchy crust. Bake for 12 – 15 minutes. Enjoy hot from the oven with butter or honey.

-Emily

Categories
Recipes

baking therapy: sourdough soft pretzels

These pretzels are wonderful! Super easy (just one rise!) and added bonus: they make use of the cup of sourdough starter that you usually discard after feeding.

Sourdough Soft Pretzels, from King Arthur Flour 

For the Pretzels
1 cup sourdough starter, straight from the fridge
3/4 cup lukewarm water
3 cups bread flour
1/4 cup non-fat dried milk
1 T sugar
1 1/2 t salt
1 T oil or butter
2 t yeast

In a kitchen aid, mix all of the ingredients together. Knead on low speed for 3 – 5 minutes, until the dough is smooth. Cover and let the dough rise for about an hour. Heat an oven to 350 degrees. Cut the dough into twelve pieces and shape into pretzels.  Place on a lined baking sheet. 

For the Topping
1 T sugar
2 T hot water
coarse salt or sea salt
1 T butter, melted

Mix the sugar with the water until dissolved. Brush the sugar water onto the shaped dough and then sprinkle with coarse salt. Bake for 25 – 30 minutes, until golden brown.

After they come out of the oven, brush the hot pretzels with melted butter. Not like this will surprise you coming from me, but the butter makes these pretzels.

-Emily

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Recipes

the holy grail of comfort food … chicken and waffles

Just when you think that you can’t take anymore and it’s only Monday, comfort food steps in to save the day. It wraps you in a blanket of sweet, salty, fatty goodness and magically you feel like yourself again. Despite my love for many other dishes from the comfort food category that have saved my life in the past like spaghetti and meatballs or macaroni and cheese, chicken and waffles may just be the pinnacle of comfort food.

Before Monday, I’d never eaten chicken and waffles. To be honest, I was a bit worried about the co-mingleing of syrup and gravy – worried that maybe syrup plus gravy might just push the symbiosis between sweet and salty over the edge. Well, I was dead wrong. Sticky, sweet syrup, and salty, meaty gravy both poured over crunchy chicken and waffles is beyond amazing. I was floored by how well each piece of this dish worked with the other components. A-MAZ-ING. So wonderful you probably should make this for dinner tonight. Your happy mind and belly will thank you for it.

Chicken and Waffles

For the chicken
I used the buttermilk baked chicken recipe that I describe a week or so ago. It worked perfectly and since it is oven baked you don’t have to worry about dealing with frying and waffle-making at once. The chicken will take about 20 minutes to bake, so put it in the oven after you’ve made the gravy.

For the gravy
2 T butter
2 T flour
1 1/4 cup – 1 1/2 cup chicken stock
salt, pepper, rosemary, thyme, lemon peel

In a small saucepan over medium-low heat, melt the butter. Add the flour and continue whisking until it is a blonde color. Slowly add the broth, whisking furiously to make sure that there aren’t any lumps. Reduce the heat to low. Season with salt and pepper. Add a sprig of rosemary, thyme and a sliver of lemon peel to the mixture. Turn off the heat. Get to waffle making.

For the waffles
I used a buttermilk pancake recipe for these waffles. The taste was wonderful, but they did not rise as much as I had hoped in the waffle iron. If you have a no-fail waffle recipe, use that instead (and email it to me).

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
3 tablespoons sugar
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
3 cups buttermilk
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

Mix the dry ingredients to combine. Add the buttermik, eggs and melted butter. Mix just to combine. There will be lumps in the batter. This is good and makes for a fluffy pancake or waffle. Make your waffles. As they come off the waffle iron, put them on a baking sheet and store in the oven to keep warm.

For the syrup
We buy Whole Foods 365 brand pure maple syrup. It is delicious, affordable and free of high-fructose corn syrup.

To serve

As you are finishing with the waffles, turn the heat below the gravy on to low. Warm the gravy and remove the herbs and lemon.

Place a waffle on a plate. Top with a piece of buttermilk chicken. Drizzle everything with gravy and syrup.

To fully maximize your chicken and waffle experience, I recommend you eat as many bites as possible with all four components. Admittedly, this method is more work, but it is worth it.

-Emily

Categories
Recipes

lemon cream pie with fresh strawberries

This pie is about as spring as you can get in one dessert! The fresh strawberries compliment the lemon cream perfectly and it’s not heavy, which is nice now that the weather is starting to warm up a bit. Additional bonuses: it looks gorgeous and you can assemble it all in advance!

Lemon Cream Pie with Fresh Strawberries

For the crust, from the Tartine Bakery cookbook


This recipe makes two pie crusts. You’ll only need one for this recipe, so stick the other in the freezer and defrost overnight in the refrigerator the nigh before you want to use it. 

1 1/2 t salt
2/3 cup very cold water
3 cups plus 2 T all purpose flour
1 cup plus 5 T unsalted butter very cold, cut into cubes

In a small bowl, add the salt to the water and stir to dissolve.  Put the flour in the bowl of a food processor.  Sprinkle the butter on top. Pulse briefly. Add the water. Pulse again. The dough will just begin to come together. Pour the dough onto a lightly floured counter. Divide into two balls. Press into 1 inch thick disks. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 2 hours or overnight. 

Roll out the dough until it is 1/8 inch thick. Lay into a pie or tart dish. Line with parchment and fill with pie weights, beans or rice (new discovery on the rice – works just fine). Chill the shell for another 30 minutes to get the flakiest crust. 

Heat an oven to 375 degrees. Bake for 25 minutes. Remove the weight and parchment and bake for another 5 minutes. Cool completely.

For the filling, adapted from the SF Chronicle
4 eggs
2 egg yolks
1/2 cup sugar
zest of two lemons
1/2 cup lemon juice (from about 4 lemons)
a pinch of salt
4 T butter, cut into cubes

Over a double boiler, whisk the eggs, sugar, salt, lemon zest and juice together. Continue stirring until a custard has formed. Be very diligent with this step. You can very easily end up with lemon scrambled eggs!  No good! Once the mixture has thickened, take it off the heat and whisk in the butter. Strain though a mesh sieve and chill. Ta-da! Lemon curd!

To assemble
1 pound fresh strawberries, sliced
1/2 cup whipping cream
1 T sugar

Slice the strawberries. Whip the cream with the sugar. Lighten the lemon curd with the whipped cream by first stirring in 1/3 of the whipped cream and then folding in the remaining. Carefully! I always am too hasty here and Jordan has to remind me to slow down. Pour the lemon filling into the prepared crust. Top with sliced strawberries. Refrigerate until ready to serve. 

This pie is delicious and the lemon cream would compliment any berry as each comes into season. The combination of the lemon and the strawberry is particularly satisfying because it hit a nostalgic vein in all of those eating it … Jordan, Matt, Alexa and I were eating our dessert on Sunday evening when Jordan pauses, “Does this remind anyone of some sort of ice cream novelty?” Instantly, and almost in unison, the rest of us cried, “Flintstones Push Up pops!” Yep. The pie tastes like a Push Up. Not sure how it happened, but it is absolutely going to happen again.

-Emily

Categories
Randomness San Francisco

our csa from eatwell farms …

… and the first strawberries of the season!!! I am so excited for the next few months of amazing spring and summer produce!

Aren’t they absolutely adorable! Don’t you just want to eat tons and tons of them!

And one other note: Our apologies for the lack of posts lately. We’re working on a few new projects and they’ve been consuming our culinary energy. Once the results are in, we will have some awesome insight for you guys!

Spring love to all of you!

-Emily

Categories
Randomness San Francisco

our first passover seder

Tuesday we celebrated our first passover seder. Our neighbor Robin moved far away from her family on the East Coast and so she didn’t have any real Jews to celebrate with. We decided to do our best to fake it and turn out an awesome Passover Seder anyway. Under Robin’s tutelage, we did. Our Passover Seder was awesome – great food, great friends, a great time!

Here are some photos I took during the dinner.

The chickens before I roasted them. The light was so pretty, I couldn’t resist.

The seder table.

Our view during dinner. Seriously, what a beautiful city!

The seder plate.

Robin’s matzoh ball soup – carefully crafted from her mother’s recipe.

Robin’s pup Honey also had an awesome time at the seder.

A tower of matzo – the perfect vehicle for salted butter! And you all know how much I love butter!

The spread – roasted chicken, roasted vegetables, matzoh kugle, risotto with leeks and wild mushrooms (not kosher for Passover, but absolutely delicious!), salad with beets and oranges, and matzo!

And for dessert – Nonnie’s cheesecake with a coconut macroon crust. (I had a bit of trouble cutting the slices so it looked a little worse for wear, but it was delicious none the less!)

-Emily

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Recipes

braised duck legs

The answer is always pork … except when it’s butter … or when it’s the topic of today’s post: duck fat!  I’ve been wanting to experiment with duck for quite some time, so I rode down to the Fatted Calf, picked up 2 duck legs and got to work.

I began by scoring the fat in a cross-hatched pattern so that it can render out.  I then seasoned the duck with salt, let it rest, and prepared mirepoix (half an onion, a carrot, and a stalk of celery, all finely diced).  Once everything was ready, I got to rendering. Just put the duck skin side down in a skillet over low heat and you’ll see the lovely fat fill the pan.

The picture above was after about 20 minutes and there was no fat in the pan when I started!

After you’ve rendered off most of the fat and the skin starts to brown (about 3o-40 minutes), flip and repeat on the other side.  Since there is much less fat on the other side, it will render much more quickly (maybe 5-10 minutes).  Remove the fat from the pan and save it; don’t throw it away!  Increase the heat to get good browning on both sides of the duck.  Remove the duck, lower the heat to medium, add the mirepoix, and cook until the onion is translucent (2-3 minutes).  Deglaze with about half a cup of wine, add a cup of broth, and bring to a simmer.  Put the duck back in the pan, cover, and place in a 300 degree oven for 2.5-3 hours.  I also added a sprig of rosemary, some fresh oregano, and a couple cloves of garlic for good measure.

Once the duck is tender, remove it from the oven, set aside and keep warm.  You can make a sauce from the braising liquid if you’d like.  When you’re ready to serve, just throw those legs under the broiler skin side up until it’s brown and crispy.

Conclusions:
This was delicious and a simple sauce made from the braising liquid added some nice flavor.  I just took out the herbs and then blended, strained, slightly reduced it, and adjusted the flavors in accordance my current mood.  This dish was also quite easy because you leave it alone most of the time; while the duck was rendering I was in the kitchen reading for school, and the rest of the time I simply ignored it all together.  One final thought: the same rendering technique can be used for duck breasts as well if you feel like being fancy, just render the skin side nice and slow until it’s brown, then sear the other side over high heat until medium-rare.

-Jordan

Categories
Recipes

buttermilk baked chicken

Everyone likes fried chicken, but actually frying said chicken is a big pain. With this recipe you end up with the perfect crunchy-crisp exterior and juicy chicken interior, but don’t have to deal with vats of oil.  We were actually blown away by how well this chicken turned out and how easy it was to prepare. Even after a few cocktails, the recipe when off without a hitch!

Buttermilk Baked Chicken 

2 chicken legs and thighs, separated
1 cup buttermilk
2 t paprika
salt and pepper
1 cup panko (japanese style breadcrumbs)
1 egg

Salt and pepper the chicken. Marinate it in the buttermilk and paprika for a few hours. Marinating the chicken in buttermilk is key and makes a huge difference in the moistness and flavor.

Preheat an oven to 350 degrees and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Strain the chicken from the buttermilk, dunk each piece in egg and coat in panko. Put on the baking sheet. Bake for about 15 – 20 minutes, until the chicken is firm to the touch. If your chicken isn’t browned, throw it under the broiler for a minute or two.

The only update we’d make to this recipe the next time we prepare it is to mix the panko with a little melted butter to give the crust just a bit more flavor and color.

We served this chicken with some beautiful artichokes, but I imagine it would go great with cole slaw or mac and cheese!

-Emily