Tea -- Drake Hotel

Celebrating 10 years of friendship!

If I haven't already made it clear, me encanta Chicago. Chicago is a fantabulous city, enhanced by my amazing friends. Chicago is home to a laundry list of greats: food, hot dogs, people, neighborhoods, baseball, restaurants, architecture, history, art, live music, comedy, culture, museums, weather (yes, even the weather), and tea-time.

At 10 AM, I'm on the phone with Camish.

Me: Susie's made reservations for us to have tea at the Drake?
C: What?! Imagine the "Wha'choo talkin' 'bout, Willis?" tone with her right eyebrow raised, eyes looking down her nose, and one hand on her hip. The classic Camisha move was in full force. You mean like what the Brits do? Skeptical but game she inquired, What do I wear?
Me: The classic tea outfit, of course. Jeans, t-shirt, flip flops. I laughed.

We arrived for our 1 PM seating, the lobby infused with the scent of tiger lilies, my favorite flower. The menu is fixed except for the tea. I had Darjeeling, while the troublesome two had wild blackberry and ginger peach. Once again, I set aside my vegetarian ways to fully experience tea-time.

We gave those trays a once over and were skeptical. How could those dinky little sandwiches with no crusts (top plate) and three slices of banana nut bread and currant scones (2nd plate) possibly fill up the 3 biggest eaters in Chicago-land. We dug in, all the while being regal and refined.

I started with the tomato and cheese on white bread. It was good, very good, in fact. Then I went for the ham and asparagus sandwich, which actually looked like sushi because it was rolled. It was better than the tomato/cheese. My favorite, hands down, was the roast beef on wheat, which had very tasty mayo. In between the savories, I dipped down to try the scones, which were excellent. Personally though, I just loved the savory and would have preferred to have more it than the sweet, which says a lot considering how much I adore sweets and butter. Much to our surprise, we were stuffed before the dessert plate came out but that did not prevent us from chowing down even more! The flavors are so wholesome, so satisfying, and so rich that you become incredibly full though everything is rather small.

We ate, chatted away, laughed, took a break, ate some more, made fun of the woman seated next to the fountain who took her tea a little too seriously by wearing pearls and a big ol' hat (think Queen of England), and bemoaned the fact, and I mean bemoaned, that our group was incomplete without Sam, the fourth friend in our circle. We raised our glasses to her.

Camisha was so smitten with our activity she couldn't stop talking about it; she's a convert and has developed a whole theme for her daughter's birthday. As she said, "If this doesn't put a little bourge in Morgan, I don't know what will!" It was such a memorable and fun way to spend the afternoon. Every time I think about tea, I can't help but smile. We''ll alway have this memory.

Tea at the Drake is about $35/person, including tip. While the tea was great, Susie swears by the one at the Peninsula Hotel, which is also slightly less expensive. On Sunday tea (at the Peninsula) commences at 4 PM, a little late. Try Saturday! Reservations are not necessary.

cr, sb, y sg vosotros amo.

White Castle -- Chicago

Dare I say it? I ate White Castle at 3 AM on Saturday morning and it was so good. You see all that food? A mere $8. We had a mini burger, chicken rings, and onion rings. White Castle is a Chicago institution, like In 'N Out Burger is to California. The little burgers are a perfect size. They're even smaller than the McDonald's burger. Perfect for little tots.

I keep eating meat. It's a phase, I think. It's kind of like the rebellious teenage phase. I just need to get it out of my system. I think White Castle did me in.

Adesso -- Chicago

Chicago is a fabulous place to visit, eat, and just be. The people are friendly, nice, and down to earth. In contrast, I found that people in New York don't really make eye contact with others. Another reason why I love Chicago is that during the summers you can eat outside in the evenings in shorts or a skirt, and not worry about getting cold. In the Bay Area, that's definitely not the case except during a heat wave or under a heat lamp which is not the same.

On Saturday afternoon, I met a friend that I hadn't seen in seven years for lunch. Funny how life works. While we lived and worked in the same city for 2 years, we never ran into the other. In any case, we met at a small but very cute restaurant in the Lakeview District of Chicago, just south of Wrigley Field. It's a cute hip area.

We sat outside because the weather was a fabulous 75 degrees with no humidity. Truthfully, I really wanted humidity. I kind of miss it. Over lunch we caught up on our lives and what each had done. He had a chicken arugula salad with Parmesan cheese and I had the mushroom and goat cheese frittata with a salad, which was one of the specials for the day. I enjoyed my frittata but I don't think it was better than the frittatas I've made. In fact, I would argue that it was probably too egg-y, and didn't have enough mushrooms. But over all it was good.

For dessert, we shared tiramisu made at the restaurant. Of course, after ordering it, I remembered my lactose intolerance. The tiramisu was excellent. We had tried to order wine but the restaurant was located across the street from a church and there is an old city ordinance that doesn't allow restaurants to sell alcohol if that's the case. However, you are allowed to BYOB, which is true of the other restaurants in the vicinity. After 4 cups of decaf, I was completely caffeinated.

We probably spent 2+ hours and I never once felt rushed. I would definitely eat here again.

West Indian Food -- Brooklyn

On Friday, we had lunch with our client on the 1100 block of Nostrand Ave in Brooklyn between Long Island Ave and Lincoln Road on the even number side of the street. Can't remember the name of the place but the food was just amazing. At lunch they have a buffet where you can select from at least 20 items, everything from goat curry to chicken curry to jerk salmon to BBQ chicken to sweet potatoes, and so much more. I was completely overwhelmed. This is not what you call vegetarian friendly but I really wanted to relish and experience West Indian food in its entirety so I ate meat. It was so worth it.

After getting a play-by-play on all the dishes, I got a little salad (not West Indian), sweet potatoes, goat curry, and beans and rice. It was amazing. Deliciosa. Then I noticed the salmon on my client's plate and was bummed, but he kindly shared a piece so my momentary anxiety on having missed out on some thing special dissipated rather quickly. In total, my lunch with a bottled water was under $6! The amount is determined by weight.

I'm Indian but didn't know what West Indian food was. Actually, I still really don't. I'm much more familiar with the North/South distinction which I could write a dissertation on. But I know that in Trinidad, Guyana, and the Caribbean in general, there are lots of Indians. In fact, I learned that Guyana's population is 50% Indian. So West Indian food seems to be a combination of classic Indian dishes like curries mixed with traditional Caribbean food like sweet potatoes, plantains, etc. I know I'm not describing all the nuances so I dare not go further.

It was so worth it to set aside my mostly vegetarian ways to eat well.

Morimoto -- Manhattan

It was restaurant week so my childhood friend made reservations for us to enjoy lunch at the Iron Chef's restaurant! It's sort of funny because she actually lives very close to me in California but her work brought her out to Manhattan for the summer, so it was totally awesome to enjoy NYC with her in a new place. I was particularly excited about this restaurant because I love the Iron Chef show on the Food Network Channel. He always makes fabulously creative food.

I decided to opt for the pre-fixed sushi lunch (which isn't terribly creative at all). The lunch which usually goes for $35 was $25 and very generous. The meal started with a mixed green salad and miso soup followed by the 6 pieces of spicy tuna roll and 8 pieces of nigiri, including eel, salmon, tuna, yellow tail, tuna, shrimp, and two other pieces of nigiri I can't remember. All of it was delicious.

Our brownie dessert was pretty good though I think I could make better brownies. But it was nice to have something sweet after all the salt.

While it was all very very good I have to say it wasn't anything that I hadn't experience before, in terms of quality, which was excellent. The ambiance was, of course, very New York. At our 2 PM seating the place was hopping. The bathrooms were unlike anything I've experienced before, with heated and adjustable seats. There were so many buttons, I didn't know what they were for. And the downstairs bar was something reminiscent out of Star Wars IV: A New Hope. Or at least, I could imagine it being that way.

I was happy to have done it, and would do it again, even if I had to pay more.

Food & Travel

These last few entries are out of order. In my excitement to get entries out, I completely forgot to write about Sankaku Sushi & Noodle before Rae. In any case, I've been traveling for work since late Tuesday afternoon through Sunday evening. That's a lot of meals out. I generally eat 1-2, may be 3 meals out a week, if that. Working out won't be an option though the hotel apparently has a nice facility since I had to choose between taking a laptop or my running shoes. The running shoes were sadly left behind.

In any case, after 2 7 AM mornings, and no breakfast or lunch on Tuesday before my flight, I was ravenous when I arrived at SFO. I was determined to eat well. I walked by Klein's deli (though I later picked up a garden salad for the flight) and Guava Java (a definite no), and found Sankaku in the United Terminal. I recently read that sushi is one of the most healthful things you can eat while traveling but was reluctant to try sushi at the airport. Instead, I opted for a salmon bowl which came with a nice piece of salmon over a bowl of rice. Very simple and tasty. At $9.50, a good deal compared to other less tasty options.

Rae, Philadelphia's 30th Street Station

So, I haven't posted in some time and it's because I was traveling to New York City, Philadelphia, and Chicago for work this week so I couldn't cook. Instead, this week, I decided I should report on foods and restaurants I've tried out while away on my travels.

On Wed. afternoon we met clients at Rae at Philadelphia's 30th Street Station. Rae is this cute uber modern restaurant attached to the station itself so if you're waiting for your train; it's a good place to have drinks, meals, or snacks. The sides of this restaurant are large sheets of glass from which you can people and car watch. It was poring out so it was nice not to have to step out of the station to get to the restaurant.

We arrived a t 3:30PM. A little too early for dinner so we shared a Caesar salad, had coffee and iced tea, and munched on this hor dourves table that was available to patrons. It was AWESOME! A variety of cheeses, fondue, breads, crackers, fruit, marinated figs, and salamis were served. The marinated figs, I hadn't tasted anything like them. They were amazing. The service was friendly. I recommend this place if you're taking the train to/from Philly. The dinner menu looked a little pricey but the food I saw other people eating did look delicious.

It was a good thing my colleague and I ate those snacks. While we returned to Manhattan at 7 PM we didn't get back to our hotel until 9 PM because of the steam pipe incident at Grand Central Station. Our hotel was only a few blocks away and since every street was blocked off we had to walk around in a rather large circle to go the mere 5 blocks we would have otherwise!

Blueberry Scones

I just adore scones but don't love that they don't taste so good when I've purchased them in stores, restaurants, and coffee shops. They're dry, too sweet, hard as rocks, and not fluffy. Having wanted to make scones forever, I decided to forge ahead after a friend shared her recipe. Plus, Sunday mornings scream scones with a nice cup of coffee or tea. The recipe, like my friend, is kick-ass, and I think I hit a grand slam in preparing them. They were perfect -- slightly crispy on the outside, soft and moist on the inside, and just perfectly sweet. The home was filled with the smell of butter and blueberries. What a way to wake up!

I've made low-fat scones and lived to blog about them. I shouldn't have. They weren't nearly as good. Not even close. The fat is what makes a scone successful. And if you use good fats, then a scone isn't nearly as unhealthy as one would think.

Ingredients
-3 cups flour
-4 tsp baking powder
-1/2 tsp baking soda
-1/2 tsp salt
-8 T butter

Cut butter into the dry ingredients listed above (until coarse, you want little chunks of butter the size of peas). Stir in wet ingredients listed below:

-1/2 cup sugar
-1 large egg, beaten
-2/3 cup buttermilk (I used low fat only because that was the smallest container available, otherwise I would have gone full fat)
-1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries

Stir until just mixed. Divide dough into two parts, and pat each into a circle. Cut each circle into 6 wedges. Bake at 375 degrees for 20-25 minutes until brown.

The dough is very sticky so I would flour your hands when you pat down otherwise you'll end up with a lot of dough on your hand, like I did. Don't be tempted to add any more liquid even if you think the batter is dry. It will come together, especially if you use frozen blueberries and they start to thaw a bit. Adding more liquid will just make the dough that much more sticky.

Enjoy!

My Babies

My tomato plants are growing so fast! The one you see above is just one of six seeds I planted. 5 of 6 germinated. Not bad. I held out hope for the 6th one but it's a no show. I got a rather late start due to delays so I decided to go with a variety that would produce fruit rather quickly, which left me with the early girl variety. This tomato has a very short growth period of 52 days versus the typical 80 plus. I'm not convinced because my babies still look rather runt like. It's been 2 weeks since the seeds germinated and 3 weeks since planting. Every morning I walk out on to my front porch waiting to see them bursting. I need more patience!

Vanilla Cupcakes and Chocolate Frosting

Cheers! Toasting our 14 year friendship!

What do you do when your very good friend comes into town? Well, I made the food that we bonded over when we first met. In our case, lots chips and salsa (we were the reason Tostitos and Pace Picante saw higher than usual earnings during those years) and boxed cake fueled us through late night study dates, rants about all things Italian, and 80's music marathons.

For our reunion, I decided to take it up a notch and make cupcakes from scratch because anything from a box no longer makes the grade, unless you're in elementary school.

I made vanilla cupcakes and frosting previously (December 2006 recipes) but given our predilection for chocolate, I decided to go for a vanilla cupcake with chocolate frosting. The frosting was amazing. Not too sweet, not too stiff, and tasted like true chocolate. Home made frosting is the opposite of anything Duncan Hines produces.

While I thought the frosting I made in December was good, it is even better now. Partly, it was the addition of chocolate, but mostly I think it was the weather. In December, though I whipped the heck out of the frosting, and I mean beat it for a solid 7 minutes, I just could not get it to be lightly and fluffy. And while I live in a relatively mild climate, it makes a big difference. Today, in the middle of a heat wave, the frosting came together so quickly. I couldn't believe butter could be so airy!

Ingredients for Frosting
-1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature (let sit on counter over night)
-1 and 3/4 cups powdered sugar
-1/4 cup cocoa powder (use unsweetened)
-2 T milk
-1 tsp vanilla

Preparation
Beat butter until creamy, about 30 seconds. Add powdered sugar, cocoa, milk and vanilla, and beat on high until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes, if not longer.

Yields enough frosting for 12 cupcakes very very generously. Leftovers can be kept in the fridge for a week or frozen indefinitely.

These cupcakes were really very good, made even more sweet by sharing with a friend who knows you so well that no words are necessary to feel understood.

Fettuccine with Sauteed Peppers and Parsley

I was totally appalled by the Italian food I had at lunch. In fact, it was so bad that after two bites, I threw it out. Authentic Italian food really focuses on vegetables which is something that some Italian restaurants really neglect, instead focusing on gobs of cheese and too much pasta. In Italy, vegetables are often the focus, as they should be, because they are so abundant.

So I came home to take the offensive taste out of my mouth. Really, I made this dish because a friend was coming over for dinner, and as usual, I decided to make a guinea pig out of her. This dish was really good, has few simple ingredients that you would most likely have in your fridge, and takes fewer than 3o minutes to bring together. I just love love love dishes that come together so quickly. It's also colorful, healthy, and so pretty to boot!

The parsley is key because it really brings the dish together, and it's a good recipe for using a lot of parsley so you don't have to feel about letting any go to waste because most likely, you won't! You really cannot have enough parsley in this dish.

Once again, this recipe comes from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone.
Serves 4
Cooking Time: 30 minutes or less

Ingredients
-4 large bell peppers (red, yellow, and orange, or all one color)
-4 T olive oil
-Salt and freshly milled pepper
-1 pound fettuccine
-2/3 cup chopped parsley
-Freshly grated Parmesan, optional

Preparation
Heat large pot of water for the pasta. Meanwhile, cut peppers into strips about as wide as the fettuccine. heat the oil in a large skillet over high heat, then add the peppers; give a stir, let them sit for a few minutes, and stir again. Continue cooking this way for about 10 minutes. The peppers should caramelize along the edges, soften , and yield their juices but not lose their sins. They will smell sweet. Season well with salt and pepper, add a ladle of pasta water, and turn the heat low.

Add salt to the boiling water and cook pasta until al dente. Scoop past out and add it to peppers, allowing some water to drip into the pan. Raise the heat and toss the pasta and peppers with the parsley. Plate dish and add cheese.

Open Open Open

Is what I was saying at 5:45 AM on Saturday morning in front of a Starbucks.

You see things that are subconsciously understood but then you're confronted with it. I was waiting for my mint tea to cool down when I noticed that staff were stocking up on muffins, etc. and they were coming out of an ugly brown cardboard box covered with plastic. Where else are their treats supposed to come from. I know that Starbucks doesn't make these items from scratch and they're probably manufactured at some plant in some unknown location that I've never been to yet their website claims to buy their baked goods from local suppliers. But then why does every Starbucks more or less have the same set of baked goods? Perhaps there's a new definition of local that I missed!?

Chocolate Dipped Strawberries (CDS)

If you can believe it, I made 110 of these and still have strawberries left! These aphrodisiacs look amazingly beautiful yet are completely effortless to make I swear. And it is SO much fun. It's pure joy. I found myself completely engrossed in the strawberries and chocolate. I caught myself smiling and actually feeling giddy about making something so easy yet fancy enough to 'wow' people.

Before the dipping started, we narrowed the pool of strawberries down looking for size (large, of course!), shape (not too deformed), color (bright red not dark red), blemishes (not terribly bruised) etc. After all of that, I came to the conclusion that none of it would even really matter because the chocolate would hide most of the flaws. Probably the most important quality was the bruising because that affects taste.

Then there was the dipping technique. I took to dipping the strawberries straight in to the chocolate when I started out and when the chocolate became less, I tried dipping it side ways, and twirling it around in a circle like a ballerina in the 2nd grade who's trying to say in her circle but some how manages to pop out of it. The long of the short is that no technique or skill is required. The results are fool proof.

Unlike commercially made chocolate dipped strawberries, mine were delicious. The strawberries were flavorful and the chocolate adhered to the strawberries so that every single red-liscious bite had equal parts chocolate and strawberry.

Have you ever noticed that the chocolate on store bought strawberries is too brittle and chunks of it come off when you bite in to the strawberry? Now, that's a waste of perfectly fine chocolate. Commercially made CDS' use dark chocolate which tends to be really quite hard at room temperature, more so if it's been chilled.

In high school I made chocolate covered bananas and I found the dark chocolate really difficult to work with, and quite frankly, the bananas didn't taste very good. It was utterly disappointing. A few months ago, I saw Ina Garten make these treats on her show, Barefoot Contessa, on the Food Network Channel, and was inspired to make them again. The thing that caught my attention was her use of cream and how it made the chocolate stay liquid-like even after the chocolate is removed from the heat.

Try this recipe -- I think you'll be super happy with the results.

Serves as many people as you want
Cooking Time: 5 minutes to melt chocolate

Ingredients
-1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
-3 T heavy cream
-Strawberries (long stemmed if you can get them)

Preparation
Melt the chocolate and cream together in a bowl set over simmering water until just melted. Stir and remove from the heat. Dip each strawberry in the chocolate and set aside on waxed or parchment paper to dry.

Notes
I made the mistake of storing them in containers. While they tasted fine, they looked like they were sweating so the strawberries will not be as attractive. I don't know why but the 'sweating' kind of made me think of when you first hold hands with the person you're interested in, your heart's kind of racing, and your hand starts to sweat. It's kind of like that.

Anyway, I digress. Store uncovered and eat within the next day or two. Using hand picked strawberries especially means that the shelf life is short.

I quadrupled this recipe and there was enough chocolate to cover 110 small to medium sized strawberries, and there was still chocolate left over. Now, that's a problem I can deal with!

Strawberry Jam

The strawberries shown above are only a fraction of what was picked. Making jam did not significantly reduce the amount of strawberries we had. After hulling what I needed, there was still a fridge full of strawberries. I still have a freezer full of strawberries so if anyone has any ideas please let me know about them. Recipes for strawberry margaritas or daiquiris would be fun!

I searched online for several jam recipes when I came across this one that hails from Santa Maria, CA which is known for producing high quality strawberries so I decided to go with it. Jam is so easy to make. It's a one pot process and requires very little effort. I don't know why more people don't make jam themselves. It tastes much much better than commercial brands and is better for you. Actually, it's probably not better for you but the use of real sugar is a plus.

Time: 1 hour

Ingredients
-8 cups hulled strawberries
-8 cups sugar (used 4.5 cups)
-Juice of 2 lemons (used 1 lime since I didn't have lemon)

Preparation
1. Clean and hull enough strawberries to make up eight cups of cut strawberries. Throw into a large pot and stir in sugar and the lemon juice. Consider the pot too small if more than half the pot is full of strawberries.

2. Bring the mixture to a boil. Turn down the heat to keep the mixture boiling but watch it carefully as it will bubble up and, if the heat is too high, boil over. You do not want this to happen because the jam is extremely sticky. Hence the need for a large pot.

3. Boil the strawberry mixture for between 30 and 60 minutes (for me, this was about 45 minutes). Skim the bubbles off the top if enough form to cause problems. What you are looking for is the liquid to come off the spoon slowly instead of draining off quickly. It will be obvious when this happens. My jam became quite thick.

Notes
I don't think it matters so much if you use lemon or another citrus. It's not for the flavor but to help preserve the color, otherwise the strawberries may become very dark. So while the taste will still be excellent, its appearance may be slightly off putting. I only had 1 lime which was not enough for the quantity I made. I bet orange juice would be really nice.

Watch the sugar. This recipe, as most others do, calls for 1 cup of sugar for every cup of fruit. Really, I think it depends on how sweet the fruit is. In my case, the strawberries were really sweet so I only needed to use half the sugar. Like when adding salt, it's better to start with less and add more until it's just right. Start with half the suggested amount and increase with 1/2 cup increments. With 4 cups of sugar it was sweet but still slightly tart. The additional 1/2 cup made it perfect.

As the jam maker and perpetual taste tester, I actually didn't like the taste of the jam. Perhaps I had tasted and looked at one too many strawberries in a short period of time. I was kind of disappointed. The jam just didn't taste the way I thought it should but that's the fun part of cooking. Food can taste good even if it's not what you expected. The lesson learned is not to have ideas of grandeur...well, actually it is to have reasonable expectations of the food tasting good but not to be so set in your ways as to know what it should taste like before you've tried your food, if that makes sense. Having made this connection about my thought process, I had two pieces of toast and spread my jam on it, and I have to say it was really quite amazing, especially since I spread butter on my toast too!

Frittata with Tomatoes and Feta

So happy to not be looking at strawberries!

I fibbed. I'm not going to write about the jam recipe. Still too close to home. After hulling what seemed like an endless mountain of strawberries Saturday morning, I was only too happy to make something quick, easy, and tasty for my kind hosts. It wasn't hard to twist my arm -- anything with goat cheese is a big plus.

While the flavor was mild, it was delicious. The ingredients are simple, wholesome, and healthy. Even the picky host thought so and he's a discriminating critic let me tell you! Again, this recipe comes from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone.

Serves 4 to 6
Cooking Time: 15 minutes prep, 15 minutes active

Ingredients
-6 eggs
-Salt and freshly milled pepper
-1 bunch scallions, including an inch of the greens, finely sliced
-1 garlic clove, minced
-1/4 cup chopped parsley
-1 T chopped marjoram, plus extra for garnish (used 1 T dried oregano which the recipe called for if marjoram was not available)
-1 T each butter and olive oil, or a mixture (used olive oil exclusively)
-4 Roma tomatoes, halved, seeded, and diced (skipped seeding)
-2 ounces feta, thinly sliced (used crumbled goat cheese instead)

Deborah's Preparation
Beat the eggs with a few pinches of salt, then add the scallions, garlic, and herbs. Preheat the broiler.

Heat the butter and oil in a 8 or 10-inch skillet until foaming. Pour in the eggs, lower the heat, and distribute the tomatoes and cheese evenly over the top. Cook until eggs are set, then slide the pan 4 to 6 inches under the broiler and brown the top. Instead of inverting the frittata, slide it onto a large platter, keeping the top side up. Garnish with additional marjoram.

My Preparation
Since I didn't have a skillet that could go into the oven, I used the stove top method. Let the eggs set, about 5 to 7 minutes, may be longer. Usually, I use the spatula to pull the edge of the eggs away from the side of the skillet. If I see brown, it's ready to be flipped. To flip, firmly hold plate over skillet and flip quickly, and slide back into pan. Some egg will leak. Don't worry about it, it happens. Cook for an additional 5 minutes.

I also sauteed the tomatoes in a little olive oil to soften them because I wasn't sure if the stove top method would cook them enough before the eggs were done. After softening the tomatoes, let them cool before adding them to the egg mixture.

The key to getting the eggs right is the heat. You don't want the heat so high that it cooks the outer part before the insides have finished cooking. Try medium heat or lower.

Strawberry Picking

Excited to be in the fields.

1 hour later with 20 lbs of berries!

Well, I finally did it. I went berry picking and it was so much fun though I have to say we went a little nuts and purchased way too many strawberries. I know, 20 lbs! What were we thinking? That's exactly it, we weren't. As we were picking, the sun fried every single of one our brain cells and prevented any logical, rational thought from occurring about what we were going to do with our brood. We were deceived because they looked so tiny in our boxes. When we rang up, even the clerk couldn't believe it.

In this area of California there are many variety of strawberries. I'm not sure what variety we were picking but they were the more "homely" type, the kind that don't look amazing but are full of flavor and taste amazing. Once you taste one, you over the look the flaws. Then there is the Watsonville variety which are deceptive because they are large and nicely shaped, and really quite handsome but have poor flavor. The Watsonville variety were not available to pick because we weren't in Watsonville but they were for sale at the stand but a taste test verified that the one's we hand selected were indeed the best.

Anyway, as soon as we got home I was online looking up every single strawberry recipe you could possibly imagine because I could not think of ways to use all the strawberries. There aren't lots of recipes that call for large quantities of strawberries. Eights cup of hulled strawberries, 4.5 cups of sugar, and 3 hours later, I had a pot full of incredible strawberry jam (recipe to come tomorrow). My fingers are stained pink because that's how many strawberries I cut up. Sadly, the fridge is still stuffed with containers of fresh strawberries. What's a girl to do?

If I see another strawberry in the next year, it will have been too soon!

Steamed Artichokes

Aren't these artichokes beautiful? I'm not sure the pictures do them justice -- they were huge! I love artichokes. They are in season for such a short time and they're divine fresh though you can get good quality canned ones these days. This morning, I steamed them and we ate them without anything. They were delicious as is but the traditional way is to eat them with melted butter.

Prep: 10 minutes
Cooking Time: 30 minutes inactive

Preparation
Always use a stainless steal knife and pot because iron or aluminum foil will discolor artichokes. As you work with artichokes, rub cut areas with a lemon (not sure why). Deborah Madison says to do this and since I didn't have a lemon, I skipped this step. Cook artichokes with 2 tsps each of flour and olive oil which helps them keep their pale green color.

Clip the thorns from the leaves, slice off the top third of the artichoke, and trim the stem so that it can stand upright, removing as little as possible from the base. Give them a good rinse, pulling the leaves a part to flush them out.

Set the artichokes upside down on a steaming rack over boiling water. Cook until a leaf comes off fairly easily when you tugged, approximately 30 to to 40 minutes, depending on the size. If you plan to serve them cold, run them in cold water or dip in iced water to stop the cooking process.

I do recommend eating them cold, it's quite refreshing on a hot summer day. I'm off to berry pick now!

Galette Dough

I forgot to give credit where credit is due. The leek and goat cheese galette and the dough come from none other than Deborah Madison, my favorite chef, and her cook book, Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. I ADORE this book. It has the best recipes and everything tastes amazing. This dough recipe is no exception.

This recipe is easy and the results are nothing short of amazing. The crust is flaky, buttery, light.....

Prep Time: 5 minutes

Ingredients
-2 cups all-purpose flour or whole-wheat pastry flour (I used all purpose)
- 1/2 tsp salt
-1 tablespoon sugar (for savory galette, I used 1 tsp)
-12 tablespoons cold, unsalted butter
-1/3 to 1/2 cup ice water as needed

Preparation
Mix the flour, salt, and sugar together in the a bowl. I'm kind of stickler for keeping things cold, so I put the dry ingredients in the fridge for 30 minutes before using. Cut in the butter by hand or with a food processor, leaving some pea-sized chunks. I place the butter in the freezer for 10 minutes to make it really cold and firm. Sprinkle the ice water over the top by the tablespoon and toss it with the flour mixture until you can bring the dough together into a a ball. Once again, I found that I needed more water than the recipe called for, say about 3/4 cups.

Press it into a disk and refrigerate for 15 minutes if the butter feels soft. I refrigerated for 2 hours because I really don't want the butter to melt.

The key to flaky pastry is making sure there are chunks for butter in the dough so be careful not to over process if you're using a food processor. I find that 7 1-second pulses is just about right. Don't get too concerned about the number of pulses. Just take a look at it to see what size the butter chunks are. If they're pea sized, you're golden.

Deborah does not use the parchment paper method -- she just flours the surface of the counter. I think it could probably work but I used the parchment paper method, but only one piece so that I could bake the galette on the parchment. Roll out the dough on parchment and lightly flour the rolling pin and the top of the dough. You shouldn't have any sticking issues.

If you don't use parchment, flour the counter and roll dough into 14 inch irregular circle about 1/8 inch thick. Fold into quarters and transfer it to the back of a sheet pan or a cookie sheet without sides. Unfold it. It will be larger than the pan until you fold the edges over the filling.

So simple. Your friends will be impressed.

Leek and Goat Cheese Galette

Before

After

Having made a dessert galette with success, I thought I would try my hand at savory one. Friends were coming over for a good-bye dinner (so sad!) and I wanted to make a dish that would show them how much they mean to me. I also wanted something that you can't traditionally get at a restaurant (at least not any I've been to) and I wanted to try my hand with leeks. I've had bad experiences with leeks in the form of poorly made leek soup so I wanted to see if I could put them in my good graces again. I think I did!

I was a little worried because yet again I was going to make guinea pigs out of my guests. I always do this -- try something brand spanking new. Why? Isn't there etiquette about such activities. As much as I want my guests to enjoy their meal, I think it's a lot of fun to be as surprised as the guests. Since this recipe had nearly 2 sticks of butter, there was no way my arteries could have possibly taken a practice run!

Leeks are a milder than onions and don't cause the same outpouring of tears. While you can replace leeks with onions where a small quantity of leeks are required, in this recipe leeks must be used. If it's possible, this crust was even more amazing and delicious than the crust for the rhubarb and strawberry galette though the dough recipes were similar. The crust was like puff pastry, really light, crispy, flaky, and golden. Not sure why it turned out better. Perhaps I didn't work at the dough so much? Not sure.

Serves 4 to 6 as a main course, more if you serve as an appetizer.
Cooking Time: 5 minutes for dough, 30 minutes for leek mixture; 25-30 minutes oven time (It took me 45 to 50 on the lower 3rd of the oven)

Ingredients
Filling
-6 large leeks, including an inch of the green (enough to get 6 cups thinly sliced)
-3 T butter
-1 tsp chopped thyme (substitute 1/3 tsp to 1/2 tsp dried)
-1/2 cup dry white wine
-1/2 cup cream (I left this out)
-1 egg beaten, reserving 1 T
-3 T chopped parsley or 1 T chopped tarragon
-1/2 to 1 cup soft goat cheese to taste, about 4 oz.
-1/2 tsp salt

Preparation
Thinly slice and wash the leeks, you should have about 6 cups. Having a food processor helps a lot but is not necessary.

Melt the butter in a medium skillet. Add the leeks, thyme, and 1/2 cup water. Stir over medium heat, stirring frequently, until the leeks are tender, about 12 minutes. Add the wine and continue cooking until it's reduced, then add the ream and cook until it just coats the leeks and little liquid remains. Season with salt and plenty of pepper. Let cool 10 minutes, then still in all but 1 tablespoon of the beaten egg and 2 tablespoons of the parsley.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Roll out dough for one large galette (14 inches with 1/4 inch thickness). Spread the leek mixture on top, leaving a 2-inch border around the edge. Crumble the cheese over the top then fold the dough over the filling. Brush with the reserved egg and bake until crust is browned, 25 to 30 minutes. Remove, scatter the remaining parsley over the top, and serve.

To shorten the baking time, you may need to move the galette to the middle rack but I like using the lower 3rd because it guarantees that the bottom gets nice and crispy too!

Notes on the dough will come in a separate entry.

Rhubarb & Strawberry Galette

I was inspired to bake this when I saw a picture of this galette in my local newspaper. I'm always attracted to vibrant colors in clothing, and food is no exception. The beautiful jewel color of the strawberries and rhubarb contrasts and just pops against the earthy brown crust. Galettes are great because they aren't supposed to 'look' perfect. They're rustic, homey, and down-to-earth. When made well, they taste amazing.

This recipe, while shared in the newspaper, originally comes from Chez Panisse Desserts by Lindsey Remolif Shere. The focus of the article was not so much the desserts but about under privileged youth learning about how to eat well and cook on farm where they use local fresh ingredients. I was totally impressed by the kids, the farm, and the food they make. It was completely inspiring it (this is where the Halleluah song comes in). Having never made a galette and with strawberries in season, I was up for a challenge.

This galette is amazing. It's both sweet and tart, it's sassy, it's gorgeous. It tastes even more amazing than it looks. It's like a hot man/woman that has an even more amazing personality.

The recipe below is presented as it was written up in the newspaper. It mostly worked but I had to modify it to make the crust work better. But if you can get it to work, this is one FINE crust. It's crispy, flaky, buttery and all the things one would desire in a crust. After spending about 24 hours in a fridge, it was still pretty crispy. Two days later, still crispy, still great.

Ingredients
The Dough
-2 cups all-purpose flour
-3/4 tsp kosher salt
-15 T chilled unsalted butter, in small pieces (1/4 inch cubes works for me)
-1/4 cup ice water

The Filling
-1 1/4 pounds rhubarb (enough for approx. 3 3/4 cups)
-1 pint strawberries
-1 cup sugar
-2 1/2 T all-purpose flour
-1 egg yolk whisked with 1 tsp water
-Coarse decorating sugar

Preparation
To make the dough, put the flour and salt in the food process and pulse to blend (why is this even necessary?). Add the butter and pulse until all the butter pieces are coated with flour and are about the size of large peas (about 10 1-second pulses). Do not over blend.

Transfer to a bowl and stir in the water with a fork, mixing until the dough just begins to come together. With one hand, knead it briefly, just until you can collect the dough in a single shaggy mass. Resist the temptation to add more water. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and press it into the shape of a large round hamburger patty. Refrigerate at least 2 hours.

This recipe did not call for enough water at all. After I put in 1/4 cup, it was dry and wouldn't come together in a "single shaggy mess." It was just shaggy all over. I probably added another 1/4 to 1/2 cup (1/2 to 3/4 cup total), and while it came together a bit more, I still felt it was not what it was supposed to be. But I avoided the temptation to add any more water and packed it up in the fridge over night.

In the morning, it was still dry so I added a bit more water and dampened my hands, and squished the down together. Not too much but enough to bring it together in a shaggy mass.

Anyway, preheat oven to 425 degrees. If you have a baking stone, put it on a rack in the lower third of the oven and preheat for 30 minutes. I do not have a baking stone and I still put it on the lower third of the oven.

Remove the dough from the fridge and let it soften for about 15 minutes so it will be easier to roll.

To make the filling, trim the ends of the rhubarb stalks, and the cut stalks into 1/3 inch-wide slices. Hull the strawberries and chop medium fine (I just sliced them). In a large bowl, toss the rhubarb, strawberries, sugar and flour until well blended.

Roll the galette dough into a 15-inch circle between two large sheets of parchment paper. If the dough threatens to stick to the paper, lift off the paper and dust the dough lightly with flour. This will definitely happen so just flour everything well before starting to roll it out.

Transfer the dough, still between sheets of parchment paper, to a rimless baking sheet. Remove the top sheet of paper. Top the dough with filling, spreading it evenly but keeping it about 2 inches from the edge. Working quickly, slide a chef's knife or spatula (in my case) under the edge of the dough and fold it over the filling to make a wide border all around. Be fastidious about patching cracks in the dough or the filing will leak out.

Brush the rim of the dough with the egg wash (I didn't have an egg so I used milk). This is purely cosmetic so you can skip it. Sprinkle the rim generously with coarse sugar. Course sugar is decorative and can be expensive. A small jar (think the size of a bottle of herbs) costs $5. Puh-lease. It's sugar that is not granulated, not anything fancy shmancy so don't buy it. Instead, I used raw cane sugar which is of course, much cheaper (2 lbs costs $3.5o), gets the job done, and tastes better with the crust and the filling.

If you're using a baking stone, slide the galette, still on the parchment paper, directly onto the baking stone. If you are not using a baking stone, bake the galette on a rimless baking sheet.

Bake until the crust is well browned and the filling is bubbling, about 50 minutes. Slide the galette onto a rack to cool. Let cool for at least 30 minutes before slicing.

FYI, to appropriately work up an appetite for such a decadent dessert, it really does help to smack a few (or in my case A LOT) of golf balls while pretending it's your least favorite person's head. It really does work up a healthy appetite and opens the heart and mind to something so sweet and perfect.

Trader Joe's Frozen Shrimp

To make the shrimp dish I blogged about yesterday I purchased TJ's Jumbo Fresh Water Uncooked Shrimp from the frozen foods aisle. What a find, especially at $7.99 for a bag (1 pound). They are farm raised and deveined, and still have their shells on, though they are extremely easy to peel off. They're huge and don't really shrink during the cooking process. We cooked them with the shell on for the linguine dish. They cooked up so nicely and had amazing flavor. I thought they tasted better than the previously frozen shrimp that I purchased at Whole Foods a few weeks ago. They are nice to have in the freezer for a quick meal.

A lot of people might be turned off by having to use their hands to peel off the shell while eating a nice pasta meal but we thought it was a lot of fun and made the experience that much more enjoyable.

Linguini with Shrimp and Lemon Oil

Last night I decided to try another recipe by Giada DeLaurentis of Everyday Italian on the Food Network channel. I find the show so distracting because they always have her wearing these low cut tops that emphasize her boobs. I think when the show started they were trying to capture the male demographic but I don't think it worked because almost all of recipe reviews come from married women with kids. While her recipes are simple they some times lack flavor but this recipe garnered my attention because it had everything good in one dish: carbs, protein, and greens.

It's easy, simple, fresh and clean. The lemon and arugula add freshness and zing. It's perfect for a warm night and has the added bonus of taking fewer than 30 minutes. With the addition of one ingredient and reduction of another, I found this recipe to be totally faboo!

Serves 4
Cooking Time: less than 30 minutes

Ingredients
Lemon Oil
-1/2 cup olive oil (I only used 1/4 cup)
-1 lemon, zested

Pasta
-1 pound linguine pasta
-2 tablespoons olive oil (I used the equivalent amount of butter)
-2 shallots, diced
-2 garlic cloves, minced
-16 ounces frozen shrimp
-1/4 cup lemon juice (about 2 lemons)
-1 lemon, zested
-1 teaspoon salt
-1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
-3 ounces arugula (about 3 packed cups -- use more)
-1/4 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

Preparation
For the lemon oil:
Combine the olive oil and the lemon zest in a small bowl and reserve. I used 1/4 cup and it was perfect. I think 1/2 c would be make the dish way too greasy. Ugh.

For the pasta:
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil over high heat. Add the pasta and cook until tender but still firm to the bite, stirring occasionally, about 8 to 10 minutes. Drain pasta, reserving 1 cup of the cooking liquid.

Meanwhile, in a large, heavy skillet warm the oil over medium heat. Add the shallots and garlic and cook for 2 minutes. Add the shrimp and cook until pink, about 5 minutes. Add the cooked linguine, lemon juice, lemon zest, salt, and pepper. Toss to combine. Turn off the heat and add the arugula. Using a mesh sieve, strain the lemon zest out of the reserved lemon olive oil and add the oil to the pasta. The zest can be discarded. Add the chopped parsley to the pasta and toss to combine. Serve immediately.

My Notes
Saute the garlic and shallots in butter instead of oil. It smells great and adds a different flavor.

Throw in the shrimp frozen.

Salt is key. Cook the pasta in salt and add it to the shrimp. The lemon juice really reduces the saltiness so you have to make up for it by adding more. The dish will be a little bland if not well salted. Also, the lemon juice is key. My friend and I were so eager to eat we plated the food and then noticed the lemon juice on the side so we dumped the food back into the pan, threw in the lemon juice, and tossed again! Funny. We thought the recipe could do with more arugula. It really does wilt into nothing so I would say add twice as much, say 6 cups.

Add freshly grated Parmesan and you have perfection in one pan.

Freezing Strawberries

I'm so jealous of all my friends who go fruit picking -- it's such a great way to pass time. They're glad I'm not with them though because while they're picking, I'm eating what they've put away in buckets. Seriously, when my friends and I went fruit picking, I was known for doing this! I call it quality assurance and it's hard work let me tell you!

My friend went strawberry picking and made jams and all sorts of goodies for the freezer that she can pull out in the the fall and winter, when in the dead of a Midwest winter, such fruit won't be available. She's so darned clever. She talked about freezing the strawberries whole on a cookie sheet before storing packing them away in a bag or container, this way the berries don't stick to each other as much, and most importantly they don't get mushed! In the winter, think of all the things she can make, like galettes, pies, jams, smoothies, and so much more!

Brie is Key

Remember those grilled portabella mushroom sandwiches I blogged about a while ago? Well, I made them last night without the cheese (because I forgot it), and the sandwich was not the same. So, don't forget the Brie or your favorite cheese or something fatty. Without the fat, it's no good.

Summer Grilling

I love sitting on sunny patios with a glass of wine. Not many things can beat this leisurely activity when you have a good company. The experience is completely enhanced when grilling, and that's exactly what a friend and I decided to do. In an hour (including shopping time), we had a beautiful summer feast that included grilled marinated shrimp, scallops, asparagus, zucchini, and yellow squash. We supplemented with herb rice.
There's something about eating food with grill marks -- I don't know what it is but it makes everything taste fresher, healthier, and better. May be it's the sun, the wine, or the company, or all of it. Food just tastes better off the grill and outside in the sun.

It was all very simple and easy. Rinse the asparagus and slice up the zucchini and squash length wise. Toss together with a bit of olive oil and salt and pepper and you're good to go. The asparagus was a bit tricky. The zucchini were ready before the asparagus and then we left the asparagus on a bit too long but it still tasted good, even if it was a little soft. Grilled softness is better than steamed softness.

We deveined the shrimp and marinated in a very good teriyaki called Veri Veri Teriyaki made by Soy Vay. Soy Vay is salty so perhaps cut some of it with water. I don't think I would have noticed the salt except that my grill buddy pointed it out. In comparison to everything else, it was salty but not in a bad way. If you're salt sensitive you could probably cut the salt by diluting with a bit of water.

It probably could have used a good 2 hours or marinating time but we were hungry and probably did it for 20 minutes. The shrimp cook quickly -- as soon as they are pink take them off otherwise they're a bit tough. I deveined shrimp for the first time. Just make a slit on the underside of the shrimp and pull out it's intestine -- it will be blue in color. After deveining, rinse the shrimp.

We didn't do anything to the scallops -- just placed them right on the grill. Probably out of laziness but hey some of the best things come out those things that are not overly done up. I am glad that we left them alone because I actually noticed the scallop flavor for the first time. At restaurants they have a tendency to drown them in some sort of sauce to mask the taste but a scallop all by itself tastes really great. Not too fishy like salmon. I bet it would taste awesome with a lemon butter sauce, a condiment that would enhance the flavor without masking it altogether.

I would say we did really well considering everything was done on the fly, and we didn't even get in a plane.

Pizza

As much as I enjoy writing about food I've prepared, it's just as much fun to write about food other people make or give to me. This evening, having to work late work on a proposal, a friend brought food to my office so that I wouldn't go hungry as I burned the midnight oil. He brought my favorite pizza, the Margherita, from my favorite pizza place. We ate 1 slice together while I took a break, and then made sure I ate my second piece in between frantic bouts of typing. Every 5 minutes or so there would a be gentle, "take a bite, chew slowly, enjoy." What a treat. What a friend!

Blueberry Muffins

Isn't it a treat when you wake up in the morning to smell of blueberry muffins fresh from the oven? I rolled out of bed and into the kitchen to find these warm muffins sitting in a basket waiting just for me. I thought this recipe was lovely especially since whole wheat flour was used. The taste is hardier, perhaps a little nutty (?) and different if you are not accustomed to using whole wheat flour but nonetheless really nice and more filling. They were divine on their own and I imagine great with a pat of butter!

This recipe comes for The Good Housekeeping Illustrated Cookbook.

Ingredients

-2 cups all-purpose flour (1 cup was whole wheat flour)

-1/2 cup sugar

-1T baking powder

-1/2 tsp salt

-1 egg

-1 cup milk
-1/4 cup oil

-3/4 c fresh blueberries

Preparation

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. In a large bowl, mix flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. In a small bowl, beat egg slightly then stir milk and oil into beaten egg. Add egg mixture all at once to flour with blueberries, and stir until flour is just moistened (there should be lumps). Spoon into pan, and make for 20 to 25 minutes. Immediately remove from pan onto wire rack to cool. Serve warm.

Potato, Mushroom, and Kale Frittata

How am I supposed to gain weight if I don't have time to eat, much less cook? I've been working late and coming home late. Last night I was home by 7:30 (an early night) or so and it was so tempting to just eat the Indian leftover options but I just didn't have it in me. I'm tired of Indian food and tired of eating food that I didn't make myself. In any case, I forced myself to make something and this is what I came up with.

While at the grocery store over the weekend, I decided to make a frittata but I wanted it to be different than the one I previously blogged about with bell peppers and onions. I love mushrooms so I decided to grab some cremini (mini portabellas) and then was hemming and hawing about spinach until I came across multi-colored kale. The leaf parts are green but the stems were all sorts of different colors. Not sure if the colors do anything to the flavor but it was pretty and inexpensive so why not? The California spinach contamination is still too fresh in my memory to even consider using it. After all, I do want to live to share my cooking stories.

So I prepared this dish the same way I prepared the other frittata starting with the a little bit of oil and sauteing the potatoes. Then after 5 minutes I added the salt, thyme, and mushrooms. Then I added the kale which I finely chopped up in the food processor. So I get through making this when I realized that I only had 2 eggs! Two! How can you possibly make a frittata with just two eggs? You can't. I was too lazy to go to the grocery store and too stubborn to let this go. After all, it had taken the last bit of energy to make the darned thing, so I called MJ, my neighbor down the street, who kindly gave me two eggs. This reminded me of the time I visited the south of France and I was staying with friends and we would go over to their neighbor's to get freshly laid eggs because the neighbor had chickens! Of all things, and it wasn't like we were out in the country. We were in Martigues! There's nothing like freshly laid French eggs, let me tell you. There's also nothing like a French Croissant with chocolate.

Anyway, I digress. This recipe is less massive than the other frittata, I used 4 eggs instead of the usual 5.

I think the frittata turned out great and the flavor, while the herbs were same, tasted completely different. It was an easy way to get a green vegetable in the diet without noticing it too much. Not sure what my nutritionist would have to say about that since he said I needed to up the protein and fat, and decrease the amount of vegetables I eat. Never thought I would live to hear that I should be eating fewer fruits and vegetables. Hey, I should enjoy this while it lasts. In any case, I got my protein.

Really the first dish I kind of made up on my own! Yeah!

What a Small World!

This world is so small and my belief that everybody on this earth are some how connected came to fruition again this afternoon. Alex, my friend, shared with me that he and his really good friend, Genie who now lives in Iowa (previously in Washington, DC) were talking about the strawberry shortcake that I made for Alex's birthday and how I blog about the food I make. Genie was like "Hey wait a minute, I think I know that blog!!! How weird that I know your friend's blog and never knew she was your friend!"

Isn't that so freaking cool?

I appreciate that Alex would call me in the middle of the day to share this story with me. It made my day.

Genie has a great blog of her own about her gardening adventures. She wasn't much of a gardener when she lived in DC but that changed when she move to Iowa. Her blog, the Inadvertent Gardener, can be found at http://inadvertentgardener.wordpress.com/. It's awesome. Check it out.

Blackberry Pie

This time of year just screams for pies because of all the wonderful fruit that's available. Admittedly, I used frozen berries. For one thing, they hold their shape better and they're a lot cheaper. I could have easily spent $20 on berries just to get the amount I needed for the recipe! One day I hope to have a berry patch of my own.

I wonder if berry plants do well in containers. I imagine probably not because they sort of sprawl. Growing up, we used to have a boysenberry plant in our yard. It was so worth it to get pricked by those awful needles just to taste one of those succulent berries.

In any case, I'm going to discuss how to make the pie crust because it's fool proof and it only uses butter, no shortening. I messed up today yet the pie still looks grand I think! This recipe comes from Cook's Illustrated and it was my 3rd time making the crust.

Makes 1 9-inch double-crust pie shell

Ingredients
-2 1/2 cups unbleached all purpose flour
-1 tsp salt
-1 T sugar
-16 T unsalted butter
-3 T sour cream
-1/3 cup ice water

Preparation
-Process flour, salt, and sugar together in the food processor until combined, about 3 seconds. Add butter and pulse until butter is the size of large peas, about 10 1-second pulses.

- Using fork, mix sour cream and 1/3 cup ice water in a bowl until combined. Add half of sour cream mixture to flour mixture; pulse for three 1-second pulses. Repeat with remaining sour cream mixture. Pinch dough with fingers; if dough is floury, dry and does not hold together, add 1 to 2 tablespoons ice water and process until dough forms large clumps and no dry flour remains, three to give 1-second pulses.

- Turn dough onto work surface. Divide dough into 2 balls and flatten each into a 4-inch disk; wrap each disk in plastic and refrigerate until firm but not hard, 1 to 2 hours before rolling. (Dough can be fridged for up to 24 hours. Let thoroughly chilled dough stand at room temperature for 15 minutes before rolling).

Rolling the Dough Out
Roll disk out between large 2 large sheets of parchment paper to 12-inch circle (about 1/8 inch had success with the bottom crust but had terrible luck with the top crust.) It's clever because you remove parchment from one side of the dough round, and flip (easier to flip parchment than a granite slab!) it into 9-inch pie plate; and then you peel off the second layer! Working around the circumference of the pie late, ease dough into plate by gently lifting the edge of the dough with one hand while pressing into plate bottom with other hand.

During the roll out, if the dough becomes soft or sticky, put back in the fridge until it gets hard again.

Tricks
It's really important that all the ingredients are chilled so that the butter does not melt. Having little butter pieces cut into the flour is what make this crust flake. Apparently, shortening flakes beautifully and is easier to work with but it's so bad for you. So I chill everything including the flour, salt, and sugar for 30 minutes. I also placed fridged butter and water in the freezer for 30 minutes to help keep everything as cold as possible.

The challenge is rolling it out. Use a fair amount of flour, it really helps when rolling it out and will prevent the dough from sticking to the surface it's rolling out on. Normally I roll it on a granite slab but today I tried using the parchment paper method described above. It worked for the first dough disk but not the second. It's possible that I rolled it too thin and it got soft. I placed the rolled out dough in the fridge to harden again but when I went to peel the dough, it ripped and a lot of it was stuck to the parchment. Yikes! So I had to take what was left, reform a disk, and placed it in the fridge for 15 minutes before I rolling it out again. I was convinced that it would not turn out because I could no longer see the flecks of butter (it's not a good sign if you don't) but it did!

Personally, I like rolling out the dough on the counter or other work surface. While the flip trick is kind of neat the whole sticking business was enough to turn me off.

Oh, after rolling out the first piece, place it in the fridge so that it remains firm and butter solidifies again so that it can flake. After rolling the second piece, also place it in the fridge to firm up before assembling the pie together. The blackberry pie ingredients are the same as what I used for the blueberry pie which I blogged about in December/January except of course for the blackberries!

I certainly enjoy eating what I bake but it is so much better when you share food with others. It just tastes better. Why does it? Today I shared with my neighbors with 6 cats and 1 dog who provided vanilla ice cream as an accompaniment (not the pets but the neighbors!) . I think they enjoyed it. P&P, thanks for having me over.

Strawberry Shortcake

I would say not bad for a first try. My friend was right about the dough being a little sticky. I added a bit more milk than the 3/4 c the recipe called for because the dough was a little dry with a bit of loose flour on the bottom of the bowl. I surmise that because I used 1/2 white whole wheat flour, it needed a bit more milk. Regardless of what type of flour you use, I think starting with 3/4 cup is a good place to start. You can always add more but once it's added you can't get it out!

I thought the flavor, for only having 1/4 c butter, was awesome, and I added 1 tsp of sugar instead of the optional 1 T. My friend also gave me a recipe for super rich short cake which I might have to try out the next time. If this one was very good, imagine how the rich recipe must taste! I can't wait.

This recipe is super simple and took about 15 minutes to bring it all together! So quick, so easy, and everyone was so impressed that I made shortcake.

I rolled out the dough on the Silpat (thank you friends for this suggestion) and the dough just peeled right off, kind of like pulling off a fruit roll (Apricot is my favorite flavor) off the plastic wrap!

Red Pepper & Broccoli Ginger Stir Fry

I was told by a nutritionist that I need to eat fewer vegetables (and eat more fat) to gain weight! Who would have thought? Apparently, I need to use more oil, butter, and juice to get extra calories in my diet without thinking about it too much. Vegetables are really fibrous so they're really filling but not calorie dense. But I'm attracted to vegetables and with a head of broccoli and red pepper in the fridge calling out to be me used, I decided to make a stir fry for dinner. Prepared in 30 minutes, it's a easy to prepare and packed with nutrients!

Cooking Time: 30 minutes
Serves 2

Ingredients
-1 T canola oil
-1 head of broccoli
-1 red pepper
-lots of fresh ginger
-good quality soy sauce

Preparation
Chop broccoli into medium size spears and slice up red pepper into strips. Heat canola oil over medium heat and add ginger. Add broccoli and saute until bright green. Add red pepper strips. Cover pot for 5-10 minutes until vegetables are tender. Add soy sauce to taste. Serve with brown rice.

I didn't add enough ginger because that zing that ginger brings was missing. I think perhaps I should have added the ginger after the broccoli because it got really brown, and almost burned so I don't think that helped. Over all though, not bad and it was quick and edible.

Shortcakes

So I haven't made these but I will be for a friend's 34th birthday BBQ on Saturday. Here's the recipe -- so simple. I'll try it out, take pictures, and report back shortly.

Shortcakes

Ingredients
-2 cups flour (half could be white whole wheat flour)
-3 tsps baking powder
-1/2 tsp salt
-1/4 cup butter
-3/4 cup milk
-1 T sugar (optional)

Cut butter into dry ingredients until you have coarse like meal. Add milk, mix together until absorbed. Roll or pat out to about 1/2 inch thick, or a little thicker. Cut out and bake at 375 until lightly browned, around 15 minutes.

Pancakes Revisted

I'm addicted to pancakes and want to try every variation. I don't know why but it's the food that I've been craving the most (outside of bacon, yes bacon!). So I decided to take my friend's advice and substitute half of the all purpose flour with white whole wheat flour, and the pancakes were just delicious, especially with the addition of frozen blueberries which are ideal for pancakes because they hold their shape better than fresh ones.

The one notable difference, and I don't necessarily think it's a bad one, is that they are more dense and less light. This makes sense given the use of white whole wheat flour. The flavor is more full and satisfying. The added bonus, especially for me, is that I wasn't hungry 30 minutes after breakfast like I normally am after eating a huge pancake breakfast.

Friends came down to join in on the fun and festivities, bringing much needed strawberries and peaches to reduce the carb load. Much merry making was had by all with the swapping of some amazingly hilarious short stories that should really be penned just so we can remember them with the clarity they truly deserve. We would have been rolling on the floor if not for the hard wood. Stories, like good food, are meant to be shared with people that you love and care about, like the meal we had today.