Middle Crescent Kitchen

Taste of Beverly Hills Presented by Food and Wine Magazine

2010-09-04T22:24:00.000-07:00

Eating. Drinking. More Eating. Still Eating.
by Denise Fondo

Food and wine lovers spent a day of bliss in Beverly Hills. At least, this one did. Saturday's morning and afternoon session of The Taste of Beverly Hills presented by Food and Wine magazine was a great success, in my opinion. For a first time event, it was impressively organized. The layout is smart, with two main tents of food and drink samples, seating areas in between, and live demonstration tents along the side. It's a setup that gives you a sense of flow, makes the space feel more open, and prompts you to move about the grounds. On the way from one tent to the next, you see and hear demonstrations that might interest you and you may run into some well-known names from the food world. I ran into Ted Allen, Roger Mooking, and Ludo Lefebvre as I walked around the event and in the halls of the Beverly Hilton.

I really love that the event is utilizing the old Robinson's May parking lot in Beverly Hills. I really miss that store and this makes me feel rather nostalgic. I wish organizers had found a way to incorporate that adorable courtyard on the ground floor of the old store into the events. Perhaps next year. Also love the opportunity to spend time at the Beverly Hilton. Dipped into the cocktail bar in the hotel with friends in the afternoon to escape the heat, have a drink and talk about our experiences that day. Nice to have that available. With most food and wine events you are stuck in an outdoor location with absolutely no place to take a step back for a half hour or so.

I was scheduled to cover a number of demonstrations and events during the day, but managed to miss most of them. Too much food to taste! I did attend Boys Versus Girls Sommelier Blind Tasting hosted by Bonnie Graves. Randy Fuller will be writing about the this event on Now and Zin. Not to give anything away but Graves threw in a Two Buck Chuck as a trick wine and it was fun to watch sommeliers fooled into thinking it might sell for $12 a glass in a restaurant. Loved the surprise when it came out of the bag to be revealed as Trader Joe's cheap and popular wine.

Restaurants in attendance change with each session, so ticketholders are given an opportunity to taste dishes from many Los Angeles restaurants and dessert makers. Some of my favorite tastes include rigatoni with mushrooms from Nonna of Italy, meatballs from Delancey, beef satay from Talesai, beef and blue cheese sandwiches from Philippe The Original, champagne truffles from Valerie Confections and ribs from Mr. Cecil's California Ribs. I'm personally surprised by the Mr. Cecil's. Thought I didn't like their food but I'm going to have to give the restaurant another shot after today's taste. Never saw a number of restaurants listed for the afternoon, such as Water Grill and Ortalon. May have just missed them.

Just one small change to suggest, the bloggers lounge we were promised in media information, was nowhere to be found. We need a place to gather our thoughts, download photos, get our notes together, and power up our cellphones, computers and iPads. Other than that, The Taste of Beverly Hills was a lot of fun.

Seared Watermelon Steaks with Pistachios and Microgreens

2010-07-27T15:07:00.000-07:00

Love watermelon, pistachios and microgreens. Great summer dish from Chef Jose Andres using all three. Yum!

Chef Andres

Watermelon says “summer” to me. They are so versatile and full of sweet juice. We make an addictive agua fresca with its pink juice that you can find at Trés and Altitude. At home, my daughters scoop out little balls and freeze them for a cool treat. I love to sear thick slices on the grill or on a plancha. Try this at home. Your family will love it! --José Andrés

Serves 4

1 medium to large seedless watermelon
3 tomatoes
¼ cup Spanish extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon sherry vinegar
Sea salt
¼ cup chopped pistachios
1 cup packed micro greens (cilantro, mint, arugula), washed
Spanish extra virgin olive oil

OJAI PIXIES! SO DARN CUTE!

2010-07-25T23:48:00.000-07:00

DENISE FONDO

Absolutely beautiful Ojai Pixies from the Hollywood Farmers Market. A true California tangerine developed at the University of California Citrus Research Center Riverside. Sweet, juicy gems. I love eating one of two for breakfast. I also love using them in my cooking. Here is a delicious dish made with other ingredients I purchased from the farmers market.

Roasted Potatoes in Tangerine - Tarragon Olive Oil

8 medium Yukon Gold potatoes medium sliced
1 medium shallot thinly sliced
1 medium garlic clove minced
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/4 cup freshly squeezed Ojai Pixie juice
1 teaspoon freshly chopped tarragon
cayenne pepper, ground pepper, sea salt to taste

In a small mixing bowl combine the Ojai Pixie juice, tarragon and olive oil. Make sure all the seeds are removed from the mixture. Let this sit for at least an hour. Once the olive oil mixture is ready, preheat the oven the 350. Add the potatoes, shallot and garlic to a large mixing bowl. Add the olive oil mixture, cayenne pepper, sea salt and freshly ground pepper. Combine gently. If you want more tarragon, this is the time to do this.

Place all the ingredients into a medium casserole and roast in the oven for about 25-30 minutes. You want some caramelizing but you do not want the potatoes or shallots to burn.

You can change this recipe by using fresh parsley instead of the tarragon. You can use sweet onion in place of the shallot. Add a couple splashes of champagne vinegar.

Press Trip? Tough gig!

2010-07-25T20:47:00.000-07:00

When I tell people one of my jobs is travel writer, their response is usually something like, "Wow! What a great job! You must love it!" I do. Most of the time. The part of the job that is tough for me is the press trip.

There are good aspects to a press trip and I want to write about these first.

Best element of a press trip is the people I've encountered. Some of the publicists and writers I've met on press trips have become good friends. Nothing can top that for value in my life.

Another important element of a press trip is the opportunity it gives a freelance travel writer to experience a destination we probably couldn't afford on our own. Working as a travel writer does sound exciting but for the majority of us there is very little money in it. Payment for our work is also often hard to collect. We spend a great deal of time trying to get paid for work we've done for editors and publishers who must think we are all madcap heirs and heiresses on a lark. Ugly side of the job. So, a press trip may provide us with content for articles we can sell. Sometimes we have an assignment lined up before we even pack our bag. One bag. We travel light.

Now for the bad bits.

On a press trip I am someone's invited guest. Could be a hotel, a city, a tourism bureau, a chamber of commerce. The trip is generally scheduled within a inch of my life in order to experience as much of the destination as possible. I am going to receive first class treatment everywhere I go on this press trip. That's the problem. If I just go with the plan laid out for me on a press trip I am not doing my job as a travel writer.

I spend as much time as I can on a press trip working outside the boundaries of the official itinerary in order to do my job correctly. I need to experience a place without people knowing I'm a travel writer. I need to see what service is like for most people who travel to the destination. I need to see parts of town and visit businesses my hosts might not want me to visit. So, I grab every minute I can outside of my scheduled events to get my work done. I'm up very early in the morning until late into the night to get this all accomplished, while still attending most of the events on the itinerary. By the end of these trips, I'm as wiped out as the publicist who has to corral a group of feisty personalities through an experience.

On occasion I go completely off the reservation and SKIP a scheduled event. I only do this when it makes sense for my work. Like the barbecue I was invited to on a press trip about a year ago. I was ordered not to drive myself to the inn where it was being held because the steep route was too dangerous. What poor person am I sending up a killer mountain to happy inn if I can't even risk the drive? No one!

For many travel writers press trips are the very best part of the job. I can understand that, too. Traveling is one of the most freeing, exciting activities in life. Enjoying it on someone else's dime? Just that much better.

I feel quite strongly that great care must always be given to the work we produce from press trips. The very point of most travel pieces is to provide helpful information to people considering how to spend their hard-earned cash, and even harder earned days off, on a vacation. This is the very reason I am thankful for the opportunity a press trip offers me and completely committed to doing my job in whatever free time the official itinerary offers me.**

There are media outlets who absolutely will not allow their writers to take press trips and may not even hire a writer who has accepted one. I can understand the concern. The public needs to be absolutely sure a positive review of a destination comes from a writer's authentic experience and not the impressions of a press trip's controlled and skillfully finessed environment.

**Hello publicist, I know you are asking yourself now if I really did sleep in that morning I was late for our scheduled breakfast event. Probably not. Most likely, I was miles away by the crack of dawn, on my own little journey. I may have already sampled food from two other breakfast places before joining all your smiling faces around the table. Ditto lunch. Ditto dinner. And people wonder why I'm getting so fat.

Flood of Balsamic Vinegar Knockoffs!

2010-07-17T07:55:00.000-07:00

The balsamic vinegar you are using may be nothing more than rice vinegar laced with caramel flavoring and coloring. Not in my kitchen. People work hard to produce great products for us. We should always make the effort to support them. Cheap imitations geared toward maximum profits and minimal consumer satisfaction are just trash. "Ain't nothin' like the real thing, baby!"

According to an article on the website of Italy Magazine, manufacturers of genuine balsamic vinegar are meeting with the Ministry of Agriculture to explore ways to protect true balsamic vinegar products.

Always look for Protected Designation of Origin label or the DOP, if you want to know if your vinegar is a true balsamic.

Dinner Reservations? Plenty!

2010-05-19T11:11:00.000-07:00

UPDATE: WE NEVER STOPPED DINING OUT! NEVER. GOT TO LEAVE NOW. GOING OUT TO LUNCH!

“Uncle.” Seriously, Los Angeles restaurants, you’ve done me in. I’m taking the five-figure amount my husband and I used to spend annually at your tables and spending it on food to make at home. I’ll use the money to buy only the best ingredients. Yes, even those insanely priced tomatoes at the Santa Monica Farmers Market. I love to cook but time constraints make it somewhat difficult. No matter! We will happily adjust our lives to eat at our own table from this moment forward.

I used to love the words ‘Your dinner reservation is confirmed.” Not anymore. Now, the very thought of going to a restaurant for a meal fills me with anxiety. For many reasons. Many really good reasons.

Going out to eat used to be an occasion. Usually the people at the restaurant were happy to serve us, the food was great, the place was clean, and my husband and I weren’t endangered by the food on our plate, the staff, or the building.

The following is a list of a few incidents that have occurred to my husband and me at Los Angeles area restaurants over the last couple years. The list comes from memory because I never wrote them all down. I’m glad I didn’t, at least I’ve forgotten a few. The moments I recall are bad enough.

One of my complaints falls under a very big tent. The entire dining experience is simply deteriorating. The atmosphere and the service at many Los Angeles restaurants are no longer designed to make the customer feel comfortable and attended. Fellow diners frequently make the experience unpleasant for everyone nearby. Manners are as passé as Cherries Jubilee. People give no thought to the highly personal conversations they are conducting at the table next to you. Loud cell phone calls, fights with dinner companions, and screeching children running around tables, often give a restaurant all the charm of a cross-country bus trip in August.

At a small, Italian restaurant on Robertson, just north of Wilshire, we were all held captive (and horrified) by a doctor trying to wrangle a large sum of money from his dining partner. The doctor was loud, angry, and irrational. Within minutes, everyone in the restaurant knew he was in the middle of a very contentious divorce, was hiding money from his soon-to-be-ex, and had a fantastic business opportunity for his friend. The soft-spoken friend politely turned down the business opportunity. That sent the doctor into a rage shouting they were no longer friends and he should look for another doctor for his dying father. At this point, one of the doctor’s minions, dressed in scrubs, came in and called him away for an emergency. My husband and I, as well as every other diner, were silent as this dust-up dwarfed anything else happening in the restaurant. At some point before this event ruined the meals of everyone else, the manager should have asked them to keep it down, take it outside, or tuck into a dessert, compliments of the house. He did nothing.

Good service is no longer the norm in Southern California restaurants. It is a pleasant surprise. Time after time, we’ve watched our food languish at the pass as our servers fold napkins, chat with friends, have a cigarette out back, organize their appearance in a student film, stare out the window, or just, inexplicably, disappear for twenty-five minutes. Then, there is the exact opposite with servers who really feel we’ve come to have dinner only with them. We recently had a server bore us for our entire meal about his political views, which were the exact opposite of our own. We have no idea why he chose us as his victims for the evening. The restaurant was busy and, certainly, his other tables were suffering from his lack of attention. Not too long before that, the owner of an Indian restaurant spent over 30 minutes telling us why India is a better country than America and how he is a happier person than we are. He managed to insult our emotional and spiritual happiness, our car, the Hasidic community surrounding his restaurant, Catholics worldwide, and his uncle who runs an Indian restaurant around the corner from his own, in one very long, heated monologue. My husband said the phrase “off his meds” was the only way to describe the owner’s behavior that night. We have never returned to the restaurant though we used to eat there 2 or 3 times a month.

One of the most prevalent problems with dining out is over-anxious bus boys who take away food, silverware, and drinks before we are finished eating. It happens constantly. My husband has even had glasses of wine whisked away. Recently, at a seafood restaurant in Santa Monica I had to stop a bus boy from taking a lobster away. I had simply taken a break in eating to enjoy the view of the ocean and the pier. That’s all it took. He swooped in and grabbed lobster and bucket. I nearly had to wrestle him for the food. I got the lobster back but he did take off with the bucket, claw cracker, and lovely clarified butter. Two weeks ago a bus boy took away my plate when I, literally, had the fork to my mouth taking a bite.

At an Italian restaurant in Studio City, a waiter dropped a plate of spaghetti and meatballs on my husband. It hit one of his shoulders and slid down his white shirt. The waiter snapped an apology, gave my husband some napkins, and continued on his way. The restaurant refused to even pay for the dry cleaning bill. At a pizzeria on Wilshire Boulevard a pipe burst over my head soaking me in ……I don’t even want to think about that one. At a restaurant owned by two famous chefs, my husband bit into a sausage and cracked a molar on a bone, causing him agonizing pain and 2 trips to the dentist. To the restaurant’s credit, they picked up the dental bill without hesitation, making me a repeat customer. Randy still hasn’t returned, however. Then there was the night with two of my girlfriends when a very odd waitress tried to trap us in a parking structure. I still have no idea what was up with this lady but she really spooked us throughout dinner and then ran to the parking structure to bring down the gate so we couldn’t exit. We were, literally, racing her! We made it out and she stood in the street glaring at us as we drove away.

Sticking with food that hurt us, at a Mexican restaurant on La Cienega, I nearly choked to death on a piece of wood that was in my food. It got stuck in my throat. The manager told me the wood didn’t come from their restaurant. He changed his story when I showed him my wooden plate charger with a piece of wood missing from it. At a very popular taco place near Chateau Marmont, my husband was nearly killed by chicken bones left in tacos we picked up as a to-go order. Just west on Sunset, at a very popular Chinese restaurant, we found a two-inch piece of blood red lipstick in our noodles. At a popular and expensive bakery on Melrose, an employee brought my cake through the kitchen door and into the café, with a finger up one of his nostrils.

Worth our money? Nope.

Quite simply, much of the food is mediocre and I can cook so much better on even my most uninspired days. I use fresher ingredients and my kitchen is cleaner. The atmosphere is fantastic and I get to be alone with my husband. I also get to avoid the often off-putting visit to a restaurant bathroom. Sheesh……

Los Angeles restaurants, we’re out. Our money and our time will be better spent elsewhere. Perhaps on cooking classes in Italy!

New Life in Springtime!

2010-05-02T09:02:00.000-07:00

Been so long since I've written on Middle Crescent Kitchen or I Cook the World. I needed to focus all my attention on a health issue. I'm healing well and feeling my strength and stamina increase every day.

So, I will be posting recipes again on both sites. I hoped very much for this day to come. It has!

Central Coast Sunday

2009-11-02T08:32:00.000-08:00

Fresh farm foods, good wine, beautiful scenery. There are plenty of reasons to get in the car and head north on the 101 on the weekend. The Santa Barbara Farmers Market is held every Saturday, just off State Street. Many of the farmers whose stands I visit are there every weekend. If you like a one-stop location for your shopping, then certainly put this FM on your list. I prefer to meander, happening upon stands or searching out ones I've researched.

Sunday morning we passed a small, beat-up pick-up truck making its way to a farmers market, its bed jammed with fresh pineapples. Made me think about making pineapple rum cake, which I will bake later this week.

We passed McGrath Family Farm in Oxnard. For over 100 years, the McGrath Family has been farming in the Oxnard region. Shoppers who visit the farmers markets in Santa Barbara and Santa Monica know the produce from this farm very well. It's a great stop, just off the 101. You can buy organic produce at their Farm Center and even pick your own produce from their fields. Great stop if you have children with animal tours available.

We stopped in Goleta briefly, in search of the farmers market. Our hope was to track down the pineapple truck. Never found them. Not the farmers market. Not the pineapples. I blame Google Maps....

Just north of the Gaviota Pass is one of my favorite farm stands in the country, Classic Organic. You can see it, just off the 101, on Old Coast Highway. Just follow the road to the first barn with a peace sign painted on the side, for some of the tastiest produce in the state. Bins spill over with seasonal foods, while a black cat sleeps soundly near the chest holding fresh eggs. On Sunday, the outside bins were piled high with all types of squash, including pumpkins and gourds. We ran into owner Helmut, which was lovely, as we've never met him before. Told him we've been following the farm's Facebook page.

We bought butternut squash, a pumpkin, spaghetti squash, carrots, red chili peppers, a massive bunch of cilantro (for a dollar!), and some candy onions. Made the spaghetti squash today. Such a fun and silly food. Kids should absolutely love eating this wonderfully stringy squash. You'll find my simple recipe at the end of this article.

We get back on the 101 and head north, passing Restoration Oaks Ranch and recall all the tasty dishes we made last spring from the blueberries we purchased there. Shuttered until 2010. We'll be there opening weekend.

Exciting news! The Family Ranch apple stand on the 101 in Buellton is open for business! We pulled in and bought 5 pounds of Granny Smith apples, a jar of homemade apple butter, and a jar of wild blueberry preserves. The owner picks the blueberries down by a stream near their home. We tasted both this morning and they are so delicious. Nothing beats homemade preserves and spreads.

We decided to check out a new wine tasting and dining spot in Buellton, Avant Tapas and Wine. This is also a wine crush facility and quite a few winemakers are making their wine at Terravant Wine Company now. Check out Randy Fuller's piece on Avant at nowandzin@wordpress.com and 661mag.com.

We grabbed a two-top table in the expansive Avant tasting and dining room, with a view of the Santa Rita Hills. From this vantage point, you're looking at the beginning of the Santa Rita AVA. The colors of the leaves were so varied and vibrant including chartreuse, marigold, faded lime, apricot, ochre, burnt umber, and cotton-topped scrub. The Santa Ynez River is hidden within these trees, as well.

We ordered five dishes from Avant's tapas menu including a pizza, duck confit, olives and almonds, and a couple cheese dishes. The pizza was a real standout, with thin crust that had just the right salty snap. As our server said, "The wood-fired oven makes all the difference." Wish we had one in our home! Duck Confit with Kombucha Squash, and Currants is really a perfect autumn dish. Nice menu, which I feel is still evolving and I am really looking forward to following its growth. Randy Fuller talks about wine pairings for these dishes in his article about this trip.

Our last stop is the farm stand on Alamo Pintada Road, just across from Buttonwood Farms and Winery in Solvang. This is our strawberry stop. These folks sell some of the biggest and juiciest strawberries in the region. We always pick up other produce including their corn in season. I bought 3 beautiful poblano chilies, which I am going to stuff with rice, some other goodies and lace with a cream sauce. You'll find that recipe on my blog later this week.

A one day trip. Home sated and happy. Looking forward to making all these incredibly fresh and tasty dishes.

Any questions? Please contact me at icooktheworld@aol.com.

SPAGHETTI SQUASH

Serves 2

1 large spaghetti squash
2 tablespoons chestnut honey
2 tablespoon butter
1 healthy pinch cayenne pepper

Directions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Cut the spaghetti squash in two. Easiest way to do this is place a knife at the middle point of the squash and tap with a mallet.

In a small saucepan melt two tablespoons of unsalted butter and two tablespoons of chestnut honey. You can use any type of honey you like, but this is my favorite. You can buy it online from a number of sources including La Tienda and Bella Cucina. Add a decent-size pinch of cayenne pepper and cook over low heat until melted and combined.

Place a cup of water in a small baking dish and add the squash. Pour the honey-butter mixture equally into each piece of squash. Drizzle some over the rim of the squash, too. Place in lowest oven rack and bake for about 50 minutes. Add more water, if it completely evaporates. Remove, let the squash cool, and serve.

You can sprinkle some brown sugar over the rim of the squash when you've finished cooking it, as well.

Music For You

2009-09-27T00:04:00.001-07:00

Apple Rum Raisin

2009-09-23T07:59:00.001-07:00

We made our favorite trip on Sunday to Central Coast Wine Country. We stopped at the Classic Organic Farm & Market and bought some wonderful produce: incredibly aromatic parsley, a basket of red, green, and purple heirloom tomatoes, peppers (which I am going to put in our smoker), a gorgeous spaghetti squash and a huge onion. At Apple Lane on Alamo Pintado, we bought four pounds of freshly picked golden apples. I made today's recipe with some of those apples. We also picked up three trays of strawberries and a cantaloupe from the stand just across from Buttonwood Farm Winery.

I do love Farmers' Markets but I love buying my food directly from the farms even more. Weekend travel plans are often built around trips to farms and orchards, near wineries when possible! We keep a cooler on our backseat, always ready to hold bottles of wine and bags of produce.

Local Harvest is a wonderful site listing farmer's markets, farms, and orchards across the country. Let me know if you visit any of the places listed on the site. Send pix!

I love combining apples and rum. Enjoy!

APPLE RUM RAISIN

1 cup of black raisins
1 cup dark rum
8 golden apples
1 tablespoon vanilla (I used Double Vanilla from Penzey's)
1 teaspoon cinnamon
Juice from 1 medium orange
2 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon golden brown sugar
Sea Salt and pepper to taste (Optional! I used Maldon Sea Salt)

In a small saucepan, warm the rum. Add the raisins and rum to a small mixing bowl and let this sit for about 20 minutes. Meanwhile, clean the apples, remove the stem, core, and slice. This is a rustic dish, so slice the apples in any style you choose. In a large mixing bowl, add the apples, rum raisins, vanilla, cinnamon and orange juice.

In a Dutch Oven or non-aluminum saute pan, melt the two tablespoons of butter. Add the golden brown sugar and stir until it is melted into the butter. Add the apple mixture, stir until coated with the brown sugar butter mixture. Saute for about 15 minutes. Don't let the apples get too soft. You want some texture to them. Place in a serving bowl, add a sprinkling of sea salt and freshly ground pepper to taste.

Can be served warm or cold.

Serves 6-8

Variations:

If you'd like, you can mix 1/2 cup of mascarpone with two tablespoons of honey. Mix this well. Add a dollop to the top of each serving of the Apple Raisin Rum. Vary the taste by changing the honey. Try any of these: orange blossom, chestnut or lemon.

Use 1/4 cup of either pineapple juice, coconut juice or cherry juice in place of the orange juice.

New Project! New Blog!

2009-09-20T02:06:00.000-07:00

Haven't posted to this blog in a while, as I've been developing another project. It's called I Cook the World, which is exactly what I am doing. Going from A to Z, I'll be making dishes from every country in the world. Yes, it will take some time and I'm so excited about this project. You'll find my introduction and recipes from Afghanistan at http://icooktheworld.wordpress.com.

Visit my new blog, try the recipes, send suggestions.

I look forward to your participation and feedback.

Denise

Nail 'em!

2009-08-25T16:04:00.000-07:00

Still laughing about the quintessential Julia Child moment I caught on Sunday. Black-and-white French Chef, so one of the very old ones. Julia is attempting to teach us to make an authentic bouillabaisse:

"Now, take the eel, nail its head to the table and skin it."

Just wonder how many cooks on my little Mid-Century street complied!

Goodbye to an old friend.

2009-08-24T11:58:00.001-07:00

One of my beloved Howard Holt tomato cups committed suicide today. Literally, jumped off the shelf where it was safely tucked away with its 7 mates and tomato soup tureen. We'll miss you, pal. Gone at 47-years-old. Oh! The times we've had together.

The Amish and Burritos

2009-08-24T11:03:00.000-07:00

I bought The Amish Cook at Home cookbook a few months ago and just had the opportunity to sit and read it this morning. I grew up in Pennsylvania and often miss the food from home, including delicious recipes from Amish kitchens. The surprising ingredients included:

Miracle Whip? Hot dogs? Burritos? Bacon-wrapped jalapenos? Cans of cream of mushroom soup? Velveeta?

This is the silliest excuse for a collection of Amish recipes. I get that the authors, both Amish culture experts, may want to lug this style of cooking into the modern, pre-packaged, multi-cultural food bazaar. Since that's their choice, MARKET it that way. Note to authors and publishing company: Nobody needs another recipe for chicken baked in cream of mushroom soup. Ever. Again.

If you'd like this cookbook I'm giving it away to the first one to ask!

Cookbooks

2009-07-07T22:14:00.001-07:00

I collect cookbooks. I love the old ones I find with someone's notes written on the pages. It feels like such a personal connection to be reading their suggestions, additions and notes on a recipe. I recently bought a church cookbook from a town in New England, originally published in 1964. Tucked inside were nearly thirty pages of notes made by the original owner. From them I learned she was single and keen to find a husband. She marked a number of the recipes with the words MEN LIKE. In caps. I wonder if any of her recipes did the trick. My money's on her recipe for WACKI PORK and not HELENE'S TAHITIAN DELITE.

I cherish the handwritten recipes handed down to me by my family and friends. I simply love looking at the handwriting, some of it scribbled and some transcribed in beautiful longhand. Just seeing my mother's nearly unreadable scribble tugs at my heart.

We recently moved and though I've made some progress unpacking enough cookbooks to fill one bookcase, I still have six or more boxes of cookbooks to unpack.

Here are some images of the recipe collections I've made over the years. I've written out recipes, clipped and pasted many from magazines and adhered recipes written out by family and friends to their pages. I can barely close the covers. They are wild and unruly and contain far too much information. I love them this way. Each book is a history. They connect me to people and memories I love.

Summer Squash and Red Pepper Medley

2009-07-07T12:52:00.000-07:00

July 7, 2009

Sing Our Song to the Stars
Summer Squash & Red Pepper Medley

Cooking while watching the Michael Jackson Memorial. Thinking about the power of creative and destructive energy, in all its permutations.

I love the flavor of red peppers in dishes. The juices and the oils released by the peppers during cooking envelope the ingredients in a rich, sweet flavor. This is an ideal pairing with summer squash. This medley is so simple to make and is open to any twist you want to put on it. Add more garlic, other herbs and seasonings, use hotter chilies, add another vegetable.

Goat cheese, flecked with crushed pepper, spread on slices of French bread is nice with this dish. Fresh peaches and cherries are a lovely fruit pairing.

I’m recording what I used to make this dish today. How I make it the next time, could be completely different.

Summer Squash & Red Pepper Medley

Ingredients
Garlic
Yellow Onion [small – minced]
Anaheim chili [medium – sliced into thin strips]
Olive Oil [5-6 tablespoons]
Fresh Lemon Juice [to taste]
Summer Squash [2 cut in half, then sliced into thin strips]
Red Pepper [1 large, sliced into thin strips]
Maldon Smoked Sea Salt [to taste]
Freshly Ground Pepper [to taste]
Fresh Tarragon [minced – amount to taste]
Fresh Lemon Basil [minced – amount to taste]
Fresh Thyme [minced – amount to taste]
Fresh Parsley [minced – amount to taste]

A note about my ingredients:

I always use the best and freshest ingredients from olive oil to salt. I grow most of my own herbs. I never buy them from the grocery store. Pick up some “fresh” herbs from a grocery store and you’ll know why I leave them in the bin. They smell musty or have no smell, at all. If you can’t grow herbs at home, try to buy from a grower at a farmers market. Curled parsley gets such a hard time from people and I concur when we are talking about mass-produced curled parsley. Grow it at home or buy from a farm stand and you will quickly add this herb back into your repertoire. I absolutely love its flavor.

DIRECTIONS

I use a large sauté pan my mother purchased for me many years ago at a yard sale. My pots and pans are some of my oldest and most faithful friends. I add the olive oil to the pan, heating it gently. Toss the minced onion and garlic into the sauté pan and cook until soft and translucent. Add the squash, pepper, chili, herbs, salt, pepper and lemon juice to the sauté pan. Cook until the vegetables are tender but not limp. Usually takes about ten to fifteen minutes depending upon the amount of heat you use.