Another installment in the Food as Art series…
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Archives for category: food and dining
One of my favorite ways to eat tomatoes (works best with cherry tomatoes): halve or roughly chop tomatoes; add a few cloves of chopped garlic; douse with olive oil; shower generously with salt and pepper; and, finally, sprinkle with a teaspoon or so of sugar. Roast in a hot oven (400 degrees F) until the tomatoes start to brown and the oil and tomato juices are bubbling (about 15 minutes).
The high heat and small amount of sugar will cause the liquid to thicken into a syrup as the tomatoes cool. Spoon them onto toasted slices of baguette, with or without a schmear of ricotta, for a version of crostini that is hearty enough as a main course.
Yet another in the Food as Art series…
Here’s the best way we’ve found yet to cook carrots: Glazed Carrots with coconut oil.
Photo by Rachel
Another installment of Food as Art:
Photo by Rachel
Is it food or is it art? Both! (Also, another reason why I garden.)
Why I grow tomatoes:
It turns out that when I was describing the benefits of crop rotation two weeks ago (see May 4, 2014), I was only half right. The process can be much more complicated—and substantially more advantageous—than merely planting different families of plants in different plots each season. The key is choosing what to plant and the order in which to plant it.
A good example of a more scientific approach to crop rotation is described in an Op-Ed piece by Dan Barber, chef of the restaurants Blue Hill (in New York City) and Blue Hill at Stone Barns (in Pocantico Hills, New York), that appears in today’s New York Times (see “What Farm-to-Table Got Wrong”).
Chef Barber buys his wheat from a farmer in upstate New York. On a visit to the farm, he learned that the wheat is only planted at the end of a four-year cycle of carefully selected crops, each of which performs a specific task for conditioning the soil. The procession follows a basic order which can be modified as soil response and weather patterns dictate.
First up is a cover crop such as mustard, which cleanses the soil and adds nutrients. Next is a legume to fix Nitrogen. Rye follows which, apparently, crowds out weeds (and also “builds soil structure”, although no explanation is given as to what exactly this means). Last to be planted is the wheat, the crop that outsiders (and until recently, Chef Barber) would think of as the whole point of this enterprise.
What is lamentable in the wheat farmer’s case is that the market for what those outsiders might call the off-season crops—the mustard, peas and rye—is scarce. While the wheat commands high, New York City prices, the other vegetables and grains go unwanted and often end up as feed for animals raised as food. Such use is not considered by most experts to be a very efficient use of resources.
Chef’s response to this situation was to develop menu items at his restaurants that incorporate the lesser crops and thereby elevate their stature and, presumably, their price (I hope that he pays his farmer as much for the mustard, peas and rye as he does for the wheat). It’s an elegant solution—a no-brainer, in retrospect—and also a win-win. Really, it’s a win-win-win because not only do the farmer and the chef benefit but the patrons of Blue Hill get tasty meals out of it, too.
So, how might this concept apply to the backyard gardener? Well, I’m not sure about growing an entire planter full of rye or mustard but half of a planter mixed with other like vegetables or grains might work (especially if Chef shares his recipes). And I never feel like we have enough Sugar Snap peas so the year of legumes would not be a problem. The primary issue is space, something we never seem to have enough of.
Maybe the question for me is, where can I put two more planters?
No holiday is given shorter shrift than Thanksgiving. The run-up to it is short—it is practically non-existent, in fact—and the celebration is sandwiched between two holiday grandstanders: Halloween—one of the flashiest holidays—and Christmas, whose season seems to start earlier and earlier every year. On the holiday calendar, Thanksgiving does not get much attention.
In supermarkets (for example), the Thanksgiving items often will occupy only a narrow section of seasonal shelving and then only for a week or two. During that same period, the canned pumpkin and stuffing mixes will share the space with half-price trick-or-treat candy and a vast selection of Christmas goodies. The brightly-colored candy canes and foil-wrapped chocolate Santas visually dominate the muted earth tones of Thanksgiving packaging.
And once the turkey has been consumed, the Thanksgiving holiday is almost instantly forgotten. After all, the next morning sees the dawn of Black Friday, an event which has become almost more spectacular than Christmas itself and which has stretched through the weekend and into the following week to include Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday. For some retailers, the sales extravaganza begins Thanksgiving night (talk about no respect). Ads may make brief, comical references to Thanksgiving leftovers but that is usually the extent of it.
Really, it’s a shame. And not just because Thanksgiving is overshadowed by commercial activities. It’s too bad mainly because Thanksgiving is such an elemental celebration. It is observed by essentially everybody, has no religious affiliation and is almost entirely about family. Yes, food is the central physical component—the equivalent of the presents at Christmas—but the holiday focuses on sharing that bounty, rejoicing in belonging to a social group (not just a traditional family), and expressing our gratitude for everything we have.
This Thanksgiving, in addition to everything else I am thankful that the holiday has not (yet) been entirely crowded off the calendar.
We spent some time today planning our Thanksgiving meal. The menu is based on tradition so there are not many choices to make. Typically, our trusty-dusty recipes dominate although we will usually consider the variety of choices presented in the November food and cooking magazines. Often, but by no means always, something new can be accommodated.
Not this year, though. To work around work and travel schedules, we are having the main meal early—the Wednesday before—and taking it on the road. We’re still the cooks, so everything must be made ahead. Further—and, hey, no pressure—we’ll be joined by relatives visiting from out of town. This is no time for experimentation.
We always start with the basics: roasted turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy and cranberry sauce. Then we add another starch, some variation of sweet potato casserole or a second stuffing (and probably, I should use the term dressing because we haven’t stuffed a turkey since 2001). Yesterday’s New York Times Dining section (see “Essential Thanksgiving”) referred to this menu component as “something orange”, a clever characterization that they expanded to include macaroni and cheese.
(Serving mac and cheese on Thanksgiving is an interesting idea; many Italian-Americans I know include pasta as a separate course on Thanksgiving, which has always struck me as a good way to combine—or, dare I say, mash up—culinary traditions.)
We agree with the philosophy that there should be something green on the table to round out the menu both in nutrition and color. In past years, we have prepared everything from Brussels sprouts, kale, and even an arugula fennel salad (although salads are my least favorite contributor from this group). Most recently, we have been making green beans with walnuts in a lemon vinaigrette which is a perfect complement to the meal (the dish’s acidity refreshes the palate) and has the added advantage of being relatively easy and quick to prepare.
And then there must be dessert. Most often, this is pie, pumpkin or pecan. Some years, we add a second sweet, which may or may not be another pie. This year, we decided to make a Polka Dot Cheesecake, a recipe developed by Maida Heatter and featured in an early issue of Saveur magazine. The polka dots in the recipe are chocolate but we’ll make them pumpkin-flavored in honor of the season. (Maybe we’re experimenting this year after all.)
I like to start the meal (while the turkey rests) with a small glass of Bourbon. This is not my usual cocktail choice but the Bourbon and its perfect accompaniment of roasted, salted pecans are uniquely American. Both items seem appropriate for Thanksgiving which, although not uniquely American (Canadians celebrate it in October), is in part a celebration of being American.
