You are here: Home / 2011 / Archives for January 2011

Red Velvet Babycakes with Winter White Glaze

January 30, 2011 by

Valentine’s Day is right around the corner. I know this because my husband, the professional chef, is planning a special Valentine’s Day menu for the patrons of Persimmon Woods Golf Club. Lucky for me, this special dinner is the Saturday before Valentine’s Day so I actually get to spend “the holiday” with my hubby this year, which isn’t usually the case. Ah, just another part of the glamorous life of a chef’s wife (ie, it’s not so glamorous).

When I think of Valentine’s Day, I think of roses, candy hearts, and love letters … none of which I need to make Valentine’s Day special; just getting to spend time with my husband is enough. And I’m actually not a Valentine’s Day person, but there is one Valentine’s Day staple that I do love … red velvet cake.

I recently made the recipe below for Christmas Eve, but these Red Velvet Babycakes would make a perfect Valentine’s Day treat. Swap out the sugared cranberry garnish pictured below for some candy hearts or perhaps a Hershey’s kiss … and have a lovely Valentine’s Day with your special someone … I know I will with mine!

Red Velvet Babycakes

  • 3 eggs
  • 3/4 cup butter
  • 3 cups all-purpose flour
  • 2 teaspoons unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 2-1/4 cups sugar
  • 1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla
  • 1 1-ounce bottle red food coloring
  • 1-1/2 cups buttermilk
  • 1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
  • 1-1/2 teaspoons vinegar

1. Let eggs and butter stand 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Coat 24 2-1/2-inch cupcake pans slots with cooking spray; set aside.

2. In medium bowl, combine flour, cocoa powder, and 3/4 tsp. salt; set aside. In large mixing bowl, beat butter on medium-high 30 seconds. Add sugar and vanilla; beat until combined. One at a time, add eggs; beat on medium after each. Beat in food coloring on low.

3. Alternately add flour mixture and buttermilk to egg mixture; beat on low to medium speed after each just until combined. Stir together baking soda and vinegar. Add to batter; beat just until combined.

4. Spoon batter into prepared pans, filling each about two-thirds full. Bake 15 to 17 minutes. Cool in pan on wire rack for 5 minutes. Remove from pans. Cool completely.

5. Turn cupcakes over and drizzle with Winter White Glaze or icing of your choice. Top with decorations, as desired. Makes 24 cupcakes.

Winter White Glaze

  • 4 cups powdered sugar
  • 1 tablespoon meringue powder
  • 1/2 cup hot water

1. Beat together all ingredients with an electric mixer until smooth.

2. If too thick, add more hot water, 1 tablespoon at a time until desired consistency. Use immediately. Makes about 2 cups.

8 Comments

Filed Under: Recipes   Tagged With: , ,

What Can You Do When Voting with Your Fork Isn’t Enough?

January 27, 2011 by

It’s no secret that I’m a strong proponent of eating locally & sustainably. So, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that from time to time, I use this blog as a platform to talk about issues that are important to me. The US Farm Bill is one of those issues.

The “Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008″ (aka, the “Farm Bill” … strange that it doesn’t have the word “farm” in the title, right?) was enacted into law in June 2008 and governs the bulk of federal agriculture and related programs for the next 5 years.

Its 15 titles include “administrative and funding authorities for programs that cover income and commodity price support, farm credit, and risk management; conservation though land retirement, stewardship of land and water resources, and farmland protection; food assistance and agricultural development efforts abroad and promotion of international access to American farm products; food stamps, domestic food distribution, and nutrition initiatives; rural community and economic development initiatives, including regional development, rural energy efficiency, water and waste facilities, and access to broadband technology; research on critical areas of the agricultural and food sector; accessibility and sustainability of forests; encouraging production and use of agricultural and rural renewable energy sources; and initiatives for attracting and retaining beginning and socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers.”

Sounds like that does a lot for small family farmers, right? Wrong. Out of the $307 billion dollars allocated to the Farm Bill, two-thirds of the money ($200 billion) goes to nutrition programs, which is why many believe the bill should be nicknamed the “Food and Farm Bill” as it has very little to do with farming these days. From what’s left, only $70 million dollars is provided for “organic farmers” … and notice I said “organic” farmers. Many of our small local family farmers don’t make enough money to pay for organic certification so there isn’t much that this bill does for them. But, a number of groups are already calling for change in the next go-round of the Farm Bill, and I hope you’ll join me in taking action with them.

A Fair Farm Bill Vision

The folks at Food and Water Watch have started a campaign for a fair Farm Bill:

“How can we make real change happen in something as large as our corporate industrial food system? Some of us may be able to buy sustainable local food, but many people in the US do not have access to safe, healthy, affordable food. We need to do more than vote with our food dollars—we need to change the system. That’s why we’re launching our campaign for a fair Farm Bill. Food & Water Watch is launching our campaign now so we can spend the next year working with you in your community to make real change. With your help, we will build a powerful grassroots network that can take on the large corporate interests that control our food system. Over the last few years, we’ve seen huge growth in the number of activists, growers, and eaters in the good food movement, but we need to do much more to win real change. Together we can educate and engage our neighbors and elected officials to cultivate change in your local community, in your state, and in Congress.”

Will you take a second to sign the Fair Farm Bill Vision?

Charter for a Healthy Farm Bill

Another group championing for change in the upcoming Farm Bill is Healthy Food Action, a group of health professionals—nurses, dieticians, physicians, public health workers, social workers, and others—who see the downstream impacts of a broken food and farming system every day. Healthy Food Action “makes it simple for health professionals to act. It provides both vital information and a mechanism for action. By speaking out, health professionals can lend their unique, collective voice to public policy debates about food and farming—a voice to ensure that these policies are consistent with better health.”

If you are a health professional or just a concerned citizen, you can support Healthy Food Action’s efforts by signing their Charter for a Healthy Farm Bill.

Thanks for taking action.

Related Articles:
Enhanced by Zemanta

Leave a Comment

Filed Under: General   Tagged With: , ,

A Taste of The South: Sweet Potato Biscuits and Honey Butter

January 23, 2011 by

Christmas Eve was a bit different for my family this year. Instead of my mom hosting (and making most of the food), we decided to go to my brother and sister-in-law’s house instead … and they, along with my husband and I, would do all the cooking. Umm, how did that happen exactly?

I’m happy to report that after a very long day of cooking, everything turned out just fine. There were a few bumps along the way, but we rolled with the punches, and I’m pleased with the food we put on the table. The star of our show was a 3-foot pork loin wrapped in pork belly (dubbed “Porkzilla” … I figured we’d better go big or go home … or, well, back to my mom’s house). Because pork always seems to remind me of the South, I created a Southern-themed menu around Porkzilla.

One of the items on our menu was homemade sweet potato biscuits, to be served with homemade honey butter.  The sweet potato biscuit recipe below is from the November 2003 issue of Everyday Food (with my adaptations noted). Slathered with warm honey butter, these were a Southern delight indeed.

Sweet-Potato Biscuits

  • 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for kneading and shaping
  • 2 tablespoons light-brown sugar
  • 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 6 tablespoons chilled unsalted butter, cut into pieces, plus 1/2 tablespoon melted butter and more for pan
  • 3/4 cup Sweet-Potato Puree, chilled (recipe below)
  • 1/3 cup buttermilk

1. Make the dough: In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and baking soda. With a pastry blender or two knives, cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse meal, with some pea-sized lumps of butter remaining. In a small bowl, whisk together sweet potato purée and buttermilk; stir quickly into flour mixture until combined (do not overmix).

2. Shape the biscuits: Turn out dough onto a lightly floured surface, and knead very gently until dough comes together but is still slightly lumpy, five or six times. (If dough is too sticky, work in up to 1/4 cup additional flour.) Shape into a disk, and pat to an even 1-inch thickness. With a floured 2-inch biscuit cutter, cut out biscuits as close together as possible. Gather together scraps, and repeat to cut out more biscuits (do not reuse scraps more than once).

3. Bake the biscuits: Preheat oven to 425 degrees. with rack on lower shelf. Butter an 8-inch cake pan. Arrange biscuits snugly in pan (to help them stay upright). Brush with melted butter. Bake until golden, rotating once, 20 to 24 minutes. Makes 8.

NOTES: We cheated and skipped step 2. Instead, we used a medium-sized scoop to portion out the dough, a la “drop biscuits.” The finished product was a bit more rustic looking, but tasted great just the same.

Sweet-Potato Puree

  • 3 large sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into 2-inch chunks
  • Maple-butter, orange-ginger, or lime-cayenne flavoring (optional)
  • Coarse salt and ground pepper

1. In a large saucepan, cover potatoes with water. Bring to a boil; cook until tender when pierced with the tip of a paring knife, 15 to 20 minutes.

2. Drain potatoes; puree in food processor. Add flavorings, if desired (see below). Puree.

3. Season with salt and pepper. Serves 4.

FLAVORINGS: For Maple-Butter: Add 2 tablespoons each melted butter and maple syrup; serve puree with more butter and syrup. For Orange-Ginger: Add 1/4 cup each milk and orange juice, 2 tablespoons melted butter, and 2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger. For Lime-Cayenne: Add 1 tablespoon lime juice and a pinch of cayenne; thin with a bit of cooking liquid, if needed.

Honey Butter

  • 3/4 cup butter, room temperature
  • 1/4 cup honey

1. In a small bowl mix butter and honey until smooth. Store, covered, in the refrigerator.

[These recipes are linked to A Moderate Life and Eat at Home.]

Oh, whatever happened to Porkzilla, you ask? Well … he was one of those “bumps along the way” I mentioned above. We had planned on cutting him into slices so that everyone had a piece of loin wrapped with belly, but after spending over 8 hours on the smoker, Porkzilla was so tender that slicing just wasn’t an option. So, you know that old saying, “When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade?” Well, when life gives you a too-tender Porkzilla … you make pulled pork.

13 Comments

Filed Under: Recipes  

America’s 50 Most Powerful People in Food, Including You

January 19, 2011 by

“In the food world, the people with power are the ones who affect what and how and where and why we eat — or who can, if they want to. They’re the agribusiness moguls who decide what gets grown and how it gets harvested and sold; the representatives of major food processing, distribution concerns, and retail food outlets who create new products and service the demand for edibles old and new. They’re the scolds and nannies — and admirable consumer advocates — who tell us what we should and shouldn’t eat, sometimes upending whole industries in the process.”

~ via The Daily Meal

The Daily Meal recently released a list of “America’s 50 Most Powerful People in Food.” The list of names runs the gamut, from celebrity chefs (such as Daniel Boulud, Thomas Keller, and Mario Batali) and real food advocates (such as Alice Waters and Michael Pollan) to politicos (such as Tom Vilsack and Michelle Obama) and some folks I’ve never heard of before now (such as David Dillon, Chairman and CEO, Kroger Co).

As with any “top 10″ or “50 most” list, there’s already a lot of debate about the folks that were selected, as well as many musing about who should have been on the list instead (in other words, read the comment section). But, to me, the best thing about the list is who came in at #1.

It’s you. Yes, you. And it’s me. It’s, according to The Daily Meal, “The user. The reader. The consumer. The restaurant-goer. The home cook. The culinary professional. Websites and magazines report the trends; cookbooks sometimes ignite them or fan the flames. But you are ultimately the one who decides what to devour and what to leave aside. You’re responsible, finally, for the quality and integrity of our raw materials, the style and accent of our restaurants, the success or failure of our food products and cuisines. You determine what we eat and how and sometimes why. And you’re doing a great job. Keep it up.”

In our roles as food consumers, restaurant-goers, home cooks, etc, we do have the power to influence our food system … and our choices matter. Choose local. Choose sustainable. Choose foods and places that benefit your community and benefit your health. Choose foods and places that help, not hurt, the environment. In other words, vote with your fork. You can do it three times a day. And you’re doing a great job. Keep it up.

Leave a Comment

Filed Under: General   Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

The Daring Cooks January 2011 Challenge: Confit and Cassoulet

January 14, 2011 by

As each new year rolls around, millions of people make resolutions, among the most popular being to lose weight, get fit, stop smoking, or get out of debt. So, just how many of these people really stick to their resolutions? I’ve read that the number hovers around 20% … and with odds like that, well, you know.

I’m hoping to buck the 20% trend with my resolution for this year. I’ve been blogging about food for a few years now, but have never given this blog the time it truly needs to be great. Well, that’s what I resolve to do in 2011, and part of that resolution is to participate in The Daring Kitchen’s Daring Cooks Challenge each month. So, without further ado …

Our January 2011 Challenge comes from Jenni of The Gingered Whisk and Lisa from Parsley, Sage, Desserts and Line Drives. They have challenged the Daring Cooks to learn how to make a confit and use it within the traditional French dish of cassoulet. They have chosen a traditional recipe from Anthony Bourdain and Michael Ruhlman.

The first step in this Daring Cooks adventure was to make a confit. Jenni and Lisa gave us a number of options, including a duck confit from Michael Ruhlman, a chicken confit from Emeril Lagasse, and a garlic confit as a vegetarian option. For multiple reasons, I chose to make the chicken confit. The first reason is because I planned to serve the finished cassoulet at our weekly Tuesday night family dinner and my mother just doesn’t do duck. The second reason is because my husband (the professional chef) has made Ruhlman’s duck confit recipe before (and I’ve eaten it), and we both found it to be way to salty.

Next up was the cassoulet preparation. The recipe Jenni and Lisa chose is considered to be a “traditional” recipe, originating from Anthony Bourdain’s Les Halles cookbook and then “tweaked” by Michael Ruhlman on an episode of the Travel Channel’s No Reservations. The recipe is spread out over three days to make it less complicated and less time consuming.

After all was said and done, I wasn’t completely happy with this recipe. I found that it could have been easily prepared in much less time. In addition, by layering all of the ingredients in one large pot, everything just sort of “mushed” together; it all had the same texture and there was no crispness to the confit or pork belly. To be honest, it looked pretty bad. On the positive side, it did taste good … but I knew it could be better.

We had plenty of leftovers (the recipe said it made 6 to 8 servings, but it was closer to 10 to 12) so on our second consumption, I deconstructed what was in the pot. I took out what was left of the confit, the pork belly, and the sausage and crisped them up in a pan in a bit of olive oil. This finally provided the look and texture I had wanted originally. It also allowed for a much more photogenic bowl of cassoulet. Trust me, you do not want to see the pictures from the first go round.

I’ve included both the recipe for the chicken confit and the cassoulet below, along with some notes about what I would do differently next time. If you do decide to make it, leave me a comment and let me know how it turns out for you!

Chicken Confit (Using Olive Oil) by Emeril Lagasse (via Food Network)

  • 4 chicken leg portions with thighs attached, excess fat trimmed and reserved (about 2 pounds total)
  • 1 tablespoon plus 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
  • 10 garlic cloves
  • 4 bay leaves
  • 4 sprigs fresh thyme
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons black peppercorns
  • 1/2 teaspoon table salt
  • 4 cups olive oil

1. Lay the leg portions on a platter, skin side down. Sprinkle with 1 tablespoon of the kosher salt and black pepper. Place the garlic cloves, bay leaves, and sprigs of thyme on each of two leg portions. Lay the remaining two leg portions, flesh to flesh, on top. Put the reserved fat from the chicken in the bottom of a glass or plastic container. Top with the sandwiched leg portions. Sprinkle with the remaining 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt. Cover and refrigerate for 12 hours.

2. Preheat the oven to 200°F. Remove the chicken from the refrigerator. Remove the garlic, bay leaves, thyme, and chicken fat and reserve. Rinse the chicken with cool water, rubbing off some of the salt and pepper. Pat dry with paper towels.

3. Put the reserved garlic, bay leaves, thyme, and chicken fat in the bottom of an enameled cast iron pot. Sprinkle evenly with the peppercorns and salt. Lay the chicken on top, skin side down. Add the olive oil. Cover and bake for 12 to 14 hours, or until the meat pulls away from the bone.

NOTES: I substituted 2 cups melted duck fat for the olive oil. This wasn’t enough to cover the chicken completely so I topped it off with one cup of olive oil. Delicious.

Cassoulet by Anthony Bourdain and Michael Ruhlman

  • 5 cups Tarbais beans or white beans
  • 2 pounds fresh pork belly
  • 1 onion, cut into 4 pieces
  • 1 pound pork rind
  • 1 bouquet garni
  • Salt and pepper
  • 1/4 cup duck fat
  • 6 pork sausages
  • 3 onions, thinly sliced
  • 1 garlic clove, thinly sliced
  • 4 confit duck (or chicken) legs

Day One:

Place the beans in the large bowl and cover with cold water so that there are at least 2 or 3 inches of water above the top of the beans. Soak overnight.

Day Two:

Drain and rinse the beans and place in the large pot. Add the pork belly, the quartered onion, 1/4 pound of the pork rind, and the bouquet garni. Cover with water, add salt and pepper to taste, and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook until the beans are tender, about an hour. Let cool for 20 minutes, then discard the onion and the bouquet garni. Remove the pork belly, cut it into 2-inch squares, and set aside. (If you plan to wait another day before finishing the dish, wait to cut the pork belly until then.) Strain the beans and the rind and set aside, reserving the cooking liquid separately.

In a sauté pan, heat all but 1 tablespoon of the duck fat over medium-high heat until it shimmers and becomes transparent. Carefully add the sausages and brown on all sides. Remove and set aside, draining on paper towels. In the same pan, over medium-high heat, brown the sliced onions, the garlic and the reserved squares of pork rind from the beans (not the unused pork rind; you’ll need that later). Once browned, remove from the heat and transfer to the blender. Add 1 tablespoon of the remaining duck fat and purée until smooth. Set aside.

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Place the uncooked pork rind in the bottom of a deep ovenproof earthenware dish. You’re looking to line the inside, almost like a pie crust. Arrange all your ingredients in alternating layers, beginning with a layer of beans, then sausages, then more beans, then pork belly, beans, duck confit and finally more beans, adding a dab of the onion and pork rind purée between each layer. (Don’t get fancy. Just pile, dab, stack and pile. It doesn’t have to be pretty.) Add enough of the bean cooking liquid to just cover the beans, reserving 1 cup in the refrigerator for later use. Cook the cassoulet in the oven for 1 hour, then reduce the heat to 250°F and cook for another hour. Remove from the oven and allow to cool. Refrigerate overnight.

Day Three:

Preheat the oven to 350°F again. Cook the cassoulet for an hour. Break the crust on the top with the spoon and add 1/4 cup of the reserved cooking liquid. Reduce the heat to 250°F and continue cooking another 15 minutes, or until screamingly hot through and through. Serve.

NOTES: Lisa found the use of the pork rind to be necessary and I felt it would be too so I left it out. Where pork rind is called for in the onion & garlic purée, I simply sautéed a few strips of bacon and used that instead. Additionally, before assembling the cassoulet, I suggest sautéeing the cubes of pork belly and the duck (or chicken) confit as I mentioned previously. Finally, to shorten the overall time suggested in this recipe, you could easily finish the dish on day two and serve that evening.

Oh, for more cassoulet adventures, check out the other Daring Kitchen cooks!

3 Comments

Filed Under: Recipes   Tagged With: , , ,
« Older Posts