Simple Apple-Blue Cheese Spread

(Courtesy of Susan Hagen)

Apples are everywhere now!

I’m working on a new apple-cheese spread, which will be posted shortly. Meanwhile, here’s one I created last fall. Somehow it didn’t make it onto this blog, which is a shame. It’s simple, and it combines two of my favorite foods.

If you use really great blue cheese — think Stilton or Roquefort! — this spread for crackers will be truly elegant. It’s pretty tasty with generic blue cheese, however.

You may be tempted to add a little more apple, but if you do you’ll end up with a rather wet spread.

Ingredients:

1 small onion, peeled and finely chopped
1-1/2 tablespoons sweet butter
2 large apples (about 2 cups), cored and sliced (but not peeled)
4 ounces (about 1 cup) blue cheese, crumbled
1 8-ounce brick cream cheese, softened

Instructions:

In a small, nonstick frying pan, sauté the onion pieces in the butter until they begin to soften. Add the apple pieces. Cook and keep stirring until they are slightly soft as well. Beat the cheeses together with a mixer or wooden spoon. Stir in the apple-onion mixture. Place the mixture in a bowl. Chill for at least 1 hour; then bring the spread to room temperature before serving. Makes about two cups.

Keep this spread refrigerated for up to three or four days, but be sure to bring it to room temperature again before you eat it to optimize flavor and texture.

It's Almost Pudding Time!

As many readers know, one of my favorite fall activities is the Pudding Hollow Pudding Festival. This yearly homage to small-town life and food blends many of my passions–food, music, humor, and hammy acting.

The poster for the Festival (designed by Leon Peters of Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts–thanks, Lee!) looks something like the image at the left (for some reason this blog was unable to transfer the colors correctly, but I hope you get the idea!).

This year’s festival will take place on Saturday, October 31 (yes, Halloween!), at the Federated Church on Route 2 in Charlemont, Massachusetts.

Entries to the contest portion of the day are due by 11 am that morning so PLEASE START THINKING ABOUT MAKING A PUDDING. And tell your friends about this event.

(Those who have entered in past years may wonder why we're not having a pre-contest to narrow down finalists. The Sons & Daughters of Hawley have gotten so darn busy lately that we couldn't find a date on which our volunteers could schedule it. Think how much more exciting this will be!)

If you enter, you will have fun, contribute to a great cause (the $12 entry fee goes to our historical-society building project), and probably get at least a very small prize (we have quite a few!).

Entries need not be elaborate. As you can see from our contest information pages, our definition of the word “pudding” is highly flexible.

Non-cooks may shop, eat a yummy lunch, and watch the free fabulous entertainment.

We’ll get everyone home in time for trick-or-treating!

If you have questions about the day or if you’d like to volunteer to help, please use the contact form on this blog to get in touch with me, Tinky.

The contest web site includes a list of prizes and pictures of last year’s festivities.

Here’s the winning recipe from 2006 to get you in a pudding mood. The winner, Leigh Bullard of Virginia, blended two of my favorite flavors, chocolate and mint. (Obviously, the combination appealed to the judges as well.)

Michael’s Almost Famous Chocolate Mint Pudding

Ingredients:

1 cup white sugar
1 cup flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/3 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
3/4 teaspoon peppermint extract
1 square (1 ounce) unsweetened chocolate, preferably a good brand
2 tablespoons sweet butter
1/2 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
2 tablespoons cocoa
1 cup boiling water
whipped cream and crushed peppermint (if desired) as needed for garnish

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Into a bowl sift 3/4 cup of the sugar with the flour, baking powder, and salt. Beat in the milk, vanilla, and peppermint extract.

Melt the chocolate and butter together in a double boiler. Add them to the other mixture. Pour this batter into a greased small 1-1/2- to 2-quart casserole dish.

Blend the brown sugar, the remaining white sugar, and the cocoa, and sprinkle them on top of the batter. Pour the water over all. Bake for 40 minutes. Serve with whipped cream (or ice cream) and peppermint if desired. Serves 6 to 8.

The 2006 Pudding Head samples her entry.

Messy But Good Birthday Cake

I may have mentioned before that presentation is NOT my forte.

Most of the things I make taste pretty good. Quite a few look … well, I guess the polite way to put it would be “homemade.”

The cake I baked for my mother’s birthday on Saturday was a case in point.

First I made a teensy (okay, a big) error in not making sure the pan was balanced in the oven. It tipped a bit as the cake baked, rendering the whole creation a little lopsided and not incidentally spilling batter onto the floor of the oven. My dog Truffle was NOT happy when the smoke alarm went off!

Next, I rushed through icing the thing. As a result, my lopsided cake was messier than ever.

Luckily, I had some gel and sprinkle to cover up at least some of the mess. Even more luckily, the birthday girl and her guests were nice enough not to mention the way the cake looked. And of course it did taste fantastic–moist from the apples yet very cakelike.

I thought of taking a photo of Jan on her 91st birthday. Unfortunately, the idea didn’t enter my mind until nine o’clock that night. She had gone to bed at 8:30. This doesn’t mean she didn’t have a great birthday–only that she is indeed 91.

I do have pictures of her 90th birthday party on the blog post for THAT event.

Meanwhile, here’s the recipe. Do watch your placement of the pan in the oven. (To be extra sure, put a cookie sheet under it!)

Apple Chocolate Cake

If you want to increase the apple presence in this recipe, use the powdered buttermilk manufactured by SACO, available in many grocery stores. Add 2 tablespoons of buttermilk powder to the flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt; then stir in 1/2 cup sweet cider when the recipe calls for the liquid buttermilk.

Ingredients:

2-1/2 cups flour
1/4 cup cocoa
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) sweet butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup canola oil
1-3/4 cups sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 cup buttermilk
2 cups grated apple (about 2 medium apples)

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Sift together the flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt, and set aside. Using an electric mixer at medium speed, cream together the butter, oil, and sugar in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition, and beat in the vanilla. Next, add the dry ingredients alternately with the buttermilk, blending well after each addition. Stir in the apple.

Pour the batter into a greased, 10-inch bundt pan. Bake for about 50 to 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean. Cool the cake for ten minutes; then remove it from the pan, and let it cool completely before frosting with cream-cheese frosting. Topping the whole with seasonal sprinkles and/or candy corn is a plus. Makes 12 servings.

Canning Camp

My neighbor Mary Kay Hoffman likes to organize a “canning camp” in the late summer for her children and grandchildren. Putting food by with her offspring helps her manage the output of her vast garden and store food for the coming winter. It also enables her to pass along useful skills.

A few years ago it seemed as though the art of home food preservation was dying. With most fruits and vegetables available year round in grocery stores (albeit not in super-fresh form) not everyone saw the need to can, freeze, dry, or prepare a root cellar at this time of year. As a result, fewer and fewer people had the basic skills needed to put food by.

Now two factors are reversing this trend. First, Americans’ increasing interest in living sustainably makes growing (or locally buying) one’s own food more appealing. This is particularly true here in New England. In Florida, Texas, or California local produce is available year round. Here we know the snow drifts will cover gardens and farms within a few months.

Second, the poor economy has helped drive up the sales of canning jars and other home-preserving paraphernalia. Since labor is donated home preserved food is often more affordable than its store-bought competition. It is also given a boost by the fact that one knows exactly what ingredients went into it–and that it is generally made with love.

Not everyone knows how to put food by, of course, even in the country where I live. One organization here in the hilltowns of western Massachusetts recently took it upon itself to help local cooks gain preserving skills by running a public canning camp.

Share the Warmth is an Ashfield group that grew out of last year’s oil crisis. Through it town residents have helped their neighbors stay warm in a number of ways. They have aided individuals in performing basic home weatherization. Last year members rounded up winter coats for those who needed them–and organized a shelter during the ice storm that devastated much of New England in December.

Share the Warmth has also created a woodpile for people who run out of wood, and its members are planning a community garden for next year. Its most recent project was led by Mary Link, a notable canner. Mary has now organized two canning workshops to help her neighbors share summer’s sunshine all year round.

She taught neighbors to make strawberry jam in early July. Her second canning camp, which helped participants put up dilly beans, took place in early September.

Dilly-bean ingredients await canning.

Mary Link has many skills in addition to canning. She works as an administrator in the Greenfield school system and also teaches textile arts in the high school there. “I’m involved with the Ashfield Community Theater, I sing in Greenfield Harmony, I keep track of my wonderful 13-year-old daughter, and I swim across the lake,” she told me.

Clearly, canning is an important part of that busy life. I watched Mary set up for the dilly-bean workshop and was impressed with her cheerfulness and competent demeanor. When it was over I asked her how she felt about both workshops.

She replied happily that she had run into a number of participants from the first workshop who boasted of their newfound success in home canning. “It’s one of those things you feel more comfortable about if you see it done than reading about it in a book,” she explained. She hopes the program will expand next year.

Meanwhile, she has shared her recipe with my readers. Mary went into great detail about the process of sterilizing and processing jars. For that information, I refer readers to a couple of great web sites. The United States Department of Agriculture offers a PDF version of its home-canning guide. The University of Georgia also offers helpful facts and publications for the home canner.

Happy canning………

Mary Link gets ready to make dilly beans.

Mary’s Dilly Beans

Mary Link is the expert here so I’m simply reprinting the recipe she handed to participants at her workshop (and very kindly shared with me).

The “I” here is therefore not Tinky but Mary. I appreciate her thoroughness in including equipment as well as ingredients in her list of necessities for canning.

I made a batch of these myself, and I can’t wait to try them in a few weeks!

Ingredients:

for the brine:

6 cups water
4 cups apple cider vinegar
1/6 cup non-iodized salt (Morton’s calls it plain; pickling or Kosher salt may also be used)

for the beans:

2 to 3 pounds fresh string beans
1 full bunch dill (or more–I like the leaves best, but umbels in flower or seed can be used, too)
2 to 3 heads garlic (I put in about 2 to 3 cloves garlic per jar, depending on how big the cloves are. If you love garlic, you may want to put in more. The pickled cloves are delicious.)
1 cup mustard seeds
slices of hot pepper or other vegetable (optional)

Materials and Equipment:

7 to 8 pint canning jars and lids (I use the wide mouth–easier to get beans into and out of). They come with lids if you buy them new. A canner can hold 7 jars.
paper towels or dishtowels for setting the sterilized jars on; a cookie sheet may also be helpful
a canner for sterilizing the jars and canning bath
1 6-to-8-quart pot (stainless steel or enamel–not aluminum) for cooking the brine
a colander to wash the beans
bowls, cutting board, and knives for de-stemming the beans and skinning and cutting the garlic
long-handled spoon to stir brine
canning-jar tongs

Instructions:

Sterilize the jars. While they are boiling, mix and start heating the brine ingredients in their pot. Do not boil for long to avoid water loss.

Prepare the beans. (You can do this while you’re sterilizing the jars!) Wash the beans, and cut off the stem ends. Cut them to a length that leaves about a 3/4-inch space above them in the jar when standing on end. Save the shorter beans and pieces to fill in with at the end. (If you are entering them into a fair, you will want to cut them all perfectly evenly and pack the jars so they all line up and look perfect.)

Prepare the garlic (also while waiting for the water to boil, or you can do it ahead). Remove the skins from 14 to 20 cloves of garlic. Cut the cloves in half or in three so you have big chunks.

Prepare the dill. Rinse and separate the dill sprigs, remove any bad bits.

Pack the jars. Once the jars are sterilized, first pour mustard seeds in so that they barely cover the bottom of the jar (there will be more on the sides and less or none in the center as it is higher). Then throw in about 4 to 5 pieces of the garlic; then a sprig or two of the fresh dill (dividing the total among the 7 jars).

Add any other vegetables you are using. Then start filling the jar with the beans. It helps to tilt the jar to the side.

Pack the beans in as tightly as you can easily, using the longer beans first and filling in the spaces at the top with shorter pieces at the end. I like to add another sprig of dill on the top at the end, pressed down into the beans so that it will get covered by the brine. Pack all the jars before adding the brine.

Pour boiling brine over the beans in the jars. I use a measuring cup to make the pouring easy. Fill to about 1/2 inch of the top of the jar. Leaving the air space at the top is necessary for the canning process.

Cover the jars with the two-piece jar lids as you go along. Screw the bands tightly (finger tight). Place the jars on the elevated rack in the canner. Lower the rack into the canner. Water must cover jars by 1 to 2 inches; add boiling water if needed.

Cover the pot. Bring the water just to a boil. This will take a while because the raw beans will have reduced the temperature of the boiled brine. Once the water boils, turn it off. You do not want the beans to cook. Remove the jars from the hot water and place them upright on a towel to cool completely.

As the jars cool the lids should make a satisfying “pop” sound, indicating that they have sealed. When sealed, the “button” in the middle of the lid should be indented. After the jars cool you can check the seals by pressing the middle of the lids with a finger. (If the lid springs back, it is not sealed and refrigeration is necessary.)

It is best to let the jars stand at room temperature 24 hours before moving them.

Then –this is the hardest part–you need to let the beans pickle for about 6 weeks before eating. I put a note on my calendar and by the beans to remind me when they will be ready. Store unopened jars in a cool, dry, dark place for up to 1 year. Refrigerate opened jars– if there are any beans left once you open them. In my house they get gobbled up fast!

Enjoy!

Joanne Ostrowski and Sue Craft at the dilly-bean workshop (courtesy of Mary Link)

Peaches and Cream

The mixing room at Bart’s Homemade Ice Cream in Greenfield, Massachusetts, isn’t large–just spacious enough for machinery and a few people. Three of them were manning the machines on September 10. All eyes were on “Little Tommy Snow,” the silver-and-blue cylinder that mixes the ice cream for both Bart’s and Snow’s ice cream.
On this special day Tommy was blending a new flavor. Into the creamy basic ice-cream formula “he” was whipping air and an orangey-yellow mixture made with peaches from Apex Orchards in nearby Shelburne.

The other people in the room were Barbara Fingold and Gary Schaefer, the mom-and-pop owners of Bart’s and Snow’s ice cream; their Flavor Maven, Bob Jaros of Shelburne; and yours truly, a longtime fan of both ice cream and peaches (with the hips to prove it!). All eagerly awaited the first taste of Bart’s new CISA Local Peach Ice Cream.

Barbara is the president of Bart’s so it was only fitting that she was given the first creamy spoonful. As she sampled the still soft custard she widened her eyes and then smiled. Gary, Bob, and I tasted the next cups. The judges’ unanimous verdict came swiftly: the new flavor was peachy keen.

The ice cream’s intense peach flavor hits the tongue right away. The little chunks of peach distributed throughout complement the custard–and reinforce the taste of peaches and cream in every mouthful.

After our initial tasting we repaired to Gary’s office with a pint of ice cream. There we discussed the genesis of Bart’s latest product as we noshed.

Barbara and Gary explained that both the peach ice cream and the CISA Berry Local Blueberry Ice Cream that debuted this summer stemmed from Gary’s involvement in the board of CISA, Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture.

Gary celebrated the peach ice cream as “a collaborative community event.” The peaches came from Apex. The Franklin County Community Development Corporation food processing center blanched, skinned, pitted, and pureed the peaches.

Barbara and Gary try some peach ice cream.

And of course the ice cream was mixed right in Barbara and Gary’s small factory on School Street.

The pair have been involved with CISA for most of the nonprofit entity’s existence. “We’re crazy, passionate about local food,” said Gary. If all goes well, he added, Bart’s is “going to think about an apple [ice cream] and then whatever other crazy fruits grow around here.”

I asked Bob Jaros about his role at the ice-cream plant. A retired physician, he works on quality-assurance programs for a number of companies. It was clear from his contented demeanor that Bart’s and its products have a special place in his heart and mouth. “You need a palate for ice cream,” he told me. “I’ve learned with the tutelage of my friends.”

Gary explained that Bob’s work is important to Bart’s quality and reputation. “If you work in your kitchen and you mess up your cake, you mess up A cake,” he told me. “If we mess up our formula, we mess up a whole batch of ice cream.”

“Everything is tested,” Bob Jaros added, “and if it’s not right we find out before it’s sent out.”

Bob Jaros

Like Gary and Barbara, he is a firm believer in local production and supports the idea as well as the flavor of the new ice cream. “In essence the whole circle is one that supports the community in local products and local manufacturing,” he said.

Gary interrupted Bob to remind him that the milk in Bart’s and Snow’s is not yet completely local: it is processed in a small farming cooperative in New York State. He said that one of his dreams is to establish a local dairy-processing plant. “It’s this winter’s project … along with our roof,” he remarked with a wry smile.

Bob declared that one of the reasons he likes Bart’s and Snow’s ice cream so much is the high quality of the product.

“We make it the same way we did 15 years ago, which is not the case with big multinational ice creams,” explained Gary Schaefer. “They’ve all change their formula to make it less expensive.

“We didn’t have to do anything to get better,” he said. “We simply had to not change. That’s kind of a symbol of what’s going on in the whole industry. All that corporatizing of America has been really good for us.”

Bart’s CISA Local Peach ice cream is available at local stores now–until this year’s crop runs out!
Bart’s lists all the locations that sell Bart’s ice-cream pints on its web site.

“Not all [of these] will have the peach,” Barbara Fingold told me, “but most will since we’re mentioning it to all our customers and everyone seems very excited about it.”

Happy scooping…………

Rosh Hashanah Honey Chicken

The Jewish New Year arrives at sunset tonight. I have warm memories of going to Temple with my grandmother on Rosh Hashanah every September when I was little.

With a Jewish father and a Protestant mother, I was actually brought up Unitarian. By and large Unitarianism worked for me. It encouraged both humanism and skepticism.

Nevertheless, as a religion (rather than a school of thought) it had its frustrating moments. I remember asking once in Sunday school what I should believe, theologically speaking. I was presented with statistics about what percentage of Unitarians believed in God, Jesus, and so forth.

It was interesting information but not very helpful to a nine year old.

The Jewish New Year always satisfied the young Tinky. Going to Temple gave me all the religious ritual and certainty the Unitarians lacked.

Even better, it was a social event as well as a religious one. My grandmother sat upstairs in the balcony with an entire community of women. They kept one ear focused on the service and the other on each others’ news.

Rosh Hashanah also appealed and appeals to me because it falls at a time of year that feels a lot newer than that of the Christian New Year.

We start school years in September. We start diets in September. (I usually do, anyway). Fall is a time of balance, of transition, of summing up and thinking ahead–in short, a perfect time to celebrate and calibrate the New Year.

Honey is a traditional addition to meals at Rosh Hashanah. It helps cooks wish everyone at the table a sweet year.

Last year at this time I made a tasty honey cake. This year I wanted to try something savory. A girl can have too much cake in her life.

I got a little help from the folks at Kosher.com, a web site that offers more than 15,000 different kosher products for home delivery.

Kosher.com publicized itself and celebrated the New Year earlier this week by distributing apples, honey, and recipes at various New York City locations by means of a giant motorized shopping cart. I wasn’t able to go to New York so its publicist kindly sent me a few recipes. They were devised by Jamie Geller, Kosher.com’s “chief foodie officer.”

I made this chicken dish last night. It couldn’t have been easier to prepare–and the soy sauce kept the honey from over-sweetening the chicken.

If I made it at another time of year, I’d probably raise the proportion of soy sauce to honey to make the sweetness even more subtle. I’d also try substituting maple syrup for the honey since I love maple syrup.

God did NOT promise the Israelites a land of milk and maple, however, so for Rosh Hashanah I’ll stick with the honey.

I wish you all a sweet New Year…………

Jamie Geller’s Honey Chicken

Ingredients:

1 chicken (about 3-1/2 pounds), cut into eight pieces
3/4 cup honey
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
3 to 4 cloves garlic, finely minced (Jamie actually suggested 1 tablespoon garlic powder, but I didn't have any in the house so I used fresh instead)
1 teaspoon black pepper (I just turned the pepper grinder several times)

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease a 9-by-13-inch pan.

Rinse the chicken pieces, pat them dry, and place them in the baking dish.

In a small bowl combine the honey, soy sauce, oil, garlic, and pepper. Pour this mixture over the chicken.

Bake the chicken in the preheated oven until it is golden brown (about an hour–maybe a little less for some of the smaller pieces), basting from time to time. Serves 4 generously.

Jamie Geller (Courtesy of Kosher.com)

Peach Chipotle Sauce (Sort Of)

Sigh……….

Given my habit of losing just about everything, I guess it was only a matter of time before I mislaid a recipe.

Welcome to the mislaid-recipe post.

I actually made this dish TWICE. The first time I discovered that my camera had jammed just as the pork was ready to eat.

The second time the camera worked, but the recipe disappeared shortly after dinner.

I THINK I remember what I did. The recipe below replicates that memory. Unfortunately, I’m only about 80 percent sure of its accuracy.

Despite my qualms I wanted to post this sauce for readers before peach season ends because it is really, really delicious–a perfect balance of sweetness and heat.

I love it over cream cheese on crackers and also with pork. (It would probably be tasty with chicken, too.)

So here’s your chance to experiment along with me. If you do, please post a comment to let me know what you think of the recipe.

The Peach Chipotle Sauce

Ingredients:

1/2 small red onion, finely chopped
butter as necessary for sautéing
2 cups chopped peaches
1/2 cup light brown sugar, lightly packed
1/2 teaspoon salt1 chipotle in adobo, finely chopped (add a little more if you like things a little spicy; I do so I found 1-1/2 chipotles just right)

Instructions:

In a saucepan brown the onion in a little butter. Add the peaches, brown sugar, salt, and chopped chipotle.

Simmer the mixture until it reaches the desired consistency, stirring frequently. If you want to use it for baking (see below), you need to cook it only for about 15 minutes, until the flavors have melded but the consistency is not jam like.

If you want to serve it with cream cheese and crackers, cook it until it is jam like–that is, until it just begins to sheet, rather than drip, off a cold stainless-steel spoon.

This recipe makes about 1-1/2 cups of the jam-like version.

Peach Chipotle Pork Tenderloin

Ingredients:

1 generous pound pork tenderloin
a small amount of extra-virgin olive oil for sautéing
1-1/2 cups “drippy” peach chipotle sauce (see above)
1/2 cup water
pepper to taste
a little more salt to taste

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Cut the tenderloin into small medallions. (This is neater if you place it in the freezer for 10 to 15 minutes before you slice it.)

Sauté the tenderloin in a small amount of olive oil to brown the medallions on both sides. Transfer them to a baking dish.

Combine the chipotle sauce, water, and pepper and pour them over the pork. Cover the baking dish, and place it in the preheated oven.

Bake for 45 minutes; then uncover the mixture and bake for 10 to 15 minutes more. Add a little salt if necessary to taste. Serve over noodles. Serves 4.

End of Season Ratatouille

Here is another entry in the zucchini stakes–perhaps my last for this year. The little green gourds are beginning to be supplanted by their longer lasting fall cousins!

It pairs zucchini with other wonderful late-season vegetables, including eggplant, one of my all-time favorites.

This vegetable medley tastes lovely (and just a little spicy) by itself or over pasta. The formula here is meant only to get you started at the stove. If you have corn, add some kernels to the blend. If your herb garden has more oregano than basil, throw in some oregano. In short, let your garden and your pantry guide you.

Ingredients:

1 medium eggplant, cubed
extra-virgin olive oil as needed
1 large onion, sliced thinly
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 to 3 bell peppers of differing colors (I used purple and green because that’s what I found at the farm stand!)
1/2 to 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes (to taste)
salt and pepper to taste
2 small zucchini cubed, or 1 zucchini and 1 summer squash
2 large or 3 medium tomatoes
2 sprigs basil
2 sprigs parsley plus chopped parsley for garnish

Instructions:

Place the eggplant cubes in salted water to soak while you cook other ingredients.

In a 4-quart Dutch oven heat some olive oil. Add the onion and garlic, and sauté, stirring, for 5 minutes. Add the peppers, pepper flakes, and a sprinkle of salt and pepper, and sauté, stirring, for at least 4 minutes more. Turn off the heat.

In a separate frying pan heat more oil and sauté the squash pieces for 4 to 5 minutes. Add a sprinkle of salt and throw the salted squash into the onion/pepper mixture. Drain the eggplant pieces and sauté them in q little more oil in the same pan you used for the squash. After about 4 minutes, add a tiny bit of salt, and toss them into the vegetable medley.

Add the tomatoes and the herb sprigs, stir, and cook all the vegetables over low heat for 45 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes. When you are ready to serve your ratatouille remove the wilted sprigs of herbs. Place the vegetables in a serving dish and toss chopped parsley overall.

Serves 4 to 6.

I love eggplant!

Lock Your Doors!

My neighbor Jack, who read my recent rant about zucchini bashing, shared a zucchini anecdote with me the other day.

He was asked recently where he was living. When replied that he was in our small town of Hawley, he was told:

“Hawley’s a nice town. People don’t lock their doors there–except at this time of year. They’re afraid someone will come in and leave zucchini in the house.”

Here I try once more to redeem zucchini’s sinister reputation with a recipe.

Pam Matthews of Phillips, Maine, was one of my co-thespians (and friends) when she lived in western Massachusetts.

She sent me the moist, flavorful zucchini formula below. She says the recipe was originally meant to make zucchini bread, but she found it cakelike and decided to bake it in a Bundt pan instead of bread pans.

It makes a lovely coffee cake (or yes, sweet bread) on its own. You can also dress it up (as my young friend Maija did) with a little cream-cheese frosting. (The candy corn is not obligatory, although we had a lot of fun with it.)

Maija considers her candy placement.

Pam’s Zucchini Cake

Ingredients:

1 cup canola oil (or 1/2 cup oil and 1/2 cup softened butter)
2 cups sugar
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 cups flour
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (I like these so I used a little extra)
1/2 cup raisins (ditto)
1/4 cup finely chopped pineapple (optional: this wasn’t in Pam’s recipe, but I had it in the house so I threw it in, and it worked)
3/4 cup shredded coconut (again you could use a little more; I LOVE COCONUT)
2 cups grated zucchini, drained in a dishtowel

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour a 10-inch Bundt pan.

Cream together the oil and sugar; then beat in the eggs, 1 at a time. Beat in the vanilla, followed by the cinnamon, baking powder, and baking soda.

Stir in all but 1 tablespoon of the flour. Add that tablespoon of flour to the walnuts and raisins and mix well. Stir them into the batter, along with the pineapple (if you are using it) and the coconut. Fold in the zucchini.

Spoon the batter into the prepared pan and bake it until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, about 55 to 65 minutes. Serves 10 to 12.

Corn Moon

Last weekend we celebrated not only Labor Day but the Corn Moon–the golden September full moon that marks the height of the corn harvest.

Corn is the perfect late-summer vegetable. Its color reflects the hues of the sun and the goldenrod-filled fields. Its subtly sweet taste reminds us to savor summer’s beauty while we still have it.

A few years back I tasted my first corn salsa, created by Nikki Ciesluk. Nikki’s family runs an attractive, abundant farm stand in Deerfield, Massachusetts, that specializes in sweet corn. Her salsa, which was featured in Yankee magazine, made me want to make some of my own.

Somehow I never got around to making it, however–until this past corn moon. Our dear friends the Kubaseks came to visit and brought farm-fresh corn. Grilling it took a little time and effort, but Bill the Grillmeister was up to the challenge.

When the salsa was finally ready to eat, 18-year-old Jasi said, “This is the best salsa I have ever tasted.” High praise!

A note: like most salsas, this one will vary a bit depending on the heat of the peppers used and the moisture content of the tomatoes. When I made a second batch I used an unidentified pepper from my garden that turned out to be VERY hot. I toned it down by adding a bit of honey to the salsa, but next time I’ll make sure I know what sort of pepper I’m throwing in.

A second note: don’t forget to wear gloves when you cut up your hot pepper!

Bill and Jasi man the grill.

Grilled Corn Salsa

Ingredients:

3 small ears or 2 large ears corn
olive oil as needed for roasting
1 medium-hot pepper (you could go as mild as an ancho or an Anaheim or as hot as a jalpeño, but don’t stray too far in either direction), seeded and cut up
1/2 bell pepper–green, red, or orange–finely diced
1/2 small red onion, finely diced
the juice of 1 lime
1/2 teaspoon salta handful of cilantro, chopped
1/2 tomato, diced

Instructions:

Preheat your grill. Brush (with a brush or paper towels) the corn with olive oil and grill it until it begins to brown just a bit (about 12 minutes), turning frequently. Let it cool for a few minutes; then cut the kernels off.

In a bowl combine the peppers, onion, lime juice, salt, and cilantro. Stir in the tomato, followed by the corn kernels.

Serve as a side dish or with tortilla chips. Makes about 2 cups.

Bread and Roses

My roses have gone by so I had to serve Bread and Roses of Sharon!

I sang “Bread and Roses” in church yesterday in honor of Labor Day.

The words to this song came from a 1911 poem by James Oppenheim, commonly associated with a bitter textile strike in Lawrence, Massachusetts, in the winter of 1912.

Legend has it that women striking in Lawrence carried signs that read, “Give us bread and roses too.”

The poem speaks in the voice of women strikers who long for a more just world in which they will be given not merely enough to eat but also enough to nourish their spirits.

“Bread and Roses” reflects the era in which it was written. It is idealistic about the role of women in society, shot through with the passion of the progressive movement, and mindful of the disparity of wealth that characterized early 20th-century America.

Here is a stanza of the song:

As we go marching, marching, we bring the greater days.

The rising of the women means the rising of the race.

No more the drudge and idler,
Ten that toil where one reposes

But a sharing of life’s glories:
Bread and roses, bread and roses.

Oppenheim’s words have been set to at least two tunes. The version with which I am more familiar is the newer of the two. It was written in the 1970s by Mimi Farina. Farina started a nonprofit group in San Francisco called Bread and Roses, which brings music to people in institutions like prisons, hospitals, and rest homes.

Her version of “Bread and Roses” is performed every year at my alma mater, Mount Holyoke College, by the graduating seniors. On the day before they graduate they wind their laurel chain around the grave of Mary Lyon, the college’s founder, and sing all four verses of the song.

2009 Seniors with the Laurel Chain (Courtesy of Mount Holyoke College)

This tradition always touches me. It connects these young women to other Mount Holyoke graduates–some of whom march in the laurel parade with them every year.

It also connects even the most aristocratic of the seniors to working people everywhere. Mount Holyoke has a long tradition of training its students to reach out to others; Washington Monthly recently ranked the college second in the nation at contributing to the good of the country.

Mostly it reminds the seniors (and those who listen to them sing) that college, life, and justice are about more than just making a living–that to be happy, healthy, and good we must enrich the soul as well as the body.

Hearts starve as well as bodies.
Give us bread, but give us roses.

In honor of Labor Day, then, here is a seasonal bread recipe. I’m afraid you’ll have to supply the roses yourself! Read a book. Listen to music. Work in your garden. Walk in the woods. In short, do something that will make you happy….

Pesto Bread

This recipe is very flexible. If you are overwhelmed by your basil crop, double the pesto you add. Use all-basil or all-parsley pesto. (I only mixed them because I ran out of basil!) Use more whole-wheat flour for healthier bread. Use less for more delicate bread.

If you don’t want to braid your bread, put it in traditional loaf pans (greased, please). I braided mine because my friend Anna and her daughter Maija were around to help.

But don’t forget the roses!

Ingredients:

for the pesto:

1 generous tablespoon pine nuts (or walnuts or pecans if you’re out of pine nuts)
1 garlic clove, roughly chopped
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup mixed basil and parsley leaves, packed
enough extra-virgin olive oil to moisten the basil (about 1/4 cup)
1/4 cup grated Parmesan or Romano cheese

for the bread:

1 packet active dry yeast
1/4 cup lukewarm water
1 tablespoon sugar
1 cup milk
1 cup hot water
6 cups flour (I used 1-1/2 cups King Arthur Flour white whole wheat and the rest KAF all-purpose), plus a bit more for kneading
1 teaspoon salt
1 recipe pesto
a sprinkling of cornmeal

Instructions:

First, prepare your pesto. Place the nuts, garlic, and salt in a small grinder or a blender, along with some of the herb leaves. Add a little bit of olive oil, and pulverize. Continue adding herb leaves and oil until you have transformed all of the leaves into a paste. Stir in the cheese and set aside.

Next, proof the yeast in the lukewarm water in a small bowl, along with the sugar. This will take about 5 minutes.

Combine the milk and hot water and make sure that the combination is lukewarm (if it isn’t heat it briefly on the stove). In a large separate bowl, combine the flour and salt. Briskly stir in the dissolved yeast and the liquids; then stir in the pesto.

Place the dough on a lightly greased or floured surface, put a little oil on your hands, and knead the dough for about 8 minutes, until it feels just right. You may add a little more flour as you knead, but try not to add too much.

Transfer the dough to a greased bowl and cover it with a damp towel. Let it rise until it puffs up and just about doubles in bulk. This will probably take an hour or more.

Gently deflate the dough with your hands, and cut it in two with a serrated knife.

Place each half in turn on an oiled board, and shape it into a rectangle. Cut the rectangle in three at every spot except the very top so that you can braid it (I know I’m not phrasing this very elegantly, but the photo below should help). Braid the bread.

Anna prepares to braid.

Place each braid on a cookie sheet on which you have dusted cornmeal. Allow the braids to rise again until they have doubled in bulk–about an hour.

Bake the braids in a preheated 350-degree oven for 35 to 40 minutes, until they are a light golden brown. Makes 2 braids.

Maija concentrates on braiding.

Catching Some Zs

How do I love zucchini? Let me count the ways….

I know zucchini don’t always come in for a lot of praise. In fact, I tend to think of them as the fruitcake of summer.

At Christmas the fruitcake bashers jest that fruitcake is so heavy it can be used as a doorstop. In early September the jokesters snicker that country dwellers are so frustrated with their bumper crops of zucchini that as soon as the sun sets they tiptoe around and leave the things on their neighbors’ doorsteps.

It’s true that even one little zucchini vine can go crazy if left untended. Gardeners who forget to check their patch for a couple of days end up with vegetables the size of baseball bats instead of the tender little green gourds that inspired the Italian name “zucchini,” which means ”little squash.”

(Actually, in Italian the word would be “zucchine.” I hate to be overly pedantic, but I was an editor for years so I’m prone to linguistic nitpicking.)

If you remember to check your zucchini patch frequently, however, you’ll be rewarded with small, curvy cylinders that are highly versatile.

They cook quickly, especially if you just fry slices in a little butter and olive oil and toss in a few herbs and a little salt and pepper.

Grated zucchini can lend vitamin A and moisture to soups, sauces, breads, brownies, cakes, and casseroles.

You may also use zucchini to make pickles or relish and stretch summer’s bounty throughout the year.

Zucchini are cheap, and they’re good for you. As my grandmother used to say, “What’s not to like?”

So–if any of my neighbors would like to leave a few zucchini on my doorstep, I say, “Bring ‘em on!” I didn’t grow any myself this year, and I have several zucchini recipes to share with readers. Here is the first.

I learned to make these zucchini pancakes last year when I was working as a demo chef at Bloomingdale’s in Tysons Corner, Virginia. Pat Money, the Calphalon cookware representative, suggested that they would show off her pans nicely. They certainly did! I have changed the recipe a little from Pat’s version (a characteristic failing of mine), but I’ve kept the essence of the pancakes intact.

As you can see, they’re on the fattening side–so make them when you have a crowd coming over. They’ll disappear.

Zucchini Pancakes

Ingredients:

2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1 tablespoon canola oil
1 small onion, finely minced
1 clove garlic, finely minced
1 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese (add a little more if you like)
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
lots of freshly ground pepper
2 medium zucchini, grated and squeezed dry in a dish towel (about 4 cups)
1 cup flour
extra-virgin olive oil as needed for frying

Instructions:

In a bowl, combine the eggs, canola oil, onion, garlic, cheese, baking powder, salt, and pepper.

Stir in the zucchini, followed by the flour.

Pour enough olive oil into the bottom of a nonstick frying pan to coat the bottom of the pan. Heat the oil over medium to medium-high heat until it shimmers.

Place heaping soup spoons full of the zucchini batter into the pan, about 4 to 5 at a time. Flatten them slightly and fry them until they are golden around the edges and can be turned, about 3 minutes. Turn them over and fry them until they are golden on the other side, 2 to 3 minutes longer. If you need to add a bit more oil during this process, do so.

Drain the pancakes on paper towels and serve them warm. Makes 25 to 30 small pancakes.

Liquid Rubies/Liquid Gold

Truffle's new "do" makes her feel a little cold (but never nippy!) in September.

September has arrived.

A little nip has arrived in the air here in the hilltowns of Western Massachusetts. My dog Truffle got her hair cut last week so she burrows under the covers at night. And I’ve just stopped swimming, although I hope my being landlocked is only temporary. Surely we’ll have a warm spell before fall arrives officially!

The chilly evenings have reminded me, a bit belatedly, that I’d better get to work preserving at least some of summer’s flavors. Somehow I never manage to put up as many pickles and jams as I’d like to these days.

I refuse to feel guilty about this. I just do what I can when I can.

So I’m happy that I’ve started … with a little vinegar.

I’ll describe what I’ve done below in paragraph form rather than as a recipe because (as you’ll see) the process is very loose.

My Ruby Vinegar (Cold Method)

A couple of weeks ago I harvested some purple basil to make what my friends at Stockbridge Herb Farm call “ruby red vinegar.” On their advice I went the traditional route with this batch.

I gently washed 1 handful of purple basil and 1 of green. I let them dry on paper towels. Then I placed them in a clean glass jar with a plastic top and covered them with distilled white vinegar. (I used about a pint of vinegar; feel free to use more leaves and more vinegar if you like.)

I left the jar to steep in a warm but dark part of the kitchen, shaking it gently a couple of times a day.

The purple basil started lending color to the vinegar almost immediately. Yesterday the vinegar was a lovely reddish purple and tasted of fresh basil. (One has to monitor the basil; this process can take from 1 to 4 weeks.) So I strained it through cheesecloth and put it in a fresh bottle. It will lend the taste of fresh basil to salads throughout the winter.



My Golden Vinegar (Hot Method)

Yesterday I went out to the herb garden and grabbed some lemon basil. This variety of basil really does smell of citrus.

As you can see from the picture above, I have let it go to seed a bit–in part because I’m lazy and keep forgetting to nip off the flowers as they form, in part because I love to add the basil flowers to a small bouquet. They lend a lovely fragrance to their surroundings.

I put a few flowers in today’s vinegar infusion but tried to rely mostly on stalks of basil that hadn’t yet flowered; their flavor is better. For this concoction I used golden cider vinegar from a local apple producer, Apex Orchards.

I took a shortcut with this batch of basil by heating my vinegar almost to the boiling point before pouring it over the cleaned and dried leaves.

{Before I added the basil I poured hot tap water into the bottle and left it there for a minute or two so that the bottle wasn’t shocked and perhaps broken by the warm vinegar.)

As with the non-heated vinegar I used a bottle with a plastic top so the lid wouldn’t react to the vinegar.

I will shake this bottle twice a day for three days. The warm vinegar works faster than vinegar at room temperature so my lemon basil batch should be ready to strain by the time the three days have elapsed.

Note: If you’re trying this method, be sure NOT to shake the bottle right after you add the hot liquid; vinegar will spurt out and make a mess!

If you don’t have purple or lemon basil, you may use either of these methods with regular basil or indeed with almost any herb. And think about planting more varieties of basil next year.

I’m looking forward to using either of my vinegars in panzanella very soon.