My methods

I just got home from an author talk at our local public library. The author, Molly Wizenberg, has a well-known food blog, Orangette, and has recently published the book "A Homemade Life : Stories and Recipes from my Kitchen Table". While having my copy of the book signed, I talked to the author about how she cooks and bakes, her methods, and realized that I cook and bake in a way that is so linked to my personality. (That IS to be expected.) I know that I am not a measurer, I'm inexact and somewhat impatient, even disdainful of cooks who read recipes as though they must be followed right down to the perfect measuring of the last ingredient. I don't think I ever cook or bake anything exactly by recipe, nothing! But then I also realized that I am a process oriented person and the end product is not as important to me as the feeling I have as I am making something. Before I start a food project I imagine the flavors, sometimes not just imagining but also sniffing different ingredients separately and together to see if they seem 'right'. In that way, I do not think I am particularly imaginative, fusion of very unlike flavors is not my forte. While I'm creating in the kitchen, I turn the music up loud, sometimes dressing up for the occasion, look around my kitchen at the things I appreciate and begin. And I am not a great cook, I don't even cook often but when I do it's a creative process that sometimes turns out exactly how I imagined it and just as often flops.

We were talking, as Molly signed my book, about writing recipes, and I told her that I wanted to write my family's cookbook and had started by giving my children a booklet of recipes that I had written. I seemed to add my own commentary to the recipes. See the recipe I sent to my son for Valentine's Day last year, full of not just recipe, but me:

Sam's Valentine Cookies

1 stick butter (basic)

½ cup organic cane sugar (basic)

½ cup brown sugar (basic)

1 egg (basic)

a splash of vanilla (basic but oh so good)

1 ¼ cups flour (basic)

1 tsp of baking powder (basic)

1 cup rolled oats (for health)

½ cup coconut (for dreams)

gratings of fresh ginger (for love)

Mix the first three, then add egg, ginger and vanilla. The dry stuff gets thrown in and mixed with the less dry stuff. Bake at 350 degrees for about 10-15 minutes.

Love you, Sam! Happy Valentines Day. They're in the oven right now. I will be mailing them today, expect them Saturday.

Tu mama

Hierba Santa

While I was in Oaxaca in 2005, I took a cooking class at the language school I attended, the Instituto Cultura Oaxaca. We used an herb that I knew nothing about before the class. The common names include hierba santa and hoja santa, the Latin name is Piper auritum. Hierba santa is an herbaceous plant, approximately 4 feet tall, with large (about 3 inch by 5 inch) heartshaped leaves. The plant pictured here was growing in the garden where we stayed but I saw it growing everywhere, a native plant or weed?

The leaves have a pleasant anise flavor. We used it in a black bean paste for memelitas, small handmade corn tortillas covered with the beans and freshly made salsa.

This is the recipe from Berta, mi maestra, for the black bean paste for the memelitas:

Preparacion de la pasta de frijol:
Se asan 5 hojas de hierba santa junto con 3 chiles

En una licuadora:
Se mezclan la hierba santa y los chiles con medio kilo de frijo, previamente cocido.
Se licua con el agua necesaria.
Se vierte en una cacerola puesta previament al fuego por 5 minutos con cucharadas soperas de aceite.

El frijol se frie por 20 minutos.

I have not yet been able to find a source of seed or plants of hierba santa but would like to find one and try growing it in my garden.

I think this blog is more food than books. I should rename it!

Kimchi

Someone gave me the Koreana magazine issue for Winter 2008 (Vol. 22, no. 4) which has articles on kimchi. The articles cover the history and geographic variations of this food closely associated with Korean cuisine and culture. The Korean regional types probably developed because of climatic differences and ingredient availability, and vary by degree of spice, salt, amount of liquid, and of course, by mix of major ingredients. The color photos of kimchi in the magazine are gorgeous and show the diversity of color and form. The information I missed from this issue were instructions and recipes for making it at home. It's a food I have tasted very tentatively years ago and would like to explore more extensively.

Kimchi is basically a fermented food, mostly cabbage and very spicy, with a number of additional ingredients. A lot of the types are all-vegetable but a number of them include fish. It is available in most grocery stores but I would like to investigate where there might be unusual types available locally, either in Asian groceries or from stores in the Seattle International District.

Because kimchi is made from a number of vegetables that grow very well in the Pacific Northwest it seems like an ideal food to look into for this region.

Quinoa in the PNW?

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm interested in Western Hemisphere food plants. I've worked in horticulture for a significant part of my adult life before going back to school to become a librarian. My interest in food plants has never left me and I approach part of my garden space as a place to test new plant ideas out.

Last summer I planted 4 quinoa varieties in my garden, all from Seeds of Change. The varieties included Dave (Four-O-Seven), Brightest Brilliant, Temuco Traditional, and Faro Traditional. I planted twice, first planting at the end of May, the second 2 weeks later. Quinoa seeds are small and the packets had few seeds. I didn't count how many I planted each time to see what kind of germination I got but it seemed as though it was not very high. Although the second planting seemed to be more successful than the first. I wasn't sure how to plant them so they were planted shallowly in rows and thinned (where that was necessary) to about 2 inches apart, the rows about a foot apart in raised beds. I will try planting a little differently based on what I've learned. I have no data to report because it seems that quinoa is a favorite food of chickens, liked even more than amaranth or kale. They left stalks only in my garden by mid-summer. I plan to try growing quinoa again next summer and will attempt to contain the birds or protect the garden.

My friend, Deborah, works at the Oregon State University Vegetable Research Farm and we often talk about trying new crops. She also planted quinoa this past year at the farm and sent me an informal report of her observations:

"So here is what we know about quinoa from this summer. We grew 2 varieties: Cherry Vanilla from Nichols, and Brightest Brilliant from Seeds of Change, plus a relative, Red Aztec Spinach (Huanzontle) from Nichols (usually used as a vegetable--leaves are eaten--rather than a grain). They all grew very tall (6 ft or more) and all lodged to some extent, with lower branches breaking off from the weight of the seed. Brightest Brilliant was the worst for lodging--it was all on the ground after the first fall rain. We did get ripe seed, but it would have been hard to harvest good grain from the plants in the mud. We planted late (June 23), though, so I think if you planted in spring you might get a good crop before the fall rains. We did not harvest any... "

I'm rethinking the whole concept of trying to grow quinoa the way that a vegetable crop in the PNW might be grown. Our wet climate and high-nutrient soils may contribute to the lodging problem, and it is, perhaps, not a good idea to plant them in rows. I've looked at pictures of fields of quinoa and it looks like a wheat field (only much taller) and that the climate may be drier. The seed tops look heavy (high yield) and the plants may do better holding each other upright if planted closer, without wide rows between them. I may even try staking them just to see what I am able to harvest. I also think that finding varieties that mature before the rains start will be important for production of seed for eating or planting.

I plan to try again, hopefully this summer. I'll replant the same varieties as last year, will try to find some others, and will also be trying the Nichols' variety, Cherry Vanilla.

So why bother? I think about the types of food plants that we grow in our gardens and they tend to be low-protein and non-storage types. I think about local food security and it motivates me to try to grow plants that are higher in protein or more grain-like, with storage potential.

I did find a website, Quinoa Corporation, with pictures of quinoa growing in South America. They sell the grain and prepared foods made from it and have some recipes for using it. There are at least 2 recipes for 'tabouli' which is how I use quinoa, to make tabouli-like salads.

Organicology

I have received an email announcing the Organic Seed Alliance's 2009 conference, Organicology, in Portland, February 26-28. Guest speakers include Vendana Shiva, Paul Roberts, and Claire Hope Cummings. Here's the url (sorry, haven't figured out how to make it a hotlink) : http://www.tilth.org/organicology.

Winter Holidays and Food

Growing up, my family's traditional Christmas eve meal included Swedish potato sausage, pickled herring, fruit salad, yule kaka, a flaming Christmas pudding, fruitcake, and to drink, cheap red wine with ginger ale. We must have had vegies but I do not think it was carrots and rutabagas which we had for Thanksgiving. It's interesting that we had such a mix of Scandinavian and English foods. We aren't of Scandinavian heritage but living in Minnesota with it's influences from that part of the world, we seemed to adopt the food.

My children and I developed our tradition for our Solstice meal, based on living in the PNW, seasonal foods and our preferences. Usually we have crab which is in season and plentiful at this time of year and because it's Arie's favorite. If not crab, then salmon or shrimp. Fresh pasta was incorporated into the menu for Sam who liked especially bland food when he was young. Fruit salad and pickled herring continued from my childhood. Sometimes I bake holiday bread, kind of like yulekaka but my modifications to a traditional recipe which I do not have. And I have been making Mom's fruitcake every year for decades. I never make it the same, it's an incredibly flexible recipe, never seems to not turn out. I am one of those who loves fruitcake and this is such a good recipe, not too rich but moist and dark. Here's Mom's recipe with my modification notes following:

Dark Fruit Cake

3 cups apple sauce (unsweetened)
1 cup shortening
2 cups sugar

4.5 cups flour
4 tsp baking soda
1 tsp nutmeg
2.5 tsp cinnamon
0.5 tsp cloves

1 lb dates (pitted of course)
1 lb raisins
cherries and misc candied fruit

Boil together for 5 minutes, the applesauce, sugar and shortening. Let stand overnight. Dredge chopped fruit mix with flour, soda and spices which have been sifted together. Mix all ingredients together. Fill pans about 2/3 full. Bake in slow oven 250 degrees until done (takes hours). Remember to line pans with brown paper and greased waxed paper and put a pan of water in the oven. When cakes have baked and cooled, pour rum or brandy or some sort of alcohol on them, wrap them up, and store in refrigerator.

Okay, my modifications, I NEVER cook or bake according to an exact recipe. I've made this recipe in my younger, purer days using whole wheat flour, honey and oil with dried fruit. It worked fine!, or at least I remember that it worked okay. These days I use organic white flour, organic sugar (and less than the recipe calls for), butter, dried fruit, applesauce made from my neighbors' apples, medjool dates because they're about the only ones available, and I don't line the pans like Mom did, I just grease them. I have also found that if I don't mix the pitted chopped dates in the applesauce mixture before mixing the wet and dry together, that the dates tend to have the dry mix embedded in the inside seed cavity and it's very difficult to get it well mixed. So my newest change is to mix them in with the wet. It worked well this year.

Punch

I was recently in Guadalajara and while I was there visited a supermarket, buying up fruit to take back to my room to taste. I bought a large papaya, two types of guayaba, a tejocote, limes and baby bananas. I was talking to a woman who lives there about the tejocote and she shared this list of ingredients for a punch:

Guayabas
Jamaica
Tejocote
Nuezes
Azúcar de caña (Caña de azúcar?)
Ciruela pasas
Agua
Tequila