October 31, 2013 · 1:10 pm

A Squash of One’s Own

I am a big fan of squash. Any squash. Butternut, Delicata, Blue Hubbard, and Acorn. Bring ’em on (though for some of those bigger squash you may need a chain saw to cut into them)! To me these hard squashes say fall, New England, feasting. When the leaves are down and you finally decide you have to turn the heat on (we made it to October 27th before flipping the switch this year); about the time you dig into your bottom drawer for your sweaters; but before the first snowflakes hit, is the perfect time to celebrate the change of seasons with squash.

stuffed acorn squash

For me this recipe is akin to a cooking meditation. You chop and peel and stir as you sip a mug of hot apple cider or a glass of wine and hear about everyone’s day. The timing can be loose and the recipe (even though I’ve written it down for you) is flexible, more of a concept than something to follow to the letter. It’s the food version of one-size-fits-all, and you can tweak it and adapt it to your taste, as well as to what happens to be on your pantry shelves that day.

I’ve made it dozens of times over the years and while it’s wonderful every time, it hasn’t been the same twice. I’ve used sweet pork sausage, but also chicken apple sausage, garlic sausage, and one time a spicy chorizo. When vegetarians are coming to dinner I substitute tempeh for the sausage and vegetable stock or apple cider for the chicken broth. The last few incarnations have had dried cherries mixed with chunks of crisp fall apples, though previous iterations of this dish have contained silvered apricots, dried apples, dried and/or fresh cranberries, pears, and golden raisins.

veggie-sausage mix for stuffing

Nan, the woman who told me about this recipe was a huge fan of the Neville Brothers so I often find myself playing one of their CDs as I putter around the kitchen. When I told her I’d never heard of the Neville Brothers she described them like this, “They have the voices of angels – angels who sing rhythm & blues and funk and come from New Orleans.”

Happy squash! Happy Fall!

Stuffed Acorn Squash

3  acorn squash, cut in half & seeds removed

3-5  Tablespoons olive oil or butter or combination

1-2  small onions, diced

2  carrots, peeled and diced

2-3  celery stalks, diced

2-3 parsnips, peeled and diced

3-4  sausages or equivalent amount of tempeh

2  apples, peeled, cored and diced

1/2  cup walnuts, roughly chopped

1/2  cup dried cherries or cranberries, roughly chopped

4  cups dried stuffing (look for something low sodium)

2 cups chicken or vegetable stock

thyme

salt

pepper

garlic powder

sage

Butter or olive oil (if desired)

Preheat oven to 350ºF. Arrange squash, cut side down in a jelly roll pan with 1/2″ water. Bake until soft 60-80 minutes, depending on size.

While the squash are baking make the stuffing. Sauté onions, carrots, celery together 5-8 minutes depending on the size of your chopped pieces. If your sausage is pre-cooked dice up and add to the vegetable mixture. For the vegetarian version chop up tempeh and sauté until lightly browned. If you’re using raw sausage cook with vegetables until all pink is gone from the meat. While all this sautéing is going on heat up the stock until simmering.

Add the walnuts, cherries and spices to the vegetable-sausage mix and season to taste with thyme, salt, pepper, garlic powder and sage. Pour 1/2 cups warm stock over dried stuffing and stir to moisten. Pour remaining stock over the vegetable-sausage mix to moisten, then combine the two. Re-taste to correct seasonings.

At this  point the squash should be cooked. Flip over, add a pat of butter or margarine or small spoonful of olive oil  (if desired) and a light sprinkle of salt and pepper to the squash. If your squash won’t sit level slice off a tiny piece from the bottom so they won’t rock. Mound in the stuffing so it is slightly domed. Repeat with all squash halves. You should have a fair amount of stuffing left over. Place the remaining stuffing in a shallow baking dish or pie plate.

Bake stuffed squash and extra stuffing for 15-20 minutes or until the top of the stuffing starts to lightly brown and crisp. If the stuffing in the baking dish is getting too dry cover with foil. The last bit of baking time gives you time to clean up so there won’t be a mountain of pots and pans to attack after dinner. I admit I derive some OCD satisfaction from the fact that this meal comes out of the oven already portioned out (let’s not go into what that says about me). Sometimes it’s important to have a squash of one’s own.

Serve squash with a side of stuffing.

extra acorn squash stuffing

Because there is no such thing as enough stuffing…

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October 9, 2013 · 10:32 am

Be Brave Brownies

There are times when I forget how much bravery and faith it takes to step into the kitchen some days.

No one is born knowing how to cook. Everyone knows how to eat from day one, but producing the meals which get consumed over a lifetime is a learned skill. Some people master those skills early on and for them cooking becomes like a second language. Others acquired their culinary skills as needed – when they get their first apartment or in my Mom’s case, when she married and had a family to feed. I’ve noticed that for some of those late kitchen bloomers the joys of cooking are abundant while others simply tolerate their time in the kitchen because there is a need both to eat and feed people. For me being around food and cooking is akin to breathing. I do it unconsciously. There is a comfort level I’ve attained both from my love of food as well as from the hours and hours I’ve stood in front of a stove.

folding in chocolate to oatmeal batter

I don’t want to sound cocky because it wasn’t always this intuitive. I enjoyed learning to cook, but I also had to work at it. There were such spectacular failures along the way its amazing I ever took up a spatula again. For some people completely losing their eyebrows in a gas oven lighting fiasco might have turned them away from food, or at least from cooking on gas appliances, but not me (and it turns out eyebrows do grow back and you really shouldn’t wait three minutes to strike the match once the gas is on). There was a memorable visit to my parent’s kitchen from the Manlius Fire Department after I had accidentally set the stove top on fire using my new wok. The disasters have given me pause, but not frightened me out of the kitchen. There have also been some foods I’m not entirely comfortable around. Ok, I’ll say it – there are a few foods which have scared me because they were strange (offals) or dangerous (spun sugar) or had a reputation for being complicated and temperamental (chocolate). Yup, I said chocolate.

Chocolate and I go way back. I adore chocolate so much I think it should have its own line on the food pyramid. I consume some nearly every day. When we were first dating my husband noticed this obsession and asked what would happen if chocolate were illegal. I replied that he would be visiting me in jail with a file baked into a vanilla cake. Really, did he think if chocolate were illegal I would abstain from it??? Silly man. Life without chocolate? Unthinkable. I love chocolate. The thing is chocolate in some forms can be temperamental. It can seize if you add liquid at the wrong moment or turn grainy if not heated properly. There are so many ways it can misbehave. More to the point I just hadn’t tried to make many chocolate desserts beyond the classic Nestlé Toll House Chocolate Chip cookie. Even my Mom who doesn’t love being in the kitchen is able to whip up a chocolate mousse which is so velvety smooth and deliciously chocolatey you ask for seconds and then thirds. I was a chocolate wuss.

ghirardelli unsweetened chocolate

This hesitancy towards chocolate was quickly noted by my two bosses at the Leaf ‘n Bean Café after they hired me as their baker. Alan and John explained they expected me to have at least one chocolate item on the dessert menu every single day. “Sure, no problem,” I told them as I inwardly said to myself, “Shit, shit, shit what am I going to make?” One of the waitresses took pity on me and gave me the recipe for the best chocolate cake ever. A regular customer at the café heard about my conundrum and slipped me the recipe for her no fail brownies. What I quickly learned was you didn’t need to be afraid of chocolate – you just need a good recipe and a little faith.

It turns out that most chocolate desserts aren’t hard or scary. I’ll grant you making fancy chocolate that needs to be tempered is tricky, but there are so many chocolate dessert recipes which are “Easy Peasy” as Jamie Oliver says. If you are craving gourmet chocolate bonbons there are plenty of fabulous chocolatiers out there who can make them for you. I am particularly fond of L.A. Burdick. Beyond the fancy stuff I suggest you take a deep breath, find a good recipe, and head into the kitchen.

chocolate chip brownies

For everyday chocolate consumption it doesn’t get much simpler than brownies. Practically fail proof*, quick to make, as well as delicious, home-made brownies are as easy to whip up as their boxed Betty Crocker cousins. Brownies are the all American chocolate equivalent of apple pie, and like apple pie you can notch them up by serving them à la mode.

Here’s a tip from Maida Heatter on how to line your brownie pan with foil. Spread a sheet of foil over the outside of the pan and press the foil to follow the shape of the pan. Then slide the foil off and flip the baking pan over. Gently nudge the pre-formed foil into the inside of the pan and secure the ends by wrapping them over the edge of the pan.

forming the foil insert

Brave Brownies

I wish I remembered the customer’s name who gave me this recipe all those years ago. I’d like to thank her all over again for the kindness she showed to me when I was learning to navigate my way into a daily routine of chocolate desserts. Perhaps these should be called Thank You Brownies.

1 stick of unsalted butter (1/2 cup)

2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, roughly chopped

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2  – 2/3 cup flour (moist to cakey)

1/4 cup cocoa (optional)¹

pinch of salt

a handful or two of extra bits like chocolate chips, chopped walnuts or dried cherries

Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Flip over a 8″ x 8″ baking pan and smooth a sheet of foil over the outside – I have gotten very fond of non-stick foil recently. Gently lift the foil which is now shaped like your pan place it into the inside of the baking pan. Since the foil has the overall shape of the pan it should be easy to snug it in. The foil will make removal of your finished brownies, and clean up, a snap.

In a small saucepan heat the butter and unsweetened chocolate until melted over a low heat. Give it a stir every so often as they’re melting, then set aside to cool when both the chocolate and butter are melted.

In  medium bowl beat together the eggs, sugar and vanilla. Add the melted butter and chocolate. Finally stir in the flour, cocoa (if using) and salt. I beat it 50 times which is the number from the back of a box of brownie mix. Silly, but one of my quirks. You can simply beat until combined and then pour into the pan. If you want to add any “extra bits” you can either fold them in or sprinkle them on top.

Bake 22-27 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out with just a few crumbs on it. Cool for at least 20-30 minutes before trying to cut because warm brownies will cling to the knife.

oatmeal flour

Gluten Free Brownies 

Many years ago I worked with a food stylist who was starting to transition from food styling to writing cookbooks. I remember three things about Carol Gelles – her generosity to her assistants; her telling me about the deal she had with God when it came to dirty dishes – she washed and he dried; and lastly her recipe for oatmeal brownies. Back then I didn’t think of them as gluten-free, but they are made with oat flour so this is a perfect alternative for any of your friends who have an intolerance or sensitivity to gluten. If someone has a severe allergy make sure you get oats that say they are gluten free. This version is pretty much the same brownie recipe if you look at them side by side.

1 stick of unsalted butter (1/2 cup)

2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, roughly chopped

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3/4 cup oat flour (made from 1 cup oatmeal)

1/4 cup cocoa (optional) ²

pinch of salt

a handful or two of extra bits like chocolate chips, chopped walnuts or dried cherries

Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Flip over a 8″ x 8″ baking pan and smooth a sheet of foil over it. Gently lift the foil off then gentle the foil into the inside of the pan to make getting them out of the pan easy.

In a small saucepan heat the butter and unsweetened chocolate until melted. Give it a stir every so often until both are melted, then set aside to cool while you put together the other ingredients.

In medium bowl beat together the eggs, sugar and vanilla for three minutes. To make the oat flour process the oatmeal in a food processor until you have flour 3-6 minutes depending on your machine. Add the oat flour and salt to the melted butter and chocolate. Stir that mixture into the beaten eggs and sugar. If you want to add any “extra bits” mix in a few handfuls into the batter or sprinkle them on top.

Bake 33-38 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out with just a few crumbs on it. Cool for at least 20-30 minutes before trying to cut because warm brownies will cling to the knife.

oatmeal gluten free brownies

* I will give someone out there the benefit of the doubt that they could somehow screw these up, if only to be perverse or because they tried to mess up.

¹ Having made these brownies for every school event since writing this post I have decided I really like a small amount of cocoa added in. Since cocoa is similar in texture to flour you may want to consider reducing your total amount of flour used so the brownies don’t get too cake-y. Also my preferred brand is Ghiradelli, which while more expensive than regular cocoa is well worth the extra cost when it comes to taste.

² I have been adding a small amount of cocoa to the oatmeal variation too since it is gluten free and similar in texture to flour. As I mentioned in the previous recipe my preferred a high end brand such as Ghiradelli. 

PS – These brownies have been so easy to make I’ve been making them (and tweaking them) twice a week for the last two months. One of my favorites was when I had some left over cocoa powder and chocolate truffle filling. I chilled the chocolate truffle filling then chopped it into little chunks and mixed that along with the Valrhona cocoa powder into the batter. Because I didn’t think to take some of the flour out to compensate for the cocoa I added these brownies were more on the cake-y side, but the chocolate flavor was amazing. Here is one of my variations –

M&M chocolate brownies ready to bake

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September 30, 2013 · 8:54 pm

Raspberries, Napkin Rings and Crackers with Cream Cheese and Jelly

Mountain Day

Last Thursday was Mountain Day at Smith College. How do I know? Was I wandering the streets of Northampton when the bells began to ring? Did I happen to be in an apple orchard in a nearby farm which was suddenly overrun by Smithies? No, it was much more mundane. I received an email from the president informing all alumni she’d given student and faculty the day off. I didn’t give myself the day off, though I was tempted. Instead i took some time to enjoy a view of the hills from behind the town library. My own Mountain Day moment.

It’s funny the things you remember about college. With our eldest daughter in her freshman year at University of New Haven I’ve been thinking about my alma mater often. Especially the quirky little food memories which have stuck with me for more than a quarter of a century.

napkin ring

Every Thursday night Smith would serve us a family style dinner by candlelight, complete with linen napkins and tablecloths. I loved those cloth napkins and so did my mother. She was so entranced with the tradition she got me my very own cloisonné napkin holder. The cloth napkins took a little getting used to since unlike paper napkins where you use and dispose of them after every meal our linen napkins had to last us for a week. If it became too grubby you could put them in the napkin hamper, then use paper until the following Thursday when you got a fresh cloth napkin. We even had our own individual napkin cubbies in the dinning hall.

Smith’s food was what we referred to as “grade A institutional food”. Great food considering it was made in such large quantities, but by no means home cooking. Every so often I’d go on the hunt for something that wasn’t made for 100+ students or that was rare enough to be a considered an out-of-dining-hall treat. One fall, around this time of year, one of my best friends Jim Ferguson and I were wandering around the farmer’s market in Amherst, Massachusetts. As much as I loved Smith, it was nice to occasionally get off campus and cross the river to visit Ferg and his friends at Amherst College. One booth was selling small boxes of what were probably the last of the fall raspberries. We bought two. Half a pint of heavy cream, two bowls, and two spoons later we locked ourselves in Ferg’s room. No sharing. No talking. Just gobbling fresh raspberries swimming in heavy cream. One small box each. It was perfect.

Raspberries and heavy cream

I’m sure many of the meals we ate were amazing, after all with Julia Child and Charlotte Turgeon as two of our illustrious alums college dining services had something to aspire to. The funny thing is it isn’t the fancy food I recall (and still eat) but the simplest. It is the humblest of desserts. Probably something thrown together when the cooks were just so tired of feeding us they wanted to weep and throw their ladles in the soup. And we loved it. We acted like a bunch of hungry sharks circling around a hurt fish. It required no cooking and no prep. Are you ready? Cream cheese, Ritz Saltine crackers and jelly. If you think about it it’s almost like a deconstructed cheesecake. Don’t believe me about how good this is? I dare you to try it.

Crackers, cream cheese and jam

What are your favorite college food memories?

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August 16, 2013 · 6:52 pm

Focaccia – A Love Story

I believe in Romance with a capital R. My Grammy Thompson was adored by her beloved Teed before and after they were secretly married. My parents met on a blind double date and walked down the aisle twelve months later. My husband Shawn and I were introduced by mutual friends (yep-another blind date). One week later a different set of mutual friends tried to get us together, only to realize we’d already been introduced. Then there is one of my favorite romantic stories involving my brother Jay, his (now) wife Leah, and a loaf of rosemary focaccia.

Jay and Leah

My brother, like a lot of guys, was pretty quiet about his romantic interests. After all I am his big sister and telling me about different girls he was interested in would have been weird in that sibling “ew cooties” kind of way. However what was a guy to do in the days before the internet and cooking channel if he needed food advice? His choices were at the time limited to A) buying a cookbook B) buying a cooking magazine or C) calling his big sister. Which is what lead to me giving my baby brother advice about dating food.

Truthfully I don’t remember the whole menu, but I do remember one food I strongly recommended he make because it was guaranteed to impress – focaccia. The tricky part was I had to teach him how to do it over the phone. He managed the proofing of the yeast and initial mixing of the flour just fine, but I could hear that he’d run into a problem when he started to knead the dough. Jay had me on speakerphone since his hands were sticky with dough (remember this was over twenty years ago when the closest thing to skype was the George Jetson’s phone). What I heard was a whole lot of nothing. Here’s how the conversation went –

“Why aren’t you grunting?”

“Why should I?”

“You’re supposed to be kneading the bread dough, not just rolling it around!”

“I am kneading it, you just can’t see me!”

“Well then I need to hear you huffing and puffing with the effort of kneading.”

“I am (huff) putting effort (puff) into kneading (grunt) this dough!!!”

“Better. Do that for ten minutes. It should feel like a baby’s bum soon.”

“How the heck (grunt) am I supposed to know (huff) about baby’s butts (puff)!?!”

A few phone calls later he had the focaccia in the oven and something simmering on the stove. When I asked my brother how his date had liked the dinner (and especially the focaccia) he told me, “Great.” Why is it that brothers are so reluctant to give post date details?

dipping focaccia in extra virgin olive oil

It wasn’t until a few years after Jay and Leah were married that I finally got to hear the inside scoop of how the focaccia was actually received. My sister-in-law said the date was indeed fabulous (after all she married my little brother!!) and after dinner Jay had given her the rest of the focaccia to take home. She was going to visit her parents the next day and wanted to show them this amazing bread which this fabulous guy had made for her. She took the remains of the focaccia, balanced carefully across the palms of her two hands, and walked into her parent’s kitchen. Since it was Sunday morning, and Leah was gazing so reverently at this piece of bread, her mother thought she was bringing them some sort of large, misshapen communion wafer. She looked up at her mom and said, “Mom, he made this for me!”

If you haven’t ever tried it focaccia is a flattish bread filled with herbs then drizzled liberally with olive oil before baking. Perfect for nibbling on before or with a meal. I often serve it with a shallow dish of extra virgin olive oil.

Rosemary Focaccia

1  1/2 cups warm water

1 package yeast (2 1/4 teaspoons)

1-2 teaspoons honey

3  1/2 – 4 cups flour (I do a 4:1 ratio of white to whole wheat but all white is fine)

2 teaspoons salt

1/4 cup olive oil plus 2-3 Tablespoons more

4 Tablespoons fresh rosemary leaves, divided

1/2 cup sautéed onion slices (optional)

1/2 cup pitted olives (optional)

Proof the yeast by mixing the warm water with the honey and sprinkling the yeast over the top. When yeasts bubbles to the top of the water and “foams” it is good to go. Start with 3 cups of flour/s, salt, 1/4 cup olive oil, and 2 Tablespoons ripped up rosemary leaves. Mix together into a shaggy ball and plop out onto a flour covered counter to knead.

shaggy focaccia dough before kneading

Knead for ten minutes, adding enough flour to keep dough from sticking to your counter. Huffing and puffing show you’re putting some effort into this. The dough should be quite soft, though not sticky when you’re done. Place into a lightly oiled bowl, cover with a clean tea towel and let rise until double about 2-3 hours.

smooth as a baby's bum (focaccia after kneading)

Once dough has doubled punch it down and knead a few times to remove any air bubbles. Roll or pat it our to about 1/2″ thick rectangle and place on parchment covered or lightly oiled jelly roll pan. Cover with tea towel and let rise another 30-40 minutes. About half way through the second rising preheat oven to 400ºF. When dough has doubled again make several random indentations with the tips of your fingers. Then drizzle 2-3 Tablespoons of olive oil over the top (it will pool in the indentations) and sprinkle the remaining 2 Tablespoons of rosemary leaves over top. If you want you can sprinkle with a touch of coarse salt.

rosemary focaccia ready to go into the oven

If you want you can add sautéed onions and or olives. It starts to become a pizza without the cheese or sauce, but focaccia is flexible enough to handle a couple more ingredients.

Pop in the oven and bake 15-20 minutes or until the focaccia is nicely browned. Serve as is on a board so people can pull chunks off as they eat or with a small bowl of olive oil.

Leah and Jay twenty years later

Disclaimer: Just because this bread is so awesome doesn’t necessarily mean that whomever you make it for will want to marry you. But it could happen…

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August 4, 2013 · 6:02 pm

Teeny Tiny Spoons – Favorite Tool #12

Spoons are an important kitchen tool. Stirring, scooping, ladling, serving – a spoon is often the first thing I reach for. On my kitchen counters, and in many drawers I’ve got wooden spoons, metal spoons, one funky yellow plastic spoon, as well as my blue and white enameled cup full of teeny tiny spoons which sits right next to the stove. Spoons are one of the habits I picked up from my Grammy Caldwell.  Taste as you cook, but only use a spoon once to taste with. Grammy was soooo ahead of the curve. She was against double dipping before the phrase double dipping existed! I am sure they drilled all the Home Economics students at Syracuse University about cleanliness and proper sanitation in the kitchen. Grammy did her best to pass some of those ideas along.
teeny tiny spoons

What I loved about the Gram’s tasting spoons was you could always tell how close the pot of food on the stove was to being done when you looked into her white enameled sink. The more tasting spoons there were scattered across the sink, the more likely the food would soon be heading to the table. Below is how many spoons it took to adjust the seasonings in the quinoa tabouli I made the other night.

small tasting spoons in sink

The cup of teeny tiny spoons in my kitchen is also a strange little three dimensional map of our lives. Baby food spoons from Isabelle and Russell’s first forays into solid food, porcelain spoons from a visit to China town in NYC, small espresso spoons from when my friend Eva introduced me to espresso with a twist of lemon peel and two cubes of sugar, bright plastic spoons from a photo shoot. It’s a cup full of history even though I’m probably the only one who remembers most of it.

boys with small spoonsThe other thing teeny tiny spoons are good for is eating little bowls of yummy. Like the last vestiges of peach cobbler which our friend’s sons Mateo and Lucas are doing above. Little spoons make little bits of food last just a little bit longer.

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