Leek and Ginger Matzo Balls in Lemongrass Consommé

"I feel that I have done everything, absolutely everything wrong, but perhaps something nice will happen anyway." —Jane Bowles


Thank you, Ms. Bowles, author of the lesser known classic Two Serious Ladies for summing up my approach to cooking so succinctly. And thank you to my former professor for sharing the quote in the first place. As you can all see, it's a real gem.

This week, the something nice that I was hoping would happen was some Passover-appropriate matzo ball soup. This version from this month's Bon Appetit with the lemongrass broth looked especially appropriate since Los Angeles has been experiencing some springtime weather that might be described as summerish.

Bon Appetit's version:

Photograph by Patricia Heal

Bon Appetempt's version:

(Matt usually does the final photo and is supremely embarrassed by this one. So the balls are out of the broth? Sheesh. At least I got the chives in the spoon.)


Hey now, so whaddya say we get started by buying more chicken than you've ever even thought to buy in your entire life? Two whole, four pound, broken-down chickens went into this broth. And just when I thought I was getting to the point where I had a pretty sweet collection of pots and pans, this recipe comes in and proves that I am still apparently lacking. Our biggest pot didn't come close to holding all the veggies, chicken and 18 cups of water called for. But since we were going to boil the broth down to 8 cups anyway, I thought it would still be OK. (See above quote.)

Also, multiple grocery-store trips still left me without lemongrass. We added cilantro thinking that it, combined with the ginger and lemon, would still give us a nice refreshing if not lemongrass-like taste to the broth. (Again, see above quote.)

Enter schmaltz and our homemade schmaltz rink. Buying all that chicken, cooking it, and pulling off all the meat from the bones (to save for other purposes as this recipe doesn't call for it) to make the homemade broth is, yes, a bit labor intensive, however, how else are you going to ensure quality chicken fat? Alsoo, for some reason, it just seems wrong to purchase chicken fat, doesn't it?

Clearly, the little lemur was a bit freaked by the tiny horse who also showed up on the rink to do some schmaltz-skating.

I assumed that after the broth-making, the rest of the soup would come together in no time. Because of this assumption, Matt and I ate dinner around 10:30pm tonight. I didn't read the recipe all the way through, which clearly states that the raw matzos need to chill in the fridge for at least four hours. Why? I don't know. And then, they need to simmer in hot water for another hour and ten minutes. So, word to the wise, make your matzo ball mix in the morning.

Pulling off the lid of the pan of those simmering, fluffy, plumped-up matzo balls an hour and ten minutes later is well worth the wait. The apartment smelled ultra cozy. And the soup was great--very much like the classic matzo ball soup with a little bit more tang from the subtle hints of lemon juice and ginger. I'm really curious about how it would've tasted if only I could have procured the lemongrass. But I guess there's always next time?

Looks like some of that chicken made its way back into the recipe anyway... Happy Passover!! Next year in Israel!

Bloody Mary Test Kitchen

This week has been what I like to call Bon Appetempt-lite. As ambitious as I want to be, I sometimes have to hold back and make a couple of Blood Marys, even when what I really want to do is make homemade kombucha. (This will still happen. It just has to wait until after Easter/Passover-related attempts have come and gone—the latest Martha Stewart Living is staring at me, goading me on, as I type.)

Bon Appetit's version:

Photograph by Mitchell Feinberg

our version:

Why don't those glasses have shadows, you may be wondering. Well, we actually took this picture in space so there wouldn't be any shadows. OK?

So let's embark on a Bloody Mary journey, shall we? Up first is Bon Appetit's curry-spiced version.

Bon Appetit's take on the Bloody Mary steers away from spicy heat-wise, which is usually how I like my Bloody Marys, in favor of curry spice. The rest of the ingredients are pretty standard. And while it made for a beautiful beverage, I ultimately wanted something spicier.

So we made a Bloody Mary. BFD, right? Well, we haven't gone totally lame on you guys. Remember when I said that Matt went wild at Surfas the other week when we bought that springform pan and cheese-making stuff? Well, we also bought these kind of crazy-expensive pickles, which funnily enough are featured in the Martha Stewart Living that keeps staring at me as I type this. (Martha, you must chill.)

But, how does this relate to this Bloody Mary post? Well, when you spend twelve dollars on pickles, you kind of need them to be more than just pickles, and lo and behold, these were. See, we accidentally got the spicy variety of McClure's pickles and after checking out their website, we discovered that the leftover brine can be used as a Bloody Mary mix. Simply fill the pickleless jar of the vinegary, pepper-laden brine with tomato juice, shake and enjoy.

I have to say, as tasty as the curry-spiced Mary was, the McClure one was one of the best I've ever had. You have to like a spicy Bloody Mary though. I mean, this drink is spiiicy, like I sort of felt like my stomach was going to die, but in a good way.

Curry-Spiced Bloody Mary via Bon Appetit:
(makes 8)

10 cups tomato juice (preferably organic)
1 2/3 cups vodka
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup fresh lime juice
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons Madras curry powder
2 teaspoons (or more) fine sea salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Crushed ice
Celery sticks (for garnish)

Preparation
Combine first 6 ingredients in large pitcher. Whisk in 2 teaspoons sea salt and pepper. Season with more salt, if desired. Cover; chill. DO AHEAD Can be made 8 hours ahead. Keep chilled. Whisk before serving.

Fill tall glasses with ice. Pour in Bloody Mary mixture. Garnish with celery sticks.

chocolate-fromage blanc brownies

Say you come into a lot of fromage blanc and you've already given away and eaten as much of it as you can. In my opinion, there's only one thing left to do (apart from making your own cheese house): make fromage blanc brownies.

Sunset's version:

our version:

(Bon-Appetempt bonus points* to the first commenter to find and name the dog in the above photo.)

These brownies were fairly simple and straightforward. The only adjustment I would make is to add MORE fromage blanc. Seriously though, the recipe called for 6 ounces, but that only gives you a thin ribbon of cheese-cakey goodness running through the brownie. Next time, I'd really go for it.

All said, these were really good. Justin Bieber good.

Apologies for the mini attempt. But this week will include an additional mini attempt!

*Bon-Appetempt Bonus points not redeemable for cash and to be honest, not really worth anything.

RECIPE via Sunset Magazine:
Ingredients
1/2 cup (1/4 lb.) butter, cut into chunks
6 ounces unsweetened chocolate, finely chopped
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
2 1/4 cups sugar
5 large eggs
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
8 ounces fromage blanc (see notes)

Preparation
1. In a 2- to 3-quart pan over low heat, stir butter and chocolate until melted and blended. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla and 2 cups sugar. Transfer to a bowl. Add 4 eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Stir in flour and baking powder just until blended.

2. In another bowl, mix fromage blanc and remaining sugar and egg until well blended.

3. Spread half the chocolate mixture level in a buttered and floured 9-inch square baking pan. Pour cheese mixture evenly over chocolate. Drop 1/4-cup portions of remaining chocolate mixture on top, partially, but not completely, covering cheese mixture.

4. Bake brownies in a 325° regular or convection oven until a wooden skewer inserted in the center comes out with moist crumbs attached, 45 to 50 minutes. Let cool in pan on a rack for at least 20 minutes, then cut into 9 squares.

making cheese is whey cool

It's kind of weird to think about all the basic foods I've eaten my whole life but never made myself. Take for example: cheese. I've been thinking about this kind of thing post-soda-bread attempt and as I've been reading the culinary classic M.F.K. Fisher's How to Cook a Wolf, both of which remind me of my grandma, who has seemingly cooked, baked, fried and boiled all things consumable. So, when I happened upon the article Making Cheese: It’s as easy as 1-2-3 by Elaine Johnson and Margo True in the latest issue of Sunset Magazine, I was more than ready for the challenge.

Sunset/Cowgirl Creamery's version:

Our version:

Like most home chefs, we’re unaccustomed to intentionally leaving multiple dairy products out overnight, but the cheese-making process is all about it, and by it, I mean creating a welcoming and comforting home for bacteria. The trick is letting the good bacteria in and keeping the bad stuff whey the eff out (did you see what I did there?).
                 

So first things first: boil all utensils for twenty minutes.

Next, you ripen the milk by bringing it up to a not so hot 85 degrees.

Some things you’ll need that you probably don't have on hand include the fromage blanc culture, calcium chloride (a compound used to remove moisture and help “firm up the curds”) and vegetarian rennet, used to coagulate the milk–you must, at all costs, coagulate that milk. Are you ready? Good. Let’s do this.

Next, you cover the pot with cheesecloth and move on to your second homemade dairy product process. See, to make fromage blanc the way Cowgirl Creamery does, you need to add creme fraiche, which we realized we could also make ourselves by simply mixing 1 cup of heavy whipping creme with 2 tablespoons of buttermilk... of course you let that mixture sit out overnight so it can begin to go bad/good.

Moving on to day two.

Curds and whey, as a couplet, had previously only been familiar to me in the form of something Miss Muffet snacked on before an insufferable spider sat down beside her, but look--it's real: the whey is what drips down through the cheesecloth and collects in a kind of yellow, cloudy, watery pool and what you can make ricotta cheese with according to the Sunset directions. We opted out of using the whey as one cheese felt like enough for our first fromage attempt, but what I found out a little too late was that you can use the whey to make bread--just use it in place of water in any simple bread recipe. Cool, right? (Also, apologies to Grandma for tossing out whey, but then again, let's be honest, none of my family members are reading this blog. And I am perfectly OK with that.)

Now, you watch in awe as your mixture slowly begins to turn into fromage blanc.

And after eight hours, you stir in the homemade creme fraiche, pack the fromage blanc into this Weck jar and share the delicious finished product with all of your friends.

I must say, this was an incredibly satisfying attempt. Hope you guys try it out, too!

Also, much thanks to Bon Appetit for featuring Bon Appetempt this week! 

Mrs. O'Callaghan's Soda Bread

Bon Appetit's piece, "A Slice of Ireland" really lured me in this month with its luxurious spread on the Irish countryside and the enticing food found there.

Bon Appetit/Mrs. O'Callaghan's version**:

**Updated: Just realized that this photograph is actually NOT Mrs. O'Callaghan's version, but brown bread from Avoca in Dublin. Oooops. Sorry. (This explains a lot.)

our version:

I loved the first picture of the thick, grainy soda bread, which spanned two pages and then the one of Mrs. O'Callaghan herself.

She totally reminds me of my grandma--also Irish, also doesn't read this blog.

(above two photos by Andrew Hetherington)

When it came down to us making soda bread, we tried to keep things similarly dreamy.

This bread was super simple--no yeast or rising-time necessary. But since we had whole wheat pastry flour on hand, we used that instead of regular whole wheat flour, and we think that made the difference when it came to the appearance of ours vs. Mrs. O'Callaghan's--O'Callaghan's appearing decidedly more rustic.

Oh and speaking of Mrs. O'Callaghan and in the spirit of old-school Bon Appetempt...

Ingredients
Nonstick vegetable oil spray
3 cups all purpose flour
3 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup (packed) brown sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) chilled margarine or butter, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
2 cups buttermilk

Preparation
Preheat oven to 425°F. Spray heavy baking sheet with nonstick spray. Whisk both flours, sugar, and baking soda in medium bowl to blend. Add margarine and cut in until margarine is reduced to pea-size pieces. Add buttermilk; stir until shaggy dough forms. Turn dough out onto lightly floured work surface. Knead until dough comes together, about 10 turns. Shape dough into 7-inch round. Place dough on prepared baking sheet. Cut large X, 1/2 inch deep, in top of dough.

Bake bread until deep brown and bottom sounds hollow when firmly tapped, about 40 minutes. Transfer bread to rack and cool completely.

Ina Garten's Raspberry Cheesecake

I've noticed that a lot of people are talking about why they cook. I first noticed this back in November when I read Adam Gopnik's piece in The New Yorker, What's the Recipe?. I wanted to mention it a while ago, but realized that I didn't really know how I felt about it. He seemed to come to a kind of cynical conclusion on what we get out of cookbooks: "We reanimate our passions by imagining the possibilities, and the act of wanting ends up mattering more than the fact of getting. It’s not the false hope that it will turn out right that makes us go on with our reading but our being resigned to the knowledge that it won’t ever, quite." Back in November was pre-my minor announcement (that I've kind of fallen in love with most things culinary) and I think I sort of liked that Gopnik was getting all grumpy about failed attempts at recipes: "Anyone who cooks knows that it is in following recipes that one first learns the anticlimax of the actual, the perpetual disappointment of the thing achieved."

But then, as we all now know, I've sort of turned a corner and started to embrace the misadventures, the complexity, and even the often called for gadgetry of certain recipes. Speaking of gadgetry, I went to Surfas this past week and got me a springform pan so now I can finally join in on all fun recipes I'd been missing out on. Like, say, Ina Garten's raspberry cheesecake for example.

Lady Ina's version:

our version:

Then, a few weeks ago, I was on Ruth Reichl's website and read an entry titled, On Cookbooks, which began, "Rereading Adam Gopnik's New Yorker piece on cookbooks made me mad all over again... Before asking why we read cookbooks, we need to question why we cook in the first place." (At this point, you may want to click over to the entry because I'm about to copy and paste a big chunk of it anyway.) Ruth goes on to describe quite beautifully why she cooks:

For me one of the great pleasures of cooking is that nothing ever turns out the same way twice. Each time you walk into the kitchen you are setting off on an adventure. What will it be like this time? Will it make people happy?

And that, to me at least, is the crucial question. Gopnik seems to cook for himself; for him it is an act of wanting. I cook for other people, and to me, cooking is an act of giving. When I leaf through cookbooks or magazines I am imagining all the people who will be sitting around my table, and I am looking for food that will make them happy.

In the end it is their pleasure that will take me back to the kitchen for the next experiment. I love the physical act of cooking - the feel of the knife as it slices through the apples, the scent of the onions as they caramelize in butter, the moment when the cake comes sashaying out of the oven. But more than that, I love to watch as everybody takes the first bite, and then, hurriedly, another. And another.

Blame it on my slight obsession with Ms. Reichl, but I like her thought process and conclusion best.

Things came full circle when I happened upon Michael Ruhlman's blog entry on why he cooks, which was finally straightforward enough to get me thinking about why I cook instead of thinking about how much I like reading the aforementioned pieces. (Rulhman actually out and out asks bloggers to write about why they cook.)

So, apart from my love of taking aerial food shots, why do I cook?

Well, first and foremost, I cook because I love to eat. That one is easy. And I wish I could copy Ruth and say that the second reason was to make people happy, but that's not really a main objective for me. I mean, I'm just not confident enough of a cook to derive too much pleasure from cooking for people that aren't Matt. With that said, I would have to say the other main reason I cook is for the sense of accomplishment, the pleasure in the finished product, which of course increases with the difficulty level of the recipe. This is kinda obvious/how this blog got started in the first place, no?

And while I'm talking about why I cook, I should mention that Matt made this cheesecake. And it was insane--the creamiest cheesecake I've ever had I think. And Ina is right, it doesn't crack on the top so that you can serve it plain, though, as Ina would say and in fact does say in the book version of the recipe: "The fresh raspberries are so delicious on top, though, why would you want to?" (For some more fun with Ina-esque catchphrases, click here. And much thanks to Heather for leading me to these great works of video montage.)

RECIPE:
For the crust:
1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs (10 crackers)
1 tablespoon sugar
6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) unsalted butter, melted

For the filling:
2 1/2 pounds cream cheese, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups sugar
5 whole extra-large eggs, at room temperature
2 extra-large egg yolks, at room temperature
1/4 cup sour cream
1 tablespoon grated lemon zest (2 lemons)
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

For the topping:
1 cup red jelly (not jam), such as currant, raspberry, or strawberry
3 half-pints fresh raspberries

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

To make the crust, combine the graham crackers, sugar, and melted butter until moistened. Pour into a 9-inch springform pan. With your hands, press the crumbs into the bottom of the pan and about 1-inch up the sides. Bake for 8 minutes. Cool to room temperature.

Raise the oven temperature to 450 degrees F.

To make the filling, cream the cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Reduce the speed of the mixer to medium and add the eggs and egg yolks, 2 at a time, mixing well. Scrape down the bowl and beater, as necessary. With the mixer on low, add the sour cream, lemon zest, and vanilla. Mix thoroughly and pour into the cooled crust.

Bake for 15 minutes. Turn the oven temperature down to 225 degrees F and bake for another 1 hour and 15 minutes. Turn the oven off and open the door wide. The cake will not be completely set in the center. Allow the cake to sit in the oven with the door open for 30 minutes. Take the cake out of the oven and allow it to sit at room temperature for another 2 to 3 hours, until completely cooled. Wrap and refrigerate overnight.

Remove the cake from the springform pan by carefully running a hot knife around the outside of the cake. Leave the cake on the bottom of the springform pan for serving.

To make the topping, melt the jelly in a small pan over low heat. In a bowl, toss the raspberries and the warm jelly gently until well mixed. Arrange the berries on top of the cake. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Note: Measure your springform pan. The bottom of mine measures 9 inches, but it says 9 1/2. I put the springform pan on a sheet pan before putting it in the oven to catch any leaks.