This is why I cook: Culinary Nirvana

Once in a blue moon, everything just falls into place. You have all the ingredients you need idling in the fridge, waiting to be put to good use, you have time to cook them, nothing explodes, burns or befalls any other ill fate in the cooking process, and suddenly, just like that, you have a meal on the table that would you suspect might garner a nod of approval from even the culinary god Nigel Slater himself.

Tonight was one of those nights.




Somehow, with minimal fuss, at precisely 6:30 pm (civilized, I know!), we had put a BBQ approximation of Tandoori chicken, curried cauliflower, spicy cabbage, homemade raita, and McAuslan Apricot beer on the table, for elegant sunday night Indian dinner.

Well, to be honest, we planned the chicken (we had to, since it had to marinate over night), but everything else was leftovers that were in the fridge, in need of some TLC. The cauliflower was sauteed in a blend of indian spices and oil, then steamed. It was based loosely on Food and Wine's Cauliflower, potato and pea curry (sans potatoes and peas). The cabbage, was done a la Chachi's Kitchen, and the raita was a total afterthought: mint, cilantro, yougurt cumin, pop 'em in the blender and voila.

So there you have it, amidst a sea of marmalade-muddles, laughable loafs, and other culinary escapades, a damn fine dinner. Who knew?

Tandoori-ish Chicken:

4-5lbs chicken thighs and drumsticks, bones in, skin off

Marinade:

1 1/2 c yogurt
1/4 c lemon juice
2 tbsp chili powder
2 tbsp paprika
2 tbsp olive oil
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cayenne powder
1-2 cloves garlic finely chopped
1 tbsp ginger finely chopped or grated
1/4 tsp cardamom
1/4 tsp cinnamon

Mix all marinade ingredients together and coat chicken thoroughly (you can either use a large resealable ziplock bag, or a pyrex baking dish). Refrigerate overnight. Non-stickify and preheat a grill, drain the chicken, and plop it on the grill (it will make a mess, but its worth it). Grill covered, over direct medium-hot heat for 15 minutes, turn, and grill for another 10-15 min (until juices run clear). Serve with raita.

Raita

1/4 c cilantro, rinsed and chopped, tough stems removed
2 tbsp mint leaves chopped
1 tsp cumin
Salt and pepper
3/4 c yogurt

Pop the whole lot in the whizzer, whiz, chill and serve.

Curried Cauliflower

1/2 a large head of cauliflower
1 tablespoon ground coriander
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1/4 teaspoon dried red-pepper flakes
A couple cloves,
1 cinnamon stick

1/4 c oil

Heat the oil in a large frying pan, add the spices and cook until fragrant. Add the cauliflower and stir to coat with spice mixture. Cook for about 5 minutes, then add 1/4 c water, cover pan, and steam for another 15 min or so, until most water is absorbed and cauliflower is soft. Remove lid and boil off remaining water.

Spicy Cabbage

(Recipe taken from Chachi's Kitchen)

1/2 a large cabbage; finely shredded
1 12oz can of diced tomatoes (with their juice)
2 cloves garlic - minced
1 inch ginger - grated
2 serrano chilies - minced
1 tbsp vegetable oil
1 tbsp black mustard seeds
1/2 tsp tumeric
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp cumin
salt to taste

Heat oil in a pan, add the mustard seeds, as soon as they start to splutter, add the tomatoes, garlic, ginger and the minced chillis, stir and fry for a few minutes. Add the cumin, coriander and tumeric, fry for a few minutes. Add the shredded cabbage, stir well, so that it is coated with the mixture. Add salt and cook for 15 minutes or until the cabbage is cooked.

And of course, no Indian meal is complete without chai:

Masala Chai

1/2 c milk
2 whole cloves
3 green cardamom pods (cracked open)
1/2 inch peeled ginger, sliced thin
4 -5 2 inch pieces lemon grass
2 tsp Indian black tea leaves (I usually put this in a tea-ball)
2 tsp sugar (or to taste)

Bring 1 1/2 c water, milk, cloves, cardamom, ginger and lemon grass to a boil in a saucepan ovr med. high heat. Add tea and sugar, reduce heat, and simmer for 2 min. Remove from heat, cover, and let steep 3-4 minutes longer. Strain into 2 teacups.

Q: What beats homemade marmalade?

A: Homemade marmalade on homemade bread.

Its not impossible to find good bread here, but when it comes to bread, I've been totally spoiled (mostly by Le Fromentier). Le Fromentier tops my list for two reasons. First they have the technical aspects of bread-baking nailed (things like crumb, texture, moisture etc). I have never bought a loaf there crumbled when I cut it, or was too dry, or had a hard, leathery crust, or suffered from any other unforgivable bread flaw, which is a good start. But what really puts them over the top is their creativity. Nuts, grains I had never heard of (or at least, didn't know the French translation of), vegetables, spices, cheese, olives, herbs...you name it, Le Fromentier has made a (flawless) loaf with it. If you don't believe me, check out this blog for a (somewhat complete) list.

Now, in Seattle, it is not impossible to find a decent baguette, rye, sourdough or even whole wheat loaf, you have to know where to look, but they're out there. Beyond the standard selection though, things are experimental at best. It was the insatiable desire for a good rustic grainy loaf on which to debut the marmalade experiment that drove me to bread-making.

Well, that and the desire to try out the infamous no knead breadmaking method. The idea behind the no-knead bread making method is just as it sounds: instead of kneading the dough, you assemble all the ingredients, stir until it forms a "shaggy ball" and leave the whole lot to rise for 12-24 hrs. Then, you punch it down, give it a quick fold (only once or twice), let it sit for 15 min, shape it into a ball, and let it rise for another 1.5-3 hrs. Finally, you pop the whole lot in the oven, in a pre-heated, approximation of a bread cloche. This could be a dutch oven, clay pot, etc. Any oven safe vessel which is approx. 5-7 qts in size and holds the heat well should work (the purpose of this is to shape the loaf, and give it a nice crust). I made one loaf in an enamel cast iron dutch oven, and one in a clay pot. The clay pot loaf was more successful, but I wasn't very scientific about the whole process.

You'd think I'd have learned after my marmalade escapades to keep things simple the first time round, and just made a simple, whole wheat loaf...no such luck. I dove in, head-first and decided to make Four Seed No Knead Bread. Probably not the optimal choice for a first loaf, and the fact that I bought the wrong yeast (active-dry instead of quick/instant rise...oops) probably didn't help. I ended up with a very flat (1.5" high), grainy, dense loaf...oh well. It tasted good, and if sliced sufficiently thinly, made an excellent venue for a good strong blue cheese.

But, flat grainy loaves do not lend themselves to toast, and even less so to marmalade. So, it was back to the cutting board. This time I did my homework. I learned that yeast labels (instant? quick? active?) are *almost* as poorly standardized as cream labels are (half-and-half? light? table? old-fashioned? numbers please people!). I watched the videos on Breadtopia. I read the threads on chowhound, and finally, with new yeast, a slightly smaller pot, and renewed energy, I tried again.

This time, I simplified things a bit, no four-seeds (maybe next time) just whole-wheat flour and bread flour:

Ingredients for basic yeasted No Knead Method (from Breadtopia.com):

3 cups bread flour (the above video used 1 cup (5 oz.) whole wheat flour and 2 cups (10 1/2 oz.) white bread flour
1/4 tsp. instant yeast
1 1/2 tsp. salt
1 1/2 cups purified or spring water

* Mix together the dry ingredients.
* Mix in water until the water is incorporated.
* Cover with plastic and let sit 18 hours.
* Follow video instruction for folding.
* Cover loosely with plastic and rest for 15 minutes.
* Transfer to well floured towel or proofing basket. Cover with towel and let rise about 1 1/2 hours.
* Bake in covered La Cloche or Dutch oven preheated to 500 degrees for 30 minutes.
* Remove cover; reduce heat to 450 degrees and bake an additional 15 minutes.
* Let cool completely on rack.
* Consume bread, be happy.

The result was most definitely marmalade-worthy.



The marmalade, sadly, was delicious, but a tad loose (I'm hoping it will improve with time), and if not, well, at least now I know how to make a killer loaf of bread. Maybe next time I'll get more creative and add a some more interesting grains.

Marmalade-Making in Gruesome Detail

"It wasn't, on reflection, the wisest of days to make marmalade. I had pruned the roses, the temperature was a degree or two below freezing, and the skin around my thumbnail had cracked open in the cold. It seemed as if each drop of bitter orange juice, each squirt of lemon zest sent shots of stinging pain through my thumb. But the Seville orange season is over in the blink of an eye and sometimes you just have to shut up and get on with things."

-Nigel Slater

That was how it began: with Nigel's marmalade recipe. I love marmalade, and usually the stuff at the grocery store isn't punchy enough for me, so naturally, I decided to try to make my own.

Marmalade was probably not the wisest choice as a first time project for someone who had never canned, jarred or preserved a darn thing. I could have chosen something benign like grape jelly and saved myself the peeling, chopping and soaking--but, for some misguided masochistic reason, it had to be marmalade. As if that wasn't bad enough, I was taking my cues from two hard-core marmalade-ists (Nigel and my mother) who both firmly believe that real marmalade should be made with no added pectin. That is, if you do it right, the pectin from the oranges themselves should be enough to set the marmalade. Which means that you have to be quite diligent about buying the right oranges (Sevilles to be precise), or else things go horribly wrong. Anyways, at long last I found my sevilles (on the other side of town) and we went on a Saturday expedition to retrieve them. On the upside, we did find an excellent grocery store (two!) in the process.

The Peeling

Ideally, one wants to peel the oranges in such a way that minimal pith (the white stuff) is left on the rinds, and so that the rinds end up in rather lage chunks (to make chopping easier later on). Nige recommends a complicated algorithm involving a paring knife, my mother recommended a vegetable peeler. I opted for the latter. Perhaps the oranges were a little off, or perhaps my peeler just sucks, but peeling oranges with a vegetable peeler proved to be no easy task, and I peeled 3 knuckles in the process. At the end of it though, we were left with a pile of peels, and 12 oranges to juice.

The Juicing

This is pretty straight-forward really: just get 2 large bowls, and squeeze the oranges, pouring the juice into one bowl and chucking the spent piths into another--Don't throw these out! Afterwards, tie up the piths, seeds, pulp and any other orange bits that are not going into the marmalade with cheesecloth.

The Chopping

Sadly, it did not dawn on me until I was halfway through peeling the oranges that I might want to try to peel off large strips at a time, to ease the chopping process. As such, chopping was doubly tedious: gathering up tiny little shards of orange peel and chopping them into strips. A good knife is invaluable. Afterwards, I added the chopped orange peel to the juice (padded out with water to make 4L) and submerged the cheesecloth bundle in the liquid. The whole mess soaked overnight in the garage, to leech all the pectin out of the oranges.

The Boiling

How hard could it be, I thought, boil with the cheesecloth bundle until the strips of peel are soft and translucent, remove the bundle, add the sugar, then boil some more. Well, the first half went fine, the peel became translucent and soft, in went the sugar, and then I waited, and waited, and waited.

The Wrinkles

The general consensus, according to the all-knowing web is that marmalade will set when a small spoonful put on a plate in the fridge for 5 minutes forms wrinkles when you nudge it with your pinky finger. If that last sentence made utterly no sense, don't worry. It won't until you've actually seen it happen. Having not seen it happen, I assumed, after an hour plus of boiling that it *must* be at setting consistency, and I just wasn't doing the test correctly, or didn't know what to look for. Oops.

That evening, the marmalade was still very liquid. And I began to get worried. A short post-mortem with my mother the marmalade expert confirmed my suspiscions. Apparently, athough this is never mentioned once in the recipe, marmalade is supposed to be made with the lid *off* and the volume should reduce by about 1/2 in the process. I had just jarred 12 jars of lovely diluted marmalade syrup. FAIL.

The Recovery

I have never seen someone look so happy about having to work on President's Day as Dan did when he left the house Monday morning. Between the drama of the first failed batch, a midnight run for sugar, jars and more oranges, and the late night juicing and chopping, I think he'd had quite enough of the whole marmalade-making process. You see, I had decided at some point the night before that I would not only try to save first batch, but also make a back up batch, in case the first was beyond all help. It was about at this point that Dan fled to work, leaving me surrounded by marmalade in various states of disrepair.

I dumped all the jars from the first marmalade batch back into the pot, resterilized the jars, and amazingly, after 15 minutes of boiling, I plopped some marmalade into the fridge on a plate, pulled it out shortly thereafter, and lo and behold it wrinkled! In fact, in the 5 minutes it took to set in the fridge, the whole darn pot of marmalade had become suspiciously dark and viscous. What began as 10 jars of marmalade syrup was now 5 jars of ridiculously dark marmalade. I have not yet gotten up the nerve to try it. It may quite potent.

The failed batch of marmalade was saved, but there was still a large pot of orange rind, juice and pith sitting in the garage (the batch I'd started when I thought the first one was destroyed). So began the boiling (again). However, knowing what to look for made the whole process much less scary, and this batch took a fraction of the time of the previous one, and ended up a slightly less disturbing color. I have not got round to trying this one either, but I'm definitely more optimistic about it.

Marmalade Making Take-Aways

• I like Nige's recipe, but it's a bit vague at times. Really, some of us are quite clueless and need to have our hands held. Things that may be obvious to some (like "Boil the marmalade with the lid OFF" may not be to others).
• Good oranges really do make a difference. I think next time I will try to seek out organic Sevilles, in hopes of getting a sunnier marmalade.
  
• The bigger the chunks of peel you can get, the easier the chopping will be.
• Do not let the back of the Mason jar box scare you. You do not need a jar grabber or a wire frame or whatever else they claim is needed to sterilize jars. All you really need is a large pot and a decent set of tongs.
• Be warned, the floor will be very sticky when you finish.
  

All Things Orange

It has been a *very* productive weekend in terms of culinary endeavours: first there was the marmalade mishap and the marmalade recovery (I don't have the energy to write about this tonight--but rest assured, its coming), then there was the marmalade cake (because I had to make *something* for valentine's day) and last but not least, there was the dutch oven.

I suppose I should elaborate. The marmalade was something I'd been wanting to do for a long time, and a 3-day weekend seemed like a good chance to do it. Despite a rocky start we ended up with 6 lovely jars of normal marmalade, and 6 jars of looks-a-bit-like-molasses marmalade. I suppose batch #2 will be useful for cooking at least.

The marmalade cake is an old favorite. It got made because I had been leafing through Michael Pollan's new book Food Rules, and feeling guilty about buying premade muffins, so I decided some baking was in order. Now the issue with the marmalade cake recipe is that it lives here, in Nigel Slater's The Kitchen Diaries. This is a dangerous book. Everytime I open it I want to cook every recipe in it. I don't think I'd ever have the perserverence to make it through Julia Child's Mastering The Art of French Cooking in one year, but Nige's cooking is much more low-key, and given an adequate budget for organic meat, excellent cheese, and so forth, I would happily cook my way through his book.

But, as it was, I was already up to my eyeballs in marmalade fixin's so keeping things minimal seemed like a wise call. I made Nige's Marmalade Cake (picture below) as an tasty valentine's day breakfast. It was the perfect thing to spice up a dreary Feb. morning.

Ingredients:

175 Butter, softened
175g Golden Caster Sugar (If like me, you live across the pond and the stores don't carry Golden Caster Sugar, white, light brown, or cane sugar (also light brown in color) all work)
Zest of 1 orange
3 Large eggs, beaten
75g Marmalade
175g All-purpose Flour
Juice half an orange

Icing:
100g Icing sugar, sifted
2 TBSP Orange Juice

Method:

Step 1: Preheat oven to 355F (180c) and line a loaf tin with parchement paper
Step 2: In a mixer (or by hand) cream together the butter and sugar, add in the zest, eggs and marmalade and beat.
Step 3: Fold in flour and orange juice and pour into prepared tin
Step 4: Bake for 40 minutes then turn out onto cooling rack
Step 5: To make icing mix together icing sugar and orange juice then spoon over cooled cake.

This time round, I skipped the icing, because I had no icing sugar. The cake didn't suffer.

So that brings us to the last item of orange: The new cast iron, enamel, 22lb, real deal dutch oven. I have been on the lookout for one of these for quite some time. In addition to stews, braised meats, briskets, etc. I've seen them used to make kneadless-bread, clay-pot like Asian foods and all sorts of other things. BUT to get a new one--a good one, not a cheap costo/target knockoff, you're looking at upwards of $200. Yikes. So when I found someone selling them for $45 on craigslist, I called immediately. While not La Creuset, the one I ended up buying did come from a restaurant supplier and so was industrial quality, which is all that really matters, in the end. So stay tuned for Kneadless bread in a casserole dish (learned from a friend at McGill who made absolutely stellar, bakery quality bread this way), and at least one meat stew before the dreary weather is out -- oh and also the play by play of the marmalade-mayhem, coming soon, I promise.

Two Creative Ways to Cook Chicken Thighs

Chicken thighs are underrated. Or rather, chicken breasts are overrated. In truth, since I discovered the difference in the juiciness and taste, I have only bought chicken breasts for grilling purposes (actually, chicken thighs grill up quite nicely too, but they're smaller, so you have to be a bit more diligent about flipping them). When it comes to stovetop cooking though, chicken thighs (bone in or out) are the perfect size. Big enough that they don't disappear, but small enough that they cook quickly, and don't dry out.

Without further ado then, here are some fun ways to do chicken thighs:

Chicken Dijonnaise

Courtesy of LCBO's (Food and Drink).

I have done this with bone-in and boneless chicken thighs; both work, but I think the bone-in ones somehow give the dish more of a *French bistro* vibe. Also, they hold their shape and moisture better. To remove the skin from chicken thighs, grasp one corner with a piece of paper towel and give it a good tug.

Ingredients

1. 2 tbsp (25 mL) butter
2. 1 tbsp (15 mL) olive oil
3. 8 plump skinless bone-in chicken thighs, about 2 lb (1 kg)
4. ½ tsp (2 mL) salt
5. 1 cup (250 mL) sliced shallots (about 6)
6. ¼ cup (50 mL) good-quality smooth Dijon mustard
7. ½ tsp (2 mL) black pepper
8. 1 cup (250 mL) white wine (or vermouth)
9. ½ cup (125 mL) whipping cream
10. Thyme sprigs

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375ºF (190ºC).

2. Melt butter with oil in a large flameproof casserole or ovenproof skillet over medium-high heat. Sprinkle chicken thighs with salt. Cook in batches 5 to 7 minutes, until golden brown on all sides. Remove chicken thighs from casserole as each batch cooks, and set aside on a plate.

NB: This is probably the hardest step. The butter and chicken fat tend to spit a bit, and browning any sort of meat is a skill which I have only recently learned. There are 2 tricks: first, don't crowd the chicken--I usually do no more than 3-4 thighs per batch. Second, leave them for a good 3 minutes (at least) before flipping them, this way, the meat seals, and doesn't stick to the pot when you go to turn it, so you get a nice golden-brown layer on the meat, rather than the pot.

3. Reduce heat to medium, add shallots to fat remaining in casserole. Cook, stirring, 3 to 5 minutes until softened. Return chicken thighs to casserole, meaty side up, along with any juices that have accumulated on plate. Cover casserole and transfer to the oven.

4. Cook 25 minutes, until chicken is cooked through. Remove chicken thighs from casserole. Arrange meaty sides up on a baking sheet. Spread 2 tbsp (25 mL) mustard evenly over thighs (this seems like a lot of mustard, but it works). Sprinkle with pepper. Return chicken thighs to turned-off oven to keep warm.

5. Add the wine to the casserole. Bring to a boil over high heat, stirring to scrape up any brown bits from bottom of casserole. Boil over high heat 3 to 5 minutes, until liquid has reduced slightly. Whisk in cream and remaining mustard. Boil, stirring, 2 to 3 minutes, until sauce has thickened slightly. Taste and add salt and pepper if necessary.

6. Arrange chicken thighs on a warm shallow serving dish and pour sauce over and around chicken. Garnish with thyme and serve at once.

This goes really well with risotto, or Brussels sprouts saute.

Clay Pot Ginger Chicken

(Courtesy of Food and Wine).

I was actually really impressed with this dish. Maybe it was the ginger (I'm a total sucker for ginger) or maybe it was because we got the rice bang on, or maybe it was just the authenticity of eating it out of little white bowls with chopsticks. But I thought it was authentic-Chinese-restaurant quality good. The sugar-syrup might be the secret ingredient too.

No clay pot required. A good quality medium-to-large dutch oven will work just fine.

Ingredients

1. 2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons sugar
   
2. 1/3 cup plus 1/4 cup hot water
3. 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
4. 2 Thai red chiles, chopped, or 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper (I think we put in both)
   
5. 1 garlic clove, minced
6. One 4-inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and cut into slivers
7. 1 pound skinless, boneless chicken thighs, cut into 3-by-1-inch pieces
8. 1 1/2 tablespoons Asian fish sauce
9. 1/4 teaspoon salt
10. 1 small onion, cut into thin wedges
11. 2 scallions, cut into 2-inch lengths
12. 6 cilantro sprigs, cut into 1-inch lengths

Directions

1. In a small heavy saucepan, cook 2 tablespoons of the sugar over moderate heat until bubbling and beginning to brown around the edges, 4 minutes. Gradually stir in 1/3 cup of the hot water and simmer for 3 minutes to dissolve the caramel. Remove from the heat.

2. Heat the oil in a medium Chinese clay pot or in a casserole. Add the chiles, garlic and half of the ginger and stir-fry over moderate heat until fragrant, about 20 seconds. Add the chicken, fish sauce, salt and the remaining 2 teaspoons of sugar and stir until the chicken turns white, 3 to 4 minutes. Add the onion wedges, the remaining 1/4 cup of hot water and the caramel sauce and bring to a boil. Cover, reduce the heat to low and simmer until the chicken is cooked through and the sauce is slightly thickened, about 8 minutes. Add the scallions and cook for 3 minutes longer. Stir in the remaining ginger and remove the pot from the heat. Garnish with the cilantro and serve.