Cashew Spread

Happy Memorial Day for those of you in the USA.  I am going to celebrate the day with a cookout at the beach with friends.  What could be better than that?

I was planning to make coleslaw as my contribution to the meal but someone beat me to the punch so I will be bringing dessert and gazpacho.  Which is fine (really, it is fine).  Except that I wanted to make my new version of coleslaw that has me very excited.

One of the issues I have always had with coleslaw is that you have all of those healthy good-for-you vegetables like cabbage and carrots and onion, and then you drown them in mayonnaise and sugar.  (Yes, I know there are other versions but this is the one I grew up with and the one I like, ok?)  As I have moved away from processed foods and added sugars that has been problematic for me.  I would make it and I would eat it, but I never really considered it a healthy vegetable dish and thought of it as more of a treat.

The last few times that I made it I used homemade mayonnaise thinned with buttermilk and I added a handful of raisins instead of using sugar.  I felt better about eating that, but I still did not feel that it was as healthy as it should be.

And then I was listening to a series of interviews about food issues and someone mentioned cashew milk.  And someone else mentioned the benefits of eating raw cabbage.  [cue Melanie Griffith in Working Girl] and then I started thinking raw cabbage - cashew milk - raw cabbage - cashew milk and it just kind of came to me that I could maybe use a thicker cashew milk instead of mayonnaise in my coleslaw.

So I went online to see if it had been done before (of course it had) and I found lots of recipes for something called cashew mayonnaise that included all kinds of interesting ingredients.  As usual I took what I liked from them and left out what did not seem a good fit to me and I made my first batch.  Which was ok, but I had used cider apple vinegar and that overpowered everything far more than it does when I use it for my homemade mayonnaise.  The second time I used lemon juice and I liked that much better.

And as I thought, it makes a killer coleslaw that not only tastes great but is much more healthy than the mayonnaise version.  And it is perfect for picnics and cookouts because you don't have to worry about it sitting out in the sun all day the way you would with the mayonnaise version.  Win-win!

You will find that all of the versions of this recipe posted all over the internet call it "Cashew Mayonnaise."  I refuse to call it that because the two have virtually nothing in common.  Mayonnaise is the emulsion of egg yolks and oil.  Cashew spread is basically pulverized cashews.  Others may want to call it mayonnaise and that is certainly their right, but I just cannot bring myself to do it.

This is not a substitute for mayonnaise.  But it is delicious and versatile in its own right and I will be making it often.  If you give it a try I suspect that you will be making it often, too.

Home Cookin Chapter: Spices Spreads Dips Sauces
CASHEW SPREAD 1 cup organic cashews, soaked for 2 to 4 hours
1/4 cup avocado oil
1 Tbsp lemon juice
1/2 tsp ground mustard
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup water, plus more as needed

Drain the cashews and put them into a blender. Add the rest of the ingredients and blend together until smooth.

adapted from recipe found at http://rockingrawchef.com/cashew-mayonnaise/

exported from Home Cookin v.8.67 (www.mountain-software.com)

Whole Wheat Pasta with Peanut Sauce and Bok Choy

There's nothing new about this dish. I've been making peanut sauce for years now, bok choy has been a regular in my kitchen, and I've been making my own pasta since I took my first Master Class at FENI 2010.

What makes this so exciting to me is that it was my first attempt to make whole wheat pasta (as opposed to the white whole wheat pasta which, while better than all-purpose flour, is still not quite as healthy as regular red whole wheat). I used whole wheat pastry flour, which has a different texture from the white whole wheat so I wasn't sure that it would work. But I am showing some friends how to make pasta next week and one of them prefers whole wheat so it was a good opportunity to test it.

I followed my usual recipe of 1-1/2 cups flour, 2 eggs and 1/4 of a teaspoon salt. I started with 2 cups, made a well, cracked the eggs into it and added the salt. I beat the eggs and salt together, slowly incorporating the flour until it made enough of a dough to put down the fork and start working with my hands. It came together nicely, although it was a little more stiff and required more elbow grease to bring the dough together and to knead it. It had less spring than the all-purpose version, enough that I was a little worried that it would not hold together during the rolling, but it turned out to be easier to roll out than the all-purpose dough.

The next test was to cook the pasta. I had the thought that the noodles might dissolve in the hot water, but they held together perfectly. I cooked them for about 4 minutes, which was enough to cook them through without turning them to mush.

It had the same taste and texture of dried whole wheat pasta compared to regular. While more dense than regular, there was less tooth to it, but the deliciously nutty taste more than made up for that.

I only cooked half of the pasta the night that I made it. I wanted to make sure it would hold up in the refrigerator for a few days before cooking so I held off and cooked the second half two days later. The result is what you see here. The result was just as fresh and delicious as the first batch had been.

The entire dish came together quickly. I made the peanut sauce while bringing a large pot of water to a boil. I salted the boiling water and added the chopped bok choy stems and cooked them for 2 minutes. (I put the chopped leafy green part at the bottom of a large bowl without cooking it at all - thinking it would wilt enough with the heat from the cooked stems and the pasta.) I removed them from the water and put them on top of the stems, then I added the pasta to the water and cooked it for 4 minutes. I added that to the bowl, then the peanut sauce, and stirred it all together. I served it garnished with fresh cilantro and peanuts.

While there is nothing like the taste and texture of freshly made pasta, regular or whole what, this dish would work just as well with dried.

DIY Trail Mix

I love my granola, but even though it is much healthier than pre-packaged granolas it does have quite a bit of sugar in it. Which unfortunately means that it is not the healthiest thing to be eating every day. In addition, while it is easy to make, it does take some time so I have to plan for it if I want to be sure I have it on hand for breakfast.

With that in mind, I decided to go back to eating regular oatmeal for breakfast, adding trail mix and dried fruit. In the past I would just buy a bulk trail mix, but since I had so many of the ingredients already on hand I thought it would be just as easy to make my own.

And it was. I preheated the oven to 350 degrees, put my mix of nuts on a rimmed baking sheet, and baked them on a middle rack for about 25 minutes, checking every 10 minutes to make sure they weren't burning. I did almost burn one batch and they were not good. They were edible and too expensive to throw away, but I will never make that mistake again. I set the timer and I check.

What I love about making it myself is that I control the ratio of the kinds of nuts, and the fruit. I use the expensive nuts more sparingly and go wild with the less expensive. I also have all of the nuts available for other uses, which I would not be able to do if I were buying the pre-mixed packages.

I don't know if making it at home is less expensive than buying the pre-packaged version. That would depend on each batch, and what you ratio of more and less expensive nuts you used. But when the prices range from about $3/lb to $15/lb for the various sees and nuts, you know the pre-packagers are using mostly the cheaper ingredients and averaging higher on the pricing.

But the main reason I like making my own mix? It just tastes better.

HOW TO MAKE TRAIL MIX
Note: You can use any combination of nuts and seeds, in any amounts.
2 cups raw sunflower seeds
1 cup raw pumpkin seeds
1 cup raw almonds
1/2 cup raw pecans
1/2 cup raw walnuts
1/2 cup raw cashews
1/2 cup raw hazelnuts

Combine all ingredients in a rimmed baking dish. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until nuts are golden. Check and stir every ten minutes.

Let cool and mix with the raisins and cranberries. Store in an airtight container for a few weeks.
Preheat oven to 350 deg. F.

How To Make Peanut Butter

The last time I was in Austin I was browsing the cooking section of the bookstore (yes, there are still bookstores out there and yes, I go to them) and my eyes were caught by a book called Make the Bread, Buy the Butter, by Jennifer Reese. I picked it up and thumbed through it. Now that I am making so many things myself, I was curious to see what she had to say about it, especially the idea that there are some things one should not try to make from scratch.

I already had my own, informal and relatively unformed, list of those things that are best bought, but that list is constantly changing as I learn how to make more and more of my own food. Five years ago I would never have thought I would be making my own mayonnaise; two years ago the idea of making my own mustard, ketchup, and Worcestershire sauce would have been unthinkable. And I have been making my own bread, granola and crackers (yes, crackers) for years now.

I thought it would be interesting to compare my experiential list to hers. And mostly, I agreed with what she said. There are certainly some things better left to the experts. Until I get a bigger kitchen, canning is not in my future, nor do I see myself making a home for cows, goats and chickens anytime soon. And while I do plan to experiment with cheese and yogurt, I doubt I will go past the basic simple paneer and ricotta, possibly mozzarella. But nothing that needs to be aged or kept in a dank, dark cave.

Jennifer Reese started her project when she lost her job and was mainly looking for economical ways to feed herself and her family. While I care about my money and how I am spending it, my primary motivating force is keeping the foods that I eat as chemical and preservative free as possible. On the way, I have discovered that I actually prefer the taste of homemade to store-bought, and I can often (though not always, I admit) taste and feel the difference between the two. That was not always the case. When I first started making my own condiments, for example, they tasted nothing like the mayonnaise, ketchup, and ballpark mustard that long were my standards. And salad dressings never tasted right. But after a period of not having the commercial brands around, my attempts tasted better and better, and now I do prefer the taste of what I make myself. Like everything else, it is a process.

Nothing comes out the same every time, but it is all good, and when it is really good, it can be transcendent. As with life, if you aren't willing to experience any of the lows, you won't be able to enjoy the highs.

I was pleased to discover that peanut butter fell into the "make it yourself" category in the book, as I have been making my own peanut butter for the past six months, and I was interested to see her recipe.

I don't remember all of the details of it, but I do remember that there were several ingredients, including oil. The first time I made my own peanut butter I added oil, but I soon realized that it was completely unnecessary. All you need to make peanut butter is peanuts. Maybe salt, if you want it to be a little salty.

But you should never need to add oil to peanut butter. It can look like you do, because when you first start grinding it up it makes a thick paste of the ground peanuts that doesn't look like it will ever break up. But if you are patient and let the food processor continue to do its work, the paste does break up and you end up with the smoothest, creamiest peanut butter, one that looks and tastes exactly like the natural brands that are on the grocery store shelf.

A lot of my friends (and family) don't buy natural peanut butter because it is so hard and messy to stir together the nuts and oil that have separated after sitting on the shelf for so long. One trick I learned from my brother to solve that problem is to store your jar upside down on the shelf, so that all of the oil is on the bottom when you turn it over and open it. But if you make your own, that will never be a problem because there is no separation when it is fresh, and if you put it right into the refrigerator, it stays together. And because everything is already well integrated, you don't get that impenetrable mass of peanut paste that you sometimes get when you didn't combine it evenly.

It took me a few tries to get it to the right consistency, so I thought it might be helpful to offer a step-by-step tutorial of the process, with photos to show how it should look throughout the process. All you need is a pan, the peanuts, and a food processor. Do note that this will not work in a blender. I have it on good authority that it will burn out the motor.

This might sound like a lot of work, but it doesn't take long at all, and the food processor does all of the work. The whole process takes less than an hour (slightly more if you roast the peanuts, but you can do that as early as a few days ahead).

The first thing you need to do is to get your peanuts. I buy roasted valencia organic peanuts in bulk at Whole Foods, but you can really use any roasted (not dry-roasted, though)peanuts. I like a dark roast, though, so I put them in a pan and roast them at 350 deg. F. for about 12 minutes, and then let them cool. Sometimes there is still some of the red peel on the nuts. I will go through them and remove as much as I can, but I do not get overstressed about it. A little won't hurt.

After the nuts have cooled, place them in the food processor bowl. I usually use a pound of nuts. That fits nicely into the food processor, and the finished product goes right into a leftover peanut butter jar from when I used to buy it.

If you have more than one setting on your food processor, put it to the highest setting and turn it on. Let it go for a few minutes, until your peanuts have been ground into teeny little pieces that look like this. While you can just let the processor go until you have peanut butter, it is a good idea to stop every once in a while and see how it looks, especially at the beginning, when you are still not sure how it supposed to look at each stage of the process.

At some point the peanuts will start to clump together as they are whizzing around the food processor bowl. Eventually, it will solidify into a solid mass on one side of the bowl that looks it will never budge and just might possibly burn out your motor. This is the point where most people believe it needs some oil to get it going. They would be mistaken. You can let it keep going and it will eventually work through the mass or, if you don't believe it will ever make it through, you can turn it off and let it pulse every few seconds. The stopping and starting of the motor will slowly move the lump around the bowl until it is evenly spaced around the bowl and moving smoothly again.

Eventually, it will look like this. You can still see the pieces of peanut, but you can also see that the oil has separated out and it is starting to get smooth. Let it run for another 2 or 3 minutes, but be careful. I have heard that it is possible to overwork it and end up with a liquid that cannot be saved, but I have not had that happen yet and I have let it run for up to 3 minutes.

And just when you think it will never happen, the last little pieces of peanut disappear and you are left with a bowl full of beautiful, smooth, creamy peanut butter, just like this. If you prefer crunchy, set aside half a cup or so (to your taste) of the peanuts and grind them to the desired size. Follow this process withe rest of the peanuts and then stir in the ground peanuts.

Organic Valencia Peanut Butter

I have crossed a line, dear reader. I'm not sure whether it is for the better or for the worse, but cross it I have. Actually, that is a lie. I'm pretty sure it is for the better, all things considered, but it does make me feel like I have taken one more step away from the mainstream.

It started when Arrowhead Mills stopped making their organic Valencia peanut butter, a situation which I lamented here. Since that fateful day, I have tried several different brands of organic peanut butter, trying to find a reasonable substitute. The ones that had the right consistency did not taste all that good. The ones that tasted good had a bad consistency. Nothing came close. I thought I would never be able to enjoy peanut butter again.

I did find a brand that was palatable, but not great. I have been using it, but my peanut butter consumption has gone down significantly because it just does not satisfy that basic peanut butter craving. It has been over a year since Arrowhead Mills changed their recipe, and I have not found a decent substitute for it.

Hence the inevitable. Earlier this week I was at Whole Foods to pick up some organic apples, pinto beans and cilantro. While I was in the bulk section getting the beans, I noticed a bin of organic roasted Valencia peanuts. Hmmmmm. How hard would it be to make my own peanut butter?

And as you can see above, it's not hard at all. I decided to try a small batch in the processor attachment that came with my stick blender. I just sorted through the nuts, making sure to get rid of any pieces of red skin that was still attached to any of them, placed them in the processor bowl, turned on the motor, and let it rip.

At first I didn't think it was going to work. It did chop the peanuts, very fine, but nowhere near a paste, let alone a butter. I had read that it might be necessary to add a little vegetable oil to make it creamy, so I did (less than a teaspoon in all), and all of a sudden I had peanut butter! What a surprise!

But, I think if I had been more patient I would not have had to add any oil. This is definitely a first attempt, and there will be some tweaking to get it to suit my taste, but it's not at all bad for a prototype. Next time I will let it process longer and see if I can get it creamy enough without the oil.

When I think I have a keeper, I will let you know.

I am excited about this. It isn't that much cheaper to make than to buy, but there is a certain satisfaction in making my own. And I'm starting to think about other possibilities as well: almonds, cashews, hazelnuts . . .

The list of processed foods that I buy is getting shorter every day.

Baking Class: Granola

I hope everyone had a Happy New Year. Mine was about as low key as any evening can get, let alone New Year's Eve. I was at my brother's house, as usual, where we all went our separate ways until around 11:30, when we all gathered in the back room to watch Dick Clark Ryan Seacrest welcome in the New Year. You know things are bad when the high point of your evening is catching the long-awaited reunion/teaming of Backstreet Boys New Kids on the Block. Is it just me, or do they need to rethink their names?

And it wasn't just the evening that was low key. My niece and I have gotten into the habit of setting our goals for the year during that evening so we can get started on them on the first. The closest we got this year was talking about talking about them. So we decided that for us, the new year would start the second week of January. And once we made that decision, it was so much easier to just relax and enjoy the rest of my visit, come home and take a breath, and then get started on the new year.

Which might explain the little vacation I took from Blogging. It was unintentional, but I just couldn't get my brain into blog mode, so I decided to wait until the second week of the new year for that, too. So here we go 2011 - I hope it's a better year for everyone than last year was.

I finally bit the bullet and made myself a batch of granola. Actually, I made several. It has taken me a month or so to get it right. The first batch was dark and toasty, the second batch was underdone, and the third batch almost burned to a cinder in my brother's oven in Austin over the Thanksgiving holidays. Then I re-read the recipe and discovered that I was setting the oven too high. After that, it came out golden and crunchy.

It was smooth sailing after that, and I have been enjoying granola on a regular basis ever since. I have been sharing it with all of my friends (it makes a lot), with great success. I'll have a few handsful for a quick snack and it's quite good sprinkled over yogurt.

But my favorite way to eat is something my sister taught me years ago. As I believe I have mentioned before, she was the first one in our family to discover whole wheat, brown rice, and the benefits of vegetarian eating. That was the first time I became a vegetarian. I think it lasted six whole months.

For breakfast, we would take some granola, grate an apple over it and pour in some milk. It was delicious. The sweeteners in the granola would melt into the milk just like the way sugar cereals would, and the apple added a bright, sweet flavor of its own that elevated the whole thing into a delicious, satisfying way to start the day. The only drawback was that it took so long to grate the apple that it was a bit of a challenge, and it was impossible for me to find a way to make it transportable. So it fell by the wayside along with that first bout of vegetarianism.

After I made the granola and didn't know what to do with it, however, my mind went back to that lovely breakfast and I wondered if there wasn't a way I could make it a little easier. Maybe if I chopped the apple instead of grating it?

I got out an apple, made thin slices, then chopped them up as fine as I could manage. I put it on top of the granola, poured milk over mixture, and took a taste. And was immediately transported back to when I first tried it. The chopped apple works as well as the grated, and I can take the apple to work with me and cut it there, so I can take it to work with me.

This recipe is adapted from Molly Wisenberg's (of Orangette and Bon Appetit fame) adaptation of Nigella Lawson's recipe. This recipe just screams adaptation - you can easily tailor it to your tastes. It can be expensive, so you can adjust the ingredients to help keep it more cost effective. Just keep the basic ratios in mind and you can substitute just about anything anywhere, as long as you have the same wet to dry balance. You can also add anything you want to the cooked mixture - dried fruits, coconut, chocolate chips, peanut butter chips, peanuts - the possibilities are literally endless.

A few notes. The first time I made it, I was too impatient and did not read the instructions clearly and I added the dried fruit before I baked it. Not the end of the world, if you like hard, crunchy, slightly burnt pellets of fruity rock. If not, be sure to add the dried fruit after it comes out of the oven.

When I made this at my brother's house, they didn't have two regular-sized baking sheets with lips, so I used their two oversized sheets. It didn't help that I had the oven too high, but even with it lower the granola was spread to thinly and cooked much faster than it should have, which is why it came out burned to within an inch of its life (it was edible, thank goodness, but just barely). The next time I made it I just one of the oversized pans. It took longer, but worked out much better.

Be sure to take it out and stir it up every ten minutes. Use the cooking time as a guideline; it will stay soft in the oven so you have to go by sight - when it is nice and golden then you know it is done. If you take it out too soon, though, and it is not as crunchy as you would like, simply put it back in the oven and bake it, checking every ten minutes, until it reaches your desired crunchiness.

This was successful beyond my wildest dreams. I fully expected to like it; I did not expect to like it so much that I have made it over six times in the past month or so. It keeps a long time, but it's never stayed around long enough for me to test how long. The recipe says to keep it in the refrigerator, but I haven't bothered and it hasn't been a problem yet. I did still have some here when I was getting ready to leave for Austin for ten days so I put that in the fridge, and it was fine when I got back.

It's a little labor intensive, because you have to check it every ten minutes, but only for about 40 minutes. That's actually a small amount of work for the payoff that you get. Because it has such a great shelf life you can throw some in a bag to take with you wherever you go so if hunger strikes you have a healthy choice on hand and don't have to struggle with the choice between potato chips or fritos.

Do yourself and your friends a favor. Get crunchy and make some granola.

p.s. Do you like the bowl? I made it a few years ago, when I took some pottery classes.

Home Cookin Chapter: My Recipes

DAILY GRANOLA
NOTE: I use the same measuring cup for the applesauce, the brown rice syrup, and the honey, and I measure out the applesauce first, leaving a pretty solid coating when I empty it into the bowl. It coats the cup so the stickier liquids are easier to get out of the cup.

5 cups rolled oats
1 cup raw almonds
1 cup raw pecans
1 cup hulled raw sunflower seeds
1/2 cup raw pumpkin seeds
1/2 cup sesame seeds
1/2 cup ground flax seeds*
3/4 cup light brown sugar
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp salt
3/4 cup unsweetened apple sauce
1/3 cup brown rice syrup**
1/4 cup honey
2 Tbsp grapeseed or other vegetable oil

Set racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven and preheat the oven to 300°F.

In a small bowl, combine all of the wet ingredients. Stir to mix well and set aside.

In a large bowl, combine all of the dry ingredients. Take the time to stir everything together so all of the ingredients are mixed well.

Pour the wet ingredients over the dry mix. Again, take the time to stir it well, so that the wet ingredients are fully incorporated into the dry.

Spread the mixture evenly on two rimmed baking sheets. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, or until evenly golden brown. Set a timer to go off every ten minutes while the granola bakes, so you can rotate the pans and give the granola a good stir; this helps it to cook evenly.

When it's ready, remove the pans from the oven. Stir well - this will keep it from cooling into a hard, solid sheet - and set aside to cool. Set the timer for ten minutes and stir it one more time to make sure it is not sticking to the pan. The finished granola may still feel slightly soft when it comes out of the oven, but it will crisp as it cools.

Store the cooled granola in a large zip-lock plastic bag or other airtight container. The granola will keep in the refrigerator indefinitely.

*Flax seeds have an extremely short shelf life, so if you buy them ground be sure they are fresh, and store them in the freezer.

**Available at Whole Foods or any other health food store. Or, you can substitute with Lyle's Golden syrup.

Yield: about 10 cups

adapted from Molly Wisenberg (who adapted it from a Nigella Lawson recipe) at: http://orangette.blogspot.com/2008/02/consider-it.html

Exported from Home Cookin 6.46 (www.mountain-software.com)

Baking Class: Criss-Cross Peanut Butter Cookies

This peanut butter cookie recipe is another old family recipe. It is one of those cookies that I would always forget about, and then something would remind me of them and I would make a batch and they were so good I would wonder why I didn't make them more often, and then I'd forget all about them again for more than a few years.

More recently, I had a different kind of dilemma with them. The original recipe called for shortening, and I don't use shortening any more. I have experimented with lard with good results on the savory side, but there's just a little too much pig to my taste for use with sweets.

I generally don't have a problem substituting butter for shortening, but for some reason I wasn't sure how well it would work with the peanut butter cookies. I think because the peanut butter also adds fat to the dough, it might be too much for butter alone to handle. But I have been doing my Christmas baking and was looking for something new to add to the rotation. Much as my friends love the things I do make around the holidays, I get tired of making the same things. This year I have been experimenting, and I thought it would be a good time to see exactly what a difference using butter instead of shortening would make.

As it turned out the difference was negligible. They were crispy, sweet, and full of peanut butter flavor, although I forgot that even though I prefer creamy peanut butter as a rule, for peanut butter cookies crunchy is actually better. That aside, I think I may have liked these even better with the butter.

The proportions of this recipe worked out well for me to make a half batch for my test, which was quick and easy. And four dozen or so cookies is nothing to sneeze at. I took some to work and some to my knitting friends and still had enough to enjoy a few at home without making me feel too guilty.

Home Cookin Chapter: Cookies

CRISS-CROSS PEANUT BUTTER COOKIES
1 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 eggs, well beaten
1 tsp vanilla
3 cups flour
1-1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup peanut butter, preferably crunchy

Preheat oven to 400 deg. F.

Combine the brown and white sugars and mix well. Sift together the flour, baking soda and salt and set aside.

Cream the butter. Add the sugar and cream well, until the mixture is light and fluffy. Add the beaten eggs and the vanilla and mix it together.

Incorporate the flour just until the dough begins to come together, then add the peanut butter and make sure it is fully blended into the dough.

Roll the dough into balls the size of walnuts. Place one inch apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. Press each ball on one side with the tines of a fork, then press the tines over each cookie at a right angle to the previous lines to make a criss-cross effect.

Bake at 400 deg. F. for about 7 minutes, until they are just beginning to brown. Be careful not to let them burn. Check them after 5 minutes.

Makes approximately 10 dozen, depending on size.

Exported from Home Cookin 6.46 (www.mountain-software.com)

Baking Class: Buttermilk Pie with Almond Meal Crust

I was recently gifted with a package of Bob's Red Mill Almond Meal/Flour, and I have been looking for ways to use it. I decided to start small, and went with substituting one fourth of a cup of it for an equal amount of the flour in what has become my go to pie crust for a buttermilk pie.

With so-so results. It wasn't bad, but I couldn't really taste the almond, and the crust did not brown as much as it usually does. It also didn't hold it's shape as well when I cut into it, but that might be because I couldn't wait for it to cool all the way before I cut into it. The piece I cut the next day, after it had been in the refrigerator overnight, held it's shape beautifully.

The pie itself was perfect, as you can see. The filling was smooth and creamy and not too sweet. I think this is how the buttermilk part is supposed to be, and not nearly as dark as the previous one.

I guess my main problem with the pie crust is that it did not really brown. It tasted all right, but all right is not usually what I am looking for in a pie.

I think the crust might have browned more if I had toasted the almond meal before adding it to the flour, and it might have added more almond flavor. I think I will also reduce the butter next time. The almonds add their own fat, and it was actually a little too rich for me.

I have it in mind this would make an intriguing apple pie. I will get back to you.

Baking Class: Sand Tarts

I got the recipe for these gems from one of my co-workers at the library in Austin many years ago. So many years ago, in fact, that I no longer remember who it was that gave me the recipe.

Which is a shame, because they are spectacularly delicious, and are fancy enough to be taken to the poshest places. They have earned their name - they are light and sandy and melt in the mouth.

And best of all, they are ridiculously easy to make, and don't take too much time. The most time-consuming part is rolling them in the confectioner's sugar. Don't let the cookies cool for more than a few minutes before you start rolling them. It's the heat that makes the sugar stick.

I have made these successfully with pecans, walnuts or almonds, but I have to say that the pecans are my favorite. They are more dense, and their rich subtle flavor floods each bite.

I have made these cookies in half batches, but I have almost always regretted not having more. They disappear quickly.

Home Cookin Chapter: Cookies

SAND TARTS

Makes approximately 4 dozen cookies

1 cup softened butter
1/2 cup confectioner's sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2-1/4 cup flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup pecans, walnuts or almonds
approximately 1 cup additional powdered sugar for finished cookies

Cream the butter and confectioner's sugar together. Add the vanilla and stir it in. Add the salt, flour and nuts and mix well.

Chill the dough for at least two hours, or overnight. Roll into balls or crescents and place on an ungreased baking sheet (parchment optional).

Bake at 350 deg F. for 20 minutes, until the cookies are just lightly browned. Remove from the oven and, while still hot, roll them in a soup bowl filled with powdered sugar.

Exported from Home Cookin 5.9 (www.mountain-software.com)

Baking Class: Pistachio Shortbread

For someone who has not historically done much baking, I have accumulated quite a few baking cookbooks over the years. This is a good thing now that I have dedicated myself to the more precise side of the kitchen arts. Some would say finicky; you can't play fast and loose with flour, oil and baking powder the way you can with onions, garlic, carrots and celery.

In general, I would place myself squarely within the parameters of the cook, as opposed to the baker. I'm much more comfortable throwing in a splash of this or a dash of that, without having to worry that my stovetop will explode. I was never good at chemistry, and that is mostly what baking is. If you get the wrong ratio of liquid to dry to leavening, your oven very well *may* explode. So there is a lot of measuring, and weighing of ingredients, and adding them in a specific order, and cooking for an exact amount of time. In other words, a lot of room for error.

But I have been learning, and improving. As with any other skill, the best way to learn it is to do it, and to keep doing it until it becomes familiar. Each recipe teaches me something new, and it is something that I can then apply to the next recipe. I am becoming a more accomplished baker, although I think I will always lean more toward cooking than baking.

So I am happy that I have accumulated some baking books along the way. Two that stand out are Nick Malgieri's Cookies Unlimited, from where I got the recipe for these delicious Sesame Seed Wafers, and The Good Cookie, by Tish Boyle. They are quite similar, even down to how they are arranged, and have a lot of the same recipes. So I thought it would be a good idea to test recipes from both books to see how they compare.

I still have a good amount of pistachios in the pantry, and have been looking for ways to use them. So my eye was caught by a recipe in The Good Cookie for pistachio shortbread cookies. I had all of the ingredients in the pantry.

I haven't made roll cookies in a long time, so I was a little nervous about tackling them. But the recipe was clear and everything went smoothly. It's funny that I've made pistachio meal twice in the same year. It worked well both times, but this is much sweeter.

These cookies are delicious. The pistachio flavor comes through, and adds a textural component that makes the cookie melt-in-your-mouth tender. They are absolutely addictive.

So far, I have made one cookie from each cookie cookbook, and both turned out well. I will have to test more recipes from each before I can determine which one I think is better.

I rolled out half of the cookie dough and cooked it right away. I froze the rest and rolled that dough out on another day. The second batch was just as flaky, tender, and tasty as the first.

Home Cookin Chapter: Cookies

PISTACHIO SHORTBREAD COOKIES

Makes about 46 cookies

1/2 cup shelled unsalted pistachios*
3/4 cup granulated sugar, divided
1-2/3 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup cornstarch
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup (1-1/2 sticks) unsalted butter
1 large egg yolk

Position a rack in the center of the oven and preheat the oven to 325 deg. F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or foil.

Place the pistachios and 1/4 cup of the sugar in the bowl of a food processor and process until the nuts are finely ground, about 30 seconds. Add the flour, cornstarch, and salt and pulse until blended. Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, using the paddle attachment, beat the butter and the remaining 1/2 cup sugar at medium-high speed until l ight, about 2 minutes. Add the egg yold and mix at low speed until
blended, scraping down the sides of the bowl as necessary. Add the dry ingredients, mixing until combined.

Scrape the dough out onto a work surface and knead it a few times, until smooth. Divide it in half and shape each half into a disk.

Place one of the disks on a large piece of waxed paper, place another piece of waxed paper over it, and, using a rolling pin, roll it out to a thickness of 1/8 inch. Carefullh peel off the top piece of waxed paper, then replace it loosely and flip over the dough. Peel off the second piece of waxed paper. Using a 2-inch fluted or scalloped round cookie cutter, cut out as many cookies as possible from the dough. Arrange the cookies 1/2 inch apart on the prepared baking sheets. Gather up the scraps and reroll them between sheets of waxed paper.

Bake the cookies, one sheet at a time, for 13 to 16 minutes, until just lightly colored around the edges. Watch the cookies carefully, as their color will change very quickly. Transfer the cookies to a wire rack and cool completely. Repeat with the remaining dough.

Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 5 days.

*According to the recipe, if you can only find salted nuts, place them in a sieve and rinse under cold running water. Dry them thoroughly with paper towels. I just used the salted ones without rinsing them and they came out fine.

from The Good Cookie, by Tish Boyle (John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2002).

Exported from Home Cookin 5.7 (www.mountain-software.com)

Baking Class: Pistachio Cherry Chip Cookies

Last summer Mary brought me some cherry-flavored chips she picked up in Michigan. I held onto them because I wanted to make something I could share with her and both of our schedules have been kind of crazy. Now that I'm baking more, I wanted to make these sooner rather than later.

While chocolate and cherry seem like a natural pairing, Mary can't eat chocolate so I had to find a different flavor that would combine well with the cherry. I decided pistachios would do the trick. Pistachios are often paired with fruit in middle eastern cuisine so it seemed like a no-brainer.

Cookies seemed the way to go. This is a simple variation on a familiar chocolate chip recipe. I changed some of the amounts so it would make a smaller batch. Sometimes what stops me from making cookies is how many I have to cook at a time. Unless I'm making them for a group or an event, a few dozen is just the right amount.

I think if I made them again I might use lemon extract instead of vanilla. It might brighten up the cherry flavor just that little bit extra. Either way, these were delicious, and everybody loved them.

Home Cookin Chapter: My Recipes

PISTACHIO CHERRY CHIP COOKIES

Makes 3 dozen cookies

1-1/4 cups flour
1/2 tsp soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 stick butter, softened
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup firmly-packed brown sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp water
1 egg
3/4 cup cherry-flavored chips
1/3 cup chopped pistachios

Heat oven 375 deg.

Combine flour, soda and salt; set aside.

Cream butter and sugars; add vanilla and water and mix well. Add egg and mix together.

Add cherry chips and pistchios and mix together.

Drop by heaping teaspoonsful onto cookie sheets lined with parchment paper. Bake 10-12 minutes, until cookies are golden brown.

Let cool.

5/3/09

Exported from Home Cookin 5.7 (www.mountain-software.com)

Beet Salad with Walnuts

As I mentioned in this previous post, this summer for me has been all about the beets at the Green Market. This is the same beet salad that you saw on the plate with the baked chicken and garlic potatoes. I did roast some walnuts and they do go beautifully well with this salad. The sweet and sour smoothness of the beets, punctuated by the crispness of the onions and celery, gets a final little flush of flavor from the roasted walnuts.

I took this picture one day later than the one from my earlier post. I love how the redness from the beets has made serious inroads of infiltration into the celery and onion. By the next day, everything in the salad was beet red; you could only tell what was what from its shape and texture.

For that reason, it is best to keep the roasted walnuts out of the salad until just before serving.

For all of you beet haters out there, I must confess that I, too, hated beets as a child. I don't know when it changed, but I do know that there is no comparison between what comes out of the can and what is pulled fresh from the ground. When cooked properly, they are tender and sweet and bursting with flavor. I did recently learn that if you do not get all the dirt off of them before cooking them, they will absorb it and all you will be able to taste is the dirt. Now I make sure they are properly cleaned and they are delicious every time.

This salad is a perfect accompaniment to any summer meal, and would make a nice change from cole slaw or bean salad.

Home Cookin Chapter: My Recipes

BEET SALAD WITH ROASTED WALNUTS

Note: This salad is best made the day before.

2 bunches baby beets, with roots and at least 1" of stems still attached.
1/2 red onion, thinly sliced
3 ribs celery, thinly sliced
1/4 cup vinegar
1 tsp dijon mustard
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup olive oil
1 tsp fresh oregano, or 1/2 tsp dry
salt and pepper to taste
toasted walnuts, chopped, for garnish

Fill large pot with water and bring to a boil. Trim beets, leaving one inch of the stem and the roots. Wash well, making sure to remove any dirt that is attached. Add to boiling water, lower heat and cover. Cook for 20-40 minutes, until knife inserted into a beet goes in and out smoothly. Remove from heat and let cool.

Remove stems and roots and cut into one-fourth inch slices. Add red onion and celery, oregano, salt and pepper.

In small jar combine vinegar, mustard, sugar, and oil. Shake well and pour over salad. Mix everything well. Taste for seasonings and adjust, if necessary.

Let sit at least one hour before serving to allow the flavors to combine.

Sprinkle roasted walnuts over the salad before serving.

Exported from Home Cookin 5.6 (www.mountain-software.com)

Peanut Sauce

This is one of those sauces that is a cinch to put together and only takes a few minutes on the stove. I have loved it ever since I dipped my first skewer of Chicken Satay into a bowlful at one of the first Thai restaurants I ever frequented in Austin back in the early eighties. The restaurant was called Satay, and it's still there.

All I knew about Thailand at the time was from The King and I, and that wasn't much. I didn't even know that it was a Thai restaurant. As far as I remember, I just assumed it was Chinese and I was a little puzzled that I didn't recognize more of the dishes. But I do remember that it was mighty tasty, especially that peanut sauce that started off the meal.

But the chicken on the skewer part of the appetizer really didn't do much for me. So much as I loved the sauce, it kind of stayed at the back of my mind and since there weren't that many Thai restaurants in Austin, I rarely had the opportunity to even think about it, let alone order it.

Chicago has a large Thai population (but not the largest as I previously thought - that's L.A.) and a lot of Thai restaurants. You can't throw a bottle of Sriracha without hitting one. So after I moved here I ate a lot of Thai food - it's cheap, fast, and holds up to delivery well. And I rediscovered peanut sauce. So I began looking for recipes.

And found quite a few. But I didn't have any thoughts about how to serve it since I didn't really want Chicken Satay and spring rolls were way too ambitious for me. So again, it just stayed at the back of my mind, until I would run across another recipe and think about it for a minute or two, and then it would go right back behind all the other recipes I wanted to try.

So I don't know exactly what made me finally decide to whip up a batch. Maybe it's the fish sauce I bought at the Asian market down the street (that has since closed, alas). Maybe it's the whole wheat linguini I bought on impulse.

Whatever the reason, I am glad I did. This stuff is really, really good. And really, really easy. I found a lot of recipes with many variations, so you can pretty much wing it, as far as I can tell. I've made it a couple of times now and it's been thick and delicious every time. It is delicious with pasta as a side dish, and if you add grilled chicken it becomes a hearty main dish (almost like Chicken Satay, but when it's not on skewers I like it much better, for some reason).

Home Cookin Chapter: Sauces

PEANUT SAUCE

1/4 cup peanut butter
2 tsp soy sauce
1 Tbsp brown sugar
1 Tbsp lime juice
1/4 cup coconut milk
1/4 cup water
1/4 to 1/2 tsp red chili flakes (to taste)
1 clove crushed garlic

Place ingredients in small saucepan, bring to a simmer and cook for about 5 minutes, until it thickens.

Serve over whole wheat pasta.

Servings: 4

very loosely adapted from several recipes found online

Exported from Home Cookin 5.5 (www.mountain-software.com)

Curried Peanut and Tomato Sauce

I'm not sure where to start with this post. I had this recipe for Curried Peanut and Tomato Soup from Epicurious.com for a while so I finally decided to make it. It calls for two tablespoons of curry powder. I still have some of that awesome madras tamarind curry powder I got for my birthday a while back so I decided to use one tablespoon of that and one tablespoon of the sweet curry powder I get at The Spice House.

It was delicious, but almost too spicy for my (not so) delicate little taste buds, and it was watery. So watery that the onions and tomatoes pushed to the front of the stage instead of blending into the ensemble as they were hired to do. I was not in love with it. But the flavors were there, so I thought maybe it just needed a little magic stick blending.

And justifying my faith in its mystical magical ways, it cut those onions and tomatoes down to size (pun intended). But it was still too spicy to eat by itself. You would think I would have learned from the Carrot Ginger Soup that two tablespoons of any spice is too much in a recipe. But no, I had to go ahead and put it all in there. And that madras curry powder is one hot powder. So what to do with this too-hot-to-eat-by-itself-but-delicious soup?

Why, make a roux and turn it into a curried mushroom sauce of course! I don't remember why I bought the mushrooms, but they were just a day or two away from a full languish in the vegetable drawer of the fridge. If I remember correctly, they may have been the victims of one of those times when I forget what I am making and buy enough separate ingredients to make three different dishes instead of one. What a happy accident, because I would never have thought of it otherwise. And mushrooms were the perfect addition - they absorb so much of the flavor and heat that it really tamed it down, while adding their own subtle earthiness to the mix. I hadn't really planned for it but I had some bread that was slightly stale so I toasted that up and spread the mushroom sauce on top and it was delicious. So delicious that I decided to forget the soup idea altogether and worked on it as a sauce. I thought it might work well with pasta.

And here it is - the final product. And it did go well with the pasta, although I think it might be just a little bit better with noodles, or rice. I thickened it up, which made it possible to leave the tomatoes and onions chopped without having them dominate. I toned down the curry powder and that helped the other flavors come out a little more.

There are a lot of variations possible with this recipe. There are a number of vegetables that would work well with (or even without) the mushrooms. It is so good I'm already thinking of making it again. Maybe for lunches next week . . .

Home Cookin Chapter: Soups and Stews
Curried Peanut And Tomato Sauce
Serves 4
2 Tbsp flour
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
1 medium onion, chopped
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp black pepper
1 Tbsp sweet curry powder
1 tsp madras tamarind curry powder
1 (14-oz.) can diced tomatoes in juice, chopped if large, reserving juice
1-3/4 cups broth
1/4 cup smooth peanut butter
2 Tbsp chopped fresh cilantro

1 lb. sliced mushrooms
1 Tbsp vegetable oil

Cook onion, salt, and pepper in the 2 tablespoons oil in a 2- to 3-quart heavy saucepan over moderate heat, stirring occasionally, until softened, 4 to 5 minutes. Add flour and curry powder and cook, stirring frequently, 2 minutes. Add tomatoes and broth and cook, stirring frequently, until sauce thickens.

While the sauce is cooking, heat 1 tablespoon oil in medium skillet. Add mushrooms and cook until just done - do not overcook or they will get rubbery. Set them aside. Once the sauce has started to thicken, add the peanut butter and stir until smooth. Continue to cook until sauce thickens to the consistency you want.

Add the mushrooms and stir in the cilantro before serving. Serve over pasta or rice.

loosely adapted from Gourmet Quick Kitchen February 2006
Epicurious.com © CondéNet, Inc. All rights reserved.

Exported from Home Cookin 5.5 (www.mountain-software.com)

African Chicken

Work has been crazy for the past few weeks and what little capacity my brain cells have were totally exhausted there. I have finally realized why I will never make it as a professional writer. (Well, one of the reasons, anyway). You have to use your brain to write, and I guess my poor little cells are too delicate to put in more than a couple of hours a day. By the time I got home in the evening it took all of my concentration just to sit on the couch and watch endless reruns of the "Law and Order" syndicates. Last Monday I even forgot to watch "24," but I guess that's as much an indictment of how crappy this season is as an indication of how overtired my brain is.

But I wasn't even knitting much, and that's a definite indication that something is wrong. And then I stopped cooking and then I stopped eating well and the dishes started to pile up and it was not such a pretty sight, I can tell you. But work has finally eased up and I've had a chance to pull things together somewhat and get back into the kitchen.

Something else that usually happens when I get overly stressed is that I start thinking about comfort food, and old recipes that I used to make all the time but haven't thought of in years. I don't know what made me think of African Chicken, but once I did I knew I had to make it. It was the first recipe I had ever seen that called for peanut butter in a savory application (nope, no Thai food yet) and I was skeptical, but intrigued enough to give it a try

I liked it so much that for a while it became my go-to dish when I had company for dinner. The sauce thickens into a kind of paste that is delicious with brown rice. It is easy to make, with few ingredients that come together for a whole that is much greater than the sum of its parts

I have had this recipe for so long that I don't remember where I found it. I think it was a magazine, or maybe the weekly food section in the Austin paper. I'm pretty sure it wasn't from a cookbook. It was long before the internet so it never occurred ot me that I might need the attribution. I did a quick Google search and found an unattributed version of it here

I wasn't sure I wanted to post it here without attributions, but since it's already out there anyway I will go ahead, with apologies to the original source. It's too good a recipe not to share.

Home Cookin Chapter: Poultry

African Chicken

Serves 6

4 lb. chicken, cut into pieces
2 Tbsp oil
2 medium onions, thinly sliced
2 cloves minced garlic
1/4 cup peanut butter
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1 Tbsp red wine vinegar
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
15-oz. can tomato sauce

Arrange chicken in large baking dish. In 10" skillet heat oil; add onion and garlic; cook until wilted. Stir in peanut butter, coriander and red pepper flakes. Gradually stir in tomato sauce and vinegar. Pour over chicken.

Bake uncovered in 400-degree oven until chicken is tender--about 50 minutes.

Exported from Home Cookin 5.4 (www.mountain-software.com)

Nigerian Kidney Bean Stew

There's a new version of Blogger out. Expect lots of swearing after I've upgraded.
Kidney beans are iffy for me. They have a little bit of an aftertaste to me that is similar to black-eyed peas, and it's that funky aftertaste that makes it impossible for me to eat black-eyed peas.

And please don't say "Oh, but you've never tried my black-eyed peas." I can't tell you how many times I've had people say that. I probably haven't tried your black-eyed peas, but I can guarantee that I won't like them. I haven't run across anything that can hide that funkiness. Anything. Ok?

I can eat kidney beans, but not usually by themselves. But they're really good for you, at least according to the World's Healthiest Foods, so I want to eat more of them. I've always liked to put them in my chicken and vegetable soups, and (purists might want to turn away for a moment) in my chili, because that odd little aftertaste isn't so obvious when there are fifty other ingredients in the bowl vying for my tongue's attention.

So when I first came across this recipe for Nigerian Kidney Bean Stew in Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian, I wasn't so sure it was something I wanted to try. There's a recipe I've had for years called African Chicken (note to self: Must make that again!) that uses tomato sauce and peanut butter so I knew I liked that combination, but I wasn't sure how I would like the kidney beans as the star of the show. But I had already made a couple of recipes from the book with much success, so I decided it was worth the risk.

And it was. The peanut butter and tomato sauce base is the perfect vehicle for highlighting what is tasty about kidney beans, and that strange aftertaste I dislike so much disappears in this dish. It's quite tasty with brown rice, but it's also really good with whole wheat couscous. And if you don't have any couscous or brown rice ready, it's awfully good all by itself.

Home Cookin 4.9 Chapter: Soups and Stews

Nigerian Kidney Bean Stew with Peanut Sauce
Serves 4 to 6

1-1/2 cup dried red kidney or pinto beans
salt to taste
2 Tbsp peanut or canola oil
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2 cloves finely chopped garlic
1/2 large green pepper, chopped into small dice
1 tsp ground cumin
1 cup canned tomato sauce
1/4 tsp cayenne
1 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
1-1/2 Tbsp smooth peanut butter

Soak and cook beans; do not drain. Add salt, stir to mix, and leave in cooking liquid.

Put the oil in a wide, medium pot and set over medium heat. Add onion, garlic, and pepper. Stir and fry just until onion has turned translucent, turning heat down as needed. Add cumin and stir once. Put in the tomato sauce, cayenne, lemon juice, and 1/2 cup water. Stir and bring to simmer. Turn heat to low and simmer gently, stirring occasionally, for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, put peanut butter in a small bowl. Slowly add about 6 tablespoons of cooking liquid from beans, mixing continuously. Stir this mixture back into the pot of beans.

When tomato mixture has finished cooking, pour into the pot of beans. Stir and bring to a simmer. Cover, turn heat down to low, and simmer gently for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Serve hot.

from Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian by Madhur Jaffrey (Clarkson Potter, 1999)