Twas the week before Christmas

And all through these weeks,
I've been up to my eyeballs,
In cookies and treats.

Okay...that's all I can muster.

Needless to say December has been a whirl of lunches and dinners (some less edible than others), gatherings, treats and nights in the kitchen fighting with Beelzebub to procure 500 cookies. The next few weeks will bring much the same (except no more cookies--if you've not received any...well...umm...be nicer to me and we'll see if you get on next year's list).

I've had a couple of requests for recommendations for books for foodies. I receive a number of food related books to review each year--not everything gets a post, but I did select a couple which I've not yet reviewed but deserve to be mentioned. Both were given to me courtesy of their publishers:

The Widow Cliquot

by Tilar Mazzeo

Harper Collins

254pp/C$33.99

Mazzeo tells the story of a young widow, assumes the helm of what would become one of the world's most famous champagnes. Tracing Mme Cliquot's story from revolutionary to Napoleonic France, the author deftly combines socio-political events with the personal struggles of a young widow, mother and business woman.

Keys to Good Cooking: a guide to making the best of foods and recipes

by Harold McGee

Doubleday Canada/Random House Canada

576pp/C$42

McGee's latest tome easily takes the home cook by the hand and guides them through the basics of cooking and more important why recipes work (or more importantly, don't work). He guides the the reader though tools, concepts and ingredients in simple, straightforward language. I think it would be good for those who are rather new to the kitchen and it's frustrating ways.

So, that's it for me until the New Year. Until then, I'm leaving you with a plate of linzer sandwich cookies: nutty, sweet and flavoured with cinnamon and cloves.

The recipe is from Canadian Living's cookie edition. The only real change I made was to use preground filberts--I don't have a food processer, so I bought a packet of ground nuts and went to work. The recipe comes together nicely and is so easy to work with...and, unlike other cookie doughs, you can easily re-roll the scraps withouth the finished cookie toughening.

Linzer Cookies
Adapted from Canadian Living's recipe
Yield three dozen

Ingredients
215g (1.5c) ground filberts (hazelnuts)
240g (2c) ap flour
1tsp baking powder
1.5tsp cinnamon
0.25tsp ground cloves
0.25tsp salt
grated zest of one lemon
280g (1.25c) butter
150g (0.75c) sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
1tsp vanilla
250ml (1c) jam (raspberry, apricot, strawberry, blueberry, whatever you have on hand)

Method
Toast the ground nuts either by spreading it in an even layer on a tin foil-lined cookies sheet and popping it into a 180C/350F for about five minutes or until golden and fragrant OR toast the flour in batches on the stovetop, over a medium heat, in a large cast iron pan until golden and fragrant.

Mix toasted ground nuts with flour, baking powder, spices, salt and lemon zest.

In a separate bowl, cream together butter and sugar. Then beat in the vanilla, the whole egg and yolk one at a time. Stir in the nut flour mixture in two or three additions, until the dough comes together, without over mixing. Divide the dough in half and flatten into discs. Wrap with cling film and refrigerate for at least one hour.

Preheat oven to 180C/350F and line cookie sheets with parchment.

Roll out each disc onto a lightly floured surface to 0.5cm/0.25" thickness. Using a 6cm (2.5") round cutter. If desired, use a smaller cutter to cut a shaped hole from half the cookies (for the tops).

Bake 2.5cm (1") apart for 8-12 minutes, until the bottoms are lightly golden. Let cool on pans for a few minutes before transferring to racks. Let cool thoroughly before sandwiching.

Option: dust with icing sugar before serving.

To assemble:
Spoon a teaspoon of jam onto the bottom of a "bottom" biscuit and sandwich with a top.

Notes:
- I've not tried it but you can probably substitute other nuts for filberts, such as walnuts or almonds.

- For crispier cookies, sandwich the day your are serving them, otherwise the the jam will soften the cookies, the longer they've been assembled. Nothing wrong with that...

cheers!

jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

On My Rickety Shelves: Kitchen

Thanks to the lovely people at Random House Canada, a copy of this month's cookbook selection was delivered to my doorstep.

Kitchen
By Nigella Lawson
Alfred A. Knopf/Random House Canada
512 pages; $55

There’s a small number of authors whose new works I eagerly await: AS Byatt, Christopher Brookmyre, Stephen Fry, Nigella Lawson and Nigel Slater. Their words are smart, engaging so incredibly well honed. When I grow up I want to write like that.

When I peruse a cookbook, I skim it for more than just recipes. Without a doubt the recipes must make me want to lock myself into my kitchen and lose myself in chopping, drizzling, frizzling and sampling. Just as important is how the author coaxes me into keeping that book in my hands. I want the author to talk to me as a friend and be someone I’d invite into my kitchen. I don’t want to be talked down to, lectured to by someone with self-fashioned airs of superiority.

Nigella Lawson brings her brand of combined eloquence and common sense cookery in her new offering, Kitchen. In it, she continues her particular type of food diarisation—her first book How To Eat features a section on nursery foods and feeding very young children, others included foods palatable to younger mouths—this time as a busy working mum with equally busy teenagers.

Her recipes, as usual, range from combining simple ingredients into quick and tasty meals such as Egg and Bacon Salad to longer cooked meals such as Beer-braised Pork Knuckles with Caraway, Garlic, Apples and Potatoes. She also brings in disparate foodish inspirations from areas such as Spain, Vietnam, South Africa and Italy. The instructions are clear and easy to follow and usually accompanied by lovely photographs. Many recipes include tips about freezing, how to use leftovers and make-ahead notes.

As with her other Canadian imprints, the text appears to be the same as in the original British imprint, which means she uses weight metrics and not volume. This may be an issue for many North American cooks, but since a digital kitchen scale can be bought for the price of a couple of bottles of extra virgin olive oil, this shouldn’t be that much of an issue.

What some readers may find useful are two early sections: “Kitchen Caboodle” and “Kitchen Confidential”—the first is what’s known in some books as “batterie de cuisine,” a listing of kitchen equipment the author finds essential. What’s equally useful is her “Hall of Shame” section that lists regrettable purchases she’s made (ahem, including the slow cooker). Such lists are, of course, highly individual and should be taken with a grain of salt. Kitchen Confidential compiles her various kitchen tips on ingredients such as baking powder, sea salt and vermouth to tools and gadgets such as pastry brushes and disposable rubbery gloves and tips on baking and frying.

As with my other reviews, the proof of a book’s value is in the recipes. Here are the ones I attempted:

Vietnamese Pork Noodle Soup (p82)
I really like pho, but find their quantity overwhelming when at restaurants. Nigella’s version had fresh and bright flavours and it was very warming. As with any home cooked food, I can control my portion, but here I thought the noodle quantity was two to three times what I think it should have been or the amount of broth should be increased. Easily resolved the next time I make this.

Spanish chicken with chorizo and potatoes (p100)
Delicious. Spicy sausage and roast chicken with just a hint of orange. I was so happy with this meal that I’ve since replicated it with other types of sausage and seasonings. It’s more than easy and (as you can tell from the picture) a doddle to decrease to feed one person (as opposed to six).

Chocolate Chip Cookies (p236)
Everyone has their own idea as to what makes a good chocolate chip cookie and this was definitely not mine. I prefer thin, buttery discs which are crispy around the edges and chewy in the centre. I also like them to be of a reasonable size (say 2” or 5cm in diameter). Hers are cakey and are dolloped in ¼ cup measurements. I would have used a teaspoon or a tablespoon at most.

Sweet Potato Supper (p340)
This dish combines three of my favourite ingredients—asparagus, bacon and sweet potatoes—in an incredibly simply way. I loved the way the salty, smoky bacon played against the lush sweet potatoes and slightly caramelised asparagus.

So how does it rate?
Overall: 3.8/5
The breakdown:
Recipe Selection: 4/5
Writing: 4.5/5
Ease of use: 3/5
Yum factor: 4/5
Table-top test: Lies flat

Kitchen comfort-level: Easy-Intermediate
Pro: A good range of recipes ranging drawn from a number of cuisines.
Con: Based on the pho and cookies, some on-the-fly corrections may be needed.

cheers!

jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

On My Rickety Shelves: Fat

Thanks to the lovely people at Random House, a copy of this month's cookbook selection was delivered to my kitchen.

Fat: An appreciation of a misunderstood ingredient with recipes
By Jennifer McLagan
McLelland & Stewart/Random House Canada
240 pages; $37.95

Fat is vilified. Whether it’s a woman’s natural curves or a recipe’s call for lard, this basic stuff which of which we’re made and need is the same stuff entertainment and corporate-sponsored “food experts” tell us to ostracise and eliminate.

Ironic, this, given in stressful times when we need comfort, we are drawn towards fat (as well as it’s taboo’d compatriots, sugar and fat)—whether it’s a bowl of rich ice cream covered in hot caramel sauce or a bolstering embrace by soft arms.

Jennifer McLagan’s Fat: An appreciation of a misunderstood ingredient with recipes
takes on populist thinking of the past 30-40 years, and tells us that fat, unadulterated by undue processing, needs to regain its rightful place in our diets.

She reminds us that up until the last century, fat was good: we wanted a “fat paycheque” so we could buy the plumpest chicken and those who didn’t get enough fat in their diets were often ill (something I still maintain), as well as what the food industry has done to degrade our collective health such as introducing quantities of trans-fat laidened hydrogenated fats and easily oxidised polyunsaturated oils.

McLagan’s well-written and thoughtful work focuses on four animal fats, some in regular, purposeful home kitchen use, but others not so: butter, pork fat, poultry fat and beef and lamb fat. While photographs do not accompany each recipe, the images provided are vibrant and lovely. The book is also dotted with mini-essays about the importance of fat in history, whether it is pemmican, Haseka “The Butter Saint” or the origins of Fat Tuesday.

What I find most helpful are the instructions for once-common bits of kitchen business such as rendering fats or removing marrow from beef bones, the latter I needed to make her Risotto Milanese. Her no-nonsense words guided me through the process well enough to produce an amazing dish.

As with my other reviews, the proof of a book’s value is in the recipes. Here are the ones I attempted:

Mixed Spiced Nuts (p36)
I’m not a fan of processed spiced nuts—manufacturers tend to mistake salt and sugar for flavour. Combining the resinous hints of rosemary, cumin’s and coriander’s smokiness, salt sugar and a bit of heat, these buttered nuts were easy and almost disparagingly deliciously addictive.


Pumpkin and Bacon Soup (p83)
I liked this soup, but I didn’t love it. It was nearly effortless, but even though smoky bacon and its rendered fat were used, it lacked depth of flavour. I will make this again, but instead of using plain water, I’ll use vegetable or chicken stock or perhaps apple juice.

Simple Roast Chicken (p138)
Often simple is best. McLaglan’s recommendations very closely mimicked my own standard roast chicken recipe, and it produced a bird with juicy meat and crispy, golden skin. My only qualm is I felt 100g of butter was too much, and I’d easily halve the amount.

Risotto Milanese (p195)
I’ve rarely found a risotto recipe that matches the dish I had in Milan six years ago. McLagan’s recipe uses beef marrow, along with butter to make this perhaps the most luxurious risotto I’ve ever had.





So how does it rate?
Overall: 3.6/5
The breakdown:
Recipe Selection: 4/5
Writing: 3.5/5
Ease of use: 3.5/5
Yum factor: 3.5/5
Table-top test: Lies flat

Kitchen comfort-level: Intermediate
Pro: A good range of recipes ranging drawn from a number of cuisines.
Con: This isn’t a book for those who need or want to be coddled in the kitchen.


cheers!
jasmine


I'm a quill for hire!

Film Review: Julie and Julia

I must admit when I first heard that Nora Ephron was making Julie and Julia, a film that combined the lives of Julie Powell (former food blogger) and Julia Child (American culinary institution), I was torn between wanting to camp out at my local cinema for opening night and washing the cat.

In as much as I have fond memories of Julia's confidence (and voice) in her highly influential cooking shows, I never took to Julie's blog or her book. When Jenny of All Things Edible suggested she, Mary of Beans and Caviar and I see the film, how could I turn down a night out with two food bloggers to see a film about Julia and food and blogging?

Ephron mines Child's autobiography (written with Alexander Prud'homme) My Life in France with Powell's blog-cum-memoire Julie and Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously for a screenplay that intertwines the two women's stories.

Yes, there are parallels: Julia Child, a diplomat's wife in post-war France, finds purpose in food and along the way enrolls in Le Cordon Bleu and, over the series of years co-authors Mastering the Art of French Cooking a seminal two-volume work that eventually brought Child and French cooking into American homes via television. Julie Powell, a New York City municipal worker answers phones in the aftermath of 9/11, blogs her way through MAFC (Vol. One) in one year as an escape from daily existence and in the process becomes one of the blogosphere's first to find mainstream popularity, sharing her adventures with thousands of online readers.

Production quality is high: Meryl Streep's eery chameleon-like ability to transform herself into any character is amazing and Amy Adams' performance as a disillusioned 20-something is something many can easily identify. Set decoration and costuming are impeccable--important, I think in what is a double period piece, although I must admit that I was partially distracted looking at Streep's shoes and other tricks to give her Child's height.

I laughed. I sympathised. I was hungry. At one point I wanted to go into Powell's kitchen and show her how to poach an egg. At another I wanted to step into Julia's kitchen and give her a hug as she found out her sister was pregnant. Throughout I wished smell-o-vision had been invented because I could just imagine the aromas wafting from both kitchens.

Let's be honest: It's a chick flick. It's a foodie film. It's a film about "finding yourself" (good gravy, I hate that phrase). It's a film about relationships--my heart melted whenever Streep and Stanley Tucci (who played Paul Child, Julia's husband) were together. If you're looking for sex amongst the sauciers, hand grenades in the pomegranates or a gun that shoots bullets instead of frosting...this film's not for you. Really--go see one of the other mindless bits of Hollyweird drivel and leave this to people who cook and eat.

I left the cinema with one thing in mind: "If they release a DVD version that cuts out all the Julie Powell parts, I'll buy it."

Powell's qualities I picked up on while flicking through her various posts as well as leafing through her (still unbought) book which turned me off were more than evident on screen: narcissism, over-inflated ego and her profanity crutch (it's mentioned in passing, probably to keep a PG-13 rating).

For me the cinematic moment that encapsulates Powell's ego was when she found out Child, her idol and the woman to whom she hitched her fame-brought wagon, didn't really care for her or her blog. The reaction was that of an entitled, talentless and overly-protected and overly-lauded little girl who is faced with the cold reality of their mundane ineptitude for the first time: shock/disbelief and sadness (Powell probably went through the other five stages of grief, but there's only so much time and celluloid).

Powell has since argued that the Julie Powell on film is not the Julie Powell in real life. In reading her plea two things came to mind. Minor details like what you did or didn't do in school, as well as who you do or don't hang out with is irrelevant because as many of us who've a few braincells to rub together know: Hollywood makes stuff up so characters and events are interesting to the popcorn-munching masses. The other is: Powell's probably never had her portrait painted by someone without a vested interest in placating her ego. In other words: she doesn't like the interpretation derived from the thousands of words she's committed to pixels and print.

At the same time, the Julia Child on film can border on caricature. If Julia were alive today, what would she think of her cinematic doppelganger? I don't know: the film paints her as knowing her mind, so I'm guessing that she would have voiced her opinions. One thing I'm fairly sure of is she probably wouldn't whine.

What we are presented with are character and feat interpretations as amassed by writers, actors, directors and editors as well as focus groups and marketers. There are thousands of words and hours and hours of film about and by Child, far fewer about and by Powell. I think they did the best they could with what they had. As Kalyn wrote in her review, it would be better if Ephron and her team better translated Powell's culinary and blogging feat to screen. I wonder what pre-FoodTV cookbook authors (aka not the "I appeal to the 18-55 year-old male demographic and those who'd rather look at food than cook food" bobbleheads) have to say about getting published about the treatment of Child's accomplishments.

My guess is Ephron is neither a home cook nor a motivated blogger which is a shame because that part of the film was not handled as well as it could have. It's akin to making a movie about travelling to the moon written, produced (etc) by a team who's never studied the space sciences, but may have looked into a light-polluted night sky. In other words: it lacks consistent authenticity.

One thing I cannot fault is the food. It looked wonderful--even Julia's mountain of chopped onions looked fabulous. I just wanted to eat everything...

In prepping for this review, I decided to revisit Shari's MAFC index. Truth be told I'd love to have done a poached egg dish for this, but I just did Oeufs à la Bourguignonne for Hélène's MAFC event. Being the stubborn person I am, I kept to the egg theme and did a favourite breakfast-brunch dish: Oeufs en cocotte. It's easypeasylemonsqueezey, highly adaptable and is a non-recipe recipe, but Julia's recipe is in the link.

I did two versions: the first had a layer of mushrooms sauteed in garlic butter and the other was prepared in a ramekin lined with shaved salami. I like baking them until the whites are opalescent ad the yolks are thick and creamy...perfect for dunking toast tips.


cheers!
jasmine

PS. I will never hear Talking Heads' Psycho Killer the same way ever again:

What I'm reading: The Heart is an Involuntary Muscle by Monique Proulx

I'm a quill for hire!

On My Rickety Shelves: Little Cakes From the Whimsical Bakehouse

Thanks to the lovely people at Random House Canada, a copy of this month's cookbook selection was delivered to my kitchen.

Little Cakes from the Whimsical Bakehouse: Cupcakes, Small Cakes, Muffins, and Other Mini Treats
By Kaye Hansen and Liv Hanson
Clarkson Potter/Random House Canada
176 pages; $27.95

My readers know my cake decorating skills are the antithesis of those produced by Charm City Cakes. So frustrated I am with the prospect of prettifying my baking that I've deemed the mere attempt at piping "foofing"... as in: I don't do foofy cakes. Normally I glaze...at best I schwoop...but pipe? Never. So why did I accept the offer of Little Cakes from the Whimsical Bakehouse? Simple: I wanted to prove to myself that I could produce a cake that, while not of Duff Goldman's calibre, would not be a total embarassment.

Kaye Hansen and Liv Hansen are the creative and baking forces behind The Riviera Bakehouse in Ardsley, NY. Kaye is a self-taught baker while her daughter Liv uses her art school training to create eyecatchng cakes. They've appeared on various US Television shows and have produced a series of cake books under the "Whimsical Bakehouse" name.

Their latest tome was written for people like me, who find the entire prospect of cake decorating daunting, but would like to learn. The book itself is broken out into four main areas: getting started, anytime little cakes and muffins, special occasion little cakes and templates; they also include a section on suppliers. Recipes include cakes and other pastries, fillings and icings; decorating instructions and templates are also provided.

The most useful information this book gives about cake decorating. Basic tools of the trade from bases to pans to brushes and scoops are all explained, including tools and special ingredients. The fundamentals of filling, crumbing and icing cakes are covered to some extent, but some of their baking tips are overly basic, almost to the point of "dumbed down" more than is necessary...at times I felt like they were talking down to their readers, in a schoolmarmy tone that just puts my back up--"carefully measure all of your ingredients" and "most cake and muffin recipes can be baked in cupcake papers."

For me the most important part of this book is the confidence it gives the neophyte decorator. Instructions are easily followed for desired effects. Granted some techniques are less daunting than others--dolloping and smoothing icing on a cupcake vs piping hydrangeas--and some require an artistic temperament--piping and shading acorns.

The recipes are laid out in a non-standard format--instead of starting off with an ingredient list and following with instructions, ingredient information is provided in a sort of "as needed" basis, lists appearing, just before they're called for in the recipe. This may be problematic for some bakers.

The recipes themselves are rather lacklustre. Normally I would make three or four recipes to test a book but after two, I'd decided I didn't need to try any more. Even though the foods come together well enough, the flavour tasted as soul-less as if they were made by assistance of a store-bought pouch. I may be odd, but when I bake at home, I want the products to taste like someone cared about the end product, not bought from the grocery store.

Almond Coffee Cakes (p57)
This recipe is easy but may hold some people back, simply because the requisite baking tin (a 12 mold mini-square tin) is not necessarily in every home's baking rack. As you can tell from the photo I don't have one and I decided to make this recipe in my 12-bun cupcake/muffin tin. The other issues I have with this recipe is--and I'm not sure if the fault is mine, or with the batter or instructions was the cakes fell apart where the centre of cumbs separated the two halves of batter. Not the end of the world, but not enjoyable. The flavour was so reminiscent of pastries bought at overpriced coffee shops--flat and very sweet.



Banana Muffins (p52)
I substituted the called-for walnuts with almonds, which I don't think detracted from the muffin. The authors suggested topping the cakes with some chopped walnuts...instead I spooned the dregs of my last batch of granola). The muffins were incredibly moist and but again, lacked any sort of twinkle that would set this apart from something made from a cafeteria reliant upon packet mixes.





Ella's Birthday Cake
Okay. I know what you're thinking--there can't be a recipe for something called "Ella's Birthday Cake." You're right. There isn't. I wanted to give you an idea of what someone, with no confectionary talent can pull together based on what she learned from this book. It's not the fanciest or "cleanest" cake, but it's decidedly prettier than I'd produced before. I learned how to smooth on the icing and adapted the acorn technique for the multicoloured polka dots. Not bad for a first try, I think.

The Hansens give home bakers ideas about how they can make cupcakes and cakes a bit more festive. They can start off with basic techniques and then go on to create their own masterpieces.

So how does it rate?
Overall: 2.75/5
The breakdown:
Recipe Selection: 2.5/5
Writing: 3/5
Ease of use: 3.25/5
Yum factor: 2/5
Table-top test: Lies flat

Kitchen comfort-level: Novice
Pro: Decorating instructions that can take decorators from square one to beyond.
Con: The cakes taste so absolutely...boring.

cheers!
jasmine

What I'm reading: The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad

I'm a quill for hire!

On My Rickety Shelves: Gale Gand's Brunch

Thanks to the lovely people at Random House, a copy of this month's cookbook selection was delivered to my kitchen as part of Cookbook Spotlight.

Gale Gand’s Brunch!: 100 Fantastic recipes for the weekend’s best meal By Gale Gand with Christie Matheson
Clarkson Potter/Random House Canada
208 pages; $32

Each meal comes with its own baggage. Formal dinners evoke multiple courses of sometimes stodgy preparations, complete with esoteric place settings. Normal dinners—created under time constraints—may rarely see the entire family, together, at one sitting. Weekday lunches more often than not can be microwaved leftovers or unidentifiably consumables lifted from a frybasket hastily, wolfed in a cubicle while finishing up that report or this presentation. Breakfast (for those of us who care to break the fast) may be a quick pre-packaged grab-and-go affair or simply a highly caffeinated liquid meal.

And then there’s brunch.

Brunch: the hybrid early-ish meal that’s neither breakfast nor lunch. It combines languidness with occasion. Yes, I fully realise the oxymoronic overtones I imbue the meal, but it is a repast that can incite contrary behaviours. At a time when meals are increasingly solitary events, brunch gathers a crowd—whether it’s a crowd of two or 12. It’s celebratory and social. Those whose first instinct is to avoid a proper morning meal and quite possible treat the mid-day break as an opportunity for errand-running or brisk-walking will make time for a table featuring waffles and poached eggs, brown sugared bacon, tartlettes, light soups, pastries and grilled sandwiches.

It is, quite possibly, one of my favourite reasons to eat. As if I ever really need a reason to eat.

Gale Gand, James Beard Award-winner pastry chef, restauranteur and American TV personality, takes on brunch in her sixth cookery book Gale Gand’s Brunch! 100 Fantastic recipes for the weekend’s best meal. Her inspirations come from travelling Europe and the US, taking with her ideas rooted in “a hot milky cup of coffee served with warm butter pastries and intensely flavoured jams.” She presents it as a near-perfect entertaining meal, one that’s sweet and savoury, easy and relaxed.

Her recipes cover a number of topics, including drinks, eggs, breads, savouries, salads and condiments. Not all her recipes are photographed—and Ben Fink’s images are quite lovely—but as someone who rarely allows fripped imagery to sway a cooking decision, this doesn’t bother me (yet I suspect those who use images as a crutch to preparing new-to-them foods may see it as a detriment).

Apart from generally being clear and accessible, the recipes can offer inspiration beyond the same-old same old. Gand helps home cooks go beyond traditional and sometimes predictable flavours to delicious and sometimes inspired combinations, from ginger scones with peaches and cream to roasted pears and rhubarb with orange to watermelon gazpacho.

I think her strength is her ability to take something simple and with a little bit of zhuzhing, turn it to something slightly out of the ordinary. For example, from her basic omelette—seasoned eggs cooked in a pan—to easy and elegant fillings including tri-colour bell pepper, ham and cheddar; oven roasted tomatoes, scallion and goat cheese, and caviar with crème fraîche.

I tried to choose wisely in my recipe selection, by varying dishes as a good representation of what she offers: easy and involved, food and drink, as well as differing main focal ingredients. In general, the recipes I tried produced tasty foods, but in a couple of instances I thought were a little too fussed for me, or could have grabbed me more. I suppose if you are cooking to impress, then a certain amount of extra steps are necessary, but if I’m inviting you for brunch, my goal is not to impress. My goal is to visit with you and have a meal at the same time.

Baked eggs in ham cups (p68)
This is a fancy way of doing oeufs en cocotte. Here, I didn’t follow the recipe exactly as written: the ham I had wasn’t big enough for the muffin bowls I think Gand called for, so I prepared them in cupcake tins, which means I could only break one egg into the hammy bowl. I also didn’t have little tomatoes, so instead used a sundried tomato pesto, instead of basil pesto. It was tasty and relatively easy, but I think I’d prefer to do them in little ramekins and not deal with removing them from the cupcake tray.

Cranberry-Almond Granola (p102) This was a perfectly adequate breakfast cereal, but it was slightly lacking—I would remove some of the oatmeal and introduce sunflower seeds and perhaps some flax seeds to the mixture. I’ve had it for breakfast every day for a week, either with warmed milk or vanilla yoghurt, and haven’t tired of it.

Hot Cocoa with brown sugar (p22)
Quite honestly…once you try this, you’ll probably not go back to powdered mix again.

Torta Rustica (p65)
Augh. Maybe it was my mood, but this was fussier than it needed to be. AND it seemed to take a full afternoon to assemble. AND I could have done it with one sheet of puff pastry instead of two. It was very pretty when sliced—with strata of ingredients nearly perfectly set—and quite the tasty main dish. It would pair nicely with a green salad with balsamic vinaigrette.

Gand takes the home cook from basics and then with a few switches leads them through deliciously simple variations that will satisfy both the cook and guests alike


So how does it rate?
Overall: 3.75/5
The breakdown:
Recipe Selection: 4/5
Writing: 3.5/5
Ease of use: 3.5/5
Yum factor: 4/5
Table-top test: Lies flat

Kitchen comfort-level: Novice-intermediate
Pro: Solid basic recipes that can be tweaked to taste or adventure level.
Con: Just thinking of that torta makes me tired.

cheers!
jasmine

Daring Bakers: Lasagne of Emilia-Romagna

• Recipe's origins: Lasagne of Emilia-Romagna from "The Splendid Table: Recipes from Emilia-Romagna, the Heartland of Northern Italian Food"
• Recipe's orginator: Lynne Rossetto Kasper
• Our hostess: Mary of Beans and Caviar
• Our co-hostesses Melinda of Melbourne Larder and Enza of Io Da Grande

The March 2009 challenge is hosted by Mary of Beans and Caviar, Melinda of Melbourne Larder and Enza of Io Da Grande. They have chosen Lasagne of Emilia-Romagna from The Splendid Table by Lynne Rossetto Kasper as the challenge.

As much as I love being a part of the Daring Bakers, I've often felt there's too many challenges involving sweet baking. Don't get me wrong, I love cakes and cookies and pies and whotnots, but I think it's important to remember that savoury baking can require just as much skill and patience as sweet offerings.

Is savoury baking the poor cousin to much-loved and sought-after sweet baking? Not in my books.

Needless to say, I was doing a little dance of joy when I found out our lovely hostesses chose home made pasta as an integral part of our challenge.

My Dear Little Cardamummy once attempted homemade pasta. It was...umm...disgusting. I don't think she followed a recipe and what she produced was doughy and stodgy and sat in my tum like a lead-lined brick. I did my best to discourage further experiments. Whether or not she continued, I don't know as I think I've blocked all other attempts at feeding me her pasta have been blotted out of my memory.

Fast forward to this past Christmas. The lovely people at KitchenAid met with me as a follow up to their 2008 Kitchen Trends Report (Adobe Acrobat required), which I co-authored, and offered me a pasta machine attachment for my stand mixer. Of course I accepted and immediately thought of a couple of things I wanted to try it out on...pasta and non pasta alike.

Yeah, I didn't roll the pasta sheets by hand, as required in the challenge. But I had a new piece of equipment and I so very much wanted to try it out. For those of you who have been salivating over the attachment--I'm quite happy with it--after hand kneading the dough, I ran it through the rollers a few times and came up with a very lovely product.

Home made pasta is quite easy (and I'm sure if Mum had a recipe, her attempt would have been much more successful). The only thing I would do differently is purée the spinach instead of finely chiffonading it. The chunks were a bit large and I think was the cause for a few nervous moments of dough tearing during early rolling stages.

I used the challenge's bechamel, but substituted half the milk for heavy cream--I had some in the fridge that needed using up. My word the sauce was good. I had to be careful to keep from...ahem...oversampling.

The ragu was my own which I made and froze a few weeks before I knew about this month's challenge. Quite simply: soften diced onions, carrots and celery in olive oil, add a small tin of tomato paste and fry for a bit. 300g each ground pork, beef and veal, then a 798ml tin of unspiced puréed tomatoes and a good glug or two (or three) of red wine. Add salt, pepper and basil, stir well so the meat is nicely mixed, cover and set simmer for about an hour or so. Stir every once in a while. Check for doneness and flavour, spice as you see fit.

I didn't want an overly tall dish, so I limited my layering, reserving the rest of the pasta and sauces for future use. The finished lasagne was delicious--one of the best I've had.

To see what the other Daring Bakers did, please visit our blogroll.

cheers!
jasmine

On My Rickety Shelves: Animal Vegetable Miracle

Thanks to the good people at Harper Collins Canada for providing me with this month's book.

Animal, Vegetable Miracle: A Year of Food Life
By Barbara Kingsolver with Steven L. Hopp and Camille Kingsolver
Harper Perennial
370 pages; $17.50

Transplantation stories—kit and caboodle packed up and moved to strange and alluring surrounds—are a bit of weakness. Tim Parks, Peter Mayle and Georgeanne Brennan have all sucked me into their travels and travails as they navigate new customs, meet the local colour and slowly try and work their ways in to the weft of their new neighbourhood fabric. Amusing, eye-opening and painfully self conscious these books help to satisfy my armchair travel-cum-voyeurism. Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal Vegetable Miracle walks in this genre, but also tramples on socio-political foodism that is de rigueur.

The book’s premise is simple: Kingsolver, her partner and children leave Arizona for an Appalachian farm to grow their own food, eat locally and basically become better people for it. They grew a lot of vegetables, raised chickens and had various “a-ha” moments regarding food production and food consumption.

Multi-authorship is a tricky premise to execute effectively and in my opinion, this is a prime example of too many cooks. Kingsolver is the main narrator, recounts mushroom hunting, travelling to Montréal, market shopping and other slices of life. Interjections about modern food production appear from her partner Steven L. Hopp, including treatises on locavorism, food pricing, and genetically modified foods. Her daughter Camille provides her own insights into the familial adventures along with recipes and menu ideas.

I had a hard time getting into this book. I started it several times, and at each attempt I set it back on the table with great exasperation.

Barbara Kingsolver is a very good writer. Primarily known as a fiction writer, her words engage the reader and bring her new community (and her family) to life. If this book were “only” a story about a family moving out to a farm and their adventures and learnings, it would be a fabulous read. Unfortunately, it’s not. Hopp’s essays contain a degree of earnest, evangelistic scholastic work usually voiced by those who’ve just learned about how food gets to our plates. Readers would be better served by Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dillema or Gina Mallet’s Last Chance to Eat. Camille Kingsolver’s essays are marked by purpled prose indicative of schoolgirl essays; quite honestly, I was quickly disinterested in the younger Kingsolver’s words and barely skimmed most of her passages. I think I’d have rather read Lily Kingsolver’s (Barbara Kingsolver’s youngest daughter) views of the process. Really.

The differences in styles and abilities interfere with the text’s flow, and to me create a chopped and disparate book. The anecdotal recounts of their experiences are fun to read, but I’m not sure if they balance out the food politics presented, nor are they salves to what seem like her daughter’s indulgent passages.

cheers!
jasmine

On My Rickety Shelves: Nigella Christmas

Thanks to the lovely people at Random House Canada, a copy of this month's cookbook selection was delivered to my kitchen.

Nigella Christmas: food, family, friends, festivities
By Nigella Lawson
Alfred A. Knopf/Random House Canada
288 pages; $50

Christmas does strange and occasionally deluded things to people. Overcome with seasonal cheer, nostalgic traipses to family dinners which may or may not have actually happened, or simply psychic pressures for those who need a GPS to find their kitchens to become instantaneous domestic goddesses (or gods) sees many people planning grand yet intimate entertaining. Booksellers line windows with covers featuring beautifully simple yet ornate tables complete with celebrity authors with whiter than white teeth bared in a welcoming grin that exudes “There’s no way you can mimic in a few hours what the small militia of cooks, stylists and other sorts take weeks or months to do…but I’ll let you believe you can…” Television specials are little better: perfectly coiffed, presenters with nary a drop of exertion or stress-induced dew punctuates the ease in which Stepford homemakers can pull together a perfect Christmas for the perfect set of family and friends.

Perfection is never my goal. Deliciousness is. Mind you…when others seem to push their culinary envelope, I’m more than content to fall into familiar routines. Don’t get me wrong. I love my November-December foodish rituals: fruitcakes and sticky toffee puds, dozens upon dozens of cookies, turkey with the trimmings…cognac. There’s a sense of comfort in doing the same old-same old. But at the same time there’s a part of me that searches for something new or, at the very least, a new-to-me way to prepare something not so new…that doesn’t eat up the last remaining moments of a far-too-crammed schedule.

Nigella Lawson’s latest recipe collection, Nigella Christmas: food, family, friends, festivities, promises readers practical, no-nonsense holiday inspiration. A companion tome to her 2007 three episode Nigella’s Christmas Kitchen, Lawson provides additional recipes and advice to those hoping for entertaining that can run from elegant to homey.

The book itself is what I’ve come to expect from a post How To Be A Domestic Goddess Lawson: gorgeous, glossy with La Lawson herself as the ultimate bit of food porn, tucked between sparkly-topped biscuits, glistening and glazed cocktail sausages, and juicily studded gammon. Recipes are divided into nine sections, each focussing on a different part of cheery holiday entertaining, including suggestions for “mass catering” and not-so mass catering for cocktail parties, side dishes friendly suppers, Christmas baking edible gifts, pages on both the main holiday meal along with a Christmas brunch, hot drinks and, as is her way, foods to combat the season of overindulgence. Heck. She even offers a stress-relieving Christmas rota to help plan the big day.

For me, Lawson’s lure is her words. My goodness, she’s not afraid to use her vocabulary…nor does she seem overly concerned with dumbing herself down for the masses—where else, in modern writing, would one read

“So the following, I hope, will allow the abstemious to raise a garish glass
with the rest of us.”

Her turns of phrase are voiced with experience, practicality and an honesty that never seems forced or contrived. One of my favourite lines is about the Tiramisu Layer Cake (p93):

“I wish I were the sort of person who could make enough but no more, but that’s
never going to be the case: when I made this for my brother’s birthday, he came
back round for a couple slices the next day. And that’s the way I like it.”

The recipes are trademark Lawson: practical, delicious and rooted in tradition but updated to modern flavours and tastes. For example her “luscious dinner for 6-8” (p70) features a lamb and date tagine, red onion and pomegranate relish with gleaming maple cheesecake for dessert. No, in this case it’s not everyday food, but it’s warm and hearty food to be shared with friends. Each recipe is easily followed and has make-ahead or freeze-ahead tips within the margin. Most, if not all, are photographed. Most of the recipes serve at least six people, with relatively few for smaller groups of diners.

One thing I was quite concerned about prior to receiving the book was North American publisher’s preoccupation with translating weights into volumes—grams of flour to cups of flour. Rarely, in my experience, are the Americanised instructions as accurate as the original (and dare I venture a guess that there are problems when going the other way ’round); mentions of problems in her earlier tomes are scattered far and wide throughout the blogosphere. Thank goodness the good people at Random House Canada did not winkle away at the original text. As far as I can tell everything is left in its original English. Yes this may pose problems for some, but really…all you need to do is buy a scale (mine’s from Canadian Tire) and look up the Centigrade to Fahrenheit conversion.

All that said, the value of a cookbook is in the cooking. Wherever possible, I scaled down the recipe to serve four or so people.

Cuban Cure Black Bean Soup (p264)
This is what I call a “pantry soup”—pretty much everything can be procured from a tin (okay, not the sausage, herbs or onions, but still) and combined into something quite tasty. This is my new favourite soup—spicy, hearty and a flavourful broth.

Potato, Parsnip and Porcini Gratin (p64)
Loved the smokiness and sweetness from the star anise and parsnips. The only thing I didn’t like was how the fat separated from the cream, leaving a bit of an oil slick. I’d probably increase the amount of milk while decreasing the cream.



Rolled stuffed loin of pork (p 158)
My friend called this pork-stuffed pork, wrapped in pork, which is an incredibly accurate description. A great balance between sweet and salty and very, very easy to make. Chose to forego the ruby sauce...wasn't in a saucy mood.







Incredibly Easy Chocolate Fruit Cake (p180)
As its title beckons, it is incredibly easy to make. I’ve made it for our Christmas pudding so I can’t say how it will taste…but it’s bound to be moist—not for its regular boozification, but for the chopped prunes.








Truth be told, I’m usually sceptical about holiday cookbooks—they overpromise on dreams and underdeliver on ease. Not Nigella Christmas. Her home-friendly recipes and guidelines make this book extremely easy to use…at Christmas and whenever you need to cook a special meal for family or friends.

So how does it rate?
Overall: 4.5/5
The breakdown:
Recipe Selection: 4/5
Writing: 5/5
Ease of use: 4.5/5
Yum factor: 4.5/5
Table-top test: Lies flat

Kitchen comfort-level: Intermediate
Pro: Gorgeous words that accompany easy and delicious recipes
Con: This is crowd cooking—not many options for intimate entertaining

cheers!
jasmine

On my rickety shelves: The Food You Crave

Thanks to the lovely people at Random House Canada, a copy of this month's cookbook selection was delivered to my kitchen.

The Food You Crave: Luscious recipes for a healthy life
By Ellie Krieger
Taunton Press/Random House Canada
320 pages; $33

Admittedly, whenever I hear any combination or derivation of the terms detox, recipe low-fat, low-salt, low-cholesterol or healthy I cringe. Years of reading about this diet and that lifestyle, vilified foods, praised foods, not to mention the eventually contradictory nutritionism conditioned me to block out most of the good-for-you, you-should-eat-this-way noise that bombards us daily. My personal eating mantra is pretty simple…and very reminiscent of Michael Pollan’s “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants,” along with avoiding packaging that tries to convince you of the contents’ edibility.

Granted, it can be difficult finding food (and yes, it depends upon what you declare “food”—My Dear Little Cardamummy is convinced lobster isn’t food). Finding food-like things is easy. I’m not saying there isn’t a place for food-like things—I fervently believe a healthy diet does include the occasional Swedish berry—but too many food-like things can be an issue: hence the proliferation of the above, cringe-worthy-to-me terms.

The thing is, food (by my definition food is healthy) should taste good. Unfortunately, it seems as if many of the healthy-monikered foodstuffs I’ve eaten don’t taste good—they are bland, soggy, mealy...boring.

I’ve never understood it.

Shouldn’t one reward good behaviour? As in: if you avoid overreliance on polyhydrogenatedsalisucraloseinatified foods by eating (umm…) real ingredients, the food should not only taste good, but also make you feel good and hopefully happy.

Take the vast majority of the Milk Calendar recipes I’ve been cooking through this year: they were developed to use dairy and have some sort of nutritional balance. Well…some weren’t bad, but others tasted so horrid, I wonder what on earth happened to the recipe developers’ and taste testers’ mouths (and brains) to ever declare those recipes…tasty.

So when I flipped through this month’s cookery book selection, I was a little nervous. Ellie Krieger’s The Food You Crave: luscious recipes for a healthy life had the warning signs of a book that “meant well”—earnestly written with an eye towards nudging readers towards the healthy lifestyle du jour. She is a registered dietician and hosts Healthy Appetite, on the US’s Food Network.

Her expository was heartening to me…in fact, Krieger won me over in the introductory paragraph to her food philosophy:

“In my food world, there is no fear or guilt, only joy and balance. So no ingredient is ever off-limits. Rather, all of the recipes here follow my Usually-Sometimes-Rarely philosophy. Notice there is no Never.”

Here’s a compliment: Quite honestly, if it weren’t for her tips on things like building a better muffin and Mediterranean-inspired eating and boxes of nutrient numbers that accompany each recipe, I’d not think of this as a healthy eating book. I’d think it was a “normal” general-purpose cookbook. Really. The unappetising nature of many “healthy” or “diet” recipes is pretty much absent in her suite of recipes. Breakfast can include Poached egg with herb-roasted turkey breast and sweet potato hash, dinner can be Spinach with warm bacon dressing, and supper can be Tuscan roasted chicken and vegetables. And dessert? Banana Cream Pie. Need I say more?

The book itself is fresh and light. Well-written and easy to follow recipes punctuated with the occasional (lovely) photograph. The entire book itself is simply designed and, well, inviting.

Every recipe I tried worked really well produced delicious food that made me feel…good. What more can I ask for?

Curried Butternut Squash Soup (p 78)
Incredibly easy and very tasty, and (like many good soups) was incredible the next day. I used a the hot curry powder I have in my pantry…probably should have reduced the quantity a bit.





Sage-rubbed pork chops with Warm Apple Slaw (p 195)
The chops were so intuitive, I wouldn’t call it a recipe…but it was a good reminder of how tasty simply prepared food can be. Apart from the unending chopping, the slaw was easy to pull together. I think it could have used a little sugar or honey, but otherwise was very tasty.











Mocha cake with Mocha Cream Cheese Frosting (p 282)
This was a very good and moist cake. As I’m of the school that believes cake should have a tender crumb, so the whole wheat nubblies in the crumb turned me off. I’m not a fan of dolloped frosting, so the relatively thin layer was just perfect for me.






The Food You Crave is exactly that. The food you crave.

So how does it rate?
Overall: 4/5
The breakdown:
Recipe Selection: 4/5
Writing: 4/5
Ease of use: 4/5
Yum factor: 4/5
Table-top test: Lies flat

Kitchen comfort-level: Novice
Pro: Easy and delicious healthy foods
Con: Can’t think of any.



cheers!
jasmine