The tangy balsamic-soaked cherries are just an option -- the "cake" is amazing all by itself!

This is one of those rare “cakes” that swings easily from sweet to savory — comfortable before, during, or after the meal. Our family friend, Sarah (close pal of daughter #1), first brought this torte to a dinner party to accompany Winter Vegetable Stew. It was a cold, wintery evening, and the torte was the perfect compliment to the rustic soup. When Sarah and I set out to make it again for Kitchenelly, we decided to spin it to the sweet side, and top it with cherries (fresh from Oregon, jammed into my suitcase). It complied convincingly. And last night I made it as an appetizer. I sprinkled the batter with thinly sliced shallots before baking. Once again, a stand-out with the prosecco. You want this in your repertoire, just like that little dress in your wardrobe that works for a barbecue and a fancy cocktail party (speaking from a woman’s point of view, of course).

Sarah Green, who will be writing for Kitchenelly when I can get her

This post introduces Sarah, who will be writing for Kitchenelly when she isn’t crushing grapes or cooking from the wonderful bounty up in Napa Valley where she’ll be working through the Fall. She is a recent college graduate and fantastic baker — Sarah has been baking since she could reach the counter. She’ll bring a lot to Kitchenelly and I’m looking forward to her posts.

Goat Cheese Torte | 8 to 12 servings, depending

This goes together so quickly and is so easy, yet it has an elegant and sophisticated flavor. Feel free to cut back on the sugar if you want it a little less sweet. Sarah’s recipe is inspired by Dorie Greenspan’s from her beautiful book, Around My French Table.

8 ounce “log” of soft goat cheese
1/2 pound fresh cherries
1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
The leaves of a 6-inch spring fresh thyme
Butter for the pan
Flour for the pan
5 large eggs
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon sugar
3 tablespoons cornstarch
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Pinch of salt

Remove the goat cheese from the refrigerator to soften at room temperature.

Pit and halve the cherries and place in a bowl.

I love my cherry pitter but watch out for stains -- that's why we're not doing it on the wooden board!

Toss with the balsamic vinegar and thyme leaves and set aside until needed.

The cherries with macerate slightly with the balsamic, releasing some of their juices

Preheat the oven to 400°F.

Very generously butter an 8-inch round cake pan, and then coat lightly with flour.

Separate the eggs.

Sarah and I both use the eggshell method for separating eggs -- carefully crack the egg, and gently pour the yolk back and forth in the shell halves until the white is released

Getting any yolk in the white will prevent the white from beating properly -- also, any shell bit that gets in the white can be removed easily by using the shell half as a scooper

In the bowl of a mixer, combine the goat cheese, egg yolks, 1/2 cup of sugar, cornstarch, and vanilla and beat until creamy and smooth, about 3 minutes.

Smooth and creamy with all the goat cheese blended in

In a mixing bowl, beat the egg whites with the pinch of salt until soft peaks form. Sprinkle with the remaining 1 tablespoon of sugar and continue beating a minute or so more, until stiff peaks form and the whites are shiny. With a spatula, stir 1/3 of the whites into the cheese and egg batter. Scrape the remaining 2/3 of the whites onto the batter and fold in gently.

Try not to stir at this point, which will deflate the whites

Pour the batter into the pan and bake on the middle rack at 400°F, without opening the oven, for 15 minutes.

Pour gently to keep the whites as puffy as possible, and don't shake the pan

Reduce the heat to 350°F and cook another 25 to 30 minutes, or until well-browned on top and cracking. The cake will puff up while baking, but settle as it cools. Cool on a rack for 10 minutes and then turn the cake out onto a plate, turning top side up.

Make sure to put this little torte in your wardrobe repertoire to pull out for any event — it’s a keeper.

Kelly McCune © 2011

©2012 Kitchenelly. All Rights Reserved.

Like (one of) Lada Gaga's outfits on the Grammys -- sheer, transparent, bumpy

Three important things came together in this dish:

1.  I prepared this dish, as instructed, for a “dinner club.”
2.  I bought a torch, took back a torch, bought another torch, took it back, and finally bought the right one. Then I learned how to use it.
3.  I tackled the finer points of a recipe written by one of the preeminent molecular gastronomy chefs in the country, Grant Achatz of Alinea in Chicago.

First off, I’ve never attended a dinner club, though I’ve heard about them. The husband and I were invited as the guest couple, and warned in advance that we’d be asked to prepare a very specific dish and bring wine to go along with it. I happily agreed, and a few days later got a fax of the recipe. It was a little tough to read, so I checked out a blogger who is working her way through the cookbook in question. Some of her first words were “…I made this dish over two days…” — ack! This will often scare me off a recipe, but I was committed.

My recipe was “Transparency of Manchego Cheese” from Alinea, Mr. Achatz’s cookbook for regular folks. He is a pioneer of molecular gastronomy — for those of you who are still scratching your heads, it’s cooking by chemistry, using science to inform choices about ingredients and flavors and to understand the underlying transformation that food undergoes when it is cooked or combined. For a great explanation and funny video, check out Chow. Now I’m not the most precision-oriented cook, nor am I terribly good at carefully following a recipe, and this doesn’t jibe too well with this kind of cooking. However, I bravely dehydrated olives, without a dehydrator and the wrong kind of olives. It does take hours, so plan ahead. I roasted peppers, garlic, dried out croutons, but then came the olive oil pudding — what?

What is olive oil pudding doing on a cheese course? What is olive oil pudding? Not only that, I couldn’t get any purchase on the recipe since it was written in grams. Yes, even the liquid measurements were stated in grams — that’s weight, not volume.

Yessir, 60g olive oil -- by weight! -- is in my world 1/3 cup

It’s all up in the lab, here. Well, I’d already bought a torch (later) and squirt bottles and dang it, I didn’t own a digital scale so I used my little postal scale — hah! Very cute but it took a couple of attempts to nail it just right. But I do have it down, and wow, olive oil pudding may just be the food of the gods. All questions or concerns about its presence on this dish are hereby settled.

That would be 525g whole milk, yep, 2 cups

On to the torch, though. I confess I’ve never torched anything. I’ve worked with hot grills and flames and experienced all kinds of incendiary moments, but no hand-held torch. I’ve wanted one, though. So I bought one for this recipe at Bed, Bath & Beyond.

Cute but tame

Brought it home, juiced it up with butane, but the wimpy little flame would hardly hang on! So I took it back and exchanged it for another one. Much better…or so I thought.

I took this fun new purchase to the dinner club, along with all the other parts of the dish — the anchovies (okay not “white” anchovies), dehydrated Calamatas (sorry, they didn’t have pitted Niçoise!), garlicked-up crostini (well, croutons seemed so small), roasted peppers, and roasted garlic (with rosemary, because that seemed more…interesting), and the olive oil nirvana pudding (not in a squirt bottle, though, because gee, that seemed silly).

Well, the other couples were bringing their A-game to this dinner. We started off with a beautiful salmon carpaccio in a cone thingy, stuck into rock salt. A-m-a-z-i-n-g. Then a crab dish with a flavor-of-the-sea gel, a perfectly grilled tenderloin with an agar-thickened sauce, some foam thing somewhere, it was all fantastic. My turn. I assembled the dish, layered on the manchego and my poor little flamer pooped out on serving #2. Fortunately my hostess had the real deal out in the garage. Yes, folks, go for the industrial strength of a propane blowtorch. You’ll feel like a welder!

If you keep it clean it won't look like you brought it in from the garage

I have now made this dish a few times, each time tweaking the ingredients and the process. The dried-out olives and peppers are such breakthrough flavors for me that I’m considering a dehydrator. I think I’ve got it down, and with apologies to Mr. Achatz, I present my version of Transparency of Manchego Cheese.

Not Quite Alinea’s Transparency of Manchego Cheese | 8 servings

1 cup pitted Niçoise or other black olives (40 in all)
1/2 pound mini sweet peppers or mini bell peppers
Ciabatta or other crusty bread for crostini
Olive oil
1 garlic clove
8 anchovy fillets
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
1/2 pound Manchego cheese

For the Olive Oil Pudding:
2 cups whole milk
4 egg yolks
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/3 cup olive oil

Preheat the oven to its lowest setting (mine is 170°F but some ovens go lower). Scatter the olives on parchment on a large baking sheet. Halve, seed, and remove the ribs and tops of the peppers. Scatter them with the olives on the parchment.

A colorful array

Place the baking sheet in the oven until the peppers and olives are very dry, approximately 6 hours.

Slice the bread into four large or 8 small 1/2-inch slices and toast on both sides. Brush immediately with olive oil on one side and rub lightly with the cut side of a garlic clove.

Brush one side with olive oil

Just a light rub of cut garlic -- raw garlic is strong, so one clove will be more than enough for 8 pieces

Cut larger bread slices in half for two servings -- make extra of this to serve on the side

Have the anchovy fillets on hand.

I found nice, mild anchovies packed in oil with peppers

To prepare the olive oil pudding: In a medium-sized saucepan, bring the milk to a boil over medium-low heat. Meanwhile, in a medium-sized bowl, whisk the egg yolks, sugar, cornstarch and salt together until blended.

The mixture may be a little dry, but just scrape it out of the whisk with a knife and keep mixing until its blended

When the milk has just boiled, scoop out 1/2 cup of hot milk and pour it into the bowl with the egg yolks, whisking to incorporate the hot milk. This tempers the yolks.

Whisk in the hot milk quickly and vigorously until smooth

Pour this mixture back into the saucepan and whisk to blend. Reduce the heat to low and bring the mixture to a simmer, whisking almost constantly. This may take another 5 to 7 minutes.

If you whisk *too* constantly, you'll actually keep the mixture cooled off so that it won't come to simmer

When the mixture simmers, remove it from the heat. Pour in the oil, whisking constantly to incorporate and cool the mixture. Pour into a bowl.

Whisk in the oil, quickly and vigorously -- you're making an emulsion, so you want to do this with gusto

Allow the pudding to cool for about 10 minutes, whisking periodically to keep it from forming a skin. Place a sheet of plastic wrap directly on top of the pudding and cool to room temperature.

You'll find you want to "taste" this pudding several times...just to make sure...of what, I can't tell you!

Chop the dried peppers and set aside.

This was my substitution for roasted peppers, and they are fantastic -- I'll be making these often, to add flavor to dishes and salads and pastas. Same is true of the dried olives

To assemble the servings: In a small saucepan over medium-low heat, reduce the balsamic vinegar until thickened, about 5 minutes. Drizzle this along the centers of 8 heatproof plates. Arrange a large spoonful of pudding, an anchovy fillet, 5 olives, and a crostini.

Very thinly slice the Manchego cheese using a sharp cheese slicer or a mandoline and arrange in one layer covering everything.

The saltiness of the anchovy and olives is perfectly offset by the pudding

Fire up the bad boy torch and broil away

Using the torch (or under a broiler or salamander), melt and scorch the cheese over the ingredients.

I recommend it -- don't know why I waited so long to get myself one of these, because the scorch has its own particular flavor

Sprinkle the chopped dehydrated peppers over the top of each serving.

Now that you know I won’t follow a recipe, you’re crossing me off your dinner club invite list, right?

Kelly McCune © 2011

©2012 Kitchenelly. All Rights Reserved.

Thin, crisp on the outside, sweet flavors on the inside

The Husband is Jewish, so through marriage I’ve been pulled into the mystique of the latke. It is truly an irresistible food — so easy, really, but I was always timid about making them. After all, shouldn’t there be a bubbe somewhere in my kitchen, teaching me the ins and outs? Do I have the exact right grater? Flour or matzoh meal? I mean seriously! But the Husband has no demands latke-wise, and my mother-in-law lost the knack years ago in the shuffle of living in places like Seoul, Amsterdam, Manila, and Dallas. I’m on my own here.

I have made latkes in the past, but with regular potatoes. I have failed, however, to absorb the technique, so every year is like a new start — how long do you drain the potatoes? Well, Daughter #2 has been coming home every year from her school’s “Yam Festival” raving about the sweet potato latkes, so I decided to give them a try. Less pressure since they are less traditional. She was right, they are delicious, especially with some homemade applesauce and sour cream. And these are made with a lot less oil (shhh, don’t tell the bubbe!). So Happy Hanukkah, or heck, just make ‘em for any day of the week.

Granny Smiths and a couple of Honeycrisps

Homemade Applesauce | 2 cups

You may be wondering why in the world you’d make applesauce from scratch. The answer is that it’s fast and it couldn’t be simpler. You can season it, sweeten it, cook it down, leave it chunky, add herbs, add wine — all in under a half hour. Here’s the short version of the recipe: Peel, core, chop 8 apples, throw in a pot with sugar and seasonings and small amount of water, cook gently 25 minutes. Done.

8 tart apples
2 heaping tablespoons sugar or to taste
Cinnamon stick
1-inch chunk of fresh ginger
Small pinch of thyme (optional)
1/4 cup water

Peel and core apples and cut into large chunks.

I use a paring knife but if you prefer a peeler that's fine -- whatever is fast

I just cut the apple around the core into 4 hunks (rather than search the drawer for my apple corer)

Apple chunks, cinnamon stick, and ginger chunk (leave some peel on it so you can identify and remove it at the end -- !)

Put the apple pieces, sugar, cinnamon stick, ginger, thyme and water in a pot. Cover and cook gently for 25 to 35 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the apples are tender and mostly falling apart. Let cool, remove the cinnamon stick and ginger, and serve.

This is cooked on the shorter side to make a chunkier applesauce

Sweet Potato and Leek Latkes | makes 24 to 28 latkes

Might as well invite people into the kitchen to eat these as you make them — it’s more convivial, and they are so good right out of the pan!

1 large leek
2 large sweet potatoes
3 tablespoons chopped chives (about 12 long chive stems)
1 teaspoon salt or to taste
1 egg, beaten
4 tablespoons flour
1/3 cup canola oil, more or less
Olive oil

Trim the root from the leek and cut off most of the green tops. Cut in half lengthwise and rinse between the layers. Drain well and pat dry. Cut the leek into a fine lengthwise julienne.

Grit tends to collect between the leek layers, especially toward the top end, so rinse well

Cut the leek first into julienne strips...

...and then chop it down a little further for a fine shred like this

Scrub the potatoes and pat dry. Halve and coarsely grate. Chop the chives.

I didn't bother to peel the potato -- the extra color and nutrients are nice!

Nice color and flavor in the latkes

Combine the shredded leeks, the grated sweet potatoes, and the chives in a large bowl. Add the salt a little at a time, mixing well as after each addition. Mix in the beaten egg. Sprinkle in the flour, tossing the mixture to coat evenly.

Sweet potatoes are "dry" enough that they don't require draining for latkes like regular potatoes

Make sure the egg and flour are evenly distributed throughout the potato mixture

Preheat the oven to 200°F. Line a baking sheet with a rectangle of a paper bag, inside facing up.

Heat a thin layer of canola oil along with a few drops of olive oil in a large skillet over medium to medium-high heat. When the oil is hot, form the latkes: on your hand, put a blob of potato mixture about the size of a golf ball. Flatten it against your fingers, and drop that right down onto the hot pan. Form another one and drop it in, repeating until you fill the pan. The latkes should sizzle but not smoke.

Cook the latkes on the first side until deeply browning and crisping, 2 to 3 minutes. The latkes cook fastest on the first side since there is more oil. Flip them carefully and cook on the second side until nicely browned, 4 to 5 more minutes.

They should hold together but be fairly thin

A nice, deep flavorful brown -- the sweet potato caramelizes beautifully

Place the cooked latkes on the paper bag-lined baking sheet and keep warm in the oven.

The bag keeps the latke crisp, and still absorbs the excess oil

This is a great way to keep latkes warm — that is, if you have any that haven’t been snatched right off your spatula!

Happy Hanukkah.

Kelly McCune © 2010

©2012 Kitchenelly. All Rights Reserved.

From a "head" of garlic come "cloves" -- a large clove of garlic on the left, and small clove on the right, and some of the "paper" of the garlic head has been peeled off

I love garlic. Just the right amount of garlic, that is. There is a restaurant nearby (or 100 restaurants) that has taken the public’s love of garlic to the extreme — they are quite simply overdoing it, and that gives garlic a bad name. They have gallons of pre-chopped garlic on hand, so the temptation to slop just a little more each time into that pasta dish or onto that pizza has resulted in a garlic knock-down, and you come out smelling like the stuff.

Rules of thumb: mince, chop or whatever you’re doing to the garlic just before using it. It’ll be fresher and less bitter. Resist the urge to go wild with it, and exercise restraint if you’re using it raw. Rub your fingers with a lemon wedge to get rid of the smell, unless you like it on your hands!

Raw garlic can have a caffeine effect on some folks, so keep it to a dull roar. I had just discovered the wonderful technique of rubbing the cut side of a garlic clove onto toasted and oiled bread, but I wasn’t given the instruction to use one clove of garlic for, say, 12 to 15 pieces of bread — maybe not even a whole clove is needed. Just a brush-by, not a grind. Anyway, I must have used several cloves, and wow, those crostini were crazy-strong. We ate ‘em up, and then I was awake all night with a very stimulated heart rate and some breath that would have been enough for any vampire.

Moderation = Love.

Roasted garlic = Passion.

I really want one to myself, but I will share

How to Peel, Chop, Mince, Paste and Roast Garlic

Regular garlic has smallish cloves, 12 to 15 of them per head. Look for a compact, firm, non-sprouting head for the freshest flavor. Elephant garlic is something between a leek and garlic, bearing some flavor resemblance. Its big cloves are milder but can be used in the same way.

If you need only a clove, peel away some of the paper and snap one off of the outside of the head. To break up the head, turn it to angle down against the board and give it a good whack. One way is to hold the heel of your hand against the garlic, and use the other hand as the “hammer.”

Turn the head at a downward angle to the board and give it a good smack with the heel of your hand

The cloves will easily break off the root. They can be used just like this — with the paper on — to roast with chicken or meat. Then you will squeeze the pulpy garlic out of the paper to eat with the chicken.

To remove the paper from an individual clove, place the flat side of a chef’s knife on top of the clove and give it (again!) a good whack to crack the paper. Depending on how hard you’ve whacked it, the clove will either be whole or impressively smashed.

Just a firm pop with the heel of your and will crack the paper

Trim off the root and pull away the paper.

This one I gave a mild whack, so the garlic clove is fairly intact but the paper peels right off -- when you trim off the root the paper will come away completely

Four degrees of strength applied to the whack on the knife gives you cloves ranging from intact to smashed

A whole, intact garlic clove can go right into a stew or sauce, which can be removed before serving. I like to split them so that the oils come through but they are still easy to find when I want to take them out. Cook whole cloves gently in butter and cream for half an hour to mash and add to mashed potatoes. Slice whole cloves for the basic Italian aglio/olio combination, which I use for pasta, boiled potatoes, and countless other dishes that would be good with some garlicky oil.

Make the classic pasta sauce, aglio, olio e peperoncino, by gently cooking sliced garlic and red pepper flakes in olive oil

Cook it gently because garlic gets bitter if overcooked

From here, depending on how far along the initial smash takes you, you can chop (large dry chunks), mince (small dry chunks), or mince to a paste (gooey and pasty). The helpful ingredient in any of these processes is salt, which makes the garlic a little sticky and prevents the little bits from flying around on the board.

This is a medium-smashed clove of garlic -- sprinkle just a tiny pinch of salt on it before chopping

The salt makes it a little sticky and helps the garlic cling to the knife -- this is chopped and can be used in any recipe that calls for chopped garlic

Use the knife to "gather up" the garlic as you keep chopping it -- this is minced at this stage

To move to the paste stage, smash the minced garlic against the board with the side of the knife, breaking the chunks down, and then continue to chop it, alternating between the two

This is pretty pasty, and will melt nicely into a dish where you don't want the garlic to have an obvious presence

Roasting garlic renders it so tame and mild and sweet, a delicious condiment for a hunk of great Italian bread. Hard to say how many to make, but I would easily eat half a head of it, with no adverse effects.

Preheat the oven to 375°F. Line custard cups or muffin tin cups with foil (for easier cleanup). Use fresh, whole, intact heads of garlic. Peel away the outside papery layers, but leave the cloves attached. Trim just the top of the garlic head, leaving most of the cloves covered with their paper.

Some recipes instruct you to cut a lot off the top, but I like to let the garlic cook inside its own paper

Place the garlic in the cup and drizzle it with a teaspoon or so of olive oil, aiming for the spaces between the cloves. Rub the outside layers to coat. Sprinkle with sea salt and place a rosemary sprig under the head if desired.

Try to drizzle between the cloves

After rubbing with oil, sprinkle the garlic head with sea salt and tuck a rosemary sprig underneath

Cook the garlic for 34 to 45 minutes in the preheated oven, checking to make sure it isn’t getting burned. Cover lightly with foil if it’s getting too brown.

Remove and serve on plate, drizzled with the olive oil that has collected at the bottom of the cup.

Garlic = Life.

Kelly McCune © 2010

©2012 Kitchenelly. All Rights Reserved.

Deep satisfaction in deep winter

I’ve had my share of winter this year. Okay, I know here in Southern California it’s nothing compared to what my pals in North Carolina, D.C., and even Dallas (8 inches!) have had to contend with. I did dip into it, though, with two trips to Oklahoma, each time blanketed by a “freak” snowstorm that was getting less and less unusual. And back here at home we finally have rain.

It was on one of those rainy days that I pinned down this butternut squash tart idea. A friend and I were talking about it (she’d had a good one at a pastry shop and we wondered how it was made), but I had a non-meat eater coming that evening for dinner so I needed to work it out. My mind will often go completely blank when I have to cook for a particular diet (like the time I could only think of beef stew with stout or coq au vin for my teetotaling friends…it’s like a tic! Don’t even ask me to cook for Passover — all I can think of is dairy, dairy, dairy). This is a savory tart, like quiche, but made with ricotta and goat cheese rather than egg, cream and cheese. It has the rustic flavor of something comforting for a cold winter night — the ones we have left, that is.

Butternut Squash Tart | 1 tart

I think you could make this with an acorn squash, but I haven’t tried it yet.

1 unsweetened pie crust (make the Slightly Sweetened Pie Crust but omit the sugar)
1 small butternut squash, about 2 1/4 pounds
Olive oil
Small pinch of herbs de Provence
Salt and freshly ground pepper
3 or 4 large shallots
1 15-ounce container of ricotta (whole milk or part-skim)
1 egg
1 tablespoon heavy cream
Small pinch of dried thyme
1.5 ounces plain goat cheese
2 tablespoon raw pumpkin seeds

Prepare the pie crust, and have the prepared crust in the refrigerator.

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Trim the bottom of the squash, scoop out the seeds, and slice into 1/3-inch rounds.

Trim off the bottom end of the squash

Scrape out the seeds and pulp

Slice into rounds -- use a large and sharp knife

Arrange the slices on a baking sheet and lightly oil each slice. Sprinkle with herbs de Provence and salt and pepper.

Oil each slice, top and bottom, to keep it from sticking to the pan

I often use (recycled!) foil or parchment to keep my clean-up to a minumum

Roast the squash in the preheated oven until browning, about 20 minutes.

Squash is done when it is tender and browning, particularly on the pan side

Set aside until needed.

Line the cold pie crust with parchment or foil and weight with pie weights, rice or dried beans. Cook in the 400°F oven for 8 minutes.

I still haven't gotten pie weights, which I think would be worth it

Remove the weights and prick the par-baked crust several times with a fork.

This keeps the crust from distorting, and par-baking it prevents it from getting soggy

Cook another 5 minutes. Set aside the partially baked crust until needed. Reduce the heat to 375°F.

Peel and thinly slice the shallots. In a skillet, heat a little olive oil and cook the shallots until soft and coloring, about 10 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

Cook them just until they get a little color

Spread the cooked shallots on the bottom of the par-baked pie crust.

Shallots have such a nice flavor -- something like a combination of garlic and sweet onion

In a bowl, mix together the ricotta, cream, egg, and thyme and season with a little salt and pepper.

Beat together until well blended

Spread the filling over the shallots. Break off small blobs of goat cheese and press them into the filling at regular intervals.

Your fingers are the best tool for this task

Arrange the roasted butternut squash on top of the filling.

Cover the top of the filling

I like the roasted rings on top, but any arrangement is fine

Press the squash gently down onto the filling. Bake in the 375°F oven for 35 minutes.

While the tart is cooking, toast the pumpkin seeds: coat them lightly with olive oil, sprinkle with salt, and roast in the hot oven for less than 5 minutes. When they begin to pop they will only need a minute more.

Rule Number 19: Never walk away from roasting nuts or seeds -- they burn when you turn your back!

Sprinkle the toasted seeds over the cooked tart. Serve warm.

Takes that leaky roof right off my worryin’ mind.

Kelly McCune © 2010

©2012 Kitchenelly. All Rights Reserved.

This was playoff game #1, then there was that crazy game #2 and now I'm saying Go Saints (but it would be Go Vikings...)

Uh huh. Yup. That’s right. I do watch the Super Bowl. Where I come from that would be considered a given (Oklahoma, home of reluctant but loyal Cowboys fans). But where I live is another matter. People in these parts approach the Super Bowl apologetically — put it in quotes. This might be different if we had a team in this megalopolis, but no. Did, don’t. Might, don’t yet. So we’re a fan amalgam of where we’re from, places we love, dream teams, underdogs. One constant, though, is that there must be a Super (Size Me) Sunday array of snacks. And in my little circle it’s wings.

Another name for this sports bar snack is Buffalo wings (so named for a restaurant in Buffalo, NY, where they are reputed to have been “invented”). And it’s perfect that Calvin Trillin, known for his love of anything that requires him to lick his fingers, was lurking somewhere in that area circa 1980, interviewing and eating, when this snack hit the big time.

I love wings but not the big franchise kind. They just don’t taste personal, and often come with either indifferent barbecue sauce or ranch dressing, a newer substitute for the classic accompaniment, blue cheese dressing. So I’ve taken on the wing, and the sauces as well. I used a dry brine and kept the wings in the refrigerator overnight to tenderize and flavor them. Once you’ve made your own you’ll be required to bring them to every Super Bowl party you ever attend — even in the NFL-free zone of Los Angeles.

Roasted Chicken Wings with 3 Sauces | 50 pieces

If you have lots of other food, allow 5 pieces per person. I’ve seen some hungry snackers go at it, though, so plan accordingly. I bought 5 pounds of wings, or 16 individual wings, which yielded 32 pieces. I also bought 2 1/2 pounds of drumettes at a considerably higher price per pound, and that was 20 pieces. I recommend buying whole wings and cutting them up yourself — it’s fast and simple and cheaper by a long…pass.

7 1/2 pounds chicken wings
For the dry brine:
2 tablespoons salt
2 tablespoons onion powder
2 teaspoons dry mustard
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon chili powder
2 teaspoons dried oregano
2 teaspoons dried thyme
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
1 teaspoon cayenne
1 teaspoon cumin
Oil

Cut the whole wings into two pieces, discarding the tip end.

Whole wing on the left, drumette -- the part closest to the breast -- on the right

With the tip of the knife, identify where the joint is between the drumette and the flat center piece of the wing

Cut firmly between the two ball joints

Trim off the wing tip -- it's a little harder to find the natural cut point, but it is below the joint where the two bones of the flat piece come together

Trim off any excess skin.

Sometimes the drumettes, especially, have a little extra skin

Arrange the chicken pieces in one layer.

All in a row...

Mix the dry brine ingredients together in a bowl and sprinkle over the chicken, turning to coat the underside.

Most important ingredients are the salt and the heat -- the salt "brines" the chicken and the cayenne determines the spiciness

If you are making more than about 50 wings be sure to increase the amount of dry brine

Place the wings in a couple of large, open plastic bags and leave them in the refrigerator overnight.

Just leave the top open, and if you remember, turn the bag over a couple of times

When you are ready to cook the chicken, preheat the oven to 425°F. Arrange the wings in one layer on one or two lightly oiled baking sheets. Cook for 50 minutes to 1 hour, trading shelves if you use more than one pan, and turning once while cooking.

When the wings are done, let them sit for 5 minutes to cool before removing them from the pan -- they will "unstick" more easily

Bourbon Bacon Barbecue Sauce | 2 cups

Oh, yes, very good.

3 slices good quality bacon, cooked crisp, drained, and minced
1 1/2 cups ketchup
1/2 cup bourbon
1/4 cup molasses
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
2 tablespoons espresso or very strong coffee
1 teaspoon dry mustard
1 teaspoon onion powder
Tabasco or other hot sauce, to taste

Combine all the ingredients in a non-aluminum saucepan.

I prefer not to use uncoated or untreated aluminum pans with tomato-based sauces

Bring to a gentle boil. Reduce the heat and simmer, very low, for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat and cool before serving.

Nice smoky flavor from the bacon

Curry-Ginger Yogurt Sauce | 1 1/2 cups

1 1/2 cups plain yogurt
1 tablespoon cream or half & half
1 1/2 tablespoons curry powder
1 teaspoon sugar1-inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and finely minced
6 or 8 sprigs of cilantro, leaves minced (about 2 heaping tablespoons)

Combine all the ingredients in a bowl and mix well.

This sauce is great on chicken salad, too

Not the usual Super Bowl fare, admittedly

Herbed Aioli

Serve wings with herbed aioli made from homemade mayonnaise — a wonder of garlic, olive oil and herbs. You may have to switch out the beer for a white Rhone.

Garlic & herb deliciousness

Now all I need is a couple of dollars ridin’ on the Saints…

Kelly McCune © 2010

©2012 Kitchenelly. All Rights Reserved.

A play on shapes: long & skinny, little ovals, and rectangles

The phrase “company’s coming” used to be popular when dinner guests were expected. Was that just Oklahoma? I don’t hear it said any more, but we do have “people over.” And there is usually a buffer snack, designed to stave off hunger if the thing in the oven is taking forever to cook and to provide a window for latecomers. But I’ve been fretting about this pre-game warm-up for a while now, since I’d found myself in a decided rut. I had slipped into the soft cheese/hard cheese/crackers array, with a possible olive or nut mix tagging along. Don’t get me wrong, I love to nibble exactly those things before dinner, especially washed down with a crisp but not too dry white wine. But something was missing.

I feel like a middle-schooler here, trying to justify why only the Converse® Design Your Own sneaker will do. I can give you soooo many reasons why I need something new:

1. I’m sure I’ve served the exact same cheese 10 straight times
2. My living room sofa is challenging since it’s really a day bed and one can’t lean in to the cheese board like they might want
3. I have only one cheese slicer

4. Even I am getting sick of that Spanish nut mix from Whole Foods
5. I can’t leave well-enough alone
6. I have some cool little wooden plates that are languishing in the cabinet

So out came the plates. I decided to arrange the appetizers on the plates and serve them that way; now everyone could have their own small plate to ponder, replete with goodies to nosh on at will. Sometimes it’s nice not to have to share.

Individual Appetizer Plates | 6 plates

The plates above are composed of breadsticks, roasted Lacinato kale (I like this variety for its mild flavor and non-fibrous rib), goat cheese “olives,” real olives, pan de higo and seared halloumi cheese with sage. Play with shapes and flavors and textures — but do join me out here, up and out of that rut. And on the day bed.

1 bunch Lacinato kale (also called Tuscan kale or dinosaur kale)
Olive oil
Sea salt
Parmesan or Romano cheese
8 ounces chevre
1 tablespoon zahtar
1 tablespoon smoked bittersweet paprika
8 ounce package (approximately) Halloumi cheese (sheep and goat milk cheese from Cyprus)
8 fresh sage leaves
Freshly ground black pepper
Pan de Higo (Spanish fig & almond cake)
Breadsticks
Assorted olives

Preheat the oven to 275°F. Rinse the kale, trim off part of the stem, and dry well.

This variety is beautiful -- a deep blue-green

Use a paper towel to dab the kale as dry as possible before coating it with oil -- this keeps it from steaming rather than roasting

Rub oil on your hands and then coat the kale lightly with the oil

If you have a oil sprayer, use that to lightly coat the leaves

Sprinkle the kale with salt and roast in the oven until very crisp and dry and slightly browning, about 30 minutes. Sprinkle with freshly grated Parmesan or Romano cheese and set aside until needed.

The kale browns slightly but maintains its great color

Press a spoonfuls of chevre into oval shapes, making 12 “olives.”

Goat cheese is crumbly but it will hold its shape if you press it together

Put the zahtar on a flat surface and roll 6 of the goat cheese olives in it until coated. Use more zahtar if needed.

These make delightful little bites, and no crackers are needed

Coat the other 6 goat cheese olives with the paprika.

Smoked paprika has a wonderful depth of flavor and a slight sweetness

Prepare the halloumi last, since it is best served warm. The other elements can be made in advance.

Halloumi comes packaged in a block of approximately 8 ounces -- it has a salty, feta-like flavor and a texture something like mozzarella

Slice the halloumi into 1/3-inch slices. You will have 6 to 8 slices

Trim the end pieces so they will lie flat in the pan

Heat a large pan, either cast-iron or non-stick, over medium heat. Have a sage leave ready for each slice of halloumi.

Place the sage top side facing out -- it will attach to halloumi as it cooks

Place the cheese, sage leaf side down, in the hot pan.

No need for oil, since the halloumi cooks in its own brine

Brown the halloumi, sage side down, for about 4 minutes, checking to make sure it doesn’t get too brown. Turn and cook another 4 minutes.

Halloumi has a high melting temperature, which is why is can be pan-seared or grilled

Sprinkle with freshly ground pepper and serve warm. Slice 6 pieces of pan de higo. Arrange each plate with a breadstick, a piece of roasted kale, 2 chevre “olives,” a couple of actual olives, a slice of browned halloumi and a slice of pan de higo.

Pass the vino, per favore.

Kelly McCune © 2010

©2012 Kitchenelly. All Rights Reserved.

A simple pump and your favorite olive oil turns the oil into über-PAM®

When PAM® first made its appearance on grocery store shelves back in the 1960s my mom was certainly an early adopter. It piqued her natural attraction to fun-new-food-items, but mostly it eliminated the ornery chore of greasing the cookie sheet for the endless chocolate chip cookies she made back in the day. Simple! Just spray it on! Oh, and by the way, PAM® stands for “Product of Arthur Meyerhoff,” its inventor. Yep.

I have resisted cooking spray for decades. Just can’t really see where it would be needed. A couple of years ago, however, I succumbed to one that was labeled “Organic Cooking Spray Extra Virgin Olive Oil” — all the right buttons pushed. The ingredient list kept putting me off, though: organic extra virgin olive oil, yes, but also organic grain alcohol, soy lecithin, and propellant. Now I’m not accustomed to propellant in food, because isn’t that something that pushes something else? When does that ever need to be in food? Alas, that same can still languishes on the shelf. In fact, I think I’ll go in there right now and throw it out.

Spraying and food don’t usually go together, unless you are a Easy Cheese® person. Good news, though! I finally brought home an olive oil mister, and I’ve been falling in love with it ever since.

The olive oil sprayer works without propellant. The lid acts as an air pump, pulling air into the chamber and creating enough pressure to force the oil through the fine mist sprayer. The Cuisipro (under $20) recommends filling the container 1/3 full and pumping the lid 12 to 15 times, or until it becomes difficult to depress. The sprayer will work for 15 seconds or so, adequate to oil a pan, coat vegetables, or flavor salad greens. If you haven’t finished your task, just pump it up again.

This is a Cuisipro sprayer, easy to fill and clean and is well-constructed

Leaving the contents “pressurized” may wear out the sprayer seal quicker than necessary. Be sure to loosen the sprayer top to release the pressure after using it. I find that twisting the top back on rather than a straight down push keeps from adding pressure before putting it away.

What do I use it for? I like to “rub” vegetables lightly with olive oil before grilling or roasting them, but it’s a nicer task with the mister. I think I might be using less oil, too. Here I’ve made the difficult job of lightly oiling kale by a quick spray with the mister.

Rinse and pat dry the kale, lightly spray with olive oil, and sprinkle with salt. Shown here is Tuscan kale (also called Cavolo Nero, Lacinato kale, Dinosaur or Dino kale) and Purple kale

Roast kale in a 275°F oven for about 25 minutes, or until it is crispy and holds its shape. This makes a great cocktail snack. Purple kale, which has a thicker, stringier spine, can be cut into ribbons.  First cut out the spine, stack the leaves and cut crosswise into strips, arrange them haphazardly on a baking sheet, mist with olive oil and sprinkle with salt. Roast, tossing the strips midway through cooking, until crunchy, about 20 minutes. They make a nice garnish for soup or pasta.

The Tuscan kale works best if you want to cook whole leaves since the spine is very narrow and not too stringy, though I've used some younger purple kale leaves here, split down the middle

©2012 Kitchenelly. All Rights Reserved.

The heat of the tomatoes softens the fresh mozzarella

Last Monday night was an all-round great evening. The subject, from 5:30 until 10:30, was food. Very, very good food. We started the evening at Nancy Silverton/Mario Batali’s Pizzeria Mozza, and since there were 7 of us we tasted 7 different pizzas. And yes, the fuss is accurate and deserved — the pizza is deeply good. Then we saw Julie & Julia at the Arclight Cinema in Hollywood, and both the movie and the theater itself were also deeply good (especially all things Meryl Streep). You reserve in advance at the Arclight, are seated by an usher, and very kindly admonished by the same usher to silence cell phones and mouths during the movie. Ahhhh. I may be spoiled forever for pizza and movie theaters.

But back to Pizzeria Mozza. We started the meal with a different take on a standby, caprese, which I resisted because I make it at home with some regularity. And now that my home-grown tomatoes are ripe and I’ve found some amazing mozzarella at the creaky (I mean really creaky) little Italian store down the hill, I was trying to hold it off. But caprese fans will out, and the thing was ordered.

I got a tiny bite of it but it was delicious. The hot roasted tomatoes plopped right onto the mozzarella begin to soften the cheese but leave behind its slight tang. The basil, instead of chopped and sprinkled on top, was pureed with olive oil and drizzled over the mozzarella, making it even easier to mop up the goods with some bread. And that is one of the great pleasures of the last bites of caprese: the mozzarella gives off a little briny “milk,” which mixes with the oil which mixes with the tomato which you try to dab up with a hint of basil. Here it’s making its own soup for you.

This is my take on Mozza’s caprese — and a new way to visit an old friend. Look for the freshest mozzarella you can find, and some really good bread to go with it. After all, Nancy Silverton is the woman behind all that bread at La Brea Bakery. And some of us need something good to go with our bread.

Little cherries and pears were what looked freshest that day -- my own pears had been finished off

Roasted Tomato Caprese Served Warm | 6 hearty servings

1 pound little tomatoes, such as cherry, pear, little heirloom, mixed varieties
Olive oil
Sea salt
25 to 30 basil leaves, about 5 large sprigs
3 tablespoons olive oil
Small pinch salt
Small pinch sugar
Small squeeze of lemon
1 pound fresh mozzarella
Freshly ground black pepper

Preheat the oven to 275°F. Wash the tomatoes and dry thoroughly. Place them on a large baking sheet and drizzle lightly with olive oil. Rub the oil over the tomatoes and sprinkle with sea salt.

I like to use a foil sheet so there's no clean-up, but I throw it in the recycling bin -- parchment would work, too

While the tomatoes are roasting, lightly rinse the basil and shake it dry. Chop coarsely.

There is some argument that rinsing the basil washes away some of the oils that flavor it, but mine is from my garden and has to be washed

You'll end up with a heaping half cup of chopped basil

If you have an immersion blender or a mini food processor, put the chopped basil along with the oil, salt, sugar, and lemon in the cylinder or bowl and puree until fine.

Here's my immersion blender, but it's not essential

The little squeeze of lemon will help keep the basil leaves bright

A cross between basil "sauce" and pesto

A regular-sized blender or food processor is too big for this job, so if you don’t have a little machine, simply chop the basil until its very fine and mix it with the salt, sugar and lemon.

Slice the mozzarella into rounds and arrange on a plate.

My creaky Italian market was closed (see how creaky?), so this mozzarella came from Whole Foods

Drizzle with the pureed basil, top with hot tomatoes, and sprinkle with freshly ground black pepper.

And pass the bread, please.

Kelly McCune © 2009

©2012 Kitchenelly. All Rights Reserved.