Lemonade to Keep in Your Fridge at All Times

Mint, rosemary and VANILLA lemonade. Vanilla! I made it for our friends Jon and Kelli the other night, and from now on and until the fall, I’m going to keep a batch in the fridge, always.

The recipe is from A New Turn in the South, and like the lemonade, Hugh Acheson’s book will have a heavy presence in my summer rotation (I wrote about his peach pie in my latest post).

The lemonade is great on its own. Kelli tried it with her beer, and was surprised to find it worked—even with the vanilla note. And I am absolutely sure it would be good with vodka, bourbon or even tequila.

The very last glass poured from the pitcher is the most vanilla-ish; the seeds, which make it through the straining, sink to the bottom rather prettily.

Damn, this is good stuff.

Mint, Rosemary and Vanilla Lemonade

Adapted from Hugh Acheson’s recipe in A New Turn in the South

8 cups water, just boiled

8 lemons, halved and juiced (you’ll use both the juice and what remains of the lemons)

1 cup white sugar

10 sprigs of fresh mint, plus a handful of leaves to garnish the pitcher / glasses

1 or 2 sprigs rosemary

1/2 vanilla bean

In a large non-reactive pot or bowl, put the lemon juice and the juiced halves, the sugar, the mint sprigs, the rosemary and the vanilla (split the pod, scrape the seeds into the pot or bowl, and throw the empty pod in, too). Pour the boiling water over, give it a gentle stir, and let it stand for 30 minutes, leaving the flavours to infuse.

Strain the liquid into a large pitcher, discard the solids, and refrigerate. Serve very cold, over ice, with some fresh mint leaves. 

Peach Pie

In this heat, all I want to do is cook from A New Turn in the South. Hugh Acheson is from Ottawa, but he cooks in Athens, Georgia, and in Atlanta.

And his kind of cooking—definitely southern, with refreshing twists that will cool you right down—sits well with me on these hot, humid Toronto days.

When I bought a basket of peaches at the market, I went straight for Acheson’s cookbook.

Admittedly, peach pie that needs to be baked for forty-five minutes is not his best recipe for the hottest days.  You have a choice: Either wait for a cool day, or promise yourself you won’t lose it and kill someone in your excruciatingly hot kitchen.

Peach Pie

Adapted from Hugh Acheson’s recipe in A New Turn in the South

Pie crust (your favourite butter-based recipe), enough for two layers of a 9-inch pie plate

½ cup packed brown sugar

1/3 cup white sugar, plus 1 tablespoon for sprinkling

3 tablespoons arrowroot OR 2 tablespoons cornstarch plus 1 tablespoon white flour

2 teaspoons cinnamon

Pinch of salt

Peaches (Acheson recommends 8 large ones, I used a dozen smallish ones), peeled, pitted and sliced)

1 ½ cold butter, cubed

1 egg, beaten

First, prepare your dough. Roll out the bottom on a floured surface, and place into a 9-inch pie plate, trimming the excess. Roll out the top dough, and punch out a few decorative (and practical—the steam will escape) shapes with a small cookie cutter. You can reserve the punched out pieces to decorate the top of your pie, too.

In a large bowl, combine the sugars (except for the 1 tablespoon, which you’ll reserve for the top of the pie), arrowroot, cinnamon and salt. Mix in the peach slices until coated evenly. Immediately (and before the whole thing becomes a goopy mess), pour into the prepared pie dish. Scatter the cubed butter over the fruit, and place the second layer on top, pinching, crimping and trimming to make it tidy. With a brush, spread a thin layer of egg (if you are decorating your pie with the cutouts, coat the under side of the cutouts to make them stick). Sprinkle the sugar on top.

Place the pie in the freezer for 15 minutes or so, while you heat your oven to 415F. Place a large cookie sheet in the oven to heat it up. That is something I’ve just learned from Acheson. I believe it helps distribute the heat evenly across the pie crust.

To bake the pie, place the plate on the pre-heated cookie sheet. Bake for 15 minutes, then reduce the oven to 370F and bake for a further 30 minutes, or until the crust is golden, and the peach filling is bubbling enthusiastically.  Serve with much vanilla ice cream and preferably outside, under the shade. 

Toronto's Tigers and Elephants

We both had time off at the end of June, so Andrew took me to the zoo.  While he took some excellent photos with his Nikon, I played with the TiltShift Generator App on my iPhone.

Zoos have always tickled me. Every fall my parents would take my brother and me to the zoo in Winnipeg.  October or November were the perfect time—cold enough that the tigers were slinking out of the coolness of their dens to have a prowl around, paw at the glass, and give us a growl, for good measure.

And this latest trip to the Toronto Zoo was on an oddly cool day in June, so the cats were on the prowl, and everything else was either squawking, honking or enthusiastically burrowing noses into sand, on the hunt for some juicy grub. 

Dessert For Breakfast

I realize this photo makes this oatmeal look like something a forlorn and mistreated child in a Roald Dahl story might have for breakfast.

In reality, it’s on par with having pie for breakfast—strawberry rhubarb pie, with a dollop of cream.

Not much of a recipe here, but for guidelines on cooking steal cut oats, see my post on the magic properties of the stuff.  Along with the water and oats, I added chopped rhubarb, strawberries, a grating of lime zest, and a spoonful of brown sugar. By the time the oats were cooked, the rhubarb and berries were softly stewed.

Returning to Mexico City

It had been a long time.

Yet, when I landed in Mexico City, I headed into the subway, and I slid right back in. Back into the habits I developed there, as a student, five years ago--Habits like keeping your eyes peeled for bustling taco joints or a decent looking burger cart, and habits like planting your buttocks firmly into the subway seat to avoid sliding into your neighbour's lap when the driver inevitably slams on the breaks.

My visit to Mexico City, as incongruous as this might sound, felt like a breath of fresh air. The bustling, the shouting, the smoke rising from makeshift grills on the sidewalk--it got my heart pumping, and left me grinning ear to ear.

  

The last meal I had, before my flight out, was a sopa Azteca, that slightly-too-ubiquitous "tortilla soup" you find in Mexican restaurant menus here in Canada. But this one was rich, and complex.

To recreate it at home, and I went straight to Diana Kennedy, the doyenne and archivist of traditional Mexican recipes. The closest thing I could find is her recipe for sopa Tarasca, in her book, The Art of Mexican Cooking. Kennedy explains that there are two types of Tarascan soup: this one, which is close to tortilla soup, and another that is made with a base of pureed beans.

The flavour of this soup comes from its ancho chiles. Anchos are dried poblano peppers, dark red, smoky and aromatic. You can find them, along with your epazote and Mexican oregano, in Latino markets (if you live in Toronto, Kensington Market has it all).

Maybe you’ve noticed that I don’t have a photo of my soup. My apologies—I wasn’t planning on posting the recipe on the blog. The picture above is from Mexico City’s Central de Abastos, a colossal wholesale market that feeds 80% of the city.

Sopa Tarasca, or Tortilla Soup

Adapted from Diana Kennedy’s recipe in The Art of Mexican Cooking

Serves 4 as lunch, or as a substantial starter

For the broth:

½ cup water

½ lb tomatoes, roughly chopped, with skin and juices

1 very small onion, sliced

2 ancho chilies, stem off, deseeded, deveined and soaked in hot water for 

            10 minutes

1 corn tortilla

1 tablespoon safflower or sunflower oil

5 cups chicken broth

1 or 2 sprigs of dried epazote

A few good pinches of Mexican oregano

Salt, to taste

For all the wonderful stuff that goes into that broth:

6 more corn tortillas, cut into strips, and shallow fried in oil until golden and

 crisp

3 more ancho chilies, stem off, deseeded, deveined, pounded flat, torn into

garnish sized bits, and very briefly fried in a bit of oil

A good handful of cubed or torn fresh mild Mexican cheese (such as

asadero), or crumbled queso añejo

Crema fresca or sour cream to drizzle

1 avocado, cubed

4 small radishes, thinly sliced

1 lime, cut into wedges, to serve

Instructions:

In a blender, combine the water, tomatoes, onion, drained ancho chilies, and tortilla. Puree until smooth.

In a heavy soup pot, heat the safflower oil, and pour the puree into the pot. On medium high heat, fry for about 8 minutes, mixing frequently. Stay close, and make sure it doesn’t burn. It may spatter.

And the chicken broth and the epazote, and gently simmer for ten to fifteen minutes. Season with salt and Mexican oregano.

In each of the four bowls, arrange the fried tortilla strips. Gently ladle the broth over the strips. Arrange the remaining ingredients, except for the lime, on each soup (some may sink, some will remain prettily on top). Serve immediately with lime wedges to squeeze.  

I Made Lamb Tagine Twice Last Week

As you may know I’ve been spending some time with a cookbook by David Tanis, Heart of the Artichoke. So far, both recipes I’m writing about have included golden raisins.

Which leads to me think of another good reason to publish The Review Series (of which, by the way, this is part 2.2). When you stick to one cookbook for a week or two, you’ll find the ingredients repeat themselves, which means that you need to skip out to the grocery store less frequently.

Anyway, that being said, I haven’t been skipping out the door to fill the pantry very much over the last few days—or even peeling my miserable self off the couch.  I’ve had the flu. I’ve lost five pounds. Bananas, rice, juice, toast, and repeat. Milky coffee? Nope. NO! Abort, abort!

I’m on the mend though, and I feel better now. But yesterday, I couldn’t even drink one beer, which leads me to believe I’m not quite there yet.

That being said, I tried this lamb tagine recipe last week, when all was well and no one knew that the entire country would be hit by a massive stomach flu. I made this beautifully, heavily spiced and fruity lamb stew—twice. Once with lamb shank, and once with lamb shoulder.

David Tanis is just so lovely. His menus are beautiful, his meals hearty. The photography has an almost dreamy, hazy quality to it. And this particular stew is so warm and inviting that I ate it all week.

I modified his recipe for Fragrant Lamb with Prunes and Almonds, based on what was in my pantry. For one, it became Fragrant Lamb with Prunes and Pine Nuts.

Also, as with my last recipe, if you’re missing one of the many spices, don’t run out to buy it. Either substitute it (sensibly), or omit it.  Looking at the ingredient list, you may think it’s heavy on the ginger (both fresh and powdered). Trust me, it melds in with the other flavours beautifully.

I also opted for a one-pot approach. If you have a tagine, or if you want to make it in a well covered baking dish, you could do as he does:  Only sauté the onions on the stove top, and then pile everything together and pop into the oven. But if you have a Dutch oven, or something large that can go from stovetop to oven, here’s what I did:

Lamb Tagine with Prunes and Pine Nuts

Adapted from a recipe in David Tanis’ Heart of the Artichoke

Serves six, over rice or with crusty bread

6 lbs. lamb shanks (whole and trimmed) or 4 lbs. boneless lamb shoulder (in chunks, and trimmed)

Salt and pepper, to taste

2 tbsp. butter

2 onions, chopped into largish pieces

A pinch of saffron

Six to eight cloves of garlic, chopped

A thumb-size of fresh ginger, peeled and chopped into fine slivers

1 cinnamon stick

1 tsp. coriander seeds

1 tsp. cumin seeds

1 tbsp. powdered ginger

1 to 2 tsp. cayenne powder (depending on your taste for heat)

1 cup golden raisins

2 cups pitted dried prunes

4 cups chicken broth

1 cup tomato puree

For the garnish:

A small handful of pine nuts, briefly toasted in a dry skillet until golden

Preheat the oven to 325 F.

Season the lamb with salt and pepper, and set aside. Prepare all your garlic and spices and have them ready to throw in all at once.

In a large Dutch oven, melt the butter, and sauté the onions with the saffron gently until they are just soft. This will take five minutes or so.  Now add your garlic and spices, and briefly sauté along with the onions, for thirty seconds. Remove from the heat, and add the raisins and half of the prunes. Give this a good mix, and then tuck in the meat, piling the onion, spice and fruit mixture on top of it. Pour the broth and tomato puree over this.

Cover with a tight fitting lid, and bake for two hours. About half way through the baking time, have a peek, and stir things around a bit to rotate the meat so that any un-submerged parts have their turn in the spicy juices.

When the two hours are up, take the pot out of the oven. Remove the lid, mix in the rest of the prunes, put the lidless pot back into the oven, and crank the heat up to 400 F.  Bake for another 15 minutes.

Remove the stew from the oven, and let it rest for ten or fifteen minutes. To serve, pile onto plates or bowls, and let the guests scatter pine nuts over the stew. 

Spice Cake for a Sunday Afternoon (The Review Series: 2.1—David Tanis’ Heart of the Artichoke)

This Sunday was April first, April Fools’ Day. When Andrew had his back turned, changing a record, I splashed soya sauce into his coffee. It was a giggly, silly, rainy afternoon.

It was also a perfect afternoon to have a long, lazy drawn out lunch. We had a friend, Daemon, come over. I made some fat chunks of tuna braised in chickpeas, and a crunchy green salad.

I also made this David Tanis cake. It’s dense and interesting. Works wonderfully with strong coffee and some oranges.

A note on the book: It’s called Heart of the Artichoke, and I love, love, love it. For the most part, it’s built on menus – spring, summer, fall and winter menus, and menus for large groups.  I sometimes use David Tanis’ books as launch pads for my own menus. If, for instance, I already know I’m making roast chicken, I’ll go see what Tanis serves with his roast chicken. It gives me ideas, if not a recipe itself.

Here’s a sample of what Tanis’ menus look like. From his Spring Menus, “Reclaiming Arugula”:

-Fennel Soup with a Green Swirl

-Pork Scaloppine with Lemon, Capers, and Chopped Arugula

-Zucchini Pancakes

-Italian Spice Cakes

-Tangerines

There was arugula and fennel in the salad I served that afternoon, but if I was in keeping with this menu, it was accidental. I did, however, serve tangerines.

Italian Spice Cake

Adapted from a David Tanis recipe in Heart of the Artichoke

A wonderful thing about this cake is that you barely get anything dirty. Once you’ve simmered your sugars in a large saucepan, you can mix the rest of the ingredients directly into it. You never end up dirtying a bowl.

The list of ingredients is long, but it’s mostly the spices. If you’re missing one or two, don’t rush out and buy it just for this cake. A small omission won’t make that much difference.

½ cup water

½ cup sugar

¼ cup honey

The zest of an orange

The zest of a lemon

½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

A pinch of grated nutmeg

A pinch of cayenne powder

¼ teaspoon ground cloves

¼ teaspoon ground allspice

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 tablespoon cocoa powder

2 eggs, beaten

½ cup golden raisins

1 cup whole almonds

1 cup unbleached white flour

½ cup almond flour

Pre-heat the oven to 375 F. Grease a 9 or 10 inch tart pan with butter.

In a large saucepan, bring the water, sugar and honey to a simmer for a minute or two.

Take off the heat and mix in the zests, the spices and the cocoa. Now add the eggs, mixing to a smooth, uniform consistency. Now, add the nuts and raisins, and stir. Finally, add the flours, alternating between the two types.

Pour the batter into the cake pan, and smooth in all directions with a wooden spoon. Bake it for 30 to 40 minutes, or when a toothpick comes out dry. After about ten minutes of cooling, unmold the cake, and set on a cooling rack. This cake is good the day after, too.

A quick note to readers:

I’ve been told that there’s a glitch on the comment section of the blog. If you try to leave a comment and it doesn’t work, please send me a quick email, dianeeros@gmail.com . I’ll see if I can resolve this. Or just write to say hello! Thanks.