an open cupboard

It’s day 30 of NaBloPoMo. Can you believe it? Posting daily has become almost normal. I find myself writing more fluently, no stalling and pondering what exactly I want to say, writing, and deleting, and rewriting. In fact, on the days that followed the three days that I was too knackered to post, I felt a little out of practice. Daily posting seems to turn a spigot in my head that lets the words out. Sometimes, the words link together harmoniously, like a daisy chain coming full circle. Other times, I throw metaphors around like so much confetti after a really boisterous new year’s eve party. Still, this NaBloPoMo thing has inflamed the itch to write, and for that I am grateful.

Another thing I’ve learned is that posting every day is exhausting, though not for lack of ideas. The more frequently I post, the more I think about food, the more I want to share with you. But all the cooking, thinking, writing, editing, and rewriting—and lest we forget: photo snapping, winnowing, grimacing at bad photos, resizing, and uploading—is a lot of work. It’s like talking on the phone with your best friend for three hours. Great fun, but you could so use a nap afterwards.

Mostly, it’s been hard on poor A. November has been a blur of grocery shopping, planning Thanksgiving, cooking, posting, cooking, posting, cooking some more, and dropping in to say hello to my husband between posts. The poor man has forgotten what my face looks like, seeing only the glow of the laptop screen reflected on my forehead. “In December, I’ll have my wife back,” he says. I’m sure A is one of many NaBloPoMo spouses and partners who deserve a prize for their patience this November. Hmm… I’ll have to come up with something good.

This dish was born, as so many are, of ingredients that happened to be lying around. The squash—pumpkin—actually, was lounging around the wooden produce bowl, chatting up the onions and apples. The spinach leaves were chattering in the fridge, complaining of the damp and chilly turn the weather had taken. The bacon, of course, said nothing, as the hog it was made from had long since gone to piggy heaven. A box of spinach spaghetti called out from the cupboard, so as not to be excluded. “I know I’m green, and that’s a little weird for pasta, but you must’ve bought me with something tasty in mind,” he pleaded. True. No reason to discriminate against a noodle for being green. Pasta comes in all shapes, sizes, and colors, and every one is beautiful in its own way.

As my ingredients had taken the trouble to talk to me, I had no choice but to respond with pots and pans, a cutting board and a knife. What’s that, you think it’s violent and cruel to place a knife at the neck of a talking gourd? It’s not so much an act of violence as it is rearranging all the players for the play. A whole pumpkin is too big and haughty to share the stage with mere spinach leaves. But cut it down to size, say an inch and a half, and a squashy type becomes fast friends with delicately leafy spinach type folk. Bacon may not say much, but its smoky, crunchy presence is felt by all. Even green spaghetti is happier after boiling, its rigid, anxious strands now loose, and playful, and dancing. The grand finale is a pat of butter that bows to the audience as it melts on the hot pasta. “Ah!” sighs spaghetti, contentedly. And so do I, as I take a bite.

pasta with smoky sweet spinach and squash

pasta (enough for 2-3)
4 rashers streaky bacon
butter
1 small leek, split, washed and sliced into half coins (greens removed)
250 gr squash, cubed
3-4 handfuls fresh spinach leaves, washed and drained
allspice, salt, pepper to taste
maple syrup

• Cook the pasta per the instructions on the box.
• In a large cast-iron skillet, fry the bacon on low to medium heat. You want the bacon to slowly turn golden brown. Remove from the pan and put on a plate as soon as it has browned on both sides.
• Drain the bacon fat into a heat-proof container and save for a future use.
• Melt the butter in the skillet and add the leeks. Stir and cook until the leeks begin to turn golden.
• Add the squash and stir. Cover the pan for a few minutes so that the squash steams and begins to soften.
• While the squash cooks, crumble the bacon into small pieces.
• Uncover the pan after the squash softens.
• Season with allspice to taste.
• Add the spinach a handful at a time and stir.
• Pour in a small amount of maple syrup, about a teaspoon.
• Add the crumbled bacon and stir to incorporate. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Serves 2-3

Here it is, day 7 of all you can eat. Inspired by Sam, the originator of this foodblogging challenge, I put together a slideshow of the foods I ate on day 7. It’s not nearly as pretty as Sam’s slideshow, but it does the job.

It’s been an interesting ride. I haven’t written down everything I eat in quite some time, and I’ve never shared this information with the blogosphere. Writing about and photographing what I eat has caused me to think about my eating habits, and possibly tweak them somewhat. As a result, this has turned out to be one of those experiments in which the result is directly affected by the mere act of observation. Would I have eaten all the things I did had I not been publishing them? Who knows. Would my diet have included an infinitely smaller proportion of turkey had this challenge taken place in August? Definitely.

Click the photo below to watch the show.

Everything else I ate:

• day 1
• day 2
• day 3
• day 4
• days 5 & 6

I am sick to death of leftovers. Sick… to… death. If I never eat another heritage turkey again, I can’t say I’ll be disappointed. No matter how much homemade cranberry sauce you eat it with, turkey gets a little old when you’ve been eating it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for, oh, I don’t know… four days straight. Of course, by next year I’ll have forgotten all about the horror of leftovers and go through the whole silly ritual all over again.

Note to self: next year make ten pounds of pie instead of turkey. Leftover problem solved.

It takes only one holiday full of cooking, eating, overeating, and endless cleanup to smash a twenty two day NaBloPoMo streak. By the time the last dish was in the dishwasher and the kitchen counter was white again, I was thirty minutes past the daily deadline and several minutes away from collapsing into bed. But I’ve continued taking photos of all my meals, although, strangely, I only have a few photos of some of the numerous dishes served at the Thanksgiving meal.

breakfast

Welcome to breakfast on Thursday, November 23rd. This is my attempt at photographing the usual shake from a different angle.

snack

For my mid-morning snack, I ate a slice of sourdough bread dredged in a little bacon grease and spread with a bit of butter. I had just prepared the dressing for the turkey. The herbed bacon grease that coated the otherwise empty cast-iron skillet smelled so delicious, I had to taste it.

lunch

Lunch was a brief, hurried affair, consisting of a slice of buttered sourdough bread and the remaining tofu cilantro salad.

thanksgiving dinner!

The heritage turkey was gorgeous and delicious. I slipped herb-infused butter under its skin and stuffed the cavity with a quartered lemon, half an onion, some unpeeled garlic cloves, a carrot, a celery rib, and some sprigs of fresh thyme. The turkey baked for about an hour or so at 450° F (232° C). I baked it breast-side down, then turned it breast-side up about halfway through baking. The turkey was evenly browned all over, and had wonderfully crisp skin and succulent meat.

Vegetarian cornbread stuffing, made with Anson Mills cornmeal (great stuff!). I combined a few recipes to make this stuffing. It features pomegranate seeds, leeks, and celery. Tasty, but a bit crumbly. It might’ve needed more vegetable stock, or perhaps some MEAT to make it stick together.

These are chocolate birthday cake, flourless chocolate birthday torte, and pecan-crust pumpkin pie, all prepared by my brother d, all delicious. The chocolate cake is based on a very caramelly Callebaut, whereas the flourless torte includes a smokey Valrhona.

Stay tuned for more reports on Thanksgiving dinner…

Hanging out with your 3 and 5 year old nephew and niece while trying to prepare a Thanksgiving meal is exhausting. Ask me how I know. Tonight’s post will be minimalist in nature, as I’m about to pass out. Just thinking about all the cooking I’ll be doing tomorrow makes me question my sanity.

To those of you who feel as though they too have been passed through a salad spinner one too many times, I have a suggestion. Sometime between now and tomorrow afternoon, take 10 minutes and meditate. Or do yoga. Take a cat nap. Daydream. Draw a picture with crayons. Eat some chocolate while lying on the grass and staring at the clouds (or lying on the bed and staring at the ceiling, if the grass is too wet and the sky is too gray). Just take a few minutes for yourself, breathe deeply, and smile. It’ll help you panic that much less later on.

Here are my food photos for today. You can fill in the blanks.

Yes, my afternoon snack was pie dough scraps. What? Like you’ve never eaten raw cookie dough?

This post is day two of documenting all you can eat, a blogging event hosted by Sam of Becks and Posh.

I spent the day at the de Young Museum with my family visiting from out of town. We had lunch at the museum cafeteria, which is actually pretty good.

breakfast

Breakfast was a strawberry, almond milk shake with half a banana, coconut butter, ground flax seeds, and cinnamon. Yes, it’s exactly the same as yesterday. I like a simple breakfast—one that requires little to no thought this early in the morning. My five-year-old niece would be overjoyed to eat a pink breakfast.

My French butter with fleur de sel sits quietly in the background, just waiting to be spread on some crusty bread.

lunch

The lovely salad was baby spinach and arugula with goat cheese and fresh sliced beets. The beets were rather mild, but tasty. The burger was medium rare Niman Ranch with provolone cheese on an Acme bun. Pretty good burger (although not rare as I ordered it), with a rich, beefy flavor. The bread was several notches above typical burger buns, with a pleasantly firm texture that withstood the meaty juices.

snacks

My mid-morning snack was eggplant spread samples with crisp flatbread chips at the Ferry Building farmers market. The smoky fire-roasted eggplant spread was my favorite. Sadly, I don’t remember the name of the producer.

For an afternoon snack I had about a quarter of a large shortbread cookie with nuts from Bakesale Betty (purchased at the Temescal farmers market on Sunday). These are some buttery cookies, and not too sweet. The nuts add both flavor and texture, rounding out the cookie.

dinner

My brother-in-law cooked a great dinner tonight! We had barbecued burgers with barbecued bacon and aged cheddar cheese on English muffins. I put together some home made ketchup by cooking down overripe heirloom tomatoes with apple cider vinegar, brown sugar, salt and pepper. There was also a garden salad with a balsamic vinegar dressing and oven baked potato wedges. I took the opportunity to finish up my broccoli, bok choy, and seaweed from yesterday.

The bacon-burger-cheddar combination is brilliant, I highly recommend it. Barbecuing the bacon gives it a smokier taste, which complements the burgers very well. The cheddar adds a tangy flavor and a creamy texture (I didn’t melt the cheese). The ketchup was quite good, if I do say so myself. I threw in the tomatoes, seeds, skin and all, which produced a chunky, more natural tasting ketchup.

afterward

Looking over these photos, I’m a little shocked at today’s menu. I don’t think I’ve ever eaten that much beef in a day. I think tomorrow will be a vegetarian day, otherwise I might start growing horns and udders. And blimey, I’ve been eating a lot of junky snacks. Shall I eat more fruits and vegetables tomorrow? Will I abstain from meat? Stay tuned to find out.

Sam of Becks and Posh has issued a challenge: document everything you eat between November 20th and 26th. Being a word-centric person, I completely forgot that this challenge involved photographing everything I eat (duh!). So I’m afraid today’s entry is missing a breakfast photo, and, er, the lunch photo is a little unusual. But all of this week’s breakfast photos should be much the same as today’s, so worry not.

Wait a minute, I hear you say. What’s this all about anyway?

Sam thought it might be fun to see what food blogger’s actually eat on a daily basis, as opposed to the usual foie gras with calvados reduction served on a bed of dry-farmed heritage xanga. (What’s xanga, you say? It’s such a rare heritage plant that nobody’s ever heard of it. Pronounced ZANE-gah.)

Here’s all I could eat, day 1.

breakfast

My usual almond milk smoothie with fresh strawberries, half a banana, coconut butter, cinnamon, and ground flax seeds. It’s a very portable breakfast, which you can drink in the car or on the train. It’s usually quite tasty, depending on the combination of berries I use and the sweetness of the berries. Sometimes I throw in some raw chocolate nibs for zip and zing.

lunch

Due to last night’s laziness, I relied on the cafes at work for sustenance. Not the best idea. I had teriyaki chicken breast with cilantro rice and tempura butternut squash. The chicken was alright, only a little dry, and the teriyaki sauce wasn’t too sweet. The cilantro rice was a bit mushy, but it had a nice cilantro flavor (I ate it despite myself, just for the cilantro). The tempura squash was neither tempura, nor squash (discuss). The tempura coating was soggy with oil (ugh!) and the vegetables weren’t squash at all, but rather somewhat flavorless string beans. To their credit, the flavor of the string beans was probably overpowered by the tempura coating. I bought some greens at another cafe, to make sure I had enough veggies. These were a perfectly reasonable steamed baby bok choy, broccoli, and seaweed. I nibbled at them and then rushed off to a meeting.

It’s a good thing I scroll through foodblogs while eating my lunch, otherwise I would have completely forgotten to snap any photos. Think of the first photo as the absence of teriyaki chicken and cilantro mushy rice with soggy tempura green beans. It’s better that way.

snacks

My mid-morning and afternoon snacks consisted of a slice of buttered challah which I prepared this morning with French fleur de sel butter. Oh how I love that butter.

I also ate one bite of some cake I found in the break room. I decided it wasn’t nearly worth the calories and promptly disposed of my slice.

dinner

I arrived home from work at around 7:30, and threw together the following:

• Baby spinach salad with winesap apples, peppercress, and hazelnuts sprinkled with olive oil and pomegranate molasses
• An Afghan crepe filled with mildly spicy spinach, bought from the Afghan food stand at the Temescal farmers market on Sunday
• A spoonful of hummus bought from the same stand (great hummus!)
• A couple spoonfuls of tofu cilantro salad from Hodo Soy Beanery, also purchased at the Temescal farmers market. I love their tofu, and this was quite a good salad.

Pies are all about the crust, which is to say they’re all about the dough. Well, not really. At least half the fun is eating the gooey sweet fruit that fills the buttery cavern of your pie. But the best filling in the world won’t save a poor crust, turning an otherwise tasty pie into an abject failure. Knowing this, and with Thanksgiving just around the corner, I signed up for Shuna’s pie dough class in Berkeley. Let me tell you, having been to that class, I now recognize all the horrible errors I had previously thought were standard pie-making protocol.

For example:

• Fancy, high-fat, European style butter isn’t necessarily better. If you do use fancy butter, cut back a bit on the amount you use (six ounces rather than eight is a rule of thumb).
• Processing the dough until it forms a ball is a very bad idea. If your dough has formed a ball, your crust will be be tough.
• Roll your dough from the middle outwards, not from the edge.
• Once a crack, always a crack. If your dough starts cracking as you begin to roll, the cracks will stay and grow. To fix the crack, gently mush together the cracked dough back together with the blade of your hand.
• Rotate pie dough frequently when rolling so as to avoid it sticking to the work surface.
• Lightly rolled dough produces a light crust. A large, fairly heavy rolling pin is preferable, and easier to use. It requires less physical effort on your part, resulting in a flakier crust.
• Use a whole lotta beans. When baking blind, fill the entire shell with beans.

These are just a few salient points. By touching the dough at various stages of processing, listening to it (a dough that makes lip-smacking noises is not only rude, it’s way too wet), tasting it blind-baked and non-blind baked, I began to see pie dough as its own unique creature. A professional pastry chef is a dough psychologist, gently coaxing the dough to wellbeing while working through its potential for multi-faceted neuroses. Warm pie dough is insecure, resulting in a melted, self-conscious crust. Over-working the dough results in an aggressive, tough pastry. A dough might look perfectly well-adjusted in the mixing bowl, but do anti-social bits of flour and butter lurk at the bottom?

The ingredients themselves have their own unique personalities. Flour must be aerated and weighed. Butter must be kept as cold as possible and chopped coarsely. Water must be absolutely ice cold. Understanding the behavior of each ingredient—and why it behaves the way it does—is just as important as understanding the whole. A pastry chef is both scientist and artist.

After all you learn about pie-making, Shuna’s pie is magic. How can flour, butter, sugar, and water produce such ethereal flakiness? And how do crunchy apples become sweet, buttery velvet in your mouth? To me it’s alchemy.