For the Love of Food

Live Nude Veggies

2009-06-22T08:39:00.006-05:00

This little number is one vegetarian dish that has enough POW to substitute for 4th of July fireworks. It is always a pleasure to discover something we may not have stumbled into on our own and this was the case with the raw kale salad you see here, sandwiched between the red and orange.

We were doing some work with Northshore health guru, Dena Mendes, a cyclone of information, advice and energy, when she introduced us to raw kale gone wild. So let's break this one down, starting with the Kale:

We start with a bunch of curly or lacinato kale (aka tuscan or dino or cavalo nero), cleaned well, thick woody part of stems removed. The leaves are chopped into 1 to 2 inch pieces, tossed into the food processor and pulsed...not too much though, we don't want raw kale soup this time, although that sounds like something to investigate..... Next we add some grated parmesan, pecorino or grana padano cheese, dried cherries cut into smaller pieces...the little bits of cherries are a smattering of tart deliciousness in a sea of green. The third balancing agent is nuts--pine nuts, walnuts or pecans are great. Now we drizzle on some raw olive oil, lemon juice and zest and pulse another time or two and we have the raw kale salad. We love it on its own, but with its cohorts in this case, any dabbler in veggie love will be quite pleased.

Mashed roasted beets form the lovely red pillow the kale is resting upon. We peel and dice raw beets, toss them with olive oil, salt and pepper, mix in some sliced garlic, wrap it all up in a foil packet and pop it in the oven where it steam/roasts until sufficiently soft. Next the contents are emptied into a bowl for the mashing...a hand-held potato masher will do the trick.

On top the very stunning display is carrot, stripped with a veggie peeler and fried until golden in olive oil. It is crunchy, tasty, flashy and fun. You will love it like we love it, I have no doubt!

The final, but crucial ingredient is the jalepeno vinaigrette dressing the perimeter of the plate. Trust me, this is not just for looks. It is a flavor enhancer that seems to work well with almost anything....It makes a dish POP! Jalepenos are minced...seeds and ribs can be left in or omitted depending on your spice tolerance. They go into the mixing bowl along with a clove of raw garlic also minced and a pinch of kosher or sea salt. Mash up a little, add some fresh lime juice, give it all a good stir and drizzle in some extra virgin olive oil while whisking. This dressing becomes silky quite easily due to something in the jalepeno, which is part of the magic. If you make this, try drizzling it over any dish that needs a little waking up. When we first discovered it, we put it on everything but the breakfast cereal.

Earthy sweet beets, bitter-green kale, crunchy-sweet fried carrots and tart/spicy jalepeno vinaigrette. Its flavors keep pace with its fetching looks and it is win-win on the health front, too. I have yet to see someone levitate right after eating this, but we know it is possible, any day now! If you make this and find yourself floating, please tell us about your experience!

Sat Chit Ananda

2009-05-19T12:06:00.007-05:00

Who doesn't love morels? To find them on a restaurant's menu is a goose, to be sure. Even better to see and smell them raw and dirty at the farmer's market. But to walk through the just-woken forest ground among fresh signs of deer and the first weeks' growth of all manner of wild green things and to suddenly hear, "I FOUND one!" is a thrill so rarefied and special that consciousness of all other things momentarily disappears. And if this exclamation just emerged from your own mouth, then you have - albeit briefly perhaps - attained what only our greatest sages and masters have known.

Jodi and I just returned from our first Ohio morel hunt in six years and now the world is righted again. Anyone who's ever hunted these beautiful, quixotic specimens knows that the mission necessarily becomes one of total obsession, the day's waking hours often ending in bed with images of mushrooms hidden under leaves playing like a slideshow on the backs of your closed eyelids.

We've done a lot of hunting and gathering in our travels, from all manner of wild berries to greens to other kinds of mushrooms, but there's something different about morels. I think it's that you can be standing right over one, looking at it for 30 seconds and still not see it. All blended in so perfectly with the rumpled dead leaves from Fall, knotted tree roots, and old hickory nut shells, they just disappear until suddenly - like those old eye puzzles that look like a senseless pattern until you relax your eyes enough that a perfect image of the statue of liberty shoots out at you - there it is!!!! It's been there this whole time. And you were there to salvage this morsel of deliciousness that could have so easily been wasted, left unnoticed to rot in a matter of days or hours.

Now, cooking these beauties may not quite measure up to the thrill of finding them but it ain't no slouch either. After doing the necessary slug, ant, and bug removal - hey, these mushrooms are wild - we got in the dugout. First up, Buttermilk Biscuits with Ramp and Morel Gravy. Yep, nothing carries mushroom flavor better than dairy, so out goes the country sausage, in come the morels, and you've got a breakfast Thomas Keller and your Kentucky grandma could share. Oh yeah, and in another act of Mother Nature's brilliance, she has adorned the Spring forest floor with a carpeting of ramps just in time for the morels to pop up. So on those cruelest of cruel days when you leave the woods skunked, a bag o' ramps is always a consolation prize.

Next up: Central Ohio's classic Fried Morel sandwich. Buttered bread, floured and butter-fried mushrooms, more buttered bread. That's it.

And finally (our trip was too short, as always): Blue Cheese, Ramp, and Morel Bread Puddings with an asparagus sauce. A new classic of ours, and already showcased in our very first blog entry.

So here's to you, my fungal friend: Thank you again for being so frustrating, so unintelligible, so glorious, and so tasty. May we meet again.

Did someone say TUNA?

2009-05-17T19:42:00.004-05:00

The answer to the weekly question was TUNA: versatile, healthy, savory and satisfying, but most importantly, a protein we could all agree to love. The question? What should we have for the family dinner Sunday night.

At the suggestion of tuna I began to think hmm.... bland, as tuna is one of those ingredients in which my interest depends on what phase I am in. I have gone through times when it was the best thing going like in Kauai when it is being served up raw and delicious around every corner and at times it seems boring. So when the tuna ideas began to come forward in my mind and turn this potentially unexciting dinner into a clean, savory and punchy treat, I was tickled and increasingly excited about what was to come.

The crust: I can never really name the seasonings and will have a hell of a time if we ever decide to write a cookbook....but we can guess smoked paprika, toasted cumin, cinnamon...but a nice amount of flavor packed on to the raw tuna, which is then doused with some olive oil, seared on all sides and sliced.

The salad: edamame, radish, steamed carrot, orange, avocado, cilantro and mixed lettuces (you can see how I started to love this idea--it just screamed healthy good times).

The Dressing: Toasted sesame vinaigrette with lime and honey, balsamic vinegar, tamari, minced ginger and garlic, toasted sesame oil and olive oil and a little peach jam for a touch of extra viscosity.

On the top we made a glaze of reduced soy, orange juice, cabernet and balsamic vinegars.

It was as good as it looked. It was luscious with the avocado and bright with the orange segments, and the tuna really stole the show. We did have to make plain tuna with caramelized onions and mashed potatoes for the least adventurous family member, but we all swooned.

Honeymoon Time Travel

2009-03-12T10:16:00.000-05:00

Jodi and I lived in Barolo, Italy for 3 months back in 2000 - in tents in the garden of Rafaella Pittatore's agriturismo. In between picking nebbiolo grapes, fierce euchre contests over four dollar bottles of the best barbera, and a near daily obsession with agnolotti del plin, we managed to sneak some time with chef Ercole Musso in his Barolo Osteria, I Cannubi. At the foot of the famed Cannubi hill, we'd sit with him and his wife Loredana between Pranzo and Cena or after hours, talking politics in broken Italian, sipping Tokaji. He invited us into his kitchen for one whole afternoon so we could experience "La Cucina Italiana" and we marveled as he made everything - EVERYTHING - from scratch and by himself. He fed 80-100 during busy lunches or dinners and he was all alone in the kitchen. "Ercole" translates as "Hercules", so I guess it's no wonder.

Ever since those days it's always been my dream to get married in Barolo - a small affair outside on Rafaella's lawn - our little Barolo friends bringing unlabeled bottles from their family cellars, salumi from Franco the Macellaio, some grissini from "the paneteria people", tajarin or ceci soup from Rafaella's mother, and of course Ercole on the outdoor wood-fired grill. Well, familial and financial circumstances wouldn't allow for such a party this year, but I think the gods did what they could. A few months before the wedding, we found out that of all things, Ercole and Loredana recently left Barolo and opened up "The Post" - a restaurant in Grand Cayman - one of the two stops on our honeymoon cruise.

So Barolo came to us, sort of. And boy was it sweet. Right across from Seven Mile Beach we were treated to a REAL Italian antipasto of prosciutti e formaggi, Piedmontese wines and grappas, Caribbean spiny lobster risotto served in the shell, and a continual offer of more and more and more with the classic Barolo refrain of "All you have to say is Si" But after eating non-stop for a week already on the cruise ship we had to say "Basta" - though not before Jodi's long-prayed-for finale: Ercole's Panna Cotta. Just enough gelatin to keep it from spilling off the plate, this virtuosic effort has haunted us since 2000 and has eluded our every attempt to reproduce it. Alas, strewn with a few berries and an aged balsamic-ish sauce, it sat before us again - regal, uncomplicated, and utterly perfect. I guess we were too entranced to snap a picture of it, but feast your eyes on his amazing chocolate dessert: a luscious showstopper to be sure. Tasting that panna cotta again, though, was like traveling through a wormhole - it consumed us. And when food does that, it's grace. It's religion.

And for the rest of that afternoon and evening, long after Loredana's hundredth "ciao, ciao, ciao" goodbye at the pier, our bellies and our smiles bore the stigmata of Ercole.

Cruising into the Future via Mexico

2009-03-11T14:31:00.001-05:00

Alas, we are in Chicago, which translates as: at the end of all the craziness. Between the move across the country, the wedding and cruise, and settling in to a new place...we found ourselves floating back and forth from elation to exhaustion over and over again....WHEW! What a ride! Great time to stop, take a breath and share one or two stories from the wedding trip as a bridge between the San Francisco foodie life and the exciting Chicago adventures to come.

From the moment the cruise plan was hatched we knew we were onto something potentially serious. Bringing this group of people together anywhere was bound to make for good times. We had 24 people on the "yes" list, only our closest friends and family members. It was even more perfect than we had imagined!

But since this is our FOOD blog, I will cut to the culinary highlight of the wedding cruise: Cozumel, Mexico. Keep in mind we are super fans of the Mexican table....we can hardly wait to stain up some of our new kitchen wedding gifts with chili puree and achiote pastes! We didn't have time to research anything about Cozumel and what to do there, so when we docked, we crossed our fingers and walked onto the island.

Twenty minutes into our journey downtown on foot someone finally said yes to one of the cab drivers and 7 of us piled on in. Although we were all enjoying the walk, the cab ride proved to be worthwhile after pumping the driver for information about where to get the best Conchinita Pibil, a specialty of the Yucatan region of Mexico. He explained where to go and how to get there as he dropped us off deep in the heart of Cozumel at a VERY local outdoor market. There were no tourists around, which delighted all of us....but we did see our somelier from the ship dining at one of the market's tiny little restaurants.

We looked around, someone got a HUGE avocado and mango smoothie (wicked good) and before too long the tune of LUNCH was being hummed by at least half the group. Luckily the restaurant the cab driver mentioned was just a few blocks away. We slipped through the quiet streets and easily found our way. Our first impression was not the best...it was so large and spotless that we were a little afraid we had been sent to a gringo trap. But that twinge of concern was nothing compared to the fright we all experienced when Jeff found out there was no Conchinita Pibil on the menu. It was not pretty!

But we had come this far, everyone was hungry and we all had beers on the table...Bohemia Negro, I think, very yummy. It really didn't seem like we could leave at this point, we just had to go with it. We asked the waiter what the best yucatecan dish on the menu was and he pointed us toward the Pollo Negro, black and spicy from the toasted chilies. Reluctantly, Jeff consented to this new paradigm and we moved on, admittedly made easier by the top notch tortilla chips and guacamole that appeared on the table.

After the grumbly beginning, we all loosened up and Jeff was soothed by the fact that there were fresh house made corn tortillas available. We were not prepared for the obscene love that we were to feel about this black chicken. When it finally hit the table we saw, smelled and tasted that all was right with this experience and that although the cabbie misled us in some ways, he was our new hero. The chicken was soft, moist and bathed in the black sauce that was NOT a mole. It was deep and tangy and somewhat unfamiliar. We had to know more about this mysterious inky potion. The waiter was able to get across that this was another paste like achiote paste, which is what makes pibil pibil. Back to the market!!

We did manage to get our hands on some of these wonder pastes. You can find the red achiote paste in the US but it is always a thrill to pick it up in Mexico from the market where they pry a hunk off for you from a massive block. We found the red, the new beloved black paste and a new one none of us had tried or seen before that is spent green tea green. It is still burning a hole in our pockets at this time and we are dreaming of a spicy paste-y Mexican dinner ASAP!

After that score, contentedness was wafting in the air. We lollygagged along the streets that led back to the more touristy parts of downtown, shopping and bargaining as we went. We whiled away the entire afternoon just enjoying having this beloved group of friends together. Some of us bought jewelry or blankets, and others....Mexican wrestling (Lucha Libre) masks. You can't imagine the sight of this!

Day turned toward evening and we managed to find a menu with Conchinita Pibil. There was a cute patio and we decided to have a small nibble before heading back to the ship. It was good but could not be compared with any of the dishes we had as a group at lunch. But there was a real highlight featured in the photo. The margaritas were just delightful! Fresh lime, expertly balanced....and no one was holding back. People were having one or two, maybe three....and finally the waiter threw out his best card. Matt ordered one more and the waiter said "I have something for you!" When he returned he had a Margarita in a glass as wide as Matt himself! We got such a kick out of this...I did not think it possible, even with 9 people, this drink would be taken down. Sometimes we amaze ourselves though.

Sun soaked and electrified by a perfect day with pals, we made our way back to the ship, miraculously punctual. The party continued on board from dancing on the deck, highs and lows at the slot machines to literally gut busting laughter and some late euchre played through half closed eyes as a night cap. We bid each other "buenos noches" and the ship rocked us to sleep.

Weddings Holidays and Travels, Oh My!

2008-12-21T17:50:00.000-06:00

We ask your forgiveness. If we have any faithful readers, we know we are disappointing you! As it happens with everyone, especially around holiday time, we have hopped on the moving sidewalk and it is cranked up to 500 mph.

The excuses: Don't worry, they are good ones! First, we are getting married--soon. The wedding will be February 5th on a cruise ship in Miami. Second, between now and the wedding we are ending our job here in Marin County, driving across the country (the southern route to avoid snow and to seek fresh tortillas and a bowl of green in New Mexico), and moving to Chicago! Now understanding might be sinking in.......hopefully?!

We are very excited about all the changes, events and travels and the wedding. But the blog has been neglected and as much as we hope it is not true, this abuse may continue until things settle down. But our intention will be to get some great food pictures and travel stories on the page to share with you all.

In the meantime, one photo and a short story. We made these pot stickers from dough bought in Oakland's Chinatown. We were both very impressed with our shaping technique, if we do say so ourselves! They are filled with sauteed mushrooms and chicken sausage, ginger, soy and sesame. The sauce is sweet and spicy tamarind and the pile of colorful goodness in the back is the answer to our intention that night to eat something very healthy: bean thread noodles with lots of veggies.

Thanks for your patience and keep one eye on the blog in case there are any short travel vignettes. And wish us luck!!!

All smiles and Fresh Mint

2008-11-03T11:49:00.001-06:00

I'm sure you are already wondering why Jeff is always the one in the picture, glowing, with some sort of ice cream product in his hands.....me too. I guess he is particularly photogenic in just this scenario. Could he look any happier?!

So the ice cream feature du jour is from Sketch Ice Cream in Berkeley. We feel fortunate that this place exists and that we stumbled across it one fateful day last winter. Eric and Ruthie, the owners of Sketch are literally super cool and every decision they have made for their shop is just right. The design, from the interior to the packaging is simple and perfect. To get a glimpse of what we mean, just check out their website and blog...and if you are in the area, you must make your way over. They are serving up some of the best ice cream in the area...often with a side of Eric's dead pan humor...which we just love!

The Ice Cream: Sketch ice cream is Soft serve. That is a big part of what makes sketch so unique. They usually have about 6 flavors rolling each day, including at least 2 very seasonal and/or inventive picks. These are the ones we find ourselves wavering between. Some of the best we have put in our personal Sketch hall of fame, including--rose geranium, burnt caramel, cherry blossom, cocoa nib, cardamon, banana.......I could write a little story about each one of these. The banana we have not stopped thinking about since we had it 6 months ago. It was almost tart, which you would not guess for a banana ice cream. We don't know how they do it. Raw talent is the only explanation.

So in the picture Jeff is holding a house made waffle cone (you smell them being made as you walk up to the door) with fresh mint ice cream. There was no debate that day. You can't keep us away from anything titled fresh mint. The beauty of this one is the flavor of freshly torn mint leaves, as opposed to mint extract. It is a real star!

Also available at Sketch: Granite, frozen yogurt, fudgesicles that are almost black in color, dairy free and so chocolatey they redefine your idea of chocolate. They have fun toppings for your frozen concoctions and they make some amazing confections like salted chocolate covered toffee....all in this sweet little shop. You get the idea, pure goodness, an example of mastery!

Scrumptious Health Bomb

2008-10-16T18:11:00.000-05:00

Once upon a time in Montpelier, Vermont we spent many a lazy morning leafing through our friend Sandra's cookbooks over coffee. There was something magical about that kitchen space with its long wooden table, windows to the endlessly green world of Vermont, dogs underfoot and John's impeccable music selections piped in from mysterious locations.

We learned things there like how to cook tofu in such a way that anyone, really anyone would love it. We also discovered these black bean and oat cakes. They jumped off the page of Mollie Katzen's Moosewood low-fat favorites book, which is a dream for any one interested in internationally inspired, healthy, light food that is not weak on the flavor front.

On this particular day we had a craving for something clean for dinner after eating only focaccia and chocolate croissants all day in the city and that craving led us right back to this well tested favorite. So in this picture we have the cakes made up mostly of black beans and raw rolled oats--no kidding, it works-- with carrot, onion, garlic and some mexican seasonings. They are seated atop a pile of spicy green goodness....swiss chard, onion, garlic and some of those gorgeous red carrots. Normally we cook and puree golden beets for the sauce on this dish...but in this case we had some Mole Amarillo from the Red Iguana restaurant in Salt Lake City. You just can't say no when you have mole looking you in the eyes. We seared some asparagus and rested them on top, then enjoyed the whole healthy experience....which was exactly what we were in the mood for!

A Study of Corn

2008-10-05T12:01:00.000-05:00

Sometimes there's nothing as intriguing for a cook as taking one ingredient and riffing on it several ways in the same dish. Corn opens itself to this task maybe more than any other staple. Crunchy, juicy, unctuous, smooth - all its textures. Sweet, toasty, flinty, buttery-without-butter - all its flavors. Corn is an entity. Cooked into a porridge of polenta, grilled on the cob and buttered, popped into a little white explosion of movie theater joy. It is limitless and yet it is all corn.

In this dish we have a polenta souffle over a puree of sweet corn and poblano rajas topped with a salad of arugula, hot smoked salmon, and avocado all dressed with a pumpkinseed/chili yogurt. We cooked polenta as we always do with lots of garlic, herbs, milk and chicken stock and then turned it into a souffle base with egg yolks and parmesan. Then we folded in some beaten egg whites, popped it in the oven and in twenty minutes: a pillowy but cornmeal-coarse souffle.

Corn shows us its silky side when pureed and the marriage of sweet corn and roasted poblano peppers is one of the truly great combos in the vegetable kingdom. The raspy but deep poblano plays high and low over the sweet, sweet corn creating this spicy/roasty flavor profile. We often toss in a pinch of turmeric when we work with pureed corn, which allows its luminous yellow color to reassert itself.

And the yogurt dressing allows for the arrival of one corn's other great friends: pumpkin seeds. We actually took the leftover dressing from the Rick Bayless-inspired salad from a few posts ago and mixed it with equal parts plain whole milk yogurt. The result is not bashful as it brightens the rich avocado and king salmon, and then rains down on the corn below like contrails of flavor.

As I look back I can't help but think a little chili-spiced popcorn speckled about the plate....

Happy Fall, Happy Lamb Chops

2008-10-04T14:07:00.001-05:00

Last night in the San Francisco area we had our first bona fide "storm" of the season. What does this mean? Wind blowing-oh my- and for the first time since March (outside of a few drops one night in April) It RAINED in Marin county! I know a lot of people around here are sad to see the endless days of sunshine interrupted by some clouds and showers, eventually giving way in December to some full on weeks of nearly constant rain....but we are quite happy to feel the cool breeze ruffling the papers on our desk. AAahhh. I was listening closely at just the right time and I heard the whistling wind whisper "lamb chops" very quietly in my ear.

We have a not so secret love affair with health foods, hanging out with the bulk bins, always having a "grain drawer" stuffed with millet, quinoa, various nuts and seeds and finding it unacceptable to be without kale in our refrigerator. We also love to make our all natural kashi bars and peanut butter apple oat cookies, handsome enough that our friend Matt Frank renamed them "Lookies". We adore the wide world of veggies and treat them like neglected children, lavishing attention on them as they realize their full potential. But we work (as cooks) for a woman who really loves the classics and needs her dose of meat, giving us the perfect opportunity to make some really yummy comfort food.

Now on to the dish in the picture. Rack of Lamb. So simple to make and what a delivery. We liberally seasoned this beauty with salt, pepper and a mix of dried green herbs--probably Napa Style's Herbes de Napa. We seared it on all sides and popped it into the oven. On the side is a sweet potato puree and a warm salad of greens and multi colored carrots. The icing on the cake is that gorgeous red sauce under the lamb....a red wine pan sauce made just after searing the lamb so it is rich with meaty flavor and maybe just a small pat of butter swirled in at the end. Seriously good stuff. I didn't realize what a fan I would become of making and eating lamb chops, but it has happened. So easy to make and flavor that never fails to impress me every time!

A Mouth full of Excitement

2008-10-01T11:37:00.000-05:00

Even though it is somewhat rare for us to repeat dishes, we have enjoyed this salad so many times. It is actually a Rick Bayless recipe from his cookbook "Mexican Everyday". We love Rick's style and Mexican food consistently ranks as a favorite of ours. This salad really packs a flavor punch making it hard to resist.

The elements that make this up in combination with each other really can't be beat. Along with greens of your choosing, mango and avocado are key players, and smoked salmon makes it a perfect light dinner that is good any time of year. Rick suggests bacon instead of the salmon, but since we LOVE smoked salmon, we always use it...but sometimes yield to the temptation to crumble a piece or two of bacon over the top!

The real show stopper here is the bright and lively dressing. The first step is pan toasting pepitas, or green raw pumpkin seeds. This is not only the lovely base of this punchy dressing, but a good time all by itself! You put these little devils in the hot pan and if you are into this sort of thing, you can stand with your face in pretty close and watch them go from flat to almost round. Cheap thrills for the easily entertained.....we love it!

After the pepitas are puffed and toasty we remove them and add olive oil to the pan, along with whole garlic cloves and a jalepeno. Once the garlic and jalepeno are softened, they are added along with the oil to a blender with lime juice, salt, honey.....and some of the pepitas. This is whizzed up and the resulting dressing is creamy, spicy and delicious. It is a great idea to make a little more of this than you will need for the salad because you can immediately see that it would be good on or in anything! The salad is topped with more of the pepitas for a little crunch and cheese (queso fresco or feta) is optional, but it really doesn't need it. This one is a keeper and we find ourselves craving it like clockwork about once a month.....maybe dinner tomorrow night......?

Rescuing The Rutabaga

2008-09-20T14:22:00.001-05:00

It has always seemed tragic to us that the sweet and earthy rutabaga has been relegated to the dustbin of modern American cookery. It is one of those cheap, humble, durable vegetables that doesn't glitter on the shelves at the market but shines for the patient cook, honest and unpretentious like your oldest friend.

In this dish: Farro with Spice-Roasted Rutabagas, Bean Broth, and Smokey Arugula Salad, the rutabagas get a good dose of rosemary, aleppo pepper, and garlic powder and after a short while in a hot oven, they're crispy on the outside with a spice-crust and like butter on the inside. The foundation, the anchor is farro - one of our favorite grains - both chewy and toothsome, and it was cooked with lots of garlic. Carrots roasted whole along with arugula and radish all tossed with a smoked paprika and honey vinaigrette form the crown.

And about that unassuming broth you see ringing the bowl: one of the most beautiful things in the culinary universe is the liquid you get after cooking a big pot of beans. You could throw the beans away - not that we would ever do that - and it would still have been worth cooking them. This broth, or bean liquor, is hauntingly sweet and redolent of garlic and herbs and the slight starchiness thrown from the cannellini beans makes it taste rich somehow, though it's essentially fatless and vegetarian. So we spiked this lucky leftover with fresh lemon juice, drizzled on a little olive oil, and poof: the dish was tied together.

A healthy study in textures and so darn satisfying to eat, this is what we mean when we tell people our style is "vegetable-driven".

Bread and Sweet Music

2008-09-18T17:51:00.001-05:00

Luckily for all who know him, Jeff slowly, over the course of his life, developed a healthy obsession with all things bread. In a way that must be somewhat unusual, he studied all the bread making books, made his own sourdough starter, and before you could say "sour raisin rye" he was making things that look like this! Often this is shocking to people because producing true artisan style bread in the home kitchen seems to be a difficult task indeed. This is why obsession can be a good thing......just look at those results.

We both worked in a bread bakery in Vermont, which really helped us nail down the tricky "shaping" aspect of making beautiful bread. It was a pretty awesome experience, with lovely almost ritualistic rhythms in the day. Mixing the dough, shaping the loaves, firing the wood ovens, and the most exciting....loading and unloading the cavernous brick hearth. The final step? Standing over the bread, fully baked and piping hot, and listening to them crackle. Seriously, they snap and crackle as the interior air bubbles cool and contract pulling the harder crunchy crust inwardly enough to actually fissure. Sweet, sweet music.

Nothing Satisfies quite like an Ice Cream Cone.

2008-09-15T17:33:00.000-05:00

I feel like we shouldn't even mention the Bi Rite Creamery in the Dolores Park neighborhood because judging by the length of the line around the block it is possible that everyone on the planet (or maybe the Bay Area) already knows. They must know about the artisan small batch charm and the local and organic focus. I'm sure they know about the swoon inducing array of fabulous flavors. Our favorites include mint chip, ritual roasters coffee toffee, salted caramel, and something we can't remember exactly but had provocative hints in the title like "malted, cookie bits, vanilla...." You probably get the idea!

This place is a must see, taste and smell. It is gang busters on the weekends and in the evenings, so if you can sneak away from the desk or maybe call in sick, weekdays are a great time to visit. If you are like us the decision can be somewhat torturous, but in a good way. Not like choosing between having your teeth cleaned or doing your taxes, more like choosing which slice of heaven you want to experience today. Hint: a wicked good place to start--coffee toffee on top of mexican chocolate in a cone.

If you can pull yourself away from the ice cream, not as easy as you might think, the fresh fruit popsicles are to die for. They always have 1 or 2 flavors showcasing the week's hot ticket at the farmer's markets. Last week there were 2: pluot and melon. We have also seen concord grape recently. If you go there, let us know!

Shrimp? Romesco? YUM!

2008-09-11T18:25:00.000-05:00

To be honest, this is a dish we made several months ago.....the details may be a bit fuzzy at this point. I looked for any notes we may have made about this but nothing turned up. Let's get to it anyway!

We have some well spiced shrimp here, certainly smoked paprika, chipotle powder, and probably some Penzey's spice blend or another. These beauties are resting on a romesco sauce, something Jeff has been talking about for years. There are some grilled asparagus, saffron scented brown rice and the green sauce (if we remember correctly) is a fava bean puree. We made a lucky discovery this year at Whole Foods: Frozen fava beans already shelled and skinned and ready to be put into anything. A fava puree with its silky texture is pure pleasure, especially when you weren't the person working on them for an hour!

This dinner smacks of healthiness while still holding its own on the flavor and texture front. It fits squarely in the middle of our food philosphy: Excellent, beautiful, real food where flavor is not sacrificed in the pursuit of clean eating.

A beauty of a Raw dish

2008-09-10T20:49:00.000-05:00

This one is high on WOW factor. This recipe is straight from Charlie Trotter and Roxanne Klein and their collaboration RAW, a real showcase for top of the line, raw food. Having seen a photo of this in their book, we knew it must be done. There were challenges built in, to be sure, but we triumphed in the end!

The main players here are beets. Red, golden and chioggia (candy striped) beets were used. A few of our other ingredients were substituted. It has rings of hearts of palm and daikon radish. The trickiest part of making this as gorgeous as Charlie and Roxanne's version was slicing the beets in a fashion that allowed them to be curled into those cone shapes. I think they recommend a veggie peeler, we may have had better luck slicing by hand.

Under all those lovely raw vegetables there are 2 circles of sauce, one a date puree, the other a cranberry puree.....the outer ring of this dish is a bright and spicy jalepeno vinaigrette. This really was fun and maybe I didn't mention it before, but it was delicious, too. Well worth the effort!

A spring delight

2008-09-10T00:13:00.000-05:00

This dish was created on a night when there seemed to be nothing coming together mentally that said "perfect" to us. The only thing that was certain was the fact that there were morels in the fridge from the Marin Farmer's Market and they were begging to be used. We hadn't shopped for anything to go with them but a plan did crystallize.

The idea sprung from staples, this is the stuff that is always on hand: eggs, milk or cream, cheese, bread....even if it is not the freshest! In what felt like no time we were tossing together a morel brioche bread pudding with blue cheese. This inspiration almost had to be divine and the flavor smacked of heaven itself. Fresh morels with cream and eggs......how could this go wrong?

The plate was gorgeous. We also had some other beauties from the market. Multi colored carrots, asparagus were sauteed and piled up beside the bread pudding and some arugula flowers topped it all off. Another dirty secret? Truffle oil, oh yes.