salads101...101salads

the minimalist, Mark Bittman, published an article on 101 salads last week. they all take less than 20 minutes and are truly a product of his genius.

here are some of my faves from his list...

astonishing

tomatoes, peaches, red onion, red pepper flakes and cilantro. drizzle with olive oil and lime or lemon juice.

there is no better use of raw carrots

shredded carrots, cumin seeds, olive oil, lemon juice and cilantro. raisins can add some sweetness to the mix.

this will be even better in the fall

slice fennel and crisp apple, and mix with mustardy vinaigrette and parsley.

saladmania

if you have a party on the hottest day ever, it's ok to eat just salads. these were the treats people brought for kristen's birthday... pictured is an arugula and radish salad, orzo salad with grape tomoatoes and feta, artichoke salad with roasted red peppers and greek salad with balsamic. not pictured: Israeli couscous salad by kKristin and elof, sweet crack kalbi short ribs by lily and spicy black pepper pork tenderloins by alex. there were also bratwursts. i do not know who brought them. but i ate one with mustard.

going to market

lunchtime at the market on the world's hottest day. it seemed like a good day to eat some fresh produce or a salad. due to a brief lapse in judgement i ate pepperoni pizza.

cobble cobble cobble (that joke was corny)

Allison made this recipe from the August issue of Gourmet on the hottest day in Seattle EVER. Srsly, we broke a record.

At first, I was having a hard time imagining how corn covered in mint and feta would taste. Well, turns out it tastes just like heaven. Allison made a healthier version by mixing a combination of fat-free and regular feta with the half cube of butter. If that's not healthy, then I don't know what is.

Allison's Corn on the Cobb with Mint-Feta Butter (Gourmet, August 2009)

Ingredients

1/2 stick unsalted butter, softened
7 ounces feta, finely crumbled (1 1/2 cups)
1/4 cup finely chopped mint
8 large ears of corn, shucked, each cob cut crosswise into 4 pieces

Preparation

Stir together butter, feta, mint, and a rounded 1/2 teaspoon salt in a large bowl.

Cook corn in a large pot of boiling water until crisp-tender, about 3 minutes. Transfer with tongs to butter mixture and toss until well coated.

Mini Cheesequakes Will Rock Your World

My mom used to make these and I remember them being easy enough to help her with and perfectly portable for lunches and picnics. It's been about 15 years since I last had them, and they are as tasty and simple as I remember. Also, I like having a reason to buy Nilla Wafers.

We used to just eat these plain without any topping. My mom mentioned that for added flair, if they're being served at a party, you can brush them with apricot preserves and top with a kiwi slice. I made these for Kristen G's b-day, and it seemed like a good time to introduce some flair. You could also top with any seasonal fruit of your liking: cherries, strawberries, peaches, etc. Some people also top them with canned pie filling.

MINIATURE CHEESECAKES (I call them cheesequakes)

Ingredients

1 12 oz. box of Nilla Wafers

2 8 oz. packages of cream cheese

3/4 c. of sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp. vanilla

3 kiwis, peeled and sliced

Apricot Preserves, heated for brushing tops

Preheat oven to 350 degrees, and line muffin tins with muffin cup(metal and paper muffin liners work best because they are sturdier). Put a Nilla wafer in each cup. In a mixing bowl, beat cream cheese, sugar, eggs and vanilla with an electric mixer until fluffy. Fill each muffin tin almost to the top.

Bake for 15 minutes. Cool. Brush tops with warm preserves and top with a kiwi slice.

Makes about 18 mini cheesequakes.

Hot & Spicy Garlic Green Beans

In case you need a tasty side dish to go with your 7 flavor beef, these green beans will hit the spot.

HOT & SPICY GREEN BEANS

1 lb. green beans, with the ends snapped off

Splash of olive oil

1 tbsp. hot chili oil

1 tbsp. red pepper flakes

5 cloves garlic, chopped

1 tbsp soy sauce.

Quickly cook the green beans in salted boiling water (about 3 minutes, make sure they're still crispy and bright green) and drain. Heat oils, add garlic and red pepper flakes. Add green beans to pan and saute. Add soy to pan and cook for another minute. These are pan to plate in about 5 minutes.

The 7 Flavors of Highly Effective Beef

Really, seven flavors? Is the human brain even capable of processing seven flavors? Can you name seven flavors? Even if you subscribe to the Japanese belief in umami (meaning tasty, brothy, meaty or savory) and include fat in there as a flavor, that still only leaves six: sweet, salty, sour, bitter, umami and fat. Let's face it people, seven flavors is a lot of flavors.

I guess you won't know how advanced your own brain is and if it can defeat the laws of science to discover the seventh flavor until you eat this beef. Having eaten this beef myself, I've affirmed that the brain is amazing, that it can process seven flavors at once, and that it does all sorts of things I'll probably never understand.

This recipe for Seven Flavor Beef, adapted from the restaurant Wild Ginger, was passed on by a client and then through my office. If it's any testament to how easy and delicious it is, three of us made it within the last three days. We are all wild (ginger) about it.

The 7 Flavors of Highly Effective Beef

1½ hours 30 min prep SERVES 2 -4

INGREDIENTS

16 oz. flank steak, sliced on an angle

MARINADE

1 tbsp. minced lemongrass
1/2 tbsp. peeled and minced fresh ginger
1 tbsp. minced garlic
1/2 tbsp. fish sauce
1/2 tbsp. sesame oil
1 tbsp. honey
1 tbsp. dried red chili pepper flakes
1 tbsp. Chinese five spice powder
1 tbsp. kosher salt

FINISHING

2 tbsp. vegetable oil
1/4 cup thinly sliced red onion
1/2 bunch thinly sliced green onion
1 cup bean sprouts
4 tablespoons hoisin sauce
1 tbsp. ground peanuts
20 leaves Thai basil

DIRECTIONS

1. Combine all marinade ingredients in a nonreactive baking dish and marinate beef for 1 hour, turning frequently to distribute spices.

2. Heat oil in a wok and heat over high heat. When oil is hot, add red onion, green onion, and bean sprouts and sear for 1 minute, stirring. Set aside on serving dish.

3. Add beef to very hot wok and sear until rare. Add hoisin sauce and toss until coated. Add ground peanuts and basil and cook until meat is medium rare.

4. Serve meat over onions and bean sprouts.

Serve with rice and try to eat with cool people.

Le Gibassier: It's What the Ladies Man Eats for Breakfast

With a family wide fondness for anise and an apparent shortage of baked goods containing it (save for the Bake Shop sweet rolls in AK, which, surprisingly, don't fare too well on the plane ride home) we were ecstatic to stroll into Portland's Pearl Bakery expecting a nice croissant treat and find something even better. Le. Gibassier. You don't even need to know how to pronounce it in order to appreciate its deliciousness. I think it's French. It doesn't matter though, great flavors know no language barriers and never judge you for mispronunciations.

Since Amy was still here and has been thinking about making them for a while (and since my mom keeps a note in her iphone to remind her what they're called in case she ever wants to look up the recipe and make them), we decided to give it a shot and see how accurately we could replicate them at home.

If you don't have a kitchen scale at home, now is a good time to make friends with someone who does. If you don't want to make new friends purely for exploiting them for their kitchen appliances, then you can save $10 and go buy your own. Either way, it's pretty much impossible to make this recipe without a scale.

LE GIBASSIER

(Adapted from Advanced Bread and Pastry by Michel Suas)

For the sponge
85 grams bread flour
39 grams milk
11 grams egg 25g
1/8 tsp instant Yeast

Combine, cover and ferment at room temperature for 12-16 hours.

For the final dough
326 grams bread flour
95 grams egg
81 grams granulated sugar
7 grams salt
12 grams yeast
60 grams butter (cold, but pliable)
60 grams olive oil
Juice of one orange
28 grams water
7 grams anise seed
zest of one orange
82 grams candied orange peel
Sponge

Pour liquids, then sponge into the bowl of the mixer. Add dry ingredients except sugar, candied fruit, zest and anise seed. Incorporate all slowly for about 2 minutes. Put the dough hook on the mixer and knead for 9-11 minutes on medium speed. The dough should have a great deal of gluten strength and hold a strong window. Slowly sugar. Incorporate before each new addition.

When a nice dough window can be formed, add the butter. Bring the dough back up to an intensive consistency, with very strong gluten formation. Add candied fruit, zest and anise seed at the lowest speed, just to incorporate. Place rounded dough into oiled bowl, cover so no crust forms, and ferment for 1 hour.

Round the dough lightly into a boule, let rest for 20 minutes.

Roll to about 3/4" thick and cut into desired shapes. Lightly cut 3-4 slits on top of the shapes if you wish to. Place on parchment-lined pan and let rise again for approximately 1 1/2hours. Bake at 400 degrees Fahrenheit until golden brown, about 10-15 min. Brush with melted butter and toss in granulated sugar.

I believe it is a hand pie.

These sweet little pockets of goodness are what you eat when you decide you're too old to be eating pies out of a paper bag, sold three for $.79. OR if that time never comes, it's what you eat when you are out of range of a 7/11. If neither of these conditions ever come true for you, it's a good option if you're in need of a quick and easy dessert, suitable for serving to others. Because I like portable economy pies as much as the next guy, but I always worry people will find the wrappers in the garbage. After already distributing the recipe for said "homemade" pies, this can pose a problem. It's best to avoid this whole mess and keep your dignity by grabbing some fruits and getting started.

CHERRY AND PEACH GALETTES

Filling:

2 cups bing cherries, pitted

1 cup peaches

1/4 cup sugar

2 1/2 tsp. cornstarch

Crusts (Courtesy of Cooks Illustrated):

2 cups all-purpose flour (7 1/2 ounces)

2 tablespoons cornstarch

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon sugar

12 tablespoons cold unsalted butter , cut into 5/8-inch cubes (1 1/2 sticks)

7-9 tablespoons ice water

Wash:

1 egg, beaten

Sugar for dusting

1) Combine flour, cornstarch, salt, and sugar in food processor with three 1-second pulses. Scatter butter pieces over flour, pulse to cut butter into flour until butter pieces are size of large pebbles, about 1/2 inch, about six 1-second pulses.

2) Sprinkle 1 tablespoon water over mixture and pulse once quickly to combine; repeat, adding water 1 tablespoon at a time and pulsing, until dough begins to form small curds that hold together when pinched with fingers (dough should look crumbly and should not form cohesive ball).

3) Form Mound:Empty dough onto work surface and gather into rough rectangular mound about 12 inches long and 5 inches wide.

4) Fraisage & Chill: Starting at farthest end, use heel of hand to smear small amount of dough against counter, pushing firmly down and away from you, to create separate pile of dough (flattened pieces of dough should look shaggy). Continue process until all dough has been worked. Gather dough into rough 12 by 5-inch mound and repeat smearing process. Dough will not have to be smeared as much as first time and should form cohesive ball once entire portion is worked. Form dough into 4-inch square, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate until cold and firm but still malleable, 30 minutes to 1 hour.

5) About 15 minutes before baking, adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 400 degrees. Cut up fruit and mix with sugar and cornstarch.

6) Roll and trim dough: Place dough on floured 16 by 12-inch piece of parchment paper and dust with more flour. Cut into six even pieces and form into round balls. One by one, roll each ball out with a rolling pin until it is about 1/8 inch thick, dusting top and bottom of dough and rolling pin with flour as needed to keep dough from sticking. Trim dough so edges are even with parchment paper. You'll end up with six round circles.

7) Fill with fruit: Place about 1/4 to 1/2 c. of fruit on each dough circle, keep in mind you'll want a little over an inch of crust around the fruit to fold up.

8) Form border: Roll up 1 inch of each edge and pinch firmly, creating a fold every two inches around the circle. With parchment on cookie sheet and tarts formed and filled, brush each pie with egg wash and dust with sugar.

9) Bake at 400 degrees for approximately 45-55 minutes or until crusts are golden brown and fruit is bubbling.

Serve warm with vanilla ice cream. And enjoy! As we discovered, these are even more deliciuos reheated quickly in the oven on day 2, and again served a la mode.

Amy Comes to Town...Pasta Comes to the Table

When Amy comes to visit, we make some delicious foods,and sometimes we even take requests for any family favorites she has(and let's be honest, we have)been craving. This visit the requests were at the mercy of the ingredients we had on hand: fresh peaches, bing cherries, heirloom tomatoes and fresh basil. There was also a little roll of mom's homemade galette crust in the fridge. She'd made it a few days earlier and decided it was too hot to take a stab at baking, and risk turning the whole house into an oven. It's hard to turn down the opportunity to cook with so much fresh produce on hand, and no one was complaining at the prospect of the meal we could prepare with these ingredients, so we got to work! And here is what we created...

Pasta alla Checca (a fresh and light family favorite, perfect for warm summer evenings). This is one of the first meals I learned to make myself, a recipe my mom learned while assisting chef Giuliano Hazan when he came to Seattle on his book tour for the Classic Pasta Cookbook. Over the years, the recipe has undergone many adaptations from its original form which included thyme, marjoram, and oregano,in addition to basil. A point of contention in the Massar Pfleiger household...Amy and I bet on this over dinner. We changed the recipe so long ago that I had absolutely no recognition of the dish ever including more than just the lone basil herb. She won the bet. But we all won dinner with happy bellies filled with tasty pastas.

PASTA ALLA CHECCA

1 lb. spaghetti or linguini

1/2 lb - 1 lb. heirloom or roma tomoatoes, cut into 1/4 inch pieces or cubes (we used mini heirlooms from Trader Joe's this time - fantastic!)

8 oz. fresh mozzarella, cut into 1/4 inch pieces or cubes

1 cup basil leaves, sliced into thin strands

2-3 tbsp. olive oil

6 cloves of garlic, chopped

3-4 tsp. red pepper flakes

Salt and pepper

Salt pasta water liberally and bring to a boil. While that's heating up, prepare tomatoes, basil and mozzarella. Pieces should be no larger than a dime, in order to be easily incorporated with the noodles. Mix chopped tomatoes, basil and mozzarella in a large bowl and set aside. Heat olive oil in a small skillet, adding garlic and the red pepper flakes. Once the garlic has started to sizzle and bubble around the sides, remove from heat and set aside for a minute or two. The garlic will continue to cook and the heat from the red pepper will continue to develop. Pour the heated oil, garlic and red pepper mixture over the tomatoes, basil and mozzarella, and toss to mix. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Cook noodles al dente, drain and pour over other ingredients, toss again and cover with a lid, plate or cookie sheet to help the cheese melt before serving. If you'd like, serve with freshly grated parmesan at the table.