tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-346413442024-02-07T03:04:30.417-08:00the wine wallone couple's food and wine adventures in Seattle and beyondpaulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.comBlogger133125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-55174854165529070482010-01-19T08:11:00.000-08:002010-01-19T08:14:09.242-08:00Salumaio updatenot sure how to quantify this, but my first short story, published spring '09, was the third most viewed page on the Contrary website for 2009. Incidentally, the current issue has 3 poems from Sherman Alexie. Here's a link to front page of current issue, which includes top ten most-viewed list from 2009.<br /><br />http://www.contrarymagazine.com/Contrary/Winter_2010.htmlpaulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-59118563968973554592009-09-11T13:05:00.001-07:002009-09-11T13:12:20.652-07:00One Bar Food That Is Almost Always Better At Home<span xmlns=""><p>With the college football season upon us, one of the most important times of the year, I would like to turn my attention to a wonderful and much-maligned snack you can serve to your guests that will literally drive them crazy with adoration for your cooking skills. But first things first. When I say college football, what I really mean is Michigan Wolverine Football. Before reading any further, submit yourself to the notion that the Wolverines are the finest college football program in the history of the sport. If you've previously rooted for some other school as a result of your college education or geography, now is the time to make the switch. Start by waking up tomorrow morning and dressing yourself head-to-toe in maize and blue. You'd be surprised how good it can make you feel.<br /></p><p>But let's get on to talking about Buffalo wings, my purpose today. We've all had them, we all love them, but the vast majority of the time they are not as good as they <em>could</em> be. By way of background, allow me to state that in addition to cooking professionally or teaching cooking to future chefs, I lived in Buffalo for seven years, from ages seven to fourteen—prime chicken wing eating years as far as I'm concerned. My parents, reasonable folks, would order our family ludicrously large pizzas and buckets of wings on a weekly basis. For a family of four boys this was just what the doctor ordered. It was the eighties, and people didn't worry about all the senseless chatter you hear nowadays about eating local or organic, much less healthy. Not in Buffalo, at least. Incidentally, I still to this day favor the pizza I grew up on. Pizza in Buffalo is really heavy on the sauce, lighter on the cheese, which is exactly the opposite of what most prefer, in my experience.<br /></p><p>But on to the wings. One major advantage that a restaurant has over the home cook with regards to Buffalo wings is the use of a deep-fat fryer. If you have a fry daddy or some other such contraption, or are the kind of demented soul who likes to torture yourself with deep frying at home, don't even bother. I've got a technique that will produce the best wings you and your guests have ever had.<br /></p><p>First, buy the right kind of chicken wings. There are basically three kinds of wings you can purchase in most grocery stores. First, there is the kind that is frozen that is presauced, in some cases even pre-cooked. Under no circumstances should you purchase this product if you're goal is to serve real Buffalo wings. If you want to serve "Buffalo" style wings that are pre-sauced or coated with barbeque sauce, you might as well root for a team like Ohio State. The second kind of wing to avoid is the frozen, still-raw wing that comes in the five pound sack with some kind of colorful packaging. This is the most cost-effective, but the problem is that these wings are too large. They come from old hag chickens that have run around the barnyard for too long. They are simply too tough to chew on and do not produce a desirable product for you or your Wolverine-loving guests. Here's what you have to do. Go to the fresh meat section and pick up some small styrofoam packages of small fresh, raw chicken wings. They should be about three inches in length. If you're not sure if you're getting the small, tender ones, compare them to the frozen bags of wings. In terms of size it's night and day.<br /></p><p>Bring your wings home. Feel a bit of pride at what you are going to engage in. Here's where it gets all culinary. Instead of simply cooking your wings, borrow a technique from classical cookery of duck. Duck, like chicken wings, contain a great deal of fat in the skin. In order to open the pores to allow the fat to run out during cooking, it's necessary to blanch them very briefly in rapidly boiling water. Bring a large pot of water to the boil. Dunk your chicken wings, only a few at a time, into the water for no more than 10 seconds. Any longer and you will cook them, which is not the point. <br /></p><p>After blanching, turn your oven up to a ridiculously high temperature—as high as it will go. Lay your wings out on sheet pans, preferably on a rack to allow air to flow around them as they roast, in a single layer. When oven is smoking hot, slide in the wings for about ten to fifteen minutes, or until you're confident they are done. They should have a light golden to brown crust on them. While they are roasting, prepare the sauce!<br /></p><p>Here is the only kind of sauce you should coat chicken wings with if you want them to be Buffalo wings. Best case scenario, order some online from the Anchor Bar in Buffalo. This stuff is an almost neon orange, probably toxic and very delicious. Short of that, buy some sauce like Frank's Red Hot, Crystal, or Tabasco. The goal here is not just pure heat, but tang. Mix whatever sauce you buy with equal parts melted whole unsalted butter and place in a large bowl. Keep it warm.<br /></p><p>When those wings come out of the oven, slide them right into that bowl with the sauce and toss, toss, toss. Use the bowl to toss so that the sauce sloshes out all over your kitchen counter and your freshly-pressed Michigan shirt. I wouldn't have it any other way. Next, slide your wings onto a platter with celery sticks and homemade blue cheese dressing.<br /></p><p>Homemade blue cheese dressing? I thought we were done <span style="font-family:Wingdings;">J</span> Not quite. Never buy this pre-made, it's too easy to make yourself. And never, ever serve Buffalo wings with Ranch dressing. Talk about a tragedy. For blue cheese dressing, buy some quality genuine blue cheese. Make sure you have plenty of store-bought but full octane mayo on hand, more Crystal or Tabasco sauce, Worcesterschire sauce, fresh lemon and salt and black pepper. Basically add blue cheese to mayo until very chunky. Keep seasoning until you can't taste mayo anymore, which is one of the golden rules of using pre-made mayo for a sauce. I can't guarantee that your blue cheese dressing will taste as good as mine, but I've had lots of practice. Most often what it needs is more salt, lemon juice, Crystal, Worcesterschire and pepper.<br /></p><p>Take control of your life today. Get your supplies, including Wolverine shirt, Buffalo wing ingredients, lots of cold canned beer and bloody mary fixings. Wake up tomorrow morning, brush your teeth, put on your Michigan gear, fix a bloody mary, make your wings. Take a moment to step outside in the glorious sunshine, beer in one hand, bloody mary in the other. Then retreat into a dark cave, and see how the other half lives.</p></span>paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-52273284795145978422009-09-04T14:20:00.001-07:002009-09-04T14:20:57.948-07:00A Gardening Tragedy<span xmlns=""><p>Each day, like Don Corleone in his old age, I like to go into my garden and spend a little time among my tomatoes. I don't really do much to them while I'm out there, unless I need to water. Partly I don't know what <em>to</em> do to them! Mostly I just walk among them, look at their leaves, examine the ripening fruit—enjoy their company.<br /></p><p>But at this time of year the plants are definitely starting to die. It's not so much the wilting and the spotting of the leaves or the reddening of the fruit. It's as if their entire stature has started to shrink. They're a lot thinner through the middle. They seem to be all stem and fruit and less and less leafy liveliness. They're really more of skeletons than anything. I can't help but wonder if I did all I could during this growing season. I'm aware that the answer is, most likely, no. But that's okay. I've committed greater crimes in my garden, one of the more venal of which I will describe at this time. I do this not so much out of a sense of expiation as an acknowledgement that sinning seems to be such a central part of me and my gardening habits.<br /></p><p>This story has to do with the Great Snowstorm of 2008 in Seattle, an event so momentous it seems to have cost us our otherwise wonderful mayor, Greg Nickels, as well as shaved several years off the lives of the majority of our citizens. I'm sorry, but coming from Michigan, a few inches of snow in December, no snowplows or not, does not a tragedy make. The story that follows, however, does.<br /></p><p>Long before the snow came, around this time last year, my wife and I set out in the garden several types of lettuces, greens, and other winter vegetables. By the time December rolled around, they were doing swimmingly. We had been eating wonderful lettuces and greens for months, picking them one minute, eating them the next. Enter into the picture several inches of snow. Our lettuces became buried under a soft bed of white. We flew back East for Christmas (where there was real snow!), and by the time we returned to Seattle in early January it was the grey, dreary, snowless place we have come to call home.<br /></p><p>Before we even got into the house, suitcases in tow, I went straight for where the plants had been. Several lesser varieties of lettuce, such as frilly frisee and that primadonna of Italian lettuces, lolla rossa, were gone completely. Gone without a trace. It was as if something had just zapped them out of existence, wiped them, quite literally, off the face of the earth. Some of the hardier varieties, your more quotidian romaine, were still there, but not long for this world. Imagine a head of lettuce lying completely flat on the ground. It was one-dimensional, each of its leaves spread out like a child's drawing of a flower. I lifted a limp leaf, hoping against hope that I might revive it. There was nothing left to do.<br /></p><p>But standing in the back of the bunch were several plants I had all but forgotten about back in the fall. At that innocent time, slugs had all but eaten them to stumps. But there they were now, several sturdy, healthy, proud collard greens. It was a triumph of the proletariat over the bourgeoisie. I felt victorious. I monitored their progress for the rest of the winter. They were knee high when we decided to reap their benefits and cut them down. It was early spring, around the time I started to build my raised beds, and there wasn't room for them anyway. I had one very, very full shopping bag of the freshest collard greens I had ever seen.<br /></p><p>I proceeded to stuff them into the back of the refrigerator, behind the milk jug and the water pitcher. And there they sat, week after week. That's right. One of the worst things that I do as a gardener is spend time growing things, only to throw them out later after they go bad.<br /></p><p>A couple of things should be noted about collard greens. When properly stored, as mine were, they take a long time to go bad. Two, I personally love to cook them. After cooking in New Orleans for a year, where I learned to fix them with lots of bacon, brown sugar, and Abita amber, they have become a household staple several times of year. I've cooked them for parties and even catering events. I've been told on several occasions that they were the best collards that someone had ever tasted. And I knew it. Most collard greens are bland and boring. Mine roared with life, and flavor.<br /></p><p>Why did I let them go to waste? I don't know. Each week my wife asked me to cook them. Each week I grew more and more apoplectic about them. I tried to pretend they weren't back there. Finally I took the bag and threw it directly into the trash can, not bothering to open it up and see them in their wilted state, not bothering to honor them with the food waste bin which sits adjacent to our regular trash.<br /></p><p>"What happened to the collard greens?" my wife said one winter day, noting their absence almost immediately.<br /></p><p>"I don't know," I answered meekly.<br /></p><p>"What do you mean you don't know?" she responded rather logically.<br /></p><p>I honestly didn't know, and I still don't. I have no excuses. Every time I try to come up with one, it just seems to fall apart, as if buried by you know what.<br /></p><p>Will I ever be able to bring myself to grow collard greens again? Let's add that to the list of unanswerable questions. I seem to have a garden full of them at this point.</p></span>paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-21032336609192931082009-08-19T08:44:00.001-07:002009-08-19T08:45:19.068-07:00How to Live the Good Life<span xmlns=""><p><br /> </p><p>If you do not currently have a garden of any kind, or even a house plant, you should consider doing so. Few things are capable as providing as much nourishment for the soul as helping something grow. Once you gain the confidence that comes with keeping something alive, you will quickly discover that there are things you can keep alive that taste really, really good. For me, gardening is really a selfish pleasure. But, naïve as it may sound, it makes the world a better place as well. It improves our air, and it provides something green for others to look at. Anytime you can make your own selfishness align with the better of someone else you are doing a good thing.<br /></p><p>I have only been gardening for a couple of years. For so long it seemed as if gardening was just a vastly complex hobby that offered the newcomer so many different ways to fail. I used to tell people around our P-Patch that hour for hour and ounce for ounce, my wife and I work the hardest for the least amount of actual gain, if such a calculus were to exist.<br /></p><p>But no longer. At least when it comes to basil. Our first year, which was really a half year, the summer of 2007, we grew a few basil plants with moderate success. We planted late, didn't fertilize or water enough, and were pleasantly pleased with our results. I don't recall that we had enough even make a batch of pesto that year, but we certainly made our share of caprese salads and the like. Last year, 2008, we got an early start and planted seeds in the spring in the south-facing window of our Ballard apartment. They grew too fast, became too spindly, and amidst the madness of house shopping and then moving, in May of last year, the basil plants never made the transition. I don't even remember exactly what happened to them. But that's probably for the better. I don't even recall being too upset. So accustomed to failure when it came to gardening, we likely shrugged our shoulders, hung our heads low, and moved on.<br /></p><p>But then came this year, 2009, the year of the bountiful sun and the somewhat experienced gardening team at the old Redman household. I built raised beds back in February. I ordered shipments of the finest organic topsoil and compost that money could buy. We purchased basil plants from a local nursery sometime in May, just as the sunshine was beginning to blanket our glorious corner of the Earth. We watered. Boy, did we water! By late June we were looking at four waist-high bushes of basil. They were as big as the nascent tomato plants that grew alongside them. I joked to my wife that this was my Italian bed. That basil and tomatoes were meant to be together not just on the plate but also in the garden. I perhaps grew slightly smug at our success.<br /></p><p>For the past month or so we have been making pesto once a week. Everytime we go out to cut down some basil, thinking we are going to have to take down a whole plant, only to realize that no matter how much we seem to cut, there is always much, much more. We eat pasta lousy with pesto. We purposefully make too much pesto, and then overdress the pasta with its luscious greenness. No, I take that back. It's not possible to overdress pasta with pesto. In addition to our lovely meals, we have been making pesto and freezing it. Will it taste the same come January, when we are staring outside at gloom and rain and bare tree branches? I don't know. <br /></p><p>Our plan for this week is to cut down most of our basil. We plan to make another big batch of pesto, as well as try freezing some whole leaves, which we've heard works well. There's also other reasons to cut down the basil. It's started to flower, and while I love watching the bees gather round, since they seem to take as much if not more pleasure in our basil, it also means that the plants won't produce many more leaves. <br /></p><p>There is something else I need to confess to. My gardening is not quite where it needs to be. I planted too many tomato plants—good problem to have!—and they have completely overtaken the basil. My "Italian bed" is a tangle of green. It is more green than I ever could have imagined. It's impossible to tell where the basil ends and the tomatoes begin. I've mistreated my basil in this way. But it doesn't complain. It just does its thing, as it's done for centuries. It quietly goes through life and doesn't seem to complain. We could all learn a thing or two from that.</p></span>paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-87065470762431744442009-05-19T12:03:00.000-07:002009-05-19T12:04:31.573-07:00Grate Your VegetablesThere is a simple side dish you can make that accomplishes the magical goal of being inexpensive, extremely good for your body and your soul, and ludicrously delicious. Start by reaching for your box grater, that neglected tool you may not have used for since before they started selling pre-grated cheese-- remember when?<br /><br />Now this dish involves vegetables. Vegetables, that elusive category of food you may have seen once on television. Not only vegetables, but a couple of the most despised species: carrots and beets. You want to choose one or the other. You can serve them alongside of each other, but don't mix them together. Unless you want to.<br /><br />Begin with that most important first step. Peel your vegetables and baptize them under wonderfully cold water from your kitchen sink- Remember to be thankful for the Cascades and the luscious bounty they give us! A thousand page book could be written on the quality of our public water. Also, cleansing your vegetables in this manner will simultaneously cleanse your soul. Promise.<br /><br />From here this dish is so simple you might as well open a pre-dinner beverage. But watch those fingers! A grater and its crude edges can do a dandy on the delicate flesh of your finger.<br /><br />Whether using beet or carrot, simply grate the raw vegetable using the large holes. Now season with the four most important ingredients on Earth: salt, fresh-ground pepper, vinegar and olive oil. What kind of vinegar? Try red wine for the beets, perhaps rice wine or white wine for the carrots. How much of these seasonings? It is too difficult to describe in words. Add each seasoning judiciously, taste, and continue seasoning. One thing to keep in mind is these salads do best after sitting out for a good twenty minutes, and change considerably overnight in the refrigerator. <br /><br />How should it taste? Like a tangy, crunchy mouthful of soul-satisfying flavor. Munch on this alongside a nice piece of protein--whatever your inclination or your pocketbook calls for-- and watch your body and your soul become invigorated at the table. <form id="236732" class="mt-enclosure mt-enclosure-image" style="display: inline;"> <img alt="Box Grater" src="http://seattlest.com/attachments/seattle_paul/IMG_4912.JPG" width="240" height="320" class="image-none" /> </form>paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-29593976611487433482009-05-01T07:59:00.000-07:002009-05-01T08:03:45.661-07:001st Work of Fiction PublishedHello, Wine Wall? How are you? :)<br /><br />It's been a while. Thought I post links to a couple of other writing projects that have come up for the scant few who visit this quiet little corner of the Internets.<br /><br />-Salumaio, Paul's first published short story, a work of "food fiction", has been published in the Spring issue of Contrary, a literary journal based out of Chicago. <a href="http://www.contrarymagazine.com/Contrary/Salumaio.html">Here is a link if you care to read.</a><br /><br />-I've started contributing to the online-only P-I as part of their Seattle Views section. <a href="http://blog.seattlepi.com/paulredman/archives/167608.asp">Here is a link to my first piece</a>.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-72417736325863543052009-03-21T09:36:00.001-07:002009-03-24T08:39:37.914-07:00La Vida Dolce Per Tutti<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiPyHEejdWMq1eRRra190PiGbmihJ-mt83zBDcmERXlKrmFje0E9zOiQFX97Wppc9B-H1SOWABZm_GA2LAKQULc9S4hlaEysj7MGjuluwesMjD-ISxLZ6Ve4OLZKVZratHEIG_/s1600-h/IMG_4724-1.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiPyHEejdWMq1eRRra190PiGbmihJ-mt83zBDcmERXlKrmFje0E9zOiQFX97Wppc9B-H1SOWABZm_GA2LAKQULc9S4hlaEysj7MGjuluwesMjD-ISxLZ6Ve4OLZKVZratHEIG_/s320/IMG_4724-1.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5315713719409179778" border="0" /></a><br /><span xmlns=""><p>If your soul yearns for spring, which is literally coming in fits and starts this year, take matters into your own hands. Feed yourself a hearty salad of delicate spring greens without even making a trip to the local grocery or farmer's market. Right now is the time to head out to your backyard, or a neighborhood park if you are a true city dweller, and start picking your own dandelion greens. Get them now before they blossom and their leaves turn woody. It's terribly simple and will make you feel like the most sophisticated eater in the world. Go out and pick your greens this weekend. Stick your fingers into that cold, muddy soil, disregarding strange looks cast your way from condescending urbanites. If you are self-assured, take an elegant wicker basket with you. If audacity is your calling card, wear your floppiest summer hat. Simulate a trip to the farmer's market with all the characteristic showmanship you can muster. Fill your basket with as many greens as you can before modesty takes over and you remember that your original mission was simply to have a satisfying lunch. Take your greens home. Scrub your sink and fill it with the coldest water possible. Fill it to the brim and stop for a moment to appreciate the resources at hand. Now carefully plunge your harvest into the water, stir gently, as if leading an infant around in circles in a swimming pool for the first time, and then let them float. Let them float and let the sand and dirt precipitate silently to the bottom. Cherish your life. Go and sit in a sunny corner chair and read a book, or just gaze outside and think of summer. When you are ready, when your stomach growls, remove your greens from their baptism and spin them dry. A salad spinner is another cheap addition to your <em>batterie de cuisine</em> that will repay itself in innumerable delicious salads over the rest of your life. If you want to elevate your greens to their most noble use, dress them lightly with the freshest, fruitiest olive oil you can afford. Bless them with a pinch of good salt, a turn or two of the mill, and a squeeze from a nice lemon. Toss them lightly. Pile them high on a white plate. Admire them before digging in. If you follow these steps exactly, your reward will be otherworldly indeed. </p></span>paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-12613476499544061692009-03-18T09:46:00.001-07:002009-03-21T09:17:11.572-07:00The Best Friends You’ll Ever Have<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEielSKkrn427CQJQTDO5QK-RUciOZ2UvWIiqmzLfub_LwMzN938_HC1njAzrOiSTr1uWNQieOeYhTKdfv9SWyT96Ab67eRKsou94t9f3kLYGC0ORHbrlPTjbc6XVh1c8a57COGB/s1600-h/IMG_4687.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEielSKkrn427CQJQTDO5QK-RUciOZ2UvWIiqmzLfub_LwMzN938_HC1njAzrOiSTr1uWNQieOeYhTKdfv9SWyT96Ab67eRKsou94t9f3kLYGC0ORHbrlPTjbc6XVh1c8a57COGB/s320/IMG_4687.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5315675820399139266" border="0" /></a><br /><span xmlns=""><p>A quick and simple way to add complexity of flavor to your cooking is to always start with a few humble ingredients: sharp onions, firm carrots and crisp celery. Peel the onions and carrots, being careful not to trim away too much. Rinse them under cold water and pat dry. Rinse a stalk of celery, trim the ends, and place all three vegetables on your cutting board. Now chop them very fine. When you go to cook something like spaghetti sauce, a piece of chicken, a pot of beans, or, if you are adventurous, a soup from scratch, begin by cooking these three vegetables. In French cuisine they form a kind of holy trinity, and are used to add depth of flavor to hundreds of dishes. You can almost begin by sauteeing these three vegetables in some fat before you have even decided what it is you want to make!<br /></p><p>To experience one of life's countless little joys, take a healthy pat of very fresh butter, heat it slowly, add these three vegetables, stir, and close your eyes. If the whole world could inhale such things collectively, there would be no need for war. Sprinkle in some salt and fresh-ground pepper and then try to contain your animal passions; remind yourself that the good life includes both indulgence and modesty. <br /></p><p>Onions, carrots and celery will become your faithful friends if you call on them often, treat them with respect, and don't let them wither away in the reaches of your refrigerator. They will greet you when you come home cold and tired from a long day of work. If you have no work to go to, they will not judge you for it. And, best of all, your dining companions will begin to notice that your food is more pleasant, that it seems somehow different, perhaps a touch more soulful. If someone should inquire directly as to the changes you and your food seem to have undergone, you need not say anything in response. Shrug, smile, and continue quietly on your path to perfection. <br /></p></span>paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-85596224376256708172009-03-13T09:28:00.001-07:002009-03-13T10:11:35.074-07:00Feed Yourself: Bake Bread<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUTdnzk3EuDbpG2pq9dMO9bL4lE31X6ayPaRvrfHSs_B47L33LpnefjPJn4oNxlMV238rlZbOSlrGoQgaM4y7RJKQAk9dvEtJCza9MtlbBGSgpH5iBDBdNrMQ7BdaK-Uvr_fIx/s1600-h/IMG_4641%5B2%5D"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUTdnzk3EuDbpG2pq9dMO9bL4lE31X6ayPaRvrfHSs_B47L33LpnefjPJn4oNxlMV238rlZbOSlrGoQgaM4y7RJKQAk9dvEtJCza9MtlbBGSgpH5iBDBdNrMQ7BdaK-Uvr_fIx/s320/IMG_4641%5B2%5D" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5312720500537283330" border="0" /></a><br /><span xmlns=""><p>If you are unemployed, underemployed, or just hungry, there is a simple and satisfying way to nourish your soul and your belly. Bake your own bread. It requires nothing you don't own already. Sure, there are lots of ways to complicate it, to make it more expensive, but they are not necessary. First take about four cups of any old flour. Mix it with about two cups of lukewarm water. Sprinkle in a couple teaspoons of large-grain salt and a packet of yeast. Now knead. Knead like you have never done anything before. Knead like you are making love for the last time. Turn and press the dough until your muscles ache with soreness, muscles you might not have known you had. Now knead some more. Don't even think of using a machine to do this unless you have kneaded bread by hand at least one-hundred times before. And remember, later, what it felt like to make something so special, all by yourself. Cooking should always be a solitary pleasure. After your dough is kneaded, form it into a ball and place in a bowl, covered with a fresh kitchen towel. Allow it to double in volume. Knead it gently once or twice, and allow it to double in volume again. There is a delicate gas structure that has developed in your risen dough, and overhandling at this point will ruin it. Form it into the desired shape- round and rustic, long and narrow, or individual rolls. Crank your oven up to five-hundred- so much good cooking happens at high heat! While the oven is warming, let the dough continue to rise, covered lightly with the towel. When your oven is good and hot, take a very sharp blade and put a half-inch gash or two in the top of your loaf, scarring it irrevocably but allowing it to expand further in the oven. Before you slide it in the oven, get a spray bottle of water handy. Slide the dough and its parchment onto your baking sheet, and place in the oven. Close the oven door almost all the way, and spray water on the loaf and into the oven itself (but not the light) before closing the door. Let it bake about a half an hour. While your bread quietly goes about the business of driving you insane with its wonderful aroma, think about all the things you want to do to it. If, upon its completion, you find yourself tearing it apart, piece by piece, ravishing it to mere crumbs while still warm, you would not be the first. But try to stretch it out, make it last. It will be incomparable toasted, buttered, and dipped in hot coffee. A humble sandwich can be elevated to the greatest heights. Should it become stale, all is not lost. Simple things like croutons for a salad, or French toast with syrup, will never be the same. A kind warning: your friends may call you impracticle, whimsical, irresponsible, or worse, for baking your own bread. If you like, keep your little secret to yourself. Rush home for no other reason than to bake bread. One thing is certain. You will be better for it. </p></span>paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-72146444175761680362009-03-04T09:02:00.001-08:002009-03-05T07:14:00.183-08:00Recession-Proof Roast Chicken<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2rO6XRg_VZMN-OSvh1rCDjPVYCjdN_vmBa0ZK-a_XDRYB4KjSvAV7NJFwbUvMPOJ-RGhyphenhyphenH7auj9o3wosY-AIn-4dVzUk19PbxYJSgXqvwsx-gkfalwuuCLCZr9ufde-cnZLw1/s1600-h/IMG_4607%5B1%5D"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2rO6XRg_VZMN-OSvh1rCDjPVYCjdN_vmBa0ZK-a_XDRYB4KjSvAV7NJFwbUvMPOJ-RGhyphenhyphenH7auj9o3wosY-AIn-4dVzUk19PbxYJSgXqvwsx-gkfalwuuCLCZr9ufde-cnZLw1/s320/IMG_4607%5B1%5D" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5309721291492305330" border="0" /></a><br /><span xmlns=""><p>One of the best ways to replicate the flavor and quality of restaurant food at home is to roast a chicken. There are a couple of things you can do to make it truly special. First, buy yourself a humble bird- it need not come from the local farmer's market. Take it home, open it up in your sink, and remove any body parts found in the cavity. Wrap these in plastic and place them in your freezer (more on that later). Now rinse the bird inside and out under the ice-cold water that runs from the Cascades into our taps. Refresh it like your rinsing an infant. Then pat it dry with paper towel, every last crease and crevice. Here comes the important part. Pour a healthy amount of salt into a little bowl. For those who want to measure: your bird should be about 4 to 5 pounds, so measure about 3 tablespoons of large grain salt, less if its iodized or fine sea salt. This is an unseemly amount of salt. Welcome to restaurant cooking! Into your salt grind some black peppercorns, about twenty turns of the mill. If you don't own a mill, go to Goodwill and buy one. Preground pepper is utterly useless. Stir these together well. Now take your pristine chicken and season it inside and out, rubbing your salt and pepper over every last inch of it, even the wings. When your bird is seasoned, place it on a plate lined with fresh paper towel, and set it uncovered in the fridge overnight. This is essential. Sleep poorly while you dream of your chicken. Let hunger gnaw at your sanity the whole next day (but don't starve yourself completely!). Instead of longing for an expensive tryst at <a href="http://howtocookawolf.com/">How to Cook a Wolf</a>, think of <a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://www.amazon.com/How-Cook-Wolf-M-Fisher/dp/0865473366">How to Cook a Wolf</a>, M.F.K. Fisher's World War Two meditation on how to "keep the wolf at bay", the wolf of hunger, that is. When you think you are ready, remove the chicken from the fridge and place it on the counter. Look at it one last time before its transformation. Turn up your oven to 450, 500 if you are courageous. Set your cast-iron skillet in the oven to heat up. If you don't own one, go back to Goodwill. It is cheap and worth its weight in gold. When it's hot, pour a little oil in the bottom, tilt the pan to spread it around, and place your chicken in the pan. Truss it first if you know how. Cook it for one hour at high heat, then lower the temperature to 350 or maybe 325 if you are cautious, and bring the chicken home. After a second hour of pure torture, remove it from the oven, let it rest in the pan for 5 minutes, then remove the chicken and let it rest on a plate or board for another 5. Your skillet should be filled with half an inch of liquid gold. Pour this into a small bowl and let it cool. You can relive your roast chicken ten times or more by using this fat to cook your next meals. Try it for scrambled eggs on the weekend! After you devour your bird, freeze the carcass, to be used later with the innards, to make chicken stock. That's the problem with cooking. It never really ends.</p></span>paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-7402167827709179062009-02-27T07:48:00.001-08:002009-02-27T08:22:29.311-08:00Tuesdays with Market<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZZcwQKfhKN0UzsFvkqtrqtIdft5GBeYWYZxsdhrSHXHpg2lT4uFnqEy1s0drCItUWWOocD1l70mIChcDu9Vsr_LHHtmj0JIBAtHkzqClc3rxhyieBDS0D7icnzNy0PKkZigz-/s1600-h/IMG_4590.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZZcwQKfhKN0UzsFvkqtrqtIdft5GBeYWYZxsdhrSHXHpg2lT4uFnqEy1s0drCItUWWOocD1l70mIChcDu9Vsr_LHHtmj0JIBAtHkzqClc3rxhyieBDS0D7icnzNy0PKkZigz-/s320/IMG_4590.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5307512867285678450" border="0" /></a><br /><span xmlns=""><p>For this trip to our friendly <a href="http://www.pikeplacemarket.org/frameset.asp?flash=false">Pike Place Market</a>, the quirky culinary epicenter of the Emerald City, we visited <a href="http://www.campagnerestaurant.com/cafe_splash.html">Café Campagne</a> for their incomparably affordable happy hour. I've always had an affection for French cuisine, starting back in my first kitchen class in culinary school, Skills Development. I'm sure my face took on a glazed look as the chef, Anthony Natale, began to talk about something called <em>fond de veau</em>. That was over ten years ago, and French cuisine is no less interesting to me today, in spite of the way it is sometimes disparaged as overly fussy or old-fashioned. If you go to France you realize it is the food (maybe not veal stock!) that ordinary citizens, working class folks, eat. One of my favorite stories to tell my students is how fascinated I was by reading the school lunch menus posted outside a grammar school in this or that nameless French city, during the two years I spent abroad in Europe after culinary school, chasing the ghostly dishes I was indoctrinated by in culinary school.. "What kind of food do French schoolchildren eat?" I always ask. The entire class always gets that faraway look that is or should be a message to the teacher that what they are saying is not readily apparent. "French food!" I exclaim, to only slightly more recognition. Oh well. It's still funny to me.<br /></p><p>Anyways, Café Campagne's <a href="http://www.campagnerestaurant.com/cafe_menu.html#HappyHour">happy hour</a> is the cheapest in town. $1 mini lamburgers exploding with juice and perfectly cooked- unlike the raw-in-the-middle burgers I forced my friends to eat last weekend after misreading their doneness while grilling them in the dark after a beer or two. There are also $1 pate sandwiches. Both are served on gougeres, which are the same thing as a cream puff, minus all the sweet stuff. Fantastic. There are also decent <em>pommes frites</em> served with garlicky aioli. Perhaps the highlight was the <em>tarte flambee</em>, which in this case is a flatbread smothered with a thick layer of melted onions, a dab of crème fraiche and a healthy smattering of crisp bacon strips.<br /></p><p>Maybe the best part about this happy hour is that there is a selection of a dozen or so French wines of moderate quality offered for $2/3 oz pour! What a great way to sample several regional wines in one sitting for not much money. Granted these are not the prime examples of French wines, but they are tasty and pretty much as they should be. White Burgundy is a touch flinty and utterly lacking in oakiness. Bordeaux is grapey and tannic. There are also two sparkling wines offered.<br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Just to put things in perspective, when we went to Il Bistro two weeks ago, the happy hour bill came to $50. This time it was $30 and the food was better, the server infinitely more skilled. Campagne is a fancy, top-notch restaurant. Their happy hour is an absolute steal. Go for it.</p></span>paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-52375253989245412322009-02-24T09:39:00.000-08:002009-02-24T09:41:07.056-08:00Food AllergiesSeattle food blogger Herbivoracious has some helpful advice, and a harrowing tale to boot, about the importance of educating oneself about food allergies.<br /><br />http://www.herbivoracious.com/2009/02/understanding-deadly-food-allergies-this-post-could-save-a-life.htmlpaulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-59511159096654572732009-02-03T20:43:00.000-08:002009-02-03T21:08:02.345-08:00Tuesdays with Market<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.insiderpages.com/photos/business/full/754/3723464754/207963.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 800px; height: 600px;" src="http://www.insiderpages.com/photos/business/full/754/3723464754/207963.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />Il Bistro is quintessential Market - dimly lit, hidden, and cheap at happy hour. We gorged ourselves in style at this classic Market haunt beneath the pig and steps from the gum wall. For a mere $50 (including tax and tip) you can get crostini with goat cheese and roasted garlic, crostini with sausage and peppers, seared calamari in a rich tomato broth, mixed antipasti (cheese, olives, salumi), mushroom ravioli, rigatoni with meat sauce, a couple of beers, two glasses of wine, and some bread to sop up the sauces and soak up your drinks. All of the food was better than good. Not amazing, but certainly tasty. The dry spice garnish used for the ravioli was slightly off-putting, but the cream sauce made up for it. The pasta was almost too al dente. I personally wouldn't be bold enough to serve it that way, for fear I would be accused of under-cooking, but we enjoyed it. And, Let's face it, you don't go to a candlelit Italian restaurant in an out-of-the-way corner of the Market for the food. You go there for the atmosphere. Il Bistro has atmosphere in spades. From its warm red glow, to its marble table tops, to its wood bar, this is someplace you bring a date. Plus, from 5-6:30 p.m., it's some place you can afford to bring a date, even during a recession. The are going to be at least a few more months of cold weather and bad economic news. Find yourself someone special, take the steps just past the pig, and indulge.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-72946620420600766022009-01-27T20:00:00.000-08:002009-01-27T20:30:07.073-08:00Date Night - an occasional series<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHnNd8y2UATiPY3ISoDRKULQHMuwz1gkLm5UwXxR-JqF4ugOiU_7Fjc1hVajyymAazQ3HxOewZ_GatbCDFlV_RyP8toUc9AVIIVQszBxnBM63EmK13vVraOT5aujMfquFFgpfC/s1600-h/Fall+2008+231.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHnNd8y2UATiPY3ISoDRKULQHMuwz1gkLm5UwXxR-JqF4ugOiU_7Fjc1hVajyymAazQ3HxOewZ_GatbCDFlV_RyP8toUc9AVIIVQszBxnBM63EmK13vVraOT5aujMfquFFgpfC/s320/Fall+2008+231.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5296195452058833362" border="0" /></a><br />Yes, we here at the wine wall realize that we've been slacking off. What can we say? You've heard our excuses before (holidays, snow, our "real" jobs getting in the way, etc). But we've made a resolution (better late than never) to begin again. Yes, despite our best intentions, you will never hear about our adventures in Little Rhody (Johnny cakes, both East and West Bay style, latkes, or the exact right cheese and wine to pair with Scrabble), our trip to Mexico, our Christmas party, our Election Night party, or even our most recent dinner at The Herbfarm (although it was amazing and we took lots of pictures). But the future is bright . . .<br /><br />We are bringing back an old favorite - Tuesdays with Market - a weekly exploration of Pike Place Market's bounty (ie our quest to eat everywhere in the Market that sells prepared foods). And we are starting a new tradition - Date Night - aka "I worked late, got stuck in a parking lot on I-5, and we realized we had better set our sites a little closer to home." That's what happened tonight and it was the perfect excuse for us to hit one of our favorite Greenwood haunts . . .<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://gorditoshealthymexicanfood.com/">Gorditos</a> </span>claims to be "Healthy Mexican" but the only thing healthy about it is the portions. They have a burrito there the size of a baby. Seriously, there is a side by side comparison photo on the wall and the burrito actually appears to be slightly larger than the baby. We usually get that burrito's slightly-less-large-but-still-too-big-to-ever-be-eaten (even by the likes of us)-in-one-sitting cousin. I like the veggie one, not because I'm trying to save the planet but because it comes with free guacamole inside, and Paul usually gets a meatier version. We also like them "wet," meaning smothered in cheese, salsa, and sour cream. While, like all Seattle burritos, they suffer from a distinct lack of cohesion and must be eaten with fork and knife, these are certainly some of the most satisfying efforts at Mission-style burritos around. And, after one of these and a Pacifico and some chips, a healthy food coma will wipe out the stress of that meeting that ran over and even the I-5 commute.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-29059319533383106102008-12-03T12:02:00.000-08:002008-12-03T12:06:33.408-08:00The Holiday SeasonOne of the strangest parts about going to Mexico for a week during Thanksgiving (yes, it was wonderful!) was coming back to the U.S. to find that the holiday season was upon us. It was strange, like going outside to get the mail and coming back to find a different house waiting for you.<br /><br />I don't know if it's that or the sense that due to the economy this season will be less jubilant and joyous (code for commercial) than other holiday seasons, but I am getting the sense that we are off to a slow start this year. It could also be because Seattle just had one of the balmier Novembers on record, apparently.<br /><br />I for one have always loved this time of year. Not that I go in for all the crap that goes along with it, but this is the one time of the year when we can overeat and overdrink with impunity:) Therefore, allow me to kick off the season here at the Wine Wall with a hearty Ho, Ho, Ho. Let's have some fun people. Let's enjoy our friends and family, be thankful, and, yes, let's have a good time and eat lots of stuff that's not good for us.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-15132147987582949352008-10-23T10:39:00.000-07:002008-10-23T11:07:12.564-07:00The ability to self-correctIn the wake of a recent dining experience at <a href="http://events.nytimes.com/2007/02/25/travel/25surfacing.html">Frasca Food and Win</a>e, perhaps the finest Italian restaurant in North America, located in Boulder, Colorado, I have come to a conclusion about one aspect of great restaurant service: the ability to self correct is of paramount importance.<br /><br />We were eating a multi-course meal and pairing glasses of wine with each course. On one of the first courses, we were served our food (hot) but not the accompanying wine. We took a few bites before I decided to set down my fork and wait for the wine to arrive. It was a tasting menu, the portions were small, and I decided that if the name of the game is tasting the food with the wine in your mouth at the same time, I wasn't going to waste another bite. It had the potential to be a fairly substantial wrinkle in an otherwise out-of-this-world dining experience. I glanced around for a server, sent out my best something's wrong here vibes, and then the our wine was brought over after only a couple of minutes in the wilderness. We never directly spoke with the server about the missing glasses of wine, but on every subsequent course our wine was delivered before the previous glass was emptied- long before the next plate of food hit the white tablecloth. What it represented to me was a professional institution in which employees are constantly recalibrating their actions on the fly, which is perhaps one definition of five-star hospitality.<br /><br />Upon reflection, perhaps there is a deeper, more personal reason for my animosity towards a wine- or a plate of food- served after its time, so to speak. While in culinary school I had to do rotations through the school's four restaurants, which, because of the time of my final term in school, which was the holiday period, roughly from Thanksgiving through New Year's, was the busiest time of the year and every table was full from open to close, every night of the week. As a captain, or front waiter one night in the Escoffier Room, the school's classical French restaurant and easily the one with the fussiest service (and some of the most expensive wines), I oversaw a service failure which still haunts me to this day. I was serving a four top, two couples, well-heeled types who came up from the Manhattan area- the bread and butter of the CIA restaurants' clientele, one could argue (tour buses of seniors being another major contigent!)- and they were ordering some serious wines. For the main course, which was rack of lamb, they dropped a bombshell and ordered one of the more expensive wines on the list, a Bordeaux whose exact provenance escapes my memory- and easily the most expensive bottle of wine I sold in a season of expensive bottles of wine during my short career as a server at the CIA.<br /><br />To make a long story short, since the bottle of wine was stored in the school's vast wine cellars, not in the dining room where most of the wine was stored, it was a twenty minute walk and a pain in the ass to retrieve it. I had to ask the dining room fellow, who was doing an actual fellowship under the tutelage of Bernard, who was the instructor/maitre d'hotel type dude (formerly the captain of the dining room at Daniel in Manhattan). The meal progressed, the food was served, and the fellow and I promptly forgot all about going to get the $200 bottle that needed to be decanted and give time to breath in order to fully open up.<br /><br />The four guests were served their racks of lamb, and I stood off to the side watching them eat, when, like an idiot staring blankly off into space, I wondered why the person who had ordered the wine had set down his utensils and started looking right at me. I realized my mistake, the fellow went to grab the bottle, it was hastily opened and poured, and the meal carried on without so much as a mild rebuke from the customer- a sign of true good taste and manners.<br /><br />Now this could be chalked up to me- and the fellow, technically- being students. It was a school, a learning environment, and I certainly learned from my experiences there. But nonetheless. The customer paid market price for his wine but was given less than a great service which is included- and expected- in the price of said bottle, and that's what buggers me.<br /><br />I haven't spent any time in the ten years since this incident working in a dining room, but I like to think that if I ever do, I will have the ability to self-correct- no matter how much time has past in between.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-84177764303843603472008-10-20T07:16:00.000-07:002008-10-20T07:22:08.419-07:00Gardening Updatejust a quick post to say that we have been working feverishly to put our garden to bed for the winter, and will put up some posts with pictures soon. Part of our problem is that Sunday is the only day (I am currently teaching on Saturdays as well) we have to garden, except that there is lots of other stuff to do on Sundays too- not the least of which is sit in front of a roaring fire drinking red wine or sherry! That's right. We do live some kind of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">bourgeois</span> life that is <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">over packed</span> with activities. How I long for the simple life of my student days, when I could read for hours and hours a day. Oh well. Now I read a book for a few hours a week and feel lucky to do so. But back to our food life. In addition to winterizing our p-patch, we have been growing several varieties of lettuces (and some feral spinach that popped up out of nowhere) in our front yard. That in its own right deserves a post and some pictures. Wine wall readers, if you are out there, sit tight. We will have more examples of the mixed success that is our eating and gardening life coming soon.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-25094308208557689082008-09-08T19:45:00.000-07:002008-09-08T19:51:24.764-07:00Dahlia<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAhmNZP2ga9gjKGybvHG_6iyJhLDipAXU6PDE6B4WQ9PMyZEPIqeCC0wyLBs_QEvRtBmyo0r3N4L163Kr2UxLiRAcKYucI8jV80qAFfeDztNm7h8kSeA7oLr2B2TdpGi5-QMmP/s1600-h/IMG_3956.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAhmNZP2ga9gjKGybvHG_6iyJhLDipAXU6PDE6B4WQ9PMyZEPIqeCC0wyLBs_QEvRtBmyo0r3N4L163Kr2UxLiRAcKYucI8jV80qAFfeDztNm7h8kSeA7oLr2B2TdpGi5-QMmP/s320/IMG_3956.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5243848715907821634" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqgOblJ1bJDgbO3l1jno-moJfcKcgXXg6m0AePa-BgoHDa-sRE70an9lZ09regVi-28yNYpF395mQjG8P25N4u1W7piG5uTPMvdD9PpbKzV5CMR9xX0cWVmzCjfW5Cn3v9J_er/s1600-h/IMG_3957.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqgOblJ1bJDgbO3l1jno-moJfcKcgXXg6m0AePa-BgoHDa-sRE70an9lZ09regVi-28yNYpF395mQjG8P25N4u1W7piG5uTPMvdD9PpbKzV5CMR9xX0cWVmzCjfW5Cn3v9J_er/s320/IMG_3957.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5243848718858950530" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRKMMYWyA1anEfCMgd6pGknRJZU5nzPR8fl8Clfpnw8iZX11mB98lT6AjBiz-4fSfw3LMkKDnp3510R17iudFKPCYSWUCx9iD4X87W_lHcsEom3zirTFchxiGm0iIGVKrrUkkY/s1600-h/IMG_3959.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRKMMYWyA1anEfCMgd6pGknRJZU5nzPR8fl8Clfpnw8iZX11mB98lT6AjBiz-4fSfw3LMkKDnp3510R17iudFKPCYSWUCx9iD4X87W_lHcsEom3zirTFchxiGm0iIGVKrrUkkY/s320/IMG_3959.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5243848721633255362" border="0" /></a><br />In addition to our mastery of fruit and vegetable husbandry, we are expert flower growers (cue term for that). Hah. Hardly. Actually, the people who lived in our house before us were flower people par excellence. In addition to all the roses that we knew about, there are tons of various flowers blooming all the time around here. Dahlia, we don't know ye well, but oh do we love thy sexy purple flowers. Baby.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-78847696594459451212008-09-08T19:39:00.000-07:002008-09-08T19:45:33.641-07:00Potato Detective<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAtnHc5HuI_0u9eHCS-dPa6gY3sI33cRJHFuAl5XHKysdIUeUCbf0UlMtkXZge_CjlwX1-bROlkxY-2_jTE4Xrx5fVwGpyIeB09CB3lj24w1qauqFEhXnkVo4OI3BjDTgtoVK-/s1600-h/IMG_3921.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAtnHc5HuI_0u9eHCS-dPa6gY3sI33cRJHFuAl5XHKysdIUeUCbf0UlMtkXZge_CjlwX1-bROlkxY-2_jTE4Xrx5fVwGpyIeB09CB3lj24w1qauqFEhXnkVo4OI3BjDTgtoVK-/s320/IMG_3921.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5243847022701565650" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAcJxyamuEAYNB9Wc2FPbZpzP2Oy6Ix412R5a8tOgxJLH4O9KKGCMVKoqYEkv5WFNo7DGhxiZZkJtATACPJR_tLAVSjvjMpm9At5haTQAQ7JhMvcWa6kGh3CL_UTKyVLEr4fYJ/s1600-h/IMG_3922.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAcJxyamuEAYNB9Wc2FPbZpzP2Oy6Ix412R5a8tOgxJLH4O9KKGCMVKoqYEkv5WFNo7DGhxiZZkJtATACPJR_tLAVSjvjMpm9At5haTQAQ7JhMvcWa6kGh3CL_UTKyVLEr4fYJ/s320/IMG_3922.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5243847027390568306" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcpI8phGX1gFXGO8KOx6gk2SuTqybQ07p2cWMhM1u2mz3ZwNPGXab_neRS710t1zZELvLzXS22xlD-xGJc0AUnM-NhFTG-Tf5JEZZu1mK_CIy3kIciGr32MlOOY5HmNTxhvX-I/s1600-h/IMG_3924.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcpI8phGX1gFXGO8KOx6gk2SuTqybQ07p2cWMhM1u2mz3ZwNPGXab_neRS710t1zZELvLzXS22xlD-xGJc0AUnM-NhFTG-Tf5JEZZu1mK_CIy3kIciGr32MlOOY5HmNTxhvX-I/s320/IMG_3924.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5243847035366635298" border="0" /></a><br />The Potato Detective, no relation to Cakespy, has come across a nefarious case of rotten homegrown potato. This is the first one we've encountered, so it's not quite time to cry outbreak, but this is nonetheless disheartening. We don't know what this defection is, but we do know that we will serve no unhealthy potato, homegrown or not. We will hunt you down where you live. We will follow you to the gates-- okay, enough already. We all know who the staff of the wine wall is voting for. That's company policy.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-33087245976543173832008-09-08T18:36:00.000-07:002008-09-08T18:42:08.823-07:00Candy-Striped Beets<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV23d95ptbJ0oO_42QAamfL6VNV4sJdoelj14iLmDDb6Ww4VLClL5SVUF1FZpFBCaqQRlaPn0mt8inQ-cVZ4WIEEaHIRnqcAoN2jbqhRyC5Y-Pp4x0Pws9fI8e1BvElyRoLksv/s1600-h/IMG_3902.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV23d95ptbJ0oO_42QAamfL6VNV4sJdoelj14iLmDDb6Ww4VLClL5SVUF1FZpFBCaqQRlaPn0mt8inQ-cVZ4WIEEaHIRnqcAoN2jbqhRyC5Y-Pp4x0Pws9fI8e1BvElyRoLksv/s320/IMG_3902.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5243830571712917698" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbUB_aUa2nHOHfFzNB2JwIm4y0RhkhpZe2DCkqCLC3XhGfQwVkeDrJ0Ch2HsRB1XlsNqhXcXeY_mPCAEz42ausM7jg0Nk3ubx4_z5Jp1YZHVzi9wPKc4g2Sdtu8zmPHSdpQ6Y1/s1600-h/IMG_3905.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbUB_aUa2nHOHfFzNB2JwIm4y0RhkhpZe2DCkqCLC3XhGfQwVkeDrJ0Ch2HsRB1XlsNqhXcXeY_mPCAEz42ausM7jg0Nk3ubx4_z5Jp1YZHVzi9wPKc4g2Sdtu8zmPHSdpQ6Y1/s320/IMG_3905.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5243830578527685874" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpPwWz3Yb-qMCVp4W8FE_-q8vwOIahkXXc2moE6rflZ0eJg6yXFfwJ4Au8H87UxNB6HjqS0hajXGCVNBThWkHo1cjbxdh8zPRwNbY7AHTUTr-IU0gABu0fXvn6aDIFHEAGNw1R/s1600-h/IMG_3914.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpPwWz3Yb-qMCVp4W8FE_-q8vwOIahkXXc2moE6rflZ0eJg6yXFfwJ4Au8H87UxNB6HjqS0hajXGCVNBThWkHo1cjbxdh8zPRwNbY7AHTUTr-IU0gABu0fXvn6aDIFHEAGNw1R/s320/IMG_3914.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5243830579939721554" border="0" /></a><br />Perhaps the defining characteristic of the chiogga beet is that the interior of the beet is candy-striped. Quite striking to look at and fun to eat, though they are absolutely the same as a red or a yellow beet in terms of flavor and such. Party! As to why some of our beets are mostly white, I have no earthly idea. They still taste the same.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-70347018456375162662008-09-08T18:19:00.000-07:002008-09-08T18:29:09.004-07:00Peche, Je t'aime<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGvI9KcOMPmZ571V4UiFDfAyAEfLLZ_51BXWbU-bg_Eu_ctlop4q1mYNKcus1xyoh6H8CZ2JWOqQr_gD179cqF9rSvuG_KcG1AqK5JVqrwErh1j-rTgNfOGLYN60RQ8orPpdY0/s1600-h/IMG_3864.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGvI9KcOMPmZ571V4UiFDfAyAEfLLZ_51BXWbU-bg_Eu_ctlop4q1mYNKcus1xyoh6H8CZ2JWOqQr_gD179cqF9rSvuG_KcG1AqK5JVqrwErh1j-rTgNfOGLYN60RQ8orPpdY0/s320/IMG_3864.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5243827077711213218" border="0" /></a>Really. You are my favorite fruit, by far. <br /><br />We have two peach trees and one nectarine tree, and they have finally ripened. So far they have been juicy, sweet, tart and floral. Wow. What a treat.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-46175390045829665042008-09-05T15:28:00.001-07:002008-09-05T15:36:09.347-07:00Dude That Is So Beet<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgu1CaVv6pKgmhoRvAN7r5bB7zXYounhuQK8bQvq92rEiqP1jXHy_kiuM7vZh1QJgd1G81dmRphSUutugd5BRKsottKcM9Mvx-aLcRzCxlEzg5rpyBgo7Nm6GJfbuI5z9L43uw/s1600-h/IMG_3811.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgu1CaVv6pKgmhoRvAN7r5bB7zXYounhuQK8bQvq92rEiqP1jXHy_kiuM7vZh1QJgd1G81dmRphSUutugd5BRKsottKcM9Mvx-aLcRzCxlEzg5rpyBgo7Nm6GJfbuI5z9L43uw/s320/IMG_3811.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5242668921584189810" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkghVAzHAu7rA82OQ2jOb66YC5W99gorfdWkJdbuYio_xoHwUBePP7LZbzQ7DdvT_s7H1jLG6mcy43Qn7gsZ_bbrfDKAJEwM4FPcOUYeVHGlImWnmqkMt0eZ_cDbMkKwPePK96/s1600-h/IMG_3812.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkghVAzHAu7rA82OQ2jOb66YC5W99gorfdWkJdbuYio_xoHwUBePP7LZbzQ7DdvT_s7H1jLG6mcy43Qn7gsZ_bbrfDKAJEwM4FPcOUYeVHGlImWnmqkMt0eZ_cDbMkKwPePK96/s320/IMG_3812.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5242668925490378658" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl5x_iSwlVtb-MdOUoKJWVQ2vdtcie3CZCJKRSmlgSt_2VSbYaF9gKvkK3ELFTGa7gnqBlDuvEoZ_ZheKnyrtAUWm_OZhdqI3O3llw7VjGa5OPKFIdeuaS1BL6qTz7iOkgocjM/s1600-h/IMG_3831.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl5x_iSwlVtb-MdOUoKJWVQ2vdtcie3CZCJKRSmlgSt_2VSbYaF9gKvkK3ELFTGa7gnqBlDuvEoZ_ZheKnyrtAUWm_OZhdqI3O3llw7VjGa5OPKFIdeuaS1BL6qTz7iOkgocjM/s320/IMG_3831.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5242668928630847602" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLwV-6CgmdF64Gw3RL0XrYfgMsUwbzAxdBj1I8RvAFDQc1x9JBYdzYRQsVOQAa98obipuAU2_9Bf0N3Q4Xe-VNho4S7IwzAKtja4YpjZaAdNi42fh9M_Ct6rxxzt8z_l_F8CgZ/s1600-h/IMG_3832.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLwV-6CgmdF64Gw3RL0XrYfgMsUwbzAxdBj1I8RvAFDQc1x9JBYdzYRQsVOQAa98obipuAU2_9Bf0N3Q4Xe-VNho4S7IwzAKtja4YpjZaAdNi42fh9M_Ct6rxxzt8z_l_F8CgZ/s320/IMG_3832.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5242668933478197570" border="0" /></a><br />hehe. We take'm where we can get'm around here, especially after a long week. Seriously, we are like maniacal about beets around here at the wine wall. One of our favorite vegetables. Sweet, earthy, versatile- and despised by many. Remember the litte beets we pulled a while back? Well these are what the big guys look like now. They seem to love the black as night soil down at the P-Patch. They are the size of baseballs. Behind the basket in the last picture is the winter kale, which we will explain in a future post. Suffice it to say that the winter garden is already going strong here in Seattle!<br /><br />BTW, these are the appropriately bourgeois heirloom Italian variety known as chiogga.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-47565437534471337882008-09-01T19:18:00.000-07:002008-09-01T19:53:06.052-07:00When you can't make pie . . .<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgL6r8SsiMRRo_Ysb6A0S94PEjaN8-nxbNgCCjkNDG9ZumM1vPOHMoR9gmV8ccDA3YsIUc9oJUw3GJNdXFGaBekGwgQruMRz9SNEs4SseuTUKQjridLFH14-oCzxZx7w68h4rM6/s1600-h/IMG_3771.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgL6r8SsiMRRo_Ysb6A0S94PEjaN8-nxbNgCCjkNDG9ZumM1vPOHMoR9gmV8ccDA3YsIUc9oJUw3GJNdXFGaBekGwgQruMRz9SNEs4SseuTUKQjridLFH14-oCzxZx7w68h4rM6/s320/IMG_3771.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241251524301604386" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHw7_Hd4bk1lUKEHi9j_QXZicBux6cx7ohI0UKtCM-OTQH_M9vipNKcB8IkvyCtDlFspdwrrAZcJJhXkRFP_3yS5uKqBoM2r8W17ZEy6HGDRvpn4dKwV126zcYFCOdG4GK1UAd/s1600-h/IMG_3774.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHw7_Hd4bk1lUKEHi9j_QXZicBux6cx7ohI0UKtCM-OTQH_M9vipNKcB8IkvyCtDlFspdwrrAZcJJhXkRFP_3yS5uKqBoM2r8W17ZEy6HGDRvpn4dKwV126zcYFCOdG4GK1UAd/s320/IMG_3774.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241251274770866674" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJcg1GSjoR359rIapO6gxGOSCN6tmm8PFj7XOlrxmbteyjDIQaCtSfkbyBGeRfqnNtmDZGr30nD7vFmHGbMbotwHUILjZk5x6XodLN7S5QfDyiEJ5zqAMBSiGWdnKahXrJVj8r/s1600-h/IMG_3772.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJcg1GSjoR359rIapO6gxGOSCN6tmm8PFj7XOlrxmbteyjDIQaCtSfkbyBGeRfqnNtmDZGr30nD7vFmHGbMbotwHUILjZk5x6XodLN7S5QfDyiEJ5zqAMBSiGWdnKahXrJVj8r/s320/IMG_3772.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241251041103049554" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7j_4LZrXD6fhUSorrm1cGOyI2_NclB_vmwHAURK38JmpiTkn8dEwiwnn02KOmq8nNvoxI6O2qrY3bNZ_VGHLHSe3EAgLvcSjbXS-WdXjNRUU3KRGQyQSYn3vmtXsdsBcjt2n_/s1600-h/IMG_3778.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7j_4LZrXD6fhUSorrm1cGOyI2_NclB_vmwHAURK38JmpiTkn8dEwiwnn02KOmq8nNvoxI6O2qrY3bNZ_VGHLHSe3EAgLvcSjbXS-WdXjNRUU3KRGQyQSYn3vmtXsdsBcjt2n_/s320/IMG_3778.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241250814353309074" border="0" /></a><br />So we had 3 pie apples. That's right just 3. When we bought the house, we were provided with a map of our trees and the first tree when you enter the garden was labled "Gravenstein - pie apples." It's a young dwarf tree, shorter than my husband. So we were excited that it managed to produce even 3 apples. But the thing is . . . 3 apples are not enough for pie. And then we realized that 3 apples would be plenty for a dutch baby pancake. Have you ever had a dutch baby? Have you tasted it's puffy, buttery, skillet-baked deliciousness? No? Then you are missing out. The dutch baby goes by many names, but it's basically a puffy pancake baked in a cast iron skillet in the oven in more butter than most folks want to know about. I adapted a recipe off epicurious.com for the <a href="http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/BIG-APPLE-PANCAKE-230981">Big Apple Pancake</a>, substituting our Gravensteins and almond extract for vanilla (which made it fantastically, subtly, almondy). The result? Probably the best damn pancake we've ever had. Try it. Try it soon. Apple season is upon us.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-16816940740258924362008-09-01T16:48:00.000-07:002008-09-01T16:59:50.714-07:00Cooking Technique: Searing Meat for Stew<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxJdGTxpd-2OPbCrPDbahEwY3hrgzKCPCsFJT7ZEtitnf14GMVVVy6pREqBMwSh1C2ArG1UQQV2LmQe7By6_KXI4mlTWNgS4JzRlBjLOyNZ1bMWIZuTKmpWGmnSvxtXV2bRX29/s1600-h/IMG_3834.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxJdGTxpd-2OPbCrPDbahEwY3hrgzKCPCsFJT7ZEtitnf14GMVVVy6pREqBMwSh1C2ArG1UQQV2LmQe7By6_KXI4mlTWNgS4JzRlBjLOyNZ1bMWIZuTKmpWGmnSvxtXV2bRX29/s320/IMG_3834.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241205937254577906" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj69cmx97ISwR69XfZ1WsKODY1tRps_cxtLYZN30bc7-McqwOHbfuMgejF0YWnWOasy0j44WCq5sWN9NPGCT-q70JWZmF1uDRyL21AlxVGSvblzZO84EkxqkLdHfrPm-J3iVuOF/s1600-h/IMG_3844.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj69cmx97ISwR69XfZ1WsKODY1tRps_cxtLYZN30bc7-McqwOHbfuMgejF0YWnWOasy0j44WCq5sWN9NPGCT-q70JWZmF1uDRyL21AlxVGSvblzZO84EkxqkLdHfrPm-J3iVuOF/s320/IMG_3844.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241205941675302146" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio6SdXXeKcyFy13zmhXdSQaJ_d0TwEkpVJduSUQJeG3VV1yfJ3j1AkXVu4nPWw3y3K-jQh9HSTi54GsNpb0Q0wjfviFmOqSX06J8iWmArfZPdoA0eo6sWqxS1sz_PL3j4k0ook/s1600-h/IMG_3851.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio6SdXXeKcyFy13zmhXdSQaJ_d0TwEkpVJduSUQJeG3VV1yfJ3j1AkXVu4nPWw3y3K-jQh9HSTi54GsNpb0Q0wjfviFmOqSX06J8iWmArfZPdoA0eo6sWqxS1sz_PL3j4k0ook/s320/IMG_3851.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241205944729840770" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgo-ZYuCTcN63Vg8_6fSutFoxUzsXOcMpa2wozLtd6l9G4EGMLUr20W6nRJM1F66NtRSYqy7AysNMJUknqWdoPCcArLwAJjWm7wrBii58kKJhjMVKP-Lg8xOO26MrOFLeK40-k8/s1600-h/IMG_3853.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgo-ZYuCTcN63Vg8_6fSutFoxUzsXOcMpa2wozLtd6l9G4EGMLUr20W6nRJM1F66NtRSYqy7AysNMJUknqWdoPCcArLwAJjWm7wrBii58kKJhjMVKP-Lg8xOO26MrOFLeK40-k8/s320/IMG_3853.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241205947912360210" border="0" /></a><br />If you plan to make a stew, assuming it's not something unusual in which the meat should not be browned, as in a blanquette de veau, follow these steps to ensure the best flavor:<br /><br />-season meat with salt and fresh ground pepper and then dredge the meat in flour<br />-shake off excess flour piece by piece (not doing this diligently guarantees poor results)<br />-get healthy amount of oil very hot in skillet (choose the right pan: very low and outward sloping sides to give steam a direct route into the atmosphere so as not to steam meat)<br />-set pieces of meat in hot fat so that there is ample space between each piece and brown on all sides<br /><br />Note: the pan you make the stew in does not and should not be the same pan you brown the meat in, since the shapes are so different they could never serve the same purpose.paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34641344.post-83787247357670921492008-09-01T16:27:00.001-07:002008-09-01T16:37:26.435-07:00Turn and Burn<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1bSfDBwZM7Or-RmdgExGzxd8wq5plInw6XHpd7fBwbpSfyAcMj-iSOXo2RD2skK1g-24Bbbf2ndaFsfMKGUJE3BJYbxJWHKLot9tL2e6_Epp7Djz9bp-JvdL8Qpu_MZTKCGTr/s1600-h/IMG_3817.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1bSfDBwZM7Or-RmdgExGzxd8wq5plInw6XHpd7fBwbpSfyAcMj-iSOXo2RD2skK1g-24Bbbf2ndaFsfMKGUJE3BJYbxJWHKLot9tL2e6_Epp7Djz9bp-JvdL8Qpu_MZTKCGTr/s320/IMG_3817.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241200488285041410" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgY5wUpyKYyWDv45GWiJ3ELkzllSJEoUfaLq4A8V9GwvSrSDvZnQPQh_BNd70UltNKo08ifpdZZiHlq1q6NmyCNyHprn9LuYUUMlJW-ECm91BlPlgShhzg8Cn-l_aJRwNWcR8KF/s1600-h/IMG_3818.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgY5wUpyKYyWDv45GWiJ3ELkzllSJEoUfaLq4A8V9GwvSrSDvZnQPQh_BNd70UltNKo08ifpdZZiHlq1q6NmyCNyHprn9LuYUUMlJW-ECm91BlPlgShhzg8Cn-l_aJRwNWcR8KF/s320/IMG_3818.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241200495464113666" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV0qB_KS8r5PnYvJSmIvgb1D2NDhd3Id6ZeMrCVjzX6RrNapZ_h0Ng4CaqX1cyZhhcRFh4a_TeKXitrPl6ch0OT1iOU3QuUH4fPEBzoizPBw_-C4HeYOjE3oxwLq7K1ldWFWKR/s1600-h/IMG_3824.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV0qB_KS8r5PnYvJSmIvgb1D2NDhd3Id6ZeMrCVjzX6RrNapZ_h0Ng4CaqX1cyZhhcRFh4a_TeKXitrPl6ch0OT1iOU3QuUH4fPEBzoizPBw_-C4HeYOjE3oxwLq7K1ldWFWKR/s320/IMG_3824.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241200504381508962" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqU9sCzc2L31qiso1OF1caw_Wf-kukO9VYnbeAPbe_4h6gZYpmx3AXh9uhdG3UJGiVhlPBCrNYPTmK9WYJFavSRQS6WTmO8yjLAL7RlUuAkPoBJsvkcQQZnJRrK23PjKianVN4/s1600-h/IMG_3833.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqU9sCzc2L31qiso1OF1caw_Wf-kukO9VYnbeAPbe_4h6gZYpmx3AXh9uhdG3UJGiVhlPBCrNYPTmK9WYJFavSRQS6WTmO8yjLAL7RlUuAkPoBJsvkcQQZnJRrK23PjKianVN4/s320/IMG_3833.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241200508014421362" border="0" /></a><br />This is a hot compost bin we maintain at the P-Patch. It's filled with weeds and other stuff pulled from the garden, green grass clippings and brown leaves. The deal is, if you mix green and brown you get compost (nitrogen plus carbon equals humus). The beauty of hot composting, which is what this is, is that you can put things like weeds in and the heat will cook the seeds, not to mention that all of it breaks down faster. Compost is about the best plant food you can use. This bin has been hot for over a week, meaning that steam rises from it and it's warm when you stick your hand in it. To keep it hot, it needs oxygen, so I turn it every few days or so from one bin to the other. How do we have brown leaves since it's the end of summer still? They are saved from last year!paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07453346250359710788noreply@blogger.com0