Eating

This week, a friend asked me to post a recipe for hummus. This is a somewhat controversial issue: just ask someone from Jerusalem or Beirut. People in the Middle East are totally obsessed with this creamy stuff, as you can see by the gigantic vat above (weighing 23,520 pounds) prepared by Lebanese chefs who set the latest Guinness world record—beating Israel, which had previously beat Lebanon. So there’s the Galilee hummus or the Jerusalem kind, with or without fava beans, topped with warm chickpeas or served without. I suppose it’s like masala or gumbo, with every good chef developing his own version. Mine was inspired by a horseradish-laced hummus I once bought at Whole Foods. I was never able to find it again and, after hankering for it for months, I finally concocted the version which I humbly offer you here.
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We all experience that moment of truth when the dinner hour rolls around, nothing has been planned and it's just you and the fridge in a Mexican standoff. These days, the problem is often that there's so much in my fridge I can hardly maneuver around the jars of whey and pickles and stock; the mounds of just-picked kale and lettuce; the stockpiles of lemons and radishes. This particular evening, I dove in and emerged with a pound of shrimp, a jar of red curry paste and some wild lime leaves. There were snow peas, pea greens and shelling peas from the garden, and with that and a can of coconut milk, a curry seemed possible.
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I'm excited for the 4th of July! Looking forward to our 3rd annual Pulled Pork Fest. We'll be smoking three Boston butts this year (plus a few kosher chickens) and we always have all the requisite fixings on hand. For North Carolina style, that means cheap white buns (I'll pass), cole slaw (two kinds, with and without mayonnaise), and pickles. Bread-&-butter are my favorites, though we'll also have dills since this is a New York crowd. This year, the pickles are homemade, and I've already gotten started because they're best when they can sit around for a few days, acquiring more flavor. I decided to make the bread-&-butters with alternative ingredients, and then I got all insecure and thought they came out too salty, and not sweet enough, and I got another 4 pounds of kirbys to make a new batch. But two independent taste testers convinced me otherwise, even after a side-by-side tasting with a jar of commercial pickles. Too sweet, they said. Not as interesting as yours. So here you go, bread-&-butter pickles made with a relatively small amount of rapadura sugar, raw cider vinegar and some traditional spices. I'm making the dills today, a lacto-fermented version, so I'll let you know how those turn out.
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G and I signed up for a mozzarella-making class at Artisanal, the center for all things cheese, located on the West side in Manhattan. It was originally an offshoot of Terrance Brennan's restaurant of the same name, though I'm not sure the two are still affiliated. At any rate, they have state-of-the-art cheese caves there and a staff of knowledgeable affineurs (cheese "agers") and educators, and a fun range of classes. We took a cheese & honey pairing class there last year that put a bee on our bonnet about raising our own bees...but that's another story. Now that I'm all up on curds and whey, what with making my own fresh cheese and all, I thought the next logical step would be making my own mozzarella. Somehow I thought we would be starting from scratch—with fresh milk and some rennet. But it turns out that making curds is a rather more involved process than they want to take a classful of cheese novices through in a 2-hour course and, like many perfectly respectable cheese-makers, they start from pre-made curds. I confess, I was a little disappointed, although at least Artisanal purchases its curds from DiPalo, the venerable cheese shop on Grand Street in what used to be New York's Little Italy. If you've never been to DiPalo, you must pay them a visit right away. They import amazing cheese, salume and pasta from Italy, and they make their own delicious mozzarella fresh every day. The people at Artisanal said that DiPalo will sell you a pound of fresh mozzarella curd if you know to ask for it. Once you've got the curd, making the mozzarella is a walk in the park. Of course, you know me: I will make my own curd one of these days, and you'll be the first to know all about it. Maybe I'll even get my hands on some water buffalo milk to do it...
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I love all the trappings of an American summer barbecue—pickles, ketchup, chips, mayonnaise. But now that I've become so conscious of what goes into the industrialized versions of these classics, I will never set out a bottle of Heinz again. It's loaded with high fructose corn syrup and corn syrup, salt and "natural flavoring," which could easily mean MSG. So sad, considering the origins of this wonderful tomato condiment. The word "ketchup" (also "catsup") derives from the Chinese ke-tsiap for pickled-fish sauce, a widespread condiment since ancient times. (See here for my reference to its Roman origins.) The English added mushrooms, nuts and even oysters to it; the Americans added tomatoes from Mexico. So ketchup was originally a lacto-fermented sauce, full of nutrition, enzymes and good bacteria, and not the sugar-laden, heat-processed junk we consume to the tune of half a billion bottles annually. Guess where I'm going with all this? Straight to making our own ketchup. It's easy, really good and keeps in the fridge just like your Heinz. But plopping it on your kids' burgers won't send their blood sugar through the roof or rot their teeth. You can also modify this ketchup to suit your own tastes: add a little curry, or a couple of minced jalapeños, or some toasted, ground fennel seeds. The basic recipe tastes pretty close to the bottled stuff, though it's a little funkier, more complex in a palate-pleasing, umami way.
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You’re probably seeing garlic scapes at your local farmers markets right about now. They are those unruly shoots that spring from the tops of garlic plants (much like hair springs from my head most mornings). A beautiful, bright green, scapes have a garlicky fragrance flavor that is milder, fresher and more grassy than garlic bulbs. (The scapes are cut in order to strengthen the growth of the bulbs underground.) Try them raw, or lightly cooked in a stir-fry. This pesto recipe shows them off nicely, and is great as a dip, stirred into hot pasta, eaten with cheese or spread on a sandwich.
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A radish is a beautiful thing, something like a baby turnip with a bite. I'm sure you're already familiar with the classic European way of eating them with slightly softened butter and a sprinkling of coarse sea salt. What could be better? In his seminal cookbook, Nose to Tail Eating, British chef Fergus Henderson suggests that you eat your radishes in this manner and then follow that with a light salad made of their greens tossed with a vinaigrette. Sort of a vegetarian nose-to-tail approach, no? Thin slices of dark bread, buttered and layered with radishes and sea sat, make a fantastic sandwich. And I love an early summer salad of sliced radishes, blanched English peas and chopped preserved lemon, tossed with a couple of tablespoons of creme fraiche and maybe a chiffonade of mint. BUT, perhaps you have an aversion to radishes. Too strong you say; or maybe even too watery or too strange. For those of you in this camp, and any others who would like to branch out in new radish directions, may I recommend the delicious braised radish?
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I know, I know. Another creamy, icy, indulgent treat. Don't be mad at me. It's that time of year. Besides this rich and delicious ice cream is completely dairy-free and can be made with no added sweetener. Its secret ingredient? Bananas! I happen to be a huge fan of banana ice cream, so when my sister-in-law forwarded me a year-old link to this recipe on Apartment Therapy's The Kitchn, I was excited to try it. Theirs called simply for frozen bananas whipped in a food processor, but I added a few extra ingredients in very small quantities—maple syrup, lemon juice, crème fraîche and cinnamon. Feel free to customize it according to your own flavor fetishes, but consider peanut butter, chocolate, cardamom, coconut milk and lime (but probably not all together). And remember, bananas are a great source of potassium, magnesium and vitamin C. They're also full of fructooligosaccharide, a prebiotic that helps colonize your intestine with good bacteria. As if you needed another reason to try this...
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Rhubarb abounds at the moment. Driving along the little country roads out here, you see many a luxuriant patch with broad, lofty, ruffly green leaves and the occasional gorgeous flower soaring above. The markets are full of the celery-like stalks in shades that range from rose to raspberry. I'd been feeling a tad deficient for having produced such adamantly green rhubarb, but then I looked up the variety we planted and it turns out Victoria rhubarb is meant to be green! Naturally, it's not the one most commercially favored, since everyone is attracted to the gaudy red stuff, but I'm now quite proud of my green stalks with the discreet hint of pink at the very base. It tastes just as wonderful, and I find the color makes a lovely counterpoint to the vivid strawberries with which it's so often paired. Food52 continues to be an inspiration (even though my strawberry-fennel ice cream, nominated last week, did not win—#$@$%#!), and I think you'll love this simple but flavorful poached rhubarb that I've topped with strawberry preserves that deliver a bit of heat. Make it now, before all that beautiful red (or green) rhubarb has seen its best days.
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Yes, I know, you think I'm senile and posting again about that divine strawberry-fennel ice cream. Wrong. It's yet another wickedly delicious fruit ice cream. Who knew? I was never a huge fan of this genre, tending to pass over the Graeter's black raspberry in favor of the coffee or caramel or mint chip. But this is one of the most delectable flavors EVER. I don't know if it has to do with the raw milk or the brilliant orange egg yolks straight from the farm, but I'm thinking it's about the way the slightly tart and wonderfully intense flavor of the raspberries plays off the unctuous custard. Because we were impatient, I didn't wait for the custard to cool completely before putting it in the ice cream maker, and then we were unwilling to wait for it to harden in the freezer. The result was almost like frozen whipped cream (um, that's what it is, right?) and we had to shovel the stuff in quickly before it could melt.
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