Share a summer salad

Need a flavorful #salad to share at your table? Toss one up with chickpeas and let this salad work like a meal.

Confined Confection

For the past few weeks, it feels as if I’ve been camping out in my own kitchen. To acclimate a four-legged family member to our home, we gated off and puppy-proofed that room. We may come to regret the kitchen location, but it seems to make sense for the baby who needs easy access when heading outdoors on quick notice.

Already named “Denver” before he joined us, this puppy’s routine around the kitchen finds at least one of us playing with him, brushing his chocolate-brown coat, teaching him to sit with miniature milk bones, or bumping into each other while opening the refrigerator to search for treats for the trainers.

Now that Denver’s entertaining himself for longer stretches of time, he runs loose around the corner into the butler’s pantry—a safe puppy play environment with no carpets or butler to be found.

Denver, like our older dog Cammie, loves tiny pieces of raw carrot, which make great little training rewards for warm, furry creatures. A more mature pet now, Cammie trained with carrots starting at 8 weeks old and they remain her favorite puppy perk. It’s impossible to bring an orange bunch into the house without her waiting patiently in hopes that one will fall to the floor.

Though the carrots serve as rewards, tiny dabs of butter work well as diversions. When we were training Cammie, she wanted to nip at everyone, and we learned from a devoted dog lover to curb her mouthing and nipping habit with a slather of chilled butter. Within 48 hours, she received countless praises and stopped the nipping. We’re keeping the butter to a minimum with Denver, and he nips when seeking attention or alerting us to his needs. A little sweet creamy butter even helps prevent the rest of the household from nipping at each other, too.

When a cake appears around our place, we’re suddenly all on our best behavior. Just as with puppies, where behavioral experts advise to have a toy ready at all times, it could prove beneficial to have a slice of cake ready at all times for people. If there’s a stick or two of quality butter on hand, use them to make this dense cake-based crust that holds a gooey layer of cream cheese, butter and powdered sugar.

If you can call it traditional, original gooey butter cake may be made with basic staples stocked in home kitchens. Quality butter and cake flour are worth the extra effort of rounding up, though any will do to turn out a rich gooey butter cake. In St. Louis, where locals claim to have created the confection, commercial bakeries offer the cake laced with everything from chocolate chips to key lime. The recipe shared here resembles the original.

Gooey Butter Cake

Crust

1 cup sugar

2 cups flour

¼ teaspoon salt

1 ¼ teaspoons baking powder1 stick unsalted butter, melted

2 eggs, beaten

Filling

8 ounces cream cheese, softened

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 cups powdered sugar

Topping

¼ cup powdered sugar

1. Sift dry crust ingredients together. Add beaten eggs and melted butter and stir until thoroughly mixed. Press thick, sticky dough into greased 9 x 12 baking pan.
2. Mix cream cheese with eggs, butter, vanilla and powdered sugar. Beat at medium speed 2 minutes. Pour over unbaked dough.
3. Bake 35 minutes at 350 degrees until puffy and golden. Cool completely and dust with remaining powdered sugar.

 

Text and photos by Mary Ann Ebner, Cook On: 1 part chaos, 2 parts calm

First published by The Highlands Current

Share Some Luck with Spinach Pie

By Mary Ann Ebner

There’s something organic about bring-a-dish gatherings with few rules to pull people together for musings on more than food. We all know someone who cringes at the mention of a potluck. He or she may avoid edible uncertainty, but that’s part of the point. Bringing something you love can spark fresh perspectives for companions.

The starting point, at a minimum, should be a dish that can be served on a plate and eaten with basic utensils. Even without rules, it’s unlikely everyone will bring their signature dessert, but worse things can happen besides a table loaded with sweets. There’s usually a taste or two for everyone, with a range of gluten-free, vegan and carnivorous recipes.

Years ago, when I worked at a campus radio station, it was announced that the year-end party would be a potluck. The general manager and engineer were full-time employees, but the rest of us were students with limited cash flow. We spent little time or money on cooking, and when we dined out it was usually at the Stagger Inn over pitchers of beer and platters of potato skins. That was high-end nutrition compared to the microwavable sandwiches peddled from campus vending machines.

As potluck day rolled around, our lack of money and cooking experience didn’t stop us from covering a couple of desks with an assortment of contributions. At least three salads turned up, along with a fruit pie that was probably stocked from the freezer section, although its creator chose not to say.

The fruit pie was popular, but the most sampled dish was a bowl of blackberry Jell-O. It wasn’t spiked (or so we were told) or topped with whipped cream but represented the willingness to take part without making a fuss over ingredients and temperatures.

Shared meals not only spread the work around but bring communities together — the best payoff. Fresh spinach is a reliable crowd pleaser and does its work in simple or lavish recipes. This variation of spanakopita is essentially spinach pie made with phyllo sheets, which are easy to use but require quick work to prevent them from becoming brittle. If you find a few triangles left over, wrap them up. They’ll taste even better the next day.

Potluck Spinach Pie

16 servings

3 eggs
3 cups ricotta cheese
1 cup Parmesan cheese, shredded
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 cups mushrooms, sliced
4 cloves garlic, diced
1 small red onion, chopped
3 to 4 bunches fresh spinach, trimmed
1 cup Italian parsley, chopped
1 cup roasted sunflower kernels
20 sheets phyllo pastry, thawed
3 tablespoons butter, melted
sea salt
black pepper

Lightly beat eggs with fork in mixing bowl, stir in ricotta and Parmesan, season with salt and pepper, set aside. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Sauté onion and garlic in 1 tablespoon olive oil. Add mushrooms. Cook over medium heat 2 minutes. Remove from heat and add to ricotta mixture.

Cook trimmed spinach in remaining olive oil until leaves wilt. Season with salt and pepper. Remove spinach from pan, drain and chop. Stir into ricotta mixture along with fresh parsley.

After all other ingredients are prepped, unroll phyllo sheets and cover with plastic wrap and a damp towel during assembly. Butter large baking pan and layer two sheets of phyllo dough over bottom of pan. Brush layer with butter and sprinkle with sunflower kernels. Repeat with three more layers. Spoon the spinach ricotta mixture over the top layer. Sprinkle with sunflower kernels. Cover with phyllo layer, brush with butter, sprinkle with sunflower seeds and repeat to use remainder of sheets. Brush top layer with butter. Using a serrated knife, cut into squares, then into triangles. Bake until golden, about 40 minutes.

First published at The Highlands Current

Cook On: 1 part chaos, 2 parts calm, text and photos by Mary Ann Ebner

 

Choose your filling

Hamantaschen are three-cornered treats stuffed with many favorites—prune, apricot, poppy seed or cream cheese fillings. The traditional pastries of Purim, the Jewish holiday that celebrates the defeat of the villain Haman, taste great any time of year. Make hamantaschen and test a triangle or two before curious neighbors smell the delicious aroma and drop in with an appetite.

Chocolate Reserve

By Mary Ann Ebner

It often pays off to stash a little chocolate — and cocoa  — in the cupboard. The confectionery staples embellish everything and cool weather calls for cocoa.

To those who temper chocolate, temperature matters beyond the chocolate thermometer. As autumn arrives, chocolate delicacies hold up longer, while demand from chocolate lovers increases.

When temperatures dipped, Alps Sweet Shop stepped up chocolate production. The family business, which has locations in Beacon and Fishkill, has handcrafted small-batch fine confections for more than 90 years. It was founded by Peter Charkalis and today is run by his granddaughter, Sally Charkalis-Craft, and her husband, Terry Craft, a master chocolatier.

Terry Craft, master chocolatier and co-owner of Alps Sweet Shop, pours 110  pounds of salted caramel onto a cooling tray at their Beacon location. 

Customers streamed in to Beacon’s Main Street location last week to choose from sweets in cases brimming with chocolate-covered caramels, heaven-and-earth truffles, chocolate glace fruits, almond butter crunch and molded chocolates.

Terry Craft and his candy makers work year round but fall production keeps them in the kitchen even longer, stirring kettles bubbling with the likes of salted caramel and dark chocolate. He studied his craft in the U.S., Belgium, France, Canada and England, and although producing confections is labor intensive, he says he finds the work rewarding.

“It’s a feel-good type of business,” Craft said. “People are either coming in here to make themselves happy or to make someone else happy.”

The recipes haven’t changed since Peter Charkalis’s day, but the production methods have evolved from the days when every morsel was handmade. Sally’s mother, Mary Charkalis, recalled a turning point in 1968 when the shop bought its first piece of machinery, an enrober. Sally’s grandfather was not happy about the purchase, so her father waited until he was on vacation in Greece to have it delivered. (He eventually came around to appreciate its benefits.)

An enrober — which moves confections down a conveyor belt, along a cold plate to set the bottom and then through a curtain of chocolate for coating — still stands ready in the Beacon shop. Alps has since further modernized its methods by purchasing an automated candy wrapper and computerized molding equipment.

Like any connoisseur in matters of taste, Craft knows cocoa (or cacao, as it is more commonly known where it’s grown). He prefers a Criollo cocoa bean from Ecuador. The common Forastero bean is a close second but he says it doesn’t have the pronounced flavor. As a third option there’s the Trinitario, a hybrid of the Criollo and the Forastero.

“The best of the best [chocolatiers] can tell you while eating them not only what part of the world a bean is from but the region or plantation where they’re grown,” Craft said. “This particular plantation has a patented fermentation process and right now I have exclusive U.S. rights. These Ecuadorian Criollo beans are right off the plantation.” He cracked open a bean, removed the nib and gently crushed it.

“The nib is where the excitement starts,” he explained. “The nib is pressed and the cocoa butter is extracted and what’s left is called the chocolate liquor,” the paste that serves as the essential ingredient for chocolate. Craft sells the Ecuadorian product to restaurants and pastry chefs as well as a microbrewer. He also coats whole beans in organic chocolate and recently filled an order for 25,000.

“You can taste the earthiness, a savory touch, fruitiness and the soil of the region,” he said. “And the cocoa bean is off the charts with its flavonoids and high in vitamins and minerals.”

Savor a piece of gourmet chocolate or make the cake recipe here that calls for cocoa powder and bits of chocolate. Some chip chocolates have a high melting point, so a better choice is a premium chocolate like the break-up bars that Alps produces in milk, dark and organic white chocolate.

Fragrant cocoa powder, Kahlua and rich chocolate enhance this Bundt cake. 

Home cooks should be able to find small quantities of good cocoa at local markets. Natural unsweetened cocoa, non-alkalized, will be darker while alkalized will soften bitterness. Some cocoas may also affect rise and texture of a cake. This chocolate cake always pleases, thanks in part to flavorful chocolate, powerful cocoa and a dose of Kahlua.

Chocolate Kahlua Cake

1 ¼ cups sugar
1 ¾ cups flour
1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
½ cup natural unsweetened cocoa powder
4 eggs, beaten
16 ounces sour cream
¾ cups canola oil
⅓ cup Kahlua
6 ounces chocolate, broken into small pieces

Glaze

2 tablespoons cocoa powder
3 cups powdered sugar
1 ½ cups Kahlua

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter Bundt pan and dust with cocoa. Mix flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking soda and salt. Add eggs, sour cream, oil and Kahlua. Stir thoroughly and fold in chocolate pieces. Pour batter into pan and bake 1 hour.

Whisk glaze ingredients and set aside.

Allow cake to cool, then invert. Pour glaze over cake and set 1 hour. Refrigerate if serving next day. Serve with fresh mint leaves.

Photos by M.A. Ebner, first published by The Highlands Current

Twist your own salty pretzels

Quarts of local blueberries, ears of Hudson Valley sweet corn and a mess of fresh greens boasted just-picked prominence at the Beacon Farmer’s Market last weekend, but crusty-on-the-outside, delicate-on-the-inside pretzels added to the market’s choice. These weren’t the stadium-style commercial fare thawed at the riverside and warmed up in assembly-line fashion, but individually prepared pretzels made with locally milled flour and pulled recently from the oven.

To describe the pretzels as “adequate” in size would be unforgivable. Twisted and baked by Beacon’s All You Knead Artisan Bakers, the day’s offerings ranged from generous to gigantic, so good and perfectly satiating for hungry market shoppers. My son (who worked up an appetite while playing Pokémon GO around town) promptly polished off one of the crispy golden purchases — hand-rolled, boiled, baked and finished with sea salt and butter — and we each saved another for later … but not much later. We shared them at home that afternoon and made plans to test our own old-fashioned recipe.

A couple of years ago, friends took my family on a tour of one of the country’s oldest bakeries, the Julius Sturgis Pretzel Bakery in Pennsylvania’s Amish country. Tucked into an historic stone house in the town of Lititz, the bakery’s owners still turn out soft pretzels on site, in their building listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Before tasting their boiled and baked specialty, we learned how to hand-roll our own baking rope using a premeasured piece of dough to shape it into a traditional design with three open loops. We didn’t actually pop our own rope twists into the oven, but while we practiced the rolling and shaping technique, our docent shared a lengthy backstory of the pretzel and its early beginnings as a noble treat of baked dough twisted into a semblance reflecting crossed arms held in prayer. I hadn’t really made much of a connection between prayer and pretzels prior to that but lately I’ll admit to a quiet reflection with my pretzel indulgence, in hopes that I can polish off the salted symbol without seeing an immediate body bulge along with unwelcome pounds.

That’s the thing with just-baked bread and other wheat-based foods. Their richness packs a few calories but appreciating the taste of a warm slice of sourdough or a buttery garlic knot once in a while can be too much to resist. And freshly baked bread or just-twisted pretzels don’t have to fall into the luxury goods shopping cart. Homemade and bakery-fresh bread puts loaves with a long shelf life to shame and preparing yeast breads at home costs little — for ingredients or baking tools. For this pretzel recipe, the dough also works well in loaf form. Instead of breaking pieces into pretzel-sized portions, divide the batch of dough into four parts and shape into mini loaves. Follow all other directions for boiling and baking. When ready to eat the loaf, slice it down the middle but only half way through the loaf and stuff with a spoonful of egg salad or grilled vegetables. Or thinly slice your pretzel loaf and drizzle it with honey.

Working with a few ingredients turns basic dough into a shared pleasure and letting friends and family roll their own ropes into a range of custom shapes from twists to knots makes the real work easy. The end result: a pretzel far better than any stadium-bought substitute.

Salty Soft Pretzels

Yield: 1 dozen pretzels

1 package active dry yeast

1¼ cups water (85 degrees)

1 teaspoon granulated maple sugar

4 cups flour

2 tablespoons kosher salt

For pretzel boil

3 cups water

¼ cup baking soda

In a large bowl, combine yeast and sugar in warmed water, (not exceeding temperature guidelines). Without stirring, yeast should activate in 5 to 10 minutes. Once activated, gradually add flour to bowl. Mix thoroughly until all flour is absorbed. Remove ball of dough and place on lightly floured surface. Knead dough firmly for a few minutes and cover dough mound with a moistened towel. Let rise 20 minutes. Uncover and pinch dough off into desired number of pieces for pretzels.

Individually roll dough pieces on lightly floured surface into rope forms, about 15 inches in length. Twist the dough into any shape you like or go traditional starting with an upside-down U, crossing ends twice and dropping the large loop down to fold over onto the ends of the rope. Tuck ends under or over large loop.

In a medium saucepan, bring water and baking soda to a low boil. With a slotted metal spatula, lower pretzels one at a time into boiling water and allow to float in boiling solution 30 seconds. Remove and place onto parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Sprinkle immediately with kosher salt or sesame seeds or your custom spice blend. Bake about 20 minutes at 400 degrees until golden brown. Remove from oven and serve warm or add your favorite dip … hummus, mustard or salted caramel.

By Mary Ann Ebner, first published by The Highlands Current

Big on Beans

With his standard limit of one daily cup, Charles Day would rather skip coffee than drink it stale. The Cold Spring resident has tasted his way to faultless flavor not simply by sipping through a procession of espressos or lattes but by perfecting beans before the first pour.

Day started home-roasting coffee beans soon after he and his wife, Susan Wallach, relocated from his native England to Brooklyn.

“Susan’s sister’s husband got me interested in roasting 15 years ago,” Day said. “He presented us a roaster as a gift.”

The gift served them well but met its retirement. Now on his third roaster, Day, who moved to Cold Spring 11 years ago, uses a Gene Café CBR Model 101, made in Korea.

Before and after — green coffee beans and freshly roasted beans

“It’s been very impressive,” Day said as he prepared to roast a batch of Sumatra Wahana Rasuna Honey beans. “You can get one for a few hundred dollars but this one was a little over 500 bucks.”

The roasting area doesn’t require much space. The roaster sits close to a basement wall with a window used for ventilation. Before Day begins the process, which is a full-on sensory engagement, he scans the raw beans and runs his hands through the tray to check texture and look for imperfections.

“Broken beans can lodge themselves into the little holes in the roaster and can burn,” Day said. “Then you get a bad batch.”

Charles Day of Cold Spring inspects a tray of green beans in his home roasting process.

He experiments with beans of various origins to make a balanced cup, purchasing from green coffee suppliers, including Roastmasters.com in Connecticut and Sweet Maria’s in Oakland, California. Even the slightest change in roasting time can alter the profile of a batch as the process transforms the green coffee into powerfully aromatic brown beans.

Susan appreciates his darker range of coffees as well as an often-present warm aroma — roasty and earthy — wafting through the house. “He and I like different coffees,” she explains, so the aroma is constantly changing.

Anyone who has savored a custom cup of the family’s coffee (full disclosure: I enjoyed every drop) will never willingly return to mass-produced beans.

Cold Spring’s Charles Day fires up his home coffee bean roaster.

Day says coffee’s distinct smoky scent takes him back to his youth in Rochester, Kent. Though tea was rather important, the smell of fragrant coffee reminds him of his teen years. “I used to change buses for school and where I changed buses there was a little store, a coffee and tea store, with a roaster,” he said. “That’s where I used to smell it.”

Tea still matters to Day but since moving to the U.S., he drinks more coffee. He’s been mostly vegan for three years, but emphasizes that “mostly” keeps him eligible for an occasional diversion with his coffee. “Susan makes a coffee icing on a chocolate cake,” he said. “So sometimes, yes, I’m mostly vegan.”

Day recently conducted a roasting demonstration at Wave Hill, a public garden and cultural center in the Bronx, where he works as the Ruth Rea Howell horticultural interpreter. As a member of Cold Spring’s Tree Advisory Board, he pays precise attention to details in professional and personal endeavors.

Charles Day — cooling the beans— engages all of the senses in home roasting.

In his roasting log, Day keeps a record of procedures, including dates, temperatures, roasting time, stages of the roast and overall taste. The roaster combines heat with an agitation method as well as a collection process to retrieve the chaff, the light husks that come off beans as they expand during the roast. When the roasting begins, an audible crack sounds, similar to the sound of popcorn popping.

“One of the most important points of having the log is it tells me details of cracks,” he said. “Until that first crack, the coffee is not roasted. Immediately after that first crack is finished, the coffee can be withdrawn as a very light roast. You can continue to the second crack for a darker roast and beyond that, it can be roasted to black and very dark.”

With this particular batch, Day estimated he would roast for 17 minutes with a peak temperature of 482 degrees Fahrenheit. As the first crack sounded, he dropped the temperature to 460 degrees and checked the remaining time for roasting: 6.5 minutes. Once the batch reached the desired stage, he recorded the time, temperature and crack notations and transferred the beans from the rotating chamber to the cooling tray.

After cooling, Day stores his roasts in airtight jars and labels them. Within a week, he fires up his roaster to replenish the family supply for grinding, brewing and relishing, favoring the freshness over store-bought beans, which may age for months.

“The general recommendation is not to use the beans for 24 to 48 hours,” he said. “It’s best after 48 and we tend to make it by the cup with a filter throughout the week. After a week it’s still perfectly drinkable but it’s not quite as flavorful.”

If you’re not a home-roasting candidate, search for a respected roaster. Day enjoys the beans roasted in small batches by Coffee Labs Roasters in Tarrytown and sold at Bank Square Coffeehouse in Beacon. “When I roast it, I guarantee that it’s fresh,” he says, “but there’s a good reason why there are professional roasters.”

Coffee Cake

½ pound (two sticks) salted butter

3 cups flour

2¼ cups sugar

2¼ teaspoons baking soda

3 tablespoons ground cinnamon

3 tablespoons freshly ground coffee (medium grind)

1½ cups buttermilk

2 eggs, lightly beaten

Mix flour, sugar, baking soda, cinnamon and ground coffee. Add butter. Blend gently two minutes until crumbly texture forms. Reserve ¾ cup of dry mixture and set aside. Add buttermilk and mix thoroughly. Gently fold in beaten eggs.

Pour into a greased and floured 8-inch springform pan. Sprinkle reserved dry mixture over top of batter. Bake at 350 degrees for 50 minutes. Cool, remove from pan and serve with coffee.

Text and photographs by Mary Ann Ebner, first published by Philipstown.info

Berried in Pumpkin

 

For all its warmth, silky smashed pumpkin, mildly spiced and tucked into flaky crust, might as well be classified as health food.

No matter how plentiful the turkey and Brussels sprouts, there’s always room for a velvety slice topped with whipped cream or served a la mode. Few Thanksgiving hosts challenge the pastry’s status as a given for holiday spreads which is how the traditional pie will manage to keep its place on our table this year, even as we break from family custom and add another dessert — pumpkin cranberry bars.

Fresh cranberries

Combining pumpkin with cranberries brightens any dish with splashes of crimson. Sweetened dried cranberries offer convenience, but they don’t do a baked good justice. A baking occasion calls for the fresh plump sort, the kind that make baked goods pop with color along with bits and pieces of tarty-sweet fruit and skin.

Pick up fresh cranberries just about everywhere this time of year, packaged in small bags at many local markets including Foodtown. Organic cranberries are also available locally, and Beacon Natural Market carries them in the fresh produce and freezer sections. If you’re cooking for one or two, a bag of berries goes a long way, but if you’re feeding the neighborhood, stock a supply to last the rest of the year. For those with a true cranberry crush … Beacon Natural Market is offering their own fresh organic cranberry sauce spiked with orange and a medley of spices.

To modify my own holiday menu, I’ve adapted a pumpkin bar recipe with the fresh berries and chia seeds. When I set out to include the seeds, I didn’t intend to create a superfood to overshadow the pie. I unexpectedly found myself with a supply of raw seeds on the doorstep — in a box from Amazon. One of my kids received a birthday gift from family friends and when the gift giver closed out his online shopping cart, the gift and a 2-pound bag of chia seeds were on the way to our address. Once discovered, there was no chance of redirecting the seeds to their rightful recipient, a master when it comes to blending morning smoothies with yogurt, fruit and chia seeds.

Chia seeds

Beacon Natural Market carries a selection of chia products ranging from vacuum-packed seeds to miniature single-serving packets in seed and ground form. Kitty Sherpa, market co-owner with her husband LT Sherpa, said the store stocks many brands and quantities of the tiny chia seeds, which according to the Mayo Clinic, date back to ancient Mayan and Aztec civilizations as a dietary staple.

“The health benefits of chia have become popular over the last 10 years,” Kitty Sherpa said. “It’s high in protein and fiber and provides omega-3 fatty acids. It’s also high in antioxidants and a good source of calcium, magnesium and copper.”

With their healthy reputation, I couldn’t bear to let the seeds age on the kitchen counter, and they’ve been making their way into brownies and biscuits. When chia seeds sit in liquid for a short time, the combination thickens and takes on a gelatinous form that folds into batters just as naturally as eggs with a much lower dose of fat and cholesterol.

“With chia coming into prominence,” Kitty Sherpa said, “for things like baking, as an egg replacer, it’s a great way to use it. And it has such a mild flavor that it’s almost a hidden ingredient.”

It may take more time for chia seeds to land on the average shopping list and pumpkin bars could never replace pumpkin pie, but cranberries — packed with their own nutritional benefits — remind us to count our blessings, sweet and savory.

Cranberry Pumpkin Chia Bars

Yield: 3 dozen bars

1 ¾ cups flour

1 cup sugar

1 teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon salt

1 ½ cups mashed pumpkin (use sweet sugar pie pumpkins or canned pumpkin)

½ cup canola oil

¼ cup buttermilk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

*2 tablespoons chia seeds

*½ cup water

3 cups fresh cranberries, rinsed and dried

½ cup butterscotch chips

Choose a 3- to 4-pound sugar pie pumpkin. Cut pumpkin in half and remove seeds (save seeds for roasting). Place split pumpkin on baking sheet and bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes. Cool. Scoop out pumpkin and mash or puree.

In a small bowl, add water to chia seeds. Let stand 10 minutes and stir. Seeds and water will take on a gelatinous consistency. In a large bowl, mix flour, sugar, baking soda and salt. In another bowl, combine chia seed mixture, pumpkin, oil, buttermilk and vanilla. Add to flour mixture, stirring just until moistened. Fold in fresh cranberries and butterscotch chips. Pour into a greased jelly roll baking pan or cookie sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until the surface bounces back from touch. Cool completely and cut into single-serving bars.

*In place of chia seeds and water, substitute 2 beaten eggs.

By Mary Ann Ebner, first published by Philipstown.info

Break out this tomato pie a la vodka

If red-ripe tomatoes and a humble pie recipe succeed in their temptation, be prepared to reach for bottles of the good stuff, a fine bottle of extra virgin olive oil and a reputable bottle of vodka.

A few key ingredients …

You’ll want both of a decent quality to make tomato pie a la vodka.

A Southern-ish tomato pie sampled on an evening cruise up and down the Hudson and a not-so-light (but dripping with flavor) penne a la vodka side dish shared at a summer reunion inspired this hybrid conception. The pie served on the boat ride was made by a Southern gentleman who knows his way around the kitchen. When he shared the origins of his tomato pie discovery, he gave a good deal of credit to his father-in-law who had introduced him to the dish. What he discovered along the way when doing a little Google research of his own was that the family recipe looked remarkably similar to a variation by the celebrity Southerner Paula Deen. With his kitchen and relationship wisdom, he elected not to take the findings back to the family — his wife’s or Deen’s.

To preserve the traditional tomato pie for the Southern cooks who know how to put the right amount of flake in a recipe, an adaptation of my own credits all who’ve created a variation of some sort, whether with mayonnaise, a mild Gouda or creamed butter. Anyone can layer tomatoes and smother them with an assortment of cheeses and herbs, which makes a hybrid pie a good choice for putting the best of summer’s tomatoes to use.

A serving of creamy vodka sauce adds an extra-heavy layer of calories to anything it sits on, and that’s probably why it tastes great over everything from piecrust to pasta. To experiment with my own vodka sauce, I couldn’t find a drop of basic vodka on hand, as in a bargain brand. The limited release Ultra Luxury Stoli vodka (not readily available for sale in the U.S.) — elegantly bottled and recently hand carried by a friend returning from Latvia — was off limits. The pie prep called for a shopping trip. Without help from Russia or even Poland, the recipe needed something all-American. But before I could even make it in the house with a full bottle of Tito’s Handmade Vodka, produced in Austin, Texas, one tap of the Tito’s bottle resulted in a shattering crash of glass and spirits all over the stairway. For the record, no sampling of the distilled product had yet occurred. It’s certain that the scene actually looked pretty funny, then it didn’t — when my hand (still gripping the neck of a broken glass bottle) started bleeding … in three places. My lack of coordination often presents itself at inopportune times.

With a replacement bottle of vodka firmly in hand (while cautiously keeping my balance), I eventually set out to experiment with the sauce. I did end up substituting the splashed-away Tito’s Vodka with an even choicer option (Grey Goose) and didn’t risk touching the Stoli reserve bottle. My first batch needed to be cooled down for the mix of preferences in the family, so I eliminated hot red pepper flakes and dipped in to a supply of roasted Spanish paprika, which added the ideal blend of mildly smooth and smoky flavor to the sauce.

Jet Stars on the vine

From my modest garden, Jet Star tomatoes produced the best-tasting crop at home this year. They matured earlier than expected but were able to vine-ripen before the squirrels and woodchucks moved in covertly to harvest them. The meaty fruit of the Jet Stars holds up firmly when sliced for a pie. If you’re buying tomatoes to slice for a similar pie, search for a large plump variety. A selection of enormous juicy tomatoes that I picked up in the Catskills worked well for firm slices and one hefty tomato filled a pie dish.

Without the expense of an entire bottle of distilled beverage, tomato pie a la vodka makes an affordable and simple meal. The pie combines ripened garden treasures with a sweet and tangy cream sauce that brings on even more tomato flavor. Served sliced on a plate, layered on a pizza or tucked into a flaky pie crust, there’s no better time to appreciate tomatoes.

By Mary Ann Ebner

First published: Cook On: 1 part chaos, 2 parts calm

The Paper/Philipstown.info

Wedge of tomato pie a la vodka

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tomato Pie a La Vodka

Yield: 8 servings

For a single layer crust

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup lard or shortening

3 tablespoons icy cold water

Mix dry ingredients and gradually cut in lard with two table knives. Add water by the tablespoon to mold together, handling as little as possible. Work dough into a ball and roll thinly on lightly floured surface with rolling pin. Carefully roll your dough back onto rolling pin and lay dough over pie pan or deep dish. Bake crust for 15 minutes at 350 degrees. Remove from oven and set aside.

For the vodka sauce and filling

1 large or 2 medium tomatoes, sliced

2 medium tomatoes, diced

2 cloves garlic, diced

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

¼ teaspoon sea salt

¼ teaspoon smoked paprika

¼ cup vodka

½ cup heavy cream

2 tablespoons flat parsley, chopped

2 cups shredded Parmesan cheese

1. In heavy pan, sauté garlic in extra virgin olive oil over medium heat. Add diced tomatoes, sea salt and smoked paprika. Mix in vodka and allow mixture to cook for 5 to 10 minutes while continuing to stir. Stir in heavy cream, lower heat and cook while stirring an additional 5 minutes.
2. Layer tomato slices into half-baked piecrust. Pour sauce over tomatoes. Add layer of chopped parsley and top with shredded Parmesan cheese.
3. Bake 30 minutes at 350 degrees. Cool and serve.

Fresh and Floral

With a hint of its natural aroma, lavender brings a fragrant goodness to foods and drinks. The dreamy ingredient in many varieties shows off a purplish flower with greenish-gray foliage and, in even the smallest quantities, stretches a long way in the kitchen. The versatile plant adds a unique flavor to everything from hot herbal teas to salad vinaigrettes and waffles.

Culinary lavender

Though baked goods flavored with lavender have long accompanied my morning cup of coffee, I hadn’t seriously considered the herb’s refreshing qualities as a cold beverage enhancer. But basic lemonade makes the case. While I was away in Colorado this summer, I sampled a splashy lunch-time variation with friends. The serving of lemonade dressed up with lavender, lavandula angustifolia, quenched a table full of tired hikers with its soothing properties. The herb’s distinction gave the drink a little edge without overwhelming the lemony base.

Discovering a source close to home means there’s more lavender to be shared in the warm weeks ahead. Ellen Duffy-Taylor, owner of North Winds Lavender Farm in Pawling, New York, carries the scent of lavender with her from farm to market. During the outdoor market season, she offers her lavender products — craft and culinary — every other weekend at the Cold Spring Farmers’ Market (her upcoming market participation dates include Aug. 8 and Aug 22). Local consumers are turning to her culinary lavender not only for cooking and baking but to mix up flowery cocktails from martinis to cosmos.

“People are actually using my lavender to make lavender lemonade and a lot of bartenders are using the syrup for cocktails,” Duffy-Taylor said. “Culinary lavender is very popular. We have one whole culinary field producing lavender that is edible and it’s naturally grown. We’re not certified organic, but we don’t use pesticides or herbicides.”

In addition to a selection of craft lavender and aromatherapy products, North Winds Lavender Farm sells its lavender syrup, lavender shortbread cookies, culinary lavender buds and jellies at the Cold Spring Farmers’ Market. The rich jellies pair well with cheese and transform toast into a breakfast feast while the syrup complements pan-seared meats, fish and steamed vegetables. The culinary buds include a mix of English and French lavender.

“We sell (culinary lavender) by the cup, half cup or quarter cup,” Duffy-Taylor said. “Selling by the pound at the market is just crazy. For people who are cooking, a cup is usually adequate.”

Lavender lemon cookies

My favorite lavender lemon cookie recipe calls for 1 tablespoon of crushed buds and the measurement adds plenty of presence — introducing a subtle fragrance before the first bite. The lemon and lavender work together and the end result is a rich but-not-too-sweet confection. High-grade culinary lavender is traditionally strong, and too much in any recipe, whether in sauces or baked goods, may overpower food with an overly perfumed accent. Using the fragrant flowers sparingly saves a cook from having to start over and will, in the end, reduce costs. Considering that little is needed in any creation, the harvested lavender flowers are affordable. One cup is priced by North Winds Lavender Farm at $12 and is sold in several increments. For any savory or sweet dish, use lavender moderately to experiment with the herb.

Duffy-Taylor has been farming for 18 years and 2015 marks her 10^th year in the lavender business. She’s been making the same lavender shortbread cookie recipe with all natural ingredients for years, and the fragrant baked goods will soon be available beyond the farmers’ market.

“I’m opening a store in September,” she said, “on Charles Colman Boulevard (in Pawling) right on the main drag. It will include everything we sell at the farmers’ market.”

To make something softly scented — out of your ordinary repertoire — pick up a little lavender. The lavender lemon cookie recipe shared here produces a delicate floral flavor. If you haven’t used lavender, incorporate a pinch in a familiar recipe. If you like the result, move on to a slightly more generous amount to adjust the taste for your preference. For further adventure, try lavender syrup (North Winds offers syrup in 8-ounce bottles for $7) mixed up with your favorite gin or infuse vinegar with lavender stalks and flower heads.

By Mary Ann Ebner, Cook On: 1 part chaos, 2 parts calm

First published by The Paper/Philipstown dot info

Lavender Lemon Cookies

Makes 3 dozen cookies

1 stick softened butter, unsalted

1 cup sugar

1 tablespoon lemon zest

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 large egg

1 tablespoon crushed lavender buds

1 ½ cups flour

½ teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon salt

¼ cup course or decorative sugar

1. Grind lavender buds with a mortar and pestle. Set aside.
2. In a medium bowl, cream together butter, sugar, lemon zest and vanilla extract. Mix in egg. Add ground lavender and mix until smooth.
3. Combine flour, baking soda and salt. Fold into butter mixture. Refrigerate dough for 30 minutes.
4. Drop dough by the spoonful onto ungreased baking sheet. Flatten dough balls lightly with the bottom of a small glass. Sprinkle with course or decorative sugar.
5. Bake 8 to 10 minutes at 350 degrees until cookie edges are slightly golden.