the honey eater » i might be crazy

Cherry Vanilla Bread Pudding

naomi — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 01:06:00 +0000

Let me tell you a story:

Once there was this girl who really liked this boy so she thought she’d make him bread pudding. Not just any bread pudding, but a chai bread pudding, where the milk is steeped with spices and tea and the final dish is rich, flavorful and complex. She looked through her cupboards and was happy to discover that she had most of the ingredients on hand, which was good because spices like cardamom can be expensive. She went over to his apartment to make this bread pudding in his (and what is now their) tiny kitchen. She warmed the milk, mixed in the whole spices and tea and let it all steep for an hour. She mixed the milk with eggs, and added the bread and let it soak for a half an hour. She put it in a big pan and put that in an even bigger pan and put all those pans in the oven (along with some hot water to make the bain marie) for fifty minutes. She pulled the bread pudding out of the oven, perfectly browned and beautiful and it tasted. . . . awful. One thing this girl had neglected to do was check her spices (who knew cardamom could go bad! and in such a bad way! especially after it sat in storage in Pittsburgh one hot summer and hadn’t been used for a good three years).

From that day on the boy had a very negative attitude towards bread pudding. It became a running joke, he would say “you can make anything you want, just don’t make bread pudding!” One day, the girl and the pudding decided to plot a comeback. While the boy was away the girl made him bread pudding sans cardamom with two of his favorite flavors, cherry and vanilla. And it worked! He couldn’t believe it was the same recipe, the same pudding just in a new party dress. He loves this bread pudding now and would happily eat it any day of the week.

Moral of the story: always check your spices, especially if they’ve spent an inordinate amount of time in storage during hot and humid months/on high shelves/not being used. And make bread pudding, it’s delicious.

Cherry Vanilla Bread Pudding
adapted from Martha Stewart

This is the most perfect bread pudding recipe. The bread and custard seem to meld into one beautiful, happy whole. It can be customized in a myriad of ways: add spices and use raisins instead of cherries, or go tropical with bananas, coconut and rum. You could add 8 ounces of chocolate to the cream recipe. If you’re brave you might add 1/4 cup black tea, 3 cinnamon sticks, a 2″ piece of peeled ginger, 8 whole cloves, 10 cardamom pods and 1/4 cup sugar to the cream mixture and let steep for an hour. You could possibly then strain said mixture, and mix it into the eggs. You could hypothetically then make a chai bread pudding for yourself, if you like, and if you have fresh spices.

I halved the recipe and made it in little individual cups (as you can see) but I prefer it in one big pan, there seems to be a better custard to bread ratio, so that’s the recipe I’m giving you. However, if you like, you can cut the recipe in half and cook it in 6-8 oz. baking dishes, just reduce the baking time to 40 minutes.

12 ounces brioche or challah, cut into 1″ cubes
2 cups milk
3 cups heavy cream
4 large eggs plus 1 large egg yolk
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup dried cherries

Butter a 9″ x 13′ baking dish.

Place the bread in a large bowl.

Whisk together the eggs, yolk, sugar, salt, and vanilla in a medium bowl.

Heat the milk and cream in a medium saucepan until just about to simmer. Slowly pour the cream mixture into the egg mixture, whisking constantly. Pour over bread, folding to combine. Let stand 30 minutes, tossing and pressing occasionally to keep the bread submerged.

Preheat oven to 350° F and put a kettle on to boil. Stir cherries into the bread mixture. With a slotted spoon, transfer bread to a buttered dish; pour liquid in bowl over the top. Turn the top layer of bread crust side up.

Set dish in a roasting pan and transfer to over. Pour boiling water into the roasting pan until it reaches about halfway up the sides of the dish. Bake until golden brown, about 50 minutes.

It’s your ribs. I’m afraid they’re delicious

naomi — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 15:59:57 +0000

I may be a nerd, but I love this:

“The metaphor of the cookbook was long the pet metaphor of the conservative political philosopher Michael Oakeshott in his assault on the futility of thinking that something learned by rote was as good as what was learned by ritual. Oakeshott’s much repeated point was that one could no more learn how to make good government from a set of rules than one could learn how to bake a cake by reading recipe books. The cookbook, like the constitution, was only the residue of a practice. Even the most grammatical of cookbooks dies without living cooks to illuminate its principles. The history of post-independence African republics exists to prove the first point; that Chocolate Nemesis cake that always fails but your friends keep serving anyway exists to prove the second. Unsupported by your mom, the cookbook is the model of empty knowledge.

“All this is true, and yet the real surprise of the cookbook, as of the constitution, is that it sometimes makes something better in the space between what’s promised and what’s made. You can follow the recipe for the exotic thing- green curry or paella- and though what you end up with would shock the natives, it may be just as good as or even better than the thing intended. Before I learned that green curries were soupy, I made them creamy, which actually is nicer. In politics, too, where the unwritten British constitution has been turned into a recipe- as in the constitutions of Canada and Australia- the condensation of practices into rules can make for a rain of better practices; the Canadian constitution, for instance, wanting to keep the bicameral vibe of a House of Lords without having a landed gentry, turned it into a Senate of distinguished citizens by appointment, an idea that can rebound back as a model for the new House of Lords. Between the rule and the meal falls the ritual, and the real ritual of the recipe is like the ritual of the law; the reason the judge sits high up, in a robe, is not that it makes a difference to the case but that it makes a difference to the clients. The recipe is, in this way, our richest instance of the force and the power of abstract rules. All messages change as they’re re-sent; but messages not sent never get received. Life is like green curry.”- from What’s the Recipe by Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker, November 23, 2009

Summer gratin

naomi — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 17:45:00 +0000

I love my farmers market. I go to the big one in Union Square, and this time of year, it’s just bursting with fresh fruits and vegetables, milk and cheese, flowers, honey, and most everything I could possibly want. When I get home, I proudly take out each item and display it on the table for Amir to admire. Perhaps it is some latent gathering instinct passed down through generations of women who searched fields, farms, and now farmers markets for food for their families. Or perhaps I’m just mildly insane. Whichever.

I made this gratin for my parents when they visited at the end of June. They tore through it. It was bright and fresh. There was grated zucchini, and lots of fresh herbs, some spring onions, and a tomato added in because it’s summer, and they’re everywhere, and you have to use them whenever possible. Then the whole thing was topped with cheesy bechemel, what’s not to love?

Well, not a lot really. My parents, as I said, loved it. They continued to think about it for a good 48 hours. I felt, however good it was the first time around, that there were unexplored possibilities with this gratin. The flavors are very Provencal so I decided to boost the tomato further, I also added a bell pepper, and while I was at the market I saw beautiful crimini mushrooms, so I added those as well. Because I’d upped my vegetable quotient, I scaled down the rice a very little bit. I also used my new favorite cheese, Tumbleweed by 5 Spoke Creamery. The cheese is grassy and almost cheddary, and I thought a little lemon juice tossed in with the vegetables would set it off nicely.

I should mention that this dish introduced me to marjoram, for which I am forever grateful. It is spicy and sweet and you should use it more often. Now for an embarrassing admission: while at Whole Foods, buying my version of a crack baguette, I grabbed what I thought was parsley, but it was cilantro. Whole Foods can make me very anxious, there are too many people and I’m always getting knocked by carts, so I grabbed the first flat-leafed herb I saw and ran.

The gratin turned out perfectly, richly flavored and not too heavy, and tasting like summer. The mushrooms added a nice meatiness, and the Tumbleweed added bite. I was thrilled with my amendments. Except for the cilantro part, it was fine, it didn’t detract at all, but parsley would be better. Do as I say, not as I do.

Summer Gratin

adapted from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison*

This is not a thirty-minute meal, it is anything but. It takes hours to prepare. You could make things easier on yourself by stretching your tasks out over a few days. Make your rice one day, then make your bechemel the next night, on the third night, chop your vegetables and get to gratin-ing.

For the Herb Bechemel:

2 cups (scant 500 ml) milk

1/4 cup (30 g) diced onion

1 bay leaf

3 sprigs parsley

2 sprigs thyme

3-1/2 (47 g)tbsp butter

3-1/2 (35 g) tbsp flour

salt, pepper and nutmeg to taste

1/3-1/2 cup (25 g) chopped herbs (I used basil, marjoram, parsley [not really, but you should] and thyme, I also went for the larger amount)

In a saucepan, heat the milk over medium heat with the onion, bay leaf, parsley and thyme until bubbles begin to form, but the milk does not boil. Remove from heat and let steep for 15 minutes.

Strain milk into a measuring cup or tea pot, or whatever you have that’s easy to pour from.

Make the roux: melt the butter, add the flour, and cook over medium heat for 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Quickly pour the milk into the roux and whisk until thickened. Let mixture come to a boil, stirring constantly. Reduce heat to very low and let cook for 20-25 minutes whisking occasionally. The mixture may be a little lumpy at first (mine was) but it should smooth out.

Season with salt, pepper and nutmeg. Stir in herbs. If you’re not going to use it at once, place plastic wrap directly on the surface to prevent a skin from forming (I didn’t do this, a skin formed, it was fine).

For the gratin:

measurements for vegetables are extremely approximate, the pictures show more or less what I used, so use that as a guide and improvise as much as you want.

3/4 cup (115 g) long-grained brown rice, cooked until tender

about 1/2 pound (260 g) summer squash

1/3 pound (150 g) mushrooms

1 small bell pepper

2 spring onions (you could also use 2 shallots or 1/2 a small onion)

2 tomatoes

2 tablespoons olive oil

1-1/2-2 cups (about 400 ml) Herb Bechemel**

1/4 cup (15 g) chopped parsley

2 tablespoons chopped marjoram, plus extra for garnish

1/2 cup (60 g) grated cheese (I used Tumbleweed, but you could use Parmesan or Ricotta Salata)

Salt and pepper
juice of 1/2 a lemon

Preheat oven to 375-degrees F (190 Celcius) and lightly oil a gratin dish (I used this pie pan, which holds 1.4 quarts or 1.5 liters. An oval dish would be better, with a round dish it takes a while for the center to brown.)
Coarsely grate your squash and toss it with a little salt, place it in a clean dish towel in a colander and set aside to drain.

Finely dice your onion and pepper and chop the tomatoes and mushrooms. Wring out the squash to rid of excess moisture. Heat the oil in a medium saucepan or a wide skillet over medium heat. Add onions and bell pepper and cook until softened, about 3 minutes. Add the mushrooms, tomatoes and squash and cook, stirring frequently, until the pan in dry and your vegetables have begun to color, about 15 minutes. Add 1/2 of the bechemel sauce, rice, herbs, and lemon juice. Add salt and pepper to taste. Smooth mixture into the gratin dish. Mix cheese and the remaining bechemel and smooth it over the top. Bake until the top is golden, about 25 minutes. Sprinkle with extra marjoram and serve.

*If you don’t own this cookbook, buy it. Try the original recipe for this gratin and cook everything else in the book, you wont be disappointed.
**You could probably use a cream of mushroom soup, or something like that if you don’t have time to make your own bechemel.

Final note: make this sherbet, it is so intense, you really only need a few bites to feel completely satisfied. (I’m big on the imperative today, aren’t I?)