Pear Brandy & Apple Brandy

Fruited Brandies are wonderfully simple to make and cost far less than flavored brandies in the liquor store. Unless the funds are available to buy Calvados or other well-known brandies the cheaper varieties can be contaminated with corn alcohol, corn syrup or imitation flavor of unknown origin.



everything necessary to make fruited brandies at home



Crapabble brandy being my absolute favorite, even over peach brandy. The taste is quintessential apple pie packed into a thimble-size glass. Plus crabapples are often free for the picking. This year when the crabapples ripened I was too sick to take advantage of the tree’s bounty. Which means my cupboard is bare of fruited brandies, and winter is coming. This is unacceptable, untenable. So while I was brandy poaching a couple pears I started a pint jar of pear brandy, and another of apple brandy.

Making fruited brandies is one of my favorite uses for old, crystallized honey. I scoop it into the jars first, add the spice, fruits and then top with brandy. With swirling, over the infusion time, the honey dissolves. No waste, and no sticky dribbles down the jar sides.

Follow a vegan diet? Agave works in place of honey. I've used both in different batches with success.

For 2013, wish me good health, so I can return to making gallons of crabapple brandy, apple pie brandy, and plum spiced brandy as Yule Gifts.

Pear Brandy

Ingredients

1 medium sized, ripe pear, such as Bosc or Bartlett

2 cloves
2” cinnamon stick
Pinch of nutmeg
1 oz of honey
Brandy – inexpensive like Korbel

Directions
Stem, core and slice pear into sixths, leaving the peel on. Place in pint mason jar with other ingredients and cover with brandy.

Swirl 2-4xday for the first week, then daily for another week. Let rest in a cool, dark place for another two weeks minimum, two months preferably.

Strain and pour liquid back into the jar. Use in pies, tarts, or as an aperitif. I keep some of the fruit in my freezer to mince and use a dollop of to season those same pies and tarts.

Apple Brandy
Ingredients

1 small, tart apple, such as Granny Smith or Crabapple

1 sliver of lemon zest if using non-crabapples

4 cloves

2” cinnamon stick

¼ tsp mace

Pinch of nutmeg

2 oz of honey

Brandy – inexpensive like Korbel

Directions

Stem, core and slice apple into sixths, leaving the peel on. Place in pint mason jar with other ingredients and cover with brandy. When unable to use crabapples I add a strip of lemon zest to boost the tartness.

Swirl 2-4xday for the first week, then daily for another week. Let rest in a cool, dark place for another two weeks minimum, two months preferably.

Strain and pour liquid back into the jar. Use in pies, tarts, or as an aperitif.

Brandy Poached Pears

I’ve been craving brandy poached pears ever since Grace Burrowes latest heroine reminisced about eating brandy poached pears in childhood. Pears poached in red wine, orange juice and spices are robust; a winter staple, especially served with elk steak with more of the reduced sauce over vanilla ice cream for dessert. Brandy poached are entirely different…delicate and heady, a memory of late summer.



Soft Focus



This week the small, locally owned grocer’s had red Anjou pears on sale…a lovely bin of fat, fragrant pears. Add in a windy, snowy, cold autumn day and these are the results.

 

The only problem…I used the last of my brandy! Will have to run out tomorrow for another bottle so I can have a small snifter with my bowl of poached pears…or open a bottle of Fre non-alocholic bubbly and eat the pears swimming in bubbles…or in reality, Both!

Ingredients
2 big, fat, ripe pears
6oz / 180ml brandy
6 oz / 180ml water

3-4 tbsp honey

1 tsp vanilla
2” length of cinnamon stick (break a longer stick on the counter edge)
4 whole cloves
Nutmeg, freshly grated, 3-4 swipes aka not very much (optional)


Directions
Put the water, brandy, honey, vanilla, cinnamon stick, and cloves into a 1-1 ½ quart sauce pan on low-to-medium heat. I use my smallest burner, 5,000 btu.
While the sauce begins to heat, peel pears, core, quartering each half.
Place in sauce pan so all the slices are in the fluid. They don’t have to be completely covered.


Snifter o'Bliss



Cover pan with lid, or a saucer (darn it, sometimes those wee sauce pans don’t come with lids) and poach for 15 minutes. Halfway through, gently shift the pears so the uncovered part are moved down into the fluid.

 

At 15 minutes, check for tenderness. Pears go from just-right to pear sauce in a blink…I like mine tender yet still solid. Remove the pears with a slotted spoon to serving dish. Turn the heat up to high and reduce the liquids to syrup. Down to about ¼ the volume. Add the bit of fresh nutmeg.

Pour over pears and serve immediately. If storing, cool the syrup in the pan. Once cool, spoon over pears in storage container and place in the fridge. Otherwise the hot syrup will cook the pears a bit more.

Baking Powder tips

While rummaging the internet I found a starch-free baking powder. Yes, a gluten-free, corn-free baking powder.

Follow this link to the Starch-Free Bakewell Baking Powder:

http://www.newenglandcupboard.com/bakewell-cream.php

They also have a safe "Baking Cream" that is vegan and starch free. The original is advocated by King Arthur Flour Company.

Since the smallest amount these products come in is 8oz, here is David Lebovitz's blog post on how to test if baking powder is still good:

http://www.davidlebovitz.com/2011/11/how-to-tell-if-baking-powder-is-still-good/

Perhaps order a package of each and split with friends? I am...once I can be active in the kitchen again. Will have a firm answer by Nov. 22nd on when and how my wrist will be fixed. Until then witcherly ideas and confections will keep circling 'round in my noggin.

Happy Baking!

Win Le Creuset

In the midst of this hectic Monday take a minute and visit David Lebovitz's blog. He's teamed up with Le Creuset to give away a six piece cookware set for Christmas. Hurry since the contest cut off times are based on Paris time:

http://www.davidlebovitz.com/2010/12/le-creuset-holiday-give-away/#more-3038

It will probably be another week or more until I'm up and cooking. Right now Vega shakes are keeping me fed. A vegan, gluten-free, soy-free protein and fiber supplement is hard to find. One that tastes decent even more so. Add an wee umbrella to the glass and it will be your very own "Thomas Crown Affair" worthy gloppy, green breakfast.

http://shop.sequelnaturals.com/sequel-estore-us/Graceful-Aging_2/whole_food_health_optimizer-large_chai

Tomato Soup

In my memories tomato soup is as good as the old Campbell's soup commercials imply. Fragrant, creamy, soul-warming, nourishing yet decadent with a diagonally-cut grilled cheese sandwich to dip in a brimming hot mug. As good as grandma's lightly floury hugs, filling but not so much as to not have room for her fresh baked cookies.

It is another simple comfort food that became verboten for too long. Canned soups are full of corn syrup, boxed soups have cream or enough salt to pucker your face off, or worse taste like liquid cardboard. None of which evoke nostalgia or fulfill a craving. Then a couple years ago I stumbled onto a recipe. At the same time I bought my first immersion blender. Over the winter making the recipe mine involved changing proportions, deleting some ingredients and mugs upon mugs of soup.

This recipe is fairly forgiving, if you have two leeks and only half an onion, go ahead and make the soup. Craving garlic, add a bit more. Change up the peppers for roasted and add a dash of cilantro. Have yellow or orange bell peppers moldering in the crisper? Chop'em up and toss them in the pot.

Make a pot after work while enjoying a glass of the white wine or make it on a weekend while enjoying a couple glasses. This soup freezes very well making it as convenient as the old canned stuff.

Tomato Soup

2-3 tablespoons of olive oil

1 leek (chopped)

1 yellow onion (chopped)

2 garlic cloves (chopped)

2 stalks of celery (chopped)

1 red bell pepper (chopped)

3-4 oz white wine, usually a sauvignon blanc

1 15oz can of pumpkin

1 tablespoon of basil (chopped) (or a palm of dried)

1 tablespoon of parsley (chopped) (or a palm of dried)

1 15oz can of diced tomato

1 small can of tomato paste

1 dash white pepper

4 cups of chicken broth, or veggie broth for a vegetarian option

Large pinch of kosher salt

Warm the olive oil in a dutch oven or soup pot. Add the chopped leaks, onion, celery, garlic and bell pepper.

Sauté until the onion is translucent. Add the white wine and simmer.

Add the tomatoes, tomato paste, pumpkin, broth, and seasonings. Simmer for about 30 minutes.

Purée with the immersion blender in the pot or transfer in batches to the blender. Let me know if what memories it evokes for you.

Yukons and Yams

Yesterday turned out to be a no-cooking day. As I was getting ready to scrub the Yukon gold potatoes and the yams the garbage disposal fell off the sink. While running, and it kept running, giving the kitchen, the floor and the under sink cabinet contents a good rinsing, or flooding. Which means instead of slow roasting yams and boiling potato pieces the day went to mopping up, cleaning out under the sink, calling handy friends for help. Hopefully later this afternoon a good friend will have the disposal reattached, or replaced, and holiday cooking can move forward. Trying to be thankful it didn't happen Thanksgiving morning...and that not all my handy buddies are hunters off on a mountain somewhere.

Now we'll resume our regularly scheduled programming:

Yukons and Yams

You know how some leftovers taste better than they did during the meal? More flavorful, rich and enticing? That is one of the key reasons I like to prepare most of the side dishes and desserts a couple days before a feast. It gives the flavors time to meld, deepening the tastes, becoming leftover rich for the big meal.

Yukon gold potatoes are my favorite with their thin skins that don't require peeling and a buttery taste. While hosting a function at a hotel the chef made me yukons mashed with kosher salt and olive oil. They smelled divine, so golden yellow I was certain they'd been soaked with butter. I was blissfully wrong, slowly eating each bite and sorely tempted to lick the plate clean. That chef gave me back mashed potatoes. Even now I hesitate to put gravy on them, it distracts from their buttery simplicity.

Buy 6-8 oz of potatoes per person you're serving. If your crew consists of big eaters or carb fiends, bump that up to 12 oz. It will mean having a few leftovers, maybe.

The beauty of preparing potatoes, either kind, is there are no measurements after weighing them for purchase. Everything is by taste, by desired consistency, and fluctuates every time based on the potatoes.

Scrub the potatoes then cut them into even sized chunks. Place them in a pot large enough all the potatoes only half fill it. Add enough water to barely cover them. Sprinkle with Kosher sea salt. Cover the pot and cook on medium-low, stirring occasionally. Cook until the potatoes are soft and the liquid is almost gone.

I mash mine in the pot with extra-virgin olive oil, and a bit more sea salt. When I want smoother whipped potatoes the Kitchenaid immersion blender is the tool of choice; chunkier potatoes call for the old fashioned hand-masher. If it seems like they aren't salty enough add a bit of granulated garlic. It will enhance the salt and flavor without over powering the rest of the flavors. White pepper will avoid little black flecks, but really if your guests are whining about flecks in their potatoes they need to be a someone else's table.

At this point the potatoes go into a storage container to cool. The day I serve them about an hour before dinner I'll put them back in a pot with a bit of coconut milk creamer to keep them from drying out. If they aren't seasoned to the point you want to keep eating them out of the pot, keep adding salt, garlic, or creamer, until you do. Then they're ready.

Preparing the yams/sweet potatoes isn't much different, buy them in the same quantities as the other potatoes, scrub them well. Roasting the yams in-skin starts caramelizing the sugars, reducing the amount of sweetener needed later. If there aren't any other dishes needing to be baked, preheat the oven to 400 and bake the potatoes for an hour, or more, until they are tender to the touch. No need to wrap them in foil or even put them in a pan, right on the rack works best.

If you're baking other things, no worries, any temp under 400 works, the yams will just take a bit longer to cook. If you're lucky enough to be feeding a big crew having an oven full of yams roasting makes for a warm, autumn and caramel redolent house.

Once they're done, use mitts or silicon pads to remove from the oven. When they are still warm/hot but cool enough to handle without burning yourself, slit them open and scrap out the 'meat' into a mixing bowl. Mine end up in the Kitchenaid mixer with the paddle attachment. No mixer? That old fashioned potato masher works great too, just more effort on your part, or step where kids can easily help.

Add a splash of orange juice, a bit of light brown sugar, and a splash of Grand Marnier liqueur. If the yams seem a bit dry I'll add a splash of extra-virgin olive oil. Agave syrup also works in place of the brown sugar.

Just like the potatoes, store in a container and reheat in a pot with a bit more OJ and Grand Marnier.

These will be sweet, fragrant, yet nothing like the canned candied yams covered in sugar and marshmallows. If there are any leftovers a sweet potato pudding makes a wonderful hot breakfast or snack.

More later about cranberry relishes, right now it is time to reassemble the kitchen sink with a working disposal.

Biscuits and Herbed Margarine

In 2001 a coworker introduced me to a fabulous cookbook: How it All Vegan. By then I'd figured out my dairy allergy, which made vegan recipes very desirable. I could be absolutely certain there wouldn't be even a hint of dairy in a vegan dish. Since I didn't have my own kitchen at that time someone else having already figured out how to make the substitute taste good, hopefully, was imperative.

After having a piece of pie made from the book I bought a copy. Such decadent, amazing pie, there had to be more amazing-ness in there. The next dish I tried were these biscuits, just as delicious and as the name promised, easy. Flaky, fluffy, and dare I say "buttery?" I ate biscuits for a week: plain, slathered in jam, with safflower butter, with gravy from the vegan restaurant around the corner from my office, with cold cuts, rice cheese and mustard. These will absolutely have your guests shocked when they take a bite. Add the margarine and cranberry relish and prepare to sigh with a mouthful of bliss.

I also like that the most of the recipes in 'How it All Vegan' make small batches. If you need more than six biscuits, double or triple the quantities. Do roll them out, the small bit of extra effort is worth it when you easily split one of them open and catch a glimpse of the fragrant steam escaping from the layers.

For the upcoming holiday feast make the biscuits while the bird roasts. With the margarine make it anytime between now and the day before. It is step & time intensive, definitely not a 'day-of' recipe. I'll be making a half batch of it later today. Who knows, I may make a batch of biscuits to taste-test the margarine on!

Easy Biscuits

adapted from "How it All Vegan" by Tanya Barnard and Sarah Kramer

2 cups gluten-free all-purpose flour (I prefer Pamela's)

3 tsp baking powder (Hain is the only one I've found that is gluten-corn-dairy-free)

1 tsp sea salt (Penzey's Kosher-style is currently in my cupboard)

1/4 cup shortening or margarine (palm shortening is free of everything but palm)

1 cup plain So Delicious coconut milk, soured with 1 tsp white vinegar

Preheat the oven to 425 (450 if the oven isn't convection)

Sift together the dry ingredients in a large bowl.

Cut in the shortening.

Add 3/4 cup of the soured milk. blend until just mixed, adding the other 1/4 cup of milk if the batter is too dry (most likely here in the arid West).

Gently roll out on a floured board, cut with floured biscuit or cookie cutter.

Bake on a parchment lined cookie sheet for 12-18 minutes until lightly golden.

Try not to burn your fingers eating them fresh from the oven...not that I've ever managed to wait long enough to not burn mine.

The herbed margarine recipe I'll be trying for the first time is from the Washington Post:

http://projects.washingtonpost.com/recipes/2010/09/29/homemade-herbed-margarine/

Depending on how it turns out I plan on making a batch of biscuits with the margarine instead of palm shortening.

Progress

I'm inching towards healthy again. One sign is being interested in food again. This caught my eye:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2010/09/28/ST2010092802859.html

Imagine a flavorful, rich, creamy substitute for the butter we can't have anymore, without the transfats, odd chemical ingredients or incipient blandness. I'll definitely be playing with this in recipes over the winter.

What flavor are interested in whipping up?

Zucchini Risotto

My neighbors are wonderful people. Besides being cool, fun, and nice, this week they've shared their harvest bounty with me: fresh herbs and zucchini! I know, I'm the only person who is thrilled to get zucchini. It is just so versatile. Cakes, bread, soup, stir-fry, and now risotto. Fresh herbs too. My growing space only has an sheltered Eastern exposure where herbs languish, so gifts of herbs and veggies are most welcome.

While standing over a warm stove top for an hour stirring isn't necessarily convenient on a week night after work, risotto makes it well worth the time. With air conditioning and a tall kitchen stool it is much cooler that grilling! Plus if you live at lower altitude the cooking time can go down by a third or more.

Keys to a creamy, lustrous risotto are:

• completely coat and warm the risotto in the oil and onions

• then deglaze with the white wine

• only add a cup of broth at a time and it must be hot, almost boiling when you add it, keeping the temperature in the pot steady.

• Stir, stir, stir

If you are fortunate to have kitchen minions aka kids, they can help stir in shifts, between getting home work done. It isn't unusual when I have girl friends over to enjoy a glass of Crios Torrontes, take turns stirring while catching up. For me it is soothing to be in the moment (or hour) sipping a glass and contemplating what else to make with my neighbor's bounty.

Zucchini Risotto with Lemon Thyme

2-3 tbsp olive oil

½ onion, finely chopped

2 small cloves of garlic, minced

1 c arborio rice (I prefer Lundberg organic)

1 c chilled white wine

6 c hot fluid – either veggie broth, chicken broth or water, your choice

8 oz chopped zucchini

small bunch lemon thyme I used the leaves of six to eight 6” stems

white pepper to taste (Penzey's is my preferred)

sea salt to taste

Warm a 7 quart dutch oven over medium-low heat. Add the chopped onion and saute until the onions are translucent.

Add the garlic, saute for a couple minutes to release the flavor.

Add the arborio rice to the the pot, stirring well to completely coat with the olive oil. While the rice starts to toast, put two cups of the broth in the microwave and heat to the boiling point.

After the rice has toasted for a couple minutes – so the pan is fairly dry and the rice isn't sticking or getting scorch spots – add the cup of white wine to deglaze the pan. This will also help the thick starch coat on the rice break down faster.

Once the wine has absorbed, add in the first two cups of heated broth/liquid. Stir the pot slowly and continuously until the rice absorbs the most of the fluid, about 15-20 minutes.

While stirring, heat the rest of the broth one cup at a time.

Each time the liquid is mostly absorbed, add another cup of the just boiling broth, until all six cups of fluid are incorporated into the pot.

With the sixth cup of broth, add the chopped zucchini to the pot. Continue stirring.

Drain and rinse the beans. Add them to the pot, stir another five minutes to warm the beans.

Ladle into bowls, sprinkling each serving with lemon thyme leaves.

Salt and pepper to taste.

Pina Colada Granita

Today a bonus posting to enjoy while I work on the chocolate zucchini bread:

Anytime I crave coconut I think of Jenna. Add pineapple and I'm thinking of hot summer nights in the 80's - arriving home from exercising my horses or a long hot weekend of showing. I'd have Canadian bacon pineapple pizza delivered and make an alcohol-free pina coloda.

Now I think of Jenna and make granita - a cold, crumbly treat that tastes like a tropical vacation. Yesterday's almost 100 degree heat made granita a top priority. Here's the recipe so you have a secret weapon against the next heat wave.

Ingredients

14 oz can of chunk pineapple
14 oz can of light coconut milk
4 oz light agave
2 oz lime juice
2 oz silver rum (Thanks to Michael & Beth I'm a huge fan of Mount Gay rums)


Toss all the ingredients in the food processor or blender and puree until frothy and smooth. The rum is optional - for friends who abstain I leave it out.

Chill the puree over night, covered with cling-wrap. For sorbet freeze through one cycle of the ice cream maker.

If you can control the craving, grab all the ingredients and place them in the fridge overnight. That way the puree can go directly from the food processor into the ice cream maker.

For a true granita: Place the puree in a 9x9 glass or plain metal pan (Do NOT use a nonstick pan! Teflon shaving make a lousy garnish.) Put the pan in the freezer, then every 30 minutes scrape the mixture with a stiff metal spatula. The texture will be closer to shaved ice, not a smooth sorbet. Will still melt beautifully on your tongue during a hot summer night.

Chocolate Balsamic Vinaigrette

Was there a time as a child that you imagined chocolate at every meal? In every dish? Life being a veritable candy land? For the next three posts I’ll share the dishes from our Lammas feast, each showcasing a different dark chocolate ingredient – cocoa, 72%, and 85%.

For celebration meals I ask the guest of honor to pick an ingredient they’d like to be in each course of the meal. The purpose is tri-fold: the celebrant receives a unique meal, I get a challenge, and we don’t get stuck in a rut.

For Lammas the boys (really, they are young men, but at half my age I’m prone to call them boys) chose chocolate. This spring one gave me an autographed copy of British chocolatier Paul Young’s book “Adventures with Chocolate.” If you can find this book on the internet and have it shipped here to the US it will be more than worth your effort.

A complete 180 degrees from Caesar salad, this dressing is sweet, tangy, dark and purely surprising. Be sure to use a real balsamic vinegar, not a cheap caramelized imitation, not only will it taste poor, it will probably be contaminated with gluten.

Perhaps this dressing will intrigue vegetable-indifferent kids to enjoy salads?

Chocolate Balsamic Vinaigrette

Converted from Paul Young’s “Adventures with Chocolate”

2 ¼ oz balsamic vinegar

1 oz light brown sugar

.6 oz 85% dark chocolate, broken into pieces

Place the vinegar and sugar in a glass measuring cup, heat in microwave to a scant simmer, just starting to bubble. Don’t boil it! Whisk until the sugar dissolves, add the chocolate, again whisking until emulsified.

Cool slightly, add extra-virgin olive oil at two parts vinegar mix to one part olive oil, or one to one if you want a lighter dressing. Shake or whisk until emulsified. This will a dark, glossy dressing. It doesn’t need to be stored in the fridge, but if you do the chocolate will solidify and need rewarming in the microwave or in a sunny spot.

If you can find some late season strawberries at the farmer’s market, try them dipped in a bit of this dressing.

Serve!

I used Bolivian extra dark eco bar for this batch. If you don’t have 85% on hand use ½ oz of 100% baking chocolate and increase the sugar by ½ a tsp. Using a lighter chocolate will make this dressing unbearably sweet and lose the rich under note that good dark chocolate provides.