by Sam Tackeff | Jul 2, 2010 | Books, Food Travel, omnivore books, Soups
I have a little secret to share with you. Ok, so it’s not a secret to anyone who knows me, but, I happen to be obsessed with Jamie Oliver. It started in 1999, right around when we first got cable television, I discovered the Food Network, and then I discovered the Naked Chef. It was one of the first cookbooks I cooked through. I should have blogged about it. Oh well. When Jamie married Jools, I put his photo up next to my bed (which I had clipped from my grandmother’s People Magazine) and cried a little bit.
I can’t believe that it was over 10 years ago. Now, 14? 15 books later? He has come out with a new one – except it isn’t out in the states yet. Jamie Does is another brilliant book from Jamie Oliver that I encourage you to get your hands on. Don’t be put off by his media presence – he is legit – I assure you this man can cook seriously good food.
I took home a copy of ‘Jamie Does‘ about a month ago from Omnivore, and could not be more excited about it. It’s a fantastic cookbook. The premise is based on Jamie’s travels across Europe and North Africa (Lucky Bastard!) : he heads to Spain, Italy, Sweden, Morocco, Greece and France, searching for the flavors, techniques, and recipes of each country.
There are so many reasons I love this book (aside from the fact that everything Jamie Oliver does is wonderful,) but my favorite part are these beautiful spreads of the main flavor components and ingredients of each country. The tagline of ‘Jamie Does’ is “Easy twists on classic dishes inspired by my travels”. So many people are afraid to cook new types of cuisines, but as long as you have the flavors and the general cooking techniques, you can fiddle around and make things taste delicious and fairly authentic.
Each page of this cookbook is filled with beautiful spreads and photographs by David Loftus – real food that you want to eat, and feel empowered to prepare. You don’t have to go to these places to eat, you can travel right in your own kitchen. (Although, frankly, this cookbook makes me yearn to whip out my passport and my credit card and make reckless financial decision…) And yes, there is a tv show. I’ve been watching the grainy version on youku, because British networks are cruel, cruel people and will not stream online to the U.S. audience.
Here are links to more of Jamie’s recipes: head over to his website to access hundreds of his recipes . An incredible resource!! And of course, he’s on twitter, too. Now if only we could get him to Omnivore Books for a signing….
* * *
Last night I put together a quick summer minestrone soup with some of the contents of my farm box. I also had a loaf of bread that our neighbor baked, which needed to be eaten, and I decided that soup would be the perfect accompaniment. After searching for the proper treatment for my veg, I was inspired by the ‘Spring and Summer Minestrone’ in ‘Jamie Does‘
Spring Minestrone with Pesto
adapted from ‘Jamie Does’
Serves 2-3, 25 minutes
In a heavy bottomed pot, heat a glug of olive oil. Saute an onion, a couple of chopped carrots, a few cloves of garlic, and a few slices of really good thick cut bacon, chopped. After those have been going for about 5 minutes, add in two chopped zucchini, and cook for a few more minutes. While that’s going, chop up a tomato, and a bunch of parsley, and whatever greens you have in the fridge, and stir it all in. Swiss chard? Kale? All I had was lettuce. It worked just fine. Add a handful of peas if you have them (I didn’t.) And then cover with some good organic chicken or vegetable stock. Bring to a boil, and add a small handful of pasta (I used 1/2 cup israeli cous cous). Season with salt and pepper, and turn down to a simmer for 10 minutes.
While the soup is going – you make your pesto. A classic pesto will have fresh basil, garlic, pine nuts, parmesan and olive oil. I had basil, garlic, walnuts, Kerrygold Dubliner with Irish Stout, and olive oil. It worked out just fine. I dumped a large handful of the basil into my mortar and pestle with a pinch of coarse salt, and bruised them well. I added a few cloves of garlic, a couple of walnuts, and made a paste. I grated in about an ounce of cheese, and loosened it all up with a few good glugs of olive oil.
When the pasta was cooked, I ladled it into bowls, and topped with a dollop of pesto. I toasted thick slices of the bread, and topped them with a pat of Kerrygold Butter.
by Sam Tackeff | Dec 2, 2009 | Mexican, Pantry Staples, Soups
Ok… I may have… in a fit of passion… ordered a massive quantity of beans two days ago from Rancho Gordo. And by massive quantity I mean… 15 pounds of beans. So, I’m going to do my best in the next few days to reduce my current bean pantry, and hopefully share with you all some of my results.
This morning I was surfing around the interwebs and found a recipe called “Good Soup for Sick People” on Heidi Swanson’s site ‘101 Cookbooks‘ and even though I’m not sick, it sounded like a good soup for cold people, tired people, and people on their day off work huddled on their couch, (ie: me.)
Heidi makes hers in the oven, using her nice Le Creuset pot, [which I’m about to be blessed with for the holidays but I’m having trouble currently making the choice of color and size (Dijon? Carribean? Onyx? Advice anyone?)] but as I don’t have one yet, I had to make do with the stove top. It works out just fine.
This recipe basically has 6 ingredients, all of which were in my pantry, and is completely hands off. Prep time? About three minutes. And it’s pretty flexible – if you have shallots instead of onion, you could do that, or if you need to use canned stock, that’s fine too. Although I’d go for a low sodium variety so that you can adjust your own seasoning. No chipotle in adobo (although really you can get these everywhere)? – go for a dried chile.
So you put it all in a pot. And you wait. And then what you get at the end is this savory, spicy, and hearty soup – the beans will have plumped up and the onions and garlic become so soft they melt in your mouth. It tastes a little bit like french onion soup… with a kick! Believe me, that chipotle really fires you up! I think this one is going to go into heavy rotation in the next few weeks.
Spicy Bean Soup (Good for Sick People)
adapted from 101 cookbooks
serves 2
Ingredients:
1 cup of dried borlotti beans (or other cranberry beans), preferably that you have soaked overnight*
1 large onion, sliced or roughly chopped
8-10 cloves of garlic, peeled, whole, trimmed
8 cups of stock (I used home made turkey stock)
1 chile pepper in adobo
1 bay leaf
To serve : (optional, but highly recommended):
fresh cilantro
freshly grated parmesan
1. In a soup pot, add all of the ingredients, and bring to boil. Cover, turn down the heat to a simmer, and let it go for an hour or so. After the first hour, check to make sure your liquid hasn’t decreased too substantially, and add water if needed. Let the thing simmer for a second hour until beans are tender, and you can’t hold yourself back from eating it all.
To serve, top with some fresh cilantro, and a shaving of Parmesan.
Eat. Feel restored.
*Note: I didn’t soak my beans. They were done in just over 2 hours. But then again, that’s because I buy them from Rancho Gordo, and they are fresh, fresh, fresh!
by Sam Tackeff | Nov 12, 2009 | Food Travel, Ingredients, Local stores, Pantry Staples, Soups
A few weeks ago we headed down the California coastline to a tiny town named Pescadero, on a quest for beans. Pescadero, at the midway point between San Francisco and Santa Cruz – is known for a lovely beach, antiques, the historic artichoke soup at Duarte’s Tavern (which apparently Guy Fieri is a fan of), and the burrito joint in the gas station – but if you drive farther down the road you will get to a mystical and magical place named Phipps Country Store, which has both an unusually large selection of beans, and an unusually large selection of birds, small furry animals, livestock and antique stoves.
So, truthfully, I drove over an hour just to buy beans. But, oh what beans!!! Phipps brags over 50 types of beans, most of which are grown by them, using no sprays/chemicals. While I was there I picked up some chickpeas, runner beans, soup mixes, and chestnut runners, all glorious stuff.
Included in my purchase was one really great package of red lentils and barley – that came with a recipe which I adapted for dinner.
This soup is perfect for the winter weather, and like most soups, tastes absolutely delicious for lunch the next day even if you are eating it cold. My twist is the miso – I use white miso, which adds a really nice depth of flavor to soups without it tasting miso-y or exotic. You can easily find white miso paste in the refrigerator section of any asian market, and I would highly recommend buying it to have on hand. If you can’t find miso, you could substitute bouillon.
Phipp’s Red Lentil Barley Soup
makes 8-9 1 cup servings
1 slice thick cut bacon (I use Niman Ranch)
1 cup (or 1 large) onion, chopped
1 cup (or three stalks) celery, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 can (28 oz) tomatoes, or 4 cups diced fresh tomatoes
3/4 cups red lentils, rinsed
3/4 cup pearl barley
4 cups water
2 cups low sodium chicken broth
1 tablespoon white miso paste
1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary, crushed
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano, crushed
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 cup shredded swiss cheese, or sharp cheddar (optional)
In a large heavy bottomed soup pot, place the slice of bacon over medium heat, until most of the fat is rendered. Add in the onions, celery and garlic, and cook until tender, about 10 minutes.
Add the water, chicken broth, miso paste, tomatoes, lentils, barley, rosemary oregano, carrots and pepper. Bring to a boil, and then turn down the heat and simmer gently for 40 minutes or until the barley, lentils and carrots are tender. Top with swiss cheese or sharp cheddar if desired. (It goes well with or without!). I made a small batch of salt and olive oil rolls from my refrigerated master dough from “Artisan Bread in 5 minutes a day” and it went perfectly with this.
Nutritional Information: (Per 1 cup serving, not including cheese) Calories: 158, Total Fat: 1.6 g, Sodium: 115.9 mg, Total Carbs: 29.3 g, Dietary Fiber: 6.5 g, Protein: 7.7 g
Phipps Country Store and Farm
2700 Pescadero Road, Pescadero, CA 94060
(650) 879-0787
Hours: 10:00 – 5:00 during winter, Closed Mondays
by Sam Tackeff | Jul 1, 2009 | Soups
Last weekend we had lovely guests – Devon’s dad John and his wife Patti, who came not only with gifts of garlic from Gilroy (home of the garlic festival), but a copy of Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything – Vegetarian which I have been lusting after for the past several months and haven’t had the chance to acquire.
We took them to our favorite thai restaurant, Regent Thai, which happens to be a block from our house, and has blissfully delicious Tom Kha Gai, thai coconut chicken soup, and then on Sunday morning we went for breakfast burritos next door at Toast – which are enough to sustain you for the majority of the day. I’ve been working diligently to re-create the Tom Kha Gai soup at home – I’m still tinkering, but I’ll post it when I get it up to speed!
After going on a wandering adventure in the car over to the East Bay, our guests suggested that I make dinner (something that I concede I hadn’t even considered doing at the time of our market trip.)
And so it’s a very good thing that my new habit has been to go through cookbooks and magazines, and food shows and write down the recipes I think I will enjoy in my little moleskin, which ideally I will have in hand at the market if I have to shop for something at the last minute. This has proven to be very useful, because if my menu planning is left to the last minute, I end up fretting, ravenous, and very cranky – or – as in this case – heading to the market with guests a 4pm without a thought having been given to cooking.
We ended up at The Berkeley Bowl – my first time in this fabled food purveyor. The Berkeley bowl is a supermarket that has a produce section much more akin to a farmers market than the vegetables and fruits being relegated to the lackluster outer edges of your everyday super chain. I was excited to find some fresh shellbeans and oyster mushrooms – the perfect additions to Coq Au Riesling – a lovely chicken stew.
I must admit – I hadn’t actually tried this recipe before serving it to guests – but I trust Nigella, and indeed it turned out lovely. It’s definitely one I’ll keep on hand!
Coq Au Riesling
adapted from the lovely Nigella
serves about 4, with a smidge of leftover
Ingredients
a few tablespoons olive oil
2 cloves garlic, smushed
a leek, chopped (or an onion)
1/2 cup chopped bacon
8 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
5 ounces (or more) oyster mushrooms
1 cup fresh shellbeans (I used cranberry)
3 Turkish Bay Leaves
1 entire bottle Riesling
– Cream (heavy or half and half) – optional, but tasty
– a few tablespoons chopped fresh dill
– Papardelle Egg Noodles (to serve)
Method
1. Heat the oil in a large french oven or soup pot, and fry the bacon until slightly crisp. Add the smushed garlic and chopped leek for a minute or so.
2. Cut the chicken thighs into two or three pieces, and dump them into the pan with the bay leaves, torn up oyster mushrooms, and fresh shellbeans. Pour in the entire bottle of Riesling (unless you want to reserve a half cup or so for the chef….)
3. Season with salt and pepper, and bring to a boil, cover the pan, and turn down the heat to simmer gently for about 45 minutes – or until the shellbeans are cooked through and soft. If you’d like, finish with a quarter cup or so of cream for the last few minutes.
4. Serve over the Papardelle egg noodles, and be sure to sprinkle with fresh dill. It’s delicious.
Note: This tastes really good right when you make it, but even better the next day!
by Sam Tackeff | Jun 22, 2009 | Pantry Staples, Soups
I went to the gym today.
I’ve been trying to drag myself in there for weeks.
I strolled in and screamed I NEED INCENTIVE! And so I got a free personal training session on the weight circuit and gave every muscle a moment to shine. It doesn’t hurt to have a cute trainer to get you really sweating. Huzzah! I’m feeling great that I’ve finally done it, and as I walked out of there, a woman walked briskly across the room and told me I had beautiful hair (and that was post gym hair!). I’m still beaming!
When I got back to the house, I was determined to continue my positive streak, so I put together this soup in about five minutes from some leftovers of Jamie Oliver’s Sticky carrots* that I had sitting in my fridge. You could just as easily boil some carrots with a little salt, pepper, and garlic, and make the soup in about 20 minutes from start to finish.
Quick Carrot Soup: In a blender, put a few cups of leftover cooked carrots (mine had salt and pepper already on them, but if yours don’t just add some), a half cup of plain yogurt, a half teaspoon of cumin, and a half teaspoon of turmeric, and a dash of water (or chicken stock if you have it), and blend until smooth. Top with some snips of dill.
Serve with garlic toast: just lightly coat a few pieces of day old bread with some good olive oil, put under the broiler or in the toaster for a couple of minutes, and then just lightly sweep a clove of garlic over the warm toast.
*Jamie’s Sticky Carrots: Cut a couple of pounds of carrots into two inch lengths, and stick them straight up in a small saucepan fitting them together snugly. Add a couple of Turkish bay leaves, salt and pepper, and a small nob of butter (a tablespoon or two) on top. (I add in a few cloves of garlic here, although his recipe doesn’t have them). Add enough water so that the carrots are halfway submerged, and bring to a boil. Simmer, covered, until carrots are cooked, about twenty minutes, and then just take off the lid and continue to cook until the water cooks down almost away, and the carrots get stick and lovely – about half an hour more. Jamie has you turn them out so they are all beautiful on the plate (taking care not to burn yourself), and serve.
