Seasoned greetings - Maple spiced pecans

I love pecans in most everything but pie. I know, I know. I am a heathen. Why ruin a good pecan by putting it in a gloopy mixture. I love the texture and the feel of a whole pecan half. TH swears by toasted pecan pieces mixed in with fudge sauce and coffee ice cream. I like them in chocolate chip cookies, but recently, I have been eating them candied - either by the handful or tossed in salads. They make a mighty fine hostess gift and work well with a fruit and cheese plate. They are also great candied, because they call for no unusual ingredients. You can play around with what you have lying around and they will still taste delicious.

The original recipe comes from a book we bought in 1991 and whose cover has faded to a pale pink. I believe the title is "Foods from the Sun" and right now the author escapes me. All I know is that she was an editor at Southern Living and everything I have made from the book is wonderful. I'll edit this when I can get to my copy.

This is the last recipe in the book and honestly, one of the best.

Maple Glazed Pecans - adapted from "Foods of the sun" - date unknown

yields one pound

1 lb pecan halves

1/2 cup maple syrup (I used grade B -dark amber)

1 1/2 T half and half

1 1/2 T Grand Marnier

1/4 t sea salt

1/4 t cayenne pepper (I used piment d'esplette because I had it around)

1/4 t cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 F. Place pecans in a jelly roll pan and bake for 12 minutes or until the start to look toasted. Remove from oven. In a large skillet combine maple syrup, half and half and grand marnier and bring to a boil. Allow to boil for 2 minutes. Add salt, cayenne pepper, cinnamon and pecans and stir well to coat all pecan pieces.

Cut a piece of parchment paper to fit the size of your jelly roll pan. Pour pecans and syrup onto jelly roll pan and bake for an additional 8-10 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool. You may have to break up the pecan pieces.

Store in an airtight container.

Notes:

If you make these often, you might find the syrup too goopy, sometimes I drain the syrup before I put the pecans back on the jelly roll pan for the second baking.

If you like more heat or more cinnamon, by all means, up the amounts to 1/2 t.

I like to put them in an acetate bag and give away as hostess gifts. My friend Anne uses jam jars for her candied almonds. They are always appreciated by recipients.

Homemade Marshmallows - easy peasy and fun to do

Wow, where has the month gone?

Mine has been spent in a frenzy of whipping eggs whites, conference calls, chasing tails, decorating pink hippos and keeping us all amused while house bound through band after band of storms drenching Seattle. The dog is not very happy and neither are my hostas.
 
There are now 10 days until Christmas and seven until Solstice.  I cannot wait until Solstice- the
days slowly get lighter and it feels like even for the gloomiest Gus, things are going to get better
from there on. Soon we can leave our offices in the evening dusk and by March, we're able to do all
our dog walks in the light. We won't feel so housebound. I long for that. In order to keep myself busy in the evenings, I have been making marshmallows and foisting them upon friends, colleagues and neighbors. 

They are so simple to make and taste nothing like the overly sweet  uniform cylinders you have leftover from your July attempt at making s'mores or the stuff you used to get in your bowl of lucky charms. These are a rustic concoction that take only about 25 minutes to make and can be flavored with many different extracts or liqueurs to appeal to any taste.

If you have kids you are trying to amuse during the holidays, this might keep them occupied for part
of the afternoon.  Mostly helping you measure, watching the marshmallows form as the gelatin and the
sugar syrup combine and then helping you cut and coat the final product. 

Then you can all relax with a cup of hot cocoa topped with one of these beauties.

Basic Marshmallows with a few variations (adapted from Martha Stewart)
Makes approximately 36 marshmallows


Equipment:
stand mixer with a whisk attachment
spatula
9" x 9" square pan
or 13" x 9" pan
saran wrap
heavy bottomed 1 qt pan
wooden spoon


Base Ingredients
3 packages knox or equivalent in powdered gelatin
1/2 t flaked sea salt
1/2 cup cold water
2 cups sugar
2/3 cup corn syrup (I used karo)
1/4 cup water
1/2 cup potato flour
1/2 cup confectioner's sugar

Flavorings - use on of the following, or experiment

Vanilla
2 t vanilla extract

Mint
1/2 t peppermint extract
1 drop electric pink or green gel food coloring (optional)

Orange
1/4 t orange extract
1 drop electric orange gel food coloring (optional)

Lemon
1/4 t lemon extract
1 drop yellow gel food coloring (optional)

Framboise
1 T framboise liqueur

Chocolate-Cointreau

3 T cocoa
3 t cointreau

Directions:

Cut saran wrap to cover the bottom, sides and give you over hang on your pans, this may vary depending on your pan size.  Make sure all sides of the pan are covered with saran wrap. Spray generously with spray oil. I suggest doing this in the sink, the stuff goes everywhere and is slippery.

Pour gelatin into bowl of stand mixer, sprinkle 1/2 cup of water on gelatin, let sit for 10 minutes.
While gelatin is sitting, combine sugar, corn syrup and water into a heavy bottomed pan and stir over
medium heat until all ingredients dissolve. When dissolved, increase heat to medium high and let
mixture come to a vigorous boil for 2 minutes making sure to brush down sugar crystals from the sides
of the pan back into the mixture.
Remove from heat.

With whisk attachment running at medium speed, add salt to gelatin. Carefully pour hot syrup mixture
into bowl of stand mixer taking care to try and have the mixture run down the side of the bowl.  This
decreases the chance of it splattering hot syrup on you. Increase the speed to high and whisk for five
minutes, at this time, you can add the gel food coloring to your marshmallows.  Fear not. The color may
seem intense at first, but as the volume of marshmallows increases, the color will dissapate and
mellow.

At 10 minutes, add flavoring or in the case of the chocolate/cointreau add both cocoa and cointreau now.
At 14 minutes, turn off mixture and working quickly with a cooking oil coated spatula or hands (I use a spatula), remove the marshmallow mixure from the bowl and place into prepped pan, smooth out with spatula which you may need to coat again. It is not going to be completely smooth, they are homemade.  Spray the sides of the saran wrap overhang if you haven't already and cover the top of the marshmallows so they are completely covered.

Let them sit to cure for approximately 6 hours.  I like to do let them sit overnight.
When they are ready to cut, mix potato flour and confectioner's sugar together and place in a flat
rimmed cookie sheet or jelly roll pan. A pie plate will work too. Sprinkle a generous amount of the coating mixture onto your work area.Unwrap marshmallows and depending on the size of your pan, you will cut or use cookie cutters to cut out the marshmallows.  Coat knife in spray oil, cut marshmallows into approximately 1" squares and toss in coating mixture.  For marshmallows formed in a larger pan, you have the option to cut into squares (you will have many more) or use a sprayed cookie cutter and cut out shapes. Depending on your pan volume, you should yield 36-40 marshmallows.

Place coated marshmallows into a air tight container and use within a week. If you have friends like
mine, they should last approximately one day.

Package in acetate bags and tie top with ribbon. If you want to be really nice, add a small whisk and
a tin of sipping chocolate with your favorite recipe.





nibbits

Alice Medrich in Seattle results in the best cookie exchange ever

Vanilla Poached Quinces

Let’s talk about quinces shall we?  They are horribly in fashion, showing up on farmer’s market tables and in the best of food blogs.  Before the quince became popular you might see a shriveled one or two at the grocery store near the plantains and star fruit, waiting for someone to take them home and love them.  Quinces are used in the United States for sweet dishes – jellies, conserves, and pastes.  In Persian cooking, they are served in savory stews and sometimes used as a confection.  No matter how you use them, they have to be cooked before eating, they are astringent and harsh.  When I cut into them, their texture reminds me of spongy wood.  With such descriptions, I can see why you might be turned off. Please don’t, with a little peeling, cutting, water, sugar and time on the stove,  the quince is transformed into a lovely rosy fruit that will make you forget all your misgivings about it.

So far this year, I have gone through two of my three basic quince season phases.  Elation and joy at the first quinces of the season leading to the making of quince jam and paste,  the offering of the quince to my mom for the savory stew and now, the realization that one quince goes a long way when you have been eating them for a while.

This year, instead of canning a lot of quince jam, I decided to just poach my first batch of quinces to have with my morning bowl of yoghurt.   Light sugar syrup and a few quinces poached with vanilla and a little lemon can make any morning seem a little brighter.  The recipe I typically use comes from Alice Waters’ Chez Panisse Fruit, a great compendium of seasonal fruit recipes that I suggest you pick up and peruse when you have the chance. 

Vanilla Poached Quince (adapted from Alice Waters, Chez Panisse Fruit, Harper Collins, 2002)

Makes 2 pts of poached quinces

Cooking time – ca. 1.5 hours, mostly unattended

Ingredients:

2 cups sugar

6 cups water

2 lbs quinces, ca. 4 large                                                                                                                              

½ vanilla bean

1 lemon  

Combine sugar and water in a 4 quart heavy pot.  Bring to a boil, stir to dissolve sugar, when dissolved, reduce heat to a simmer.  Peel, quarter and remove seeds from quinces, making sure to cut out any bruised or blemished areas.  At this point, you can reserve skin, seeds and leftover bits for other uses. * Slice quarters into ¼” slices.  Add quince slices to the syrup.  Slit vanilla bean in half lengthwise and scrape out seeds and add to syrup.  Wash lemon.  Slice lemon thinly, into approximately 1/8” slices and add to syrup mixture.  Make sure quince slices are submerged in simmering syrup.  Waters suggests cutting a parchment round the size of the pot diameter, layer over the fruit and syrup and weigh the parchment down with a plate, the alternative is to stand by stove and use a spoon to keep fruit submerged, you decide.

The quince slices should be tender in about 45 minutes.   Remove from heat.  If you like heavier syrup, remove slices from syrup, set aside.  Bring syrup mixture back to a boil and boil for another 10-15 minutes to thicken up the syrup.  Remove from heat and when back to room temperature add back the quince slices and the lemon.   The lemon should be transparent and candied at this point and very delicious with the quince.

The syrup and quinces can be stored in the fridge for approximately two weeks, if they last that long. I like to add them to my yoghurt and top the mixture with a teaspoon or two of roasted pecan bits.  I have also served them aside a ginger pound cake or topping a  French yogurt cake.

There you have it, elation, offerings and realization all in one bowl.

*  The skin and seeds of quinces are full of pectin, Christine Ferber, the famous French Jam maker uses quince juice extracted from these discarded bits as the foundation of some of her jellies.  For more information, refer to her instructions in her book, Mes Confitures: The Jams and Jellies of Christine Ferber.



Bowls of full of memories - pear-ginger granola

My short term memory seems to be going, or I should say, there is so much going on it is easy to lose the little things in the all the stuff flying around the interwebs and our lives.  I can tell you my long term memory is great, just ask TH. I am famous for bringing up things in an argument that happened 15 years earlier. Its a gift I picked up from my father, just ask my mother.

I can also remember the provenance of each bowl in our kitchen.  Bowls are my weakness - cafe au lait bowls, hand thrown bowls, and old stoneware bowls, some found locally, some brought back from various trips around the world. In my opinion, most every meal, save a good steak can be eaten in a bowl. Desert island dwellers take heed, a spork and a bowl will save your life, although a coconut will do in a pinch.

Okay, enough with the bowl lust, let's talk about filling that bowl.

A few weeks ago, I had the great honor of meeting Melissa Clark at a book reading.  I have read many of her columns, but hadn't really familiarized myself with cookbooks. Her new cookbook, In the Kitchen with a Good Appetite: 150 Recipes and Stories about the Food You Love , has both great recipes, but even better stories behind each recipe.  One recipe that I have been making over and over again is her olive oil granola recipe. Like all good cooks and scientists, I first made the recipe by the book, and then started to modify it to my tastes.

Dang, this stuff is good and so far, everyone else who has sampled it has agreed.

The olive oil is an interesting twist on the neutral flavored oils used in most granola. I was my usual skeptical self.  I was worried about the taste overpowering the rest of the ingredients, but when paired with maple syrup, it works. I used a few different types of oils and settled on the Trader Joes Extra Virgin Olive Oil which has a nice flavor and a little lighter in color. The recipe also calls for 1 teaspoon of salt, do not skip this, you need it as a foil for the sugar and maple syrup. I used Secret Stash Salts' flavored salts, but if you can't get ahold of this wonder ingredient, please use a flaky sea salt. Unlike most granolas, this recipe does not make a chalky granola nor an oily one, it is perfect granola for munching out of hand or as a topping for greek yoghurt or for crisp. Melissa suggests serving it with fresh ricotta and fresh berries. I also tried a combination of fruits and nuts, using basically what I had lying around in the pantry. It is a great granola to use up odds and bobs in your pantry.

Pear-Ginger Granola (adapted from Melissa Clark's Olive Oil Granola Recipe from the book -  In the Kitchen with a Good Appetite: 150 Recipes and Stories about the food you love (Hyperion, 2010)

makes ca. 7.5 cups of granola, which depending on your family could last nearly one day or a week, give or take

Approximate time to make recipe from start to finish ca. 55 minutes, active time 15 minutes

3 cups thick cut oatmeal (I used Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free oats), but regular cut (not quick cook) oatmeal should be fine

1 cup unsweetened flaked coconut

1 cup pumpkin seeds, hulled

1 1/2 cups sliced almonds, raw

1/2 t ground cardamon

1/2 t ground cinnamon

1/2 t ground ginger

1 t flaked sea salt, I used Secret Stash Salt almond cardamon salt or vanilla salt, depending on what I had lying around

3/4 cup maple syrup, I used grade B, dark maple syrup

1/2 cup olive oil, extra virgin, but not too dark

1/3 cup light brown sugar, packed

1/2 cup uncrystallized candied ginger, cut into a small dice

3/4 cup dried pears, cut into a small dice

Directions:
Preheat oven to 250 Degrees F.

Take a large piece of parchment paper and cut it to fit an 11 x17 inch jelly roll pan  with about an inch of overhang on the sides.

In a large bowl, measure out oatmeal, coconut, pumpkin seeds, almonds, and brown sugar and mix well. In another bowl, mix together cardamon, cinnamon, ginger and salt until combined. Add spice mixture to large bowl of ingredients and mix to combine.  Mix together the maple syrup, oil and brown sugar and stir until dissolved. Add this to the oatmeal/spice bowl and using a large spoon or your hands and make sure the oatmeal,coconuts and seeds and nuts are coated with the syrup/oil mixture.

Place granola mixture onto jelly roll pan and place in oven to bake, stirring every ten minutes until the granola has taken on a lightly browned color and some of the syrup has cooked off, this should be approximately 35 minutes at 250 degree oven.

Remove from oven, and let cool in tray.

When cool, mix in chopped fruit.

Store in an air tight container.