NOTE: I am a fan of 30-day challenges, and November is traditionally a time of two: National Novel Writing Month, and 30 Days of Thanks. As I am not a fiction writer, this year I have chosen to publish a daily blog for the entire month, expressing my gratitude. This may not be entirely food-focused, but expect recipes aplenty. Feel free to join me in the comments below. What are you thankful for today?
These are a few of my favorite things.
There is pretty much nothing better than hot, fresh-baked goods on a cold Sunday morning, and today is no exception.
This day I am grateful for easy, always successful, super adaptable scones. This morning I made cherry ginger almond and ate two as soon as I pulled the pan from the oven.
This can be done easily in a food processor, but I like to make these by hand.
Preheat oven to 400 degrees (375 on convection).
In a large bowl, combine the dry ingredients and whisk to combine.
In a smaller bowl. combine egg and yogurt and whisk to thoroughly incorporate egg with yogurt. Set aside.
Grate the full stick of butter into the dry ingredients and use your fingertips to crumble flour into butter. It should resemble cornmeal.
Stir in add-ins, then add wet ingredients to dry and stir until clumps begin to form. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until all of the crumbly bits are incorporated.
Shape into an 8″ disk then use a bench scraper or sharp knife to cut into 8 scones. Sprinkle each scone with turbinado sugar, then place on a baking pan lined with parchment paper.
Bake for 15 to 18 minutes until scones are golden brown. For a traditional scone, let them cool completely before eating, but I bet you don’t make it that long.
You can add pretty much anything you want to these: chocolate chips and walnuts, other dried fruits, coconut, different spices. I think cooked and crumbled bacon would pretty much through these over the top, specifically with the same dried cherries and maybe a little maple glaze.
NOTE: I am a fan of 30-day challenges, and November is traditionally a time of two: National Novel Writing Month, and 30 Days of Thanks. As I am not a fiction writer, this year I have chosen to publish a daily blog for the entire month, expressing my gratitude. This may not be entirely food-focused, but expect recipes aplenty. Feel free to join me in the comments below. What are you thankful for today?
#Yum
’tis the season.
Not for Christmas or good cheer or any of that, although I did make the mistake of going into some fine retail establishments today and was assaulted by a plethora of holiday-themed crap from China that no one really needs and will all end up in a dumpster at the end of the year.
’tis deer hunting season, and although I am not a deer hunter myself, I am a fan of venison in its many forms.
Last weekend, Khristian and I were invited to dinner at a friend’s house. This friend happens to be Graham, the brother of Peter, Khristian’s collaborative partner, and the husband of Brooke, a woman who was in my 200-hour yoga teacher training cohort.
#Smalltimore
A couple hours before we went, Khristian informed me that Graham was serving venison pot pie with a spelt crust for me, a gluten-free person.
Except spelt isn’t gluten-free.
I am not gluten-free because I have celiac. I am gluten-free because I feel better.
Not that it’s really anyone’s business, but it seems necessary to clarify because I had already planned on “eating around the gluten,” which is what I normally do when I go to dinner at a new person’s house.
So imagine my surprise when we got to Graham and Brooke’s and found that not only had Graham switched to a gluten-free flour for the crust because of the gluten/no gluten spelt debate but they had also bought gluten-free crackers for hors d’oeuvres and made a separate gluten-free pear crumble.
Today I am grateful for people who go out of their way to make a person feel welcome.
I have struggled my whole life with a feeling of unworthiness, and people who go out of their way (and I am lucky to have more than a few of them in my life) help that feeling fade away. To be so accommodated at someone’s house in a totally unexpected way was lovely and refreshing and certainly needed these past few weeks.
NOTE: I am a fan of 30-day challenges, and November is traditionally a time of two: National Novel Writing Month, and 30 Days of Thanks. As I am not a fiction writer, this year I have chosen to publish a daily blog for the entire month, expressing my gratitude. This may not be entirely food-focused, but expect recipes aplenty. Feel free to join me in the comments below. What are you thankful for today?
I have been craving cake for two weeks.
If I was not gluten-free, this would be easy enough.
Gluten-filled cake is like pizza or sex: even when it’s not the best, it’s still pretty good. A cake craving can be easily handled with a quick Suzy-Q from the 7-11 or something from the bakery at Giant. They even hand that shit out for free sometimes, so I could have technically just gotten a couple of samples and have been done with it.
Gluten-free cake, on the other hand, can be a total waste of money and the time it takes to go buy it. Some are gritty, some taste heavily of the bean flours with which they are made, and some forgo things like sugar and butter and try to be healthy.
I am too lazy to go try to acquire a cake that tastes terrible, and I just didn’t feel like baking a cake that feeds 14 for just little old me.
Today, I am grateful that I made a cake.
This cake.
Imma eat the shit out of this cake.
It’s a little bulgy in the middle (like I will be after eating it ALL GONE) because the frosting is a marshmallow creation that isn’t always up to, well, holding up a cake.
No matter. It does the job as long as it needs to, which isn’t very long because I may be sending this out to those lucky folks who ordered food this week. #Surprise
I used the white cake recipe from the piecaken experiment last year, subbing coconut milk for regular milk, and I covered the whole damn thing with coconut.
NOTE: I am a fan of 30-day challenges, and November is traditionally a time of two: National Novel Writing Month, and 30 Days of Thanks. As I am not a fiction writer, this year I have chosen to publish a daily blog for the entire month, expressing my gratitude. This may not be entirely food-focused, but expect recipes aplenty. Feel free to join me in the comments below. What are you thankful for today?
Day one in a new America, but day ten in the (now very challenging) gratitude challenge.
Yesterday was a roller coaster of emotion for me. I spent most of the morning in bed, crying when I thought about how I was supposed to teach yoga to children later that day.
I watched HRC’s concession speech and saw a more presidential non-president elect than I think I have ever seen. I half expected her to say, “You know what? Fuck you. I have given my entire life in service to this country, and you went with someone who has given his entire life in service to gaining wealth for himself.”
But she did not. As always, she was graceful, intelligent, and passionate.
So here we are, day ten of gratitude, and today, I am grateful for soup.
Soul medicine.
Not just any soup.
Soul-warming noodle soup from Mi & Yu Noodle Bar in Federal Hill (also now in Mt. Vernon but parking sucks there).
After teaching yoga I stopped off and picked up some soup on the way home – kimchi broth with tofu and pho for me, and vegetarian broth with tofu and ramen for Khristian.
I drove home in the dark and the rain and found Khristian in the kitchen, sipping bourbon and reading.
I took off my jacket and boots while Khristian unpacked our goodies. We sat down together in the dim light of the kitchen and consoled ourselves with spicy, aromatic, and deeply nourishing bowls of soup.
Exactly what was needed.
I have a recipe for pho, an amazing recipe that is full-on plagiarized from somewhere.
I repeat: this is not my recipe.
I repeat that because I recently saw someone try to pass this recipe off as their own on The Kitchn, word for word. Plagiarizing recipes is a big fat no-no, and I called them on it.
The problem here is that all I have of this recipe is a stained piece of paper with the ingredients and the method – no attribution. So I point out it’s not mine but cannot give full credit, which is distressing but sometimes that’s the way things happen. You cut out a recipe or jot down ingredients, not realizing that it will be life-changing and you’ll want to share it later.
If you are not lucky enough to live near Mi & Yu or some similar place, make this when you need comfort. The broth freezes beautifully, so you can even make it on a bright, sunny day and just save it for when the clouds roll in.
Pho
Born in Vietnam in the 1880s, pho is little more than beef broth with thinly sliced vegetables and meat cooked directly in the piping hot broth, served with fresh herbs and lime. I have very little experience with cooking Asian food in general and with pho specifically. I am sure there are a million variations on this very delicious theme.
But I don’t profess to be a connoisseur. I have not made a career of seeking out the best pho, and I have never been to Vietnam. I don’t trust street food, where, it’s rumored, some of the best bowls are to be found, and I didn’t even know how to properly pronounce the word until my friend Kerry’s husband Mark looked at me askance and said with a bit of an air, “You mean, FUH?”
But I will say that this is the best pho-king pho I have ever had. It takes work. Multiple days. It costs a lot of money, way more than a bowl of something just as good at a pho shop would taste. But at the end of it all, you get to sit down with a bunch of friends around bowls filled with fresh, brightly colored vegetables and meat and share something utterly delicious and satisfying.
Broth Ingredients
Note: Make this the day ahead. When ready to serve, heat to nearly boiling and refresh with sliced fresh ginger. This broth can also be frozen.
5 pounds beef bones with marrow (oxtails can also be used)
2 pounds beef chuck, or other similar, flavorful cut of stewing or roasting beef
2-3” pieces of ginger, bruised with a knife and charred (see technique below)
2 medium yellow onions, peeled and charred (see technique below)
¼ cup fish sauce (don’t skimp)
3 tablespoons light brown sugar
Toasted spices: 10 whole star anise, 6 whole cloves
1 tablespoon salt (not iodized; sea salt, preferably)
Broth Method
Charring technique: Bruising the ginger by pounding it with the flat of a chef’s knife before charring helps release more juice and flavor. For both ginger and onion, use tongs and hold over a flame until the sides are burnt and smoking. Both ginger and onions will become fragrant in about three or four minutes. Peel skin and discard before using.
For the spices: toast star anise and cloves in a dry sauté pan over medium heat until fragrant. Cool slightly and wrap in cheesecloth. Set aside.
For those with electric or convection cooktops, ginger and onions can be placed directly on the burner for the same effect. A crème bruleé torch can also be used.
Assemble two stockpots, one large and one medium. In the large stockpot, bring six quarts of water to a boil.
Place the beef bones and chuck in the medium stockpot and cover with water. Bring to a rolling boil and boil for five minutes. This first step removes impurities from the beef and helps you create a clear broth.
Remove the bones and beef with tongs and place in the large stockpot, discarding water from medium stockpot.
When the water returns to a boil, simmer for about 20 minutes, skimming fat and foam that rises to the top. Add charred ginger, charred onion, fish sauce, and sugar, then simmer for about 40 minutes until beef is tender (continue to skim the surface periodically). Remove beef, cutting it in half. Place half back in the pot, and the other half in a bowl of cold water for ten minutes. After ten minutes, remove from water and cut into thin slices (set aside for serving).
After about 90 minutes of simmering, add spice bag and allow to simmer and infuse the broth for about 30 minutes. Remove spice bag and onions, discarding both, then continue to simmer, skimming constantly. Add salt and cook for a total of at least two hours (the longer the better).
Remove bones and beef and discard. Strain broth through cheesecloth. At this point, the broth can be cooled and kept for later serving. It can also be frozen.
Garnishes
One package rice sticks, prepared according to package directions
Raw beef sirloin, frozen and then thinly sliced across the grain
Yellow onion, thinly sliced
Scallions, green part only, sliced into rings
Bean sprouts
Lime wedges
Asian basil (or regular basil if Asian basil is not available)
Chopped cilantro
Assembly
Bring broth back to a rolling boil. If you have cooled it completely or frozen the broth, refresh with two or three pieces of fresh ginger.
Warm soup bowls with boiling water.
Assemble all of your garnishes. If you are having friends over, place all garnishes out and allow them to add what they like.
General guidelines for assembly combine cooked beef with raw ingredients that get cooked with the hot broth. Start with prepared noodles in the bottom of the bowl. Add a few pieces of cooked beef chuck and a few slices of raw sirloin. Ladle boiling soup on top of noodles and serve with large bowls of fresh onion, scallions, and herbs. Make slurping sounds and be prepared for not much talking.
NOTE: I am a fan of 30-day challenges, and November is traditionally a time of two: National Novel Writing Month, and 30 Days of Thanks. As I am not a fiction writer, this year I have chosen to publish a daily blog for the entire month, expressing my gratitude. This may not be entirely food-focused, but expect recipes aplenty. Feel free to join me in the comments below. What are you thankful for today?
Even though I voted early, I found this sticker a couple of days ago and will be wearing it proudly today. #VOTE
I have voted for president in three states in my lifetime: Maryland, Washington, and Georgia.
I vote in primaries.
I vote in mid-term elections.
I donate money on occasion to candidates.
Today, I am grateful that this shitshow of an election is over. #Gratitude
This blog is posting in the morning, so I don’t know how grateful I will be for the result of the election tomorrow, but if things proceed as they should, all campaigning and mudslinging and incivility will be over, at least until the next election.
(okay, that’s a bit naive, but allow me that indulgence for just this one moment)
Every presidential election since I can remember I have stayed up late, watching the election returns on TV. Even when I was a little kid we would huddle around the black and white TV, watching the percentages change. The first election I can actually remember is Jimmy Carter’s.
Ten days ago, in preparation for the ritual election returns watching, I baked an election cake. Election cakes date back to before the Revolutionary War when they were prepared for hundreds of people using nuts, dried fruit, wine, and whiskey.
A cake for many, many voters.
Bakeries across the country are reviving the election cake tradition using the hashtag #MakeAmericaCakeAgain. When three people tagged me on an election cake post, I figured I would give it a shot.
Trouble is, I am no fan of yeast as it can be problematic in gluten-free baking, and traditional election cakes use yeast for their raising agent. Election cakes use yeast to create a live sponge, into which fruit, nuts, and additional flour are added.
In all other aspects, though, this shit is just a boozy fruitcake, which I happen to have on lock.
I made this cake ten days ago because it just gets better (and boozier) with age. It’s also very, very forgiving, so if you don’t have the particular dried fruits on hand you can make do with what you have. Just keep the total amount the same and you should be just fine.
Suzannah’s Modern-Day Election Cake
Ingredients
1 cup golden raisins (or regular)
1 cup currants
2 cups of any combination of the following: dried cherries, blueberries, cranberries, chopped apricots
Zest of one orange
Zest of one lemon
1/4 cup crystallized ginger, chopped
1 cup rum, bourbon, or brandy
1 cup sugar
10 tablespoons butter
1 cup apple cider
Teaspoon of each of the following: clove, ginger, cinnamon, allspice
Brandy for basting (I used Laird’s Applejack because it’s what I had)
Method
THE NIGHT BEFORE: Combine dried fruits, citrus zest, chopped ginger, and booze in a glass container. Mix thoroughly and place overnight in the ‘fridge. This can be in the ‘fridge for two (or more) days, so if you get distracted, no problem.
It’s also delicious straight off the spoon, but that can be dangerous.
When you are ready to bake, place dried fruit, sugar, apple cider, and spices in a non-reactive saucepan. Bring to a boil, stirring often, then turn heat down and simmer for ten minutes. Remove from heat and let cool to room temperature.
Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
Sift together flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.
Add to cooled fruit mixture and mix thoroughly. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well to incorporate each egg. Add chopped pecans.
Grease three disposable loaf pans (you are going to want to share these. Maybe). Divide batter evenly between the tins and bake for one hour. Test for doneness by inserting a paring knife. The knife should come out completely clean. If crumbs are sticking to the knife, bake for another five minutes and test again.
When the election (cake) is (finally) finished (over), remove from oven and baste liberally (yuk, yuk) with brandy. Cool completely in tin before turning out.
You are welcome at this point to try your cake. It will be spicy and fruity and nutty and delicious.
But this cake gets even better with age.
Wrap it tightly in plastic, store on the counter, and baste with brandy every couple days. In two weeks you will be eating a little slice of heaven, like we will be eating on election night.
I have heard that this cake last for a month or more. I may make it again on Thanksgiving and take it to Christmas to see how it goes. The booze and the sugar act as preservatives.
