Monthly Archives: August 2009

Bee in the Bonnet

Posted on August 17, 2009 | Leave a comment

Last weekend at the market, I saw some lovely chanterelle mushrooms and have been thinking about them ever since. How to lovingly brush the dirt off them with a pastry brush, saute them in butter and add them to a risotto. Being sick has taken its toll so I didn’t make it back today but plan to troll the markets this week and have cash on hand for these beauties. Last weekend we’d about run out of cash and carry capabilities so put this purchase off for a week. Hope there are some more next time.

I was first introduced to chanterelle mushrooms in northern California, at Cafe Beaujolais, where the organic growers and harvesters of wild things (fish, mushrooms) would come by every few days. Last week they even had hen-in-the-woods which I’ve never before seen in person but I never have $30 on me especially after the kids across the way hijacked me for $1.50 for two dixie cups of lemonade. Next time, let’s hope. Dee

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Gordon is Right!

Posted on August 16, 2009 | 1 Comment

I’ve been sick much of this past week and didn’t even get out of the house for two days. So I was able to watch a bit of food television, but missed Top Chef Masters semi-final and will have to catch it on Wednesday, hopefully, before the finale.

Kitchen Nightmares was my fodder. Can Chef Ramsay be insufferable, crude and arrogant much of the time? Yes. Is his restaurant expertise spot-on much of the time? Yes. Plus we did stay in Scotland for several months and I miss hearing the accent: he was set to join the Rangers in Glasgow, where we lived. I also miss bagpipers in the streets, so if anyone can send one to Utah, please do. I miss the daily sounds off George Square.

So I saw a few episodes and it appears that Rule #1 is: Don’t Piss Off The Locals. Now I know what’s wrong.

We came here late March and found a local eatery with great pizza, ambiance and the owners and our regular waitress were fantastic. When our favorite waitress was on, we’d each get a hug, and she even offered to take me to find an acoustic guitar from the same place she bought hers, a funky place near the University. Summer came. I came in alone one evening because I didn’t feel like cooking for one and Jim was at a software user group meeting downtown. It was crowded, but the owner blew past me with no recognition. The “hostess” stared at her fingernails for five minutes before the people in front of me said they weren’t in line but waiting for a pick-up. I asked for a table. She told me if I could find a place at the bar I could sit there if I wanted to. I walked out, found a place five minutes away and was treated well and had a lovely dinner.

To add insult to injury, I wrote a glowing review of the first restaurant on TripAdvisor. And a month later, we ordered pizza for delivery and it’s a five minute WALK away. They said it would be here in 40 minutes. Ninety minutes later it arrived, stone cold. I called to complain and they took it off my card.

Eight months of the year these restaurants need the locals desperately. Ski season, July and August the tourists come in and they conveniently forget who we are. There is a message to be sent, and that’s Don’t Piss Off The Locals! Find a place for us, if you can, and we’ll remember you fondly. If you can’t, try, and tell us you couldn’t do it and offer for us to share a free dessert next time. We’ll be back. We were going there twice a week!

It’s time to write a review of the second restaurant I walked to that night, where we ate lunch today. ‘Nuff said. Goodnight now, Dee

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Gearing Up

Posted on August 16, 2009 | 1 Comment

Looks like visitor season is about to start, and it isn’t even snowing yet. Jim’s contract is up in a few weeks and we’ve a couple important guests coming in over the next couple of weeks. Much is going on in our lives, as can be imagined.

While we drove 1,500 miles here with two teams of horses (horsepower) and two wagons (cars) stuffed to the gills, there’s no way we’d be able to leave that way. Promising ourselves not to purchase anything other than food, we slipped up a bit on that one. A few books, a guitar, larger bucket for dog food. If we’re migrating to another city next month, we’d rather sell the older car, pack the dog and our clothing in the newer one and send everything else on a truck. As it is, 98% of our stuff is in storage.

Jim’s parents are coming for a little over a week. Last time we toured we took ten days and saw New York State, Vermont and a bit of Ontario. Now those are some of my old stomping grounds, and the first trip of any kind with the in-laws so I wanted them to decide where to go and what to see. Then, because we had set start and end points for the flight home, when we chose an itinerary we had to find hotel rooms for the night so there was Jim on his cell phone trying to get online and book rooms.

This’ll be different because they’ll have a base to call home and can stay in the area to sight-see, take the free bus into town, or rent a car for a couple of days and drive to Moab or Yellowstone for a couple of days if they get bored here. Jim will be working all but the long weekend so I’ll take them around for a couple of days and then they’re on their own!

One of my most favorite things to do to prepare for guests is plan the menu. It’ll be easy to have breakfasts in the frig from our delivery service, which is where I get applewood smoked bacon, orange and apple juice, eggs and milk. Plus, I’d like to have a couple of things ready to just toss into the oven if we’ve a long day sightseeing. Of course it all depends upon the weather, which turned cool enough this weekend that we have the heat on at night (not great for the nasty flu I have, plus at 28% humidity for my new guitar) and Jim re-lit the pilot on the gas fireplace and we used it for a few moments to take off the chill Saturday morning.

If it’s very warm, I’d like to prepare a cold dinner beforehand (tuna salad, hard-boiled eggs, fresh tomatoes, cheese, ham, artisan bread…) but if it’s cold I’ll make a stew or Jim’s least favorite dish, Moussaka. He hates eggplant.

I’m learning to like my new iPhone 3G. It’s a refurb but today I downloaded some free apps including Epicurious. Remember, I don’t have a single one of my cookbooks with me here (very disciplined, I know) so when I want ideas I check this out and now I have it on the phone, which I’ve yet to try. For breakfast I thought of Julia Child’s “Uncle Hans’ City Scrapple” which I made for my cousins once many years ago, but I don’t have the recipe. It’s from The Way To Cook. If anyone can tell me the ingredients, I’ll figure it out. I know it’s cornmeal (don’t know fine or coarse) and sausage and you bake it as a loaf, then weight it down in the frig overnight. Then you slice it and dredge it in cornmeal and fry it to golden perfection. I have the book, but it’s in storage 1,500 miles away and I’m sure the publisher won’t help me, even though I own Mastering I and II plus several others and recently purchased My Life In France. Email to dee@cookingwithdee.net if you can help out. I’ll serve it with eggs (short-order) and baked tomatoes with toasted panko and parmigiano reggiano. Perhaps a few Southern biscuits as well.

So my To Do list includes: Don’t succumb to pneumonia, and get over this nasty cold/flu; clean house; move office out of dining room (to where, exactly?); deal with several months of receipts; get carpets cleaned; plan menus; set up guest room and find storage space (again, where?); find a cheap solution for printer/paper that doesn’t involve using the box in which we moved Jim’s PSIII; make more lists; bathe the dog and get her nails trimmed; shop; and pick folks up at the airport.

Oh, and maintain sanity at all costs. It’s a tough job but someone has to do it! Hope you had a great weekend. Mine was not one I want to remember, just get over this darned bug. Jim’s still feeling its effects, going to sleep around nine every night, and he went back to work on Wednesday. I didn’t come down with it until Wednesday night. Cheers, Dee

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Posted in Editorial, Utah

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Farewell, Molly

Posted on August 16, 2009 | 2 Comments

Ms. Molly said goodbye to the world she’s had with Val and family for 32 years, today. The horse that was bought by Jim’s grandfather, who died many years ago. The trouble is, our cousin and vet and Zoe’s hip surgeon had to do it herself. I’ve helped several of my pets go to the beyond when they were unable to lead anything resembling a normal life, but this is too much to bear. I had to watch a vet, she is one.

Most people kick children out of the nest at 18 or 21. This horse was hers for 32 years. Val is a strong woman, as a vet she works on small and large animals all the time, but Molly was always there.

We thank Val the Vet and our same cousin for taking such good care of our Zoe, who has no hips but made her own. We wish Val and her family well overcoming this loss while we are assuaged by knowing that several of Molly’s offspring are moving up in endurance racing and there’s a “grandson” who also shows promise in that regard.

My husband won’t miss Molly much because when she was pregnant the first time and the foal started kicking, she thought it was Jim, and it wasn’t but she kicked him nonetheless. Every time he visited the farm she hated him. That’s his story. I still don’t think he’s glad that she’s gone. I will tell you in no uncertain terms that this horse is not going to dog meat. I hope she’ll be buried near Pork Chop. In memoriam, Dee

RIP Molly, Dee

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Posted in Editorial, Pet

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Food Delivery

Posted on August 14, 2009 | 1 Comment

has a whole new meaning. A few weeks ago I tried a delivery service for milk, apple and orange juices, organic fruits and vegetables and applewood smoked bacon. When we had guests I doubled some orders for the week, they got tacked on to my standing order. When I removed them, my entire standing order was removed and has not been the same since. When we have guests we’d like to add to our regular order for the week and then revert to the basic order.

Either I’m messing up, their website is messed up or they want to trap people into huge standing accounts they can’t possibly eat. I’d prefer the former.

That said, we had a delivery at the back door this morning, a dead mouse. The ermine/stoat got one and Zoe scared him through the window and he dropped it for a few moments. I didn’t want to clean it up off the deck so tried to get our dog off the window (totally closed) without success and he claimed and brought his kill somewhere on the property. At least it’s not where I can see it or have to clean it up.

I’ve been remiss for a couple of days because of a nasty flu. Sorry. This morning I opened the slider in our bedroom and heard the cranes at 6:12 this morning. They’re here, but hidden because the grasses are so high. I miss seeing these beautiful killers, whoops, creatures. It seems that everything we see is a carnivore out here.

I’m awaiting another kind of food delivery, had dinner planned from frig and freezer and countertop tomatoes but Jim wants Mexican so I’m going to try a plain quesadilla and see if my compromised constitution can take it. Enjoy your evening and whatever you do, don’t catch this crud from folks in the office! Cheers, Dee

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Posted in Editorial, Utah

Why Cooking?

Posted on August 12, 2009 | 1 Comment

As I read about Julia Child (My Life in France) it got me thinking about my lifelong interest in cooking and why I chose that particular pursuit. I may have an answer for me, as well as for you. I think it’s because it’s the first interest, besides reading, I came upon on my own.

My father wanted us to learn music and immersed me in violin lessons (his main instrument) a year before I or my peers were eligible to take lessons or be in the orchestra. Then came piano lessons. My mother wanted us not to walk like truck drivers (Julia Roberts is gorgeous but she does walk like one) so every Saturday we went to ballet, tap and toe lessons.

I’ve written my story for you before, at the age of seven I found Betty Crocker’s Boys and Girls Cookbook in the local library and held on to it dearly while it amassed a whopping $0.31 in late fees. When the librarian called my mother, the gig was up. A few weeks later I turned eight and a brand new book was my parent’s gift to celebrate the occasion. My sister and I held lavish parties for our brother’s birthdays, among them Kings and Queens with the castle cake, and Pirates with a treasure chest cake and a real live treasure hunt. Of course all the accoutrements were there as well. Cardboard crowns with gumdrops on each point, tagboard cones with a chiffon scarf trailing for the girls. And the pirates each had a black construction paper tri-cornered hat and tagboard “sword” covered in aluminum foil. Mom provided the treasure chest. I wonder to whom she left it? It was a tin treasure chest from the lebkuchen our uncle would send us every year from Zurich. She used it every year, along with other tins from other lebkuchen shipments, to store Christmas cookies: apple shortbreads; mincemeat tarts; Scandinavians; Snickerdoodles; and more. I hope my two sisters have the tins. They’re very special to all of us but these ladies are the bakers in the family.

So, for over forty years I’ve been cooking, learning about cooking, reading and collecting cookbooks. I quit work and spent my life savings on cooking school, only to find out that few restaurants are run with the same commitment and inspiration as one owned by Margaret Fox. Instead, minions are forced to enter through a basement, given a coat and pants of a 300 lb. man, and use canned ingredients. I could only take that for two days working nights while going on a series of interviews during the day and I tripped and broke my finger and was led to another profession while I healed. Under Margaret, I looked out windows facing the Pacific ocean, overlooking a garden of Swiss chard and other vegetables and herbs. Fishermen stopped by with freshly-caught salmon, baskets of freshly picked wild chanterelles arrived at the door, and organic farmers came to pick up the vegetable peels that amassed in five gallon buckets at our feet.

Once one has thrived in that kind of environment, imagine spending every night scraping cheese off French onion soup bowls! Last year I broke down and bought two lions-head soup bowls so I could gratinee Julia Child’s French Onion Soup. It took over twenty years to get over 16 hours of cheese-scraping memories. Now they’re in storage with every cookbook I own and 99% of our “stuff.” After nearly five months without our things, I miss them. Luckily I have my laptop and can look up recipes online but I long for the day I can pick out 5-6 cookbooks off the shelf and create the perfect dinner party.

I think it was the first interest I had of my own. My father used to lament the fact that whenever we got together with our aunts all we’d talk about is food. Family reunions consisted of a movie or museum but they were really about breakfast, lunch and dinner! Luckily he’s since become quite a good Italian cook. Mom started subscribing to Gourmet in the mid-1970′s and became a very good cook. My sisters cook everything but when they were younger they specialized in baking. And my brother is a natural in the kitchen.

I finally took up music again at age fifty, learning acoustic guitar. No parent is telling me to take lessons, I chose to do so of my own volition, and if I quit it’ll be only my fault. It’s a lot more difficult for me to pick up for me than cooking. Luckily I’ve an audience of two at home (husband and dog) who are enthusiastic about both efforts. The dog really doesn’t care about the guitar but her enthusiasm for my cooking is more like 200% so if I stretch the truth a bit, forgive me.

The organic packages will be curtailed after this week. I’ve a feeling they’re just discarding produce no-one else wants to buy and sending it along to us. One honeydew melon, four hard peaches, one hard mango, a bunch of grapes and a pint of cherry tomatoes for $19.95. I feel I get better deals and a lot more choice at the farmers’ markets. I intend to try a couple more markets this weekend, and the fish guy will be opening up in our neighborhood in a couple of weeks. At the Park Silly Market on Sunday my heart leapt when I saw a gorgeous bunch of onion tops some guy was carrying. Forget the guy, these were huge spring onions! First time at this market, I had to find out where he got them, and so we did. Is there something wrong with me that a cute guy went by and all I cared about was the onions? Cheers, Dee

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Posted in Editorial, Education, Recipe Ideas

Disappointing Chicken

Posted on August 12, 2009 | Leave a comment

I used to cook these bone-in, skin-on chicken breasts prepared french-style (milk, flour, egg, bread crumbs) at 400 degrees for about 45 minutes. They were hot, moist and succulent with a crispy crust infused with a smoked paprika dry rub that was infused into both the flour and bread crumbs.

Tonight, I was making some mac & cheese to go along with the chicken breasts, along with a salad of Italian greens and a homemade sherry vinaigrette. The mac & cheese needed to be about 350 degrees for 30 minutes so I changed the temp for the chicken and put it in for 1 hour at 350 rather than 45 minutes at 400. I’m also cooking at mountain temps so everything is a mystery for me right now. Chicken turned out dry and hermetically sealed with all the seasoning on the coating, which was crisp and tasty, and none inside the overcooked breasts.

The mac and cheese turned out great but the best part of the meal was the salad, simply dressed with my sherry vinaigrette and topped with roasted chopped walnuts and a few locally grown cherry tomatoes.

All in all , not a bad meal. Hope Jim’s well enough to go back to work tomorrow and that I don’t catch the crud he’s had for the past three days. Cheers, Dee

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Update to Ermine

Posted on August 11, 2009 | Leave a comment

Ermine has been out hunting for a few days, and has brought back….. a girlfriend! So we have a herding dog who is nuts for the first ermine/stoat that lives on the deck, and now there are two. At least she’s getting some added exercise running from one side of the room to the other to chase them from inside the house. Luckily they stay hidden when we’re out grilling. To refresh your memories, here’s a photo of the first one. The second one moves too fast to get a photo from inside.

Here’s the one that’s been here a couple of weeks:

Ermine

Ermine

Let’s hope we don’t have a family on its way pre-winter. I don’t know their schedule for stoat-rearing but an entire family of these critters may be too much for our Zoe. As it is, we have to keep the sliders downstairs closed so they can’t get in. Outside is fine. Inside is a disaster. Cheers, Dee

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Posted in Editorial, Utah

Apprenticeship

Posted on August 10, 2009 | 1 Comment

Today’s NY Times talks about student internships, mostly those students take to get them into college and out of college and into a job. Of course there are now middlemen who broker internships for a fee. Can’t get a job out of college? Have your parents pay for you to take an internship! That negates the intent.

That’s not how it worked when I grew up. I paid to go to cooking school and paid to go to my unpaid internship so I could get a job cooking and actually make money. I lived in a cabin with a privy lock on the door and no heat. I bought $5 of wood every night but could only make it last until about 3:00 a.m. then I froze. Nothing on the windows, flying termites all over the bathroom so I had to make a ritual of boiling water in the tub, close bathroom door in the morning and block it everywhere with towels.

I was lucky that the people who leased the cabin to me left a mattress downstairs with a few blankets, and a couple of dishes and pots and pans. He moved next door with his girlfriend but I never saw him, except when our shifts collided at work.

As these rich people buy internships for their unemployable children, one wonders what our world is coming to. These rich WASP’s run the country but their kids are stupid and marrying fellow rich WASP’s and it seems the gene pool peaked about 100-150 years ago with Andrew Carnegie and now it’s going downhill rapidly but they can pay to keep that slide going. At least for now until their kids run the banking, insurance and other industries into the ground because their parents bought them an internship and like one of my favorite thespians, John Houseman, used to shill, “they earn it” but these folks don’t.

My husband runs into firms that will only hire “Ivy League.” Nonetheless, they’re headquartered in Texas. Hate to say it but New Yorkers are too snobby to move to Texas, and Texans will be treated like cow patties in NYC. I’m not talking racial equality, which I champion alongside women’s rights, I’m talking a southern man in a northern town, being looked down at (with a physics degree) as stupid because he has a trace of a Texas accent.

Whatever our families have, they’ve earned the hard way. My dad was the first in his family to go to college and he has a doctorate in higher education. My mother graduated from college after I did but summa cum laude (I was dean’s list) and passed her CPA exam first time out. All our families have wanted for money but found a way to succeed legally using their brains and hard work.

Perhaps we should let the bluebloods die out as a breed, the only other option is for a few to fall in love with those of the working class and make something of themselves through their offspring. Think about it, Dee

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Posted in Editorial, Education

Top Chef Masters II

Posted on August 10, 2009 | Leave a comment

I missed this week’s second final round so had to wait to see it yesterday at 12:00 noon. Unfortunately culinary dynamo Anita Lo was sent packing her knives. She has dominated this series and I think she just got tired, plus she got her Asian vibe on and thought that cheddar cheese soup with mini-burgers in it would satisfy an American’s quest for a perfect burger.

Once again, I applaud these chefs for going head-to-head to benefit their favorite charities. I love Hubert Keller but Make A Wish has been a really lame charity over the years and I don’t know that his winnings would be well-spent (take that from a former expert in that arena) but I would still love for him or the others to win. I also give kudos to Top Chef Masters staff for making this different than Top Chef. Yes, they’re each driving a Lexus, great product placement, but it’s Critic’s Table, thankfully for chefs and audience alike there are no bunk beds. The chefs are treated as the pro’s they are in everyday life.

No romantic entanglements (at least none we know of) and when one chef is paired with another to assemble a “surprise” box of food, they don’t pull a “Spike” and give them twelve boxes of raisins (I made that up, first thing that came to mind) and nothing else. It is evident that they respect and care for each other even though each contestant wants to win for their charity.

I don’t have a favorite and just want to see the tale be told, as it’s probably been over for a while and the insiders know who won. There is something to be said about professionals at or about the same level, going to work every day and being in a collegial atmosphere. In real life, they’re the boss of many minions in their restaurants. That’s why it’s so cool to see them peel onions or open oysters, or go to a grocery store, things they haven’t done in years.

Bravo to Bravo and Top Chef Masters. Dee

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Posted in Editorial