What the heck is jicama?

Chattanooga ChooChoo

Fri, 07 Dec 2012 10:23:00 -0500

A second ode to my favorite united state to visit…Tennessee. With a third travel season under my belt, I have once again managed to drive through Tennessee just as the leaves are beginning to change, the cool breezes are rolling in, and the Vols fans are coming out of the woodwork. Now, football fun aside, I come to see the students, and enjoy the food. I’ll include as many pictures as I can! Working my way west back east, this trip concludes with Chattanooga.

Chattanooga has a compact downtown area, with a mix of franchises and local enterprises. One of the first gems I discovered in the fall of 2010 is nestled right down the street from the Tennessee Aquarium. By the way, a trip to the Tennessee Aquarium is an afternoon well spent. The displays and exhibits have a good balance of kid friendly entertainment, but I still felt like an adult that learned something from a trip, too. Back to food - Thai Smile 3 was a gem of a find. There are few dishes that basil can ruin, which is why I order the spicy basil noodles each time I go. The server always asks about the desired heat level on a scale of 1-6. I have yet to make it past 4! With a hearty helping of spice, I can never finish the whole dish. I’ve been known to take the leftovers back to the hotel, and eat the cold leftovers for breakfast. It sure beats cold pizza!

Next up, I enjoy getting coffee or tea at Greyfriar’s Coffee and Tea Co. on Broad Street. Nobody makes oolong tea taste better! Usually, I make a pit stop here on the morning before I head up Signal Mountain for college fairs.

On the way down the mountain, I have to stop at Petunia’s Silver Jalepeno for lunch. The owners had a vision of a fish taco stand long before the nationwide food truck craze. They went with a different version - a food Airstream trailer! It’s a silver bullet on the side of the road that serves up a decent veggie burger, and fantastic fish tacos with just the right amount of pepper sauce and relish.

Any trip on the road is not complete without the local pizza place. Everyone who is anyone knows that Ingleside Village Pizza in Macon is pretty hard to beat, but I may have found a close second. Lupi’s has a lengthy selection of classic, fresh ingredients with which to build a pie you can write home about. And, best of all, Lupi’s is a participating restaurant of the Harvested Here network. Part of the Gaining Ground movement in Chattanooga, surrounding counties, and parts of north Georgia, it’s a foundation that promotes and supports local growers, and encourages local restaurants, chefs and schools to provide healthy eating options within 100 miles.

Going to Graceland

Tue, 27 Nov 2012 12:55:00 -0500

Memphis has too many fun places to eat! One of my favorite stops was McEwens downtown. Last year when I dined there, I was sadly not the proud owner of an iphone. I have no delicious pictures! However, the Sweet Potato Crusted Catfish is a southern girl’s dream dinner. Topped with creole honey mustard and laid to rest with sides of wicked good mac and cheese and braised collard greens, this could easily be my last meal request. I would only ask that my mother’s squash casserole and rice and tomatoes be considered dessert.

A stone’s throw away stands the impressive, historic Peabody Hotel. I was only able to afford a drink in the lobby bar, but I was in town in time to watch the Duck March! A time honored tradition, the North American mallard ducks ride the elevator down from the rooftop Royal Duck Palace to the lobby each morning and afternoon, parade through the people, and take a splash in the lobby fountain. Too cute for words!

Heading east to Nashville is not only a very pretty drive, but a journey of anticipation. Nashville, specifically the East Nashville neighborhood, is home to my two favorite stops during travel season. Lunch at The Silly Goose is never disappointing. My Frisby Sandwich on flax seed bread had a tangy, grilled portobello mushroom, walnut pesto with kalamata olives, sun dried tomatoes and thomme cheese. I had a sweet and refreshing glass of basil lemonade right from a jelly jar. I love the Goose’s decor. Most of the rustic tables are for communal seating, and my silverware (real silver) comes wrapped in a bright red bandanna atop the menu on a clipboard. The back of the menu has a map of Tennessee and pin points all of the local farms that the Goose supports within 150 miles of Nashville.

Although I know I’m sweet enough, I usually need a little sugar to finish the meal. Next door, Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams serves up the most unique flavors imaginable. Thanks, Kaylan, for recommending it. Now, I can’t openly admit how many times I have frequented this establishment, especially when some trips have infringed on my Admission duties…. I think that would constitute the creation of Ice Screamers Anonymous. Yes, I have tried all the flavors. They make you, really. You can’t in good conscience choose a duo or a trio of goodness without knowing what they all taste like. You can’t know for certain that the Sweet Corn and Raspberry goes well with the Bangkok Peanut, or the Pistachio and Honey plays nicely with the Goat Cheese and Red Cherry until they skip double dutch on your tongue. You may think that the Ugandan Vanilla Bean is just another vanilla. Au contraire, mon fraire. Tis false, this assumption. It’s better than vanilla. Here are my top three combinations.

Cherry Lambic Sorbet / Queen City Cayenne / Ugandan Vanilla Bean

Riesling Poached Pear Sorbet / Wildberry Lavender / Lime Cardamom Sorbet

Holiday Collection 2011…

Sadly, I’m stuck in Macon for the Holiday 2012 unveiling. But I’ll be back in the saddle this summer. I need to visit Mas Tacos and a few other tasty places. And if you, the reader, are there without me, please report back!

The Evolution of a Garden

Mon, 24 Sep 2012 14:33:17 -0400

One of favorite things about being female is my industrious nature. Sure, I enjoy the occasional weekend spent catching up on my Netflix, but most of the time I would rather be doing something productive. With the summer closing out, and fall settling in, visions of changing leaves, harvests and pumpkins come rushing in. While some go crazy over football and tailgating, I go crazy for fall gardens. I’ve had to settle for apartment patio plants for a few years, and must get my gardening fix in my mom’s backyard! I like to think of it as perfecting my technique before my husband and I get a backyard of our own. Team colors like green and yellow, red and black, and orange and blue make the adrenaline rush for some. My greens and yellows are of the swiss chard and winter squash variety, with red beets, black seeded simpson lettuce, and cute little carrots to complete the team roster.

Last weekend marked one of the final opportunities to plant seeds for a 30 to 75 day harvest window in middle Georgia. For the past few years, the area just over the edge of the brick patio has been the compost ground. The graveyard of egg shells, coffee grounds, vegetable peelings from every stir fry, and stale bread has been the birth place of countless earth worms in free food heaven. This summer the backyard goal was to fence in the free range chicken coop so the little ladies don’t lay eggs all over the place. The hens still have plenty of roaming space, about 1/4 of the yard, leaving another small plot for a 10x10 garden. This may seem small, but it is a significant amount of space for a vegetable cornucopia.

It only took about an hour to prepare the ground. With a shovel, Mom and I marked out the square boundary, making sure to leave a path on each side from which to harvest. Each packet of seeds only needed a half to a full inch of soil for planting, so digging up the square garden did not take too long. Tilling the soil to break up large clumps, and ridding it of rocks took up most of the time. Once well tilled, we used a broom handle (resourceful, eh? who needs a trowel) to draw rows into the plot. This was reminiscent of cutting into a huge brownie pan! Then we began dropping seeds. Drop, cover lightly, water, repeat. Had it taken too much longer, it would have been terribly back breaking work, which really makes me appreciate the fact that I don’t have to manage huge acres of farmland by hand! One week later, you can almost see the first two rows of lettuce breaking ground and sprouting!

Without getting too spiritual on you, gardening provides a remarkable sense of connection with the earth. Joel Salatin, a very outspoken advocate of the “slow food” movement, says “How dare you treat your soil like dirt!”. How dare you not put an incredible amount of effort into nurturing something that benefits you and whomever you share it with. It’s creation and care, humility, patience and love. Aren’t those written somewhere? As mentioned in a previous entry, I do consider food an important part of communion and community. Imagine if the world leaders got together over a good potluck. Do you think the G8 and UN could run a little smoother on a full stomach of culturally rich casseroles?

Now, we wait. And wait. And weed. And weed and weed some more. But then one weekend, we’ll get to harvest. Whatever will we do with so many vegetables? You tell me. What’s your favorite salad recipe, or what do you like to do with carrots, beets, swiss chard, peas, etc.? Kaylan, I know I’ll be making a batch of your beet burgers! Give me some ideas here! And go out and grow something. Start small if you still think you have a pale green thumb. A houseplant is a good start and lettuce is pretty hardy, so it shouldn’t let you down.

Miso candid :)

Sun, 12 Aug 2012 14:27:49 -0400

A month between updates went by entirely too fast! I said I would write a blog, not consistently write a blog… I will do better. Wesleyan College is working on an Admissions blog, and a key component will be polling prospective students regarding their favorite places to eat in their cities that the Admission Counselors will visit. Sweet. Keep your eyes peeled for that one! That should pretty much force me to stay on top of my internet presence.

Back to business, and how to mix business with pleasure. As a college fair traveler, it can be very lonely on the road. One easy fix is to find fun places to eat. Fast food gets old, well, fast. Any decent sized city should offer local fare, whole in the wall gems, and unique joints that you can’t find at home. Welcome to Athens, little grasshoppers. Since most people don’t know where Watkinsville is, I usually call Athens home by default. Although, I don’t claim UGA as the home team. Woof. Traveling to Athens for work can easily turn into a foodie’s fun house. With Annabel in tow, let the misadventures begin!

Our first stop for lunch was Chango’s Noodle House, where we devoured enormous steaming bowls of miso soup, as well as veggie spring rolls and fuzzy edamame. This is a favorite stop of mine in Athens. It’s a communal style seating room where people gather for just about any occasion. All of the noodle bowls are great, and can be made with tofu upon request. My two other favorite dishes are Spicy Thai Basil and Garlic Eggplant.

Checking in at the Hotel Indigo was a snap, and I returned a few weeks later to stay again for my high school reunion weekend. The Madison Bar and Bistro offered a great dinner menu that was very reasonably priced for the basic traveler. If you’re looking for a “green” place to stay with plenty of modern flare, it’s a very hip choice. Annabel chose the Southern classic shrimp and grits, with a side of iphone. I nearly drank every last drop of the curried zucchini soup special.

Our next luncheon out was with a few near and dear Alumnae at the Last Resort Grill. Another staple of the Downtown dining scene, LRG is always bustling, and always delicious. Offering fried green tomatos, sweet potato pasta, the veggie grill, and homemade desserts…to quote Reverend Lovejoy regarding the Bible - “It’s all good”.

Dinnertime again? For the most best meal, we suited up for Ted’s Most Best. Growing up, I remember this joint as a downtown Michelin tire shop and repair garage. Well, the Michelin sign is still there, but the garage area and front sidewalk have been converted into patio seating for the pizza goers. Huge criss-crossing country Christmas bulbs, a rosemary and wild flower garden, and a bright green sign all indicate you’ve arrived at Ted’s. For $15 Annabel and I split the White Rabbit pizza with artichoke, arugula, bell peppers, onions and bechamel sauce. I also hummed aloud as I nibbled on a spinach and golden beet salad, my favorite food.

Finally, you can’t leave town without an obligatory breakfast, not necessarily during the breakfast hours, at The Grill. 24 hours of food, all day, every day. The menu is too extensive to highlight here. Just go. Eat breakfast, or a burger, or apple pie since you can’t go wrong. To start your day, or sober up, the booths are comfortable just the same. You stay classy, The Grill. See you next time.

Market Madness

Thu, 14 Jun 2012 11:01:33 -0400

After too many afternoons trapped in the office, I finally took a late lunch and made it to the Mulberry Market downtown. Sponsored by Community Health Works, the Market is a grass roots initiative to provide better food access and education about wellness to the community. Seeing rows and rows of fresh produce and baked goods was a welcome sight for a hungry shopper.

I planned on preparing a meal made with ingredients that came from less than 100 miles away from home, except for the chili sauce and beer. Sorry, but I couldn’t do a home brew, and next summer after canning tomatoes, I’ll try my hand at chili sauce. For now, I’ll have to settle for Heinz. This ridiculously easy recipe came from Andrew’s grandmother, Gama, who loved her beer roast and Braves baseball.

After almost a year of veggie fare, grass fed beef from Rockingchair Ranch in Bolingbroke, Georgia, is back on the menu. With a chuck roast in hand, along with a small bag of onions and red fin and yellow fingerling potatoes from Gray, and carrots from Dublin, I set off for home to cook dinner. To me, roast and veggies is the quintessential Sunday dinner, a classic comfort food dish that needs no twists or changes. Plus, I find chopping veggies very therapeutic, so any excuse to do that is a welcome change of pace.

If you have a Le Creuset slow cooker, you’re job is very easy. Pour one bottle of Heinz chili sauce along with one beer of choice in the pot and gently whisk together. I love the bubbles! Add a cup of water or vegetable broth to make sure there is plenty of liquid to cover the veggies and meat. When you add the salt and pepper (to taste) the bubbles go crazy! I’m also partial to adding a few chopped cloves of garlic, a tablespoon of cumin, as well as a tablespoon or two of sugar to cut the acidity of the tomato in the sauce.

Next, add your chopped veggies, and add celery or fennel or turnips for more crispy things if you like. Finally, season the outside of the chuck roast with salt and pepper and pan sear for a few minutes on each side to seal in the juices. Place gently in the pot. In a 350 degree oven, cook the dish for 1 hour per pound of meat. Then, remove from the oven and let it sit for about 30 minutes before serving. Whoa. I like to serve it over rice, but it also does well on its own. Once you have devoured all of the meat and veggies, the remaining sauce freezes well as a starter for your next batch of soup.

Enjoy your “locavore” fare - support your local farmers’ market and buy local produce when you can. Trust me, anything that comes from a good backyard garden tastes better than the grocery store version shipped across the country or a continent. Heirloom tomatoes, skinny carrots with those cute little fronds, squiggly eggplants and potatoes with some good ole Georgia clay stuck on ‘em, make for a most delicious meal that can’t be replicated!

Communion in the park

Sun, 20 May 2012 23:27:51 -0400

One of our greatest blessings is the ability to enjoy acts of simplicity. Sure, our overactive social media’d brains appear to prefer thousands of neurons firing every second. In fact, our brains need a bit of recovery time, and sometimes it comes when we least expect it.

My recent vacation trip to western New York is my new standard of relaxing. Knowing I would need a few days of leave after traveling with my boss, I planned a trip to see a dear friend, spend precious days away from the hustle and bustle of the office (still checking email, of course), and enjoy life at a slower pace. And Kaylan’s house was the place to be. Although she is in the midst of her own hurry to have a baby, her home has retained a calm, and even in her preparation, great care has been taken to preserve a spirit of quiet.

Sunday is a day that can easily turn into a scramble. The hustle to get ready for Monday, and the hours spent completing everything you neglected on Saturday, usually make the weekend fly by in those precious hours before The Simpsons. But our Sunday scramble was filled with laughter and family cooking - my two favorite things! Our simple lunch of pretzels, almond butter, carrots, apples, bread with cheese and thinly sliced radishes was an invigorating start to an afternoon of preparing beet burgers, calzones and mac and cheese. If you’ve never given a radish a chance, this is a good introduction. These little red gems are deliciously crunchy when thinly sliced and eaten raw on top of salad greens or bread with cheese. Trust me, try it.

I can’t complain about a single meal. And yes, I will count our endless supply of Sour Patch Kids as a meal! We enjoyed black bean cakes with chipotle corn sauce, beet burgers, Indian food with homemade paneer, mockaritas and ridiculously good peanut butter ice cream with chocolate sauce. Each meal was eaten with the knowledge that we had spent a fulfilling day despite some rainy weather. Seeing Houghton in the spring was a taste of lush farmland and late dogwood blooms. There’s plenty more to do in New York than just see the city.

On my last day, we shared a picnic in Highland Park in Rochester. Among the raisins and almonds, the meat of the meal was bread and cheese. I could not ignore the feeling that we were sharing communion, a thanksgiving in the park for friendship and memories, a vivid reliving of our time spent together. Such simple food triggered a complex emotional experience. At least, those were the neurons that my brain was firing, and it was an unexpected thrill that could only have been experienced in that moment.

Not only did I instantly relive my time with Kaylan, but I remembered the weeks I spent hiking the Camino de Santiago with my mother. Most days, our snack or lunch on the trail was made up of bread, cheese, maybe jamon serrano, a smoked sliced ham that we were very tired of after 6 weeks. Dried fruit and a few pieces of chocolate with hazelnuts or almonds gave us the sugar boost we needed to soldier on. Stopping on a hillside, or under the shade of a tree to break bread allowed us to intimately experience our environment, and make sacred memories of our trip. Don’t worry, I’m working on a longer blog for these stories. And Peru! Oh, the food of Peru!

Let that smell of a familiar meal bring on a wave of memory, or enjoy your surroundings whether alone or with friends or family. Food is a sacrament and eating creates community. If you take that knowledge to every meal, however simple, be prepared to gain perspective.

It's a bird, it's a chicken, it's an Australorp!

Sat, 12 May 2012 20:27:03 -0400

Spring has sprung, and it’s time for backyard chickens!

One of the perks of having backyard chickens is, of course, having fresh eggs. Sure, you can buy organic, free range, grain fed eggs at the grocery store. And with all that baking I’m about to do, I have to on occasion. They’re edible, but nothing tastes like a backyard egg. Home raised, fresh eggs have less cholesterol, less saturated fat, and more vitamin A, beta carotene and omega 3. And I really know that they are from free range, grain (and veggie scrap) fed, organic raised chickens. How? Because I see them and help feed them on occasion, and know they have a happy life.

Mom has been the hen in charge of all the research, and this year she decided to go with Australorps. This breed was developed post World War II in Australia (hence the Austral) and bred with Black Orpingtons from England. This breed is best known for high egg production and meat. An Australorp has set the record for laying 364 eggs in 365 days. Math : 24 chicks x 1 egg a day = a lot of cakes to bake, custards to cool and deviled eggs to devour!

The chicks were adorable little balls of fluff, and the teenagers are have developed black feathers with a dark green sheen in the sun. Mom says that this sassy lady will sit in her lap or perch on her shoulder. She is also partial to eating from your hand. When most of the other chickens flutter away with the rest of the herd, she is strutting off on her own. A liberated chic if you ask me! Does this sound too much like a personal ad? I’m taking name suggestions….

I know Japanese.

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 17:30:54 -0400

Not really, but I can pretend. One of my favorite times of year is the 10 days of Macon’s International Cherry Blossom Festival. Over 300,000 Yoshino cherry trees are beautiful in bloom, and they make a spectacle of the city of Macon.

To celebrate the wonderful blooms, our office had a Hanami picnic under the trees on the lawn. Hanami means “flower viewing”, and is a traditional spring custom in Japan. According to Danielle, our resident Japonesa ;), she says it’s perfectly normal to see everyone from mothers to business men enjoying a picnic lunch and beer under the trees around town during the blooming season. How fun!

Our office Hanami included take out from Sushi Love and dessert in the form of mochi. Mochi is a small square dessert made of glutinous rice with a sweet filling of mild flavor. Last year I was brave enough to try the red bean paste, so this year I attempted a green tea. It has a very interesting texture, very gummy and chewy! Annabel is holding up the box of mochi in Danielle’s video.

Happy Hanami!

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 16:32:31 -0400

Happy Hanami!

Portion Control

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 22:27:13 -0400

Talkin’ ‘bout cupcakes! Little cakes that keep you from eating a whole cake, but not necessarily from eating the whole dozen.

As yet another kick start to the Cherry Blossom Festival, Annabel, Amy and I scooted downtown for some free baked heaven. Amanda’s Cakery gave away free cupcakes for an hour this morning to those willing to wait on the rapidly warming sidewalk. And boy, was it worth it. See almond pound cake with vanilla butter cream below…oh yeah. Pound cake cupcakes are most delicious, and butter cream icing is pretty hard to mess up. Bon Appetit has a rock solid recipe for sour cream pound cake cupcakes which has yet to fail me.

One of my favorite things about butter cream icing (other than butter and sugar), is that you can flavor and color it to your heart’s desire. Extract is a good introductory option, but you can also use a few tablespoons of squeezed juice, or a few tablespoons of zest and get a great fresh effect, too. One of my best attempts was sour cream pound cake cupcakes with kumquat icing. What the heck is a kumquat, you ask?

Kumquats are the little golden gems of the citrus family. You can eat the fruit inside, but you have to take out the little green seeds. To me, the guts are not so good as they are a good bit more sour than the skins. The skins are great for a citrus zest or juice. Or you can chop them and mix with whipped cream, dump it in a graham cracker crust and have a poor man’s pie! The flavor is very distinctive - it definitely has the bite of citrus, and a hint of sweet, but it’s almost musky compared to an orange or a lemon. Your icing and batter options are endless. Much like what to pair with your budino, you can add fruit, herbs, or a combo of both to make a signature creation.

Amanda’s Cakery and Hello There Cupcake are offering Cherry Blossom specialty creations. Hello There is another of my favorite sweet spots in town. They make a mean Heavenly Chocolate, Funky Monkey, Chai Spice, and Carrot Cake - my absolute favorite.

Okay, kids, go out and satisfy that inner child of yours. Eat some cupcakes!

The best of both worlds

Sun, 18 Mar 2012 22:32:34 -0400

Can there be a dessert that is the best of cake and the best of pudding. Oh, yes, there can be. Perusing my most recent issue of Food and Wine, I ran across a recipe for warm chocolate budino. In the special wine issue, one story featured two Napa Valley chefs who are complimenting California wines with southern Italian food. So, it’s only natural that an Italian “pudding” is showcased on the dessert menu.

When all those fresh eggs from Mom’s chickens start rolling in, I’ll be up to my eyeballs in custard. Until then, I’m happy making this dessert every other night. I’m using the picture from the website, since I’m sure my first attempt at this will not look as nice when it’s plated.

The recipe is very easy to read, and the ingredients are extremely simple. That’s the beauty of Italian food to begin with - or any comfort food for that matter.

Preheat the oven to 350 and butter and lightly flour an 8 in round pan. Line with a circle of parchment paper and butter and flour the paper. In a small bowl, mix 1/2 cup of all purpose flour, 1/2 tsp of kosher salt and a 1/4 tsp of baking powder. (ps, this is all a boxed cake mix is, all of the dry ingredients together plus preservatives) In another bowl microwave 9 oz of bittersweet chocolate chips and 1.5 sticks of butter until melted. Whisk in 2 Tbs of good olive oil and 1/3 cup of sugar. Finally whisk in 4 eggs (lightly beaten already) until smooth. Whisk in the dry ingredient mixture until combined and put into the pan.

Set the cake pan into a rectangle pan, and place in the center of the oven. Fill the pan with enough water to reach 1/3 of the way up the cake pan. Bake for approx. 35-40 min, until firm. Transfer to a cooling rack for 30 min.

Your last step is to invert the cake onto a plate in order to remove the parchment paper, and invert again onto a serving plate. You can top each slice with the restaurant’s salted roasted almonds and vanilla ice cream of choice, or something creative of your own. Mint? Fresh fruit and basil? Raspberry culis? Candied orange slices? You can’t go wrong!

To-thai-ly delicious

Sun, 11 Mar 2012 22:54:17 -0400

Me love Thai food. Watch it go down, down into my belly.

As I planned meals for the week, I decided to do a little magic with coconut milk. I’m not a huge fan of coconut, even though I do love the occasional Almond Joy. However, coconut milk is a whole different ball game.

Thai food is most notably known for a few standout ingredients - lemongrass, ginger, basil, Kaffir limes, Thai chiles / curries and coconut milk. For those of you without a peanut allergy, there are some very unique dishes with peanut, too. One of my favorite things about most ethnic foods is the simplicity. It’s very easy to throw three or four main ingredients together, and add a few spices to make them incredible. The following recipe is great for 2, so adjust the amounts for more. Also, with the chopping and the simmering, it should take about 15 min to prep and 20 min total to cook.

Directions for the International Aisle at Kroger : If you want more heat, make sure you purchase a spicy curry or Thai chiles. Otherwise, the curry you buy in the spice aisle is very mild and really more for flavor than heat. Red pepper is a good substitute if you don’t want to invest in a ton of specialty chiles. The same principle applies to ginger. Unless you want to peel and find a use for an entire hand of ginger, just stick to the ground version in the spice aisle. Canned coconut milk usually comes in a “lite” version, which works just as well. It has less fat - just make sure you’re buying the unsweetened version. The milk comes from the grated meat of a coconut, so the canned version is the easy route :)

Spicy Eggplant and Green Bean Curry

Start with the veggies. Cut fresh green beans into small sections. Peel a medium eggplant and slice it into thin strips about as long as the green bean sections. I had a little bit of red cabbage left over from the lentil fritters, so I added that in as well. Next, chop three green onions. You can save the tops for garnish. Zest one lime and set it off to the side, along with a quarter cup of chopped cilantro.

In a medium saucepan, sautee a few minced cloves of garlic over medium heat and add a healthy sprinkle of ginger. Add the green beans and let them cook for a few minutes. Next, add the eggplant and onions. Season with salt, pepper and curry to taste. Add any other heat you’d like, and cook for about 10 min.

Once the veggies are tender, remove them from the saucepan, and heat a cup of unsweetened coconut milk with the lime zest until it simmers. In a separate pot, following the instructions on the back of the box, prepare enough couscous for two. It takes about 5 minutes total - easy peasy. Once the milk simmers, add the veggies back and let everything mingle for a few more minutes. Add the cilantro just before serving over the couscous.

Whoa mamacita! The lime, the hint of sweet with the milk, the spice and cilantro, all make for a wonderfully hearty but light meal. Oh, and what the heck is couscous, you ask?

cous-cous : a form of semolina (made from wheat) that is a staple food of Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia and Libya. It works well as a base for any dish that could be served with rice.

Eh bien, tant pis!

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 10:49:01 -0500

“I don’t believe in twisting yourself into knots of excuses and explanations over the food you make…Maybe the cat has fallen into the stew, or the lettuce has frozen, or the cake has collapsed - eh bien, tant pis! Usually one’s cooking is better than one thinks it is.” —-Julia Child, My Life in France

This French expression loosely translated as “Well, too bad” or “Oh well, never mind”, is one of my favorite things that Julia Child exclaims in her book. When moving to France with the perceived disadvantage of being 10 feet tall (just kidding), having only a faint grasp of the language, and no skills in the kitchen, Julia did arrive with the most important skill of all - attitude. Her willingness to “Never apologize!”, and her determination to squeeze as much detail out her Le Cordon Bleu education and home experiments as possible, catapulted her into a world renowned career as a cookbook author, TV host and chef extraordinaire.

I’d like to share some formative books that I’ve read about food, and encourage you to comment and add your favorites. I’m also going to add a list of books that are in “the stack”, that ominous tower of paper next to my bed. Too many books, too little time.

Seeds of Change : Six plants that changed mankind by Henry Hobhouse. This one I mentioned in my first post. Want to know how potatoes spread to Europe? No, they didn’t originate in Ireland.

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. First of all, Poisonwood Bible is one of my top 5 favorite books, so I knew that I would love this one, too. It’s a wonderful memoir of eating seasonal foods that come from her home garden - a family mission to survive one homegrown foods for a year, and enjoy it!

The Omnivore’s Dilemma : A History of Four Meals by Michael Pollan. This book gave me the final push on my journey to being a quasi-vegetarian, and an avid hater of corn. It’s a bit dense, but very interesting. Form your own opinions. However, I do like another of his well know books - In Defense of Food - better.

The Unsettling of America : Culture and Agriculture by Wendell Berry. Pollan quotes Berry often in his books. Berry’s agri-theology makes me want to join a commune. Anyone else in? The description from the back cover highlights the cultural and spiritual importance of farming, but provides a chilling look at how agribusiness has taken farms away from families and out of a cultural context; thus estranging us from the land and our care of it. Although it was first published in 1977, it’s arguments are, unfortunately, even more relevant today.

Waiter Rant by Steve Dulanica. Hilarious tales and exposes of the front of the house workings of a restaurant, written from a waiter’s perspective and life experiences. Why should I never order the special on a Tuesday? Why should I always play nice with the waiter? Why I should tip 25%? Stop being cheap!

Kitchen Confidential : Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain. First of all, the man is gorgeous. Secondly, no one can make me laugh and cringe in the same sentence, and still keep my respect. He warns would-be restauranteurs and chefs in training, if you can still get through his book and want that lifetyle, then there is seriously something wrong with you. Welcome to the dark side.

My Life in France by Julia Child and Julie and Julia by Julie Powell. Just adorable. The second title was given to me by my dear friend Rosie, and I devoured it. This prompted me to ask for Julia’s cookbooks for Christmas, and finally get around to reading her memoirs. Next up, the cookbooks.

Yes, cookbooks can be read. In fact, if a cookbook isn’t interesting between the recipes, what’s the point? I can just spend all day looking up recipes on the internet. Which I do, but reading is so much more fun! A great cookbook should contain stories that connect you to the dish, the ingredients, maybe even a little history.

Spain - A culinary road trip by Mario Batali with Gwynth Paltrow. Don’t laugh. Although written by two very self important and pretentious beings, the cookbook is fantastic. The chapters take me back to several of my travel destinations, and the mini history lessons are quite fun. Nerd alert!

I Know How to Cook by Ginette Mathiot. Another wonderful gift from Rosie, and the “cooking bible” to three French generations. My favorite easy recipes so far - Hazelnut Petit Fours and Savory Cheese Cookies. OMG, I love Gruyere.

Soby’s New South Cuisine by owners/chefs of Soby’s. There’s good food in SC, you say? Well, there is in Greenville! My brother in law did his residency in Greenville, and he and his wife discovered this little gem of a restaurant. Soby’s came about during a time of renovation and re-invigoration of the downtown area in the early 90s. The owners bought a large warehouse type structure with a history as a grocery, liquor store, furniture store and cotton warehouse. How could it possibly look like a restaurant after that?

Andrew and I had dinner there on our way to Asheville over Christmas break this year. Soby’s left us with nothing less than a fantastic dining experience. From the decor to music to dinner, the service and experience was exceptional. Not only was I able to toast Wesleyan’s official 175th Anniversary in style (pic coming soon) but we had a wonderful time. Andrew enjoyed the Applewood Smoked Bacon wrapped Pork Tenderloin with broccolini and habanero butter. I sampled the Fried Green Tomatoes (duh) with remoulade and candied carrot strips, and the North Carolina Rainbow Trout topped with cabbage and jumbo lump crab with a side of seasonal succotash. Instead of a traditional dessert, we opted for scotch and Frangelico. (see food notes below)

If you’re ever in the Greenville area, this place is worth a stop. You can also try the other Table 301 spots if you’re down for independent dining - Soby’s on the Side (breakfast and lunch), The Lazy Goat and Devereaux’s.

And finally, in the stack…

Grow Organic by DK Publishing. Andrew gave this to me as a Valentine’s gift when we first started dating. As I’m waiting on a real backyard, it is still unread. The chapters on composting were most helpful for my mom and creating her backyard garden.

Culinary School : Three Semesters of Life, Learning and Loss of Blood by S.J. Sebellin-Ross. Hopefully, I’ll still want to go…The reviews says it’s just as scathing and undercover as Kitchen Confidential.

Spice : The History of a Temptation by Jack Turner. From Amazon…”a history of the spice trade told not in the conventional narrative of politics and economics, nor of conquest and colonization, but through the intimate human impulses that inspired and drove it. Here is an exploration of the centuries-old desire for spice in food, in medicine, in magic, in religion, and in sex—and of the allure of forbidden fruit lingering in the scents of cinnamon, pepper, ginger, nutmeg, mace, and clove”. How can this be bad?!?

And last, but not least, a few notes…

re-mou-lade : a fancy French word for sauce. I’ve seen it most often used with fried green tomato dishes, crab cakes and anything else small that needs a little sauce on the side.

bro-cco-li-ni : a member of the carrot family, it has a peppery taste, and is shaped like taller broccoli with smaller florets and thinner stalks.

su-cco-tash : most commonly prepared with lima or shell beans and kernels of corn cooked together, succotash is commonly served as a side dish to highlight seasonal vegetables. It comes from a Narragansett (American Indians of Rhode Island) word - msickquatash - for boiled corn kernels. New food trend - edamame succotash - soy beans with corn, peppers and other little delights.

Succotash rhymes with balderdash, calabash, diaper rash, mountain ash, nettle rash, petty cash and sour mash, in case you want to write a poem about it.\

Frangelico : a hazelnut liquor from Cavale in northern Italy. It tastes like liquid hazelnut, so be prepared. The best part of ordering this as a dessert is the sweet, the alcohol, and the “I can still sit comfortably after a huge dinner” feeling. I’ve had it room temp in a snifter, and on the rocks, and both are yum. You’re choice!

habanero butter : whoa. It was fanciful - just enough heat to add a kick, but mellow. And here, from bonappetit.com, are some paraphrased instructions on how to make your own compound butter. Compound butter is the easiest way to add a punch of flavor to any meat, rice, pasta, or hey - toast! Mix softened butter with minced capers, olives, fresh herbs, peppers, or even citrus zest. Be creative! Wrap the mixture in plastic wrap and form into a log to make it easy to slice. Wrap plastic in foil and freeze for up to one year. Slice into coins and top anything, anytime!

I'm mental for lentils!

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 18:21:44 -0500

Lentils - most people love em or hate em. I love em! And, for my me and my vegetarian friends, they make a great protein. In fact, lentils have the third highest protein content of any legume or nut. This is also very convenient, as lentils are a staple part of most West Asian and Indian diets, which are primarily vegetarian populations. Plus, I always love colorful food. Lentils come in a variety of colors from brown to yellow to red-orange and even black.

When preparing lentils, there are endless variations of delicious soups and dishes with rice that contain these colorful little boogers. My favorite dish is yellow lentils from our local Metropolis Indian restaurant on Riverside. I think if I were stranded on an island with one meal for the rest of eternity, that would suffice. The Chana Masala is pretty good, too, and that would be a close second. Well, as long as they come with a side of garlic naan. Hear Homer, hmmmm, naan.

As delicious and heartwarming as soup can be, man cannot survive on soup alone. If you have a husband who gets tired of leftovers quickly (see: Andrew Jenkins), and you don’t want soup for lunch all week at work (see: Parrish Jenkins), you have to find some creative lentil alternatives. I came across a recipe for lentil fritters with a red cabbage slaw for pitas. Real Simple gave me this one, and it is fantastic! You can go to the Real Simple recipe page and search for lentil fritters to get the full recipe. I used a bag of dry lentils, so they had to cook for about one hour before the rest of the recipe came together.

This is one of those recipes that I read and thought, “I have no idea what this will taste like”. Between the cilantro, parsley and cumin, it has a lot of very unique and bold flavors going in, but lentils are a great platform for flavor. Bold is good! I’ve only ever eaten cilantro with guacamole, so I had no idea of what to expect with this. Using strong flavors with a fairly one note “bean” makes each dish taste different - you can experiment with different spices each time, or with the other foods you add to them.

Once you combine the lentils, cilantro, garlic, parsley, bread crumbs, and salt and pepper in a food processor, you form the mixture into fritter patties. The size is up to you. The original recipe called for smaller patties to fit inside a pita. I went bread-less for this recipe and decided to serve the patties on top of the cabbage slaw, with the yogurt dressing on the side. By the way, this was also the first time I’ve eaten red cabbage, and it was awesome! The acid from the lemon juice acts as a natural tenderizer, so it’s best to make the slaw about a hour before serving so it has time to refrigerate and soften. I also left out the olive oil since it made the first batch a little runny.

Once I had enough patties ready for dinner, I was able to place the rest in a Ziploc bag in the freezer separated by wax paper, and have about 15 left over for later. They freeze well, which means in the future I will just need a half a head of lettuce and a bit of yogurt for dressing. Dinner in a pinch. Each fritter takes about 4 minutes to cook on each side with a spoonful of olive oil in a pan. It was a great dinner - the texture with each part of the meal brings a lot to the table. Lentils can be mushy, but with bread crumbs and a nice crust from the pan, they had more substance than I expected. Plus, with the crunch of red cabbage, it was fun! The yogurt helps cut the spice of the red pepper, but adds a nice coolness to the dish. These would make fun sliders, too! Enjoy!

len-til : a widely cultivated Eurasian annual leguminous plant (Lens culinaris) with flattened edible seeds and leafy stalks used as fodder. Fodder is a funny word. It means food for domestic animals, like cattle.

cum-min : a small annual herb (Cuminum cyminum) of the carrot family cultivated for its aromatic fruits; also : the seedlike fruit of cumin used as a spice.

pars-ley : a European herb (Petroselinum crispum) of the carrot family widely grown for its finely dissected curly or flat leaves which are used as an herb or garnish.

ci-lan-tro : leaves of coriander (annual herb of carrot family) used as a flavoring or garnish.

My notes : Cumin smells like feet, but once it’s cooked it tastes great. It works well in any vegetable soup, chili, or with any red meat. Mom uses it most often in chili and for beef tips with rice. I’ve also used it with roasted carrots and sauteed squash, as a break from the usual salt and pepper.

Dear Avis...

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 22:36:22 -0500

Most people don’t think of a bowl of potato soup as a gourmet dinner. And in fact, it shouldn’t be thought of as that. It’s one of those wonderful home cooked creations that warms the heart and tummy because it’s made with simplicity. Yet, this simple meal can conjure up the some of my favorite young adult memories and meals.

Potatoes, the world’s beloved tuber, made it to Europe as lumpy stowaways on the ships of the returning Spanish conquistadors. Thanks to the Incas, and other indigenous populations of South America, potatoes have spread as an international staple. However, Europe wasn’t fortunate enough to cultivate and enjoy even a fraction of the diversity of potato species that the Americas did. Try some of the cute purple potatoes you see at the grocery store. Or, try your hand at an heirloom species next year in your backyard garden. Seeds of Change: Six Plants that Transformed Mankind, is a great book about exactly what it’s title says.

My history with potatoes has been pretty bland: French/freedom fries (ridiculous!), baked potatoes, au gratin, mashed, potatoes and carrots with Sunday roast, and a few other mildly delicious seasonings for an otherwise pretty innocuous starch. But that’s what makes it a staple food, right? It’s that side starch that completes your meal. And that’s fine! But what if the potato was the star? Hats off to the first bowl of potato soup.

Potato is the perfect blank canvas. Potatoes and ____. Insert fun ingredients here. And that’s exactly what Mrs. Avis did for my teen years. As the mother of 6 kids, she needed a tome of meals to feed her family heartily. Cassie, her oldest daughter, is still a great friend, and we shared many a family meal together at the Hester household. I know it will surprise you to find out that I was a majorette in high school. Yes, me in a fringed bathing suit and baton on a chilly November evening, showing school spirit. Cassie did a bang up job of recruiting me when some graduating seniors left the team a little short. She swore that my natural grace, my hand-eye coordination, my sheer awesomeness, along with her skills (which were superb),would serve me well, and I would be twirling and arabesque-ing in no time. In eight or so straight weeks, she completely convinced me that I would be an asset. I can honestly say that I tried to be more of an asset than an ass. History will be the judge!

Of course, in retrospect, if she’d only told me that I would be eating her mother’s potato soup every Friday night before a cold football game, I would have agreed to commit a felony. Probably. The soup was just that good! A hot bowl of creamy potato soup was the perfect start to the make-up and glitter frenzy for the big game. So, in closing,

Dear Avis,

Thanks for the recipe, after all these years. I have had great times cooking my own potato soup with your “secret” ingredients. And, yes, it is still pretty good for you, before adding the sour cream, cheese and bacon!

Love, Parrish

Who's coming to dinner?

Sun, 15 Jan 2012 20:51:40 -0500

Annabel, of course! What better way to spend a Friday night than a cooking class at home! Thanks to fresh lettuce from Danielle, backyard basil pesto, and spiced peaches from Mom’s kitchen cannery, we made a delicious home-cooked meal. One of the best tools you need in the kitchen is a great sous chef. Four hands were much better than two, and cooking with a buddy is half the fun. Beer helps, too.

Appetizer : Eggplant pesto

Eggplant is a pretty polarizing food - you love it or you hate it. Most people hate it since their only experience with it is eggplant parmesan. Quite possibly the worst eggplant I’ve ever had was the soggiest, most breaded and unpeeled slice of mush. Blech.

Here’s a better way to eat eggplant. Peel it for everyone’s sakes! Once peeled, line a baking sheet with tin foil, and thinly slice the eggplant. It should be thin enough that it cooks in under 8 minutes, but thick enough to withstand absorbing a good bit of olive oil. After you have a baking sheet of slices, brush each slice with olive oil, flip and repeat. Broil the slices for 3-4 minutes, flip and broil the other side for an additional 3-4 minutes. Next, top each slice with a dollop of pesto (homemade recipe below) and a dusting of grated parmesan cheese. Broil a final 2-3 minutes and serve hot. Awesome start to a meal.

Pesto from the store is delicious, but nothing beats bright green basil pesto that just came from your backyard. Or your freezer, since you can make tons of it in the summer and then have it all year round. You only need a food processor and plastic storage. Process 3 cups of fresh basil leaves, 3-4 cloves of garlic, 1/2 cup of olive oil, 3/4 cup of grated parmesan, 3/4 cup of chopped walnuts and salt and pepper to taste. Sweet! Scoop out and store for the winter. You can even freeze it in ice trays so that you have individual pesto portions for quick pasta dinners.

First Course : Lettuce medley with roasted grapes and balsamic vinaigrette

I like simple salads. Truthfully, I hate making salads, so the best ones for me are the ones with 5 ingredients or less. And yes, 2 of those ingredients are lettuce and dressing! I also like to taste the individual ingredients, so the less dressing and more flavorful the other ingredients, the better. Starting with a good base of greens is the key.

After seeing Iron and Top Chefs roasting grapes on multiple episodes, I decided to try it myself. Turns out, it was as easy as washing red seedless grapes, placing them in an oven safe saute pan at 350, and roasting for 10 minutes. The grapes release a good bit of juice, which is nice to use in the dressing. In a bowl, eyeball 2 parts balsamic and 1 part really good olive oil. Shake a little salt and fresh ground black pepper in there, and a dash of sugar to cut the acid. In this case, I used a spoonful of the grape juice instead of sugar. Whisk with a fork until the balsamic and oil mix well.

Plating is easy - pile o’ lettuce, top with roasted grapes and drizzle vinaigrette on top.

Second Course : Vegetable Lasagna

So easy, so good. In this dish the pasta “secret” is to have enough liquid to ensure that the lasagna cooks itself in the oven. Start by sauteing an onion with a few cloves of chopped fresh garlic. To that add a large 28 oz. can of diced tomatoes and a large 28 oz. can of tomato sauce. I have yet to cook with tomatoes from a box, but my mother in law swears by them. I will give them a try soon! To the tomatoes I usually add a little salt, fresh ground black pepper, cumin, turmeric, cinnamon, sugar to cut the acid and Worcestershire sauce. Oh, and the queen of greens - kale. After that sauce is nice and bubbly, you can add your veggies of choice (squash, zucchini, baby portabellas, carrots, whatever else). Let it all simmer for 10-15 min. You can arrange the lasagna strips in a large Pyrex dish, and then layer with sauce and cheese. Repeat until you have 4-5 layers. Bake at 350 for 25-30 min.

Dessert : Peach Cobbler and Lemon Nutmeg Ice cream

For cobbler a la mode, let a half gallon of vanilla or vanilla bean ice cream soften for 15 minutes. Stir in the zest of one lemon and 2 teaspoons of nutmeg. Refreeze while the cobbler is baking. The next time you need to bring ice cream to a party, this is a great twist. It works well with any citrus zest, and sweet spices like cinnamon, nutmeg or cardamom.

The first rule of any dessert with fruit - fresh is best. This easy cobbler recipe is great with any fruit combo. Start with a 350 degree oven and butter. Doesn’t that just automatically sound delicious…butter. I can’t help but think of Meryl Streep in Julie and Julia having her first fish in France.

Let half a stick of butter melt in a square ceramic dish while mixing everything else. In my recipe I have fresh (then canned by Mom) spiced peaches with cinnamon and clove, so I don’t add extra sugar. Otherwise, mix 1 cup of sugar, 1 cup of milk and 1 cup of self-rising flour and stir until just mixed. Add peaches to the ceramic dish with butter and gently pour the batter over the top. Bake for 25 min or until brown across the top.

Cheers to a wonderful dinner, Annabel!

Queen of greens

Sun, 15 Jan 2012 20:51:00 -0500

This will be a shorter post since I have two for this week. On Monday, I did a quick little pasta dinner, which is great in a pinch. Most of my pasta dinners are for two since Andrew and I can only stand leftovers for so long. Pasta with cream and cheese sauce doesn’t get much easier. And don’t worry, you will see plenty more posts with lots of cheeses!

Common pasta question: How do I keep pasta from sticking and clumping? Oil in the water? Lots of salt? Lots of water? High boil and constant stirring?

I say none of the above. The “secret” is stirring the pasta into the sauce and finishing the two together. Oil doesn’t mix with water anyway, so don’t waste it; boiling and stirring too much breaks the pasta. My best recommendation is to boil just enough water to cover the pasta, using a few tablespoons of kosher salt so it doesn’t taste like cardboard, boiling on low and a quick stir or two. If you have a good slotted spoon or pasta server, you can scoop the pasta directly into the sauce that’s been cooking on the burner next door. You can save a step and skip the colander.

For the sauce, saute a small onion and a carrot. Cut the stems out of a few stalks of kale, and add the shredded leaves. Pour in 3/4 cup of half and half, and a healthy sprinkle of pecorino romano. Complete the sauce with a dash of salt, fresh ground black pepper, paprika and cayenne pepper. Let it simmer next to the pasta and reduce a bit. Just before adding the pasta at the end, add 1/4 cup more of half and half and let the pasta and sauce blend for a few more minutes before serving.

Kale is quickly becoming the “queen of greens” and rightfully so. It’s a great substitute for spinach, rich in vitamins, cheaper and better for you. As a leafy green, it cooks down like collards, but is not as bitter. I find that it goes well with tomato bases of any kind - lasagna, veggie soup, spaghetti sauce.

kale : a member of the cabbage family (broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, brussel sprouts and kohlrabi), with curly leaves

paprika : a mild red spice made of ground pods of various sweet peppers

pecorino romano : a hard, sharp Italian sheep’s mile cheese, similar to parmesan.

My notes: Kale should be your new best friend. It’s easy to buy, cook, dress up and dress down. It’s like your favorite black dress. Paprika is not just for deviled eggs anymore. It is a great mild spice that works well with tomato / cream bases. Romano is nice and strong like parmesan - a very distinctive cheese that goes well with any Italian food, and by the slice with a glass of red wine, too.

Day 1 : She's viral...

Sun, 08 Jan 2012 22:08:44 -0500

I finally did it. I started a blog. For those of you who aren’t my closest friends kindly humoring my delve into the land of cyberspeak, I’m Parrish, and I love food. I’m Parrish S. Jenkins on Facebook, and that will give you all the personal details you’ll ever want, as well as sweet photos of my cats. Oh, and that guy I married.

A few things before we begin…

1) I am not a writer.

2) I am not a writer; but I can spell, proofread, edit and generally express myself well. If you are reading this blog to gain insightful and profound knowledge, you may need to look elsewhere. If you are reading to learn more about food, see my fun recipes, and take note of the delicious destinations in your own backyard, then keep reading.

3) I adore alliteration. I’m not sorry.

4) Popular topics may include, but are not limited to: food definitions for the Chopped fans, great wines to try, fun cities and fun eats, local food, those crazy vegetarians (myself included), and the adventures of Phlat Pharrish. Oh, it will be awesome.

This is my thesis, and then the real adventure begins.

I can’t pinpoint the exact moment I decided that I wanted to start a blog, but the culinary interest has been bubbling since 2003. I had the opportunity to work for an incredible chef at an Italian fine dining establishment in Macon, Georgia. Marco Ristorante Italiano was run by Executive Chef Dario Leo, who came to Macon after leaving a 5 star restaurant in Boston. This, after jobs in hotels and restaurants across Europe since the age of 14, and a career as personal chef to ambassadors. Yeah, I got to work for the man. Long story short, he awakened in me a passion for food - simple, quality ingredients - and got me thinking about culinary school and a life in the industry.

With a husband in law school, and two jobs under my belt since graduating from Wesleyan College, culinary school is still my dream deferred for a bit longer, but this is my next step : a creative outlet to chronicle my eats and learn more about food. I am not a pretentious gal. I love food, but I don’t have to have a mousse, or a foam, or a swirl of liquid around the plate to appreciate it. This is the blog that will bring luxury down to the layman.

And now, I thank you for your patience. For those of you that kept reading, I present to you the answer to what the heck is jicama. I suppose Webster is the man to consult for this one.

ji-ca-ma : (hicumuh) noun

an edible, starchy, tuberous root of a tropical American vine (Pachyrhizus erosus) of the legume family that is eaten raw or cooked.

My notes : As a sweet and starchy root, it can be eaten raw like an apple (in a salad with oranges, lime and cilantro), or cooked in a stir fry with spices such as garlic, cayenne pepper and cumin.

Stay tuned!