Tomato, Semolina, and Cilantro Soup

I am heading back to Alberta for roughly a week this coming Friday; part of the trip will involve collecting a few boxes of my things from a friend who has been storing them for me, and the rest will entail something of a road trip with a few friends who want to explore Edmonton before venturing to southern British Columbia for a few days.

Part of leaving for any length of time involves cleaning out the fridge. I hate coming home to things that have spoiled, so I pre-emptively go through and cull what might go through zombification before I get home again. Usable things I try to give to friends and the rest goes on a brief journey to the bin. Going through the fridge today revealed that I had leftover egg whites, celery, cilantro, and tomatoes that desperately needed something done with them before they edged over into the discard pile. I really hate throwing out food; not only is it wasteful which makes me feel uncomfortable when there are so many going without, it's also bloody expensive eating for one and having to throw things out because I didn't get to them doesn't make life any more affordable. It's something I have been trying to get better at. My ex and I had a fair number of arguments because my enthusiasm would frequently over-run my organizational ability and we would end up having to throw things out. I know it used to drive him crazy. Working on it now is a bit late for salvaging the situation between us, but hopefully it makes my life easier as I work on being alone.

So: egg whites, celery, cilantro, tomatoes.

The egg whites went into a set of cinnamon and espresso macarons that ended up with hazelnut buttercream as a filling. They weren't quite perfect (hollow and I think slightly underbaked), but they were still tasty.

The celery, cilantro, and tomatoes ended up going into the Tomato, Semolina, and Cilantro soup from Plenty. This soup is pretty straightforward to make and quite filling - a good option for cool weather. I'd serve it with grilled cheese sandwiches on a dark bread if I were feeling indulgent, or with a side salad dressed in something sharpish with something else salty in it - feta, olives, capers, perhaps - if I wanted something lighter. I found the soup fairly mild in flavour, but tomato-y; it probably wouldn't go amiss to add some parmesan or feta to the soup itself if you were feeling so inclined.

As usual, the ingredients are as listed in the book and the notations include my observations and alterations.

Tomato, Semolina, and Cilantro Soup
(p. 130, Plenty)

Serves 6

3 tbsp olive oil
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1 celery stalk, roughly chopped
2 tsp ground coriander
2 tsp ground cumin
1 1/2 tsp sweet paprika
2 tsp finely chopped thyme
3 1/2 cups cilantro leaves, roughly chopped
2 tbsp tomato paste
5 medium tomatoes (1 lb in total), peeled and finely chopped
salt and black pepper
~6 1/2 cups water
1 1/2 tbsp sugar
1 cup semolina
1 1/2 tbsp lemon juice (optional)
3 tbsp Greek yogurt (optional)

In a medium/large pot begin heating the olive oil over medium heat. Once it comes up to temperature, add the onion, celery, coriander, cumin, sweet paprika, thyme, and half the chopped cilantro.

Reserve the remaining cilantro for the garnish off to the side somewhere for now. Sauté until the onion is starting to soften and turn a golden brown.

 Add the tomato paste and stir to combine.

 Add the tomatoes, some salt and pepper, and let everything cook for a few moments. As my tomatoes were very soft, I ended up crushing them in my hands over the soup pot and peeling them that way - the results were far more rustic in appearance, but it seemed more efficient than trying to peel them with a knife or boiling them briefly to separate the skins from the flesh. Plus, this way was more fun. ^_^ 

Add the water and sugar to the pot and bring everything to a boil. Once the broth is boiling, reduce the heat a bit and simmer the soup for 20 minutes. 

To add the semolina to the soup, have it already portioned into a small container that you can easily pour from. You will need to pour the semolina out in a thin, steady stream while whisking with your other hand. This should prevent any lumps of semolina from forming, although if they do, don't fret - they'll be like little dumplings by the time everything is finished cooking and so aren't really much of a detractor. 

 Let everything continue cooking for another 10 minutes, whisking occasionally. During this 10 minutes, things will thicken considerably and take on an almost porridge consistency. If that isn't to your preference, you can add some more water or broth (I'd go with chicken broth if I had the option) toward the end of cooking to loosen things up again. Taste and add more salt and pepper if required, as well as the lemon juice if desired. I highly recommend the lemon juice, it helps things pop.

To serve, ladle into bowls and garnish with the reserved cilantro and yogurt, if desired.

This was an interesting texture experiment for me. I don't think I can think of it as a soup, as the thickness of it borders on scoopable and, to me, soups need to be pourable. So in my head it's more like a stew or porridge. That said, it was fairly tasty, although perhaps on the bland side. I added some shredded parmesan as well as the cilantro for garnish and that helped a bit, but I think if I were going to do it again, I'd sub out 3 or 4 cups of the water for a robust vegetable or chicken stock and simmer a few parmesan rinds in the soup as it is cooking to try and round out the flavour a bit more. I might also increase the tomato paste a bit and caramelize the onions further. I did enjoy the texture, and I could actually see this as a good brunch food on a cold and wet morning - it has definite stick-to-your-ribs-ness going for it and a very fresh flavour.

Solo Tomato Party

I've been relishing the quiet and sense of freedom in my flat today. I've tinkered, puttered, worked, mused, and created all day. It's been lovely. It occurs to me that it was almost two years ago that I moved out to Regina. I started out living with a friend here and after a year moved into my own tiny place. I've grown to love living alone over the last twelve months and have just renewed my lease signalling my intent to continue living alone for the next year. Alone-ness is something I used to be very afraid of and I did everything I could to avoid it. It seems funny to me now that the thing I was trying so hard to avoid was the very thing I probably needed more than anything else.

Living alone has its challenges - there isn't someone to help you out instantly if you are sick, need a hand, or require a bit of companionship. But I've been lucky and made friendships and cultivated relationships to the point where maybe the help or presence isn't instant, but it's still there if required in any of those situations. In some ways, I find that a better fit for me, as it's been teaching me self-reliance and forcing me to explore the outer edges of my own creativity for dealing with situations that I perhaps might have previously avoided or only dealt with minimally or haphazardly.

A former classmate whom I esteem greatly posted this list from Buzzfeed, and it surprised me how many of these apply to me now. It makes me wonder if I was wrong thinking I was an extrovert for so long, or if there's been such a noticeable shift in my personality... probably some of both. I can be social, don't get me wrong, and when I am in the mood for people, I can be very gregarious, but I am so glad I've learned that I don't have to be "on" all the time, and that it's okay to take time (even days or weeks!) to myself. I've noticed that I need dedicated recovery time if I've been in large groups or been too social, and I am getting better about taking that time. I still have a hard time saying no to people though, which sometimes conspires against me - in particular when I go home to visit. So many people to see, and I don't want to disappoint any of them! This whole process of learning to be alone has involved a lot of mental dialogue about what I think of as selfishness in regards to my own behaviour, and learning that maybe a little of it on my own behalf - like claiming alone time or recovery time - isn't actually "selfish" at all. But it's hard sometimes to go against all the mental chatter that says I have to be everywhere at once, volunteering, assisting, go, go, go.

Today felt like time outside of time, if that makes any sense. It was very relaxing and left me especially open to all of the nuances of tomatoes while I was cooking this afternoon. Tomatoes are pretty pedestrian to me - I've grown up with their ubiquitous red presence, and for the most part, they've never seemed exotic or strange; in fact, they tend to get looked over and taken for granted. Or at least that was true until I'd read the ethnography Tangled Routes: Women, Work, and Globalization on the Tomato Trail as part of one of my undergraduate Anthropology classes. I stopped taking them so for granted after reading that book, but I didn't really cook with them in any greater frequency, bar as bases for sauces and such. Moving to an urban centre introduced me to other varieties of tomatoes that I'd never seen before - yellow ones, tiny ones that were striped green and burgundy, bright green ones. I developed a little foodie crush on tiny cherry and grape tomatoes, snacking on them like I would popcorn if they were available. But I still didn't cook with them much, preferring them raw most of the time. Today, for the first time I can remember, I cooked with a variety of them.

 As I cooked, I admired their various bright colours and shiny skins, the differing levels of sweetness and acidity. According to Yotam, the Tomato Party recipe was developed to showcase all the types of tomatoes available, and to play up their "tomatoey"-ness. I had a few from the farmer's market and some from the grocer and all of them were pretty much perfect. If you have an abundance of tomatoes at your disposal, give this dish a try as a means of exploring this tasty tribe. As usual, the ingredients are as listed in the book, and the written description incorporates my own observations and alterations.

If you don't have Sardinian fregola (Yotam says it's available at kalustyans.com), you can use Arab mograbiah (from Middle Eastern grocers) or Israeli couscous. Or you can leave out the fregola and double the quantity of couscous. I ended up making only Israeli couscous and it was lovely.

Tomato Party 
(p. 131, Plenty)

Serves 4

3/4 cup couscous
salt
olive oil
2/3 cup boiling water
1 cup fregola
3 medium vine-ripened tomatoes, quartered
3/4 tsp brown sugar
1 cup yellow cherry tomatoes, halved
2 tbsp roughly chopped oregano
2 tbsp roughly chopped tarragon
3 tbsp roughly chopped mint
1 garlic clove, crushed
1 small green tomato, cut into thin wedges
3/4 cup red cherry tomatoes, halved

Preheat the oven to 375F.

Prepare the couscous - if you are using regular, fine grained couscous, put it into a bowl with a pinch of salt and a little bit of olive oil. Pour the boiling water over it, stir everything together, and cover the bowl with a piece of plastic wrap or an inverted plate. Set it aside for ~12 minutes, then remove the covering and fluff everything with a fork. Leave aside to cool. If you are using Israeli couscous, you will want to prepare it according to the directions on the package. I ended up simmering mine in some chicken stock which was a great decision.

If you are lucky enough to have the fregola, add it to a pan of boiling salted water and simmer for ~18 minutes, or until al dente. Drain it in a colander and give it a rinse under cold water, then leave to dry completely.

Assemble your tomatoes:

Quarter the vine ripened tomatoes and arrange them over half of a large baking pan. I lined the pan with parchment paper to make cleaning up a bit easier, and ended up cutting each tomato into sixths because quarters seemed unwieldily. Sprinkle the tomatoes with the sugar as well as some salt and pepper. I ended up using coconut sugar as my brown sugar was completely dried out, but it's such a small amount that almost any sugar should be fine. Drizzle the tomatoes with some balsamic vinegar and a little bit of oil. I used a pomegranate infused balsamic because I had it on hand and it smelled fantastic.

Place the tomatoes in the oven and bake for 20 minutes.

While the tomatoes are baking, prepare your herbs if you haven't already. I ended up using oregano, lemon thyme, rosemary because they were what I had on hand that where fresh and I figured different herbs were probably better than no herbs at all. I have to say, I am really enjoying having herb shrubs in my flat.

Once the herbs have been chopped, slice the yellow cherry tomatoes if you haven't already. I didn't have quite a cup's worth of yellow ones, so I added a few red ones to make up the difference.

After the tomatoes in the oven have baked for 20 minutes, remove the pan from the oven and increase the heat to 400F. On the empty side of the baking pan, arrange the cherry tomatoes. Season them with some salt and pepper and drizzle them with some olive oil.

After the oven reaches the higher heat, return the pan to the oven and roast the tomatoes for ~12 minutes.

Once the tomatoes have finished roasting, remove them from the oven and allow them to cool. This is important for the presentation - if you mix the hot tomatoes into the couscous right now, they will turn to a not so aesthetic mush, although they will taste just fine. I know this from experience. Cooler tomatoes will hold their structural integrity a bit better.

As the tomatoes are cooling, slice the green tomato into thin wedges. I didn't have one, and so it was omitted. I chose to dice my garlic rather than leaving a crushed clove floating around the bowl.

To finish preparing the dish, mix together the couscous and the fregola if using in a large bowl. Add the  cooked tomatoes with any juices that accumulated on the pan, herbs, chopped garlic, cherry tomatoes, and green tomato wedges.

Very gently mix everything together with your hands. Taste for seasoning and add more salt and pepper if required. A splash of additional olive oil might be desired as well. Spoon into serving bowls and enjoy.

I enjoyed making this recipe. I didn't have the full measure of herbs and I was a little impatient waiting for the roasted tomatoes to cool and so got some less cohesive ones after mixing, but that was just fine. I stand by my decision to cook the Israeli couscous in some broth as it helped add a little bit more savoury character to the overall flavour. If you aren't up for chicken stock, a good veggie stock probably wouldn't go amiss. I don't think I'd try a beef stock though. I've never had fregola before, so I can't help but wonder if that might be adding to the flavour of the base and if I was missing out on something by not having it. I think this might make a good picnic salad, but I'll be a better judge of that once I try the leftovers tomorrow.

Saskatoon Muffins with Lemon Thyme and Feta

I had a really wonderful day yesterday. I woke up leisurely but early, and not at all hung over - a surprise, given my wine and video game shenanigans the night before - got up and started researching immediately, and then broke to take care of the many mundane chores I needed to accomplish. I felt happy and was productive for the first time in quite a while. Once my chores were done, I accepted an invitation to go out and meet some of the artists who paint the murals all over town, which was spur of the moment and quite fun. The evening was spent having dinner with some of my extended family as my Grandparents are here picking up my small cousin and spiriting him away for a few weeks of adventuring in Alberta. Unexpectedly, my happy productivity followed me home, and I decided to take advantage of it to bake.

But before I get to the recipe, I'd like to post a few things I have been exposed to recently in case anyone is interested:

• A former classmate of mine has recently started her own blog on the food of the Northumberland Shore of Nova Scotia. Penny has recently completed her M.Div and has been working with different congregations on the east coast. Her blog focuses on exploring local food sources, recipes, and contemplating the connections between cooking, consuming, and community. You can check out her blog here. It's giving me wanderlust. 
• Bill Corbett and I connected at a company holiday party a few years ago and spent a delightful few hours chatting about food and wine and all things delicious. He has started a road blog, documenting his experiences with affordable, independent eateries in the western United States and Canada. Of particular interest to some of you might be the two entries he wrote about locales in Edmonton, which can be found here and here. I absolutely love the watercolour portrait in his banner. ^_^
• I discovered a new magazine called Kinfolk, which is dedicated to small, food and camaraderie focused gatherings. What really caught my attention was the format - it's divided into four parts: the first part is for solo expeditions and experiences, the second for duos, the third for "few". I was quite taken with the idea of a publication advocating for individual experiences and solo activities and hope to see more like this in the future. Also, the photography is stunning. 
• Bianca and I had a beautiful brunch earlier last week, and I wanted to post a picture of it so I remembered how fantastic it was. I'm still getting used to my new camera lens:
  

Now, back to the baking...

Originally, I had wanted to make the Feta, Roasted Red Pepper, and Basil muffins from Sur la Table's Art and Soul of Baking. Reviewing the recipe helped me to realize that I was short both the roasted red pepper and the basil required to make the muffins, so I decided to improvise. I have a healthy shrub of lemon thyme growing on my windowsill, and I had a bag of saskatoon berries in the freezer which had been brought to mind when my Grandparents served the saskatoons they had picked during their travels today as part of the dessert this evening. My goal was not a sweet muffin, but rather a more savoury one, and I think it worked out fairly well.

Saskatoon Muffins with Lemon Thyme and Feta

Makes 12 

2 cups (10 oz) all purpose flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

3/4 cup (3 oz) feta cheese, crumbled

I cup saskatoon berries, stems removed (if they've been frozen, they can remain frozen until adding)

3 tbsp lemon thyme leaves 

1 cup buttermilk*

1/4 cup (2 oz) olive oil

1 large egg

*In a perfect world, I would have used buttermilk, but I didn't have any. So I substituted 1 cup vanilla flavoured soy milk (I swore I'd bought the unsweetened/unflavoured, but apparently not) with ~1 tbsp white lemon-infused balsamic vinegar. You can improvise your own buttermilk this way using regular milk as well; what you are after is a bit higher acidity to set off you baking soda and baking powder properly which contributes to the rise of the muffins. I recommend a slightly fruity vinegar here if you have one - apple cider or even a red or white wine vinegar, but regular white vinegar will work and will not leave your baking bitter, I promise. I used one of my infused vinegars because I had it around and it added another little kick of citrus flavour to bump up the subtle thyme. You could also use an infused olive oil to add a bit more flavour, but I didn't have one with a flavour that I thought would work in the profile I was creating. I'm tempted to try this recipe again but substitute the white lemon balsamic for the dark pomegranate balsamic that I have just to see what happens... If you don't have fresh thyme on hand, you can substitute an equal amount of finely chopped fresh basil. Don't used dried herbs here, they won't give you the flavour the recipe intends. If you like a sweeter muffin, add ~2 tbsp sugar to the dry ingredients.

Preheat your oven to 375F and centre a rack in the oven. Prepare 12 muffin tins - if you are using metal pans, coat them with cooking spray or melted butter, or paper liners as you prefer. If you are using silicone cups, no additional grease will be required. Set the pan aside for now.

In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. 

Crumble your feta, portion out your berries, and prepare your herbs. 

Lemon thyme grows in a shrub and has many tiny leaves along each small branch of the plant. It takes some time to pick all of the leaves off, but as you work on it, everything starts to smell citrus-y and wonderful, so it's not an unenjoyable task. Put these three ingredients aside for now. 

In a large measuring cup, measure out the milk, olive oil, and egg. Whisk everything together until well blended and then stir in the herbs. Set aside for a moment.

Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients and then pour the wet ingredients into the well. 

Mix everything together with a spatula until there are no streaks or pockets of flour in the batter and the batter looks relatively smooth. Then add the herbs, feta, and saskatoons. 

Mix everything together until the cheese and berries are evenly distributed through the batter. Working quickly to get the best lift out of the leaveners, portion the batter evenly into the prepared muffin cups. Bake at 375F for 18-20 minutes, or until the tops of the muffins are just starting to turn golden and a skewer poked into the centre of one comes out clean. Let them cool for 5 minutes in the pan before removing them from the pan to finish cooling. Be careful while taking the muffins out of their baking containers - these ones are quite tender while they are hot and might break if not handled gently, although they firm up just enough once they are cool. 

Eat them warm or at room temperature. These can also be frozen for up to 1 month. 

Enjoy!

Green Gazpacho

First - I have a new lens for my camera, so if pictures are a little wonky, please bear with me as I learn the differences between it and what I was using before. Thank you.

Second - this is the best hot-weather supper I've made in ages. I couldn't figure out what it might taste like from reading the recipe, but it's amazing. I made a few adjustments to the recipe to tailor it to what I had on hand, but not that many. Give it a shot - it comes together in practically no time at all. And if you omit the croutons, there isn't a whole lot going on that might heat up the kitchen.

Third - the recipe says it serves six. That might be more like serves six to eight. This made a LOT. And that was without the ice in it, which would have boosted the volume further still...

Yotam advises that a standing blender is the best way to prepare this gazpacho, but I imagine that would take many batches. I used my 12-cup food processor and still found I had to pour some of it into a bowl, prepare the rest and combine it all at the end. Not a hardship, but I imagine that might get a little tedious in a smaller standing blender... An immersion blender might do the trick, but as I have never really used one myself, I couldn't say that with any confidence. If anyone does try it with an immersion blender, can you please let me know how it goes?

This soup is loosely based on tarator, a cold yogurt and cucumber soup from the Balkans, according to the introductory text in the cookbook. A green gazpacho is a new concept for me, as most of the gazpacho recipes I have read prior to this feature tomatoes rather heavily. I really enjoyed the vibrant colour of this soup as well as the layers of flavour. And given that it's comprised mostly of green growing things, it tastes incredibly fresh. I think I am in love.

As usual, the recipe is directly from the book and the written description includes my alterations and observations.

Green Gazpacho
(p. 180, Plenty)

Serves six (or more)

Croutons
2 thick slices sourdough bread
4 tbsp olive oil
salt

Soup
2 celery stalks, including leaves
2 small green bell peppers, seeded
6 mini cucumbers (1 1/4 lbs), peeled
3 slices stale white bread, crusts removed
1 fresh green chile (or less if you don't want it too hot)
4 garlic cloves
1 tsp sugar
1 1/2 cup walnuts, lightly toasted
6 cups baby spinach
1 cup basil leaves
2 tbsp chopped parsley
4 tbsp sherry vinegar
1 cup olive oil
3 tbsp Greek yogurt
about 2 cups water
9 oz ice cubes
2 tsp salt
white pepper

To make the croutons, preheat the oven to 375F. Cut the bread into bite-sized cubes (Yotam advises 3/4") and then toss the pieces with the olive oil and some salt. Spread on a baking sheet and bake for roughly 10 minutes, or until the bread has crisped and turned golden. Remove from the oven and set aside to cool until needed.

To make the soup, begin by assembling and prepping your vegetables.

The first of my substitutions came here - I used large garden cucumbers rather than the mini ones due to cost, used one very large green pepper rather than two small, and added an extra stick of celery because my two were looking a little scant. Roughly chop all of the vegetables and place them into your blending option. I am going to say food processor going forward, as that was what I used. This amount of vegetables was already a substantial volume in the processor, so I went ahead and pureed what was there to give me more room to pile in additional ingredients. The results looked like this:

To that puree, add the bread, chile, and garlic. You can retain the chile seeds if you'd like it a bit hotter, or add additional chile to taste. I didn't have any white bread in the house (I rarely do) so I crumbled up and used the last chestnut scone in place of the bread slices instead, figuring with the nuts in the soup, the flavour of the scone wouldn't be a problem. It wasn't. You could probably get away without including any of the bread called for if you wanted to. Then I added the spinach, basil, vinegar, and oil. I omitted the parsley because I was out. Then I had to blend again as I was running out of room in the processor. To the results of the second blending I added the nuts, substituting the pecans I had on hand for the walnuts.

I blended everything together into a smooth puree, and then poured roughly half into the bowl I intended to use for serving as I was out of room in the processor with a few ingredients yet to add. I knew I was out of room because there was green juice sneaking out of the connection for the lid. It looked like the Hulk was bleeding on my counter.

To what remained in the food processor I added the Greek yogurt, water, salt, and the white pepper. At this point I thought I was going to include the ice, but then realized I didn't have enough in the freezer to chill both the drinks and the soup, and opted to reserve it for the drinks as I could settle the soup into the fridge for a decent stretch of time before my company arrived. So I combined the two portions of puree and stirred them together well before putting the bowl in the fridge.

If you like your soup thick, I advise leaving out the ice cubes. I made it this way and it had a lovely texture and body. If you prefer your soups a little thinner, add some or all of the ice, or additional water until you achieve your desired consistency. Taste the soup and adjust the seasoning if necessary.

Serve immediately and very cold.

We crumbled a bit of feta and a few of the croutons into the soup as a garnish and enjoyed it immensely.

I was really happy with the meal tonight: gazpacho and a strata I had made earlier served for the main course, and we had homemade coconut lemongrass sorbetto for dessert and Pimm's lemonade as our beverage. I wasn't sure all of the flavours would work together, but they did. An excellent meal shared with people I am quite fond of resulted in good conversation and the passing of a pleasant evening. It was exactly what I wanted today and I like it when things work out that way.

Chestnut Scones

One of the purchases I made while I was at home was a bag of chestnut flour. I'd been looking for it haphazardly for the last year, ever since reading this recipe in Dorie Greenspan's Baking and finally found it at the Italian Centre Shop. I might be the only person I know who dances a jig in the middle of a shop aisle upon finding flour, but I'd be happy to be proven to be in good company. 

These scones have a slight sweetness and their flavour is subtle, but really lovely. I was expecting them to be more exotic than they turned out to be, but that was just fine. It's a great recipe as is and I think there's room for tinkering. I want to make another batch and add some of the bergamot extract to it, as I think it could be delicious.

Chestnut Scones

(p. 34, Baking)

Makes 12 

1 large egg

3/4 cup cold heavy cream

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup chestnut flour

2 tablespoons sugar

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

8 tablespoons (1 stick or half a cup) unsalted butter, cut into small pieces and chilled

To begin, centre a rack in your oven and preheat it to 400F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone mat if you are lucky enough to have one. 

In a small bowl or measuring cup, stir together the egg, cream, and vanilla. I ended up using vanilla soy milk instead of the cream, which wasn't a problem. 

In a larger bowl or the basin of a large food processor, measure out the flour, chestnut flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Whisk or pulse to combine the dry ingredients thoroughly. Add the chilled butter pieces and blend the butter into the dry ingredients until the mixture is pebbly. You should have some larger flakes of butter and some smaller pieces - the variation is a good thing here. If you are working with a food processor, take care not to over-process so that everything is evenly dispersed. 

Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix to combine. This dough will be wet and sticky. Don't over mix it or the scones might be tough. I found it easier to remove the flour/butter mixture from my food processor and do the wet/dry mixing in a bowl on the counter. Still in the bowl, knead the dough gently by hand 8 to 10 times until if forms a smooth mass. 

To shape the scones you have a few options. Dorie recommends turning the dough out onto a lightly floured counter, dividing it in half, and shaping each half into a disk roughly five inches in diameter. Each disk can be cut into six wedges. Alternatively. I portioned the scones straight out of the bowl with my fingers, which resulted in a more rustic drop-scone look that I happen to be partial to. The scones can be frozen at this point by placing them on a baking sheet, putting that sheet in the freezer and then wrapping them with plastic wrap once they are fully frozen. They don't have to be defrosted before baking, just add about 2 minutes to the total baking time. 

To bake the scones, place them in the oven for 20-22 minutes, or until their tops are golden and firm to the touch. They are best if cooled on a rack for 10 minutes before serving, or at room temperature. 

My new camera lens gets here today, so here's hoping I can provide some better food photos with its assistance. ^_^

Watermelon and Feta

I have just come back from a great visit to my home city, refreshed and laden down with ingredients for cooking and baking that I have yet to find in Regina. I probably spent a little more than I should have, but who could turn down bergamot and pistachio extracts? Or a dark fuchia-purple opaque vinegar that has been infused with cassis? Or the five colour orgoglio pasta that looks like bits of cubist paintings shredded and rolled into tiny tubes? Or the Polish fruit teas that smell like summer in a bag? Not me.

Having these new things to play with has revived my cooking brain a bit, which was feeling a little burnt out and bored prior to the trip. I can now make the chestnut scones I'd read about in Dorie Greenspan's Baking. I can try a new variation on pistachio gelato. I can muck about with the bergamot extract and see what happens. It's exciting and I needed this sense of play back. I also needed the heat to not be hovering around 40C with the humidity and it has obliged. It's still warm here, but not so prohibitively warm that I feel like I can't cook, although I might save my baking for the late evening just the same. I've also just finished reading Blood, Bones & Butter, which is an amazing memoir full of wry and gritty humour and descriptions of food and places that practically glow in the mind. It has stoked and sated my wanderlust in equal measures and tempted me back to the kitchen to make good, simple food.

Before I left to go home, the heat here was intense. Part of the problem with that kind of heat is that I don't feel much like eating and far less like cooking. I can sit and research the entire day if I have iced teas to sip on, but negotiating solid food decisions becomes difficult. I had splurged on an abundance of produce at the beginning of the month (yay scholarship disbursements!) and was mostly eating things  plain and raw. Along with the Rainier cherries, apricots, cucumbers, and tomatoes I had purchased was a small watermelon. This watermelon became dinner one night when it was too hot to even think. Initially I prepared half the watermelon because I wasn't that hungry, but the flavours wowed me so much that I went back for the other half and polished it off, too. This is my new favourite way to eat watermelon and I was so surprised by it that I texted a few friends that night extolling its virtues. You will want to try this, promise.

You don't have to stick to the proportions of the recipe if you don't feel like it - adapt it to whatever suits you. I didn't use the full measure of feta, and I added a bit of fresh, course ground black pepper to the second batch. I also omitted the olive oil and the onion the second time around, although fruit infused olive oils could probably be a lot of fun here. The basil is a surprising and delicious addition - give it a shot, even if you have your doubts about it.

Watermelon and Feta
(p. 282, Plenty)

Serves 4 (if you feel like sharing)

10 oz feta
4 1/2 cups large chunks of watermelon
3/4 cup basil leaves (loosely to moderately packed)
1/2 small red onion, very thinly sliced (optional)
olive oil

Slice the feta into thin pieces or break it by hand into smallish chunks. Arrange everything except the oil on a serving platter or in a shallow bowl and gently mix them together a bit. Drizzle with the olive oil and serve immediately.

The Pricey Pesto

I am publishing this post mostly as an excuse to laugh at myself. Today, I let my inner magpie - that brainless, flighty, impulsive bit of myself that goes off on tangents that start "Ooh! Shiny!" and typically end in some kind of bemused contemplation or regret - buy a total of $64 worth of basil. How? My particular blend of mathematical ignorance combined with my desire to cook amazing things for other people and resulted in hilarity.

I was wandering the Farmer's Market this morning with my friends Bianca and Dale, admiring and getting excited about all of the produce that is starting to come available here now that we are a few months past melting. There were lots of lovely new additions to tables - colourful golden and burgundy beets, crisp lettuces and other leaves, freshly picked shelling peas, new potatoes, all kinds of squash... Among the new additions were bundles of dill and other herbs on display at many of the stands. As we walked past one particular stand I noticed a couple of very large pots on the ground beside a table and observed that they were full of lovely, full bushes of basil, one of the few fresh herbs I use a lot of that I hadn't managed to grow myself so far this summer. I asked the gent tending the stall how much the plants were, and he said "Well, they've been growing for quite a while, so probably $35 each." I nodded and decided I didn't need one that badly, or at least not that one, as I had heard of smaller plants available at a supermarket for quite a bit less. He then piped up and said that he was selling his loose basil for a dollar a gram. Somehow in my head that seemed like a reasonable price, and I remembered that I had promised Amie (well, promised is the wrong word really, it was more like ceding to her demands ^_~ ) that I would make the pesto buns I had made for a previous gathering again for our next one which is coming up quite soon. I knew I needed 1.5 ounces of basil (about 2 cups loosely packed) to make the pesto for the buns. So not being smart enough to pull out my phone and check the conversion from ounces to grams, I told the gent that I needed the 1.5 ounces and he nodded and set to work snipping bright green leaves from the bushes and piling them into the bowl on his scale. In the end he gave me 1.9 ounces of basil, estimating a 0.4 ounce loss once I had removed all of the stems. Converting that to grams resulted in 56 (if I am remembering all of the numbers correctly, and I think I am)... which meant I now owed him $56.

Talk about sticker shock.

My first reaction was to refuse as I certainly hadn't been expecting that kind of pay out - and to top it off, I didn't even have cash on me and had been planning on paying back my friends for the purchase once I made it to a bank. Apparently I looked shocked, because the gent was suddenly watching me fairly closely. More thinking out loud than trying to be annoying I said "I certainly wasn't planning on spending $56 to make these buns", to which he nodded. I knew I was going to go through with the purchase regardless, because it was my own fault that I hadn't done more to ascertain the outcome myself and it seemed unfair to leave the picked leaves behind to wilt and therefore penalize him for my shortsightedness. As I stood there and thought for a moment, he leaned over the table and with a very conspiratorial look said "I'll give it to you for $40." Still a lot of money, but slightly lower on the scale of wow. I accepted, borrowed the money to pay for it and then left my friends sitting at a sunny bench while I ran to the bank. From that point on, we got up to some other shenanigans, which included a brief sojourn to a supermarket to track down the smaller basil plants I had not purchased earlier  - two of them for $8. It's a slightly different variety, but hey, it works. I am pretty sure there are people buying similar quantities of weed for less money than I paid for the first bundle of basil, though...

It so happens that I am reading about the development of the modern economy for my research right now, and my experiences today illustrated a point I'd been learning about quite eloquently - it's usually better to own the means of production than to be reliant on buying the results. If I had bought the $35 plant at the beginning of the exchange I'd have saved money, had more than the required amount of basil for the recipe, and probably ended up with a hardier plant specimen than my later supermarket offerings. Live and learn. Now that I've had time to let it settle in my brain, it makes me laugh and is a good example of how my impulsiveness and good intentions get me into minor trouble now and again.

And now a quick set of photos to celebrate the pricey pesto:

The recipe for the pesto and the buns themselves can be found here.

Also - I now have a rasp grater. That thing is awesome.