Rosemary Brown Butter Oatcakes

The weather report indicates that we're in for six straight days of rain. Not that I'm complaining. Though I might write often about the weather here, which of course includes the spectacular lack of light in winter, getting through the dark months requires a shift in mindset that I actually find soothing.

Winter is a time to be gentle toward oneself. It's a slowing down of all things, the right time for eating foods that tend to involve braising in the oven or long simmers on the stove. It's about sitting quietly at the kitchen counter, sipping a cup of green tea, or perhaps some of the Winter Blend from Tony's Coffee, while reading a novel involving an epic journey or heartbreak and loss.  

Meanwhile, the outside world - to which I am referring to Nature herself - marches on, providing us with soundtracks that include the roar of high, southerly winds tearing through the woods, the stratiform rain clattering on the rooftop, the almost imperceptible swoop of clouds rising then sinking.

Cheese and crackers are just the thing for an afternoon in the house, when one is safely tucked away from the meteorological hubbub, peering outside now and then only to see if the mail truck has arrived, or to watch the doe and young buck who, nearly blending in with the moss and mud, are carefully and quietly moving between the cottonwood trees.

Our CSA provided us with extra branches of winter rosemary this past week. I didn't want to waste any of it so I put it into these oatcakes. A wonderful Scottish invention, the oatcake is a plain thing in the best sense of the word. Neither only sweet nor solely savory, but wisely hinting at both, it is a sensible and nourishing vehicle for whatever you want to put on top of it - honey, cheese or a slathering of marmalade.

Adapted from one of my most favorite cookbooks, River Cottage Every Day, this version includes brown butter. Cooking butter at a low flame is the perfect way to fill the house with a warming and nutty scent in minutes. The brown butter's toasty depth counters the rosemary's astringent flavor, bringing this flaky, crunchy oatcake into well-mannered harmony.

Perfect food for a rainy day, I'd say.

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Part cookie, part cracker and totally tasty.

Rosemary Brown Butter Oatcakes

Makes about 22.

Ingredients
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into cubes
1 1/3 cup quick oats
1 1/3 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
2 teaspoons finely chopped fresh rosemary
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
Fresh black pepper, several grinds
Handful of sunflower seeds

Boiling water, about 3/4 cup

Instructions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly flour 2 baking sheets.

To make the brown butter:
Place butter in small saucepan with high sides. On medium heat, melt butter. Swirl pan for more even melting. After butter melts, it will foam up in a white foam before settling into a more solid raft on top of the liquid. Continue to swirl the pan and watch the butter. You will begin to see brown flecks on the bottom. They will move more toward filling the entire bottom. The butter will become golden with toasty brown bits and smell nutty and fragrant.

Combine the dry ingredients, including the rosemary. Make a well in the center and pour in the brown butter. Make sure to include the flavorful brown bits. Using a large spoon, combine thoroughly.

Pour boiling water into the mixture a combine with your spoon. Using your hands, work the mixture together into a dough. If it seems too wet, you may add more quick oats, a spoonful at a time. Shape the dough into a ball. Let it rest for a few minutes.

Roll dough out between 2 sheets of parchment paper to a thickness of about 1/4 inch. Using a round cookie cutter, cut out circles 2 1/2 inches in diameter. You can reroll any scraps but the dough will become increasingly crumbly the more you work with it. You may need to dampen the dough slightly with a bit of water on your hands, or if it needs more give it a light sprinkle of water before pushing it back together and rerolling.

Place oatcakes on prepared sheets. Bake for 20 minutes, then flip the oatcakes over and bake for an additional 10 minutes. Remove from sheets and cool on a wire rack.

These will keep for up to 7 days in an airtight container but surely you will devour every morsel before the week runs out.

Hearty Legumes and Greens Soup

As long as it's still January, I fear we will continue hearing about detoxes and cleanses, including those of the celebrity variety.

I do my best to eat a balanced diet, but sometimes it's hard to keep up, especially when I have a three-year-old running about (jumping around pretending he is a dinosaur of the carnivorous variety would be more accurate).

Mostly we eat what he eats. Sometimes I eat what's left on his compartmentalized kid plate after it's been sitting for a while -- shriveled peas, slivers of stale cheese, dried out tortellini.

Not so long ago I was talking to a cashier at Trader Joe's. He gazed at my son sitting in the front of the shopping cart and mentioned that he had a two-year-old daughter at home. Somehow, we began discussing the five-second rule and how now that we're parents we've inevitably cast such silliness aside.

"Five seconds on the floor, thirty seconds, is there really a difference?" He shrugged, though I could tell he was sincerely hoping I would agree.

I nodded then asked, "Do you ever pick up food from the floor and just eat it?"

"Yeah," He admitted, his eyes shifting away, perhaps from embarrassment. "Definitely."

Let me clear something up right now. There is no shame in picking up an old cracker, dusting it off (this, to me, is what easily constitutes a "cleanse") and popping it into your mouth, especially after you've been awoken multiple times in the middle of the night for no apparent reason by a little human and just can't think very clearly now that daylight has arrived. 

To all the highly-ambitious, disciplined individuals who are currently engaging in detoxing and cleansing activities involving solid or liquid food items other than old crackers, I commend you. The best I am going to be able to do this year I'm afraid, is clean out the pantry. Which I think in some ways, is equally as important as cleaning out one's colon.

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Time to clean out that pantry!

Now. Cleaning out the pantry doesn't necessarily mean throwing everything out. I for one hate wasting food and am always trying my utmost to make sure nothing goes to waste. However, if you've amassed odds and ends of dried beans over the course of the past twelve months as I have, soup is an ideal vehicle for using them well.

Here's a hearty and satisfying winter "stoup" - a stewy, hearty soup, versions of which you'll find in any French or French-inspired cookbook from grand dame Julia Child to restauranteur, Jody Williams.

You can use a variety of beans, as long as there are some larger, sturdier ones mixed in with smaller types. Beans of nearly any kind have an affinity for dark, leafy greens and pork. I used a nice ham hock - a cured but uncooked ham - from the Berkshire hog we'd purchased from Farmer Jeff in the Fall.

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The beauty of a Berkshire ham hock.

If you lack access to a hock, bacon or a ham bone will suffice as well. The greens used here also lend a mineral flavor which cuts through the richness of the pork and starchiness of the beans.

Get your kitchen in order and make this - very, very soon. Then, feel pleased as you sit back and eat a bowl of this satisfying soup, your pantry well cleansed.

Hearty Legumes and Greens Soup

Serves 6-8

Ingredients
1/2 cup dried chickpeas
1 cup lima beans
1/2 cup pinto beans
1/2 cup green lentils
Extra virgin olive oil
1 bunch Swiss chard
1 yellow onion
1 fennel bulb
1 garlic clove
1 tablespoon fennel seeds, finely ground
1 tablespoons tomato paste
1 uncooked ham hock

Freshly ground black pepper
Salt

Instructions
Place chickpeas in a bowl, covering with at least two inches of cold and allow to soak overnight. In a separate bowl, place lima beans, pinto beans and lentils, cover with water and allow to soak overnight. The next day, drain and set the two separate bowls aside.

Thoroughly wash chard. Remove leaves from stems, roughly chop. Finely dice the stems. Peel and finely dice the onion. Trim off stems and finely dice the fennel. Mince the garlic clove.

Over medium heat, place 1/4 of olive oil in a large soup pot. Add the chard leaves, stems, onion and fennel. Cook until vegetables begin to soften, about 12-15 minutes.

Stir minced garlic, ground fennel seeds and tomato paste into the vegetables. Cook until fragrant, about one minute. Add ham hock. Add drained chickpeas then cover the entire mixture with water. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to allow the mixture to simmer for 30 minutes.

Add the remaining reserved beans and lentils then add enough water to cover. Cook for about 1 1/2 hours, until the soup becomes quite thick and all the beans are tender. Season with salt and pepper. The ham may have added all the salt that you will need.

Remove ham hock. Trim all the skin and meat off the hock and cut into small pieces.

To serve, ladle soup into bowls, add pieces of ham and additional pepper. Garlic croutons are a nice addition as well.

Adapted from Jody Williams' Buvette.

Leek, Potato and Smoked Salmon Soup

The Pacific of coastal Washington seems an entirely different being from the ocean I knew when I lived in Southern California. There, even on January days, I would step off the sandy expanse of beach, leapfrog under the waves going past the break and swim happily away.

Here, sandy beaches are as uncommon as sunny days in winter and the Pacific is cold, dark and mysterious. The earth's brittle tectonic plates lay hidden fathoms beneath the San Juan de Fuca Strait to the south and the Georgia Strait to the northwest.

The Washington coast offers a contrasting beauty, one with impressive cliff drop offs and rocky beaches that disappear and reappear with the changes of the tide. It can be moody and unruly. It is my kind of coast, its primordial energy ever apparent.

The longer I live in the Pacific Northwest the more I seem to want everything from my interactions with people to the food I eat to be as straightforward as the coastal landscape. Less adornment, more of the basics. This place, by its natural, unstripped stance defies those of us who live within it to seek the authentic in all aspects of life.

When it comes to food, the local ingredients and products we have available to us are so stellar that they need few flourishes. The actual flavor of everything from a sliver of roasted beet or parsnip to a morsel of aged Gouda shines through in each bite.

Take this soup. Perfect for the chilliest and dampest day, it's made of five simple ingredients: leeks, potatoes, a small piece of smoked salmon, veggie broth and a splash of milk. It may not sound like much but it is indeed comfort in a bowl. Comfort, which joins together the plainest flavors of the winter soil with the brininess of the sea. 

For me, the star here is the hot-smoked salmon, from Lummi Island Wild, which practices reef-net fishing here in our local waters. If you have never heard of reef-net fishing, it is one of the greenest fishing methods, practiced by Native American tribes for centuries. Salmon are caught and immediately placed, live, in tanks to minimize stress and decrease the release of stress hormones. This results in sweeter tasting fish.

Hot-smoked fish as the one I've used in this soup is cooked through during the smoking process then allowed to cool, whereas cold-smoked fish is processed at around room temperature and remains raw.

If you don't have access to a good smoked salmon, try another type of fish such as smoked trout or pollock. Your soup will still be warming and flavorful. More importantly, it will surely soothe you wherever you are located, whether sitting fireside in a cold, rainy climate or by a southerly and sunny shore.

Leek, Potato and Smoked Salmon Soup

Serves 4

Ingredients
2 large leeks
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 1/2 lbs. Yukon gold (or other waxy type) potatoes
6 cups vegetable broth
6 oz. hot-smoked salmon or other smoked fish
1/2 cup milk

salt and pepper
handful of chopped chives or green part of scallion

Instructions
Peel potatoes. Cut into 1/2-inch dice.

Using only the white part of the leek, cut leek in half lengthwise. Slice leek into thin half-moons.

In a medium pot, bring vegetable broth to a simmer. Add the entire piece of salmon and cook for 4 minutes, just enough to warm the fish and allow the broth to take on some of the fish flavor. Remove fish from broth and flake into bite-size pieces.

In a separate pot melt butter over medium-low heat. Add leeks and cook for 10-12 minutes, stirring occasionally until leeks have softened but not browned. Add potatoes then warmed broth. Bring to boil and turn to low, allowing mixture to gently simmer until potatoes have soften, approximately 30-40 minutes.

Once potatoes are tender, remove 3 cups of mixture and puree in a blender. You may alternatively use an immersion blender. Return puree to soup pot and add the milk. Add more milk or water to thin soup as needed, making sure not to bring the soup back to a boil once the milk is added.

Add flaked pieces of salmon. Season with salt and pepper.

Serve in bowls garnished with chives or chopped scallions. A drizzle of smoked olive oil is always nice, as is a crusty roll on the side.

Adapted from The River Cottage Fish Book.

Kimchi Pasta

It's 2015. Happy New Year!

Did you make any resolutions? Set new goals?

Now that we're a few days in, I'm still reflecting on what I'd like to accomplish this year. I don't think there is any need to hurry when it comes to making plans that will be realistic yet challenging for the remainder of the year.

My athletic goal, however, was already carved out for me the first day of 2015 when I was recruited by my husband, Marc, to join his RowPro virtual rowing team.

During the winter, enveloped by monochromatic days (lately, when I step outside, it always feels like it's about 4:30 p.m., whether the actual time is 8 a.m. or 1 p.m.) we go a little stir crazy and often end up with big, hopeful goals revolving around athletics and fitness. Marc also happens to be training for his third IronMan race in the summer and rowing is a great way to cross train during the cold and wet weather.

With this rowing challenge, each member of our team logs his or her daily workout and our team mileage is tallied up. We've each been assigned individual goals.

Mine is 50,000 meters per week.

Why yes, I did have to ask Marc to repeat that number again right after he told me. I hemmed and hawed for a few seconds, said I quit the team then changed my mind again and announced that I would rejoin it, which meant agreeing to the 50,000.

For some people, that kind of distance on the ergometer (indoor rowing machine) is easy, but for me, it's a challenge.

This is especially true given that I suffered an injury last April while picking up a very heavy bag of groceries and could not do any on- or off-water rowing from then until October when after much physical therapy and an eventual shot of cortisone in my forearm, the problem improved.

Now that I am getting all this rowing in, I figure I should be allowed to devour heaps of my favorite carb-laden dish. Right? No way am I going on any detox juice cleanse when I have serious working out to do.

A toddler sniffs out a family favorite.

Kimchi pasta is beloved in our home as well as those of all our extended family and friends. Over the years, we've slowly brought increasing numbers of devotees into the fold. I haven't met anyone yet who doesn't taste this dish made from spaghetti, red kimchi, onion, and heavy cream and immediately fall in gah-gah love. It's a funky yet comforting umami explosion with each bite.

The combination might sound a little weird to those who so far have been deprived of it. Trust me, though. Once you try it, your palate will be longing for more.

I first tasted this dish about five lifetimes ago at my brother Warren's friend's restaurant, a little place on La Brea Avenue in L.A. I don't remember the name of it, just that it was a favorite hang out of a bunch of Korean art school kids and that there was a basketball hoop out back.

Warren started making this dish and the rest of us went crazy for it. Over time, each of us have added our own personal touches. Warren always includes some kind of seafood such as langostino or bay scallops.

My favorite addition is wild Oregon shrimp, whose brininess goes perfectly with the assertive yet creamy sauce. But, I don't include it unless my husband isn't eating since he's allergic to shellfish.

Start the new year right and make this right now! Cheers!

Kimchi Pasta

Ingredients
3/4 lb. spaghetti

1/2 cups red kimchi (I use napa cabbage kimchi)*, homemade or store bought
1 small yellow onion
2 cloves garlic
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 teaspoon gochujang paste
1 teaspoon bonito shavings, optional
1/4 cup white wine
1/4 cup heavy cream

8-12 oz. of cleaned seafood (fresh or frozen) such as small bay scallops or wild shrimp

1/4 cup cooking liquid from the boiled pasta

2 tablespoons sesame oil
Japanese rice seasoning (fumi furikake)

Instructions
For the pasta, place a large pot of salted water on high heat to boil. Note: The sauce comes together very quickly, so you want to be ready to add in the cooked pasta fairly soon after the sauce is finished.

Chop kimchi into small pieces, set aside (including any liquid that comes out of the kimchi). Peel and halve onion, slicing thinly. Peel and mince garlic.

Over medium heat, place butter in large pan. Once it has melted, add onions. Cook until they begin to soften, for about 7-8 minutes. Add garlic and cook for another minute, until fragrant. Add gochujang and work it into the onion mixture. Cook for 3 more minutes. Add bonito shavings, if using, and stir. Add kimchi and its liquid, stirring to combine. Add wine and turn heat up to medium-high, allowing liquid to mostly evaporate (about 5 minutes). Turn heat down to medium.

If using seafood, add now and cook until seafood is warmed through and still tender.

Now is also an ideal time to add the spaghetti to the boiling, salted water. Cook it until it is al dente

Add cream. Allow to cook for another 2-3 minutes, until the cream thickens slightly. Turn heat to low. (If your spaghetti needs additional time, you can turn the heat off until you are ready to add it to the sauce.)

Drain spaghetti, remembering to set aside a bit of the liquid. Immediately add spaghetti to the sauce pan. Drizzle 1 tablespoon of the sesame oil over the pasta and sauce, then combine. Add cooking liquid from the spaghetti to your liking (you may or may not need the entire amount) and combine again.

Serve kimchi pasta in individual bowls or on plates garnished with additional drizzles of sesame oil and a generous scattering of Japanese rice seasoning.

Serves 3-4.

*Red kimchi, as opposed to the mild white variety, includes gochugaru, Korean chili flakes that give the kimchi its heat and distinctive red color.

Ma Po Tofu

On a dark night a couple of weeks ago spent with a group of holiday-convivial writers at a local watering hole, I found myself sitting across from my friend, Marv.

Before us were plates of slightly overcooked salmon, Caesar salads, soggy fries. Talk of girl heroes with bat DNA, epic fantasy, and novels with not one, but two authors floated around us.

The storm of the moment was battering itself relentlessly against the building, rattling the windows beside us with much ferocity. Meanwhile, Marv and I hunched together, talking conspiratorially about Ma Po Tofu, a flavor bomb of a dish from Chengdu. 

Ma Po Tofu is my kind of comfort food. 

I'm not quite sure how we got on the topic, but Marv did time in the Chinese Studies department at the University of Chicago and has a passion for Chinese food, which has led him many times into the kitchen guided by his battered copy of Fu Pei Mei's Chinese Cookbook. 

We compared notes, including Marv's disclosure that he appreciates a scattering of Sichuan peppercorns, the flavor hallmark of the dish, at the very end, whereas my preference is to make an infused oil ahead of time which I then add during cooking. Whatever our differences, the mutual consensus was a longing to devour some Ma Po Tofu at that very moment.

Some may find the idea of a tofu-and-pork dish spiked with tongue-numbing Sichuan peppercorns and a name that translates into "pock-marked face woman" to be anything but comforting. But trust me, in the low-light (or more like pretty-much-no-light) days of December here in coastal Washington, Ma Po Tofu infuses the palate - and the winter soul - with a needed hit of heat and exuberance. 

Ma Po Tofu isn't merely about spicy-hot though. It is, as in all good and sensible cooking, a dish about the balance of contrasts -- of heat and mildness, harshness and richness. Pork and chili bean paste, peppercorns and fermented black beans. Soothing tofu remains unruffled even as it is enveloped by such vividness. A toss of thinly sliced green onions provides freshness. And a final dash of additional ground peppercorns? Well. Why ever not?

If you're in need of something comforting yet vivifying, this is it. Ma Po Tofu provides an especially welcome reprieve here in a land where winter eating centers around squash and parsnips, leeks and potatoes. Indeed, during darkest December, a dish such as Ma Po Tofu does nothing but elevate the spirit. 

Here is the version I learned to make from my niece Sarah, who came to visit us in September. She's a remarkable young woman who recently took a year off medical school to do research at Stanford. She's a very talented home cook, and yes, she's also a trained concert pianist (am I really related to her?). She lives in a hacker house now in the Bay Area, where she cooks for its 13 or so residents. This dish is on regular rotation there.

For good reason.

Ma Po Tofu 

Ingredients
For Sichuan peppercorn oil*:
1/2 cup Sichuan peppercorns
3 cups neutral oil such as sunflower or canola
1 head of garlic
2-inch piece of fresh ginger
1 cinnamon stick
1 teaspoon coriander seeds
2 star anise
1/2 teaspoon of cardamom pods
1 1/2 teaspoons salt

For the dish:
2/3 cup chicken broth
2 teaspoons potato starch 
2 teaspoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon sugar

1 tablespoon neutral oil
2 medium cloves of garlic, minced
2 teaspoons minced ginger
4 green onions white part only, minced
1 tablespoon fermented black beans (or black bean paste)
1/2 teaspoon Sichuan peppercorns, black seeds removed then ground (optional)
8 ounces ground pork
2 teaspoons chili bean paste (doubanjiang) 
2 tablespoons homemade Sichuan peppercorn oil
14 ounce block of soft or regular tofu, drained and cut into 3/4” cubes

Green part of green onions sliced thinly on the diagonal for garnish

Directions
To make pepper-corn oil (best done ahead of time for maximum flavor):
1. Place oil in heavy-bottomed saucepan. Add garlic, ginger, cinnamon, star anise and cardamom. Simmer on low heat for an hour. The oil will become very fragrant. 
2. Add Sichuan peppercorns and salt. 
3. Allow to cool, pour into jars and set aside. 

*You will have plenty of leftover oil. It keeps indefinitely in the refrigerator.

To make the dish:
1. Add the chicken stock, cornstarch, soy sauce and sugar to a small bowl and stir to combine.

2. Heat a wok or large frying pan until hot. Add the oil, garlic, ginger and green onions and stir-fry with a spatula until fragrant. Add the black beans and Sichuan pepper and continue stir-frying.

3. Add the ground pork and use the spatula to break it up any clumps, leaving very small pieces. When the pork is cooked, add the chili bean paste and Sichuan peppercorn oil and stir to distribute. Add the tofu, and toss to mix (be gentle or the tofu will lose its shape).

Stir stock mixture thoroughly, scraping up anything that may have settled, then pour it over the pork and tofu. Toss to coat, then boil until the sauce thickens. If the spirit moves you, scatter additional ground Sichuan peppercorn to your liking.

Garnish with the green parts of the green onions. Serve with rice.

Adapted from Bon Appetit and pbs.org.