gray skies, red soups : goat cheese & tomato soup

Oh, I do love a good soup day.

There's a chill on the air and a little hungry empty spot somewhere in between your heart and your belly. Each little silver drop from the gray sky is an invitation to stay in bundled in my sweatshirt & head wrap & make a toasted cheese sandwich to dip in a steamy bowl of soup. We are diving headlong into autumn, increasingly an emblematic chill in the air. There is one house down the street, the lawn covered with leaves in the orange scale of fall colors. I want tomato soup. For real. Tomatoes are the hardest to let go when the seasons shift. They are so delicious, August & September are dotted with the jewel toned juicy delicious of ripe tomatoes. A couple weeks ago, I got the last haul of Roma tomatoes from my local market & made up this recipe. I have made it again with canned tomatoes & it was still very delicious. A bit richer, a bit denser, a bit redder. What I am in love with about this soup is the inherent brightness that the goat cheese brought. I do love a good creamy soup, but sometimes the cream does not love me back. So I came to think, why not use a little fresh goat cheese? We never go wrong together. It is one of those rare relationships with nary a miscommunication. I like goats & all that they make & the cheese likes me back. Combined with the sweetness of slowly softened leeks & good tomatoes, its a perfect combination. Sitting here watching the fat gray sky, this will make for a perfect soupy autumn day.

tomato & goat cheese soup

what you need: soup pot blender slotted spoon cotton butcher's twine to tie bouquet garni ingredients: 1.75 # roma tomatoes, peeled, seeded & chopped (or a large 28 oz can of quality diced roma tomatoes) 2Tbsp sherry vinegar 1 tsp granulated sugar (optional) 1 leek, white & bright green, cleaned & sliced thin 1/2 medium yellow or sweet onion, diced 2 cloves garlic, peeled & diced fine 1 Tbsp tomato paste a bouquet garni (i made one with 2 basil stems, 4 parsley stems & a sprig of thyme) a bay leaf 4-6 cups vegetable or chicken stock 1/2 tsp ground allspice several gratings of nutmeg or a scant pinch of ground 2.5 oz fresh goats milk cheese, bring to room temperature sea salt fresh cracked black pepper good extra virgin olive oil a few tablespoons of fresh chopped parsley & basil how to make it: -toss tomatoes with sherry & sugar, use sugar if you prefer a sweeter tomato flavor -pre-heat a medium, heavy bottomed soup pot over medium high flame, add a few tablespoons of cooking oi & heat -add diced onions & thinly sliced leeks & stir to coat, reduce heat to a medium flame, stir occasionally until cooked through, but not brown. the onions will be soft and see through & the leeks will be soft & bright -add tomatoes & stir to coat with onions, add garlic & dried spices & cook all together for about 5 minutes. season with some salt & pepper. stir occasionally until the tomatoes start to exude liquid that begins to caramelize slightly -add 4 cups of broth, you can add a few more cups of cold water also, if you like a thinner soup or if the broth does not cover the tomatoes. -add bouquet garni. bring all to a light boil then reduce heat to simmer -simmer about 20 minutes & stir a few times while cooking -using a slotted spoon, lift out about 1-1.25 cups of tomato chunks & onions & set aside -discard bouquet garni & bay leaf -remove the center of the blender lid, add broth & tomatoes to fill up to about half of the blender work bowl, cover with lid & cover hole with a heavy folded towel (this allows the steam to escape without burning you or building up pressure inside the blender) -puree until desired consistency, puree in batches if necessary, never fill blender more than half full with hot liquids. -in last batch, add the goats milk cheese & puree -return pureed soup & reserved vegetables to the pot & bring to a simmer -check seasoning & adjust using salt & pepper, add a little sherry vinegar if you want more zestiness -to serve: garnish each bowl with sprinkles of fresh herbs & drizzle olive oil over the top

purloined citrus is best

okay, so we asked permission for these oranges.

but they sure taste all the more sweet knowing they were not only free of charge, we were saving them from being wasted. there's something so much sweeter about a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice when its made from oranges that would otherwise die the fate of a merely decorative lawn ornament. because that is what happens out here. people grow the most miraculous trees laden with fruit and their yards become littered with rotten fruit. that's just messed up. [/caption] so what does any self respecting food lover do? they convince their girlfriend to get a fruit picker, ask the next door neighbor if they'll be needing all those oranges & thereby secure a steady supply of oranges! you may call it stealing, you may call it foraging, you may call it the most genius thing on earth. this is the most local food a gullet can get. so, most months we have oranges, lemons, oroblancos sometimes. and now pomegranates. and then figs. since moving to LA, i have come to feel silly purchasing citrus when all around us its just weighing down tree branches in every other yard lining the streets. now, keep in mind, while i am not condoning stealing anything, its a nice fantasy/secret ambition to done black ninja outfits & go on a city wide mission to make marmalade. or not. you know, depending on where you stand on free food or ninja costuming.

butterflies on payroll

it was one of those idyllic days.

we went on a hike on a perfectly sunny day. it got hot, so we took a dip in a lake fed by mountain streams. she swam across, i stayed at the edge catching mudbugs. or crayfish, or crawdaddies, whatever you will. it was as if all of nature was in our groove. we sat down on a tree stump on the bank of the lake & ate lunch. i dropped a little bit of the trail mix we were eating as a side dish, a chipmunk came out, nibbled on it, then stood for a while watching us watching him. a few minutes later, three chipmunks were there, they came right up to us. i named them: green bean, hazelnut & oliver. one of them broke into our backpack & had its way with a baggie full of snacks. i suspect it was oliver. we headed back & i needed to get some good shots of yarrow. i had harvested some a few days prior & didn't get a shot of it. it was one of the last things on my to-do list. and what do you know, there was a stand of yarrow, just above a rushing brook. so i took a picture. then this butterfly came along. and it hung out the whole time i took pictures. i mean really? butterfly? did you know that women with no contest to your good looks make millions showing up for a photo shoot & performing as well as you did? i look at these pictures & all i can think of is when jenelle said, of another equally idyllic picture from the week, is: "damn, that's almost perfect, all we need is some dolphins high-fiving in the back ground & forget about it!"

oregon, i think i love you

Where does it all go? That vacation glow?

For a few charmed days up to a few prized weeks we vacate the menial pace of our daily lives & embark on a mini-adventure. Taking it all in for some truly special moments. That hint of romance walking down unfamiliar streets feeling like anything can happen. You can fall in love with a place & your work-free heart pumps, flushing your cheeks & filling the brain with endless possibility. When I think of our vacation to Oregon just a few short weeks ago, I get all aflutter. Truly great vacations are magic. They make you feel like all of life & living it is gonna be even bigger, brighter & taste so much better as a result of it. After all, how can it not, everything will be seasoned with the pepper of a week spent exploring. [caption id="attachment_279" align="aligncenter" width="448" caption="ever a mix of mid-19th century industrial design & a proliferation of green, portland is covered in gems"][/caption] Having climbed natural wonders, heard the laughter of beloved friends old & new & felt the warmth of family, you can return to the bones of daily life still invigorated. Your lungs still full of fresh mountain air. Then a few weeks pass & you realize the glow is all but worn off. [caption id="attachment_272" align="aligncenter" width="448" caption="this chipmunk "shared" lunch with us along side the banks of a mountain stream fed lake. poor us."][/caption] Good thing I take good notes. Seeing the pictures can genuinely bring back all that excitement, all those delicious meals & vibrant colors. While I may be hot & sticky in this late summer heat wave, just on the other side of weeks full to the brim with freelance projects & days stuffed with meetings, I am breathing in the cool green air of our trip to Oregon. It started with a trip to Portland, a couple days of eating absolutely nothing but delicious food & taking in the particularly gorgeous blend of lush landscape & old urbanity. Neighborhood streets dotted with galleries & cafes dissemble along old sidewalks to lilting hills of fecund yards full of plants & classic trimmed porches. The hipster supermarket phenomena: thumbs up. Love it. Insurance that there is always a great meal to be had. We covered a lot of ground & took a lot of pictures & so let me get on with it. The only way to do our Oregon trip justice is to break it up into a few entries. Permit the flavors to linger a bit longer. Some non-edible highpoints, little gems along the way. We found the best little independent gallery called ‘land.” Simple & to the point, the layout of the two story gallery/shop allowed for the great paper works to shine, stationary & prints by Jill Bliss were a highpoint. From Portland we took a train to Gresham where we procured some of the most amazing produce, in particular some peaches & berries. The Pacific Northwest grows berries like none other. The slow creeping heat allows, even in the hottest of summers, for the depth of the floral berry flavors to develop before they get heavy with sugar. Simply amazing stuff. I can't express the lust inducing cravings I get for these berries. After a delicious evening at my parent’s home, we drove out to the central coast to a family favorite of Yachats where we stayed at an ocean front cottage. There is nothing quite like the beauty of a nights rest to the tune of tides & salt air. There was arts & crafts night, a stellar coffee cake, kite flying & so much amazing sea food. [caption id="attachment_277" align="aligncenter" width="336" caption="i mean, really? you're gonna be this perfect of a day for a hike? who cued the butterflies?"][/caption] We came back to Mount Hood & took a day trip along the river, dabbled a bit with Washington state along the highway, took in Multnomah Falls & ate our way back over the mountain. By the time I came back to LA, my lungs were sweetened with green mountain air, my pulse slowed by the inevitable pace of a state committed to growing some of the most amazing fruit in the world. Every time I return, I fall more in love with Oregon. I can't wait to get back. Yeah, yeah, the rain, you say. I say, bring it. I'll get galoshes & an underwater camera. [caption id="attachment_278" align="aligncenter" width="336" caption="some flowers we picked from the side of the road."][/caption]

a perfect day for sun tea

Did someone say Indian Summer?

Okay, so maybe its not Indian Summer, it's just a late hitting, below the belt sort of heat wave. While friends in the midwest are donning gloves today, we're hiding out in shady corners under fans & air conditioning units in 105° heat. As my friend from Chile says, "what is it you American's say about lemons? Yeah, make something better out of it." So, I vote for heatwave sun tea. Nothing is quite more refreshing in the oppressive heat than a glass of cool tea. And nothing is quite more oppressive on hot days than heat coming from the kitchen. Sun tea is actually just another way of saying "Cold Extraction." A long, low or no heat extraction of tea which will render a delicious tea with no tannins, full flavor & no heat. People are a bit creeped out these days to do a true sun tea, and as they should be, the perfect temperature for growing bacteria is in that 75°-140° range, so yeah, optimal conditions for brewing creepers in your tea. This is why it is so important to use only highly clean, filtered, preferably reverse osmosis, water. Spring water, no. Tap water, oh, heck, no. Also, be sure your container is clean, plastic is not good for this, use only clear, clean glass. Also, nice to know: you don't actually need the sunshine to make a good sun tea. Although there is this summer romance associated with it. You set up your tea on the back porch, go run around all day & come home to a lovely caramel colored dream. It's like magic. With a clean container, good tea, clean-as-saint-theresa-water, and about 8-10 hours, you'll have a great batch of tea for drinking on ice & no heat to speak of. I actually like doing cold extractions even when its not hot out just for the simple fact that you can get rich flavor with no tannins. So, sun or no, you can have your tea & drink it to. Put it together before bed & wake to it in the morning. Its okay, no one will judge your nightshade tea. As with all tea brewing, you need to be sure your proportions are good. For sun teas, I typically do a mix of either black or green tea with herbs, like mint or lavender, or both. I love to do black tea with cinnamon & roses, Japanese sencha with mint & tarragon, the tea in the picture is Chinese green w/lavender, mint & dried stevia leaf. I work in proportions, so this recipe below will really only be useful to you if you're using looseleaf. Either way, brew your tea & pop it in the fridge immediately when its done. Try to drink it within 24-48 hours of brewing. If you see a little ribbon forming, that's a nasty little strand of bacteria forming, pitch it out. While it most likely won't make you sick, unless you have immune problems, it will most certainly will not make for a pleasant arena in your belly. cold extracted iced tea or sun tea per quart of clean water: 1/4-1/2 cup of tea & aromatics (per gallon of water, there should be about a cup or so of tea, depending on strength of tea) suggestions: green tea w/mint & lemongrass earl grey w/lavender green tea w/mint, lavender & sage herbal blend of mint, lavender, roses, sage & lemongrass dream a little dream & make it into tea! how to make it: -clean a large glass or ceramic container using boiling water or a sanitizing solution & rinse well -add your tea to a reusable cloth tea extracting bag or large paper one, you can also use those funnel shaped coffee filters & secure the top -add cold, clean water to your container, drop in tea & cover securely -steep 4-6 hours in sunlight, or up to 8. steep 8-10 hours indoors at room temperature -remove tea bag, squeeze liquid from bag into tea container, discard bag. sweeten to taste, or don't, refrigerate for up to 48 hours. -serve over ice with a plate of cookies & i'll be right over.

carve your cauliflower

Cauliflower has a complex, beautiful architecture.

Carve a cauliflower with the same love & respect for structure as you would a game bird. It makes me sad that cauliflower gets a bad rap. So what, it's the only white vegetable, it still has personality. (Okay, the only white vegetable except for white asparagus grown in the dark. That kind of makes them the veal of the vegetable world, doesn't it?) Anyway. Cauliflower. I rather like the stuff. It has a beautiful complex structure. I hate to see them hacked up into little bits like vegetable cheese crumbs. I like to take special care to carve it well; to show the beautiful individual florettes or little cross sections like reverse silhouettes of tiny trees. When you cut up a cauliflower, you should start at the bottom. Turn your pristine head, free of grey spots, upside down. Use a thin sharp knife to carve around the base at an angle so you can remove a sort of dreidel-shaped chunk from the bottom. Trim away the leaves to expose the central "trunk" of the cauliflower. From here all the bases of the cauliflower florettes will be visible to trim free. Also, the base is good eats, especially if you are making a soup or saute, so chop up the center into bite sized pieces once its been freed of all its florettes.

farewell summer



It is time to say goodbye to summer.

The grey puffy sky outside my window says it so. The $140 bill for my human biology textbook affirms the sigh. Sigh. Bye, summer. You were great. Most of all, what I love about summer is outdoor cooking. I also love camping, though it had been long time since I had done so before our trip this summer. Also nice is the accidental farmers tan just from walking around. Arms still brown, summer still lingers. Several weeks back after a week full of disappointing news about losing jobs, freelance gigs cut short (thank you, economic recession, for that boost of confidence) we decided to cut out of town. Packed up the car with our tent & city-living stresses to shake. We landed in Ojai with coordinates to secret swimming holes. Hiking ensued, feeding burros in a creek happened. My feet slipped happily along mossy rocks & all that stress of the world just slid away into chilly mineral rich waters. Our campsite came with the requisite fire pit & a little charcoal pit. But we forgot charcoal. Somewhere in the neglected recesses of my mind, I gathered up the necessary information for building a fire & set out to cook for the weekend. It was rad. I made a lot of smoke at first, but then, flames, glorious flames! And glowing embers. Some rather proud moments of wilderness lifestyle proficiency. Okay, so, my style of wilderness proficiency; it is decided: I am not a backpacker. I am far too fussy for all of that. Gimme a cooler full of fresh vegetables & sausage, not trail mix & dehydrated proteins. I need to cook, must cook, must have coffee in the morning, even if it was instant. The morning chill bristling through the trees above just sounds that much better with a warm cup of coffee & a hot potato frittata. What I love about camping is the sort of planning-ahead & dependence on common sense it takes to have a great weekend. I made a Sparta-chic meal of grilled Andouille sausage, grilled spring onions & fresh corn on the cob for dinner one night & while we ate our dinner, our breakfast was already starting. I cut up some potatoes, foraged herbs & a sweet onion & set it over the grill to cook while we ate. It was to be the base for a frittata. The potatoes kinda burned, but, who’s counting? See, open fires aren’t consistent, they are far harder to moderate than charcoals, so you have to be patient, play along, don’t take it too personally. What is at one minute a barely simmering heat is the next a blazing inferno. Things cook unevenly, you get smoke in your eyes, things get sooty. It is my idea of a grand old time. Our leftover dinner got chopped up and stirred in with the eggs. All got layered over the potatoes that had spent the night in the cooler & we had a veritable feast both evening & morning. Better than any pricey brunch munching alongside hungover hipsters sipping on mimosas & hiding last night’s makeup behind sunglasses; we had chipmunks rustling in the brush, kids racing along the path connecting the campsites. We had hike-weary bones & and sleeping bag creases on our cheeks. So, if this were a back to school essay on what I did this summer: I went camping, I cooked over open flame. I fell in love with Ojai & swam in secret pools. My cast iron skillet has never been happier. After 10 long years gracing one gas range after another, it had its first go over an open fire. I am still getting charcoal smudges here & there, like little soot kisses, reminders of an amazing summer weekend.