You've Got To Taste This

Summer hasn't really begun for me until I've picked a bucket of fresh blackberries. In Northern California blackberries are everywhere, the thorny branches growing wild in the hills or climbing around backyard fences. They're more like a weed than a treasured fruit. Ever since I could walk I've picked the plump berries with purple-stained hands, eating one for every berry that ended up in the bucket. These days when I see a blackberry bush I think of the puff pastry turnovers, pies, or jars of jam I'm going to make. Fresh blackberry jam just might be the world's best breakfast food, preferably eaten with a spoon directly from the jar. Once you've tasted homemade jam you'll never buy it again. It's a breeze to make; just pick a cool day and get over your fear of canning. (For the best canning tips get a copy of The Joy of Cooking: All About Canning & Preserving, which has easy, step-by-step instructions for sterilizing the jars. If you plan to make only one batch of jam and eat it within one week, there is no need to sterilize the jar; you can store it in a bowl.)
Making jam requires choosing one of two paths: pectin or no pectin. Pectin, a naturally occurring substance in fruits, acts as the thickening agent in jam but purists love the slow-cooked, pectin-free method. The pros and cons of pectin require a whole other blog, but suffice to say using pectin thickens the jam more quickly so there is less of a cooked sugar flavor you get from slow cooking. I decided to go pectin-free and was happy with the result. I also left the seeds in, because I love that almost nutty texture of berry jam. My last tip would be to play around with the amount of sugar you use; most recipes call for a 1:1 ratio of fruit to sugar, but if you have very ripe fruit you might want to reduce the sugar. I found it almost too sweet for my taste, although my friends and family adored it.

BLACKBERRY JAM
2 cups fresh blackberries, washed and air-dried
2 cups sugar (adjust this as needed)
1 teaspoon lemon juice

Sterilize the jam jars and set aside.

Place the berries in a stockpot and crush them with your hands. Add the sugar and lemon juice. Turn the heat to high and bring to a boil, stirring to combine the berries and jam. Once it boils turn the heat to medium-low and cook for about 15 minutes, stirring frequently. Skim any foam off the top.

To test if the jam is set, I use the refrigerator method: spoon a little jam on a plate and turn off the heat. Place the plate in the 'fridge for a few minutes. If the mixture gels (i.e. doesn't run off the plate when you hold it sideways) the jam is set. If it doesn't gel, keep cooking the jam in 5 minute increments and keep testing. Once the jam has set turn off the heat and carefully spoon the jam into the sterilized jars. Proceed with canning as directed. Or simply spoon the jam into a jar or plastic container and keep it in the 'fridge for up to 1 week.

Note: This recipe only makes about 2 medium-size jars of jam. I think if you're going to go to the trouble of making jam you should go big, so I used 20 cups of berries and ended up with about 12 small jars of jam. Give homemade jam as a gift and you'll instantly have more friends.

The ballots are in and the winner is clear! The Farmers Market in Williamsburg, VA has been voted America's favorite medium-sized (between 31 and 55 vendors) farmers market!

In its contest this summer, the American Farmland Trust received 30,000 votes and listed almost 900 participating farmers markets from across the U.S., and Williamsburg was a winner!

I was super excited when I saw this! I attended college in Williamsburg, and the Farmers Market was one of my favorite 'burg events. Williamsburg's Famers Market is located in Merchants Square on Duke of Gloucester Street, and it couldn't be more in the heart of Colonial Williamsburg.

The market is held weekly (Saturdays) from May through October and also opens for special holiday and winter weekends. 

For four years, I bought delicious vegetables, fresh flowers, and my favorite Greek foods (you've got to try the baklava from the Greek food stand) from the Farmers Market, as well as pumpkins every October to use for jack-o-lantern carving.

So next time you're in America's Historic Triangle (that's local lingo for the Williamsburg-Jamestown-Yorktown area of Virginia), be sure to check out the Williamsburg Famers Market. With a national prize now to its name, you've just got to.

For more information about the Williamsburg Farmers Market, click here.

As the demand for preportioned products continues to rise, Jif has jumped on board with a reduced-fat, on-the-go peanut butter product.  With all of the positive health qualities I adore about peanut butter, Jif To Go is perfect for stashing in my office for a mid-afternoon snack attack. However, each little cup contains 2 servings of peanut butter (4 Tablespoons) which totals around 380 calories--way more than I need for a snack--so I try to stretch it into at least 2, usually 3 servings. Smeared on a slice of high-fiber bread or on an apple, this snack is satisfying and gives me that extra boost of protein to keep me feeling full until dinner.

The peanut butter cups come in a package of six, 2.5-ounce cups that, depending on the retailer, costs between $1.99 and $4.00.

For moms on-the-go, this is an easy, healthy snack to throw into a purse with some celery or apple slices for a family trip to the park or a little league game. For the avid backpacker, hiker, or biker, stash it in a backpack for a protein-rich snack that is lightweight and won't bulk up your pack or weigh you down.

I could probably live off of peanut butter, banana, and soft white bread sandwiches for the rest of my life, but here are a few other favorite recipes that use peanut butter: 

Chocolate and Peanut Butter S'mores

Spicy Soba Noodles with Chicken in Peanut Sauce

Peanut Butter Pie

Shrimp Pad Thai

Asian Peanut Dip

Peanut Butter Candy Bar Brownies

What are some of your favorite uses for peanut butter? Do you prefer the traditional or all-natural?

      Fried chicken. OK, I know that sounds a little overboard, but bear with me here.

      A few months ago I received an extremely romantic gift from my thoughtful partner, T. No, not flowers or a candlelight dinner—it was an advanced uncorrected proof of Ad Hoc at Home. (He knows me well.) I have an insatiable curiosity about food, but I’ll admit that seeing Thomas Keller’s name emblazoned across the front page left me a bit intimidated. This is the man responsible for The French Laundry, a staple on awards lists that has been named best in the country on the Restaurant Magazine list of Top 50 Restaurants of the World no fewer than five times, and best in the world twice.

     I put the galley to the side, and little by little it drifted to the bottom of a growing stack of food books and proposals. But although I’ve fancied myself a foodie over the past few years, and have been fortunate enough to even be considered a globetrotting one, I have been a dyed-in-the-wool Southern foodie since the day I was born. And in the back of my mind I remembered that Ad Hoc, Keller’s home-cooking venture in Yountville, California, is infamous for its fried chicken.

     If my grandmother taught me anything, it’s that fried chicken is an endeavor best undertaken by the very brave. Sure, it’s simple, but here’s the conundrum: Because there isn’t much to it, there are infinite ways to mess it up. Too dry, too browned, too bland, too greasy—if you’ve eaten fast-food fried chicken, you’ve probably seen it all.

     Granted, this is Thomas Keller fried chicken, so while the ingredients are familiar, there are still … well, steps. I haven’t eaten at The French Laundry or Ad Hoc (bucket list!) but I suspect that what garners these restaurants their consistent praise is the kitchens’ meticulous attention to preparation. Luckily for me, T is the king of meticulous attention.

     He read every word of the recipe carefully, and then we jotted down the list and headed to the market. We were both giddy with the prospect of our project, thrilled to be Attempting Something Difficult in the kitchen. We cut our whole chickens into pieces, then placed them in a lemon-celery-salt brine, where they’d marinate for 12 hours.

     The next day word spread, and by 5 p.m. there was a line of family and friends in the kitchen, a dog underfoot, and martinis poured. Oil shimmered in two copper pots over closely monitored flames. And then the fun began. Chicken hit the assembly line—seasoned flour, buttermilk, seasoned flour, oil—and cooked with almost alarming precision. Two minutes, 11 minutes, 16 minutes, no more, no less.

     But we saw why as the chicken emerged, perfectly deep brown for dark meat and golden brown for white. The crispy skin was drained and salted; grabby fingers were smacked. I set out plates and napkins that were universally ignored in the race to snag the first still-too-hot pieces.

     And the response? Silence. Silence marked by chewing. Eyes that widen in surprise don’t make much noise. This was unlike any fried chicken any of us had ever had (sorry, Grandma). The meat was moist and tender with a lemony tang that made us all say, “so that’s what my fried chicken was missing!” And the skin? With that golden color and incomparable flavor, it could be used as currency. That’s what’s so exciting about food, that real artists can come along and make something old truly new again.

Which, you have to admit, is more than you can say for the Sistine Chapel.

More photos of my Fried Chicken endeavors at :Foodimentary Flickr

I've just finished reading Julie & Julia (the book about the woman who spent a year cooking all of the recipes from Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking and is now a movie starring Meryl Streep and Amy Adams).  While the book did not really inspire me to do any French cooking, it did make me want to drink a gimlet.  Throughout the book, Julie and her husband Eric have quite a fondness for this cocktail, but they make theirs with vodka instead of gin.

They are missing out, in my opionion, as there's nothing quite as refreshing as a gimlet made with some really good gin.  One of my friends just gave me a bottle of Bombay Sapphire gin, and you can make a mightly fine gimlet with this mighty fine gin!  If you're making one, it's a really good idea to use premium gin because the only ingredients in the cocktail are gin, lime juice, and a twist of lime.  

Normally I lament the end of summer because it seems like the end of the season for drinking gin and tonics, my favorite cocktail.  I'm now thinking that I'll switch to gimlets because somehow they seem right year 'round.   Julie Powell certainly seemed to think so! Of course, you do have so many great options when it comes to gin: gimlets, gin rickeys and martinis!  Check out all your options and browse our gin recipes.  Let me know if you have any favorites.   I'm feeling inspired to have a cocktail party now that I have this lovely bottle of gin.  

France, Italy, Australia, the U.S.: these are just a few countries represented in the wine aisle of your local wine store. But lately when I'm looking for an interesting new white wine, I look to Greece. While historically Greece has made some pretty mediocre wine, Greek winemakers have stepped up their game and are turning to both indigenous and international varietals to produce high-quality wines. (The climate is the main reason: 300 days of sun, varied soils, and the proximity to the sea--in Greece you’re never more than two hours from the water--are a grape's paradise.)

International varietals such as Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, Merlot, Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, and Viognier, are being grown alongside the indigenous varietals like Assyrtiko, Moschofilero, Agiorgitiko, and Mavrodaphne. It's the indigenous varietals that are the most interesting; grapes that are found only in Greece produce fabulous, food-friendly wines. Many winemakers have devoted their efforts to dessert wines, producing late harvest wines as well as fortified wines, which are some of the best in the world. There are 300 wineries in ten wine regions. My favorite wine from Greece is the fragrant, medium-bodied Moschofilero, a fragrant, lively white that is fantastic with seafood and Greek food, of course.

The most well-known Greek producers include Boutari, Evharis, Tsantali, Gaia Estate, Sigalas, Porto Carras, and Xerolithia, and a good wine store should be able to help you find at least one of these, and the online wine store wine.com carries a few as well. Three smaller producers are worth seeking out: Biblia Chora is a small winery producing organic wines in Macedonia while Katogi Strofilia produces excellent reds, whites, and rosé, and Alpha Estate is making some tasty reds. Prices for Greek wines usually start around $14, so give the big boys of France, Italy, etc. a break and try something from Greece instead.

At 9 months old, my daughter weighs in at just 14 lbs 13 oz, even though she was born at 7 lb 11 oz.  (And no, I'm not even going to apologize for this gratuitious proud mama shot.)

For those of you good at math and deciphering the CDC infant growth charts, you'll know that puts her right around the 5% line for weight.  Even though she eats like a horse, she still struggles to gain more than 2 oz a week, which is the low end of average.  She's healthy and doing great, but I still weigh her once a week just to make sure she's staying on track.  We've been hearing from a lot of other mamas who have to keep an eye on their "petite" little ones, and are wondering how they can pack on a few extra pounds and hang on to that growth curve.  Since we've had good success with Amy Grace's menu lately, I thought I'd share one of my favorites: Buttery Baby Oatmeal with Yogurt.

Since commercial baby cereal dissolves in liquid without any heat whatsoever (sketchy much?) - and I prefer to use unprocessed foods when I can anyway - I started making AG's oatmeal from scratch.  Once every couple of weeks, I cook two adult servings of oatmeal (1 cup uncooked oats), add a sizeable chunk of butter for extra fat and calories (usually around 2-3 Tbsp per batch), then spoon into ice cube trays and freeze.

Then, every morning I add just a splash of water to an oatmeal cube and heat it up in the microwave.  You might have to play around with the time to get it right, but mine usually takes around 35-45 seconds.  After that, I add a Tbsp of YoBaby yogurt to the oatmeal and mix it all up. 

Amy Grace LOVES this combo, and she gets a nice serving of whole grains and calcium with some extra fat and calories from the butter and yogurt.  Plus, the oatmeal dilutes the yogurt's sweetness, so she's not getting used to eating super-sweet foods at a young age (the first time she tried the yogurt by itself, she practically vaulted out of her Bumbo chair towards the spoon.)  

What's your favorite homemade baby food recipe, or tips for bulking up those little babies?

Because I love food and I’ll pretty much try anything, I find it hard to make broad superlative statements about a specific dish. I’m usually suspicious if anything is too loudly or too often touted as THE BEST. But it’s hard not to acknowledge when something simple and homespun gets a gourmet touch, and no one waves that particular magic wand better than James Beard Award–winning chef Daniel Boulud. His undeniably decadent approach to the hamburger—a beef patty filled with red wine–braised shortribs, foie gras, and black truffles—has been an infamous staple at Boulud’s New York French bistro concept, DB Bistro Modern, since it opened in early 2000.

When I read the breathless DB Bistro feature in the New York Times, I was skeptical. (I also cringed at the thought of paying close to $50 for what is essentially backyard barbecue food.) But it was too late. The thought of that burger, and its unapologetic grandeur, rolled around in my brain for weeks. Gradually, I wore myself down. “Sometimes a chef can bring a new perspective to the table,” I thought. Grass-fed cows … tender ribs … rich foie gras … luxurious truffles …

Needless to say, I was drooling by the time I got the opportunity to face the formidable stack. I make an annual pilgrimage to Vancouver, home of a DB Bistro location that tops many B.C. “best of” lists. And I’m grateful that the experience didn’t disappoint. These are flavors that were born to be together, and the result—a towering sandwich served with perfect golden-brown pommes frites and tarragon aioli—is beautifully coma-inducing.

I left with my eyes glazed over, stomach thrumming with happiness. These days, with pundits screaming from every news channel and alarmists predicting the collapse of the economy at any moment, it’s hard to shell out $50 for the water bill, much less a lowly hamburger.

But then again, maybe it’s those big fat memories that keep us satisfied in the lean times.

I go back and forth about whether my 7-year-old son is a picky eater.  Sometimes I think he is, but than other times, he surprises me.  He is very much like his dad, with his near total disdain for green vegetables.  He will eat cucumbers, artichokes and salad.  That's it.  I don't think I can call him a picky eater the way he inhales artichokes.  None of his friends will touch them.

He never had any interest in artichokes until a few months ago.  He was watching me peel the leaves off the choke and dip them into a vinaigrette. 

"Do you want some?" I asked.

"No, thank you."

"Ok, more for me," I said and went back to peeling and dipping.

Minutes later he said, "I changed my mind.  I'll try some."

He tried one.  And then another.  And then he just took the whole artichoke out of my hands.  Ever since then, every time he sees them at the grocery store, he asks for them.  I just read an article about raising non-picky eaters and one of the things it mentioned was to keep eating what you enjoy in front of your kids because as they continue to see the food item, and your enjoyment of it, they might come around on their very own.  It totally worked on my son with the artichokes, without me even knowing it at the time.  Heck, even my 18-month-old daughter eats them now.  I love that she knows just which part of the leaf to eat.

Now when it comes to eggplant, we were in unchartered territory.  No one in the house is a big fan.  I'll eat it if it's there and like it fine, but usually don't go looking for it.  I was pretty sure my son wouldn't be interested, so it's just not something I make that often.  Until recently.

I happened upon a recipe for Penne with Sausage, Eggplant and Feta in a special Fresh and Easy publication from Cooking Light.  Both my kids love penne, sausage and feta, so I knew it would be a homerun.  But what about the eggplant?  Skip or leave in?  Decisions, decisions.  I ended up leaving it in; it had been awhile since I had it and thought this might be another opportunity to introduce it to the kids, much easier when there are so many other flavors in the dish that they already like.

And the verdict?  They totally ate it.  I'm pretty sure it's because they didn't look closely enough to pick it apart from the sausage, but I'll take it.  If you haven't tried this recipe yet, do.  It comes together really quickly, makes a perfect weeknight meal when dinnertime becomes the witching hour, and hey, it just might get your kids to eat eggplant too. 

See the recipe here for Penne with Sausage, Eggplant and Feta here.

With just 5 weeks to go until our little guy is set to make his debut, I have to look back and laugh at some of the odd (borderline crazy!) things I've done to take care of those pregnancy cravings. Here are some of my strange experiences, and recipes I could have prepared at home to avoid public embarrassment.

Chicken Sandwich Burn: Early on, I was out running errands on a Saturday, and it struck me: I need a chicken sandwich, and I need one now! Who cares if it's 10:30 a.m.? So I casually drove up to the closest fast-food restaurant, went inside (drive thru would take too long!), and ordered. With bag in hand, I looked around, got anxious at the thought of woofing it down in front of others, and proceeded to run to my car. And there I sat: No need to drive anywhere when you can eat in the parking lot! What I did know: The sandwich would be warm. What I didn't know: It would be so hot and I was eating so fast that I burned my lip on the grease (obviously not a grilled sandwich!).

Solution? California Chicken Sandwich