Blintzes and Stuffed Eggplant

The Food Nanny
August26,27 2008
Meal 1: Savory Red Pepper and Pear Blintzes, Rosemary and Sweet Corn Rice Salad, Melon Salad
· Bring the crepes up to room temp, and warm the pepper mixture in a pan or microwave. Divide the filling evenly among the crepes placing the filling in the center of each crepe, shaping the pile into a rectangle. Fold the sides in first to almost the middle, and then roll the blintz by bringing the bottom edge to the middle and rolling the whole package tightly. It’s easier to do than explain.
· Serve the rice at room temp or warmed briefly in a sauté pan with a little oil and then a few drops of water.
· Enjoy the melon chilled.

Meal 2: Eggplant Stuffed with Moroccan Spiced Beef or Tofu, Radiatore with Garlic and Chard
· Bake the eggplant rolls at 350° until the sauce is bubbly. Cook 5 minutes more.
· Serve the pasta at room temp or warmed briefly in a sauté pan with a little oil and then a few drops of water.

Trivia: What is a chutney?

Blintzes are an old world delicacy - really just stuffed crepes- that like most foods have been bastardized or omitted from our culinary lexicon. They are traditionally filled with pie filling or sweetened cheese and topped with sour cream. But they certainly lend them selves well to a savory filling as well. This week I tried something of a compromise: getting sweetness out of something traditionally considered savory - the pepper.

This variety of pepper is called Jimmy Nardello's Italian. It is an heirloom variety that is gaining noteriety. The fruits are long and thin, and they are a bit seedy for their size, but their flavor is really quite rewarding. They are a great kitchen garden variety in that should you be cooking and suddenly get possessed with the need for something red, sweet, and easy to add to a one meal portion you can just sprint out and grab a couple of Jimmy's sweet peppers from their plant.

We coupled the pepper with sugar, vinegar, and a base of early pears from the market to make a sweet, but tangy filling for the blintzes. We hope you enjoyed them.

The stuffed eggplant is the opposite reversal: making something savory sweet. I think the Middle-Eastern and Mediterranian-African cuisines are masters of this. By combining eggplant and beef with herbs, dried currants, toasted almonds, aromatic spices, and a tomato sauce suffused with the earthy notes of cinnamon, cumin, and turmeric we tried to create a dish that was both substantial as wellas etherial. Ultimately I find these combinations, like cayenne spiced honey, or rice and golden raisins, olive oil, and crisped lamb to be among the most sultry of cuisines.

Trivia Answer: The three sisters are the Native Americal companion planting arrangement of corn, beans, and squash. Your soup last week featured corn and squash. The significance of this arrangement is that it offers remarkable lessons in agro-ecology, ethnobotony, nutrition, and common sense. The arrangement was widespread throughout the Americas and, of course was as diverse as the geography itself. What may be most significant about it is how it transformed world cuisines. Always remember that corn, beans, and squashes ( including cucumbers and melons) are all New World crops, along with potatoes, tomatoes, and peppers, exported to Europe, Asia, and Africa where their impact has been considerable, to say the least. I implore you to look further into the origins of our foods, and the looming fates of their varietal diversities.

Cannelloni & Enchiladas

The Food Nanny
August18,19 2008

Continuing the tomato indulgence thanks to Jon and his crew at Blue Moon Farm

Meal 1: Cannelloni with Roasted Eggplant, Pesto Stuffed Buns, Mixed Greens
· Bake the cannelloni at 350° until the sauce is bubbly. Cook 5 minutes more.
· Warm the buns in the oven also if you wish.
· Dress and serve the salad.

Meal 2: Roasted Chile Stuffed Enchiladas, Two Sisters Soup, Tangy Rice Salad
· Bake the enchiladas at 350° until the sauce is bubbly. Cook 5 minutes more.
· Heat the soup and serve.
· Serve the rice at room temp or sauté in oil to heat it through and serve.

Trivia: What are the “Three Sisters” and what is their significance?

!Muy Picoso!
For the first time in many years my hands are throbbing following a work session with quantities of active peppers. I hope no one's palate was taken too far aback.
To anyone who is entirely skeptical about herbal and culinary efficacy I present the habanero, or poison ivy, or the poppy. Today I inhaled, applied topically, and twice ejected into my eye doses of capsicomes all in the name of making enchiladas. Its kind of fun playing with fire like that. Lets you know that you are in the presence of something considerable and not to be toyed with.
There are, to my knowledge, two antidotes to capsicomes: alcohol and dairy.
Capsicomes(the heat chemicals in chiles) are alcohol soluable - part of the reason why water is not a suitable remedy. In fact, the measure of heat in a chile, the Scoville Unit, is based on the amount of alcohol needed to flush the palate of occupying capsicomes. Sounds like a pretty dubious measure to me. I mean, how accurate can that really be - especially after washing down 3-4 chiles ?
Capsicomes are also fat soluable, and so they will move from off your tongue and into some yoghurt, or cheese, or other dairy product and hopefully buffer its concentration against your tissues. Thus such items are a logical accompanyment to spicy food. So, open another cold one( if you are of age) and pass the crema.

Trivia: Cappellini is angle hair pasta.

Heirloom Tomato Gazpacho & Cappellini Margherita

The Food Nanny
August12/13 2008
Meal 1: Heirloom Tomato Gazpacho, Pizza Bianca, Chick Pea and Sweet Corn Salad
· Warm the pizza bianca in the toaster or oven.
· Serve the soup chilled, garnish with a few drops of very good olive oil.
· Serve the salad at room temp.

Meal 2: Cappellini Margherita with Prairie Fruits Chevre, Grilled Zucchini, and Herb Crusted Eggplant
· Bake the cappellini at 350° until the sauce is bubbly and the cheese is melted and slightly browned, approx 20 mins.
· Bake the zucchini and eggplant in the oven until warm through, about 10 minutes.

Trivia: What is the common name for Cappellini?

Presenting: Your Dinner, starring -Tomatoes !

One of the most beautiful things about gazpacho is that there is no place to hide. This is a soup that should really never be made out of season. Although I confess to having a secret with regards to this serving: I used frozen tomatoes! Just for the base, and I froze fresh tomatoes overnight. In the morning peeling them was a snap - just run them under cold water and the skins slough right off. The rest of the tomato, sans stem core, is then pureed when thawed. Beats the pants off making tomatoes concasse. I remember spending two work days making one sauce from two cases of plum tomatoes when I was an apprentice. I learned to respect tomatoes concasse, and to avoid them. That being said, detectable little rolls of tomato skin are an unforgivable sin in most cuisine, and gazpacho would be an epitome. The freezer trick works like a charm for roasted peppers too. Put some up for the winter and thank me in January, or even next April for that matter.

Gazpacho also benefits from cucumber I think, but not zucchini. I prefer cooked zucchini, and cucumber excels at raw. Additionally, parsley not cilantro. This isn't for chips you know! Penultimately, there should be a whiff of heat, and an aroma of garlic, whitout being harsh. Finally, olive oil seduces the concoction of garden fruits into a unified palate experience that is totally naked.

Salt yours freshly upon serving.

The Cappellini Margherita is a play on the popular pizza. Fresh basil and dollops of Leslie's chevre hopefully play up the very fresh, sweet flavor of Jon's tomatoes. The sauce is nothing more than garlic cooked very gently in olive oil and then arrested with tomato sauce (tomato puree reduced by 1/3). As I was heating the whole thing I noticed the light, sweet tomato flavors fleeing from the heat, so I pulled it from the stove, salted it and dressed the cappellini right then and there without wasting a further note. Heat releases, but heat also destroys!

Enjoy the meals and look for a deepening of flavors next week as the daylight continues to receede, and the summer richens.

Heirloom Tomato Galette and Summer Omelet

Food Nanny
August 4 & 5, 2008
Meal 1: Heirloom Tomato Galettes, Mixed Greens, Green Bean Salad with Fried Sweet Peppers
· Warm the galette in the oven at 350°.
· Dress the greens.
· Serve the beans at room temperature or warm it in a sauté pan.
Meal 2: Summer Omelet, Savory Corn and Rice Salad, Roasted Beets with Walnuts
· Serve the omelet at room temp or warm it in the oven gently at 300° for 15 to 20 minutes.
· Warm the beet salad in the same manner as the omelet or serve at room temp
· The rice can be either served at room temp or heated in a sauté pan with some butter.

Ahh Toms!

Thats the correct way to pronounce them...neither tomAto not tomAHto, it's Ahh Toms! They are here and we are buying them, en masse to be correct. We purchased 160 lbs. from Blue Moon this week and are putting them up for your shares this winter. We certainly expect to buy a lot more, plus onions potatoes, garlic, winter squash, carrots, and other root crops. But lets not think of winters warming flavors just yet. The tomatoes are here!

Everyone has caught wind of the heirloom tomato thing by now and well they should - these beauties offer us a true measure of what we have traded away in handing our culture, cuisine, and agriculture to inept and greedy stewards who offer us paltry facimilies in return. Its like getting glass beads for Manhattan all over again. Especially since heirlooms are never ours to sell off in the first place.

I particularly enjoyed the effect of slicing, seasoning, and then oven drying the tomatoes before putting them on the galettes. This process had the effect of both concentrating flavors a la sun dried tomatoes, while also removing the excess moisture that is often the downfall of many a well intentioned fresh tomato pizza. We plan on processing many tomatoes in a similar manner and making tomato paste to freeze. Thanks to Eric Menzel for hipping us to this great idea.

Well when life gives you tomatoes, make tomato soup! Hint for this coming week.

PS The answer to the previous trivia is: Dill, butter, and sea salt. There is nothing better on boiled new potatoes.

Sorry for the tardy posting on that.