cinnamon plum cake: fresh fruits take the cake

This gorgeous cinnamon plum cake balances the refined sugar in the cake with the natural sweetness of plums, which I tossed in kirsch, sugar, and Vietnamese cinnamon. It's a tasty dessert, but I like eating it for breakfast with a cup of strong, French press coffee.

Cinnamon Plum Cake

 2 eggs
½ cup vegetable oil
1 cup flour
¾ cups sugar plus 1 – 2 tablespoons extra to toss with plums
6 tablespoons kirsch
6 black plums (approximate, depending on size of plums)
¼ teaspoon Vietnamese cinnamon
1 slightly rounded teaspoon baking powder
Powdered sugar to top

Preheat convection oven to 325 degrees or a normal oven to 350 degrees.

Blend together eggs, vegetable oil, sugar, half of the cinnamon, and half of the kirsch until smooth. Slowly blend in the flour and baking powder.

Slice the plums in half vertically from the top and remove the pits. Then turn the plum and begin slicing horizontally starting from the top, into ¼ inch discs (view a short demonstration here). Toss the plums in the remaining cinnamon and kirsh with 1 – 2 tablespoons sugar.

Bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour or until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean. Top with powdered sugar, sprinkled through a fine mesh sieve, and serve.

 



roasted butternut squash soup: a recipe to live by

I’ve made butternut squash soup with ingredients as diverse as apple, curry, and molasses. Invariably, I’ll adjust the seasonings and flavors more than a dozen times before it tastes right.

This time, I wanted to nail down a fail-proof recipe that I could repeat every time and hand down to future generations with pride. (Nieces, nephews, listen up!)  

After trying and failing again, I simplified my approach, focusing on the flavors of the core ingredients. I found that the trick to a great butternut squash soup was this:

1) Don't overcomplicate it. Keep the seasoning simple: Salt, pepper, and cayenne balance the sweetness of the roasted veggies and add heat.
2) Use homemade chicken stock. If you must, use high quality store bought chicken stock such as the one from Kitchen Basics.
3) Roast the squash and onions first. Roasting, as opposed to boiling the raw squash in the stock, brings complexity, depth of flavor, and sweetness to the soup that make it irresistible.

A quick blast in the blender, a little cream, and a drizzle of black truffle oil, and boom: you might just have the best B-nut squash soup you've ever tasted. The truffle oil adds an intoxicating aroma and earthy flavor.

This is my version of butternut squash soup, and one I will live by.

Roasted Butternut Squash Soup

1 medium butternut squash
1 large yellow onion
4 cups homemade or high quality store-bought chicken stock
2 cups water
1/2 cup cream
Pinch of cayenne
Salt
Pepper
Olive oil
Black truffle oil

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Slice the skin off the squash and chop the flesh into 3-inch inch chunks. Quarter the onion, starting vertically at the root so the quarters hang together. In a roasting pan, add the squash and onion and toss them with 3-4 tablespoons olive oil, salt, and black pepper. Roast for 30 minutes or until the vegetables start to caramelize.

In a large soup pot, add the roasted veggies.

Deglaze the roasting pan with 2 cups of water and pour the liquid into the soup pot with the roasted vegetables. Add 4 cups of chicken stock, a generous sprinkling of salt, and a pinch of black pepper and cayenne, and cook at medium-low flame for 1 hour.

Turn off the heat and let cool. In batches, scoop the mixture into a blender and blend until smooth. Add the liquid back into the a pot. If it is too thick, add more chicken stock.

Finally, add the cream. Serve with a drizzle of black truffle oil and chopped chives or thyme.

orange ricotta pancakes: skip the baking powder, add flavor

Baking powder ruins a perfectly good pancake. There, I said it. Go ahead. Label me anti-American. Pancakes that rely on baking powder for fluff taste like pounded-down muffins sopped in syrup. (Good morning, dry mouth! Good morning, sugar headache!)

No, in my sleepy world of pajamas and coffee, pancakes should be like a cloud, eggy and moist with a hint of sweetness and a golden exterior. Add an exotic flavor, like citrus or liqueur, and wash it all down with strong coffee, and I'll be awake in no time.

The fluffiness from this pancake comes from beating the egg whites and then folding them into the batter. Balanced against the rich texture of ricotta cheese, this pancake is both airy and creamy.

Orange Ricotta Pancakes

 4 large eggs, separated
¾ cup whole milk ricotta
3 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon orange zest
1 tablespoon orange blossom water
½ cup flour
¼ cup milk
2 tablespoons butter

Combine egg yolks, ricotta, sugar, orange zest, orange blossom water, flour, and milk and blend well. Depending on the moisture level of the ricotta, you may need to add a few more tablespoons of flour. The texture at this stage should be viscous, like honey dripping off a spoon.

Beat the egg whites into soft peaks and immediately fold into the pancake batter.

Heat a griddle on medium until hot. Melt the butter and spread it evenly across the griddle with a basting brush.

In batches, pour the pancake batter so that each pancake is about four inches wide. Cook for about 2-3 minutes on the first side. Flip, and cook an additional 1-2 minutes on the second side.

Keep pancakes warm in the oven while making the remaining batches. Serve with syrup, jam, or fresh berries. Top with powdered sugar.

blue cheese stuffed figs: flavor rockets for any time of day

Every fig season has me more excited that the last. When I spotted a stack of plump, fresh figs at the grocery store this season with no one around, I wanted a bullhorn to shout: "People! The figs are here!"

After containing myself, I picked up a plastic carton of the tender morsels, inspected all sides to ensure none were damaged, then lowered the container into my shopping basket, peering at it as if it were a newborn child.

My love of figs has prompted a life-long hunt for new and interesting fig recipes. Last year, I made a delicious fig tart and fig, bacon, and arugula salad. This year, I wanted something I could make fast as a appetizer so I stuffed them with blue cheese and pecans and served them on slices of speck.

The warm sweet fig with blue cheese and speck created an explosion of salty-sweet flavor that had me hooked and wanting more.

Blue Cheese Stuffed Figs with Speck

12 Black Mission or Brown Turkey figs
1 small bunch parsley, minced
1/3 cup blue cheese crumbles
3 tablespoons chopped pecans
6 slices of speck

Preheat oven to 425. Stem each fig and slice a shallow "X" on the top (if the cut is too deep, such as in the photo, above, the figs will fall apart in the oven -- I learned the hard way!). Mix together the cheese, pecans, and parsley. Fill each fig with a spoonful of the mixture. Place them on a baking sheet (a Silpat non-stick cooking mat makes for easy clean-up) and in the oven for about 12 minutes or until the cheese has melted.

Lay the speck flat across each plate and top with the baked figs.

smoked salmon salad: a light dinner with serious flavor

The confluence of events that led to this recipe is random: A jar of smoked sockeye salmon I found in my pantry from my trip to Alaska, a new workout regime that emphasized muscle-building with high-protein food, and the fact I was cooking alone after Paul left for a week-long business trip.

The brain cells collided and I suddenly envisioned an arugula salad with smoked salmon, kalamata olives, chickpeas, goat cheese crumbles, and lemon vinaigrette.

I believe that certain foods have the power to make one happy, to change one's mood. Just the thought of making this salad excited me, not only because it was healthy, but because it reminded me that mind-blowing flavor often comes from simple ingredients combined just the right way. This easy-to-make salad packs so much flavor, it has become my new favorite weeknight meal.

Smoked Salmon Salad

Serves 2

Smoked sockeye salmon or other smoked salmon (about 2 ounces per person broken it into chunks)
6 cups arugula
1/4 cup pitted kalamata olives, sliced in half OR a 3 tablespoons capers, drained
1/2 cup chickpeas from the can, drained and rinsed
1/2 cup grape tomatoes, halved
1/4 cup pecans, chopped
1/4 cup goat cheese or bleu cheese crumbles to top
Salt, pepper to taste
1 lemon, quartered
Red wine vinaigrette (one small shallot, diced, added to a combination of 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar to 1/4 cup olive oil plus salt and pepper to taste)

Mix together the arugula, tomatoes, pecans, chickpeas, salmon, and olives (or capers). Dress the mixture lightly with the vinaigrette, sprinkle the goat cheese on top, and serve with lemon wedges. Devour it by yourself or with a loved one or two or three, and feel the joy that simple good food brings.

quickie crepes suzette: an accessible weekend treat

The smallest things give me the greatest pleasure, like the first bite of a crepe on a lazy Sunday morning. A tender crepe lightly coated with berry drippings and powdered sugar always says ‘weekend’ to me like nothing else.

I usually prepare my crepes with a simple, four-berry jam. But on this day, I woke up feeling adventurous. Playing on the crepe suzette theme, I grabbed a jar of orange marmalade, scooped out a few spoonfuls into a saucepan, added lemon zest, lemon juice, and a splash of Grand Marnier.


Auguste Escoffier's suzette recipe, published in Larousse Gastronomique, mixes tangerine juice, Curacao, and olive oil in the batter and lets it set for two hours before cooking. Escoffier then melts more than a half stick of butter mixed with tangerine juice and zest on top.

My quickie version uses Grand Marnier instead of Curacao and marmalade instead of butter as the base of the sauce, which makes this dish healthier without losing the flavor. Sorry, Escoffier, it’s a healthier world now -- at least in this household!

Quickie Crepes Suzette

For the crepes (makes 9 – 10 crepes, depending on pan size)

¾ cups Italian tipo '00' flour or all-purpose flour*
¾ cups milk
½ cup warm water
2 eggs
2 tablespoons butter, melted
1 teaspoon sugar
½ teaspoon salt

For the sauce

5 heaping spoonfuls of orange marmalade
1 tablespoon Gran Marnier
½ teaspoon lemon zest
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 tablespoon of butter

Combine all the ingredients and whisk or blend until smooth. Let the batter rest for at least a half hour.

Meanwhile, make the sauce. In a small saucepan, melt the butter. Add the orange marmalade, the lemon zest, the lemon juice, and the Grand Marnier and bring to a simmer. Turn off the heat and cover until ready to serve.

Heat a crepe pan on medium-high heat. Add about a teaspoon of butter to the pan. I like to use a silicone pastry brush to spread the butter evenly across the pan to limit the amount of extra butter between crepes. When the butter sizzles, the pan is ready.

Using a soup ladle, scoop one ladle full of batter (or slightly less depending on the size of your pan) onto the pan's surface and quickly distribute across the pan evenly by lifting the pan and rolling it around. When the underside begins to pull away from the sides and brown, flip the crepe to its backside with a spatula using a metal spatula (rubber spatulas will stick to the crepe's surface). Cook the second side for about 30 seconds, then place the crepe on a plate in a warming oven at 200 degrees and continue until the batter is used.

To serve, fold several crepes over like envelopes on a plate, and pour the sauce over the top.

*Lately, I’ve been experimenting with Italian ‘tipo 00’ flour. After years of crepe-making with all-purpose flour, I found that crepes made with ‘00’ flour are thinner, more tender, and eggier – exactly what I think a crepe should be. You can find a great explanation of the difference between all purpose and 00 flour on Joe Pastry's terrific blog.