Vineyard Picnics To Go

if life gives you lemons, make limoncello

bj @ vineyard picnics to go — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 17:42:53 +0000

It’s raining lemons in California now. Beautiful, luscious meyer lemons. So my dear friend, Susan Mernit, asked me what could she make with lemons. So besides using lemon as an acid in just about any sauce or meat dish, I answered . . . lemonade, limoncello, lemon marmalade, lemon confit, preserved lemons, lemon curd, meyer lemon ice cream. More ideas from you, please. So, before I share my recipe for limoncello, I will tell you that there’s a great recipe for lemon confit in Tom Colicchio’s wonderful cookbook, Think Like a Chef (click on the link to check out the review by D.C. Foodie on the book, it’s a really special little book, well worth reading from cover to cover). What to use it on, cedar plank grilled wild salmon, yummm. And Terra has a completely perfect recipe for meyer lemon ice cream. I served it in between two lovely chocolate chocolate chip cookies to make a simply scruptious ice cream sandwich. You might want to roll the edges in chocolate nibs, but be careful that the chocolate doesn’t overwhelm the flavor of the ice cream. And now for my limoncello recipe, simple. The proportions of meyer lemons to Everclear are up to you. I fill up the bottle 50% or more with peels.

meyer lemons

Everclear

simple syrup (1:1, sugar:water)

1. Peel skin from lemons, being careful to not include pith as it is bitter.

2. Add lemon peel to Everclear and let sit for about 1 month. Do NOT put in a plastic container, use glass!

3. Remove peel and mix lemon infused Everclear and simple syrup 1:1.

4. Bottle and freeze.

Enjoy! This is one of my very most popular recipes. So much more punch and so much less sugar than the commercial brands. bj @ vineyard picnics to go

the sexual energy of vanilla

bj @ vineyard picnics to go — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 21:37:37 +0000

The snail, the Summer 2008 issue of Slow Food’s mag, has a fascinating article, full of little known “did you know” ’s about vanilla. After completing a little additional research about this exotic and flavorful plant, I am ready to share some tasty tidbits.

Did you know #1: The indigenous Totonic farmers of Veracruz, Mexico are cited as the first cultivators of vanilla. They believe that hand-pollinating vanilla plants has so much sexual energy that the men do not touch their wives during the days of the ritual. They worry about the plants getting jealous and the men loosing their potency.

Did you know #2: Vanilla pods are the only edible fruit of the orchid family.

Did you know #3: The orchid flowers bloom for only a few hours and, since it is unlikely that insects will do the job, must be hand pollinated during this extremely brief period.

Did you know #4: True vanilla contains over 250 compounds, while artificial vanilla contains only one, vanillin. The bean must remain on the vine for nine months to develop its complex flavor and fragrance profile.

Did you know #5: When vanilla pods dry on the vine, the phenolic compounds crystalize, creating a coating that the French call hoarfrost which intensifies their flavor and aroma.

Did you know #6: Similar to how viticultures think about the flavor of their grapes, the flavor of these “true vanilla beans” is influenced by terroir.

Did you know #6: Fresh vanilla beans are odorless and tasteless; they heat-cured and dry the green pods to develop the flavor.

Sometimes a little knowledge intensives the enjoyment! Why not try Gaya Vai-Mex Vanilla’s beans; available for purchase at www. vanilla mexico.com.

bj @ vineyard picnics to go

perfect guacamole

bj @ vineyard picnics to go — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 18:45:35 +0000

While perusing food blogs, I came across what looked like a good recipe for guacamole on definititely not martha, a defnitely cool food site. I thought I’d share my Mexican version with you. The history behind this recipe is that my Park Slope neighbor, Antonia Guerro - note the Mexican name - taught me to make it. She then told me it was the best she’d ever had. And, casting all modesty aside, it is!

2 avocados, perfectly ripe

1 jallapeno pepper, finely minced

1 lime, juiced

1 clove garlic, finely minced

1/2 cup cilantro, coarsely chopped

cayenne, to taste

S&P, to taste

1. Cut through peeled avocado’s until coarsely mashed with two knives. Do not puree!

2. Add all other ingredients and stir gently.

Taste, taste, taste! You may need more seasoning, spices, lime juice, garlic, jallapeno. Or not. Cooking is NOT a science. How hot is the pepper? How big is the clove of garlic? How juicy is the lime? How large are the avocado’s?

bj @ vineyard picnics to go

soul food chicken . . . great!

bj @ vineyard picnics to go — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 18:32:53 +0000

So, here it is, my simple recipe for roast chicken. Use a great chicken like the one I bought at Soul Food. Back east I used to buy D’Artagnan. Brine

1 gal water

1 cup salt

1/4 cup honey

6 sprigs thyme

3-4 peppercorn

1 lemon, halved and juiced

3 cloves garlic, smashed

1. Brine overnight in the refrigerator.

2. Remove from brine, stuff squeezed lemon and thyme in cavity and let air dry in refrigerator for at least two hours.

3. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Truss chicken. Cover chicken with salt and pepper, herbs (I like thyme and rosemary), olive oil and lemon juice.

4. Cook approximately 50 minutes.

Enjoy!bj @ vineyard picnics to go

a visit to long meadow ranch

bj @ vineyard picnics to go — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 14:49:38 +0000

I’m lucky enough to live down the road from Long Meadow Ranch, even luckier to have heard Ted Hall lecture on the benefits of heterogeneity, natural biodiversity, in yeast cultures for fermenting wine, and to hear their produce manager talk about how their portable chicken coops fertilize their garden.

But this weekends foray was to buy their wonderful grass-fed beef, reasonably priced, culled from their hardy herds of Shorthorn and Highland cattle. A wonderful by-product of my visit enabled me to visit Rutherford Garden, where I purchased farm-fresh eggs, opal basil, adriantic figs, garlic, not-quite-dried shallots, and fragrant lavender.

Inspired by Michael Pollan and Thomas Berry, I am more committed than ever to local and sustainable farming, this being the key to a strong regional culture, energy conservation, and the very best food. So, I next visited the Marin Farmer’s Market to check out Adante’s cheese, recommended to me by Chez Panisse’s chefs, delicious peaches from Kashiwase Farms, and Prather Ranch’s meat. There they sold me a Soul Food chicken which I promptly brined and ate, delicious!

bj @ vineyard picnics to go

black gold

bj @ vineyard picnics to go — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 18:13:51 +0000

Food is spiritual, connected to the earth. Think about our soil, created over thousands of years. The earth, the actual, physical earth we live on. Our caring for it, and bringing food forward from it, is an act of stewardship, an expression of the deep responsibility we have to our earth and to the living creatures on it. Michael Pollan talks about the dark rich soil of Iowa in The Omnivore’s Dilemma:

This part of Iowa has some of the richest soil in the world, a layer of cakey alluvial loam nearly two feet thick. The initial deposit was made by the retreat of the Wisconsin glacier ten thousand years ago, and then compounded at a rate of another inch or two every decade by prairie grasses . . . . It’s gorgeous stuff, black gold as deep as you can dig, as far as you can see.

And, unfortunately:

What you can’t see is all the soil that’s no longer there . . . the two-foot crust of topsoil there probably started out as closer to four.”

I don’t know a lot about farming, but I have been learning that diversity enriches soil. When the season is over, plants leave behind nutrients. What is needed by one vegetable will be furnished by another. At the end of the season, fava beans, for example, add much needed nitrogen to the soil. Both nitrogen and carbon are needed to create fertile soil. So life requires birth, death, and rebirth. There is an integral relationship among all of creation, both living and non-living.

Like raising children, the earth should be interfered with as little as possible. It is best left alone. Its true potential can only emerge if allowed to express its essential nature.

bj @ vineyard picnics to go

“how to” pate a choux

bj @ vineyard picnics to go — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 13:11:36 +0000

The simple trick to pate a choux is to stir, making a figure eight, for 8 minutes after adding the flour. Do not believe the cookbooks that tell you one minute, or even five! Also, put the eggs in, one at a time, immediately after taking the butter, water & flour mixture off the burner. Do not wait until the mixture cools. Enjoy your cream puffs, eclairs and gougeres! bj @ vineyard picnics to go

were i to teach a course on god, I would begin with a plate of persimmons . . .

bj @ vineyard picnics to go — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 10:53:57 +0000

While preparing for a sermon on food at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of North Bay, our inspiring, kind, and dedicated minister, Bonnie Dlott, sent me this poem to use in the service. I love it and I hope you do too!

Were I to Teach a Course on God

By Nancy Schaffer, from Instructions on Joy

Were I to teach a course on God

I would begin with a plate of persimmons —

The sweet, crisp kind, the ones more

Orange than red: the hard, squat Fuyus

I eat each November morning on hot

Wheat cereal with almonds.

I would slice the persimmons gently

Across their fat centers, then hold them out.

See the star shape? I would

Offer them, so all might wonder.

I would slice Bosc pears

Straight down their middles

So the threads of each stem

Trace wispily down to that rounded

Place where dark seeds lie, tear-shaped

And wet in white, firm flesh.

I would hold those halves

Silently forward, their bottoms smooth

In the curves of my palms.

I would teach God with plates of pomegranates,

Both before they were opened and after.

I would bring wet washcloths.

We would bury our faces and eat:

All that luminescent purple-red,

Those clear-bright kernels fitted in tight rows

On small and tumbling hills—

And all that juice, so easily broken, sweet

And puckery all at once. We would say nothing.

I would teach this way:

With plates of fruit, a knife;

Many washcloths. With my eyes

Very large; my mouth mostly silent,

So all might eat.

bj @ vineyard picnics to go

what can we do? use canvas bags instead of plastic!

bj @ vineyard picnics to go — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 17:45:05 +0000

This post is exerpted from a slide show sent to me by an impassioned friend and colleague, Jill Schwartz, NYC.Data released by the United States Environmental Protection Agency shows that somewhere between 500 billion and a trillion plastic bags are consumed world wide each year (National Geographic News, September 2, 2003). Less than 1% of bags are recycled. It costs more to recycle a bag than to produce a new one. There’s a harsh economics behind bag recycling. It costs $4,000 to process and recycle 1 ton of plastic bags, which can then be sold on the commodities market for $32 (Jared Blumenfeld, Director of San Francisco’s Department of the Environment).Plastic bags have been found floating north of the Arctic Circle near Spitzbergen, and as far south as the Falkland Islands. Plastic bags photodegrade. Over time they break down into smaller, more toxic petro-polymers which eventually contaminate soils and waterways (CNN.com, technology, November 16, 2007). As a consequence, microscopic particles can enter the food chain. The effect on wildlife can be catastropic. Birds become terminally entangled, Nearly 200 different species of sea life including whales, dolphins, seals and turtles die due to plastic bags. They die after ingesting plastic bags which they mistake for food (World Wildlife Fund Report, 2005). What can we do? If we use a cloth bag, we can save 6 bags a week. That 22,176 bags in an average life time. If just 1 out of 5 people in our country did this, we would save 1, 330,560,000,000 bags over our life time.Bangladesh has banned plastic bags. China has banned free plastic bags. Ireland took the lead in Europe, taxing plastic bags and has now reduce plastic bag consumption by 90%. Rwanda banned plastic bags. Israel, Canada, wester Indida, Botswana, Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Taiwan, and Singapore have also banned or are moving toward banning the plastic bag. On March 27th, 2007, San Francisco became the first US city to ban plastic bags. Oakland and Boston are considering a ban.Plastic shopping bags are made from polyethylene, a thermoplastic made from oil. Reducing plastic bags will decrease foreign oil dependency. China will save 37 million barrels of oil each year due to their ban on free plastic bags. It is possible . . .bj @ vineyard picnics to go

the sad truth about cheap food and expensive oil

bj @ vineyard picnics to go — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 18:02:19 +0000

In his book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Michael Pollan traces number 2 corn, that’s the corn that used to fatten cattle and produce cornstarch, corn oil, and convert the “oses” into fructose and sucrose, from the farm to the supermarket. In the process, he documents just how much oil is needed to convert basically inedible, indigestible food to calories that can be ingested and processed by cows and humans.The sad truth is that it take 1 1/2 calories of oil to generate 1 calorie of corn product for cattle feed. A whopping thirty-five gallons of oil, nearly a barrel, is needed to produce a twelve hundred pound steer. For wet milling, that is, grinding, filtering and using centrifuges to extract extract usable calories from number 2 corn, ten calories of fossil fuel are used to produce one calorie of processed food!We can all expect our food to get a lot more expensive . . . or we can use the sun for energy and eat more nutritious, healthier, and tastier food! Seems like a no brainer. Check out his talk at TED at http://blog.ted.com/2008/02/michael_pollan.php. bj @ vineyard picnics to go