Meyer Lemon Sorbet in Lemon Cups

The citrus crop is coming on strong now at the Farmer’s Market. We now have our pick of tangerines, oranges, pomelos, grapefruit, and lemons. Stacy and I bought our first pomelo and fifteen more Meyer lemons during our outing to the market Saturday. The market traffic was light this week as folks were driven away by the heavy rains and cold winds. Despite the bad weather, we shopped for a luncheon I am cooking for Stacy and her group at work. In addition to the citrus, I bought fingerling potatoes, cauliflower, and placed an order for hanger steaks that will be ingredients in the six-course I plan to prepare and serve to the party of twelve this coming Wednesday.

I included a palette cleanser course between the cauliflower soufflé course and the grilled hanger steak with sea salt crusted roast fingerling potatoes entrée course. The palette cleanser is Meyer lemon sorbet in lemon cups. I made the sorbet from the fifteen Meyer lemons yesterday and it tastes incredible. The presentation of the sorbet will be in cups made from the shells of the lemons. There are several citrus dishes I serve that use the colorful shell as the cup which makes a charming statement on the plate. To remove any citrus from the shell, cut off the top 1/3 of the fruit and reserve the top to use as the “cap”. Then use a grapefruit spoon or small teaspoon to remove the pulp. This neat trick is accomplished by gently working the spoon between the pith and the pulp in a circular motion around the shell being very careful not to puncture the shell. Usually the pulp will release all except for the bloom end at the bottom. To finish the removal, gently hook the spoon under the pulp and pull from the shell. If some strings are left in the bottom of the shell, use a kitchen shear or paring knife to extract. Then cut a small flat spot on the bottom so the fruit will stand on a plate. Be careful not to open a hole in the bottom of the shell when making this cut. Now you have a shell cup and cap to use as the vessel to serve the dish you make from the pulp. Sometimes I will cut a design in the top lip of the cup for large fruits like oranges. The cup will also resist oven temps for a dessert prep that has cold filling in the cup and a piped meringue on top, sort of like a baked Alaska.

Here’s the recipe for the sorbet.

Lemon Sorbet in Lemon Cups For 8
12 lemons - You'll need one lemon per person plus a few to cut zest from. Make sure the bloom end (not the stem end) has a nice shaped "bump" and try to purchase uniform lemons.
Cut off the top 1/3 of the lemon (stem end) and reserve for the "cap." Hollow out each lemon by using a grapefruit spoon gently working just inside the rind and circling the flesh while being careful not to puncture the lemon. Remove juice and flesh and put it in your juicer. Make a slight shallow cut on the bottom of each lemon shells while being careful not to cut through to the inside of the lemon) This will allow them to sit upright on a plate without falling over.
Freeze the shells at least one hour or overnight. Then fill with sorbet for service. The frozen shell will help keep the sorbet frozen.

LEMON SORBET:

1/3 cup lemon zest cut from the extra lemons
1 cup strained fresh-squeezed lemon juice - from lemons used for cups and extra lemons
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1 Tablespoon vodka (keeps the sorbet from freezing solid)
1 1/2 cups water

In a medium saucepan over medium heat, combine sugar and water until sugar dissolves. Add lemon zest. Stir until mixture comes to a boil; boil 2 minute. Add the lemon juice and vodka, stir well. Remove from heat, cool completely and strain.

Ice Cream Maker - Transfer mixture to ice cream maker, process according to manufacturer's instructions.

Freezer Method - Pour into container, cover, and place mixture in the freezer. When it is semi-solid, mash it up with a fork and refreeze again. When frozen, place in a food processor or blender and process until smooth. Cover and refreeze until serving time.

Can be prepared 3 days in advance. Cover and keep frozen.

Makes 8 servings.

Preserving Meyer Lemons

At this time of the year we see the beginnings of the citrus crop signaling that it will soon be winter with long, cold nights and rainy days. One of my favorite ingredients to make using citrus is preserved Meyer lemon rind. The Meyer lemon is a hybrid between a lemon and an orange that came from China. It was widely planted in California until it was understood to cause blight of other citrus crops. Nowadays there is the "improved" Meyer lemon that does not carry the blight. The fruits have delicate skins that will turn a blush of orange if left hanging on the tree long enough. When preserved, the rind is a savory, lightly sour and complex flavor balanced with salt that is used in the curing process. Any recipe that calls for acid and salt will benefit with preserved Meyer lemon rind as a substitute. One of my favorite is lemon-scented cauliflower. Simply mince some preserved Meyer lemon rind then mix with a bit of butter,salt and pepper, and brush onto washed florets. Roast the cauliflower for about 8 to 10 minutes until lightly golden brown. This is an excellent side dish. I also use the cooked cauliflower in savory soufflés.

To preserve Meyer lemons, use a 1/2 liter canning jar. I like the kind with the glass lid and rubber band for sealing. Always sterilize the jar and use a new sterilized band before proceeding. Thinly slice the lemons and toss in a bowl with kosher salt.

Pack into jar and top with lemon juice to within 1/4 inch from the rim. Add three bay leaves and five or six black pepper corns. Wipe the rim with a damp towel and seal the jar. Over the next two weeks, leave the jar on your kitchen counter. Shake the jar every morning and every night. The lemon rind undergoes a lactic fermentation much the same as a kosher dill pickle or sauerkraut. Place finished jar in refrigerator. Preserved Meyer lemons keep at least a year. They also make a nice holiday gift.

Mulligatawny Soup

I recently saw this soup on the Food network show Diners Drive-ins and Dives and decided I had to try it. It is delicious. A nice comfort food for the cooler months that is basically chicken curry in gravy over rice. The recipe has everything in one pot as a soup. I like rice, so I used 1 Cup rice cooked instead of 1 cup cooked rice which was a change I made after I photographed the ingredients.

The recipe was scaled to serve Stacy and me for a Tuesday after work dinner with enough left-over for a lunch for me. Since the rice and chicken are already cooked, it is a good use of left-overs (I guess that makes my lunch a left-over left-over?).

Every week I buy a whole broiler chicken, usually 2-1/2 lbs, that I break down into boneless breasts, boneless thighs and bone-in legs and wings leaving the carcass almost bare. I roast the carcass, giblets (without the liver), wings, legs and thighs while the breasts brine. Later that evening, the breasts become the center of a nice dinner for Stacy and me while the carcass and giblets go into the freezer until I have enough bones to boil in my 16-quart stockpot, which is about once a month.

My rice is steamed in my home-made chicken stock, which adds protein and imparts a deep, rich flavor to the long-grain white rice. In total this recipe used 6 cups of chicken stock.


Recipe adapted from the recipe contributed by Judy Miles, owner of The Little Depot Diner in Peabody, MA to DDD.

Ingredients
• 1 medium onion diced
• 3 carrots, diced
• 2 celery stalks, diced
• 1 medium leek minced
• 1/4 cup butter
• 1-1/2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 3 teaspoons curry powder
• 4 cups chicken stock
• 2 Sierra Beauty apples, peeled, cored and diced
• 1 cup white rice cooked in chicken stock (1 cup rice, 2 cups chicken stock, dash of salt, 21 minutes steam time)
• Legs and thighs from one chicken roasted 15 minutes, cooled and diced.
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon herbs from Provenance
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1/2 cup cream, hot

Directions
In a large pot, over medium heat, melt the butter and add the onion, leek, carrots, and celery stalks. Cook until tender, but do not burn them. Stir in the flour and curry and cook for 3 minutes. Pour in 4 cups of chicken stock and let simmer for 30 minutes. Then add in the remaining ingredients, except the hot cream. Let simmer for 15 minutes and then add in 1 cup hot cream. Ladle into serving bowls and serve.

Stacy and I loved the soup snug in our warm house on a frigid, drizzly Tuesday evening. One idea I have to improve the soup is to puree the mirepoix after the 30 minute simmer then add the rest of the ingredients. I believe this will make the soup more like a bisque.

Apple Oatmeal Crisp

Can you believe today is Nov 1? The beautiful beguiling weather the past week feels more like summer. Except Saturday morning. Stacy and I went to the market early Saturday morning groping our way up the Peninsula in the heavy fog that draped the roadways. The traffic was light on the highway and at the stalls around the market as it seemed the cool, damp weather kept folks tucked away somewhere warm. The Bay Bridge closure may have also discouraged people from making the trek to the market. Too bad because they missed the fall seasonal fruits and vegetables at their peak. Squashes, lovely Brussels sprouts, all sorts of root vegetables including turnips are available all around the market. The highlight for me, the apples right now are incredible. We stopped at the Apple Farm (Philo) stand to buy apples for an apple crisp that would punctuate our dinner with our friends Rich and Ann at our home Saturday night. We bought six Sierra Beauties, which are a wonderful cooking apple. Another really good apple is the pink lady which is available now through April from a farmer with a stand in the front of the Ferry building. The pink lady is a good snacking apple and really stands out in apple stuffing that I make to complement a crown pork roast that takes center stage at our family Christmas dinner. We also bought a dozen kumamoto oysters to go and two to eat there from George at Hog Island. The oysters are a creamy, briny treat this time of year. The dozen would be our appetizer at dinner with Rich and Ann.

We started the meal at 6:30 PM with oysters on the half shell from Hog Island accompanied by Hog Wash and cocktail sauce, Bellwether cresenza cheese and Acme baguette rounds which were complemented by two chardonnays, one from Lodi that Rich and Ann brought, and the Landmark Overloook that we served. We slurped the oysters and smeared the cheese on the bread rounds as Rich barbequed a 2.5 pound chateaubriand that he had marinated in cabernet and garlic for 24 hours. Meanwhile I boiled some purple potatoes from Zuckerman’s farm and steamed some dry-farmed haricot verts from Dirty Girl Produce in Santa Cruz. The meal was hearty and delicious.

Earlier in the afternoon Stacy and I did the prep to mis en place a tasty apple crisp using the sierra beauty apples. Stacy popped the desert in the oven when the meat went onto the grill so that it would be done and piping hot when we finished our entrée. It was served with a dollop of homemade vanilla ice cream that I froze after lunch. The apple crisp is a home dessert that was commonly served in the fall at family dinners. It’s easy to make.

Here’s the recipe:
Apple Oatmeal Crisp
6 firm apples (Sierra beauty or pink lady work well) cored, peeled, and cut into ¼ inch slices
Juice of 1 lemon
Zest of 1 lemon minced
¼ cup calvados (or a high quality brandy)
¾ cup light brown sugar
½ cup unsalted butter
¾ cup flour
½ cup regular rolled oats
1 tsp cinnamon
½ tsp ground ginger
¼ tsp ground nutmeg

Method:
Mix together apples, lemon juice, lemon zest, and brandy. Place in a buttered 9-inch round cake pan. Mix sugar, butter, flour, oats, cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg until crumbly. Scatter evenly on top of apple mix. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour. Serve warm (it’s really good with vanilla ice cream).

Crazy about pumpkin?

What a coincidence that the Food & Wine section of the Chronicle today was all about pumpkins in the middle of a few weeks of being crazy about pumpkins. I have always loved pumpkin pie. I mean LOVE pumpkin pie. To give an example, when I was in college I would reward myself with a slice from the cafeteria every time I aced an exam. I graduated summa cum laude. Was it the pie? Is pumpkin brain food?

We love our winter squashes, particularly the brilliant orange dumpling squash and the faithful butternut. We like to roast our squash and then make a soup or serve the flesh mashed as a side dish. It occurred to me last year that a pumpkin is just another variety of winter squash that I should be able to treat in much the same way in the kitchen and vice versa. As the pumpkins started making their appearance at the Farmer’s Market a couple of weeks ago I have been experimenting with them.

I started with the classic treatments for pumpkin by making a pumpkin bread and then a pumpkin pie, both started from a sugar pie pumpkin. My pumpkin pie was so good that I ate the entire pie in three days save a forkful that Stacy stole before I devoured the tasty treat. It was the best pumpkin pie I have ever eaten. It probably benefited some from being the first pumpkin pie this season, although I give credit to poaching a fresh sugar pie pumpkin and grinding fresh spices to making the pie light, fresh and sublime. I also made a pumpkin bread that I steamed like an English pudding. It was good, seriously good. Again, I started with a fresh sugar pie pumpkin and then used fresh, organic ingredients to make the best bread I could. Stacy took the finished bread to work which received accolades from her co-workers. Seriously good indeed. Here’s the recipe which can be made in a simple loaf pan, a fluted tube pan, or a traditional English pudding pan (a fluted tube pan with a lid to contain the steam).

Ingredients
3 cups sifted all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon fresh ground nutmeg
1 ½ teaspoons fresh ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon fresh ground cloves
½ teaspoon salt
3 cups sugar (granulated definitely works. I plan to try brown sugar in the next bread)
1 cup vegetable oil (I used canola for the pie last week. I plan to try ½ cup vegetable oil and ½ cup melted butter in the next bread)
3 eggs
2 cups fresh pumpkin puree (I poached a sugar pie pumpkin)
1 cup coarsely chopped walnuts
1 cup chopped raisins (I used some dried red flame raisins from a farmer on the plaza)

Method
Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees
In a bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and soda, spices and salt
In a mixing bowl, combine sugar, oil and eggs whisk to blend well.
Stir pumpkin into the egg mixture.

Gradually add the dry ingredients about ½ cup at a time stirring after each addition. Fold in the raisins and walnuts. Prepare tube pan with butter and flour. Spoon batter into tube pan. Bake for about 1 hour and 15 or 20 minutes until a knife inserted in thickest part of bread comes out clean.
Remove from oven and cool on a rack for 10 minutes. Remove from pan. And cool completely on rack before slicing.
This loaf serves a large dinner party of 12 easily for dessert with seconds.

Market Report:
What else? Pumpkins are all over the market. Lots of stalls have sugar pie pumpkins and the Balakian Farm stall also has several heirloom varieties. I plan to try one of the Musquee de Provenance which is also known as the Fairy Tale pumpkin. If you like eggplant there are many varieties available now from several stalls at the market. I plan to use some as a stuffing for poultry using the recipe in the Café Beaujolais cookbook. We arrived at 9:30 AM and already Marin Sun Farms had sold out of their eggs from pasture-raised chicken. Bummer. The best news for us was that Mountain Home Ranch had chickens that weighed about 2 pounds each. We found the small birds to be delectable last spring before the farmer starting growing the birds too large (over 6 pounds each). He is being rewarded with bringing smaller fowl as some upscale restaurants around the City have discovered him. I hope that keeps him motivated to continue to harvest his flocks while the birds are young and tender.

There are still some tomatoes available, which are pretty much all early girl variety. Still sweet and firm, they make an excellent caprese with the fresh mozzarella from Cow Girl Creamery and some basil from the garden. It is the last gasp of summer as we get into the cooler and blustery fall season.

Stacy and I rounded out our trip to the market with a stop at Sur La Table to buy four Emille Henry 2-cup terrines. The vessels are perfect for my chicken pot pie with a butter crust. Stacy liked the one I made for her on Tuesday of last week so much that she wanted to serve the dish as the entrée for dinner with our weekend guests and good friends Jim and Kristin. The ceramic terrines were perfect for the dish as the shape distributed the heat evenly to the filling and the smaller opening in the top allowed me to make four perfect caps from one 9-inch butter pie crust. Our meal was simple and comforting. Kristin brought a shrimp-stuffed jalapeno wrapped in bacon as our spicy appetizer that we enjoyed on our deck with a flute of champagne. We then went into our dining room to dig into the piping hot chicken pot pies. The yellow terrine was beautifully presented with a golden brown crust on a multi-colored Kate Spade dinner plate that had yellow accenting a red and black rim and white center. It was a simple meal with gourmet flavors. We drank some wonderful wines grown and made by a mutual friend on their vineyard in El Dorado. We finished the meal with Kristin’s homemade carrot cake cupcakes. It was divine.

We are all booked up for the Thanksgiving Prelude meetup coming up November 7. It promises to be a fun day with some interesting and enthusiastic cooks.

Peas and Carrots yin yang soup

Carrots are ubiquitous in my cooking usually as one of the trilogy of mire pois aromatics that create the canvas of flavors in stocks, soups, salads, braises, and on and on. I am a big fan of soups especially vegetable or fruit soups. This dish is a combination of two delicious soups that complement one another in flavor, texture and color. When served together in a single bowl the presentation is spectacular.
Be careful to prepare the soups with the same hearty textures so that they flow together to form the yin yang design without being too runny.

Prepare carrot soup and pea soup separately

1/2 cup crème fraiche

To Serve:
Simultaneously pour both soups from opposite sides of serving glass and offset to form a Yin-Yang design. Slide the bowl back and forth to bring the soups to the same level.

Place a dollop of crème fraiche in individual sauce boat and serve alongside or drizzle on top.


Carrot Soup

1 tablespoon olive oil
2 pounds carrots, peeled, sliced
1 large onion, finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, brunoise
2 whole cloves
4 cups (about) chicken stock (vegetable stock may also be used)
1 1/2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
dash of nutmeg

Heat oil in heavy large saucepan over medium heat. Add carrots, onion, garlic, and cloves and sauté until onion is translucent, about 8 minutes. Add 3 cups broth. Cover and simmer until carrots are very soft, stirring occasionally, about 30 minutes.

Remove cloves from broth and discard. Puree soup in batches in blender. Return soup to same saucepan. Mix in lemon juice and nutmeg. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Thin to desired consistency with more broth. (Can be prepared 1 day ahead. Cover and refrigerate.)

May be served cold or reheated.

Green Pea Soup with Tarragon

2 lb fresh shucked peas (weight after shucking)
1 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 cup sliced shallots
4 cups (or more) chicken stock or vegetable stock
2 teaspoons chopped fresh tarragon, divided

Heat oil in heavy large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add shallots and sauté until golden and almost tender, about 7 minutes. Add peas, 3 cups broth, and 1 teaspoon tarragon; bring to boil. Reduce heat to medium and boil until flavors blend and peas are tender, about 7 minutes. Cool slightly. Working in batches, puree remaining soup in blender until completely smooth. Return soup to same saucepan. Bring to simmer and thin with more broth by 1/4 cupfuls, if desired. Stir in remaining tarragon. Season with pepper.

Scratch pumpkin pie

The Ferry Plaza was packed on Saturday when Stacy and went to do our weekly shopping and to meet our friend Crosby for lunch. Crosby had invited us to watch the air show from the roof of his building on Telegraph hill so we invited him to join us for lunch to make a full day together. I enjoy how the changing of the seasons affects our diet as we try to eat seasonally from the farmer’s market as much as possible. As we are moving into the cooler and wetter months, we are craving comfort foods and our taste for white wine wanes as our enjoyment of full bodied red wines increases.

This week I am experimenting with making pumpkin pie and pumpkin bread starting from fresh sugar pie pumpkins instead of opening a can. Several vendors at the market offer the small orange gourds for sale. I bought one last week that I cleaned, quartered and roasted. This week I bought another pumpkin to try poaching to see if it works better. The roasting method caused a tough skin to form on the inside of the pumpkin. I am sure poaching the pumpkin will prevent that from happening, although I am concerned about having too much moisture content in finished product.

Why go to all that trouble when canned pumpkin is so widely available and so inexpensive? For me there are three reasons:

1) Taste: Starting from fresh produce always produces a fresher tasting final dish. It also lets me control all of the seasonings that get added to the produce.

2) Source: When I start from fresh produce that I buy directly from the grower I know where the plant that bore the fruit grew and how it was tended by the farmer. I get to know the farmers that I buy from so that I know that we are eating produce that is grown using protocols that do not include chemicals or manipulation of the produce (like hot housing).

3) Satisfaction: Making a dish all the way from fresh produce to finished product is a satisfying and fulfilling journey. The simpler the better for me too.

Here’s the recipe for pumpkin pie:

2 cups pumpkin puree:
To make the puree, get a sugar pie pumpkin and cut off the top. Cut the pumpkin in half from stem to bloom. Scrape out the seeds and the stringy innards. Clean and toast the seeds for a nice snack. I like mine with sea salt and a bit of pepper.

Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees. Place the pumpkin halves skin side up in a baking dish with 2 inches of water (This is the poaching method). Bake for about 45 minutes until the pumpkin flesh is soft. If the water gets nearly all evaporated, add boiling water to keep the poaching process going. Cool, remove the skin and puree the flesh of the pumpkin.

¼ teaspoon salt
¾ cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground ginger
¼ teaspoon nutmeg
¼ teaspoon ground cloves
2 eggs
12 oz unsweetened evaporated milk

Mix the ingredients together well.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees

Pour mix into a 9 inch baked pie shell (blind bake a nice flour and butter crust). Protect the exposed crust edges with aluminum foil so they don’t burn.

Bake the pie for 15 minutes then reduce the oven temperature to 375 degrees and bake for another 30 to 45 minutes until a knife inserted in the center of the pie comes out clean. You may remove the crust protection in the last 10 minutes of baking to crisp up the crust edges.

I like my pumpkin pie with a dollop of whipped cream (not the stuff from a can!). I sometimes whip my cream flavored with a bit of almond liqueur.

This pie is always a hit at Thanksgiving. We will make the pie at the November 7th meetup. There are still four spots available.