Shaggy mane

Lovely blooms of shaggy mane (Coprinus comatus) mushrooms awaited as I came home Wednesday night. Right combo of rain (plenty) and humidity. Look for them in sandy-soils, grassy, and lit but not sunny. Also called inky caps they turn inky black starting from the bottom skirt and all but disappear in a wink of inky-ness. Kind of like squid ink; somewhat ephemeral. The pure white caps are great cleaned, chopped and sauteed in olive oil or butter. These are not mushrooms with a remarkable flavor. It is very subtle. I made a single egg omlett and put the 1/4 cup of mushrooms in before folding. Salt and pepper make a difference. Delicate woodland flavor. I would guess a milk or cream of mushroom soup base would let out some more flavor.

Turnips redux

The smaller are sweeter. The terroir is there too. Even soft on the shelf seems to cook well and taste as I might expect. When making batch one of the puree of turnip I cut each into smallish chunks: 1/2 and 1/2 and 1/2 and 1/2. I guess that makes 16 pieces. The boiling was short, monitored by a fork. As in potatoes: softened is done. Off to the food processor with a bit of butter, salt, and some grinds of pepper. They were fantastic, almost as good as I had hoped; however, they were a bit watery. The watery tone did not make the taste bad, or look bad, but it wasn't where I wanted to be. I am certain it was a) boiling and b) too small a piece. So the following batch was only in quarters. Same processing, and a much, much better consistency. They were not like a whipped potato, but they did hold a peak somewhat. They were slightly more particulate, softly granular, and still had a bit of water. Last time I whipped parsnips - no water, even though boiled too. So now I might try the roasting then into the processor. I am certain I will have to put it through a chinois because I don't think the baked will process smoothly. We'll see. Winter is the perfect time to do this experiment as the fragrance scents the house and the heat, well, the heat is welcome.

Turnips of the purple tops

On the shelves now the purple topped turnip is sweet. Keep away from the softballs and stay around hardballs to golf balls (for size reference note "Onions" prior to this post). A 1/4" dice sauteed at high heat, agitated to keep them cooking uniformly, without salt or pepper, makes a nifty side to many dishes. I am strongly against salting at the start of or in the middle of cooking. I think it forces too much moisture out of the food. There's plenty of time to salt afterwards. I just cut off the top knot and bottom root, peeled with a vegetable peeler and sliced and diced.

Food preparation is cutting. I don't think you can get away from it. For an average dinner I spend most of the time preparing in some fashion which most often is cutting: slicing, dicing, peeling, paring, and so on. I am a big fan of cutting as you increase the surface area and so can cook faster and taste more of the food and have a great texture.

I do want to try mashing/whipping turnips to see what that is about.

I got distracted and will make a turnip dauphinoise The recipe is simple and is really slicing, mixing, and cooking.

The whipped turnips still intrieuges me so it will be worked on soon. Liz was selling wonderful, firm purple tops at the winter market here. An experiment sponsored by Berkshire Grown to see what response could be had from growers, servers, and buyers. Although overcast it it was well attended and festive and very social.

Brussels sprouts

Those vegetables that were distasteful, were over cooked. You know the ones I'm talking of. Very overcooked. I think the fibre without flavor is a real deal killer. Colorless vegetables or dull ones also work against the pleasure. I think a recent foray into Brussels sprouts was notable. I hashed the sprouts after cutting off the old looking ends and any worm-eaten outer leaves; not many in my case. I found them on ice in a large display at my local green grocer.

A cut in half, the long way, the cut in thirds, long way again, then dicing them across the previous cut yields what I am calling hashed Brussels sprouts. What is waiting for the Brussels sprouts is important. I slowly cooked, at low heat, 4 cloves of garlic. When fragrant I then cranked up the heat under the pan. Then into this pan I put the hashed (diced) veggies. Stirring a bit to mix it all up you can see the greens and yellows intensify. I take that as a good sign when cooking vegetables. You're done. Less than a minute. Or two at best. When sampling the sprouts at the end of cooking you can taste a wonderful tone of nuts, but the essential sprout flavor is there. To finish before serving there are lots of options. A light salt and pepper is important. You can grate some Reggiano or basic Parmesean cheese. I served mine with some sauce made with French Dijon mustard and chicken stock, simmered a bit. Butter would be a real crowd pleaser. I think these Brussels sprouts are often not cooked to show off their great taste.

I think serving them as individual leaves is also great, but a real effort. You have to love those for whom you will make it. It's a sit in the lap with a bowl and paring knife kind of day. Either a silent meditation or a chat with some friends.

Karen toasted some pecans, chopped them a bit and sprinkled over sauteed sliced Brussels sprouts. Very notable.

I ate at a new restaurant in Lenox last night. That chef put Brussels sprout slices in with balsamic, blue cheese, and pancetta. Wonderful combo. For my taste the Brussels sprouts were cooked a bit more than necessary. Maybe cooked and held for service.

I think, though, they are really seasonal and may disappear from shelves at some time in early winter. I would check to see if they were available from my local CSA.

Cranberries

Obligatory: of course. Fun to tinker: more fun than a barrel of..... What? Plastic blister wrapping? You get the same effect when cooking cranberry sauce. At a slow boil you hear the pop-pop-pop until there are no more.

A bag of 12 ounces makes a little more than 1/2 a quart of finished. This year I dispensed with white or brown sugar and went with miel corse (a Corsican honey) and some local honey to dilute the Corsican; lime zest, lime juice, orange juice and white wine instead of other liquids; a dash of salt; allspice, ground black pepper, and cinnamon sticks; and some dried cherries (at least 2 or 3 ounces). The cranberry seems to exude pectin so gelling is easy. I would have added maybe a full cup of liquid instead of 3/4 and 2-shot glasses.

It's very intense. It would surely be perfect in a turkey sandwich on Saturday. I'm curious to hear what the eaters say tomorrow.

Onions

I really have to post a photo of Karen's onion crop. I have below, part of the crop. They are so beautiful and plentiful. They are actually a very sweet red onion. I have noticed in my travels that American commercial produce tends to be BIG. Apparently we like our green peppers big. Big, better, more; that's some mantra here. Sometimes it works, but I know the economy is suffering. Clearly the smaller green peppers from non-commercial sources are available, possibly from farmers markets, and surely from our garden. Their flavor is more intense and concentrated. There is more thickness to the flesh of the commercial green pepper but it doesn't result in a satisfactory flavor.

When living in Pennsylvania in the 70's I had a friend named Richard who loved to hike and one of his favorite foods was green peppers. He might have other foods, but the fact that it was a water food and fresh was enough incentive for Richard. He'd eat them whole. I think that's where I got my habit.

The onions. I carmelized a whole onion this week. Thinly sliced on my Benriner and slowly cooked to golden transformed and concentrated the sweetness. Not a dot of added sugar was necessary. I made it as a side for some chicken livers bought for dinner from the local chain market. Don't ever read the label of chicken livers. Rarely do you see any ingredient providing more than 100% of anything; if I recall they had 136% of my daily required minimum intake of cholesterol. Yikes. Undaunted I made some and had a richly rewarding dinner.

I don't know how long our onions will last but they will surely accompany many dishes this winter.

Kale

I don't know why I wrote about kale in the chard post.

Cooked it again tonight. It was a curly kale but softer than what Karen grew in the garden. Since I actually bought it at the chain-store it may have been in the pipeline a while. It was unlabeled as to origin (I really, really hate that and hope soon that all veggies will be tagged as to origin).

The stem/stalk was as thick as a chair leg but the leaves were dense and tight but soft. It appeared to be younger rather than older. The taste, as reported from around the table, was to the eaters' liking.

I think, if one only cuts, cleans, dries, and sautees the kale that it will not be cooked. It seems so important to blanch it in water first, even to return to a boil after putting it in the water. Hard to kill this stuff I think.

Onions and oil finished the cooking. Salt and pepper and white balsamic finished it off before serving.