A Bloggable Soup

Well, the LHC turned on and I essentially disappeared into a hole of data analysis.  It was everything a girl dreamed it would be, but I was only able to emerge a couple of times to participate in quotidian activities.  On one of those brief occasions this soup was born.  It's simple, healthy and tasty.  I don't like split peas too much because I think they taste chalky but we had a bag in the pantry and I felt obligated to use them.  Some vegetables, some yogurt and a food processor later I had a pretty good soup on my hands.  By blending the peas with yogurt the chalkiness largely disappeared and it was replaced with a creamy tang.  It also freezes well so you can make a big pot and save some for later.

Split Pea Soup

makes about 6 servings

1 large onion
2 carrots
3 celery ribs
1.5 cups of dried split peas (i used yellow)
6 cups of vegetable broth (approximately, you might need more)
2 Tbsp dried cumin
1-2 tsp smoked hot paprika, chili powder or spice of your choice
salt and pepper to taste
juice of 1 to 1/2 lemon

2/3 cup of flavorful plain yogurt, like Brown Cow.

Dice the onions, carrots and celery into small pieces.  Heat a couple of tablespoons of olive oil in a heavy bottomed pot and add the onions.  Saute for a few minutes and then add the carrots and celery.  Continue to saute until the onions are translucent and the carrots and celery are soft.  Add the cumin and stir a bit, then add the split peas and the broth.  Simmer, partially covered, until peas are soft, about 45 min.  You might need to add some more broth or water at some point. Stir in the chili powder and salt and pepper to taste.  Squeeze in a half a lemon or maybe a full lemon if you are using Meyer lemons.  Puree until smooth in batches then blend in the yogurt.  If you are going to freeze some of it, divide the yogurt and don't add it to the to be frozen part until you reheat it.  You can serve with a drizzle of olive oil and some fresh pepper!

Mmmm...Cream Sauce

We don't usually eat very rich foods.  Cream is generally reserved for desserts, and even then we don't have it often.  However, a few weeks ago I bought some cream on a whim for the creamy rice stuffed squash.  It sat in our fridge for a week or so (thankfully it was ultra pasteurized!) until I spotted it while trying to figure out what to make for dinner.  A cream sauce, made completely without guidance so I make no promises as to its authenticity, resulted and I was quite pleased.  Given that its main ingredients are cream and butter, it will not become a dinner staple, however it is perfect for a bit of indulgence every now and then. 

I used roasted tomatoes in this recipe, and I think their acidity cut some of the heaviness of the cream.  Slow roasting tomatoes yields delicious results, even with less than stellar produce, and I highly recommend giving them the full 45 min to 1 hr they deserve.  (Google 'slow roasted tomatoes' and you'll find hundreds of variations).  The sauce itself is quick to make, so you don't have to plan too far ahead if you already have the tomatoes on hand.

Pasta with Cream Sauce and Slow Roasted Tomatoes

4 or more diced and Roasted Tomatoes
(Dice, toss with olive oil, salt and pepper then bake for 45 min - 1hr at 350F.)

4 small or 2-3 medium garlic cloves, minced with salt

5 sprigs of fresh thyme

2/3 to 1 cup heavy cream * this is very approximate, I didn't measure it before I poured, unfortunately

2 Tbsp unsalted butter

1 packed cup of chopped greens

1/4-1/2 bunch of parsley, chopped

2 servings of cooked pasta, shells or tubes are best because they suck up the sauce

optional lemon wedge

Melt the butter in skillet over medium low heat, then add the minced garlic.  Cook for 3 minutes, until soft and fragrant, then add the leaves of the springs of thyme.  Add cream, stirring until it's hot, then add the greens, cooking till wilted which should take a couple of minutes.  Then add pasta, tomatoes and salt and pepper to taste.  Take off stove and add in 1/2 bunch chopped parsley.  Serve with a lemon wedge if you think it needs more acidity.

Roasted Squash with Bok Choy and Edamame

I don't like tofu.  Since I'm a vegetarian I'm supposed to eat it three times a day, but I can't.  I think it tastes like the sponges women use to put on thick, oozy foundation.  I used to eat it when I was bike racing, but I never truly enjoyed it.  Tofu can be good, for example well marinated tofu is often delicious, but it still feels like a sponge.  I just can't get over the sponginess so I don't cook it.  This is irrelevant information unless you read the following recipe and wonder why I didn't use tofu, since it would seem to be the natural choice.  I find edamame to be a more palatable protein and use it instead.

Now that I've preempted the question that probably would not have occurred, let's move on to the recipe.  It's very simple, healthy and satisfying.  Enjoy!

Roasted Squash with Bok Choy and Edamame.

A winter squash, I used red kuri
Several heads of bok choy or baby bok choy
1 cup Edamame
2 cloves of garlic
Vegetable or peanut oil
Soy sauce
Rice vinegar

Rice, cooked the way you like it.

optional: 
Toasted sesame oil
2 Tbsp sesame seeds

Preheat oven to 375F.

Slice the squash into thin 1 inch pieces and toss with a few tablespoons of the vegetable or peanut oil, a couple splashes of rice vinegar and a couple splashes of soy sauce.  Put in a single layer on a baking sheet and roast until soft and the edges are starting to brown, about 25 min.  You should probably stir it a couple of times so it doesn't get blackened.

While the squash is cooking, clean the bok choy and slices it into 1 in thick strips (very approximately).  Mince the garlic.  Heat 1 tablespoon of veg/peanut oil over medium heat.  Add the garlic and cook, stirring for one minute, then add the bok choy and stir.  You can put a tablespoon or so of water into the pan and cover to wilt the bok choy.  It should take about 7 min.  While the bok choy is wilting, heat a small sauce pan over med-hight heat.  Add the sesame seeds and stir frequently for one minute or until the seeds are lightly toasted.    When the bok choy is just about done, add the edamame to heat it through.

Once the squash is done, add it to the pan with the bok choy.  Toss with a splash of soy sauce and another of rice vinegar.  Drizzle with some toasted sesame oil and the sesame seeds.  Serve over rice.

Roasted Tomato and Olive Sauce

We often end up eating assorted spreads with crusty bread and salad for dinner.  The combination of the bold flavors of the sauces, the refreshing crunch of the salad and the soul-satisfying mouthfuls of good bread is irresistible on nights when I don't want to spend a lot of time in the kitchen.  Below I share a concoction that I developed a few weeks ago.  It falls somewhere between a condiment and a sauce.  The night I made it we had it with bread and the next day I tossed it with pasta for lunch.  Yum.


The green sauce in the background is basil pesto enlivened by some mint.  I substituted 1/3 of the basil for mint which gave a subtle twist to the always delicious basil/garlic/oil/cheese concoction.

Roasted Tomato and Olive Sauce

6 Romas or other firm tomato, diced (seeded and pulp removed if you want a drier sauce)

couple pinches of red pepper flakes
2/3 cup pitted Kalamata olives
2 Tbsp chopped fresh herbs such as basil, parsley, oregano or marjoram

Olive Oil, salt, pepper


Preheat the oven to 350F.

Toss the tomatoes with the red pepper flakes, salt to taste and a few glugs of olive oil.  Roast them for about 30 min until they just start to brown.

In a food processor combine the tomatoes, olives and herbs*.  Blend until desired thickness is achieved.  You might want to add some more olive oil if the sauce seems too dry.  You could also use sundried tomatoes, in which case you'll definitely need some oil.   

It can be served spooned over bread or tossed with spaghetti and some parmesan! 

*I might have thrown in a few cloves of garlic too.  Embarrassingly, I don't remember.

Perfect Lazy Day Cake

I've been busy lately.  I'm working on several projects at once, I had a cold and Kyle took (and passed!) his quals which all combined to make me pretty stressed out and somewhat anxious.   This weekend, however, the day after the quals, we had a supremely lazy day.  It was raining (in Berkeley in September!) and we were exhausted from the late nights and the celebrating.  It was the perfect day to make the Everyday Cake from Orangette.  As she mentions, the simple, homely cake is perfect for an afternoon snack and I enjoyed it as breakfast for a couple of mornings.  My only suggestion to the recipe she posts is that you use almond extract instead of vanilla.  It gives the cake more character.

Cool Cucumbers and Rambling Romas

These recipes went over well at a recent impromptu dinner-party-turned-debate (a natural evolution resulting from mixing wine and a group evenly split between natural and social scientists), so I'm going to share despite the fact that there are no pictures. I didn't think it would be too polite to stop everyone from eating to shove a camera in their food.

I served chilled cucumber soup followed a roasted eggplant and tomato orzo dish. The cucumber soup was inspired by the huge bag of cucumbers which came in our CSA box this week. I had failed to finish the cucumbers from the previous weeks box and the only thing I could think of doing with them besides putting them in salad was making soup. I poked around the internet and my cookbooks and cherry picked ingredients according to what I liked and what I had on hand. The result is rather refreshing but with a very strong flavor.  Think tzaziki in a drinkable form. Note: this recipe and the following feed 7-8.

Chilled Cucumber Soup

3 lg or 4 medium cucumbers seeded and chopped
1.5 cloves of garlic, minced
1 small yellow or white onion, chopped
1 tsp of salt
a generous handful of chopped dill
1/2-1 tsp of chile pepper (I used a chipotle powder)
1-2 cups of plain yogurt*
3/4 cup of butter milk*

* One of the guests had a daily allergy so I also made a vegan version by using plain soy yogurt and water in place of the yogurt and buttermilk. Surprisingly good!

You put it all in a food processor and puree, then put it in the fridge until you are ready to serve. Super easy. Adjust the salt and pepper to taste. You might want to put in less of the yogurt and buttermilk in the beginning and add more if you think its too thick.

I started thinking about the main course with a couple criteria in mind. 1) it could not be very complicated to make, and 2) it had to use the eggplant and romas I had gotten in the CSA box. I also had a pile of meyer lemons on the counter from our tree that I thought would be nice to incorporate. A search for eggplant and lemon turned up this recipe which I used as a basis for the dish. From there it just grew organically into something quite tasty.

Warning: This recipe cooks a lot of the ingredients separately before combining them in the end so planning out when you are going to do everything is advised. I didn't really plan much at all before starting it, so that's probably why it's so rambling.

A Rambling Dish of Roasted Eggplant and Romas with Orzo, Among Other Things

 

This picture has nothing to do with the dish--it's just a pretty farmer's market haul.

1 eggplant diced and salted and let to drain for 2-3 hrs
1 tsp red pepper flakes
lots of olive oil
optional vegetable oil
1 large onion
6-8 good sized roma tomatoes, diced
2 cans of garbanzo beans
3 meyer lemons (if using regular lemons, use only 2)
4 garlic cloves
1 bunch of parsley, chopped
handful of basil, ribboned
1.5 cups of orzo
salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 450F, if you are so inclined you can preheat the pan you will roast the eggplant in.

Toss the diced and salted eggplant in the juice of 1/2 a lemon, the red pepper flakes, a few glugs of olive oil and pinch or two of salt. Spread onto a baking sheet or roasting pan and cook until soft and brown in spots, about 30 min. You should stir several times during the roasting so that the eggplant doesn't burn.

Put together the vinaigrette by whisking together the juice of the remaining lemon, 1 garlic clove crushed and minced with a large pinch of kosher salt and the ribboned basil and about 1/2 to 3/4 cup of olive oil. Let sit.

Then drain the cans of garbanzos and dump the beans into a loaf pan or some other smallish oven proof pan. Mince the remaining 3 cloves of garlic and add them. Then you want to basically cover the garbanzos in oil. I used about 2/3rds canola oil and 1/3rd olive oil. It's a lot of oil. I was hesitant and I didn't quite cover them but should've since the ones on top got a little dried out. Cover the pan with foil and put it in the oven on a rack below the eggplant. Cook it until the eggplant and tomatoes are done, it doesn't really matter how long.

Lastly (for the oven anyways), in an oven proof skillet, saute the onions over medium heat until they are soft.  Once the onions are soft add the diced tomatoes and cook, covered but stirring occasionally, for 10 min. Then put the skillet, uncovered, in the oven and let it cook for 10 min.  I got very excited about this part because there are few things better than roasted tomatoes.

At some point you need to cook the orzo in salted boiling water until al dente.

The garbanzos, eggplant and tomato/onion mixture should be finishing all around the same time. Once they are all done you combine them (spoon out the garbanzos, don't dump the oil in) and the orzo in the skillet, if its big enough, or a large bowl if you are going to serve it immediately. Throw in the chopped parsley and stir in the vinaigrette. Salt and pepper to taste. You can return it, covered, to the turned off but still warm oven until ready to serve. I passed around some crumbled feta at the same time but it wasn't really necessary.

Ok, I guess I failed on requirement 1.  Trust me when I say it's not that complicated.

Best Chocolate Chip Cookies Ever (Grad Student Variation)

Simply put, these are the best chocolate chip cookies ever. Perhaps the best cookies ever. You will never bite into a chewier, more flavorful chocolate chip cookie than this one. However, I must warn that it's not for the faint of heart or the counter of calories. You must approach this cookie without regard for health and without fear of indulgence. It is nothing if not decadent.

The recipe is the result of a New York Times search for the perfect chocolate chip cookie. It's genius lies in two departures from the usual cookie recipe. First, it uses my favorite trick in baking, letting time do the work for you. Optimally, you prepare the dough 36 hrs before you plan to bake the cookies, letting it sit in the fridge in the intervening time. The waiting period gives the flour a chance to fully absorb the liquid, primarily the egg. Second, it tops the cookies with sea salt just before baking. The salt plays off the sweetness of the dough and the slight bitterness of the chocolate to make it a truly unforgettable cookie.

I've slightly adapted it for the grad student budget. If you make this cookie you must not dispense with a) the fridge time, b) the salt, or c) the golf ball sized scoops of dough. c) is important because it allows different regions to develop in the cookie as it spreads out in the oven heat. You get a crispy outer edge which morphs into a chewy, gooey center. Also, cook them until they are just golden brown and follow the directions of first putting the sheet on a rack for 10 minutes before transferring the cookies to the rack. In doing so you are letting the cooking process, which continues once they have left the oven, complete itself undisturbed.

NY Times Chocolate Chip Cookies
Adapted for the Graduate student budget

(The original recipe is here, if you want to get fancy.)

3 1/3 cups of all purpose flour (17 oz)
1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons coarse salt
2 1/2 sticks (1 1/4 cups) unsalted butter
1 1/4 cups (10 ounces) light brown sugar
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons (8 ounces) granulated sugar
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons natural vanilla extract

1.25 lbs of chocolate chunks (about 1.5 bags of the nestle semisweet chocolate chunks)

Sea salt*

1. Sift flours, baking soda, baking powder and salt into a bowl. Set aside.

2. Using a mixer fitted with paddle attachment, cream butter and sugars together until very light, about 5 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Stir in the vanilla. Reduce speed to low, add dry ingredients and mix until just combined, 5 to 10 seconds. Drop chocolate pieces in and incorporate them without breaking them. Press plastic wrap against dough and refrigerate for 24 to 36 hours. Dough may be used in batches, and can be refrigerated for up to 72 hours.

3. When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a nonstick baking mat. Set aside.

4. Scoop 6 3 1/2-ounce mounds of dough (the size of generous golf balls) onto baking sheet. Sprinkle lightly with sea salt and bake until golden brown but still soft, 18 to 20 minutes. Transfer sheet to a wire rack for 10 minutes, then slip cookies onto another rack to cool a bit more. Repeat with remaining dough, or reserve dough, refrigerated, for baking remaining batches the next day. Eat warm, with a big napkin.

You can also freeze the dough balls. Allow them to defrost in the fridge for 24 hrs before you bake them. I tried baking them directly but since they were so big they defrosted unevenly.

Yield: 1 1/2 dozen 5-inch cookies.


*I use fleur de sel (salt flower), an airy and flavorful salt which dissolves on your tongue. Trader Joe's has a good one for a good price.

Roasted Peaches

On my way home from work yesterday, as I was thinking of what I needed to pick up from the grocery store, I had a flash of inspiration. Kyle had requested I get something for dessert and I realized I could put a twist on our standby dessert of fresh fruit and vanilla bean ice cream. The result? Warm, sweet peaches, soft enough to melt away from our knives like butter, splashed with tangy balsamic vinegar syrup and accompanied by some plain and simple vanilla bean ice cream. Yum. And it only takes about 20 min!

Roasted Peaches with Balsamic Syrup

Syrup:
3/4 cups of balsamic vinegar
1 - 2 rounded teaspoons of brown sugar

2 peaches, halved and pitted
1 tbsp unsalted butter

Preheat the oven to 400F.

In skillet (oven proof if you have one) melt the butter over medium heat. Add the peaches, cut side down, cover and cook for about 8 minutes, checking them often to make sure they aren't sticking to the skillet.

Meanwhile put the balsamic vinegar in a small sauce pan over medium low heat and add the brown sugar. Let this cook down, stirring occasionally, until the liquid turns syrupy and clings to a spoon. It should take 10-15 min.

Move the peaches, cut side down, to a baking sheet or just leave them in the skillet if it is oven proof, and put them into the oven. Cook for 8 minutes then remove the sheet/skillet and flip them cut side up. Return them to the oven and turn on the broiler for 3 minutes. *these times are rather approximate and will vary depending on the size of the peach. just watch to make sure they don't burn!

Serve drizzled with the balsamic syrup and accompanied by a big scoop of vanilla bean ice cream.

Warmed Garbanzos over Bitter Salad Greens

Yesterday I came home from Monterey Market with more tomatoes anyone in their right mind would buy for two people. I couldn't help myself. As soon as I stepped under the market's canopy the dry farmed Early Girls, whom I haven't seen in almost a year, called to me and I was powerless to stop myself from shoveling them into my cart.* A bag full of basil and a loaf of good bread had also found their way home with me so I decided to make bruschetta, arguably the best way to serve fresh, wonderful tomatoes. However, bruschetta does not a meal make so I needed to find something most substantive to accompany it. Also, I wasn't in the mood to spend a lot of time in the kitchen, so it had to be quick. Motivated by thoughts of herbed italian canellini beans and the memory of this wonderful dish (I made it a couple of years ago and often think about it fondly), I came up with garbanzo beans cooked in olive oil with some simple adornments of garlic, parsley and parmesean. To complement the warm creaminess of the beans I served it over some bitter salad greens, also a Monterey market buy, dressed in olive oil and vinegar. The result was unexpectedly satisfying!

Sadly there are no photos associated with this recipe due to an unfortunate accident involving a car door and Kyle's camera's LCD screen. Hopefully we'll get it fixed soon!


Warmed Garbanzos over Bitter Salad Greens

1 can of garbanzo beans
1/4-1/3 cup olive oil
1 garlic clove, minced with a pinch or two of salt
1/4 cup of loosely packed chopped parsley
1/4 cup grated parmesean or other hard salty cheese
salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Bitter salad greens in a simple vinaigrette. I used red indian mustard greens dressed with olive oil and sherry vinegar.

Warm the garlic in the olive oil in a very small pot over medium-low heat. Add the garbanzos and continue to cook until the oil starts to bubble. There should be enough oil to cover about half to two thirds of the garbanzos, add more if necessary. Add the parsley, stir and continue to cook for 1 min. Remove from heat and stir in the cheese, salt and pepper. Allow to cool for 5 min then serve over the dressed greens.

* According to wikipedia these tomatoes have a cult following. I'm glad to hear I'm not alone in my obsession! Here is a video about dry farming from one of the local Early Girl producers. He looks like a hipster, talks like a surfer and knows farming like, well, a farmer:

More on Dry Farming from Dirty Girl from Oliveto Community on Vimeo.

More Summery Fun

The wonderful thing about summer cooking is that it is so simple. The produce is so fresh it requires little preparation and the long sunny days demand light and delicate meals. All I did for the above pasta dish was to thinly slice some squash lengthwise with my mandoline and then saute it with a bit of olive oil and garlic until it was just tender. I transferred the squash to a bowl and sauteed three thinly sliced gypsy peppers in the same skillet with a bit of additional oil. Then I tossed cooked penne with ribboned basil, a couple of diced fresh tomatoes, the sauteed vegetables and some crumbled feta. Yum. And so visually pleasing too!

Summer Splendor

Tomato season is truly upon us! This week our CSA box contained three types of delicious tomatoes. What you see above are sliced heirlooms with some basil, lemon and garlic mixed olive oil. I minced a small clove of garlic, combined it in a bowl with the chopped zest of one lemon and about 10 slivered leaves of basil and covered them with olive oil. After mixing and letting it sit for a few minutes I brushed the toast with the oil then layered it with the tomatoes and finished it off with the basil/lemon/garlic mixture and some parmesean. Tasted just like summer!

Stuffed Poblanos with Black Beans, Spinach and Several Cheeses

Four forest green, firm and satiny Poblanos arrived in our CSA box on Friday. They were so beautiful they demanded special treatment. I scoured the internet and my cookbooks for recipes and while I found many tempting dishes, nothing called out to be made. Most recipes were for stuffed peppers and I also found a recipe for spinach, goat cheese and poblano lasagna which I vaguely remembered being told was not very good. With these examples rattling around in my head I went for a bike ride and inspiration struck (although not at Inspiration Point). I had a vision combining the best of the lasagna and stuffed peppers, and the nascent recipe satisfied my requirement of using, for the most part, what I already had at the house: tons of tomatoes from my farmer's market spree, cilantro and jack cheese from last weeks' quesedillas, ricotta from last week's lasagna, oregano I had picked up for the gratin a la myriam I was making for a Sunday party as well as onions and garlic from the box. Because I started with dried black beans, the total time spent was long, but there wasn't too much much active time. Perfectly fine for a lazy Saturday afternoon/evening.

Black Bean and Spinach Stuffed Poblanos with Tomato Sauce

for the beans:
1/2 cup of dried or 1 can of black beans
1 small onion, chopped
4 cloves of garlic, minced
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp ground corriander
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
1/2 tsp chipotle or other spicy powdered chile
6 cups of water if you are using dried, 1/2 cup if canned
1 bay leaf

for the cheese/spinach filling
1/2 cup ricotta
1 cup (packed) spinach
1.5 tbsp chopped fresh oregano (1 tsp dried)
juice of 1 meyer lemon or 1/2 regular lemon

for the tomato sauce:
4 medium to large tomatoes, diced
3 minced cloves of garlic
2 tbsp olive oil
scant 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro

Additionally:
4 poblano chiles
2 tortillas
few oz jack cheese
ricotta salata (optional)

If you are using dried beans bring beans and water to a hard boil for 1 minute, take off the stove, let sit for 1 hr. Drain off the water, add another 6 cups and the bay leaf and simmer for 1.5 hrs. For both dried and canned: Saute the onions over medium heat until soft and translucent, then add the garlic, cumin, corriander and oregano. Cook for another couple of minutes. If using dried beans, add to the beans and simmer until the beans are soft and the liquid has thickened, about another 1.5 hrs. If using canned beans, add the beans and 1/2 cup of water and cook until the beans are soft and the flavors have melded, this probably only takes a few minutes. Once the beans are to a texture you like, add the vinegar and pepper and add salt to taste. Beans are done.

While the beans are cooking you can make the tomato sauce. Heat the olive oil in a sauce pan over medium heat and add the garlic. Cook for a minute then add the tomatoes and cook, stirring occasionally, until the tomatoes have broken down and the sauce has thickened. This can take up to 20 min. When the sauce is near the consistency you like, add the cilantro. I think that oregano would also be a great choice of herb. Tomato sauce is done.

Now, onto the ricotta filling. Blanch the spinach in a pot of boiling salted water for one minute then dump into a collander and let the liquid drain out. Transfer to a cutting board and chop roughly. In a bowl mix the ricotta with lemon juice and the oregano. Add the spinach and stir, salting to your taste. I'm not a big ricotta fan, so that's why I've put a lot of extra flavors in this. If I didn't need to use up the ricotta I might've used goat cheese thinned with a little cream, which is what the lasagna recipe used. I think it would've give the dish a slightly more assertive flavor.

At some point you need to roast the poblanos. Turn on the broiler and broil them till the skin is blacked on all sides, about 8 min, turning them once. You can also do this over a gas flame if you have it. Immediately transfer the charred peppers to a bowl and cover with a plate. Let them sit for 20 minutes then slide the skin off them.

While you are letting the peppers sit you can make the tortillas by brushing both sides with olive oil then sprinkling one side with some of the grated jack cheese. You then put them under the broiler. I recommend putting them on a wire rack and then on a pan or putting the wire rack driectly on top of the oven rack and putting a pan on a lower oven rack to catch any melted cheese. This way the bottom side does not get soft. Take them out after 3-4 minutes and put cool them on a wire rack before cutting into four pieces.

Now you need to assemble the poblanos. Preheat the oven to 400F. Take each pepper and cut off the top 1/3rd lengthwise, being careful not to tear the delicate skin. Remove the seeds gently and put them onto a lighly oiled baking dish. Fill halfway with the ricotta mixture and the other half with the beans. My poblanos were small so I could only fit two layers, but if I had larger ones I would've filled them with 1/3rd ricotta, 1/3 beans, 1/3 tomato sauce. Put the top back on the chiles then sprinkle with some jack. Put in the oven for 10 min till the cheese is melted and the peppers are heated through.

Arrange two plates on the counter and split the tomato sauces between them. Ladle any remaining beans into the center then lay the poblanos on top. Sprinkle with the remaining cheese and grated ricotta salata, if you have it. Serve with the tortillas and enjoy the product of your hard work!

Whew I'm exhausted just from writing that!

Variations on a Theme

I've been busy lately. I gave a couple of talks last week, one at a workshop at SLAC, the national linear accelerator lab at Stanford, and one to a high school cosmology workshop at LBL. You'll hear more about the later in the future, it was recorded and will go on YouTube at some point. The picture above is of me speaking at Stanford, although you mostly just see my slides. That talk took a lot of preparation because it was the type that postdocs or senior people usually give. I spent hours preparing for it in the hopes that I wouldn't screw up, and I can happily report that it seems I succeeded in my goal. At the very least most people didn't realize I was a grad student, which is a good sign.

I managed to do a little cooking in between all the talk writing and I thought I'd share some of my creations with you. These are not so much recipes as variations on a theme, roasted vegetables, which find their way from bruschetta to quesadillas.

Thema: Andante

The first incarnation of this dish is elegant, bold and perhaps one might say stately, if you can give that attribute to summer squash and tomatoes. It is also quite simple and easy to make.

(all quantities are very approximate)
1.5 lbs summer squash of any sort, sliced into bite sized pieces
1/2 pint cherry tomatoes, halved. If using larger tomatoes cut them into bite sized pieces
1 cup sliced mushrooms
2-3 cloves of minced garlic

4oz crumbled feta cheese (or as much as you like)

Olive oil
Balsamic Vinegar

Several tablespoons of fresh herbs: oregano, basil, parsley or marjoram, or a few teaspoons of dried herbs such as herbes de provence.
Salt and pepper to taste.

Sliced assertive bread, best if a day old.

Preheat oven to 350F. Put vegetables and garlic in a roasting pan or baking disk and drizzle with olive oil to coat. Splash with balsamic, probably a couple of tablespoons. If you are using dried herbs, add now. Add salt and pepper to taste and put into oven for 15 min, stir and then return to the oven until the vegetables start to brown, about 15 min more.

Put roasted veggies into a bowl, stir in fresh herbs, if using, and crumbled feta. You can adjust the olive oil and balsamic now if you like. Let it sit for a little while so the flavors have a chance to meld. Toast the bread and arrange on plates. Cover with vegetable mixture and serve with knife, fork and napkin!

Variation 1: Vivace

If the first version was bold and stately, the second was bright and crisp but not too drastic a departure from the original idea. It is another bruschetta, but lighter with some unexpected ingredients (mostly because I was trying to use up our vegetables before the next box came!)

As you can see from the photo above, I used green beans, carrots, squash and green peppers, all of which were cut into bite sized pieces. Additionally I used:

a handful of chopped green olives
juice of one lemon
a couple pinches of red pepper flakes

and as in the previous

olive oil
salt
pepper
fresh herbs
2-3 cloves of fresh garlic

Preheat the oven to 350F. Toss the cut vegetables and olives with the olive oil, red pepper, and garlic. Bake for 20-25 min, stirring once, until vegetables are cooked and just starting to brown. Move to a bowl, mix with the herbs, lemon juice and feta. Serve over toast!


Variation 2: Con Moto
For this variation I added some sauteed red onion and black beans to the leftover variation 2 and made soft tacos (of a kind). You simply saute a small red onion with some olive oil and toss in some canned black beans at the end. I also made an impromptu "salsa" with what I had in the fridge to go with it.

2 medium sized, flavorful tomatoes, diced
1/2 small red onion, finely chopped
1 medium sized garlic clove, finely chopped
juice of half a lemon
1/4 cup chopped parsley

Then heat up some tortillas and spoon in the black bean-vegetable mix and some salsa and enjoy! I should put the disclaimer out that part of the reason I had so much of variation 2 around to work with was because my other half was out of town and left all the eating to me. He's lucky he was gone because that salsa has a real bite to it and discourages any kisses for several hours after its consumed. But it was delicious, so it was worth the bad breath :).

Variation 3: Andante

We end with an Andante because this last variation is the heaviest of them all and by this time you are moving quite slowly under the influence of variations 1 and 2! Its a simple quesadilla, using the leftover roasted veggie/onion/black bean mix and a generous extra helping of feta. You simply take your tortilla (whole wheat if you want to incorporate some whole grains) and spoon the leftovers, beans and all, into one half along with a generous helping of extra crumbled feta. Fold it over and brush with olive oil. Place the olive oil side down on a skillet over medium high heat. Brush the top side with olive oil and cook until the bottom is lightly browned before turning over to cook the top side. Serve right away! If you are making multiple tortillas you can usually fit two of them in the skillet at once for speed.

Then pat yourself on the back for finding a way to eat all of those veggies!

Gratin de Tomate, Courgette et Chèvre à la Myriam

I can trace the genesis of my love of food and cooking to my year in France. During that time I learned that contrary to my childhood prejudices, tomatoes and cheese were wonderful things, that there are few better ways to spend a saturday morning than at an outdoor market and that an evening is best spent in a kitchen with good friends and a bottle of wine. As a child I was an extremely picky eater and stubborn, a bad combination for any parent trying to feed a family. My mother, however, never forced me to eat things I didn't want to and kept telling herself (and me) that someday I would move to a foreign country and come back eating all sorts of new and different things. How's that for foresight?

I arrived in France an abhorrer of cheese, tomato and salad dressing and left with an appreciation for all things culinary. Except meat, of course, which the French never managed to convince me was worth eating. Part of this transformation came at the feet, or rather in the kitchen, of a good family friend, Myriam Rey. Myriam and the rest of the Reys met my family when Jean-Michel, the father/husband, brought them to live at FermiLab for a year while he worked with my dad. When I spent a year in France they became my family away from home. Myriam cooks with the quintessential grace of the french home cook. Every thing is simple, fresh, delicious and prepared seemingly without effort. She made something like dish I'm sharing with you in this post when I visited them last summer while working at CERN. It's perfect for the summer when tomatoes and squash are abundant. We got some beautiful Romas and zucchini in our box this week so I couldn't resist making it.

Gratin de Tomate, Courgette et Chèvre à la Myriam

4 long or 5 to 6 normal sized roma or other firm tomatoes
2 medium or 3 small zucchini (courgette)
4 oz log of goat cheese

1 cup of brown rice
1.5-2.5 cups of water or vegetable broth

1 lg or 2 small white or yellow onions, cut in half and thinly sliced
1-1.5 cups of thinly sliced mushrooms (brown is better)
3 cloves of garlic, minced or pressed
2 tbsp olive oil
1/3 cup of white wine

herbs, fresh or dried, for garnish
coarse salt and freshly ground pepper

Preheat the oven to 350 F and lightly oil the inside of a 9x13in baking dish.

Start the rice cooking in the broth either on the stove or in a rice cooker.

Heat the oil in a skillet to medium heat and add the pressed garlic. Cook for a couple of minutes, stirring frequently, then add the onions. After about 8 minutes, add the wine, two minutes later add the mushrooms and a pinch or two of salt. Cook until the onions are translucent and the mushrooms are beginning to brown, about 15 more minutes.

In the meantime slice the tomatoes and the zucchini into thin rounds of approximately the same size. Keep the cheese in the fridge until you are assembling the dish.

Once the rice is cooked add it to the onions and stir until combined. Then scoop the mixture in to the baking dish, smoothing till it forms a flat layer. Get the log out of the fridge and remove the wrapping. You'll be slicing off a round the size of the vegetables one at a time

Start laying the vegetables and cheese slices on top of the rice, alternating tomato and zucchini twice then cheese: zucchini-tomato-zucchini-tomato-cheese-zucchini-tomato-zucchini-tomato-cheese, etc. Do a full row and the start the next with tomato. The picture should be worth a thousand explanations in this case.


If you are using dried herbs, sprinkle some on now, along with salt and pepper. I sprinkled a bit of herbs de provence and then used some fresh ones after it was cooked.

Put the dish in the oven and cook for at least 3o minutes. You can check on it at 30 and if the zucchini don't look cooked enough, let it go longer, possibly up to an hour. The time to cook depends on the thickness of the slices, I think mine took 45 min to bake.

Sprinkle with fresh herbs (I had basil and parsley lying around but any herb should work). Serve carefully, it has a tendency to fall apart. And enjoy!
Here is a photo from the original Myriam made last summer. She added some sort of sausage in the meat eater version and used the wonderful french chèvre which has a rind. I can only find it in the US for exhorbitant prices, so I usually use the rind-less Trader Joe's version. She also exhibited greater patience or better planning than I and most likely cooked hers for an hour.

Summer Squash Are Here!

The farmer's market was overflowing with summer squash today so I thought I'd share one of my favorite summer squash recipes, an easy and delicious pasta dish modeled after I ate at one of the best Italian restaurants I've been to, Trattoria la Siciliana. Situated at the southern end of the College and Ashby shopping strip, the Trattoria is small and loud with long lines and a cash only policy, but the food is so good you don't mind. Besides, it's par for the course in Berkeley. They serve an amazing dipping oil which makes it worth a visit just to munch on crusty bread drenched in the garlicy, fresh-herb packed oil. I've been there twice; the first time Kyle treated me for my birthday, the second time my dad treated us. The dish I'm about to share presented itself on the second trip and it was a revelation. Breadcrumbs on pasta?? Who knew the result could be so delicious? Apparently it's common in Italy but hasn't made it across the Atlantic.



Pasta with Summer Squash, Fresh Herbs and Bread Crumbs.

The following quantities are all relative and extremely approximate. Let X be the number of people you are going to serve.

2-3 * X medium summer squash
1/3-1/2 * X cups of fresh bread crumbs*
1-1.5 * X cloves of garlic
a little less than 1/4 cup*X of chopped fresh parsley
2 Tbsp * X chopped fresh herbs of your choice (in the photo I used marjoram)

your typical pasta serving size * X

Olive Oil
Parmesean

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Cut squash into 1/4-1/2 in slices, put in a glass baking dish so large enough so that they sit in 1-2 layers. Chop, slice or mince the garlic and add to the dish. Splash with olive oil, salt and pepper, toss. Sprinkle with the bread crumbs and toss again. Put in the oven for 20ish minutes, or until the squash is cooked through and the bread crumbs are nice and golden.

While its baking, boil water, salt it and cook the pasta of your choice.

When the squash is finished you can either add the pasta and a little olive oil to the baking dish directly, or you can put the pasta onto plates and serve the squash-breadcrumb mixture over it. Sprinkle with Parmesan if you like and drizzle with some nice olive oil. Enjoy!

*You can make bread crumbs by putting some day old bread in a food processor and whirling it into crumbs. They freeze well so you make a bunch and keep some in the freezer. Some people like to toast their bread crumbs first, I generally don't.

The LHC May Not Be Working But I'm Still Doing Experiments

Today I performed an experiment. The hypothesis: "I can make cabbage taste good". It was considered a high risk, high payoff experiment. High risk because I have only had success making cabbage based salads in the past, and high pay off because this difficult vegetable has dominated our CSA box in recent weeks. Success would save us from culinary frustration and boredom. Reading through the literature I found that potentially tasty cabbage had been obtained in a stuffed and rolled state. So off to the kitchen I went with two different fillings in mind. I decided that creating two fillings rather than just one was prudent because a) I had a big cabbage and b) in the event of failure of one stuffing the other could still potentially succeed. I'm happy to say after two hours of work our hypothesis was validated for both stuffing states and a pleasing cabbage based meal was produced. What follows is not so much a recipe as a general description of the method followed by a vague description of the stuffings.

Stuffed Cabbage:

Not the most beautiful looking, but certainly yummy!

1 head of cabbage

Bring a large pot of water big enough to submerge the cabbage to boil. Remove any outer leaves that are discolored or wilted. Cut around the core in square with deep incisions but don't actually try to remove it.

Submerge the cabbage in the boiling water for 4-5 minutes and then carefully remove. Peel off the 3 or so layers which now are supple and then repeat the submerging process until you've removed as many leaves as you want. You can use the rest of the cabbage in a salad or in your stuffing.

Lay the removed leaves on the counter and let cool. Cut out the tough triangular region at the bottom of the leaf, but don't cut off too much because you need room for the filling.

When you are ready to make the rolls, preheat the oven to 375 F and get a glass baking dish ready. Open a cabbage leaf, put a small french-sized ice cream scoop size of filling in the middle and then roll the leave up tightly up as you would a burrito or egg roll or other wrapped food of your choice. Put the rolled cabbages in the baking dish, add a 1/4 cup of liquid of your choice and cover tightly with foil. Bake for 30 min and serve either plane or with a sauce of some sort.

Filling #1
This concoction was a middle eastern side of the Mediterranean inspired stuffing. I cooked bulgur and french lentils in vegetable stock then added olive oil and grated carrot. I also sauteed onions and then added chopped mushrooms which i'd pulsed in a food processor until they were minced. These were cooked until the liquid mostly evaporated and then added to the bulgur mixture. It was topped off with a generous sprinkling of Ras-al-Hanout(one of my favorite spice blends), some chopped preserved lemon, and a handful of chopped dried apricots.

Filling #2
The second filling was inspired by the greek side of the Mediterranean and what was available in my fridge. I cooked brown rice, then added chopped fresh parsley and marjoram, a handful of chopped marinated artichoke hearts, some more preserved lemon and a spoonful or two of Trader Joe's sundried tomato bruschetta. Some small chunks of feta and mozzarella were enough to make the filling substantial. And delicious.

When I baked both I added the juice of 1 lemon to the water since almost everything I cook these days has to contain some part of a fresh lemon.

The stuffed cabbages were a fun and different meal for us to have, but it was definitely a weekend production. It could get a lot easier if you had some pre-cooked rice or other filling and just went with simple stuffing ingredients like nuts and raisins or cheese. I froze half of the batch and am curious to see how they survive the freezer stay.

Warm and Salty Things

Last weekend I threw Kyle a birthday party and somehow I got it in my head that making many small appetizers, salads and bread rather than one main dish and a few sides dishes was a great idea. That is probably not a choice I will make again since it had me in the kitchen the entire day, from 9 am until the party started! However, in the process I discovered some delicious recipes which I'd like to share with you. I found a wonderful cupcake recipe on one of my favorite food blogs, but I'm going to go salty instead of sweet on this post and share with you some very tasty appetizers. Dangerously tasty appetizers. I'm warning you that these are I-could-eat-them-all-day-every-day tasty.

Baked Olives from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone

Bakes olives sounds unassuming, right? Well, there is nothing unassuming about their flavor once this recipe is through with them!

2 cups Kalamata Olives
1/2 cup dry red or white wine
3 Tbsp olive oil
3 garlic cloves, 1 sliced, 2 coarsely chopped
1 bay leaf
2 Tbsp marjoram or 1 tsp dried oregano
1 Tbsp chopped parsley
freshly ground pepper
several pinches of red pepper flakes

1. Preheat oven to 375 F. Rinse olives if salty and put them in a baking dish large enough to hold them in one layer. Add the wine, half the oil, the sliced garlic and the bay leaf. Cover tightly with foil and bike until they are fragrant and swollen, about 45 min.

2. Pound the chopped garlic in a mortar with the marjoram, parsley and a few grinds of pepper. When the olives come out of the oven, poke each one with a fork or tip of a knife then stir in the garlic-herb paste, remaining oil and the red pepper flakes. Its best to let them sit a few hours to let the flavors meld and them warm them back up before serving.

I don't have a mortar so I just chopped the garlic finely into the marjoram. I also didn't use any parsley and it was great. I'd imagine that this tastes good with any assortment of herbs, and preserved lemons would make a really great addition in the step 2.

Sesame Lemon Feta Spread

(sorry, no picture for this one...I ate it too fast)

This is an adaptation from another recipe from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, one that came about by necessity when the original recipe failed miserably. The original instructions were to cut up feta into little rectangles then fry them for a few minutes before removing them and sprinkling with sesame seeds. I'm addicted to a corsican feta which the cheese shop down the street sells at a really good price but I think it's softer than the average feta. As soon as the cheese hit the oil it began to melt and loose its form and so to save the beautiful feta, this dish was born. Enjoy!

8 oz feta (the softer the better)
1 tbsp olive oil
2 bay leaves
freshly milled pepper
juice of 1 lemon
2 tsp of chopped marjoram **again any herb will work
1 tbsp sesame seeds

1. Toast the sesame seeds in a dry skillet over med-high heat. Mix in a bowl with the marjoram and set aside.

2. Heat the oil in a small skillet over medium heat with the bay leaf until you can smell it. Crumble the feta into small pieces and add to the pan. It should bubble and begin to melt. Stir until it becomes somewhat smooth, remove from the heat and add the juice of the lemon. Stir until incorporated and then stir in the pepper and sesame-marjoram mixture. Serve warm or at room temperature.

In which I get in touch with my inner pioneer woman: Peas and Parsley Risotto

Today I shucked peas. I sat at my kitchen table, a bowl at my right for the peas, a bowl at my left for the pods, and methodically tore off the ends, split the pods down the middle and slid my thumbs along the inside to release the little green orbs. I felt like I should have been wearing a muslin dress, playing out some storyline of a Laura Ingalls Wilder book, or an episode of Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman. Dr Quinn was one of my favorite TV shows growing up. What's not to love about a strong female doctor making her way in the Wild West, saving lives and changing minds? But I digress...back to the peas. The peas came in our CSA box and, as with many things that come in the box, I did not know what to do with it. I turned to my trusty cookbook, Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, by Deborah Madison and a recipe for risotto with peas caught my eye. It ended up being quite tasty. The peas made a satisfying pop when you bit into them which I've never experienced with frozen ones and the risotto was much creamier than I usually make it. I normally make risottos with little to no dairy, probably because the first risotto I ever made was for a vegan friend. This recipe, however, called for cream, and since I had some crème fraîche on hand I decided to go for the full dairy risotto experience.

Risotto with Parsley and Peas

Risottos are very labor intensive, but I think that's why I like making them. The continual stirring becomes hypnotic and you can almost loose yourself in the cooking process. Have fun!

For the parsley liquid:

2 bunches of parsley to yield ~ 3 cups of packed parsley leaves, discard the stems.
1.5 cups of water
.25 tsp salt

For the risotto:

2-3 tbsp of butter I used unsalted
1.5 cups Aborio rice pearl barley might work as well
.5-1 cup dry white wine the wine lends an acidity to the risotto which brings out the flavors. I sometimes even use a 1 to 1 ratio of wine to rice. Use anywhere from .5 to 1 cups depending on your taste, more would be overpowering for this risotto.
5 cups of broth or water I used water this time
One medium sized onion, or several shallots, or several spring onions, finely chopped
1.5 cups of shelled peas, fresh or frozen.
.5 cups of cream, marscapone cheese, or crème fraîche
.33-.5 cups of grated Parmesan, plus more for the table
salt and pepper to taste

1. Make the parsley liquid by bringing the 1.5 cups of water to a boil and then adding the parsley leaves and .25 tsp salt and cooking for 1 minute. Take the pot off the heat and let cook for 5 minutes. Purée in a blender or other instrument of your choice until smooth. Set aside.

2. Prepare to make the risotto by heating the 5 cups of stock or water to a simmer in a small pot. Have a ladle or measuring cup near by.

3. Heat the butter in a wide heavy bottomed skillet or sauce pan over medium heat. Add the onions and cook until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the rice and stir constantly for about one minute, until the centers of the grains are white and the outsides translucent. Add the wine and stir constantly until absorbed. At this point I usually just start adding the broth/water 1/2 a cup at a time, stirring until each addition is absorbed. Deborah recommends adding 2 cups of stock and covering, stirring occasionally until the liquid is absorbed, about 5 minutes. I tried it her way and it worked fine. After the two cups is absorbed, continue to add the rest of the liquid in 1/2 cup increments, stirring constantly throughout the process.

4. When the rice is close to being done and you've gone through most or all of the liquid, turn up the heat a little and add the parsley liquid all at once, stirring furiously until its all absorbed. When its just about absorbed add the peas and the cream, then season with salt and pepper, remembering that you are going to add some Parmesan, so it better not be too salty. Take off the heat, stir in the Parmesan and serve.

Meyer Lemon Martinis: This One's For You, Mom.

My mom is a martini woman. Not the spine-straightening vodka and vermouth type; that's my Uncle Frank's specialty. Jeweled, slightly sweet and tingly refreshing drinks like cosmopolitans are more her style. When I come home to visit we usually spend an evening sitting at the kitchen counter, sipping cocktails. It's always wonderfully relaxing. Here is a drink I think she'll like.

One of my best friends from college, Jasmin, lives across the bay in San Francisco. We try to get together a couple of times a month for dinner and drinks. This weekend I hosted and was trying to decide what to make for dessert. Our apartment building has a Meyer lemon tree in the backyard (pictured) which is currently producing copious amounts of lemons and consequently everything I am cooking lately features lemons. I decided that dessert should be lemon-centric but nothing I saw on the internet or in my cookbooks looked either appealing or easy enough to be worth making. Then an idea occurred to me: who needs dessert when you can make cocktails?! A visit to Google and a few clicks later I had a recipe for Meyer lemon martinis, which I've reproduced below. Mmmmm, Mmmmm, they were delicious!

Meyer Lemon Martinis
2 oz Vodka
.75 oz meyer lemon juice
.5 oz lemon-infused simple syrup (instructions below, increase to .75 oz if using normal lemons)
* a shot glass is 1.5 oz

Mix, shake, and pour, that's all there is too it! To serve I ran a squeezed lemon half around the rim of our flared-mouth wine glasses and then coated the rims with sugar.

Lemon-infused Simple Syrup

2 parts water
1 part sugar
lemon zest to taste (I put one lemon's worth of zest in 1.5 cups of water)

Put the water, sugar and lemon zest in a pot, stir until the sugar is dissolved and heat until just boiling. Take off the heat and let cool, strain and store in the fridge.

Et Voilà, Baguette!

Friday evening I stumbled home and flung myself on the couch after seven straight days of talks. Yep, seven. APS had begun the previous Saturday at 8:30 am and lasted through Tuesday. I got on a plane back to Berkeley Tuesday afternoon, missing the last half day of APS talks, and Wednesday morning I was back at LBL for a 7:30am meeting. That meeting was followed by the start of a workshop which lasted until Friday evening. When I flung myself down on the couch my brain was so saturated I vowed to not think about physics for the entire weekend. My plan for the weekend included sleeping, bike riding, cooking, and attempting to bake a decent baguette. I am happy to report that I had a wonderful weekend accomplishing all four of the above activities and almost succeeded in not doing any physics!


This post is to detail the baguette making, which was just as satisfying, if not more so, than the bagel making. The baguettes are made pain à l’ancienne style, detailed in Peter Reinhart’s book, which involves letting the fridge do most of the fermentation work. The result was a wonderfully crusty, sweet and nutty baguette which I couldn’t quite believe came out of my oven. I was supremely happy the rest of the day. It’s funny how flour, yeast, water and salt can do that to you.

Baguettes à l’Ancienne from Peter Reinhart’s The Bread Baker’s Apprentice

6 cups unbleached bread flour (27oz)
2 1/4 teaspoons salt (fine sea salt)
1 3/4 teaspoons instant yeast (increase by 25% if using active dry)
2 1/4 -3 cups ice-cold water (needs to be as cold as possible)
Semolina or cornmeal for dusting
*you will need an oven-safe, heavy duty skillet and a spray bottle of water for the baking stage

Step 1: Mixing

Stand Mixer Instructions: Combine the flour, salt, yeast and water in the bowl of the electric mixer with the paddle attachment and mix for 2 minutes on low speed. Switch to the dough hook and mix for 5 to 6 minutes on medium speed. The dough should be sticky on the bottom of the bowl, but it should release from the sides of the bowl. If not, sprinkle in a small amount of flour until this occurs (or dribble in water if the dough seems too stiff and clears the bottom as well as the sides of the bowl).

Hand Mixing: Standmixing is much preferred because it minimizes contact with the dough so it doesn’t heat up as much. However, I was using my stand mixer and didn’t realize that the dough had climbed up the dough hook and got a bunch of grease in it from the place where the hook attaches to the machine. I decided to start over and hand mix it with the following process. Combine the flour, salt and yeast in a large, wide mouthed bowl. Add the water and mix (by hand or spoon) until combined. Then, dip your hand in cold water and knead the dough inside the bowl by holding the bowl with one arm and using the other hand as a dough hook, folding and pressing the dough against the sides of the bowl. Do this for about 10 minutes. I think my dough got a bit too warm and wasn't quite sticky enough, even though I added more than the 2 1/4 cups of water. Next time I will add closer to 3 cups.

Step 2: Refrigeration
Lightly oil a large bowl and immediately transfer the dough with a spatula or bowl scraper dipped in water into the bowl. Mist the top of the dough with spray oil and cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Immediately place the bowl in the refrigerator and chill overnight, to retard fermentation.


Step 3: Final Fermentation
The next day, check the dough to see if it has risen in the refrigerator. It will probably be partially risen but not doubled in size (the amount of rise will depend on how cold the refrigerator is and how often the door was opened). Leave the bowl of dough out at room temperature for about 2 to 3 hours (or longer if necessary) to allow the dough to wake up, lose its chill, and continue fermenting.

Step 4: Shaping
Prepare the oven for hearth baking by putting a baking stone at the bottom and a heavy duty skillet on a rack near the top to function as a steam pan. Preheat the oven to 500 F, or 550 F if your oven goes this high. Boil ~4 cups of water and keep covered near by. Cover the back of two big sheet pans with baking parchment and dust with semolina flour or cornmeal. If you don’t have a baking stone you will just cook the bread on the back of the sheet pans.
When the dough has doubled from its original prerefrigerated size, liberally sprinkle the counter with bread flour (about 1/2 cup). Gently transfer the dough to the floured counter with a plastic dough scraper or spatula that has been dipped in cold water, dipping your hands as well to keep the dough from sticking to you. Avoid punching down the dough as you transfer it, to expel as little as possible of the carbon-dioxide gas that has built up in the dough during fermentation.
If the dough is very wet, sprinkle more flour over the top as well as under it. Dry your hands thoroughly and then dip them in flour. Roll the dough gently in the sprinkled flour to coat it thoroughly, simultaneously stretching it into an oblong about 8 inches long and 6 inches wide. If it is too sticky to handle, continue sprinkling flour over it.

Dip a metal pastry scraper into cool water to keep it from sticking to the dough, and cut the dough in half widthwise with the pastry scraper by pressing it down through the dough until it severs it, then dipping it again in the water and repeating this action until you have cut down the full length of the dough. (Do not use this blade as a saw; use it as a pincer, pinching the dough cleanly with each cut.) Let the dough relax for 5 minutes.

Take one of the dough pieces and repeat the cutting action, but this time cut lengthwise into 3 equal-sized pieces. Then do the same with the remaining half.
Flour your hands and carefully lift one of the dough strips and transfer it to an inverted parchment-lined pan, gently pulling it to the length of the pan or to the length of your baking stone. If it springs back, let it rest for 5 minutes and then gently pull it out again. Place 3 strips on the pan, and then prepare another pan and repeat with the remaining strips.
Score the dough strips as for traditional baguettes, slashing the tops with 3 diagonal cuts. Because the dough is sticky, you may have to dip the razor blade, serrated knife or scissors in water between each cut. You may also omit the cuts if the dough isn't cooperating.

Step 5: Baking
Take one pan to the preheated oven and carefully slide the dough, parchment and all, onto the baking stone (depending on the direction of the stone, you may choose to slide the dough and parchment off the side of the sheet pan instead of off the end); or bake directly on the sheet pan. I recommend wearing long sleeves and using oven mits or gloves and hot pads.
Make sure the pieces aren't touching (you can reach in and straighten the parchment or the dough strips, if need be). Pour 1 cup of the hot water you set aside into the steam pan and close the door.

After 30 seconds, spray the oven walls with water from the spray bottle and close the door. Repeat twice more at 30-second intervals. After the final spray, reduce the oven setting to 475 F and continue baking.

Meanwhile, dust the other pan of strips with flour, mist with spray oil, and cover with a towel or plastic wrap. If you don't plan to bake these strips within 1 hour, refrigerate the pan and bake later or the next day.

The bread should begin to turn golden brown within 8 or 9 minutes. If the loaves are baking unevenly at this point, rotate them 180 degrees. Continue baking 10 to 15 minutes more, or until the bread is a rich golden brown and the internal temperature registers at least 205 F.
Transfer the hot breads to a cooling rack. They should feel very light, almost airy, and will cool in about 20 minutes.

While these are cooling, you can bake the remaining loaves, remembering to remove the parchment from the oven and turn the oven up to 500 F or higher before baking the second round.