Tom and I were over at the farm in Prosser this weekend, all anxious to get something planted in the garden. Well, at least I was. Tom is still contending he is not a farmer. Unfortunately, the roto-tiller man was detained and will not be able to till until later this week. Peas and lettuce will have to wait another week or two, alas. Our garlic is up though and looking quite well! (see photo)
The last two years of gardening in Prosser have been quite the learning curve, but I am convinced that this year the stars are all aligned. Rabbits and faulty irrigation plagued us the first year and last year too much- too fresh- manure didn’t do us any favors. But spring is here again (isn’t it?) and the garden beckons. I fall for its promise every year. Does that make me a sucker or an optimist?
(Editor’s note: In addition to their Seattle residence, Tom Douglas and Jackie Cross bought a house and small farm in Prosser, Washington, a couple years ago.)
March 31st, 2009 | No Comments »
Want to take a virtual look at the vegetable garden on the south lawn of the White House?
Check it out here.
Here’s the layout by Assistant White House Chef, Sam Kass.
And here’s where the citizens of our nation critique and criticize the layout of the garden. It is the People’s Garden, after all.
March 31st, 2009 | No Comments »
Here’s my menu:
Robiola cheese toasts with peppers
Ground lamb and pistachio kebabs (photo left)
Lola’s pitas (purchased from Dahlia Bakery)
Tzatziki
Arugula, watercress, and mint salad with lemon and olive oil
Garlic smashed potatoes (photo top)
Rhubarb crostatas with vanilla ice cream (photo center)
I stole the cheese toasts idea from an appetizer on the Serious Pie menu. Robiola (a soft-ripened cheese from the Piedmont- you can find it at the Whole Foods cheese counter, for example) is spooned onto small toasts, then put the toasts in a hot oven to melt the cheese. Add peppers on top before serving. (Serious Pie uses these great Calabria peppers. I used Mama Lil’s.)
The kebab recipe is from one of my favorite cookbooks, Spice, by Ana Sortun, one of my favorite people and a marvelous cook who’s also the chef owner of Oleana in Boston. I used ground lamb instead of the ground beef specified in the recipe. The wonderful trick in this recipe is that you beat the raw meat mixture in a Kitchen Aid with the paddle until the meat is sticky-smooth. This gives the cooked kebabs an incredible sausage-like texture. My husband, Frank, did his usual excellent job on the grill.
The potatoes are from another one of my favorite cookbooks, Tom’s Big Dinners. Tom dreamed up the garlic smashed potato recipe before Lola existed, now you can eat them anytime you want to at Lola. We ate every last potato out of a huge roasting pan of them because they were so darn delicious, with the crevices in the smashed places on each crisp and crusty potato absorbing the olive oil, garlic, Greek oregano, salt and pepper. There’s also a tzatziki recipe (called Cool Cucumber Yogurt) in Big Dinners. Be sure to use whole fat Greek yogurt.
The crostatas are a dessert we serve with different fruit fillings at all the restaurants pretty frequently. Here’s my version, though I plan to get Pastry Chef Garrett’s fabulous dough recipe one of these days. Though if I do say so myself, these were pretty fabulous as well, and of course I made them with local, Washington rhubarb. Here’s the recipe: Read the rest of this entry »
March 30th, 2009 | 1 Comment »
An article in last Sunday’s NYT business section, “Is a Food Revolution Now in Season?” does a good job of summing up the hopes and fears of the sustainable-food movement at this moment in time, just two months into the Obama administration.
The article summarizes the movement this way:
“At the heart of the sustainable-food movement is a belief that America has become efficient at producing cheap, abundant food that profits corporations and agribusiness, but is unhealthy and bad for the environment. The federal government is culpable, the activists say, because it pays farmers billions in subsidies each year for growing grains and soybeans. A result is an abundance of corn and soybeans that provide cheap feed for livestock and inexpensive food ingredients like high-fructose corn syrup. They argue that farm policy- and federal dollars- should instead encourage farmers to grow more diverse crops, reward conservation practices and promote local food networks….”
For food activists and their supporters, here are some of the rays of hope:
Michelle Obama has been acting as a champion of fresh, local, healthy food, and she started a food garden on the White House lawn last week.
Tom Vilsack, the new secretary of agriculture recently “took a jackhammer to a patch of pavement outside his headquarters to create his own organic people’s garden.” Vilsack has also been pursuing food safety, the improvement of nutrition in the school lunch program, a focus on healthy eating, and health care reform. Also, Kathleen Merrigan, a longtime champion of organic and sustainable agriculture, was named as Mr. Vilsack’s top deputy. (For more on Kathleen Merrigan, and why the food activist community is doing cartwheels over her selection, read this article from Gourmet’s website.) Read the rest of this entry »
March 26th, 2009 | No Comments »
Last night we did a “Little Taste of the Dahlia” featuring rhubarb. Tim Richter,a fifth generation farmer from Richter Farms in Puyallup talked to us about growing rhubarb. Plus he brought rhubarb starts for all the attendees. Take a look at the rhubarb plants in this photo. Aren’t they gorgeous!
We started with a rhubarb bellini, which was delicious. The next taste was two sticks of raw rhubarb- one to dip in sugar and one to taste plain. (Tim told us stories of eating raw rhubarb dipped in sugar as a child growing up on the farm). Dahlia Chef, Brian Walczyk, served smoked trout with tarragon pancakes and a little brunoise (tiny dice) of raw rhubarb on top. Executive Pastry Chef, Garrett Melkonian, dazzled everyone with an amazing pavlova with rhubarb confit.
I’m taking my rhubarb plant home to put in the garden, plus I’m potting up a tiny one for the sunny kitchen window in the Tom Douglas office. Doesn’t rhubarb jam sound delicious?
(Editor’s note: here’s an interesting article about Washington rhubarb farmers in The News Tribune. The good new is: “lousy weather is good for rhubarb.” The bad news is: local rhubarb may be on the endangered list. Washington Rhubarb Growers Association says there are now only 5 major growers and 10 farmers, down from 100 rhubarb farmers sixty years ago. So, support Washington’s rhubarb farmers and be sure to ask for local rhubarb when you go to the supermarket.)
March 25th, 2009 | No Comments »
I discovered this tofu factory and store, Thanh Son Tofu (118 12th Avenue, 206-320-1316), when I was working on a wedding. The groom, who’s a chef, told me this was his favorite place to buy tofu because of all the different flavors, textures, and shapes. Since I needed to buy strips of tofu for the lettuce wraps on his wedding menu, I went there myself to check it out. Since then, this is a regular stop for me. Besides fresh and fried tofu, which can be cut into different shapes and sizes, they have trays of brightly colored rice, containers of crispy fried shallots (great in bahn mi), soy milk, and many other things.
I eat tofu at home all the time. You can hide the fried tofu in anything- even my boyfriend eats it since it’s fried and he doesn’t know what it is. You can make a bahn mi (Vietnamese sandwich) with pickled carrots and jicama, onions, and lettuce, spicy mayo, and fried tofu. I also heat up cubes of fried tofu and serve it with peanut sauce as an appetizer when entertaining- people think you fried the tofu yourself. My boyfriend, Ryan, likes tofu best in pho, but my “signature” dish is just tofu in some broth. Hooray for tofu!
March 25th, 2009 | No Comments »
Maneki, located in the ID, is the place to go for Japanese grandmothers’ home cooking- good, cheap food. On my last visit, I went away from my standard order of sukiyaki and instead got the kame meshi (photo left), rice cooked with bbq eel in a special pot. The rice is steamed with the eel so it takes on the eel flavor. Delicious. They cook it to order, so it takes 30 minutes. There’s also a version with edamame and beer (photo right), but the eel was better. We also ordered the miso oyster Rockefeller and gooeyduck bata yaki with lemon, butter, and mushrooms. Make a reservation, you can’t just walk in anymore. Jean Nakayama, owner of the 100 year old restaurant, won an American Classics award from the James Beard Foundation in 2008.
March 23rd, 2009 | 1 Comment »
During Washington Wine Month (March), we’ve had winemakers in our restaurants every Friday and Saturday night sampling their newest releases. Our customers have responded with enthusiasm at the opportunity to meet these movers and shakers and to taste wines with the people who made them. The photo is of Bob Neel from McCrea Cellars, who was pouring his Rhone blends, Sirocco Blanc and Rouge, at Etta’s. The beauties with him are our own Sabrina Moss (on the right), wine educator extraordinaire, and (on the left) social media mogul (aka Tom’s assistant) Katie Okumura.
March 23rd, 2009 | No Comments »
Here’s a photo of Kogi, the Korean taco truck. My Dad went there for his birthday and had a kimchee quesadilla and Korean bbq tacos. He really loved the tacos.
(Editor’s note: you may have awoken this morning to this National Public Radio story describing the way Twitter turned the Kogi taco truck into a sensation. O Brave New World!)
March 23rd, 2009 | No Comments »
Tom Douglas makes it onto the finalist list!!! Check it out here.
March 23rd, 2009 | No Comments »
Tom and I were over at the farm in Prosser this weekend, all anxious to get something planted in the garden. Well, at least I was. Tom is still contending he is not a farmer. Unfortunately, the roto-tiller man was detained and will not be able to till until later this week. Peas and lettuce will have to wait another week or two, alas. Our garlic is up though and looking quite well! (see photo)
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