Popover Magic

I love popovers. They're tricky, myriad tips and tricks exist that claim to make them foolproof, and I'm still trying to find a recipe and technique that works for me. I just found a website that takes a super-simple approach that I'm going to try tonight, albeit with the obligatory twist.* I'll post the results.

*The twist: Line the popover tin with bacon strips and broil until crispy and then add the batter. Once done, split open the popovers and fill with scrambled eggs and feta cheese. Hehehe :-)

UPDATE:
Popovers are awesome! I tried the twist and it came out OK. The biggest problem is that the bacon has to be super crispy before you put in the batter, and the only way to do that is to cook it beforehand, in the microwave, and then bend it into the popover tin before it hardens completely. Not easy. The other thing the bacon does is disrupt the rise of the popovers, making them not so tall and airy. In the future I think I'll stick to making the popovers as a plain, or just slightly adorned poof, to be filled with delicious additions (like bacon) after they have risen to their ful and glorious heights.

A Monster Burger

As cliche as it sounds summer really is the barbeque season and by barbeque season I really mean the season in which anything and everything can be cooked over an open fire. Hyperbole? I think not. Wait until you try grilling bacon or using a fire to heat up donuts and cookies. Once again, the breakfast cereal restriction may apply, but maybe fire-roasted granola could be delicious? But I digress. Burgers are particularly common BBQ food, but the burger that I made on Sunday night was anything but common.By itself the hamburger (misleadingly named as may be) is a kind of blank slate, not because meat has no flavour (untrue) but because the taste and texture of a burger are such easily malleable characteristics. Even plain ground beef - choose your favorite kind - will taste very different if cooked in a very flat patty as opposed to a thicker wheel. And will also taste different depending on how gently, how long and over what kind of heat the meat is cooked. But then comes the fun part - what to add to the meat before cooking? I tend toward some combination of the following:

Breadcrumbs - to hold moisture
Egg - makes the burger stick together
Salt and Pepper
Onion - makes the whole thing taste a little sweeter
Olive Oil - carries other flavour through the meat
BBQ Sauce - delicious in the burger! (Pick your favorite)
Worcestershire Sauce - sweet and smoky
HP Sauce - sweet and tangy (some tamarind in it)
Hoisin Sauce - also sweet and smoky
Vinegar or Lemon Juice
Garlic
Thyme
Oregano
Ginger
Cinnamon - with beef is a very good thing, adds depth
Chili Pepper Flakes - spicy is good!

The combination of things I mix into the meat changes every time, and also changes depending on what I want to pile on the burger after it is cooked. This time I just added breadcrumbs, oil, salt, pepper, and onion because I had big plans for this burger. See, I made a large batch of pesto the previous week and had a lot left over, so I wanted to see whether a burger stuffed with pesto would be a good thing. In short, yes, but that isn't the whole story...

A hot grill in the offing is not to be sneezed at, nor wasted, so we cooked not only burgers, but chicken (slathered in pesto or BBQ sauce,) thick slabs of onions, red peppers, and sweet potatoes wrapped in foil - the last by far the most fabulous. My first attempt at sweet potatoes in a fire was on a camping trip: we wrapped them in foil, skewered them on swords, and then stuck them in the fire. They came out rich and sweet and delectable. And then I had roasted yam on a sandwich and the idea to put them on a burger was born! The pestoburger was enormous - a feat of enginnering triumph containing four tablespoons of pesto. I had to build a bowl of meat, put in the pesto, and then seal with more meat. Cooking and flipping very carefully avoided any catastrophic explosions and then I melted a slice of goat gouda on top for good measure. The final tower also included slices of roasted sweet potato, grilled onion, and roasted peppers, all on a toasted whole wheat bun. Not bad for a casual, unprepared-for, spur-of-the-moment Sunday evening cookout. And boy was it delicious! There was a lot of sweetness from the roasted vegetables and the pesto cut that nicely, still tasting fresh and clean despite cooking inside the burger. And I could even taste a little of the nuttiness of the pine nuts. And the best part was that none of the flavours was overpowering - I could still taste the meat (there'd be no point to the burger otherwise) and the other items all stayed present. Admittedly, though, it was a little hard to get all of the flavours in one bite.

A few final comments:
1. Trader Joe's BBQ sauce is quite tasty - we tried it on other burgers and on chicken and it has good sweetness but also a spicy bite.
2. Pesto also works really well on chicken skewers - it mellows out a lot.
3. When grilling, be sure to wear appropriate clothing - I got covered with soot and splatters of all the delicious things we cooked.

SUNDAY AFTERNOON BBQ
Feed as many as you like

ROASTED SWEET POTATOES:
Wrap sweet potatoes in foil and place on the grill (avoid the hottest parts but make sure that the potatoes get a fair amount of heat.) Turn every so often. You'll know they're done when they feel very squishy through the foil. Slice as condiment or eat like a burrito or eat with a spoon. These keep very well (and get even sweeter!) if re-wrapped in new foil and refrigerated - they're easier to slice for sandwiches when cold, too.

ROASTED ONIONS AND PEPPERS:
Cut 1/2 inch thick slices of onion and slightly wider strips of pepper and skewer. Put on grill, away from hottest parts, and turn frequently until both sides of onion are yellow-brown and glistening and edges of pepper are starting to char.

PESTO CHICKEN:
Clean, slice, and skewer chicken pieces. Rub with pesto. Grill, turning frequently to avoid the pesto burning - it's best if the pesto roasts but doesn't get the full heat of the fire. (BBQ sauce is good over hot flame, though.)

BURGERS:
Are delicious! And totally unique to the cook. So have fun!

Perennial Firsts

We don't exactly live at the mercy of the seasons anymore when it comes to what we eat - that's the reality of the 24-hour Supermarket and the globalization and industrialization of food. It's actually quite amazing and impressive that, in theory, at any given moment anyone in the world could be eating something from anywhere else in the world with nary a can opener, glass jar, or other preservative in sight. I say "in theory" because it is actually a travesty that so much of the world's population does not have access even to the most basic subsistence nutrients, let alone the diversity of exotic foods that I may take for granted as part of my everyday life.

Perhaps it is for these reasons that I take so much pleasure from cooking seasonally and locally, and especially in making those recipes that mark different parts of the year. And though a sort of restriction, to focus primarily on what's available to me in the place I live, food that is living and growing in the same weather I feel every day, makes me feel that much more present in the current place and time and season. It probably makes sense, then, that the productivity of my kitchen would follow the productivity of the fields and orchards, which really takes off in late spring and early summer.

Three dishes mark my transition to warmer weather, each an illustration of that fleeting overlap between the delicacy of spring produce and the explosion of summer flavour. The first is Salsa, which I featured in an earlier post. This, more than any other dish I make, follows the transition from spring to summer to fall, changing in flavour and texture as time goes on and the first salsa of the year is definitely a milestone. In late spring, when the farmers' markets open, the available flavours are a combination of the earthiness of last years apples and onions from cold storage and the first slightly tart tomatoes and nectarines from inland where it gets hot sooner. The resulting salsa teeters on the edge between rich, deep, and hearty, like a steak, and bright and sharp, like a crisp spring day. Like the place at the red edge of the rainbow where you catch a glimpse of violet that hints at the next rainbow.

Another dish that really heralds the coming warmth and produce explosion of summer is the first rhubarb-basil compote or cobbler. Rhubarb starts a little earlier than basil and in truth both are really summer crops, but the cool thing about living and eating in Seattle is that within 50 miles there are such diverse microclimates that allow the cultivation of all sorts of foods (in some cases different neighborhoods seem to have different weather, but that's a different story.) But the first time that rhubarb and basil show up in adjacent wooden bins at the farmers' market I dive in and make a heap of compote for yogurt, ice cream, sandwiches, and really anywhere else I care to try. It is sweet and savoury and tart all at the same time, and so I keep finding other uses for it.

Another delightfully multipurpose sauce that continues to surprise me is pesto. The first pesto of the season is a momentous occasion in part because it is green. Winter is a lot of colours, from white to scarlet red, brown to rich purple, but one thing that is mostly absent from the menu is green. All that changes when spring rolls around. Many of the early greens - asparagus, kale, lettuces - prefer to stand on their own, lightly dressed so the subtlty and grace of flavour can be best appreciated. Basil, on the other hand, walks straight up to you and says "Hello, I'm delicious and I go with everything." A little egocentric, perhaps, but quite true. My pesto changes colour over the summer, too, depending on the state of the ingredients. The first batch is lighter - using green garlic and shallots instead of garlic cloves and the first basil of the season which is a brighter, sunnier green. The extra moinsture makes it slightly frothy, too. And the taste is fresh, almost like the smell of cut grass - a little sweet and a little sharp at the same time if you mix in the right amount of pepper and pine nuts, too. And it goes on everything. Well, maybe not breakfast cereal and such, but you never know... On Sunday I stuffed a burger with it and that was an incontrovertibly brilliant success!

So go forage. I haven't even begun to talk about some of the seasonal gems, like porcini mushrooms as big as a fist, a raspberry the size of a golf ball but infinitely tastier, and small, wrinkly, amazingly rich strawberries. But you only find if you taste, and you can only taste if you look, and you can only look if you go explore.