salty femme.

Were any of my current readers around when I used to post recipes? Well I’m bringing it back. The connection between recipes and the rest of my blog may not seem obvious but domesticity is a huge part of my femme identity. So with that…

I have been making a pot of soup every weekend, pretty much since winter started. My limitations: vegetarian soups that are sufficiently filling, containing no legumes. This has actually not been so difficult. Below is a recipe for a soup I made on Friday. I had a butternut squash sitting on my counter for weeks, looking sad and abandoned. This recipe is especially wonderful because it requires just one pot. Also, it’s a creamy soup with no milk of any kind.

Butternut squash soup with potato and leek

This is a variation of this recipe (meaning the recipe looked boring so I added many other things).

1 celery stalk, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
2 leeks, chopped
2 tbsp. olive oil
1/2 tsp. thyme
1medium butternut squash, peeled, seeded, and cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1 fist-sized potato (I used Yukon gold but anything will work), cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1 whole fresh peperoncino or 3/4 teaspoon dried hot red pepper flakes (I used 5 or 6 of these wonderful dried jalapenos they have at the co-op)
2 teaspoons coarse sea salt
3 1/2 cups vegetable broth (I used a combination of veggie broth and water)
1 bunch parsley, rinsed and then tied in a little cheesecloth pack so you can remove it easily (you can also put your peppers in there too)
2 tsp. sea salt
1 tsp. curry powder (optional)
sunflower seeds

In your soup pot, heat olive oil on low heat, cook celery, onion, and leeks for 12 minutes, adding the thyme about 6 minutes in. Add squash, potato, salt, peppers, parsley, and water/broth. The ratio of solids to liquids will seem funny, but you can adjust that when you’re done cooking by adding more water. Cook for 30-40 minutes, remove parsley and peppers, and then blend the soup in your blender or food processor in batches, being careful of the hot hot hot. Return soup to pot. If it seems too thick, add more water. If the soup is not spicy to your liking, you can add some curry. (it will probably need more salt so you can add that too).

I always need something to break up the texture if a soup is totally smooth, so sprinkle each bowl with some sunflower seeds when serving. That’s all!

Next week I’m going to post a recipe for tahini dip that has been requested by many. I figure it’s easier to post here than to remember who to email it to.

After a busy week, I decided that what I needed most was to bake away my troubles. I don’t know if it quite worked but it was a relaxing few hours. I went to the Union Square greenmarket on Friday afternoon and picked up a very large amount of apples, all kinds of apples, picked in the few days before Friday, all beautiful, shiny, and $1/pound! I was in heaven. I bought a bunch for baking (tart ones are best) and a bunch for munching on (this time I bought Macouns and Empires). For baking, I bought a mix of Cortlands and Jonathans. I baked an apple crisp, the recipe for which I will not post because you can find a recipe for apple crisp everywhere you look. My apple crisp had a topping made of brown sugar, flour, oatmeal, and Willow Run soy margarine. Next time, I think I will try adding pecans and/or walnuts to add some extra crunch.

I also made an apple-pecan quickbread, which was much more exciting (and tastier, in my opinion) than the crisp. It makes an excellent breakfast treat for lazy weekends (or for a quick breakfast on your way to synagogue, as the case may be). The recipe is from epicurious (originally from the Magnolia Bakery Cookbook) and can be found here or below. As instructed by my fellow epicurious readers, I added some cinnamon and nutmeg for some extra flavor (I also put in a pinch of ginger). I shredded the apples instead of chopping them, which gave the bread a smoother texture. I also substituted apple cider for the OJ, though I assume either of those or apple juice would suffice. Next time, I will probably add more apples than what the recipe called for, and maybe try adding some raisins. Also, it could’ve used more pecans than it called for. Here’s the original recipe - my additions/substitutions are in parenthesis.

Apple-Pecan Quick Bread (from the Magnolia Bakery Cookbook)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Grease a 9 x 5 x 3-inch loaf pan.

In a large bowl, sift together the flour, the sugar, the baking powder, and the salt (and the spices), making a well in the center. Set aside. Stir in the liquid ingredients until just combined, being careful not to overmix. Gently stir in the apples and the pecans. Pour the batter into prepared pan and bake for 50-60 minutes or until a cake tester inserted into center of loaf comes out with moist crumbs attached. Do not overbake.

Makes 1 loaf.

I was so flattered when I received a request from my cousin, a fantastic baker in his own right, to post on my blog the recipe of the Ginger Snap cookies I baked for this weekend. So here it is. These are *such* easy cookies and are beautiful and very elegant. I made the dough early in the week and refrigerated it until Friday morning, when I formed and baked the cookies. The trick to the chewy deliciousness of these cookies is to bake them for 10 minutes ONLY - don’t leave them in longer, even if they seem like they’re not done yet. Once they cool, they’ll harden just enough. Also, do not leave out the salt in this recipe - it gives them a really good balance for some reason. The original recipe is from the food network and can be found here or below. My cousin tells me that they sell special fat sugar at Williams-Sonoma (or any of those specialty stores) that would go really well as the outside coating of these cookies.

Ginger Snaps
(Recipe Courtesy of Cathy Lowe)

3/4 cup butter, unsalted and softened
1 cup light brown sugar
1/4 cup molasses
1 egg
2 1/4 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

Cream together the butter and sugar. Stir in molasses and egg. Add 1 cup of flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger and ground cloves and stir to combine. Add remaining flour 1 cup at a time. Chill dough in freezer for 15 minutes (Saltyfemme adds: you can also refrigerate for a few hours or overnight, depending on your time constraints). Shape dough into 1-inch balls and roll in sugar. Bake on greased cookie sheet at 375 degrees for 10 minutes.

(The photo above was stolen from Dylan’s fabulous blog, though the cookies pictured were indeed baked by yours truly. I made those cookies a few months ago for a dinner that he attended. And I didn’t take pictures of the cookies this weekend. But they’re the same.)

Another food post…hhmm. My domestic urges seem to be getting the best of me these days. I hope to have a post with a bit more thought in it sometime soon. For now, here’s another recipe for another summer salad. It was made for a family weekend in the country where there will be much barbequing of meats and thus a vegetarian dish was requested. Hopefully the non-vegetarians will also enjoy.

This recipe is loosely based (and I mean *loosely*) on this recipe from Epicurious for a “Garden Lentil Salad.” I started with the lentils, kept the radishes, black olives, and parsley, and basically ran with it after that. This salad has a complicated flavor. I like two kinds of mild onions (red onions and scallions) and arugula is one of my favorite summer additions to grain/bean based salads. The co-op has the most delicious organic arugula right now (among many other greens I cannot identify but hope to experiment with in the coming weeks). The recipe, as I made it, is as follows:

1 1/4 cups French lentils* (about 8 ounces)
20-30 small cherry tomatoes, halved
1 bunch of scallions and half a red onion
1/2 cup chopped trimmed radishes (see this post for radish tips)
1/3 cup chopped or halved pitted brine-cured black olive (such as Kalamata)
1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley
1 bunch chopped arugula

olive oil (to taste)
juice of 2 lemons
salt and pepper

1. Boil the lentils for about 20 minutes, drain, set aside. (you can add some salt and a bay leaf for extra flavor if you like).
2. Prep your tomatoes, scallions, onion, radishes, and olives. Add to the lentils once they’ve cooled.
3. Add parsley and arugula the day you plan to eat the salad – if you cook it in advance, wash and chop them and set aside until before you serve them. Otherwise, they may get soggy.
4. Add lemon juice, olive oil, salt, and pepper just before serving. Don’t add too much salt because the olives are quite salty.

*French lentils are a brown, and a bit rounder than normal lentils (rather than flat). They’re great for salads because they keep their shape when you cook them.

Today I baked a peach pie for an impromptu family dinner. It came out pretty fantastic (save for the burnt edges, but the family is very forgiving), which I think was a result of the combination of the humid air (adds a good amount of moisture to the dough) and the fact that I used a food processor to make the dough so the fat was still frozen when I mixed it with the flour. Also, the peaches they have at the co-op right now are delicious. Plus, the Joy of Cooking has once again proved itself to be the best cookbook on my shelf for all the standards. What other cookbook not only gives you a recipe for pie crust but also gives you instructions on how to make the crust in a food processor? Amazing. The only thing that I don’t like about peach pie is that when you thicken and then cook peaches, they have a taste and texture reminiscent of canned peaches, which is never a pleasant thing to taste in pie.

Because I like lists, here are a few things I remembered while baking today:

• Pie is so easy to make. No one should be afraid to make their own pie crust.
• In the tradition of my grandmother and then my mother, leftover pie dough should never be wasted. Roll out the dough, spread some jam on it and sprinkle on nuts and/or raisins. Roll it up, brush it with egg or milk and bake it. Slice it and voila, you have delicious strudel. Alternatively, strudel can be made on its own and does not need to be preceeded by pie making.
• When baking in the summetime, have an air conditioner in your kitchen if you plan to turn the oven on to 425, especially if you have a friend keeping you company during the baking process.

I did, however, treat my sweaty friend to some iced decaffeinated green tea with dried jasmine that I had made the day before, which got rave reviews. Green tea with all kinds of dried flowers from the loose tea section at the co-op (above the spices) makes some tasty iced tea and gives a little variation to the monotony of iced lipton.

Lest you assume I am only capable of blogging self-righteously and wordily about serious issues, here is my first food post. Today is a rainy summer day, perfect for experimenting in the kitchen and making all kinds of iced tea.

It’s hot and sweaty summertime in New York, which means it’s time for summer salads. I do enjoy a good grain-based main dish salad, in addition to variations on the lettuce/spinach based vegetable salad. This morning I put together a simple and fresh salad with a quinoa base. The quinoa can be made in advance and refrigerated. Warning: this salad is not for cilantro haters. Also: all vegetable amounts can be increased or decreased depending on how much you enjoy them. The only science in this recipe is the ratio of quinoa to water (1:2). And this salad comes out quite small, enough for maybe 2-4 people. Doubling may be necessary.

Quinoa salad with lime and cilantro

½ c. quinoa
1 c. water

3 scallions, chopped
4-5 medium radishes, sliced thin
1 medium zucchini, sliced ½ ich
2 c. water
2-3 limes, depending on juicy-ness
2 tbs. olive oil
¼ c. chopped fresh cilantro (or more, depending on your taste)
salt and pepper to taste
sprinkles of chili powder

1. Rinse quinoa in a fine sieve. Rinsing the quinoa is key, otherwise it will taste bitter. Place quinoa and water in a saucepan, bring water to a boil, lower, and simmer for 15 minutes or until all water is absorbed and the edges of the grains are translucent. Transfer into a bowl and refrigerate while you prep the rest of the vegetables.
2. Boil second round of water in the same pot that you used for the quinoa with some salt – drop in the sliced zucchini and cook for just a few minutes. Drain and put into the fridge with you quinoa.
3. Chop/slice scallions, radishes*, and cilantro. Mix them in with the quinoa and zucchini, add lime juice**, olive oil, salt, pepper, and chili powder. If you want to get really serious, refrigerate the salad with all ingredients except for the lime juice and olive oil. Add those two ingredients immediately before serving***.
   

*If you hate the bitterness of radishes like I do, try the following trick: (courtesy of my dad!) put the chopped radishes in a small dish with about a tablespoon of kosher salt. Let stand for 5 minutes, then rinse a few times. The salt absorbs a lot of the bitterness.

**A citrus trick I learned from a certain glass lady, who learned it from her mom. To get a more intense flavor from a lime or a lemon, use everything but the peel: quarter it lengthwise (as if you were going to put it into a drink), then remove the peel from each quarter and chop the flesh. This is especially good in dips when you are using a food processor, as you can smooth the flesh of the lemon or lime into the rest of the dip. But in a salad, you can use the flesh of one of the lemons or limes and just the juice of the rest of them. In this particular salad, I used the flesh of 1 lime and the juice of the other.

***The main problem with grain-based salads is that the intense flavor you might taste when you cook it tends to fade in the refrigerator because the grains absorb it. This is why if you’re preparing this or any main dish salad in advance, make sure to add the dressing/lemon juice/olive oil just before you serve it.