Fritters on the Fourth

Hello,

 

Happy Fourth! I know it’s been awhile, but I had to dish about the wonderful the apple fritters we had this morning. I used a recipe from Ree Drummond (The Pioneer Woman). The dough is pretty straight forward: flour, an egg, milk, a dash of melted butter, cinnamon, sugar and diced apple. No yeast or waiting for the dough to rise. Just mix everything in the bowl and plop a tablespoon of dough into hot oil.

 

The fritters float to the top and take about 6 to 8 minutes. After a few minutes draining on paper towels, a dusting of powdered sugar completes the process. The dough

Apple fritters (from a Ree Drummond recipe) are moist, soft and addictive. Bet you can’t eat just one.

is so moist, the apples soften slightly and you can pick up the cinnamon. I could easily eat 10 of these, but stopped after 2 1/2. The smell in the house reminds of me of the fair and the scent of funnel cakes cooking. Happy Independence Day!

A salad idea

So I had a salad revelation last Wednesday. I had lunch at Z Café in South Coast Plaza for the first time and was thinking something with vegetables since I knew dinner would be a bagel sandwich with turkey and cream cheese (which turned out to be pretty good) and a piece of fruit.

I ordered the kale and apple salad with a lemon dressing, buttery feta cheese and grilled chicken that had a crisp, herby crust. Oh, the salad also had grilled red onions that were more sweet than tart. The kale was raw and the apple slices were paper thin. The kale’s ruffled leaves were ideal for catching the dressing, which tasted like it had just lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper. This is one of those salads that allows the individual ingredients to shine without being overly complicated. The salad would be equally swell with salmon instead of the chicken.

I didn’t eat all of it — they give plenty of kale and chicken, so the $11 price is worth it. Z Café also has sandwiches and pizzas and the place is immaculate. You can eat indoors or outside on the spacious patio and bask in summer’s warm air. I left with a full stomach and an idea in my head for a future meal.

Donut discovery

Baked donuts. You’re probably skeptical, but stay with me. The strawberry-buttermilk version from Fonuts in Los Angeles is worth an escape from the deep-fryer.
In the holiday tradition of making a breakfast treat, I tried the Fonuts’ recipe for Memorial Day.
Two words: moist and flavorful.
The donuts have canola oil and chopped strawberries. They bake in a 350-degree oven and, as long as you coat a bundt cake or individual angel food cake pans with cooking spray, plop out just fine.
I underbaked mine just a bit (for 12 minutes). The recipe calls for 13 to 15 minutes. Remember that all ovens are different, so if your oven runs on the hotter side, 12 minutes may be enough.
The icing cooperated too. The strawberry-confectioner’s sugar blend formed a nice sheen atop the donut.
Do try these and let me know what you think. Thank you Fonuts and Saveur for printing the recipe.
Enjoy Memorial Day.

It’s been awhile

I’m sorry it’s been awhile since I last wrote. Since the last time, I started a news reporting job for the Coastline Pilot newspaper in Laguna Beach. I cover police, fire, school board and the city’s planning commission.

I’ve done  a little cooking; mostly stuff for lunch along with granola (Molly Wizenberg’s recipe is great), and the requisite dessert.
Of all the food I’ve had lately, a chicken soup with orzo recipe from Bon Appetit was especially satisfying. It’s a very simple soup (chicken broth, onions, celery, orzo, shredded chicken, and a splash of lemon juice). For added color and nutrients, I added spinach. It’s a humble soup, but soothing, light and you feel healthy after eating it. What’s not to like?

I’ll be back soon. For Memorial Day, I’m trying a baked strawberry donut recipe from Fonuts in L.A. that Saveur magazine printed in its donut issue. Yea!

Muesli spices up the morning

Muesli is a breakfast composed of oats, nuts, dried fruit and a sweetener like honey. The difference between it and oatmeal is that the oats do not cook, but rather soak in hot water.

This week I threw a curveball into my breakfast routine. After reading about a muesli-like recipe in the latest issue of Bon Appetit, Ina Garten came on television and made muesli, the softened oat-nut cereal that is ripe for experimentation, like oatmeal. Muesli is similar to oatmeal, with softened oats, a sweetener like honey or brown sugar and fruit (dried, fresh or a combination).

The difference is muesli doesn’t require a separate pot. All the ingredients go into a cereal bowl and the transformation begins. Garten uses quick-cooking oats and soaks them in hot water for 15 to 25 minutes. She adds hazelnuts, granola with raisins (I substituted Kashi Go Lean cereal and added some raisins), honey, and sliced fresh strawberries.

I was hesitant to try muesli, thinking the nuts might soften too much and the whole thing would turn into a bowl of mush. Boy, was I wrong. Ina never lets our family down and she came through again. The muesli was a revelation. Usually I don’t add fresh fruit to oatmeal, but the strawberries added a welcome, fresh element to the muesli. It helped that the Go Lean cereal stays crunchy while sitting in liquid. Since the oats and nuts didn’t sit in the water for too long, they maintained their crunch.

I’ll be experimenting with muesli, and adding it to my breakfast routine. Cheers!

Mustard makes everything (except dessert) better

My go-to ingredient of late is Dijon mustard. The condiment can do more than lather a slice of bread for a sandwich. My favorite Dijon combination includes olive oil and sherry vinegar. The mixture lifts roasted or steamed cauliflower to another level and provides a pleasant tang to raw kale for a salad. The combo of Dijon and sherry vinegar is appealing because the vinegar provides a touch of sweetness to mellow the mustard’s acidity. I’ve even spread Dijon atop a salmon fillet. The mustard acts as a glue for fresh herbs atop the fish. Roast the fish in a 425-degree oven for 12 to 14 minutes for a quick lunch or dinner.

On an unrelated note, my aunt and uncle sent a gift basket for Christmas that included a bottle of the 2010 CottonWood Creek Cellars red table wine. The organic blend from Madera, Calif., combines Merlot grapes (29 percent) with “dry red” grapes (71 percent), according to the CottonWood website. The fruit-forward wine tastes like cherries and plums with a touch of tannin. Drink with a burger, red-sauced pasta, or lamb.

Oh, I finished my master’s journalism program at the University of Southern California in December. Thanks for all your prayers.

Snowballs in Mission Viejo

An ornament hangs on our Christmas tree.

I know the last post was how cookies with hot chocolate signaled Christmas.

But, hear me out. NOW it’s officially Christmas. Why?

Because we have snowballs. Of all the Christmas cookies my mom and I have made through the years, snowballs are my favorite. I’ve tried different recipes, and for the most part each one comes out well.

This year I used a recipe from Food Network Magazine for cherry-almond snowballs. The cookies receive a double dose of almond essence. The nuts are ground in a food processor and combined with flour to form the dry part of the dough. A 1/2 teaspoon of almond extract also goes into the dough. I love the smell of almond extract. It reminds me of a bearclaw. 

A dried cherry sits inside this snowball cookie. The dough contains ground almonds and both vanilla and almond extracts.

The cherry part comes from dried cherries soaked in amaretto. You push a single plump cherry into the middle of each ball of dough before baking. Call it a little treasure inside the cookie. The cookies then receive the requisite dunk in a bowl of powdered sugar — twice.

The appeal comes from the cookies complimenting a cup of hot chocolate. Or perhaps the powdered sugar-dusted confections provide the “snow” in Southern California. Whatever the reason, snowballs make me smile. And that’s what this season is largely about. Merry Christmas and what is your favorite Christmas cookie?

Cookies, cocoa welcome Christmas

Ahh, Christmas is finally here. Sure, the house has been decorated with snowmen, garland and twinkling lights for weeks, but the sign that Christmas has arrived is a nighttime snack of Christmas cookies and hot chocolate.

Last Saturday was the first time this season I ate cookies and hot cocoa for a snack. Yes, it might look like a measly portion of hot chocolate in the mug but too much cocoa near bedtime makes this guy restless (not good for trying to fall asleep).

So I exercised moderation with the chocolate, drinking a 5-ounce cup with a homemade marshmallow floating on top. I warmed whole milk in a saucepan and added 2 tablespoons of Ghirardelli sweetened cocoa powder.

The stained-glass looking confection is a fruitcake cookie, a recipe from Ina Garten. The cookies are packed with dried figs, candied cherries, raisins and walnuts. Disclaimer: The fruit and nuts need to soak overnight with a little sherry and honey. You’ll also notice the online recipe has dried apricots and pecans instead of walnuts. I used the recipe printed in Garten’s book, “Barefoot Contessa at Home.”

This is basically a shortcake cookie with dried fruit and nuts. Roll the dough into a log, chill overnight and simply slice and bake. The other two cookies are a honey spritz version I helped my mom make at my grandma’s house. My grandma even got in on the decorating, topping the cookies with the tiny sugared beads. Wednesday we’re making Meemaw’s cookies, a recipe from Paula Deen that has taken a place in our Christmas cookie repertoire. Think of an oatmeal cookie studded with toffee, shredded coconut and dipped in white chocolate with peppermint pieces sprinkled on top. Sweet, rich and refreshing from the peppermint, these cookies are addicting.

Meemaw’s cookies, a recipe that appeared on Paula Deen’s show, are loaded with goodies such as cocont and toffee and dipped in white chocolate.

Have fun baking and let me know what cookies you’re making. Merry Christmas!

Cookies perk up as they sit

These chocolate chip cookies have layers of dough atop large chocolate chips.

Ever notice that some things taste better with time? Whether it’s cheesecake or chili, many times a food’s flavor shines once it’s had time to relax. This was the case with the chocolate chip cookies I made nearly two weeks ago. I used a recipe from the October issue of Saveur. I never made chocolate chip cookies like these. I felt like I was making pie crust.

The recipe called for portioning the dough into three pieces, rolling each of them out into a rectangle and alternating layers with chocolate chips. 

No, it’s not pastry for turnovers or pie, but dough for chocolate chip cookies.

Then I used a biscuit cutter to portion the cookies. No spoon scooping the dough here.

The first day I was unimpressed with the texture and taste. I like a chewy cookie, but these were crisp. 

The solution: warming them in the microwave for 10 seconds. This helped matters, but it wasn’t until a week later that I warmed a cookie, bit into it and enjoyed the play of salty, sweet and chocolate.

This chocolate chip cookie recipe came from Saveur magazine’s October 2012 issue.

I still prefer a recipe printed in the Los Angeles Times, but these cookies aged well. They will do when I’m craving a chocolate chip cookie. Here’s to cookies.

Sotto hits the Italian spot

Are you ever torn over which restaurant to go to? I know, there are more important things to focus on, but deciding on a dinner place last Thursday was a main priority. I debated between Eva, Sotto, and Huckleberry. I saw an ad for Huckleberry Cafe doing a Thursday night prix-fixe menu for $30. Eva has its Sunday family dinners with unlimited wine, but that doesn’t help for Thursday. Then there is Sotto, a place I had been to last December and a spot I longed to return to. There’s something about the atmosphere: casual, elegant, and neighborly all in one.

Price was a key factor, and I went with a VISA gift card in hand, for what I thought was $25. I figured the amount would cover food and I would pay for a glass of wine out of pocket. I went thinking pasta, but ordered two small- to medium-sized plates instead — the mackerel with buckwheat and cauliflower in an oven-dried pesto sauce and a tomato-based soup filled with tender clams, sausage pieces, spinach and pigeon peas with a big slab of the restaurant’s homemade bread. The edges of the bread were singed black as if the bread had just been pulled out of the wood-fired oven. You can see chefs Steve Samson Zach Pollack and crew in the open kitchen working to churn out seriously good food. The mackerel was phenomenal — moist with the skin left on. The buckwheat had the texture of Rice Krispies, which is a good thing. It was an ideal contrast to the soft fish and cauliflower.

A slice of homemade bread rests in the meaty tomato broth of the ‘spicy clams in guazzetto’ at Sotto in Los Angeles.

The soup was very hearty. It tasted meaty if a bit too salty. But the clams were so tender, as was the bread with its soft interior. I could eat a big plate of the bread with some ricotta and be a happy man.

The two entrees equaled $28, so I ended up spending $8 more on food than I wanted. The waitress charged $20 to the card, leaving me with $22 to cover the rest. I’m glad the soup and bread were a substantial portion. The cannoli rocks at Sotto, but I decided to forgo dessert at the restaurant. All in all, it was a memorable night. Now I can look forward to a trip to Eva.

Oh, and Sotto has a deal worth checking out. Every Tuesday through Friday from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. in the bar, a pizza and cocktail cost $19. Cocktails go for $12 on their own and the least-expensive pie on the menu is $9 by itself.

Sotto

9575 W. Pico Blvd.

Los Angeles, CA 90035

(310) 277-0210