Make Me Cook

Now for something savory and different, yet common at the same time. Are you intrigued?

Food ABCs - Letter C
Cipollini

Another poor culinary term that is often butchered like a piece of prime rib with a butter knife, as SIP-pol-lee-ni or SIP-pol-lee-nee. The correct pronounciation of these little cuties is actually chip-oh-LEE-nee.

Ahh but now that you know how to say it… what the heck is it?
Cipollini are small yellow onions (I’ll post a picture later for you). They have an appearance that looks like someone stepped on them as they are quite flat, almost like a disk.
Their flavor is VERY sweet and they are wonderful baked with balsamic and olive oil or marinated. You can usually find them at Farmer’s Markets in the fall, they will be about the diameter of a ping pong ball and flat.

Exceptional additions to an apricot topped baked brie. Just roast them until carmelized then serve them with your fruited baked brie cheese. These also make lovely additions to anything you plan on roasting. They release a beautiful savory flavor into the basting sauce.

Welcome to another Food ABC lesson!

Food ABCs - Letter B
Blini

Commonly mispronounced by even culinary snobs as BLI-nee, the correct pronunciation is BLEE-nee.
Blin (prounounced BLEEN) is the singular form of the word, while Blini refers to more than one.
Okay, sure now you know how to say it but what the heck is it, right?
Think teeny thin pancake.
Blini originated in Russia. They are yeast risen buckwheat pancakes about the diameter of a Red Bull can (about 2 inches).
How are they served? Do you eat them with syrup, fruit and a side of bacon?
Nope, Blini are used sort of the same way a cracker is used in an appetizer course. Traditionally Blini are topped with sour cream, then smoked salmon and/or caviar. They are quite delicious!

You want your Blini to come out thin… thick is bad form for your Blini to have, they are not thick like american pancakes. Think somewhere between a Crepe and an American style pancake and you are doing good.
You don’t have to stick with traditional toppings, you can venture out and top it with just about anything you would put on a cracker. They are absolutely elegant and if you make some… you better make plenty becuase they will get gobbled up.

I’ll throw a recipe at you too, that way you just learned a new culinary word and you have a recipe to back it up and impress your guests for the holidays with an elegant taste of Russia.

Traditional Blini Recipe
2 Eggs, room temperature
2 cups Warm Milk
1 Packet of Yeast
2 tablespoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon Salt
1/4 teaspoon Baking Powder
2 1/2 cups Buckwheat Flour
2 tablespoons Olive Oil

Olive Oil for frying

Make sure your cold ingredients have stood until they are at room temperature.

Warm your milk until it is warm to the touch but not scalding, otherwise you will kill your yeast off. In a bowl mix together the milk, yeast, sugar and about 1/2 cup of the flour. Let it sit for 30 minutes. This is your “starter” and it needs to ferment.

After it has fermented, add in the salt, baking powder, 2 tablespoons of oil and another 1/2 cup of flour. Whisk it carefully until blended. You are going to repeat this step, adding 1/2 a cup of flour in at a time until your flour is gone and your batter pours from your whisk in a thick ribbon. You should have the consistency of a slightly loose cake batter. If your batter is too thin, add in a little more flour until it is the right consistency.

Lightly oil your skillet over a medium heat. Take a large tablespoon and ladle the batter into the pan. Roll the batter a bit (same as you would a crepe) until you form a little disc. Let it cook until you see lots of little bubbles appear on the surface. Wait until your bubbles pop and dry, this should take about a minute, then flip over your Blini and finish it off for about 20-30 seconds more. Yank it out of the pan and you are done.

Serve it with a dollop of sour cream and top that with either caviar or smoked salmon… or be decadent and do both! Remember, you can use these the same as you would use a cracker, so don’t let tradition hold you back from making something special for your friends and family.

Blini also keep well, place small square of parchment between them and keep them in the fridge in a ziploc bag. You can easily make these a day or two ahead.

Have you ever gandered at a word in a recipe of on a fanchy shmancy menu and wondered silently to yourself “What in the hell does that means?!”

I like to think that I know my stuff, but every once in a while some weird word rears its ugly head and I am left sitting there shaking my head dumbfounded and clueless. I hate it when that happens! So what I am going to do for the next 26 days is start a little ABC Food Class. I’m going to start with A and we are gonna end up at Z, everyday some new fancy shmancy word, complete with definition. You can sport that fancy word around to all your friends and let them admire your giant encyclopedia-sized brain of food knowledge.

Food ABCs - Letter A
Assiette
Okay, no it’s not a fancy way to say “ass” or a feminine way of saying it either. Assiette is a french word. It is used to describe an assortment, well in fact it means assortment plate.
The word itself can actually change several meanings depending on the verb that it is paired up with, but in the culinary world it refers to a plate of assorted edible items.
Mostly these items are things such as cheeses or salt cured meats.
So the next time you serve up that nibblets tray of cheeses you can call it Assiette de Formage.
And for that salami and ham platter boldly exclaim you are now serving your special Assiette de Charcuterie!

Stay Tuned for the letter B tomorrow!

Oh yeah, been on the road all this past week in the Northern California area. Taken in some great scenics as well as some amazing food… things like Lobster Ravioli with a sage and nutmeg cream sauce…. omg! Not to mention great company, seeing Paul Bunyan pee his pants, waking up in the Trees of Mystery, eating under a canopy of $10,000 worth of silk flower (I am totally not joking) and visiting with friends and family. It’s been a wonderful trip so far.

Needless to say that the fresh and natural flavors of the region, and dare I say the hippy foodstyle has left me inspired and influenced. I’ve been filling my red tome with the myriad of ideas that have filled my brain, everything from book ideas (yep I said book baby!) and recipes. Expect great things incoming.

I’ll be posting some pictures later, but for now I must crawl into my loft bed and get a good nights sleep because I have about 500 miles of road ahead of me in the morning. Gah! Wish me luck!!!

See you all in Seattle!

No, I haven’t forgotten this place. And most importantly I haven’t forgotten about you wonderful people who come here and read my ramblings Truth be told, I’ve missed all of this.

A dear friend of mine Marilyn gave me a big needed kick in thebutt to give this blog some attention. So here I am writing with a bruised behind to let you all know what has been happening.

I’ve been SUPER busy. When it is not work it is family life. Those of you who know me well know that my Father has been battling cancer for some time now. We’ve been dealing with that and the constant scares of it popping back up everytime his blood count is off. I just heard today that he is going in for back surgery, which is totally unrelated to his cancer problems thankfully. That’ll be the first part of June, so I’ll be helping my Mother get some things prepared down at their house to help ease along his recovery. The upside of all of this is that he won’t have the pain he currently is experiencing in his back right now anymore. I just get a little scared everytime he goes into the hospital, actually anytime anyone I care about goes into the hospital… I turn into a nervous mother hen

On the busy front, I’ve been shooting ALOT. I went to the coast and did some shots at a bed and breakfast and took my Mom with me to give her a break, as she needed it badly. I made her play the part of Photography Assistant and had her holding bounces and moving the props where I needed them. She had a blast doing that. I’ll post a granola recipe and a little parfait recipe to go with it in a couple days (I really promise it will happen).
I’m also gearing up for a charity project to help out the victims of Hurricane Katrina, more on that later. My deadline is the beginning of June, and I’ll be posting more about it as the time gets closer.
I’m also working on a couple other gigs, I can’t say too much about them yet, so when the time comes I’ll be sure to let you all know.

As far as work goes, I’m super happy with the progress of things. I’m seeing my work at places like Food Network, All Recipes, Chefs.com and I even had a kitchen product catalogue for Spoontree Inc. use my images to grace a majority of their catalogue pages. The talented designer, Jacom, over at Avid did a SUPER job on putting the catalogue together. I’ll be posting that later on, since my quick post is turning into a novel hahaha.

If you run over to Chefs.com you can get a peek at my images being used all over that site. Yesterday, my image (that they purchased from our stuffed chili challenge) was featured on the front page in their little flash movie that they change out daily. But it is also used at the header of the article as well. Pretty cool. I took a screenshot of it, and put the original next to it… but most of you will remember from when we did those nummy chicken stuffed chilies.

I’m gearing up to give this blog some much needed love. A re-design in in the works. Something exciting and new, I hope that you will all like it. Also, some features that you can use as tools in your everyday cooking routine and a bunch of new recipes coming down the pipe line. The index of recipes will get finished and there’s a few more suprises ahead. Just you wait and see. And don’t you worry about me forgetting about the past recipe challenges, believe it or not I actually have the hand scrawled notes of these recipes firmly in hand awaiting translation into something legible I’ll be hitting you with more recipes than you will know what to do with

The fresh fruit challenge beckons, so get yourselves ready for that goodness. We’ll have that done and ready to go in time for those Summer picnics so you can WOW your friends and relatives

Thanks for hanging in there with me, and especially a huge thanks to all of you who have been messaging me with your kinds words and support. I have miss you all too. I’ve been gone too long, and now I’m back to stay