New Recipes For A Traditional Seder

 Passover will be coming up soon and with it a new kind of Seder. Families will be gathering but it won't be like the large groups of years past. There still will be traditions but updated ones. It's time to update the age old dishes as well.

Susan Spungen , chef,cookbook author, food stylist and food consultant (she was vital to such moves as Julie & Julia, It's Complicated and Eat,Pray, Love , wrote about five new recipes to add to the Passover table in yesterday's New York Times Food section. These are dishes for a new type of holy day  and Seder meal. Some dishes like haroset , matzoh ball soup and gefilte fish cannot be changed. Others though, can be tweaked.For the main meal, think  about serving chicken with apricots and olives. It's festive to be made for birthdays too. The chicken can be marinated for anywhere from two hours to overnight with a blend of different spices.Ground sumac (the same used in za'atar) gives the tang as well as a pinkness to the meat. Apricots and olives are also added to the marinade for a combination of sweetness and saltiness along with dried thyme. Fresh squeezed lemon and oranges juices give it more fruitiness as well. Or course there has to be matzoh at the table, but try a matzoh frittata instead of a matzoh brei. This is combining the traditional egg and matzoh with caramelized onions, button mushrooms and rosemary.The mushrooms and onions are cooked first and then added to the egg and matzoh mixture.

Chef Spungen also offers a yummy whole roasted cauliflower with pistachio pesto. The pesto is a mix of pistachios and cilantro along with flat leaf parsley leaves for the traditional  green  pesto color and texture.Lemon zest is added for tartness and color The cauliflower itself is roasted with two small yellow onions and olive oil. The pesto is spooned on top of it along with additional zest and parsley. Many home chefs serve tsimmes or the traditional Ashkenazi stew of carrots, prunes and raisins. Chef Spungen offers something slightly different with no prep work and very little time. Hers is sweet potatoes with a tsimmes glaze. The sweet potatoes are first cut and halved lengthwise and then rubbed with olive oil . After they're  roasted in a 400 degree Farenheit oven for thirty to forty minutes. The glaze is a blend of either the juice of navel or Cara Cara oranges along honey cinnamon and ginger. Cut prunes, vital in the original tsimmes recipe, are also added. The glaze is first boiled them simmered until it becomes thick and syrupy. It's then poured over the sweet potatoes. Orange zest is put on top for decoration and to counteract the sweetness

Again ,Passover will be different this year. Have dishes celebrating the difference. Try these recipes for a spin on the traditional  flavors and tastes.

The Baby Restaurant Boom

 Everyone thought there would be a Covid baby boom. That didn't happen but another baby boom of sorts did occur. It seems the pandemic allowed little eateries to sprout and even flourish during the past year.

Pete Wells, Food critic for the New York Times Food section wrote about this phenomena in today's section.It seems strange this happened since mostly everyone stayed home and cooked. Paradoxically the challenges that killed so many existing businesses fueled the fires for food trucks and pop up to flourish. There are advantages to opening up now, especially the agility to change with the times.They also may have lower overhead costs too which help.One restaurant, Kasama opened last March right around the time of the mass closings., Chef Genie Kwon and her husband Tim Flores adapted to this with an incredible flexibility. They offered breakfasts at their traditional Filipino restaurant. They made steaming lattes for customers who weren't away they were the restaurant's chefs.They postponed making lumpia and fried fish until they 're able to open their dining room. The couple turned to take out , offering duck dumplings like Chef Flores. mother made. These are in a mushroom broth that keeps them hot on the ride home.

Other eateries around the country also thrived and adapted to this new normal. Leah and Louise, a fancily redone juke joint in Charlotte North Carolina did just that. The restaurant's original theme was "small plates, Southern food by way of Mississippi River Valley" as per Chef Greg Collier. However that didn't fly. His chicken sandwiches did , however. It wasn't on his original menu yet he had to come up with something that was affordable to people now on budgets. He sold seven hundred the first month they were out. It kept the business above water. Yet it wasn't what he wanted.He wanted customers to savor his other dishes. He and his wife, Sabrina came up with another dish  a popular rice bowl with veggies. Yet it's the customer that now decides what a restaurant serves. Ni Hao in Baltimore offers meal sets that came about from what customers wanted. Comments were absorbed on the Chinese language app WE Chat. Dishes were tweaked to what they felt was acceptable. Some new restaurant owners like Andreas Koutsoudakis Junior, a hospitality lawyer inherited his from his father who unfortunately died from Covid 19. He redid the place and serves only dishes that customers can come to eat. There is little take out.

The baby restaurant boom is taking hold despite the pandemic. It's not luck but flexibility and good cooking that's making this happen. It's a good sign of life coming back.

Leeks Tweaked

 A favorite family dish is leeks on toast. This Piedmontese recipe has been in my family for almost a century, garnered when my great aunt married a boy from Biella , Italy. It is a great dish that brings out the garlicky ,earthy flavor of leeks. I thought I'd give  a few tweaks.

I had leftover leeks form yesterday's celery soup. In fact I'm planting the roots in my backyard for my allium garden along with my garlic and onion sprouts.

The leeks do have to be cut and soaked in salted water to remove dirt. This just takes ten minutes.

The slices are then rinsed in cold water to get rid of the dirty salted water.Usually the leeks are boiled in hot water over a burner but I decided to steam them for five minutes in the microwave. Doing this retains more of their flavor and nutrients.

As for the bread I decided to switch it up and use this artisan bread from Shop -Rite. It's a French peasant loaf from the Heidelburg Bread Company.

They don't need to be toasted. The slices are crusty enough.

The leeks were put on top. They were super soft thanks to being steamed in the microwave.

Then it's adding a good dollop of I Can't Believe It's Not Butter and a sprinkle of Follow Your Heart vegan Parmesan  soy cheese. 

The slices are then baked in a preheated 325 degree Farenheit oven for ten minutes.

Ten minutes later they were ready - the perfect marriage of crusty and melty .. The vegan cheese is just the same as the real Parmesan and it even browned

As for the taste, it was phenomenal. I love the French bread underneath which went well with the leeks. It sopped up the I Can't Believe It's Not Butter and was still toasty and crispy.

The updated version is worth making. It's a nice spin on the original, with an earthier , more intense flavor thanks to steaming the leeks. It's a great weeknight or week day dish, easy to make, easier to eat.

A Classic Redone

 The vegan celery soup from  blog The Simple Veganista is  now a classic go to recipe. It's a easy boil and simmer of chopped celery , onions, potatoes and garlic in Not Chick'n broth. However change was needed. The onion was a bit too overpowering so I went with another recipe suggestion  - chopped leeks.

Leeks are a wonderful addition and have the most subtle, sublime flavor. They're an allium which puts them as a cousin to garlic and onions. Yet their taste isn't overpowering  - which is perfect for the soup.

The other ingredients stayed the same. There were four to five cups of coarsely chopped celery.

Then the leeks which are about two cups here.

Keep in mins you don't have to cook them first as you do for other classic leek dishes like leeks on toast. They are washed, chopped and added to the pot to be sauteed with the celery.

I usually saute the veggies in a mix of olive oil and I Can't Believe It's Not Butter. I decided to switch out the olive oil and sub in vegetable oil. It does make for a lighter flavor, perfect to bring out the sublime of the leeks.

Both were cooked until they were bright green for about eight to ten minutes

The original recipe calls for five garlic cloves but I used three fat ones, finely chopped.

Then two cans of diced potatoes. You could follow the recipe on the website and use white or Yukon Golds. Adding the canned ones was easier.

Then it was five cups of water and two Not Chick'n cubes and simmered for another ten minutes. It was then blended with an immersion blended for a creamy texture.

The taste was perfect, lighter and fresher tasting than the onion version. It's the perfect Spring soup and a great first course at an Easter dinner. I love the leeks in it and how they don't overpower the celery. The flavors work in tandem with each other. They also don't overpower the potatoes or the garlic.

The vegan celery soup is a classic recipe can be varied. Subbing in leeks for the onion is inspiring, creating a flavorful new taste. It's perfect for the days ahead.

A Year

 It's been a year since our lives have changed. What have we learned? A lot. Whether it was about our inequalities and how they affect our eating habits or learning how to cook and bake. These twelve months have been eye opening, that's for sure.

What is striking about the past year is that the pandemic and loss of income and jobs brought many people to the edge of poverty.Families were teetering already when their companies shut down. Luckily there were angels, people who put together care packages that helped those in need during rough times. These provided enough food for everyday meals along with holidays and birthdays. Imagine the richest country in the world having millions of starving people, of kids going without meals so their younger siblings or grandparents can have their portions. What this pandemic should have taught us is that many Americans are living just above the poverty line. We need to raise salaries and offer better benefits - maybe even food credits for those with kids but can't qualify for food stamps.The SNAP or Supplemental Nutrition Assistant Program is not the best and our government needs to improve it.Again the new administration is well aware of this and there will be changes. Some cities around the country offer free gardens which means free fruits and veggies to those who need them. We must institute this in every US city and town. The financially challenged will be able to get the valuable nutrition they need.

On the lighter side if there is one -we all learned how to be better home chefs and bakers. People who didn't even know how to boil water embraced their inner chef and experimented with all sorts of recipes. Kids joined in and a whole new generation of junior chefs was born. Generations cooking together also provided valuable bonding time as well as supplementing their educations. Measuring cups were great at showing kids fractions with a cup and a half of water or a quarter cup of flour. They learned about the world through international recipes as they mastered the West African fufu or Brazilian feijoada or black bean stew. Everyone embraced their air fryers and immersion blenders with gusto as they also created some of their own recipes.Baking took everyone out of their cooped in funk. It was so popular that the US experienced four shortages thanks to home bakers taking the sourdough challenge. That bread was the star of the lock down and no wonder. The chewy tangy crumb and crusty exterior was the security blanket we needed in the past twelve months. It was perfect , either warm with melty butter or filled with our favorite meats and veggies.

This past year was historic and not in a good way. We learned  a lot , about ourselves  and our communities. Has it made us more caring and more innovative? Let's hope so.

Spring Cleaning Cuisine

It's nearing Spring and that means giving your kitchen a good cleaning. Yet what happens with all those cans and frozen foods? Eat them if they're still good. Don't waste a food product that's still viable. 

Thanks to the pandemic, we all have pantries full of cans of different foods. Keep in mind that canned food is at its' peak for a two year period according to Ron Giles, head of quality assurance at Goya Foods Inc. If you have a lot of beans, then think of a three bean salad. This is a nice side for hamburgers or hot dogs, Just add some sliced onions, herbs and a simple vinaigrette for a tasty side dish. You could also add them to any kind of chili. If you have white beans, then add them to a chicken or turkey chili for a different spin. What about those canned vegetables? They're good for two to five years before they need to be tossed. They still can be made into sides or even added to soups.Think of a peppery corn chowder with those niblets or add some minced green and red peppers for a tasty version of fiesta corn. Canned potatoes are a great thickener for soups, working better than a white flour roue. They can also be used in a quick potato salad with the addition of hard boiled eggs, mayo and celery. Green beans can be used in a salad or in a stir fry with mushrooms, carrots and bean sprouts. You can also fry them and flavor them with lemon and pepper for a new side.

Your freezer probably should be cleaned out too. Frozen food lasts three months at best. Use it before you waste it. Tater Tots are one of the most versatile. They make for a great air fryer snack, especially if you add extra seasonings like chili or garlic powder. You can also serve up different dips with them too from homemade ketchup to aioli. Tater tots can also be turned into a yummy breakfast casserole. This is great way oif also using up any cheddar cheese along with bacon and sausage. The meats are cooked first along with scallions and peppers and then layered over the potatoes along with a mix of whisked eggs and milk. Frozen veggies like broccoli or green beans can be turned into a tasty salad  once cooked and chilled. Just add some crushed garlic and a good red wine dressing. Brussels sprouts can be steamed and then served with melted butter and Parmesan cheese for a lovely side with chicken or turkey. That ground turkey or beef you've had for the last couple of months is still good. Don't keep it any longer because it's not as great after four months. Defrost it and think about turning it into meat loaf, perfect with mashed potatoes and gravy or sliders for a fun weekend meal.

It's that time of the year for purging., Yet use what you have in a variety of different dishes and snacks. It's a nice way of turning Spring cleaning into Spring cleaning cuisine,

A Schnitzel With Kick

 Everyone loves Weiner schnitzel and who wouldn't? It's a a delicately flavored veal coated in bread crumbs and then fried. Yet imagine it with a kick - a splash of vodka that makes it even better. Yes, this is not the traditional staple of Vienna anymore. It's been elevated to another level.

Chef J. Kenji Lopez-Alt is the one behind this transformation and he wrote about it in yesterday's New York Times Food section.He developed this recipe for his San Mateo California beer garden Wursthall. This is more of a fusion restaurant than a truly German one. Chef Lopez Alt also serves chorizo and Korean hot chicken sandwiches. Yet he shines at the Teutonic dishes. He cooks the schnitzel in the same way that Harold Dieterle did at his late and much lamented restaurant Manhattan restaurant Marrow. Chef Dieterle cooked pounded duck breasts in a puffed crust, a German method known as soufflieren that coaxes the breading away from the meat. The meats then becomes well insulated by a layer of air while the extremely hot fat cooks the crust to a delicate crispness that's also rich in flavor. Yet Chef Lopez-Alt adds vodka - about a quarter of a cup of the eighty proof kind. It's brushed on both sides of the meat before breading. Doing such evaporates any water making for the puffiest crust ever. It's not unlike British chef  Heston Blumenthal's recipe for his fish and chips which also has a lighter crust. Chef Lopez-Alt also does this for his tempura recipe.

Yet the other ingredients in schnitzel should also be top notch. You can use veal but also consider center loin pork chops too. Just keep pounding them until smooth and then whack with the back of a knife after pounding for more texture. The next ingredient is the flour. Chef Lopez-Alt says stick with regular flour used for baking. It's the eggs that are added that can be controversial.Some say they should be lightly beaten.Other  like You Tuber Kein Stress Kochen recommends beating the eggs until they're completely smooth. You can also add oil to them as the editors at Cooks Illustrated, Keith Dresser and Steven Dunn do. There should be four to five in the batter. Then there are the crumbs that make up the crust. They should be finely milled to hold in the moisture. The canned ones should do fine. You can use panko but they have to be ground to produce a finer, more floury type texture. What should the schnitzel be fried in? Oil and plenty of it.The pieces have to swim because it can be bad if they touch the pan.The crust will stick and burn onto it. You can use clarified butter but peanut,canola and even rice bran work. Just swirl the meat constantly in it for evenly cooked and browned pieces.

The perfect schnitzel has the perfect kick - vodka. This ensures a puffy crust that is the dish's signature along with an even more delicious flavor. Try it for a truly tasty Viennese delight.