Vinegar

Grainews

February 2021. My palate tips to sour, as opposed to my husband, who prefers sweet stuff. I am not sure I can draw any conclusions, but it makes for interesting small talk while we drink our morning coffee. So as a certified sourpuss, I was thrilled to recently read about Alchemist Vinegar, artisanal vinegars made by Paul Poutanen, owner of Tippa, a distiller in Okotoks, Alberta. I promptly ordered a sampler and am awaiting its arrival. I love vinegar, and six open bottles occupy prime real estate on the butcher-block beside my stove. They offer testament to more than a passion for salads and things sour. Acid is one of the cornerstones of the balancing act – seasoning a dish with salt, acid, heat, sweetness, even fat, to bring its flavours into harmony.

Many of the vinegars on my caddy are Canadian – wine, balsamic and sherry, malt and cider. What they have in common is acetic acid, that nose-tickling, assertively pungent waft of acid that increases in strength when it is heated. Vinegar is made from alcohol, with specific proportions of specific bacteria that need warmth and oxygen to metabolize the booze into acetic acid and water. Along the way, the bacteria live on the surface of the liquid, forming a thick, slimy, yucky film known as the “mother.” (Winemakers and vinegar makers live in an uneasy truce if they are neighbours, and often the vinegary is located far from the winery to minimize the possibility of the mother consorting with the young wine, with predictably sour results.)

Some of my bottles hold self-infused vinegars – my own fruits, berries and herbs stuffed into jars of cider or wine vinegars. My favourite infused vinegar is vanilla-flavoured: cut open two vanilla pods, scrape out the seeds and add both seeds and pods to a bottle of mild vinegar. Cover and let infuse for at least a month, then use sparingly, for flavour accents as well as acidity. Malt vinegars, made from cereal grains and sprouted barley, carry distinct reminders of their beer base, well exemplified by Spinnaker’s Gastro-pub vinegars. Apple cider vinegar has an unmistakable orchard fruit note, like that made by Okanagan Vinegary Brewery.

Two Canadian wine-based vinegars that I love have achieved cult status, each made in a winemaking region. The boutique winemaking Venturi-Schulze family of Cobble Hill, near Victoria, has produced Canada’s first balsamic vinegar since 1970. Just as is in Italy, the grape juice is simmered and reduced, then aged in a series of wooden barrels – acacia, ash, oak, cherry and chestnut – in a solera system similar to that used in sherry-making, with the evaporated portion called “the angels’ share.” Michelle Schulze, step-daughter of patriarch Giordano Venturi and daughter of former micro-biologist Marilyn Schulze Venturi, told me years ago that vinegar-making requires even better grapes than those used in wine-making because such reduction highlights any weaknesses. The Italians of Modena, the birthplace of balsamic, say that balsamic vinegar is not made for your children, nor for your grandchildren, but for your children’s children’s children. This balsamic is subtly wood-scented, darkly sweet, overlaid with mellow acids. Dole it out, drizzle it on ice cream and as a finish for intensely flavoured sauces, pour it into tiny digestif glasses at the conclusion of a meal.

Made in Niagara, Minus 8 is similar to icewine, as it too is made from grapes that are not harvested until the temperature drops to -8C, and barrel-aged in a solera sherry-making style. This vinegar has a woodsy nose, its sweetness counterweighted by assertively balanced acid. The house website lists several other vinegars: you might want to try IP8, Dehydr8, Veget8 or L8Harvest.

Soon I’ll have a few more bottles of vinegar on the caddy. But first we eat, and then we compare notes on your favourites.

Spiced Gastrique

A gastrique is a quick and simple sauce, a reduction, highly flavourful and on the sharp side, that is based on caramelized sugar and vinegar enhanced with optional spices. Think of it as a digestif, and drizzle on grilled or roasted fish or meats that are rich and in need of sharp flavours that cut to the bone.

Serves 4

¼ cup white sugar

1 whole star anise or ¼ tsp. cracked fennel/anise seed

2/3 cup white wine

2-3 Tbsp. good (but not exceptional) vinegar

Black pepper and salt to taste

In a shallow sauté pan over high heat, dissolve the sugar in 4 Tbsp. water with the star anise or seeds, stirring. Once the water evaporates, caramelize the sugar without stirring, about 3-5 minutes. Slowly add the wine and reduce by half the volume. Add the vinegar and reduce again by one-third. Season to taste. Use hot on grilled or roasted foods.

Kitchen Kids 2

Grainews

January 2021. When my Millennial kids were young, on the last Friday of each month I showed up at school early, having first made a trip to the recycling centre to return our household’s flotsam. “Noon dismal,” my kids called it, that early discharge. We made it into a family ritual by going out for Vietnamese pho, the modest cost usually covered by what I had pocketed at the recycling centre. I figured it was a good lesson in the tangible upside of recycling, but it also gave my boys an early and lasting fondness for food from another culture.

Eating out was a rarity in our household, reflective of my job as a chef, and of the era: a recent study reported by Dalhousie University shows that 64 percent of Millennials ate home-cooked meals while growing up, down considerably from the 94 percent attributed to those born before 1946, but more than Gen Z (born between 1997 and 2012), 55 percent of whom were raised on home-cooked meals.

Since the pandemic, 60 percent of Canadians regularly cook at home, which anyone in charge of their family’s weekly shopping trip is aware of – shelves bare of flour and yeast, denuded fruit and vegetable bins in grocery stores attest to our hands-on habits of late. Home cooking is enjoying the biggest surge in decades, with even Millennials and Gen Z adults swerving from their habits of buying meal kits and pickup/takeout to wielding a knife from time to time. So, parents, the question becomes this – how to involve the kids in caring about food?

Empowering your child to make good choices by talking about food – who grows it, how it fuels the body, the differences between healthy and junk food – will help them learn to make better choices in self-care. Start by instilling exercise as a habit. Appetites will bloom. Beyond that, here’s how you can approach the subject. Keep it Simple, Sweetie: KISS.

KEEP IT SIMPLE.

* New ways to present old favourites can open new possibilities. Not too weird, and the ingredients should be recognizable. Or not: you can always hide less-than-favourite foods in other dishes. For instance, add grated zucchini to a frittata or crispy fried fritters.

Buy raw foods rather than packages, whole fruit rather than cans or processed junk foods. If it’s in the house, it will get eaten, so simply minimize temptations and avoid lecturing. But if you don’t have something – potato chips, say – in the house, you and your child will eat fewer potato chips and you won’t have an argument about what to eat at snack time.

INVESTIGATE OTHER CUISINES.

* When it is again safe to dine out, take your children to restaurants for different flavours and textural exposure. Be curious. Cook unfamiliar foods. Kids won’t eat adventurously if parents don’t. Visit ethnic markets and the library. Look online to figure out how to make things like salad rolls, then do it together. Come spring, take your kids to the garden or help them seed herbs and carrots in pots.

STRENGTHEN SKILLS.

Until it is safe to attend cooking classes, there are many online lessons. Watch Jacques Pépin make two types of omelettes on YouTube, for instance, then go to the kitchen and copy him.

SAME SAME.

What you eat is what your kids eat. Do not cook down to kids or cook a “kids’ meal.” Do not buy into “I don’t like it because it is green/white/purple.” Insist that everyone try everything once or maybe twice. Our house rule was always that you couldn’t form an opinion if you hadn’t tried at least a few bites. So first we eat, and then we debate the merits of  live versus virtual cooking classes.

Salad Rolls with Dip

Everyone loves noodles. These are fat-free and tenderly delicious. Makes about 12 rolls

Hoisin, peanut or oyster sauce dip:

¼ cup hoisin sauce, oyster sauce or peanut butter         

2-3 Tbsp. lemon juice                                                          

1 Tbsp. minced cilantro                                           

1 Tbsp. garlic, pureed                                                          

1 Tbsp. ginger root, pureed                                    

½ tsp. hot chili paste                                                           

soy sauce or salt to taste

½ cup water                                                                                                 

Salad rolls:

1 lb. cooked chicken, BBQ duck or pork, finely sliced

1 bunch cilantro, minced or whole leaves

2 cups cooked fine-textured vermicelli-shape noodles (rice, bean thread or wheat)

2 tbsp. pureed garlic

2 tbsp. pureed ginger

1 bunch green onions, sliced

1 package rice paper sheets in dried rounds

warm water for soaking the sheets

To make the dip, combine its ingredients and adjust to taste.

For the rolls, combine the pork, cilantro, noodles and seasonings in a bowl. Mix well.

One sheet at a time, immerse the rice sheets in a bowl of warm water. When pliable, lay flat on a smooth-textured kitchen towel.

Place the filling on the lower third of the sheet. Tuck in the edges and roll up. Repeat until all filling is used up. Serve cold with a dip.

Cooking for Comfort

Grainews

December 2020. Pandemic or not, worrying about food is part of the zeitgeist, especially for those of us who feel responsible for others – our elderly friends and relatives, new moms with a babe in arms, immune-compromised cousins, kids at university or on a tight budget. Dropping off a meal is still one of the best ways to administer a long-distance hug. But even as we debate whether or not  – and how – we will celebrate our holidays, our daily bread and sharing is still a necessity.

So how do we safely share food with friends or family outside of our immediate bubble? After your gift of grub is cooked and cooled, transfer it to a washable food container or wrap it carefully in foil or plastic. Delivery needs to be contactless – wearing your mask, set the packet on a neutral spot like a bench or table at least two meters from your friend or beloved. Then send those virtual hugs along when your gift is picked up.

If you have received a gift of food, set it on an empty counter and transfer the food to your own plates or bowls. Refrigerate or store the food. Wash the emptied container, then wash the counter and your hands. When you eat that gift, your “thank you” will reach your benefactor, no matter the distance.

What food to share depends only on what you have on hand and what your beloved might enjoy. If you have it in your head to give dinner instead of seasonal treats, then homemade pizza is a great idea. It’s easy to make multiples in whatever size suits, and extras can be frozen. And it’s just so much better than anything store-bought or even picked up from a pizzeria. Pizza is one of those things that I never buy. You won’t either.

If you grew tomatoes last fall – or know a gardener who did – you might have made some roasted tomato sauce for the freezer part of your pantry. It’s an indispensable staple, hands-down the best instant sauce. It’s not too late to make some now: even out of season Roma tomatoes from far, far away make a roasted tomato sauce that outshines anything premade.

If you are delivering a pizza, underbake it marginally so that your beloved friend can reheat it without compromising the quality, and keep the arugula garnish on the side.

That’s all it takes. So first we eat, and then we can make plans for a meal together after the pandemic. Be careful out there. Feed your family and friends and yourself well this season.

dee’s Pizzeria Pizza

Spread out the work over the day to make assembly a quick job. Makes 4 rounds or 2 large rectangles

Dough:

1 tsp. yeast                                                                
1 tsp. sugar                                                                
1/2 cup warm-to-hot water                                        
 4 cups all-purpose flour                                           
1 Tbsp. kosher salt                                                    

½ tsp. dried thyme or oregano                       

2 cups warm water, more as needed                                      

2 Tbsp. olive oil                                                         

Roasted tomato sauce:

3 lb. ripe Roma tomatoes                               

2 onions, sliced                                              

1 head garlic, peeled and sliced                                  

2 Tbsp. olive oil                                             

salt and pepper to taste

Toppings:

2 Tbsp. olive oil

1 head garlic, peeled and sliced

2 onions, sliced

1 bell pepper, diced

8 mushrooms, sliced

salt and pepper to taste

1 cup sliced sausage or salami, optional

2 cups grated cheese (Gruyere, cheddar, asiago, Fontina)

2 cups arugula, optional

Combine the yeast, sugar and water. Let stand for about 5 minutes until it is puffy. Add the flour, salt, herbs and remaining water. Mix until the dough is smooth and elastic. Add the oil to the bowl, swirl it around to coat the sides and bottom, and roll the dough so its entire surface is oiled. Cover the bowl and refrigerate the dough to rise until doubled in bulk or until needed.

Set the oven at 450 F. Lay the tomatoes in one layer on a parchment-lined baking sheet, spread the onions and garlic over top, drizzle with the olive oil and add salt and pepper to taste. Roast until the tops are charred and the vegetables are tender, about an hour. Remove from heat and coarsely chop in a food processor.

Heat the oil in a sauté pan, then add the garlic and onions. Fry until half-done, then add remaining vegetables and optional meat. Cook over high heat for several minutes.

Remove dough from the fridge, cut in half or quarters, and shape into 4 thin flat rounds or 2 large rectangles, working with oiled hands directly on top of parchment-lined baking sheets. Let rise while you prepare the toppings.

To assemble the pizza, preheat oven to 450 F. Spoon ½ cup of sauce onto each pizza shell and spread thinly, then add layers of vegetables, sausage and cheese on top. Bake for 12-15 minutes, or until nicely browned. Let cool before slicing, then top with arugula.

The Big Cheese

Grainews

October 2020. Life in a pandemic takes its toll in many ways. One of the noticeable changes is how we spend our leisure time. No trips this year – not that I was actively planning, and not that I go often, but I’d love to see Europe again. I want to see Asia, too, and Australia, Africa, South America, more of North America. But not under these conditions. Not now. But the whole travel thing is complicated by my unwillingness to be the proverbial exploitative tourist. I do not want to take advantage of people.

So I’ve been reading instead, notably American humourist Calvin Trillin’s Tummy Trilogy. I adore his wicked humour as he tootles across the continent with the longsuffering Alice, and I howl every time I read about the next hotsy-totsy “La-Maison-De-La-Casa-House” restaurant he skewers. It’s a great way to do a little “on the road-ing” without leaving the safety of my ancient schlofbonk in my upstairs studio. Then for a change of pace and tone, I turn to foodie flicks and Bourdain reruns. (Check your library or online: Big Night; Julie & Julia; Babette’s Feast; Mostly Martha; Ratatouille; Like Water for Chocolate; Tampopo; Eat Drink Man Woman; Soul Food; The Wedding Banquet.)

But mostly I’ve been cooking. It’s been my cure for stress, trauma, and day-to-day worry for decades. This morning, for instance, I was suffering from anxiety about a pair of feral kittens who were born in our barn this spring. Last week their loving mama took them on a hunting lesson, then she got hunted. Now the kittens are orphans, stranded halfway down our driveway, sheltering in a stand of aspens, afraid to venture home. I fear for them. Coyotes hunt close by, as do red-tail hawks and great horned owls. The kittens won’t be coaxed and they are too wild to pick up. So I feed them. Then I go back to my kitchen and cook. Today I plan to make grilled Gruyere cheese sandwiches for lunch. Or maybe we’ll have fondue made with Gruyere for supper instead. Last week we had Margherita pizza topped with Gruyere. And corn quesadillas with the last of the summer vegetables and grated Gruyere. A Gruyere and new potato omelet for brunch. French onion soup with extra Gruyere. Lamb burgers topped with…

You bet there’s a theme. I received a big – I mean BIG – block of very good Gruyere from a friend who was passing through town a couple weeks ago. (We visited safely, in a park, a picnic at arm’s length. Then she hauled this enormous piece of cheese from her cooler and went on her way.) We’ve been eating Gruyere-everything ever since.

You might, in a generalized way, call it “Swiss” cheese, but Alpine or high-mountain cheeses include Franco-Swiss Gruyere; Swiss Emmenthal and Appenzeller; French Cantal, Beaufort (a type of Gruyere) and reblochon; Italian Fontina, Asiago and Gordo; and Norwegian Jarlsberg. They are made in summer, when the cows graze in high-elevation meadows. The milk is made into big wheels of cheese that often have holes from carbon dioxide generated during the cheese-making process. In general, all are dense, sweet, nutty, cave-aged – and slightly crystalline as they age. Gruyere is one of more than 180 European cheeses that have Protected Designation of Origin (DOC) status, so its production is strictly limited, and contained within a geographic region and to particular methods of production.

These cheeses are all yummy. Feed the kittens, download that movie or your favourite Bourdain episode, and melt some cheese. First we eat, then we talk about Meryl Streep as Julia Child. Great casting… and by the way, the kittens found their own way safely home to the barn.

Classic Alpine Cheese Fondue

Use a single type or a traditional mixture of Alpine cheeses – Gruyere, Appenzeller and Emmenthal – and add non-traditional ones – Asiago and Jarlsberg – to taste. Allow 1/4 lb. cheese per person. Add exotic flavour agents like truffle-infused oil before serving if you like. Set out a range of garnishes to suit your palate: sliced raw or cooked vegetables, crusty bread cubes, sliced ham or sausages, pickles and olives, chutneys and savoury relishes. Don’t ignore la religiouse, the crust on the bottom of the pot; for many, it’s the best bit of fondue.

Serves 4

1 clove garlic, halved

1 lb. grated cheese, a mixture

1 Tbsp cornstarch

1 1/2 cups dry white wine

Garnishes and dippers:

a drizzle of herb-infused olive oil or truffle oil, optional

crusty bread

vegetables

ham, kielbasa or other cooked sausage

Rub the garlic along the inner surface of a fondue pot.  Toss the cheese and  cornstarch together. Heat the wine in a heavy-bottomed pot to just below boiling point. Add a handful of cheese, whisking well, and add more as each handful melts. Stir until homogeneous. Transfer to fondue pot or small individual bowls. Serve warm with preferred garnishes and dippers.

MFK & Me

Grainews

September 2020. I’ve been thinking rather a lot about M.F.K Fisher. That is unsurprising – she’s been one of my food-writing writing candles in the night for decades, ever since I read her small and elegant book, A Cordiall Water. I went on to acquire everything Fisher wrote, including her wartime response to food-rationing, How to Cook a Wolf, and her grief-imbued The Gastronomical Me, which along with her culinary evolution records the illness and suicide of her beloved second husband.

But beyond those early influences are the more recent: of course this column’s title, “First We Eat” is a Fisher-ism, one that perfectly ascribes the primary importance of food. I am also hip-deep in writing a Master’s thesis about Fisher and her one-sided literary relationship with an older man, Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, author of The Physiology of Taste, which Fisher translated in 1949. He was a provincial French lawyer with a profound interest in things scientific and all things culinary, and he was a survivor of the French Revolution. He died in 1826, a year after he self-published his one and only book. When Fisher undertook her translation, she was a rising literary star, with several books under her belt, mostly written in the intensely personal essay form that she became famous for and which has become the staple of the food writing genre she is credited with originating.

Fisher had the gift of insight and the skill of observation, which she hitched to her perpetual curiosity about people. In this way she was like Brillat-Savarin, whom she called “the Professor” (as he did himself, for his pleasure in once being mistaken for an august elder academic).

Brillat-Savarin is nowadays remembered chiefly for several of his aphorisms, most famously among them, “Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are”. But his book is more than a collection of witticisms. He thought widely – about food, its actions within the human body, about science, about the nature of being human, and like Fisher, he was a close observer of humanity.

In one of my favourite anecdotes from his book, Brillat-Savarin describes his trip on horseback in 1793 during the Reign of Terror, the most terrifying days of the French Revolution, to visit the local Representative, a certain Monsieur Prot, to ask for a safe-conduct paper in an attempt to avoid prison and certain execution by guillotine. During his visit, he had the presence of mind to take advantage Madame Prot’s love of music, and it was at her behest that he left the house with head still firmly attached and papers in hand. But as telling was his response en route to the Representative’s house: stopping at an inn, he spotted game birds and a hare roasting on the kitchen spit, and told himself, “Providence has not completely deserted me after all. Let us pluck this flower as we go by; there’s always time left for us to die.”

In her footnote on the scene, Fisher writes, “He does not say that they were a typical pair of newly arisen politicians in a most unsavoury government… He does not say that Madame had bad manners… He does not say that she was a wrinkled old singing teacher… He does not say that he used her… And as for the dinner… it is everything admirable about a man with his back to the wall who can yet dine and drink and sing with gaiety as well as good manners.”

Even so. First we too eat, even with our backs to the figurative but isolating wall of Covid-19, and as we observe the long-drawn-out American election process. Today, we share a delicious chicken schnitzel embellished with lemon caper sauce. I wish you gaiety and good manners as you dine.

Chicken Schnitzel with Lemon Caper Sauce

I like Japanese panko crumbs for their texture, but any dry crumbs, not too coarse, will do. Add a salad dressed sharply in vinaigrette and a good bottle of white wine. Serves 2

2 boneless chicken breasts

salt and pepper to taste

¼ cup flour

1 egg

¼ cup milk

1 cup bread crumbs

olive oil for the pan

¼ cup butter

1 lemon, juice and zest

2 Tbsp capers

2 Tbsp chopped parsley

Put the chicken in a plastic bag and use a meat mallet or the base of a small pan to pound it flat and even. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Put the flour in a shallow bowl, mix together the egg and milk in a second, and put the crumbs in a third. Dip the chicken pieces in flour, then egg mix, then coat them in the crumbs.

Heat the oil in a sauté pan, then fry the chicken in medium-high heat, turning once. When cooked through, transfer the meat to plates and keep warm in the oven.

Wipe the crumbs from the pan. Add the butter. When it foams, add the lemon juice and zest, capers and parsley. Spoon over the chicken and serve immediately.

Embellishing the Everyday

Grainews

June 2020. Mom doesn’t like to cook. I hardly blame her – she’s 84, after all, and spent decades feeding five kids and my dad. When Mom had double knee replacement surgery seven years ago, Dad stepped into the kitchen. Mom was relieved, and after her knees healed, she didn’t return to cooking, but ate whatever Dad made.

Now a widow, Mom cooks again, albeit reluctantly and sparely. I do her shopping, and I deliver a variety of homemade dishes – soup, pasta sauce, muffins, crisps –when we visit for weekly movie night, and I make lunch (with leftovers) in her kitchen when we return from our farmers’ market forays.

Mom and I are working our way through the backlog of ingredients Dad accumulated before he died. He was a keen shopper, loved a bargain, and thought if some was good, more must be better. When Mom found several packets of round steak in the freezer, she turned the meat over to me, saying she’d never cook it. So I made a big potful of beef and wild mushroom stew for her. But even a carefully made stew constructed with good stock and wild mushrooms and red wine appreciates a little up-sell. So I made puff pastry, and filled six two-portion ramekins with stew, then covered each ramekin with pastry, slashed and glazed with egg wash, unbaked and ready for the freezer. I told Mom to roast some vegetables and a spud whenever she thawed and baked one of the ramekins. The pastry and roasted vegetables transformed that simple dish into a multi-textured meal.

The same pastry upgrade can be accorded to vegetable stew, chicken stew, lamb tagine – any would benefit from a little lily-gilding. It needn’t be scratch-made puff pastry, although it’s the most dramatic. Back in the day in my little Calgary restaurant, I routinely made chicken pot pies to order, topping a bowlful of chicken stew with stacks of buttered filo pastry, subjecting the whole thing to enough time in the oven to transform the pastry to a golden cap. Or, in the southern style, a few biscuits served as topping transformers. Even an upper-crust layer of thinly sliced and buttered potatoes can reinvent a day-to-day stew.

The process of adding a crust to a humble stew is like making cobbler or crisp instead of eating a bowlful of plain berries: it adds texture and a layer of complexity without increasing the degree of difficulty. Despite its rep, puff pastry really isn’t difficult. Sure, it has an aura of glamour, but like most pastry, puff pastry just requires a rolling pin, a bit of time and practice. Quietly serve the results without labeling them as “puff” until your hands are attuned.

So here’s a quick puff pastry to embellish your next humble stew or fruit cobbler. It is so much better than most commercial versions, and making it is quicker than waiting for that frozen brick of commercial puff to thaw.  Try it. First we eat the results, then we can discuss other ways to embellish the everyday.

dee’s Quick Puff Pastry

When I make pastry to top savoury dishes like stew, I sometimes use equal parts of butter and good lard. For sweet dishes like fruit, I use all butter all the time. Makes enough for 6 small ramekins or 3 9” pies.

pastry:

3 cups all purpose flour

a pinch of salt

1 cup cold butter, cut in cubes (or half butter/half lard)

1 cup cold water (more as needed)

egg wash:

1 whole egg

4 Tbsp. cream

Combine the flour and salt. Use a pastry cutter or 2 knives to cut the butter into the dry ingredients until the fat is the size of big peas. Add the water (more as needed depending on the climate and humidity). Mix to just hold together.

Turn out the pastry onto a floured counter. Use your hands to form the pastry into a thick rectangle. Keep the edges as tidy as you can. Fold one-third of the pastry over top, then fold the far side over top so you have a fat rectangle. Turn the dough 90 degrees. Roll out the dough into a fat but tidy rectangle, then fold in thirds again. Turn and repeat 4 times. Wrap and chill for 30 minutes.

Remove from the fridge 30 minutes before you plan to roll out for use. Cut dough into 4 pieces and roll on floured counter to preferred thickness. Use a sharp knife to cut to required size and shape. Cut several slashes in the centre of the pastry as steam vents. Transfer pastry to top of stew or fruit filling.  Chill for 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 400 F. Make the egg wash by whisking the egg and cream until well blended. Brush onto the pastry. Bake for 20 minutes, then reduce heat to 375 F. Bake for another 20 minutes or until golden.

Hand-made

Grainews

May 2020. Before the pandemic, I spent an afternoon at my neighbour Sharon’s house, teaching her how to make pasta. Her house is about 100 years newer than mine, and has fewer eccentricities, like the small ceramic tiles covering the only work surface big enough for rolling out pastry, tiles painstakingly installed by my late dad in one of his periodic re-dos. Those tiles catch flour in the grouting crevices, but they are perfect for hot pans straight from the oven. Sharon and I drank wine and told stories as we cooked, although Sharon stopped talking, her lips set in concentration during her first effort at feeding a strap of dough into the pasta maker. When she caught the first handful of noodles as they emerged from the cutter, she sighed in relief and resumed telling me about her donkeys.

I first made pasta at a tiny nouvelle cuisine restaurant where I worked during the 1980s in Calgary. I experimented with adding all kinds of vegetable purees and herbs to the dough, although Calgary diners back then were just not ready for garishly pink beet-stained pasta, although they liked the saffron version, yellow stains that bled across the dough like paint on a canvas. In my own restaurant in the 1990s, we bought fresh pasta after learning we just couldn’t keep up with making our own. Since then, fresh pasta is a made-at-home event.

A food processor is best for combining the dough. For rolling and cutting, use a machine attachment for your countertop mixer, a hand-crank pasta machine like my Italian beauty (if you are willing to jury-rig it a bit to keep it from wiggling about as you crank the handle) or a knife and rolling pin (but only if you use doppio, or “double zero” Italian-style flour, which is super-finely ground flour, but make sure you choose a grade milled specifically for pasta, not bread or cake). I use all purpose flour when I make pasta and roll it in my stainless steel Imperia. Good Italian-made pasta makers are easily ordered online.

Judging by the state of the nation’s grocery shelves, we all have flour in our houses, so between bouts of feeding your sourdough starter and shaping loaves, cranking out some noodles is a good use of time. Like bread-making, the end result is something that offers succour as well as sustenance. And truly, there’s nothing like a fresh bowl of pasta dressed in butter and Parmesan cheese, or in a Bolognese that spent hours in the oven.

But if you quail at the time outlay, consider: if you amortize the time spent making (an hour, but half that spent letting the dough rest) with the time spent cooking (2 minutes, maybe less, depending on thickness), fresh pasta begins to look like an ideal supper for folks confined to home with an appetite and time to put in. So let’s get to it. First we eat, then tell me what’s new with you in your socially distant home.

Hand-made Pasta

Pasta is made of only a few ingredients. Weighing those ingredients is the best choice for the most consistent texture: flour can be compressed or aerated, and eggs vary in size. The more often you make pasta, the sooner you can make it intuitively, by feel, like an Italian nonna. Until then, weigh your ingredients, including the liquid. Makes about 500g, enough for 2 – 4 servings

300g all purpose flour

salt to taste

3 large eggs

2 large egg yolks

water as needed to bring the egg volume to 185g

Aerate the flour and salt in the food processor for a couple spins, then add the liquid. Mix until blended. The texture should form a rough ball. If it is pebbly or sandy, add water, a spoonful at a time. If it sticks to the bowl, add a little more flour. Turn out on the counter and knead, but not like you knead bread. Use smaller motions and only pinch over a bit of the dough at a time, almost like pleating, then turn the dough a few degrees and repeat. Knead for 8 – 10 minutes, until smooth and supple. Wrap well and let rest at room temperature for half an hour.

Dust the pasta with flour, ground semolina or rice flour to minimize sticking. Divide into 4 or 6 pieces, keeping the extra pieces wrapped up so they don’t get too dry. Flatten one piece with the heel of your hand, dust again, then feed it into the pasta maker’s aperture, set at its widest opening. Lay the dough on the counter and fold the two ends to meet in the middle. Turn it 90 degrees. Flatten the leading end with the heel of your hand before feeding it into the aperture. Send it, flattened narrow end first, through the aperture a second time, still set at the widest setting. Repeat the fold and roll 4 times, dusting with flour as needed.

Advance the aperture by one click. Pass the dough through twice, flouring as needed, but do not fold it in between. Advance the aperture again, and roll through twice. Cut each piece in half when it gets too long to handle. Continue rolling until the dough is thin, perhaps stopping at the second-last setting.

Let stand uncovered on a floured countertop or floured tea towel for 15 – 30 minutes, until the top surface is almost leathery, then turn over and dry the other side. Put a pot of water on to boil and salt it very generously.

Attach the cutter. Move the crank to the cutter mechanism and position the dough so it lays flat and feeds though smoothly. Crank, catching the noodles as they emerge from beneath the cutter. Lay them on a tea towel dusted with flour. Repeat with the other pieces. Cook for 1 – 2 minutes in boiling salted water. Taste to determine when the noodles are just cooked through, or al dente. Remove from the pot using tongs, not by dumping the noodles and water through a strainer. Toss in sauce and serve immediately.

Grainews: First We Eat: Sausage-making

Grainews

Sausages used to be the great unmentionable, made from things no one wanted to know about, never mind eat. But although they began as the thrifty butcher’s way of using up trimmings, sausages have gone uptown.

Making your own sausages, like anything homemade, means the cook controls everything, from the selection of meats, salt and spices to the amount of fat.

Begin at the butcher’s. I buy pork trim, cut it up myself, and grind it as well. If you don’t have a meat grinder, ask the butcher to grind it medium or coarse, or a mixture, if you like a coarser-textured link. It doesn’t have to be just pork, although German and Alsatian pork sausages are justifiably famous. I like to make sausages from pork, turkey, chicken, lamb, beef, or game, but often add ground pork to the mix, especially with game, which is extremely lean. (Hunters take note: the butcher will need your animal’s provenance, so take along the tag – or the information on it – when you take your game to the butcher to be ground.)

Order pork fat from the butcher as well. Old-style sausage-masters will tell you that the best sausages are made with 25 percent fat – for tenderness, mouth feel and flavor. But I drop that figure and add other ingredients – apple, pear, carrot, onion, leek, peppers, mild cabbage – without sacrificing any of those critical elements to keep my sausages’ fat content manageable.

Buy casings too. Natural pork casings are carefully washed intestines, if you must know. Synthetic casings are sometimes available, but really, do you wanna do that? Back in your own kitchen, thaw the casings.

Add salt and seasonings to the meat and fat. Some cooks find that sautéing, roasting or grilling any vegetable additions makes a milder sausage. Please yourself. If you are grinding your own, cut ingredients so they fit in your meat grinder’s feeder tube. Season and chill the mixture overnight before grinding it all. Next day, add ice, cold beer, wine or juice, or ice water to help the mixture develop a sticky texture.

Put the casings into a bowl of water, using a clothespin to clamp one end of a casing onto the edge of the bowl. Remove the clothespin and hold the casing open under running water. Use shears to sever a length several feet long. Re-pin the new end to the bowl, and drain the detached piece.

(To store unused casings indefinitely, drain well and add several large handfuls of kosher salt. Mix, wrap and refrigerate or freeze.)

Sauté a few patties and taste for seasoning. When the blend is balanced to your taste, set up your stuffer with the right size of “horn.” Slide the casing onto the horn. Yes, you can make jokes.

Like some stage productions, stuffing sausage is a four-hander: one person fills the hopper and runs the controls; the other uses both hands to pack the sausage as it fills. Leave a few inches empty at the beginning of the casing so you can tie it off later. Decide on a sausage length, and twist the casing as it fills or afterwards, to create separate sausages, alternating directions, three complete turns each time, to ensure the whole thing doesn’t unravel like a Slinky losing its kinks.

Use a large needle or hatpin to prick any air bubbles as the casing fills, and leave some room at the end. Knot both ends. Repeat. When you are done, don’t wait for dinner. Strike up the grill to celebrate. And congratulations. You have just contributed to an enduring culinary tradition. First we eat, then we talk about how many other ways there are to season sausages.

Turkey Apple Sausages

These sweet links are great with arugula salad, lentils, grainy mustard and crusty rolls. Serve with lightly chilled rosé or German beer.

Makes about 24 sausages

2 lb. white/dark raw boneless turkey

½ lb. pork fat, diced

2 tsp. curry powder or Chinese 5-spice

1 lemon, zest only

2 T. minced fresh thyme

2 T. minced chives

2 T. kosher salt or to taste

black pepper and hot chili flakes to taste

4 apples, peeled, diced and sautéed

¼ c. cooked black beans, chopped

½ c. cold water or white wine

12’ hog casings, as needed

Dice the meat and fat. Combine all the ingredients except apples, beans and water/wine, mixing thoroughly. Chill, Grind. Add remaining ingredients. Test for seasoning before stuffing sausage casings.

Cook on the grill, in a hot oven or under the broiler until the juices run clear, about 8-10 minutes, depending on the size of the sausages.