More spice than fire: White Chili

Also this week in Blue Kitchen:
Here we go again. Meet the two new cats who joined our household this week. Well, sort of meet them.
Where John Coltrane went first. If you thought you knew how experimental Coltrane’s music got and how much the avant garde owes him, think again.

Easy to make, this white chili recipe is lively, robust and flavorful without being obvious. Lots of spices and herbs come together to create a satisfyingly complex taste without too much heat. I used to make it a lot, but it had fallen off the radar screen for reasons unknown. With chili season upon us, though—well, it’s always chili season at our house, but around late fall or early winter, it gets serious—it was time for it to make a comeback.

For the most part when we’re thinking chili, we stick with two takes on it, Marion’s and mine. Which gets made depends on which flavor we’re craving and who has the time and inclination to cook. What made me remember this big-flavored white chili was a recent bowl of ersatz white chicken chili from a restaurant near my office. The restaurant chili would have been fine had they called it soup. It had lots of clear broth, a definite sign of soup to me. And it had no cumin, a definite sign of, well, not being chili.

This recipe is definitely chili. It has a robust flavor and packs a little heat. There’s no mistaking the cumin presence. And—sorry, Texans—it’s got beans. But just like our two mainstay chili recipes above, it’s got some decidedly non-traditional touches too. Fresh ginger, for instance, and mushrooms. Bay leaf and oregano. And the only tomato you’ll find in it is a little used for garnish at the end. Based on a recipe from the Chicago Tribune’s excellent Good Eating section, it is hearty and satisfying—and the perfect antidote to a cold winter’s evening.

The last salsa cruda of summer

A quick note before I get started: Check out Kitchen Notes at the bottom to see how Marion adapted her delicious Plum Cake with pears as the prune plums disappeared from store shelves for the season. But read this post first—no dessert ’til you’ve finished.

 

We didn’t have a garden this year. What with our move and everything, it just didn’t happen. So for the first time in years, we didn’t have tomatoes and basil and rosemary and a host of other goodies straight from our yard.

But at the farmers markets, the produce stands, even the grocery stores, you can see the season changing. Some summer staples are disappearing, and those that remain just don’t seem the same. The peaches that I reveled in for the first time in years are now sometimes being a little more iffy. And tomatoes, though still plentiful, aren’t the deep, robust red found just a week or so ago.

If you’re lucky enough to be harvesting your own tomatoes and basil—or if, like us, you do all your harvesting retail—here’s a quick, delicious way to make use of some of summer’s remaining bounty.

Both Italian and Mexican cooks lay claim to the term salsa cruda, with very different meanings. For both, salsa cruda means uncooked sauce. But Mexican salsa cruda is, well, an uncooked salsa—salsa verde is one example. [Oh, and by the way: Show of hands, who doesn't know that salsa has replaced ketchup as the number one condiment in America? That says something cool about the American palate, I think!]

For Italians, salsa cruda is truly an uncooked sauce, most often to be served over pasta. The only thing you cook is the pasta itself. When you toss it with the salsa, the pasta cools down a little and the salsa heats up a little, creating a light late summer/early autumn meal. A month or so ago, I posted one of my favorite Italian salsa crudas, Pasta Shells with Italian Tuna and Artichokes. This one is even simpler.

Tomatoes are the star of this dish, and straight from the garden is best, of course. I didn’t even think of tomatoes as more than an ingredient in sauces or ketchup until I tasted one Marion had grown in our backyard in St. Louis. Suddenly, I understood what the big deal was.

Store-bought tomatoes are getting better, though. More varieties, better quality—I even saw heirloom tomatoes on a recent Whole Foods visit. Our go to tomatoes at the store these days [not counting grape or cherry tomatoes] are tomatoes on the vine—sold, as the name implies, still attached to the vine. I have to admit, the first time I saw this, I assumed it was just another marketing ploy to separate foodies from their money: Tomatoes sold on the vine command a considerably higher price than their plucked brethren.

But it turns out the vine really does make a difference. It continues to supply nutrients to the fruit, even after harvesting, naturally ripening them and producing firmer, juicier, better tasting, more nutritious tomatoes. How much the actual stem adds to the party isn’t fully understood, but that’s only part of the story. They tend to be better varieties to begin with, and receive gentler handling in harvesting and shipping to keep them attached.

Handle with care. Here are a couple of quick tips on keeping tomatoes and getting the most flavor out of them. First, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never refrigerate tomatoes. As in never. That is the quickest way known to man to rob them of flavor. Also never, never, etcetera place them upside down, resting on their “shoulders”—the raised, well, shoulders around where the stem attaches. All that pressure concentrated on those small points is a perfect way to bruise them and promote rotting. Place them right side up, on their bottoms.

Whatever tomatoes you use—homegrown or store-bought of any variety, including plum tomatoes—this simple, flavorful treatment makes for a light meal on its own or a fabulous side that will vie for attention with a seared chop or other main course.

A few simple ingredients take center stage

Two weeks ago, I wrote about soup. Last week, beans. So this week, naturally enough, it’s bean soup.

This particular soup came out of a failed attempt at a promising sounding recipe that just didn’t deliver. I’ve talked in the past about my overflowing, unkempt binders of recipes. As often happens, I was flipping through them looking for one recipe when I found another, for Tomato Bean Soup with Pasta. I love cannellini beans and I thought they would have more of a starring role in this soup. But the recipe turned out to be too busy, with too many ingredients all vying for attention—the white beans that caught my interest originally and tomatoes and pasta and either swiss chard or kale. In the end, the results were only okay, with no one flavor asserting itself.

Still, the idea of a soup like this one should have been was intriguing enough that it started me searching for others. As usual, I found a couple/few recipes that all gave me ideas for what I ended up creating.

The original recipe called for either Swiss chard or kale. Both are cruciferous vegetables, meaning they contain cancer-fighting antioxidants. They also contain healthy doses of of vitamins A and C as well as iron. Chard is a member of the beet family. Its flavor has been described as spinachlike—mild and earthy.

Kale is a mild-tasting member of the cabbage family. It has been called the archetypal winter green because it prefers cold climates—it will survive even if left in the ground all winter—and its flavor is actually enhanced by a winter frost. Both chard and kale have a slightly bitter undertone that adds depth to their flavors.

Marion has also used escarole in soups for that same slightly bitter touch. Any of these greens—as well as spinach—would work well in this soup, I think.

Chilled soup and a cool borrowed memory

How has this happened? Summer is almost gone, and we haven’t gotten around to making any cold soups. No gazpacho. None of Marion’s delicious attempts at recreating the cold cucumber bisque we used to get at Café Balaban in St. Louis—she never matches our fading memories of it [it's been years since we've had it or they've even served it], but she always creates something summery and fresh. So when I saw a simple, authentic sounding recipe for vichyssoise over at Katie’s Thyme for Cooking, I had to give it a try.

One reason the idea of vichyssoise appealed to me, I have to admit, was the opening of Anthony Bourdain’s highly entertaining book Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly. He talks about his very first realization that food was more than mere fuel. Even though I read it back when it first came out in 2000, this passage stays with me:

My first indication that food was something other than a substance one stuffed in one’s face when hungry—like filling up at a gas station—came after fourth grade in elementary school. It was on a family vacation to Europe, on the Queen Mary, in the cabin-class dining room. There’s a picture somewhere: my mother in her Jackie O sunglasses, my younger brother and I in our painfully cute cruisewear, boarding the big Cunard ocean liner, all of us excited about our first transatlantic voyage, our first trip to my father’s ancestral homeland, France.

It was the soup.

It was cold.

As Bourdain explains, it was something of a discovery for someone whose entire experience with soup to this point had consisted of Campbell’s. Here’s how he describes that first taste of vichyssoise:

I remember everything about the experience: the way our waiter ladled it from a silver tureen into my bowl; the crunch of tiny chopped chives he spooned on as a garnish; the rich, creamy taste of leek and potato; the pleasurable shock, the surprise that it was cold.

Bourdain realizes that vichyssoise has become an old warhorse of a menu selection, but says the very name “still has a magical ring to it.” Good enough for me. I had to make some.

But first, I did a little reading. Turns out this most French-sounding soup was created in New York in 1917. By a Frenchman, though—Louis Diat, head chef at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel. He based it on a warm potato and leek soup, a classic French soup that he made from a recipe his mother had given him. Julia Child’s version of this traditional Potage Parmentier in Mastering the Art of French Cooking is simplicity itself. Of course, much of French cooking is deceptively, elegantly simple.

One variation on this basic soup includes watercress. The slightly peppery crisp taste of this herb sounded like it would the perfect addition to this creamy, cold soup.

Salad days for peaches

Peaches and I haven’t always been on the best of terms. In fact, I’ll go entire seasons without buying a single one. First, there’s the way they often go directly from being hard as baseballs to mold-covered science experiments, with no apparent moment of just being ripe and ready to eat in between. And even when they do begrudgingly ripen, there’s often something bland or mealy or otherwise disappointing about the taste.

And then there was the tree. When Marion and I bought an old house in St. Louis, the backyard came equipped with a large, ancient peach tree. It provided a shady spot in the yard and a little extra privacy from the house directly across the alley. We looked forward to eating fruit from our very own tree.

Unfortunately, as with many old fruit trees, it had become diseased. Every summer, it faithfully produced bushel upon bushel of peaches, none of them edible. They would drop to the ground, already rotting, creating a fragrant mess on the lawn. No matter how carefully I picked them up before mowing, the mower would invariably find at least one I’d missed. Every bit as pleasant as it sounds.

And then there were the drunken wasps. Or bees or whatever. Attracted by the rotting, fermenting fruit, hundreds of them would swarm loopily around the tree and the lawn, eating the spoiled fruit and becoming completely intoxicated and lethargic. And the problem was, you never knew if they were going to be happy drunks or mean ones.

Each season, sections of the tree would die off, and we would cut away those parts. Gradually, we whittled it down to something we could entirely cut down. That was one of my happiest days as a homeowner.

This year, though, the peaches are amazing. They’ve broken my heart so many times in the past that I usually just walk right by them in the produce department. But this year I couldn’t. Their deep, beautiful color beckoned, even from a distance. Up close, their heady perfume held promise. I picked one up. Not hard as a baseball—just nice and firm and, well, ripe. So I bought some, hopeful but still ready to be disappointed. They. Were. Incredible. Delicious and sweet, with a big peach flavor and a nice, not-too-mushy texture. And the ones that were maybe a day or so away from ripeness obediently ripened without rotting.

Since that first test batch, I’ve been buying them like they’re going out of style. Which, of course, they are—summer won’t last forever. Besides eating them straight, we’ve been cutting them up on cereal, mixing them with plain yogurt, adding them to fruit salads and constantly looking for new ways to use them. Which led to this salad.

Sunday dinners and simple pleasures

Crowd pleasers are nice. Even better is when they’re brainlessly simple and taste rich, calorific and sinful, but are none of the above. That is this sauce in spades—in fact, it’s 100% fat free. And best of all, it was just one part of a simple, crowd pleasing Sunday dinner.

Susan over at Food “Blogga” recently waxed eloquent and passionate about reviving the tradition of Sunday dinners. Of course, the Sunday dinners of her childhood memories took hours to prepare, with “every Italian-American woman with any pride starting the ‘gravy’ [East coast Italian-American for tomato sauce] at breakfast to be ready for 2:00 Sunday dinner.”

Most of us just don’t have that kind of time these days—or at least the desire to devote that kind of time to a meal on a weekly basis. But Susan’s right—there really is something special about Sunday dinners. Marion and I used to host regular Sunday dinners with a rotating cast of characters. Dinner was anything from a simple pasta with red sauce to Chinese [Marion is insanely good at Chinese---her Szechuan dish Ants Climbing a Tree is legendary, both for its taste and its heat] to the biggest pot roast in the store.

Whatever the food, though, dinner also always included wide-ranging conversation, laughter and numerous bottles of wine. And at some point in the evening, Sunday dinner regular John could be counted on to lean back in his chair, make a sweeping gesture toward the stereo and say, with complete conviction and satisfaction, “This is the perfect music for a Sunday evening.” It didn’t matter if it was Mozart on the turntable or Ella Fitzgerald singing Cole Porter tunes or Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys or Coleman Hawkins’ muscular tenor sax. Whatever it was, John always proclaimed the music to be perfect. And somehow, he was always right.

But things change. People move. The Sunday dinners fell by the wayside. Sure, many dinner parties have followed, but there was something so magical about the anticipation of those Sunday evenings and the way they prolonged the weekend, adding a beautiful finish and staving off the inevitable switching to gearing-up-for-the-work-week mode.

So we’re reviving Sunday dinners. Not every Sunday, but more Sundays than not. And if this past Sunday was any indication, it’s high time we did. This one was just family—Marion’s sister Lena joined us. But anytime you get her and our daughter Laurel in the same room, hilarity ensues, as too many bad sitcom descriptions say. Both were in fine form.

I kept the food quick and simple. The whole weekend had been a busy one, so there wasn’t time to fuss over something all day, even if I’d had the notion to do so. If you’re a regular visitor to Blue Kitchen, you’ve probably noticed that such notions rarely strike. In fact, terms like quick, easy and the ever-popular “brainlessly simple” are far more likely to appear in my posts than, say, “time-consuming, but worth it.”

I also don’t mind repeating myself. Deb over at Smitten Kitchen recently confessed to an aversion to ever repeating recipes, always choosing to try some thing new. I have no such issue. Marion and I had so enjoyed the Endive Salad with Blue Cheese and Walnuts I posted last week that I trotted out a bigger version as our starter. It was awesome [another term whose gratuitous overuse has caused me to generally avoid it, but it really was]. Oooohs and aaaahs all around. I had a few bites with everyone, then took my wine glass to the kitchen to continue cooking. When I came back later to check in on conversation, the plate had been picked so clean that a less fastidious person might have been tempted to just return it to the shelf without washing.

The rest of the dinner was equally simple and well received. Garlicky mashed potatoes and steamed green beans tossed with a little butter for sides. And quickly seared salmon fillets with this, yes, brainlessly simple sauce that had people doing everything but licking the bowl. Seriously.

With all due respect: Skillet Roasted Potatoes with Parsley

Parsley has long been the Rodney Dangerfield of herbs, getting little or no respect. For years [in America, at least], it was always curly and its only role was as a look-but-don’t-eat garnish on dinner plates at restaurants just slightly above diners on the food chain—social climbers that fancied themselves “fine dining” establishments. The irony, of course, is that places that use the term “fine dining” are as much about fine dining as people who use the term “classy” have class.

Lately, though, parsley has come into its own as a legitimate herb, especially with the increased availability of the more strongly flavored Italian or flat-leaf variety. Still, parsley doesn’t even appear on the radar screens of many cooks when they’re thinking of herbs, and that’s too bad. To me, parsley has a wonderfully fresh flavor that brings a lot to the party in a wide variety of dishes. It also has a slight peppery taste, not unlike arugula. And it’s the perfect foil for big flavors like garlic—think shrimp scampi.

For all these reasons, I thought I’d do something with parsley for Weekend Herb Blogging. Hosted this week by Sher over at What Did You Eat?, it was started a year ago [that's seven years ago in blog years] by Kalyn over at Kalyn’s Kitchen. Be sure to check out Sher’s Round-up of WHB Sunday evening or Monday [whenever she gets them all reviewed and posted].

A Little Something on the Side: Tuscan Beans

As much as possible, I try to be a “waste not, want not” kind of guy. So, having some nice rosemary left over from my last week’s Rosemary Apricots post done for Weekend Herb Blogging, I thought I’d make this simple, delicious side dish. Also being a “two birds, one stone” kind of guy, I decided to post this one on Weekend Herb Blogging too. This week, it’s hosted by the newly married Anna over at Morsels and Musings [best wishes, Anna!].

This recipe came together as much of my cooking does these days. I read a reference to Tuscan beans somewhere that made it sound like a flavorful, rustic side dish that would complement a host of main courses nicely—roasted chicken, chops, lamb shanks… But it only mentioned some of the ingredients and didn’t give a recipe. So I checked out Epicurious.com and Googled “tuscan beans.” That gave me a number of ideas for ingredients and variations, which I combined with an actual recipe for a simpler side dish I make using only white beans, rosemary, garlic and olive oil.

The simpler dish is a not bad side when you’re really pressed for time and want something interesting [see this recipe in Kitchen Notes]. This only slightly more involved dish can on occasion outshine the main course.

Rosemary Apricots: Toute de sweet

I just found out about Weekend Herb Blogging, a weekly event created by Kalyn over at the popular Kalyn’s Kitchen. So when I came across some particularly nice looking rosemary at the produce market, I thought I’d toss my toque in the ring.

Rosemary is probably my favorite herb. Every year we grow some in the yard and some in a pot on the back porch, and I always watch it impatiently, waiting for it to get big and hardy enough for me to start harvesting occasional sprigs. Even when I’m not clipping bits to use in some dish or another, I like brushing against the plants as I pass, catching a whiff of the big, distinctive fragrance they release. Rosemary does wonderful things to lamb, chicken, pork, roasted potatoes—and to apricots, in this wonderfully simple French dessert.

I think there is a perception among many cooks and non-cooks alike that French cooking is complicated and daunting. And while much of classic Gallic cuisine can be, the essence of a great deal of French cooking [to me, anyway] is taking a handful of carefully chosen ingredients and preparing them simply in a way that brings out the best flavors in each of them and blends them into something that isn’t just delicious, but somehow exactly “right.” This recipe [adapted from one found in Laura Calder's excellent French Food at Home] uses just three ingredients—four, if you count water. It is quick and brainlessly easy to make, and its elegant simplicity never fails to impress. Ever.

Rosemary Apricots
Serves six

6 firm ripe apricots, halved and pitted
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
leaves from 1 large sprig, rosemary

Gently heat sugar in a sauté pan with water and rosemary. When sugar is dissolved, bring to a simmer. Place apricot halves in pan fanny side down, as Ms. Calder so charmingly puts it [the rounded side down, for the less poetic among us] and poach until tender, about 3 minutes—maybe 4 minutes if your apricots are on the firm side of ripe. Don’t let them get too soft.

Remove fruit with slotted spoon and place two halves on each serving plate. Increase heat to medium high and boil the cooking liquid down to a syrup, about five minutes. Spoon around apricots and serve. It may seem runny as you spoon it around the fruit, but it quickly thickens as it cools—essentially as it contacts the plate.

CAUTION: Be careful about the plates you choose for serving this dessert. The syrup gets very hot and can crack delicate or antique plates, particularly glass. Seriously. I speak from firsthand experience here.

Kitchen Notes

Cooking with Rosemary. You can cook many dishes that call for fresh rosemary with dried rosemary leaves [or needles, as they're often called], using about one third the amount called for. Not this dessert, however—it demands the softness of fresh leaves.

When preparing a dish that calls for a whole sprig rather than the leaves, I often bruise it with a rolling pin or the side of a glass. This releases more of the rosemary’s oils and flavor. But the act of plucking the leaves from the stem, as you do for this dish, sufficiently roughs them up.

SPECIAL NOTE: Be sure to check out the rest of the Weekend Herb Blogging at Kalyn’s Kitchen this coming Sunday.