A tale of two cakes

I've been cooking savories, really. There were the tempura shishito peppers...

These are so, so fun.

The secret to good tempura batter: use carbonated water!

Tempura kale for good measure.

The carrot greens, bean sprout, and carrot salad with a fantastic avocado sesame dressing...

The vegetarian Cajun risotto...

It all starts with a roux, and the true Cajun holy trinity: celery,
onion, and green bell pepper.

A little white wine, Tabasco, and vegan andouille
later... I cannot tell you how delicious this was.

But the Great Cake Experiment of Intern Year 2014... um... takes the cake. It all started when Andy requested a carrot cake*. It struck me that carrot cake doesn't taste all that much like carrots. Why not attempt another root vegetable cake that features the vegetable more prominently? So I made a control mini carrot cake:

And then a mini beet cake (Please excuse the decorations, which ended up resembling seaweed more than beet tops.):

I added some coffee to the batter to bring out the earthy, rather than the vegetal, quality of the beets, and used clove, caraway, and hazelnut extract. The carrot cake recipe on which I based the beet cake yielded a wet batter to begin with; the extra moisture added by the coffee made the texture just a wee bit odd. I can fix that. I want to fix that, because the flavor of this was so, so very good. This begs for a Swiss buttercream cream cheese frosting, lighter and tangier (and more heat-stable!) than your grandma's version.

Beet cake
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking soda
1 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar, light or dark
1 tsp salt
1 tsp caraway
1 tsp cloves
1/2 tsp ginger
1 cup canola oil
1/2 cup lukewarm coffee, a dark roast if you have it
4 eggs
3 cups finely grated raw red beets
1/2 tsp hazelnut extract

Combine your dry ingredients in a medium-sized bowl. In a large bowl, whisk together the sugars and oil. Whisk in the eggs one by one until well-blended, then whisk in the coffee and extract. Add the dry ingredients and fold until not quite combined, then fold in the shredded beets (getting them a little floury keeps the beet from sinking to the bottom of the pan).

Grease and lightly cocoa** two 9-inch cake pans. Fill each with half the batter. Bake for 30-40 minutes each, or until a knife or toothpick inserted into the center of the layer comes out clean but moist. Cool 10 minutes in the pan, then turn out onto a rack to cool completely.

Cream cheese Swiss buttercream

2 egg whites
1/2 minus two tablespoons granulated sugar
1 cup unsalted butter, cool but soft
8 oz cream cheese, cool but soft
pinch salt

In a double boiler, whisk the egg whites and sugar together until sugar is dissolved and mixture is hot and foamy (160F, if you have a thermometer). Pour into a stand mixer and whip until the mixture is cool and forms stiff peaks. When the mixture is completely cool, start whipping in the butter about a tablespoon at a time. Don't get disappointed if it looks curdled; keep whipping! Do the same with the cream cheese, continuing to whip until everything is very fluffy. Add the salt just at the end.

Cajun risotto
1 onion
1 large green bell pepper
2 stalks celery
2 large cloves garlic
1 red bell pepper
1/2 cup white wine
dried thyme
Tabasco
Tony Chachare's
black pepper
1 1/2 cups Arborio rice
vegetarian andouille or similar sausage
chopped parsley
fresh lemon
about 5 cups mushroom or vegetable stock

Start to heat your stock with a large bay leaf in it. Dice the onion, pepper, and celery; all should be similar sizes. Mince the garlic. Finely chop the red bell pepper. In a large saute pan, heat about 3 tablespoons oil or butter. Add 3 tablespoons flour and stir constantly and vigorously as it cooks to a color just lighter than peanut butter. Add a couple tablespoons of stock and the onion, bell pepper, celery, and garlic and saute until the vegetables are soft. Add the rice and stir to coat, then add the white wine and stir until it is almost all absorbed. Begin adding the hot stock about a half cup at a time, stirring until it is almost absorbed each time. When done, the rice should have a bit of a bite without being chalky in the middle. About 7 minutes before you think it will be done, add in the red pepper and season with dried thyme, Tabasco, Tony's, and black pepper. Add the andouille and a squirt of lemon just at the end. Serve with lots of fresh parsley and a lemon wedge for squeezing.

*He loves "dense cakes," of which carrot cake is not an exemplar but which is nevertheless his favorite.
**If flour can be a verb, why can't cocoa?

An apple or five a day

Well, look at that. It's the end of September. Guess this intern year thing is getting the better of my culinary side. The upside is that we've skipped straight to autumn, which means it's apple season! I've already picked up some new ones to sample. I tried to pace myself. It didn't work. I'll be posting about actual food I've been making, but first, without further ado:

1. Williams red: This one was terrible. I'm choosing to believe that I just picked a bad one, or it's too early for them, because the apple is so beautiful!



2. Pristine: Pretty, no? This one wasn't bad. It reminded me of a more floral, less generic Golden Delicious.



3. Seek No Further: Yes, it's that good. Complex, tropical, aromatic... I need more of this in my life.

4. Gravenstein: This one had an interesting texture, so firm it was almost rubbery. I didn't mind, but I like unusually firm apples. 

5. 20 oz Pippin: I forgot to photograph this one, but that's okay because it was sort of a nondescript green apple. It tasted like a very large Pippin.

6. Cox orange Pippin: This wars with the Seek No Further for my personal favorite of the bunch. Isn't that a pretty color, too?

Best thing on sliced bread

For the past week and a half, I've been on a rotation called jeopardy, which consists of coverage for every other intern on service, plus a few scheduled night shifts. I got called in last night... or maybe it was two nights ago... for the first time. That happened to be the only night I'd made plans; I'd invited over a cointern and his boyfriend for what I have now dubbed the Yuppie White Person Sandwich of Magic. It consists of taleggio cheese ($3.99/lb at East Village Cheese!); thinly sliced white nectarine; homemade bush basil, arugula, and walnut pesto; and fresh arugula, all on freshly baked poolish-based 15% wheat bread. Grill prn. So. Delicious. I also did fig and homemade frangipane mini-tarts including homemade fig jam and a short crust with some fresh rosemary in it. Also so delicious.

But I got called in, so there was no time to plate them attractively and certainly no time to share with anyone else (only questionably a tragedy, since there was more for me). Sorry for the lack of pictures; please don't let that deter you. Make that sandwich. Make it now.

Natural medicine

I read at least two articles from each issue of the New England Journal, Neurology, and Current Infectious Disease Reports. Part of this week's reading was this case from NEJM. Told he was not a candidate for fecal transplant but still seeking relief from his symptoms, the patient performed a home fecal transplant. Home fecal transplant. HOME FECAL TRANSPLANT. I don't even want to think about how he actually performed this procedure.

Ready to eat?

This is bush basil. There are actually several cultivars that can go by that name, including spicy globe basil, Greek bush basil, and dwarf bush basil; I'm not sure which this is. All three varieties are intensely herbal and are particularly good to eat raw both because the leaves are so tiny they don't need to be torn or chopped, which can be unsightly if the edges oxidize, and because they have no trace of the bitter funk that your classic basil can get. Also, my internet research tells me that in western Africa, particularly Sierra Leone, bush basil is used as an antipyretic. Now I can work at Bellevue with no fear of Ebola!

I muddled some of it with my fancy olive oil and a drop of lemon juice for these flatbreads, and sprinkled more on top. There is also fig, fresh corn, caramelized onions deglazed with white wine, and ricotta, with a healthy sprinkle of black pepper. I put some raw bush basil leaves on top.

Using red wine vinegar and the olive oily tomato juice from yesterday's cobbler, I made a quick vinaigrette for an arugula salad topper. This is possibly the best vinaigrette ever. Make the cobbler just so you can make this vinaigrette.

Don't be koi

A couple weeks ago, I went food shopping after a long, long day on call. Maybe it was the bone-crushing fatigue, but I had a maudlin moment with an enormous whole seabass sinuously displayed on ice. And now I'm strictly vegetarian again. Enter the fishless existence.

Luckily, the farmer's market is teeming with late-summer delights. Enter the tomato:

(That last photo is particularly terrible. New camera soon, I promise.) These went into a Mark Bittman recipe, with some adaptations of course. Cherry tomato cobbler is one of my new favorites.

There was an awful lot of liquid left in the bottom of the ramekins, possibly because I accidentally baked it at too high a temperature (meaning that the biscuit finished cooking before the tomatoes could properly caramelize). I've reserved it for a tomato basil vinaigrette.

Cherry tomato cobbler
Based on a recipe by Mark Bittman. Serves 8. Feel free to halve it.

2 pints cherry tomatoes, preferably a mix of interesting cultivars like those at the farmer's market
1 small onion
2 cloves garlic
at least 1/4 cup basil (I used bush basil; more on this tomorrow!)
salt, freshly ground pepper
1/4 to 1/2 tsp sugar
2 tablespoons butter, very cold
1 egg, cold
1/2 cup cold buttermilk
3/4 c flour
3/4 c cornmeal
1/3 c Parmesan
3/4 t baking powder
3/4 t baking soda

Thinly slice garlic cloves and onion and chop the basil. Halve the cherry tomatoes. Toss in a bowl with salt, pepper, sugar, and a little olive oil. Set aside.

Mix together the dry ingredients (flour, cornmeal, powder, soda). In a food processor or with a pastry blender, mix with the Parmesan and butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Add the egg and buttermilk and mix just until blended.

Fill a greased dish or several greased ramekins with tomato mixture. Lay slightly flattened scoops of biscuit dough on top. Bake in a 425-degree oven for 25 minutes, or until biscuit is browned and tomatoes are soft. Serve warm, sprinkled with more cheese and basil if you like.

All scream

There were cactus pears at one of the fruit stands! Good thing, too, since I was already planning to make these (with the addition of black beans to the salsa and substitution of ricotta salata for the queso fresco, since according to Chris the Cheese Guy, Fairway is having a tiff with its Mexican warehouse and there won't be Mexican products for some time (???)). A creamy cactus pear ice cream felt like just the dessert to go with it.

No-churn ice cream can't beat the real thing; it has a slightly greasy post-prandial mouthfeel and goes from solid to oozy very quickly. That being said, it doesn't require extra equipment, and it is hard to mess up. It usually includes heavy cream plus coconut cream or condensed milk, so there's no egg custard base to curdle. Overbeating the whipping cream or overfolding the mixture are the only real potential barriers to fat-laden dairy goodness in the flavor of your choice.

Candied hot peppers

~1/2 lb hot peppers
1/3 cup vinegar
1 cup sugar, preferably turbinado
juice and zest of 1 lime
2 tablespoons tequila

Slice the peppers about 1/4 inch thick, either lengthwise or widthwise. Discard the spongy stuff in the middle, but don't get rid of those spicy seeds!

Mix the vinegar, sugar, zest, and juice in a small pot and bring to a rolling boil. Reduce the heat to low and carefully add the tequila (it will spit and sputter). Add the hot peppers and simmer until the liquid is reduced a and the peppers are soft, about 5 minutes. Strain over a bowl, reserving the syrup. Put the pepper slices in a clean glass jar; how many seeds you include is up to you and your hardy palate! Add syrup to cover and tightly cap the jar. Cool completely before refrigerating.

Cactus pear and jalapeno no-churn ice cream

2 cups whipping cream, very, very cold
10 oz condensed milk
3 cactus pears
1/3 cup finely chopped candied jalapenos, plus some of the jalapeno syrup
1 small vanilla bean, or 1 tsp extract
1/4 tsp sea salt
optional: 1/4 cup fresh mint, gently torn

Peel and cube the cactus pears, and toss with the candied jalapenos. Be careful; if the pears aren't pre-cleaned, you will have to use gloves and thoroughly rinse them under cold water to remove the tiny furry spines.

Mix the condensed milk, vanilla, sea salt, and (optionally) mint in a liddable container. Whip the cream in a stand mixer until it holds stiff peaks. Stir about a cup of the cream into the condensed milk mixture to lighten it. Add a few tablespoons of the jalapeno syrup, titrating to taste. Gently fold in the rest of the whipped cream without deflating it. Cover the container and freeze the mixture for an hour.

After an hour has passed, gently fold in the cactus pear/candied jalapeno mixture, relid the container, and replace in the freezer. Fold one more time after another 30 minutes to one hour. Freeze for an additional 5-6 hours, or until firm.

Deception

It's so easy to be fooled by how supposedly healthful foods are marketed. Protein bars, sports drinks, trail mix... their levels of fat, simple sugars, and calories belie the packaging. Granola is one of the worst offenders. Our local Fairway has bins of the stuff in any flavor you could imagine. If it's anything like the boxed stuff, it's terrible for you. Solution: make your own!

Using all-natural, freshly-ground peanut butter gives you the oil needed for a crispy granola, not to mention a delightful flavor, but without a lot of added sugar. On that note, nothing drives home the massive amounts of sugar used in commercial granolas and cereals like making your own with a half-cup of sweetener and getting only a very lightly sweet product. I tried a really artificial sugar-free pancake syrup I've had hanging around. It was...fine. Much better was the pop of chopped dried apple and ginger.

Peanut butter quinoa granola

1/2 cup peanut butter (the freshly ground kind, not the artificial kind)
2 tablespoons flaxseeds
1 cup raw quinoa
1/2 cup amaranth or millet
2 cups rolled oats
1/4 to 1/2 cup honey, agave syrup, or maple syrup
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract, or the contents of 1/2 large vanilla bean
1/4 teaspoon almond extract
3/4 to 1 cup chopped dried ginger, apple, dates... whatever you like
2 tablespoons grated fresh ginger
nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon, or other spices to taste (try black pepper, too!)
1 teaspoon sea salt, plus more to taste
2 egg whites

optional: 1/2 cup coconut flakes (unsweetened, if you can find it)
optional: other nuts and seeds of your choice
optional: use hazelnut extract and add some bittersweet chocolate for a Nutella-esque flavor

Rinse the quinoa well to get rid of those nasty saponins. Heat an empty pot over medium heat with about 1/2 teaspoon olive or sesame oil. Add the quinoa and amaranth/millet. Stir frequently for about 10 minutes, or until the quinoa puffs up and smells toasty; you'll see the volume in the pot increase when this happens, but the grains won't turn transluscent or anything. Set aside to cool.

Preheat your oven to 250 degrees and line a large cookie sheet with parchment paper. In a big bowl, combine the coconut, sweetener, extracts, and peanut butter. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix very well. In a separate bowl, whisk the egg whites until frothy and mix into the granola until just combined. Spread the granola mix in a 1-inch layer on the prepared cookie sheet and pat down firmly to form one contiguous layer.

Bake for 30 minutes, then flip the granola (without breaking the sheet, if you can!) and bake for another hour or so, flipping about every 15 minutes. Allow to cool for 1 hour after baking, then break up and store in an airtight container to keep it crispy.