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breakfast/brunch, dessert, food history, polish cuisine, ukrainian cuisine, vegetarian

Kutya: A Relatively Healthy Dessert (with recipe)

Healthy eating can be a challenge for those of us with a sweet tooth. While nothing can fully replace the baked goods and other desserts with limited nutritional value, there are healthier ways to at least calm the cravings. One option is kutya, a dessert based on wheat berries, honey, nuts, poppy seeds, and sometimes a bit of cream. Traditionally a Christmas Eve specialty in Poland and Ukraine, it’s good enough to eat year-round. I fully agree with Mimi Sheraton in 1000 Foods to Eat Before You Die (pages 401 – 402).

During the Early Modern Era, both Poland and Ukraine (then mostly part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth) exported huge amounts of grain, especially wheat, to Western Europe. In the 16^th and early 17^th Centuries, the Commonwealth was one of Europe’s great powers. The story of how the grain trade aided both the rise and fall of Poland-Lithuania is way too complicated to get into here (and I’m still trying to make sense of some of the economics). Suffice it to say, the role of grain is central to Polish and Ukrainian history – and cuisine.

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I liked this a lot better than the Armenian wheat pudding anoush aboor. The grains have more texture and aren’t oversalted, adding nuts gives it more crunch, and honey gives it a more dessert-like character. Many recipes call for raisins or other dried fruit. For my own recipe I omitted them, and added the optional splash of cream. It wasn’t as good as the chocolate cupcakes I made for a co-worker’s baby shower, but it’s pretty hard to compete with homemade frosting. This wheat berry pudding is still a good dessert. It’s even filling enough for breakfast, without causing a sugar crash later.

There are two warnings I should give you beforehand. 1) Poppyseeds can cause a false positive for opiates on a drug test. This is fairly well-known, but worth a reminder. 2) Poppyseeds stick in the teeth. The problem seems worse in kutya than in cake or muffins, probably because they aren’t “bound up” in the structure. Have a toothbrush and floss handy.

Ingredients:

1 cup wheat berries or farro, cooked according to package directions and cooled
½ cup almonds, toasted and coarsely chopped
½ cup walnut pieces, toasted and coarsely chopped
¼ cup poppy seeds
¼ cup honey
¼ cup cream or half-and-half

Directions:

Combine the poppy seeds with a quarter cup hot water and allow to soak for about an hour. Drain off the water.
If you have a mortar and pestle or spice grinder, crush or grind the seeds a bit. They won’t get very fine, and this step isn’t strictly necessary, but it does help release their flavor. Mix in the cream or half-and-half.
Stir together the wheat berries, nuts, honey, and poppyseed mixture. For the best presentation, serve in pretty painted bowls.

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beverages, food history, korean cuisine, winter

Ginger Tea: Korean Cold Remedy (with basic recipe)

It’s that time of year. Cold and flu viruses are everywhere, and most people will get sick at least once. I’ve already had a few colds, a sinus infection, and most recently the flu, and the season is only just winding down. Humans living in temperate and arctic climates have dealt with these illnesses for thousands of years. (Those living in tropical climates had a whole other host of ailments.) Around the world, home remedies consistently involve soup, tea, and other hot liquids. Only the ingredients vary.

One Korean cold remedy is ginger tea. In this case, there are no actual tea leaves involved. Hot water is poured over slices of fresh or dried ginger and often a cinnamon stick. A little honey sweetens the mix and balances the spice. Some studies suggest that ginger is an anti-inflammatory, and honey is known for its anti-bacterial properties, so this traditional remedy might have scientific backing. It certainly won’t hurt. And Korean ginger tea is delicious.

You have to be careful with folk remedies. Many herbs and spices have some medicinal benefit, but some have side effects or interact with prescription medicines. Luckily, all the ingredients in ginger tea are widely consumed without incident, the cinnamon challenge notwithstanding. As an added bonus, it’s caffeine free, for the perfect evening drink.

To make it:

All you need is a few slices of fresh ginger and about a teaspoon of honey per cup. Add boiling water, stir with a cinnamon stick, and leave it in. The normal cassia cinnamon sticks found at the grocery store are good – there’s no need to hunt down the softer, more expensive “Ceylon cinnamon.” The subtler Ceylon cinnamon would be completely overwhelmed by the ginger. Once the tea is cool enough to drink, the flavors will be fully infused. Just give it another stir before enjoying. The ginger slices and cinnamon stick can be reused for a second cup of tea. The flavor won’t be as strong, but it is still distinctive and tasty.

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appetizers, food history, jewish cuisine, snacks

Schmaltz: Better If You Grew Up On It

Perhaps more than any other cooking fat, rendered chicken or other poultry fat is associated with a specific cuisine: Ashkenazi Jewish. It was a historical necessity. Butter couldn’t be used in a meat meal, due to the prohibition against combining meat and dairy. Certain types of beef fat aren’t kosher, which makes tallow a tricky proposition. As a pork product, lard was definitely out. Since olive trees can’t grow in Central and Eastern Europe, poultry fat was the only option before seed oils like canola and sunflower. Few other societies faced the same religious restrictions in the same kind of environment, so use of rendered poultry fat, or schmaltz, became stereotypically Ashkenazi. Jewish immigration brought it to America, especially New York.

For generations, New Yorkers have used schmaltz in frying, knishes, and even as a spread on matzo crackers. Since the recipe on pages 464 – 465 of 1000 Foods to Eat Before You Die doesn’t make a huge quantity and I only had enough chicken skin for half, I decided to follow Mimi Sheraton’s suggestion to try it on piece of matzo with just a little salt. It wasn’t bad, tasting sort of like fried chicken cooked in slightly overused oil, and was even tasty after getting used to the flavor coming from a soft spread. The little chicken cracklings, called gribenes, were even better, tasting like pieces of fried chicken skin, which they what they are.

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That said, schmaltz is a lot of work for a small reward. Not to mention, half of the cracklings stuck to the bottom of my pan, requiring multiple soakings and scrapings to remove. With the widespread availability of vegetable oils, shortening, and margarine, rendered chicken or other poultry fat is no longer necessary for kosher frying. And for anyone craving the fatty chicken flavor, many grocery stores sell ready-made fried chicken.

Schmaltz certainly has historical interest, and is currently enjoying a culinary revival, but I struggle to see the appeal. Having grown up eating non-kosher casseroles with ham and cheddar cheese, cheeseburgers, and pulled pork, the traditional “New York deli” specialties don’t have any nostalgia value. Would I scrape the solidified fat from a chilled pot of chicken or turkey soup to make gravy? Certainly – it would give the poultry flavor a nice boost. But I’m unlikely to make my own schmaltz again. It was worth trying once. In this case, once was enough.

british cuisine, dessert, food history, scottish cuisine

Haggis: Better Tasting Than Expected (with a deep-fried Mars Bar for dessert)

Of all the world’s foods, haggis has one of the worst reputations. In the modern age, minced sheep’s organs, fat, and oatmeal, cooked together in the stomach, are a hard sell. It’s a dish born out of harder times. Traditionally, Scottish farmers often found it more productive to raise cattle and sheep than to grow grain, and oats tolerate the cool, damp climate better than wheat. Almost from the arrival of agriculture, residents of Scotland had everything they needed to make haggis.

Today, it’s Scotland’s national dish. Traditionally, it’s heavily peppered and served with neeps and tatties. Neeps are mashed “turnips,” which are actually rutabagas. Tatties are potatoes. Aside from the potatoes, this would all be recognizable to ancient peoples.

In Edinburgh, you can even get it battered, fried, and enhanced with Indian-style spices at fish and chips shops. One such shop was within easy walking distance from the hostel where our group was staying, so was the perfect stop for a quick lunch between morning and afternoon activities. In addition to fish and chips, which were delicious, they served chicken, vegetable, and haggis pakoras, which are a sort of Indian fritter. In this case, a traditional Scottish staple was cooked Indian-style, and served by Kurdish proprietors. Talk about international cuisine.

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I was a little unsure about the haggis, but it was actually delicious. Since everything was ground up, it tasted like a peppery, crumbly sausage, enhanced by a spicy coating. There were no “weird” flavors at all.

That evening, we went to a restaurant and tried a more refined version, served with neeps, tatties, and gravy. It was sort of like sticky meatloaf, probably from the ground oats in the mix, and rather pleasant. Overall, I still preferred the pakoras, but both were good. The trick with “variety meats” must be to grind them up, add a lot of spices, and possibly fry them. Almost anything tastes good that way.

Apparently, Scottish cuisine has a reputation for deep-frying anything, including candy bars. Mars bars are sort of like American Milky Way bars, with a nougat and caramel center. When battered and fried, they become sticky, melty, and crispy, a delightful mix of textures. It’s clear why both haggis and deep-fried Mars bars are foods to eat at some point in your life. (For more information, reference 1,000 Foods to Eat Before You Die, by Mimi Sheraton, pages 38, 40 – 41.)

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christmas, dessert, food history, german cuisine, recipes, winter

Marzipan Two Ways: Lubeck and Konigsberg Style (with recipe)

Kongisberg-style marzipan — Lubeck-Style

For many people, the days leading up to Christmas are cookie-baking season, and they finish eating them around New Year’s. Crunchy butter cookies are especially great. Not only are the delicious, but they can be kept longer than most cookies without getting stale. This enables a cook with sufficient willpower to make a variety over the course of a few weeks to a month. When I worked at a bakery for a year right after graduating college, we made and assembled the boxes of assorted butter cookies before Thanksgiving, and they held up fine. This year, I decided to make my own selection to give as gifts.

Marzipan is another popular Christmas treat, especially in Europe. At its simplest, it’s just a mixture of blanched almonds, sugar, and enough water to form a paste. Many homemade versions add egg white as a binder. Historically, a few bitter almonds were used to add the distinctive aromatic almond flavor, since the more common sweet almonds have a pleasant but very mild taste, but it was hard to get the ratio right. Bitter almonds contain a small amount of cyanide, dangerous in the hands of an inept or unscrupulous cook, so almond extract is typically used today. Rosewater is a traditional flavoring, though perhaps not as common today.

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Almonds, sugar, and rosewater were elite, prestigious ingredients in the Middle Ages, especially in Northern Europe where there were more middlemen between the source and final destination. Exactly when and where marzipan came from is unclear, though the Middle East is a likely candidate. Sweet dishes with nuts and rosewater can be found from Morocco to India. Through a combination of trade and warfare, Europeans discovered and adapted these specialties.

In Sicily, shops sell stunningly realistic-looking marzipan fruit. English Christmas cake and Swedish princess torte are covered with a layer of rolled marzipan. All over Europe, marzipan is covered in chocolate, stuffed into festive breads and cakes, and made into figurines, including the pigs that are supposedly good luck for the New Year. Germans seem to be particularly fond of it, and specialize in two main kinds, both originating in trading ports on the Baltic Sea. Lubeck-style is soft and typically lower in sugar, while Konigsberg-style is browned under a broiler for a caramelized flavor. (For more information, see 1,000 Foods to Eat Before You Die, pg. 304)

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Homemade marzipan is easier to make than you might expect, and has a much better flavor than most store-bought varieties. The only somewhat tricky part is blanching the almonds, but it’s more time-consuming than difficult. Just put the almonds in a bowl, cover with boiling water and stir, let stand a minute, pour off most of the boiling water, and add cool water until you reach a comfortable working temperature. The skins slip right off when squeezed, especially if the almonds are kept in the warm water until ready. Individually squeezing each almond takes a while, but it’s a satisfying process, especially with something to listen to. If you can rope in your spouse, child, guest, or any combination, it will go even faster.

There’s one thing to note before beginning. Rosewater is a common flavoring in marzipan and goes very well with almond, but be careful with it. Depending on the brand and how fresh it is, rosewater varies in strength. Generally, brands with an alcohol base are stronger and keep their flavor better after being opened than those distilled with just water, but this is far from an absolute rule. Add it slowly, a teaspoon at a time, tasting as you go, until desired flavor is reached. You want a light floral taste, not edible perfume.

Ingredients:

1 pound almonds, blanched
1 cup powdered sugar
1 – 2 teaspoons almond extract (use more if not also using rosewater)
1 teaspoon or more rosewater
2 – 4 tablespoons water
Sugar for rolling out dough
Parchment paper (essential for getting baked marzipan off cookie sheet)

Directions:

Coarsely grind almonds in a food processor, add sugar and flavorings, and grind again to reach a sandy texture.
Add 2 tablespoons water, process again, and taste for rosewater. Add more if you think it needs it.
Pinch some of the mix together to see if it comes together as a sticky dough. If not, add more water, a tablespoon at a time, until it does. The texture won’t be as fine as store-bought marzipan.
For Lubeck-style marzipan, the mixture is ready to form into shapes, coat in chocolate, mold around whole almonds, and so on.
For Konigsberg-style marzipan, lightly sugar a flat surface, pat the marzipan into a disk, sugar the top, roll out about a quarter-inch thick, and cut out shapes with cookie cutters. Since the dough has no flour, it can be rerolled without toughening.
Bake on parchment paper-lined baking sheets at 350 for 12 – 15 minutes, just until set.
To brown the marzipan, place each cookie sheet under the broiler for two minutes, with the oven door cracked (which keeps the broiler from overheating). Then, watching constantly, broil for another minute or two, until the tops are golden brown.

As an added bonus, eggless marzipan such as this is gluten-free, dairy-free, vegan, pareve, and Passover-friendly. Assuming the parchment paper is clean, that is, and not previously used for several batches of butter-and-flour-based cookies.

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christmas, german cuisine

German-Style Christmas Markets: A Mix of Food and Fun

Germanic cultures take Christmas cheer seriously. In Germany, Austria, and occasionally in neighboring countries, towns go so far as to have specialized Christmas markets, called Christkindlmarkt, which have been going on for centuries. At these frequently month-long festivals, you can buy (or just admire) all manner of traditional handicrafts. And of course, there are plenty of snacks. Selections often include sausages, marzipan, chocolates, and German-style mulled wine called glühwein. A similar Scandinavian mulled wine is called glogg.

Due to large-scale German immigration in the 19^th Century, the tradition spread to the US, particularly Wisconsin. Many schools have holiday craft fairs, usually to raise money for various clubs and extracurricular activities, which bear a strong resemblance to Germanic Christmas markets. In my hometown, the two or three-dollar admission gets you access to dozens of local vendors, all set up in the high school commons and gym. Knitted hats, scarves, and mittens, painted wood and glass ornaments, creative jewelry, local honey and maple syrup, homemade jam, artisanal soaps and candles, bake sale treats, candied nuts, kettle corn, and all manner of decorations are available for purchase.

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And don’t forget the lotion and lip balm. They’re great gifts because 1) they get used up and don’t add to “clutter” and 2) everyone can use them. When the heat gets turned on, everyone’s skin dries right out, especially the hands and lips. Almost every craft fair has a vendor selling these things, and they always do good business. Just make sure not to put scented soap and lotion in the same bag as your food, or the aroma will infuse. Eucalyptus-scented brownies aren’t for everyone.

For a more “authentic” European Christmas market experience, there are several options. I spent an enjoyable afternoon at one a few weeks ago and found some great treasures. It resembled a craft fair in some ways, but with more unusual and high-end merchandise. One memorable stand had ostentatious fur hats, made of fox, coyote, wolf, racoon, skunk, and rabbit. They were pretty flamboyant and definitely out of my budget, but fun to look at. Other stands had unique maps, Baltic amber, alpaca wool socks, scarves, and hats, hand-painted wooden nesting dolls, German beer steins, and of course, all sorts of food.

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Just like in Germany and Austria, the market in Wisconsin served up sausages, schnitzel sandwiches, little spätzle dumplings, red cabbage, and amazing potato pancakes. I definitely need to master making them at home. Desserts included apple strudel and crepe-like German pancakes, homemade cookies and bars, tins of Scandinavian-style gingersnaps and cardamom cookies, and all sorts of European chocolates. To wash everything down, there was a variety of beer and wine, including, naturally, hot glühwein.

After purchasing a few “winter survival” lotion/lip balm kits, I loaded up on edible treasures. Between the toffee, cardamom cookies, and fabulous 2-year aged cheddar, a trip or two to the gym might be in order. Really, that’s a good idea anyway. The more time spent watching documentaries while on the elliptical, the more Christmas treats you can enjoy.

breakfast/brunch, fall, french cuisine, summer, vegetarian

Using Up Herb Plants: Omelette aux Fines Herbes (with basic recipe)

Every fall, I bring my potted herb plants in from outside to enjoy using them for a bit longer. It works well enough for a while, but eventually they start to suffer from the limited sunshine. Since most of them are annuals, the time comes to use up what I can before starting again when summer returns. Everything except the rosemary is either done or fading. To use up as much as possible, I made a French classic, omelette aux fines herbes.

Fines herbes is a mix of parsley, chives, tarragon, and chervil, common in French cuisine. The first three are widely available in the US, but chervil might require a specialty spice store or the internet. Supposedly it tastes like a milder parsley with a bit of a licorice undertone, but I couldn’t taste much difference. To compensate for all the herbs except parsley being dried, I also added some minced scallions to brighten things up.

For many French chefs, making a perfect omelet is one of the primary tests of skill. After following the basic directions on pages 107 – 108 of 1000 Foods to Eat Before You Die, mine turned out pretty well. The flavor is distinctly understated, but the freshness from the herbs was nice as fall turns to winter. The slight licorice flavor from either the tarragon or chervil is definitely there. Perhaps it just needs a little heat to release its flavor. Chefs disagree on how much browning, if any, is ideal. Personally, I like more browning, both for flavor and the fact that it helps the egg unstick itself from the pan.

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For each omelet, I used three eggs, beaten together with salt, pepper, and a tablespoon of milk. The herb mix contained three large parsley sprigs, minced, one minced scallion, and a teaspoon each dried chives, tarragon, and chervil. Half of the herb mixture gets added into the eggs before cooking. After melting about a tablespoon butter in a skillet over medium heat, the egg mixture is added to cook.

To make sure that none of the eggs end up runny, I like to tilt the pan and lift up the edges of the cooked portion, letting the uncooked egg flow underneath. After this, sprinkle the remaining herb mixture over the surface. When the top is almost set, fold the right and left thirds of the omelet over onto the center. If this doesn’t work and you end up with a half-moon shaped omelet, don’t worry about it, it will still taste good. Let the omelet cook for another minute, covering the pan if desired to help it set, then slide it onto a plate.

To make this simple mix of eggs and herbs sound extra fancy, serve with pommes de terre frits, compote de pomme, fruits frais, café au lait, or any combination thereof. In English, these are fried potatoes, applesauce, fresh fruit, and coffee with milk. To make anything sound fancy, say it in French, even if you have to use a translation app.

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dessert, fall, jewish cuisine, recipes, spring

Healthy Spring (or fall) Dessert: Ashkenazic Charoset

At first, it might seem strange to have apples in a dish for a spring holiday. Passover, the most important holiday on the Hebrew calendar, celebrates the Israelites’ Exodus from Egypt. It always occurs in the spring (in the Northern Hemisphere), while apples are a symbol of fall. On further reflection, the use of apples actually does make sense.

Charoset is a blend of chopped fruit and nuts, representing the mortar enslaved Israelites used in Egypt, and is an essential element on the Passover Seder plate. Historically, most Ashkenazi Jews lived in Central and especially Eastern Europe. Not many fruits are in season there in March or April, but apples could be stored in a cold cellar over the winter. The only other option might be rhubarb, at least when there is plenty of sugar to counter the acid. Holiday food traditions seem to change more slowly than what people eat every day, so even with modern shipping and preservation, apples remain the base fruit.

There are many recipes out there, typically including walnuts, sugar, spices, and an acidic liquid to keep the apples from oxidizing and turning brown. Most common is sweet, kosher red wine. Not all kosher wines are sweet, but Manischewitz, the most common brand (for all sorts of kosher products, in fact), is. With at least 51% concord grapes and a bit of extra sweetener, it tastes exactly like the classic non-fermented grape juice, with the alcohol flavor only coming in at the end. Naturally, grape juice would be the perfect non-alcoholic substitute.

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If you’re wondering why wine isn’t all kosher (as I was), it’s because ancient pagan people often used it in their rituals. To ensure their wine hadn’t previously been used in these rituals, the production from picking to transportation to serving had to be done by kosher-observant Jews. Unless, if I understand things correctly, it gets heated, which renders it unsuitable for pagan rituals. Once that’s done, anyone can handle it.

Ashkenazi charoset is delicious, regardless of faith or season. It’s sweet, tart, two different kinds of crunchy, juicy, and especially tasty during the fall, when apples are freshest. Walnuts make the mix more substantial, and spices like cinnamon and ginger make it taste like crustless apple pie.

Ingredients:

4 medium sweet-tart apples (I used 2 cortlands and 2 zestars)
½ cup walnut pieces
A few drops of lemon juice, if desired
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
¼ teaspoon ground ginger
¼ cup (4 tablespoons) sweet kosher red wine or red concord grape juice
Sugar to taste

Directions:

Core the apples, slice, and mince as finely as you can with a knife. (One of those devices that cores an apple and cuts it into 8 or 10 slices works perfectly for the first part, and I don’t bother peeling. If using a food processor for the second part, be careful not to overprocess.) Place in a large bowl. Toss with a few drops of lemon juice if desired.
Mince the walnuts and stir in, distributing evenly. Add the spices and wine and stir again.
Taste for sweetness. Depending on the apples, you may or may not need sugar. If the mix needs it, add sugar a tablespoon at a time, tasting as you go.
Let rest in the refrigerator for 24 hours for the best flavor.

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