Waipio Wedding

The road was straight downhill from here. And, I do mean down. Four-wheel drive is required and absolutely necessary. The grandkids and I were all screaming at Bob to "Slow Down", as he's laughing. This is the way to Waipio Valley, scene of that wedding I mentioned a few weeks ago. I said I'd post a photo, but decided to do a post of photos instead. It was just so lovely.

In fact it was so nice, even these wild horses came.

Parents, this is the way to have your kids marry. No expensive hotel space to rent, catered meals, or troop of musicians for hire, absolutely no costs whatever. Well, hardly. Planned potluck food. Outdoors in a beautiful setting. I love it. Not the road getting there particularly, but once arrived, it was terrific.


Old friends, some good food, Prosecco and Tangerine Wine (made by yours truly) swimming, kayaking in Waipio river which empties into the sea here, surfing even. None of which athletic things I did. I sat and ate and talked and enjoyed the view though.


The Family of the Bride, were visiting from Canada. There was actually a wedding as well. We convinced him to put a shirt on first.




Their friends played some enchanting music,


and Bob joined in on pipe and harmonica.

Unfortunately, I must have been too busy eating to get any pictures of the food. Fresh caught grilled fish, bbq'd beef, wonderful salads, two delicious cakes (none of your commercial wedding cake here) and other stuff, which I'm forgetting at this remove in time.

Bolting Lettuce Soup

Lettuce get rid of all that bolting lettuce, in soup?? I was convinced by Amy at We are never full to try lettuce soup. She shared her grandmother's recipe for cold Butter Lettuce Soup, and of course, not having any Butter lettuce, but several small heads of heat crazy, bolting Savoy, I thought what the heck, we'll try that. Adding in some Tatsoi leaves for their lovely, deep green, along with the chives, and a single radish for garnish. What serendipity, I had it all!

Besides awesome color, and a positive spin on the sad end of my lettuce, this soup was cool, refreshing and quite delicious, if I do say so. Flavorful, with a slight tangy, bitterness, reminiscent of endive, nicely offset by the potato and cream. Bob, who would rather do without lettuce altogether, liked it a lot. Especially as he knew a beef tenderloin steak was immediately following.

Well, since the lettuce, tatsoi and chives came from our garden, this will be my July 15 entry for the Grow Your Own event, hosted by Andrea this time.


First of all I went out with my cute little basket and gathered the produce.

BOLTING LETTUCE SOUP

(Served 2)
Ingredients:
* 3 smallish heads lettuce (they don't really, absolutely, have to have bolted)
* Tatsoi, watercress or arugula leaves as desired
* bit of olive oil or a tablespoon of butter
* 1/2 large onion, diced
* 1/2 or whole, small new potato, peeled, cubed and boiled till soft (I used the water prior to dipping my lettuce)
* 1/8 cup chopped chives
* 2 tablespoons dry sherry or white wine
* 1 cup chicken stock or vegetable broth
* 3/4 cup buttermilk (I used milk with yogurt well blended in) or cream
* ice bath

1. Bring water to boil in a medium saucepan, meanwhile preparing an ice bath by putting ice cubes and cold water into a large bowl. Chop bottoms off the lettuces and immerse leaves in the boiling water for thirty seconds. With tongs, remove all greens from the boiling water and “shock” them in the ice water to keep their color. After cooling in the ice water, remove and allow to drain and dry on a towel.

2. Meanwhile, in the olive oil (or butter), sauté your diced onion until translucent. After three minutes or so, add the boiled potato and stir. Add a pinch of salt and about half the chives, stirring again. After a minute or so, add the sherry or wine and allow to cook down (about one minute). When the alcohol has cooked off, add broth and stir. Toss in the rest of the chives and allow to cook for 30 seconds then shut off burner.

3. Remove pan from stove and pour into blender, adding half the cream or buttermilk, along with the cooled and drained greens (removed from any stocks), and puree. Add the final bit of buttermilk, and blend one more time. Taste for seasoning & add more salt if necessary.

4. Refrigerate until well chilled.


5. Serve in bowls with some chopped chives and sliced radish. If desired, swirl in some thinned sour cream, buttermilk or regular cream. For a lighter taste, I decided not to go with any extra cream, and it was great. A perfect summertime change from salad.

Mountain Apple Wine

These are what we call Mountain Apples here. There is a tree in the back of our office property. Fruit is fresh and juicy, texture sort of like strawberry or pear. They don't keep at all well though, so either a juice, drunk up rather soon or, yes, they're calling me ........ wine. Mountain Apple Wine. And, it should be a lovely rose in color. This will be my first use of this particular fruit for winemaking.

To give you an idea of how fast these were going to the worms, I prepared (cut up and removed seed from) the strainer full and put them in the freezer. The second batch, I thought could wait until the next day and ripen a bit more. However, next day, cutting those open revealed lots of worm inroads. Had to toss a lot out. I ended up with 6 lbs. worth though which will make about a rehoboam of wine, not to be confused with the Hebrew king, or 4.5 liters, or 500cl. A little over a gallon anyway.


So, I then added 3 lbs. sugar and a lb. of honey, dissolved in boiling water, to the mashed fruit, as well as a lemon, some peppercorns, bruised, with 3 allspice leaves, and we're good to go. Right into a primary fermenter, where it will stay for a few weeks, until the sugar is fermented down to 3-4%. Use of a hydrometer is highly recommended. Also, reading Terry Garey's excellent book, The Joy of Home Winemaking, without which, or something comparable, this process probably shouldn't be attempted.

In the top right photo you can see a net bag containing the fruit, and the pretty rose colored future wine. I just got myself an industrial sized potato masher from a restaurant supply store, which works great for mashing fruit.

This is something that teaches patience. After another year and 6 months or so we can try it out. At that point we may want to leave it even longer. I take lots of notes for future reference. Also highly recommended. With a duck confit or feta the wait isn't so long. Still, things that test our patience are good.

Feta and Ricotta Making

Ripening Feta

This cheese-making business all started with Isaiah going off to Boy Scout Camp for a week. So, his mother didn't want to take her usual gallon of goat milk. I told the goat guy that I'd like a gallon as I've been wanting to try making Feta cheese. This was my entertainment last week. Turning a large jug of goat's milk into 2 containers of Feta and a little tub of ricotta from the whey. Truly, I enjoyed the whole process. Felt very holeistic. Just so you know, that's sort of like holy these days.

Here you see more whey draining off the curds and a tub of collected whey on the side. I found directions, after searching the interweb, at this wiki site. This seemed the easiest and clearest recipe, with photos.

After the cheese is done, you cut it up in large chunks and put in a salt brine to ripen for four weeks. I have a sneaking feeling that it could have been pressed firmer. I really really need a cheese press. Finally, you can make ricotta out of all that whey you've saved.

This is the curds draining after the whey has been brought up to 200F.
The ricotta was good. It tasted like goat cheese ricotta and we had some in a salad and some in an omelet with sauteed vegetables.

I would highly recommend this whole process. It brings out your inner chef.

Collards in Tomato Sauce with Penne

I've mentioned before what an amazing plant my collard is. Crop after crop I've harvested from this one lonely guy. He went through a bad patch recently. Sort of like me with this cold. We revitalized the garden bed around him though, and voila! Back in the groove. His stalk is just getting taller from all the croppings.


The latest harvest is now featured in my delicious entry for June's GYO. Grow Your Own, for the uninitiated, is a monthly event featuring a recipe made with something you grew or foraged your very own self.

I've cooked collards the quick way and the slow Southern way, but I was in the mood for a slow Italian version. So, they did some time with a ham hock, an onion, peppercorns and garlic - a few hours worth. Then I removed most of the stock (which was very useful a few days later to cook up some of those fabulous Le Puy lentils). To the remaining collards and stock, I added a bit of tomato paste, some really good tomato sauce and meat pulled from the ham hock.

Ingredients

1 large bunch collard greens, washed, de-stemmed and roughly chopped
1 ham hock
1 onion, in large chunks
1 teaspoon salt
4 cloves garlic
2 all spice leaves
1 bay leaf
6 or so peppercorns
2 heaping tablespoons tomato paste
2 cups good quality tomato sauce
2 tablespoons olive oil
Penne pasta
Parmesan Cheese for topping

Put ham hock in large saucepot, adding enough water so that it is well covered and bring to a boil. Then add the remaining ingredients, except tomato paste and sauce, turn down heat and simmer 1 1/2 - 2 hours or until the greens are soft and tender.


Remove ham hock and set aside. Drain off stock, except for about 2 cups. Add to that the tomato paste and sauce. Take meat off the ham hock, and add it back into the pan as well. Stir up everything. Now, while all the flavors are melding together nicely, cook your pasta. Combine sauce with the pasta, or serve separately, tossed with the olive oil.

Top with some Parmesan cheese. I loved the flavor combination of tender collards, ham and tangy tomato. This is great with a side of crisp salad, like fresh arugula and baby greens. Add a baguette and you're in business.


Enjoy my entry for June's GYO event. And be sure to check out all the great dishes, hosted this month by Graziana at Erbe in Cucina.

Fabulous Ginger Cake

Just finished The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge, for June's Cook the Book event. What a lovely little fairy story. Though meant for children, I enjoyed this tale of how forgiveness, love and understanding hold a force strong enough to conquer evil.

The dwarf cook also welded an extraordinary power in turning out prodigious amounts of delicious sounding food for the Manor house meals, particularly the final tea, given to reconcile formerly warring parties at the book's conclusion.

I've been wanting to make a Yorkshire pudding with roast beef. It was served in the Manor house, but somehow just didn't go with this warm weather. Gingerbread however, is good for all seasons. In winter with a scoop of whipped cream and in summer with fruit sorbet or vanilla ice cream. It calls to mind a wonderful English style tea party.

I printed out this recipe several months ago from Deb at the Smitten Kitchen site, and had been meaning to try it, so this was a perfect time. I'll be bringing it to a wedding reception, and will add a photo from that to my post as an addendum.

This Gramercy Tavern recipe calls (appropriately) for a cup of Guinness or oatmeal stout. Since I've tried the famous Chocolate Stout Cake and found it awesome, I figured this should be good. I got the oatmeal stout, and thought (ha) I had all the remaining ingredients. This seems to happen a lot. You're ready to bake, and then don't have one little thing. In this case, we needed a cup of dark molasses, not blackstrap, which is what I had. My daughter had about half a cup so I filled it the rest of the way with Agave Syrup. I figured, hey, this syrup has been in my fridge for awhile, might as well use it. Though I did add a few tablespoons of the blackstrap too. So There.

Also, as is often the case, I couldn't resist a bit more fiddling. Instead of 2 tablespoons of ground ginger, I used 1, plus a tablespoon of fresh, raw, finely minced ginger. Since I had it. Other than those two changes, I followed the recipe. Since many of you may not have either Agave Syrup or raw ginger handy, I'll give the original ingredients list here:

1 cup Guinness or oatmeal Stout
1 cup dark molasses (not blackstrap)
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
2 tablespoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
pinch of ground cardamom
3 large eggs
1 cup packed dark brown sugar
1 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup vegetable oil (I used Canola)
confectioners sugar for dusting

Preheat oven to 350F. Generously butter a bundt pan and dust with flour, knocking out excess.

Bring stout and molasses to a boil in large saucepan and remove from heat. Be careful, I used a medium pan, and almost failed to grab it off the heat in time, before it boiled up and over the top.
Whisk in baking soda, then cool to room temperature.

Sift the dry ingredients together onto a piece of waxed paper. Whisk the eggs and sugars well in a large bowl. Whisk in the oil, and then the molasses mixture. Add the flour and whisk until just combined.

Pour batter into your bundt pan and rap pan sharply on counter to eliminate air bubbles. Bake in the middle of oven until a tester comes out with just a few moist crumbs adhering, about 50-55 minutes. Cool cake in pan on a rack for 5 minutes. Turn out onto rack and cool completely.

Serve cake, dusted with confectioners sugar, with unsweetened whipped cream, vanilla ice cream or a fruit sorbet.


This cake is better made a day ahead. In fact, it's fabulous the same day. I had to try it. To make sure it was ok to bring. Not poisonous or anything. So moist, with a bit of crunch to the crust that is delightful. Rich, spicy, extraordinary and shouldn't be designated bread of any sort. It is an elegant Ginger Cake. A real keeper, and I wouldn't change a thing.

Move Over Sam Choy Fried Rice

This fried rice was sooo delicious, I made a main meal of it. What else do you really need? A few sun-ripened cherry tomatoes and fresh cilantro from our garden is all.

When we get to visit Honolulu every so often, Sam Choy's is a favorite stop for breakfast or lunch. The food is terrific, and his fried rice is pretty darn good. But, if I say so myself, mine is really, really good. Awesome, in fact.

By now you know how I do love duck, so the last of the confit went into this - mostly giblets, sliced up, some still-a-bit-crunchy green beans, flavored with shoyu, sesame oil, ginger, garlic, etc. Add whatever vegetables you have on hand. I definitely used more than is typical for our local fried rice. Peas are good, slivered carrots, shitake mushrooms, celery, and of course spring onions, scallions or regular old onions. I put so many goodies in there, they almost aced out the rice. But, I do think this is about the tastiest way to use up your left-over rice. Mine is usually a blend of brown long-grain, wild rice and white basmati.

Move Over Sam Choy Fried Rice

Ingredients
1 egg, beaten
2 - 3 tablespoons duck fat or olive oil
1/2 chopped onion
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 thumb raw ginger, finely grated or minced
1/2 cup or so chopped fresh or frozen vegetables
1-2 tablespoons shoyu
1 tablespoon sweet chili sauce (or to taste)
1 tablespoon patis or oyster sauce if desired
2 teaspoons sesame oil
1/3 - 1/2 cup diced cooked bacon, duck, chicken, ham or Portugese sausage
2 or more cups cooked rice
2 tablespoons chopped green onions, chives, parsley or cilantro

First slice and dice your vegetables and bit of meat or tofu, then get out a wok or large frying pan, heating a tablespoon of oil (I used that lovely rendered duck fat). Gently pour the beaten egg in a thin layer, let firm up, then remove and slice into long strips (or you can just scramble the egg). Put that aside, then saute onion in a bit more oil, or fat of choice, til turning translucent.

Next add the ginger and garlic, fry a minute or two then toss in whatever other vegetables you're going to use, stir frying madly til just barely tender, adding more oil if needed. If you have something that takes a bit longer add your shoyu with a tablespoon of water and put a lid on it for a few minutes. Which is what I did for the green beans.

Now add whatever left-over meat you want, if any, or tofu cubes (teriyaki tofu would be good) and let it heat through. Many locals would use diced, fried Spam here. Finally add the chili sauce, shoyu, sesame oil and rice. Stir fry til heated then taste and see if you want to add any salt or fish sauce. Toss the egg in and finish with green onions if using, or cilantro. I often add a topping of crispy fried duck cracklings.


I just had a little left from dinner, so for breakfast added an egg over easy. Truly great with a half papaya and some green jasmine tea. Breakfast, lunch or dinner actually, all three. I love this ono fried rice any old time.

As a side note, you may have noticed, I'm not doing too many of my rants these days. I figure focusing on all of the idiocy going on in the world at large is too depressing. We can pray for our leaders, love one another where we are and just do our best. Not that this was ever intended to be a food and garden blog, but at the very least, I'm enjoying it.

More Mushrooms

Oh no, there she goes again, with those "edibility unknown" mushrooms. But, I just can't resist. They tasted fine, and as mentioned previously, I didn't die. They're growing right outside, by the new galangal bed, and in the wood chips mulch by the orange tree, begging to be used. Though, Bob informed me he didn't want to eat any mushrooms that weren't bought in a store. Period. So, either I eat them all myself or find a more infallible source of information on this variety.

I just finished a fantastic book, The Last Chinese Chef, by Nicole Mones. I got a bit ahead of myself reading for the Cook the Books event, but do you see where this is leading? If I can just find an authentic Chinese chef, from China, I'm betting he (or she) would know these by sight. It's a possibility. So I'm putting in a call to Dora, a friend of ours who escaped from China during a difficult period there, to see if maybe she knows someone. She's also a very good cook, but I think I should invite her out for lunch. To discuss. And, I think we need to go to Honolulu. There's probably nothing suitable here in little old Hilo. I want to try the lotus leaf wrapped pork ribs mentioned in Mones' book (the recipe is on the above referenced web site.) I'll keep you posted.

Banana Ice Cream with Dulce de Leche

If you've thought I was through posting banana recipes, you'd be wrong. As long as they keep coming, I'll be trying to do something creative with them. When I can't think of anything or am too lazy to cook, there's always dried bananas.

But, just couldn't resist this recipe I found at Mike's Table. What an outstanding combination: bananas, roasted in brown sugar and butter, vanilla ice cream, and Dulce de Leche swirled in at the end. Of course, I had to fiddle with it. No cream?? This is ice cream folks. So, instead of using whole milk, I used half milk and half heavy cream. But, the good thing is, no cooking an egg custard. Plus, since I was making it for my grandson's birthday party, where there would be all kinds of picky kids running around (confession time here) I thought, if I throw in some lovely, toasty, macadamia nuts, there will definitely be enough. Ha ha, for the adults. And, won't it add to the whole flavor combination? And, I was right, on all counts, though the more discriminating of the children had some. "Honey, do you want chocolate ice cream, or the banana one with nuts?"

Roasted Banana Ice Cream with Dulce de Leche Swirls

This is derived from David Lebovitz’s The Perfect Scoop, via Mike's Table

7 ripe bananas (plus one for adding later in frozen or fresh chunks)
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 Tbsp butter
3 cups whole milk (as much of this as you want can be cream)
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
juice of 1 lemon
1/2 tsp salt
1/3 cup toasted, chopped macadamia nuts
1/2 - 3/4 cup dulce de leche

Slice 7 of the bananas, and toss them in the brown sugar and butter (melted a few minutes in the baking dish). Bake in a 400°F oven for 40 minutes, stirring once.

Once time is up, the bananas should be nicely browned and syrupy. Scrape the contents of this pan (bananas and syrup) into a blender/food processor along with the milk, cream, sugar, vanilla, lemon, and salt and blend until smooth. Cover and chill this in the fridge for a few hours.

While that is cooling, you can make the Dulche de Leche (very easy - milk cooks in oven) or if you don't want to heat up your kitchen, you can maybe buy this in some supermarkets. I wasn't able to here in Hilo, but you may be able to in a bigger city, one with more strange/ethnic stuff available.

Dulce de Leche.

one14 oz can of condensed milk
dash salt

Pour the condensed milk and dash of salt into a nonreactive oven-proof container (enamel, glass, etc). Cover with tin foil and put this in a warm water bath so that the water goes about halfway up the height of the pan. I used a heavy glass measuring cup. How simple is that?

Set this in preheated 425F oven at least an hour - check if it is looking like caramel yet. Is it thick and gloppy? Then it's done.

Here you see the Dulce before whisking smooth.

So, when it resembles dark butterscotch, remove from the oven, carefully take off the foil, and let it cool to room temperature, whisking well once it does. While it's cooling, you may want to toast some chopped macadamia nuts. Watch them so they don't burn. I overdid mine and had to do another batch.

Once well chilled, churn the banana-cream mixture in your ice cream maker, according to manufacturer's directions, for about 20 minutes. About 5 minutes before it's finished, dump the nuts in. I sliced a frozen banana (you can use a fresh one as well) into little bits, and once time was up, mixed it into the ice cream along with a few globs of dulce de leche. Immediately scoop your finished ice cream into a suitable container and put into the freezer.

It should sit overnight to take on the right texture. This is so creamy, nutty, rich caramelly good, yikes!