Vanessa Barrington

Turning Sunburned Persimmons into Persimmon Butter

Blackened organic persimmons for 75 cents a pound vs. around $3 a pound?

Sign me up because I’m making persimmon butter. Bought these from Kaki at the Berkeley Farmers' Market. They told me the alarming-looking sooty skin wouldn’t affect the fruit and they were right.

This and the galette I’m using it for are the last two recipes for the book. I really wanted both recipes in the book so I’m thankful that Chronicle let me go past deadline until the persimmons came into season. I wavered between using Hachiyas (the more obvious choice) or Fuyus. Fuyus are more readily available and I figured they would behave like apples when turned into butter. Whereas the Hachiyas are lovely to eat and put into puddings and cakes as long as they are gooey ripe, which can take forever. I think I made the right choice, but I’ll be trying this with Hachiyas as well just to be sure.

I was also going for an interesting flavor profile so I settled on cinnamon, cardamom, rum, vanilla beans, and lime. Wow. It’s really good. Visions of holiday gifts are now dancing in my head.

Here’s the method:
Peel and cut the fruit into chunks and put it in the food processor.

Process until smooth and then put it through a potato ricer or food mill if you have one. If you don’t, it won’t make that much difference. 

Put the pulp in a heavy enameled cast iron pot and add a whole cinnamon stick, a whole vanilla bean, split and scraped, and the crushed seeds from one cardamom pod. Cook it down over low heat for at least an hour until it darkens and thickens, stirring occasionally and watching carefully so it doesn’t stick and burn. 

 

Add two tablespoons of white rum and continue to cook for 10 minutes. Add the zest of one lime grated on a microplane. Stir and taste. Cool and refrigerate. I used about 2 1/2 pounds of persimmons and it yielded about 2 cups of persimmon butter.

For the galette, I used about 3/4 of a cup of persimmon butter. I simply spread it on thinly leaving a border and then laid the apples out on top. The dough for the galette was my usual dough from this recipe but instead of all butter, I used 4 tablespoons leaf lard bought from Prather and 3 tablespoons butter. That turned out to be a very good decision. I brushed the apples and crust with a little butter halfway through baking. 

This was served in the Headlands kitchen to Eduardo, his baking assistant Megan, and a few people who wandered in. It was a hit.

The rest of the butter is being eaten on toast. Yesterday, I spread a little on a piece of whole wheat toast and added thin slices of gruyere. What a sublime afternoon snack!

PS: I’m not sure that I want to think about why the persimmons are burning.

Hunger Challenge Day Five

I wake up resigned. It’s Saturday and I feel a little depressed. I start thinking about all my friends the farmers’ market vendors. Will they wonder where I am? I sure miss them. The farmers’ market is my church, my favorite place in the world to be. I don’t know what to do with myself and keep wondering if there are persimmons in the market yet. I convince myself that they are making their debut today and I’m missing it. Then I feel like a baby.

When food is your one luxury, the only thing you spend money on and it’s also your entertainment, what do you have left?  What will I do with myself on Saturday with no shopping and cooking? I don’t feel like myself. I feel like I’m living in a world devoid of color and I start to fantasize about going shoe shopping. I snap myself out of that really quickly and make breakfast.

Breakfast: 1 egg; 1 piece of toast; 1 wedge of melon
I suddenly realize that the bread tastes really sweet. And it’s not even a really cheap brand, but it’s definitely got sugar in it. My taste buds are off or something. In Hunger Challenge land all foodstuffs contain sugar.

I spend the morning cleaning the house and then a friend comes over with some figs from her tree. I give her some cucumbers from my garden and some jam that I’ve made. I eat a couple of figs. It’s crazy to turn down free food. I’m trying to find the line between really challenging myself and being so contrived that it’s ridiculous. I’m feeling apprehensive again because it’s Saturday and there are family activities planned involving children and meals out. I’m really not sure how I will deal with it yet.

Lunch: A bowl of the emergency lentil/rice/bok choy soup and a tortilla with butter. Really good.  A lot better than those enchiladas. I also eat half of a pear with peanut butter.

In the afternoon we go bowling with family. Everybody gets popcorn. It’s easy for me to resist even though I’m hungry. Then, we go to a Mexican restaurant that I really like. Now I’m really hungry. I think about just giving in and then decide that that would definitely be crossing the line I mention above even if others pay for my dinner. I mean this is supposed to be a challenge. So I order water and sit there. And sit there. And sit there. I’m really hungry. After holding out for 30 minutes I eat some of the free chips with salsa. There’s that line again. I mean really. They are free. I’m sitting there. And I’m hungry. The bill comes and I start to automatically reach for my wallet. Then I realize I didn’t eat anything and I feel sort of crazily gleeful.

Dinner: I heat up two enchiladas and a scoop of beans. The beans taste good but I have to choke the enchiladas down. The cilantro doesn’t help. Do I really have to eat these one more time? I am relieved when dinner (and Saturday) is over.

Curtido & Raita from the Eat Real Festival

Thanks to everyone who attended my fermentation demo on Friday at Eat Real. I had a blast and it was great to see so many enthusiastic fermenters out there. As promised, here is the curtido recipe for those who did not get one and following that, a link to Nishanga Bliss' blog post about fermenting with her raita recipe. I can't recommend her blog enough, especially for people who want to learn more about nutrition and how to eat deliciously. She's a macrobiotic chef, an acupuncturist and she's working on her doctorate right now.

 Curtido

Time Required: 15 minutes active; 3 to 5 days passive

The technique for making curtido is exactly like sauerkraut. Curtido is a great foil for rich, heavy, meaty, or fatty foods, which is why it’s so good on pupusas. I like it on tacos and beans too.

Makes 1 quart

1 medium head green cabbage, sliced as thinly as possible
1/2 a small onion, peeled and sliced thinly
2-3 carrots, peeled and grated on the large holes of a box grater
1-2 tablespoons kosher salt
2 jalapenos, cut in quarters lengthwise, seeded and sliced thinly
1/2 teaspoon dried Mexican oregano, crushed

Put the cabbage, onion, and carrots in a large bowl. Add the salt and, with clean hands, toss and squeeze the vegetables until they start to soften and release their liquid (about 5 minutes). Add the jalapenos and oregano and toss to distribute. Pack the mixture tightly into a one-quart, wide-mouthed glass Mason jar, pushing down on the vegetables with a wooden spoon or your fingertips with as much force as you can until the level of liquid rises above the vegetables. Put a smaller jar inside the glass jar to keep the vegetables submerged. Cover with a clean tea towel and secure with a rubber band.

Leave out at room temperature for about 3 to 5 days. Check once daily to be sure the vegetables stay submerged, pushing down on them if needed. Taste daily starting on the 2nd day. The curtido is ready when it tastes good to you. When it’s to your liking, fasten the lid and transfer it to the refrigerator. It will last months in the refrigerator. It doesn’t really go bad but will soften over time.

Nishanga's Blog

Me and fill-in MC, Michelle Fuerst, having a good time in the Scratch Kitchen.

Photo Credits: Susan Fleming

All my Pretty Pickles and a Happy Announcement

It's been pickling pandemonium around the homestead these last two weeks. Why, you ask, am I making pickles with not-quite-in-season vegetables when summer is just around the corner? Yes, they look delicious, but definitely out of character. The reason is because I'm working on a new book and deadlines don't care what's in season when.

You may have noticed that my recent posts have had a distinctly DIY character (and been somewhat irregular). That's because the focus of the book is resourceful, no waste, make-it-yourself deliciousness. Restoring the lost arts, building blocks for the kitchen and all that. Publication is scheduled for fall 2010 with Chronicle Books (with photos by the talented Sara Remington, who also did the photos for Heirloom Beans). The manuscript is due in exactly a month!

We're still settling on the final title but in the book you'll find plenty of pickles as well as basic dairy products, homemade beverages, all manner of grain-based goodness, condiments for your pantry and fridge, and meal building ideas utilizing all your homemade products.

I hope you find this as exciting as I do. I will tell you this: I've been having a lot of fun in the kitchen and am really starting to see the book take shape. I hope to help people avoid unnecessary packaging and additives, save money, have a lot of fun, and gain confidence in the kitchen arts and sciences. I don't want this book to be aspirational. Large sections of the book will be tips and ideas to demonstrate how to use and combine the different homemade items to make quick, healthy, everyday meals.

Pickle Key

Clockwise from upper left:
Wild fermented half-sour dills
Spicy table pickles
Lacto-fermented baby beets
Bread & butter pickles
Spicy pickled green beans
Cucumber garlic relish (center)

Homemade Cultured Butter

I love the tangy, complex taste of cultured butter, but I rarely buy it since it is pretty expensive. It's pretty easy to make regular butter (just overwhip some cream) but that seemed too easy. When I started researching how to make cultured butter, I realized that the technique for culturing it is the same as for making homemade creme fraiche. (another expensive product that's much more economical homemade) Since I'd just made homemade creme fraiche (pictured above with Sourdough-Buckwheat Pancakes with Caramelized Apples) I thought I'd try making butter out of some of the creme fraiche. It worked out better than I could have dreamed. Too bad we had already eaten our pancakes with regular store-bought butter before I got around to it. Yes, we put butter and creme fraiche on our pancakes. Something wrong with that?

So here's the process: Make creme fraiche (We'll get to that in another post and there are many ways to do it. All excellent and easy)

Begin beating it with a hand mixer at medium low speed. Turn it up as it begins to reach whipped cream consistency. When it goes beyond cream and starts to look more yellow and curdled, you'll want to turn it down again because you don't want to splatter buttermilk all over. It took me about 8 minutes to get to this point.

When the buttermilk separates as much as it seems like it will, pour it off and save it. Trust me it's delicious and I never understood why people drank buttermilk until today.

Push the butter into the sides of the bowl with a spatula to get as much buttermilk out as possible.

Once all the buttermilk is drained off, add cold water and work it around and through the butter with a spatula. If you skip this step your butter is likely to sour quickly. Do this about three times until the water is fairly clear.

Drain off the water and transfer the butter to a piece of parchment. This is where you work in your salt (if wanted) or any other flavorings. I made a small amount of lavender butter out of some of it. I'm thinking biscuits with honey!

Chill your buttermilk and enjoy! It's good for you! My dad would be proud.

Homemade Red Wine Vinegar

So I got a line on a 100 year old vinegar mother from the old Cribari wine family. I got my instructions and I'm ready to go. Truth be told: I was a little apprehensive about the wooden barrel. They are expensive, require curing, and though picturesque, they're not the best thing for vinegar. The cute little spigots get clogged up with mother and the bung hole in the top isn't big enough to actually get the vinegar out. They make them with lids especially for vinegar, but those cost $200. I'm so happy I found this glass, Italian-made cask at Oak Barrel Wine Craft on San Pablo in Berkeley. $36 and I'm in business. Ready to make my vinegar. It's picturesque in its own way don't you think?

This is the cask out of its casing.

This is the straw-lined basket it nestles in to control temperature and encourage air flow.

Here's the set up ready-to-go.

Here I am pouring in the mother. Now, we wait.......

January Events: Book Signing, Winter Soups and Stews Class, Fermentation Workshop

Hitting the New Year Running:

Saturday, January 10th--book signing and food samples from Heirloom Beans at Omnivore Books
3-4 PM Free!

Wednesday, January 14--Winter Soups and Stews class at Sur La Table in San Francisco 6pm. $75

Saturday, January 24--Fermentation Workshop at The Cooperative Grocery in Berkeley. Time of day to be determined. Email or leave a comment, if you're interested. The Cog is also looking for new members. Now is the time to join! Workshop Free! Bring your own veggies and jars. I'll bring salt and recipes.

Earthquake Preparedness

Are you ready?

Most people I talk to are not. I had "earthquake kit" on my list of things to do for 7 years. What made me do it finally? Probably the free-floating anxiety due to the upcoming election, the economy, shorter, darker days. My anxiety needed a place to land. It landed at Trader Joes. Normally I'm not a fan, but you really can't beat it for situations like this.

What do you need?
Experts recommend enough food and water for 3 days (a gallon per person per day plus pets)

There are lots of recommendations for bags of supplies right by the door and in the car (work boots, tools, extra flashlights, cash, food, etc).

We're not going that far. It's much too hard to anticipate what you'll be doing and where you'll be if/when it happens and it seems like a lot of trouble and expense. But the food and water I can get behind.

And also the cash. Well, isn't everyone stashing what cash they have in the house these days?

So here's what I'm thinking. We'll probably be living in our backyard in a tent if the house is damaged. So I got propane for the stove, batteries for flashlights, and food that can be boiled in the bag, canned fish for protein, soups with beans, peanut butter, instant oatmeal, jerky, bars, and dog food.

Plus I figure we'll have food in the house that needs to be eaten. Our camping equipment lives in the storage shed outside and should be reachable. But that's the thing: who really knows? We just have to do the best we can.

Everything you see here plus three cases of 1 liter bottles of water cost about $120.00 I did this as the economy was tanking a couple weeks ago and it occurred to me at the time that if we just urged everyone to get their earthquake, hurricane, disaster, election, armageddon kits together, we could keep the economy afloat!

Go shopping! Now where have I heard that before?

Something to Relish

I'm rarely compelled to blog about a product, but here's an exception. I found this at The Pasta Shop in Berkeley just as they were building the new display. They found it at the Unfancy Food Show in Brooklyn. I was smitten by the packaging first and that's about as far as it would have gone if the nice man hadn't offered me a taste. (they make beautiful pickles too but at a higher price point). As it was, $6.99 was my gateway to a brand new addiction. The brothers McClure do indeed know what they are doing, which puts me in a pickle because now I need to figure out how to make my own version. How hard can it be? cucumbers, vinegar, water, salt, peppers (jalapenos?), garlic, dill. I think it will take awhile before I can make such a perfect relish, but I'm going to try.

And what have we adorned with this lovely little relish? Crazy sounding, but we put it on salami pizza. It works to cut the richness in the same way that pepperoncini works on a salami sandwich. What other plans do we have? Lots! Hot dogs, sausages, chicken salad and tuna salad sandwiches, bowls of pinto beans, tacos, pulled pork sandwiches. I don't know. It kind of sounds like I'm going to have to up my meat consumption temporarily or think of some vegetarian ideas. Send yours along please. 'Scuse me, I've got to go buy some Mc Clure's pickles now.

Happy New Year

We had a fantastic open house and invited many friends old and new. Everyone came and feasted on vegan black-eyed peas, rice, and greens, mini corn muffins with ham and mustard butter, fantastic desserts provided by our party co-host and much much more.

We made wild sauerkraut to go with our black-eyed peas, rice, and greens. Sauerkraut tastes particularly good when used as a foil for any rich bean dish and, I recently learned, it’s a traditional lucky New Year’s Day food in Eastern Europe.

Not only is sauerkraut lucky, but you would do well to add fermented foods to whatever healthy diet resolutions you may have made for the New Year. Fermented foods are filled with healthy microorganisms that are beneficial for your immune and digestive systems. And they taste great. Fermentation is a cornerstone of civilization itself. Honestly, where would we be without salami, cheese, coffee, chocolate, sourdough bread, wine, beer, and certain teas, like puer? The good news is you don’t need a degree in microbiology to ferment foods at home. And you don’t even need a starter culture. You can ferment in your own kitchen using the microbial organisms living unnoticed among your silverware, spices, and olive oil. Humans have been doing it for thousands of years. For more information on wild fermentation, check out Sander Katz’s site. If you ever have a chance to attend one of his workshops when he’s in town, don’t miss it. He’s an engaging and funny speaker and self-described “fermentation fetishist”.

Wild Happy New Year Sauerkraut

1 head green cabbage, sliced as thinly as possible
2-3 carrots, peeled and grated on the large holes of a box grater
3-4 red turnips, grated on the large holes of a box grater
1-2 tablespoons kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon fennel seeds, lightly crushed

Put all the vegetables in a large bowl along with the salt and fennel seeds. With clean hands, toss and squeeze the vegetables until they start to soften and release their liquid (about 5 minutes). Pack them tightly into a glass jar, pushing down on them with as much force as you can until the level of liquid rises above the vegetables. Put a smaller jar inside the glass jar to keep the vegetables submerged. Cover with a clean tea towel and secure with a rubber band. Set on the kitchen counter for about 5 days. Check once daily to be sure the vegetables stay submerged, pushing down on them if needed. Taste daily starting on the 3rd day. The sauerkraut is ready when it tastes good to you. This could be anywhere from 3-10 days. When it’s to your liking, you may screw the lid on and transfer it to the refrigerator. Will last weeks or months in the refrigerator. It’s only bad when it doesn’t taste good to you anymore.