Caprese Salad Bites

Another quick and simple appetizer that tastes great and looks nice on your table.  I think I first had these at my friend Ann's a few years ago and had completely forgotten how great they are and easy to make.  You end up with all of the great tastes and flavours of a Caprese salad in your mouth at one time in a quick bite.

I saw a show on the Food Network recently where a Chef did an interesting take on this idea too.  He makes his own cheese, so what they did was use a little pipette to absorb mozzarella water, and then threaded the cherry tomato on the pipette, and topped it with a drizzle of balsamic vinegar and a perfect basil leaf.  The idea is that you squeeze the pipette in your mouth the same time as you bite into the tomato giving you the perfect burst of Caprese.

Caprese Salad Bites
(Makes 15-20 bites)

1 container Mini Bocconcini or Mini Mozzarella di Bufala
2 tablespoons Basil Pesto (jarred is fine)
1/2 container cherry tomatoes
Salt and pepper to taste
Mini-skewers

Drain liquid from cheese container.  Add pesto and toss to combine.  Add a grind of salt and pepper and combine again. Allow to marinate in the fridge for about 1 hour before assembling.

To assemble, place one cherry tomato and one marinated cheese ball on each skewer.  That's it!  Very simple and very delicious.

Eggplant Caponata

I seem to always be in search of easy but interesting appetizers - things that have great flavour but that do not take a lot of strange ingredients or a lot of time and effort to make.  I try to avoid things that might scare a crowd or those I don't cook for often, yet are different enough to keep me interested.

Today I decided to try an Eggplant Caponata.  Two of the most popular and highly rated recipes I came across were those from Mario Batali and, of course, Ina Garten.  I liked Ina's use of roasted red peppers and capers - two of my favourite ingredients - and Mario's use of cocoa powder to give depth of flavour, so I combined both ideas to end up with the below recipe.  The result is fresh tasting, vegetarian and really required little effort beyond the initial roasting and some preparatory peeling and chopping.

I have more friends coming over next weekend, so I think I am going to do Mario's version up and do a comparison.

Eggplant Caponata
(mostly adapted from Ina Garten)

1 large eggplant or 2 medium sized ones
1 teaspoon olive oil
3/4 cup green olives, pitted and chopped
1 medium onion, peeled and finely diced
1-2 large or 3-4 small cloves garlic, peeled and finely chopped
3 tablespoons Italian parsley, minced
2 tablespoons pine nuts, toasted
1 teaspoon cocoa powder
Juice of half a lemon
2 tablespoons capers
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon ground black pepper

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Meanwhile, line a baking pan with foil.  Cut eggplants in half lengthwise.  Rub foil and eggplant with olive oil.  Poke eggplants with a fork all over.  Place eggplants cut side down on foil lined pan. Bake in preheated oven for 45-50 minutes until eggplant is very soft and can be pierced easily with a knife.

Toast pine nuts in a shallow pan until slightly brown, being sure to keep tossing in a pan so they don't burn - 2-3 minutes should be more than enough. Set aside to cool.

While eggplant is baking, prepare other ingredients if you haven't done so already - chop onion, roasted red pepper, olives, garlic and parsley.  Place these ingredients in the bowl of a food processor and pulse to combine.  Don't over process - you want to retain some texture.

Once eggplant is soft, remove from oven and allow to cool until easy to handle.  Scoop out eggplant pulp removing any large sections of seed, roughly chop, and place in a separate bowl.  Discard skin.

Add eggplant to bowl of food processor and pulse to combine again.  Add red pepper flakes, tomato paste, cocoa, salt and half of the pine nuts and capers.   Pulse again to combine.

Return mixture to a mixing bowl and stir in remaining pine nuts and capers.  Add lemon juice and red wine vinegar and stir to combine.

Serve with toasted pita wedges or fresh made or prepared crostini.

Please excuse the less than stellar food photography this week.  My food photographer is on vacation and now making demands for a raise.  Or maybe even just a salary.  I guess paying in food no longer is enough.  Hopefully, he'll be back on the job soon!

Culinary School Chronicles - Poached Chicken with Sauce d'Archiduc

Classes of late have moved farther away from food theory and more to practical application of the skills we have acquired.  I wonder if anyone but me has actually spent the time reading the manual they gave us....?  Probably only the few die-hards like me and my tablemates who haven't given up on showing up yet!  16 bodies of 24 again today.  Oh well...it means more product for those who show, so whatever.

Today Chef did a demo of Mushroom Rice Pilaf and then we learned to take chicken breast off the front end of the bird, remove the skin and poach it.  Very similar technique to what I did a few weeks back when we poached Rainbow Trout.

We also did a take on Sauce Archiduc which is a derivative sauce that combines the chicken's poaching liquid with a Béchamel sauce (back to Mother sauces again!).  The traditional version popularized by Escoffier is a cream and mushroom sauce, but this version incorporates lemon grass, Thai green curry paste and no mushrooms.  The sauce picks up a subtle hint of flavour from all of these ingredients and gives you that nice little burny tickle at the back of your throat that us capiscum lovers want.

Honestly, until I took this course, I never would have considered poaching to be a viable method of cooking - it seemed too much like boiling or microwaving to me.  But I was wrong.  Between the poached rainbow trout and the poached chicken today, I am a convert.  And it actually is quite a quick cooking method for your "a 1à minute" moments.  I didn't even know I had a là minute moments until I took my course but apparently I do!  And all of these classics still hold up incredibly well at a dinner party.

We also learned about the making of a clouté.  I must admit I love the French cooking terminology we keep learning.  Everything has a name and a defined method.  So classic.  So French!

Anyway a clouté is made by peeling an onion, and cutting it in half.  You then cut a fairly deep insert into the onion and place a bay leaf in the cut.  Then you use a few cloves to pierce the onion and bay leaf to hold them in place. This is my clouté looking back at me from my milk like a little clove studded face.

Basically what we do is place flavouring agents in the bottom of a sauté pan, adding the chicken and poaching liquid, then cook the chicken.  At the same time you make a classic Béchamel sauce and that sauce is added to the strained poaching liquid to create the Sauce Archiduc.  Using the Béchamel is just a different way to thicken an sauce instead of using a Beurre Manie or other method.

What I can say about this dish is that it seemed to be enjoyed by all on Saturday night, including the kids who cleaned their plates.  We served this dish with Mushroom Rice Pilaf and Roasted Asparagus.  Yummy!

Poached Chicken with Sauce d'Archiduc

Poaching liquid:

4-6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (if you can leave the wing on and Supreme it...even better)
1 tablespoon butter
1 shallot, peeled and finely minced
2 tablespoons ginger root, finely minced
1 teaspoon Thai green curry paste
1 cup chicken stock
1/2 cup white wine
2 stalks lemongrass, cut half and bruised

Archiduc Sauce:

Reserved poaching liquid
1 recipe Béchamel sauce (see below\)
1/2 cup heavy cream (35|% cream)
Salt and pepper to taste

Use a sauté pan just large enough to hold the chicken breasts in a single layer.  Butter the inside of the pan and sprinkle with shallots, lemon grass, curry paste and ginger.

Season the chicken breasts with salt and pepper.  Place them on the pan presentation side up (the prettiest side).  Sprinkle with lemon juice and add just enough stock to cover the chicken.

Cover the chicken with a cartouche ( a buttered piece of parchment paper cut in the shape of the pan - this acts as a paper lid).  Bring the liquid to a low boil over medium heat.  Reduce heat and simmer until the internal temperature of the chicken reaches 175 degrees, approximately 15 to 20 minutes.

Remove chicken from pan and place in another dish, cover with foil to keep warm.  Return the poaching liquid to a boil, and reduce by half.  Add the Béchamel sauce.  Return to a simmer and continue to cook for 5 to 7 minutes.  Strain the sauce.

Adjust seasoning and serve over reserved chicken breasts with Mushroom Rice Pilaf and some lovely seasonal vegetables.

Béchamel Sauce


2 cups homo milk
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons butter
1 clouté (half an onion with a bayleaf and 2 cloves)

Rinse a small saucepan with cold water.  This will create a coating in the bottom of the pan and reduce the chance of your milk burning on the bottom of the pan.

Add the milk and clouté to the pan and bring to a simmer.  You want to scald the milk but not boil it.  You will know it is scalded because bubbles will form around the side of the pan and if you swish the milk a bit you will get a wisp of steam coming off it.

Melt butter in a separate saucepan.  Add flour and combine well.  Cook for 1 minute but try not to add any colour - we are making a white sauce so we want a blonde roux.  Allow to cool slightly.  For this technique to work the milk and the roux MUST be a different temperatures - moderately warm and hot are ok.

Away from the burner add about 1/4 of the hot milk to the roux.  Mix until smooth.  Add in another 1/4 of the milk and mix.  Keep adding the milk a bit at a time until all milk is taken in by the roux.  Turn the heat to very low and cook for 2-3 minutes.  Take off heat at reserve for use in Archiduc Sauce.

(Incidentally, if you add about 2 cups of Swiss cheese to the Béchamel right now, you get a Mornay sauce which makes an awesome Mac'n'Cheese.)

Friends for Dinner - Vegetarian

Tonight was fun - got a chance to hang with my old (that is NOT a comment on our age by the way) friends who I went to high school with.  Actually, two of the ladies I have known since grade 6!  Hard to believe we have known each other so long.  Unfortunately, through time we lost touch -well actually I lost touch with them during university.

But through the magic of technology, and Facebook, we managed to reconnect 2 summers ago and I am glad to have them back in my life, even if only electronically mostly and in person once every couple of years.  It is true what they say about true friends - you might not see each other for a long time but with true friends you just pick up where you left off.  And we did.

Here`s a couple of nice quotes about friendship before I get down to the business of cooking:

A friend is one of the nicest things you can have, and one of the best things you can be. ~Douglas Pagels

Only your real friends will tell you when your face is dirty. ~Sicilian Proverb

The most beautiful discovery true friends make is that they can grow separately without growing apart. ~Elisabeth Foley

Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art.... It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things that give value to survival. ~C.S. Lewis

All right....back to the business at hand.  My friend Jill who is visiting from Scotland is a vegetarian so I thought since she was coming for dinner that I`d do a full vegetarian menu.  That`s why a few weeks ago I experimented with Falafel.  

Surprisingly they`ve become very popular with my family, and were a huge hit as lunch when we were camping - who knew!!!  Except Brenden tells me he only likes them cold and with ketchup...whatever!  You cannot even try to explain the tastes of a 15 year old boy.  At least he tried it and has been using up the leftovers from Friday night like crazy!

So here`s our dinner menu:

Appetizers:

Eggplant Caponata with Toasted Pita Chips and Flatbreads

Caprese Salad Bites

Main:

Pickled Turnips by Toorshi

Falafel Balls with Taratoor Sauce on Pita

Tomato Mint Chutney

Cucumbers Tossed in Yogurt with Mint and Parlsey

Curried Couscous with Orange and Mint

Toorshi Pickled Turnips