Orange Sorbet

This dessert started with eggplant. That is, if it weren’t for the eggplant, I never would have made orange sorbet. I had a couple of varieties of eggplant to use, and I started craving a Thai eggplant curry. I knew I had seen an eggplant curry in The Kitchen Diaries which I read several months ago but don’t think I’ve mentioned here before. In that book, which is a year-long food diary about enjoying the right food in the right place at the right time, Nigel Slater mentions a meal involving a curry of eggplant, tomatoes, and lemongrass. He explains that he likes to follow a "stinging-hot principal dish" with a "sharp citrus dessert." The thought of a spicy dish with complex flavors followed by an icy, fruity, sorbet appealed to me very much. The curry in the book is made with a homemade paste involving shrimp paste which would have sent me on a day-long ingredient hunt, so I started asking around about eggplant curry recipes. Leela from She Simmers shared with me an informative post of hers about purchased curry pastes vs ones made from scratch, and her post also includes a link to an easy green curry recipe from Kasma Loha-unchit. That’s the version that I made only with mushrooms instead of pork. Then, it was back to the book for the dessert. So, yes, eggplant brought me along a winding path that led to orange sorbet.

Making the sorbet couldn’t have been easier. A simple syrup was made, and orange zest was added. Since the juice of a lemon was going to be added later, I zested some of said lemon and added it to the simple syrup as well. Once the syrup was cool, fresh orange juice and the juice of the lemon were added. I left that mixture in the refrigerator to chill thoroughly for a few hours before churning it in an ice cream maker. For garnish, I topped servings with a little lime zest.

The eggplant curry with coconut milk, Thai chiles, Thai basil, and green curry paste was spicy and lovely and the eggplant chunks took on all the flavors nicely. And, as suggested, following that with a cooling, citrusy, orange sorbet was refreshing and delicious. With no prompting, questioning, or fishing for a response, Kurt said he liked it. Even though he rarely dislikes a dessert, he doesn’t come right out and say he likes one very often, and then we both wanted seconds of this, so I know for sure it was really good.

Beet and Goat Cheese Terrine

Last Saturday, we enjoyed another delicious Austin food bloggers’ potluck, and this time it was a picnic in a park. There are several great photos from the event at Aimee Wenske Photography and Foodie is the New Forty. I wanted to bake one of my favorite cookie recipes for the potluck, and those cookies were shown in one of my earliest-ever blog posts. I shot a few new photos and updated the post after Saturday’s event. So, the cookies were easy enough, but I also wanted to experiment with a new dish. I had recently read the LA issue of Saveur which is full of beautiful photography, including the cover photo, by Austin’s own Penny De Los Santos. In the magazine, there’s a story about Wolfgang Puck and how he defined California cuisine, and there’s a photo of Beet and Goat Cheese Napoleons that caught my eye to say the least. I had some beets from my CSA, and I thought this dish would be something that could be served at room temperature and had a chance of holding its shape while being transported to a park. I did make some changes though. In the original Puck recipe, individual roasted beets were sliced, cut into equal-sized pieces with a round cutter, stacked with a goat cheese and herb mixture, and then cut into pretty wedges. That resulted in some trimmed pieces going to waste, and I thought it might somehow be simpler to layer everything into a terrine and then cut squares from it. Also, in the original, all red beets were used, but I decided to make it a little colorful and used red, Chioggia, and golden beets.

First, I roasted all the beets and then removed the skins when they were cool enough to handle. Slicing them evenly was quick work with a benriner. For the goat cheese, I softened two nine ounce pieces and added chopped oregano, parsley, and basil from my garden. I used a loaf pan lined with plastic wrap and layered golden beets first, topped with a layer of herbed goat cheese, then another layer of golden beets since they were the biggest beets I had they were used twice, more goat cheese, Chioggia beets, goat cheese, and last were the red beets. I covered the top with plastic wrap and set another loaf pan on top. That top pan was weighted down with a few jars, and this all spent the night in the refrigerator. The next day, I turned the terrine out onto a board and cut it into squares. For the orange vinaigrette, I simplified the process from the original recipe and just combined shallots, orange juice, rice wine vinegar, and olive oil. I tossed some red kale micro greens in the vinaigrette and topped each stacked square with a few of them. Rather than the suggested hazelnuts, I used some walnuts that I had on hand and scattered them about the stacks.

One of the great things about terrines is that you have to make them in advance. Because of that, I was actually on time for a party for once. And, after being pressed overnight, the layers stuck together well, and the cut pieces held their shape. However, because the beet slices were overlapped, my version didn’t have the perfectly straight lines of the layers seen in the Saveur photo, but I was still happy with it. The intended flavors were there, and beets, goat cheese, herbs, and orange make a classically good combination.

Orange and Pistachio Magdalenas

As I was reading The New Spanish Table, I was so excited about the tapas, seafood, and rice chapters, I didn’t really even expect much from desserts. I should have known better. There are ice creams, sorbets, and granitas with flavors ranging from honey and cinnamon to beet and strawberry. There are also confections and cookies such as the orange and pistachio magdalenas seen here. These light, little, tea cakes are made with olive oil instead of butter and are flavored with orange juice, orange zest, and orange flower water. Something about the fragrance of orange flower water seems like summer to me. Is there a flower that blooms in the summer with a similar scent? Whatever it is about it, I like it, and it added another dimension to the Moorish-inspired flavors of these delicate, mini cakes. They’re similar to French madeleines but were baked in a mini-muffin pan.

The batter was started by mixing eggs and confectioners’ sugar. Then a combination of flour, salt, and baking powder was added alternately with a combination of cream, orange juice, and olive oil. Last, chopped, toasted pistachios, orange zest, and orange flower water were added. The batter was covered and left to rest for 30 minutes before being baked in buttered mini-muffin cups. After the cakes cooled, they were dusted with a sprinkling of confectioners’ sugar.

It’s a good thing these are simple to make because they disappear from a serving platter quickly. They’re cute and so light that when you pick up the bite-sized morsels, you quickly lose count of how many you’ve sampled. Since I hid some away to ensure they’d last a few days, I can also report that they keep very well, and the layered orange flavors are perfect with a cup of tea.

Braised Carrots with Carrot-top Sauce

Happy in the Kitchen by Michel Richard has been a delight to read and to explore. The gorgeous, exciting food is fun to read about, and it’s interesting to learn the techniques that made it all possible. Richard’s approach to food is to consider variations beyond classic preparations. With each ingredient, he explores what new and different things it can do or become. For him there is always something to discover, and that’s what inspires him as a chef. The most interesting thing about this book is that despite the jaw-dropping look of the food, the preparations are all pretty simple. That was his intent: to present these new and different ideas that are not difficult to make.

So, with some incredibly fresh and beautiful red carrots from Hands of the Earth Farm, I set about creating Richard’s braised carrots with carrot-top sauce. I know, it’s a plate of carrots. But, wait. It’s a plate of perfectly tender, braised carrots with a mind-blowingly delicious sauce and a simply dressed salad. This is a must-try dish for the carrot-top sauce alone. The preparation began with chopped onion sauteed with butter. Then coriander, orange juice, and salt were added along with the carrots. That combination simmered for a few minutes. Chicken broth was to be added but I had none and used water instead. Water worked fine. After adding the water, the simmering continued for another 15 minutes. Meanwhile, the leaves were removed from the carrot stems, and then they were blanched, shocked, and squeezed dry. When the carrots reached a state of desired doneness, the remaining sauce was added to the blanched carrot leaves. Those were pureed with additional butter. Seasoning was adjusted. A quick salad was to be made of mache, but I used chopped baby spinach and arugula instead. The chopped spinach and arugula were tossed with red wine vinegar and olive oil.

The bunch of carrots scene was achieved with the leaf-like salad situated at the top of the plate with the whole carrots below which were sprinkled with dried orange zest. The sauce was spooned alongside the carrots. One minor concern was that my sauce wasn’t quite as bright green as that in the book, but it was so good I didn’t worry about the color for long. I served this as a shared first course, so all the carrots were positioned together on one plate.

The carrots’ orange juice-braised sweetness was balanced by the acidity of the vinaigretted salad. The butter-rich sauce with the savory onion and bright carrot leaf flavors was an unbelievably nice component. After seeing this dish in the book, I knew there would be visual appeal, but I had no idea how flavorful it would be. As soon as we tried it, the cuteness and wit of the dish became completely secondary to taste and textures and just plain deliciousness. It was intriguing enough to try and so enjoyable it’ll definitely be made again. Every item presented in the book looks like a similar win-win situation, and I’ll be trying more of them soon.