Spring meal: White pizza with ramps & strawberry salad.

From our CSA this week, we received more flavorful salad greens, mustard greens, 2 pints of strawberries, & a bunch of radishes. We hadn't even finished our first set of salad greens yet! Plus, we've had 3 weeks of strawberries. PLUS! We've still have copious amounts of ramps & scallions. What to do!!

So, tonight I made a white pizza with ramps & a strawberry salad. It was a very nice balanced meal. PLUS!! We had a nice white wine with the meal.

Nice.

Just a warning - don't be afraid of the number of ramps. Ramps are much mellower than garlic or scallions/leeks. Don't fear the ramps!


Here's the basic recipe:

White pizza with ramps
10 ramps
1/4 cup parmesan cheese
1 or 3/4 cup shredded Italian cheese (we used Sargento's reduced fat Italian blend)
3/4 cup ricotta cheese
2-3 tablespoons dried basil (or a handful of fresh basil)
1-2 tablespoons dried oregano
1 tomato, diced
1 pizza crust

So, I did a dirty, clever trick with the tomato. I purchased an heirloom tomato from the crappy Giant near me (not the super nice Giant). Mostly, heirloom tomatoes have tons of tomato flavor, which is indicated by their scent & their minimal travel time. However, I screwed up & chose a random heirloom without a good scent that traveled from Canada. After I chopped the tomato, I sprinkled it with a very small amount of sugar & a ton of basil. Then, it tasted more tomatoey. It wasn't perfect, but it was better than tasting like water.

Basically, the pizza crust is topped with ricotta cheese, then 1/2 of the ramps, the seasonings, then the tomatoes, then the shredded cheese. (Jeff says that you can cook all of the ramps in the pizza. I liked a few of them raw on top. But taste a raw ramp & choose your own adventure!) Sprinkle the top with the parmesan. Also, I brushed the exposed crust with some olive oil & sprinkled with some parmesan.

Bake for 30 minutes at 350 degrees. Top the pizza with the rest of the ramps & (if you're feeling feisty, some fresh arugula leaves).

Enjoy with a nice white wine, such as a 2007 Cascina del Pozzo Arneis Roero (Italian white table wine - cheap!). Also, make a nice green salad & top with sliced strawberries & balsamic vinaigrette.

AWESOME!! & very Spring-y!


Aside: Ramps are SUPER ULTRA good pan-fried with potatoes. Just add the ramps near the end of the cooking. Nice onion/garlic flavor with potatoes - very good!!

Food & Wine Steak with Herb Nut Salsa

Tonight, the man & I had steak with an herb nut salsa. The recipe came with our Food & Wine Adventurer Club wine shipment.

Aside: Food & Wine introduced two wine clubs last Fall/Winter: a collector edition & an adventurer edition. They ship us 6 bottles with a recipe booklet that pairs each wine with a primary recipe (& 3 alternates). Some wineries also do the same, which is pretty awesome.

The wine was really good for a cheapy wine, & it paired really well with the recipe. Good job, Food & Wine!!

Wine: Domaine de Baumard - Logis de la Giraudière - 2005. Fancy name for a red table wine... but it is really nice. Don't pay over $20 for it. Rating: 3.5/5

Recipe: Hanger Steak with Herb Nut Salsa Rating: 3.5/5

The salsa was salty herby goodness - So, I made very simple sides: roasted potatoes & onions with very little salt & some pepper and halved grape tomatoes with leftover herbs, basil, & shallot. Both cleansed the palate nicely after bites of the steak/salsa & sips of the wine. We made a few minor modifications: no tarragon, no chervil, anchovy paste in lieu of anchovies, less oil.

Also, ignore the recipe's note about 12 minutes for toasting the hazelnuts. Toast until fragrant, & don't wander away. Otherwise, it's a mad dash to open the door, turn on the fan, & cover the smoke detector.

Overall, the dish was very good together. We will probably make this again when the vegetable & herb garden is in full force. I recommend the wine & recipe together as a semi-fancy meal.

Onion tart.

This year, we celebrated Open That Bottle Night with a few friends.

For those of you who don't know:
Ever have a special bottle of wine that is sitting on the shelf... gathering dust... maybe looking a little lonely? Open That Bottle Night was created strictly for that bottle. It doesn't have to be expensive. It just has to be unopened & waiting.

For our Open That Bottle Night, we opened 5 bottles of wine. Of which, the best was last - an amazing 2003 Caymus Cabernet Sauvignon. I'm not a big red drinker, but this one could convert anyone. Anyone, I say!

To pair with the wines, everyone brought a little something. Kate, our hostess, made lamb chops and roasted potatoes. Someone else brought a spinach bread & red wine chocolate cake. The man & I brought an onion tart and tea smoked chicken lettuce wraps.

The onion tart? It was phenomenal - a definite keeper. If you read the recipe, you'll see crème fraîche in the ingredients. Crème fraîche is the delight of sour creams & expensive to boot. If you can't find it or don't want to "waste" $5 for a tiny pot, substitute full fat sour cream. I doubt anyone will notice a difference in quality. (Except the cook - who will not be tempted to repeatedly dip a spoon into the sour cream & lick. At least, not me.)

I ended up making it twice this week. After all, we had the ingredients even the crème fraîche (*lick*lick*), & it was amazing. Even non-onion eaters loved it.

The tea smoked chicken lettuce wraps were also good, but not nearly as amazing as the onion tart.

Make it!! Make it tonight!

Dessert.

Since the man & I have been together, I've gained 7 pounds of "happy" fat. While I'm still happy, I had decided to make smarter choices for our meals & portion things more realistically.

However, this doesn't mean that we've stopped having dessert. Oh, no. That wouldn't do. There are definitely fewer desserts in a week, though.

Last night, the man & I had a little date night. We opened a bottle of wine (courtesy of Food & Wine's wine club), I made strip steak with garlicky olivada, & then we had poached pears for dessert.

It was a caloric splurge night for sure.

The pears? They were magnificent. We couldn't find star anise, & I didn't want to use my vanilla beans for this. So, we used extracts without any real hit to taste. Also, I used about 1/2 cup agave nectar in lieu of the 1 & 1/4 cup sugar. (That's a LOT of sugar!!)


I ate my half pear plain with a little of the syrup on top. The man had his with a little vanilla bean ice cream. Divine!!!

We gave this 5/5 stars. Make it!!

P.S. We used the small bottles of Robert Mondavi cab sav for this. The bottles come in a 4-pack & are super convenient for cooking.

Beef Bourguinon

There are high expectations when you attribute a quintessential French recipe to a renowned French chef. You expect melting deliciousness with a well-rounded flavor profile.

Food & Wine listed a recipe for Boeuf Bourguignon with the name Jacques Pepin with it. I thought, "Well if something can pull me back into the cooking game, it's Jacque Pepin's beef bourguinon."


The Preparation Area: Complete with Digital Recipe laptop

First, let me say: There were a few items that I couldn't/wouldn't comply with. The man called me from the grocery store & couldn't find pancetta or cippolini onions. We got bacon & "white boiling onions" that basically resembled large pearl onions. Also, I didn't peel the baby carrots. Who peels baby carrots? The French, that's
who. Nobody else. Being not French, I plopped those right into the mix. (I blow my nose in their general direction!)

When the recipe called for boiling the pancetta, I cooked my bacon in the skillet instead. I wasn't going to boil bacon. That is le gross. Then, I crumbled it into the vegetables (or garnishes as Chef Pepin calls them).

How was it? Well, the sauce was very good. Originally, I didn't put any butter in the sauce as we were fresh out, but it definitely tasted better once I added it.

Words of advice:
1. Get the pancetta. Bacon didn't make it better. There is something about chunks (not scraps) of lardons that make recipes better.

2. Get a full flavored Burgandy, Cotes du Rhone, or Beaujolais wine. I used a South American Syrah, which was rather flat. The French recipe poo-pooed it.

3. Let it stew for longer. The broth wasn't reduced enough as per Food & Wine's pictures. It would've been much better if it was more concentrated.

The man gives the broth a 4/5 stars - but the stew together got only 2 or 3 stars.
I'd give it a 3/5 stars. I liked it, but I'm on the look out for something better. Neither of us packed it for lunch the next day.

Next boeuf bourguinon is going to be Julia Child's from Mastering the Art of French Cooking (recipe here). I hope it's better!