Cookbook Review: "Dorie's Cookies" by Dorie Greenspan

Come on, Dorie. Your book's title is Dorie's Cookies, so why is the first recipe a brownie?

Okay, now that I've got that out of my system, I can be serious.

It meets all the professional and casual expectations I consider important to a reader. Having worked alongside her in the past, I'm certainly not surprised. She's practical, reasonable, and fantastic to work with, all of which translates quite well into the book.

The first section is Techniques, Ingredients, and Gear, which is always important. Notions for getting the most out of your methods aren't something I turn down in a specialty cookbook like this. Minutiae on ingredients I can take or leave, but that's because I'm a professional too- the average home baker will likely find some useful tidbits. Equipment is vital- if you don't have the usual suspects, you'll know what you do need or want to get the job done. That's something cookbooks are notoriously bad at, and while baking-centric volumes have better odds, they still tend to be a little more “Well of course you need this- you're baking!”, which I don't like. Dorie doesn't do that.

Tools that remove variables are always a blessing in baking, so it's no surprise that most of them do that in some form or another. Some choices are obvious- the hand tools like like a rolling pin, a scale, or cookie scoops (just ice cream scoops with tiered measures). Then there's the heavies like the stand mixer or hand mixer, and the food processor. Most of the people looking at this book as something beyond a display piece will probably have most of this stuff. But there's also things like an oven thermometer (don't trust the number on the oven display), or what she calls 'cheaters', for your rolling pin. Elegantly simple- they're bands of set thicknesses to wrap around the edges of your rolling pin to insure your dough's also uniform. Don't underestimate the benefits, believe me.

Now we get to the proverbial meat of the book, wherein there's something for everybody. Lots of these I'd never see myself baking except to sell or send as gifts. Certainly not a problem though, there are plenty I'd happily bake every day (though of course I shouldn't- I like being the exact same weight I was in high school). But whether they're to my taste or not, they're thoughtfully constructed and intuitive to make. That's what really matters, right? No matter how delicious, the balance of “is this too much of a hassle” should always be a consideration, and Dorie does so from start to finish, sometimes so subtly you'd hardly notice.

I could happily run through the many chocolate, coffee, and almond variations and nothing else without a moment's regret- I actually stopped reading at one point to bake a recipe and see if it worked (Chocolate Chip Not-Quite Madelbrot, p. 104). Not only was it effortless, I cut it back by a third and it scaled perfectly. Recipes designed to scale up or down well are also rather uncommon, something she mentions here and there, so trusting one to halve or double isn't a big deal and there are usually notes if a recipe will make it difficult.

Several times throughout the book I'd be eyeing a cookie and think “Hmm, I wonder why she didn't add XYZ flavor/component”. Then I'd look at the next recipe or two and see one that did. Her flexibility with ingredients and flavor combinations is excellent, and serves quite nicely to fill out the book. (I've actually got another new baking book that does this very well too. Probably have a review on it by the end of the month.)

There's one thing that threw me a bit, but it's just perspective. There are a goodly number of savory cookie recipes in here, and my brain didn't immediately want to associate 'savory' with 'cookie', jumping instead to 'cracker', 'scone', or 'biscuit'. Don't let it get into your head, and nothing else will bug you.

Overall, this is an excellent volume on cookies. It give you what you need, what you want, and what you might try for yourself.

Cupboard Shortcuts and Time Savers

As someone who prefers to do most of the actual work of cooking myself, I still acknowledge the need for handling things in a hurry, whether it's for savory or sweet applications. As such, there are a number of things I like to have on hand as 'just in case' ingredients that I use to take some time lag out of delicious, or just save me time washing dishes.

Puff pastry. An expensive but essential part of my freezer, I always have at least one box on hand- usually the brand made with actual butter. Near to limitless in its utility, I've made meals out of samosas, pot pies, quiches, or rissoles, desserts ranging from palmiers and cinnamon twists to napoleons and curd cups, even snacks like herb and cheese breadsticks or mini turnovers.

Salsa. While I tend to make my own for direct applications, I also usually keep one of the cheapish canned supermarket ones in the cupboard. I could use it to bulk out my own batch, but frequently it'll get added as a liquid component to soups, stews, or braises. Don't have stock on hand? Thin out your salsa and get your work done. Ditto for making rice, though that may not look pretty.

Beer. This one's a little odder, but important. Rather like salsa, it serves as a foundational flavorful liquid for poaching, braising, or other techniques. Typically my go-to is a 12-pack of Sapporo cans, but most mild beers will serve just fine. Most recently, I blended it into a dark roux that later became a rather nice gumbo. Many of the other components had sweet and spicy notes, so the faint bitterness served very well to round out the flavors and bring depth to the whole.

Curry bricks. Yes, I use them too- and not just the curry ones either. I often keep the prefab brick for what the manufacturer calls Hayashi Rice on hand as well. While important to be aware of potential allergens, they make it so much easier to bring out massive flavor with hardly any work, and have food on the table in a matter of minutes.

Frozen vegetables. It might sound obvious, but growing seasons don't last forever. Many things with fairly short prominence periods are best preserved by modern freezing technology, but my freezer is small so my choices are limited. For utility's sake I keep peas, corn, and spinach available. They all make for suitable vegetable sides in a hurry, and can also be used to enrich soups, stews, sauces, or other amalgamations like fried rice.
Tip: when making a batch of soup you want to cool and store, add the frozen vegetables after you have the soup is done and exactly where you want it. That way the cooling process happens faster and more efficiently.

Applesauce. Odd one, no? But it's always in my cupboard. Moisture and flavor for any forcemeat, a foundation for dips, dressings, baking, sauce work, and if need be you can just put it alongside a sandwich to bulk out your lunch.

Miso (and/or Doubanjiang). These are in the category of essential because they're literally better than bouillon. Fermented soy products with tons of flavor, they can be used in marinades, dressings, soups, sauces, and almost anywhere you'd put salt- even on the sweet side of things. For example, I don't really like peanut butter cookies, but adding a little white miso to the dough creates a transcendent thing indeed.

Recipe Dev: Oatmeal Cookies

I'm a cookie guy. It's an ideal dessert for a lot of people because it's self contained, portable, and scalable. A plated dessert might be fantastic, but would you order three of them if you liked the flavors? Almost certainly not! Cookies don't have that problem- you can have one or two for a nibble... or look around to make sure nobody's watching before you indelicately obliterate that box of Thin Mints you told yourself would last a month. No, I didn't see that- nobody did. Honest.

Another delightful point in the favor of cookies is their versatility. Depending on your ingredients, your scoop size, your baking time, and any number of other things, you can turn the same cookie recipe into very different results in a way you can't do nearly as easily with cakes, pies, and pastries.

Unless you're allergic to chocolate, you probably enjoy a good chocolate chip cookie. I certainly do, and put my personal recipe up here back in February. That one calls for a mixer, but but today I wanted to showcase a cookie that doesn't. The recipe here is one I sometimes send alongside my Almond Cookies in tins during the holidays- a pleasantly robust oatmeal cookie. A sorely underrated gem of a cookie that's easy to tinker with. A little on the soft side, not too sweet, perhaps a little crunch underneath, and absolutely NO FUCKING RAISINS EVER okay that's out of my system good yes hello there how are you? Ahem.

This recipe is quite simple, coming together in about ten minutes (before going in the fridge to firm up). I designed it specifically not to require a stand mixer since I don't own one, but I've found that having a hand mixer (or immersion blender for one step) does help yield a fluffier finished product, if that's your thing.

Equipment: 1x Medium Bowl, 1x Large Bowl, Rubber/Silicone Spatula, Measuring Spoons, Kitchen Scale, Half-Sheet Pan (~13"x18"), Parchment Paper, Oven

Ingredients: (Yields about 3 dozen cookies, but the recipe also halves perfectly)

275g Rolled Oats
225g All-Purpose Flour
2 Tbsp Cornstarch (this makes it more like cake flour)
230g Unsalted Butter (melted)
180g Brown Sugar
90g Granulated/White Sugar
2 eggs (L or XL are both fine)
2 tsp Vanilla Extract
1 tsp Baking Soda
3/4 tsp Salt
2-3 tsp Spice Mix (I use cardamom, allspice, black pepper, ginger, and nutmeg)

Process:

If you plan on baking these as soon as they're ready, preheat the oven to 375F/190C.

In the medium bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, and spices. Set it aside.

In the large bowl, combine the salt and melted butter with both sugars, and mix with the spatula till well combined and slightly fluffy. Then add the eggs and vanilla and do the same. (Here is where I use the immersion blender for a few seconds to whip air into it and ensure everything is aggressively homogeneous.)

In 2-3 stages, mix the contents of the medium bowl into the large until just barely combined.

Use the empty bowl to weigh the oats, then add and gently mix until evenly distributed.

Refrigerate the dough for at least 30m, or ideally overnight.

Line the half-sheet tray with parchment. Using heaping tablespoons (or a #50 portion scoop if you have one), tray out cookies 12 at a time in a 3x4 configuration, refrigerating any unbaked dough until needed.

Bake for 12-15 minutes, and allow to cool for another 5 once out of the oven before removing them from the tray.

Potato Poblano Soup

 

Just a quick, easy recipe, dialed in a bit more thoroughly. The directions look long, but it's quite simple.
Shoutouts to Walter Carranza, wherever you are. This was largely his brainchild many years ago as a way to use up leftover mashed potatoes, but it's just as easy from scratch.

Ingredients:
1# Russet Potatoes
4oz Unsalted Butter, melted
4 Poblano Chiles
Neutral Oil
6oz Sharp (ideally smoked) Cheddar Cheese, grated
1qt Whole Milk
Water
Vinegar
Salt
Garnish (Sliced Jalapeno? Scallion/chive? Cheddar? Crumbled chips? Roasted garlic?)

Equipment:
Stove, Oven, Medium pot, Silicon/rubber spatula, Potato masher (or similar tool), Immersion blender (or powerful standard blender), Fine strainer, Medium bowl, Sheet tray, Aluminum foil, Vegetable peeler, Box grater, Cutting board, Knife.

Directions:
Preheat oven to 400F/200C. Fill the medium pot halfway with cold water, and salt it aggressively, as though cooking pasta.
Peel the Russet Potatoes, cut them into relatively uniform 1-2" pieces, and place them in the salted water.
Place the pot on the stove and start heating on medium. Bring to a simmer and cook through.
While the potatoes cook, line the sheet pan with foil. Split the poblanos in half vertically, removing the seeds and pith from the inside, as well as the stems.
Oil the halved peppers gently, season with salt, then place on the foil-lined tray skin-side up.
Put the tray in the preheated oven for 20-30 minutes, or until the skin has colored and visibly pulled away from the flesh of the chiles.
Once the potatoes are cooked, drain them and allow to dry/cool slightly in the strainer.
Melt the butter over low heat in the pot used to cook the potatoes, then remove from heat.
Remove chiles from the oven when adequately roasted, place in the medium bowl and cover tightly with foil. Allow to steam for 10 minutes.
While waiting for the chiles to finish and the potatoes to cool slightly, grate the cheddar cheese.
Remove and discard the skins from the roasted poblanos, then finely chop what remains.
Return the potatoes to the pot with the melted butter. Mash coarsely and season.
Over medium heat, add the milk to the potatoes, stirring gently to ensure the potatoes start to disintegrate.
Add the poblanos, then blend the mixture till smooth.
Remove from heat, strain into the bowl, add the grated cheese, and stir till evenly melted in. 
If there is significant mass caught in the strainer, return that to the pot, then blend and strain it again to ensure as little waste as possible.
Season with salt, a teaspoon or two of vinegar, and possibly a few dashes of your favorite hot sauce.
Enjoy.

Weights, Volumes, and Balanced Scales

 

Recipes come in all sorts of forms and flavors. Some start with longform anecdotes you don't want to read, some have history lessons or ingredient sourcing instructions, and a lot of them just suck.

That suck can be for a variety of reasons, but the most common is the measurements. Cups, spoons, sifting, leveling, liquid, powder, solid, crumble... it doesn't matter what it is, it's not going to be consistent unless you're weighing it, and I absolutely hate that, which is why I almost always prefer using weighted measurements and scales. 

But what do you do if the recipe doesn't have them? What if it never did? A whole lot of recipes tend to lean vague- sometimes by accident, other times by design. 

An old cookbook from medieval France might have 'Two pounds flour' in a bread roll formula. Easy enough, right? Until you realize that at the time, a French pound was twelve ounces rather than sixteen. Oops!

So here- some quick volume to weight conversions that won't screw up home kitchen recipes.

    1 cup All-purpose Flour should be 140g, and Whole Wheat Flour nearer 150g
    1 cup of Self-Rising Flour will be a hint less than 140g, and Bread Flour 145g
    1 cup Granulated Sugar is a flat 200g, and most non-clumped Brown Sugar is more like 190g
    1 cup of Tapioca Starch? 135g (my developed recipe for Pão de Queijo uses 200g, or ~1.5 cups)

Many historical cookbooks take for granted the common culinary lexicon of the period in which they were published due to space and expense concerns, as well. 

I recall a recipe in the Fannie Farmer Cookbook for risolles, which are essentially samosa or ravioli, made with puff pastry in lieu of standard dough, then deep-fried.

The first step in the recipe? "Make Puff Paste". Because, of course, everyone reading the recipe already knows what it is and how to make it...

These are the struggles of the recipe writer. To take the temporary and turn it into a timeless treasure through the written word. Don't be afraid to look at a recipe and wonder if something's not right, and don't be shy about taking notes and making edits for the next time around. Every time you fix something, the next person to use it will be grateful, whether you're around to hear it or not.

Marinade Miscellany (and homemade Jerk Paste)

 

What's a marinade? Broadly, a suspension of several liquids and solids designed for multiple purposes and to have multiple effects on food.

What's in a marinade? 4 obligatory components: Oil, Acid, Seasoning, and Flavoring. Quantities and specifics are left up to the creator, enabling enormous versatility.

What do you do with it? So long as you know what they always do, anything else you like!

1. The Oil: It can also be for flavor, but its primary purpose is to ensure the marinade makes better and more uniform contact with every available surface- a transfer medium.
2. The Acid: It is also significantly for flavor, but functions as a tenderizer for proteins. It can be used to ensure superior texture in tough cuts of meat, but also risks the denaturing of it if immersed too long or in too potent an intensity. A deliberate example of the last can be readily found in ceviche, wherein acids are used to 'cook' fish in lieu of heat application.
3. The Seasoning: Simply salt, and for some people pepper. A flavor enhancer and water extractor, salt amplifies the effects of all the other components. Strictly speaking, there are sufficient pseudo-salts that granulated isn't always necessary, but a neutral salt never hurts for balance.
4. The Flavoring: That's everything else. Give your dish what it needs to take it where you want to go!

The marinating process can be fast or slow, depending on the ingredients and intended target. To help contextualize, marinades are for more than meat- almost all salad dressings qualify as marinades as well. Since more delicate items like greens don't leave much time for them to work, they tend to be very potent in flavor. 

There are plenty of interesting ways to adjust marinades for your needs and desires, but one of the most common for me is finding a way to use the marinade to avoid waste. Often, it'd be as part of a cooking liquid for the marinated item, or cooked into a sauce for it.

While marinades tend to be mostly water-based liquids, the quantity of flavorings can be used to change the physical structure of it too, as I'll show in this example below: 

---

This is my baseline recipe for Jamaican Jerk Paste. It's thin enough to use as a marinade, and thick enough that you can leave it on when cooking. It's not blazing hot spice wise, but you can adjust your chile type and quantity for your own preferences.

• 2 bunches Cilantro (stems and all)
• 6 Garlic cloves 
• 5 Scallions (all but the roots)
• 2 Serrano Chiles, stemmed and seeded
• 1/4 cup each neutral oil and vinegar (I use rice vinegar; distilled white vinegar is more common)
• 4 teaspoons Allspice, finely ground.

Coarsely chop all plant solids, season very lightly with salt to cause water leech.
Combine all ingredients and blend till emulsified. Taste and season- be aggressive.
Cover and allow to ferment at room temperature for 24 hours before using or refrigerating.

Jerk away~

Chicken thighs and drumsticks, marinated for 24 hours, roasted at 425F / 220C for 20-25 minutes, then carefully finished under the broiler for a little color and evaporation. Delicious.

Recipe Dev: Chocolate Chip Cookies

Unless you don't like chocolate, you probably like chocolate chip cookies.

This is a recipe I've been fiddling with on and off that I rather like. It's not too sweet, and has plenty of depth and complexity without being complicated. While it does call for a mixer, it's not strictly necessary, just takes a bit longer to do by hand.

Equipment:

Mixer with Paddle Attachment
Scale
Small Saute Pan
Rubber/Silicone Spatula
#50 Portion Scoop (~2Tbsp)
Medium Bowl
Measuring Spoons
Sheet Tray
Parchment Paper
Oven

Ingredients:

300g All-Purpose Flour
1/2 tsp Baking Soda
1/2 tsp Salt

3/4c / 170g Unsalted Butter, melted and browned (170g being the pre-browned weight)
1c / 190g Brown Sugar (light or dark)
1/2c / 100g Granulated Sugar
2 tsp Masala Chai spice
    (Mix ground Coriander, Cardamom, Nutmeg, Black Pepper, Clove)

1 Tbsp Vanilla Extract (or 2 tsp vanilla / 1 tsp almond)
1 Large Whole Egg
1 Egg Yolk
2c / ~12oz Semisweet Chocolate Chips
    (Ideal- Guittard 68% cookie drops)

Process:

Preheat the oven to 325°F (~165°C). Line two sheet trays with parchment paper.

In the small saute pan, melt and gently brown the butter. Allow to cool to room temperature.
Combine the weighed flour, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl; set aside.
In the mixer w/paddle attachment, cream together the melted butter, brown sugar and white sugar until well blended, 3-4 minutes on medium-high speeds.

Beat in the egg, egg yolk, and vanilla until the mixture is light and creamy, 1-2 minutes.

Mix in the dry ingredients on low until just combined, ~1 minute.

Remove the mixing bowl from the mixer, then stir in the chocolate chips by hand using a spoon or rubber spatula. If necessary, chill the dough in the freezer or refrigerator for ~15 minutes here to firm it up.

Place cookie dough onto the prepared sheet tray(s) using a #50 scoop (about 2 Tbsp). The single batch should yield approximately 36 cookies

Use one tray to hold all the cookies, and place them in the refrigerator to chill. Once thoroughly chilled, the portioned cookies can be baked and/or bagged and frozen.

A standard half-sheet tray will comfortably bake 8 cookies at a time in a 3-row, 3/2/3 configuration. Bake in the preheated oven for 13-14 minutes (rotating the tray halfway through), or until the edges are lightly toasted. From frozen, add 2-3 min.

Cool on baking sheets for a few minutes before removing. The carry-over from the still-hot tray is an important final step for ensuring the center is fully cooked.

Awoo Cuisine!

Recipe Dev: 'Chicken Tikka Masala'

 

Food from the Indian Subcontinent has wandered all over the world with speed and efficiency since the days of the Raj. While it has fallen into some of the stereotypes and traps of, say, takeout Chinese, it manages to keep a fairly strong semblance of its identity while being simplified or streamlined for the more casual diner.

The subtleties are, to some degree, lost in translation. The most comprehensive Indian cookbook I've ever read sometimes feels like it has more ingredients than recipes- and it's got about a thousand recipes! But despite the tendency to tone down the complexities, some underlying principles remain. 

One being that it's a regional cuisine more suited towards those of a vegetarian or sometimes vegan bent, and so a bit more malleable accommodating those somewhat common dietary restrictions. 

Another being that the quantity of vegetable matter involved is often quite robust without being obvious, so for those times when one must sneak nutrition into a troublesome child or picky eater's meal, this region excels better than most.

Lastly, there's one I consider extremely important for both restaurant and home kitchens. In defiance of some relevant cultural norms, Indian food tends to be both very friendly to large-batch cooking and very well suited for leftovers.

I could go into much more detail, but this post is for the recipe. It's not complicated- the hardest things to find might be the curry leaves, and you can leave those out if need be. The spices might seem numerous, but all of them can be found at a conventional Western supermarket, along with all the other ingredients. Some measurements are a little vague, to be adjusted to personal taste and compensate for product variability. 

I've shared this one on an individual basis before, and that helped another chef of my acquaintance land a job that boosted his career prospects big-time. Now all of you get to try it! It serves 4 as an entree.

Ingredients-

8 Boneless / Skinless chicken thighs (about 1kg, a bit over 2lbs)
Salt & Pepper
-----
½ cup oil or ghee (if oil, you'll need ¼ cup each oil and unsalted butter)
2 large onions, diced fine
4 cloves garlic, minced
Ginger, the size of 4 fingers, peeled and minced
1 serrano chile, halved vertically
1 28oz can crushed tomatoes
3/4 cup heavy cream
1 small stick cinnamon
2 stalks curry leaves
Juice of half a lemon or lime

Spice blend- All spices here are finely ground unless otherwise specified.

2 tsp Garam Masala
2 tsp Madras Curry Powder
1 tsp coriander
½ tsp green cardamom
½ tsp cumin
½ tsp black pepper
½ tsp turmeric
¼ tsp clove
¼ tsp crushed red pepper

Equipment- Wide pot or tall-sided skillet, wide enough to fit all the chicken in a single layer.

Method-

Season the chicken with salt and pepper.

In a flat-bottomed pot or flat-sided skillet with a lid, heat half the ghee (or the oil), and brown the chicken aggressively, then remove. Any other fat is to be used at your discretion.

If the pan has browned (but not burnt) bits on the bottom once the chicken is browned, add the onions to the pan and cook on medium-high with a 3-finger pinch of salt, scraping to make sure all the fond comes off the pan without burning. Adding ¼ cup of water to steam everything off the pan may help as well.

After 2-3 minutes reduce to medium-low, and cook for 8-10 more, until the onions are soft and beginning to color.

While the onions are cooking, cut each chicken thigh into 3-4 pieces, depending on size.

Once the onions are jammy, turn the heat to high and add the garlic, ginger, chiles, and cinnamon stick.

Cook for 2-3 minutes longer, stirring constantly, adding more fat if needed. Adjust seasoning.

Once the chiles have bloomed and blistered a little, reduce the heat to very low.

Add the spice blend and stir rapidly for 5-10 seconds to bloom the spices, then add the crushed tomatoes, stirring to incorporate and keep the spices from scorching. Rinse the can with 1 cup of water and add that too. Taste.

Return the chicken to the pan, bring to a simmer, and cook uncovered for 15-20 minutes.

Add the cream and simmer ~10 minutes more, stirring occasionally.

In the last 2-3 minutes of cooking, taste for seasoning, add the curry leaves, and adjust with lemon or lime juice as needed to brighten.

Serve with rice, naan, or whatever. Watch out for the chiles and the cinnamon stick.

Awoo^^

Fiddling With Pho, Part 2: Broth

 

It's a tricky thing to get the kind of flavor development you want in a comforting bowl of soup without muddying up the flavors themselves. Pho is no different in that respect, but it has some more interesting aspects that require vigorous balancing. The additions and techniques themselves are fairly simple, but the adjustments and quantities are largely up to you. In some ways, part of the process is rather like making stock... twice. You make it, and then you make it again using the first stock in lieu of water, compounding the flavor development.

• Salt. Yes, it's obvious, but it does merit a mention. Underseasoned food means the flavor suffers, irrespective of how well that flavor has been developed.
• Reduction. Slowly and deliberately evaporating a portion of the water will leave behind the flavor compounds and concentrate them.
• Gelatin. This is one that doesn't get a lot of play, but for a richer and more viscous mouthfeel, an extra envelope of unflavored gelatin will get you places you could never otherwise go.
• Fish sauce. It's got a lot of names (including some nasty ones if you spill or break the bottle), but it's a necessary fundamental to a proper bowl of pho. It's not vigorously salty, but it adds enormous depth and body.
• More spices. You're going to want to infuse even more flavor- that means ginger, galangal, coriander, star anise, cinnamon, and all manner of other aromatic enhancements.
• Sugar. Yes, sugar. Ideally dark brown sugar or palm/coconut sugar for their more complex flavor profiles, this adds a great deal of intensity in a way that salt and pseudosalts cannot.

Now if you cook a lot, there's one that you might expect to see but don't: booze. I can't say for sure why that is, but my personal hunch is along the lines of "Why not just drink it?". Drinking culture is quite normalized in Vietnam, and anecdotally homemade booze is also not uncommon, particularly among the more rural mountain communities. I don't know the necessary minutiae of Vietnamese history offhand, so I can't help but jokingly wonder- can we partially blame the French for that?
For once though, I doubt it.

Fiddling With Pho, Part 1: Stock.

It's still very much soup season, and for me the gentle complexity of a bowl of pho really hits the spot. On the surface it's simple. Noodles, meat, broth, vegetables, garnishes. But the complexity comes at every single step. The broth is the keystone, but you can't get a good broth without a good stock, and the best stock comes with a few tricks up its sleeve.

• Bones. If beef or pork, start them in cold water and bring to a boil for 5-10 minutes to blanch and release some gnarly, scummy detritus. Then fish out and reserve the bones, dump that water, clean the pot, put the bones back and start over.
• Charring and Toasting. Many specialized stocks use aromatics whose flavor is intensified by caramelization or other methods of blooming flavor. This will deepen both flavor and color, but raise the risk of a burnt or acrid flavor, so treat with caution.
• Minimal Knifework. The larger the pieces, the less likely the vegetables will break down, and the clearer the stock is likely to be.
• Aggressive Quantities. Your flavorful ingredients should only just barely be covered with water. Yes, it's expensive. You thought paying 15 bucks a bowl was too, I bet.

So while these are useful axioms and informative tidbits, they are deliberately bereft of precise quantities and proportions. This being due to the disparity in equipment availability between many home kitchens. Here's my personal starter for a batch of stock designed for pho. It's robust, aromatic, and full of potential flavor, but has no salt, and none of the real magic that comes from a complete, fortified broth. This is just the basic stock- the first step on the road to greatness.

Ingredients:

5# /2200g pork, beef, or chicken bones
3 onions / 900g halved, peeled, and charred under a broiler or other device
10 dried shitake mushrooms
8 oz /220g ginger, sliced to expose max surface area, and charred like the onion
(Alternatively, 6oz /165g galangal, treated identically)
3-5 stalks lemongrass, crushed
3 Tablespoons whole coriander seed, toasted
5 whole star anise, toasted
2 cinnamon sticks, toasted
5 whole cloves, toasted
1 bay leaf

Equipment:

Large pot, at least 12qt capacity
Coarse strainer
Cheesecloth (optional)
2 Large bowls (or other vessel), one that can fit inside another
Ice
Ladle and tongs

Process:

- Place bones in large pot and add enough cold water to cover the bones by 2 inches.

- Bring to a rolling boil and continue for 5-10 minutes. There will be a variety of scum that floats to the surface.

- Drain the bones and rinse them under cold water. Wash the pot, making sure all the unwanted leech is gone, then place the bones back in.

- Add the other ingredients, and fill the pot with cold water. 10 quarts or till level with the ingredients, whichever is lower.

- Bring to a simmer, and cook for at least 3 hours. If the liquid level drops, add more. To prevent excessive liquid loss, lid the pot.
(This isn't something you have to constantly monitor. A peek every half hour or so is fine)

- Carefully remove the bones and other large items and dispose of them to reduce the weight of the pot. The softer vegetables are left nearly whole to help prevent clouding of the broth through breakdown.

- Add ice to the larger of your two bowls, then a little water. This ice bath will speed the cooling process.

- Pour the liquid into the second bowl through a strainer (the cheesecloth is in case you don't have a fine enough strainer to prevent solids in the stock), and then place the finished bowl of stock in the ice bath.


And that's all there is to the first part of a fine bowl of pho. Nicely quick and easy, right?

...No? Really?

Maybe you weren't overpaying after all.

Comfort Food for the Cold and Wet

 Topical, because sweet merciful crap is it raining here.

    There are four inches of standing water in my backyard. I walked to the closest supermarket yesterday- less than half a mile. My hat was soaked, my jacket drenched, my pants wet up past the knees, and my subconscious very grateful that I hadn't bought flour.

    Tiger is also extremely pupset that he has to go out in all this, and I do not blame him one little bit. Can you imagine spending your entire life in a place where it hasn't rained (the drought is older than he is!), and now in your old age you have to go get absolutely sodden every time you want to pee? Poor doggydog. Washed a lot of towels this past week keeping him clean, dry, and happy. But he's worth the trouble.

(Look at the poor beastie. "You want me to do what out there?")

    So the big trick when wet weather has you worn? Make it warm again. 

Soups are the way to go, and the simpler the better. Notable names can sometimes feel a little complicated- menudo, ramen, beef barley, pho, yukgaejang, minestrone, caldo verde, even chicken noodle... but that might be just the sort of distraction you need to forget about the outside! Post holiday season, there may also be cause (or a bone in the freezer) for split pea soup with ham. 

    Perhaps my favorite technique is even simpler- simmer everything you want till tender, then give it a minute with a blender for a smooth puree. Best with things like potato or butternut squash- delightful mild flavors that also make fantastic mediums for a little something extra to brighten a wet and dreary day.

    My personal favorite potato soup is something crafted many years ago by a fellow named Walter while we were working at a place called Tuscarora Mill, in Leesburg VA. We often had mashed potatoes left over from dinner service, and they frequently saw use as a thickener for other soups, or just made into one on their own- some stock, some salt, and suddenly, soup!

    The trick with Walter's was surprisingly simple. Having extra roasted poblano chiles on hand, he peeled them and into the soup they went, pureed with some roasted garlic and a good bit of our house-smoked cheddar cheese. The subtle heat and robust vegetal flavor of the roasted chile added a great deal of depth to a simple potato soup, and the smoked cheddar worked beautifully to round it out. Starch and fat aplenty, infused with flavors strong enough to be obvious, but not enough to be intrusive or overwhelming.

    This works beautifully with most soups centering around a puree of starch. Butternut squash, pumpkin, or sweet potato? Try adding chipotle or curry powder for a big burst of flavor and essentially no effort. Celeriac, turnip, or rutabaga? Maybe some rosemary, a little crumble of some strong cheese, bacon, perhaps some caramelized onion? Pick your favorite herb or spice combination and have at!