Monthly Archives: February 2010

Focaccia for the win

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I have mentioned before, on this very blog, that I am afraid of yeast.  However, as it has surely become clear by now, I love baking.  It was only a matter of time before these two truths collided and a new truth was constructed.  As I told my students only a few days ago, it was not always a “truth” that our solar system was heliocentric.  They grudgingly accepted this, but I now elatedly announce that I am no longer afraid of yeast!  Perhaps a bit timid, a bit guarded still, but not afraid.  What has changed, you ask?

This is a rosemary olive oil focaccia-style loaf from a cookbook put out by Food and Wine Magazine that I finally got up the guts to try out.  I learned three things by making it: 1.) yeast is not as easy to screw up as I thought; 2.) following directions is smart; and 3.) the way to a man’s heart may really be through his stomach.  At least if he shares a last name with my husband.

While this bread was not difficult to make, I think it would have been better if I had read the recipe more carefully.  After assuming I had killed my yeast when it all sank in the warm water I sprinkled it over, I didn’t bother to knead the dough before setting it aside to rise.  Then I baked it at the wrong temperature and despaired when it didn’t seem done before realizing my mistake.  And after all that, it was still delicious.

The bottom half inch or so was denser than the rest of the loaf, and I don’t know why that happened, unless it was related to my inability to read the directions the first time through.  But it was really, very good.  The olive oil made the texture pleasant – moist and chewy, and the rosemary contributed a nice, herby, woodsy flavor that contrasted well against the brisk brightness of the sea salt that also flavored the bread.  It is amazing how something with so few ingredients (flour, yeast, oil, water, salt, rosemary, and cornmeal) can have so much flavor.  And excitingly, as the recipe itself declares, this bread has endless flavor combination possibilities.  Next time I think I will add chopped kalamata olives.  N. agrees.

What was really glorious about this bread was how well I managed to combine and link flavors in the dinner that went with it.  We had a roast chicken and a vegetable side to go along with my yeasty triumph, and in the choices of aromatics I was able to clearly connect each dish.  The bread contained rosemary, and so when I made an herbed butter rub to massage under the chicken’s skin, I included plenty of fresh rosemary.

Our vegetable side consisted of glazed carrots, parsnips and pears with craisins and pecans.  Since the glaze was mostly orange juice, I added orange zest to my chicken herb rub and stuck a few orange slices inside the cavity of the chicken before it went in to roast.  If I had remembered in time, I would have added orange zest to the bread dough as well, to really link all three elements together.

The orange did, I think, add a delicate sweetness to the chicken, though I’m not sure it was recognizably citrus.  I think lemon would be more identifiable.  But the butter made even the white meat of the chicken tremendously succulent, and the herbs and garlic definitely added a punch and depth to the flavor.

The veggies were rich with autumnal flavors, and while I enjoyed them, I think they would match better with a pork or turkey main rather than chicken.  In fact, they might be delicious as a vegetable dish for Thanksgiving; the craisins make that an easy link-up.  Since carrots and pears are already sweet, the craisins and pecans were a natural pairing.  I always think pecans have a kind of caramel or molasses-like smokiness to them, which seemed to work very well with the herby, spicy notes of the parsnips.

Given that somewhat wild flavor the parsnips impart, a strongly spiced root beer or sarsaparilla might make a fitting non-alcoholic beverage pairing to this meal, or maybe even a ginger ale like Blue Sky that prides itself on natural flavors.

So let’s take a moment here and reflect: Roast chicken, glazed vegetables, and homemade bread.  Two of these three dishes required advanced planning and multiple stages, and then (as per usual, these days) I made broth from the chicken carcass after it was picked clean, with plans already in mind for the leftovers.  Long cooking times, “complex” procedures, and making use of every part of the meal.  If that doesn’t say Sally Homemaker to you, I don’t know what does.  All I can say is: I promise that I did not wear pearls while I cooked this meal.

Excuses and slow-roasted salmon

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I know, I know, I broke my once-a-week resolution.  But you see, I have this exam hanging over my head.  It’s a two part oral examination that involves me reading a paper I’ve written about a 14th century poem, and a committee of three professors listening and then quizzing me both about the paper, and then in the second part of the exam, about medieval literature in general, based upon a hundred-or-so item list I have put together.  My exam is next Friday.  It’s a little intimidating.

But I don’t want to talk about that now.  I want to talk about salmon.  Even if you are not a seafood person, chances are you are okay with salmon.  It’s a beautiful fish.  It’s meaty and rich and juicy and can be cooked in a number of ways.  One of our treats in the last few days of the winter break was slow roasting a huge filet of it.

I had never experimented with slow roasting like this before.  Per my recipe’s directions, I stirred together brown sugar, sea salt, and a big handful of fresh, finely chopped dill.  I love dill.  It has this fresh green smell to it that makes me feel alive and happy, and mixing it with sugar had to be a good thing.  Once combined, I sprinkled the mixture over the fish and packed it in, rubbing and pushing the herbed sugar against the flesh so the flavors could penetrate.  Then I slapped plastic wrap over the top of my baking dish and stowed it in the fridge for 5 hours.

With eons to go before dinner, I preheated the oven to 175F, unwrapped the baking dish and transferred the fish to a cookie sheet before sticking it in the barely-warmed oven and leaving it for over an hour.  Over an hour!  For fish!  I could hardly believe it either.  Trusting in the recipe, I left it alone for what felt like forever.  After a time, the smell of roasted fish and caramelizing sugar started to fill the house, and this wasn’t a briny, salty, fishy kind of smell, this was almost like a thick roast of red meat.  Once in a while there was a crackling noise from hot fat oozing out of the fish and sizzling against the cookie sheet.

Meanwhile, I prepped our side dishes: barley simmered in chicken broth and a green salad of butter lettuce, cucumbers, and sliced avocado.  As the fish recipe called for a dipping sauce of mayonnaise and whole grain mustard, I made a salad dressing with the same two flavors, adding white wine vinegar to thin it out, and a drizzle of honey to prevent it from being too bitter.  Hooray for tying flavors together!

When the timer went off for the fish, I opened the oven door and despaired.  The little cracks in the sugar coating that I could see fish through looked bright pinky-red still, as if the fish was quite raw.  Gulping back disappointment, I gently flaked into the filet with a fork and almost had to pick myself up off the floor, where my knees were threatening to melt into a puddle.  The fish was perfect.  It was cooked, and the texture was silky but firm and buttery smooth.

We ate.  The salmon was remarkable.  Though I only had it in the refrigerator for five hours (hey, we were hungry!) and the recipe called for eight, the meat was on its way toward the texture of smoked salmon, rather than baked or roasted.  I don’t know what the slow heat did, exactly, but the fish peeled off its skin in perfect fork sized chunks.  It was so rich and smooth that it was almost like eating a slice of warm butter.  The sugar surprisingly did not overpower the taste of the fish, and the mayonnaise-mustard sauce was tangy and added just the perfect touch of acid.  I was surprised that it wasn’t too creamy, with the silkiness of the salmon, the smooth mayonnaise, and the sweet sugar, but the punch of chewiness from the barley leant a nice contrast in texture, and the crisp butter lettuce and cucumbers in our salad didn’t hurt either.

Let’s see a close-up:

I think if the fish had chilled and marinated inside its sweet rub for a full eight hours before getting the slow heat treatment, the texture would have been even more pleasing.  N., who isn’t a big seafood fan, pronounced this a tentative success the first night, but the next day, when he had a cured salmon sandwich with thinly slice cucumbers, mayonnaise sauce, and a crisp leaf of lettuce on toasted sourdough, he was a complete convert.  We will have this again, when my exam is over and time operates normally again.  When I have time to devote to a dinner I begin almost ten hours ahead, and time to linger over it when it is finally, triumphantly ready.  Here’s the recipe I used, if you want to give it a try yourself.