Apple Cheddar Monte Cristo Sandwiches

Posted on September 22, 2014 by Chelsea

When you tell people you live in Los Angeles, one of the first things they often say is something in the realm of “well you can’t beat the weather!” Well, okay, but you can get sick of it. As I drove home from work the day we had these sandwiches for dinner, one of the local radio DJs said something akin to “is it still summer? I won’t let it be fall yet.” Cue snarling and angry words from me. How could she?! I mean, I like the sun. I love summer. But here’s the thing: I miss my jeans. When I get home from work and evict myself from my teacher clothes, I miss sliding into the worn embrace of my soft, familiar denim. Not to mention spending a day without the hair plastered to the back of my neck. Appetizing, I know.

So maybe out of resentment at the season (or lack thereof, since it just slid from mid- to late September and we spent the last two weeks ping-ponging between mid-80s and near 100 degree temperatures), I came up with a dish that screams fall at the top of its lovely, melty little lungs. Apples. Cheddar cheese, as sharp as possible. Dense, moist sourdough. Sage, that most autumnal of herbs. Maple syrup. It’s a bit of a breakfast sandwich, but since when have I ever been opposed to that sort of thing as an evening meal?

In its preparation, this sandwich takes the Monte Cristo as its font of inspiration. Though I’m using cheddar instead of swiss, and replacing ham with apples that have been gently sautéed in brown butter with a liberal dosing of maple syrup (are you hungry yet?), the whole assembled sandwich gets dunked in an egg batter and then fried until delicately crisp on the outside and limp with melted goo on the inside.

In an effort to be responsible diners, we ate this with a wilted kale salad-ish concoction, but it honestly didn’t need any accompaniment. In fact, the second time I made it in as many weeks, I didn’t prepare any side dish at all, and that and the relatively petite slices of bread I used made me feel completely justified in demolishing two sandwiches all by my lonesome. Well, minus the apple slice or two that I shared with Miss Lucy. It’s tough to refuse those velvet brown eyes.

Your fingertips will get greasy as you eat this. But despite the richness of the cheese and the eggy coating and the caramelized, syrupy apples, the sage keeps the whole thing from being overwhelming. Its sharp, herbaceous note cuts through the cheese, and it somehow miraculously maintains a bit of crunch even buried between the layers of filling. For me, it’s sandwich nirvana.

Apple Cheddar Monte Cristo sandwiches

Quantities for 2 sandwiches

1 tart apple, quartered, cored, and cut into thin slices – I like granny smith

6 tablespoons butter, divided

3-4 tablespoons maple syrup

¼ teaspoon salt

8 whole sage leaves

4 slices sourdough sandwich bread

⅔ cups extra sharp cheddar cheese

1 egg, lightly beaten

½ cup milk

2 tablespoons flour

Heat 4 tablespoons of the butter, the maple syrup, and the salt over medium heat in a 10-12 inch skillet. When the butter has melted and is bubbling with the syrup, add the apple slices in a single layer, and scatter the sage leaves on top.
Cook on medium heat until the underside of the apples is brown, about 5 minutes. Flip the slices over, and cook again to brown the other side, about 2-3 minutes more. Try to keep the sage leaves on top of the apples so they get crisp from the heat but don’t burn. The apples will show that they are almost ready by puffing up and looking swollen just before they begin to get golden, and the butter and maple syrup mixture will get deep, deep toffee colored and become a thick caramel.
Remove the pan from the heat and cool while you ready the other ingredients.
Shred the cheddar cheese and set it aside.
In a shallow bowl, combine the egg, milk, and flour, mixing well to eradicate flour lumps. The addition of the flour will help the exterior of the sandwiches stay crisp – I use the same trick with French toast.
To assemble the sandwiches, layer cheese, then half the apples and half the sage, then a bit more cheese onto one slice of bread. You should aim to use ⅓ cup of cheese per sandwich, but we want to have some on both sides of the apple slices to hold the whole thing together better. Top with the second slice of bread, and repeat for the second sandwich.
In a skillet, heat the remaining 2 tablespoons butter over medium-low heat. While it melts, set the first sandwich into the egg and milk mixture and leave it for 30 seconds or so to allow some of the batter to penetrate the bread. Then flip it over and let it sit another 30 seconds or so. Repeat with the second sandwich.
To cook, raise the heat on the skillet to medium and carefully add the sandwich (or sandwiches, if your skillet is large enough to accommodate both). Cook over medium heat, flipping halfway through, until both sides are golden and crisp and the cheese is melted. This should take about 5 minutes per side.
Slice as desired, and consume hot.

Photo Friday

Posted on September 12, 2014 by Chelsea

Lavender in the sun.

Pesto Parmesan Pull-Apart Bread #TwelveLoaves

Posted on August 18, 2014 by Chelsea

I’ve put off writing this post. I wasn’t sure how to begin. Every time I sit down to think about it, I end up surfing the net, scrolling through Facebook, seeing more and more headlines, reading more and more articles about the terrible things our world has been going through recently. As one of my friends and former colleagues put it recently, “the entire internet needs a trigger warning.”

I don’t often offer political or moral commentary on this site. That’s not its job. And I don’t often try to convince you that seeing things my way is the way you should see. My truths are mine, and yours are yours. But when terrible things happen, and when death and tragedy are instigated and framed through questionable motives – sometimes on both sides of the event – I question my own job here.

I’m not going to espouse to you what I think. Not today, and probably not ever, unless it’s something frivolous and food-related. I’m just going to say, with caution, that unless you have cut off access to emotions, to moral codes, or to the internet itself (I know, gasp!), over the past week or two – certainly over the past month – the world has been pretty depressing.

So that makes a food blogger wonder where she stands. When people are suffering, when people are angry and dying and struggling, for me, there is uncertainty: is it disrespectful or willfully unaware to coo over the cuteness of a cupcake or speckle my posts with just the right adjectives to describe the lusciousness of a sauce? I’ve considered this before, written about it before, and I always come back to the same conclusion: no. Food is important. Food means things, not just about nurturing our bellies but nurturing our hearts and our minds and, depending on what you believe, our souls. I talked to N. about this the other day, thinking again of how to write this post, and he said “we have to have some things to be happy about.” Food seems like one of those things.

Finally, what helped me figure out what to write so as to be aware of, respectful of, but not overwhelmed by these events I’ve found troubling, was the introduction to Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi’s cookbook Jerusalem. Looking back through this lovely book, I was struck by a short section they have titled “A comment about ownership.” In a place – whether that is a city, or a nation, or the world itself – where we feel a need for the power that ownership and control bring us, it is hard to share. We pull ourselves apart from one another in an effort to feel safe, or right, or justified. Ottolenghi and Tamimi argue that searching out the true “owner” of a dish through its national or personal origin is not only difficult, but futile. Either it has been made before, or there exists another, or three, or a dozen, similar dishes claiming different origins: a “variation on a theme” (16).

Though Ottolenghi and Tamimi are commenting on dish origination – which makes sense, as they like to provide a little background about the meals they offer – what struck me was not just where a dish comes from, but where it goes. For a long, long time, sitting down at a table, or a fire, or a bowl, has meant something more than filling your stomach. It means trust, or love, or a forging of bonds. You eat together and you end up sharing more than a meal. I’m not sure that’s still true, but I think it should be.

So weirdly, when it came time to sample this month’s loaf for the Twelve Loaves project, I had chosen something divisive in its very name: pull-apart bread. When you tear into it, this loaf peels into separate bits, as I see happening so often in our world. Yet its richness, its docile tendency to give up layers and hunks and edges, suggests it is meant to be shared. We pull it into soft fragrant pieces, but we’re doing that together, and the act of sharing brings us comfort and happiness.

I’ve wanted to try a pull-apart bread for a long time, particularly after seeing Deb’s nod to Welsh Rarebit on Smitten Kitchen. To answer the call of summer herbs for Twelve Loaves, I settled on pesto, blending the sharp-sweet, fresh licorice scent of basil with the usual garlic, pine nuts, and lemon juice. I amped up the parmesan quotient and included it not in the spread itself, but as a separate layer to melt and cling.

There seem to be two schools on pull-apart bread. One involves rolling little spheres of dough and jamming them into a pan together, so when they cook they swell into one another and form tenuous ties. This is also commonly called Monkey Bread, especially when it is sweet. The other, which I haven’t seen as frequently but which I chose to work with after seeing Deb’s offering, results in something more like a Pillsbury Grands biscuit or puff pastry stood on end. It involves rolling the dough thin, slicing it in long strips, layering those strips and slicing them into squares, then levering those stacked squares – like servings of lasagna or birthday cake – sideways into a loaf pan like a deck of cards to rise into one another and smash together during baking. As you peel the warm layers apart, you get the bite of pesto and the salty richness of parmesan.

I want you to make this. It’s a bit of a project, but it’s so, so delicious. And when you make it, I want you to share it. Pull it apart, by all means. But let that action by extension pull you together.

Pesto Parmesan Pull-Apart Bread

Makes a single 9×5 inch loaf

Adapted heavily from Smitten Kitchen

For dough:

2 teaspoons yeast

2 teaspoons sugar

½ cup milk, warm but not hot

2 ½ – 3 cups bread flour, divided

1 teaspoon salt

4 tablespoons soft butter

2 eggs

For filling:

3 garlic cloves, skins removed

¼ cup pine nuts

2 tablespoons lemon juice, or to your taste

4-5 cups packed basil leaves

½ cup (approximately) olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

2 cups parmesan cheese (I know, but it’s so fluffy! 2 cups is practically nothing… besides, you’re sharing…)

In a glass measuring cup, warm the milk. I like to pop it into the microwave for 20-30 seconds. When it is just warmer than body temperature (poke your fingertip in – it should feel just warm to the touch), add the sugar and the yeast and stir it up. Let this sit for 5 minutes or so while the yeast wakes up and begins to bubble.
Meanwhile, combine the salt and 2 cups of the flour in the bowl of a stand mixer and stir to combine. When the yeast and milk mixture is bubbly and smells like bread, add it to the flour and salt and mix on low speed using the paddle attachment until damply crumbly. Add the butter and the eggs and mix on low speed again.
Add an additional ½ cup flour and mix to combine. As soon as the dough starts to come together and there are no longer dry swaths of flour, switch from the paddle attachment to the dough hook.
Knead for 3-4 minutes until a soft dough the consistency of play-dough forms. If it looks really sticky or is not coming together or pulling away from the sides of the bowl at all, begin adding the additional flour 2 tablespoons at a time, kneading for a bit in between each addition. You may not need all of the additional flour – I only used 2 ½ cups total.
Lightly grease the inside of the bowl (or switch to a clean, lightly oiled one), flip the dough over a few times to ensure it is lightly greased as well, then cover the bowl with plastic wrap and set it aside for 50-60 minutes to rise. We are looking for the ball of dough to double in size.
While the dough rises, make the filling. Drop the garlic and the pine nuts into the belly of your food processor and let it run for a few seconds, until the garlic and pine nuts become a fragrant crumble. There is still some blending to go, so they don’t have to be a smooth paste yet.
Add the lemon juice and as many of the basil leaves as will comfortably fit, and turn on the processor. Most of the basil will almost instantly be shredded into tiny bits. If it isn’t, or if nothing seems to be happening, take out the lid from the food chute and begin pouring in the olive oil through this chute in a slow, steady stream.
Once there is room in the food processor bowl again, add the remaining basil leaves, if there are any. Repeat the olive oil streaming process until you have a thick paste. I usually end up adding my basil in two or three batches. You may use more or less olive oil – this is somewhat according to preference, but you do want a fairly thick pesto that you can spread, not pour.
Taste for seasoning; add salt and pepper and pulse to combine. Set aside until dough is finished rising.
When the dough has doubled in size, punch it down by gently depressing your fist into the center. Let it rest for a minute or two, then turn it out onto a well-floured board and, using a floured rolling pin, roll it out to a rectangle of about 12×20 inches.
Spread pesto over the entire rectangle of dough, right up to the edges. We don’t need a bare margin for this loaf.
Cut the rectangle crosswise into 5 strips of 12×4 inches (so the short edge of the initial big rectangle becomes the long edge of each of the 5 strips). Sprinkle one with about ½ cup parmesan cheese – this will be the bottom of the stack.
Carefully, using a spatula with a long blade or a dough scraper to help you, top your parmesan covered base with another strip of dough. Sprinkle another ½ cup parmesan atop this new layer.
Repeat until you have a stack of five layers, though the final layer will not have cheese on top, which is fine.
Gently, exceedingly gently, use a serrated knife to cut the dough layers into 6 segments of about 2 inches each. Turn each segment layer-side up (showing off its stratigraphy) and snug it into a greased 9×5 inch loaf pan. You can turn the pan up on its short end to make this a bit easier – take a peek at Deb’s images (link above) for a visual. Follow this with another segment, and so on, to create a stack of layers. When you finish and set the loaf pan back on its base, Deb says this looks a bit like a full card catalog drawer, and I think this is a good assessment.
Cover your strange, layered loaf with plastic wrap and set it aside to rise again for 30-45 minutes. Preheat the oven to 350F so it is ready when you are.
Once the dough has risen again, which will squash the layers together a bit, remove the plastic wrap and stow your loaf it in the 350F oven for 25-35 minutes until it is puffy and nicely bronzed on top.
Cool a minimum of 10 minutes in the pan (though 15 or even 20 is probably safer; mine collapsed upon removal), then carefully flip it out and serve warm for best flavor and “pull-apart” effect.

Project Sauce: Sole Meunière

Posted on August 11, 2014 by Chelsea

We are now, with one exception that you’ll see in a week or two, deep into the butter portion of this sauce project. It makes sense. Most of the big deal “mother” sauces are French, and the French do have a soft spot for butter. And that makes sense too. I mean, all you have to do is melt a few tablespoons of butter and you’ve already got a sauce. Think of the way it softens with the maple syrup on your pancakes, becoming something so much richer and more complex than either would have been by themselves! So let’s talk about some buttery details for a minute, and then I’ll take you to our sauce this week: meunière, a classic butter and lemon sauce specifically intended to be served with a sautéed filet of sole.

As I continue to learn about sauces, I’m seeing emulsion after emulsion. A fat bound to a liquid, often with some thickening agent that gives body to the sauce and helps the normally separate ingredients get along. Think vinaigrette: the fat is the olive oil, the liquid is the vinegar. Dropped into a glass together, they form distinct layers. But beat them vigorously, often with a dollop of mustard to help them blend, and they become a thick, rich dressing. Kitchen magic.

What I’m finding quite interesting about butter is that whole butter, the sort we buy in paper-wrapped sticks, is in fact an emulsion in itself. The butterfat, which is what solidifies when milk is churned, is the fat portion. But there is also some water in butter, and there are milk proteins too, which stabilize the emulsion. So in that one stick you have a liquid component and a fat component, hanging together in stasis.

When you brown butter, that darling of savory and sweet concoctions alike, several things happen. First, as the butter melts and bubbles furiously, you are seeing the water content boil off. If you stop at this point, skimming off any solids on the surface and reserving just the molten gold of the butterfat, you have clarified butter. But if instead you keep cooking it, the milk proteins that once acted as emulsifiers start to toast, and become deeply bronzed, and you have brown butter. You can even see those proteins roasting and browning in the photo above.

Meunière sauce capitalizes on brown butter. And with the water content of the butter boiled off, it needs a liquid to play with again, so we add the tart brightness of lemon juice. And then, for an herbal note, a scattering of parsley. That’s it. It’s so simple it feels almost like cheating. And yet it’s a classic, likely because how could a splash of butter and lemon be anything but delicious?

Food Blog August 2014-0410 Unlike most other sauces, aside perhaps from hollandaise, meunière is pretty dish specific. It doesn’t really stand alone; it’s a sauce but also indicates preparation: sole meunière, or sometimes trout meunière. And though I obeyed and ladled mine over two delicate white filets, I could just as easily see this sauce, essentially a hot vinaigrette, serving as a bright gravy for mashed potatoes or roasted chicken. I would ladle it over a great tray of steamed green beans, or even stir some pasta into it and add shaved parmesan to the top (sidenote: as a kid who didn’t like marinara sauce on pasta, I would have welcomed this alternative with wide-open taste buds).

Food Blog August 2014-0405 But as I said, I went traditional here. Not as traditional as sautéing or deboning the fish tableside, as some classic preparations demand, but I resisted my usual urge to add twists or additional ingredients. I wanted to see what this was about.

Okay, so I added some lemon zest to the salt and pepper I used to season the fish before dredging it in flour. But really, such a tiny alteration hardly counts, right? And when you serve the filet tenderly over some rice pilaf and drag your green beans through the last remnants of the sauce, well, words fail (no, seriously. I’ve sat here for fifteen minutes trying to think of how to tell you it was good!). Bring on the butter. She is clearly justified as the diva of the sauce world.

Sole Meunière

Adapted from Ina Garten and Anne Burrell

Serves 2

4 tablespoons butter, divided

2 filets of sole, 3-4 ounces each

Salt and pepper for sprinkling

Zest of 1 lemon

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1-2 tablespoons minced parsley

Preheat your oven to warm (200F or so) and place a sheet tray with a rack balanced over it inside. This will allow you to keep the fish warm and crisp while the sauce finishes.
Heat 2 tablespoons of the butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat.
While the butter melts, unwrap your fish and season both sides with a sprinkle of salt, pepper, and lemon zest.
Dredge the filets lightly in flour and then lay them flat straight into the pan, being sure they are not touching. If they sit around in their floury state, they will not get crisp.
Sauté for 2 minutes over medium-high, until the fish begins to look opaque. It will be about ⅔ cooked at this point. Flip each filet carefully, again, being sure they are not touching, and cook another 1-2 minutes until the bottom is golden and comes away easily from the pan. Remove each filet to the rack in the preheated oven.
Wipe out the pan and heat the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter, again over medium-high heat. When it is melted and bubbling furiously, add the lemon juice and stir to combine.
As the butter starts to brown, which should only take about a minute, season the sauce with salt, add the parsley, and remove from heat.
Transfer the fish to a plate or serving platter and spoon or carefully pour the sauce over the fish to serve.

Grilled Potato and Radish Salad

Posted on June 30, 2014 by Chelsea

In the last three years, I have had the incredible good luck of attending a wedding each summer. Two years ago, I had the great honor of making the cake. One year ago, I sobbed as I watched two women legally and joyfully exchange vows, then start perhaps the greatest dance party I’ve ever attended. And this past weekend my eyes welled as the bride – dressed in a frock she designed herself, alternating white and lemon yellow flounces – betrayed just a tiny quiver in her perfect, crimson lips as her sister read a toast: a poem she’d written herself.

The poem was about the bride and groom, but it was also about older and younger sisters: the beautiful friend/family/learning relationship they have as they grow up together. It was, there is almost no need to assert, beautiful. Of course it was. It was about the things the girls had weathered, and how the groom had woven his way into their laughter and music, through music of his own. But it was also about what the bride had taught her sister.

Sisters learn funny things from each other, and it is disarming and lovely to be allowed to see what things they consider most important. How to read, how to write, how to sing. And, somehow magically, “how to cook radishes.” Until five or six years ago, I’d never given much thought to cooking radishes. To be honest, I hadn’t given much thought to radishes at all. They were just there, all weird and pinkly peppery, flying saucers scattered through the occasional salad, or sharp and pungent and paired with butter and salt.

But here’s a funny thing, about radishes, about weddings, about friends and family and learning: as you get older, you get to choose things. Weddings help us construct the families we choose. But so can friendships, and so can an experience like graduate school, and so, oddly enough, can radishes.

When N. and I lived in Eugene, Oregon, we decided to grow a garden. It was easy, there. It was a matter of shoving seeds into a spare bit of dirt, and watching them grow. Until the height of summer, it rained so often you barely had to worry about watering. Peas were one of our first crops, and of course we were invested in our tomatoes. But I’d still never considered radishes. Until, at S.’s house, a friend who has now become family, I was handed a french breakfast radish, pulled from her own little vegetable plot minutes before, a pink and while icicle the neighborhood deer had left quite alone. “You can just eat the whole thing,” S. told me, and I did. And the mild crunch, and the crisp, juicy spiciness, all but made me a convert then and there.

After that first year of gardening, I always bought a pack of radish seeds. And they will never not make me think of S: razor wit, funny and honest and lovely and brilliant. She’s a willing and gracious hostess, she’s a fantastic cook, and she’s the mom to my own dog-daughter’s canine BFF. She, like the bride and groom this past weekend, like J & HP whose wedding cake I made, the people I can barely wait to spend fourth of July weekend with, is one of that special and cautiously assembled group: the family I chose.

And as the fourth of July approaches, and those lovely people you choose to surround yourself with, to learn from, to sing with and read with and cook with, begin to turn their thoughts to potato salad, let me offer a fresh take to consider. This is not your traditional mayonnaise-laden, pickle-and-onion-and-dusted-with-paprika barbecue offering. (If you are after one of those, may I humbly suggest this one?) But I like this different approach, because it is lighter and fresher, because it does not require stove or oven heat, and because it makes me think of S. Tiny fingerling potatoes and plump lipstick red radishes get quartered, salted and peppered and oiled, and grilled until tender and silky. And then a few green onions, just to get a gentle char. Meanwhile, an assertive vinaigrette gets overburdened with herbs and whisked within an inch of its life to be drizzled over a bed of greens. I like arugula. S. would tell you to use the radish greens (but wash them a few times first – they can be really sandy). Potatoes and radishes get tumbled in, and after a quick toss the greens are barely wilted and the dressing soaks into the grilled vegetables like sponges in a bath.

I don’t know if this is how my bride friend’s sister learned to cook radishes. I suspect not. But the point is, those lovely things we learn, and choose, and become, should be shared.

Grilled Radish and Potato Salad, for Sarah.

Adapted from Cuisine at Home

Serves 2 as a main, 4-6 as a side

1 pound radishes, rinsed well, tops and tails removed

1 pound baby potatoes – the smaller the better

4 tablespoons olive oil, divided

1 bunch green onions or scallions, root ends trimmed off

¼ cup white wine vinegar or lemon juice

2 teaspoons dijon mustard

2 teaspoons finely minced dill

2 teaspoons finely chopped parsley

salt and pepper to taste

2-4 cups loosely packed arugula, or a combination of arugula and well-rinsed radish greens

If you are using a gas grill, place a grill tray on the burners and preheat the grill to medium over direct heat. If you are using a charcoal grill, light the coals. As they begin to turn gray, add the grill tray to let it heat up. If you are using an oven, preheat it to 425F with a sheet tray inside.
Quarter the radishes and halve or quarter the baby potatoes. You want equal, bite-size pieces – they need about the same amount of time to cook.
In a large bowl, toss the potatoes and radishes with 1 tablespoon of the olive oil, and salt and pepper to taste. Transfer them to the preheated grill or sheet tray in a single layer.
Grill until tender, 10-15 minutes, agitating as required to prevent burning. If you are using an oven this may take more like 20-25 minutes.
Meanwhile, make the vinaigrette: in a large bowl (I use the same bowl as before), whisk the remaining 3 tablespoons olive oil with vinegar, mustard, and herbs.
When radishes and potatoes are tender, transfer them to the bowl with the vinaigrette. Add the arugula (and radish greens, if using) and toss to combine.
Grill the green onions for 3-5 minutes, until the white bulbs are slightly softened and the greens are nicely charred. Chop and add to the salad, again tossing to combine.
Season the salad to taste with additional salt and pepper, if needed, and serve warm or at room temperature.

Homemade Mayonnaise and Toasted Potato Salad

Posted on May 26, 2014 by Chelsea

Food Blog May 2014-3905 My interests for some time have been food and bodies. Academically, as I’ve noted on my About page, I studied bodies. I’m interested in the way we represent them in literature, and increasingly, the way we represent them in our own self-presentation. This makes me a better teacher, I think, because it keeps me aware of my students as people – as living, breathing bodies who think and act and speak not always according to logic or reason, but to their status as physical beings ruled by whims and appetites. It also makes me, I hope, a better human being, since I recognize what this kind of embodiment means for my fellow beings.
Outside of academics, I love food (I’m sure you would never have guessed this). This pair of interests makes total sense to me. Bodies, after all, require food. It fuels us, it nurtures us, and it affords us pleasure of many sorts. The pleasure of a full belly. The pleasure of a silky custard against the tongue, or a thick hunk of steak between the teeth, dissolving into creamy fat at the edges.
All too often, though, our associations between food and bodies are negative. We use the slippery jiggle of jelly to describe a stomach or a bottom that we deem too ample or not sufficiently firm. Our brains are “fried” or “scrambled” when we feel tired or off our game. “Muffin top” is a newer construction thanks to the popularity of tight and midriff-baring wardrobes (deemed, interestingly enough, one of the most creative words of 2005 by the American Dialect Society). And of course there is the classic complaint of “cottage cheese thighs.”
Food Blog May 2014-3891 I want to propose a new one, to break this concentration on the negative textures and attributes we give our bodies, and refocus attention instead on their strength and abilities: mayonnaise arms.
At first glance, this sounds just as negative as the others. The rich fatty consistency of mayonnaise calls to mind a sagging bicep rife with cellulite. But I’m not talking about a visual comparison. I’m talking cause and effect. Though she certainly has a more traditional exercise routine, after my weekend of making mayonnaise from scratch, you could tell me First Lady Michelle Obama’s amazing arms were forged whipping her own condiments and I wouldn’t be at all surprised. The sustained whisking mayonnaise requires, pulling egg yolk and oil together into a magical, fluffy, silky, creamy emulsion, has the potential to produce incredible toned limbs (and then sit down to a perfectly dressed BLT. Just saying).
This is my fifth installment in 2014’s Project Sauce,* and for the first time I have to admit I was quite nervous. Even the fussiness of last month’s hollandaise didn’t throw me off all that much, since I’d made it before. But the idea of whisking a raw egg yolk and some oil into a fluffy spread had me feeling tentative. First of all, despite understanding a bit about the power of emulsions, it seemed so unlikely those humble ingredients could even approximate something like the jar of Hellman’s hanging out on my fridge door. Secondly, even though I knew my chances of getting salmonella from my homemade spread were quite low, I still felt a little uncomfortable about what seemed like dangerous cooking.
However, there’s nothing like the internet for at once increasing and assuaging fears. Amongst articles about salmonella poisoning babies and questions about whether it’s safe to eat macaroni salad that has sat around on a picnic table for hours, I found a few mayonnaise recipes that suggested heating the egg yolk gently to 150F, at which temperature the bacteria that causes salmonella bites the dust. This is also the temperature where egg proteins solidify, but the addition of acid in the form of lemon juice or vinegar raises the coagulation temperature, so you still maintain a liquid yolk even while reducing the already minimal chances of food-borne illness. Other cautious suggestions offered using pasteurized eggs (this heating process is basically pasteurizing them), or washing the shell carefully before cracking (since the shell itself is where bacteria like to hang out). This gentle heating sounded like a reasonable suggestion to me, so using a combination of recipes and procedures (privileging Michael Ruhlman’s suggestions in Ratio, to which I find myself returning again and again), I whisked and measured and heated and cooled and whisked and whisked and whisked and ended up with a bowl of fluffy, creamy, pillowy spread that looked almost identical to the commercially produced stuff I’ve been buying and greedily applying to fried egg sandwiches for years! Several times, in between shaking out my arms as they screamed at the endless whisking, I said aloud, stunned, “It looks like mayonnaise! It actually looks like mayonnaise!” This was, apparently, one of those things I never really conceived of making myself.
So. Mayonnaise is possible. Though like the other sauces I’ve created, it needs a vehicle for consumption. As Ruhlman notes in a defense of fat-based sauces, “you wouldn’t want to eat a bowl of vinaigrette or a cup of mayonnaise or a stick of butter” (165). I laughed – in my deepest, guiltiest heart of hearts a cup of mayonnaise sounds attractive, though probably not without some kind of starch or vegetation to cut the thickness – but he’s right. It’s not a lone ranger.
With Memorial Day upon us and summer leaping ever closer, then, I went to one of my favorites: potato salad. In my version, fingerling potatoes are boiled and then crushed and lightly toasted in olive oil, so their skins get slightly crisp and they break apart gently when mixed with the other ingredients. Hard boiled eggs, capers, dill, garlic, and a generous scattering of green onions provide the colors and flavors for that beautiful blank canvas of potato and mayonnaise to play with. And I can’t resist a little squeeze of mustard. Creamy. Toasty. Fluffy. Perfect.
As summer gets ever closer, instead of complaining about our beer bellies or muffin tops or cottage cheese thighs, I vote we create, and celebrate, mayonnaise arms instead!

*Yes, mayonnaise is considered a sauce, even though the thick, creamy spread we most commonly envision when we hear the term is used primarily as a condiment. But think aioli: basically a thin mayo with garlic added. Even hollandaise is similar to a thin mayo, with the egg yolk heated and emulsified with butter rather than oil. In perhaps my favorite application, Belgian in inspiration, mayonnaise is used to sauce french fries, and what a glorious sauce it then becomes…

Homemade Mayonnaise
Makes a scant cup
Note: this is a quite lemony mayonnaise. If you aren’t fond of that flavor or want to dial back the citrus, use just one teaspoon of lemon juice, and a tablespoon of water instead. Alternately, you can use a vinegar of your choosing to create your preferred flavor of acidity.
Note #2: I strongly recommend you get everything ready for this before you begin the process. I’m talking various bowls, ice bath, oil measured, all that. You’ll be happier for it, I promise.
Note #3: Though this mayonnaise stores just fine in the fridge for a week, it may separate a bit as it chills. Vigorous whisking at room temperature, and in a dire case another dribble of water or squeeze of mustard feverishly incorporated, should bring things back together.

1 large egg yolk (save the white for a meringue or angel food cake or fluffy waffles)
1 teaspoon water
1 tablespoon lemon juice
½ teaspoon salt, or to taste
1 cup (8 ounces) vegetable oil

Before you begin, start about 2 inches of water heating in a medium pot. You want to bring this to a bare simmer. While it heats up, fill a large bowl with ice and water and set it in the sink. We are heating the egg yolk in the unlikely event it is harboring bacteria, but mayonnaise is a “cold” sauce, so we will need to cool the yolk quickly once it has reached the appropriate temperature.
In a medium, heat resistant mixing bowl (I used glass), whisk together the egg yolk, water, and lemon juice (or vinegar, if you’re using that instead). Set the bowl carefully over the pot of simmering or near-simmering water, being careful not to let the water come to a boil or to touch the bottom of the bowl.
Whisk the egg yolk mixture constantly but slowly over the pot until the yolk registers at 150F on a kitchen thermometer, about 4-5 minutes. You don’t need to whisk with particular determination here – we are not looking to change the consistency as we would with a hollandaise; just to keep it moving so it doesn’t scramble.
At just under 150F, the yolk will thicken a tiny bit. At first when this happened I thought the whole thing was ruined. It’s not. Don’t worry. The addition of the acid and water will prevent the protein in the yolk from fully coagulating.
As soon as you hit 150F, remove the bowl from the heat and carefully float it in the ice bath, continuing to whisk constantly until the yolk mixture cools to room temperature, and taking care not to let any ice water into the mix. You don’t want it to be cold – cold ingredients are reluctant to emulsify (think of bottled salad dressing and the way it separates). Just room temp will do nicely.
Once the yolk has cooled, take the bowl out of its ice bath and set it on a counter, wrapping a twisted kitchen towel around the base of the bowl to prevent spinning.
Now, add the salt, and begin to drizzle in the oil slowly. You want to add just a few teaspoons at a time, whisking like a madman through the whole process. At first you’ll just have a greasy mess, but slowly as you add more oil, the mixture will get pale and fluffy and creamy, and suddenly will start to look suspiciously like, well, mayonnaise.
Continue to drizzle the oil in slowly, whisking the whole time. If your arm gets tired, switch to the other one! If the mixture suddenly starts to look extra shiny or like it might separate, stop adding the oil and whisk extra hard for a minute or two. It should come back together.
Once your mayonnaise is fluffy and creamy and stable, taste for salt (this is much, MUCH less salty than a commercial mayo), and use immediately, or store in the fridge for up to a week.

Toasted potato salad with homemade mayonnaise
Serves 1 generously, or 2 as a modest side

10 baby potatoes
2 teaspoons olive oil
2 hard boiled eggs, chopped
4 green onions, thinly sliced on a bias
1 tablespoon capers, chopped
2 teaspoons finely chopped fresh dill
1 clove garlic
¼ teaspoon coarse salt
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
Black pepper to taste
¼ cup homemade mayonnaise (or more, to taste)

Boil the potatoes in salted water until they are fork tender (times will vary depending on the size of your potatoes. Check them after the water has been boiling for 6 minutes, then determine for yourself). When they are done, drain them, remove to a flat surface, and use a potato masher or the back of a fork to lightly crush them. You are looking to split their skins and just flatten them a little bit.
In the same (now empty) pot, heat the 2 teaspoons olive oil over medium heat until they slick and shimmer around the pan. Add the crushed potatoes and fry for 3-4 minutes, flipping them over halfway through to reveal golden brown toasted bottoms. When both sides are toasty, remove from heat and let cool.
While the potatoes cook, prep the other ingredients, tossing the chopped eggs, green onions, capers, and dill into a medium bowl.
To prepare the garlic, smash the clove with the side of a large knife, and remove the peel. Then chop the garlic into a fine dice. Sprinkle the ¼ teaspoon coarse salt over the garlic, and make it into a paste by firmly dragging the flat of the knife across it. The abrasive salt crystals will break down the garlic, making it easier to mix into your salad evenly. Add the pasted garlic and mustard to the bowl.
When the potatoes have cooled a bit, add them to the other ingredients, toss together, and add the mayonnaise. Mix gently to incorporate, taste for seasonings, and add black pepper to your liking. If you wish, add additional salt, mustard, or mayonnaise to suit your palate.
Eat immediately, or chill, covered, in the refrigerator until ready to serve.

Apple Cheddar Monte Cristo sandwiches

Quantities for 2 sandwiches

1 tart apple, quartered, cored, and cut into thin slices – I like granny smith

6 tablespoons butter, divided

3-4 tablespoons maple syrup

¼ teaspoon salt

8 whole sage leaves

4 slices sourdough sandwich bread

⅔ cups extra sharp cheddar cheese

1 egg, lightly beaten

½ cup milk

2 tablespoons flour

Pesto Parmesan Pull-Apart Bread

Makes a single 9×5 inch loaf

Adapted heavily from Smitten Kitchen

For dough:

2 teaspoons yeast

2 teaspoons sugar

½ cup milk, warm but not hot

2 ½ – 3 cups bread flour, divided

1 teaspoon salt

4 tablespoons soft butter

2 eggs

For filling:

3 garlic cloves, skins removed

¼ cup pine nuts

2 tablespoons lemon juice, or to your taste

4-5 cups packed basil leaves

½ cup (approximately) olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

2 cups parmesan cheese (I know, but it’s so fluffy! 2 cups is practically nothing… besides, you’re sharing…)

Sole Meunière

Adapted from Ina Garten and Anne Burrell

Serves 2

4 tablespoons butter, divided

2 filets of sole, 3-4 ounces each

Salt and pepper for sprinkling

Zest of 1 lemon

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1-2 tablespoons minced parsley

Grilled Radish and Potato Salad, for Sarah.

Adapted from Cuisine at Home

Serves 2 as a main, 4-6 as a side

1 pound radishes, rinsed well, tops and tails removed

1 pound baby potatoes – the smaller the better

4 tablespoons olive oil, divided

1 bunch green onions or scallions, root ends trimmed off

¼ cup white wine vinegar or lemon juice

2 teaspoons dijon mustard

2 teaspoons finely minced dill

2 teaspoons finely chopped parsley

salt and pepper to taste

2-4 cups loosely packed arugula, or a combination of arugula and well-rinsed radish greens

1 large egg yolk (save the white for a meringue or angel food cake or fluffy waffles) 1 teaspoon water 1 tablespoon lemon juice ½ teaspoon salt, or to taste 1 cup (8 ounces) vegetable oil

Toasted potato salad with homemade mayonnaise Serves 1 generously, or 2 as a modest side

1 large egg yolk (save the white for a meringue or angel food cake or fluffy waffles)
1 teaspoon water
1 tablespoon lemon juice
½ teaspoon salt, or to taste
1 cup (8 ounces) vegetable oil

Toasted potato salad with homemade mayonnaise
Serves 1 generously, or 2 as a modest side