Magic Viniagrette

 

This is an all purpose vinaigrette that I’ve used in many diverse dishes with such positive results that I called it “Magic Vinaigrette”. 

Besides normal use on vegetables and salads it can be a gentle addition to a piece of plainly cooked seafood. It’s excellent as a marinade. And…..it’s magic! 

Here’s the magic potion: 

-  It uses 50/50 olive oil and canola oil, which dilutes the olive oil to a more subtle flavor.

-  Then it uses a 50/50 mix of white wine vinegar and sherry vinegar. High quality sherry vinegar is divine, but can be quite strong on its own. So again, subtlety is added by blending with the ww vinegar.

-  The proportions are 4 parts oils to 1 part vinegars. It gets finished with an optional squeeze of lemon juice and S&P. 

The ingredient selections are critical: 

-  A robust, high quality extra virgin olive oil is needed

-  Use high quality Sherry vinegar from Spain. Mass-produced sherry vinegars from the grocery store are not really a good substitute, as they tend to have just the slightest flavor of sherry and are often harsh. 

-  Rather an ordinary white wine vinegar, I use rice wine vinegar from China. Pearl River Bridge products (including their great soy sauces) are beginning to show up in large US supermarkets over the past year or two. 

The two vinegars themselves and the 50/50 split of the oils and vinegars are the magic. 

Magic Vinaigrette

 

 

	Small	Regular	Large
Extra Virgin Olive oil	1/4 C	1/2 C	1 C
Canola oil	1/4 C	1/2 C	1 C
Spanish Sherry vinegar	1 T	2 T	1/4 C
Rice Wine vinegar	1 T	2 T	1/4 C
Lemon, juiced (optional)	1/2	1	2

 

• Salt and Pepper to taste
• Combine in a jar and shake well
• Keeps 4 weeks or longer

Broccoli Salad for Your Labor Day Picnic

As many of you know, I’ve been dealing with cancer for the past few years. Blogging fell low on my list. Many people have kindly asked that I share my advice, menus and recipes again. If you’re one of them - thank you. It’s meant a lot to me that you found this useful.  

Sending my love, Tom

If you’re cooking this weekend this is a nice version of broccoli salad, because of its use of Asian flavors instead of the regular suburban mayo, ranch, bacon, etc. 

Broccoli Salad

Dressing

 

½ cup raisins

½ red onion, finely sliced

¼ cup apple cider vinegar

4 tsp sugar

1 tsp Kosher salt

Ground black pepper

• Combine and let rest for 10 min

 

3 Tbs olive oil

1 Tbs sesame oil

• Add to mixture and stir

 

Salad

 

1½ pounds broccoli, chopped into  ½” pieces

1 apple, cut into ½” cubes

2 scallions, sliced

½ cup toasted almonds

1 cup red or green grapes, cut in half

• Toss with dressing

 

 

Notes: 

• Include the broccoli stalks: cut into small, thin, bites sized pieces, excluding the toughest woody parts
• If desired, blanch broccoli for less than 1 minute and cool in an ice bath
• To toast almonds: roast at 300 degrees for 8 to 10 minutes

Adapted from New York Times Cooking subscribe here. 

Technique: Ice Bath

Doesn't that phrase sound fancy and complicated? Ice bath. 

It's nothing more than a bowl of water with ice cubes. 

It's also a technique that can  take your vegetable cooking skill from novice or capable all the way to expert in no time. Here's why. 

One of the hardest things to do is to get a food, especially a vegetable, cooked to the right temperature. Especially if you're cooking in boiling water. Even if you do get it near-perfect, the residual heat in the vegetable allows it to keep cooking. 

The solution? Ice bath. Especially if a vegetable can be served cold or room temperature. As soon a veg in boiling, salted water gets to perfect doneness, use a mesh strainer, a perforated / slotted spoon or any utensil to dump the vegetables into a bowl of icy water. In a matter of minutes the heat will dissipate and you have perfectly cooked vegetables. 

(Why does spellcheck keep flagging the word doneness? And spellcheck? It wants spell check. I beg to differ.)

Here are some guidelines: 

• Use a really big bowl of ice water. Who cares, it's just water. And ice.
• When testing a single piece, skewer it on a fork and dip it into the cold ice water for a few seconds, then taste to see if it's done. 
• This technique is particularly well suited to cooking green beans (especially thin French haricot verts) and potatoes - as each hold heat easily. 
• When I mentioned a mesh strainer, I was picturing (and suggesting) the contraption in the picture above. It's often called a spider strainer, because it looks like a spider web. You can buy one at amazon by clicking here. But the shipping will probably cost more than the strainer. The best place to get them is at Asian markets. 
• If the vegetables you're cooking are not going to be served room temp, you can use the same technique but just stop the cooking a little earlier than totally done.

One of the testaments to the importance of this technique is how heavily Thomas Keller relies on it. He's been considered the best chef in the country for quite a few years now. His book Ad Hoc At Home is supposed to be geared to home cooking. But like him, it's actually quite, well, particular. Just like him. Though I did meet him at a book signing once and he was quite nice, even though it was the end of the evening. 

Grill-Steamed Vegetable Packets

After sharing thoughts about summer vegetable chopping yesterday, here I present a simple technique to get mixed vegetables onto your grilling menu with little fuss and easy advance preparation. Yes - this approach is just like the "hobo dinners" or whatever that campsite foil package dinner deal is called. We're just taking it upscale a little.

The advantages of using this approach are:

• The vegetables can be chopped hours in advance
• You can grill-steam the packet(s) somewhat in advance of the prime-time grilling window (e.g., burger / steak / whatever grilling) because these veggies are great at room temp. 

Grill-Steamed Vegetable Packets
Two large packets to serve 6-8 people

2 red peppers, chopped into 1/2" pieces or larger
2 yellow or orange peppers, chopped into 1/2" pieces or larger
1 red onion,  chopped into 1/2" pieces
4 medium zucchinis, ends trimmed, halved down the center, sliced into "1/2 moons" about 3/8" thick
   --- Trust me - 1/4" is too thin, 1/2" is ok, but I think in between is perfect.
4 medium yellow squashes, trimmed as zucchini
   --- You can salt and drain the zucchini and squash if you'd like.
   --- Let them drain for 15-20 minutes, then gently wipe with a paper towel
1 tablespoon fresh oregano, chopped (or 1 teaspoon dried).
   --- You can add plenty of fresh oregano, but be spare with the dried stuff.
4 tablespoons olive oil
4 teaspoons balsamic vinegar

1. Prep all the vegetables and toss with half the olive oil, the balsamic, oregano and S&P. This can be done up to 3-4 hours before cooking. 
2. When grill is warming / fire starting, lay out two large pieces of heavy duty foil. Drizzle one tablespoon of oil on each sheet and spread it around. Put half of the vegetable mixture on each sheet. 
3. Wrap the sheets into a package, rolling from the sides and sealing at the top. You can use more than one piece of foil and can wrap this package almost any way you want - tightly, loosely, whatever - just get it fairly well closed for grilling, allowing the ability to open the top and check doneness of the veg. 
4. Place packets on hot grill for about 10 minutes. The heat of the grill, thickness of the foil, the size and amount of vegetable will all modify how long it takes to cook these through. 
5. The main thing is to not overcook the vegetables - you'd eat most of them raw or nearly so anyway - so underdone is better than overdone. If they are a little under done you can keep the package closed for a few minutes off the grill. If they come off the grill perfect, open the packages widely or turn them out into a serving bowl. 
6. Before final serving taste and adjust salt, pepper, or even a touch more oil or balsamic.   

Click on this link for a printer friendly version of this recipe

Technique: Chopping Summer Vegetables

It's summer. You'll be making salads, grilling vegetables, and maybe even harvesting some homegrown ingredients from your backyard garden. The farmer's markets are beginning to go really wild.

In short, you'll be chopping some vegetables sometime soon.

There's ONE thing you really need to know - it's all about the knife.

Eventually, if you chop enough vegetables you'll get faster and more precise. Given enough different vegetable related dishes, you'll learn different ways of tackling the same vegetable, depending on how it is to be used (think sliced vs. chopped tomatoes). But no matter what, if you don't have a good, sharpened knife, it will be more laborious and potentially painful in more ways than one.

For what it's worth, I recommend an inexpensive but durable chef's knife - the Victorinox 8" Chef's Knife.  Even if you splurge on or already own an expensive knife, all that's really going to matter after the first 6-12 months is how sharp you keep the blade. In fact, in some professional kitchens, knife sharpness is more than a matter of pride - it becomes a competition among chefs.

Except for cutting bread and boning meats/fish, I use my large chef's knife for 98% of my chopping. Maybe 99%. Literally. And I even know what that word means.

Enough already - here are some handy tips for summer vegetable chopping (with a large chef's knife):

• Cut fresh corn in half, then stand the cut ends on your cutting board like a tower. Run your knife from top to bottom to cut off the kernels. You'll need exactly FIVE vertical cuts to remove all the kernels - no more, no less. 
• The fastest way to chop tomatoes is to cut them in half end to end, then again into quarters. At this point it's easy to push the seeds/juices out of each quarter. You may need to trim the whitish core and the stem pit (or whatever that dark thing is called that holds the tomato to the vine). After seeding the quarter, cut big chunks, or more vertical, thin slices, which can be chopped crosswise into little 1/4" cubes. 
• Cucumbers - trim each end, cut in half, place the fat middle end on the cutting board, like suggested for the corn. With just a little practice you can trim the peel off from top to bottom, not taking off much, if any flesh. So - no need for a peeler. After trimming, slices or quarters are easily obtained. 
• Snozzcumbers - you're on your own. I can't recommend a viable approach. Hopefully the BFG is not reading this note. 

Toss cucumbers, zucchini or squashes into a colander with a generous sprinkling of kosher or sea salt. Let them sit for about 20 minutes - and they'll lose a lot of the water that would otherwise end up watering down your dish. 

• Chop the stem portion of a bell pepper, as if beheading it (the stem is the head). After slicing this top open, you can trim vertically, four times around the core and seeds, to create big flat pieces of pepper.  When you trim this way, run the knife edge right along the inside of the white spines - you don 't want that part - it's bitter. 
• A similar technique works well horizontally for small peppers, usually needing just three cuts.  
• After cutting large heads in half or quarters, I like to cut broccoli and cauliflower from the stem end toward the "leaves", making small cuts that allow the "trees" to fall apart. The bigger trees get more of the same treatment. 

When chopping anything into tiny pieces, keep the tip of your knife anchored on the cutting board rock/press the broad end (nearest the handle) down to chop through. Steady the food with your non-cutting hand. Yes, you can and should tuck your fingertips "under" (curl them back a bit) for safety. Also, pretend in your mind that you're a professional chef (you already have a very sharp knife, right) and your in chopping competition with the dude/dudette next to you. It doesn't take too long to get fast, faster and fastest. But do watch those fingertips. 

• Last, for now, smash garlic with the flat knife blade and the skin will fall off. Lay the knife blade over one clove, holding the handle, and with your other fist, pound once down against the blade. It is SO easy. 

Grilled Vegetables
Don't overgrill - you'd eat most any of these veggies raw anyway.
Add some oil, S&P and balsamic vinegar.