zoramargolis

 Maybe I can find something utilizing the chard stems too.

Marcella Hazan has a famous recipe for chard stems that are first braised in chicken stock and then baked with parmesan cheese.

What I am looking for today, turnip greens with the turnips attached.  Preferably organically grown.

Try Mom's Organic Market in Merrifield. I vaguely recall seeing white turnips with the greens a few days ago. I could be wrong about that, so maybe call before you go.

Zora, I get your point, but not sure that I agree.  I don't expect great depth of flavor out of everything I eat, and "poverty kitchen" cooking is something I ate a lot of in my youth - and still enjoy.  I often make simple vegetable soups, and really the only difference between them and a ribollita is the presence of bread in the soup.

An uncle of mine grew up poor on a farm in Poland. He emigrated to Canada as a very young man and some years later married my mother's sister, joining a Belarusian family of good cooks. He always waxed nostalgic about a soup that his mother made, that he had loved when he was growing up. Most of his family had perished in the camps during the war, but eventually, some time in the late fifties or early sixties, my aunt was able to get the recipe from one of his sisters, who had survived and moved to Paris. My Uncle Josef's sister swore that the recipe she sent explained the exact way that their mother had made the beloved soup. My aunt followed the recipe to the letter. And surely you know what happened: he thought that it tasted like dishwater. Porc, I'm not suggesting that the simple vegetable soups you still love aren't delicious. Just speculating on why Ina Garten's ribolitta recipe might taste flat and uninteresting to you.

For those of us who are into food, have sophisticated palates, enjoy intense flavors, some of what comes out of the "poverty kitchen" of various cultures can seem flat or uninteresting. Carrots, celery, kale, potatoes, some tomatoes and an onion cooked in a big potful of water is just not going to be ambrosial. We look at the recipe and see healthful vegetables and Italian tradition, and somehow expect that following the traditional recipe will yield great depth of flavor. However, the role a soup like this plays in an impoverished home, from whence it emerges, is that it fills the belly when one cannot afford meat. If ribollita is going to satisfy first world palates, it's going to need enhancement with ingredients beyond the traditional ones.

I learned from watching Julia Child on tv years ago, that a bottle of inexpensive dry vermouth should always be on hand to add small amounts to various dishes. It keeps for a long time without oxidizing or going bad. I wouldn't use my cooking vermouth for making martinis, but I only open a bottle of regular white wine to cook with when I am going to use the entire bottle, as in a pot of chicken stock.

Will do!  Where do you buy your porcini powder?

On the internet, you can get it from Kalustyan's in NYC or Surfas in Culver City, CA. There may be other internet sources as well. I tend to buy it in person at those two stores, when I am in NY or L.A. It's one of my secret umami enhancers--I use it in any mushroom dish, obviously, but also in tomato sauce, any sort of stew or braise. You don't necessarily know that it's there, it just adds to deliciousness.

My vegetarian BIL and SIL are staying here with us this weekend, to attend a birthday celebration for their son-in-law. We hosted them and the niece and nephew for brunch today. I made shakshouka with the addition of feta, and burnt eggplant, which I cooked in the woodstove last night. We started with prosecco, and ate the shakshouka with afghan flatbread I bought at Halalco. J and his brother made their mother's recipe for crumb cake while I was out at the farmers' market this morning, and we ate the cake with fresh pineapple, strawberries, and blood orange slices.

I just looked at Ina Garten's recipe, and a few things occured to me. First, I would add chopped fennel to the vegetables. Second, it has no bay leaves or bouquet garnie. I would tie up a leek green with a big bunch of parsley, fresh thyme, celery leaf, rosemary, and fennel fronds. Third, I would put in a healthy splash of dry vermouth or white wine. To add extra flavor, I would sprinkle on some porcini powder--which is a flavor enhancer I often use--or, soak and then chop some dried porcini and add the soaking liquid. For more flavor, some anchovy paste mixed in with the sauteed vegetables at the beginning of the process, or a couple of teaspoons of nuoc mam with the broth.

Ribollita.  Used an Ina Garten recipe and was somewhat disappointed; it was a little one-dimensional.  Still hit the spot, though.  Perhaps vast quantities of grated parmesan helped.

Now that you have tasted Ina's recipe and found it wanting, what will you do differently the next time you make it?

Last night's dinner:

early appetizer:sweet-spicy Korean fried chicken wings from H Mart

fat tire

later:

slow roasted farmed salmon with black sesame seeds

roasted bok choy with miso crust

rice

B&J's vanilla with sugared strawberries

2013 Nobilo sauvignon blanc

On 3/5/2015 at 9:40 PM, Pool Boy said:

Huh.....I am curious about the use of pasta inserts. I really see no need for what I perceive to be a unitasker (a colander of course is sort of a unitasker, but I use it for at least a few things in my kitchen so for me that doesn't count).

the pasta insert is not a unitasker. I use it as a steamer when I make tamales, or cabbage, or large batches of cauliflower. It also is useful when making stock. Put the bones and vegetables in the insert, fill the pot with water, and then when it is done cooking, you can remove the solids by lifting out the insert. Then, all you need to do is strain.

Born in Los Angeles, CA. Left there in 1966.
NYC (briefly in Upper West Side, then Soho) 1966 to 1971.
Brattleboro and Putney, VT 1971 to 1976
Los Angeles, CA (Playa del Rey, Santa Monica, Inglewood, Westchester) 1976 to 1996
Washington, DC (Palisades) 1996 to April, 2015
April 2015 onward Edgecomb, ME

Wednesday night:

shakshuka with feta, smoked eggplant and merguez meatballs instead of poached eggs

saffron basmati rice

sugared strawberries

2011 Vií±ademoya Bierzo

Thursday dinner:

homemade cream of mushroom soup, made with oyster, crimini and porcini

grilled 4 cheese*, ham, and shallot sandwiches on rye-pump swirl**

*Idiazabal, Comte, sharp cheddar, reggiano

**I've been making grilled cheese sandwiches using Gabrielle Hamilton's method: spreading the outside of the bread with mayonnaise before putting into an ungreased fry pan.

I have two stainless steel stockpots--one large (3 gallon) and the other larger, probably holds 4 gallons. They have heavy bottoms and glass lids. Well, they did both have glass lids. The lid for the smaller of the two shattered and ruined a pot of chickenstock a long time ago. But my larger All-Clad lids fit perfectly, so not a problem. I bought pasta inserts for both of them, and I use the larger one for waterbath canning. I bought them at Tuesday Morning, for an amount I don't recall, but it was well under $100 each. I don't know the brand or where they were made, but they work really well. I make stock, obviously. And cook pasta. I use them to make big batches of bbq sauce and have no problems with scorching.

IIRC a runcible spoon is one with a serrated edge, somewhat akin to a spork.

When K was little, we had a wonderful edition of The Owl and the Pussycat with illustrations by the fabulous artist Jan Brett. The poem was read to K many, many times, and we loved studying the amazingly intricate images. Great memories!

For those of us who eat in restaurants only occasionally, the problem is not as acute. Originality doesn't mean a whole lot in most of the world, where a limited number of dishes forms the regional cuisine which is eaten on an every day basis and has been for generations.

posole verde made with an eco-friendly turkey thigh instead of pork shoulder. I cooked the posole in my pressure cooker for 45 minutes before adding canned hominy, but the turkey was still tough, so I had to add more time under pressure, twice. Surprising how long the turkey took to get tender enough to pull off the bone. Must have been a tough old bird. Ultimately very tasty, though. I made it with homemade smoked turkey broth.

pico de gallo

tortillas and butter

Talenti vanilla bean gelato with berry coulis

Fat Tire

The name of the business has been changed to Straw Stick and Brick Deli. Or I'll blow your house down. The same couple own and operate it. My understanding is that this name change was due to legal pressure from Le Trois Petits Cochons, a commercial charcuterie manufacturer in the New York metropolitan area.

Sam Fromartz's book was just shortlisted for the 2015 Art of Eating best book prize. click

eta: Sam's book did not win, but the book that did win sounds terrific. I have a lot of Mexican cookbooks, but I may have to add this one to my collection. click

The bay leaf and thyme are typical in Alsatian versions of braised sauerkraut, as in a choucroute.

In riesling?! How nice. We've been using water all these year - I need to try that!

Saute a sliced onion before adding the rinsed sauerkraut and the wine. In addition to the juniper berries, don't forget a bay leaf or two and a bouquet garnie of fresh thyme and parsley.

While it is not strictly a bread technique and recipe book, I'll bet he would really enjoy Sam Fromartz's recent memoir In Search of the Perfect Loaf. Sam is a local DC-area journalist who became fascinated by bread-baking, focused on making a great baguette. The book is a chronicle of his obsession with learning about how to make great bread. He's a terrific, entertaining writer who manages while telling the story of his passion for bread and the many interesting characters he encounters in his quest to learn how to bake, to provide vast amounts of information about the history of wheat cultivation and bread baking, the many types of flour and how they need to be handled to make bread. It's a great read, and he describes his own techniques, too. Highly recommended.

It's wonderful in sauerkraut braised in riesling. Always needed in a marinade/braising liquid for venison.

All-Clad seconds online

Another option is to go to the Leesburg Outlet Mall when the Williams-Sonoma Outlet is having a sale. Sometimes it's 40% off their already discounted prices. I've gotten pieces of All-Clad for amazingly low prices compared to the regular retail--they may be seconds, but it's unlikely that you can actually find the flaws. Often it's just a tiny scratch, nothing that affects the use of the thing. Get on their email list and they'll notify you when they are having a sale.

I began my vinaigrette career (a laughable notion really) by using a press but then stopped when I developed sufficient knife skills to quickly chop garlic very finely and the salt trick of grinding the chop into a paste with the side of a heavy knife. Then didn't lose any garlic stuck to the press and one less thing to clean up, I'm a little surprised you don't do that too but guessing I'm about to learn something else here which, of course, was the not-so-hidden agenda of this thread. :-)

I use a press for different reasons: one, because I'm often in a big hurry to make salad dressing because we're about to sit down to eat and I've just noticed that there isn't any already made in a jar in the refrigerator; two, I use it for chunks of shallot, onion, or ginger when I just want the juice; three, because I'm lazy and I haven't been able to notice a damn bit of difference between garlic pureed by squeezing it in a press or laboriously grinding it into a paste with salt and the back of a knife. I use a knife with garlic when I want it sliced or rough chopped. When I don't want to bite into pieces of raw garlic, I use a press.

Sometimes I make vinaigrette in the blender, and then I just throw the whole clove of garlic in--after peeling it. That's actually the best way, because then it stays emulsified for a long time. Especially if you put a fair amount of mustard in, and a tablespoon of water. But sometimes, I don't want to have to wash the blender jar, and I just make it in a pint mason jar and shake it.

Basic vinaigrette for me always includes either garlic or shallot squeezed in a press, dijon mustard, salt, black or white pepper. I vary the flavors by using lemon or lime juice in place of vinegar, or a combination of citrus and rice wine vinegar, cider vinegar, red wine or sherry vinegar. Maybe a splash of balsamic. And then the choice of oil-- all olive, or a combination of olive and grapeseed. J. loves Annie's shiitake-sesame dressing, and I often buy it for him. Sometimes I'll make an Asian flavored dressing with ginger and toasted sesame oil, but I prefer French-style vinaigrettes.