The Salty Spoon

Oh, hi.

It’s been a while since those Wondrous Pillows of Carbtastic Splendor graced my editing window, and I want to assure you we haven’t been starving in the silence.  Since that post, I’ve been traveling, working, and thinking (and, admittedly, making several things that have needed a bit of tweaking before I present them to you – such is the mystery behind the food blogger’s curtain).

I’ve been thinking a lot about Gourmet. Though I had only just begun my subscription (ironically, the first issue I received was its last), I could not help but recognize the magnitude of this loss. When so much talent dissipates after accumulating so handsomely, the void is severe and deep. I read post after eloquent post from others, eulogies for this publication that brought elegance to so many dining tables. It was heartening to see a fitting tribute assemble itself from the food community.

But then came Christopher Kimball’s New York Times editorial about Gourmet, the internet, and the current state of recipe writing.  In his hamfisted attempt to explain how a publication with such a dedicated following could meet its end, Kimball took several  cheap shots at food bloggers, calling us a “ship of fools” who will never produce results as reliable as his hermetic  test kitchen.

I have been tempted to respond.  Kimball is someone I have, admittedly, looked up to in the past.  He has worked tirelessly to craft a franchise of publications and programs that have helped a growing generation of home cooks achieve consistency in their kitchens.  I regularly participate in test panels for America’s Test Kitchen.  It’s a bit disheartening to see that Kimball holds such a contemptuous view of the food blogosphere. In my head, while driving to work or peeling apples for pie (coming soon) or pushing a cart through the grocery store, I have written several rejoinders that delve into my beliefs about the essential, communal qualities of cooking and creating recipes.    But I haven’t let any of those arguments make their way to the page.  There’s no need.  As his subsequent responses show, Kimball really believes his way of cooking and writing recipes is the best.  He doesn’t value the things we, as food bloggers, bring to the proverbial table.  If the mountain of other feedback he has received from the blogosphere hasn’t given him pause about holding so steadfastly to a view that continues to alienate a community of people who could lend substantial support and conviviality to his business, then one more rant from me won’t do it either.

To tell you the truth, I’m grateful to Kimball.  His editorial and its aftermath have served as a lightning rod to motivate me to examine my own beliefs about food, about cooking and, most importantly, about what I’m doing here with The Salty Spoon.  Without boring you with a manifesto, let me simply say this: cooking is a part of my life and always will be. I share that part of my life with many people, both online and in person. I work at incorporating good food into my life and my household every day, and I hope by showing you, my readers, this process and my joy in executing it that you might be moved to join me. I am not an expert or a trained chef. Rather, I’m a kinesthetic learner with a big appetite and a warm heart. I love to eat and I love to laugh, and I try to inspire you to do the same. If that means I’m sailing blissfully along on Kimball’s ship of fools, so be it. I rather like the view from here.

Fall recipes are coming soon.  Though it’s a bit of an ephemeral concept here in Los Angeles, these pictures from our recent trip to Ithaca help me imagine cooler air, musty leaves, and good things made from apples.  The moon is waning, and all is well when a cup of cider is close by.

I learned to arm wrestle really, really well working at the Olive Garden.  It had almost nothing to do with being a hostess there, but the arm wrestling champion of Butte, Montana taught me herself.  Her name was Mary, and she was a great teacher.

The key to winning at arm wrestling, according to Mary, is two-fold.  Getting the knot of forearms, hands, and elbows into a configuration that allows you to pull with your bicep is of paramount importance.  Getting there quickly, to the abject shock of your opponent, is equally critical.  Done correctly, you’ll leave them painfully mumbling in your dust as you swagger away, heady with the pride of your win.  Though the expression is woefully time-worn, it really is all in the wrist.

For two summers and a winter break in college, I was part of the front of the house “A team” at the Olive Garden in Billings.  I had applied for work at several restaurants in town, and the Olive Garden was one of my last stops because it was the furthest strip mall from my house.  It shared a parking lot with Red Lobster, where I failed the 300-question personality test prior to my interview.  By the time I received a Dear Bria letter informing me that my immediate future did not include reciting pithy witticisms about a menu filled with shellfish, it was the OG or nothing.

My arm wrestling lesson came around the same time gnocchi were added to the menu, during my second summer. New additions to the menu meant team meetings at the restaurant on Saturday mornings, where we put the “know your food” OG principal into practice (the other four principals being hot food hot, cold food cold, money to the bank, and clean restrooms).  I don’t remember anything else from the tasting that day, nor do I really remember whether or not the gnocchi were any good.  I can only recall the moment that marked what would prove to be a weeks-long process in fighting about the pronunciation of “gnocchi.”  It was not, as I emphatically argued, acceptable to refer to it as “nookie.”

It’s a good thing none of us are 19 for more than, say, a year.  It’s just so difficult to know Everything and struggle to communicate it to the rest of the world given a paltry allotment of only 24 hours per day.  I believe Mary was neutral on the pronunciation debate, but favored some sort of object lesson that would shut me up for the sake of keeping the peace.   Somewhere between hearing her credentials and that first, brutal loss, I managed to forget about the pedantry of the matter.

Today, I don’t care if you call them gnocchi, nookie, or Wondrous Pillows of Carbtastic Splendor.  Just make them, and soon.

The ricotta quantity is stated in ounces, rather than cups.  If you buy your ricotta, it should make a difference to you as 15 to 16 oz is a standard size.  If you made whole-milk ricotta with me and are staring at a giant wad of cheese, wondering how much to use, get thee to the store and pick up a food scale.  It’s an excellent way to maintain consistency and accuracy in the kitchen.  Fundamental recipes are ratios based on weight, not volume, and you will open many doors for yourself with the ability to scale recipes up or down based on weight.  Get one.

Regarding the bread crumbs: I cheat.  If you happen to have a few slices of white sandwich bread laying around, remove the crusts and blitz them in a food processor.  Toast the resulting crumbs in a 300 degree oven for 10 minutes until they are golden and use them here.  Despite my bread-making proclivities, honey-oat whole wheat bread is the only kind we (almost) always have readily on hand.  It doesn’t make for very good bread crumbs, so I cheat with the kind in the little cardboard can.

(Keep reading Ricotta Gnocchi…)

I think we have talked about the way I pine for lazy weekend mornings to while away with plates of fresh muffins.

A recent foray into vegan, gluten-free cooking (long story) left me with a sizeable quantity of almond milk and gluten-free all-purpose flour (“GF AP”). I didn’t have specific designs on them at first, but figured the inventive mood would strike at some point. One morning, it did.

And here is where I confess something slightly embarrassing. I make biscuits with Bisquick. I know, I know. It’s rather antithetical to all of my feelings about baking. I’m wrapping myself in a little shower curtain of shame in order to explain this, but it’s relevant to the how and why I decided to try using almond milk in muffins, so stick with me. After months of enjoying the splendor of traditional baking powder biscuits made with butter, John and I decided to get back on Weight Watchers (a wagon from which we have long since fallen). After recommitting to the double-W, we couldn’t justify the eleventy vermillion points in a serving of those biscuits (vermillion is a number with so many zeroes it turns red). One day, I discovered that Bisquick’s Heart Healthy baking mix made decent, though not equivalent, biscuits. What can I say, they are incredibly fast and relatively low in calories and fat.

Have I lost all baking credibility with you? I hope not. Remember the marshmallows? The bread? The olive oil cake? Surely you can cut me a smidgen of slack for this one thing. Oh, and if John tries to tell you about a bag of frozen potstickers that allegedly appears in our freezer on occasion, HE IS LYING.

So. As I was saying, I had gobs of almond milk and GF AP and no plans for either. On a whim, I decided to see what would happen if I used almond milk in place of regular milk in my Bisquick biscuits. My reaction, upon opening the oven, summoned from my core an authentic, Utahn OH MY HECK that would have made Norm Bangerter proud. They were HUGE and had the most amazing texture – pillowy soft with the tiniest crumb.

Since the basic muffin recipe is quick and quite malleable when it comes to ingredient manipulation, I decided to take the almond milk for another spin and see what it could do. When combined with GF AP, the result is scrumptious and workable for the gluten-free and dairy-free crowds (so long as your dairy-free parameters concern Things That Come From a Cow; the recipe includes eggs).

Food allergy/intolerance struggles are near and dear to my little peanut-allergic heart. I’m pleased to offer this recipe for my gluten-free and dairy-free friends who yearn for baked things that don’t suffer in texture or taste.  All too often, recipe adaptations for food allergies/intolerances are woeful approximations of the real thing.  In tasting these muffins (and sharing them with my lovely, gluten-free neighbor), I was really heartened to see that they taste and feel like…muffins.  They aren’t a weak knock-off, they’re just good.  Give them a shot, whether or not you happen to have a hard time with gluten or milk proteins.  You’ll have something wonderful to share with those who do.

The blueberries get a subtle but beautiful boost from the maple syrup (again, thank you Flavor Bible). If you want your berries to be further and fewer between, skip folding them into the batter and sink them, individually, with your fingers once you’ve portioned the batter into the wells.

Note that this recipe also works with spelt flour, if you happen to have some around. If you go with spelt flour, I recommend a food scale so you can measure out 8 oz – it’s a little more dense than GF AP, and you’ll want slightly less than the 1 ¾ cups called for here. Spelt, for the uninitiated, is not gluten-free; if you swap it in place of the GF AP flour, you can’t feed these to your Celiac friends. If gluten isn’t an issue, I highly recommend playing around with spelt flour – it’s high in protein and has a lovely nutty, sweet flavor.

(Keep reading Gluten-Free Blueberry Muffins…)