It's Been a Good Year

Tomorrow's my birthday.

It's time for me to take stock of my previous year, decipher what my one-year-older self might discover, and see where this coming year might take me. I'm also posting my favorite recipe for a great fritatta, Happy Birthday to Me!

I've had a great time this past year writing and re-discovering photography-for-photography's sake, just like in college. Working as a photo art director day-in and day-out, I figured I was getting my fill of photography, and felt incredibly lucky that I landed (and have held onto for the past 11 years) a wonderful job in a very small field, that utilized my BFA in photography.

What I hadn't realized, was that my own photography, which had been shelved for the past 20 years, was an outlet that I missed. It's one thing to tell the photography and stylist how you'd like a shot to look (and I work in the fashion industry for my day job). It's an entirely different thing to be in complete control of a shot: content, lighting, styling, angles, everything. This is my place, where I don't have to negotiate with anyone, don't need to explain why I want something a certain way. It's a haven for me, that also allows me to write to my heart's content.

With my blog, I've loved meeting new people and reconnecting with friends. I have also been given many impromptu lessons by my photo-industry friends, who I can't thank enough. The support, love and guidance that all my friends have shown me this past year has made me realize how many great people I have in my life. And, how many people are willing to eat my thousands of dishes the day after a shoot.

My daughter has grown, she turns thirteen the day after my birthday, into a lovely young lady. There are times when I just can't figure out what demon took over her, but for the most part, she's still entertaining to be around, and has taken up chess and singing. Oh, and, she's almost as tall as me. Yes, at only 5'1",  it's not such a big feat, but she's getting there faster than I did, which means that my hope that she'll make it to 5'6" or taller might come true. (In case you were wondering, I chose 5'6" because in general, pants are made for that height, so she'd never have to have her pants shortened, like I do :).

For the coming year, here are my to-do's. I'm not calling them resolutions or goals or anything like that. Too serious. Just a list of things I'd be thrilled to do.

Writing and Shooting:  I'm going to keep writing and shooting, with an eye towards cultivating some paid work. A book would be ideal, but let's not get ahead of ourselves. There will be, I hope, many new opportunities to meet more people and get more input on my work.

Friends I love: I want to spend more time with my friends, too, somehow integrating them into the few hours I have left after the full-time job, the food projects and time with my daughter. It will somehow happen, even if friends will need to participate in my shoots when they join us for dinner.

Dance!  There will be more dancing. Not for everyone, that's just a goal for me, but I'd be happy if others want to come along. I think I'll get into some kind of performance again (a few years ago it was samba, including a jaunt down Mission St. as part of the Carnaval Parade). At the very least, a combination of weekly classes and Wii Zumba should do the trick.

So, I hope that you will join me periodically in pursuing my to-do list.

And, make this fritatta while you're at it.

Fritatta A la Gran Fran

serves 4 as a main course, 8 as a side-dish and 1 or 2 as many, many meals.

Ingredients:

• 2 Russet potatoes peeled and sliced thin
• 5 Eggs
• 1/4 cup Olive Oil
• Salt to taste

You will need a broiler-proof non-reactive deep skillet.

Method:

• Heat pan over medium-high heat. Add the olive oil, and swirl it around to coat the sides and bottom of the pan.
• Place potatoes in pan, one at a time to create one layer. Do not crowd them. This will make a nice base for the Fritatta.
• Cook the potatoes over medium heat until they are browned, about 10 minutes. Flip the potatoes over and cook another 5 to 8minutes, watching carefully to make sure they don't burn.
• Crack 5 eggs into a bowl and mix them as if you’re making scrambled eggs. Be sure to break up all the yolks and get them all mixed together well. Add salt to taste, but not too much.
• When the potatoes are cooked on both sides, sprinkle them gently with salt. Pour the beaten eggs over the potatoes. Move the pan around to distribute the eggs evenly. After a minute or two, slide a spatula around the sides of the pan and tilt the pan so the raw eggs run into the space that the spatula created.
• Keep the pan on the flame for 3 minutes or so, shaking the pan gently, until the eggs begin to set to about an inch around the circumference of the fritata.
• Set the broiler for 3 minutes. Place pan under the broiler and watch carefully as top of eggs get bubbly, firm, and golden, until the top is well browned.
• Remove from oven. Place a serving plate on top of the pan, using oven mitts, grab the pan and plate and flip the Fritatta out onto the plate.

Enjoy hot, warm, cold, or at room temperature. Wonderful with a ripe tomato salad sprinkled with finely minced scallions, a dusting of kosher salt, and a good dollop of olive oil (this is Gran Fran's addendum to the above recipe).

It's Cold Here: Mashed Potato Time

Okay, I know, we're in San Francisco, and all of you real-season dwellers are guffawing at my being cold in 45 degree and sunny weather. To be fair, I grew up in NY and know what real weather feels like. But, there is something out here that makes me cold from the inside. I wonder if it's just that I'm so used to the temperature hovering around 65 degrees most of the year, that this shift in temperature seems more sudden than the transition from Summer to Fall to Winter in NY.

So a very simple mashed potato was in order as dinner the other night. There is nothing as satisfying or warms you up as well as mashed potatoes.

I made two versions, one with dairy  (for my daughter) and one without (for me). The dairy-free ones are not quite the same, but hey, I have to eat within certain guidelines, so have found a decent work around.

All that's left is for me to find a cashmere jumpsuit to make it through the winter.

Mashed Potatoes

• 6 Russet potatoes, skinned and diced
• 3/4 cup of milk (cow or almond)
• 3 tbsps of butter (or olive oil)
• Salt to taste

Method:

• Boil the potatoes in enough salted water to cover them. They're ready when you can easily put a fork through them.
• Drain the water and return the pan to the stove. Put a high flame under the pan for one to two minutes, to dry out the potatoes.
• Add most of the milk and all of the butter (or oil). Mash with a potato masher.
• Keep adding the milk until the potatoes reach the consistency you'd like.
• Add salt.

Enjoy.

The Jam Continues On

My friend and I did some more canning this past weekend. Ms. S is a lovely lady from Minnesota with a grandma in Iowa who taught her about all things preserved. I am not much of a measurer (ala Gran Fran), Ms. S measures everything to a T.

Needless to say, our jam session was interesting, what with me just chucking all sorts of stuff in my pot, and her making sure to follow her grandma's instructions to the letter. Of course, Ms. S ended up with a lovely and perfect batch of strawberry jam, which was perfectly set and tasted great.

I ended up with more of a chunky sauce, best to accompany meats. It's not that mine tastes bad, on the contrary, it tastes great. But, it's really hard to classify it. The ingredients are simple enough: oranges, figs, sugar, water, pectin, sage and cinnamon. The end result is really flavorful, just not necessarily for spreading on one's toast.

Mostly, I'm here to boast about how I used my first jar. By spreading it over a pork loin, that was placed atop carrots and new potatoes for roasting.  The jam melted into a wonderful sauce. It coated all the veggies and gave the pork a really nice sheen, not to mention the contrast of the sweet orange flavor with the meat.

The greatest part about working with Ms. S, was how we each approached our projects with such different attitudes. We acknowledged that though each of us had her own way, we could totally see the benefit to each of our methods. It's nice to find someone who is different from you, but who gets you so completely.

The recipe that follows is just for the pork loin. I want to refine the chutney recipe a bit more before I post it officially, so, for now, I will recommend that you use a nice orange marmalade instead.

Pork Loin, Carrots and Potatoes with Orange Jam


Ingredients

• 2 pounds Pork Loin
• 8-10 New or Fingerling Potatoes cut into quarters
• 2 large Carrots, cut into 1/4 inch chunks
• 3 sprigs fresh Sage, chopped coarsley
• 1/4 cup Orange Marmalade
• Oil for searing the meat
• Salt and Pepper to Taste

Method

• Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
• Place a heavy-bottomed non-reactive oven proof pan on the stove over medium-high heat. When it is heated well, add olive oil to coat the bottom.
• Put the pork loin in the hot pan and sear on both sides, about 4 to 5 minutes per side.
• Once the meat is seared, pick it up with tongs and put the potatoes and carrots beneath in the pan, then put the pork on top of the veggies.
• Spread the marmalade, jam or whatever saucy goodness you are using over the meat, making sure to coat it thoroughly. It's also nice to get some of it on the veggies, so they get a little crispy and sweet while they cook.
• Sprinkle sage over the pork and add some salt and pepper.
• Place the pan in the pre-heated oven and cook for approximately 25 minutes.

gran fran and her non-reactive pans

Gran Fran got some pots and pans in the early 1960s. She loves them. The Wagner Ware (pictured here) is her favorite, with her Le Creuset pots coming in a close second. News Flash! Wagner Ware is NOT non-reactive!! Only to be used for certain recipes, they are still Gran Fran's top pick.I believe Le Creuset came via her love of Julia Child, while the Wagner Ware was more of a day-to-day pot. Each, of course, has its special use.

There are, of course, times when one or the other brands of pots will be always used. While the Wagner Ware is usually used to boil water for pasta, the Le Creuset is its mate for making the sauce (you know, you can't use the Wagner Ware, it's reactive, after all...). There were times when the handles (held on by a single screw) would fall off her favorite Wagner Ware, which would not deter Gran Fran. Instead, she would just grab a potholder and grip it right onto the metal where the handle had been. Joe managed to order some new handles for her, so the pots continued on through the 70s, 80s, 90s and today.

Then, there are the dents and dings that all of the Wagner Ware pots have endured over the years. Gran Fran is a big proponent of shaking her pans whilst cooking. I noticed this on Julia Child's first episode, which featured omelettes. Julia shook her pan to fold the omelet. Gran Fran shakes her pans to keep things from sticking. But, she is known for her noisy pan shaking. You can't hear the dishwasher when she is making something that needs a good shake. And, she also likes to clear the kitchen when she is cooking in case ingredients come flying out of the pan.

Just this morning, I found myself frantically shaking a pan of potatoes and realized I am becoming my mother. In many ways this isn't so bad, but crazy pan-shaking isn't what I had hoped for as an ever-lasting trait from my mother. To be fair, Gran Fran makes a mean pan of fried potatoes, so it's not such a bad trait to have inherited.

As you may remember, Gran Fran just has a big birthday. My plan was to get her a new Wagner Ware pot to replace her dented one, but it's going on eBay for as much as $120 a pop, not including shipping. To me, this seemed excessive for a sentimental gift, to a woman who would less than likely use said new pan when her dented, dinged, handle-less pans have been so good to her.

Fried Potatoes ala Gran Fran

serves 4 as a side dish

*use whatever kind of pan you'd like, non-reactive not 100% necessary here

Ingredients:

• 4 large russet potatoes, peeled and cubed

• Olive Oil to coat the bottom of your pan

• Salt to taste

Method:

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

• Heat oil in pan, until hot but not smoking.

• Add cubed potatoes to pan, over high heat.

• Turn potatoes every 2 minutes. Alternately, you can shake the heck out of the pan.

• Lower the heat to medium after 8 minutes. Keep shaking or turning potatoes to keep them from burning. But, make sure you leave them long enough to brown on all sides.

• Once they are browned on all sides, remove the pan from the flame and place in the preheated oven for 10 minutes.

• Remove from oven, salt to taste and enjoy!!!

Ribollita: It's A Stew & Soup All-In-One!

"How many more days are we going to be eating this?"Ah, the familiar refrain from many years ago, of me questioning Gran Fran about the never-ending quantity of our beloved Ribollita.

Literally reboiled, this stew-y soup got us through many a cold evening. Gran Fran started making it when I was in college and the last one I made was very recently, seeing as it goes from 90 degrees to 40 degrees from one day to the next, out here in San Francisco lately.

And so, I am now the proprietor of many plastic lidded containers to friends and family of said soup. I cannot make fewer than 15 servings. No matter how hard I try, how small the pot is that I use, or how many ways to Sunday that I reduce all of the ingredients, I always, always end up with a huge pot of soup. The only saving grace in having gallons of this soup is that I have plenty of friends, vegetarian, vegan or otherwise who seem to never get enough of my Ribollita.

I would gladly eat this hearty soup for every meal, especially since you can alter the flavors just by adding or subtracting herbs, changing the kinds of beans you use or sometimes adding a little red wine. But, the issue here, is not the awesome taste of all the ingredients coming together. No, it's the huge amount of carbs included in the recipe, which of course makes the soup even more tasty. Not only are there beans, pasta and potatoes, but also a good hunk of white or Italian bread.

Remember when only doctors or scientists used the term "carbs"? Sometimes you'd hear about it on the news, but it made no never-mind to me. I just wanted me some good, filling soup, you know? Now, I have to worry about all manner of ingredients and how they come together to create some kind of evil within. It was nice to come home and see Gran Fran working on her soup, without a care in the world about whether or not she might be struck down for combining bread with pasta, let alone then adding potatoes.

Well, all I know is that when I moved out to San Francisco 17 years ago, I had to get some recipes stored up for inexpensive, filling meals. And, if they reminded me of Gran Fran and Joe, then all the better. So it was that the Ribollita became my first foray into large scale cooking for roommates and a revolving cast of characters. At 22, I had no worries about weight or nutrition, but plenty to worry about when it came to cashflow.

I kid you not, for a mere $6.00 a pot, you can easily feed 8 people. And, it's veggie and vegan friendly, so as the new one in the house, it made for a great first meal to be able to cook for the varying diets of my roommates. I recall having Gran Fran on the phone (well before my cell phone made an appearance so of course, the phone had a cord, which flowed from my tiny room through the hall into the kitchen) advising me how to make the tomato paste puree with the herbs, oil and garlic.

All the while, Gran Fran would ask things like "Are you making a nice roast beef to go with it? Or, of course you could serve tofu, but, you know, I don't go in for those sorts of things." I knew then, just as much as I know now, how important it is for us to cook "together". All these years later, we still call each other when we're cooking, going over ingredients, temperatures, serving suggestions.

Enjoy your Ribollita tonight, tomorrow night, the next, and maybe well into next week. Oh, and don't think about the carbs, just the excellent goodness of the soup!!

Serves 8

3 large Idaho or other baking potatoes, peeled, sliced, washed and dried 3 carrots, peeled, washed, diced 1 large onion, minced 5 Tbs. Olive oil Salt and pepper 16 to 18 cups boiling water 1 cup elbow macaroni or other small pasta. 1 package frozen corn 1 package frozen peas 1 can chick peas, drained and well rinsed 1 can pink kidney beans, drained and well rinsed 1 can cannelini beans, drained and well rinsed 2 slices country bread

Seasoning Ingredients: 1 large bunch basil, stems removed, finely minced or 1 ablespoon dried basil 2 T tomato paste 6 T olive oil salt pepper crushed red pepper flakes 2 cloves garlic, finely minced

Optional Garnish: Shards of Reggiano Parmigiano or Asiago cheese Additional crushed red pepper flakes

1. Soup: Heat olive oil in a heavy, nonreactive stockpot. Add potatoes, carrots, and onion. Sprinkle liberally with salt and pepper. Add bay leaf. Cook vegetables over medium heat, stirring often, until golden. 2. Pour boiling water over vegetables. Bring to a boil over high heat. Stir. Reduce heat to medium low. Partially cover pot and simmer soup for 45 minutes 3. Bring soup back to the boil over high heat. Add pasta. Stir. Reduce heat to medium. Cook for 8 minutes or until pasta is almost cooked. 4. Add corn, peas, chick peas, cannelini, and kidney beans. Stir and cook for about12 minutes over medium heat or until corn and peas are cooked and beans are hot. 5. Break bread into very fine pieces bread .Crumble into soup. Stir, incorporating bread bits into soup by pressing them against the side of the pot. Remove soup form stove. 6. Seasoning: In a small bowl, combine tomato paste, olive oil, basil, salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, and garlic. Fold seasoning mixture into soup. 7. Serve soup, with grated cheese if desired

mashed potatoes…i don't think so.

Here’s the deal, sometime around Junior High, Gran Fran began adding leeks to the mashed potatoes. Even though I was a fairly easygoing pre-teen and teenager, for that matter, but the addition of leeks brought out my full-fledged wrath of pre-teen-dom in all its glory.What in the heck was she thinking? How could you improve upon the creamy goodness of a nice batch of russet potatoes, boiled, dried over the flame, salt, butter and milk added, and mashed? Now, she had added some soft, green things, that made the potatoes taste downright wrong.

The bigger issue was, you had to eat what was on your plate, which should be expected. Now, I know in my heart this is wrong, but with my own daughter, we’ll call her Iz, I make modified versions of what I’m eating, with less spice, or none at all. This was an okay solution when she was small, but she has just turned 10 and it is sort of crazy to serve two meals in a household of two.

To be fair, Iz will always try new things and sometimes discovers dishes she likes. But, this is only at other people’s houses, not mine. Yes, I know, it’s my own doing, but I still like to talk about it. And, the odd thing is, she loves to cook and will make all sorts of things that she will not eat. Final thought on Iz is that she has a good palate and will eat lots of different things, including sweet potatoes, Brussels sprouts, and all manner of veggies, meats and carbs, just not with any sauce or spices. But, how could I not love a kid who counts bacon as a food group?

Last night, a friend showed up to cook dinner and brought along potatoes and leeks. I cornered him and grilled him on how he was going to prepare them, warning him that he’d have to leave if he planned on making them into a smushy mess of mashed-like potatoes. He assured me that he would be making a gratin of some sort, and was then allowed to stay.

Gran Fran was kind enough to share her recipe with me, which, as now that I'm an adult, actually sounds like something I might like. But, I don’t have the courage to make it, for fear that Gran Fran’s look of disappointment (from back in the ‘80s) will come back to haunt me. And, I’m probably just a little bit too stubborn to admit she might be right on this one.

Mashed Potatoes with Leeks and Vegetables

Serves 6 as a side dish

Ingredients:

• 5 Russet Potatoes, peeled, washed, and cubed • 3 cloves of Garlic • 2 Leeks, white and light green parts only, thoroughly washed, dried, and diced • 4 Carrots, peeled, washed, sliced into discs • 4 Stalks of Celery, peeled, washed, and sliced • 4 Tbsps. Butter • 1/2 cup milk or cream, slightly warmed • Salt to add to water

Method:

1. • Place potatoes and vegetables, garlic and salt in a non-reactive pot; add enogh cold water to come to the top of the vegetables, cover pot, and cook until they are soft, about 25 minutes.
2. • Remove from the heat, strain the water out and put the vegetables back in the pan.
3. • Place the pan back over high heat, to dry the ingredients out, for 4 minutes. Then turn off the heat.
4. • Add the butter and milk (or cream) and mash them all together until they are the consistency you like (the more you mash the mixture, the smoother it becomes).
5. • Taste the mixture and add salt to taste.

Mashed Potatoes Without Leeks

(the right way, as far as I’m concerned) Serves 8/Serves 6 as a side dish

Ingredients:

• 5 Russet Potatoes peeled, washed, sliced • 4 Tbsps Butter • 1/2 cup milk or cream, slightly warmed • Salt to add to water

Method:

1. • Place potatoes in pot; add cold water to some to top of potatoes, add salt; cover pot. Cook until they are soft, about 25 minutes.
2. • Remove from the heat, strain the water out and put the vegetables back in the pan.
3. • Place the pan back over a high heat, to dry the ingredients out, for 4 minutes. Then turn off the heat.
4. • Add the butter and milk (or cream) and mash them all together until they are the consistency you like (the more you mash the mixture, the smoother it becomes).
5. • Taste the mixture and add salt to taste.