balance

First, my apologies for the inherent violence in these images. While occupied in the mundane task of making dinner, I seldom think about my food as something other than a task-at-hand, something to work with as a medium, not something that lived and no longer lives. That thought process generally comes before, when I choose to purchase (or not) meat. We hover on the border between omnivouressness and vegetarianism, but generally spend more of our time on the omnivouress side of the line. Yet I find myself uncomfortable with the images here, with the reminder that my dinner last night was an exchange of life for life. As Annie Dillard said (in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek), "This looking business is risky."

Essentially, this "looking business" is a short tutorial on how I roast a chicken. Based on the number of chicken roasting accounts out there, this act has as many authors as there are chicken-cooking cooks in the world. I (the authoratative "I", that is) start by organizing my ingredients on a cookie sheet or some other "salmonella containment device"--something to create boundaries between clean and unclean, safety and danger. A few things remain constant: a lemon (or lime), pricked with a fork to go inside the body cavity, garlic slices to slip under the skin, and salt and pepper to rub everywhere. On a typical Sunday, I'll also slide fresh rosemary and thyme under the skin and in the cavity. However, this week we played a post-modern Thanksgiving game, making our own feast days before the actual holiday, combining chipotle pepper's fire with the sweet of honey and tang of lime.
I preheat both my oven and my stove-top/oven safe dutch oven to 425F while I work on chicken preparation. First up: salt and pepper rub, followed by garlic under the skin and in the cavity, and then the lemon or lime. If I have string on hand, I will to a simple truss, just to hold the legs together. I rarely have string. I then make three slashes on each of the thighs, a trick learned from the Puck of cooking, Jamie Oliver.

At this point I pause, wash my hands, remove the dutch oven from the oven and place it on the stove-top over medium-high heat. To keep the chicken from sticking, I add a small bit of oil in the bottom, a teaspoon or two, and then I place my chicken in on it's right or left side, thigh to the heat, and fry (sear?) for three minutes. After the first three minutes, I flip the bird 180 degrees, and repeat with another three minutes of frying. This starts the cooking on the parts that take the longest to cook, and reduces the overall amount of time I have to tie up my oven in chicken baking. Finally, I move the bird to its back, breast pointing toward the ceiling, swipe a glaze over it (if using) and place in the oven to bake, uncovered, until done. I regularly cook 3-4 pound birds, so "done" is about an hour, but best measured by a thermometer poked between thigh and body.

Our post-modern feast, if I'm using the word correctly, consisted of chipotle-honey-lime glazed chicken, chipotle-garlic mashed potatoes, mini-caramel corn muffins (decreases baking time, brilliant!), salad and squash. Key to all of this was the chipotle-honey-lime glaze:

Chipotle-Honey-Lime Glaze
1 Tbsp adobo sauce (the sauce found in a can of chipotle chilis)
1 finely chopped chipotle pepper
1 Tbsp honey
1 Tbsp lime juice
zest of one lime
1 Tbsp freshly ground cumin
1/4 tsp mexican oregano

Mix together. Divide the sauce into two small bowls, 1/2 for glazing your chicken, the other half for adding to garlic mashed potatoes (start with less, and add to taste).

To be honest, the chicken was good, but the mashed potatoes? Divine!

Soon after we first moved to NYC, Rusty of Nine Moons, upon meeting me, inquired whether I had any great cookie recipes. I thought, then paused, then announced, "Um. No. I bake other people's cookie recipes." Then I spent the next year wondering why I never make up my own cookie creations.

What would my ideal cookie have? Chocolate chips? Dried fruit? Soft and chewy, or nicely crisped? Cakey like a Madelaine, or lacy like a Tuille? Cookie questions wandered in and out of my mind, sometimes leaving me alone for days on end, other times interrupting my attempts to fall asleep before a big project.

Inspiration struck recently after reading Francisco Migoya's posting on his popcorn candy-bar creation. Popcorn, caramel . . . cookie? My ideal cookie, found!

I originally envisioned a cookie subtly filled with popcorn dust, followed by a wonderful caramel burst. So far, technology (or more accurately, lack thereof) has limited my goal--I don't own a tamis, and turning popcorn into dust has proved an elusive game. I started with the obvious one: food processor + popcorn = dust. But no, popcorn dust fail. I've tried staling my popcorn in the oven, and then blending: same results. I've left the popcorn out for a week, then processed--fail again. I spent two hours pushing popcorn through my mesh strainer, since it's the closest thing to Francisco's recomended tamis technique, and found success. But then I mentally tossed that technique because *who* would want to make a recipe that includes two hours of pushing popcorn through their mesh strainer?

At this point, you're probably asking "why, idiot girl, haven't you just gone and purchased a tamis?"

I don't know. I'm suddenly feeling the strong urge to go get one.

Tamis questions aside, if you like the fun of finding noticeable popcorn bits in your cookie, follow the method below. And if you don't, and you own a tamis (or, like me, are going to go get one imminently, or have a better idea about how to get popcorn dust, which you will kindly share in the comment section), follow the method in italics.


Caramel Popcorn Cookies
makes about 3 dozen, if you make smallish ones

3 cups popped plain popcorn
12 Tbsp unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1 large egg
1/4 cup + 2 Tbsp caramel syrup^

2 3/4 cup all-purpose flour, unbleached
2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

1/4 cup granulated sugar for coating dough before baking

Whisk together flour, soda and salt. Set aside.

Place popcorn in food processor, and process until as fine as possible. You will find that you don't get a fine powder, that's okay. Leave in the food processor--we'll come back to the popcorn.

Using a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, beat butter until well creamed, about 30 seconds, then add granulated sugar and brown sugar. Beat until light and fluffy. Remove about 1/4 cup, and add to the food processor with the popcorn, and process for another 30 seconds. Set aside.

Add the egg to the remaining butter/sugar mixture, beat until light and fluffy, and then add the caramel syrup. Next, add the popcorn/butter mixture and the flour mixture. Mix until just combined.

Transfer cookie dough to an airtight container, and refrigerate for 2-3 hours before baking.

To bake, preheat the oven to 350. Make nickel to quarter-sized balls of dough (depending on how big you like your cookies), toss in granulated sugar, and then bake for 7-9 minutes. Allow to cool on a rack, and then eat away.

If you want your popcorn texture finer, you can push the popcorn through a tamis. You will need a total of 1 1/2 cups of popcorn dust. You can omit the step where you combine the butter and popcorn, and add the popcorn dust in with the flour mixture.

^Caramel Syrup
This recipe is from Shuna Fish Lydon of Eggbeater; since first making this in the November 2008 Daring Baker's Challenge, I find myself using caramel syrup in a lot of things, and recommend keeping some on hand to add to hot cocoa, plain yogurt, or on top of goat cheese.

1 cups sugar
1/4 cup water
1/2 cup water (for "stopping" the caramelization process)

In a small stainless steel saucepan, with tall sides, mix water and sugar until mixture feels like wet sand. Brush down any stray sugar crystals with wet pastry brush. Turn on heat to highest flame. Cook until smoking slightly and dark amber in color.

When color is achieved, very carefully pour in one cup of water. Caramel will jump and sputter about--have long sleeves on and be prepared to step back.

Whisk over medium heat until it has reduced slightly and feels sticky between two fingers. {Obviously wait for it to cool on a spoon before touching it.} Store unused caramel in a covered jar in the refrigerator indefinitely.

I had really cool pictures from the 2009 Foodbuzz Blogger Festival.

Really.

I looked at them on the train, and thought happy thoughts all week long about how when I could stop falling asleep every time I opened my eyes (me + red-eye flight = dead for a week) I could finally post all about my amazing adventures overcoming my hatred of crowds, and general sit-back-and-watch tendencies to make a new bucket full of food-loving friends. I met so many wonderful people!*  Of course, illustrations of my adventures would abound. After all, aren't you excited to see Pt Reyes cheese, and read about my take on the pastoral picture painted by the Cowgirl Creamery maven and my fetish paper ideas all at the same time? Yeah. I was excited to share that. And my camera, or my memory card, or something ATE almost all my pictures. Yesterday they were there, today they are not.

(I did eventually find Denise from Chez Us, which made me very happy, even if it was just to say "hi")

Maybe I should enjoy the irony of my camera eating my food pictures.

I'm not.

Here are a few highlights that survived the carnage (for a really great roundup, see Diana's day, plus a really great picture of her, moi and Kelly from the Pink Apron!):

I am so glad I went. It seemed a bit indulgent, leaving mid-semester just as things start to get hectic, this idea of flying across the US just to eat food, meet other bloggers, learn about new products, and see some friends. But you know what? It was worth it. So thank you Foodbuzz, and thank you Foodbuzz sponsers (Bertolli, Nature's Pride, Kikkoman, Kerrygold, Joie de Vivre, Mezzetta) for the work and effort you put into it. I want to bake you all yummy cookies.

*To make things less overwhelming, I will highlight two of the bloggers I met on each of my posts for the next 10 weeks or so, because that's how long it's going to take!

My racing self got pulled off a shelf, shined up, and sent out to run a 10K a week or so ago. Up and down, fast fast fast, my brain chanted, and my feet did their best to oblige. Lucky me, because waiting at the end were piles of plums just calling out to come home.

I resisted that plummy siren call until the plum attendants began crying "last call," and shoveling their wares into any willing bag. Then I surrendered. A whole plum clan came home, their blackish purple blue bellies set up camp on my table, insisting on covering every available surface (and some papers, too) as they jostled for space. Were they urban plums masquerading as settlers?

This morning saw the birth of that spot where enough and enough combine. A flurry of books made suggestions: jam, cake, tart, all ignored in favor of clafoutis's simple dessert meets breakfast song.

Plum Clafoutis
4 generous servings
4 plums, pits removed and sliced
1 1/2 tbsp unsalted buttter
4 tsp vanilla extract
6 eggs
1/8 tsp salt
3/4 cup all-purpose flour

1/3 cup sugar
1 cup 1% milk
1/4 cup half and half


Preheat your oven to 425. Heat a 9" cast-iron skillet over medium-high heat. Add 1/2 Tbsp butter and saute plum slices in the butter for one to two minutes, or until they start to turn translucent at the thinnes edges. Turn off the heat, remove plums from pan and set aside to cool. Add the remaining 1 Tbsp of butter to the skillet so it will melt from the remaining heat of the pan.

Combine vanilla, eggs and salt, and whisk together until well-blended. Add flour and sugar, and whisk until smooth. Whisk in milk and half and half until combined.


Pour batter into buttered skillet, then arrange plum slices on top, eating pieces as you go, because they taste a bit better when they're destined for somthing else. Bake at 425 for 30 minutes, or until puffed and golden and just an itty-bit dark on the edges (if you like it that way). Remove from heat, sprinkle with powdered sugar and top with a bit of lightly sweetened whipped cream. Sigh happily.

Repeat tomorrow?