A Fish Story

From sea to shining sea, our world’s waterways are teeming with fish, and it’s a good thing when you ponder the recommendation that everyone consumes three servings of fish per week, that’s a lot of fish in our plates!

The reason for this mass consumption of fish is simple: fish is heart healthy.  One serving of fish, even the fattier specimens, contains less cholesterol than one serving of red meat.  To boot, fatty fish including salmon and tuna are loaded with Omega3 fatty acids.  These fats are your friends, going to battle against harmful cholesterol in your body and also contributing their fair share of work in the antioxidant category.  Eating more fish is a win-win … well, except for the fish whose destiny is a date with your dinner plate.

There are numerous ways to enjoy fish.  Whether pan-fried, roasted, baked, poached, grilled or broiled, a fish fillet or steak can stand in as a starring entrée of any dinner, regardless of the menu’s culinary ethnicity.  In the French style Nicoise salad platter, the starring grilled tuna steak is surrounded by a variety of costars such as green beans, new potatoes, tomatoes, olives and hard-boiled eggs.  This is one of my personal summertime favorites.  When it comes to Asian appreciation, I must regularly frequent a Japanese eatery to feast on sushi and sashimi.  There is something blissfully carnal about savoring a cold, raw, deeply colored bite-sized slab of raw salmon or yellow fin tuna as it tantalizes the warm palate.  Okay, I’ll admit it.  If I’m preparing salmon or tuna at home for the grill or roasting pan, I have been known to slice off one of those bite-sized slivers for my personal enjoyment.  Classic French sole meuniere is among my home cooking repertoire, as is panko crusted salmon and seafood chowder.  Mexican fish tacos are all the rage these days, and Brian has perfected his recipe for them.  One of the most natural pairing of flavors is that of tuna and avocado, as with the tuna tartar that I made for a holiday appetizer.  Many Asian restaurants offer plates of alternating thin slices of tuna and avocado served atop a bed of seaweed salad.

For those who shy away from fish because they have an aversion to strong, fishy flavors, you can still get in your weekly quota of good health.  Stick with whiter fish varieties and season them with flavors that you do enjoy.  The combination of milder fish that is smothered with the flavors of tomato sauce, salsa, pesto or chili seasonings will make the meal enjoyable to your palate.

Be sure to make friends with your fishmonger; become a regular customer and they will sway you from fish that’s less than fresh, debone your fish and toss an extra shrimp or two on the pile for your cat.  I am fortunate to have a local fish market where the employees all know me and they have been in business for many, many years.  Of course, it helps that I am also fortunate to live on Long Island.  Surrounded by water, fish here is plentiful.  Over the next month, Long Islanders will be returning their boats to the water for the season.  Many of these boaters are avid fishermen who take to the ocean, the sound, the bays and the inlets in pursuit of our abundant fish, mollusks and crustaceans.  For the zoologically challenged, lobsters and shrimp comprise the crustaceans and clams, mussels, oysters and scallops fall into your mollusk category.

Cooking fish is easy and quick, so much so that is can easily be considered a home cooked fast food item.  Tuna steaks grill for about four minutes per side.  That’s eight minutes for my fellow math-challenged friends.  A salmon fillet roasts for twenty minutes in a 450-degree oven.  Pan-frying a fish requires just two minutes of your time per side.  As for the simplicity, always have some homemade sauces or jars of good salsa on hand.  A jar of salsa can be freshened up by stirring in a chopped tomato, some chopped fresh cilantro and a chopped fruit such as a mango, peach or pineapple.  Pour the salsa over a salmon fillet in a roasting pan and pop it into the oven.  One of my favorite dinner-in-a-hurry options is to generously smear homemade pesto over a fillet of Chilean sea bass and roast that.  It’s so simple and yet so flavorful.  To pan-fry sole, scrod, red snapper or other thin fish fillet, mix up a seasoned flour with flour, salt, pepper and a spice or two of your choice.  Dredge the fillets into the flour and then lay them in the hot olive oil or butter in a frying pan.  The fish will become golden brown and slightly crusty.

 

Are you ready to kick off your healthy dose of fish consumption?  This fish story has a happy and unexaggerated ending of three tasty ways to enjoy these creatures of the sea.  From the ocean waters to your table, enjoy!

Panko-Crusted Salmon with Sun-Dried Tomatoes

Ingredients:

1 pound salmon filet

3/4 cup panko breadcrumbs

½ teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper

1 teaspoon salt

4 cloves garlic, minced

¼ cup chopped fresh parsley

8 sun-dried tomatoes, chopped

Grated zest of 1 lemon

Extra virgin olive oil

Preheat oven to 450-degrees.  Place the salmon fillet, skin side down, on a baking sheet or in a shallow roasting pan.  In a mixing bowl, gently mix the panko, pepper, salt, garlic, parsley, sun-dried tomatoes and lemon zest until everything is combined.  Cover the entire surface of the salmon with the panko mixture.  Very lightly drizzle olive oil over the top.  Roast in the oven for 20 minutes and serve.  Serves two.

Serving suggestion: roast asparagus in the oven at the same time.  After grating the lemon zest for the above panko mixture, squeeze the juice from the lemon into a glass measuring cup.  Whisk in an equal amount of olive oil or walnut oil, add ½ teaspoon salt and ¼ teaspoon black pepper and then pour the mixture over the asparagus before roasting.  Why not roast the entire meal in that oven?  Start roasting a pan of new potatoes fifteen minutes before adding the salmon and asparagus into the oven.  A sauvignon blanc would be ideal to sip with this dinner.

Wasabi-crusted Tuna Steak

Ingredients:

2 tuna steaks

1 cup dried wasabi peas

½ teaspoon black sesame seeds

½ teaspoon white sesame seeds

1 teaspoon grated ginger

2 tablespoons soy sauce

1 teaspoon rice vinegar

1 tablespoons sesame oil

2 tablespoons thinly sliced scallions

Preheat oven to 450-degrees.  Place the wasabi peas in a food processor and process until coarsely ground.  Set aside.  Place the sesame seeds in a frying pan and toast over medium heat until the white seeds start to turn golden.  Remove from heat and transfer the toasted seeds to a glass measuring cup.  Add the ginger, soy sauce, rice vinegar and sesame oil to the cup and set aside.  Place the tuna steaks in a baking pan.  Firmly press the ground wasabi peas into the tuna so that they adhere, covering the entire surface.  Whisk the ingredients in the measuring cup thoroughly until combined, and then lightly drizzle the mixture evenly over the tuna steaks.  Place the tuna in the oven for 10-15 minutes.  Remove from the oven, sprinkle with the scallions and serve.  Serves two.

Serving suggestions: brown rice, lightly sautéed snow peas and a good craft beer.

Fish Tacos

Ingredients:

1 pound firm white fish such as scrod, monkfish or halibut

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 small red bell pepper, cut into matchstick strips

1 small green bell pepper, cut into matchstick strips

1 onion, thinly sliced

2 garlic cloves, minced

2 tablespoon lime juice

3 teaspoons chopped cilantro

½ teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon chili powder

2 garlic cloves, minced

Flour tortillas

Sour cream

Tomato salsa

Cut the fish into small bite-sized chunks.  Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium-high heat.  Stir-fry the peppers and onions until the onions are translucent and the peppers are crisp tender.  Add the garlic and sauté for another minute.  Stir in the fish, lime juice, cilantro, cumin and chili powder.  Cook and stir until everything is combined and the fish is opaque and cooked through.   Serve with flour tortillas for filling, along with sour cream and salsa for condiments. Serves two.

Serving suggestions: accompany with margaritas and guacamole dip with tortilla chips.  For a salad idea, try tossing tomato wedges with thinly sliced red onion, avocado wedges and diced jicama.

Food For Thought

Long Island’s waters are home to a diverse variety of fish and seafood, and fisherman have put in years of laborious work aboard their fishing vessels.  From Little Neck clams to Blue Point oysters, our fishing territory is also abundant with mussels, crabs, lobsters, tuna, striped bass, bluefish, flounder, cod and much, much more.  Long Islanders know seafood, perhaps better than anyone else in the continental U.S.  Chefs in restaurants from Manhattan to Greenport, and everyplace in between, have been experimenting with new recipes and conjuring up some amazing presentations for these jewels of the sea.  Visit one of the numerous seafood restaurants on your next dinner outing and savor one of your three weekly servings of fish.  Try the Lobster Roll North in Baiting Hollow, the Seafood Barge in Southold, the Sea Basin in Rocky Point, the Soundview in Greenport or Land and Sea in Mount Sinai for my favorite picks.  Land and Sea also has a complete fish market, so be sure to go home with some fish to cook up your second serving for the week.

 

Ingredient of the Month: Chives

Every kitchen gardener knows when spring has arrived, signaled by spring green shoots gloriously erupting through the soil and evolving into one of the most coveted herbs of garnishment: the chive. 

Chives are one of the hardiest herbs and the easiest to grow.  They require no maintenance, are the first to make their appearance in the spring, endure all the way through the festive cooking projects of Thanksgiving dinner, and they faithfully return year after year. 

Used primarily for its long slender leaves, chives are actually the smallest member of the family that spans onions, leeks, garlic and shallots.  The leaves of this herb are hollow and usually snipped to desired lengths with kitchen scissors.  In late spring, lavender-hued blooms erupt from among the chive’s leaves.  These flowers are edible and add a pretty pastel touch to spring salads.

Chives add mild flavor and flecks of bright green color to corn bread, mashed potatoes, rice pilafs, omelets, dips, salad dressings, and cheddar biscuits.  Their brilliant emerald hue encourages generous sprinkling for a decorative finishing touch to fish, potatoes, soups and bisques.

Chives are best when harvested from your own garden immediately before use.  During the colder winter months, fresh chives can be purchased from the supermarket.  Seek only those with bright green leaves, devoid of any brown or yellow, and be sure that they are not wilted.  Do not waste your money on dried chives from the spice section of the supermarket, they offer no flavor advantage whatsoever.

Chives are one of the key herbs used to make the fines herbes combination often used in French cuisine, along with tarragon, chervil and parsley.

If you have been revisited by chives in your garden every year, but have snubbed the rather ubiquitous green blades in lieu of stronger ingredients such as minced garlic or chopped rosemary, reacquaint some of your favorite dishes with the addition of this underappreciated herb.  Next time you prepare scrambled eggs, toss some into the pan.  The next soup you present at the table, whether a warming bowl of cream of mushroom or a chilled summer vichyssoise, finish the presentation with a final sprinkle of chives over each serving.  Preparing some appetizers of smoked salmon with cream cheese and horseradish over toasts?  Add some flecks of spring over them before serving.  Take any classic favorite recipe and incorporate some chives into the ingredients to create a new incarnation that welcomes spring.  This is exactly what I have done in this recipe for gourgere, a French gruyere-infused choux pastry that is piped into a ring and then baked until golden and puffy.  Personally, I think this cheesy delight makes the most perfect lunch when accompanied by a salad and a glass of wine.

GOURGERE WITH CHIVES

Ingredients:

1/3 cup butter

¾ cup whole milk

¾ cup flour

3 eggs

1/3 cup chives, snipped crosswise to half-inch lengths

1 ½ cups shredded Gruyere cheese

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  In a large sauce pan, heat the butter and the milk over medium heat until the butter is melted.  Add all of the flour (throw it all in at once) into the pot.  Constantly stir the mixture over medium heat until it all clumps together into a ball that does not stick on the sides of the pot.  Note: this process is making a choux.  Remove the pot from the heat and cool slightly, about 10 minutes.  Still keeping the pot off of the heat, add the eggs, one at a time, stirring vigorously to incorporate each egg before adding the next one.  Once all of the eggs have been well mixed in, stir in ¾ cup of the cheese and the chives until they have been mixed through.  Spoon the mixture onto a nonstick baking sheet, arranging it to form a ring.  Sprinkle the remaining cheese around the top of the gourgere, then place into the oven and bake for 30 minutes or until billowy and browned.  Just as with a soufflé, the gourgere will deflate once removed from the oven.  Cut into wedges, like a pie, and serve immediately.

This Month's Flavor: France

When someone poses the question ‘What is your favorite cuisine?’ I immediately launch into an inner struggle, ever vacillating between two possible responses.  I am the central divide on a tug-of-war rope.  On one side is the Italian team, offering up such indulgences as lasagna, cannolis, cheese and wine.  On the other side is an equally strong competitor, team Francais, offering comforting stews, luscious cream pastries and, well, cheese and wine.  Hmm, a very perplexing choice indeed.

Perhaps being half French yields the slight advantage of giving just the bit of edge to pull my response in favor of my heritage; the varied cuisines of France may win out by a fractional margin.

To be appreciated in French fare are the various influences, to which we may thank the surrounding nations that hug France’s borders.  Most people think of French cooking as the sophisticated haute cuisine found in the capital city’s upscale Paris restaurants, and on one level there’s nothing wrong with that.  I mean, what’s not to love about rich creamy sauces and decadent desserts?  Geographically however, France has embraced the benefit of taking the influencing flavors from its neighbors, incorporating these prime ingredients that each region has to offer, and offering a country of culinary styles that are varied enough to please any palate.

From the eastern Alsace region which borders Germany, we can enjoy such tasty eats as quiche, a savory single-crust tart with a cheese custard-like filling studded with bacon, ham or shellfish and often vegetables as well.  Choucroute also hails from this region, a platter of cabbage cooked in wine along with several different sausages and/or cuts of pork, potatoes and carrots, seasoned with juniper berries and herbs.  Some wonderful beers are crafted in this region as well; and speaking of beverages, nestled right in between Paris and the Alsace region of France is the origin of bubbling happiness from the Champagne region.

Traveling a bit further south along the eastern border, such delicacies from Switzerland grace the French table, including fondue, the perfect pairing of melted cheeses and crusty baguette.

To the south, France shares some of its border with Italy, and both nations engage in Mediterranean cookery that includes key ingredients such as olives, tomatoes, olive oil, garlic, herbs, seafood and what many of us would call summer vegetables, such as zucchini, peppers and eggplant.  Provence is the crowning mecca of this region, giving rise to ratatouille, a vegetable stew, as well as a seafood stew called bouillabaisse, aioli which is a garlicky mayonnaise best enjoyed as a dip for vegetables, and pistou which is actually the French form of pesto.  Soupe au pistou is basically a soup of summer vegetables that is served with a topping of pistou.

Spain borders the southwest corner of France.  From here we enjoy spicy sausages, tomatoes and peppers. One well-known comforting dish of this area is the cassoulet, featuring sausages and white beans.

The Burgundy region offers many of the dishes that our minds evoke when we think of French cooking, such as boeuf bourguignon, coq au vin and chicken Dijon, all of which are entrees cooked with wine, the stellar ingredient that is vastly produced in this area.

With the Atlantic Ocean washing over the western shores, oysters are an abundant indulgence in France.  The west coast is also teeming with mushrooms and truffles.  The western region of Normandy produces apples for cider and for Calvados, as well as Camembert cheese. 

Finally as we move inward we traverse through Auvergne, home of some renowned cheeses including Bleu d’Auvergne; and the Brittany region where crepes are prepared in many a kitchen.

To summarize, each region of France has something special to showcase, a starring ingredient that is utilized in the kitchen to full advantage.  Foods are chosen and prepared according to what the local market has to offer in its particular climate.

I now pass along to you a recipe for ratatouille.  While many of us cannot take in the suggestion of this dish without visions of a certain cute animated rodent sharing the nomenclature dancing in our heads, this is one of the simplest French dishes to prepare.  It is versatile, in that it can be served in a number of presentations, and it can be very flexible in its ingredients.  Don't have a zucchini on hand, but have a couple of yellow squash in your fridge?  No problem.  Got a red bell pepper instead of a green one?  Use that.  As long as you have the requisite squash-eggplant-tomato-onion-bell pepper combination, it will be comforting and delicious.  It is also very rustic in its preparation; vegetables can simply be coarsely chopped into chunks rather than taking the time to finely and uniformly cut the ingredients.  The following is a slight variation on my mother's basic recipe for ratatouille.  Some other variations and serving suggestions will follow, but always start with this base recipe.

Ratatouille

Ingredients:

1 coarsely chopped onion

4 chopped cloves of garlic

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 eggplant, unpeeled, cut into large cubes

2-3 tomatoes, coarsely chopped

1 zucchini, sliced crosswise

1 large green bell pepper, coarsely chopped

2 teaspoons fresh thyme leaves

1 bay leaf

2 teaspoons fresh oregano, chopped

2 teaspoons fresh basil, chopped

First, sauté the onion and garlic in olive oil in a Dutch oven.  Then add the eggplant cubes and sauté.  Once the eggplant begins to brown, add all remaining ingredients.  Simmer for about one hour, uncovered, stirring occasionally.  For a soupier texture, cover the pot while simmering.  Season to taste with salt and pepper.  Serves 3-4.

The ratatouille can be served as is, alongside a main dish.  Another option is to serve it over pasta. 

Ratatouille can also be served as a main vegetarian dish in the following presentation:

Make the ratatouille.  Saute four bags of fresh spinach until cooked. Arrange the spinach on three plates.   Meanwhile, broil three portabello mushroom caps until they start to brown.  Place one mushroom cap in the center of each plate, right on top of the bed of spinach.  Ladle the ratatouille over the mushroom cap and spinach.

Here is another interesting twist:

Make the ratatouille.  During the last 20 minutes of simmering, add one can of chick peas, drained and rinsed, and also half of a cup of kalamata olives.  When ready to serve, ladle the ratatouille over couscous.

Lastly, if you have a husband like mine who simply must have his meat, here is a main dish compromise that will satisfy the meat lover in your life: 

Before sautéing the onions and garlic, first brown six chicken drumsticks in the olive oil until browned on all sides.  Remove.  Saute the onions and garlic, then the eggplant.  When adding all of the remaining ingredients, add the drumsticks as well, cover the pot and simmer until the juices from the chicken run clear when poked with a fork.  

For a change, you could substitute six Italian sausages for the chicken drumsticks, following the same order of cooking as in the chicken recipe above.  This would pair well served over pasta.

Cooking up a pot of ratatouille is an opportune way in which to use up the influx of harvested summer vegetables that begin taking over your counter at the end of the season.

While the cooking of France is diversified and delicious, if I had to be completely honest, I think that this virtual tug of war will be tied to the bitter end, as I will always equally embrace the tasty ingredients, enticing aromas, culinary cultures and oh so heavenly dishes that both the French and Italian tables alike have to offer.

Savor the Spuds

The countdown to the holiday season begins, as Thanksgiving soon leads the way into tree-trimming parties and gift gathering frenzies.  Another year will see its conclusion, but what a way to go; ushering the year's end with holiday feast after feast for two months sounds pretty good to me.   We begin with the Thanksgiving turkey day tradition on which we eat ourselves into a tryptophan-induced comatose oblivion.  A month later the Christmas Eve feast of seven fishes rolls around, followed by the elegant Christmas Day dinner.  With only a week to recover from those two meals of indulgence, then it's the New Year's Eve cocktail parties and the New Year's Day dinner to embrace good luck for the coming new year, and to feed the resulting hangover from said New Year's Eve cocktail party.  Let us not forget all of the little gatherings in between to trim trees, bake cookies, engage in shopping marathons and team up for gift-wrapping sessions.  We endure office parties with coworkers that you swear you have seen quite enough of at work already; and meet up for drinks with old friends that you know you should have been meeting up with all along during the preceding ten months.  November through January first is truly a foodie's paradise indeed!


We kick off the season with the traditional Thanksgiving turkey repast.  Thanksgiving dinners have come a long way since the pilgrim's debut of this annual tradition.  With the emergence of ethnic ingredients in our markets, the basic components of a traditional Thanksgiving dinner can now be jazzed up into platefuls of culinary intrigue to tantalize the palate.  One specimen of this creative cookery is the humble potato.


The ancient Incas cultivated the potato thousands of years ago; now hundreds of varieties are available around the globe.  We have the russet potato, also called the Idaho potato for its place of origin when first developed.  Picture a naked Mr. Potato Head, if you will.  The long tuber with its thick and rough brown skin is the spud of choice for making baked potatoes or French fries.  Round potatoes come dressed in very thin white or red skins, and are ideal for boiling, roasting, and making mashed potatoes.  My favorite potato for roasting or mashing is the Yukon Gold potato, which has a gorgeous creamy-textured golden flesh.  New potatoes are basically young round white, red or Yukon gold potatoes.  Often referred to as baby potatoes, they are perfect for roasting or boiling with little preparation involved, as the skins are wispy and therefore do not need to be peeled; and the potatoes are small enough to cook halved or even whole, so little to no cutting is necessary here either.  Potatoes which are shaped and sized like a thumb are called fingerling potatoes and are just as effortless to cook as new potatoes.  I love the blue potatoes I have recently been purchasing.  They are readily available in both the new potato and the fingerling variety; and unlike many blue or purple vegetables, they do retain their color throughout the cooking process.  Finally, we have the sweet potato, a large tuber with a thick coppery skin and a deep orange flesh.  Although much firmer than the aforementioned potatoes, it cooks up moist and tender and can be used in many of the typical potato preparations.


For weekday side dishes, roasting some new potatoes with olive oil, salt and pepper works just fine.  For Thanksgiving dinner, however, add some more flavor and dimension to that roasting pan, such as a combination of chopped fresh herbs and some grated pecorino romano cheese.  Thinking about potatoes au gratin?  Make it extra special by substituting basic cheddar with a goat cheese, or a combination of a blue cheese with gruyere.  You could even use both Yukon golds and sweet potatoes to make a gratin that will offer up wow factor.  Another option for the Thanksgiving side is the twice-baked potato, in which the potato is baked, halved, the flesh then hollowed out into a bowl and mixed with some other flavor-boosting ingredients such as cheeses, herbs, garlic, onion, chopped bacon, etc. and then stuffed back into the skins and baked once again.  The possibilities here are endless.  


By far the most popular starchy side on Thanksgiving remains the mashed presentation.  Mashed potatoes do not have to be boring run-of-the-mill potatoes mashed with milk, butter, salt and pepper.  No, there are infinite opportunities to create here too.  Mashed potatoes benefit from the addition of such ingredients as roasted garlic, truffles, rosemary, chives, corn, even chopped chili peppers or wasabi.  You could even boil a root vegetable, such as parsnips or celery root, and mash that along with the potato for an added flavor dimension. Here is a recipe that I came up with one day, rather effortlessly, just by grabbing things off the shelf of the pantry and spice rack.  It turned out to be one of those occasional culinary gems I concocted that turned out to be a winner.
Smokey Chipotle Mashed Potatoes (4-6 servings)
Ingredients:   
3 Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks   
2 sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
½ cup sour cream
½ cup heavy cream
1 teaspoon chipotle chili powder

½ teaspoon liquid smoke

Salt, to taste

Place cut-up potatoes in a large stock pot (not a nonstick pot), then fill pot with water.  Bring potatoes to a boil.  Reduce heat slightly and allow potatoes to continue a low boil for about 30 minutes, or until very tender. Drain the potatoes, making sure to shake the colander several times in order to drain as much water as possible.  Return potatoes to the same pot.  Add sour cream, heavy cream, chipotle chili powder and liquid smoke to the pot.  Using the highest setting on an electric hand-held mixer, beat potatoes until they are well mashed and blended.  If they appear too stiff, add more sour cream, a little at a time, until desired consistency is achieved.  Mix in salt to taste.  The flavorings for this can be adjusted to your personal taste: if you want more heat, add more of the chili powder; if you want a smokier flavor, add more liquid smoke - a little at a time, a little of the liquid smoke goes a long way on flavor.

This is how you put a not-so-traditional spin on flavor to some of your traditional Thanksgiving dinner courses.  Start turning your kitchen into a laboratory, peruse your spice rack, herb garden, pantry shelves and your refrigerator's dairy ingredients, and let the creative experimentation begin now so that your ingenious creation will be tweaked and ready for presentation once the holiday table is set.  Sure, Thanksgiving is a traditional American holiday; but there is no reason you cannot infuse some of your family's ethnic heritage into the mix.  You could even abandon tradition altogether and season the basic dishes with ingredients which center around a theme cuisine which you are particularly fond of, whether that turns out to be Italian or southwestern American or Cajun.  Be creative, but also be warned: after this year's sampling, invitees may be counting on a permanent seating at your future holiday tables!

Ode to the Pumpkin

The month of October brings forth the annual pilgrimages by all to the nearest pumpkin patch.  On Long Island, the entire eastern north fork is devoted to the quest, evidenced by the clogging traffic congestion on roads whose designers never anticipated such volume.  The surrounding wineries, farm stands and restaurants have all capitalized on the pumpkin picking weekends as they offer fall festivals which become more and more spectacular each season.  We all visit the various farms that beckon to come and pick their pumpkins - pay us to complete our harvest so we don't have to!  It's all in fun, after all what would a front porch on Halloween be without the jack-o-lantern sentries to welcome our guests?  Uncarved pumpkins of varying size and color strategically arranged with colorful mums make for a warming entrance into our homes throughout November as well.


The pumpkin is a member of the gourd family, as are other squash and, yes, the watermelon.  Pumpkins have been a crop of North America dating back to the native Indians.  Embraced by the settlers who colonized America, it quickly earned its rightful place on the Thanksgiving table as pumpkin pie, this presentation retaining the starring role in Thanksgiving tradition ever since.


This year the white pumpkin is all the rage in sophisticated fall decor since they graced the covers of home magazines.  The humble round orange pumpkin has evolved indeed to a variety of sizes, shapes and colors.  I saw white ones, I saw hunter green ones, I saw buff shades and sagey grey-green hues.  There was even a plum-purple variety on display.  With all of the choices that abound, the best laid seasonal display for your home is a carefully chosen selection of several different specimens; and then the orange guys are destined to be carved into grinning and grimacing faces to adorn the steps and porch railings that surround our front doors.


What about the ones that don't make the cut for the role of Jack?  There are pumpkin recipes galore from September through November.  We can't run away from the pumpkins that surround us.  Their flavors, enhanced with autumn spices, appear to us wherever we turn, from pumpkin spiced latte at the coffee house and pumpkin doughnuts at every bakery to pumpkin-filled ravioli in the Italian markets and pumpkin bisques in the restaurants' stock pots.   Most recipes call for using canned pumpkin; Libby's is one brand, simply pureed pumpkin without added seasonings, it is perfectly acceptable for any recipe whether sweet or savory.  However, if you have an overabundance of pumpkins that your overzealous excitement loaded into the wagon out on that  pumpkin picking expedition, why not use them up?  They do make a perfect seasonal decoration through the Thanksgiving Day feast, but we all know darned well that the day after the feast, you'll be joyously evicting those pumpkins in lieu of reindeer and snowmen.


The process should be simple enough, much like baking an acorn squash.  Take the pumpkin and halve it.  Scoop out all of the seeds - by the way, a melon baller works wonders for that task.  Lightly rub the cut side with melted butter and place, cut side down, in a roasting pan.  If the pumpkin is large, you may need to use two roasting pans and you may need to cut it into quarters or even eighths.   Generally the smaller the pumpkin, the more tender it will be.  Place in a 425-degree oven for about an hour.  Remove from the oven, flip over the pieces so that the cut sides are face-up, a spoon should easily go deep into the flesh with no resistance, otherwise return to the oven and keep checking every fifteen minutes.  Once cooked, allow to cool completely, then scoop out the flesh.  Place the flesh into a very fine-meshed sieve, place the sieve over a large bowl and allow to drain for a couple of hours.  You don't want that added liquid that seeps out to end up ruining your recipe.  Next toss the pumpkin into the food processor and puree it, then deposit it into some tupperware and you're ready to cook!  My husband Brian is already being enlisted for a repeat performance of a pumpkin bisque he made a few years ago; it was creamy, velvety bliss.


If you reserve the seeds from the pumpkin, they can be husked and toasted.  These nutty-flavored toasted pumpkin seeds, called pepitas, are healthy snacks and also often used to top soups, salads and some Mexican dishes.


Here is the recipe for my grandmother's pumpkin bread, which she passed down to me when I was engaged to be married; it has become an annual fall tradition ever since.


Pumpkin Bread
Ingredients:   
2 ½ cups flour
2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon nutmeg

2 eggs

½ cup vegetable oil

1 15-ounce can pumpkin

½ teaspoon vanilla

1 cup coarsely chopped walnuts

1 cup raisins

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Grease and flour two loaf pans.  Mix all ingredients.  Divide batter between two pans.  Bake for 1¼  hours.  Cool before removing from pans; do not cut until completely cooled.  Makes 2 loaves.

Alternative: for my fellow chocolate lovers out there, substitute 1 cup of chocolate chips for the raisins.  I came up with this idea and acted on it one year, to the delight of my chocolate-loving husband.  Grandma loved chocolate as well, so I do not think she would disapprove!

Happy Halloween!

Tonight is the night the full moon loves most, 
     when ghouls and ghosts and goblins host ...


You too can host an elegant autumn repast to celebrate the holiday.  With the upswing of fall festivals complete with pumpkin picking, cider-sipping and getting lost in corn mazes, the increasingly elaborate haunted house tours and haunted hayrides, and more and more dramatic Halloween decorations popping up on front porches and gardens, everyone is getting into the act these days.  Halloween, it isn't just for children anymore.  While you may no longer pass for that delightfully cute trick-or-treating tot, leave the cheap candies and the bobbing for apples to the kids.  You can still enjoy some tasty treats with a few of your friends to make the holiday special to a grown-up's taste.  Incidentally, a note about the cheap candies: we are all guilty of this so by all means, go ahead, sift your way through the trick-or-treat bowl and fish out the favorites from your own childhood to hoard for yourself!  My guilty pleasures here are Nutrageous, Snickers and peanut or almond M&Ms.


Whether the imagination and creativity of a costume party is your idea of a Halloween celebration of choice, or a sit-down dinner at a festively staged table scape steadfastly remains your comfort zone, preparing a spread worthy of the occasion is as easy as incanting abracadabra over your stove. 


Focus on foods and beverages that reflect the seasonal colors and the flavors of a fall harvest.  Start with some drinks to welcome your guests, the darker in color the better.  A dark malty stout would fit the beer bill perfectly.  A couple of mixed drinks which would be perfect include a dark chocolate-espresso martini - it's as close to black in color as you can get - and the bloody-red pommegranate martini.  For the entree of the meal, I would recommend a roast, such as the pork roast in the recipe below which cooks with fall apples.  Sides can be any of fall's colorful bounty, such as baked acorn squash, roast butternut squash puree, brussels sprouts, purple potatoes, or a combination of roasted root vegetables which will showcase all of the colors of fall.  For dessert, bake up something sinful and decorate it specially for the occasion.  I will be making dark chocolate cupcakes with orange - both in color AND in flavor - frosting; then each will be finished with three candy corns on top.


The setting aids in staging the Halloween mood.  For background sound, sure you could use one of those recordings of scary sound effects, or a mix of Halloween songs; or if you are trying for the more sophisticated gathering I find that the Bach concerto is a perfect accompaniment to the evening.  In areas where guests will tend to congregate, arrange some bowls filled with quality chocolates and good candies in colors of black, orange and white.  A perfect example for this would be the Jelly Belly gourmet jelly beans in the aforementioned colors.  To enhance a mood of eeriness, limit lighting in the dining room and living room to the dancing flames of numerous candles set around.  For the table, I saw a perfect tablecloth in the JC Penney catalog: black with satiny black striping.  I would set out white dishes with that for contrast and elegant flare, and place a white mini pumpkin at each place to follow through the black-and-white theme.  Then for Halloween accent I would top each plate with an orange napkin.  Down the center of the table, try votif candles and pumpkins of varying colors, shapes and sizes.  So easy, lighting, music, table scape and seasonal menu are the makings for a perfect holiday, costumes optional.

Pork Tenderloin with Apples and Fennel
Ingredients: 
2 pork tenderloins
1/4 cup apple cider
2 tablespoons thyme leaves
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon smoked paprika
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon chipotle chili powder
1 teaspoon salt


3 very firm apples, such as granny smith, cored, cut into thick wedges
2 fennel bulbs, halved, cored, sliced crosswise


Additional extra virgin olive oil for drizzling
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Salt
Fresh cracked black pepper


Preheat oven to 450-degrees.  In a small bowl combine cider, thyme, 2 tablespoons olive oil, brown sugar, smoked paprika, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, chipotle chili powder and 1 teaspoon salt. Rub mixture all over the pork, then place pork in the center of a large roasting pan.  Mix together the fennel and apple in a large bowl.  Drizzle with additional olive oil, add 1 teaspoon cinnamon. Toss to coat.  Season to taste with salt and pepper.  Arrange the fennel and apple around the pork in the roasting pan.  Roast for 30-40 minutes.  Serves four.


One redeeming quality about this dish is that it can be prepared in advanced, as could a couple of side dishes which would also roast at the same time in separate pans.  You could potentially take a sip from your drink, disappear into the kitchen, slip the entire meal into the oven, walk out and nod a response to somebody's conversation without missing a beat.  Plan to sit down late, after the visiting ghoulies and goonies have trickled down so that you aren't engaging in an evening cardio workout as you jump up and down to placate the trick-or-treaters who come a-knockin'.  One more tip for a little added fun to your gathering: rent a couple of horror flicks to watch after dinner over dessert and coffee.  My top picks? 'The Exorcist', 'Carrie', 'Dracula' (either the 1931 Tod Browning version starring Bela Lugosi or the 1992 film by Francis Ford Coppola) and George Romero's 1968 'Night of the Living Dead'.


Happy Halloween!