Yashim Weekend (a Two-fer)

If you look to the right of this screen and scroll down a bit, Dear Reader, you will encounter the archive summary that I have captured and included to the left. Each triangle opens the months of a given year, with additional triangles revealing our individual posts. The parenthetical digits are a tally of our posts for each month and year.

The earliest years were our most active, with a brisk pace of two posts a week in 2011 and one and a half for a few more years, and averaging the titular one post per week for a few years after that. In 2018, alas, our pace has fallen off. With the holidays (which include a lot of comfort food and little time for experimentation) behind us and my sabbatical ahead of me, I decided that this weekend was my chance to build on last weekend's success and try to establish a stronger pace for the new year.

I was ambitious enough to bring Jason Goodwin's Yashim Cooks Istanbul: Culinary Adventures in the Ottoman Kitchen to our weekend house, and lazy enough to select two of its easier (or so it seemed) recipes.

I did not realize until after the fact (thanks to my favorite librarian) that January is National Soup Month. I am glad that my choice for a simple dinner Friday evening was a lentil soup, perhaps the simplest recipe in the whole book and ideal for Friday evening. It is the first recipe attempted by the fictional detective Yashim in the mystery series that led to the creation of this most unusual cookbook.

For this I sautéed onions and garlic in a mix of butter and olive oil (decadent!) and then added a potato (peeled and hand-shredded), red lentils, vegetable stock (in lieu of the called-for chicken stock), and a few spices.

This simmered for about a half hour; in the final few minutes, I prepared the soup's topping. I heated olive oil in our indispensable cast-iron skillet and stirred in mint leaves and a combination of crushed red peppers and paprika. This was the perfect compliment to the rather subtle flavor and creamy texture of the soup itself. Next time I'll search look in different grocery for the pul biber Turkish pepper and I will use more of the mint, since it shrivels.

Yashim Cooks

Buoyed by the success of the soup, I tried something a bit more ambitious on leisure-cooking Saturday. Chicken with pomegranate and walnut seems to be among the simplest recipes in the book, and though it was not complicated, I should have started it a bit earlier in the afternoon than I did. The first step was to prepare a pomegranate syrup. Since I could not find it in our local grocery, I followed the simple recipe that Goodwin provides on the page before the main recipe.

This is really just a simple syrup -- he calls for 1.5 pints of pomegranate juice, 1 cup of sugar, and the juice of one lemon. He cautions that this is more of an activity than a recipe, and advises "vigorous and relentless stirring" for up to an hour. So I turned on my WBUR app and settled into my whisking zone. At the time I made the video above, all was going well, though I was beginning to wonder about the crucial word "until" in the directions, as in "until it reduces to a syrup."

I have made other syrups, and used what has worked before, which is simply a wild guess that when the volume had been reduced by about 2/3, it would be close to ready. I was, in fact, afraid that it might be a bit thin. My relentless vigor, it turned out, was for naught. As soon as I removed the pan from heat, the syrup began to adhere to the sides, quickly dry out, and smoke. I tried to salvage what was left by pouring it into a bowl, but the physics were still operating the same way. When I got back from disarming the smoke detector in the hallway, there was just a couple ounces of syrup, rapidly reducing. I poured it into yet another bowl, forming a perfect hard shell.

An hour into the process -- but all caught up with the TED Radio Hour -- I turned the page to the recipe at hand. Fortunately, I had prepped a few things with my non-whisking hand. This dish begins with browning chicken thighs, and then removing them to a plate. In the same pan, I sautéed onions until translucent and then returned the chicken to the pan, on top of the onions. I added water (broth was another option) and later finely chopped walnuts (Goodwin suggested a mortar or electric blender, but I just minced madly for a while), turmeric, a few other spices,

At the end, I generously garnished with the seeds of one pomegranate. The result was quite delicious, despite the absence of pomegranate syrup, and I will definitely try this again. But I will leave the question of "until" to the professionals by purchasing the syrup somewhere.

Watch this space for more Yashim cooking. We have been in Istanbul only once, during a layover last year on our way to Jordan.  Our experience -- though quite brief -- of food in that part of the world is my motivation to delve more deeply into this volume!

Lagniappe: I am posting a teaser here about National Clam Chowder Day -- February 25 -- in hopes that readers will help me remember that one a couple days ahead of time (as I will need to plan a visit to the fishmongers).

A tasty combination

Knowing how much we enjoyed cooking seafood, for Christmas our thoughtful child went to an olive oil and vinegar shop and asked the proprietor what to recommend for cooking fish. They walked out having purchased some Baklouti Green Chili Pepper Olive Oil and Alfoos Mango White Balsamic Vinegar. But that's not all they did. They then went to a Spirit shop and showed the condiments to the shopkeeper and asked what wine to pair with them. A 2016 Poully Fuisse from the Maison Louis Latour was the answer.

Last night we stopped at our favorite fishmonger and picked up some haddock. While James went rowing Pam stayed at the beach house to prepare the fish. It was simply cooked in plenty of the olive oil then drizzled with the vinegar before eating. The spicy-sweet combination of flavors did indeed blend exceptionally well with the wine. 

So glad we raised our child to be a food and wine snob. And happy that we did not use all of the oil and vinegar so we can enjoy this dish again!

Classic Beef Stew (Wets)

Gift card in hand, we headed to Trader Joe's on the day after Christmas and bought (among other things) some stewing beef. I wanted to make a childhood favorite using the classic beef, potato, and carrots mix I remembered from my youth. It seemed only fitting that a classic dish should come from a classic cookbook, so I used the recipe from the Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book. I made only minor deviations from the recipe. Instead of vegetable juice cocktail and "instant beef boullion granules" (I don't even know what those are) I used a can of tomato sauce and some beef stock from a box. I also used tri-colored baby carrots instead of sliced carrots, and skipped the celery all together. 

Some tasty comfort food for the holiday week. 

A final note on the title of the post: when I was growing up my father always pronounced the name of this dish backwards - "wets".

Med-School Turkish Chicken

During the fall 2018 semester, I had the heaviest teaching load of my semester, and though I continued to cook a lot, I did not take much time for innovation. I apparently took even less for blogging about it -- not only did I fall off my share of the once-per-week blogging, but I even did cook a new recipe and forgot what it was before I could get it into this space. Sorry, dear readers.

With grades (though not grade-haggling) from that semester behind me, I am happily embarking on a very different sort of semester: a sabbatical! I will still teach an online course (the chance to do extra work is my university's approach to equitable pay), but will have no in-person classes. I have plenty of academic work to do, but at my own pace. Which means more blogging, including food blogging.

It is perhaps appropriate that my comeback recipe is from fellow academics. Some time in the early 2000s (no publication date is given), the International Club of the University of Massachusetts  Medical School self-published Mélange (An International Cookbook). The publisher -- Fundcraft -- is still very much in business, but its on-line ordering is not working at the moment, so it is not clear whether the book is still available. I have no idea how or when we acquired it.

These are not professional cooks, but rather professional students sharing their favorite recipes and, by extension, their cultures from throughout the world. It is a wonderful little volume we should consult more often! As far as I can tell, its only previous appearance here was Pam's 2013 Syrian Rice post.

So, what did I cook? Contributors Fiorenza and Erdem Orberk call it Cerkez Chicken, in reference to the Caucasian people who were displaced to Turkey by the Russian invasion of the 1830s. Herewith, the recipe as they wrote it:

Click to enlarge

I was looking for this because we had several boneless chicken breasts that I needed to prepare; I used these instead of a whole chicken, and assumed that "simmer" in this case is equivalent to poach. I simmered them until cooked through. Because this did not yield a genuine stock, I substituted a vegetable stock. I should probably have used less than the 2 cups called for.

We had chopped walnuts onhand, which I further minced, along with half a red bell pepper. (The other half went into our dinner salad.) With no old bread on hand, I used a couple handfuls of Triscuits.

Otherwise, I followed the directions above and added one step that I assume was intended: I put this in a small casserole dish, with the pepper-butter mixture drizzled on top, and baked at 350 for 25 minutes. Honestly, it could have used a bit more heat and a bit less liquid. Still, this was a lean, delicious meal that we will be repeating.

I will also be browsing Mélange in some of my upcoming spare time!

Lagniappe: This geographer could not resist providing a bit more information about the Cerkez (also known as Circassian) expulsion. The map below is from The Politics of Genocide Claims and the Circassian Diaspora, published by Martin W. Lewis in GeoCurrents, January 24, 2012.

Map by Martin W. Lewis; Click to enlarge

Recetas: The Big Picture

Readers of this blog know that we enjoy cooking and that we cook often. Our kitchens are full of cooking tools and staples; when we shop for food, it is ingredients that we buy. Because most people do not have a blog on "making food" (as it is called), we already knew that we were outliers.

But today's rebroadcast of the Future of Food Shopping story on The Innovation Hub suggests that we -- and people who use this blog -- are becoming quite scarce. Industry analyst Eddie Yoon found than only 15 percent of adults in the United States both enjoy cooking and do so regularly.

He replicated that research more recently -- in a time with more cooking shows on television than ever before are reaching record audiences -- and found that the number had dropped. Only 10 percent of us enjoy cooking and do it regularly. His discussion with Boston-based journalist Kara Miller examines both the decline in interest in cooking and the fact that those who do enjoy cooking are doing so less. They move on to discuss how the food industry might respond to these trends, and none of what they suggest is very encouraging!

As we discuss often with our friends in the Equal Exchange Action Forum, industrial food systems already prioritize convenience at the expense of environmental health, economic fairness, and community development. We hope that some of the hundreds of cooking stories in this blog can help readers find their way to a greater interest in -- perhaps even a passion for -- the preparation of their own food. And whether you cook more or not, please consider joining the Forum.

Lagniappe

The discussion with Eddie Yoon is one of three segments in an hour-long episode entitled Watch What You Eat. One is about the growing importance of cooking on television; the other is about the role of the car in making restaurants the leading source of food for people in the United States.

Spicy Slow-Roasted Salmon with Cucumbers and Feta

When James and I bought our beach house one of our intentions was that on Thursday nights we would buy some fresh seafood for me to prepare there while he went out on his whaleboat row and then we would have dinner together when he returned from the sea. We actually pull this off quite infrequently, but last night we managed to make it happen. 

Our dinner preparations started with a visit to the fishmonger. Traffic at rush hour wasn't too bad, but was made worse by the fact that we were three cars behind a "texter" at the traffic light in the left-turn lane who was oblivious to the fact that he had a green arrow despite the fact that multiple cars were honking at him. He finally made his turn just as the regular green light came on, the rest of us in line then took our chances going through the light behind him. As it turned out he was going to the same place we were, so we caught up with him at the store, which we we were afraid might be closed because as we approached we saw the parking lot was empty - an unprecedented situation in our experience. The texter pulled up just ahead of us, but did not immediately get out of the car (likely to finish whatever conversation he was in the middle of at the light). I told James to get out fast, so he could beat him inside. No telling what the texter would find to distract himself with once he had his turn at the counter. James headed inside and several other cars then pulled into the lot as well. The texter eventually got out of his vehicle and went inside, too. I waited in the car with our crazy dog and couldn't understand why James was taking so long, so long in fact that someone who went in after him came out ahead of him.

It turned out that there was a new person (a young woman) working at the counter who offered to remove the skin from the salmon filet James had selected, but she really didn't know how. Another employee (a young man) offered to help, but the young woman insisted on trying it herself. Finally an (older, male) employee, one James recognized from our many visits took care of it. Then he had the young woman weigh the filet again "just for this customer" which saved us $3. James also had to make a final statement to the young male employee, admonishing him for calling the other employee a "girl". The young woman, I was happy to learn, also stood up for herself on that one. 

Anyway, once James had done his part to smash the patriarchy, we were headed home and I began preparations for the meal, which came from the New York Times Cooking page.

Our indispensable cast-iron skillet was put to good use. First I heated some olive oil and then added a variety of spices (see recipe below). Once the oil was cooked with the spices the filet was placed in the pan, basted with the oil, and then put into a 300 degree oven.

The fish cooked for about 20 minutes, with occasional additional basting. Meanwhile I peeled and diced a cucumber. Once it was cooked the fish was broken into segments and placed onto our official fish platter along with the cucumber chunks. We had ample additional olive oil for dipping the fine bread James had also picked up at the fishmonger.

This was quite delicious. The many herbs and spices, along with the feta cheese (recently purchased from a farmer's market) gave the dish a lot of flavor.

Thanksgiving Dessert - Pumpkin Layer Cake with Caramel Buttercream

This recipe came from the New York Times Cooking. The online recipe was accompanied this lovely photograph, which looked only a little bit like my finished product. The color of the cake and icing are the same, and I did have three layers. Although mine were rather lopsided, and the caramel cream did not ooze down the sides in quite so perfect a manner. I am sure however, that mine tasted just as divine as this one must have.

With a rather ambitious ingredient list and a whopping 15 steps it was a good thing I left work early on the day before Thanksgiving to get started on this. The first problem I encountered was that I did not own three round cake pans. In fact I had zero. Off to the store went my wonderful husband to bring back the necessary baking items.

Once the appropriate equipment was procured I started mixing the ingredients for the cake. The instructions regularly refer to a stand mixing bowl, and its various attachments. In our house we have only hands, arms, and muscles for mixing. Mostly it wasn't a problem, but I will admit that in making the buttercream frosting it did present a bit of a challenge. Thankfully, my wonderful husband is also a rower and has Popeye-the-Sailor-man-type biceps and forearms (sans anchor tattoo). Ultimately I did have to pick out some biggish chunks of butter from the frosting so that I could more evenly spread the buttercream. Our college child was home for the holiday and suggested using store bought caramel sauce and/or frosting. I explained that was not an option because "on Thanksgiving we go all in". Said child also made a comment along the lines of "what, no pie!" which the New York Times Cooking page actually indicated was a possibility. Fortunately, there is always more than one dessert at Thanksgiving, and a pie was offered by one of the other families with whom we spent the holiday.

In the end the entire family had some hand in preparing this delicious dessert, and it was a hit on Thanksgiving day.

See directions below. This is not a quick one!