It's Spring!

Gorgeous sunny, perfect spring days in Manhattan last week. I saw Carolina Herrera dressed in her trademark chic. She walked elegantly in her suede stilettos and blond hair as she gently pulled a leash, proudly praising her black poodle for peeing near a tree. I passed her and her dog and smiled to myself. I love NY! Then I picked up my kids from school and instead of the usual protest, they welcomed me with smiles. Precious!
The breeze blew in the scent of the new blossoms crowning the trees. Their branches had been naked for many months. Overnight they are full and colorful. As a friend of mine commented one of those days: "Manhattan smells like flowers. Can you believe it?" This City tends to emit plenty of aromas, but trust me, they are rarely pleasant, so it's a time to rejoice.

Bright yellow daffodils bring sunshine to the sidewalks and, just as every year, they allow me that relieved feeling of the cold season being over.

Colorful tulips are making their entrance, and nice and springy produce is showing up at stands, markets, and who am I kidding? at Fairway.* Asparagus, artichokes, baby eggplants and rhubarb are being stocked. Organic berries slowly become more affordable. All the stores are now decorated with the Easter pastel palette and filled with chocolate, marshmallow and candy bunnies, chicks, and eggs.
And with all that spring excitement comes Passover, with its traditions, preparations and questions. In NYC, "baby's first Seder" onesies, toy plague kits, and wind-up walking matzah balls (yes, seriously) are displayed right across the pink Peep marshmallow bunnies.
Although quite "innovative," these Passover products have been outshone this year by QUINOA, which has taken the central stage of the Passover panorama. I haven't seen yet a current Passover publication in which this ancient seed of the Inca isn't mentioned. Is it allowed? Isn't it? Why, how, where? It used to be a little known grain-looking ingredient famous only among healthy-eating aficionados who praised it as a good source of vegetarian complete protein, iron and calcium. In the last 10 years, it has gained tremendous popularity, probably also due to the increase of Celiac disease diagnosis, as quinoa is gluten-free. Quinoa has gone kosherly mainstream, as some rabbinic authorities have permitted to be eaten during the 7-day Jewish holiday. Of course there are those who don't embrace it nor recommend it, but apparently it's been accepted by many. And I will definitely be preparing it.
Quinoa makes a great tabbouleh when you add to it chopped tomatoes, cucumbers, fresh mint and dill, lemon juice (fresh, please) and extra virgin olive oil. I also like it with carrots, kale and lots of garlic and chiles. In general, I think it goes well with any combination of vegetables and gets great texture when served with crunchy seeds or nuts! I made the following version last week, in one of those fantastic spring days I was talking about. We enjoyed it very much, even if it wasn't Passover yet and we could have had some couscous instead.
It's full of goodness and it's a great lunch when you want to take a break from the classic heavier dishes of the Holiday.

*Due to an overwhelming credit card bill last month, I'm abstaining as much as I can from visiting that place, my favorite store, my muse, my office...

QUINOA WITH ROASTED GRAPES, SHALLOTS AND ITALIAN EGGPLANT

Serve it warm or at room temperature. Just make sure it's seasoned well before you plate it. Sometimes it needs readjustments with salt, pepper, lemon juice or honey.

• Vegan
• Free of: soy, dairy, wheat, gluten and eggs
• Super ingredients: quinoa (provides complete protein, fiber, and iron), eggplant (rich in antioxidants, such as anthocyanins, vitamins, minerals and fiber), grapes (rich in phytonutrients, especially anti-aging resveratrol), lemon (vitamin C and limonoids), garlic (contains powerful phytonutrient allicin)

INGREDIENTS

1 cup quinoa (rinsed if package instructions specify to do so)
2 cups water
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt, plus more for seasoning
Pinch saffron threads. optional
2 Italian (baby) eggplants (stems trimmed and cut into 3/4-in cubes. Don't peel)
1 cup seedless grapes
2 shallots, peeled and roughly chopped
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil, separated
1/2 cup salted pistachios, shelled (optional)
1 lemon, juice and zest
About 1 tablespoon fresh herbs, chopped (I used thyme)
About 1 tablespoon raw honey, or to taste
1 garlic clove, minced
Black pepper, to taste

METHODPreheat oven to 400F
Line one rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
In a medium pot, bring quinoa, water, 1/2 teaspoon salt and saffron to a boil. Reduce heat, cover pot and simmer for about 15 minutes, or until the liquid is absorbed and the spiral-shaped quinoa germ detaches from the seed.

While quinoa is cooking, place cubed eggplant, grapes and shallots in a bowl and add 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil. Toss with your hands making sure all the fruits and veggies are well oiled. Season with salt and pepper.

Roast for about 20 minutes. The eggplant will be soft and melted, and the grapes' skin might burst, but make sure they don't burn.

In a serving bowl, place cooked quinoa and fluff it with a fork. Add in roasted eggplant mix and pistachios.
Season with the remaining olive oil, add the juice and zest of the lemon, sprinkle in the herbs, swirl in the honey and add the garlic. Mix well, but gently.
Taste for seasoning and adjust if necessary.

Serves 4-6 people

The Math of Food

Ask anyone in the education field and they would agree that cooking is a great way for children to learn mathematics. There's counting, measuring, adding, working with fractions, pattern making, etc, etc...
However, in my personal experience, the height of the arithmetical learning process doesn't occur in the kitchen, but at the table: Nothing teaches kids about numbers--and life--better than dinner time. They don't only learn how to count, they learn how to negotiate, estimate, calculate probability, make predictions and to understand the essence of the human psyche.
You might think I'm crazy (and you might be right), but I'm not wrong, as I've proved my theory over and over. I conduct the same science experiment every night and it always works. I offer my children a balanced, nutritious, wholesome dinner, made keeping in mind (mostly) their food preferences (which I might say are complete opposites between the two of them), and it always has the same result: I have to start bargaining about how many peas they still need to eat, how many more pieces of broccoli should go into their mouths, how many more spoonfuls of soup, so they can finally eat their dessert. I make an offer. They calculate, analyze, feel the territory. They add, count a bit more, subtract, and empirically discover the beauty of fractions. They give me a counter-offer. Our numbers go back and forth until we reach an agreement.
I know...this is wrong for a million reasons, and I should be in charge of stopping it: food treats should not be a prize, no negotiating should take place with kids, etc, etc. But I can't put an end to it, because if a square of chocolate, a cookie (or yes, one cherished Jellybean saved from a party favor bag) will motivate them to eat more veggies, I shouldn't oppose to them learning math in the process. Right???
The following recipe is based in one I originally found in an issue of Gourmet back in 2001. While I'm still mourning my favorite food magazine, I'm glad the recipes are still available online. So here's the link to the original version that I ended up changing a lot for this post. The one at Gourmet is a bizarre sounding combination of a soup. When you read it, it looks more like a smoothie recipe, but it's surprisingly delicious. I'm skipping the banana because my daughter cannot tolerate that fruit and she can feel it even if I disguise it in soup with curry, so I decided to experiment with parsley root. Also, I had a lonely carrot hanging out in the fridge, and I threw it in. I really liked the final result.
The soup is called "One-of-Each Soup" because it uses one of each ingredient, feel free to play around. As for the math, as long as you can count to 1 you can prepare this soup. The numbers that will follow at dinner time are up to your kids and might be harder to calculate....

ONE-OF-EACH SOUP (my version)

• Vegan
• Free of: eggs, nuts, seeds, eggs, dairy and soy

With a slight Indian flavor but at the same time a delicate taste, this interesting soup is good at the first spoonful and keeps getting better and better as you eat more of it. It has an interesting quality for becoming yummier at each mouthful.
With a variety of vegetables and fruits, the curry spices and the greet tea, this dish is full of vitamins, fiber and powerful antioxidants.

INGREDIENTS

• 1 large organic potato, peeled and coarsely chopped
• 1 medium onion, coarsely chopped
• 1 organic celery heart (inner pale stalks with leaves), coarsely chopped
• 1 organic Granny Smith apple, peeled and coarsely chopped
• 1 parsley root*, peeled and coarsely chopped, reserving leaves for garnish
• 1 organic carrot, peeled and coarsely chopped
• 1 pint (2 cups) brewed green tea, cooled (plus more for thinning the soup if necessary)
• 1 cup unsweetened rice milk
• 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil, plus more to finish the soup
• 1 teaspoon curry powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 (5.46 oz) can coconut milk

*Since parsley root is some times hard to find, you can switch it for its identical looking impersonator: parsnip.

METHOD

In a medium saucepan, bring cold brewed green tea, vegetables and apple to a simmer. Cover and cook for about 15 minutes, until tender.

Stir in ric and coconut milk, 1 tablespoon olive oil, curry powder, and salt and heat just until hot (do not boil).

Puree soup in a regular on immersion blender until smooth (use caution when blending hot liquids). Thin soup with more green tea, if needed.

Finish soup with a swirl of olive oil and garnish with the reserved parsley leaves. 

Serve hot.

Freezes well.

Serves 4

Homentaschen

We moved to Manhattan at the end of May. It was a sunny week back in 2000, and trying to get oriented, I walked around the neighborhood. I needed to discover the supermarket (big disappointment compared to the suburban mega stores with wide aisles, shiny floors and 243 varieties of Clorox), the bank, a place to buy produce, a kosher butcher, and whatever new interesting things all the little bodegas carried. I wanted to understand why there was a Duane Reade in each and every block and peeked in some delis to figure out what they were. I was taking in so much newness... 
Among my findings, I was surprised to see hamentaschen--those filled cookie triangles traditional of the Purim Jewish holiday--pretty much in all those shops (OK, not in the bank). I grew up knowing them as a seasonal and symbolic item, not as a mainstream NY food displayed together with black & white cookies and the iconic bagels. I guess it was one of my first "only in NY moments." 
Last Sunday, my friend Nancy Wolfson-Moche of "you are because you eat," invited me to teach with her a michloach manot workshop for children at her studio. These food packages, which are traditionally gifted in the Purim holiday usually contain hamentaschen. The food baskets are given to family, friends, and there's a priority to gift them to people in need, either financial or in need of a hug. It brings a bit of the festive spirit into everyone's life.
Some send lavish baskets full of bells, whistles and tissue paper, but I love making them with my kids simply using paper bags, markers, stickers and ribbon.
We all had a great time baking the hamentaschen and decorating the boxes at the workshop. It was a really fun day. 
The kids were incredibly proud and a scent of accomplishment and warm cookies perfumed the air. Of course, some hamentaschen broke, others burnt, some overflowed, but others were perfect, and all were delicious.

I created the following recipe especially for the occasion, but it's such an easy, tasty and wholesome one that I needed to share it with you. I know there's not much time, but trust me, they are really quick to whip up. Try them out for Purim, or do the NY thing and bake them any day of the year.  

HAMENTASCHEN

Dough

INGREDIENTS:          

1/2 cup (125 grams) pure maple syrup

1/2 cup (120 grams) extra virgin olive oil

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

2 teaspoons (8 grams) (measured before ground) chia seeds, ground

3 cups (300 grams) gluten free whole oat flour

1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt

METHOD:

Mix maple syrup, oil, vanilla and ground chia in a large bowl by hand with a spatula. Add in oat flour and salt and mix until the dough forms.

Portion dough into 3 pieces and wrap separately in plastic wrap. Refrigerate for about 1/2 hour.

Berry filling

INGREDIENTS

1 cup frozen organic blackberries or raspberries, thawed

2 tablespoons chia seeds, whole

2 teaspoons pure maple syrup

Juice of 1/2 lemon

METHOD

In a 16-oz measuring cup, place berries, chia, maple syrup and lemon juice and crush with a fork. The mixture should be very chunky.

Let set for about 20 minutes.

Shaping and Baking

While dough chills and filling sets, preheat oven to 350 F.

Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside.

Roll out dough in between 2 layers of plastic wrap to a 1/4 or 1/2-inch thickness.

Remove top plastic and cut dough into circles (about 2.5-inch diameter) with a cup or a cookie cutter.

Place about 3/4 teaspoon filling in the center of the circle and pinch sides forming a triangle.

Bake for about 15 minutes, until dough looks drier and firmer to the touch (be careful when touching!).

Let cool and package or serve.

Makes about 2 dozen cookies.

Happy Purim!

It's Time to Partea

You may be debating if you should point out the typo on the title or if you should just let it be.
I know I write in Shakespeare's language, the same way Sofia Vergara speaks it (but then, unfortunately, that's where our similarities end).
I'm aware I need an editor to change, explain, correct and make this blog make sense. And some dear people have kindly offered to help, but then, after researching the ingredients, developing, testing and photographing the recipes, writing the posts, waiting for those charitable editing souls to finish, and finally making the corrections,I would probably be able to post once a year. And since I believe food is as infinite as mathematics, I just put my self-contiousness aside, and I shamlessly type, even if I write in English with a heavy Spanish accent.
I apologize for often turturing the Queen's language all the way into Spanglish, but I really try my best to be as respectful as I can.
Now, going back to my "partea," the title is not a mistake, but an effort to be creative (or funny, or loved, understood, accepted or noticed), as this week I'm blogging about tea.
A couple of years ago I was assigned to write a story about "cooking with tea" for Kiwi magazine (sorry, tried to find the link, but it's not available, so please take my word for it). It ended up being an incredible learning and inspiring experience for me, and I just kept writing.
I had long conversations with Chas Kroll, then the director of the American Tea Masters Association, and to tea expert Diana Rosen, co-author of many tea books, including Cooking with Tea.
I found the topic so fascinating that I kept bargening to get a higher word count in the piece, even without increasing my pay (did I mention I'm a brilliant business woman?). When published, the initial story was reduced to a third of what I had originally turned in.
Now that I'm my own editor-in-chief, and I (unfortunately) don't depend on ad space, I'm happy to revisit the topic and expand a bit more. Here it comes:

Second only to water, tea is the most consumed beverage in the world. It’s believed that Camellia sinensis, the tea bush, originated in China 5000 years ago. From there, tea, the drink made by steeping the dried leaves of this particular bush in hot water (note that steeping leaves, roots, seeds, barks, etc other than C. sinensis doesn't result in TEA, but an herbal infussion or tisane), became a favorite throughout Asia, where it was highly praised for its restorative properties and considered a symbol of status. In the early 1600s it was introduced to Europe, where it gained many devotees, especially among Brits.

While here in the United States, Starbucks lattes and Coca colas are still more popular, the tea market has quadrupled in the last 15 years, as the information about its health benefits has spread.

This antioxidant-packed beverage helps improve mental performance, regulates cholesterol levels, increases
metabolism and even prevents dental caries, among many other fabulous tricks that are still being researched.

Depending on the processing of the leaves, there are four basic types of tea (in increasing order of oxidation level and caffeine content): white, green, oolong and black. Besides the type of processing, each one of these teas--just like wine grapes and honey--comes in many varietals; and the color, fragrance and taste of each batch is affected by the climate, soil, altitude and rain of the place they come from. So, depending on the processing and origin of each bush, different teas, have different flavors.

As Ms. Rosen explained me, white tea, from young leaves, is subtle with floral and citrus notes. Green tea can have a light, smoky flavor with grassy and ocean notes. Some Oolong teas have floral, fruity or spicy hints, while others have more roasted flavors. Black tea, the most consumed tea worldwide, is astringent, and its flavor varies dramatically among regions.

With all this alternatives, tea experts and aficionados recommend that you let your own palate be your guide. “Each tea is individual and should be tasted first to find its predominant characteristic (is it sharp, soft, citrus, earthy, or smoky?), and then it can be matched with a recipe,” explained Rosen. She recommended using intense teas when preparing intense-flavored dishes, and pairing delicate teas with delicate foods. “Sweet, grassy, green teas are wonderful in salads or egg dishes; black tea is great with meat or poultry, and it’s delicious in fruit
compotes, where it cuts the sweetness. Fruity teas are good for ice cream or egg sauces.”

As a suggestion, don't add a lot of tea when cooking, a little goes a long way and DON'T cook the tea for too long because it can turn bitter.

A new flavor experience opens up by not only sipping, but also cooking with tea, especially when using greeen tea. Some types of green tea, especially the premium kinds (such as Japanese ichibancha, gyokuro and sencha) have a very high umami content. Thus, green tea can be the secret way of infussing a dish with "deliciousness". 


Some ways of incorporating tea into cooking are:

- Flavoring oils or butter (infuse warm oil or butter for a few minutes, then remove tea bags,
cool oils and refrigerate butter). Flavored oils can be served in salad dressings or drizzled over soups. Infused butter is a hit on pancakes and as an ingredient in pastries.

-Substituting brewed tea for water when cooking rice or pasta.

-Infusing stocks for soups or sauces.

-Sprinkling on fish, poultry or beef before cooking

PARSNIP OVEN-ROASTED "FRIES" WITH GREEN TEA AND APPLE CIDER GLAZE

For this recipe, I was inspired by a similar one published in this month's issue of Bon Appetit magazine. I saw the photo and ran out to but parsnips. I love these pale-carrot-looking roots. They have such a delicate, sweet and floral taste that I thought would go great with mild green tea and some apple cider left over in my fridge. The thyme imparts a very pleasant woodsy flavor.
I hope you like this dish as well!
INGREDIENTS

• Vegan
• Free of: gluten, wheat, soy, nuts, dairy and eggs
• Super ingredients: antioxidant and fiber rich parsnips, green tea and thyme

1 cup (8 oz) apple cider
2 bags green tea (or 4g. loose green tea, separated), separated
About 10 sprigs fresh thyme
11/2 lbs (about 5 medium) parsnips
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
Coarse sea salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste

METHOD
Preheat oven to 450 F.
Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
In a small saucepan over medium high heat, cook apple cider, 4 thyme sprigs and one bag of green tea (or 2g. in a tea filter), until the liquid reduces to a 1/4 cup. It will have to simmer for about 30 minutes. Do not boil. 

Remove tea bag after 10 minutes and discard.
While cider reduces, peel parsnips and cut them into approx. 3-inch long and 1/2-inch wide sticks.
Spread parsnip sticks into one layer on the baking sheet and add oil, salt and pepper and mix, until all the sticks are evenly oiled and seasoned. Top with the remaining thyme sprigs.

Sprinkle sticks with some of the contents of the tea bag (about 1/2 teaspoon), so they are all lightly sprinkled. Reserve the remaining tea for another use.
Bake parsnip for 10 minutes, turn and bake for another 6 to 8 minutes, until they brown.

By this time, apple cider should have reduced enough. 

Remove thyme sprigs and pour glaze over parsnips immediately after they come out of the oven, so glaze caramelizes with the heat of the baking sheet.

Serve immediately.

Enjoy!
Makes about 4 servings

Blame it on Umami

There's a food trend that's been bothering me for quite a while, and I just reached my limit last week when I visited the adorable little Upper West Side store Spices and Tease .
I was performing my kid-on-a-candy-shop act looking and smelling all the lovely displayed spice and tea blends. I was memorizing combinations and trying to make mental notes (which is hard these days of brain decrepitude), until I saw the "onion and bacon salt."
"Enough! I cannot take it any longer." I thought. Why are they adding bacon to everything? It used to be that if you kept kosher, with the exception of gelatin and possible bug infestation, desserts, teas and spices were kind of on the safe side. That is, until an inconsiderate person decided to add bacon to chocolate, cupcakes, ice cream, milkshakes, and successfully fed them to his/her friends or customers and invaded that sacred world.
Apparently the gross sounding combinations taste really good, because the fad keeps expanding.
The crunchiness, fat and salt in the cured pig meat might add something special to the sweetness of its new companions, but I would blame the success of the pairing to UMAMI.
Umami--for all of us who still think that the basic tastes are only sweet, sour, salty and bitter--is the officially recognized fifth basic taste experience that our taste buds' cell receptors can perceive.
Although the first four known tastes are pretty easy to identify, umami, which comes from the Japanese words for "delicious essence" is harder to describe. It's a savory, full-flavor taste that is not sweet, sour, salty nor bitter, but yet complements all of them. It's what makes stocks and broths delicious and satisfying. As explained in the Umami Information Center website, "umami is a pleasant savoury taste imparted by glutamate, a type of amino acid, and ribonucleotides, including inosinate (primarily in meats) and guanylate (more abundant in vegetables), which occur naturally in many foods... As the taste of umami itself is subtle and blends well with other tastes to expand and round out flavors, most people don't recognize umami when they encounter it, but it plays an important role making food taste delicious."
By cooking, aging, drying, curing, ripening and fermenting the foods naturally containing glutamate, the umami taste concentrates even more. That's why red wine, bonito flakes, dried mushrooms, soy sauce, beef stock, aged cheeses and of course, bacon can turn dishes into deliciousness. 
The word glutamate might seem familiar, as in mono sodium glutamate, yes: MSG. The feared food additive famous for flavoring Chinese take-out and many of other foods that had an immediate, fast and inexpensive umami effect. Although the amino acid is indeed the same, MSG is a synthetic form of the substance naturally present in many real and natural foods, and in this case, glutamate has not been linked to allergies nor headaches like the artificial flavoring has been.
Umami might be the answer to our love for pizza, French fries, ketchup (you thought it was all due to the high fructose corn syruped tomatoes???), sushi, your mother's chicken soup and deli pastrami, as among the foods containing the highest concentrations of umami are:
Seaweed, fish (like tuna, anchovies, mackerel, cod and sardines), shellfish, beef, pork, chicken, eggs, Parmesan cheese (and other aged cheeses), green tea, soy sauce, and the following vegetables: tomatoes, Chinese cabbage, soy beans, Japanese mushrooms, truffles, potatoes and carrots. 
And now we know the secret of deliciousness...Some tomato sauce here, bone marrow there, shaved truffles, a splash of soy sauce, a sprinkling of Parmesan, or a couple of hidden anchovies might make a dish go from OK to amazing. 
The irony of it all is that once I dug in deeper (I went all the way to googling Spice and Tease), I found out that their onion bacon salt is made with: Sel de Guérande ( Organic Sea Salt ), Dried Onions and Imitation Bacon Bits ( Soy Flour ). So maybe after all, and thanks to umami and food engineering (which is kind of scary), the dessert and spice worlds might not yet be completely invaded with real bacon. I just hope that we use umami to make our diets more natural, not more fake.

SHIITAKE MUSHROOM PARCELS

This dish can be served as an appetizer or on top of salad greens, cooked rice, quinoa, buckwheat or pasta-- I used umami-rich shiitake mushrooms and white miso, a mild, fermented soy bean paste to bring in the deliciousness punch. It will not disappoint!

• Vegetarian (uses yogurt), free of: nuts and eggs (miso might contain gluten)
• Super ingredients: shiitake mushrooms (which support immune system and protect against heart disease and are rich in phytonutrients, vitamins B2, 3, 5 and 6, minerals and fiber), organic miso (high in protein, vitamin B12 zinc, copper and manganese and a huge amount of phytochemicals produced during the fermentation process. Which also, makes miso a great probiotic), thyme and chives (great source of antioxidants and some trace minerals) and Greek yogurt (rich in probiotics, calcium and protein)

INGREDIENTS

1 pound shiitake mushrooms, scrubbed with a kitchen towel, stem removed and caps sliced
2 tablespoons organic (non-GMO) white miso paste, separated
4 cloves of garlic, minced
8 sprigs fresh thyme
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
8 sprigs fresh thyme
Fresh ground pepper, to taste1
1 (6-oz) plain Greek yogurt, preferably full fat
8 fresh chives, coarsely chopped

METHOD
Preheat oven to 400 F.
Cut 4 parchment paper rectangles (about 16-in x 14-in) and set aside.
Place sliced shiitakes in a large bowl.
In a small bowl, whisk in  1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon of miso, all the minced garlic and the oil and add to the shiitakes, gently, but making sure they are covered evenly.Your hands might be the best tool here!
Add thyme sprigs and divide the mixture into the center of each of the four parchment pieces. Sprinkle mushroom mixture with pepper to taste.

Gather all the edges and corners of the parchment in the center, and tie them (tightly) with kitchen twine.
Place the four parcels in a rimmed baking sheet and bake for about 20 minutes.

While mushrooms are in the oven, mix the yogurt with the remaining 2 teaspoons miso.

Once parcels are out of the oven, place in bowls or plates and let each person open their own by untying the twine. Serve with a dollop of yogurt-miso mix and top with chives.

Enjoy deliciousness (and not having to do dishes)!

Makes 4 parcels