Poppy-Seed Lavash

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LavoshI think the word lavash is elegant, but also evokes the daily rituals of life in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran, and Turkey.  In Tunisia, the baguette is our bread currency, a legacy of French colonization, but as you move farther east, fabulous flatbreads are the staff of life.  Typically baked by slapping a yeast dough against the side of an underground clay oven called a tonir, the breads have a rustic shape and brown inconsistently, giving them some chewy parts and some toasted, crisp bits.

Armenian cooking can be complicated, incorporating an array of no less than 300 types of herbs and wild flowers.  This recipe, however, simply features poppy seeds.  I recommend making up a batch of this dough when you want something to bring a meal together or give it a little heft as with soup or roasted meat and salad.  Lavash can provide that burst of toasted flavor and chewy/crispy texture to make it a satisfying meal.  It is also great as a leftover.  Turning crispy in the air, you can use it the next day with a dip or crumbled in a salad.

Poppy-Seed Lavash

Reprinted from Martha Stewart Living and Matt Dillon, chef at Sitka & Spruce in Seattle

Ingredients

  • 1 1/4 cups whole milk
  • 5 tablespoons unsalted butter
  • 1/4 teaspoons dry active yeast
  • Pinch of sugar
  • 4 cups all-purpose flour or a combination (I used 1/4 rye flour)
  • 1 3/4 teaspoons course salt
  • 2 tablespoons poppy seeds, plus more for sprinkling
  • Extra-virgin olive oil, for brushing
  • Flaky sea salt, such as Maldon, for sprinkling

Steps

1.  Combine milk and butter in a small saucepan and heat just until butter melts.  Place warm water in a small bowl, sprinkle yeast and sugar on top, and let stand until foamy and fragrant, about 5 minutes.  Whisk together flour, course salt, and poppy seeds in a large bowl.  Gather mixture into a large mound and create a well in the center.  Pour milk and yeast mixtures into well.  Gradually stir together mixtures with a wooden spoon, starting in center and working outward, until a dough forms.

2.  Transfer dough to a lightly floured work surface and, with lightly floured hands, knead dough, adding more flour if necessary if dough is too sticky, until smooth and shiny, about 10 minutes.  Cover dough with a lightly floured kitchen towel and let rise in a warm place until dough is doubled in size, about 2 hours.

3.  Preheat oven to 500 degrees with a pizza stone placed on rack in lowest position, or heat a covered gas barbecue to 500 degrees.  Meanwhile, punch down dough with lightly floured hands, cover with towel, and let rise again until doubled in size, about 1 hour.  Divide dough into 4 equal portions.  Working with 1 portion and keeping remaining portions covered, roll out dough as thinly as possible without tearing, about 1/8 inch thick, with a floured rolling pin.  Prick dough all over with a fork and transfer to a lightly floured pizza peel, baking sheet, or grates of gas grill.  Lightly brush with oil and sprinkle with poppy seeds and flaky salt.  Slide dough onto pizza stone and bake until dough bubbles and blisters in places and edges become crisp and golden brown, about 5 minutes.  Repeat process with 3 remaining dough portions; serve warm.

Dried Chili Salsa

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Chilies

Salsa

There are things about living in Tunisia that remind me of growing up in the Southwest.  One of those is chilies on a string.  Just south of Tunis is Cap Bon, well known for producing fiery hot chilies that are ground into Tunisian harissa.  Truck farmers will park around town, in the fall, and sell long strings of leathery dried chilies on a rope.  I bought one for the first time this year and it has been wonderful to have a constant supply of chilies ready at a snip in the kitchen.  Bon Appetit had this recipe for Dried Chile Salsa in February and it was just what I needed to make ready use of my chilies for a hot, cooked salsa or an enchilada sauce.  I am thinking of blending up the rest of my chilies before I go home and putting them in my chest freezer for instant use when we get back in August.

Dried Chile Salsa

Ingredients

  • 12 dried New Mexico or guajillo chiles (about 2 ounces)
  • 4 garlic cloves, unpeeled
  • 1 tablespoon (or more) apple cider vinegar
  • Kosher salt

Preparation

  • Toast chiles in a large heavy skillet over medium heat until slightly puffed and lightly darkened on both sides, about 2 minutes. Remove from pan; let cool. Add garlic to same skillet; cook, turning often, until skins brown in spots and cloves are soft, 10-15 minutes. Remove from pan. Let cool; peel.
  • Stem chiles and halve lengthwise; discard seeds. Cut into pieces; transfer to a medium bowl. Cover with boiling water; let soak, mixing often, until softened, 25-30 minutes.
  • Drain chiles, reserving soaking liquid. Transfer chiles, garlic, 1/2 cup soaking liquid, and 1 tablespoon vinegar to blender. Purée, adding soaking liquid as needed, until a smooth, thick sauce forms. Season with salt and more vinegar, if desired. DO AHEAD: Salsa can be made 1 week ahead. Cover; chill

I add about 4 ounces of tomato paste to give the salsa some body and to temper the heat.

A Proper Goodbye

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I come from a family of terrible leavers.  My parents and later, adult siblings, might come for a visit and then on day 2 or 3, we would wake up to just find them gone, long down the road before we were even up.  When I left Durango at 18 and started moving around as a young adult, I carried along some of these patterns.  I think back to boyfriends, college roommates, and neighbors who were pretty significant in my life at a particular time, but I just moved away from without much of a goodbye.

I am pondering why just slipping away felt like what I wanted to do.  I have chided myself before for being self-centered, insular, but I’m not sure that is the heart of it.  I am actually a slightly shy person, so the confrontation and intimacy of goodbyes raises my anxiety a little.  I think, too, that I didn’t believe that I was that significant to these people to warrant a formal parting.  I possibly assumed they would wonder what I was going on about if I made a little farewell speech to them about their importance to me.

While we were working at Singapore  American School, Anton, then only 10,  and I had the opportunity to take a workshop on how to leave well that changed my life.  The presenter, who is famous in international circles, was David Pollock, author of the book Third Culture Kids: Growing Up Among Worlds.    If you are unfamiliar with the term “third culture kids”, Dr. Pollock developed this description:

A Third Culture Kid (TCK) is a person who has spent a significant part of his or her developmental years outside the parents’ culture. The TCK frequently builds relationships to all of the cultures, while not having full ownership in any. Although elements from each culture may be assimilated into the TCK’s life experience, the sense of belonging is in relationship to others of similar background.

The workshop that day was designed to help children, who are living in a different culture and possibly move frequently, have a strategy for parting.  He called it building a RAFT, which is an acronym for the steps one should go through.  Here is how you build your RAFT for saying goodbye:

Reconciliation- Don’t leave relationships loose-ended.  Say what you need to say to people so you can both go peacefully and not try to avoid one another the rest of your lives.  People who move frequently can delude themselves into thinking they can just leave awkward relationships behind, but they end up taking that emotional baggage with them, which could even affect their abilities to form significant relationships in their next locations.

Affirmation- Tell people that they have been important to you, that you have appreciated the time you have had together, and that you will miss them.  There are two sides to a parting.  There is the one leaving and the one being left behind.  Both sides of the relationship need to know that they have been of significance to the other.

Farewells-  Touch base with all of your favorite places and people, knowing it is your last time.  The final weeks or days before a move can get so hectic with goodbye parties, but you must also fit in time to go to your favorite beach, take that walk you have loved, or eat at a favorite restaurant one final time.

Think about your next move- You have to get excited about where you’re heading toward or you won’t have the momentum to take you there.  Think about ways you can change your life for the better with this move.  Cast off commitments and possessions that aren’t making your life better and only take along what you love and need.  Get excited about all of the new possibilities this move will present.

Getting this strategy has helped me become much better at goodbyes.  I have made this a ritual and I don’t wait until I am entirely leaving a place to practice it.  If someone I work with is moving to another grade level and we won’t be working as a team anymore, I tell him how much I have appreciated our working relationship and friendship and how I hope it will continue.  When I leave the US in the summer, I try to leave behind a string of affirmed relationships, making sure people know that I do miss them and think of them when I’m gone.  I also make a point of noting or experiencing favorite places, restaurants, and events.  One of the most poignant observances for us is the bi-weekly transit of the Alaska-bound ferry, passing right in front of our house as it motors toward the Strait of Georgia.  We count down the ferry passings until it is finally the last one of the summer….

I am trying to help my sons be better at leaving than I was at their ages.  Gabe left Bellingham is a big hurry in December.  He needed time and space to do some thinking about what he wanted to do next, but he left a few unresolved conversations with people.  Some people were really hurt that he didn’t say goodbye or let them know he had changed plans they had together.  He got a couple of scoldings on Facebook and his brother had to make some explanations for him.  He will need to reaffirm those relationships and rebuild a couple of bridges when he gets back and I know he will do that.  He is leaving Tunis on Tuesday and even though he has just been here for 5 months, he has circles of people who love him and need to know he will miss them and that they have been important to him.  One of those groups is his assorted school chums from Habib Bourguiba Arabic school.  If you have ever wondered who goes to study Arabic in a place like Tunis and why, well here they are.  They are just other parents’ children from many different countries who are continuing with some Arabic they began in high school, perhaps have a parent from the Middle East, or see speaking Arabic as a valuable skill to their futures.  The common language amongst them is second quarter Arabic, a limited vocabulary base, for sure.  What is lovely about this group of unlikely friends is that they have stretched themselves to employ any and all language commonalities in order to communicate.  Listening to Gabe on a phone call with one of them is a melange of simple Arabic, a little Italian or Korean, a smattering of French, and some English slang.  They are buds and they will miss Gabe terribly.  He will miss them, too.

Arabic Class Enhanced

Mother Guilt

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Apples 4

The term “mother guilt”  is usually associated with a mother, like the character Mom on A Prairie Home Companion, who intentionally puts a few twists on the screw of her child’s heart for the gratification of receiving, albeit grudgingly, affirmation of his love or confirmation of a visit.  I think I am talking about the reverse of that, though.  I am talking about the almost unbearable sweetness of a child who recognizes a dream of a parent and makes an effort to connect with her about it.  Whether because it has become a shared passion or just because the child knows it is significant, the connection is dear.

Ten years ago, our family bought a small farm on Lummi Island.  Our West Shore homestead came with a simple farmer’s house, 5 acres of hay, some outbuildings, and several old fruit trees.  The one pictured below is part of our family.  At least 50 years old and perhaps another half that much, this tree nearly kills itself each summer producing loads of tart, green,  softball-sized fruit.

Apple Tree

When we renovated the farm house, I considered this tree in all seasons, and created a baking counter with casement windows that could swing wide open and practically bring the tree indoors.  In summer, deer come by in the afternoons to eat the groundfall apples and nap in the shade, I think listening to classical music from the CBC, while I am cooking.

Baking Counter

We have only been able to live the life we envision on this farm in snippets because we work overseas and can only be there for six weeks in the summer and possibly a couple more in the winter.  Our oldest son, though, went to university in the nearby city and has been able to live on the island or commute there on weekends for several years, now.  Even though this place can be a challenge to maintain sometimes, he loves what we love about it and has begun living the life we would live which includes growing our own food and preserving it.  I bought a heavy-duty dehydrator a few years ago and in the fall,  Gabel painstakingly cuts the apples into slivers and sees them through the drying process.  Then what does he do with the bags and bags of dried apples?  Like a cat who has proudly pounced upon a mouse, he brings them to me, all of them.

When the boys came to Tunis for Christmas, their backpacks were a hit and miss of items we had put on our wish list for them to bring, but Gabe did put in eight small packets of his freshly dried apple crop.  I have been saving them here in the freezer, but now Gabe is heading back this week.  He has finished what he has been pursuing here in Tunis and is ready to get a jump on a summer job, register for summer school, and get our farm back in shape.  We’re having some of the friends he has made through his Arabic school over for a dinner of his favorite foods, tomorrow.  We will have pinto beans, Mexican rice, dried chile salsa, goat cheese tamales, and a cake, featuring his hand-dried apples.  Imagine, feeding his friends, from several different countries, cake, made with the fruit from the heart of our home?  These are heavy apples, indeed.

Dried-Apple Cake

(Adapted from Smitten Kitchen, Carrot Cake with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting)

2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon ground ginger
2 cups sugar
1 1/4 cups canola oil (If you possibly can, use extra-virgin olive oil instead.)
4 large eggs
3 cups reconstituted dried apples
1 cups coarsely chopped nuts (I used toasted hazelnuts, also a NW specialty)
1/2 cup golden raisins

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Butter two 9-inch-diameter cake pans. Line bottom of pans with baking paper. Butter and flour paper; tap out excess flour.

Whisk flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger in medium bowl to blend. Whisk sugar and oil in large bowl until well blended. Whisk in eggs 1 at a time. Add flour mixture and stir until blended. Stir in apples, nuts and raisins.

Divide the batter between the prepared pans, and bake the layers for about 40 minutes each, or until a tester inserted into center comes out clean. Cool cakes in pans 15 minutes. Turn out onto racks. Peel off baking paper; cool cakes completely.

Maple Cream Cheese Frosting

Two (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1 stick unsalted butter, room temperature
2 cups confectioners’ sugar
1/4 cup pure maple syrup

In a stand mixer beat all the ingredients on medium until fluffy. Chill the frosting for 10 to 20 minutes, until it has set up enough to spread smoothly.

To assemble, frost the top of one cake, place the other cake on top. Frost the sides and top, swirling decoratively. Refrigerate the cake for 30 minutes to set up frosting.

House Rule:

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He who brings home challenging seafood must figure out how to cook it.

Octopus Face

This happens.  I send one of my men to the market to get some simple white fish and he comes back with bloody hunks of saw-cut tuna, or I send one for some easy squid and he comes back with octopus.  Honestly, I have been meaning to commit myself to octopus in a big way.  The local fishermen at the Punic Ports, on my corner, have intriguing clay pots on a rope they use to trap and draw them in.  I saw a menu item in Croatia for a clay-pot braised octopus and I am so going to make that.  Do you know what puts me off?  The beak.  Octopuses have beaks and you have to clean them from the flesh.  Ew.  Here is what you do, though.  Cut the legs from the head, right below the eyes.  The beak will still be attached to the leg portion, so push that out.  Flip the hood assembly inside out and gut it.  Then, skin the outer membrane from the outside of the hood.  Rinse it all under fresh water, and flip the guts out on the sidewalk for the neighborhood cats.  While you do all of this cleaning, put a pot of salted water to boil.  When it reaches a boil, dip the octopus pieces in three times each to blanch them.  The muscles will tighten and curl.  Put all of the octopus in the boiling water, reduce the heat to a mere simmer and cook for 45-60 minutes or until it is tender.  Now, you can do what you want with it.  We dipped the braised octopus in egg, then Panko, and pan fried them.

For my part, I made a pretty, pretty chickpea soup.  The truth is that I was watching the ABC interview of Amanda Knox yesterday on the Internet and it made me ravenously hungry for the best chickpea soup of my life which was from a tiny restaurant in Perugia.  Perugia is the Amanda Knox connection.  I connected to the tragic Amanda Knox story on many levels and I am a little embarrassed to admit that hunger was one of them.

I was home yesterday, prepping for today, so I first soaked my chickpeas by pouring boiling water over them and letting them soak for 2 hours.  I drained the peas, then, returning them to the pot, and added two chopped onions, 2-3 chopped carrots, 2-3 chopped celery stalks, with leaves, 2-3 cloves of garlic, a large sprig or two of sage and rosemary, and a couple of bay leaves.  I cooked this for a couple more hours, until the beans were a little al dente, then cooled it and refrigerated it over night.  The next day, the peas were completely infused with the scents of the vegetables and herbs.  I sauted some pancetta and 1 tablespoon of tomato paste and pureed the pancetta, tomato paste, and 3/4 of the peas in a food processor.  Then, I returned the peas to the pot to heat.  To serve, I topped it with some pan-fried pancetta and sage leaves.

Chickpeas

Substitutions Encouraged

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I am on a “use it up” theme these days, but honestly, this way of cooking is what makes me the most satisfied, in general.  I really get a thrill out of surveying what I have in the freezer, pantry, and refrigerator and then putting together something, hopefully, wonderful without making a run to the store or market.

Today is Tunisian Labor Day so I’ve got a little time at home, mid-week.  I am pulling long-horded foods out to the kitchen island so they are in my working notice.  I’ve still got several artistic pastas from two trips to Italy in the past 5 months, and I’ve got this vaccuum-packed wild, smoked salmon filet that was backpack transported by my sons, at Christmas.

Salmon

Thinking of a preparation, I could mentally taste a light white sauce.  I didn’t want something as heavy as true bechamel sauce and nothing overly cheesy.  I think this combination could turn into tuna noodle casserole if I’m not careful.  My go-to Italian cookbook, Made in Italy Food and Stories, by Georgio Locatelli has a white sauce for fish and pasta.  It is made with warm milk, not cream, and thickened with pureed potatoes instead of roux.

Riced Potatoes

At the end, you drop in cubes of a premade and chilled greens/butter.  He is recommending basil, but you can vary the greens depending on the meat or main vegetable you choose to use.  How about mustard butter with beef or swiss chard butter with chicken?  This is the beauty of this dish:  any pasta + any main meat or vegetable + any greens/butter will = a great, light(ish) pasta dish.

Chipped Herbs

Cubed Butter w:Herbs

Herb Butter

Ingredients

  • 2 large bunches of basil or any combination of greens
  • 100g unsalted butter, softened
  • 2 large or 3 medium  potatoes, peeled
  • 500 ml milk
  • 200g meat or main vegetable
  • 500g pasta
  • Salt and pepper

Put the greens in a food processor and chip them, then add the butter and process to a bright green paste.  Spoon into a container and leave in the fridge until you need it.

Put the whole peeled potatoes in a pan of cold salted water.  Bring to the boil, then turn down the heat to a simmer and cook until soft.

When the potatoes are nearly cooked, warm up the milk in a pan.  Don’t let it boil; just heat it through, so that it won’t bring down the temperature of the potatoes when you add it to them.

When potatoes are cool enough to handle, but while still hot, put through a fine sieve.  Add the milk and season.  Keep in a warm place.

Meanwhile, cook the main meat or vegetable using your preferred method.  You could pan fry, grill, bake or saute.

Cook the pasta until al dente.

Put the potato puree back on the heat and whisk in the greens butter by spoonsful.  Finally,  season with salt and pepper.

Toss the pasta into the sauce to coat.

Serve the pasta, topped with the meat or main vegetable.  Finely grate parmigiano reggiano to taste.

For Northwesterners, the wood-smokey salmon, combined with the potato-cream sauce, was reminiscent of salmon chowder, but more refined.  It was a nice touch of home for a rainy day off in Tunis.

 

 

Pack-Out Pancakes

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DSC_3537

Shutter: 1/80, Aperture: f/4.0

I am starting to feel that lightness of a life sea-change around the corner.  We’ve had an interesting year with many unexpected events.  We have done good, hard work, tried our best, made some mistakes, had some triumphs.  Then, paralleling all of this life going on, I have been working on an additional teaching certification in educational technology and information literacy for the past year and a half.  I just put the wrap on my final project for that sequence last week and I am beginning to let myself dream a little about how I might like to use some of my time that will be freed up.  I know I want to cook and write a lot.  I want to make huge growth in my photography skills.  I also want to get some music back in my life.    I’m breathing a little deeply, including the exhales.

I won’t start making any concrete plans.  Right now, I want to click through these last 6 weeks of school like a pro.  Each sector of life has its own checklist to be completed, and using up our food in the freezer and pantry is the thing I can get to right now.  The cover of Bon Appetit this month shows a stack of pancakes.  That seemed a little odd to me for the May cover.  I anticipated something a little springier, like asparagus.  I haven’t paid much attention to pancakes since the late 1970s when a few hippy cafes started making whole wheat pancakes.  After our kids were past preschool age and especially after we moved to Asia, pancakes seemed too heavy and sweet as a regular choice and there just wasn’t enough food in them to justify all of those calories.  But BA added an intriguing caption to the cover photo.  It said, “Pancakes worth flying for from our No. 1 hotel.”  When I checked the recipe to see what set these cakes apart, I was impressed that they were  loaded with a variety of whole grains and they could clearly be adapted in almost infinite ways.  I will reprint the recipe here as BA wrote it, but I substituted petite oatmeal for the oat flour, semolina for the cornmeal, and barley flour for the brown rice flour.  I also had a couple of packs of dehydrated blueberries from Trader Joe’s and it was time to use those, too.  This was an intense looking pancake as the berries turned them a dark color and the semolina gave them a subtle crunchy coating.  We liked them.  They were tender on the inside, had lots of texture and flavor, and motored me through a busy school morning which is the real test.

Blackberry Farm Griddle Cakes

Reprinted from Bon Appetit, May 2013

  • 1 large egg
  • 2 cups buttermilk
  • 1/4 cup pure maple syrup
  • 1 cup gluten-free oat flour
  • 2/3 cup yellow cornmeal
  • 1/3 cup brown rice flour
  • 1/4 cup buckwheat flour
  • 1 Tbsp. baking powder
  • 1 tsp. baking soda
  • 1 tsp. kosher salt
  • 1/4 cup (2/3 stick) unsalted butter, melted
  • Vegetable oil (for skillet)

6 Servings

Fast-track this recipe by tripling the dry ingredients and storing them in a jar.  At breakfast time, scoop out 2 1/4 cups.  All the other measurements stay the same.  Alternatively, cook off a double or triple batch and then freeze them, individually, for a quick microwave breakfast.

Whisk egg, buttermilk, and maple syrup in a small bowl.  Whisk oat flour, cornmeal, rice flour, buckwheat flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl.

Whisk buttermilk mixture into dry ingredients, then whisk in butter until no lumps remain.

Heat a large nonstick or cast-iron skillet over medium heat; lightly brush with oil.  Working in batches, pour batter by 1/4-cupfuls into skillet.  Cook until bottoms are browned and bubbles form on top of griddle cakes, about 3 minutes.  Flip and cook until griddle cakes are cooked through, about 2 minutes longer.