Blueberry-Mint Vinaigrette

It was a very hot day for Portland, and I didn’t really want to add to the heat by warming up my kitchen. With fresh blueberries, herbs in the garden, plenty of greens on hand, and a full pantry, I didn’t need any heat.

The key component in this vinaigrette is blueberry syrup. I made some a few weeks ago by putting a 2 pints of blueberries and a cup of sugar into a food processor and pulsing a few times to purée roughly. I put the purée into a saucepan over medium-low heat, tasted and adjusted the sugar, then simmered for about 30 minutes. I poured the simmered pulp into a colander lined with two layers of cheesecloth and let it drain. The remaining pulp went into the composter, while the syrup went into a small glass container in the refrigerator, where it sat until I remembered it.

Making a vinaigrette is quite simple when you know the correct ratio of oil to vinegar, 3:1. If you didn’t know that ratio, or you did but you want more of that kind of handy information, you really must get yourself a copy of Michael Ruhlman’s Ratio. I didn’t follow the 3:1 ratio strictly, because of the lack of acidity in the ingredients I used for this vinaigrette.

Blueberry-Mint Vinaigrette

2 teaspoons fresh blueberry syrup
1 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoons riece wine vinegar (unseasoned)
4 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil
2 leaves spearmint, minced
salt and pepper to taste

I added fresh blueberries, shredded mint, and diced red pepper to the mixed greens and herbs I had on hand. Simple, refreshing, and with the mint, cooling on a hot day.

Garlic Confit

Garlic confit is magical stuff. I keep some around to use in everything. I even warm up a clove or two and smear it on bread when I want garlic bread. And it’s so easy to make that you should never be without some. Let me show you.

Start by peeling a bunch of garlic–or buy pre-peeled garlic like I do–and trim the ends off each clove. Then put them into a saucepan and cover with oil. The original Thomas Keller recipe I used, and the blog post on it at Bouchon for Two, calls for canola oil. I now use extra virgin olive oil, because I prefer the flavor of olive oil, and the heat isn’t high enough to destroy the oil.

You’ll use low heat, and, if you have it, a diffuser. If you don’t have a diffuser, use a fry pan as a diffuser. You want to heat the oil until you see tiny bubbles rising, but not too many of them. Hold at that heat for about 45 minutes, until the garlic cloves are softened.

Spoon the garlic into a sterile container and then carefully pour in the oil to cover by at least half an inch. Don’t discard any of the oil if you have extra, just use it for cooking.

In My Pantry: Vinegar and Oil

Olive Oil

The oil you use to cook with will be the foundation flavor upon which you’ll build. Even though heat destroys some of the oil’s character, it will still play an important role in the final flavor profile of what you’re cooking. That’s why I never use anything other than extra virgin when I use olive oil.

Olive oils typically are available in four grades. Extra virgin olive oil is low in acidity–frequently less than 0.5% and never more than 0.8%–without detectable flavor or aroma flaws and mechanically produced. Virgin olive oil has acidity up to 2.0%. is without detectable flavor or aroma flaws, and is mechanically produced. Olive oil, also called ordinary olive oil, has acidity up to 3.3% and is a mixture of extra virgin olive oil and lampante olive oil. Lampante olive oil is not fit for consumption as is, and is treated with caustic chemicals to rectify the problems and remove flavor.

The flavor profile of extra virgin olive oil depends on a number of factors, including the type of olives used to produce it and when the olives were harvested. Generally olives will be harvested early, while they’re still unripe, or will be harvested late, as they start to fall off the tree.

Early harvest olives, those grown in cooler climates, and those grown in cooler years, tend towards green, astringent, bitter, pungent, leafy-herbal, and olive-fruity flavors and aromas. Tuscan oils are usually early harvest, and have what’s called pizzicante–a tendency to grab the back of the throat with a pungent or peppery finish.

Late harvest olives and those grown in hotter climes tend toward sweet, light, flowery, and nutty-fruity flavors and aromas. If you want a delicate and mild oil look to Moroccan oils or California oils made from Mission or Manzarillo olives.

For delicate and mild oil, I prefer Le Fasce from Italy and Olio Santo from California. The fruitier, more fragrant oil of Alziari (France) is an excellent choice, while Lungarotti (Italy) adds some pizzicante. If I’m making pesto I prefer the more olive and pepper flavored oils, particularly Espuny, a Spanish oil with a distinctly piney note. L’Estornell, also from Spain, is a wonderfully olive-y oil. When I want a green oil with the aroma of a newly mown lawn I will select Ravida, Banfi, or Marfuga, all from Italy.

Deborah Krasner has written an excellent guide to olive oils called The Flavors of Olive Oil. She explains a lot about how and what to taste and includes flavor profiles for about 200 different oils.

 Other Oils

There are other oils in my pantry, of course. I use tea seed oil for stir-frying because of its high smoke point. For a nut oil I prefer hazelnut (filbert) or pistachio.

Balsamic Vinegar

Balsamic vinegar is made by reducing the juice of Trebbiano grapes, then straining the resulting boiled must. The boiled must is then reduced 30-50% to produce saba, a sweetener used during the Roman Empire. The saba is barrelled and allowed to acetify and evaporate for ten years or more, all the while being exposed to fluctuating temperatures. The result is aceto balsamico tradizionale.

In my opinion, the very best balsamic you can get for less than $100 is Villa Manodori Balsamic Vinegar. It’s the one I use for everything, including dessert!

Other Vinegars

In addition to balsamic vinegar, I keep red wine and apple cider vinegars on hand. When I can find a good champagne vinegar, I like to keep it handy for lighter vinaigrettes.

If you’re fortunate enough to find a sauternes vinegar, snatch it up. I’ve had some, and it makes a superior vinaigrette, especially when used with an excellent balsamic vinegar and an oil with some good pizzicante.

Pantry: Grenadine

Grenadine is used in many drinks, but the grenadine you can buy in grocery and liquor stores is, well, nasty. And it might not even have any pomegranate in it, but it may contain some “tasty” corn syrup and bright red dye. Unfortunately, pomegranate juice really isn’t bright red, and grenadine shouldn’t set your teeth on edge with sweetness.

There are lots of recipes for grenadine available. Most of them start with bottled pomegranate juice. If you’ve forgotten to plan for the guests arriving in a couple of hours, fine. Make a simple syrup using bottled pomegranate juice. It’ll be better than any grenadine you’ll find in the store. But if you can plan ahead a bit, hand-crafted grenadine requires nothing more than fresh pomegranates and a few days.

When selecting pomegranates, be sure to reject any that have a brownish area at the blossom end because they’re past their prime and will have an “off” flavor. Carefully cut the pomegranate open crosswise, then remove the seeds using a spreader or other blunt-end knife. Avoid the cottony white pith; it’s very bitter. If you want to buy just the seeds, go ahead.

Measure the quantity of seeds; you’ll get about one cup from one ripe pomegranate. Put the seeds and an equal amount of sugar into the work bowl of a food processor and add one-fourth as much water. That’s a 4:4:1 ratio, and it scales up nicely; one pomegranate will produce about six ounces of grenadine. Pulse a few times to make a rough purée. The object is to break open the pulpy membranes and release the juice. If you don’t have a food processor, a blender will work fine.

Pour the purée into a glass bowl, cover with a cloth, and let stand at room temperature for 3 days, stirring now and then. Place the bowl into a larger bowl with some water in it to avoid sharing with ants. If you taste every time you stir, you’ll find the flavor deepens and richens over time, and that the color darkens slightly.

To finish, line a sieve with dampened butter muslin or two layers of dampened cheesecloth, place over a saucepan, and drain the purée for two or three hours, extracting all the juice without any pressure. Then place the saucepan over medium-low heat, raising the temperature of the syrup to about 180°F/82°C and no higher than 200°F/93°C; you should see tiny bubbles rising to the surface. Cook for about 3-5 minutes at temperature. Pour into a sterilized bottle, cool, cap, and store in the refrigerator.

You may find you need to adjust your cocktail recipes somewhat when using hand-crafted grenadine. It isn’t as sweet, so you might need more.

In My Pantry: Salt and Pepper

Salt and pepper. The most ubiquitous pantry items in Western Civilization, they’re on virtually every table. And we always say “salt and pepper” as though there were just one of each. I don’t know about you, but I typically have six or more salts and at least four peppers. Let’s explore my pantry.

Salt

I have several kinds of salt in my pantry. The one thing I don’t have is table salt. It have no use for it except to make copper-cleaning paste (equal parts flour and table salt, add distilled white wine vinegar to make a paste). Table salt is bad for you. Worse, it tastes awful. I use sea salts, kosher salt, and natural rock salts only.

Most of the salts I use are finishing salts. They aren’t used as a basic cooking salt, but rather are added at the point of “season to taste” or as the food is plated. Sometimes I’ll put a cellar of the appropriate finishing salt on the table for those who insist on adding salt to their food at the table.

Sel gris is basic grayish sea salt. You can find sel gris in most any grocery store now. It’s usually called sea salt or gray sea salt, but I like to use the French because it’s more posh. In the picture above, the salt on the right is sel gris. This is the salt I use as my basic cooking salt.

Fleur de Sel, or “flowers of salt,” is a hand-harvested sea salt. Workers scrape the topmost layer of salt before it sinks into the salt pan. Usually it is harvested early in the morning, when the dew is rising, but only when there is no breeze. Fleur de Sel de Camargue, Fleur de Sel de Guérande, or Fleur de Sel de Noirmoutier would be an excellent addition to your pantry. In the picture above, Fleur de Sel is on the left.

That pink salt in the center of the photo above is Australian pink flake sea salt. It has a slight mineral flavor and is a bit spicy. It’s an excellent all-around salt, and is the salt I use most frequently to finish a dish.

I use a smoked sea salt when I want to add a smoky flavor to something; I have both chardonnay- and cinnamon-smoked salts. I also have Himalayan Pink and Alaea red sea salt from Hawai’i. I use the Alaea when I want a very earthy salt.

I believe that you really must have at least two salts in your pantry: either sel gris or kosher salt; and Fleur de Sel. If you expand to three, go with a smoked salt. From there you are only limited by your taste and budget.

Pepper

Pre-ground pepper is an abomination with no place in the kitchen. I usually have four peppercorns in my pantry–five counting allspice. I also have two pepper mills.

Tellicherry peppercorns are the basic black pepper of choice. The taste is strongly peppery with a nice bite. They grow on the Piper Nigrum vine and are the fully ripe corn.

White peppercorns are black peppercorns that have been soaked to remove the husk. They bring a sensation of warmth to food without so much peppery bite, and are absolutely essential if you’re cooking something lightly colored and want pepper.

Pink peppercorns aren’t true pepper at all. They’re actually the dried berries of the Baies Rose. They are sweeter than black or white peppercorns and are commonly used to season fish or desserts–pink peppercorns are an excellent addition to chocolate. They cannot be used alone in a pepper mill because they’re too soft. It’s alright to use them in a pepper blend, however.

Szechuan peppercorns are required for authentic Szechuan cuisine. They’re the berries of the prickly ash (Xanthoxylum piperitum). The taste is citrusy and a bit medicinal, and if you taste one by itself it will cause tingling and then numbness of the lips. If you try one, be sure not to bite more than once or twice before spitting it out. If you don’t feel any tingling within a few seconds, the pepper isn’t fresh. Szechuan peppercorns cannot be used in a pepper mill.

You really should have both black and white peppercorns in your pantry, and a pepper mill for each. The best pepper mill I’ve found is the Perfex pepper mill. It offers the best control over the grind and is front-loading so you don’t have to try to find your perfect setting when you reload.