Clare's Cooking Blog

This recipe was inspired by chef Kaori Endo of Nanashi in Paris, and printed originally in Bon Appetit, in October of 2011.  It makes for a really unusual, tasty and (relatively) healthy dessert.

• 1 ripe mango, peeled, pitted, and cut into small cubes
• 2 teaspoons sugar

Mix the mango with the sugar, and leave to macerate for 30 minutes or so.  Then divide evenly among four glasses, or ramekins - whatever you are serving the dessert in.

• 3 1/2 ounces high quality white chocolate, chopped
• 1 1/2 cups low fat Greek-style yogurt
• 1 teaspoon matcha powder
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 1 tablespoon hot water

Put the white chocolate in a metal bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water, and stir until melted.  Remove from the heat and whisk until smooth.  Let it cool slightly.  Gradually whisk in the yogurt.  Divide this mixture between two small bowls.

Whisk the 2 teaspoons of sugar with the matcha powder in another small bowl.  Add the hot water, and whisk to form a thick paste.  Give this time - it takes a while to blend thoroughly. Add the paste to one of the bowls of chocolate-yogurt mixture and whisk to blend well.  

Now make a well in the green mixture, and pour the white mixture into the center. Fold it just once or twice, just enough to create swirls.  Spoon the mixture over the mango in the ramekins.

If you want one final extra touch, you can sprinkle over the top a blended mixture of finely minced toasted pistachio nuts, lemon zest and sugar.  Measurements here are to taste - and the mixing can happen in a food processor, or a mortar and pestle, or just with a little more effort on the chopping board.

This recipe comes from food.com, but behind the website is Mina the Brat, who in turn is sharing the recipe she got from a friend’s Cuban mother.

What’s striking to me is that whereas some flan or caramel custard recipes uses heavy cream, this one uses both evaporated milk and condensed milk.  Which I’m guessing is because fresh milk just isn’t that available.  Which in turn explains why the cafe con leche in Cuba tastes different - I’m betting it’s also made with either evaporated or powdered milk. That would also explain the extra sweetness.

The recipe suggested cooking the flan in one large flanera or casserole dish.  I don’t have a flanera, and I was nervous about ‘turning out’ a whole big flan without destroying it, so I settled for little ramekins.  The recipe made eight, which was great, since we were serving only five, so I got to ‘test’ one at lunch time!  I wasn’t sure how to adjust cooking times to account for the ramekins, so I checked with other recipes, and I’ve given here the time and temperature that worked for them.  IF instead you want to cook one big flan, I’d suggest 45 minutes at 350 degrees, and then leaving the flan in the turned off oven for another 10 minutes to finish setting.

First step: grease the bottom and sides of 6-8 ramekins, very lightly, with butter.  Just a smear - to help the custard slide out at the end.

For the caramel:

• 2/3 cup sugar
• 2 teaspoons water

Put 2 teaspoons water in bottom of small pan.  Add 1/2 cup of sugar, and heat until it dissolves and turns a nice dark golden brown.  Stir as little as humanly possible.  Immediately (while it’s still liquid), pour enough into each ramekin to coat the bottom. Allow to solidify.

Fit all the ramekins into a baking dish or casserole dish that will allow you to pour water in so that it reaches at least half way up the sides of the ramekins.  The custard is going to bake in this ‘water bath.’  Fill a kettle, bring it to a boil, and then let it sit until you are ready to pour the water around the ramekins.  It’s best that the water be hot, even before the whole thing goes in the oven.  

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.

For the custard:

• 1 whole egg
• 5 egg yolks (save the whites for other uses!)
• 1 (12 ounce) can evaporated milk
• 1 (14 ounce) can condensed milk
• 1/2-1 teaspoon (depending on taste) vanilla extract

Beat the egg and egg yolks together - a whisk works well.  Add the two cans of milk and the vanilla extract and mix well.  Use a jug (for control) to pour the custard mixture, into the ramekins, on top of the hardened caramel. [HINT: Don’t completely fill the ramekins on the first pouring - that will let you make sure you have enough, and you can come back and ‘top up’ if you’ve got left over mixture.]

Pour the hot water from the kettle around the ramekins, topping it up with more hot water from the tap if necessary, until the water reaches at least half way up the sides.

Now comes one of those instructions that sounds SO easy, and is, in fact, a little more tricky. Put the baking dish with the ramekins in their water bath into the oven (on a middle-ish shelf), and bake for 40 minutes.  Turn the oven off, and after another 10 minutes remove the dish from the oven.

What’s so hard about that?  Getting the dish in and out of the oven without spilling hot water on yourself, or getting some of it into the ramekins - that’s what! Just take your time, and use a steady hand - it helps if the baking dish is deep enough that the water isn’t too close to the top.

Lift the ramekins out of their water bath and cool.  Chill for at least one hour before serving.  However - I personally think flan has more flavor if it’s not ice cold, so if it’s had several hours of fridge time take it out as you sit down to start the meal, so that it’s had time to warm up a little before you eat it.

To plate the flan, run a butter knife around the outside edge of each ramekin. Put a plate large enough to handle both the flan and the liquid caramel over each flan and invert. Shake a little to help it slide out.  Garnish the top of each flan with a mint sprig (to be authentically Cuban) and serve.  

Photo credit: Miklos Pogany

This recipe was originally in the August 2011 issue of Bon Appetit.  The guests who ate it for breakfast this morning thought you could also add a little crumbled bacon to the filling ….  The recipe called for dill, which I didn’t have, so we did without any fresh herb but I think either dill or basil would make good additions.

Crust:

• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp fine sea salt
• 6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) chilled unsalted butter
• 1 cup buttermilk

Filling:

• 2 pounds large ripe vine tomatoes, cored and cut into 1/4 inch slices
• 2 1/2 cups coarsely grated extra-sharp cheddar (8-9 ounces)
• 1/4 cup finely grated Parmesan (1/2 ounce)
• 1 scallion, trimmed and chopped (use white and green)
• 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill or basil
• 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
• 2 tsp sugar
• 3/4 tsp fine sea salt
• 1/2 tsp fresh ground black pepper
• 1 1/2 tablespoons cornmeal

Use a nine inch diameter pie dish (glass or ceramic if you have it)

Crust: Whisk first 4 ingredients in a medium bowl. Using fingertips, rub in butter until coarse meal forms and some small lumps remain.  Stir in buttermilk and knead gently with hands until dough forms.  Wrap dough in plastic and chill for at least one hour. 

Food processor alternative:  Put dry ingredients in bowl.  Add butter, and process until the mixture is a coarse meal.  With the processor running, slowly pour in the buttermilk.  Hopefully the dough will form a ball.  If that doesn’t happen, don’t over process - just tip the mixture into a mixing bowl and finish forming the dough by hand.

Filling: Lay tomatoes in a single layer on a baking sheet lined with two layers of paper towel.  Place another two layers of paper towel on top, and let stand for at least 30 minutes to ‘drain.’ 

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.  Roll out the dough between two sheets of plastic wrap until you have an 11” round.  Remove the top layer of plastic wrap, invert the dough on to the pie dish, and carefully peel off the second layer of plastic wrap.  Don’t be discouraged if this is a laborious process, and take it slow.  I thought for sure I was going to rip the dough, because it REALLY didn’t want to release its grip on the plastic, but eventually it behaved.

Toss both cheeses in a medium bowl until evenly incorporated.  Reserve 1/4 cup of the cheese mixture to sprinkle on the top of the pie just before it goes in the oven.

Whisk the scallion, mayonnaise, herb, vinegar, salt, sugar and pepper in a small bowl.

Srinkle the cornmeal evenly over the bottom of the crust.  Top with 1/2 cup of the cheese mixture.  Arrange a third of the tomatoes over the cheese (overlapping if necessary), and then spread half of the mayonnaise mixture over the tomatoes.  Then repeat - this time using 1 cup of the cheese mixture, half of the remaining tomato slices, and the rest of the mayonnaise mixture.  Now sprinkle the remaining cup of cheese mixture, and the rest of the tomato slices.  Sprinkle the reserved 1/4 cup of the cheese mixture on the top.  Fold the overhanging crust up and over the edges of the tomato slices.

Bake the pie until the crust is golden and the cheese a golden brown (about 35-40 minutes).  Check about half way through, and if you’re worried that the crust is going to get too dark, cover the pie loosely (so that air can still escape) with foil.

Let the pie cool for at least an hour before slicing and serving.

When I was growing up, the main meal was in the middle of the day.  After that came ‘tea’ at about four or five, or whenever you got home from school.  Tea featured hot black tea with milk and sugar; sandwiches, English style, meaning plenty of bread and butter, but not much in the way of filling (it could be jam, or Marmite, or perhaps a single layer of cheese or ham), and then something sweet - a piece of cake or a ‘biscuit’ (cookie) or two.  ’Supper’ came later, and was something perhaps cooked, but anyway quite light.  It might be soup, with more bread, or scrambled eggs, baked beans or mushrooms on toast - you get the idea.  If you’re thinking we ate a lot of bread, you’re right - but it was good bread, brown or white, from the local baker’s, with a crunchy crust and a chewy middle - as far from flaccid packaged Wonderbread as bread can get.

All of that is actually just a prelude to saying that one of my very favorite main meals was my mother’s cheese and tomato pie.  The tomatoes came out of a tin, the cheese was a good sharp English cheddar, and above and below that mixture was my mother’s delectable shortcrust pastry (I owe it to her that I have no fear of pastry making).  We’d have the pie with new potatoes and at least one other vegetable, usually green.  I loved the smell, and the contrasts - between the crunch of the top crust and the melting interior; between the sharpness of the cheese and the sweetness of the tomato.

So … fast forward to the present.  I was thinking about making something special for a breakfast with Dan and Cynthia Lief this Sunday morning. They stayed with us last night after we all helped Frank Reece (along with friends and family) celebrate his 65th at the Cambridge Boathouse to a fabulous soundtrack of music from the sixties and seventies. Leafing through the new Bon Appetit magazines I’ve already mentioned I found a recipe for a tomato and cheddar pie - and needless to say I felt I’d found my inspiration!  

If I needed any further incentive, I found it in the fact that the crust featured buttermilk - and I just happened to have half a carton of buttermilk in the fridge left over from the jalapeno cornbread muffins I’d made for Superbowl Sunday.  I hate buying a special ingredient for a recipe and then wasting the rest of it … so here was the opportunity to put the buttermilk to good use, and take it off my conscience.

I’d meant to have the pie made before we went to the party, but for one reason and another that didn’t happen.  So the dough, which was meant to chill in the fridge for an hour spent the night there instead, as did the tomato slices tucked up between sheets of paper towel to mop up their extra moisture.  It’s a credit to the recipe that despite all that abuse of the ingredients, it came out really well.  Modesty aside, it’s a credit to me that despite a late night and lots of dancing I was up by seven thirty to put the pie together and bake it so that it could still rest for its mandatory hour before we tucked into it a little after nine!

Unlike the cheese and tomato pie of my childhood this one is an open tart.  But there’s plenty of browned buttermilk crust at the edges to replicate the crunch I remember, and the textures and tastes of the interior conjure up my family’s kitchen table, and the family gathered to share that favorite meal.

The recipe comes next!

It’s my turn, once again, to host the Literary Guild for dinner.

For quite some time, I’ve known exactly what the star turn in this dinner would be - a matcha and pistachio-crusted halibut (or other firm-fleshed white fish).  

There’s a story behind this choice.  Used to be I subscribed to Bon Appetit, faithfully. It was less intimidating than Gourmet, or Saveur, and served me well. Then there was just too large a pile of issues I’d never even looked at, along with a more battered-looking pile, each of which sported just one post-it marking just one favorite recipe. So I gave up my subscription, and even thinned out the piles (saving every Thanksgiving and winter holiday issue, naturally, along with the ones featuring best of each year).  But last month I was walking down the five flights of stairs from our Boston studio to the street, instead of taking the elevator, for once, and on the building’s ‘free shelf’ found three contemporary issues, including the home entertaining issue for October of 2011, which promised ‘ultimate dinner parties.’  So I scooped them up, and took them home for bedtime reading.  

I’ve been fascinated by matcha for a while, and I love pistachios, so this recipe demanded to be tried - and completely lived up to its reputation.  The only drawback is the price of the fish; halibut, and Chilean sea bass, which would be another really good choice, are both pricy, and not even always available.  I’m thinking that flounder would hold up well enough, probably, and offer a suitable alternative.  Tilapia, perhaps. I’m not taking any chances with the Guild, but there’s room for some experimenting on other occasions!

Then the question was what to serve along with the fish.  The vegetable was relatively easy to decide on: green beans, blanched until just crisp tender, dumped in ice water immediately to keep their color, and then reheated in a little olive oil, lemon zest, garlic and chopped parsley.  The starch has had me stymied for a while - but now I know its going to be Chinese forbidden (black) rice.  The color is a lot of what feels right: the assembled plate will be green, white and black.  Nice! The only remaining question is whether to jazz the rice up in any way, or whether to just let it be its own sweet nutty self, so that it doesn’t distract from the other flavors.  I’m going to do a trial today with just some chopped cilantro and lime, and possibly a touch of toasted sesame oil … and then make the decision.

Dessert is going to be the New Year’s panna cotta recipe.  And I’m still working on a salad - wanting to stay with an Asian theme, and also to use my new Japanese spiralizer!  

Serves four (but you’ll have leftovers of the pistachio topping).

Bon Appetit published this recipe in its October 2011 issue.  The recipe comes from Chef Daniel Patterson of Coi in San Francisco.  

• 1/2 cup raw unsalted pistachios
• 1 1/2 tsp matcha powder
• 1/2 tsp sugar
• 2 tbsp dry breadcrumbs
• 1 tbsp unsalted butter, melted, plus more for parchment paper
• 1/2 tsp finely grated lemon zest
• sea or other natural salt, freshly ground pepper
• 4 5oz skinless halibut fillets or other firm-fleshed white fish

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Scatter pistachios on a small rimmed baking sheet; toast until browned in spots, about 3 minutes.  Let cool.

Grind pistachios, matcha and sugar in a food processor until nuts are coarsely chopped, about 15 seconds.  Add bread crumbs, melted butter and lemon zest.  Process until combined (but not a paste) - about 10 seconds.  Season topping to taste with salt and pepper.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper; grease lightly with butter.  Lightly season fish all over with salt and pepper.  Pat the nut mixture evenly on top of each fillet. Place fillets on prepared sheet, and bake until just opaque in center - 8 to 10 minutes.

The disadvantage of cutting the fish into separate fillets before baking is that it’s harder to balance the topping on each piece.  But the advantages are that the fish cooks more evenly and quickly, and that each will reach its customer looking more elegant!  The purpose of the parchment is to make it easier to lift each fillet off the baking sheet and plate it without sticking, breaking, etc ….

If you have to buy more pistachios than the 1/2 cup you need for the topping, I’d recommend toasting the rest as well.  You could use a few as extra garnish, or throw them in with an accompanying vegetable - like green beans - or salad - or just enjoy them in your oatmeal in mornings to come.

The usual gang gathered at Dan and Cynthia’s on New Year’s eve this year. Dan had organized us around an ambitious menu of little plates, with the idea that we would nibble our way through the five hours between seven and midnight, rather than sit down to an overwhelming meal. As a strategy, it worked! There was still too much food, of course, but more opportunity to pick and choose, and checking in with people on New Year’s day, no one had been kept up with indigestion or just that too-heavy-for-comfort feeling. If we were doing it over, would we tweak it some? Yes, I think so. But most everything was delicious, and the groupings really successful. 

HERE’S THE MENU: 

FIRST COURSE: - Smoked fish platter, Barbara Fernald - Pesto torta, Kate Chaplin - Eggplant tapenade, Kate Chaplin - Potato latkes, with sour cream and caviar, Dan Lief

SECOND COURSE - Chili garlic shrimp, Cynthia Lief - Popovers, Josephine Schmidt - Stuffed mushrooms, Donna Isaacs - Dates stuffed with gorgonzola and wrapped in turkey bacon, Henry Isaacs - Onion focaccia, Cindy Thomas

THIRD COURSE - Crispy duck, wrapped in lettuce with scallions, cucumber and hoisin sauce, Miklos Pogany - Spicy green beans, Cynthia Lief - Marinated cauliflower, Cynthia Lief

FOURTH COURSE - Asian pulled pork sliders, with red cabbage kimchee, Bruce Fernald - Green salad, with fresh strawberries and a lemon vinaigrette, Barbara Fernald

DESSERT - Mint panna cotta, Clare Dalton - Home made Heath Bar squares, Cindy Thomas

So that was the question I posed to my sister when we had our post-Christmas pre-New Year’s chat, knowing that she has hosted many a dinner party with hearty game courses, presumably needing the same light touch in a dessert. And, true to form, she came up with the ideal solution - a mint flavored panna cotta, served in little ramekins, and garnished with runny honey, shaved chocolate and a fresh mint leaf. I was thinking I might use espresso cups, but Barbara has a fabulous collection of half-cup ramekins made by our favorite island potter, Marion Baker.

Here’s how, if you’re planning to serve 8-10 people:

1 packet powdered gelatin (approx 2 1/2 tsps or 3 sheets)
4 tablespoons cold water
2 cups heavy cream
2 cups whole milk
20 fresh mint leaves, finely sliced
1/4 tsp vanilla extract

And for the garnish:
runny honey
Small mint leaves
Shaved dark chocolate (I like using a vegetable peeler on a bar of 70% chocolate; the peeler
creates a more shapely shaving!)

Combine the cream and milk in a heavy saucepan with the sliced mint leaves, and heat. As soon as it begins to bubble (don’t let it boil!), turn off the heat, add the vanilla extract, cover, and let sit for ten minutes to let the flavors infuse.

While you’re waiting, sprinkle the gelatin over the four tablespoons of cold water in a small cup, just to soften it.

Then pour the cream mixture through a fine sieve (to remove the mint) into a bowl (preferably one that’s easy to pour from). Add the gelatin, and stir or whisk until it’s thoroughly dissolved.
HINT: if it won’t fully dissolve, reheat the mixture, gently whisking as you do, just until it does dissolve.

Pour the mixture into the ramekins. It’s easiest to manage the rest of the preparation if you arrange them on a baking tray, or just a small tray. When they are cool enough not to be warming 
up your fridge, put the tray in the fridge to allow the panna cotta to gel. This requires at least four to five hours, but you could actually leave them at this stage for two or three days. I covered the tray with foil to make sure they did’t pick up any weird flavors from the fridge.

Before serving, drizzle a little runny honey over each ramekin, pile a little heap of chocolate shavings in the center of each, and add a small mint leaf as a final touch. WARNING: don’t do the garnishing too far in advance or the chocolate will melt into the honey and you’ll have a blob instead of an artsy pile!