Greetings From the Surface of the Sun!!

Drip.

Drip.

Drip.

That sound you hear isn't me sweating. It isn't my husband sweating, or even our little dog (he can't, poor thing). It's literally the liquid sound of the salty remnants of our sanity draining away slowly, one agonizing drop at a time. It's August in Phoenix, and it's HOT, and I don't want to eat anything but frozen treats.

With that in mind.......it's a perfect time for fruit sorbets! Nothing says summer like frozen watermelon with a hint of lime. This recipe will give you a delicious, cooling confection to help battle the summer blues, whether or not you have an ice cream maker (we actually don't--bad foodies!).

We had some adorable mini watermelons (I also like the term seen in the produce section of the local Asian supermarket where we purchased these: 'personal watermelon,' but it makes me giggle. It just sounds so....I don't know, intimate? This is my personal watermelon. Hee hee.), so I used those. Bonus bowl afterwards!

I recommend serving a scoop of watermelon sorbet nestled next to a creamy scoop of Haagen Dazs lemon ice cream, with a sprig of mint, in your own personal watermelon bowl. Bliss.

Fresh Watermelon Sorbet

1 cup sugar
1 cup water
5 cups fresh seedless watermelon chunks
6 tbsp. fresh squeezed lime juice

Bring the sugar and water just to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium low and simmer until the sugar is completely dissolved--do not stir or you will introduce sugar crystals and everything will get weird. Trust me. Set aside in a bowl until completely cool.

Put the watermelon chunks and the lime juice into a blender or food processor. Pulse several times to chop the melon and then process until the fruit is completely pureed. Press melon puree through a fine mesh strainer to remove the seeds and any extra pulp. Combine with the cooled sugar syrup. Chill in the refrigerator for 1 hour.

If you have an ice cream maker, pour the watermelon mixture into the freezer bowl, and process according to your manufacturer's instructions. If you don't have an ice cream maker, pour the mixture into a 9" x 13" pan and set in the freezer. Using a fork, stir the ice crystals at least once every hour for the next three hours, making sure to scrape the crystals from the side of the pan (where they will form first) and re-introduce them to the rest of the mixture. Freeze overnight. The next day, before serving, scoop out the desired quantity for serving and blend in food processor until soft*. Serve, & enjoy the cooling goodness!

(*This is one of those times when I can really see the use for a kitchen gadget, i.e., an ice cream maker. After all, ice cream or sorbet made in a machine intended for that purpose is smooth, evenly textured and lovely, because the machine continually churns air into the mixture as it's freezing. Technically, what you're making by using the pan-and-stirring-with-fork method is a granita, equally lovely tasting, but a lot coarser in texture, more like a snow cone. Putting it in the food processor the next days helps to incorporate some air and makes the texture finer, but you may need to stick it back in the freezer for a few minutes afterwards to firm it back up a little. Takes a little extra work this way, but it does taste delicious.)

I had some textural issues with this sorbet, mostly due to the fact that we don't have a proper ice cream maker. The mixture froze absolutely solid in its container, and was a real pain to chip out for serving. I'd like to experiment with some additives to keep it from freezing solid and hopefully maintain a smoother, softer texture. Gelatin, maybe, or a splash of vodka or sparkling wine? I'll keep you posted. But, not wanting to waste our precious frozen personal watermelon mixture, we ate it once as sorbet and from then on just threw chunks of it into the blender with limeade to make......FROZEN WATERMELON LIMEADE. Which, I'm telling you, is an instant summer classic.


Serve in a tall glass with bendy straw. :)

Banoffee Pie: Keep Calm & Carry a Fork!

BANOFFEE PIE.

Oh, I know. I disappear for months without a trace or even a hint of a a recipe, not one little blog post, and now I return here to you with..........banoffee pie? But just bear with me! It's going to be good.

Those of you reading this from North America may have never experienced the charms of banoffee pie; you may never even have heard of it. Let me briefly enlighten you. Banoffee (one of those delightful food-name portmanteaus, constructed from 'banana' and 'toffee') pie is a quintessentially English dessert, like trifle or sticky toffee pudding. It is a sticky, sweet, rich slice of creamy heaven. And it's even better when you top it with caramelized nuts.

It's also traditionally made by boiling an unopened can (yikes!) of condensed milk until the contents transform into a sticky brown caramel sauce known elsewhere in the world as dulce de leche. Right away, I knew that I would be deviating from tradition for three excellent reasons:

- One, that boiling a sealed can of anything for hours and hours until it either reduces and become delicious or, alternatively, explodes violently in your face in an eruption of molten liquid and shrapnel, killing you very much dead.......scares the living daylights out of me.

- Two, that I've actually heard that the dulce de leche base is a touch too thin for proper pie filling, resulting in fruit slices that sink to the bottom. And while that still sounds delicious, it's somewhat lacking in presentation appeal.

- And three, I had just discovered a recipe at one of my favorite cooking blogs, The Smitten Kitchen (I owe her so much!), for caramel pudding. Which is most likely what put the idea of banoffee pie into my head in the first place. Soft, yielding, puddingy, but stiff enough to stand up to a mound of banana slices and whipped cream--it sounded like the ideal middle layer for the pie of my dreams.


The crust is a simple crushed graham cracker crust, my favorite choice for creamy desserts like pudding-filled pie or cheesecake (versus say, a fruit pie, for which a pastry base is the only logical choice). Crumbly and delicious. The pudding, I have to say, is delicious. I added a touch more salt than Deb's original recipe calls for because I am a sucker for that 'salted caramel' flavor. I also have to say, because I feel somehow obliged to disclose it.......that this pudding is too thick and gelatinous for me, as pudding. I say this having made it twice now, it takes most of its texture from the six (six!) tablespoons of cornstarch that get stirred into the mixture. The end result is quite stiff, almost bouncy, and I just can't imagine sinking a spoon into it and eating a cup of it on its own as pudding. As banoffee pie filling, however, its very stiffness is its best feature, making for a gorgeous and easily sliced pie that holds its shape perfectly.


My husband, who has never understood the proud & historic cuisine of the British people, unreasonably insisted that we try putting sliced strawberries on the pie instead of the traditional bananas. I gasped and clutched my pearls. I told him that such a thing would be a crime against decency and Mother England, if not an abomination before humanity itself! But because I love my husband senselessly, even more than I love banoffee pie, I agreed to the compromise you see above.

And okay. Actually, it was delicious. Listen to your heathen husbands once in awhile. Only......what should we call it? Strawbanoffee pie? Banoffeeberry pie?

Top with fresh whipped cream, and a handful of nuts if desired. I recommend that you toss them lightly in a pan with some butter and sugar to glaze them, then let them cool before sprinkling them on top.

BANOFFEE PIE.

You know you want it. :)

Orange & Salt's Banoffee Pie

Graham Cracker Crust:

1.5 cups crushed graham crackers (I ended up using about half a box)

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 tsp. salt

6 T. melted butter

Preheat oven to 350. Mix dry ingredients together in bowl, add butter and stir or blend with your hands until the mixture resembles wet sand. Press well into bottom and sides of tart pan. Bake for 8-10 minutes.

Caramel Filling:

Here's a link to the excellent caramel pudding recipe over at Smitten Kitchen. Enjoy! (Don't forget to let your pudding base cool in the fridge after you've cooked it and spread it in the tart crust base, so as not to melt the whipped cream all over the place)

Pie Topping:

One perfectly ripe banana (and some ripe strawberries, if you're making Strawbanoffeeberry Pie, you weirdo you)
Half pint of whipping cream

Sugar (enough to lightly sweeten the cream, plus a little extra for the nuts....maybe a few tablespoons in all?)

Chopped walnuts (pecans would also be awesome here)

Small amount of butter

Slice fruit thinly, and place in an even layer over pie base (crust & pudding mixture, cooled). Whip cream and sugar (to taste) with electric mixer or whisk until it holds soft peaks. Spread over pie base, chill in refrigerator until ready to eat.

Heat a small amount of butter (very small, like half a tablespoon) in a skillet over medium high heat. Add chopped nuts and sugar, toss to coat. Cook until nuts are glazed with browned sugar, immediately remove from heat. Let cool, then sprinkle on pie.

Slice.

Enjoy.

Do it for England. :)

The Queen of Pop

Oh sweet, sweet, summer romance. Readers, I have been seduced........and it was by a frozen dessert.

When hot weather set in for the summer a few months ago (and in Phoenix, it clamps down over the city with a vengeance, not relenting until long after sweaters are on the department store shelves and the rest of the country seems to have swapped ice cold lemonade for steaming hot apple cider), this young girl's fancy naturally turned to popsicles*. It was fate. It was a natural collision of my well-documented love for food on sticks and anything that stands a chance at cooling me down from the boiling point in the middle of a 112-degree July afternoon. It's also something of a wave of nostalgia for the summers of my youth, when my mom always made sure we were well-supplied with homemade juice pops (made in these funky 1980s yellow plastic molds with juice-catchers at the bottom, and little sippy straws for draining every last drop! Remember those? Even back then, I thought they were the greatest invention). Freshly armed with my own brand-new set of popsicle molds, an updated version of our 1980s classics, I was ready to become the Queen of Pop.

( *oh, I know. A popsicle post in August? What's next, a roast turkey recipe in November? Well, just bear with me, sarcasmatrons, because it's worth it. I swear to you. And after all, who doesn't love a popsicle?)


Technically, here is where I should tell you that what I have been making and obsessing over all summer are in fact not 'popsicles,' that term having been trademarked in 1924 by Frank Epperson, the inventor of the Popsicle (which had previously gone by the much-less-snappy appellation 'Epsicles'). In their original form (invented, according to Popsicle legend, in 1905 when an eleven year old Epperson left a beverage and wooden stir stick on the back porch all night to freeze solid), Frank's frozen treats consisted of powdered soda mixture in various 'fruit' flavors and water, frozen to a stick. Sounds tasty, right? Um. Maybe not so much.

In fact what I've actually been making in my own kitchen is less like Epperson's iconic Popsicle and much closer in definition to the classic Mexican treat known as paletas, an ice pop based either on fresh fruit like strawberries, watermelon, guava, mango or tamarind, or creamy, milk-based flavors such as vanilla, chocolate, coconut, and even the rice pudding-like arroz con leche. The pops of my dreams are like this, thick with concentrated fruit and even green glimmers here and there of fresh herbs, or else creamy, smooth, and full of rich flavor. Almost like magic, flavors began to suggest themselves to me. Coconut and lime, with a hint of sweet basil! Tart strawberry and balsamic vinegar with honey and fresh mint! Creamy mango yogurt puree! Inspired, I think, by all the press surrounding the recent success of artisanal ice cream (particularly those in 'inventive' flavors) and wanting to bring a little of that glamour to the world of frozen pops, I began making plans to quit my day job (such as it was) and open a mobile popsicle stand. I kid you not, there was one night I even did have an actual ice pop-based dream. It's safe to say it had become an obsession at that point. A delicious, frozen obsession.

I experimented with many flavors, including the aforementioned coconut-lime-basil, strawberry-balsamic-mint, and mango-yogurt, but also blackberry-lime, creamy lemon curd, and (boldly, I thought) a slightly sweet coconut-milk based spicy peanut curry version. The last, according to my husband, is something of an aquired taste. To each his own. We found that the more watery an ingredient (say, certain kinds of fresh fruit), the harder and 'icier' the pop would freeze. Conversely, denser fruit with less water content like the sweet orange flesh of a ripe mango makes for a slightly softer, chewier pop. Yogurt is a great matrix for holding just about any fruit in frozen pop form, whether pureed or whole. And coconut milk--oh my! Coconut milk was the great discovery. It's tasty, of course, but something about the texture when frozen just makes it perfect. We're still experimenting over here at the Orange & Salt test kitchens. Summer, after all, is likely to be with us until Halloween this year. But in the meantime, I'm including recipes here for our top picks (and if you're feeling spicy, contact me for the sweet peanut curry pop recipe--I think it's an unappreciated winner and would love to share the recipe!), and I'm urging you to try them yourselves. Go on, be a pop star!

Recipe note: I have been using this particular set of popsicle molds, which results in 6 4 oz. pops. These recipes will yield enough for my set of molds, but your mileage may vary. I've been known to drink leftover popsicle mix straight from the bowl, so really, it's not a problem either way, now, is it?

Strawberry Balsamic Mint Pops

16 oz. fresh strawberries

3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons honey or sugar (this particular measurement is a very basic guide, your mileage may vary here depending on the ripeness of your strawberries and just how tart you like your sweets, so taste before freezing and feel free to adjust)

2 tablespoons fresh mint

Place strawberries, vinegar and honey into food processor or blender, puree until smooth. Strain through fine mesh strainer into bowl to remove strawberry seeds (this step optional but recommended for any very seedy fruit like berries). Place puree back in food processor with mint, blend until mint is finely disributed throughout, pour into molds. Freeze at least 6 hours.

Coconut Basil Lime Pops

1 can of coconut milk (14 oz.)

1 cup fresh lime juice

sugar to taste (again, this is intensely personal)

2 tablespoons fresh basil leaves

Blend all ingredients in a food processor or blender until desired consistency achieved. Pour into molds and freeze at least 6 hours.

Mango Yogurt Pops

1.5 cups plain yogurt

1.5 cups fresh mango pieces (if you're using a larger variety of mango like a Kent, this may be one whole fruit. However, if you're using something like the smaller, sweeter Ataulfo or Champagne mangoes I frequently see at my local markets, it may be more like two)

sugar to taste (you know the drill here)

Blend all ingredients in a food processor or blender until desired consistency achieved. Pour into molds and freeze at least 6 hours.

Pambiche-style Cuban pork tenderloin with black beans, fried plantains......and FLAN! Did I mention flan??

Once upon a time, back in ol' 2007, the husband and I journeyed to Portland, Oregon and fell in love. Not with each other, that is, we were already madly in love with each other......with the place and its people, its weather, its public transportation system, and its many, many wonderful restaurants. We had only to ask a stranger walking down the street or riding the bus next to us what was their favorite restaurant/artisanal bakery/microbrew pub and not only would we receive an immediate answer, but a handful of runners-up in case the one they had suggested was closed, too far a walk, or simply not our cup of tea (or house-roasted fair trade coffee). These people are opinionated and take their eating and drinking seriously. In the case of the man who first directed us to Pambiche, he didn't merely give us the address of the restaurant, he walked us from the streetcar we had all been riding together to the stop where we'd meet the bus we needed to take, gave us detailed directions as to where to transfer and where to get off, suggested what to try on the menu, and sent us on our merry way--with coupons!

He didn't work there. I think.

Cuban-style Pambiche (it's located at 28th & Glisan, Portland people) won us over immediately with its gloriously vibrant paint job, inside and out, its lively music & atmosphere, and......oh yeah, the food, have I mentioned the food? Amazing. See?? I had a plate of marinated roast pork with black beans and fried yucca slices that I still dream about to this very day.




In honor of our very first Pambiche dinner (which has since been repeated a few times, although sadly not as often as we'd like, since we live in Phoenix), Mike and I recently re-created a Cuban style feast at home. We marinated a pork tenderloin for hours in a bath of lime juice, olive oil, cumin and garlic, then sauteed it lightly and served it with fresh cilantro. There was a sofrito-based side of spicy black beans. And there were.......(happy sigh).....fried plantains.



Fried plantains with Mike's special 'pink sauce.'




Black beans stewed with sauteed onion, garlic and sweet bell peppers from my garden, seasoned with cumin, chili powder, and a splash of lime juice.

The best way to make fried plantains that we've found is Alton Brown's way (isn't that usually the way it goes? Recipe follows at the end of this entry). Alton prefers that you use green plantains, the ones that resemble a very unripe banana. They're quite a bit firmer than the ripe version, which makes absolute sense when you get to the step where he has you soak them in garlic-enhanced salt water, albeit briefly. Trust me, soft, ripe plantains cannot abide this particular step (ask me how I know, go on, ask me how I know!) and will crumble on you, so stick with the green ones. Once they're cooked they are tender, garlic scented perfection, golden and crispy on the outside but soft and yielding to the teeth on the inside.



And the best part is, you can use the leftover bits of pork and black beans to make Cuban tacos the next day! Win!

If you're somehow still hungry after dinner (and I promise I won't tell on you if you are), you can cap things off perfectly with a beautiful little flan, just like we did on our first night at Pambiche. They're made in tiny individual ramekins, so you won't feel like you're devouring a huge dessert portion all by yourself (unless, that is, you eat your partner's as well!). And there's fruit and greenery, see, pineapple, mint? If there's fruit it must be healthy! Cheers.



Flan with Caramelized Pineapple

1 1/3 cup sugar (divided into two 2/3 cup portions)
3 cups whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
4 large eggs

1 cup fresh pineapple, sliced into small chunks
1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon brown sugar
pinch of salt

fresh mint for garnish

Place 2/3 cup of sugar in a small saucepan and add just enough water to dissolve it, about 1 tablespoon. Heat on medium heat, swirling the syrup in the pan occasionally, but never stirring it. The syrup will boil for a while until it starts to turn brown. The trick to making caramel is to watch it carefully and to remove it from the heat while it's still a shade lighter than you'd like it to be (caramel keeps cooking in a hot pan, even as you're pouring it into the ramekins it's still cooking.......it can also burn in seconds, go on, ask me how I know this!). Once it has turned a very light nut brown, remove it from the heat and immediately pour the caramel into the bottoms of 6 ramekins. Set aside.

In another saucepan, heat the milk with the other 2/3 cup sugar until it reaches a boil. Stir in vanilla. In a mixing bowl, whisk the eggs for about a minute. Whisk in the hot milk, in very small amounts at first to avoid scrambling the eggs (this process is called tempering). Pour the milk mixture into the ramekins on top of the caramel. Place all 6 ramekins in a large oven proof dish. Fill the dish with water to about 2/3 the height of the ramekins.

Carefully place in 300° F oven. Bake for 40 minutes to an hour (bake until custard has set, test with your finger or by gently inserting a knife); make sure the water surrounding the ramekins does not boil during baking. Allow the custard to cool completely, then refrigerate.

To make the caramelized pineapple (you can do this while the flan is cooling), heat butter in a pan over medium high heat. Add pineapple, allow the pieces of fruit to cook until they are just beginning to brown on either side, stirring occasionally. Add brown sugar and pinch of salt (taste for correct amount) and stir for 30 seconds more, then remove from heat and let cool slightly.

To serve, run a knife just along the inside of each ramekin, then turn flan over onto a dessert plate. Surround with caramelized pineapple bits, garnish with fresh mint (this last step is, of course, completely optional. I happen to have an enormous, bushy mint plant that is slowly taking over the backyard--we call it MINTASAURUS--and so we use mint whenever the opportunity presents itself! Plus it makes it look all the more festively Cuban). Enjoy!



Fried Plantains, Alton Brown-style (original recipe from 'Good Eats' shown here)

Ingredients

2 cups water
3 cloves garlic, smashed
2 teaspoons kosher salt, plus extra for seasoning
1 1/2 cups vegetable or canola oil
2 green plantains

Directions

Combine water, garlic and salt in medium size glass bowl and set aside.

In a large (12-inch) saute pan, heat oil to 325 degrees F. Peel plantains and slice crosswise into 1-inch pieces. Carefully add plantains to oil and fry until golden yellow in color, about 1 to 1 1/2 minutes per side (the oil should come halfway up the side of the plantain). With a spatula or slotted spoon, remove the plantains from the pan and place them on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper, standing them on their ends. With the back of the spatula, press each piece of plantain down to half its original size. Then place the plantains in the water and let soak for 1 minute. Remove and pat dry with a tea towel to remove excess water.

Bring oil back up to 325 degrees F and return plantains to pan and cook until golden brown, approximately 2 to 4 minutes per side. Remove to a dish lined with paper towels, and sprinkle lightly with salt. Serve immediately, with pink sauce*.

(*Pink sauce is a creation of my husband's, some version of which I believe he may have originally gotten from Jacques Pepin. It's an easily made condiment and it tastes good on everything--french fries, avocado slices, sandwiches, fried plantains, everything! Take equal parts mayonnaise and ketchup and mix thoroughly with liberal amounts of hot sauce, to taste. The preferred hot sauce around the Orange & Salt kitchen is Arizona Gunslinger, but we understand if you don't, you know, live in Arizona and can't get your hands on some. Chipotle-style Tabasco is also wonderful.)

Somewhere, on a time-traveling island...........

.......this blogger consoles herself over the end of her favorite long-running tv show with a bottle of sixty year old 'MacCutcheon whisky.'

Sigh.

Once upon a time, back in 2005, a group of my friends convinced me to start watching a tv show. I hated it at first. There were too many characters to keep track of, plus flashbacks, relationships, jungle monsters and polar bears. I complained week after week. Until, that is, I found myself loving our weekly get-togethers (at which dinner and good post-show conversation were always a main feature) centered around the show, and loving the show for its many 'Oh-my-God-did-you-just-see-that??' moments. Finally, I was just plain hooked.

Now it's 2010 and my group of friends, like our weekly LOST nights, have scattered and changed. And as all good things must, LOST itself came to an end this week. While I may no longer have a crew of rowdy 20-somethings with which to watch my favorite television show (toasting with a raised can of beer every time Jin said something in Korean, the smoke monster appeared onscreen, or Michael screamed for 'WAAAAAAALLLLLT!!!!'), I do have my trusty and beloved husband. He has watched every single episode of this show right by my side (I believe it should have been in our wedding vows....'Will you love, honor and cherish her....and will you watch six seasons of her favorite sci-fi island soap opera with her with minimal complaint and without asking silly questions like what exactly the smoke monster is or why the hell the bald wheelchair guy can walk and the Southern guy has to nickname everyone?'), and I could think of no better way to close this chapter of my life than with one final LOST dinner night.




And an excellent dinner it was! We had mahi mahi tacos in honor of the late Jin Kwon, fisherman of The Island (and close runner-up for my favorite LOSTie*) with roasted tomato salsa, creamy avocado slices and shredded cabbage. We had a delicious sliced mango salad in honor of the seemingly neverending supply of mangoes provided by The Island, lightly dressed with a pinch of sugar, salt, and fresh mint. And finally, we had brown sugar shortbread 'fish biscuit' cookies, branded with the DHARMA logo, for dessert.

(* dude, I'm a Hurley girl for life.)


We had a great time watching the series finale. I'm not what you'd call a 'tv person' under normal circumstances; in fact, we cancelled our cable over a year ago, and the only television show I've bothered to keep up with regularly is LOST. In many ways, it's the end of an era. But in many other ways, it's just a tv show, and it's just as well that it came to an end when it did. The finale answered some of my questions about The Island, left many unanswered forever (no, really, what IS the smoke monster, dammit??), made us laugh (Mike) as well as cry (okay, me).



In order to truly look & feel the part of a crazed LOST fan, I wore my sweet 'WWJLD?' shirt. Please disregard the jammies and obvious bedhead.

Want to make your own fish biscuits, in tribute to the best show about a pair of feuding brothers, a time-traveling island, a handful of polar bears and about a thousand love triangles?? Well, now you can, brothah! These cookies are a twist on classic shortbread featuring brown sugar and a crisp, ever so slightly salty finish. They're as addictive as a Virgin Mary statue full of heroin, so beware--ours disappeared inside of two days!

DHARMA Initiative 'Fish Biscuits' (aka Brown Sugar Shortbread Cookies)

1 cup flour
1 stick (4 ounces) unsalted butter, sliced and chilled
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 300°, and line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Using a food processor, pulse the flour, butter, sugar and salt until dough barely begins to come together like damp island sand!

Turn out mixture onto a work surface and gather into a smooth, compact ball. On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough into a 7-by-9-inch rectangle, about 1/4 inch thick. Using a sharp knife, slice fish shapes out of shortbread dough. Set fish shapes on parchment-lined cookie sheet; I got about 16 but your mileage may vary depending on the size of your fish biscuits. Using a pointy instrument (I found a wooden chopstick to be perfect here), carve the word 'DHARMA' into each cookie.

Refrigerate the tray of cookies for 20 minutes. Remove from refrigerator and bake at 300° until light golden brown, about 20 minutes. Let cool for 10 minutes, remove from tray and enjoy. Namaste (.......and good luck)! :)



Goodbye, LOST! We'll miss you!