champ

happy late st. patrick's day, y'all.

for my mini-festivities this year, i made champ, which as about as irish vegetarian as i could get without an oven. (someday i'll get it fixed. someday.)

champ is a form of mashed potatoes mixed with a whole bunch of green onion. from what i can tell, the puddle of butter on top is traditional. even with that, the overall dish tasted rather green and fresh. think about mashed potatoes mixed with half again their bulk in green onions. think about it ... think ... there, now you know what champ tastes like. yum.



(aside: you can see a bit of meyer lemon spinach salad on the side there - baby spinach, sprinkle of meyer lemon juice, dab of dijon mustard, grated parmesan - way better than the fancy recipe salad in the previous post.)

meyer lemon

you may have noticed there's no picture of a meyer lemon here. apparently i missed that step.

there is, however, a picture of spinach salad with meyer lemon dressing and completely ruined parmesan frico. the salad part was pretty decent. i burned the crap out of the frico, though, and over-spiced it - no idea how it was supposed to taste. especially since the cheese was supposed to be asiago, not parmesan. the recipe is at http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Spinach-and-Celery-Salad-with-Lemon-Vinaigrette-235152 you could probably do it better. really, my cat could probably do it better than i did.


admissions of culinary guilt aside, i liked the meyer lemon enough to waste it on basic dinner salads instead of waiting to do a real recipe. it was pretty awesome tossed with a little dijon mustard, spinach, and some parmesan cheese. the meyer lemon was rounder, smoother, and oranger than a regular lemon. i don't know if it was sweeter or otherwise different in flavor. i wish i had a description of what the lemon tasted like plain, but that'll have to wait until next year. i meant to follow up with marmalade and lemonade, but the lemons disappeared from the market.

soda spectacular!

my brother and i went crazy again at bristol farms. their soda selection is irresistable. we haven't tried them all yet, so i'll keep adding them here as we go.

cock 'n bull ginger beer
strong fresh ginger flavor with a nice balance of spice and sweet and heartiness. you can see in the picture that the soda is somewhat opaque. i think that means it's made of honest-to-goodness real ginger. liked this a lot.

capt'n eli's blueberry pop
drinkable, but not very blueberry. tastes a lot like grape soda. in a nice, happy purple/red color.


margo's dark root beer
the initial flavor is really yummy, somewhere between root beer and sarsparilla. there's kind of a weird aftertaste, but overall, we liked it. though i'm not planning to switch brands or anything. still love my artificially flavored a&w.

rocky mountain chocolate factory coco fizz chocolate soda

i really really wanted this to be good. it could have been like ice cream soda. it could have been wonderful. but, as my brother so succinctly stated

"it tastes kind of like tootsie rolls and kind of like i'd never try it again".

blood orange

oh, man. i'm so not in the mood for this, but i said i'd post, so i'm going to do a half-assed job of it (for now, til edits and real text come).

observe, the blood orange: it's beautiful, pleasantly touched with red on the outside

and ruby in the middle.

more bitter than a regular orange, in a tasty way. though of the three i bought, some parts had an odd taste i would almost describe as meaty. that was gross.

it made a really good sweet/savory salad with celery leaves and chile flakes. recipe link to be posted later. it's at epicurious (look for blood orange and italy) if you desperately want it now.

spring garlic

spring garlic is the same as regular garlic, just picked young. it's not as papery as regular garlic, and it's a little milder.


this recipe was amazing (www.mariquita.com/recipes/green.garlic.htm). super extra yummy yums. it's the simplest thing, but the technique made the dish way more than the individual ingredients. the basic idea was to cook the eggs and spring garlic really slowly with lots of fat. it came out as a soft melty cloud gently permeated with garlic, on top of contrastingy crunchy toasty bread.


that said, i don't thnk i'm going to be a spring garlic fan. if i ever see really young-looking ones, i'd try that to see if it helps, but the particular bunch i got (or maybe all spring garlic, i don't know) was too chewy to use in any way but cooked, and if you're going to cook it, why not just buy regular garlic? oh, it feels horrible writing that. i've been nice about everything so far, and this wasn't bad. it just wasn't that special.

kiwiberry

dang, these were good.
they look like tiny, fuzzless kiwi fruit, which makes sense because i later found out they're a harder-to-ship kiwi relative. the grower's website has pretty good info (http://www.nzkiwiberry.com), as does wikipedia, of course (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actinidia_arguta).

i had no clue what they were, and i put the first one in my mouth expecting a sour berry flavor. instead, it was a delicious sweet tender fruit with the barest hint of tart. like how james bond wants the vermouth in his martinis, that's where the tart is in this fruit.

on the inside, they look even more like a kiwi, and the taste is sort of like a super ripe extra sweet blackberry. or, if you ask my mom, some unidentified kind of grape.

these kiwiberries came from whole foods, where they were crazy expensive ($5 to $6 for the tiny container) but apparently trader joe's sells them sometimes, too. they'd be well worth the purchase if you could find them a at trader joe's prices, or if you really like sweet fruits.

burdock/gobo root

ha! i posted something. bet y'all didn't think that was going to happen.

so this is burdock (as it's known in europe) or gobo root (as it's known in some part of asia i assume to be japan, from the ingredients in the recipe). despite its appearance in the picture, it doesn't really look like poo. it looks like a root. not necessarily edible looking, but still something vegetal that you could dig up in your garden.

when i searched for burdock recipes, it wasn't that successful. this one http://recipezaar.com/recipe/Kinpira-Gobo-braised-Burdock-Root-100670 was the best-looking one, so i went with it. and it was super helpful. as the author states, burdock really does stain your fingers (you might not notice it as you cook, but in the morning you'll be nice and yellow, like you did a bad job with fake tanner) and it oxidizes quickly (look at the picture - it started white and ended up that brownish grey color). and the recipe was both totally good and apparently rather traditional, as i discovered when i searched "gobo root" (v. "burdock" ) while trying to find the recipe to attribute it here. will need to fill in better on the flavors when i dig up my notes later, but overall, it had a smoky yet light earthiness. very edible and acceptable to a southern californian palate. i would buy it again. i was actually really pleased with this dish.

white asparagus

angelic asparagus. seriously, how beautiful is that?

sapote

this picture reminds me of winston churchill. but that's probably just me. the sapote was a palm-sized green fruit with a ridiculously soft melty texture. when i bought it, it was tender like a very ripe avocado, with relatively unwrinkled skin. the next day, it was like butter in your hand. any touch affected it, and the skin got wrinkly.

our australian food authority says these are called custard apples down under. which makes perfect sense when you try them. (note: wikipedia says "custard apple" is a name for the cherimoya, which we also tried, so either they're called something different in australia, or he was confused. i can see it. they're pretty similar. the sapote was better, though.)

kind of looks like an apple with two big seeds in the center, but the flavor and texture is like an avocado mixed with persimmon. creamy, and sweet in a non-fruity way. no acid or bite, just sugar and smoothness. the skin is very pearlike, with the same grain to it. pretty yummy. one reviewer even gave it a "delicious" and came back for a second piece.

ugli fruit

wikipedia says this is a natural hybrid someone found growing in jamaica, but given the name and the very effusive website for the grower, i'm not sure i buy it. though it doesn't really matter, because it tastes good. the fruit i got was the size of a big grapefruit, with blotchy orange green yellow skin and tendencies toward floppiness.

the inside looked like a grapefruit made of orange flesh, and tasted like a very very juicy (like, running down your arms) orange with some extra acidity and zing. all four testers appeared to like it. one said it wasn't as good as an orange, but i and possibly one other liked it better.

wheat berries

it's wheat.
it's berries.
it's ... well, no, really, it's wheat, and they call it berries for no apparent reason.

after boiling, soaking, and boiling again, the plain wheat berries were a pleasant chewy blandness, much like oatmeal.

with flavors added, they were pretty decent.
this picture, like the celery root's, is kind of cruddy. sorry. i was trying to get back to the tv in time for figure skating (which ended up being way later, anyway. sadness.) the recipe is from the february 2010 issue of martha stewart living. it's not up on their site yet, but there's a whole feature on walnuts at the end of the magazine. this was a salad of wheat berries, walnuts, dates, celery, and orange juice vinaigrette. quite yummy. it tastes like breakfast, even with the celery. the first bite made me think "candy salad". then it equalized to a more normal porridge-y flavor.

next-day follow-up: people at work liked it, and so did i. and you could probably take the basic idea and mix in just about anything with good results.

celery root

also known as celeriac. wikipedia says it's a kind of celery, and people just use the root part instead of the top part.
it's a rather unprepossessing creature:

the outside smelled vaguely of curry powder. this seemed really random and possibly accidental, but i sniffed them out in a couple of stores and it held true.

the celery root was really hard to cut into. but ... that turned out to be because it was frozen.

the center had a geodelike cavity. don't think this is entirely normal.

raw and plain, it really did taste a lot like mealy celery.

and here's what it looked like prepared:

the picture is so hideous i had to use it. in reality, everything was a peaceful beige color. but i couldn't figure out how to correct for the light with my camera. so the food looks pink.

and now for the flavor ...

it's quite good. on the left, you have a raw salad with fennel and apple (www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Celery-Root-and-Apple-Salad-with-Hazelnut-Vinaigrette-357255 ; note: cut the pieces smaller than i did. there was a lot of chewiness going on.) - it tasted a lot like waldorf salad, with a coleslaw texture. i used walnut oil, because i had it already. i've never had hazelnut oil, so i don't know how much difference it made.

on the right, a cooked puree with a bit of potato and onion (www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Celery-Root-Puree-236200). this tasted like thanksgiving. rich, creamy, and salty, with a celery potato flavor.

baby ginger

let's be honest here.
i have no idea why baby ginger is different from regular ginger. the skin is soft and fresh looking. that's different. there must be some distinctive quality about it, because a recipe called for it specifically. but ... it tasted a lot like ginger to me.
i tried a piece raw and it tasted spicy and maybe not as gingery as i would have thought. but i'll have to do a side-by-side comparison, because i don't think i've ever tried plain ginger.
raw baby ginger (note the adorable monkey shape of this particular piece):

the aforementioned recipe was lo mein on a chinese new year menu. so i got to test out rice stick noodles, too. turns out the size shown below makes the wide noodles they use in thai restaurants. yay!

here's the recipe i used: http://www.epicurious.com/articlesguides/holidays/lunarnewyear/cantonese_lo/recipes/food/views/Noodles-with-Young-Ginger-237367 for all of the things that go into this, the flavor is surprisingly mild. i substitued char siu sauce (a chinese barbecue sauce) for the oyster sauce. not sure how much of a difference that made. i doubt it's the culprit. for the leftovers, i've been adding more soy sauce, red pepper flakes, and peanuts, and that helps. scrambling in an egg is my next plan.
the finished dish:

bac ha

pasteurized processed cheese

pepino

no, it's not supposed to be brown like that. i took out the middle before eating. should have eaten it the first day i got it.
pepino is a member of the nightshade family, like tomatoes and potatoes and just about everything else edible. it really is fruity, though. it smelled and tasted like a really ripe cantaloupe with a bit of peachiness thrown in (though the peach part was not unanimously agreed upon).

in a salad with tomato, cilantro, and balsamic vinegar:

sounds nice and mediterranean, eh?
not so much. after putting this together, my first thought was "smells funny". it tasted funny, too. the fruit was waaaay better plain.

yuca

credit for the yuca actually goes to jason, who purchased it after i changed my mind. but i helped! and we learned someting useful, so the post goes on.
yuca is the root of the cassava plant. when puchased, it's dark brown and heavily waxed, looking very much like a salami (thanks to aly for the analogy). you have to peel it; due to the wax, a knife would probably work better than a vegetable peeler. the inside is very firm, like a carrot or sweet potato, and creamy white. there's a string that runs down the middle that you have to remove. we halved them horizontally, then quartered them lengthwise and cut at an angle down the center, like coring an apple. that worked great.
then we boiled them for half an hour and fried them until crispy. except for the blackened its of garlic we added too early, they tasted like restaurant yuca. so good. if you like potatoes, you'll probably like this. the flavor is mild and starchy, with a hearty, almost chewy texture and crunchy crust.

plantain

banana blossom

the most beautiful food i've ever cooked. many photos ensue.
lewis provides scale to better characterize the banana blossom:
the first petal (bracht?) filled with pre-bananas. someone told me these are sold canned for cooking on their own. which means an update to the entry will be coming eventually.

before slicing:

sliced:

cooked in a magnificent coconut and vinegar sauce that could be used for practically anything:

kiwano

sweet japanese tomato

i have no idea whether "sweet japanese tomato" is a legitimate subset of the tomato world, but it was slim pickings at the farmers market that week, and i took what i could get. and it worked out darned well.
the tomato was purchased really green and hard (picture a slightly blushed green apple) and ripened in my spice cabinet. when my friends down the street had an impromptu barbecue, i brought it over to try.
we tried a teeny bit fresh, and it was a very meaty tomato with a hint of chive flavor. which sounds strange, but is still true.


then my friend smoked thick slices in the hot smoker (for an hour, give or take) and seared them off on the grill. and the tomato was changed like you would not believe. it became its own sauce, full of flavor and nuance even though it was only cooked with salt and olive oil. we served it on top of grilled potatoes (also plundered from the spice cabinet).

fuyu persimmon