Stir-Up Sunday

For as long as I can remember, my father made Christmas Cake the third Sunday in November. It’s called Stir-Up Sunday for a verse in the Book of Common Prayer which begins “Stir up our hearts O Lord…”. My father would bring out the huge yellow-ware bowls he and my mother had collected over the years and begin making the cake. Here are my two sisters taking their turns stirring. Each person is supposed to give the cake a stir for luck.As you can see by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's recipe below, it isn’t too complicated to make, although the ingredients can take some time to find and assemble. I’ve converted the grams to cups to make it a little easier. The measures are close approximations, but should be fine.

Christmas cake

Makes one cake.

200g sultanas (7/8 cup)
200g currants (7/8 cup)
150g dried apricots, finely diced (2/3 cup)
150g prunes, diced (2/3 cup)
150g raisins (2/3 cup)
60g candied peel (¼ cup)
60g dried cherries or cranberries (¼ cup)
Grated zest and juice of 1 orange
Grated zest of 1 lemon
200ml apple brandy (7/8 cup)
110g hazelnuts, roasted, papery skins removed and roughly chopped (1/2 cup)
200g unsalted butter (7/8 cup)
100g light muscovado brown sugar (1/2 cup)
80g dark muscovado brown sugar (1/3 cup)
4 eggs, lightly beaten
250g plain flour (1 1/4 cup)
1 heaped tsp mixed spice
¼ of a nutmeg, grated
¼ tsp salt
90g stem ginger, finely chopped (1/3 cup)

To decorate
300g whole dried fruits, such as figs, apricots, apple slices, cherries (1 1/3 cup)
120g nuts, such as hazelnuts, walnuts, Brazil nuts, almonds (1/2 cup)
150g warm apricot jam, strained (2/3 cup)

Put the first nine ingredients in a bowl, add the brandy, stir, cover and leave for 48 hours.

Preheat the oven to 275F. Grease a round 22-24cm x 9cm, loose-bottomed cake tin, and line with parchment to come 4cm above the sides. Pulse half the hazelnuts until very fine, add a quarter of the boozy fruit and blend to a thick purée. Beat the butter and sugars till fluffy, then beat in the eggs one by one (if it begins to curdle, add a little flour). Sieve the flour, spices and salt, then stir gently into the batter. Fold in the purée, nuts, soaked fruit and ginger, spoon into the tin, smooth and bake for two to two and a quarter hours, until a skewer comes out clean. (If it browns before it's done, cover with parchment.) Leave to cool in the tin, then remove and wrap in a double layer of foil. Store in a cool, dry place, feeding it with a slug of brandy every two weeks.

A day or so before the big day, brush with warm apricot glaze, lay the fruit and nuts on top, and glaze again. If you have time, cover in marzipan and icing instead.

Store in an airtight container.

Grilled Cheese Croutons

OMG!!! What a stellar idea! Make a crisp grilled cheese sandwich, with good bread and not too much good cheese. Let it cool, then cut into croutons. Put them on anything, but especially tomato and basil salad.

From the Minimalist's 100 Summer Salads.

Southsides

My favourite summer drink is the classic Southside, a combination of lemon, lime, mint, club soda and rum. I get the drink from Mr. George Lee, the former bartender at the Greenspring Valley Hunt Club. However, it is more readily available at grocery stores in Ruxton, Hunt Valley and Timonium, or through Lindsay's Southsides on-line.I froze some of the mix in an ice-cube tray and will whir it in the blender to make a frozen Southside. Yummmmm!What's your favourite summer libation?

Arnold Palmer & Half n' Half

It's just been in the past year or so that I've learned about an Arnold Palmer, mainly because I don't frequent golf courses, but also because the idea of iced tea in the UK is anathema plain, let alone cut by half with lemonade.

For those not in the know, an Arnold Palmer drink is half lemonade and half sweet tea or plain iced tea. It's also called a half & half, depending on where you order it.

My new favourite version of it is from Big Bad Wolf, using their refreshing mint iced tea and lemonade! There are other versions of this, including one made with iced tea and lemon vodka, or iced-tea flavoured vodka and lemonade, called a John Daly.

Cheetos & Old Bay

Now that it's summer again... or at least it's now after Memorial Day... it's time to remind everyone about that summertime taste sensation - CHEETOS & OLD BAY! Just get a bag of Cheetos, and sprinkle some Old Bay over them and shake the bag. It's simple, it's tasty and it's the perfect thing to bring for a summer cook-out!

Big Bad Wolf BBQ

When I lived in Wales, I never learned the language. Oh, I felt a little guilty about it, but really, when would I ever use it? However, I did come to know three words: Bryn Blaidd Drwg (Y and W are vowels in Welsh). It means Big Bad Wolf.
I realized today that Big Bad Wolf BBQ is only about two miles from my office, so I went over and got lunch. Carolina Pulled Pork with a Kansas City Sauce and Mac & Cheese. I brought them back to my office so I could photograph them and eat them at my desk. The pulled pork or the sauce was a little spicier than I like, but it was very good. The mac & cheese tasted like it had a few types of cheeses in it. I also got a mint-iced tea, which was very refreshing. Of course, anything's better than Southern Sweet Tea.

Sundaes on Friday

I am president of the Pigtown Main Street board and we're doing some fun events this summer. The first event is Sundaes on Friday at the newly opened Sweet Tooth Dessert Shop in the Hollins Market area, on Friday, May 1 from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m.

Tickets are $10 each, which lets you get two (!) sundaes. Tickets for kids under 10 are $5.00. In addition to sundaes, there will be music and a 50/50 raffle. Sweet Tooth is located at 1111 Hollins Street, and there's plenty of parking available on the streets surrounding it.

All proceeds benefit the programs of Pigtown Main Street.

Oy Vey! Kosher Coke

Well, not really Kosher Coke technically, but Passover Coke. There are just a few short weeks during the year that you can find this Coke, which is made with sugar instead of corn syrup. There is a prohibition against corn and corn products during Passover, which will begin on April 9, 2009.

You can distinguish regular Passover Coke from Coke by the yellow top on the bottle. It usually only comes in the 2 litre bottles and several Coke products including Sprite, Dr. Pepper and Diet Coke are also available for about three to four weeks.


You can listen to a story on Passover Coke on NPR here. If you like Classic Coke, this is the closest thing you'll find! I got some today at Fresh Market at Quarry Lake on Greenspring Avenue. La'Chiam!

Kerry Gold

When I lived with David in Wales, he always had Kerry Gold butter at the house. He left it on the counter, so it was never hard - the house was frigid, even in summer, so it worked.

Kerry Gold tastes like European butter and has a lovely pale yellow colour. It looks different than American butter and you can almost taste the grass that the cows eat.

It's a happy day when I can find Kerry Gold at the grocery store. I found that the Kerry Gold site has a store located for the United States. Click here to find the closest store to you.

Garibaldi Biscuits

My older sister and I both remember having Garibaldi biscuits, made by Sunshine Bakery, when we were little. These biscuits, or cookies, are basically raisins or currants, sandwiched between two layers of pastry. Our father used to make something similar with leftover pie pastry, too, which are known as fly cemeteries.

When I lived in the UK, I could find these biscuits in every store and was delighted that they only cost about 70p per packet. The little bake shop down the road also had Eccles cakes, which are similar, but larger and flakier.Recently, a colleague of my sister's told her that she could find them at the Vermont Country Store, a purveyor of all things old and forgotten. I've also seen them at World Market.

I decided to make an abbreviated version using pre-made pie crust and the currants that I had found at Fresh World last week. They turned out pretty well. Perhaps a little tweaking, maybe soaking the currants before, and adding a dash of salt and more currants, but otherwise, a success.I found this picture on the interwebs, and I have no idea what it is, but it's funny!

"Sun-Dried" Tomatoes

This is the time of year when cherry or cocktail tomatoes are falling off the bushes and you can barely eat them all. So what I do is to "sun-dry" them, but not in the sun, in the oven. It's simple to do and you can do a lot with the tomatoes.

Here's how to do it:

• Cut the tomatoes in half length-wise and flatten them on a cookie sheet.
• Brush or spray with good-quality olive oil

• Sprinkle with sea salt or other salt.
• You can also add sprigs of rosemary or slivers of garlic.
• Set the oven to its lowest possible temperature. If you've got a gas oven, set to warm

• Check the tomatoes every hour or so until they're leathery.

Depending on the temperature of your oven and the size of the tomatoes, this will take anywhere from three to twelve hours. Don't over-cook them or they will become bitter and brittle. The house will smell amazing and you'll be tempted to pop some dried tomatoes into your mouth the minute they're done.

mmmm. chocolate

My twin niece and nephew celebrated their first birthday yesterday. Although I didn't get the obligatory icing-smeared face photo, I did take a picture of the lucious chocolate cupcakes their mother made. Thanks C&G2!

Rhubarb Upside Down Cake

I've cooked more in the past two days than in the last month, but both things I cooked were simple. First up was Mark Bittman's pasta, pesto and shrimp that was in the New York Times on Wednesday. It was beyond easy, and quite delicious.

For a picnic today, I made a rhubarb upside down cake. My family grew up eating rhubarb in numerous ways, including in pies, stewed with strawberries, and in fools. I cheated a lot with this cake and made it with a mix, but it turned out really well.

First, I caramelized sugar and butter, and spread it in the bottom of a well-greased cake pan. Greasing the pan is critical, because the sugar will stick like glue when it cools. I added a layer of frozen rhubarb I had gotten at the Farmers' Market earlier this spring. I made a cake from a Trader Joe's vanilla cake mix and poured it over the sugar and rhubarb. Baked for 45 minutes. Waited for five more and then turned it out onto a plate. The bits that stayed in the pan were still viscous enough to spread on the patches. I hope that my siblings like it!

Cheetos & Old Bay!

We went to happy hour at a small and odd local bar, and although they had a menu posted on the front door, they didn't serve food. This is mainly because they don't have a kitchen. But they did serve bowls of hors d'oeuvres, namely Cheetos and Old Bay.

It wasn't as bad as you'd expect.

Haggis

I get the Oxford English Dictionary Word of the Day, which is slightly more detailed than the Dictionary.com word of the day, as it gives the first known usage of the word.

Today's word is HAGGIS, and is described thusly:

1. a. A dish consisting of the heart, lungs, and liver of a sheep, calf, etc. (or sometimes of the tripe and chitterlings), minced with suet and oatmeal, seasoned with salt, pepper, onions, etc., and boiled like a large sausage in the maw of the animal.

I like this description, too:

1. d. A mixture, hodge-podge; a mess. 1899 Daily News 13 Sept. 7/6 They cheerfully go through the curious haggis of social and philanthropic duties served up to them each week. 1928 Bengal haggis. 1929 H. MARWICK Orkney Norn 66/1 He'll just mak a haggis o' the job.

My feeling is that if you can eat scrapple, you can certainly eat haggis. I had it a number of times when I was living in the UK, and it was even served at a black-tie dinner I attended at the famous Murrayfield Rugby Grounds in Edinburgh.

How handy... cocktail-size haggis balls! mmmmmmm.....

Hoppin' John

Tradition says that eating black-eyed peas on New Year's Day will bring you good luck. This is something that comes from the American South, and I know that other cultures also have their good luck traditions.

In Scotland, the first person who enters your house on New Years should be tall, dark and handsome. Red-heads are considered bad luck. Noisemakers and fireworks are believed to drive away the evil spirits. In Italy, lentils, which looked like old Italian currency, are eaten to bring riches.

But Hoppin' John, with its black-eyed peas, rice and pork, is the dish of choice around my house. I took the easy way out yesterday when I made it with canned black-eyed peas and rice in a pouch. I had two parties within a few hours, so didn't have time to simmer the beans for hours.

Here's the recipe: Saute a diced onion and green pepper until the onions are translucent. Cook about six pieces of bacon or some pork sausage, using the same pan. Add black-eyed peas, rice and simmer for 10 minutes. If you want, add some Tabasco or other seasoning. I saw a Hoppin' John salad which also looked interesting.

Happy New Year!

The World is My Oyster

...Which I with sword will open.— William Shakespeare, The Merry Wives of Windsor

So many of my good food memories are associated with eating oysters. I can't remember eating them before I went to college at St. Mary's in Southern Maryland, but I know my mother's family loved raw oysters, so I am sure I must have.

St. Mary's had its own oyster beds in the St. Mary's River, and after regattas at college, we'd have big oyster feasts. The scuba club would dive for fresh oysters and we'd either eat them raw or steam them on a big grill. I still remember a big oyster party after the first-ever intercollegiate Windsurfing Regatta in the US.

Later on, when I worked at the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, I learned all about harvesting oysters under sail on skipjacks, about the buyboats, and the whole oystering culture. I also ate plenty of fresh-from-the-Bay oysters during my tenure there.

After college, my best college friend, Mr. G and I would meet up between Christmas and New Years and eat oysters, a tradition we continue until today. Mr. G and I have been friends through thick and thin and back again. It's over plates of oysters and many beers that we've kept this easy friendship going.

I still have a scar on one hand from trying to shuck oysters more than 20 years ago. For years, a group of friends and I hosted a charity New Year's Eve party - the Crystal Ball. We always had fresh oysters, shucked by our friend George Hastings, the 2003 Guinness World Oyster Shucking Champion.

On New Year's Eve, Mr. G and I met up at Nick's Fish House on the lovely middle branch of the Patapsco River. You might remember that we went there on December 1st for dinner. Nick's is a great place for many reasons, not the least of which is that parking is ample and free, unlike the area around Cross Street Market, which we'd also considered.

There were two varieties of oysters on offer at Nick's - Blue Points and Chincoteagues. Blue Points come from Long Island and are much brinier than the Chincoteagues that we had. They were also much larger and waterier. The Chincoteagues were smaller and more well-formed. I must admit that I liked the Blue Points better - they taste like eating the ocean.

Happy New Year, Mr. G... you're the best!

Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto

As a thank you from Peak of Chic, I received a lovely little parcel from Atlanta. It contained some yummy goodies from Bella Cucina, Artful Food. I am a devout fan of pesto and I now was in posession of jars of artichoke lemon pesto and sun-dried tomato pesto.

The artichoke pesto was bright-tasting with just a hint of the lemon's sharpness. The sun-dried tomato pesto tasted like summer! Clear and clean tomato flavours along with a good olive oil and just a hint of garlic. I served the pestos with "home-made" flour tortilla chips and had some water biscuits so as not to compete with the pestos' stronger taste.

This afternoon, my siblings are meeting up at our mother's house to celebrate Christmas a little late. I've been tasked with bring the starters, so tried my hand at making sun-dried tomato pesto.

It's simple... a jar of sun-dried tomatos, good olive oil, garlic, parmesan cheese and pignoli. Actually, I skipped the nuts since my brother's allergic. Just put everything into the food processor and whiz it until it's a pasty texture. Make sure you add the oil from the tomatos because that will deepen the taste.

As for the chips, just buy either flour or corn tortilla flats from the store - you can get them anywhere these days. I got mine at the local Giant. Cut them into wedges and brush with a little olive oil. Sprinkle with sea salt and bake for 13 minutes at 300 F. The corn chips will be crunchier than the flour ones.

Dip. Eat. Enjoy. Repeat.

Check back soon for our oyster-eating adventures... a 25-year saga, and also Hoppin' John for New Years.

Trader Joe's Dark Chocolate Sea Salt Caramels

I had heard about Dark Chocolate Sea Salt Caramels from Trader Joe's for a while now, and the thought really intrigued me. So yesterday afternoon, I cruised down I-95 to Columbia and went to the newly-opened Trader Joe's. From where I live, it's soooo much easier to go to anyplace in Columbia than anyplace in Towson, and they have a lot of the same stores (Nordstroms, Borders, Old Navy, TJs). The new store is in a complex with the relocated Best Buy, Costco, Lowes and some golf store. The layout of the complex is strange, but at least there's tons of easy parking, unlike at the Towson TJs.

It took a bit of looking to fund the Dark Chocolate Sea Salt Caramels but there they were, perched along with the rest of the candy above the frozen foods. The photo looked great and the sea salt is from the Dead Sea... When I tried them, the first taste was overwhelmingly chocolatey, which was not what I expected. The caramel is a soft center and not very forward tasting, sort of an afterthought. The salt crystals pop up in surprising bursts, which brings another depth of flavour. But it was the chocolate that was the major flavour, and not one that I really wanted. I am not a huge choccy fan, much to the horror of my siblings.

I think that what I should have gotten, and was probably looking for was Fleur de Sel Caramels, without chocolate. Maybe next time!

Oven-Roasted Corn on the Cob

My friend, Bill Cole, who's running for the City Council in our district, came by this evening for a "stoop" meet and greet with some of my neighbours... and a film crew. Sue Chen out of San Francisco, is doing a documentary on people younger than 35 running for political office.

As they were filming, an A-rabber trotted by and the looks on Sue and her cameraman's faces were priceless. He didn't get a shot, but a little while later I heard them coming back, so he got the shot. I do my best to buy from these guys and so wandered over to get some corn. Four ears for $1.00. He tossed in an extra ear, so I gave him an extra dollar for the pony.

I thought that I could probably oven roast it, so googled recipes, which turned out to be easy-peasy. Pre-heat the oven to 350. Shuck the ears, but leave the husks attached. Remove the silk, cover the ears with butter and salt and pull up the husks! I tied a bit of extra husk around the ear to keep it wrapped up. Some recipes say to just roast without even removing the silk, but I would hate to pick it off strand by strand when it was hot. Roast either directly on the rack or on a pan for 20-30 minutes.

The verdict? Excellent, simple and delicious! With the time it takes to boil water and then cook the corn, you can roast it in the oven. You could add anything you wanted to this to tailor it to your own taste, but to me, plain and simple's the winner!