morsels & sauces

Many years ago, the husband made duck confit for cassoulet , and lordy, did my life become filled with questions. Why wasn't there more duck in it? Could we make duck confit? Where can one buy duck confit? How could we use duck confit? Is it wrong that I want to eat duck confit everyday?  I don't have answers, but I can at least show you how to make duck confit. Confit of anything (garlic, onions, chicken wings) is simply slowly cooking said anything in fat. Wait a minute... that sounds like frying. Well, close. It's the temperature thing that sets this apart from frying, and because you do this at such a low temperature, it means you're doing this for a long time, in hopes of producing a food that will keep for a long time. Which is not surprising, since the word confit  comes from the French confire , which simply means to preserve. (Want to learn more?   Don't hesitate to turn to food genius, Kenji Lopez-Alt .)  If you use  Ithai Schori and C...

Where has March gone?  Where is April going? I cannot keep track of this spring and it seems to be slipping away. For example, I made this duck confit (post on how to make duck confit itself, here ) and then I made this pasta and then two months passed and now we're here .  And here seems to be spring break, our move to Richmond (oh, Oakland how we already miss you), and a life lived out of boxes, which admittedly, we have been doing lately.  I have come to appreciate the well-labelled box, and to shake my fist at my past self who labelled far too many boxes "Miscellaneous."  Those are the most frightening boxes. Until we have a full kitchen, I am resurrecting old dinners that I haven't posted and am subsisting on pickles and popcorn. Both of which I love. Don't judge. I just love salt, okay?  Maybe I'll just get a salt lick for the new kitchen. It could happen. However, if you're feeling fancy (and we both know you and I li...

What a strange week this has already been.  On Monday night around 2 am, we felt a jolt to the whole house. Ever my father's daughter, I went downstairs in the dark to grab my iPad to figure out just how strong that short but solid temblor was. I checked earthquaketrack  and usgs . Neither showed our quake. I kept refreshing the webpages, but still nothing. First I convinced myself that it must have been a minor earthquake, like a 1.0 or 2.0 and the epicenter just so happened to be under our house. Then I convinced myself that I had dreamed it (hey, by then it was 3 am), but I was certain that the husband, who had fallen back to sleep, had felt it too. Confused, I fell back to sleep. At 7:30, I woke to find this in the backyard.   So I guess they aren't kidding when they say that earthquakes feel like a truck hitting your house.  Or a tree, in this case. Thankfully, no one was hurt (although a branch did go crashing through the neighbor's window, which co...

We wanted to celebrate with a Christmas feast with some of the husband's family; however, I also wanted something relatively easy and mostly in one pot.  So, last week the French, via the Zuni Cafe , came to the rescue. This recipe looks like it takes a while (and technically it does because you have to let it braise for a few hours), but the prep work is minimal and the clean up easy.  The hardest part about the whole recipe may have been slicing the onion. I have never been much of a duck consumer; however, this blog has pushed me to make duck three times in the past two years, and each time, I have been delighted by the results. Judy Rodgers, chef and co-owner of the Zuni and writer of the cookbook from which this recipe originates, suggests that one should use Muscovy duck legs.  Admittedly, I have no idea whatsoever which ducks sacrificed their legs to the cause, for all I did was approach the butcher and ask for four legs.  Either he was flirting wi...

Adapted from Cookbook #30:  Chez Panisse Fruit Recipe:  Grilled Cured Duck Breast with Pickled Peaches I think that duck is for some people what rabbit is to me:  frightening.  While I have admitted to not making a lot of duck out of avoidance of gamy and fatty tastes, the duck cooking has never filled me with dread.  Here's a lovely little SF Gate article on the avalanche of advice one might receive about duck.  Below you will find a little more advice from Alice Waters (who does say score the skin and definitely brine it). Alice Waters has created two cookbooks that I stand by, and stand by firmly:  This one and Chez Panisse Vegetables .  Both cookbooks are arranged by produce, so when you get that CSA box filled with lemons or the farmers market seems overrun with kale, you can figure out something to do with all of it.  [The Vegetable chapter where we find page 210 is on mushrooms, so we have to wait for the rains again be...

Adapted from Cookbook #29:  License to Grill Recipe: Grilled Duck Breast with Peach-Green Grape Chutney Duck.  I don't eat a lot of duck.  In part because of the pricetag associated with this fair fowl, but also because I, like many, find it a little fatty and gamy.  So I went a searching for tips on how to reduce the gamy taste and I discovered this:  soak the duck breasts in a salted ice water for about a hour before using.  The brine should be about a quarter cup of salt per quart of water.  Ice water helps.  Rinse thoroughly and then pat dry.  Viola.  Less gamy duck. Also duck can be tricky on a grill.  It likes to drip fat and cause flare ups, and even if you have the duck over to the side of your charcoals (see below instructions), you still need to keep an eye on the bird.  The husband and I grilled together (see earlier post on my novice status as a grillmaster), and at one point, he walked around to look ...