sour cream coffee cake with pears and walnuts

The annoying thing about following recipes is that you always end up with a large container of some obscure, random ingredient that you purchased for the sake of two tablespoons, only to stick in the pantry or in the back of the fridge, never to be seen or used again.

(See: apple cider vinegar for Madam Rosmerta's Butterbeer, buttermilk for Irish Soda Bread, or sour cream for Jamie Oliver's Green Goddess Salad Dressing.)

 

I'm clearly not the only person who finds this irritating and highly wasteful because my mother also requested that I find a recipe to use up the 7.9oz of sour cream remaining in the 8oz container. After poking around on Epicurious, I found a seemingly promising recipe for a sour cream coffee cake with pears and pecans, which I adapted due to our lack of pecans.

The recipe is included below. This coffee cake has a great flavor, but I'm warning you, it is a pain in the PATOOTIE to make, unless you have a sous chef around to pour everything into a separate bowl and stir everything in a separate bowl and clean up your five bajillion dishes when you're done. Yeesh. I'm exhausted just thinking about it.

Sour Cream Coffee Cake with Pears and Walnuts
Adapted from Bon Appetit | October 2003

Topping ingredients
1-1/2 cups walnuts
1/3 cup light brown sugar
2 tablespoons all purpose flour
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 tablespoons chilled unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch cubes

Cake ingredients
2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
1/3 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup light brown sugar
3 large eggs
1 teaspoon lemon zest
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2-3/4 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup milk
3-4 pears, peeled and chopped

For topping:

Blend walnuts, brown sugar, flour, and cinnamon in food processor until walnuts are coarsely chopped. Add butter and pulse on and off until coarse crumbs form.

For cake:

Preheat oven to 350°F and prepare a 13 x 9 inch baking dish with nonstick spray.

Using a mixer, beat butter in a large bowl until light and fluffy. Add granulated and brown sugar and beat well. Beat in one egg at a time. Add lemon zest and vanilla extract.

Sift flour, baking powder, salt, and baking soda into a medium bowl.

Mix sour cream and milk in a separate bowl.

Beat in sour cream mixture with butter, alternating with dry ingredients, in three additions each.

Spread half of cake batter in baking dish. Sprinkle over half of crumb topping; cover with pears. Spread remaining batter over. Sprinkle remaining crumb topping.

Bake for about 50 minutes, until top is brown and cake tester comes out clean. Allow cake to cool in pan on rack. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover and store at room temperature.)

walnut-crusted tilapia

This was the feast my mom and I conjointly prepared several nights ago. It was kind of fancy. We had wilted spinach sauteed in olive oil and garlic; walnut-crusted tilapia brushed with a mixture of light mayonnaise, Grey Poupon, and fresh chopped basil; baked Japanese yams; roasted kabocha squash; and finally a small helping of quinoa.

For those who are not in the know, Grey Poupon is one of those famous flagship Dijon mustard brands, like French's for yellow mustard, except Grey Poupon has much nicer packaging. It's made with brown mustard seed and white wine, which (fun fact from Wikipedia) "is produced in upstate New York under the supervision of a rabbi, to ensure that the product maintains its kosher status." So there you have it. Grey Poupon is at least partly if not wholly (wholly, holy, ha!) rabbi-certified kosher.

My dad discovered Grey Poupon when I was in the sixth grade. Incidentally, I decided to take French as an elective that year, and from that class I can only recall two things.

The first is that le mur (pronounced something like "leh me-uh") is French for "the wall."

The second is that behind every enjoyable foreign language class, there is always a teacher campaigning for a cultural food event.

For our end-of-year soiree, my mom helped me make pain au chocolat, which according to the recipe is basically a bunch of glorified croissants with Nutella inside. Another student brought in a dish made with Grey Poupon, presumably because Dijon mustard originated in France (in Dijon, France, to be precise). In response to this weird foreign dish, one of my classmates asked, "What is it? Gray poopoo?!" And so, ever since, I've mentally referred to Grey Poupon as Grey Poopoo.

Classy. And kosher!

Walnut-Crusted Tilapia
Adapted from Epicurious

2 tbsp light mayonnaise
2 tbsp Grey Poupon
a small handful of fresh basil leaves, chopped
a pinch of salt and pepper
2 cups walnuts
4 filets of tilapia

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

In a small bowl, combine mayonnaise, Grey Poupon, basil, salt, and pepper. Stir well.

Optional: Toast walnuts on a pan over medium-high heat for a few minutes or until they smell fragrant. Coarsely chop walnuts or, alternatively, fill a Ziploc bag with walnuts and pound away using a heavy rolling pin. Spread walnuts onto a shallow dish.

Pat dry filets and coat each side with mayonnaise-mustard mixture. Press into crushed walnuts, coating each side.

Place onto a baking sheet and bake for 15 minutes or until flaky.

ginger pine nut scones

My family has had a half gallon of buttermilk sitting in the fridge for a while now, and we have been looking for ways to use it all up. Earlier tonight, I found an interesting recipe for Ginger Pecan Scones on Epicurious, so my mom and I decided to give it a whirl. We ended up substituting toasted pine nuts for the pecans because (1) we don't have pecans and (2) we have pine nuts. It worked out rather nicely.

The recipe called for a tablespoon of baking powder, which is really quite a lot, but in my unscientific opinion, this is what makes the scones so puffy and nice and soft inside (while the outside gives you a perfectly crunchy bite). The three kinds of ginger - ground, candied, and fresh grated ginger - add an exotic tangy kick, but you get a creamy sort of depth from the toasted pine nuts. These scones are such a treat, and they are wonderful especially if you're looking for something a little bit different.

WE INTERRUPT YOUR READING EXPERIENCE FOR A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT.

I am sitting in the kitchen as I write this post. My mother would like me to add that she played sous chef to my baker and washed the dishes after all was said and done. So woo hoo, props to my mom. Thanks for rolling up my sleeves and scratching my nose when my hands were covered in flour and dough.

Ginger Pine Nut Scones
Adapted from Bon Appetit | April 2011
Yields 12 scones

3 cups all purpose flour
2/3 cup sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoons (or 1 1/2 sticks) chilled unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1 1/2 cups pine nuts, toasted
1/2 cup crystallized ginger, chopped
1 cup plus 1 1/2 tablespoons buttermilk
1 1/2 teaspoons finely grated peeled fresh ginger
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 425°.

Whisk flour, sugar, baking powder, ground ginger, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Add in butter and using fingertips, blend until a course meal forms. Mix in toasted pine nuts and crystallized ginger.

Form a well in the center of dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, whisk together 1 cup buttermilk, grated ginger, and vanilla extract. Pour in buttermilk and combine until mixture becomes moist and sticky.

Transfer to a lightly floured surface. Knead until dough just comes together; divide in half. Form each half into a disk, roughly 3/4 inch thick. Cut disk into 6 slices and transfer wedges to baking sheet.

Brush each wedge using reserved 1 1/2 tablespoons buttermilk. Bake until golden, about 20 minutes.

roasted applesauce

Jo and I made a chunky roasted applesauce for a giant potluck dinner Friday night, and it only required 5 ingredients: half a peck of apples (or 13 small apples - a mix of Empire and Honeycrisp... it's nice living in upstate New York), cinnamon (we used ground cinnamon because uhhh who do you think we are?! - but cinnamon sticks would be a treat), nutmeg (same deal), salt, and water (assuming water even counts as an ingredient?).

We used a recipe from Improv Kitchen as reference (by the way, I am crazy about the whole premise behind this blog: "recipes made to be broken" - my kinda girl).

I don't even like applesauce, but I thought this was sooo delicious. It had a nice texture, soft and mushy (talk about unappetizing words...) without feeling like baby food. The flavor was really deep and intense - we didn't add any sugar, so all the sweetness came directly from the roasted apples themselves - and the dish itself was really pretty too! Kind of a blushing pink color thanks to the skin. Ah, lovely... and something to make the apartment smell divine.

Roasted Applesauce
Adapted from Improv Kitchen

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Chop apples into bite size pieces, removing seeds and stems and other sketchy bits. Toss with cinnamon, nutmeg, and a pinch of salt. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and pour in a little bit of water to help break down the apples some more. Bake for another 30 minutes - or until soft and smashable. Remove from oven and mash everything up with a fork. (Careful, don't burn yourself.) Serve warm or at room temperature. Accept compliments with grace and a curtsy.

Also, speaking of apples... a few weeks ago I read John Seabrook's article about apples in The New Yorker. You'll have to pay for access to read it online, but if you manage to find the Nov. 21 issue, I strongly recommend purchasing it because it's all about food and there are some really fascinating reads. If you're interested in learning more about the different types of apples, this blog, Adam's Apples, is great fun as well.

chickpea stew

Every so often I have days where there's nothing I want more than a big bowl of hearty veggie stew and some nice crusty bread. My sister and I "developed" this recipe last winter. It's incredibly easy to adapt, which is one reason why I really like it. You can substitute ingredients, add more, take some out. Not a fussy dish at all and so delicious and satisfying.

Chickpea Stew

1 can chickpeas or lentils
2-3 medium potatoes - you can use pretty much anything, including sweet potatoes, except maybe baby or fingerlings which are more waxy and less creamy when cooked
Stewed or flash-steamed tomatoes (canned is okay)
Winter vegetables (squash, zucchini, carrots...)
1 large onion (yellow or red will work)
Several garlic cloves
Chicken broth
Parsley or cilantro
Cumin, paprika, fennel seeds (optional), cinnamon stick (optional)
Salt, pepper

Wash and chop all veggies into similar sized chunks. Slice garlic thinly.
Drain and rinse chickpeas.
Heat a pot over medium-high, add olive oil.
Add onions and garlic. Cook for 2-3 minutes.
Add potatoes. Cook for another 5-7 minutes.
Add spices. Cook until they become fragrant.
Add tinned tomahtoes, stir for a minute, then add winter veg and chickpeas.
Add chicken broth; or if you don't have broth, you can use water.
Simmer until potatoes are done, and then you can mash up everything with a fork.
Sprinkle with chopped parsley and a drizzle of olive oil, plain yogurt, sour cream, Parmesan cheese...
Serve with bread, rice, pasta, couscous, etc.

sweet potato lentil stew

As Ithaca winter approaches and the sky starts getting dark at 5pm, I find that all I really want to do is sleep and eat stew and compliment people on the fit of their pants and listen to songs like Poison & Wine by The Civil Wars on repeat. In fact, that is exactly what I've been doing today. (The perfect black pants were from Paris. Of course.)

I made this sweet potato lentil stew for dinner tonight, loosely basing it off my favorite chickpea stew recipe, which I will post here at some point in the next few days.

I'm too lazy to do a proper recipe right now - plus I don't have real measurements of anything - but I'll give a fairly accurate run through of what I did, for anyone who is interested.

Things you'll need: Garlic, onion, olive oil, a sweet potato, your favorite spices, lentils.

Peel and roughly chop a couple cloves of garlic. Chop up a small onion. Heat a pot on medium heat, add olive oil, and cook the garlic and onion together until the onion turns translucent and the smell of your kitchen makes you think your cooking skills are legit.

Peel and chop your sweet potato into bite size chunks. Add to the pot and top off with a little more olive oil. Cook for a couple minutes, stirring every so often. Add lentils (I used a can of white cannellini beans and some leftover red kidney beans) and spices (cumin, coriander, nutmeg... curry would be another nice option). Add about a cup and a half of water and cook until sweet potatoes soften.

Mash everything up to desired consistency. Serve with pumpkin seeds, feta, and a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.