Food

A recent reading of Jeff Smith's comic epic, Bone, inspired this week's classic recipe of Quiche Lorraine. In the comic, two monsters (refered to as "rat creatures") repeatedly discuss turning the heroes of the story into a quiche, and while we'd never want to see a quiche made of Fone, Phoney, or Smilely Bone, the quiche lorraine does quite well with bacon and eggs. Good for breakfast, lunch or dinner, this light, yet savory custard, is quick to prepare and can be made far in advance of your meal.

Ingredients:

For the pastry crust:

• 8 oz flour (about 1 1/2 cups)
• 8 tablespoons chilled, cubed butter
• 6 tablespoons cold water
• large pinch of sea salt

For the custard:

• 8 oz slab bacon, roughly chopped
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 3/4 cup heavy cream
• 3/4 cup whole milk
• 3 large eggs
• 1 tablespoon salt
• 1/4 teapoon pepper
• pinch of nutmeg
• 4 oz emmentaler or Gruyere cheese, thickly shaved

I’ve always known that soup was good food, but who knew it could also make me feel patriotic?

Monday was a glorious sunny day (remember that?). The balmy weather inspired a lunchtime stroll over to Infinite Soups on Tacoma Avenue. Everything about this spot is just so right. I had to wait in line for a while, but that was OK with me. A happy-go-lucky group of students was studying the handwritten menu and chatting with Todd DeShazo, soup chef and co-owner. One of the students gave me a friendly smile that felt as warm as the sunshine streaming through the front window. (The anticipation of homemade soup makes people smile, it seems.)

[More after the jump.]

They're not just for tea-time.

Crumpets are generally the perfect vehicles for your favorite spreads. Unlike bagels and sandwich loaf bread, crumpets have the added benefit of a porous top, which absorbs and holds whatever you put on it, whether it's butter, jam, or even pesto to go with an open-face crumpet sandwich. Similar to pancakes, crumpets have the addition of yeast, which adds a slight rising time to it. Fortunately, they keep well for a couple days so they can be made in advance.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup + 1 tablespoon of All-purpose unbleached flour
• 1 teaspoon dry active yeast (the best is SAF Instant yeast, which you can find at HT Oaktree Market)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon honey
• 3/4 cup + 2 tablespoon scaled milk (separated)
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon melted butter

Portuguese malasadas are a Hawaiian staple and a Mardi Gras tradition.

text and photos by Tracy Schneider

If you’re wondering just how a Portuguese doughnut became a Hawaiian specialty, you’re not alone. The explanation goes something like this:

In the late 1800s, Portuguese workers from the Azores came to Hawaii to work in the sugarcane and pineapple fields. The children of these contract workers went into other fields (so to speak). One of them, Leonard Rego, worked in a large bakery in Honolulu before opening up his own small bakery, which he named Leonard’s.

The bakery sold traditional American fare — cookies, cakes and pies — but shortly before Lent one year, Leonard’s mother persuaded him to make the Portuguese doughnuts called malasadas, a Fat Tuesday tradition much like Polish paczki. Needless to say, Leonard’s malasadas became a big hit, and the bakery, now a Hawaii institution, has been serving them for more than fifty years.

Malasadas by North Shore Hawaiian BBQ

Fortunately, you don’t need a ticket to Hawaii to enjoy these deep-fried puffs of dough tossed with sugar and served hot. In Seattle, North Shore Hawaiian Barbeque makes wonderfully crunchy malasadas from an old family recipe. They're available every weekend at brunch. But don’t be late! By noon the malasadas almost always run out.

Malasadas by Kauai

They’re gone by noon at the Kauai Family Restaurant in Georgetown also, where they serve malasadas on Saturdays. But even if you arrive too late for hot malasadas, you won’t have to leave empty handed. You can purchase a tub of the restaurant’s own batter, made with potato yeast, and make malasadas at home.

We’ll be talking Chinese doughnuts next week. Didn’t know there were Chinese doughnuts? I’ve got four to share with you!

Want more doughnuts now? Read all about beignets and the power of paczki. Or listen — Choice Morsel was recently featured on KUOW.

Tracy Schneider, a “foodie” long before the term was coined, scours farmers markets, specialty food shops and out-of-the-way eateries for the choice morsel. She has eaten her way across Europe and Asia and now forages in and around the Pacific Northwest. Follow her weekly on the CAB and daily on Twitter.

Mushroom stock is one of the cheapest and easiest stocks to make and contributes a strong earthy flavor to both cooked and fresh dishes. Because this recipe is actually better with cheaper mushrooms (criminis and portabellos instead of truffles and chanterelles), it's a strong go-to for enriching and adding complexity to basic sauces like tomato or soup broths.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 onion, chopped
• Small carrot (or 1/2 large), chopped
• Celery stick, chopped
• 1 quart crimini mushrooms, chopped
• 3 fresh thyme sprigs
• 3 parsley stems
• Clove of garlic
• 1 Tbsp peppercorns
• Bay leaf
• Salt 

Discover the power of the paczki — available only two weeks out of the year.

text and photography by Tracy Schneider

 
William Leaman, owner of West Seattle’s Bakery Nouveau, bakes paczki.    

If you popped into Metropolitan Market yesterday morning, you may have noticed a new selection of perfectly round, glazed and filled doughnuts, neatly arranged in the bakery case. If you passed them up only to return later to pick up a few, as I did, you’d have been disappointed. They had sold out hours earlier.

Such is the power of paczki.

Paczki (pronounced “pooch-key”) are Polish glazed and filled doughnuts that date back to the Middle Ages. Traditionally, they created a way for households to use up the sugar and fat in their cupboards before Lent, explains William Leaman, head baker and owner of West Seattle’s Bakery Nouveau. They also offered a way for bakeries to use up their candied fruits left over from Christmas baking. Chef Leaman’s recipe was passed down to him from a chef who made paczki from a family recipe that dated back to the 1930s.

Paczki dough is much richer than a typical doughnut, and Bakery Nouveau’s version contains more egg yolks, more sugar, plus lots of candied orange peel. Each paczki is filled with the Bakery’s own luscious crémeux custard, be it chocolate or lemon, strawberry or raspberry, and then thickly glazed or covered in powdered sugar.

While paczki are well known in the Midwest, where people buy dozens at a time to share, they only arrived in Seattle last year. Find them now at Bakery Nouveau and Metropolitan Market, but don’t tarry. They sell out in a flash, and they’re here for a limited time only.

Tracy Schneider, a “foodie” long before the term was coined, scours farmers markets, specialty food shops and out-of-the-way eateries for the choice morsel. She has eaten her way across Europe and Asia and now forages in and around the Pacific Northwest. Follow her weekly on the CAB and daily on Twitter.

Corey Kahler is a professional cook, writer and editorial intern at City Arts. In these weekly blog posts, he combines his two loves: food and words to contribute to a more practical and open-minded food public.

Though the weather has been quite warm in Seattle these past couple weeks, it doesn’t mean the nights still aren’t cold. Braised beef short ribs are one of the sturdiest dishes you can make year round.

A short rib is a thick cut of meat usually 2 to 4 inches wide, cut across ribcage of the cow. They are often used as a part of Korean barbecue (galbi) as well as a central cut in the French pot-au-feu. The ribs in these dishes are typically butterflied or come in small chunks. Our recipe is a braised dish (which means you sear your meat then cook in a liquid afterwards) and is all about big pieces of short rib with the rib bone still attached. Many people are uncomfortable around bones, but they are easy to trim away when you are eating. Plus, they create a flavorful base and thicken the eventual sauce.

This recipe is extremely simple, avoids using flour (a cheater’s way to brown the ribs, and adds a bad flavor), and it keeps everything in one pot. The ribs can be made ahead of time or served immediately. If you want to prepare in advance: pull the ribs out of the final sauce and cool the meat and sauce separately. Once you are ready to serve, spoon a big chunk of sauce (it should be slightly gelatinous) into a sauté pan along with a few short ribs. Place in a 450-degree oven and heat until the ribs are soft.

Corey Kahler is a professional cook, writer and editorial intern at City Arts. In these weekly blog posts, he combines his two loves: food and words to contribute to a more practical and open-minded food public.

Because it’s apparently National Soup Month and it’s the usual mix of cold, moist and dark in Seattle, this week’s recipe is vegetarian borscht. It’s hot, flavorful and healthy. It’s hearty, too—perfect for the weeks in January — as it makes you feel like you can survive the winters of an even darker, wetter and colder land such as Russia, Ukraine, and Mongolia where this dish is more commonly eaten, although people eat this dish in as warm of places as Hong Kong.

Most people know borscht as “beet soup,” but it’s actually a menagerie of ingredients, and in many places of the world, tomatoes are the feature ingredient. Pork, sauerkraut, veal, whipped egg whites and more can be added for endless variation, but this basic recipe keeps things simple and will get you started on creating your own.