Cranberry Sauce Two Ways

Oh cranberry sauce, the underrated thanksgiving side dish that sometimes feels more like obligation than a joy to eat. But it doesn't have to be that way. With a few simple additions, cranberry sauce can go from the unwanted party guest to a side that shines.

Cranberry sauce is super easy to make, and there are so many ways to flavor cranberry sauce that is about a million times better than the canned stuff. This year I made a few different kinds for thanksgiving gifts–one cranberry-orange style, and one red wine and rosemary style.

Red Wine and Rosemary Cranberry Sauce

2 cups dry red wine
2 1/2 cups sugar
24 dried Turkish apricots, roughly chopped
2 6" springs of fresh rosemary
juice from 2 meyer lemons
zest from 2 meyer lemons
1.5 lbs. fresh cranberries

Combine first 6 ingredients in large saucepan. Bring to boil, stirring until sugar dissolves. Reduce heat to low and simmer 10 minutes. Mix in cranberries. Cook over medium heat until liquid is slightly reduced and berries burst, stirring occasionally, about 10 minutes. Remove rosemary. Cool. Transfer sauce to bowl and serve, cool and refrigerate for up to a week, or can for later use. Yields 3 pints.

Orange-Cranberry Sauce

2 cups orange jucie
2 1/2 cups sugar
Zest from one navel orange
1/8 tsp. cardamom
1/2 tsp. grated nutmeg
2 4" cinnamon sticks
Insides from 1/2 vanilla bean
1 Tbs fresh grated giner
1.5 lbs. fresh cranberries

Combine first 7 ingredients in large saucepan. Bring to boil, stirring until sugar dissolves. Reduce heat to low and simmer 10 minutes. Mix in cranberries. Cook over medium heat until liquid is slightly reduced and berries burst, stirring occasionally, about 10 minutes. Remove cinnamon sticks. Cool. Transfer sauce to bowl and serve, cool and refrigerate for up to a week, or can for later use. Yields 3 pints.

Spring Salad with Mango and Blueberries

Yesterday was the first really beautiful day this spring in Seattle. The sun was out, the tide was low, and it hit 66 degrees. It seemed like the whole city came out in full force: dudes were walking around shirtless, small children were donning their swimming suits and splashing in the sound while wishing the Coleman Pool was open for the season, and ladies in short shorts were littering the rocky beaches. I spent the majority of the day laden with 3 cameras, traipsing around the beaches on Vashon Island and hanging out with my best friend from childhood. I even got a little bit of a sunburn on my cheeks. Go figure.

Dinner today was inspired by the glorious weather yesterday. I went outside of my comfort zone and went for the "this isn't local or seasonal by any means, but I want summer!" approach and made an huge salad on baby greens, spinach, mango and blueberries, and topped it with a ginger lemon dressing.

Spring Salad with Mango and Blueberries

Chocolate Ginger Pear Torte

Yesterday was a friend’s birthday, which, in my book, is just a good excuse to bake. I used to hate baking (well, that’s not true–I liked it, I just wasn’t very good at it). Where cooking moves organically and free flowing: you can add a smattering of this, a dash of that, balance X flavor with Y all during the process. Not so much with baking. In baking, ingredients must be precisely measured, the correct temperature, and mixed in just the right way. There is little room for error. Not to mention, when you first start replacing eggs with other ingredients, it can take some time to wrap your head around what works best for what, or even learning to combine different substitutes to end up with the best end product you can. But the PPK can help you with those building blocks.

It wasn’t until I moved in with my friend Dee, who is a great vegan baker, that I began to reign myself in and get down with the chemistry of baking. Now I treat it as some sort of science experiment, which makes the precise nature of baking enjoyable. So, it was my friend's birthday, and I attempted to procure 35 helium balloons “like a big bunch- the kind a little kid would have at a park in France!” at the bequest of her partner who is out of the country (this did not work out as planned, only 22 would fit in the car and one popped on the way home. but 21 is still a big bunch of balloons). In order to complete this Parisian themed birthday evening, I decided to attempt to make a torte, and although it looked a little homely, it was fucking delicious. We shared a few pieces over a bottle of pinot noir (red wine + chocolate = perfect equation) and I probably would have sat there and stuffed the remaining half of the torte in my face and ended up looking like a chocolate driven zombie had my wife not gracefully prodded me out the door back to our apartment.

Chocolate Ginger Pear Torte

Market Spice Tea Cupcakes

Does anyone else remember when vegan cupcakes took over the world? I do– it was 2006, I was living in Norfolk, VA, in an apartment that with a dining room that resembled a barn, a big ass kitchen and a porch perfect for southern evening beer drinking. I had quite a few vegan friends, and it seems like there we were, all minding our own business, living our lives, and then: BAM!!! Within the course of a few weeks we had all become masters of the vegan cupcake. There were cupcake clubs at the office. There were personalized cupcakes for everyone’s birthdays. There were 20 different kinds of vegan cupcakes at office potlucks. Sweet Abandon opened. Annie made a super cute batch with gummy sharks riding "butter cream" waves. I made Mexican hot chocolate cupcakes with sugar skulls. The small wonders were everywhere.

So congrats, Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero, if your intentions were to have Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the Word (literally), well, in our little corner of the world, you succeeded. Of course, once Veganomicon came out, the cupcake craze died down a little, but I think for all of us in 2006 that used VCTOTW as a springboard for cupcakery, the sweet treats will always have a place in our hearts.

I haven’t made cupcakes in quite a long time, but walking through Market Spice Tea at the market a few days ago, I picked up a new stash of their original (orange cinnamon) tea. It’s the perfect fall tea, with orange and cinnamon and clove, you just can’t go wrong. I also had the idea it might be really good in cupcake form. So I busted out my batter splattered copy of VCTOTW and got to work modifying.

Market Spice Tea Cupcakes

Indian Inspired One Pot Lentils and Rice

Just because I like good food and I like to cook doesn’t mean it’s all I like doing. I also enjoy reading personal ads and taking long walk on the beach. Just kidding. I don't really read the personals unless they are the personals on the back of The Stranger. That’s some good shit. At any rate, somedays, I just want to make a dish that takes me 5 minutes to prepare, 20 minutes to cook, and I can have leftovers for lunch for a few days. And that’s exactly what this one pot meal is. Easy, delicious, filling, and contains a complex protein I made this yesterday afternoon for lunch, and had it for breakfast and dinner tonight. Then I decided to switch my dietary habits up a bit and had a chick-o-stick (ummm... Dear marketing people at Atkinson: you really should think about renaming your candy to something one would not find in Toys in Babeland…) and a glass of wine. 

Indian Inspired One Pot Lentils and Rice

Curry Carrot Soup

Well, the rain has officially started here in the Pacific Northwest. Sure, we had a few day stretch about a month ago when it sprinkled, but that wasn’t really the start of the rainy season. A few last warm sunny fall days had been promised, so spirits were still high. And then yesterday happened. Gray and rain, and we officially stepped foot into the weather Seattle is known for. The showers permeated the city, the old windows in our apartment started to rattle against the wind and the “clunk, clink, whoosh” of the steam radiators that heat our apartment building kicked in at 7am.

Once I drug myself out of the quilted cocoon (a.k.a. my bed), and had a cup of tea, I spent the morning hanging shelves all over my apartment (which, by the way, has no storage, but very high ceilings). I realized around 3 pm I was famished, and found an onion and some carrots in the fridge: fixins for a perfect meal to welcome in the fall weather. Nothing beats hot soup on a cool day, especially when it doesn’t take much time or effort. 
 

Curry Carrot Soup