Honeyed Marscapone Fruit Tartlets

I am amazed at the varieties of figs. Incredible. It isn't just a matter of color. Some taste more tart, almost raspberry like. Some taste like pure honey. And the textures are dramaticially different. The Calimyrna fig has a thicker skin and a seedier bite. Some are less seedy and have flesh that resembles a thick jam.

There's a man that I'm utterly devoted to when it comes to buying figs. I suppose I should find out his name and the name of his farm but all I know is that he's slightly crabby and surprisingly generous (he'll throw in a few freebies here and there). Also, I know that he is of Portuguese descent. I don't know why I know this.

Most farmers market vendors sell either Brown Turkey figs or Black Mission figs but my favorite fig man seems to add new varieties every week.

He is at the Hollywood farmers market and the Echo Park farmers market.

Though I love figs and fruit in all forms, when the fruit is really good it seems like a shame to bake it or to sugar it up. For the most part I ate nearly 2 1/2 baskets of fresh figs all by myself but to use up the last few figs I made tartlets with marscapone cheese.

I had some leftover dough from my quiche so I baked those into tartlet form and filled them with the marscapone cheese and fruit and topped the whole thing with a generous dripping of honey.

Here is the recipe for the marscapone filling:

Ingredients:

1/2 cup marscapone cheese

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 tablespoons honey

pinch of salt

1. combine all the ingredients together

2. spoon into tart shell

The Hollywood Farmers Market

...made better with friends

Pasadena Farmers Market

Here is how I would rank Los Angeles farmers markets:
1. Santa Monica on Wednesdays
2. Hollywood on Sundays
3. Pasadena on Saturdays
...I'll throw in Silverlake on Saturdays for convenience of location

--note: my commitment to stop my obsession with figs has failed. I bought more. In fact, out of the 8 I bought, only 3 made it home. I ate everything while walking around the Pasadena farmers market.

Pasadena Farmers Market
Victory Park, Pasadena
Saturdays 8 to 3

Beef On The Brain

A friend once described his brain as a "silent, dumb muscle" and when I think about this I picture a slab of beef, a tumored cancerous slab of red raw meat. I don't know why. That is what my brain feels like during the week. For the summer I've been working in Orange County 3-4 days of the week, and it isn't that the work is especially hard or even unstimulating, but by the time I get to go back to my own space in Los Angeles my head feels as bit masticated and like this dull throbbing knob of a thing.
So when I get to spend my weekends in Los Angeles, I can't even say how much I enjoy letting myself reach equilibrium. I peruse farmers markets with headphones and my iPod on shuffle. I cook unnecessarily elaborate meals for one. I attempt to forget the sound of my own voice. I wake up at 7:30 in the morning and eat fruit and tea and bread with butter.

on a side note: do you ever feel that your iPod shuffle is psychically tied to you? I swear my iPod is either magical or psychic or more likely a combination of both.

Duck Egg over Chanterelles and Peas (plus other things)

I went to the Santa Monica Farmers Market the other day, which was my first time actually. I saw Mark Peel there discussing apples. He looked super official in his chef's jacket.
Things that are in season and wonderful and purchased by me:
1. figs (I need to stop with the figs. I'm more fig than girl at this point)
2. bermuda onions (very sweet, tastes vaguely like cipollini)
3. thyme
4. orange and red tomatoes

I also bought some chanterelles, which I haven't seen at farmers markets this summer. I'm not sure when chanterelles are in season but they were pretty pricey. At $12 per pound I could only afford a handful. I couldn't resist though. I have a deep love of mushrooms and chanterelles are up there on my list.

I also found a duck egg. It was the last one. I felt almost obligated to buy it. Just as an object (not as a food item) an egg is so pleasing to look at. If I could assign a personality to eggs, I'd say that they seem enormously calm. That's probably stupid. I should stop romanticizing everything I eat.

For dinner I used my purchases to make a really gorgeous dinner, for one, pathetically. Is it still pathetic if I preferred it that way? I sauteed bermuda onions with the chanterelles with some thyme and peas and topped it with a fried duck egg and then I drizzled the whole thing with the white truffle oil I got with my gift certificate to Williams and Sonoma.
Also, a side salad of tomatoes in a meyer lemon balsamic vinaigarette.
Oh! also I enjoyed figs with a port and honey goat cheese! Saeyoung, I'm bringing your some of that goat cheese. It's ridiculously good.

Ingredients:
1/2 a bermuda onion
3/4 cup chanterelle mushrooms
1/4 cup peas (frozen or fresh)
3 sprigs of thyme
2 tablespoons of butter
salt and pepper to taste
1 duck egg

1. melt the butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat
2. sweat the onions. try and not move them too much so that they will caramelize but make sure that they don't burn and go bitter
3. when the onions are cooked down and translucent add the chanterelles and thyme
4. when the onions and chanterelles are browned add the peas and cook for about one minute or until the peas are just tender
5. salt and pepper to taste
6. take the mixture out of the pan and plate
7. in the same pan with the browned butter, crack the egg and fry until the white part is opaque. You want the yolk to be runny (you may have to add more butter or oil to the pan before adding the egg)
8. top the chanterelle mixture with the egg and drizzle with white truffle oil or just extra virgin olive oil will do just fine

...other variations:

this would also be good with pancetta or some sort of salty cured meat

Further Preservation

a sampling

macerated strawberries 

boiling the preserves

Calimyrna, Black Mission, and Kadota Figs

Fig season is here! They've sort of been trickling into farmers markets for the last month and now they are all over the place.  I went to the Pasadena farmers market on Saturday and purchased a smattering of different varieties.  I must have eaten a basket of figs, sampling them from stall to stall.  I'm very particular.  And figs are testy.  

Along with other fruits I bought there I made more preserves, which is quickly becoming one of my favorite summer activities.

also, thank you to Saeyoung and Eli for being my preserve taste testers. Saeyoung's favorite--strawberry balsamic.  Eli's favorite--fig, apple, almond

This round:

strawberry with balsamic vinegar

strawberry with mint and black pepper

fig (mixed variety), fuji apple, and almonds

note*

I am auctioning off a basket of my preserves at the Les Figues Benefit Auction this year along with an alchemical baking commission.

In the basket so far are:

fig.vanilla.honey

yellow nectarine.chamomile

gaviota strawberry.grand marnier

cherry.peach.rosebud

blueberry.white nectarine.vanilla

strawberry.balsamic

strawberry.mint.black pepper

fig.apple.almond

and next week I plan on making peach and white wine preserves, which I'm sure will make it into the basket.  To purchase tickets to the event or for more info, go here.  

Melon Salsa And Tandoori Chicken

My mom made tandoori chicken last night and to utilize the last of my Galia melon I made a melon salsa to eat with her very tasty entree.

Ingredients

1/2 melon, thickly cubed

1/4 red onion, small dice

a handful of chopped cilantro

juice of 2 limes

zest of one lime

2 chopped jalapenos

1/3 cup of corn kernals (preferably fresh and raw)

1. just toss it together

Melonopolis

As has become my habit, I went to the Hollywood Farmer's Market this Sunday. I've said this before, the farmer's market is like my Disneyland.

I bought a Galia melon from Weiser Family Farms (a consistently good vendor that I recommend). I also bought some other fruits but really the prize of the day was that Galia melon.

Sometimes complications are unnecessary. A simple fruit salad is perfect and wonderful. Of course, if you add some grand marnier...well, nothing is wrong with that. For my perfect midday snack, I boiled down some Grand Marnier with sugar and craisins and tossed it with fresh fruit and chopped mint. The craisins plump up in the Grand Marnier adorably. Also, I used very little Grand Marnier in proportion to the fruit because I didn't want the fruit bathing in there. If making this, make sure that the Grand Marnier syrup isn't hot when you toss the fruit or you'll scald your snack. No good.

Heirloom Tomatoes, Two Ways

tomato, strawberry, basil panzanella 

tomato with red onions and ginger lemon dressing

Eat a tomato like an apple.  

Gaviota Strawberry Grand Marnier Preserves

grand marnier

I almost felt maternal about these strawberries

On Sunday I went to the Hollywood Farmers Market with Lan and Nancy.  Possibly the most exciting buy was Gaviota strawberries.  Gaviota strawberries are smaller, juicier, and sweeter than most other strawberries.  Their small size makes them perfect for making whole fruit preserves.

Usually I like to combine different fruits in my preserves but these were so wonderful that I felt they should be on their own, with the addition of grand marnier.  I really love the combination of alcohol and fruit, it just makes a lot of sense.  I think the first jam I ever made was strawberry and pomegranate wine.   

This preserve takes almost two days to make because to preserve the fruit without breaking it or losing the shape of the berry there's a lot of slow maceration and multiple slow boils that have to be done.  But it's actually not a great deal of work, just a lot of waiting.  

I think this may be my favorite preserve to date.  I'm pretty thrilled about it actually.  Just the raw strawberries (pre-maceration) in grand marnier was barely resistible ( i may have eaten a few). 

After canning the preserves there's usually some fruit syrup leftover and I usually just discard it but this particular syrup so excellent, I canned it as well.  Maybe I can use it for ice cream?  

Strawberries are a very cute fruit.

Cherry, White Nectarine, and Rosebud Preserves

I love rose flavored things.  I love that I can eat flowers.  

Yellow Nectarine and Chamomile Preserves

This is what I learned from Christine Ferber: The point of making preserves is to preserve the flavor of fruit, rather than muddling it with sugar.  Therefore, it only makes sense to use in-season organic fruit (preferably locally grown) and to preserve it in large unsmashed chunks that are simply bathing in sugar rather than mixed in with the sugar.  That way when you put your preserves on morning toast or over yogurt, you can remove it from the sugar bath and actually taste the fruit.  

Fantastic.  

The chamomile was wonderful in this.