Bourbon-Walnut Sweet Potato Mash

Here’s one last recipe from Bon Appètit’s Thanksgiving issue, plus a fun little experiment. I chose the one sweet potato dish from the other five regular potato dishes in Bon Appètit’s Thanksgiving potato section because sweet potato soufflé is always on our holiday table, unlike mashed potatoes. Mashed potatoes are – brace yourself – never on our table. Rice is the vehicle for all gravies and sauces on Thanksgiving and the other 364 days of the year.

Oh, you want to know about the experiment, and could care less about my lack of mashed potato consumption? OK.

Instead of sweet potatoes from the market that are breed for sweet flesh, I used the sweet potatoes from the garden center that are bred for ornamental foliage. The two plants – grocery store sweet potatoes and garden center sweet potatoes – are the same plant, Ipomoea batatas, just different cultivars.

My quest was to see if the ornamental sweet potatoes bred to look pretty in gardens are sweet enough to warrant eating. I normally toss these tubers every year when I do garden clean-up, but this year curiosity got the better of me.

I dug the tubers from three different ornamental sweet potato cultivars (Sweet Caroline Sweetheart Red, Marguerite, and Ace of Spades), threw them in my car, and forgot about them for a few weeks. So, unfortunately, when it came time to identify which tuber was which, I had no clue. A good scientist I do not make!

Confusing picture. Four potatoes, but three cultivars - last two are the same cultivar.

I boiled and roasted some of each variety, and then it was time for the individual taste tests. They were all sweet, none drastically more so than the next. And was I glad, because if one was better than the other, I was going to kick myself for letting the tubers roll around the back of my car for weeks, and not remembering which was which.

So, on to the bourbon-walnut sweet potato recipe in Bon Appètit. Trying to be a good scientist, I made a control batch from sweet potatoes from the market. Yum. A sweet, but more rustic dish than the baked sweet potato soufflé typically topped with marshmallows. I adore the marshmallows, by the way.

The mash made from the ornamental sweet potatoes, thanks to their collective white, yellow, and purple flesh, looks about as appetizing as dirty bath water. But guess what? In a blind taste test, they taste just as good as the store bought sweet potatoes bred for eating. The only thing that gives the ornamental sweet potatoes away, besides their color, is a slightly lumpier texture. But lumps can be cured with longer cooking or pureeing.

Stick with the more visually appetizing orange-fleshed sweet potatoes for the holiday table, but don’t toss those tubers from your flower beds – eat them!

Bourbon-Walnut Sweet Potato Mash
Adapted from Bon Appètit
8-10 servings

4 pounds sweet potatoes
½ cup whipping cream
6 tablespoons butter
¼ cup maple syrup
2 tablespoons bourbon
1 ½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground allspice
¾ teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 cup toasted walnuts, chopped

• Preheat oven to 350°
• Roast whole potatoes on a baking sheet for 1 - 1 ½ hours, or until tender. Cool until you can handle, then scoop flesh into a large bowl. Mash potatoes coarsely.
• Heat cream and butter in a saucepan over low heat until butter melts. Slowly combine cream mixture into potatoes. Then add syrup, bourbon, and spices. Add salt and pepper to taste.
• Sprinkle with nuts and serve.

Cranberry, Pear, and Ginger Chutney

Yep, I’m still working on some of the recipes in this year’s Thanksgiving issue of Bon Appètit. I thought I’d hit up one of the four cranberry sauces in the magazine.

My traditional cranberry sauce is my absolute favorite, and I would not be without it. Really, it’s a relish, and it’s super easy. Grind up fresh cranberries and oranges (peel and all), mix with sugar and spices, and let sit overnight in the fridge. Easy.

For giggles, I decided to go with the cranberry sauce recipe – cranberry, pear, and ginger chutney – least like my traditional cranberry holiday staple. If you can tell anything from the four or five jars of chutney in my fridge, it’s that I love chutney. The strong, piquant flavors of chutneys have a hold on me, I’m afraid.

The flavors of Bon Appètit’s cranberry, pear, and ginger chutney are quite strong, so if you have any wimpy palettes at your table, you might want to skip this one. But brave soldiers will devour this chutney. That is, if you follow my suggested changes in the recipe.

The original recipe calls for ¼ cup of grated ginger, which seemed like too much, so I halved that amount right from the start.

The two cups of apple cider vinegar did not faze me when I read the printed recipe, as I can drink vinegar straight from the bottle. But after it was all said and done, I thought the chutney to be heavy on the vinegar. So did some other people who tested the recipe. I’d suggest, at minimum, halving the vinegar and replacing the other half with apple or orange juice. (Recipe below reflects suggestions.)

This brings us to the troubling question of whether or not magazines and cookbooks actually test their recipes. Personally, I think it’s a crock if a for-profit publication doesn’t test all of their recipes. I know some do and some don’t. Which one’s exactly, I’m not sure. I do know that Cook’s Illustrated bases it’s whole publication on the fact that they test, test, and retest their recipes until they get it right. And you know what; I’ve never made anything bad from them.

I’m not saying the chutney below is bad. The recipe just needed tweaking due to, perhaps, a typo or, at worst, an untested recipe. The cranberry, pear, and ginger chutney is lined-up in the fridge door with all of my other chutneys, and most likely will be enjoyed on a cracker with cheese.

Cranberry, Pear, and Ginger Chutney
Adapted from Bon Appètit
makes about 3 1/2 cups

1 cup apple cider vinegar
1 cup apple juice or orange juice
1 cup onion, finely chopped
2 tablespoons ginger, grated
2 ½ teaspoons lemon peel, finely grated
2 ½ teaspoons orange peel, finely grated
1 cinnamon stick
½ teaspoon dried crushed red pepper (I used really hot homegrown and dried peppers, and enjoyed the heat)
¼ teaspoon ground cloves
12-ounce bag fresh cranberries
1 ¼ cups brown sugar, packed
2 large Bosc pears, peeled, cored, and cut into ¾-inch cubes

• Combine apple cider vinegar, apple juice, onion, ginger, lemon peel, orange peel, cinnamon stick, crushed red pepper, and ground cloves in saucepan. Boil mixture for about 10 minutes, or until reduced to 1 ½ cups.
• Add cranberries, brown sugar, and pears. Stir until sugar dissolves.
• Reduce heat to medium-low, cover and simmer until pears and cranberries are soft, about 30 minutes. Stir occasionally.
• Mash mixture coarsely, if at all, with a potato masher.
• Cool and serve at room temperature.
• Can be made 3 days ahead and stored in the fridge.

Balsamic-Braised Cipolline with Pomegranate

Can you believe I've never plucked and eaten a fresh cherry from a tree? I have eaten a less commonly found in backyards fruit, the pomegranate, straight from the tree. The house I grew up in had a much neglected and improperly sited pomegranate tree (large bush, really) under a towering tree in the backyard. No one cared for this fruit tree, and I remember myself being the only one excited when the tree produced a handful of fruits each year.

Cracking open this strange fruit, plucking all the ruby jewels nestled together in membrane-divided pockets, gently biting down on a handful of seeds to release the tangy, sweet juice of the flesh surrounding the seed, and then, of course, spitting the seeds from the porch in a contest with my best friend made for at least thirty minutes of fun to fill my carefree, youthful days.

Pomegranates make an appearance this time of year, and I usually indulge in at least one. Eating a pomegranate is time consuming and somewhat meditative – the opposite of how I generally eat food. The way I like to eat a pomegranate is a few seeds at a time, biting gently down to release the juices, then spit the seeds out. You can eat the seeds, but it just feels wrong to me.

These gems are appearing more and more on salads, and other foods, like the balsamic-braised cipolline onions with pomegranate recipe in the Thanksgiving issue of Bon Appètit, ever since being proclaimed a super-food. I gave Bon Appètit’s Thanksgiving menu another try, and this time it was a success. Except the pomegranate seeds.

If you enjoy crunching and swallowing pomegranate seeds, leave them in the recipe. Spitting seeds out table-side is not allowed, so for those who are pomegranate seed-spitters like me, save the pomegranate for contemplative solitude (spitting contest).

I will name him George, and I will hug him, and pet him, and squeeze him.

Cipollini must mean cute-as-a-button, because that’s what these small, flat, sweet bulbs are. How could I resist these when I spied them in the store? Actually not onions, cipollini are the edible bulbs of a grape hyacinth, Muscari comosum.

Onion or not, cipollini taste like onions, and caramelized onions are like candy to me, so I could not pass up this recipe. I ate these with this year’s Thanksgiving faux turkey (turned out well; details soon), but meat-eaters should try these braised cipolline with beef. Having eaten a grilled steak once a week until the age of 15, I do know what beef tastes like!

Balsamic-Braised Cipolline with Pomegranate
Adapted from Bon Appètit

2 pounds cipolline onions
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 cups vegetable broth
1/4 cup dry red wine
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon brown sugar
1/2 cup pomegranate seeds

• Blanche cipolline in boiling water 1 minute. Drain, cool briefly, trim ends, and peel.
• Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat.Add cipolline, salt and pepper to taste, and sauté until brown, 12 minutes.
  
• Add vegetable broth, wine, vinegar and brown sugar, and bring to a boil. Cover and simmer 15 minutes.
• Increase heat, and boil until cipolline are tender and the liquid has thickened, stirring often, 5 to 15 minutes depending on amount of liquid left in pan.
• Transfer to a serving bowl and sprinkle with pomegranate seeds.
• *Crème fraiche was omitted from this recipe, but, if you like, add 3 tablespoons of crème fraiche or heavy whipping cream to the cipolline right before removing from heat and transferring to serving bowl.

Non Appètit

I don’t know what it is about first tries…or maybe it’s psyching yourself up for something extraordinary, but I seem to fall flat with both of these things. My first attempt and much deliberated ice cream recipe from The Perfect Scoop this summer was down right disgusting. While my first attempt at a recipe from my new subscription to Bon Appètit wasn’t disgusting, it was a disappointing ordeal.

I took last Friday off, not specifically to make the cranberry-chocolate tart featured in the Thanksgiving issue of Bon Appètit, but to…celebrate Columbus Day…yeah, that’s it. Figured I had the whole day, so I’d wake up, make a tart, and have the rest of the afternoon for napping.

I’m in the largest grocery store in Wilmington bright and early, before most people are at their desk jobs, and the stock boys are still in the grocery aisles, only I can’t find a plain chocolate cookie. I stood their about to cry, because I couldn’t find a non-marshmallowed-chocolate chunked-dipped-filled plain chocolate cookie. Thank goodness for those stockers still in the aisles. Turns out they hide those plain cookies in tiny, unassuming boxes two feet above my head.

Oh, the cranberry-chocolate tart calls for gelatin, which everyone knows is made of collagen from horse hooves, bones and whatnot. I try to avoid gelatin because it is the most disgusting product ever. Do this little experiment and I promise you’ll never think of gelatin the same: rehydrate an unflavored package of gelatin and smell it – smells like filed fingernail dust. Nothing you want to eat.

Thought I’d pick up agar agar, a thickener derived from seaweed that’s commonly used as a gelatin substitute. I called five health food stores closest to me to locate this stuff, and ended up driving thirty minutes out of town to the one store with agar agar. Then it turns out that after the tart was all done, I don’t think the thickening agent was necessary.

Did your elementary school teacher give you that exercise on following directions where they hand you a sheet of paper with instructions on cutting out a snowflake, and the first instruction is to read all of the instructions first, the rest are how to cut the paper with the instructions printed on it to make a pretty snowflake, and the veeeery last instruction is to disregard all of the above instructions? I did. And half way through my merry snowflake-making way, I discovered that my teacher was a bitch.

I never learned my lesson, and I’m still generally a bitter person. “Do Ahead” in bold print embedded in the middle of a recipe’s instructions is not helpful, Bon Appètit. The cranberry topping needed to be chilled at least eight hours, and I was planning on eating the tart for lunch that same day.

Beautiful, defined berries on the left, and my cranberry mush on the right.

I did follow the recipe’s directions to simmer the cranberries for five minutes! And I got mushy cranberries and an ugly topping for my tart; nothing near as pretty as theirs.

If my family served this cranberry-chocolate tart to me for Thanksgiving instead of pumpkin pie or pecan pie (Bon Appètit does have suped-up recipes for these classics in the Thanksgiving issue), I’d throw a temper tantrum. But if cheesecake-type desserts are a family tradition for you, you just might like this tart. Go get the magazine, or hit up Epicurious for the recipe. I’m not reprinting it.

The tart tasted fine (with the exception that the crust was too hard), but the end results were not worth the my effort. Maybe if you read directions thoroughly, shop ahead of time, and are organized. But, really, who is this good?

Basically, I'm upset that my first experience with my new magazine was difficult, I STILL don't read directions, and my tart was ugly.

Food Porn In My Mailbox

Lol-ed my cat, and I think it's hilarious. Shoot me.

When Jane magazine had the plug pulled and my subscription ended (I grew up Sassy and never strayed), Condé Nast informed me with a post card that I would be receiving Glamour in place of Jane.

Puh-leez! I’m too old for Jane, and I’m definitely too old for Glamour. I don’t need a magazine to tell me how to please a man every other page, or how to get voluminous hair. Answers: sex and pie; against the laws of physics.

So, I looked at Condé Nast’s magazine roster to see what else my $10 yearly subscription could buy. Golf World? Elegant Bride? Big NO. Bon Appétit or Gourmet? Yes. Which one, though? I’m not a religious reader. I only browse these magazines at air-blasted libraries or book stores when escaping my house in the throngs of summer heat waves.

Off to the bookstore I go to compare and contrast the two magazines. (I would like to think I'm an informed shopper.) Oh. Bon Appétit is out of stock. Seeing no point in flipping through Gourmet if there’s nothing to compare and contrast it to, I snag my favorite, and shockingly expensive (the dollar is worthless), food magazine, BBC Good Food, and retreat to an isolated corner of the book store.

Eeny, meeny, miny, moe…and I’ve ordered Bon Appétit. Of course, one issue of Glamour slides under my door before I get things straightened out. I read it, of course, after tearing out nine! perfume adds with scented tabs – I don’t have allergies, and still find this olfactorily offensive. I was shocked to discover that women like foreplay. Oh, and patent leather accessories are what’s in this season.

Today, two issues of Bon Appétit show up (I guess they felt guilty for sending me Glamour), one of which is the Thanksgiving Ultimate Guide. Four versions of turkey and gravy (not making any of those!), four kinds of stuffing, four kinds of cranberry relish (love, love, love), six ways with potatoes, eight hearty vegetable side dishes, three breads, and six pies and tarts. As usual, I think I’ll start with dessert.

I’m off to gaze at the glossy pictures of perfectly arranged, staged, and lit food. As Julia Child said, “It's so beautifully arranged on the plate – you know someone's fingers have been all over it.” She was also fond of saying saying, "Bon Appétit !"

Warning: recipes from Bon Appétit may show up on this here blog in the future.