Farewell 'til next season

Few things in life are better than fresh basil. The leaves themselves are slightly bitter and oozing with juicy volatile goodness.

Every season, we plant a few seedlings, clip them as if they were a bonsai and end the season with spindly plants that flower and achieve low yields of the leaves we tried so hard to foster. This season was quite different. Instead of this "depression era mentality" of saving it all for the end, I started harvesting leaves as soon as they were available. From anywhere and not caring about the plant's future. I wanted the basil and I wasn't going to let them go to seed.

Interestingly, the more I tore off, the more they grew. In the beginning of the season (end of May, I started harvesting), I used scissors to get my fix. Then, as days got busier and dinner prep time grew shorter for one reason or another, I attacked the plant and just ripped off the leaves. And, they just kept growing - robustly. We now have 3 basil shrubs outside with more tasty leaves than we've ever had before. My friend Gary who's an extraordinary gardener, was amazed. He kept asking how carefully I harvested the leaves and I told him I just kind of attacked it. He was stunned. I am a total basil fanatic now and have grown a new appreciation of this robust herb. It'll kill me to see them wither on the first frost. But, next season, they're going in early and I'm tearing in quickly. Can't wait.

Weber mod cold smoking action shots

Frankie and the mighty Mustangs will engage in their first soccer game ever (hopefully). In preparation, I'm fooling with the video camera and trying to figure out how to get a clip published on YouTube for the family and friends to view (clips can be private and email invites can be used for viewing). I only have Windows Movie Maker for editing. Not good but adequate to grab a clip from a stream.

One of my practice vids is some action shots of my smoker apparatus. It only took about two years of weekends to finish. And, it's not done yet. Today I'm smoking salmon. Really smoking - not cooking. Take a look.

And, here's my attempt at cedar, cold-smoked Salmon. Yum.

I also have plans to do my superfast, super good baguette. Stay tuned.

Basil hydroponics?

I clipped a small bunch of basil on my way in the house one weeknight and forgot what I was going to use it for so I stuffed it into some water to see if it would survive until I could use it. That was about 2 weeks ago! Now, I noticed it's thriving quite nicely. Click on the image for a bigger view. It's pretty awesome. I'm conisidering getting a perforated clear plastic piece to place over a pool of water to set up a mini hydroponic garden to see if I can use my basil for a chunk of the winter. It's my favorite herb and I LOVE to cook with it all the time. Keep you posted.

Pulled Pork Tonight/Tomorrow

I've only tried barbecue overnight once and my heat died during the night. Tonight, after a great deal of reading my new favorite place to hang out, the forums on Virtual Weber Bullet, I found some modifications to a Weber grill to get me throuh the night easily. I made a bank of bricks to contain the coals and mesquite tidily against the side for a long burn indirect cooking of a sexy little 3.5 lb. picnic roast I picked up at Giant-Eagle today.

Tough to monitor in the early stages however. We've only been in this home less than a year and I just noticed the backyard is totally black at night. Kind of cool. I was only able to get this shot by pointing my camera in the dark and used the flash to see what was going on. This shot is about 2 hours into the cooking. Cracked about a 1/8 on the bottom vents and full open on the top.

I think I'll lose a bit of sleep tonight thinking about tomorrow night's meal. In the morning, I'll wrap it, put it in the fridge and take the kid on a wild day of activity. Tomorrow night, we feast.

"Hot meat, hot meat" Frankie will chant. Going to kill me if she becomes a vegetarian at 13.

Damn, fire went out during the night because I didn't read the "Bullet Post" thoroughly enough. I was supposed to use the minion method to do the burn. Next time I guess. For now, I just fired it back up for a few more hours. When I found the grill out, the meat was still hot. Let it rip another few hours, wrapped it a couple hours and it pulled beautifully. It was a tad dry but really good. Frankie said "It's great Papa!". I don't get that too often, high praise indeed.

Cold Smoking: Weber mod, v 2.0

In my previous version of the Weber mod, I was essentially cooking, not smoking since my dome temperature was 150-deg-F. Since then I made the several changes. I'll point out all the features of the new version and indicate which are alterations to the old one.

1. Dome, no change here. Just a thermometer inserted to monitor the temperature near the food.

2. The Thunderbelly insert (caution: most horribly designed site in the world with loud music), used, as before, to position food further from the heat/smoke source.

3. The drilled out bottom to permit the smoke into the Weber kettle, no change.

4. The 6" to 4" ductpipe reducer. Perfect to fit an inverted 28 oz. can of tomatoes (empty, 6 in 1 brand). This is a big change. I drilled about 6 3/8" holes in the bottom of the can. This permits less smoke to go through the can as my previous much larger aperature. I believe this slows down the combustion of the wood resulting in:
a. reduction of billowing clouds of mesquite smoke all over the neighborhood,
b. my neighbors' comfort because they don't have to smell the billowing clouds of smoke all day,
c. our clothes and home won't smell of mesquite all day from the billowing clouds of smoke and,
d. the smoldering wood will last much longer (a ca. 2.5" cube smoldered about 6 hours).

5. Using my chimney/smoke conduit on top of a cast iron pan greatly reduced the dome temperature. The cast iron pan got really hot, but since the heat is essentially outside the system, it dissipates into the environment much better than the previous version. On a 80-deg-F day with no wind, I was able to keep the dome temperature at a steady 105-deg-F to 110-deg-F. Still on the high end of cold smoking, but on a cooler day, with a light breeze, this may be perfect for a 24 hour period of smoking, perfect for salmon or trout.

6. 650 W hotplate set on M, no change.

This was just a dry run with no food in the chamber. I have a couple more ideas to implement before a food run. Keep you posted.

Best Feta in Columbus

Mediterranean Food Imports is my favorite ethnic market in the city. On the southwest corner of Dodridge and N. High the market has a wide variety of Mediterranean and Middle Eastern food not easily found anywhere else in the city. Over the past 5 years it's been through several owners and now it seems to be the best it's ever been.

Their best product is probably their feta. They carry Egyptian, Bulgarian, French and Greek styles. The Egyptian is probably their best seller; it's the mildest and creamiest of all the varieties.

My second favorite staple of theirs is their variety of grains and legumes. Lentils of all varieties and any mesh size of cracked wheat you can imagine. They even have Israeli couscous (sometimes called Maftoul, a larger mesh size couscous, awesome for this dish). And, now, bonus, a muslim butcher is on board. They have halal meats including Merguez sausage, a Tunesian sausage that's spicy and wonderful. I first experienced this delicacy at a Moroccan restaurant in Paris several years ago. It was heavenly. I've never seen it anywhere in Columbus.

They also have a huge variety of olives, olive oil, labne, dolmados, etc. If you haven't been there, you're missing out on one of Columubus' finest food gems.

ps An interesting recipe using merguez sausage.

Not quite cold smoked salmon

My cold smoker mod kind of shit the bed. Click on the photo to bring you to the Flickr slideshow of the project to this point.

The major problem is I ended up smoking at 150-deg-F. Hot smoking is at 225-deg-F and cold smoking should be at about 80-deg-F. Alton Brown smokes his salmon at 150 for 5 hours and I did too. But, I was shooting for several days at 80 degrees. I think I have to make the heat source even further removed from the smoking chamber.

I'll take what I have, let it rest and see what it tastes like. Maybe it'll be good enough. Keep you posted.

Notes 06-Aug-2007:
1. The fish was un-frickin'-believable. A tad dry, but I rushed the brining because Frankie demanded we go bowling (like, really fast).

2. The heat source is a bit of a problem and I'm working on switching to a food-quality liquid wax to heat the wood to smoldering (as I'm writing this, I have a dry run going). This is because the hotplate, while effective, smolders the wood too fast. A 3" cube of mesquite decomposed completely in about 3-4 hours. If I turn the hotplate down lower, it doesn't smolder at all. Also, the hotplate heats too much and the design wasn't effective enough at dissipating the heat. Maybe it'd work if it were 30-deg-F. But I want to smoke year 'round.

I want a near thermal-free smoke source.

3. Anyway, I have a pound of wonderfully smoky salmon that we'll enjoy tomorrow night on a bed of greens with warm lentils on the side and a sesame/soy/rice vinegar dressing. Yum. Not a bad first shot.

Ramming Speed

A couple weeks ago, I had another Father's Day! My wife entertained the kid while I brewed a soon-to-be-sampled batch of my English-style ale. I brew on a circa 1920's cast iron Oriole stove in a 50 liter stainless steel pot I bought from Italy. It's a nice combination of brew equipment.

The fermentation went swell starting at an original gravity of 1.052 and ending with a crisp 1.010 for an alcohol content about 5.5% by volume. I kegged it up, dropped about 20 psi CO₂ on the headspace and I think it's almost ready for tasting. All that's needed is for the CO₂ to finish dissolving into the brew and for clarification and it's finally ready. It's the maiden voyage brew in the new home.

If it tastes good, I'll be inviting some fellow food bloggers for a taste soon. Watch your email.

Cold Smoking: The Heat Source

One requirement for cold smoking is a constant source of low heat to smolder wood. This is most commonly achieved using a hot plate and pan with wood chips in it. But, it's energy intensive and requires an outlet outside for the duration of smoking.

I wondered if a kerosene tealight (or paraffin) would do the trick. This could be placed inside a can (with ventilation holes) and on top of that can, wood chips in another can. I tried this using a citronella/kerosene tealight (I wouldn't use this in the future because of the citronella, but for proof of principle). The piggy-backed cans were placed inside my funky Weber-Kettle mod and voila! Within minutes, it was filled with mesquite smoke. And barely any heat generated. Since these little tealights can go for 12-18 hours, it should be a convenient source of fuel.

The big question, which will have to be tested on a piece of real food is: Does the food acquire any flavor from the burning kerosene? I suspect, since the kerosene is well contained in these tealights and if the combustion of it in the wick is complete, all the flavor should come from the choice of wood used for smoldering.

Whole Grain Naan

This Sunday on the way home from swimming, Trish asked if I could make some naan for the dish she was preparing (a special lamb and spinach Indian dish). When she says "naan" she's being generous. I make flatbreads that are closer to a pita than naan.

Well, not this time. I used a basic bread recipe and to cook, I chose my trusty Weber Q because it has a nice cast-iron grill surface. I heated it up to the highest I could, lubed up the grill with spray oil and plopped on my dough discs. They didn't puff up like my usual flatbreads (I usually do them in the oven). About 4 minutes per side gets nice small burn marks and the breads are heavenly. I only made 4 big ones. Here's the recipe I used:

Grainy Naan Dough
water, room temperature, 150 g
honey, 10 g/2 t
olive oil, 17 grams/1 T
yeast, rapid rise, 1 packet
salt, 5 g/1 t
swirl contents until honey's dissolved.
Add:
unbleached white flour, 150 grams
grainy flour (I used a 1:1:1 mixture of rye, wheat, spelt), 75 grams
Mix with large spoon until it balls up and then kneed briefly. Let rise an hour or so. Punch down and divide into 4 balls. Press the balls out to about an 8" disc using flour to keep them from getting sticky. Let rest and preheat the grill to the highest setting. Toss the dough on (I can fit about two on my grill at a time). Within a few minutes, they'll be sturdy enough to flip with a pair of tongs. Let cool and serve. Unbelievable.

feedback from the family:
There were 4 breads made from this batch. The thickest one tasted the best. The thinner ones were a little thin and cracker-like but the thicker one (depicted in the image above) was nice and floppy and tender.

Weber Kettle Mod - Cold Smoking: Proof of Principle

I have the itch to do some cold smoking. I'm especially looking forward to salmon and trout. Cold smoking is simple; it's simply a process of bathing food in smoke but in the temperature range of approximately 10 deg above ambient to not more than 110-deg-F for a long time (18-24 hours). Therein lies the challenge. Finding a cheap piece of equipment (because I'm frugal) that can maintain a constant low temperature for at least that long is no small trick.

I took an old Weber Kettle I had from the trash and removed the bottom mechanism to permit the bottom vents to stay full open. I hypothesized if I could get the heat source below the kettle (rather than inside), I should be able to waft the smoke into the kettle keeping the temperature inside the kettle cool enough for smoking. In order to keep the cooking surface as far from the heat source as possible, I affixed a Thunderbelly stainless collar to my kettle (the cooking surface is on top of this collar). Then I used my starter chimney and built an 8 briquette fire in it, tossed in some mesquite shavings on top of the briquettes and shimmed it up close to the bottom of the kettle. In this configuration, the heat source is approximately half way in the chimney which serves to deliver the smoke to the bottom vents while most of the heat dissipates to the surroundings.

Monitoring the dome with a thermocouple inserted (with the vent full open), a temperature of approximately 95-105-deg-F (ambient temp 80-deg-F) was achieved for hours! Unfortunately, I could only hold this temperature for ca. 6 hours. Then, I'd have to charge more fuel and this would be annoying in the timeframe required for this process. Overcharging the chimney would likely result in too much heat generated.

This rig needs to be rock stable for at least 18 hours and since it's a long time, it also needs to be nearly maintenance free - I don't want to have to go out in my yard in the middle of the night (to fight a racoon).

In my next attempt, I'm going to use a hot plate and cast iron skillet to smoke wood pieces below the chimney. I'll still use the chimney as my smoke conduit.

A good first attempt, but I'm now waiting to find a hot plate at the thrift store. Keep you posted.

Baba Ghanouj, an old friend.

Ever make one of those meals that you immediately thought to yourself "why don't we have this more often?". Last night we wanted something simple and made one of our favorites Baba Ghanouj. It's so simple, healthy and we don't have it nearly as often as we should.

I took a medium/large eggplant and baked it on the gas grill until the shell was charred black (my wife started it actually). I took the charry eggplant and, with a potato masher, squashed it and pressed the flesh from it's charred body. The skin was pulled out of the bowl and to the bowl was added salt (1 t) the juice of a lemon, tahini (60 g, 1/4 C), some (nice quality) dried parsely, a couple tablespoons of olive oil and continued to mash away with my potato masher (an Egyptian woman I used to work with did it this way rather than a food processor to get a slightly chunkier texture). Depicted is the result. It was served with warmed pitas and fresh chopped veggies. A lovely Summer meal.

An interesting meat sauce

The past few weekends, we've had friends over for a simple barbecue. Just burgers and dogs on the grill. Fast easy, lends itself to the host actually enjoying the company. But, we found ourselves building up the supply of uneaten smoky-flavored burgers. I put them in the freezer and finally decided to use them.

Although I'm in the school of cooking meat raw in tomato sauce (rather than sauteeing it first), I had to make use of the cooked meat. Unfortunately, cooked burgers can be kind of tough after sitting around. I sauteed a few slivers of garlic (we go easy on the garlic in my home), some chopped onion, my new favorite canned tomatoes, 6 in 1 and tossed in those burgers just cut in half and let it barely simmer for a few hours. I then mashed up the burgers with a potato masher and voila, meat sauce with a subtle smoky hint to it.

We ate it with whole wheat pasta for a robust and flavorful meal. This is what remained of Frankie's portion (we helped a bit).

Kid Friendly Restaurants in Columbus?

Kevin Joy from the Dispatch emailed me today asking about kid-friendly restaurants. Here's an excerpt:

Basically, I'm trying to find restaurants around town that either have:

a) more upscale children's menus
b) healthier children's menus
c) no kids meals at all, but do have, at times, a family clientele...such as the time I saw kids eating sushi at Haiku.

I'd be interested to hear any suggestions, if you've heard stories or had experiences with any of the above. Feel free to forward to anyone that might want to share their two cents.

[upscale children's menu? Hmmm, I'm thinking Kevin doesn't have children]

My general guidelines on dining with a wildly energetic kid are the following:

-Any restaurant that has crayons immediately available is good.
-We try desperately not to go to fast food because there's good stuff out there for just as cheap (still happens on occasion).
-I'm afraid we're destined for noisy places with the kids, because they just can't sit still longer than the time it takes to eat (about 15 minutes if you're lucky, my daughter's now 4).

Our family's picks so far:

1. Believe it or not, Hometown Buffet, is pretty good. It's a chain but their veggies are cooked well, they have an amazing variety of foods, our friends are vegetarians and love it there too, it's rowdy as hell so no one cares if the kid jumps up and runs around. Food is lightly flavored with just s&p (probably) and the kid only costs a dollar per year of age. Good food, cheap, loud, tolerant. Sorry it's not sexier.

2. Maybe not the healthiest fare, but kid-friendly is Pig Iron BBQ (N. High). Crayons at the ready, a nice selection on the kids menu (not just mac 'n cheese, etc.). Good for the adults too! And, they're very nice to kids.

3. Healthier. Whole World Bakery. It's a vegetarian/vegan place on N. High. My daughter loves the hummous platter (hummous and fresh veggies). And we like vegetarian fare too. Pretty cheap, very kid friendly, about $20 for all 3 of us.

4. Haiku (NOT kid-friendly). We ate at Haiku when my girl was about 18 months. We went early so it was ok. But all the hipsters who came in the door avoided our table like E. Coli. It's funny, young people are the least tolerant of children in a restaurant, whereas the older set often look at a screaming child and smirk (I suspect they're relfecting on their past).

5. Sher-E-Punjab we hear is excellent. Vegetarian buffet on Tuesday nights and our friends tell us it's kid-friendly. Haven't tried it yet. Definitely will soon!

6. Cafe Shish Kebab. We went there with another couple and their 4-year old. I hate to stereotype middle eastern-run restaurants, but I'll make an exception here. The waitstaff are always wonderful with children. I don't know why, but every restaurant we've tried is great, the former Turkish Cuisine when it was on High was great, Cafe Istanbul in Easton was kid-friendly (but food was mediocre at times). The cuisine in general is flavorful and beautifully spiced without being to much for the little guys and Frankie's a big meat eater (she eats lots of good food). At Cafe Shish Kebab she loved the donner kebab. Not bad price either.

Add your favorites in the comments or send them to Kevin Joy of the Dispatch (kjoy@dispatch.com).