Tomato soup and a fresh start

Happy new year!  January is upon us yet again, and with it - the inevitable promise to cook more, exercise more and eat more healthfully.  We were home for vacation and I cooked every day.  I splurged on some great cookbooks that I've used mainly as inspiration thus far (like this and this but can't wait to dive into in earnest.  I'm re-committing to yoga - and trying to rope my husband in as well.  I even managed to get our little one to family yoga which was terribly cute.

I re-stocked the pantry with fresh spices plus specialty sauces and condiments lost in the hurricane power outage.  I have some great Asian vinegars and dark soy to enjoy and some middle eastern spices like sumac that I've been wanting to play around with.   

I've been enjoying Tasting Table's Sous Chef series; a series of recipes by interesting chefs that are layered but not complicated to make.  So far, a winning adobo that I will most certainly make again soon, and this tomato soup which was a little more involved than the typical but so bright and flavorful it's worth a bit of extra time.

Tomato soup is so terrific on a chilly day - warming and also just seems like an instant boost of nutrients.  Have a look at this recipe and see what you think.  What are you inspired to do this year?

Popover experiments

 

Have you ever made a popover?  I never had the desire until an abundance of summer fruit led me to make small batches of jam and hunt for decadent ways to savor it.  I have a few vintage popover pans that I've always intended to fiddle with but never had the time.  I was suddenly inspired to give the pans a whirl - but getting the perfectly perky popover with an impressive, airy dome was not an easy task.  

It's amazing, actually, that without any leavening agent this very simple mixture of eggs, milk and flour can develop into a light, airy and impressive-looking little item.  It's all about harnessing the power of steam, and there are a few tricks to maximizing popover potential that only became clear after several rounds of experiments:

1.  Don't overmix the batter - every recipe warns of this.  Don't do it.

2.  Pour the batter into a popover pan that has been heated in the oven - don't pour it into a cold pan.

3.  The pan matters: my vintage ones, that have the requisite air pockets in between the cups, created nicely shaped popovers, but no matter how much I greased and prepped the pans, I could not release the popovers.  Some research churned up these amazing pans (and an emergency mail order) - they truly work.

4.  Don't open the oven - keep the steam inside.

5.  Lower the oven temperature midway through.

6.  Enjoy when hot out of the oven - no matter what tricks you employ, they'll never be as crisp and delectable as they are when freshly baked

The batter itself is very basic.  Here's one to try.

Winter-inspired still life

A series of five limited edition fine art prints, available individually or as a set, just-in-time for holiday gifting. Please inquire by email if interested.

Garden gifts: Heirloom tomatoes and a special tomato tart

This weekend, we picked close to the last of the tomatoes, some butternut squash, an eggplant, a couple of bulbs of celeriac and some peppers (hot and sweet).  While the crisp air lent itself to a wonderful bike ride down the Harlem Valley Rail trail, I couldn't help but be sad that the days of harvesting a portion of dinner straight from the garden are almost over for the season.  Our own tomatoes in particular have been so wonderful - heirloom and bursting with flavor.  We've enjoyed them in salads with mozzarella or burrata, slow roasted with a drizzle of olive oil and some slivers of garlic, and most recently, in a wonderful, fresh tart.  I had high hopes of canning and preserving some of the flavor of summer - but alas, we were so excited to eat as we went, we left nothing behind.

The idea behind the recipe started here.  But the free-form shape was tricky and the dough a little too loose to be easily worked with.  Some poking around churned up this and the dough was lovely and a keeper.  Similar to the first recipe, I grated a semi-hard cow's milk cheese onto the unbaked prepared crust that I placed into a removable bottom fluted tart pan, and then used a mixture of multi-colored heirloom cherry tomatoes and the most wonderful currant tomatoes to fill the tart.  The cherry tomatoes were fine mostly cut in half (larger ones quartered) and the currant tomatoes were left whole (if you can find some, buy them - they are bursting with flavor and so unusual to look at).  The result?  A wonderfully flavorful roasted tomato tart that was as beautiful to look at as delicious.  It was a treat to explore a new way to savor the last tomatoes of summer.

Tomato Tart (adapted from Harvest to Heat)

Homemade tart dough, try this one (or in a pinch, use defrosted puff pastry blind baked for 20 minutes at 400°)
1 pint tomatoes cut into halves or quarters as necessary (multi colored cherry and currant make a beautiful presentation)
1/3 pound semi hard cow's milk cheese, grated (love this one)
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Olive oil, for drizzling
Fresh herbs (basil, chive - oregano also would be nice)

Preheat oven to 375°.  Roll chilled dough into a rectangle about 1/8 inch thick.  Press into a removable bottom tart pan of desired shape.  Sprinkle with cheese.  Fill with tomatoes.  Season with salt and pepper.  Bake for ~40 minutes or until crust is golden and tomatoes are popping.  Remove from oven and allow to cool.  Sprinkle with additional salt and pepper to taste, fresh herbs, and drizzle with a nice olive oil.