lavender shortbread

there's a great essay by andre aciman called "lavender" that traces the scent throughout his personal history. it's in those "best american essay" collections that one of us feels really ambivalent about. but i think this particular one david foster wallace edited, and both of us are pro-that.

if one of us had to write a similar essay, she would write it about ginger. she drank ginger ale with breakfast and sometimes instead of breakfast for years; she was sick a lot as a little kid and had it then, too. her favorite stir fries (and for years she could only cook stir fries) contain ginger. she's not a binger, but she can binge on ginger, and she kind of likes how it hurts. she ate a box of ginger altoids a day while lifeguarding the summer after college; she can eat an entire bag of crystallized ginger in one sitting. there's ginger tea and gingerbread and oh, also whiskey ginger ice cream. that too. dark and stormys in maine during the summer on the rocks in front of her house. much like one of us, ginger's got a lot of personality and can sometimes be a little harsh and has to restrain itself not to bulldozer the rest of the room.

shoup, what would yours be?

anyway here is a JSTOR link to the first part of the essay. it's way more moving and less precious than you'd think. so is this recipe for lavender shortbread. it's obviously really good with tea in the afternoon, but i could also see you making a mean ice cream sandwich with some rosemary honey ice cream in it.



lavender shortbread:

1 1/2 cups pastry flour (yes, all purpose is totally fine)
1/2 cup rice flour (my next post will also use rice flour; it deserves its own post. shoup, do you cook with rice flour?)
1 cup softened butter
1/2 cup white sugar
1/4 t salt
1 t vanilla extract
1-2 T dried lavender (available at any good spice store. i get mine at whole foods).

sift flour together and set aside. in your kitchenaid apple green stand mixer, if you have one, cream butter, sugar, salt, and vanilla until it's all fluffy. mix in the flour by hand, then the lavender. you don't want to overwork it. kind of like a pie crust in that way.

now, here's where i cheat. with shortbread you're supposed to refrigerate and then roll it out and make cutouts, but i do not have the patience to refrigerate dough, plus i would eat it all because i am trying to write this essay about ginger. so i just roll balls and then squish then in my hands until they're about 1/4 inch thick.

bake at 325 for 20 minutes until golden brown on the edges.

Mashed Sunchokes (as requested by Sara)

You thought we were gone! You thought we were too busy canoodling and pontificating about the emerging art scene in Detroit and reading Deleuze and drinking firewater! But fear not, dear readers, we are here with our kitties and we missed you very, very much.

One of us is Swedish.
One of us is Italian, but you probably think she is Jewish.
She is eating a 3 Musketeers Bar and is really excited to tell you about sunchokes, AKA, Jerusalem Artichokes, which despite their names, are also not Jewish. But like her, they probably wish that they were.

Did you know that when you go to Google Image search and type in Jerusalem, Jerusalem Artichoke is the third entry? Did you also know that the Jerusalem Artichoke, in addition to not being a native of Jerusalem, is also not an artichoke? It is the tuber of the sunflower.

See? You know this guy:










And now you'll know how to cook this guy:










The skin is very thin, but you must remove it. This is arduous. You won't like doing it. You might get lazy and not get all the skin off. That's fine. Unless you're working for Daniel Boulud, who will kill you with his laser eyes. Probably the sunchokes will be very dirty when you buy them, so you must also wash them thoroughly. Then you must boil them in salted water until you can easily stick a fork through them. Then you will mash them. I prefer to use ye olde Cuisinart for this. I mash them with some butter, roasted garlic (or, failing that, garlic that you caramelized in some olive oil, or, failing that, minced garlic), salt, pepper, milk or cream (which you can cut with stock if you like), and low fat sour cream. Ratios are up to you, depending on how thick you want your mash. When they are done I like to mix in some dill and tarragon, but you don't have to (but you should). They have a wonderful, earthy (but not too) flavor. Sometimes I will roast some parsnips beforehand and throw them in with the JA's during the mashing. They are a delightful accompaniment to any protein or with a melange of other veggies. I just wanted to say melange. Good night.

Chickpeas & Procrastination, via Nina The Person

as you know, dear readers, one of us lives with Mr. Pie the Cat and one of us lives with Nina the Cat.
one of us also has a friend known around the internet as Nina the Person.

Nina the Person is a wonderful chef.
she shared this recipe with me, and i'm sharing it with you. i editorialize in the parentheticals. that sounds like a rap lyric or something.

ingredients:
3 tbs olive oil
1 large onion chopped
4 crushed garlic cloves
1/2 tsp tumeric
1 1/2 cup soaked chick peas
3 tbsp each chopped cilantro and parsley

methodology:
- fry onions in oil. you want to get them nice and soft. (i would probably add in some butter.)
- add garlic cloves
- stir in tumeric and add drained chick peas and cover with 2/14 cups water (i bet you could also use a mixture of stock and water)
- simmer for an hour and a half or till the beans are super tender. add salt and pepper when they have softened. you can add extra water if they get too dry. you want the liquid to reduce to a thick sauce at the end. then stir in herbs and cook for 5 mins more.

Nina the Person says the quality of the tumeric is crucial. if you live in New Yawk you can get some great stuff in my hood at Kalustyans. if you live in Chicago i used to go to a great Middle Eastern food store with Rich in Andersonville, but i don't remember the name. if you live in another place, you can go somewhere there.