Recipe: Matzoh Ball Soup

Perhaps not surprisingly, Passover is one of Jake’s all-time favorite holidays because it's a night on which we use food to tell a story about justice. And this year's seder was particularly momentous because it marked our first full week living in New Marlborough, MA. So we invited the usual suspects to join us for a long night of singing, eating, drinking, and telling stories. 

Our (semi-) traditional seder dinner consists of the standard matzoh, hard boiled eggs, parsley, charoset, horseradish, and matzoh ball soup - but instead of brisket, we like to serve a leg of lamb. It just seems more fitting to Spring - and especially on this holiday in which the paschal lamb looms so large. We were really excited to get the leg at the awesome The Meat Market in Great Barrington - Jake's new place of employment! The whole meal came together perfectly!

Recently, in our hasty head-first dive into Spring, we've posted a lot of lamb so we thought we'd take this opportunity to share Jake's family Matzoh Ball Soup recipe. The recipe is borrowed from a A Little Jewish Cookbook, literally a pocket-sized book that Jake bought for his mom on a childhood trip to Ellis Island. It makes the lightest, most warming matzoh balls we've ever had!  But of course, we're a little biased.

Matzoh Ball Soup 

+ 2 tbsp chopped parsley, plus more for garnish

+ ½ tsp ground ginger

+ 6 tbsp of freshly melted schmaltz (rendered chicken fat) or olive oil

+ salt and pepper to taste

+ ¾ cup of sparkling water

+ 1 ½ cup of matzoh meal

+ 6 eggs, beaten

+ 2 quarts of chicken stock

+ 4 large carrots sliced into ¼” thick wheels

1. Stir parsley, ginger, salt, pepper into schmaltz.

2. Add eggs and sparkling water and beat to blend. Stir in matzoh meal.

3. Refrigerate for one hour. In the meantime, bring the chicken stock to a boil.

4. Wet hands and form chilled matzoh mixture into golf ball sized balls. Drop into boiling chicken stock, along with sliced carrots.

5. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer for 20 minutes or until balls float to top. Sprinkle with remaining parsley and serve.

Recipe: Soup Joumou and Sauteed Greens with Bacon

Early in their friendship, Kevin Jean introduced Silka and Christian Swafford to the amazingness that is Soup Joumous. The rich and hearty soup is a very important part of Haitian culture as it celebrates not only the new year but also Haiti's independence on January 1st, 1804. Starting with a squash or pumpkin base, Kevin’s family adds beef (oxtail, short rib, or neck), potatoes, yucca, peppers (sweet and hot), carrots, celery, onion, spices and herbs. It's incredible aroma and gorgeously bright color make it the perfect dish to ring in the new year.

After years of nagging recipe and/or leftovers requests, Kevin and his mother have started a new New Years tradition - making an extra pot of soup just for Kevin to share with us. This year, we wanted to contribute something simple and green, so we picked up some beautiful Collards from the market along with some bread and Alpine cheese. Christian and Lauren joined us with beer and dessert, and we promptly got down to feasting. Before we knew it, we were happily slumped in our chairs, bellies full of warming soup and heads full of big plans for the new year.

Huge thanks to Kevin and Myrtha for their generosity each and every delicious New Year! Bon Bagay!

We're going to hold on to the Soup Joumou recipe for a little while longer, in the hopes that Kevin and Myrtha open a Haitian Food Truck and make millions off their secret recipe. Instead, by popular demand, here is our recipe for collards with bacon which can easily be adapted for kale, chard, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, and other hearty greens.

Sauteed Greens with Bacon

 

+ 3 lbs of collards, or other hearty greens, washed and cut into 2 in slices (or if sprouts, cut in half)

+ 1 lb of roughly-cut bacon (preferably bacon ends)

+ salt and pepper to taste

1.Cut the bacon into big chunks and saute over high heat in a large skillet.

2. When bacon begins to crisp, add greens and turn heat down to medium-high. You could also throw in some sliced garlic at this point.

3. Saute for 5-10 minutes. When the green have wilted, add a 1/2 cup of water.

4. Continue to cook for another 10-15 minutes. The greens should be tender and dark in color.

5. Serve sprinkled with red pepper flakes and a splash of apple cider vinegar.

Serves 6

5 Days of Christmas and Happy New Year: Jake's New Knife Roll

Happy New Year! For our final Christmas post - and to properly usher in the new year - we wanted to share one of our favorite handmade gifts of 2011.

Since receiving his first set of knives on the first day of his apprenticeship at Fleisher’s, Jake has been asking Silka to sew him a knife roll. The project was a little too intimidating for Silka to tackle herself, but with traveling to and from so many demos lately it's become obvious that Jake really did need something durable and stylish to carry his tools - and this Christmas was the perfect opportunity.

After a little research Silka came across Steve Goodson, a master leather worker living in Texas who specializes in custom knife rolls. He was such a pleasure to work with and in just a few weeks of anticipation a true work of art arrived at our doorstep. Now as we enter another year of demos and events, Jake can proudly carry his knives in his new roll - and we're sure the next year of wear and tear will only enhance it's beauty! Thanks, Steve!

5 Days of Christmas: Vintage Kitchen Tools

As we've already admitted, our kitchen is chock-full of vintage kitchen utensils. Well, space be damned, we received more goodies this Christmas from Silka's mother and father. They scoured some of our favorite Western New York antique and junk shops for a beautiful collection that runs the gamut. From a perfectly working hand egg beater and herb chopper to camping gear made in Brooklyn. Looks like we need a bigger kitchen! Stay tuned!

5 Days of Christmas: Handmade Gifts

More and more each year, handmade gifts are the centerpiece of Silka's family's Christmases, and not surprisingly, these gifts are often food. This year we handed out Nigella Lawson's totally perfect granola packaged in beautiful Weck Jars with a custom B+B label - a small but sweet token.

But it was Silka's aunt Diane (of Dumb Duck Farms) who really outdid herself. She gifted us a beautiful and bountiful basket of homemade canned preserves, jellies and sauces, home-tapped maple syrup, and chocolate goodies - not to mention kitchen linens and a subscription to Heirloom Gardener! Silka's parents received the same basket but rather than a subscription, theirs came with a gift certificate for baby chicks in the spring! We don't know when did we all turned so homestead-y, but we love it!

5 Days of Christmas: Holiday Sweet Breads

Traditionally saffron bread is served to parents on St. Lucia's Day (December 13th) by the eldest daughter, wearing a crown of candles and singing songs. While we aren't nearly that hard-core, we love this sweet bread so much that we use every Christmas as an excuse to make it. Silka has baked the bright orange bread many times before, but it's really her mom who's the pro. This year Tina really ran with it, baking a beautiful loaf and enough formed buns to freeze for later.

And on the 23rd, we got an extra treat from our very close friend Mark, who surprised Silka at work with a beautiful homemade Panettone bread. She brought it home and we promptly broke into the fluffy, fruit-dotted loaf. It was such a treat and the perfect thing to get us in the spirit. Thanks, Mark!

5 Days of Christmas: Christmas Dinner

As per usual, Christmas has come and gone in a flash! So much wonderful food was eaten, given and got, that we'd be remiss not to post a few shout-outs over this next week. First up - our fantastic Christmas Eve and Day meals with our wonderful families... 

As is Swedish custom, we had a Christmas Eve feast with Silka's family. The three-course meal started with home-cured gravlax, home-picked sweet dill cucumbers, and home-made limpa bread along with knäckebröd, deviled eggs and lots of cheese. Swedish meatballs (made with beef, lamb and pork from Dickson's), a smoked Flying Pigs Ham, and Janssons Temptation (basically a potato gratin with onions and anchovies) made up the second course followed by traditional Swedish cookies, presents and caroling.

That night, stuffed, we drove to Western Mass so we could wake up to a Christmas morning breakfast of hot chocolate, scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, croissants and a Christmas Tree-shaped coffee cake. After opening presents, a hike and some major napping, we filled up on a classic Standing Rib Roast, root vegetables, salad and more and more cookies!

Big thanks to both of our loving families for another perfect holiday!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy day-after-Thanksgiving! Now that we've come down from an exhausting - but oh so rewarding - day of cooking, cleaning, decorating, socializing and eating we'd like to extend a huuuuuge amount of gratitude to the farmers and producers who made this meal, and so many others, possible.

To:

Union Square Greenmarket and Grow NYC for such an amazingly well organized and super accesible market.

Violet Hill for their lovely foraged mushrooms and the most flavorful turkey ever!

Flying Pigs Farm for the best sausage and bacon we've ever tasted.

Grazin Angus Acres for the best beef, period.

Catskill Merino and 3-Corner Field for their whole-animal sheep/lamb products.

Arcadian Pastures for their artfully cut and pastured meats.

Migliorelli for so many beautiful apples, leeks, and root vegetables.

Race Farms for all things apple.

Eve’s Cidery for the best hard cider, and their inspirational label design.

Windfall Farms for their unconventionally awesome greens.

Cayuga Pure Organics for their nutty local flour and sweet corn meal.

Ronnybrook for their sweet butter and rich milk.

Hot Bread Kitchen and Bread Alone for their awesome dedication to the art of bread making.

Cato Corner and Consider Bardwell for their impeccable cheese and thoughtful suggestions.

Berried Treasures for their insane and educational array of potatoes.

Until next meal!

Sorry, there are no pictures of dessert... it was all gone before we remembered to take any!

Sunday Dinner: Swedish Meatballs & Egg Noodles

After an exhausting week we decided to have a quiet Sunday night at home, just the two of us. Silka must have spent Saturday night dreaming of the upcoming holidays, because she woke up Sunday morning with her heart set on a traditional Swedish Christmas Eve dish: köttbullar, or Swedish Meatballs.

With the exception of Ikea, Swedish meatballs are probably one of the best recognized cultural exports of Scandinavia. And for good reason - they taste amazing! Throughout our month-long visit with Silka's relatives on Gotland we saw them on almost every menu, each time with a twist unique to the restaurant. But - as with most classic dishes - we're pretty convinced that our family recipe is the best. Wiveg/Fagergren meatballs are moist and light with lots of onions and plenty of butter. We use a three part mix of beef, pork, and veal (when we can get pastured or rose veal) and the resulting gravy is dark and meaty. 

The dish comes out a little different every time as Silka tinkers with her recipe, scouring traditional Swedish cookbooks to get them just right. And these were! We served the gravy-covered meatballs with some simple egg noodles in a caraway butter sauce and salad. The "plainness" of the egg noodles was a perfect balance to the rich, flavor-packed meatballs and the caraway seeds added a nice textural kick. Traditionally, the köttbullar would be served with lingonberry jam - a crucial part of the meal. Not only does it add color to an otherwise gray and brown plate, but the fruity acid cuts the heaviness of the rest of the meal. The salmbärssylt - another native Gotlandish jam - in our fridge was a perfect substitute.

After stuffing ourselves, we had some freshly-baked classic ginger cookies, or pepparkakor. Cookies, we learned from our visit, are a major part of Swedish daily life. Whenever you take a coffee break (which happens a lot in Sweden!) or finish a meal, an endless selection of cookies magically arrive on the table. It was too late for coffee, so we dunked our crispy cookies in some herbal tea, and settled into our food coma to watch TV.

Meatballs in Gravy

From Selma Wifstrand's Favorite Swedish Recipes

+ ½ lb beef

+ ¼ lb veal

+ ¼ lb pork

+ ½ cup bread crumbs

+ 1 ½ cups, half cream half water mixture

+ 1 egg

+ 3 tablespoon onion, chopped

+ 2 tsp salt

+ butter for frying

+ salt and pepper 

+ water and/or red wine 

Gravy

+ pan drippings

+ 1 tablespoon flour

+ 1 cup cream

+ salt and pepper

1. Melt a tablespoon of butter in a skillet and saute onions until golden brown.

2. In the meantime, soak the bread crumbs in cream/water mixture.

3. When finished, remove onions from pan and combine with meat, egg, bread crumb mixture and salt and pepper. Mix until smooth.

4. Shape balls, using about 2 tablespoons per ball. Fry in batches with butter over medium-high heat until evenly brown. After each batch, clear the skillet with water or wine and gather drippings in a container to the side. Our meatballs are never perfectly round, or even close. But that doesn't effect the taste at all! When all the balls are cooked, set aside and cover or keep in oven to keep warm.

6. In the skillet, mix flour, cream, and reserved pan drippings. Simmer for 10 minutes. If sauce becomes too thick, add more cream.

7. Serve with gravy poured over meatballs.

Egg Noodles in Caraway Butter
From Martha Stewart 

+ coarse salt
+ 8 ounces egg noodles
+ 1 tablespoon caraway seeds
+ 3 tablespoons unsalted butter
+ 1/4 cup coarsely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley - we didn't have any, but we thought they were fine without

1. Fill a large pot three-quarters full with water. Bring to a boil; add 1 tablespoon salt. Add noodles; cook, according to package instructions, until al dente. Drain noodles, and return to pot.
2. Toast caraway seeds in a dry small skillet over medium-low heat until fragrant and slightly darkened, 2 to 3 minutes. Remove from heat. Add butter to skillet, and swirl gently until butter has melted.
3. Pour caraway butter over noodles. Stir in parsley. Season noodles with salt, if necessary.

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! Halloween is an important holiday for Jake and his family so we wanted to post a little something special to show our love.

It's been a rough week for us and though we haven’t had the energy for much, we weren't going to let anything stop us from carving pumpkins. Our friend Bren joined us for the ritual and - always the curator - insisted we have one classic pumpkin and one decorated with the countenance of America’s favorite witch: Michele Bachmann.

While Silka and Bren worked diligently on their masterpiece Jake cleaned the seeds for roasting. Generally we just throw some oil and salt on the seeds, put them in the oven and call it a day. But this year we decided to spice it up a little. We went straight to our cooking bible, Mark Bittman’s How To Cook Everything, and adapted his recipe to fit the contents of our cupboards. The results: AMAZING!!

While referring to Bittman was key, we're convinced that using our new sel gris noirmoutier from The Meadow had a lot to do with how amazing these turned out. Luckily, pumpkin seed season doesn't end with Halloween! 

Fiery Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

Adapted from Mark Bittman's How To Cook Everything

+ 2 cups of washed seeds, patted dry

+ 2 tablespoons of sunflower oil

+ 1 teaspoon allepo

+ 1 teaspoon chipotle

+ ½ teaspoon cayenne

+ ½ teaspoon cumin

+ 1 teaspoon sel gris

1. Mix the spices and oil together in a bowl. Add seeds to mixture and toss so that all of the seeds are coated. 

2. Lay out, in one layer, on a baking sheet and place in oven at 350 for about 35 minutes. Toss occasionally.