Apple Galette

Walking my dog, Charlotte, this Fall around my neighborhood I noticed many apple trees loaded with apples. They were so plentiful and so many of the apples were just falling off the trees. More than the birds and squirrels can eat. My friend, Norma, has two large apple trees and offered to give me a bunch of the beautiful green and red patched apples. I just had to photograph them and make something out of them. Must not let them go to waste! So I made a apple galette and froze a bunch of apples to make two more galettes over the winter.

Denver Neighborhood apples - Newton Wonder Apple and/or Orange Pippin

Apple Galette Recipe

Dough

1 1/2 cup of flour

1 tsp of sugar

1tsp of salt

1 stick of butter ( I know everyone uses unsalted but I use salted)

2 Tablespoons Vegetable Shortening

Transfer dry ingredients to a food processor and pulse about 5 times to blend.

Then add cold butter and pulse till it looks like coarse meal.

Add the vegetable shortening and pulse about 5 times.

Add 1 Tablespoon at a time of ice water till mixture turns into a ball or spins to one side of the food processor. Dough should hold together but not sticky.

Filling

15 small apples peeled and sliced

1/3 cup brown sugar

1/3 cup white sugar

1 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. nutmeg

1/4 tsp. salt

1 lemon (squeeze juice from)

After mixing the filling all together I cook it for about 5-10 minutes.

Let cool for about 10 minutes.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees

Roll out dough to approximately 14 inches so when you fold over apples the galette will be approximately 12 inches. I found this to be immensely important to roll out dough on parchment paper because it is easy to pick up paper and place it on the full sheet pan.

Spread 1/4 cup of apricot jam in the center of dough approximately 11 inches in diameter

Then place sliced apples on top of jam in center of dough and gently fold dough over apples.

Brush a beaten egg on dough and then sprinkle large sugar crystals.

Bake for 15 minutes at 450 degrees.

Then lower heat to 375 degrees for 45 minutes.

Apricot jam in the middle of dough.

Gently folding dough over apples.

Ready to slide into the oven!!

Newton Wonder Apple or a Orange Pippin

Tomato Melon Salad

Mid-Summer we went to a fairly new restaurant here in Denver called Hedge Row. Everything we ate there was delicious and presented very nicely. One dish captured our attention over the others, that was their Tomato Melon Salad with white balsamic and olive oil dressing. So simple and refreshing. Tomatoes are still out in the stores and a wonderful dish to keep summer going into Fall.

Tomato Melon Salad at Hedge Row, Denver, Colorado

Tomato Melon Salad Recipe

You could make this salad for however many people you wanted. The photo was designed to serve one or two people. Just a wedge of watermelon and honeydew, a bunch of tomatoes cut in half with a sprinkle of micro greens or basil. The restaurant served their salad with a sweet sesame cracker that they made themselves—very delicious!! Since I did not make a homemade sesame cracker I showed it with a store bought one that gave the salad a bit of crunch.

1 small wedge of watermelon cubed

1 small wedge of honeydew cubed

22 tomatoes of varying colors and sizes sliced in half

Toss tomatoes in 3oz of white balsamic with a 1 1/2 oz of olive oil-then plate

5 basil leaves (you could use more if you like) or micro greens

One to two sesame crackers cracked

Pole Bean Salad

My husband and I went to New York City in July.  There were two art exhibits that we wanted to see and one was going to end at the end of July. Not the best time of year because it is so hot and humid.  So what possessed us!!!!  The Irving Penn, famous photographer, at the Metropolitan Museum was worth the heat and humidity.  As young aspiring photographers, Penn was and still is a source of inspiration for us.  The other exhibit was the Georgia O’Keefe at the Brooklyn Museum.  Equally as beautiful and interesting.  Of course being in New York City there is a plethora of restaurants that were desirable to try.  The restaurant at the Whitney Museum called, “Untitled” had this wonderful summer salad with grilled white and green pole beans, sliced peaches, pickled ginger, white balsamic vinegar and peach puree on top.  A refreshing summer salad to start the evening.  Side note, we saw Martha Stewart and family there!!!

The challenge in making this salad was finding the pole beans.  Never could locate white pole beans here in Colorado but did locate green pole beans at Whole Foods.  Instead of grilling the pole beans we steamed them for a good twelve minutes and then let them marinate in the white balsamic vinegar for about a half hour.  We did grill the peaches and I also made peach puree to drizzle on top.  And a few sprinkles of pickled ginger on top. Delicious!!

Pole Bean Recipe      Serves two

6 green pole beans (steamed for 12 minutes and marinate in white balsamic vinegar 30min)

6 white pole beans (steamed for 12 minutes and marinate in white balsamic vinegar 30min)

1 peach peeled and slice then grilled till markings show

Sprinkle pickled ginger

1 tsp. of black sesame seeds

Additional drizzle of white Balsamic on top of salad

2 peaches peeled and placed in a blender to puree   Then drizzle puree on top.

New York evening in July

Irving Penn Exhibit at the Met

Georgia O'Keefe Exhibit at the Brooklyn Art Museum

Riesling

Steep, lush vineyards planted with Riesling vines were the predominate view on our bike ride along the Mosel river in Germany. We knew when we were ready to stop for the day that either a Biergarten or a chilled glass of Riesling awaited us.

Riesling in the states has a bad reputation of being a “sweet wine”, and of course, it can be. Germany has five classifications of Riesling. Trocken (fairly dry in the German classification) Riesling is anything but sweet!  Refreshing, slightly chilled, there were tastes of citrus, peach and minerals that made these crisp, dry wines a fantastic summer drink.

My iphone inspiration photo made me want to capture (in focus which is easier to control on a real camera) the chill and freshness of the Riesling. I wanted the image to be more intimate with the wine!

Flammkuchen

     In late May my husband and I met friends in Germany to take a bike ride along the Mosel river.  It was so beautiful-green, green and green. So green I had to take two Claritins a day.  It was just great fun rolling along the river listening to all the birds and admiring the Riesling vineyards.

 At the end of each day we really looked forward to a shower and a wonderful dinner.  One of those dinners involved Flammkuchen which is German pizza.  This pizza had tomato sauce, red onions, black olives, mush- rooms, pepperoncinis and a sprinkling of chives on top.I guess you would say this was a veggie pizza but what we found so interesting was the crust.  It was thin and crispy and felt like we were eating a light pizza—not heavy.  So we recreated it but added meat and cheese and made it slightly heavier and delicious!!

Mosel River, Germany

Bike path and vineyards along the Mosel River.

PIZZA CRUST RECIPE

The pizza crust recipe was from “Cracker-Crust Mushroom Pizza Recipe /My Recipes” I only used the crust recipe and added our items to it.

After cooking the crust for 5 minutes we spread the pizza sauce over the crust leaving a 1/2 inch border.  Then we put crumbled goat cheese, sliced artichoke hearts (leaving a bit of the oil they are soaked in),  pepperoni, sliced grape tomatoes, sliced olives.  Place it back in oven for another 4 to 5 minutes or until crust is golden.  Top off with fresh basil.

Have a slice!!!

Spring Lilacs

During this time of year it is hard not to look at the flowers and listen to the birds.  It is just so beautiful.  A little still-life to to try and capture the season. 

More food and travel on the next blog.

Kouign Amann

My friend, Norma again inspired me to pursue more baking with yeast.  She showed me a video of Martha Stewart making Kouign Amann,  which is layered yeast dough.  It looked like a lot of fun, but a challenge.  This would be great to do on a cold snowy day.  You need to appreciate all the phases to get to the wonderful end result,  dense sweet rolls that are delicious and worth the effort.  You can also make other pastries from this dough such as poppy seed snails and cinnamon sugar knots.  We added a little apricot jam in the middle on the Kouign Amann—delicious!!

Rolling the dough with the sugar.

Pinching of the dough.  You can see all the layers!!!

These are a few that were done with the muffin pan.

We tried both the muffin pan and the rings.  

We used the recipe from Martha Stewart.  She has a great video on line that we thought was very helpful.  It was sometimes a bit challenging to find it but if we could locate it on youtube under layered yeast dough or Kouign Amann.

We thought it was successful but I think the next time I would try wet yeast instead of the powder just to see the difference.  I also thought the rings worked wonderfully for this because the dough could flatten out and got crispier than the muffin shape.  I also thought the apricot jam really added to the flavor.

We ended this post with the selected focus version because we liked it too.  We thought the all sharp version made the Kouign Amann look crispier. 

Thyme and Again Cocktail

While in Aspen, my friends and I took a break from the ski slopes to visit Woody Creek Distillery located in Basalt, Colorado.  The bar manager, Christian, took us on a quick tour of the distillery.  Very different from wine making!!  Our friends did a flight of bourbon, rye and brandy.  They loved it!!  Brian and I tried a gin cocktail called Thyme and Again and we loved it too.  So much so we want to share it with you.  We would also highly recommend a visit to their distillery.  There is a wonderful bar with a great seating area, it looked very relaxing.  During the summer there is outdoor seating and they said bring a pizza and enjoy their spirits.  Very hospitable and wonderful tasting!  Of course we all bought some bottles to take home.

Our original drink at Woody Creek Distillery.  Basalt, Colorado

Muddling behind the scenes.

Thyme and Again Cocktail Recipe

We did change the drink a little bit.  We changed the amounts of the drink to make a 4 1/2 ounces of liquid—so by the time you pour over three ice cubes we have a nice full drink in a old fashion glass.  First you muddle your rosemary, thyme and anise seeds in the simple syrup, fresh lemon juice and diluted ginger syrup in a glass that allows you to transfer liquid to a shaker with ice cubes.  You can double strain this but we preferred a bit of the particulates in the drink. So we did not strain carefully!  Once the muddled liquid is in the shaker, you then pour your gin in and shake.   Pour into a old fashion glass and  top off with ice and a bit of thyme garnish.  Now you have a delicious drink!

Gin                   2oz

Simple Syrup   1oz

Lemon Juice    1oz

Ginger Syrup-we felt it necessary to dilute (with water) this 1-4.  Then used the diluted ginger syrup. 1/2oz

Anise               1 pinch

Grilled Cauliflower

North Italian restaurant is one of our regular places… This winter they put Grilled Cauliflower on the menu. An instant favorite! Already interesting visually, adding different colors of Cauliflower we thought would be nice because it was in season

Our dish at North Italia. 

It seemed fairly simple after we asked out waiter how it was prepared. Well, not exactly so simple!

It took us 3 times trying to figure out how to reproduce the flavors of grilling; slight citrus and light cream with Pancetta. We don’t have a wood burning oven either, so this recipe improvises a little. 

Of course we had to photograph the dish without the egg as well... The colors we're amazing!

Ingredients for the Pancetta cream

1 tbsp (15 mL) butter

1 tbsp (15 ) finely chopped garlic

1 tbsp (15 mL) finely chopped shallots

3 oz (90 g) pancetta, diced

2 tbsp (30 mL) white wine

1 cup (250 mL) 35 % cream

Ingredients to marinate the Cauliflower

Juice of 2 lemons
4 or 5 cloves garlic, cut into very thin slivers
1/2 c. olive oil
1/2 tsp. oregano
1/2 tsp. salt
Freshly ground black pepper to taste
1 tbsp. finely grated lemon zest (yellow part only - opt.)

Trim the cauliflower, breaking off the buds. You may also peel the stems and cut them into 1" sections. Put in a pan with salted water to cover. Also cut the Asparagus into 2 inch sections and put to the side. Put the Cauliflower in the marinade for about two hours.

In a pan sizzle up a bit of Pancetta and set aside. Remove the Cauliflower from the marinade and heat in the same hot pan with a little olive oil and the remains Pancetta oil for about 5 minutes, then add the asparagus for about 3 minutes so as not to overcook . While this is being done put the small cast iron dish on a burner on low and when the veggies are ready, pour into the hot cast Iron dish and add the crispy Pancetta. (Put a fried egg on if you wish!) Drizzle a bit of the Pancetta cream, shred some Parmesan and crispy bread crumbs on there and your done! Careful, it's hot!

Pane Bianco

I visited Izzio bakery at the Denver Central Market a while ago and was very inspired by the artisan look of the bread (and pastries!) I’ve not worked with yeast before, but I was up for the challenge!  So when my friend, Norma, shared a recipe she really liked called, “Pane Bianco” via King Arthur’s recipe and photo on the web site. I saw how rustic and savory it looked I knew it was time to try my hand at bread.  I even envisioned exactly what kind of scene I would create…now the baking part.

Izzio Bakery at Denver Central Market

Rolling the dough out.

Norma and I worked on this post together. We made our first pane bianco together just like the recipe said.  I thought it was little bland, so I added a table spoon and a half of butter and a tablespoon of sugar to the dough.  I realized the first time I used an Italian cheese that was heavy on the mozzarella so we tried another blend with more parmesan and asiago. Much more flavorful. We approximated that we doubled the amount of cheese and and sun-dried tomatoes than recipe called for.  You just slice it like sandwich bread to serve, or toasted and it’s almost like a pizza.

Pane Bianco Recipe from King Arthur

Dough

3 cups King Arthur Unbleached Bread Flour*

2 teaspoons instant yeast

1 1/4 teaspoons salt

1 large egg

1/2 cup lukewarm milk

1/3 cup lukewarm water

3 tablespoons olive oil

Filling

3/4 cup shredded Italian-blend cheese or the cheese of your choice

1/2 cup oil-packed sun-dried tomatoes or your own oven-roasted tomatoes

3 to 6 cloves garlic, peeled and minced

1/3 cup chopped fresh basil, green or purple

Directions

To make the dough: Combine all of the dough ingredients in a bowl (or the bucket of your bread machine), and mix and knead — by hand, using a mixer, or in your bread machine set on the dough cycle — to make a smooth, very soft dough. The dough should stick a bit to the bottom of the bowl if you're using a stand mixer.

Place the dough in a lightly greased bowl, cover, and let it rise for 45 to 60 minutes, or until it's doubled in size.

Meanwhile, thoroughly drain the tomatoes, patting them dry. Use kitchen shears to cut them into smaller bits.

Gently deflate the dough. Flatten and pat it into a 22" x 8 1/2" rectangle. Spread with the cheese, tomatoes, garlic, and basil.

Starting with one long edge, roll the dough into a log the long way. Pinch the edges to seal. Place the log seam-side down on a lightly greased or parchment-lined baking sheet.

Using kitchen shears, start 1/2" from one end and cut the log lengthwise down the center about 1" deep, to within 1/2" of the other end.

Keeping the cut side up, form an "S" shape. Tuck both ends under the center of the "S" to form a "figure 8;" pinch the ends together to seal.

Cover and let rise in a warm place until double, 45 to 60 minutes.

While the loaf is rising, preheat the oven to 350°F.

Uncover the bread, and bake it for 35 to 40 minutes, tenting it with foil after 20 to 25 minutes to prevent over-browning.

Remove the bread from the oven, and transfer it to a rack to cool. Enjoy warm or at room temperature. Store, well-wrapped, at room temperature for a couple of days; freeze for longer storage.

Tips from our bakers

Substitute all-purpose flour 1:1 for the bread flour in the recipe, if desired. Reduce the water to 1/4 cup.

When making anything with yeast, including this bread, let the dough rise to the point the recipe says it should, e.g., "Let the dough rise until it's doubled in bulk." Rising times are only a guide; there are so many variables in yeast baking that it's impossible to say that bread dough will ALWAYS double in bulk in a specific amount of time.

Chop your basil with kitchen shears, just as you do the sun-dried tomatoes.

Want to make a gluten-free version of this bread? See our gluten-free focaccia recipe, with its tips for adding filling.