Sautéed potatoes with mushrooms

This is the ultimate Russian winter comfort food, and it's very easy to make. The only secret is, the potatoes and the mushrooms have to be cooked separately, then combined just before serving. Why can't we make it a one-skillet meal? Because the mushrooms need salt early, to help them release their water and become crisp; the potatoes, on the other hand, cook best without salt, that will make them break down and lose their shape, if added too early.

Here I made this dish with store-bought crimini mushrooms. Back in Russia we used any type of foraged forest mushrooms, with even more delicious results, or, in the middle of the winter, when no fresh mushrooms were available, we would rinse pickled mushrooms to remove the brine, and then proceed with the recipe.

I like to season my mushrooms with a little thyme, garlic, and fresh ground pepper. Most Russian cooks go for sautéed onions, and leave out the pepper. Try it both ways. Both are good.



Sautéed potatoes with mushrooms
Serves four

For the potatoes:
2 Tbsp olive oil
5 large Yukon Gold potatoes, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
Sea salt

Heat oil in a large cast-iron skillet over medium-high heat. Add the potatoes, cook, stirring occasionally, until almost tender. Season with sea salt, continue cooking until cooked through.

For the mushrooms:
2 Tbsp olive oil
8 oz crimini mushrooms, sliced 1/8 inch thin
Sea salt
Fresh ground black pepper
2 large garlic cloves, minced
5-6 thyme sprigs, leaves picked, stems discarded

Heat oil in a large cast-iron skillet over medium-high heat. Add mushrooms, season generously with salt and pepper. Cook until the mushrooms release the liquid and it evaporates. Add garlic and thyme. Continue cooking until mushrooms and garlic are browned.

Combine potatoes with mushrooms, serve as a side to braised meat, or on their own.


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Colors of winter

Short days, cold rains, the flu season... This is when we need more vitamins in our diet, to fight off this cold, and more colors on our plates, to add cheer to the long nights in front of the fire. Luckily, here in California, the winter farmers market supplies both.



Winter vegetables come in a palette of soft whites, muted purples, deep greens, and warm yellows; they go well with the gold of roasted chicken and duck, deep browns of braised meats, and the neutral tones of earthy grains. They prefer slow, thoughtful cooking techniques; they are complimented with sturdy winter herbs - thyme, rosemary, sage, oregano, parsley. Winter vegetables are full of vitamins, minerals, and micro-nutrients that help us survive the cold and boost our energy when we need it most.



Beets come in a rainbow of colors: red, pink, golden, white. Slice very young, tender raw beets for salads, both roots and tops. Roast larger beets for salads, soups, or to serve as a side dish: trim the greens, leaving 1 inch attached (save the greens to add to soups or braised greens), wash the beets, place them in an oven-proof dish, add 2-3 Tbsp water, cover with aluminum foil, roast at 400 degrees until tender (pierce with a wooden pick through the foil to check), 30-60 minutes, depending on the size; let cool, peel. The beets are complimented with balsamic vinegar, roasted garlic, truffle oil, thyme.

Broccoli adds emerald green color and a wealth of minerals to the plate. Separate the florets, peel and slice the stems, steam in a steamer or in a microwave until tender, refresh in ice water to stop cooking and to preserve the color. My favorite way to serve the broccoli is as a cold salad with dried cranberries and sliced almonds, with a dressing of almond butter, Tamari soy sauce, and olive oil.



Brussels sprouts like to steam, sauté, or roast. They are complimented by garlic, lemon (grate the rind over them, squeeze the juice), and mild olive oil.



Cabbage comes in green and red, and in plain and crinkled Savoy varieties. The large outer leaves, blanched, make wrappers for cabbage rolls, with rice, vegetables, meats, or anything. The tender center leaves go into soups and sautés. Green cabbages have an affinity with apples, pears, caraway seed, white wine, and onions. All cabbages go beautifully with bacon and smoked meats.



Carrot adds sunny color, sweetness and vitamins to everything it touches. There are white, gold, and purple varieties too. Love it raw!



Cauliflower is not just a white flower. It's also gold, green, and purple flower! All colors do well steamed until almost tender, then sautéed, or prepared ou gratin. Cream of cauliflower soup is a life-saver for people who can't tolerate milk products: the pureed cauliflower supplies the creamy texture, no cream needed.

Celery: the crunchy stalks are a perfect snack, great for dipping; the classic combination of chopped onions, celery, and carrot, sautéed in a mixture of olive oil and butter, can enhance any soup or transform a grain dish. Celery also makes a great soup on it's own. Did I mention Bloody Mary?



Chard is a close relative of beets, and the leaves come in the same palette of jewel colors, and can be used the same ways as the beet tops. Steam, sauté, braise.



Fennel, thinly sliced, adds subtle anise flavor to salads, soups and stews. It's also great prepared au gratin.

Garlic is love, and an indispensable ingredient in almost every savory, and some sweet dishes. Every time I heat up an oven to roast anything, I also toss in a head of garlic, wrapped in aluminum foil. Serve roasted garlic with a cheese and fruit plate, add it to mashed potatoes, spread it on top of steaks, mix it into sauces for roasted meats and vegetables. Large garlic cloves, sliced thin and fried in olive oil, make garlic chips, a nice garnish to meat dishes.

Grapefruit - juice it! This time of the year, we need tons of vitamin C, and the grapefruit delivers it, together with the tangy and pleasantly bitter flavor, and a wonderful aroma. Like most citrus fruits, it's a natural antidepressant.


Kale is a leafy cabbage, and it works well in the same types of preparations. I love to use kale leaves to wrap rice, vegetables, and meats, to make kale rolls. I also like it braised with onion, bacon, and white wine. Black Tuscan kale, aka Dino kale, aka "the favorite", is the darkest of them all, and has the deepest flavor and the highest vitamin content. It is friends with white beans, tomatoes, onions and garlic.



Leek, a mild, subtle green onion, works well in delicate soups. Also, try browning it in butter, than braising it with white wine and shallots, low and slow, until it's melting tender. Addictive. The white part is to eat; I use the green part to flavor stocks.



Lemon, my second main staple after garlic, is indispensable with fish and shellfish; it takes any green vegetable dish to the next level (think garlic and lemon green beans, or Meyer lemon roasted Brussels sprouts), and it's one of the best flavorings for a roasted chicken.


Mandarin: eat it out of hand, or add it to a green salad.

Onion, you already know... I like to marinate thin slices of red onion in 1 part sherry vinegar, 3 parts boiling water, with salt, sugar, and spices (whatever I'm in a mood for; say, allspice, cloves and cinnamon), to top burgers

Parsley root adds deeper, earthier flavor than parsley leaves to soups and stocks. My grandma always used the whole parsley plant, tops and roots, to make a soup. I like it her way. The root also roasts well, and is a nice, flavorful addition to roasted root vegetables.

Parsnip used to be a European staple food, before the potatoes arrived. It still mashes well, and a combination of mashed parsnips and potatoes is even better.



Potato. They say that the classic chefs toque has 101 pleats that represent 101 potato dishes that the chef knows how to make. I'm not there yet: I routinely make about 40 potato dishes. But my toque only has 17 pleats! I need a new toque. My latest favorite potato dish is smashed potatoes with garlic and herbs: boil gold, red, and purple potatoes until tender; let cool; mince garlic, thyme, rosemary, and parsley with some sea salt; spread the herb mixture on the cutting board; with the palm of your hand, smash the potatoes into the herb mixture; heat 1 Tbsp olive oil and 1 Tbsp butter in a large pan over medium heat; transfer smashed potatoes to the pan, cook until fragrant and golden, turning once.

Radish: winter radishes have thick skins and strong flavors. I like to peel them and cook them. Black Spanish and Watermelon radishes are great roasted.

Rutabaga: the big gentle "Swede" is sweet, and is at it's best roasted, or as a puree.



Turnip is sweet and crunchy. Peel it and roast it, boil it, or sauté it, then glaze it with honey and apple juice, balsamic vinegar, or soy sauce.



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Location:San Carlos, CA

There are flowers on the plate!

The vegetables love this miserable rainy spring we are having here. It's a shame I'm not a vegetable (yet?). The fava beans, sugar peas, heirloom tomatoes, and all the herbs and flowers are doing great.

The duck leg confit that I did this week shares the plate with baby carrots, asparagus, fingerling potatoes (Finn and Russian Banana), all sauteed in the duck fat, and nasturtium leaves and flowers.

Yes, you can eat the flowers. Just wash them well. They add a lot of color and some spicy flavor. Taste somewhat like watercress.

Other flowers good to eat are:

• Chive flowers - taste similar to chives but milder, beautiful purple color in salads


• Pansies - don't taste like much; mostly for decoration
  
• Zuccini flower - fry, stuff and braise, or just add fresh for color in salads


• Rosemary and thyme - cute and flavorful; use to garnish dishes that are flavored with rosemary and thyme leaves


• Marigold - add to salads


• Artichokes - you know

Cured braised pork shoulder

This is an unhurried preparation. It takes five days to brine the pork, then it rests to distribute the seasoning for another day, then you braise it low and slow all afternoon, and then finish it in the oven. It’s totally worth it, so melting tender, including the tasty skin, the meat is beautifully rosy pink from the brine, and so flavorful. And it actually takes very little of the cook’s time – it mostly brines and cooks itself.

I started on Monday with a pork shoulder picnic, skin on, bone in. Made the brine with the curing mixture of 8 parts kosher salt, 4 parts sugar, and 1 part InstaCure #1 that I mix by weight and use as needed. Steeped the herbs and spices in the brine, let it cool. When I grow up, I will have a special needle for injecting brine into hams. Professionals have it. I don’t. So I just poked the pork with a bamboo skewer to allow the brine to penetrate the meat a little better, covered the pork with brine, and left it, covered, in the fridge, till Friday. Drained, washed, and dried the pork, reserving the herbs.

On Saturday afternoon I tied up the pork, added the reserved herbs, a leek, a couple of celery stalks, 4 garlic cloves, and some 1/2 cup water, and simmered it VERY SLOWLY for about four hours. Parboiled the fingerling potatoes, got the car from the mechanic, went to the farmers market to get tomatoes and fava beans, shelled the beans, and went for a hike in the hills while it was cooking.

Just before dinner, I removed the pork from the braising liquid, put it together with the potatoes in a roasting pan, basted both pork and the potatoes with the braising liquid, and popped into a hot oven for about 15 minutes, just enough to add some color and crust.
Took out of the oven, sliced, served with roasted potatoes and a salad of heirloom tomatoes and fava beans.


Cured braised pork shoulder

1 pork shoulder picnic, with bone and skin, about 3.5 lb

For the brine:
6 cups water
¾ cup curing mix (1 part pink salt, 4 parts sugar, 8 parts kosher salt by weight)
5 bay leaves
4 sprigs thyme
2 sprigs sage
1 Tbsp black peppercorns
5 juniper berries

Grilling simplicity

I am a victim of a steak accident: the five large grass fed New York steaks that I left at my dear friend K's freezer in order for him to bring the still frozen steaks to our ski cabin in Tahoe, he forgot. Instead, he brought them to the last Saturday's picnic in Sonoma. Carefully defrosted. Together with a couple of gallons of lamb and beef kabobs, marinated with red wine and onions. For the seven of us.

Of course, after struggling to get down all the kabobs (delicious, just way too much!) no one cold even think about the steaks. So they gave them all to me, to take home. I told them I already have a large chunk of beef tenderloin at home. They wouldn't listen. So R. and I are stuck with steaks for the rest of the week.
Luckily, I have a wonderful cookbook to read for inspiration, Seven Fires: Grilling the Argentine Way . It's all about steaks and wood fire, including a recipe for a whole cow, roasted over wood coals on a metal frame. If he can do a cow, I can do 5 strips and a tenderloin. And I have the Farmers Market for the vegetable support.
Grilled baby artichokes and Russian Banana fingerling potatoes:

Remove the outer leaves from baby artichokes, trim the stalks. Cut the artichokes in half, place in a pot with cold water, a pinch of salt, and a lemon, cut in half. Bring to boil and cook until they can be pierced easily with a knife, about 10 minutes. Drain and let cool.

Cover the fingerling potatoes with boiling water, parboil until tender, 15-20 minutes. Drain, let cool a little, cut in half lengthwise.

Preheat the grill to hot.

Season 1/2 cup mild olive oil with salt and pepper. Toss the vegetables with the oil. (Brush the remaining oil on the steaks.) Grill the vegetables until slightly charred, turning once.

Grill the steaks on one side without moving them, until they come easily off the grill, about 3 -4 minutes. Lift and rotate 60 degrees. Grill for 2 minutes. Turn and grill to desired donness. Press the steak (carefully, hot!) with a finger. When it's as soft as the first joint of your index finger it is rare, the medium joint is medium, and the top joint is well done. Or use a termometer.

I don't specify the quantities here. Everyone's steak accidents are different.

A simple salad of mixed greens and heirloom tomatoes is dressed with juice and minced rind of one small blood orange + 2 Tbsp EVOO + salt&pepper.

Malbec.

Christmas roast beef well done. Lesson learned.

I don't use my convection oven too often. In fact, I even try to adjust some oven recipies for stovetop.

I know, it's a luxury to have a convection oven in a rental place, but in a small place with an open kitchen the loud oven fan sounds so annoying that it takes most of the pleasure out of cooking, and there is no escape from it. If I have to use the oven, I'd better know how long it would take, and go for a walk to get away from the sound.

As a result, I don't know the oven's character too well. It's OK for slow-cooking braises, where an extra 15 minutes won't make a lot of difference, or for baking small things - I'll just sit outside in the garden, and come check my cookies every five minutes.

A New York beef roast is different. It takes a while to cook, and the timing should be precise. I had figured 10 minutes searing at 500, then 1 hour at 325 for a 4 lb. roast should be good. So I seared the roast, reduced the temperature, and went for a short hike in the hills.

When I was back, the roast was medium-well done! You can see that all the bloody life is gone out of it's center. It turnes out that the convection cooks beef much faster than the usual 15 minutes per pound.

Well, this made R. happy - he thinks that I usually undercook my meat (not that it would stop him from enjoying it), and I learned a lesson.

I was very happy with the rest of the dinner: red wine and mustard sauce, roast potatoes and garlic, steamed bok choy, baby arugula salad with persimmons and pomergranate vinaegrette dressing, and especially with the wine. A forgotten bottle of Dry Creek Mariner meritage 2004 turned up on the bottom of the wine refrigerator by surprise; the wine was wonderful, and the cork was at it's limit, a couple more month and the wine would be in trouble.

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Tasting a new mushroom:

Matsutake mushrooms have been all the rage recently. From the Farmers Market to foodie blogs everyone is very excited about their unique aroma.

I approached them in the market a few times, but I didn't like the smell at all, and ended up getting other mushrooms instead.

This Saturday, while shopping at San Francisco ferry building, we were confronted by the wealth of mushrooms at Far West Fungi. The selection is overwhelming. They have black and white truffles ("Why so expensive? Are they hallucinogenic?"), porcinis, two tipes of chanterelles, and about any other mushroom I've seen in this country; fresh, dried, canned, and mushroom-seeded logs to grow your own. I had to satisfy my curiosity this time, and gor fresh matsutakes.

I cooked them with a little onion and rice, smelling all the time in the hope for the wonderful aroma to emerge in cooking. They smell the same cooked. I find their sharp resinious smell mildly irritating, chemical, and not food-like at all. They smell of a pine forest all right, but not of a sunny bright pines by a sea shore that I hoped to get, but of wet, cold pines on a rainy day, with a highway nearby.

It reminds me of retsina, the Greek wine that was traditionally preserved by sealing it with pine resin. I managed to develop a taste for chilled retsina on a hot afternoon, with bright lemony Greek summer fare; similar smell in a fall mushroom just doesn't make sense to me.

So this fashionable mushroom didn't take. I'll give it another chance by grilling it next time. But the first impression is that for the same money I would rather have porcini every time.

Duck, the better turkey

Better late than never: Our Thanksgiving table.

We actually had to have the Thanksgiving dinner a day earlier, since we were going to use the long weekend to make a trip to Death Valley, and the Thanksgiving Day is the best time to leave the Bay Area without getting stuck in traffic for hours. For the same reason there could be no leftovers. And I like duck better than turkey anyway.

Surrounded by sautéed winter vegetables, home-cured olives, fire roasted red bell peppers, a salad of mixed baby greens, and accompanied by duck stock reduction with shallots and porcini mushrooms, the duck was just enough to serve three - no leftovers.

The purple cauliflower, when cooked, turns very un-food like blue color, just as the grower at the market told me. I was so proud to have found an authentic blue vegetable!

The next day, while the entire nation was consuming millions or turkeys, we ate a late-night dinner in Denny’s in Bakersfield, CA (I had an omelet), with warm memories of our small tasty birdie.

Cooking for looks continued: grilled chicken

I did this rosemary and thyme grilled chicken breast with grilled baby portabello mushrooms, grill-roasted garlic, and mashed new potatoes as a homework for my food styling class. My idea was to use the subtle color variations of off-whites and golds to emphasize the old-world character of the dish. I even got one of my fancy plates, not used for two years, out of the chest.

It's amazing how fast the grilled foods sag if they are allowed to sit for a while at room temperature. One of the requirements for this weeks class was to experiment with keeping food "alive" under the camera. My chicken and potatoes had to be sprayed with olive oil and water several times, while I was setting up the camera and arranging the garnishes. The potatoes were cooked, chilled in an ice water bath, then mushed cold, with olive oil instead of butter, and still I had to spray them more than ones during the shooting, or they would dry. The chicken has grill marks one one side only, and was undercooked, to keep it looking fresh longer. The herbs were not a problem - they come from the garden, just keep cutting new ones and replace them. And rosemary and thyme don't wilt very fast anyway. the baby bella mushrooms and thebgarlic head were the worst: as soon as you take them off the grill, they begin to dry and wrinkle. Water and more water.

And then I messes it all up overdoing the lemon...

Comfort Food: Sauteed Chicken Livers

When summer?

This wind has been blowing for a week now non-stop. It knocks down fences, falls trees; my flower pots fly across the back yard. And it's cold.
This weather is driving all life out of me. I need comfort. Food.

Chicken liver is one of the least glamorous foods, it's cheap, people think it's not healthy, and it doesn't look like much. But it's tasty, and it keeps you warm. Here I used a few fancier ingredients like duck fat (left over from cooking foie gras and kept in the freezer) and truffle oil to add shine to this old-style home cooking, but it would actually be as comforting without all this, just use half butter - half olive oil for sauteeing.

Sauteed Chicken Livers with Marsala and Truffle Mushed Potatoes
serves 2
1 lb chicken livers, dried with paper towels and trimmed
2 Tbsp duck fat or 1 Tbsp butter and 1 Tbsp olive oil
2 shallots, minced
1/2 cup Marsala
salt, pepper

for the mushed potatoes:
8 new Yukon Gold potatoes, with skins
3 Tbsp heavy cream
1 small bunch of flat-leaf parsley, minced, plus 2 sprigs for serving
salt, pepper
6 drops of white truffle oil

Boil the potatoes in lightly salted water until tender, checking with a fork. Drain. Place the potatoes in a bowl, add the cream and minced parsley, coarsly mash with a fork, skin and all.
Season with salt, pepper and truffle oil. Keep warm.

In a large heavy pan over medium heat melt the duck fat or butter and oil. Add chicken livers. Make sure the pot is large enough to hold all the livers in one layer. Sautee until golden-brown.
Add shallots, Marsala, season with salt and pepper, reduce the heat. Cook until the wine is reduces by half, about 10-15 minutes.

Serve over the mushed potatoes, with a glass of wine, by the fireplace.

Grilled Hanger Steak

I was very happy to find a hanger steak, aka onglet, at the farmers market, because this steak, that is similar to skirt steak, but much more flavorful, is never seen in the supermarket. It weighted just over a pound, a perfect size for two servings. The steak is shaped as a long narrow leaf, and has a seam running through the center. I carefully cut the seam out before cooking, using a sharp paring knife - my brother surgeon can be proud of me, I'm not totally hopeless! - and lightly pounded the meat with a rolling pin, to make it more uniform thickness.

There is a couple of tricks to know when cooking the onglet: first, don't overcook, or it can become very tough. This one I seasoned with sea salt and pepper, brushed on some olive oil, and grilled on my gas grill at 500F four minutes per side, then let it rest for some 5 minutes. The other thing is, it has to be sliced thinly against the grain, and the grain runs in a fan pattern from where the central membrane used to be, so you have to change the angle while slicing, and the slices come out different sizes.

Served with new potatoes, sliced, arranged in a buttered baking dish with salt, pepper, heavy cream, and shaved parmesan, and baked at 375F oven for 40 minutes, and a salad of assorted young mustard greens and wild arugula, my homegrown cherry tomatoes and pinenuts, mustard vinaigrette dressing. And a bottle of 2005 Bordeaux, of course.

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Here is more stuff from the market, and yes, I have to decide what to do with a pumpkin again. This time it's an acorn squash. Also found tiny crabapples, like the ones that used to grow behind our country house when I was little, grandma would make jam from them, and dad attempted making wine, like with any other fruit. These will go on tartlets. They are firm, sour, and very fragrant.

Play with your food - deconstruction of the Olivier salad

I have missed the nouvelle cuisine and am not excited by molecular gastronomy, but I love to play with food all the same. This dish is a joke that only those who grew up in Russia would appreciate fully. Here I take the most common and mundane party dish, and re-work it in the style of nouvelle cuisine.

Olivier salad is a Russian potato salad that during the hungry Soviet past absolutely had to be served at any party. If it wasn't, the guests would ask where salad Olivier is, as if the dinner was impossible without it. The salad consists of a huge bowl filled with finely diced boiled potatoes, pickles, hard boiled eggs, canned peas, and either chicken meat left over from making a soup, or bologna or any cold meat. The salad is dressed flooded with en enormous amount of mayonnaise from a jar. It is the FOOD - heavy, filling, cheap.

So, here is my take on the classic:

Salad of potato with pickle and fresh small peas, balsamic truffle mayonnaise dressing
For 4 servings
1 chicken breast, marinated with herbes de provence and olive oil, then grilled and sliced
1 egg, boiled 9 minutes, cooled in ice water, peeled and sliced into rounds
1 gold potato, cooked, cooled, peeled and cut into round slices
2 small kosher pickles, julienned
1/2 cup fresh or frozen small green peas, cooked about 5 minutes and drained
small bunch of garlic chives

For the mayonnaise
1 egg yolk
1 tsp balsamic vinegar
1 tsp red wine vinegar
1/2 cup grapeseed oil
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/2 tsp black truffle oil
sugar, salt, pepper to taste

With a hand mixer in a bowl or in a food processor, break down the egg yolk, mix with the vinegars, then, mixing all the time, add the grapeseed oil a drop at a time. Mix in the EVOO and the truffle oil, adjust the seasoning. Put the mayonnaise into a squeeze bottle.
Squeeze a circle of the mayonnaise onto a plate, arrange the ingredients into a pyramid on top, decorate with ribbons of mayonnaise, scattered peas and chives.

The next time I'll be fooling around with this recipe, I'll replace the boiled potato with a little round potato flan made with an egg and sour cream, for better texture.

My Version of Salade Niçoise

When it gets so hot that one doesn't feel like grilling, a good dinner salad is a good solution. Light, colorful, with bright tastes of fresh garden vegetables, and big anough to serve as an entree. It does require some cooking - you still have to boil the eggs and the potatoes, and sometimes I like to fire-roast and peel the bell peppers - but you don't have to watch the cooking, just time it, so go sit in the garden while the hot stuff is boiling on the stove.

Recently, in fancy restaurants in the States it became fashionable to make a vegetable salad with fresh blackened tuna on top and call it niçoise. This is a way it's never made in Nice and around. The tuna has to be canned, it has exactly the right texture that carries the dressing well and provides contrast to the vegetables. And it's bistro food, after all! Canned tuna in olive oil is generally better quality than tuna in water, and you also get the oil for the dressing.

The yellow bell peppers and heirloom tomatoes that I planted in containers grew very flavorful, but rather small. This is why the recipe calls for a whole pepper and 3 tomatoes per serving.
I had my homemade anchovies cured in salt, so I had to do additional work of soaking and filleting them, but I like their taste and texture much better than of the canned anchovies in oil.


For the lack of Niçoise olives I used Gaeta. Please, please, if you are reading this, don't buy pitted olives! They are mushy, tastless, and they are taking over the market! It is becoming increasingly difficult to find olives with pits. Well, I still have my Greek and Persian grocery stores.

The nasturtium flowers are from my garden and are used just for the show. Actually, their taste compliments the salad well too.

The other ingredients that are sometimes added are green beans, cucumber, onions and garlic.

Salade Niçoise
for each serving:
2 small potatoes, boiled, peeled and quartered
1 egg, boiled for 9 minutes, peeled and quartered
4 anchovy fillets
4-5 leaves of lettuce, torn or cut into squares with a very sharp knife
1 small or 1/2 large red or yellow bell pepper, cut into long thin slices
3 small or 1 large ripe tomato, sliced
1 can tuna in olive oil (or in water), drained, oil reserved
8-10 small black olives, with pits

for the dressing:
1 tsp Dijon mustard
1 tsp red wine vinegar
2 Tbsp EVOO + oil from the tuna
salt, pepper, (optional) sugar to taste

On a large plate, arrange the lattuce, scatter the tomato and pepper slices. Mound tuna in the center. Arrange egg quarters on the sides, place an anchovy fillet on each. Scatter olives on top.
In a small bowl mix the mustard with the vinegar. Slowly wisk in the oil. Adjust the seasoning.
Pour the dressing over the salad.

Sunday Farmer's Market

The Sunday Farmer's Market is after me, trying to make me a vegetarian. Me. A vegetarian. Improbable as it sounds, I cannot resist going to the market every Sunday morning, just to check what's new this week, and almost every time I end up cooking a vegetarian meal. OK, I am a Sunday-only vegeterian, you can have this. And I'd still serve pâté for an appetizer.

Well, they do sell meat and fish there too, but there was nothing inspiring at the fish stand this time, and the meat... I know, it's probably one of the most expensive markets in the world (I haven't been in Tokio yet). What we pay here for is 1. The luxury to live and shop in Marin county, and 2. Getting fashionably organic, locally grown, and totally fresh produce directly from the grower. And the meat stand sells it's hugely overpriced selection of organic beef, lamb, pork, and yes, goat, in huge chunks that are vacuum-packed!

I still buy from them once in a while, when I can find a cut that's good for one or two people.

But if they just had a whole animal carcass hanging there and cut from it, I would do it every time. It would match the organic-local-fresh concept so much better! I know, refrigeration would be a problem, but I am supposed to pay $25/lb for even a humble cut, so think of something, give me a show and cut to order. Anyway, the market is not my favorite place to buy meat, so it's a vegetarian Sunday again.

This sunday catch was heirloom tomatoes (can't live without them), an assortment of summer squashes, new Yukon Gold potatoes, Cowgirl Creamery crème fraîche, giant oyster mushrooms, and, this week's star, fresh porcini! Each carefully cut in half to make sure there are no worms, clean, at a handsome price of $30/lb. I was so excited just to smell them that I forgot to ask where they come from. In California, porcini season is in January. Where does it rain in June?

You see, if you cook the new potatoes in their skins, then roughly mash them, skin and all, with some sweet butter, salt, and finely chopped garlic, and while the potatoes are cooking you slice the porcini, giant oyster 'shrooms, and some white mushrooms that you had in your refrigerator, sautee them in a mix of EVOO and butter (salt and pepper added righ away), add minced garlic and shallot 5 minutes before they are cooked, and then add crème fraîche and just warm through, you cannot add meat to this already perfect dish.
Oyster mushrooms have meaty texture, porcini give wonderful taste and aroma (white mushrooms are just for volume), and potatoes and cream match the mushrooms wonderfully and have all the richness you need in a dish. Meat is not called for here, especially if you had a nice thick slice of pâté for starter.

I'll have to figure out what to do with the summer squashes today.
Either a pasta or risotto, or I'll marinate them and use to garnish steaks. I still eat meat Monday through Saturday.