Breakfast Lunch Tea

Yes, we did this backwards.  The problem is so many cookbooks, so little time.  Often we just rave about a cookbook (in our head) and then we fail to get it on the page.  So here is the back story from yesterday's post which you should already know if we had posted about  Breakfast Lunch Tea years ago. 

Rose Carrarini was lovely English lass who like to cook, love food, and loved Paris.  So she married a Frenchman and got into the food business.  In 2002 they opened Rose Bakery.   The rest is history.  Every year people flock to Paris to find a British baker! 

Since 2002, the bakery has expanded to multiple locations across the globe and has been imitated by the best.

It is not so much that their food is remarkably innovative.  You have seen carrot cake and quiche before, but Rose Carrarini does it with more style and grace than almost anyone out there.  Her sheer joy in baking is infectious.  One look at this book and you want to rush to the kitchen.   He tiny complex tarts are little square bundles of goodness.  Her clean virtually unadorned cakes are sublime. 

We are not big on cereal here, but we do love a good a granola.  Rose Bakery's is a favorite.

Honey Granola

400 g (5 1/3 cups) old-fashioned rolled oats
125 g(1 cup) whole almonds
100 g (2/3 cups) sunflower seeds
100 g (3/4 cup) pumpkin seeds
50 g (1/3 cup ) sesame seeds
1 tablespoon wheatgerm
125 ml (1/2 cup) sunflower oil
250 ml (1 cup) honey
50 (1/4 cup) brown sugar
a few drops of vanilla extract
pinch of ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 handful of dried fruit such as sultanas or dates

Preheat oven to 165 degrees C/325 degrees F / Gas Mark 3.

In a bowl mix together the oats, almonds, seeds, wheatgerm.

Put the sunflower oil, honey, sugar, vanilla, cinnamon and salt in a small saucepan with 125 ml (1/2 cup) water.

Bring just to a boil, stirring constantly, then pour over the dry ingredients in the bowl and mix well. 

If the mixture is too wet add more oats -- there should be excess liquids  in the bottom of the pan, and the mixture should be sticky.

Spread evenly on a baking tray and bake slowly for about 1 hour.

Reduce the temperature to  140 C /275 F/ Gas Mark 1 and continue baking until the granola is golden - about an hour.

Switch off the oven and leave to dry out for a further hour -- or even overnight.

This is a great cookbook and cheaper than a flight to Paris.  But if you are headed that way, by all means, do fly on over!

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Grain Mains

What, you might ask, is such a carnivorous loving web site doing reviewing a grain book? Hey, we have done grains before.  We love grains, usually accompanied by a nice rib-eye, but we do love grains.   In fact, last Christmas we got a 5 pound bag of quinoa -- a gift that keeps on giving. 

Let me get this out of the way, Rodale sent out a copy of this book and giveaway books!!  Yes, gentle reader, you too, may get a copy of this very book.  This book, however, was already on our "Wish List."  We often get publishers offering us cookbooks and since we believe in full disclosure and since we rarely write about a book we do not like, we have certain trepidation when accepting such books.  Seriously, what if they suck?  What if they are about baby food?  What if they are just tedious?  We did not feel any of that when we accepted Grain Mains. 

Why?

First and foremost, we love Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough.   They wrote one of our Top Ten cookbooks of 2011, Goat: Meat Milk Cheese.   Secondly, they are funny.  We read a lot of cookbooks!  Rarely do they convey joy and humor, but these guys always do and that is a joy.  

An aside:

I have a friend who is in his 86, which as it turn out, is also his weight.  I never see him that he does not eventually get around to talking about Red Meat.  It is a killer.  It make you fat -- he looks at me.  It is bad for you, not just me.  Fat, cholesterol, mad cow... the mind wanders.  If you love food, you know this person and you do your best to duck and cover.  One worries that someone who actually writes a cookbook about "grain" might be a heavy-handed.  Not so in Grain Mains.


Another problem...

Corn and rice -- we can cook that.

Barley?  OK once, as a child we had Campbell's Beef and Barley soup.

Millet?  Wasn't she that poet? Edna something Millet.

Amaranth? Teff? Job's Tears?   How the frack do I cook this?  Do not despair.  Weinstein and Scarbrough give the reader a simple and easy primer on each grain.  It's flavor, texture, and a little history.  They also provide a ratio of liquid to solid for cooking  and a time frame. Yes, Virgina, you can cook Kamut.

Let's review:

We got the book for free and we are having a give away.    Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough are funny and not holier-than-thou health food nuts.  If you can cook rice you can cook quinoa.   

Grain Mains: 101 Surprising and Satisfying Whole Grain Recipes for Every Meal of the Day does just that.  The cookbook offers up a series of recipes featuring a whole grain main ingredient that moves beyond oatmeal.  Want an interesting choice for breakfast?  Try their Quinoa Cashew Muffins or Breakfast Polenta Cake with Kamut Crunch Topping. 

We find salads are a great place for introducing whole grains into a meal.  The grains add an amazing texture and elevate the most ordinary salad.   By adding wheat berries to a simple olive and feta salad, Weinstein and Scarbrough offer up the familiar with a Grain Mains twist.   They make a Reuben Salad (and I thought I was the only one who made a Reuben Salad) and add rye berries, which makes perfect sense and gives the creamy cabbage, pastrami and cheese a nice chewy bite.  And speaking of pastrami, while most of the recipes in the book are vegan or vegetarian, there is ham, chorizo, bacon and tuna to please those carnivores among us, while providing animal-free options. 

The biggest testament to the power of grains is the section on grain burgers.   The most finicky of eaters will devour most anything slapped between two buns and Grain Mains offers up several inviting creations including this one:

Black Quinoa and Black Bean Burgers

2/3 cup black quinoa
1 (15 ounces) can  black beans, drained and rinsed
2/3 cup old-fashioned rolled oats (do not use quick-cooing or steel-cut)
3 tablespoons barbecue sauce
Up to 2 tablespoons pickled jalapeno rings
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 tablespoon sweet smoked paprika
1 tablespoon chile powder
1 teaspoon ground cumin
3 tablespoons nut oil, such as walnut, pecan, pistachio, or hazelnut


1.  Fill a large saucepan about halfway with water, pour in the quinoa, and bring to a boil over high heat.  Reduce the heat to low and simmer until the grains have developed their halos and are tender, about 10 minutes.  Drain in a fine mesh sieve or a lined colander set in the sink.

2. Scrape the quinoa into a large food processor. (Believe it or not, this is the hardest part of this entire recipe: getting all those grains out of the sieve.)  Then add the black beans, oats, barbecue sauce, jalapenos, Worcestershire sauce, smoked paprika, chile powder and cumin,  Process to make a paste like batter, scraping down the inside of the bowl once or twice.  Scrape down and remove the chopping blade.

3.  Heat a large skillet over medium heat and swirl in the oil.  Use dampened hands to form the batter into 6 even, round, fairly flat patties.  Slip these into the skillet and cook until deeply browned, about 4 minutes.  Flip them and continue cooking until well browned and crisp on the other side, about 4 more minutes.  

 Gosh, burgers, salads, stews, casseroles, muffins, cakes all filled with whole grains.  Your cardiologist will love you, as will most everyone else you might just be cooking for.  Give Grain Mains a try.  We will make it ever so easy, just comment and win... maybe.

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Ancient Grains for Modern Meals

This past year we cooked a lot of “ancient grains” in our kitchen, prompted by a birthday gift of 5 pounds of quinoa. Yes, Virginia, I am the kind of girl who finds 5 pounds of quinoa a spectacular birthday gift. Along with quinoa we consumed a fair amount of farro. Not a week passes without grits and our bread is enriched with wheat berries.

Now here is a word about incorporating “ancient grains” into your diet. Before you get all freaked out about what to do with them, just think of quinoa, farro, barley, oat berries as a substitute for rice. Want to be more adventurous? Pick up a copy of Maria Speck’s Ancient Grains for Modern Meals. Maria Speck takes and old world approach to cooking, stating that she doesn’t own a lot of cooking equipment. She has a mortar and pestle rather than a food processor. She does, however, have two different grain mills, as one might expect. Many of these recipes walk you through making the grains first. Once the grains are cooked then the remaining ingredients are prepared and the dish is put together.

This year, for Christmas(it actually arrived before Christmas, but that's another story...)we got a grain grinder. It is not the spiffy German one that Speck owns, but a silver behemoth whose bucket was cracked. Upon our first use, we covered the kitchen in a fog of blue cornmeal. We then turned our blue cornmeal into a green cornbread. A good first effort!

Health professional tell us we need more whole grain. So if you think that might just be a bowl of oatmeal every now and then you desperately need Ancient Grains for Modern Meals. One of the easiest grains to both find and cook is probably couscous. Like all packaged foods, buy the plain, whole-wheat couscous and not a box that has already been flavored. Remember, your job is to add the flavor. This citrus couscous makes a lovely side dish, especially for roasted chicken.

Orange and Lemon Couscous

2 large oranges

1 lemon

3/4 cup low-sodium chicken broth or vegetable broth

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 cup whole-wheat couscous

2 tablespoons finely chopped flat-leaf parsley

1. Finely grate the zest of one orange and squeeze the oranges until you have about 3/4 cup juice. Finely grate the zest of the lemon, and squeeze the lemon half to get 2 tablespoons juice. (Reserve the remaining lemon for another use.) Whisk together the orange juice, lemon juice and zest in a liquid measuring cup or small bowl.

2. Bring the chicken broth, olive oil, salt and pepper to a boil in a 2-quart saucepan. Remove the pan from the heat. Stir in the juice mixture and the couscous. Cover and let sit until the liquid is absorbed, about 10 minutes.

3. Taste and adjust for salt and pepper. Fluff the grains with two forks, sprinkle with the parsley, and serve right away.

See, that was easy. Now that you have jumped right in you, too, will be getting large bags of quinoa for your birthday. Lets hope they throw in a copy of Ancient Grains for Modern Meals. Happy Birthday.

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