Crab Louie salad with homemade Thousand Island

Every year, for Christmas dinner, my family buys enough Dungeness crab for each person to eat their fill. To me, there is little that feels more indulgent than being full on fresh cracked crab.

We used to buy our crab from old cranky Mr. Knudson, in his back alley garage, in the coastal town of Anacortes. The last year that we stopped to see him, my mom got a small smile out of him and was sure that we were winning his affection, but he had a stroke the next year and we were told that he doesn't run his business anymore.

This year, we were pleased to have found Skagit's Own Seafood Market, and we stopped in for clams, mussels and crabs straight out of the waters around Anacortes. My mom and I were impressed by the liveliness of the crabs in the water tanks and were snapping photos of the big guys crawling over each other.

killer attack crab

The woman behind the counter asked if we wanted a better picture and stuck her hand in the tank to grab one for us. The next thing we knew, that sucker had reached around with his large pincher and had her by the wrist. She gasped, and I reached out to do something, although what I planned to do I am not sure. "No! Please! Don't touch!" she growled through gritted teeth, then reached around and grabbed the crab by the non-offending claw. With a Snap! she broke the claw back and then waited it out quietly, her nose curled in gritty determination. My mom whimpered, "I feel like crying!" and just then, the crab gave up and fell back in to the tank.

We headed back to the car, my mom a bit rattled, my brother impressed with the woman's fortitude, and me happily hugging the box of seafood.

Crab Louie with Thousand Island dressing
serves 6

for the salad:

6 large handful of salad greens
3 fresh cracked crabs (or 1 pound of crab meat)
1 can of black olives
3 hardboiled eggs

for the dressing:

1 cup of mayonnaise
1/4 cup of ketchup
1 lemon
Worcestershire sauce
1/4 cup of minced onion
scant 1/4 cup of minced green olives
dash of cayenne pepper
pinch of salt
heavy dash of black pepper


Prepare the dressing: Mix mayonnaise and ketchup together in a bowl. Cut the lemon in half and squeeze in the juice from half of the lemon. Add a few dashes of Worcestershire sauce and the onion and olives (I used the jalapeño and garlic stuffed olives that we had at home and it was oh so good). Stir in the cayenne, salt and pepper. Taste and add more cayenne, salt and pepper if desired.

Assemble the salads: Split the greens between each of 6 plates. Top each salad with 2 quarters of an egg, a handful of black olives, and a slice from the remaining half of a lemon. Split the crab between the six plates. Try not to eat too much of it while plating.

Add a large dollop of dressing to each salad (there is enough dressing for about 3 tablespoons per person) and serve.

SOLE Ginger Pumpkin Bread

Why is bartering with someone so much more satisfying than buying and selling? I love the satisfaction that comes from sharing my talents – home baked bread, garden vegetables - with another person, and bringing home a unique handcrafted gift in return. I’ve never had an argument over value. And I don’t want to haggle: I just want to give generously, and accept graciously. Somehow, we both end up feeling that we got a good trade.

 

I delivered a couple of baskets of home made goodies this week (coincidently, both people I was bartering with – strangers to each other and distant acquaintances to me – lived within a few blocks of each other). In exchange, I now have two little gifts for my sister and my future sister-in-law, and a hat for my son - knitted from the same yarn as his stroller blanket.

baking sheets of granola

The food baskets were full of bottled chai tea concentrate, granola, chocolate chip & almond cookies with smoked salt, and gingered pumpkin bread. I had some bottles leftover from making the chai, and found someone on twitter who wanted them, so I gave them away and received some backyard eggs and honey.

I used Simply Recipe's recipe for the pumpkin bread, replacing the nuts and spices in her recipe with 1/4 cup of diced candied ginger and 1/4 teaspoon allspice, and adding a pumpkin seed streusel topping.

topped with pumpkin seeds and ready for the oven

Gingered Pumpkin Bread with pumpkin seed topping 

Adapted from Simply Recipe's Pumpkin Bread 

1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon allspice
1 cup canned pumpkin purée
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup diced candied ginger

For the full Simply Recipe's Pumpkin Bread directions, see her blog here...

For the topping:

3 tablespoons of brown sugar

2 tablespoons of melted butter

1/4 cup of toasted pumpkin seeds 

a generous dash of smoked salt if you have it (I am addicted!!)


Beat together the wet ingredients. Sift in the dry ingredients. Stir in the candied ginger to incorporate. 


In a separate bowl, mix together the streusel topping.


Pour the batter into a loaf pan. Dot with the streusel topping. Bake at 350 degrees for about an hour, until a knife inserted in the center of the bread comes out clean.

Cool completely before wrapping it up, tying a ribbon around it, and trading the bread with someone for another fabulous thing!

baked in paper loaf pans make easy gifts

SOLE Notes: This week I am baking the ginger bread again, making it more local than last time. I am using Bob Redmill's flour (grow in WA and milled in OR), local backyard eggs, an organic butternut squash (WA) in place of the canned pumpkin, and Golden Glen organic butter (Bow, WA) in place of the oil. The squash and butter are provided by Spud.com

How can you say a cupcake commercial is racist??

Have you heard of this controversy over the Duncan Hines commercial? The ads have been pulled, so it may become hard to find an animated version on the internet. I will describe it for you:

A white woman comes into the kitchen, where vanilla cupcakes are cooling on the counter. She picks up the Duncan Hines dark chocolate frosting squeeze bottle. She begins to cover the cupcakes in the frosting. As they are coated, they sprout red lips and googly eyes and begin to sing "hip hop" beats. It actually sounds like more techno, but the important part is that Duncan Hines calls it "hip hop" and that term, like "urban" or "inner city" usually acts as a euphemism for African American.

Lots of people got upset about this commercial - but let me tell you - more people DIDN'T get upset. Maybe because they don't know much about 19th and 20th century comedy. Let me share this image with you:

The reason why the cupcake commercial irked my racism radar is that it evoked a very clear parallel with a type of racist comedy that has a long history in America. Although he did not invent the idea, in the 1830's white comic Thomas Rice popularized the idea of dressing up as a black man and adopting a tone of speech and behavior that played on negative stereotypes of black folks.

"In the 1830s and early 1840s, blackface performances mixed skits with comic songs and vigorous dances. Initially, Rice and his peers performed only in relatively disreputable venues, but as blackface gained popularity they gained opportunities to perform as entr'actes in theatrical venues of a higher class. Stereotyped blackface characters developed: buffoonish, lazy, superstitious, cowardly, and lascivious characters, who stole, lied pathologically, and mangled the English language."

This type of comedy was so poplar that it persisted well into the 20th century. If you would like to learn more, click on the above quote, see this NPR show about how the history of Blackface is still present in the arts, or see the PBS American Experience about Blackface Minstrelsy.

I do not believe that the folks at Duncan Hines sat around a table trying to think of some kind of racist commercial that they could produce. I doubt that the people at Duncan Hines have "anything against black people." They probably also "have lots of black friends." They probably "don't have a single racist bone in their body." But that is how racism usually works - it is often unintentional or unnoticed (by white folks). But that is no excuse.

SOLE Supper: Cranberry Waffles and Apple Honey Sauce

I have been playing around with fresh cranberries ever since making two kinds of cranberry sauce for Thanksgiving. The week of Thanksgiving, I threw in a handful of sliced cranberries into waffle batter. A perfect pairing of tart and sweet for breakfast!

Did you know the color of a chicken egg is determined by the bird's "ear lobes"?

The following week, I made the cranberry waffles again, this time not bothering to cut the cranberries in half. What's the big difference anyway? Well, apparently its the difference between waffles laced with festive bright cranberries, and waffles studded with little tart bile bombs. So, be sure to take the extra minute to cut your cranberries in half for this!

backyard eggs given to me this week by a twitter friend!

Cranberry Waffles 
makes 3 or 4 waffles

2 eggs
2 cups of all purpose flour
2 cups of milk
1/2 cup melted butter
1/2 cup of halved cranberries
1 tablespoon honey or sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

In a large bowl, beat the eggs well. Add the remaining ingredients and stir until well incorporated, but still slightly lumpy. I know, easy, right? Just be sure that those cranberries are cut in half!


Since this was supposed to be a SOLE meal, I did not want to top the waffles with maple syrup, since it is not local. I did have some honey that someone made for me about 30 miles away, and I had a couple of varieties of organic local apples.

I chopped the apples, core and all, and threw them into a pot with a cup of apples juice, some cinnamon and allspice. I cooked until soft, about 20 minutes, then ran through a food mill.

I added it back to the pot, added a 1/2 cup of honey and thinned it with a bit more apple juice. Now I had an apple honey sauce to top the waffles!

SOLE Notes: backyard eggs (Arlington, WA), whole organic milk from Fresh Breeze (Lynden, WA), Rose Valley butter, co-op produced from Washington and Oregon organic dairies (McMinnville, OR), honey (Arlington, WA), organic apples (Brewster, Washington), white flour from Bob's Redmill (grown in the NW, milled in OR). 


OOPS! I read the MA upside down and thought that it said WA when I requested the cranberries from SPUD. Next time I will get local cranberries! 


SOLE Supper sponsor, Spud.com, provided the milk, apples and cranberries. Check out Spud for yourself, by clicking on the icon in the right sidebar.

Chocolate Chip and Almond Cookies with Smoked Salt

I have been having a 6 year love affair with smoked salt. Not just any smoked salt, I am talking about Halen Mon Smoked Salt from Wales. I love it so much, I wrote a post about it, on the same day that I knocked on the unmarked door of a grey building downtown, handed over a small bundle of bills, and took home a one pound plastic bag of the salt, from the worker at a candy factory.

I have been thinking for a while that my smoked salt would taste really good on a cookie. I needed a cookie recipe worthy of my Welsh flakes of salty gold. I turned to Cooks Illustrated for the basic "Perfect Chocoalte Chip Cookie" recipe in the May/June 2009 issue.

"Perfect" cookies, made better by smoked salt 

I thought that almonds would work better with the salt, and I used the extra smooth fat chocolate chips that the Guittard company makes (If you live in the Seattle area, Central Market sells them in the bulk bins). To compensate for the smoked salt that I sprinkled on top, I reduced the salt in the recipe by 1/4 teaspoon.

browning butter for the cookies

The Cooks Illustrated cookie recipe is terrific. It calls for some odd steps, like browning the butter and beating then resting, beating then resting, beating then resting the dough. But all that craziness makes some good cookies.


Ingredients
1 3/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
14 tablespoons unsalted butter (1 3/4 sticks)
1/2 cup white sugar
3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspooons vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
1 1/4 cups semisweet chocolate chips or chunks
3/4 cup nuts 



You can find a full re-print of the recipe here.

I hope Santa appreciates these.

Indian Style SOLE Supper: Beef, Potatoes & Yogurt

My first box of locally grown organic food arrived on my doorstep from Spud. Its like getting “snail mail” except better, because its edible!

I have been browsing my cookbooks, earmarking all the good looking winter recipes, in preparation of my weekly SOLE (Sustainable Organic Local Ethical) posts. Ok, I admit, I didn’t just earmark my books, I also made a spreadsheet. I don’t normally outline my daydreams in excel (ok, maybe I do… sometimes) I’m just trying to ensure that I don’t bore my readers, or my taste buds, by cooking some variation of root vegetable soup, every week from now until April. 

I have been waiting for a friend to come over and show me how to make her fantastically good Indian curry, but she is pregnant, and has a toddler, and a full time job, and a house guest, so I think I may be waiting awhile. In the meantime, I have decided to make an Indian inspired meal with my food box.

The recipe for my potatoes came from my favorite “food porn” cookbook Fresh, by Michelle Cranston. Every recipe has a big, glossy, luscious photo. Since the potatoes I have are purple, I didn’t think they would do well in a creamy scalloped dish (it might look like a purple Martian sneezed on my plate). Dicing the potatoes and coating them in spices seemed the way to go.

For dessert, I made an Indian Chai tea with rich whole milk from a local organic dairy. I have the Chai recipe here if you would like to see which whole spices I used. 

Spiced Potatoes 

purple potatoes look a little like blood sausage, right?

Adapted from "Fresh" by Michele Cranston
Serves 3 to 4

3 tablespoons olive oil

1 pound of baby potatoes

1 large leek

1 teaspoon cumin seeds

½ teaspoon ground coriander

½ teaspoon paprika

½ teaspoon dried chili flakes

1 teaspoon salt

1 lemon or lime for garnish and spritzing

Wash the potatoes well and then cut into bite-sized cubes, leaving the skin on. Cut the leek in half lengthwise, from the white tip towards the green end. Stop cutting before you reach the end, so that the leek layers stay held together. Rinse the leek under running water, gently washing away any diret in the layers. Slice into thin half-moon shapes.

Heat the oil in a deep cast iron or non-stick skillet. Add the leeks, potatoes, and all of the spices and salt. Cook over medium heat for about 30 minutes, depending on the size of your cubes, until easily pierced with a fork. Serve with the quartered lemon.

Indian Style Beef Kebabs with Spiced Potatoes and yogurt sauce

Indian Style Beef Kebabs

Adapted from AllRecipes, Indian Style Sheekh Kebab by Yakuta

Serves 3 to 4

1 pound ground beef

1 onion

¼ cup cilantro

1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon ground coriander

1 teaspoon paprika

1 teaspoons salt

Skewers

Halve the onion, place in a food processor, and pulse for one second, 4 or 5 times. Add the remaining ingredients (except the skewers of course!), and pulse for one second, 5 or 6 more times. Scoop a handful of meat with your hands, shape into a sausage shape, around a skewer. Make 6 skewers.

Place the skewers on a broiling pan and broil on high, 2 inches from the heating element, until browned on one side, about 4 minutes. Turn and broil the other side until browned. 

Garlic Yogurt Sauce


1 cup of whole milk plain yogurt

2 cloves of garlic, finely minced

¼ cup cilantro OR fresh mint, finely minced

Dash of salt and pepper

Combine the finely minced garlic and cilantro with the yogurt. Add salt and pepper to your taste preference. 

Really, the yogurt sauce stole the show for me.

SOLE Notes:

Organic milk from Fresh Breeze dairy (Lynden, WA), pasture-fed ground beef from Thundering Hooves (Walla Walla, WA), organic yogurt from Nancy’s Creamery (Eugene, OR), purple potatoes and leeks from Ralph’s Greenhouse (Mount Vernon, WA) , yellow onions from Anderson Organics (Othello, WA). All of my main ingredients were supplied by my SOLE suppers sponsor, Spud.com.

Homemade Indian Chai Tea

In many ways, bringing an entire tree, with thousands of dropping needles, into the house and draping it in strings of electric lights, is a disaster waiting to happen. Especially when you have a one year old living with you. But it is Christmas after all. And its the closest my husband is going to get to camping with me in the woods.

picking out the perfect tree to drag into the living room

After dragging our tree into the house and vacuuming a few times, we invited the folks over to listen to Christmas music and decorate the house. I made a pot of Indian chai: creamy, earthy, spicy chai tea. If the only chai you've had is in a cardboard cup from Starbucks, with a splash of non-fat milk, than you won't recognize this special treat.



Whole spices for Chai


A few minutes in the bulk spice bins of the local co-op made the chai inexpensive to cook up at home. You can measure the spices to your own taste. I used plenty of cinnamon, cardamom and fresh ginger. More sparingly, I added cloves, all spice and peppercorns.

I use Tetley British Blend black tea because it is my favorite brand, with a strong and smooth flavor that I never tire of. You can use your own favorite black tea, as long as it is unflavored (do not use Earl Grey or other teas with flavors added).

Simmer the spices in water for 20 or 30 minutes. Add the teabags and steep for 5 minutes. Strain and use the flavored tea to heat with an equal amount of milk. I recommend using whole milk for a rich taste.

Milky Chai tea

Spiced Carrot Soup and Salt & Pepper Wings

Eating locally is easy during the summer. Farmers markets are around every corner. Cherry tomatoes are ripening and corn kernels are swelling in the garden. But then the apricots give way to apples at the farm stand, and local choices begin to dwindle. 

The Dark Days of Winter Challenge is a project of the blog (not so) Urban Hennery. The challenge is to eat at least one Sustainable, Organic, Local, Ethical (SOLE) meal per week, and then share it with each other. I am taking on the challenge, every week from now until April 15th!

I am very happy that food delivery company Spud.com has joined me as the sponsor of my weekly SOLE posts. They focus on sustainable, organic and local foods, so we will be great partners on this project. I am looking forward to see what they send me every week to cook with!

To read bi-monthly recaps of all Dark Days of Winter meals, watch for them on the (not so) Urban Hennery blog until April, by clicking on the icon in my sidebar. 

A few notes on the challenge: I define "local" as approximately 180 miles, from British Columbia to Portland, Oregon. I will try to ensure that most of the ingredients in a recipe were locally grown and produced, however, I will be using spices, salt, oils, and other staples from my own kitchen. These items are not local, but I already own them and feel that to not use them would be a little silly.

I use the word "sustainable" as a bit of a double entendre in this challenge: the foods I use should be produced locally and in an ethical manner, but I do not mean to create $100 pots of soup or spend all day searching for groceries. My SOLE cooking practice should be sustainable as a way to make dinner for my family, or else I will end up with an empty wallet and a bad mood, and no one will be inspired.

I hope that you will follow along with me and be inspired to use locally grown foods for your own dinner once in a while. If there are ingredients that you want to see me use, leave me a comment and I will see what I can do!

Without further ado, here is my first (far from perfect) SOLE of Winter meals...

Spiced Carrot Soup with Salt & Pepper Wings

Spiced Carrot Soup
Serves 4 


1 pound of carrots
2 stalks of celery
1/2 of a yellow onion
1 tablespoon of oil or butter
1 inch piece of fresh ginger
1 bay leaf
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon paprika
4 cups of vegetable or chicken broth
dash of salt, black pepper and red chili flakes
cilantro or parsley to garnish


Heat the oil or butter in a large pot over medium heat. Cut the vegetables into large chunks. Add the vegetables and the spices to the pot and cook for about 10 minutes, or until the onion has softened. Add the stock, bring to a simmer over medium-high heat, and simmer until the carrots are soft.

Use an immersion blender, or transfer the vegetables with a slotted spoon to your blender, and blend until smooth. Garnish with cilantro or parsley and serve hot.



Salt & Pepper Chicken Wings 
Serves 4


12 chicken wings
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper


Cut the chicken wings at both joints. Save the wing tip for broth or discard.

Toss the chicken wing pieces with the garlic powder, salt and pepper. Arrange on a baking sheet and bake at 400 degrees for about 45 minutes or until cooked to the bone. Half way through cooking, turn each piece over to evenly cook both sides.

SOLE Notes: The chicken for this recipe was "free range" and grown in Washington. The carrots were from Nash's organic produce in Sequim, Washington (and I also tossed in the rest of the baby carrots I had in the fridge) and the onion was grown organically in Washington. The stock that I used for the soup was made from the leftover turkey bones after Thanksgiving and had been saved in my freezer. I served the soup and wings with bread rolls I had in the freezer left over from Thanksgiving. Nothing is more "sustainable" than using what you have and avoiding waste!

Roasted figs dripping with Gorgonzola and hot nuts

ready for the oven

Can a recipe get any better than this: 3 ingredients, no special skills, and a big wow factor? I ate these gorgeous roasted figs earlier this year at Chef Kathy Casey's Food Studio in Ballard.

cut figs on the baking sheet

While there for a party, I won a copy of her cookbook Northwest Table and pulled it out for Thanksgiving appetizers. If you get her book, do yourself a favor and flip to page 49 and get working on her Overnight Rosemary Semolina Flat Bread. These are crackers taken to new heights. So good!

Thanksgiving afternoon appetizers:
Roasted figs next to Brie & Cranberry Chutney

If you want to try some of Kathy’s appetizers yourself, without lifting a single spatula, stop by next Saturday.  Tons of foodie goodies will be for sale, Kathy will be signing copies of her book, Sips & Apps and serving some of the appetizers in the book including Bacon, Blue Cheese & Pecan Cocktail Cookies, Lamb "Sliders" on Homemade Rosemary Buns, and Croque Monsieur Puffs!

Saturday, December 11^th from 11:00 am - 7:00 pm

5130 Ballard Ave NW

Seattle, WA 98107

206-784-7840

Silent Sundays: Dark Days of Winter & Eating Local

Dark Days of Winter challenge: four Sustainable, Organic, Local, Ethical (SOLE) meals a month until April

Urban Craft Uprising: Seattle's Indie Craft Fair

You probably already know that I am not a big fan of crazed Christmas shopping and consumer drenched holidays. Its not that I think shopping is evil. I've bought a couple of things to wrap and put under the tree. I might succumb to a few other things in the next few weeks. 

But you know what gets me more excited than the idea of trampling my neighbor to get 50% off of over priced toys at a big box store? Buying a one-of-a-kind present while chatting with the artist herself! Want a chance to browse through over a hundred booths of totally awesome things made by local artists? Check out Urban Craft Uprising this weekend in Seattle.

Caravan Kebab in Edmonds

I have been meaning to post about Caravan Kebab for awhile now. This place is defiantly worth spreading the word about, and I am thrilled to finally be able to get some well spiced food in Edmonds!

Caravan Kebab is housed in a kitschy neighborhood shopping mall called Firdale Village, in the south end of Edmonds. Thankfully, the feeling inside is much classier than the drive in will lead you to expect. A very friendly hostess (she is also the co-owner) greets both me and my son with enthusiasm, always bringing him his own little bowl of rice to eat (and sprinkle on the floor) while I wait for my food. This is what a good neighborhood bistro should be - upscale enough for date night, affordable and relaxed enough for a lunch date with my one-year-old.

Caravan Kebab's chef has a resume that goes well beyond what you would expect from a nondescript place selling five-dollar lunches. Seattle Times food writer Nancy Leson explains his pedigree in her July write-up:

Shahzad, 36, is a native of Pakistan who has traveled the world practicing the craft of cookery, with notable stays in Hong Kong, Thailand, India, Turkey and Greece. His eyes light up when he speaks of the Greek island of Kos, where learned tricks of the trade from 3-star chef and any number of Greek grandmas during his 7-year residence.

The first time we ate dinner at Caravan Kebab, my husband and I were celebrating our wedding anniversary, and had failed to plan ahead for a babysitter. We decided at the last minute that we would bring the baby with us and try out the place that I had been eyeing for weeks. My husband loved the Fish Masala, our son loved the high flames of the pan-fried Kaseri cheese, and I happily snapped food photos and enjoyed the warmth that comes from well spiced meat and the company of my little family. 

The last few times I have stopped by, I have come during the day, to take advantage of their $5 sandwiches and $7 curry plates. These sandwhich wraps are the not the pressed and frozen meats found in cheap gyros - this is real chicken, chopped, marinated and perfectly cooked. 


The chicken Boti wrap is hard to resist, although I did venture out to try the lamb wrap once too. I prefer the hummus served on the side, rather than in the sandwich. The flavor of the hummus is very good, but I think it competes with the chicken and other flavors. The chicken Tiki Masala, served with rice, is a steal and if I didn't like it so much, I would have already tried the Saag Paneer and Daal Makhani. But there is always next time!

Caravan Kebab

Mediterranean, Indian & European Restaurant

(206) 546-7999

9711 Firdale Avenue

Edmonds, WA 98020

(In Firdale Village Shopping Center)