Hello again, Kissers! For our recent event, hosted by Meg and Damian, we met at Damian and Frank's home on a "school night." The plan: To put our money where our mouths were with regard to creating quick, healthy, and tasty meals in that way-too-compressed vortex of time known as "after work."
The gang trickled in...Anne and Rick were the first to arrive, bearing tuna gifts, to our grand delight! Thanks, guys! They were followed by Fernando, Shawn, and Sebastian. He's growing like a weed! Or like a sprig of thyme? A sage bush? A parsley plant?
It was a beautiful, late-summer afternoon, and Frank and Damian's two cats made the most of it:
Immediately seeing the wisdom of this decision, Fernando, Sebastian, Meg, Damian, and surprise guest William all followed suit, congregating on the back porch to enjoy the sun and the garden.
Haven't the foggiest idea what they were all focused on so intently in the back corner of the yard, but I thought this was a pretty funny shot:
Pretty soon, Joyce and Jessica arrived!
Jessica said her hellos to Sebastian from the baby's-eye perspective:
Rick looks pretty jolly for a man whose been fasting for the whole day in preparation of a routine medical procedure the following day...
Joyce had picked up a gigantic sunflower somewhere (Or at least, I think it was Joyce - I missed the story of the origin of the sunflower...) UPDATE: It was actually Anne!!
I assume had assumed it was Joyce because she got more and more dramatic and artsy with the sunflower. Here is "Wistful Nostalgia With Sunflower."
This one is from the more surreal school of composition, entitled "Head Like a Sunflower."
Best buds! It was a treat for us to spend an evening with William.
Damian and Meg had organized this gorgeous collection of snacks - note the kale chips! Also, there were three "versions" of the same cow's milk cheese: one plain, one with chives, and one with cocoa powder on the outside. All were yummy!!
Jessica and Shawn chat while Sebastian has a snack.
There they are now! Otherwise occupied, Shawn couldn't participate in Meg and Damian's welcome and partaking of instruction.
But everyone else could! Here's the assembly, awaiting instruction and assignments:
The plan for the evening included a "Show and Tell" style menu. Kissers all sent some examples of quick weeknight meals that they whipped up when time was tight, and Damian and Meg picked a few to try out. On the menu for the night:
There were some gorgeous berries from the farmer's market that we'd use for dessert. They were to be cooked down slightly to use in the parfait.
We got some fresh cranberry beans on to boil - so good and good for you! We figured we'd put these in the quinoa salad.
Meg prepared some beautiful fresh green beans for roasting in some olive oil:
As I understood it, at least one bowl of these tomatoes came from the guys' own yard! UPDATE: I found out they were from Anne's and Rick's yard!! I'm so impressed! We'd use them for the chicken.
We finely diced some shallot and some summer squash:
And began cooking down some tomatoes for the pan sauce for the chicken. The herbs de provence in this mixture were so aromatic!
Kitty checks to see if anyone looks like they will be offering treats anytime soon...
While things got rolling in the kitchen, Rick knocked the rust off his child-rearing chops and held Sebastian for a while. Look! They have matching heads!
The green beans went from the oven to the red-light district. I mean the warming light below the range hood!
And of course everything is better with a shadow puppet! Thanks, Frank!
Jessica made the socca - it was different than what Shawn and Fernando typically do, as this was much thinner. More a chip-like consistency, better for snacking. The recipe that Shawn and Fernando really rely on at home is the one you can find here. It yields only one thick crepe, but when you cut it into wedges and serve it with a green salad, it makes a delightful light supper.
The first one came out of the oven and was sliced into thin pieces and passed around as an appetizer.
I'm fascinated with these three and their identical lines of vision! Here, they focus with laser-sharp crispness on something in the kitchen. Tee-hee!
Meanwhile, Shawn put random ingredient after random ingredient into the quinoa salad. I think it ended up being composed of the cranberry beans, raw summer squash, carrot, shallot, and lemon juice.
The guys take a load off. Fernando will say he was "babysitting" a sleeping Sebastian.
Here's the aforementioned sleeping Sebastian. And a monkey.
Our dishes were nearing completion, so the plating fun began. This is one breathtaking platter of roasted green beans topped with soft-fried Meg's eggs (with the exception of Fernando's de rigeur "chicharron de huevo" - can you identify it in the photo below?)...
Just look at this! Every time I see the photo I want this for dinner. Again.
Ladies and gentlemen, I present the Improvised Quinoa Salad.
Here's a closer look:
The table was set and the dinner bell was rung:
What a plate!
We glanced over our shoulders every once in a while - it felt as if someone were watching us.
Shawn exclaimed how impressed she was that we had controlled our portions so carefully, saying she felt the amount of food that we prepared and served was "just right" and expressing her happiness in not feeling stuffed to the gills. Then someone reminded her that we still had chicken to eat. Shawn's reply: "Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh..."
It was so tasty, however, that she (and everyone else!) risked the dreaded Overly-Distended Belly Syndrome.
Citing her need for extra protein for being responsible for two people's nutrition at once, Shawn even had seconds.
We all sighed contentedly and savored the flavors of dinner. Soon it would be dessert time. The berries had been cooked down with some maple syrup...
Damian had found some fresh local Greek yogurt at the farmer's market, and to its tasty (full-fat, natch!) tang we would add some amazing fancy maple syrup that Damian and Frank's friend had brought from Canada on a visit a few months prior. Then, we'd fold the whole tasty business into some freshly whipped cream! Yum!
Here, the berries pose alongside their supporting actor, candied ginger. We would layer these three ingredients into glasses to make parfaits!
Of course, I didn't specify which kind of glasses...But these worked just great, and guaranteed a hefty dessert serving for each Kisser. It tasted just like late summer--those bodacious berries with that autumnal kiss of candied ginger...It was so delicious!
Here' a peep over the top.
Again, the end result makes for easy dishes cleanup.
Sebastian still slept on...
We had a delightful discussion around the table as we digested. We touched upon politics, spirituality, community building, and our personal commitment to support any or all of these concepts in our lives. Then Sebastian woke up, and we all had fun watching him. Frank compared him to a lava lamp - he doesn't do a lot, but is very fun to watch! What a perfect description!
We have tentative dates selected for November and December, thanks to Anne's being fast on the draw and very well-organized. Please hold these dates:
November 11(for biz-ness - at Joyce and Jessica's house)
December 16 (for cookies - at Meg's house)
See you on Saturday, October 20 at Shawn and Fernando's house! Till then, Kissers! oxox
Geez louise, folks - If you thought 100 posts was impressive, just imagine--we're up to 101 already!! The technical difficulties nearly did me in this time around, but with the help of a little of High West Whiskey's Rendezvous Rye and a chocolate shortbread cookie or two, I persevered through some late nights and here we are-Finally!
It's a good thing, too, because we had such a marvelous time executing Operation: Summer-in-a-Jar recently at Frank and Damian's house. Brainchild of Frank and Anne, the plan was to can the heck out of stuff--a first for me, and an reportedly popular theme!
Folks were fired up...For starters, Anne herself developed perhaps the best preview email in the history of the group. Since I'll never manage to do it any sort of justice by describing it, I'll let her words speak for themselves:
"Hello friends and family-types!
Frank and I have logged some serious hours on the plan-o-meter (.625
hours and counting) to bring you this thrilling, chilling,
better-not-be-spilling KTC event aimed at preserving the best of summer
(or, at least, whatever we can scavenge at local farmers markets and
(thank you, Henry Kellogg) forage from local blackberry bushes). Details are still sketchy, err, ripening so let me paint this
culinary montage in broad brush strokes and we will fill in the details
tomorrow:
START TIME: 2 PM [Be late and risk having to fish out Ball canning lids from pots of scalding water]
LOCATION: Frank and Damian's (yes, yes, I know some of you
were hoping to get an early glimpse of Chateau Kellobach but the
neighbors are hosting a celebrity polo tournament in our front yard and
we wouldn't want to scare the ponies...Either that, or WSDOT is
predicting mass confusion and congestion on I-405 due to 520 closures
plus numerous events in Seattle and beyond so do you really want to mess with that?)
FOOD ITEMS LIKELY TO be TRANSFORMED by HEAT and/or PECTIN: blackberries (possibly to be prepared two ways); tomatoes; something else?
But what will we eat?, RIck asks plaintively: Frank
has graciously agreed to prepare a lasagne and we will accompany that
with a fresh caprese AND some sort of dessert whipped up from among the
preserving offerings. Kitty scratching opportunities will be presented
throughout the afternoon.
Meg is bringing canning supplies, as am I. William, I do not think
we need your half-sheets. Well, ok, maybe one?! Shawn, I don't think
we will need any 5 quart jars but stay tuned. I am thinking of making
tomato sauce or maybe dilly beans on Sunday and if it happens, shit-howdy, come on by!
<...>
Looking forward to it, as always. Sorry for the long email but Rick fed me coffee this a.m. Zeeeowwww!
NOTE: If your name is in the TO: line, you are expected to be there.
If you are a Cc, we'd love to see you but never heard that you'd be
joining us so you are not yet in the headcount."
This email, as you may recall, was met with much enthusiasm. Besides this, folks scoured their pantries/basements/storage boxes and dug out jars....
...And lids....
Snacks were laid in preparation...
A full box of peaches was at our disposal. Here's one of the kitties having a scratch on the box corner...We understood why, too-the aroma of ripe peaches was intoxicating:
Rick even brought along an apron he reports to have used as a youngster (Something about a first job, I think?). Fernando reports that he had no idea that such vibrantly-colored red dyes had been available during the Paleolithic Era.
In short, we were fired up! Ready to roll! ¡Listo, Calixto!
Fernando volunteered straight-away to cut tomatoes for roasting. He'd heard the magic words, "Tomato Confit" and even though he had no idea what the heck that meant, he instinctively knew that time was a-wasting. Here's his handiwork...Please join me in a collective "Wow!" - he's blossoming as a cook, and we're all responsible for that progress! Bravo!
Under Joyce's watchful eye, a gazillion tomatoes were rinsed...
Halved...
And prepared for roasting:
After such hard labor, even Fernando needs to relax a bit. Here he is as the unfortunate subject of Shawn's gleeful abuse. He looks more miserable than he really feels, I promise!
Next, we got busy preparing the fruit. First up, rinse and score about 342,854 peaches. Gawd, they smelled so great! The next step to easily peel far more fruit than is humanly responsible is to drop the scored peaches into a huge pot of boiling water.
After about a minute or so, you fish out the fruit and drop it into an ice bath. I've heard that this rapid temperature change is great for the skin, and it must be true - these babies have a real peaches-and-cream complexion! Hardi, har har...
After a dip in frigid water, the peaches are easy to peel:
Et, voila!
While all the peach-flavored action was going on, young Henry arrived via bicycle, with a knapsack of glass jars filled with blackberries, freshly picked. Someone (was it Damian?) shared an unpleasant story about a batch of blackberries they had prepared for a pie or something that yielded a healthy measure of tiny worms which floated to the surface after the berries were put on to cook. The reported solution was to soak the berries in salt water before cooking, which we did first:
Where are the berries, you say? Why, here are the berries!
They yielded no worms, to my relief, and we drained them for cooking:
Meanwhile, back to the peaches...Rick got to work slicing the peeled peaches:
Ta-da!!! That's only half of them, too!
These babies would go on to cook shortly. Meanwhile, it was time for the roasted tomatoes to come out of the oven. Don't they look lovely?
Here's a closer look:
We realized that we had a dilemma: What to do with the scant pound or so of tomatoes we had leftover which hadn't fit into our sheet pans? Shawn had found a recipe that very morning on the internet for Mark Bitman's Tomato Jam, courtesy of The Wednesday Chef . We conferred with these guys...
And we unanimously decided it was a go. We chopped up the remaining tomatoes and assembled the rest of the ingredients together in a small pan and put them on to simmer.
Henry decided to try his hand at caramelizing onions - after all, not many foodstuffs one stores in a jar are as versatile and delicious as caramelized onions! We sliced up a few pounds of onions, and Henry got to work. Here was the scene:
And here is the action, captured for your viewing pleasure!
Back to the peaches. Christ on a crutch, Helen, we had a lot of peaches!!
We put some of them on to cook next to the tomato jam...
It was hopping in the kitchen! Tomato confit was being assembled, peaches were cooking, onions were browned, tomato jam simmered...Here's a great shot of how snugly we fit in the kitchen. I counted 10 Kissers! Meg couldn't join us that day, so she isn't in there, and Shawn is only missing because she was snapping the photo!
I adore this photo of Joyce's enthusiasm, though - Only Fernando is missing from this one (he probably stepped out to pour more wine), or it would have replaced the one above without a moment's hesitation!
We began to see concrete fruits of our labors. Exhibit A: Tomato Confit!
We ended up offloading what I recall being tomato confit into Frank and Damian's fridge. Frank made a funny comment about how it would surely become lost in the fridge, and they'd pull it out a couple of months later and wonder what the heck it had been. We made a deal that I'd put a photo of it on the blog so they wouldn't forget about it, so here it is, guys! What is in that Athenos container? Is it still languishing in your refrigerator? Go find out! You're welcome!
After several hours of heavy labor, our physical weariness gave way to philosophical musings. Henry and Fernando worked at assembling a food mill, truly a feat of engineering on par with spaceship construction or angiographic imagery. This thing was complex. Also, it looked like a time machine! Here's a snippet of that delightful conversation:
The food mill was for the blackberries. I had no idea, but apparently to make a truly superior jam, one must separate the blackberry seeds from the rest. Rick and the guys got started on the task of passing the blackberries through the food mill, and of course we twisted the whole thing around in a most irreverent way, typical of Kiss the Cooks.
Here's a short explanation of the difference between blackberry goo and blackberry poo. Can you guess which one emerges from the backside?
Then, it was back to work. Rick began finely dicing up peaches for freezer jam:
Joyce took a break to play Hangman on Shawn's phone.
Fernando and Damian took a load off, too.
Time to can the peaches! We readied the jars:
Then we got our funnel ready. Here's the first jar of peach jam!
It was beginning to look like we had really and truly done some canning!
The tomato jam was so scant that we decided it should come along to our Lopez Island excursion. That seemed to be the most equitable solution, so we could all try a bit, since there weren't enough jars to go around. Damian volunteered to be the keeper of the jam. Of course, "Jam-Keeper" just begged to be made into a song....I think found the way to embed this as a video, but I'll have to work on it a bit. For now, click here to enjoy!
Next on the agenda was dinner. Frank had made a shitake mushroom lasagna, and we'd assemble a Caprese style salad using our incredible summertime tomatoes.
Here's Shawn showing how easy it is to wow folks when your ingredients are stellar to begin with:
See what I mean? Naturally easy-peasy!
Frank also took full advantage of the delicious peachy abundance to make a peach clafouti - here he is readying it for the oven. Wondering what the heck a clafoutis is? Read about it on Wikipedia!
Peach clafoutis a-baking, dinner was served family-style:
We also ate it family-style. This was so much fun!
Mmmmmmmm, tasty!
Pretty soon, our plates were empty. Here's the Sarah Palin plate. This bear seems to be asking, "Isn't it time for peach clafoutis?"
To our utter delight, it was! Look at this thing!
Frank was so proud (and rightfully so!), that we interrupted the final moments of dinner to present his masterpiece:
I'm tickled to say that next weekend already is our excursion to Lopez Island - woo-hoo! I'm looking forward to seeing all y'all then. Looks like this guy is sort of bummed to miss out on the excursion, though...
Our group has been cooking together at least once a month for more than a decade. From French Laundry to homemade s'mores to flavors of Asia and pastry experiments, we love to cook (and eat!) it all!
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