“True Brew I”

I’ve not always enjoyed coffee.  For the longest time, I’ve always thought it tasted far too bitter to be drinkable, let alone palatable.  In my teens, I discovered espresso at a local coffee shop, and by extension that grown-up cousin of the hot chocolate, the cafe mocha.  For the longest time, that was how I took my coffee – a tiny shot of the stuff in a cupful of chocolate and hot milk.  It was more sweet than bitter, and had just enough of a reminder of coffee without tasting like it.  As the years passed, I found myself in charge of an espresso bar in a bookstore, which gave me a good working knowledge of how to pull shots, how to steam milk, and, most importantly, the importance of grinding coffee.  Even then, I never really drank brewed coffee, as I found it too bitter.  Only recently have my tastes changed, and I’ve found that I not only enjoy coffee, but I tend to drink it black.  I can’t say what caused the change in tastes, but I welcome it all the same!

There’s only one recipe in this chapter, and it’s probably best described as “how best to make coffee.”  If I had to give one single rule about coffee, it’d be this – grind your beans yourself, and do it immediately before brewing.  Coffee beans have to be roasted to wake up the oils inside them, and once you grind them, you expose those oils to air.  The very instant coffee is ground, its flavorful compounds begin to break down, so grinding ahead of time might save you some time, but you’ll end up with a less flavorful cup of joe.

After that, there’s one more important thing, and that’s the grind itself.  Why grind the beans at all?  Well, the water won’t be able to get at enough oil if you don’t, and you want the water to pass through the grounds at a certain rate to ensure the maximum amount of flavor is passed along to the coffee.  Too coarse a grind, and the water will shoot through the grounds without bringing enough coffee oil along the way.  Too fine, and not enough water will go through, probably clogging up the machine and making a horrible mess as hot coffee spills over the sides of the brewing chamber and all over your countertop and floor.  For automatic drip, you’re looking for somewhere in the middle.  You also want to use enough coffee, since too little will mean that the water pulls all the good flavor into the brew, but overextracts and pulls along bitter compounds.  Even grinding will also help you here, which is impossible to get with a blade grinder.  Only burr grinders get you perfect grinds every single time, but if you only make drip coffee, you can probably get away with a blade grinder.

Finally, there’s the water.  You’ll want a water that is free of any flavorants, so make sure it’s filtered before you put it to the boil.

As for myself, I hadn’t made coffee at home for quite awhile, and managed to pick up a coffee machine second-hand from work.  As a result, I wasn’t very experienced with its particulars, and made a huge goof on the first brew.  The brew chamber is designed to only allow extraction when a coffee pot is in place beneath with the top on.  The coffee then drips onto the top of the pot, and flows inside.  Since I didn’t know that, I did the perfectly natural thing and left the top off.  When I went back to pour myself a cup, I was confused to find an empty pot and a full brew chamber.  I had to press on the bottom the chamber with a knife to extract the coffee, which caused a bit of a mess.

Now that I know that, I’ve made coffee several times with ease.  I’ve also tried a trick that Alton suggests, adding a quarter teaspoon of kosher salt to each batch of coffee.  Salt does a better job of removing bitterness from food than sugar does, and has the side benefit of not being sugar!  I’ve found that’s a bit salty, even for me, and have been cutting it down slightly.  But whether I put the salt in or not, nothing beats winter’s chill than a hot cup of coffee.

Next: From one grind to another.

Recipe: True Brew

“Crust Never Sleeps”

I don’t really recall my first encounter with pie – doubtlessly, it was at a very young age, and was probably pumpkin flavored.  My clearest memory with pie revolves around this family-oriented restaurant called The Copper Kettle, which served absolutely delicious pies for dessert.  My favorite was the black bottom pie – it mixed chocolate, rum and gingersnaps into a tasty treat.  I’ve enjoyed countless pies since then, and I’ve really mostly focused on the fillings, be they fruit, cream, pudding or otherwise.  Of course, most of these were store-bought or restaurant-made, which might explain I’m so filling focused – they never really spent time perfecting the crust.  A homemade pie has a tasty filling, but it’s wrapped in a crust that yields to the fork, but also gives the pie structure.  Oh, and if it happened to taste good, that’d be even better.  The crusts from my childhood are rather flavorless, almost afterthoughts of pie making.  Would Alton’s teachings be enough to help me make a homemade pie crust?

I’ve said before that I’m not a baker, and my past experiences with placing flour-based products into the oven bear that out.  So, even before this whole thing begins, I’m at a disadvantage.  The recipe plays to my weak spots.  I had to make sure to understand every step of the procedure – not only when to do a thing, but why a thing was necessary.  Fortunately, that’s where Alton comes in.  He explained the necessary steps of making pie crust, and after watching the episode a few times, I felt I was ready to make some pies.

First though, I had to decide where to do it.  I needed a large, flat, smooth space to roll out the dough, I needed a rolling pin to roll out the dough, and I needed a large food processor to bring the flour together.  There was only one place I knew about where all of those things existed – my parent’s place.  On the way, I detoured to Bed, Bath and Beyond to purchase some rolling pin bands – eight dollars bought me a collection of four sets of bands with different thicknesses.  These bands go on either end of a rolling pin, and they are designed to make certain dough is rolled to the exact thickness you set.

I decided I was going to make two pies – one for immediate consumption, and the other for work.  The first order of business was to combine all the dry ingredients together, so AP flour, cornmeal, sugar and salt all went into two workbowls.  I also grabbed a pound of unsalted butter and diced it.  A quarter pound was left out to get to room temperature, but the rest was divided into two stacks and chilled along with the flour mixture.  Once everything was nice and cold, I put the flour mixture into the food processor and pulsed a few times to combine everything.  I then added half the room temperature butter and pulsed to get the butter incorporated.  Once the butter disappeared, half of this batch’s chilled butter was added to the food processor, and pulsed until the flour started taking a mealy texture.  At that point, the rest of the butter was added, and pulsed four times, just to cut up the butter without fully incorporating it.  This was returned to the work bowl and returned to the fridge to chill again.  Everything was repeated with the second batch.

Once the first batch was cold again, I pulled it back out and grabbed a spray bottle filled with iced apple juice.  Anyone who’s made pie crust before can tell you that the water needs to be ice cold when it’s added, but Alton suggested apple juice because it has extra sugar, and adds a bit of flavor itself.  The spray bottle evenly distributes the juice to the entire surface area.  I spritzed some juice on the flour, then worked it in, continuing to spritz and work until I could grab a handful of the flour, squeeze it, and have it stick together and break cleanly when snapped in half.  Again, this was duplicated with the second batch.

While the dough was hydrating in the fridge, I got to work on making the fillings.  This was a pear tart, which started by adding four thinly sliced Anjou pears to a hot pan.  They were cooked for about two minutes, and then some balsamic vinegar was added.  This cooked for about 30 seconds, just long enough to heat the vinegar.  Sugar gets added, and it cooks for another two minutes to soften the pears.  Nutmeg, cinnamon and butter are added, and once the butter melts, blueberries get folded into the mixture.  This is removed from the heat, and a touch of flour is added just to thicken.  Incredibly simple, and very flavorful.

Here’s where things started going awry.  I pulled the first batch from the fridge, and the dough was anything but.  It still looked loose and wouldn’t hold together at all.  Same for the second batch.  Over the next two hours, I had to keep spraying the pie crust until it finally accepted enough liquid to hydrate and make a stable dough.  With a functional dough at last, I set to rolling out the dough for the galette.  Unfortunately, the rolling pin I had was rather small, so the dough guides ended up rolling over the dough, squashing it flat.  I had to remove them to get an even thickness, which sort of negated their usefulness.

At long last, the first dough was ready, so several ounces of pound cake (store bought, frozen and thawed) was added to the center, followed by half of the filling.  The cake soaked up the liquid and prevented it from oozing off the side of the dough.  A few more ounces of butter was dotted on top, and then the dough was folded up on top of the filling.  It created a pentagonal pocket of pears and blueberries, which I coated in egg wash, dusted with sugar and placed into a 400 degree oven for just over half an hour.

When the pie finally came out, I was impressed.  This almost looked like I knew what I was doing.  The crust was golden brown, the filling bubbled pleasantly, and the whole thing didn’t even make a mess in the oven.  The second pie went in shortly thereafter, and it turned out just as well.  How did it taste?  Absolutely delicious – there was barely any leftovers when I took the second pie in to work the next day.

Maybe I’m getting better at baking.  Or, more likely, I got lucky – and had some great help from an excellent teacher.

Next: From one of Special Agent Dale Cooper’s culinary passions to another.

Recipe: No Pan Pear Pie

“The Fungal Gourmet”

The first time I remember eating mushrooms, I was probably five or six.  There was a chain of fried chicken restaurants in town called “Brown’s Chicken,” and my parents would bring home a bucket of Brown’s every once in awhile for us to eat.  They had all sorts of sides as well – baked beans, cole slaw, corn on the cob – but one side stood above all of them for me, and that was their fried mushrooms.  Batter dipped, deep fried and golden brown, these things were magical.  Crunchy on the outside, meaty on the inside, and complex in flavor, at least to a child.

Brown’s disappeared from Kansas City after awhile (they seem to be still in business though, but only in the Chicago area), and took with it those mushrooms.  It would be quite some time until I found mushrooms in my life again, this time on pizza.  It happened quite accidentally – we didn’t order any, but a sliced ‘shroom got stuck to the bottom of the pizza.  I ate it by itself, and those memories came back.  At that point, I was hooked.  Any dish that mentioned it had mushrooms jumped to the top of the list.  The best fried mushrooms I’ve ever had, hands down, is from Jack Stack Barbeque.  These massive mushrooms are probably around 2″ in diameter each, and they come with a delicious horseradish dipping sauce that complements the meatiness of the mushroom perfectly.  Any time I go there, I order a half rack and chow down on their crunchy goodness.

Stuffed mushrooms aren’t my favorite application, but they’re not bad either.  The stuffing, of course, is what makes or breaks the dish, so I was somewhat concerned when the recipe he presents calls for stuffing large button mushroom caps with sauteed creminis.  Don’t get me wrong, I love both of these, but it seemed a bit redundant.  Still, a job’s a job, and I lined up an angle on a friend’s place to make the dish.  I headed over with a package of ribeyes, a trio of potatoes, and the fixings for the mushrooms: four pounds of mushrooms, split between creminis and button; fresh herbs; clarified butter; a shallot; some Cognac; heavy cream; Parmesan; panko.

I spent the first hour or so prepping the mushrooms.  It takes awhile to destem and slice two pounds of creminis, even with an egg slicer doing most of the work.  Once that was done, I set those aside and tossed the button caps with some olive oil, rosemary, thyme and garlic.  The caps were then roasted in a 350 degree oven for about ten minutes.  While they cooled, I went to work sauteeing the creminis.  Heating up a pan, I dropped in the butter, which immediately hissed and jumped around the pan.  I threw the creminis in immediately, as I needed to cool off the pan some – otherwise, my delicious butter would burn.  Two pounds of mushrooms let off a lot of liquid, which slowly evaporated as the mushrooms cooked down.  After the liquid was almost gone, I threw in the shallot, and cooked just to warm it.  The Cognac went in to deglaze the pan, and scoop up all the browned mushroom bits off the bottom.  Chives, creamy, Parmesan, dried tarragon and pepper were added, and brought to a simmer.  This was removed from the heat, and a tablespoon of panko was added to thicken.  Once everything was cool, the cremini filling was added to the cooled caps, and topped with a bit more panko.  The twenty went under a hot broiler for a few minutes, just to brown the top.

A relatively simple recipe for a hearty meal.  How was it?  Well, sadly, underwhelming.  It wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t amazing.  I actually would have been much happier to take the sauteed mushrooms and dump them on top of the steak.  It was a bit too one note – one friend suggested more cheese, and I think that the single ounce of Parmesan that the recipe suggests is far too small to really be noticed.  Two or three would probably be better.  I thought it could also use a bit more salt – as it happens, not a grain is called for in the entirety of the recipe.  That’s perplexing.

Would I make it again?  Probably not.  Besides the fact that it’s not a very complex flavor, it’s rather pricy – gathering the materials was about $40.  When three steaks cost about as much as your appetizer, something’s going on.  I’d recommend skipping this one, even though I love mushrooms to death.

Next time: Pie, and what lies beneath.

Recipes:

The Fungal Saute

That Ol’ Cap Magic