Dunk & Crumble

Dinner

Cheesy Leek & Delicata Squash Tart

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There’s an old man who sits in my local coffee shop all day.  I probably didn’t notice him the first few times I ran in for a latte, but I bet he was there.  He’s always there.  Reading a newspaper and holding a pen, sometimes making notes in the margins.  He wears thin silver glasses, wispy white hairs, a navy blue sport coat over a blue striped shirt and a navy blue ascot around his neck.  I think that’s what made me notice him, at first – the ascot.  I didn’t think much about him, initially.  Just, you know, cool ascot.  But the coffee shop days wore on, and I started noticing.

I noticed that he likes ginger cookies.  His thin lips rarely smile, and his Roman nose is always gloriously beet red.  His thin pocket square slumps down in his breast pocket like a deflated dream, barely visible except when he leans over his paper to catch the small print.  He’s always getting up and sitting back down, teetering around the coffee shop with a slow purpose, it seems.  He chews with his mouth wide open and throws stray pastry crumbs on the ground.  He’s got lots of stray crumbs.

This man often makes me smile, as I sit and work and sip.  He also makes me sad.  Who is this man?  What are his stories?  Why does he sit in this coffee shop, day after day, wearing his sport coat and ascot?  What is he writing in those margins?  Letters?  Short stories?  Nothing at all?

I don’t know.  He interests me.  I hope his life is happy.  I hope he’s got a nice family.  Somehow, I’m not sure that’s true.  Watching him makes me thankful for my own life, loves, family.  I guess that’s all I really mean to say.

All of which has nothing to do with this cheesy leek and Delicata squash tart, except that I made it for my love of a sister, who was here visiting over the weekend.  We ate it warm for dinner alongside bowls of creamy carrot potato soup, then snacked on it cold the next day, like leftover pizza.  It’s definitely better warm, but when you’re snacking and gossiping with your visiting little sister, it turns out it doesn’t much matter.

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Grilled Cheddar, Peach & Arugula

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Let’s get right to the point here: you don’t need me to give you a recipe for grilled cheese. You also don’t need an extra thick coffee milkshake, but wouldn’t your day be better if you had one right now?  Sometimes we want things that we don’t need.  Like milkshakes and pie cutters shaped like acorns and recipes for grilled cheese.

I had this for lunch two days in a row.  We’ve been lucky enough to still have some peaches at the farmer’s market (slim pickings, but I’m holding on to peach season with white knuckles), though I imagine this would be just as delicious with pears or apples, or even sweet plums.

And if you’re looking for a comfy tomato soup recipe to round this whole thing out, I’d suggest a hearty bowlful of Moroccan-spiced tomato soup.  Yum.

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Scarlet Queen Red Turnip Salad

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I’m not usually one to buy turnips at the farmer’s market, especially during the summer when my eyes are easily taken by all of the other beauties of the season — fuzzy peaches, ruby raspberries, fat tomatoes, squash blossoms.  Show me a turnip amidst this gold mine of summer produce and I’ll probably look at it and say something like “oh.  A turnip.”

But!  Show me a deep pink bulb attached to bright green, stalky leaves, and I’ll probably say something like “oh!  A radish.”  Which would be an honest mistake.  Luckily, you’d correct me by saying something like “actually, it’s a turnip!  A Scarlet Queen Red turnip!” Then you’d give me a sample (I think it’s pretty clear that you are now the owner of a vegetable stall at the Ferry building farmer’s market) and I’d look at you, wide eyed, my jaw neatly crunching the raw, surprisingly sweet and very faintly bitter root.  I’d swallow and smile, and then make that guy Ben come over to taste it, too.  He’d say “yum,” and then you’d say “right?” and then we’d say “sold!”

And then we’d have a bunch of radish-looking turnips lying around.

Since you (you veggie-stall-owning-genius you) had informed us that we could, indeed, eat them raw (and I’d be feeling too lazy to turn on the stove for roasting or quick pickles) we’d use them in a salad. A supremely crunchy, bitter, sweet and salty, bright and verdant salad.  With a hunk of crusty bread and some cheese, it’d be lunchtime perfection, without a berry or peach in sight.

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Squash Blossom Frittata

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Flowers in my eggs?!

It’s true.

Squash blossoms have been all over the Bay Area farmer’s markets lately, so when I saw some beauties by the Ferry building this weekend, what else could I do but scoop some up and bake them in a frittata with ricotta and goat’s cheese?  Any logical person would have done the same, I think.

Now, I realize that there are those of you who are perfectly logical, thank-you-very-much, but who perhaps haven’t yet come across a squash blossom at the market or in the kitchen, and maybe wouldn’t even know what to do with one if you saw it, and so to you, Miss or Mister logical-but-squash-blossom-less, I say: that’s okay.  Here’s the deal: squash blossoms are the dainty and edible flowers of young summer squashes (usually zucchini).  They are bright orange, tinged with green, and sold at farmer’s markets alongside (and sometimes attached to) fresh, tender little squishes.  Squashes.  Squash.

Squash blossoms are usually stuffed with cheese and fried, which is a perfectly amazing way to enjoy them, but they can also be steamed or baked and thrown into soup, salad or pasta.  Or you could bake some in a fabulously herby frittata with ricotta and goat’s cheese.  Entirely up to you.

(I’d go with the frittata).  (But really, it’s up to you).

(Frittata).

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Curried Cauliflower Soup

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Yes yes I know, you’re all hot and sweaty and unable to eat anything but watermelon and gazpacho and so, SO HOT.

Well, I’m not.  Here in San Francisco, the place where summer goes to die, apparently, it’s not hot.  It’s not even warm.  It’s cold.  Boot-stomping, fleece-wearing cold.  The fog rolls in, the fog rolls out.  In, out, in, farther-in, and all the while, we’re lucky if the temperature gets into the 60s.  So while you feast on fresh, cooling melon, I’m craving soup.

If you’re in the bay area like me, you’re welcome.  If you’re, I don’t know, anywhere else in the northern hemisphere, my apologies.  Still, I suspect this soup would be nice served cold.  If you can bring yourself to turn on a burner and throw together a chilled version, please let me know.

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Cool Tomato Sandwich

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Happy first day of real summer!  Rumor has it you east coasters are hot today.  Damn hot.  Real hot.  Sticky, drippy, lung-crushing hot.

So, basically, hot.

It’s a perfectly breezy 74 degrees here in San Francisco, but I’m not just going to go telling you that.  I mean, why would I?  To make you jealous?  Encourage you to shake your sweaty fist at me?  That wouldn’t be nice, no sir.  Instead, I’m going to tell you how to master the art of the sandwich of summer sandwiches, that coolest of hot-weather cool, the classic: tomato sandwich.

It’s really quite simple.  The principles of this sandwich are fourfold:

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Cashew Tarragon Pesto

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I’m going to tell you something, but you have to promise not to tell my friend Steve.  He’s deathly allergic to nuts, you see, and becomes horribly offended when I feature them here.  So don’t tell, okay?  Okay.

Cashews.  I’m slightly obsessed with them.  Shhh.

I never ate cashews growing up, because I thought I was allergic to them; a handful of mixed nuts left me oddly itchy and puffed up like a balloon one Thanksgiving – needless to say, I spent the following years as far away as I could from any and all nut products.  However, the guilty nut turned out to be none other than the evil Brazil nut, so while I continue to shun those oddly-shaped nuggets of anaphylaxis, cashews have gained a seat at the table.  In a big way.

I throw cashews into salads, soups, even bowls of cereal.  And I find few greater pleasures than eating roasted, salted handfuls straight from the freezer, which is where I store them (for freshness purposes).

I use cashews to make pesto.  With some tarragon, parsley, lemon and garlic.  I spread it on toast, eat it with pasta, smear it on roasted chicken.  I suggest you do, too!  Unless you are my friend Steve, in which case, do not eat this.  But do.  But don’t.  You know.  Sorry, Steve.

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Cashew Cream of Asparagus Soup

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We had an unofficial soup-off here the other night, whereby two soups were made, tasted and judged, and one soup was declared the winner.  It was a slurpy, soupy fight.  It was a battle of epic proportions.  Gauntlets were thrown, tears were shed, friendships were ruined.   Vegetables were blanched, fingers were nicked, steam puffed from simmering pots and, in the end, this soup took home the trophy.

That’s actually sort of a lie.

I mean, we did have a soup-off, and two soups were definitely made and tasted — our friends Dania and Craig made a smooth tomato bisque, Ben and I made cashew cream of asparagus — but as far as judgement goes, we sort of dropped the ball.  We just slurped and slurped, each insisting that our own creations were clearly the best, none of us able to keep a straight face while doing so.  In the end, no soup was declared the winner, and everyone went home full and happy.

Lame.

Everyone wins?  What is that?  This is America, dammit, the land of champions, and I demand a trophy.  This soup wins!  Cashew cream of asparagus!  Most original!  Sneakiest use of cashews!  Maybe not the best looking but all-around tastiest!  Best soup in the land!

Well.  It’s good, anyway.  Like, really good.  Don’t let the name fool you — there’s no cream in this soup.  Just some soaked and pulverized cashews, which add some protein and a full, creamy texture; it really balances out the fresh, springy green of leeks and asparagus.  Try it!  It’s award-winning, you know.

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Green & Goat Frittata

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It started with a simple enough proposition.  A run, Ben said, down to the Ferry Building farmer’s market.  Just a short run, he said, about a mile.  We can jog.  A short jog, I thought, might be nice!  Nice way to see my new city and end up at the farmer’s market.  Let’s go.

So we went!  And went.  And went, and went, and went.

Roughly three miles and many dirty looks later, Ben and I arrived at the Ferry Building, he unruffled, cool as a cucumber, me gasping for oxygen in strained bursts, my face the color of a vibrant summer tomato.

I’ve never been so happy to see a farmer’s market in my life.  This one had stalls overflowing with tangy cheeses, piles of orange and yellow citrus, and endless bunches of dark, leafy greens.  I was temporarily distracted from the searing cramp in my side by the Californian grandeur of it all – the people, the produce, the pastries!  As I sucked in big gulps of air off the Bay, Ben offered to buy me an almond croissant, and, suddenly, all was forgiven.  The peace offering complete, we browsed the market, ducking between stalls and choosing fat bunches of dinosaur kale, a large, muddy-bottomed leek, and a few sharp stalks of purple-specked green garlic.

After an hour or so, my face had turned from tomato red to what Ben assured me was a healthy, pinkish glow.  Right.  We took the bus home.

Our green market haul went happily into this frittata, along with a handful of creamy goat’s cheese, and was enjoyed by some lovely new San Francisco friends for brunch on Sunday, and then again for dinner on Tuesday.  Yep, this one is a keeper.

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Turkey Meatballs

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What’s this I hear about some fantastic bowl thing happening this weekend?  I don’t know much about it, but I guess it’s supposed to be super?  Some sort of super cup, or maybe it’s a bowl, during which people yell loudly and drink beer and dunk chips and chomp various meat products?  Or something?

Well.  I think it sounds fun.  I mean I’m not really one to watch gigantic humans battling U.S patriots for the skin of pigs, but if this whole thing is really supposed to be so super and inclusive of bowls of meat, then I think I’d like to participate.  I will make meatballs.

No, I kid.  I like, totally know everything about football.  Zone defense.  Extra points.  First and ten.  See?  Totally.  And as it turns out, I’m not really a fan of either Tom Brady (cleft-chinned cad) or Eli Manning (sad-faced man-boy).  Still, I think I’ll take Peyton’s man-boy brother to beat the spread over weirdly cartoonish Brady.  Does anyone else think he looks like Gaston from Beauty and the Beast, just with tighter pants and less cool shoes?

I mean, I’ll leave that stuff to the experts.  The point spread and the tight pants.  I’ll stick with the meatballs.

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