Diane
Proust's madelaine launched reminisces to fill 3,000 pages in his iconic "
In Search of Lost Time" and food has been the subject of many another
unforgettable memoir, so when it was my turn to host an
Epitourist feast, I thought, "why not time travel?"
Everyone was asked to prepare a dish that brought back special memories
of time past and bring a story to share about why they chose that
particular dish.
The taste of food really can transport you to another time and place;
perhaps remind you of the trip to Italy sipping limoncello or a
childhood's summer night. Taking a bite of food is fleeting while
preparing the dish can be like spending time with people you love.
And whiling away a whole afternoon eating and enjoying the dishes and memories with kindred spirits... what a Present!
Menu
Pizza bread paired with ginger ale
Wine Jelly and Brie
Sausage Rolls Revisited
French Onion Soup
Hawaiian Roast Chicken, Two Bean Salad, Coconut Rice
Lingonberry Soup
Diane's Momoir
I've been missing my mom so much this holiday season, I chose dishes that reminded me of her. So for me this was more of a
momoir lunch. My mom really taught me a lot about resourcefulness, and as I grow older I appreciate her lessons more.
Pizza Bread
When I was about nine or ten, pizza was my dream food and I constantly
pestered mom to order. Instead she showed me how to make my own. Simple
fare: lightly toast white bread, spread with cheese whiz, smear some
ketchup, cut up some wieners, add some cheddar and olives, and sprinkle
with hot pepper flakes, and broil for a couple of minutes.
I haven't had this in years, and although I can't say it is the same as
Proust's madelaine, it reminded me of late summer nights and staying up
past bedtime.
Paired with ginger ale for the Epitourist lunch.
Wine Jelly
The first recipe written in my own hand in my little cookbook is for
wine jelly, something my mom and I made together when Rob and I first
started going out. I was about eighteen years old - so young! And so
proud to share these as handmade Christmas gifts. Rob's mom was one of
the recipients, I suppose I wanted make a good impression. Since then
I've put the recipe aside and haven't made it until now, forty years
later. How wonderful to have this simple recipe to evoke such strong
feelings of love and nostalgia, from Christmas Past to Christmas
Present.
Mementos for the Epitourists of our time travel lunch.
Recipe for
wine jelly from Certo + Tips for
preserving with paraffin
Hawaiian Roast Chicken
As
I was dithering what to serve, I mentioned my dilemma to Rob, who
without missing a beat and without the benefit of options or prompting,
came right out and said, "Hawaiian Chicken." This was a bit of a
specialty of my mom's that she would make when I was visiting home from
college. Although I didn't have this recipe directly from her I was able
to find it on the
Dole pineapple site.
Served alongside coconut rice and Ottolenghi 2 bean salad.
Paired with Gewurtztraminer.
Laura's Sausage Rolls Revisited
Given the season, it seemed fitting to choose a Christmas-past food memory for an appetizer.
Sausage rolls were a staple Christmas item of my childhood. I clearly
recall the red and white tube of Maple Leaf Sausage meat that my mother
would split open and mold into a long snake, placed along a piece of
rolled out pastry. My mom made terrific pastry, but for some reason she
never made her own for sausage rolls or her mince pies. She bought
blocks of Tenderflake flaky pastry dough. I think it was perhaps because
she made so many, which she froze to have on hand all through the
Christmas holidays. She packed them into large silver film reel cans
that my father brought home from work. They were just the right height
and size.
As I baked my version, the smell wafting from the oven and watching the
grease from the pork and butter ooze from the little rolls, transported
me back in time.
Sausage rolls revisited:
I wanted to make my own pastry and filling. After much googling, I decided on this recipe from the Guardian:
Notes: Made about 25 small rolls.
Needed a little more flavouring in the filling. More salt and pepper and perhaps a bit more nutmeg and lemon.
For the pastry
225 g plain flour
Pinch of salt
2 tsp English mustard powder
175g very cold butter
1 egg, beaten with a little water and salt
For the filling
300 g port belly, skin removed, minced or finely chopped
300 g pork shoulder, minced (this can often be bought ready minced if you don't have a good butcher)
200 g smoked streaky bacon, rind removed, finely chopped
Zest of 1 lemon
Nutmeg, to grate
2 tbsp roughly chopped thyme leaves
8 sage leaves, roughly chopped
1. Sift the flour, salt and mustard powder into a mixing bowl, and grate
in the butter. Stir them together with a knife, so the butter is
well-coated with flour, and resembles a rough crumble mixture. Pour in
enough ice-cold water to turn the mixture into a dough that comes away
cleanly from the bowl - be cautious, it shouldn't be sticky - and bring
together into a ball. Wrap in clingfilm and put in the fridge for half
an hour.
2. Put the meats into a large bowl and mix well with your hands. Tip in
the rest of the ingredients and combine, seasoning well with black
pepper and a little salt (remember the bacon will be salty, so don't go
overboard). Preheat the oven to 220C.
3. Roll out the pastry on a floured surface to about a thickness of 1/2
cm, and cut into 3 length ways. Divide the meat into 3 sausages, as long
as your pastry, and place one slightly off-centre on each strip.
4. Brush one edge of the pastry strip with beaten egg and then fold the
other side over to enclose the sausage meat. Press down to seal, and
then go along the edge with the back of a fork if you like, to make a
pattern. Brush with more egg wash, cut to the desired size, and prick
each with a fort. Repeat with the rest of the pastry and meat.
5. Put the rolls on a baking tray, and bake for 25 minutes, or until golden. Cool on a rack, and serve warm.
Served with Alsace Vin Blanc
Caroline's French Onion Soup
I found Diane’s theme of Time Travel very challenging. The food of my
childhood could not inspire me. The Canadian foods of the 1970s were
pretty much meat, potatoes and iceberg lettuce. We lived in a tiny,
remote village on the edge of the James Bay Territory. My mom cooked to
feed her family and baked to satisfy her sweet tooth. It was a
necessity, not a passion. Although I served a French Onion Soup for this
Time Travel lunch, I wished I had made her aspic. It would have been
fitting, fun, delicious, pretty and festive.
French Onion Soup
Serves 8
- 2 quarts of water
- one beautiful ox tail, approximately 1/2 kilo
- 1 carrot
- 1 stick of celery,
- 1 onion sliced in half skin on
- 1 clove of garlic smashed with skin on
- fresh sprigs of rosemary, thyme and oregano
- salt to taste (adjust salt at the end)
- 1/2 cup of white wine or vermouth
- 1/4 cup of Cognac
- 4 kilos of Vidalia onions thinly sliced
- 1/4 cup of butter
- 1/4 cup of olive oil
- pretty sage leaf
- 8 slices of toasted crusty bread
- 2 2/3 cup of grated Comté cheese
Season and roast the ox tail in a 425○ oven for 30 minutes.
Boil 8 cups of water. Place roasted ox tail, boiling water and following
6 ingredients in a pressure cooker. Put pressure cooker on high heat
and pressurize. Cook for 15 minutes under high pressure. Let pressure
cooker depressurize naturally. In total, this entire process takes
approximately 30 minutes. Using a sieve, strain the broth. Feed the
veggies to the chickens and keep the meat for Monday night’s beef and
barley soup! Return the broth to the pot, add white wine and cognac.
Gently simmer.
Thinly slice onions to 1/8”. A mandolin slicer is handy here. Heat half
of the oil and butter over high heat. Once pan is nice and hot, toss in
half of the onions. Reduce the heat to medium. Place a lid askew over
pan. It is key to slowly caramelize the onions. This step should take
approximately 50 minutes. Stir occasionally and keep an eye on the
temperature. Stir caramelized onions into the simmering broth. Repeat
this step for the remaining onions.
Cube bread to make croûtons. Toss with olive oil and season with salt
and pepper. Toast in a 425 oven for 10 minutes. Set aside. Put a slight
slug of oil in a pan. Heat to medium high. Quickly fry sage leaves until
slightly darkened and glossy. Remove and set aside.
Ladle onion soup into deep bowls. Top with croûtons and 1/3 cup of
grated cheese per bowl. Broil on high in oven for 5 minutes or until
cheese is bubbly and starting to show browned/blackened spots. Remove
from oven. Crown the beauties with a sage leaf and serve.
Kaarina's Lingonberry Soup
One of my most precious childhood memories is of my grandmother showing
me the tiny blue pearls of muscari growing in our summer house garden
about an hour’s drive outside of Helsinki. A spry 80-something,
Mari-mummo took me along on her rambles through the nearby woods to
gather berries, wild mushrooms and dry kindling for the wood stove in
the old farmhouse kitchen.
We fetched our milk from a nearby dairy farm, walking through a meadow
where the cows grazed among the buttercups and bluebells. A thick layer
of cream topped the milk and mummo skimmed that off for our glorious
summer desserts.
You could mark the passage of the summer by the fruit and berry soups -
known as kiisseli - that appeared at the table under a blanket of
whipped cream. Rhubarb and strawberries, blueberries, gooseberries, red
and black currants and finally, just before it was time to go back to
school in the city, lingonberries.
I chose puolukka (lingonberry) kiisseli for our Epitour Time Travel
feast because its unique sweet and tart taste can transport even the
most down-to-earth Finn back to grandma’s kitchen. And not least,
because for the first time I found lingonberries in a Toronto grocery store at
Yummy Market. (Check ahead if they have some in stock.)
Puolukka kiisseli - Lingonberry Soup
2 cups lingonberries
4 cups water
3/4 cups sugar
4 tbsp potato starch (or cornstarch)
Half teaspoon vanilla
Generous handful of lingonberries
Heavy cream
Bring the lingonberries and water to a boil for 15 minutes. Strain and
return the juice to the pot. Stir in the sugar and return to a boil.
Mix the cornstarch into 3-4 tablespoons of cold water, making sure there
are no lumps. Off heat, pour the cornstarch into the juice in a slow
steady stream stirring constantly. Return the pot to the element and
heat until it bubbles but do not boil again. Add the vanilla. Cool in a
cold water bath.
Scoop a generous handful of frozen berries into the bottom of a serving
bowl and pour the kiisseli over them. Sprinkle sugar over the kiisseli
to prevent a skin from forming over the top. Allow to cool completely.
It is best enjoyed at room temperature on the day it is made. Serve with
heavy cream, whipped cream, ice cream, crème fraîche, vanilla sauce,
yogurt or rice pudding.
The tart red berries also grow in northern British Columbia, Manitoba
and Newfoundland but little has been done here to grow them
commercially. That could change. The long-ignored lingonberry is about
to make its way into the Super Food category. Federal research is
underway into health and
nutritional benefits of lingonberries. The little red berry could well provide future industry and new jobs for Canada’s economically challenged northern communities.
