Bobby Jay's Corn Soup Revisited

Bobby Jay's corn soup with olive oil

Four years ago, I posted my recipe for corn soup, which I had spent a lot of time developing. It is rich -- essence of corn -- despite the absence of anything but corn, a tiny bit of butter, a small amount of minced onion and a jalapeno pepper. Since then I have refined the recipe some and expanded the array of add-ins that I suggest in the note. In addition, I have experimented with using a pressure cooker and found that it is even richer due to the better extraction of flavor from the corn cobs that the superheated pressurized water permits.

So here's the updated, improved recipe for my own corn soup. This is a perfect time to try it, with wonderful sweet corn abounding at farmers markets everywhere.

Bobby Jay’s Corn Soup

Ingredients:

·       5-6 ears of corn (5 medium, an extra if small)

·       1 medium onion, diced

·       1 jalapeño pepper, finely diced (seeds and interior membranes removed), more or less, depending on how hot the jalapenos are and your taste

·       1 Tbs butter

·       4 C water

·       2 Tbs chives, finely chopped

·       Best quality olive oil

·       Salt and pepper

Directions:

1. Put the most delicate ear aside. Take kernels off remaining 4 ears of corn. Cut the cobs into thirds.

2. Sauté onion and jalapeño in butter with a little salt until soft. Add corn kernels and sauté another minute or so, just to warm through.

3. Add cobs and water. Bring to boil and simmer, covered, for 30-40 mins. [Better still, for an even richer, creamier soup, do this in a pressure cooker, bring to temperature and cook for 20 minutes.]

4. Remove cobs and puree the soup with a hand or standing blender. (I use a blender because I like it very smooth, and the added corn will provide texture.) Taste and season with salt and pepper to taste. It may need a fair amount of salt to cut the natural corn sweetness.

5. Separately, bring a pot of water to a boil. Take off the heat, add the last cob of corn, cover and wait 7 minutes. (Or cook it however you like to make corn, including in the microwave.) Remove kernels.

6. Serve soup in individual bowls. Garnish with kernels from the last ear of corn, chives and a few drops of olive oil.

Can be served cold or hot. If cold, chill and garnish just before serving.

Serves 4

Notes

Instead of chives, I often garnish with one of the following:

·       Chopped toasted or untoasted pumpkin seeds and a few drops of pumpkin seed oil or pistachio oil

·       Chopped pistachios and pistachio oil

·       Chopped hazelnuts and a few drops of hazelnut oil

·       A very tiny quantity of truffle oil

·       A dollop of crème fraîche

·       A little hot sauce or (preferably green) chili powder, or some adobe sauce from canned chipotles with adobo

·       Small chunks of avocado and olive or pistachio oil

·       White miso, about a rounded teaspoon per cup, whisked in before serving

This soup is really easy to make and virtually impossible to screw up, especially if you start with farm-fresh corn.

I hope you enjoy.

Bobby Jay

The Essence of Summer: Corn Soup and Tomato Salad

For me, summer means corn and tomatoes. The best dish I have ever invented is Bobby Jay's corn soup. When I was in Santa Fe this summer, I discovered powdered hot green pepper, a small quantity of which made the soup even better. If you don't have that, you can add a smidgeon of chipotles in adobo for a warm spicy kick. The recipe is set out below.

As for tomatoes, I use Jamie Oliver's simple recipe:  Cut a variety of heirloom tomatoes into slices, quarters or whatever shapes you like. Put in a colander and sprinkle generously with salt. After 30 minutes, place in a bowl, add dry oregano, vinegar and oil to taste, and season with pepper. Add chunks of mozzarella (di bufalo if available) or feta and torn basil leaves and serve.

Bobby Jay's Corn Soup

Ingredients

• 5 ears of corn 

• 1 medium onion, diced 

• 1 jalapeño pepper, finely diced (seeds and interior membranes removed 

• 1 Tbs butter 

• 3 C water 

• 2 Tbs chives, finely chopped 

• Best quality olive oil 

• Salt and pepper 

• (Optional) 1/4 tsp, or to taste, of powdered hot green peppers or puréed chipotles in adobo  

Directions 

1. Put the most delicate ear aside. Take kernels off remaining 4 ears of corn. Cut the cobs into thirds. 

2. Sweat onion and jalapeño in butter with a little salt until soft. Add corn kernels and sauté another minute or so, just to warm through.

3. Add cobs and water. Bring to boil and simmer for 20-30 mins.

4. Remove cobs and puree the soup with a hand or standing blender. Taste and season with salt and pepper to taste. It may need salt to cut the natural corn sweetness. Stir in the powdered hot green pepper or chipotles in adobo.

5. Separately, bring a pot of water to a boil. Take off the heat, add the last cob of corn, cover and wait 7 minutes. Remove kernels.

6. Serve soup in individual bowls. Garnish with kernels from the last ear of corn, chives and a few drops of olive oil. Can be served cold or hot. If cold, chill and garnish just before serving.

Bobby Jay

Sweet Corn -- One of Summer's Delights

I love summer for many reasons, but a number of them are gastronomic. Namely real tomatoes, especially heirlooms, local fruit and, best of all, local sweet corn. That's pretty much all you need to eat for a couple of months (although I am not so virtuous).

Last summer I developed a corn soup that is simple, virtuous (no cream) and delicious. I just served it the other night for the first time this year and it was a big hit. Click More below for the recipe. Enjoy!

Bobby Jay
More...
Bobby Jay’s Corn Soup

Ingredients:

• 5 ears of corn
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 1 jalapeño pepper, finely diced (seeds and interior membranes removed)
• 1 Tbs butter
• 3 C water
• 2 Tbs chives, finely chopped
• Best quality olive oil
• Salt and pepper

Directions:

1. Put the most delicate ear aside. Take kernels off remaining 4 ears of corn. Cut the cobs into thirds.

2. Sweat onion and jalapeño in butter with a little salt until soft. Add corn kernels and sauté another minute or so, just to warm through.

3. Add cobs and water. Bring to boil and simmer for 20-30 mins.

4. Remove cobs and puree the soup with a hand or standing blender. Taste and season with salt and pepper to taste. It may need salt to cut the natural corn sweetness.

5. Separately, bring a pot of water to a boil. Take off the heat, add the last cob of corn, cover and wait 7 minutes. Remove kernels.

6. Serve soup in individual bowls. Garnish with kernels from the last ear of corn, chives and a few drops of olive oil.

Can be served cold or hot. If cold, chill and garnish just before serving.

Serves 4

Japan 2019 - 9 Whimsical Japanese Food

When in Japan I love to try weird foods that you find in vending machines or elsewhere.

At Tokyo Midtown, a multi-purpose complex in Roppongi, we happened upon this popular ice cream place, with an array of interesting flavor combinations. Sorry, you'll have to blow it up to see them all but here they are (top to bottom, left to right: lemon-ginger, chocolat-banane, soy-strawberry, soy fruit mix,soy macha, milky mix, blueberry yogurt, kaki (persimmon) hojicha, pumpkin, mont-blanc, mix east, and annin(?) mango lychee.

Some cool items found in vending machines. First, this machine that dispensed corn soup, a favorite, either hot or cold: very sophisticated.

Corn soup in vending machine: hot or cold

Then I found one machine with corn soup and clam chowder. I had to try to chowder and can say that it was one of the worst things I've ever eaten. Fortunately, no need to be polite so tossed immediately.

Finally, a great ice cream vending machine on a train platform, with at least 17 different flavors.

Ice cream vending machine

Other things the Japanese love: Tokyo Banana, a  sponge cake with banana custard filling (reminds me of a Twinkie), and KitKats, here a banana-flavored one.

KitKat and Tokyo Banana

And there's so much more. Japanese food can be sublime or not-so-sublime. I love it!

Bobby Jay

My Big Night II- Prepping for the Meal

As I noted at the outset of my 60th birthday dinner project, there is no way I can cook for 60 plus people, so I needed to recruit help from among those who would be at the dinner. This proved to be easy: nearly all the first people I mentioned the party to volunteered to help. So a band of eight people worked for six hours the day before the party and six worked for three hours on the day of the event itself.

While it was definitely work, it was also really fun. Essentially we got nine hours of hands-on cooking lessons from our designated chef, Brendan McDermott, his principal assistants Sue, James and Bianca and a host of other helpers from ICE. Brendan is a masterful chef and he and his team could not have been more accommodating and helpful; a huge plus is that they actually enjoy teaching.

Looks Like Fun, Doesn't It?

Cooking for 60 is not like cooking for four, six or eight in many ways. First, there is just more of everything. But things also respond differently when made in larger quantities, so my recipes had to be altered. Finally, you have to make a lot of the food a day in advance, and it is important to know which things can and which cannot be stored for 24 hours. To read and see what happened, click on "More" below.

More...

We accomplished an enormous amount on the first day. We made the cold corn soup, made and formed 240 crab cakes and made the relish and vinaigrette that would be used for final assembly, made an astonishing amount of risotto to be chilled overnight before, sauteeing at the last minute, we smoked and grilled the pork tenderloin, we made the purée for the fish dish, we made the ice cream, we made the mini-madeleines and attempted the macarons (more on this later) and we made the shells for the blueberry almond tarts. Left for the day of the event were the appetizer tomato salad, the main courses (fish or duck) and accompanying vegetables and one of the purées, the filling and baking of the blueberry almond tart and the chocolates. Piglet and I had worked with chef Brendan earlier in the week to make the foie gras, which needs five days or so to come to its full glory.

Chef Brendan and the Corn Soup Team

Although the orange lavender buttercream for the macarons was perfect, the shells were not, and had to be redone by me at home that night. Fortunately, I have done this often so, apart from the fact that I was pretty tired from the day's prepping, I had little problem knocking off ten trays of macaron shells, and the assembly was quickly accomplished the next day.

Assembling Macarons

On Sunday we gathered to finish up. Making chocolate seems pretty easy, but making five pounds of it at one go is not. It takes nearly an hour to melt it over a bain marie, and tempering it by cooling and reheating to precise temperatures also takes a huge amount of time. And then you have to work with it pretty quickly or it starts to set. So this occupied a lot of time for the chocolate team. The results were great, however.

Making Chocolates

One of the highlights was making mozzarella for the tomato salad. Melting the curds (firm, roughly 2-inch cubes), then stretching them, tearing off bits and forming balls, always as gently as possible.

The Chocolate Team Switches to Mozzarella

I had made the blueberry almond tart numerous times, so was confident that it would come out well. But it is not prepossessing while being made and at least one of the members of the tart team had grave doubts. But they came out beautifully.

Making Blueberry Almond Tarts

The team also made the Moroccan vegetables for the fish dish and the root vegetable plum sauce to accompany the duck.

As the start of the event neared, crab cakes were sauteed and sauced, foie gras was cut into rounds and put onto brioche bread, smoked pork tenderloin was put on croutons (over a quickly improvised creamy lime sauce), corn soup went into little glasses, risotto cakes were sauteed and shrimp were embedded into kadaifa nests and deep fried. This was all done by ICE chefs and sous-chefs, as I and my team were off dressing for the party.

As the guests arrived and were devouring the hors d'oeuvres and champagne, the ICE team worked tirelessly to make and plate the main dishes.

Our guests started arriving at Bobby Jay's at 7:00, but more of that in the next and final post on this event.

Bobby Jay

Japan 2013 - Something for the Road

As one travels around Japan, one cannot help being struck by how many people are on the move, especially by train. And this mobile people needs to be fed.

Vending machines are everywhere in Japan, and they are well used. For the most part they sell teas of all types, sodas, juices and various types of coffee, hot and cold. Before the advent of convenience stores, which are far more ubiquitous than in the US, you could buy food, beer and even hard liquor in vending machines, but that is rare these days. Here is a typical selection.

Vending machines

One item caught my eye at Nasu station, north of Tokyo: hot corn soup. I shook it and tasted a can, but found the soup to be thin and devoid of corn taste or texture. Another member of the tour was enjoying his can, and urged me to shake harder; this released the sweet, starchy kernels of corn and it turned out to be . . . well, not bad.

Nasu station vending machine hot corn soup

Japan's train stations are full of takeout food stores and kiosks, and many styles of bento boxes, or ekiben, may be found, some of which can be quite elaborate. The better ones vary with the region and the season. We largely traveled by bus, and were provided bento boxes or sandwiches by our guide. Here's the best one we had, on the bus between Kyoto and Tamba, an old ceramics center about an hour away, rather precariously balanced on my lap.

Bento on the bus to Tamba

Although fast food chains have made great gains in Japan, you can still find interesting pre-prepared food all over. This adds an interesting dimension to the experience of traveling around the country.

Bobby Jay

Japan 2015 - Not All Good Japanese Food is Sublime

Food in Japan is not all sublime seasonal delicacies. The Japanese are huge consumers of fast food of the American variety and of their own. Every station has what appears to be an endless selection of bento boxes with fish, chicken or meat, vegetables, pickles, rice, tofu and fruit, in all kinds of combinations, neatly placed in compartments in the bento box.

We had a nice one -- in two boxes, although only one is pictured -- on our train from Kanazawa to Kyoto, the Thunderbird (pronounced "Sandabaado"), although I confess to having eaten mine on the bus between Toyama and Kanazawa.

Excellent bus bento

In Kanazawa, which ironically is known for its elegant Japanese food, a group of us went to Jiyuken, a simple Japanese yoshoku (Western-style food) restaurant that has been in business since 1909 serving, among other things, spaghetti, beef stew and rice-stuffed omelets. Here I had an old favorite, katsu curry, a breaded fried pork cutlet atop rice and a gloppy curry sauce bearing no relationship to the Indian or Malaysian variety, all topped with a fried egg and accompanied by pickled ginger. Japanese curry is a unique thing and it just is what it is: you either love it or hate it.

Katsu curry, a unique Japanese take on curry

Japan is also full of vending machines selling cold and hot tea, coffee, water, sports drinks and health drinks. Here's a photo of two with names that Americans find odd: Calpis and Pocari Sweat.

Calpis and Pocari Sweat in vending machine

And coffee, of course, an old vending machine standby.

 Coffees from vending machines

Note that Wonda Gold is "A Premium Coffee With A Radiant-like Beauty Perfected With Premium Beans." No Wonda that it's Tiger Woods' favorite (or at least he did commercials for it when we lived in Tokyo 15 years ago).

In the old days, one could buy sandwiches, beer and even sake in vending machines, but now there are convenience markets everywhere where those items are purchased, in addition to their own, less elaborate, bento boxes and, in the cooler months, oden, the steamed vegetables and fish cakes braised for hours in dashi (Japanese stock, virtually always based on seaweed and most often flavored with bonito flakes).

One of the remaining food items that may be found in vending machines is corn soup, which is surprisingly not bad. Here are two of the many brands that are available.

Two varieties of corn soup in vending machines, about $1.10 at today's exchange rate

One of my favorite things in Japan s is Häagen Dazs matcha (powdered green tea) ice cream, an intense, almost bitter confection bearing no resemblance to the insipid green tea ice cream that Häagen Dazs sells in the US. There are many other brands but -- trust me -- Häagen Dazs is best. 

Häagen Dazs matcha ice cream

In addition, our guide Andy, a great expert on Japanese culture, provided a steady stream of sembei (rice crackers) and other delights to keep us busy on train and bus rides. Among the best (well, most interesting) were the iconic Tokyo Banana cakes -- a lot like Twinkies in their cult status in Tokyo, and just as awful -- and rum raisin KitKat bars that I must admit I liked.

Tokyo Banana cake and rum raisin KitKats

Try to read the fine print at left on the Tokyo Banana wrapper. If you can't make it out, here's what it says:

People gather in Tokyo from here and there with memories of their home. And then, TOKYO gets everyone's home town. TOKYO BANANA

I could go on and on but it's hard to follow that quote.

Bobby Jay

Cooking Again - 2

Spanish style shrimp with toasted pasta

Fairly close on the heals of the meal described in my last post, we had our new friends Marianna and Nigel for dinner.

I was a little time constrained, so I recycled the hummus tahini from earlier in the week (actually I made new chickpeas and added the refrigerated tahini sauce). See my previous post for photo, which is close enough.

Accompanying that was my home-developed ricotta, sun-dried tomato and lemon zest spread.

Bobby Jay's ricotta, sun-dried tomato and lemon zest spread

For dinner, we started with my own corn soup, served with crushed hazelnuts and a few drops of hazelnut oil,

Bobby Jay's corn soup

and continued with Spanish style shrimp with toasted pasta, a great recipe from America's Test Kitchen that I have made often. See the picture at the top.

Dessert was an apricot galette. Here I used Gordon Hamersley's recipe for peach galette (from Bisto Cooking at Home), but substituted pistachios for cornmeal in the dough, substituted apricots for peaches to take advantage of the former's short season, and topped the fruit with coarsely chopped pistachios. Despite being a bit crumbly, the apricot/pistachio mix was a success.

Apricot galette with lots of pistachios

A good time was had by all, and a leisurely at-home meal provided ample time for bonding with our new friends. In the end, this is a major reason for cooking at home.

Bobby Jay

Passover 2014 - Sephardic Seder

Our family's Seder was last night, a few days late to accommodate family from the DC and Boston areas. Last year I became interested in Sephardic cooking and decided to make a Sephardic Seder for Passover 2014. This tradition is quite different from the Eastern European Ashenizi for many reasons, but the most salient is that rice and lentils and other legumes are permitted during Passover.

Based on the comments of the family, it was a success. I was particularly proud of the Persian rice, one of the world's best dishes, which I nailed: a thick dark crust on the bottom with fluffy basmati rice on top.

Some of the prettiest dishes are pictured below.

Burnt eggplant with tahini and pomegranate seeds

Persian rice - one of my favorite foods - with edamame and dill

I started planning soon after last year's Seder and eventually arrived at the following menu, based on searches through books on Jewish, Turkish, Persian, Syrian and Moroccan food, as well as relevant web sites:

2014 Passover Menu

Appetizers

Charred eggplant (Ottolenghi Plenty)

Artichoke tapenade (David Lebovitz, My Paris Kitchen)

Dried fava bean hummus (adapted from Roden, The Book of Jewish food)

Lemon scented meatballs (Batali, foodnetwork.com)

Gefilte fish bites from Citarella with Ina’s homemade horseradish

Dinner

Bordeaux style haroset (Joan Nathan, My Search for Jewish Food in France)

Watercress and chickpea soup (Ottolenghi, Jerusalem)

Turkish shredded zucchini pie (Abadi, toogoodtopassover.com)

Dja'jeh Zetoon b'Limoneh (Chicken with Lemon and Olives) (Abadi, Fistful of Lentils)

Persian Rice (Abadi, cooking lesson) with edamame and dill (Shafia, The New Persian Kitchen)

Lamb tagine (Atelier des Chefs cooking lesson)

Desserts

Flourless orange cake (Clotilde, chocolatetzucchini.com)

Cardamom rice pudding (Ottolenghi, Jerusalem)

Sesame halvah (Dweck, Aromas of Aleppo)

Cousin Vicki’s assorted cookies and bars
 

Artichoke tapenade with basil oil

Lamb tagine and chicken with lemon and olives

Shredded zucchini pie and Persian rice with edamame and dill

The Sephardic Jews, who were expelled from Spain in 1492, settled around the Mediterranean Sea, largely in Turkey and Greece, and throughout the Middle East (via Morocco). Countries represented in our Seder menu included Syria (chicken and halvah), Turkey (zucchini pie), Morocco (lamb tagine, fava bean hummus), Persia (rice and edamame and dill), France (haroset, artichoke tapenade), Italy (veal meatballs), Spain and the Middle East generally (charred eggplant, watercress and chickpea soup, rice pudding).

There is some controversy about the flourless orange cake, which does use baking powder. Perhaps surprisingly, the bulk of rabbinical opinion seems to be that baking powder can be Kosher for Passover if it is made with potato starch rather than forbidden corn starch. Since we were going Sephardic, where corn is permitted, I used the ordinary stuff, but this is a matter of choice.

There is a downside to an all-Sephardic Seder, which is that certain classics are excluded, the most significant of which is matzoh ball soup. My sister-in-law's is the best (both the broth and the balls) so next year, while we will probably stay Sephardic, we will be making an exception for her soup. After all, what good are rules if they deprive you of great food?

Bobby Jay

My Best Dishes of 2012

Gourmet's year-end edition (it has been resuscitated as an on-line only shadow of its former self) contains responses by 53 staff members and consultants to the question: What was the best thing you ate in 2012? The responses were interesting, running the gamut from Frank Pepe's pizza to Fondue au Vieux Comté from Auberge La Petite Echelle in Rochejean, France.

I am often asked questions like that, and frankly can't remember all the restaurant meals I have eaten, even the great ones. But I do keep records of what I cook, and can list the most successful dishes I made in 2012. People also often ask what kind of food I like to cook (and eat), and I think the list demonstrates that I have pretty eclectic cooking tastes. Of course, I enjoy many other cuisines, particularly Asian, but rarely make them myself, and they are never among my greatest successes. The list also understates how often I cook Italian dishes (very).

In any event, here's the list of my best dishes of 2012:

• Bobby Jay's corn soup, a recipe I developed myself: summer corn is my favorite food
• Heirloom tomato salad with torn mozzarella and basil, from a recipe by Jamie Oliver: summer heirloom tomatoes are my second favorite
• Salvatore ricotta, a wonderful creamy ricotta made in Brooklyn, from Eataly, with fleur de sel, coarsley ground pepper and Sicilian olive oil on homemade toast: not really cooked, just a wonderful bite from impeccable ingredients
• Chicken and andouille Jambalaya, from a recipe by Ethan Stiffel
• Caribbean roast and smoked pork chops, based on a recipe by barbeque genius Big Bob Gibson
• Slowly oil poached garlic shrimp, tapas style, based on a recipe from Tyler Florence
• Seared veal breast stuffed with garlic, mustard and spinach, from a recipe by Gordon Hamersley
• Matcha macarons with white chocolate ganache, commissioned by my wife for her Japanese art gallery, for which I combined about 5 different recipes over several tries: Japanese/French fusion in a single bite
• Mustard crusted tenderloin of pork with apple mostarda, from a recipe by Michael Chiarello
• Golden melon gazpacho, based on a recipe from the wonderful spa Rancho Puerta: healthy but spicy and satisfying
• Creme caramel, from a recipe from The French Slow Cooker: a perfect application for the slow cooker, wonderfully smooth and silky
• Cherries in almond syrup with toasted almonds over homemade Greek style yogurt, from a recipe in Bon Appétit: another celebration of summer's bounty
• Winter fruit compote with kumquats, prunes, figs and cognac, from a recipe by Laura Calder: amazingly easy but satisfyingly redolent of winter flavors

I never know where my mood (or reading or TV watching) will take me, so I am sure next year's list will be very different.

Bobby Jay

En passant (6) . . . Peanut Butter and Chorizo; Salvatore Smoked Ricotta; Vitamix

. . . wherein I write about things that deserve to be mentioned but are not worthy of a full post.

1. PB&C?!

Peanut butter (preferably hot) on toasted Turkish bread with chorizo. Nothing I can say can make this sound better (or worse) than the enumeration of the agreement, together with the thousand words' worth of photo below. Search "peanut butter" above to find several posts on combining this great ingredient with unexpected ingredients.

Peanut butter & chorizo on toasted Turkish bread

2. Salvatore Smoked Ricotta

Salvatore Smoked Ricotta

This spectacularly smooth ricotta with a wisp of smoke is guaranteed to make you smile. I had it recently on a piece of toasted baguette topped with kernels from an ear of grilled corn that I bought at the Columbus Avenue fair: smoke with smoke. But it's great by itself. I bought it at Saxelby's, in the Essex Market, but have also seen it at Eataly. Here's a link to Salvatore's web site.

 3. Vitamix

Vitamix 7500

I finally splurged and got one, Model 7500 -- new, lower profile; 64-oz container; not programmable like the 750, but that did not seem to be worth the extra money. So far it's pretty spectacular. I made my famous corn soup today and, for the first time, I was able to get it all into the blender in one load

Bobby Jay

Summer Freshness - Lemon Verbena Sorbet

You haven't heard from me lately because I have been recovering from an operation that I underwent six weeks ago. All went well, and I am back.

Plainly this is the best time of year for a home cook to recover from surgery because the abundance of healthful and varied local summer produce provides half the meal with no, or very little, cooking. My favorite food is sweet corn, which I serve plain or made into Bobby Jay's Corn Soup, served hot or cold. And it is hard to beat juicy and sweet heirloom tomatoes, served as a salad (salted for 30 minutes, seasoned with pepper and dried oregano, vinegar and olive oil), with or without mozzarella di bufalo or burrata. Or just sliced and made into a caprese salad with mozzarella, olive oil and torn basil.

Wonderful fresh produce can be supplemented with rotisserie chicken, by itself or in a main course salad shredded with cabbage, lettuce, carrots, nuts and the dressing of your choice (I use a Chinese inspired dressing with peanuts).

Lemon verbena, washed and laid out to dry

In summer, we eat fruit for dessert almost every night, with a little homemade ice cream (ginger being my and J's preferred flavor) or, if we are being really virtuous, low-fat yogurt mixed with some cardamom powder and vanilla. An easy way to extend the life of fragile fruits, like sour cherries, is to cook them for five minutes or so with something sweet: a little sugar, honey or maple or agave syrup. I use a spoonful each of ginger and almond syrup, and serve the resulting lightly stewed berries over ice cream or yogurt.

Going to farmers' markets can provide unexpected inspiration. One day I was browsing at the farmers' market and saw some lovely lemon verbena, which I felt compelled to buy, although I had no fixed idea of what to do with it. Returning home, I found a recipe for lemon verbena sorbet on Clotilde Dusoulier's excellent blog Chocolat & Zucchini. While the sorbet turns quite icy after the first day, I just scrape it with a fork and use it as granita atop summer berries of all kinds. It is summer on a spoon, light, herbal and a perfect complement for fruit. You can also dry lemon verbena and use it for herbal infusions (verveine).

It is a pleasure to be cooking again, especially in the summer, when preparing light and healthful meals is made easy through the efforts of our local farmers.

Bobby Jay

A Month of Intense Cooking II

Yesterday's post listed the better main courses I have made in the last month. As I said there, July and August are for fruit and ice cream, so virtually not cakes and tarts until last night.

Here are some of the best appetizers and side dishes of the past month:

• “squished” boiled and roasted potatoes - baby Yukon golds boiled in salted water until almost done, then slightly smashed with your hand or a mallet, put on a roasting pan with a little olive oil and pepper and roasted at 400 for 45 minutes
• heirloom tomato salad - copious quantities of tomatoes cut up, salted and left to drain for 45 minutes, then mixed with dried oregano, red wine vinegar and oil, topped with chunks of torn mozzarella (preferably di bufalo) and basil
• melon gazpacho - chunks of ripe musk (or other orange) melon blended with coconut milk, lime juice, chile powder, cinnamon, agave syrup, diced cucumber and mint
• 2-hour polenta (made with coarse stone ground corn meal) with pecorino and butter added at the end - the slow cooking breaks down the meal for a wonderful taste and texture
• “rillettes” of fresh and smoked salmon, served on toasted baguette slices
• tarragon French style (no mayo) potato salad - first wine, then a mustard tarragon vinaigrette poured over the still-hot boiled potatoes (baby Yukon Golds cut into halves or quarters)
• Bobby Jay’s no-cream corn soup with pistachio oil and crushed roasted pumpkin seeds

I make a salad nearly every night, usually a simple vinaigrette with tarragon, chives, dill, thyme or a combination, parmesan cheese, scallions and cherry or grape tomatoes if they're particularly good. My favorite salad of the past month:

• Mustard greens with anchovy mustard vinaigrette, scallions, tarragon, parmesan and cherry tomatoes. The bitter greens (you can substitute dandelion or other bitter greens) need a bold vinaigrette with strong flavors as counterpoint: don't skimp on the anchovies or mustard, which are what make this work.

Recipes on request.

Bobby Jay

My Big Night I - Planning

I turned 60 this summer, and several months before that my wife J asked whether I wanted to have a party. I was in Japan when I turned 50 and was able to escape any major recognition, so this time I felt it would be appropriate to celebrate. But I struggled in response to her question as to what we should do. Finally I said that what I'd really like to do do was to cook a meal for our close friends, but that unfortunately I don't possess the skills or the place to entertain 50 or 60 guests. She said that if I really wanted to do that, there would certainly be a way.

I next mentioned the idea to my friend Piglet, who has from time to time appeared in this blog. An event planner who knows her way around the catering and food world, she agreed with my wife that what I wanted to do was definitely possible.

After considering teaming up with a catering facility and staff for the event, we met with the special events people at the Institute for Culinary Education (ICE), on West 23rd Street, a cooking school that offers professional training and also has a robust "recreational" program of classes for non-professionals. ICE's cooking facilities, of course, are perfect, and it turned out they had an appropriate space for the event. Also, they could provide chefs and assistants to help plan and execute the event. Most important, although this event was somewhat different from others they have done, it was perfectly consistent with their mission of teaching people how to cook.


So now it was up to me to design the event.
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I quickly decided on the format: a sit-down dinner, preceded by a cocktail hour. The menu would consist of things I had cooked before and wanted to share with my friends. We would do six passed hors d'oeuvres, an appetizer, a main course (choice of fish or duck), cheese, dessert and after-dinner treats. I would try to use local ingredients and to reflect, to the extent possible, the late-summer early-autumn time of year.

Thus I decided to do Jamie Oliver's mixed heirloom tomato salad -- one of my all-time favorites and likely one of the last of the waning tomato season. Similarly, seared duck breast with a fresh plum sauce (from Gordon Hamersley), to take advantage of the red plums that are among the last of the season's stone fruits. Dessert would be an almond blueberry tart from Clotilde. This left the fish dish open, and I decided to go with a recipe I recently learned at cooking school in Paris: sesame crusted sea bass over a bed of Moroccan vegetables and a chickpea puree.

With the core of the menu set, I went to work on the hors d'oeuvres. Everyone (well almost) loves foie gras, and I have a nice recipe where it is infused with cinq épices and white port. I recently made a smoked peppered pork tenderloin that turned out to be even better cold. Also cold, my own corn soup, served in shot glasses. Then two hot favorites: sauteed veal and sage risotto cakes and Bobby Flay's incredible crab cakes with black olive and pepper relish and basil vinaigrette. Finally, shrimp with a leaf of cilantro fried in a nest of kadaifa, very fine threads of phyllo dough.

The Final Menu for My Big Night

Dessert would be a blueberry almond tart, from the recipe of my beloved Clotilde Dussoulier. For the finale, chocolates with fleur de sel or a pulverized 4-pepper brittle that adds a complex spice profile, lavender orange macarons (maybe the best thing I have ever made) and honey madeleines from Joel Robuchon.

As for the cheese plate, I went to visit Anne Saxelby, who promotes and sells a fantastic array of American artisanal cheeses, and selected three cheeses from Vermont: a creamy sheep, a complex clothbound cheddar and a creamy blue.

All that remained was to select wines that would complement the meal and to pick linens, stemware, flowers and other things to perk up the pretty banal room in which the dinner would be served. J took charge of the esthetic makeover, working with our even coordinator, and did a magnificent job. Although it's out of sequence, I can't resist showing you how great the tables looked.

Table Setting

Finally, invitations. To pique people's interest, the event was described as the one and only meal ever to be served at a newly created restaurant, Bobby Jay's, to be cooked by Bobby Jay and a carefully selected team of cooks (namely, the first 8 or 10 people who heard about the event and volunteered to help).

Invitation

The final thing to do was to be nervous about how things would turn out.

But more on that in later posts.

Bobby Jay