There are two recipes in this week’s newsletter. A savory potato salad and a sweet strawberry cake both created or adapted from a previous recipe by Deb Perelman, the woman behind the wildly popular food blog, Smitten Kitchen. She has won many, many awards including Saveur Magazine’s Best Cooking Blog of 2011. Deb creates her recipes from her 42 square foot kitchen (!!!!) in Manhattan with her toddler son underfoot. Her first cookbook, The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook, will be published by Knopf in 2012. -Christina
Salad with New Potatoes and Pickled Spring Onions
By Deb Perelman of Smitten Kitchen, http://smittenkitchen.com/2011/05/spring-salad-with-new-potatoes/
Salad Ingredients
2 pounds small new or fingerling potatoes (I used a mix of reds and yukon golds)
1 pound asparagus
1/4 pound sugar snap peas, green beans or other spring pea
4 small-to-medium radishes, thinly sliced
Pickled spring onions
3 spring onions (about 6 ounces)
1/4 cup white wine vinegar
1/4 cup water
1 tablespoon kosher salt (I use Diamond brand; use less if you’re using Morton or table salt)
1 1/2 teaspoons sugar
Sharp mustard vinaigrette
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons whole grain mustard (both Roland and Maille make a whole seed one I’m tremendously fond of)
2 teaspoons smooth Dijon mustard
2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
Methods
Place potatoes in a medium saucepan and cover with one inch of water. Bring to a boil and cook for about 15 minutes, or until the tip of a knife easily pierces through a potato. Drain the potatoes and let them cool until they’re almost room temperature. You can hasten this by covering them with cold water, and replacing the water a few times as it warms up.
Meanwhile, pickle your spring onions. Whisk vinegar, water, salt and sugar together in the bottom of a small container with a lid until the salt and sugar dissolve. Slice the bulbs and paler green parts into very thin coins and submerge them in the vinegar mixture. Cover and put in fridge until you’re ready to use them; if you can put them aside for an hour or even overnight, even better. Reserve the onion greens.
Refill the saucepan you used for the potatoes (here’s to fewer dishes!) with salted water and bring it to a boil. Prepare an ice bath, a large bowl with ice and water in it. Trim the tough ends off the asparagus. Once the water is boiling, add the asparagus. One minute later, add the sugar snap peas. Two minutes later, drain both together then dump them in the ice bath until chilled. Drain the vegetables and spread them out on towel to absorb excess water.
Slice the cooked asparagus spears and sugar snaps into 1/2-inch segments and place them in a large bowl. Chop potatoes into moderate-sized chunks and add them to the bowl. Cut the radishes as thinly as possible, with a mandoline if you have one. If they’re especially big (mine were), you can first quarter them lengthwise. Cut some of the reserved onion greens into thin slivers (no need to use all of them, as the onion flavor might take over) and add them to the bowl.
When you’re ready to serve the salad, or an hour or two in advance, whisk the dressing ingredients and toss it with the vegetables, to taste. (You may find you don’t want to use all of it.) Stir in as many pickled onion coins as you please, save the rest for anything and everything. Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper, o taste. Eat and enjoy!.
Do ahead: Pickles can be started in the day or days before. Potatoes can be boiled and chilled in fridge overnight, as can other vegetables. Vinaigrette can be made in advance as well, but I might wait until the last minute to toss it with the vegetables as the vinegar, over a long sitting time, can ever-so-slightly discolor the cut edges of the asparagus and beans.
+++++
Strawberry Summer Cake
Slightly Adapted by Deb Perelman of Smitten Kitchen, http://smittenkitchen.com/2011/05/strawberry-summer-cake/
( original recipe is by Martha Stewart: http://www.marthastewart.com/336020/strawberry-cake )
Ingredients
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus extra for pie plate
1 1/2 cups (188 grams) all-purpose flour (can swap 3/4 cup or 94 grams all-purpose flour with 3/4 cup or 75 grams of barley flour, see Note)
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1 cup (200 grams) plus 2 tablespoons (25 grams) granulated sugar
1 large egg
1/2 cup (118 ml) milk
1 teaspoon (5 ml) vanilla extract
1 pound (450 grams) strawberries, hulled and halved
Methods
Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter a 10-inch pie pan or 9-inch deep-dish pie pan (what I used). I did not test this with a standard 9-inch pie plate but looking at the margin of space leftover in my deep-dish pan after baking the cake, I suspect you’d be safe. This cake would also work in a 9- or 10-inch springform or cake pan. The 10-inch would make a thinner cake than pictured.
Whisk flour or flours, baking powder and salt together in a small bowl. In a larger bowl, beat butter and 1 cup sugar until pale and fluffy with an electric mixer, about 3 minutes. Mix in egg, milk and vanilla until just combined. Add dry mixture gradually, mixing until just smooth.
Pour into prepared pie plate. Arrange strawberries, cut side down, on top of batter, as closely as possible in a single layer (though I had to overlap a few to get them all in). Sprinkle remaining 2 tablespoons sugar over berries.
Bake cake for 10 minutes then reduce oven temperature to 325°F and bake cake until golden brown and a tester comes out free of wet batter, about 50 minutes to 60 minutes. (Gooey strawberries on the tester are a given.) Let cool in pan on a rack. Cut into wedges. Serve with lightly whipped cream.
Recent Comments