The Spice Route: Howard Walfish on Caraway Seeds

I'm really happy to have my friend, Howard Walfish on The Spice Route.  Howard writes two food blogs that I love to read. One is called Eat to Blog where he and his friend Donny cover a variety of restaurants, recipes, ingredients, markets and basically all things food and the other is his personal blog, brooklynvegetarian where he writes about all things vegetarian in Brooklyn including some of his own recipes.  You can also find Howard's writing at Serious Eats.  Enjoy!

Name: Howard Walfish

Where do you live? Brooklyn, NY

What do you love to do? Cook, eat, and write about cooking and eating for eattoblog.com and brooklynvegetarian.wordpress.com.

What’s your spice? Caraway seeds

What do you know about it? Growing up in a Jewish household there was no shortage of rye bread (for deli sandwiches, anyway; PB&J got good old white bread). As a kid I assumed that the tasty little seeds in the bread were rye seeds – why else would it be called rye bread? When I found out (much later in life) that they were, in fact, caraway seeds I was dumbfounded. It has a taste similar to fennel, which it is related to botanically, but isn’t quite as licorice-like. Caraway seeds are used in many Northern European cuisines, in many different ways. When I first tasted the Swedish liquor aquavit, it took me a moment to place the flavor: caraway.



What's your favorite vegetarian recipe using it? Rye bread. I’m the kind of cook who prefers technique to recipes, even when it comes to making bread. The following recipe for rye bread is just a simple one that can be tweaked to your liking. A stand mixer will help immensely, but you can also do it by hand.

Rye Bread by Howard Walfish

Ingredients
1 cup of rye flour
5 cups of AP flour (more or less)
3 cups of warm water (more or less)
half a packet of active dry yeast
a pinch of kosher salt
a tablespoon of caraway seeds, plus a little more

Method
Start by briefly toasting the tablespoon of caraway seeds in a dry sauté pan for a few seconds, until you can smell them. Then dump them into your mixing bowl. Add the two types of flour, the yeast, the water, and the salt. Then mix until the dough just forms a ball. If the mixture seems too loose and sticky, add a little bit of flour at a time until it forms. If the mixture seems too hard and dry, add little splashes of water until it loosens up. Then let the dough sit and rise covered in a warm place, for about an hour.

After the hour is up mix it again for about five minutes, then transfer it to a loaf pan (a disposable aluminum pan would work as well). Sprinkle on the remaining caraway seeds, and if you’ve got some coarse salt that would be good as well. Then let it rise in a warm place again, for at least another hour. While it’s rising preheat your oven to 450 degrees and put a small, oven proof dish full of water on the bottom rack. A broiler pan works great for this. The steam that will be released from this oven will help your bread expand more and yet form a nice crust while baking.

After the hour is up, move the pan into the oven and let it bake for about 45 minutes. Remove it from the oven, turn the loaf out of the pan, and let it cool for at least 20 minutes before eating. Best served with a smear of really good mustard and maybe a good half sour pickle.

Japanese Turnips with Miso Ghee

My CSA just started on the 11th so I'm really excited. In the first batch, I got some Japanese turnips. I used to never like turnips but this variety has a mild flavor and a nice, almost watery texture compared to others. I have been cooking with this one recipe for Japanese turnips with miso butter from epicurious that I really like and realized that instead of butter, why not use ghee! Thus, miso ghee was born.

This recipe calls for white miso which is made from fermented rice, barley and soy beans. There are several different types of miso, and this one is on the sweeter side. I started cooking with miso not long ago and realized after purchasing it from a Japanese market in Manhattan that my local corner store carries it as well so it is quite easy to find. It adds really good flavor as a base in soups, salad dressings and as a glaze on vegetables and goes really well with mirin, a Japanese sweet rice wine that is also included in this recipe. For a vegetarian, miso is a good addition because it's high in protein.

These are my turnips. They are so small so I just cook them whole:

Japanese Turnips with Miso Ghee (adapted from epicurious)

Ingredients

3 tablespoons white miso
3 tablespoons unsalted ghee, divided
3 pounds small (1 1/2-to 2-inch) Japanese turnips with greens
1 1/3 cups water
2 tablespoons mirin

Method
Stir together miso and 2 tablespoons ghee.

Discard turnip stems and coarsely chop leaves. Halve turnips (leave whole if tiny) and put in a pan along with water, mirin and the remaining tablespoon of ghee. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, and then cover and boil for 10 minutes.

Add greens by the handful and mix in. Cover and cook for 1 minute. Uncover and continue boiling, stirring occasionally, until turnips are tender and liquid is reduced to a glaze, about 5 minutes. (I sometimes add a little more liquid so it gets kind of soupy so I can mix it with rice but both ways are really good.) Stir in miso ghee and cook 1 minute.

This is what it should look like if you cook off all of the liquid:

The Spice Route: Louisa Shafia on Sumac

I'm happy to introduce and welcome my friend Louisa Shafia of Lucid Foods and the author of a really amazing cookbook by the same name to The Spice Route. I can't wait to try out her recipe below. I hope you enjoy!

Name: Louisa Shafia

Where do you live? Brooklyn, NY

What do you love to do? Show people how tasty and beautiful healthy food can be.

What’s your spice? Sumac

What do you know about it?

Sumac is a dried berry that has a sour taste and a high vitamin C content. It’s used a lot in Mediterranean cuisine and throughout the Middle East as a garnish to give food a sour flavor. Sumac is delicious on everything from kebabs to cooked whole grains. Even though it’s used in other parts of the world, sumac grows wild throughout North America. In August through September, the berries appear like bright red cones on the lemon-scented leaves of this shrub. You can distinguish edible sumac from the poison sumac plant because the berries of poison sumac are white. After you pick the berries, crush them lightly and use them fresh, or dry them and store in an airtight container.

What do you like about it? I discovered sumac in Persian cuisine. It’s usually used as a garnish for fish. I love the sour taste, and it the red powder makes a perfect garnish for lots of foods.

What’s your favorite vegetarian recipe using it? Seared tempeh with sumac (recipe can be used for chicken as well and that is what is pictured below)

Pan-seared Tempeh or Chicken with Sumac by Louisa Shafia

Ingredients

2 8-oz packages tempeh cut in thirds or 4 chicken breasts or thighs
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 scallions
2 garlic cloves
1/2 cup lime juice
3 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 teaspoon turmeric
2 teaspoons cumin
sumac to taste

Method
Lay the tempeh or chicken flat in a glass baking dish and season with the salt and pepper. In a blender, place the scallions, garlic, lime juice, olive oil, turmeric, and cumin, and blend until smooth. Pour half of the marinade over your protein and toss gently to coat. Marinate in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour or as long as overnight.

Heat a large sauté pan over medium-high heat and add just enough oil to coat the bottom. Add the tempeh or chicken and sear until brown, about 5 minutes. Brush with the reserved marinade. Turn and sear the second side. Reduce the heat to low and brush with marinade. Cover and cook for approximately 30 minutes, or until the thickest part of the chicken is opaque inside.

Season with salt and pepper. Serve the tempeh or chicken over rice, and dust generously with sumac.

Doddapatre Tambuli (Herbed Buttermilk)

Tambuli (pronounced thumbulli) is a spicy buttermilk dish made from the herbal leaves like the ones above called doddapatre soppu. This recipe is made in the state of Karnataka in South India where my mother's family is from. I had tambuli for the first time when my Auntie Asha made it for me recently and loved it. I got these leaves from my her and my Uncle Janardhan who grow them in their garden in New Jersey. The plant is a succulent and has thick, green leaves. Doddapatre soppu is referred to as Cuban Oregano. It has the flavor of oregano but it is more pungent.

My Aunt told me that often my Grandfather used to have tambuli if he was ailing from joint pain. The leaves are medicinal and have also been used as an Ayurvedic remedy for coughs, sore throat, congestion and digestion. This dish has a really nice flavor from the leaves, coconut, black pepper and cumin seeds. You mix it up with hot rice and eat.

These leaves are hard to come by and a lot of times grown in home gardens, but I'm going to give you the recipe anyway in case you ever chance upon them. Also, I know that some people make this dish with ginger if they don't have the leaves.

I'm really happy to share my Aunt's recipe for tambuli that she has perfected over the years. Enjoy!

Doddapatre Tambuli

courtesy of Asha Janardhan

Ingredients

2 teaspoons canola oil

6 doddapatre soppu leaves

1/2 teaspoon cumin

1/2 teaspoon ground pepper

2 tablespoons frozen fresh grated coconut

1 1/2 cups buttermilk or watered down yogurt or a mixture of buttermilk and yogurt

1/2 teaspoon black mustard seeds

pinch of asafoetida or hing

3 fresh curry leaves

1 dried red chili

salt

Method

Wash the leaves and chop them.

In a pan add 1 teaspoon of oil and heat under medium high. When hot add the cumin seeds until they start to turn golden. Next add in the pepper grinds and fry for a few seconds. Add in the leaves and saute them until wilted. Cool the leaves off.

Add the leaves, coconut to a blender and make a paste with as little water added as possible. Put the paste in a bowl and mix with the buttermilk/yogurt.

In a small pan, add 1 teaspoon of oil under medium high heat and add the mustard seeds and asafoetida or hing. When the mustard seeds start to pop, turn the heat down to medium and add the broken red chili and the curry leaves. Mix around so they are both coated with oil. Pour on top of the yogurt mixture.

You can chill the tambuli and serve with hot rice.

The Spice Route: Recipe Relay on Cumin

The Spice Route is a new segment on the ABCD's!  Each post of the segment will feature one of my friends sharing what they know about a spice they like to cook with and a recipe using it. I hope you enjoy and I'm so happy to kick off The Spice Route with my friends Sarah and Brianna of Recipe Relay:

Name: Sarah Maine and Brianna Bain (co-founders of RecipeRelay.com)

Where do you live? Queens, NY (Sarah) and San Diego, CA (Brianna)

What do you love to do? We love to share seasonal recipes and stories about good food that’s good for you and good for the planet.

What’s your spice? Cumin

 








 

What do you know about it? Neither of us knew that much about cumin except that it was used across many different cuisines, such as Mexican, Middle Eastern, Mediterranean and Thai foods.  A pretty impressive array, and one of the things that drew us to cumin for this segment.  Since we didn’t know much about it we embarked on a little research and here is what we found: According to Wikipedia, cumin is the dried seed of the herb Cuminum cyminum, a member of the parsley family.  It was introduced to the Americas by Spanish and Portuguese colonists. Today it is mostly grown in Iran, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Morocco, Egypt, India, Syria, Mexico, and Chile.  A well traveled spice!

What do you like about it? Cumin sneaks up on you, it can be what MAKES your favorite dish without you even knowing it’s there. It’s like the song playing in the background that makes you feel so good, but you don’t realize until way later that you heard it. It’s a mood setting spice - rustic, full bodied and warm!

What’s your favorite recipe using it? There are way too many tasty recipes that include cumin to pick only one favorite.  We decided to present two cumin recipes from cuisines on opposite sides of the world (in true RecipeRelay fashion!).  Given that we are all gearing up for the summer we chose to do two quick and easy no-cook dips: Spicy Guacamole and good ol’ fashioned Hummus.  Enjoy! 

Spicy Guacamole by Brianna Bain

Ingredients
4 avocados
1 serrano chile
2 Tbs olive oil
1 tsp cumin
1 large tomato
½ red onion
½ bunch fresh cilantro
Juice of ½ a lime
salt to taste

Method
1. In a food processor mix onion, tomato, chile, cilantro, cumin, lime juice and olive oil. Blend to a coarsely chopped mixture.
2. In a medium bowl spoon out avocado flesh and smash with a fork.
3. Add to mixture from processor to avocado and mix well.
4. Serve with your favorite tortilla chips.

Hummus by Sarah Maine

Ingredients
2 cup well-cooked or canned chickpeas
¼ cup olive oil
3 Tbs chickpea liquid (add more for a thinner texture)
4 cloves garlic, sliced
1 Tbs ground cumin
3 Tbs tahini
Juice of 1 lemon

Method
1. Drain the chickpeas, reserving some of the cooking or canning liquid.
2. In a food processor blend the chickpeas, garlic, olive oil and chickpea cooking liquid.
3. Once the chickpeas are all ground up add the lemon juice, tahini, and cumin and process until very smooth.  You can add salt if you feel like it needs it.
4. If your food processor has limitations (like mine does!) you may need to transfer the mixture to a bowl and beat it with a whisk to get it really smooth.
5. Serve drizzled with olive oil and a sprinkle of cumin.  Great with pita wedges, raw veggies, or even as a sandwich spread.