Recipe – Page 5 – Mado Food

Tomatillo Salsa Verde

You’ll find fresh tomatillos at Farmers’ Market now, wrapped in their papery husks. Inherently sour, tomatillos make a piquant salsa that can still take a squeeze or two of lime juice. A wonderful item to can. Simply multiply by 6 to create a large batch that will keep your pantry full of salsa all winter long.

2 tbsp coconut oil

½ red onion, chopped

1 large garlic clove, chopped

12 tomatillos, quartered

½ tsp salt

¼ cup water

1-2 tsp dried chili flakes

1 tbsp sugar

2 tbsp fresh lime juice

¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro

Heat oil in a medium saucepan and saute onion and garlic until soft and fragrant. Add tomatillos, salt, water and chili flakes and simmer 10 minutes, covered until tomatillos turn light green and sauce thickens. Season with lime juice and garnish with cilantro. Makes 1 cup.

September 15, 2020October 23, 2024

MadoFood2 Comments

Almond Biscotti

Servings: 5-6 dozen
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I really can’t live in a house without biscotti. They are my go-to cookie and a welcome gift to friends and family . Thanks to the double bake, they store for weeks, even months in a closed glass container and travel well on airplanes and road trips.

Biscotti Batter:

1 1/2 cups whole, raw almonds

1 ¼ cup organic all purpose flour

1 ¼ cup organic soft whole wheat flour or spelt

1 1/4 cups organic granulated sugar

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

4 large eggs

3 tsp vanilla

The Finishing Touches:

1-3 tbsp flour (for rolling out logs)

1 tbsp organic granulated sugar

Preheat oven to 350 ° F.

To toast almonds, arrange on a baking sheet and bake for 5 minutes.

In a large bowl, combine flours, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Use a whisk to mix thoroughly.

Whisk eggs and vanilla in bowl of an electric mixer until frothy. Use the paddle attachment to mix in flour and sugar mixture. As soon as the dough clumps around the paddle, add toasted almonds and mix until just combined.

Dust countertop with flour. Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper.

Spoon out one quarter of the sticky dough, dust lightly with flour and working quickly, roll into a 8-10 inch log. Transfer log to baking sheet. Repeat 3 times.

Sprinkle sugar over logs with pinched fingers.

Bake for 30 minutes or until biscotti logs are golden and firm. Completely cool logs on a rack for at least 30 min. Using a serrated knife, cut crosswise into 3/4 inch wide slices. Arrange cut side down on baking sheets and return to 350 oven for 10-15 minutes or until golden-brown and crisp.

September 13, 2020October 23, 2024

MadoFood1 Comment

Chiang Mai Noodle soup

This is a dreamy Thai noodle-soup dish, famous in the northern city of Chiang Mai. The addition of turmeric gives it rich colour. Delicious with chicken but also great with shrimp, or a mixture of both. Noodles can also be switched up. Fresh egg noodles found in Asian supermarkets are the classic addition, but dried thick rice noodles are perfect, too.

Serves 6

2 tbsp vegetable oil

1 tbsp chopped garlic

1 sweet red pepper, diced

1/2 cup coconut cream

3 tbsp red curry paste

1 tsp ground turmeric

1 3/4 cup coconut milk

3 1/2 cups chicken stock

15 basil leaves

2-3 chopped bird’s eye chillies

3 tbsp fish sauce

2 tsp sambal oelek chili sauce

1 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp salt

2 lbs. boneless chicken breast, thinly sliced or shrimp, peeled and deveined

3 tbsp lime juice

1/2 lb Chinese egg noodles or rice noodles

1/2 cup chopped fresh coriander

4 green onions, chopped

In a large pot on medium-high, heat the oil. Add garlic and stir-fry 30 seconds or until golden. Add diced red pepper and stir-fry 2-3 minutes or until tender.

Open the can of coconut milk and gently spoon off half a cup of the thick cream on top into the pot. Warm the coconut cream at medium-high, whisk in curry paste and turmeric and continue to whisk until coconut cream starts to separate slightly and glisten with oil. Add remaining contents of coconut milk can, chicken stock, basil, chillies, fish sauce, sambal oelek, sugar and salt. Bring to a boil, then simmer. Add chicken or shrimp and cook gently until it is just cooked through. Remove from heat and stir in lime juice.

In a large pot of boiling, salted water, boil egg or rice noodles for 2 minutes or until just tender. Drain.

Place one-sixth of the noodles in each bowl and ladle over with hot soup. Garnish with coriander and green onions.

September 11, 2020October 23, 2024

MadoFood4 Comments

Asian bbq’ed Chicken

Asian BBQed Chicken Thighs

Servings: 4
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While chili paste is an essential ingredient of this marinade it does not produce a spicy chicken thigh. Trust me.

¼ cup soy sauce

½ cup cooking sherry

1 tbsp sesame oil

1 tsp sugar

1 tspsambal oelek * Optional but highly recommended

1 inch knob ginger, grated

2 garlic cloves, pressed or grated

8 skin-on, bone-in chicken thighs

In a bowl, combine soy, cooking sherry, sesame oil, sugar, sambal oelek, ginger and garlic. Pour over chicken thighs (I like to marinate in a glass casserole with thighs in a single layer). Marinate for at least 30 min and up to overnight, in the fridge.

Barbecue thighs on indirect heat (as described above) for 30-40 minutes or until juices run clear and meat is thoroughly cooked.

September 6, 2020October 23, 2024

MadoFood4 Comments

Making Gnocchi with the boss

It’s a cold winter night in Toronto. I’m about to drive over to Rocca’s for dinner, but text her first.

“Get three to four medium at No Frills,” she instructs. We need Yukon golds.

When I arrive, their house oozes Puglian warmth. Randy says “You don’t have to knock” and Rocca calls from upstairs, saying “Do you want some slippers?’

She enters the kitchen and pulls out the pasta board. It’s two feet by two feet, thick plywood with a lip that catches under the table. Her father, or Nonno to the grandkids, made it for her.

Nonno will turn 95 next Sunday. They want to celebrate at a restaurant but he asks his daughters to make him cavatelli, his favourite pasta.

“Handmade pasta for 25 people,” says Rocca shaking her head and muttering Puglian swear words.

But tonight, the pasta is gnocchi.

“I’ll get started while you have some wine and cheese,” says Rocca.

Randy is dangling a large breast and nipple from a string. It’s a cheese called Caciocavallo and the size of a small cantaloupe.

“Our annual Father’s Day cheese,” he laughs, an impish grin spreading across his mug. I nibble on slices with baguette and knock back some Rosso while Rocca deftly peels the potatoes, cuts them into quarters and boils in salted water.

“I’ll demo the first batch, then it will be your turn,’” she announces.

Oh boy.

She measures out two cups of organic, unbleached all-purpose flour and piles it on her papa’s pasta board. With a flick of her right hand, she swirls a hole in the middle, creating a powdery volcano waiting for liquid. I spoon chunks of hot, cooked potato into her ricer and she squeezes, mightily, creating a rainfall of potato strands.

The essence of these gnocchi – hot steaming Yukon gold potatoes – slips and wafts through the kitchen air. We share a satisfied cooking smile. Rocca taps a free run Omega 3 egg on a bowl’s edge and we both go “ahhh” over the yolk’s deep orange-ness.

She sprinkles the flour and potato mound with salt. I ask how much and she mutters “Normale”.

She wields a bottle of olive oil and pours two large glugs into the mound, creating golden streaks and streams throughout. I ask how much and she shrugs her shoulders, too busy to fuss over measurements.

Then she does something that makes this recipe writer crazy: she slides the beaten egg into an empty measuring cup and pours reserved (and cooled) potato cooking water into it up to the one cup line.

As I sigh in frustration, Rocca clutches a quarter dry measure and twice she scoops up egg and potato water mix sprinkling it over the potatoes, flour, salt and olive oil. Using her bare hands, she mushes it all together (I recommend a dough scraper). It doesn’t coalesce into a good clump so she adds another quarter cup of egg and potato water. In seconds, it transforms into a hot, soft dough, pliable and warm. The perfect spot between sticky and dry. We cut off a half cup chunk and roll it into a snake, then cut of half-inch pieces she calls “chicklets”.

“Do you want to cut chicklets or roll out the gnocchi?”

While the former sounds easy, I know I need practice rolling. She has a small wooden board, the size of a large smartphone that is corduroy-ed, with narrow slits, and she demos how to roll a piece of gnocchi dough along this surface. One deft move and “Voila!” it’s a cute little roll with ridges.

Fast forward 18 months. Rocca is at the gnocchi helm again, this time in the Cowichan Valley bossing David and me. We stand at the counter each with a pile of PC “OO” (doppio zero) flour before us. We blend in cooked and riced BC-grown yellow potatoes plus potato water mixed with egg. A soft, warm dough forms instantly and we knead it ever so briefly. We start to cut dough chunks, roll out dough snakes, cut into chicklets and press against the gnocchi board. It takes a skillful hand but Rocca won’t do it. She says “your job” and David and I steal competitive glances at each other’s work.

We fill two baking trays with our ridged dumplings. Rocca cooks them in hot boiling salted water, plunking them in and lifting them out with a slotted spoon, the second each gnocchi bobs to the surface indicating doneness. Cooked gnocchi slide into a bath of ice cubes and cold water in order to halt cooking. Later they are drained en masse and drizzled with lots of olive oil. Their final destination is a good sauce.

I happen to have one. Braised short ribs.

In Duncan I am able to find huge, fat short ribs at Thrifty’s supermarket. (In Toronto, I’d have to order them from a butcher since they never look this fat and ample in supermarket meat counters.)

We heat up my sauce in a large deep skillet, add the gnocchi and warm everything gently while someone grates Parmigiano-Reggiano and finds our sacred, big jar of Puglian hot peppers in oil.

Gnocchi is best served as a first course, or primi. It’s filling. Just two ladles full is ample for most. Rocca smiles in approval after she takes her first bite. The gnocchi are soft, delectable pillows bathed in an unctuous sauce, bedecked with parmesan.

Rocca’s Gnocchi

Servings: 6
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While Rocca prefers the counter technique for creating the dough, you can also mix everything in a large bowl. If you don’t have a gnocchi board, Rocca says it’s ok to leave as half-inch chicklets simply cut from the rolled dough.

3-4 Yukon Gold or yellow-flesh potatoes, peeled and quartered

2 cups flour, all-purpose or “00”

1 tsp sea salt

1 egg

2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

Bring a large pot of salted water to boil and cook potatoes until tender but not crumbling. Reserve a cup of cooking water before draining potatoes. Mound flour on the counter and create a well in the middle. Sprinkle over with salt. Once the potato water has cooled enough not to cook the egg, crack the egg into a glass measuring jar and fill to one level cup with potato water. Mix. Place potatoes in a ricer (if you don’t have one, grate them) and drop potato shreds into the flour well. Pour over ½ cup of egg/potato water and olive oil and mix into a dough, using a scraper or a spatula. Add another ¼-1/2 cup of liquid if needed to create a soft pliable dough. Roll and form gnocchi.

Heat a large pot of salted water to boil, gently add gnocchi. When gnocchi float to surface, remove with a slotted spoon and place directly in heated sauce or into an ice bath to cool.

Mado’s Short Rib Pasta Sauce

Servings: 12
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Preheat oven to 350 F

3 tbsp olive oil

2 large cooking onions, chopped

2 large ribs celery, chopped

2 tsp dried thyme

Salt

Heat oil in large Dutch oven, cook onions, celery and dried thyme with salt until soft and caramelized, about 5 minutes. Set aside.

Use the same pan to heat another 2 tbsp olive oil on high and brown

3 lbs short ribs (3-6 pieces)

Seasoned with salt and pepper

This takes about 3 min per side, total about 12 min. Set aside

Deglaze pan with 1 cup red wine (Shiraz/Syrah) scraping up all browned bits. Add sautéed onion mixture and

Add

1/2 tsp dried chili pepper flakes

½ cup dried porcini or shiitake mushrooms, finely crumbled

1 cup passata (pureed tomatoes, favourite brand is Mutti sold in tall glass jars)

3 crushed garlic cloves

Handful basil leaves, chopped

1-3 tsp sea salt

Lots of freshly cracked black pepper

Fill with water to just cover the ribs

Place a sheet of parchment over the surface, cover and bake at 350F for one hour, reduce to 325F and cook 2 more hours. Meat should be falling off the bones. Allow to cool (preferably overnight in the fridge). Skim fat. Remove bones and tendons. Shred meat gently.

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September 4, 2020October 23, 2024

MadoFood3 Comments

Sourdough Blackberry Lemon Muffins

I have a bit of a reputation. Some people call me a seed stealer. I prefer the term “forager”.

It all began in my tender years of five or six when I trailed alongside my Mom and brother walking along Muskoka roads lined with raspberry bushes. We held cardboard pint boxes in our little hands and were encouraged to pluck the red, ripe ones that slipped off the white core easily. There were thorns to avoid and lots of scratches to our bare legs and arms. The sun was beating down and sweat covered our brows. But boy oh boy, did those berries taste sweet. I ate nine out of every ten berries I picked, filling my box at a snail’s pace, but without a care. This was a hunt and I was hooked.

My mom had to tear me away from the berry thicket and throw all my berry stained clothes into the wash. We never picked enough for the pies or jams we talked and dreamed of. In fact, my berries barely covered the bottom of my box but were just enough for tomorrow’s breakfast bowl of Rice Krispies and cream.

Decades later, I found myself walking down a road in Grass Valley, California with my sister-in-law, Nora until I stopped dead in my tracks. I was receiving heavy signals from my personal berry radar.

“Are those blackberries?!”

Nora couldn’t feign an ounce of interest. It was devilishly hot in the dry August sun and she was parched, needing a cool glass of water back home– which was not in the direction I was pointing.

“You can’t do that!” she screamed as I hopped down into the ditch, climbing towards a flimsy fence separating me from my bounty. It was easy to climb under and I did, rewarded by a thick cluster of fat, juicy berries.

“Stop Mado, it’s private property,” she yelled as I dove into her neighbour’s field. I pulled my black shirt out like a hamper and dropped the berries in by the handful. They were three times the size of an Ontario blackberry and as sweet as can be. The proliferation stunned me. I’d never seen so many ripe, blackberries in my fruit-loving life.

To keep the family peace, I crawled back under the fence obeying my sister-in-law’s admonishments while offering her a handful of the stolen goods.

“Huh, what are these?” She held one berry in her fingers, brought it before her nose, inhaled, opened her mouth, popped the berry in and started to moan, loudly.

I’d found an accomplice.

The following day we returned to the field armed with empty yogurt containers, filling two each in no time. That evening we dined on my first and most memorable pie. Pure blackberry pie. I’d never made pie pastry before and somehow fashioned a semblance with flour and shortening found in the back corners of her cupboards. I filled it with our black bounty, fresh from the pick but already leaking juice, crushing the bottom berries with its weight.

I had set the oven at 425 F and in 10 minutes it had not only preheated but was rumbling like a coal fire. I opened the oven door and felt a blast of heat so outrageously hot, I trembled in fear, offering my sweet berry pie to this monster. I waited five minutes and wisely turned off the oven, realizing the oven thermometer was broken, fearing my pie would explode in a ball of lava if I didn’t stop the oven’s frenzy.

Remarkably, those free California blackberries and a broken oven thermometer was all I needed to make the most flaky, golden, berry-filled perfect pie of my life. Many have followed but none, thankfully, with as much drama.

I’m still a forager and a seed stealer dividing my time between downtown Toronto and rural BC. I am apt to walk down Logan Ave with a small set of scissors and surreptitiously snip off some morning glory seeds I have been watching dry throughout the fall. Recently I filled my pockets with sweet pea pods at a Duncan community garden, knowing the owner would consider me a seed-saver, not a thief. I expect the folks in the cars lined up at our Starbucks drive-through think the same when they see me roll down my window and pull a handful of brown and dry Cosmos flowers into the car as I wait for my latte order.

It’s all Ling’s fault. She asked me what those purple and white Cosmos flowers were growing in Riverdale gardens in the 1990s. I didn’t know their name, then. I asked her why she cared and she slipped a hand into her jeans’ pocket and revealed a mess of crumbled brown seed heads. Next, she scribbled “Purple Flowers” in Chinese on a piece of paper, put the seed heads in the middle and folded an instant, origami paper envelope.

“I brought seeds from Shanghai,” she said proudly. I knew then that any refugee fleeing their homeland who cares enough to pack seeds for the escape was exactly the kind of garden guru I wanted to learn from. Ling taught me not only seed saving, but how to root cuttings and separate clusters of African violets.

So are we thieves or stewards of the earth? I like to think the latter.

That’s why I came up with this muffin recipe. It combines the best of The BC Forageables – blackberries — and uses up sourdough that is normally discarded. A double save!