Coconut & Chili--Fancy Food Show Trends 2013

In addition to "chia in everything" two other trends I saw at the Winter 2013 Fancy Food Show were lots of products with coconut and a more sophisticated use of chili. 

It was impossible to miss the virtual rivers of coconut water at the show. Interestingly, they don't all taste the same. Some are sweet and others have a funny aftertaste. Some are thin and others are slightly viscous or have chunks of coconut in them. I'm still not a huge fan, but maybe I just haven't tasted the right one yet.

Here were a few of my favorite coconut products.

Why So Good! toasted coconut chips are not yet on the market, but they will be soon. They are an addictive snack, salty and sweet but with a ton of crunch. Never mind potato chips, once you open a bag of these, poof! It's empty. Dang Foods makes a similarly delicious product, also imported from Thailand. 

JJ's Sweets Cocomels are nice little caramels that happen to be made with coconut milk. They are creamy, but not dairy so vegans can breathe a sigh of relief. 

I'm already a big fan of 479 popcorn, so I look forward to each new flavor. This time around, it's coconut, specifically toasted coconut caramel. And it's as good as it sounds. Not too sweet but kind of nutty flavored. 

Brad's raw onion rings are just one product in a line of "raw" chips and snacks. I liked the onion rings best. They are dehydrated and then flavored. "Classy coconut" is one of four flavors, but one of the best.

CHILI

Chili has been a popular ingredient in specialty foods forever, but it used to be more about heat than anything else. Now chili is showing up frequently in sweet foods in a more nuanced way. Here are some of my favorite chile products from the show. 

Chili lime chips might seem mundane these days, but Anette's Chocolate brand chili lime tequila tortilla chip brittle is anything but.  I don't know who thought it would be a good idea to make brittle out of tortilla chips, but it certainly was and incorporating sour and hot flavors into a sweet product makes it all the more delectable.  

Wild Poppy makes a line of interesting juice drinks. I particularly liked the grapefruit ginger and the blood orange chili. The heat in the ginger and chili add an almost refreshing quality to the drink, balancing the sweetness. 

Way Better Snacks Sweet Chili tortilla chips are made from sprouted grains and are flecked with sprouted chia, broccoli and daikon radish seeds, definitely a twist on the typical tortilla chip. The chili in these chips is cayenne but not too hot.

Chili mango flats from Pure Indulgent Foods are yet another example of sweet and spicy coming together, this time in a cookie like hazelnut cracker that is a good accompaniment to cheese or charcuterie. 

I'll have more favorite discoveries from the Fancy Food Show soon...

Mango Kiwi Cashew Chicken Salad in an Avocado Coconut Sauce

Regrets litter our lives.  Words spoken in haste, sentiments left unspoken.  Ideas remaining only ideas.   Bad decisions made. Actions rashly performed.

Recent regrets include, but are not limited to, the following:
-Choosing to wear flimsy pink ballet flats while spending approximately 12 hours walking around outside.
-Teaching our offspring about the wonders of popcorn and ice cream so that every single day of the week involves toddler demands for these two items.
-Adding butternut squash to macaroni and cheese, tainting the glorious cheese and pasta combination with a cloying sweetness.
-Eating marinara sauce while having a giant canker sore.
-Failing to put sunblock on my back, resulting in painful redness.
-Adding butternut squash a second time to a batch of macaroni and cheese.
-Eating a Granny Smith apple while having a giant canker sore.
-Wearing the flimsy pink ballet flats AGAIN while spending copious hours walking outside.
-Doing that super embarrassing mom move where you lick your hand to pat down a renegade hair on a child, the repercussions of this involved tiny saliva filled hands being wiped on my skin and hair.
-Eating Granny Smith apple in a salad containing both vinegar and lemon juice while having that giant canker sore.
-Picking up way too many avocados at the exact same stage of ripeness, forcing us to eat them for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for two days straight.

I am not a quick learner.

Future regrets include:
-Watching the upcoming season of Secret Life of the American Teenager.  Now would have been perfect time to stop the addiction.

Looking back, one good thing did result from this surfeit of avocados.  A salad of chicken, mango, kiwi, cashews and cilantro coated in a gingery coconut and avocado sauce.  Most definitely not a regret.

Ingredients
2 chicken breasts
canola oil
1 teaspoon Madras curry powder
kosher salt, to taste
freshly ground black pepper, to taste
1 mango, peeled, pitted and diced
3 kiwifruit, peeled and diced
1/2 cup roasted and salted cashews
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
1 avocado, pit and peel removed
1/4 cup coconut milk
1 1/2 teaspoon grated ginger
2 teaspoons lemon juice
bit of lemon zest
kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Instructions
Sprinkle chicken with curry powder, salt, and pepper, brown each side in canola oil over high heat. Turn heat to low to finish cooking.  Once it has cooked, take off heat and let cool.  Slice into chunks. Place in a bowl with the mango, kiwi, cashews, and cilantro.

In a medium bowl,  stir the avocado and milk together.  Add in the ginger, lemon juice and zest.  Mix in the chicken mixture.  Adjust salt, pepper, and lemon juice to taste.  Serve with baguette slices or on a sandwich.

Azalina's Malaysian Pop-up Dinner March 10

Suvir Saran with Azalina Eusope at the SF Street Food Night Market, 2012

There are some chefs who cook with their whole being, with their blood, sweat and tears, with their heart and with their soul. Azalina Eusope is one of those chefs and you can taste her passion in every bite. I am not alone in feeling honored to eat her food. 

Azalina’s specialty is Malaysian street food, and it should come as no surprise because she’s a fifth generation street food vendor. Fifth generation. I have no idea what my great grandparents did, let alone my great great grandparents. I know they didn’t eat food nearly as vibrant and textured and layered with flavors as what Azalina cooks. Malaysian street food is not subtle or elegant, it’s in your face, big, bold, exciting, and comforting all at once. It demands your attention and you will be happy to give it.

I could tell you that Azalina is an inspiring role model, a success story, an immigrant, a member of the Mamak tribe renowned for their cooking abilities. But I’d rather just encourage you to eat her food. While she makes regular appearances at Off The Grid Fort Mason (a street food event) most of the year, and her prepared food is showing up in places like Bi-Rite and Whole Foods, there is another way you can enjoy it. There is one more pop-up dinner she will be doing at Wise Sons Deli next Sunday night, March 10th. But I must warn you, it’s a small restaurant and it gets very crowded so...

Come early and prepare to stand in line

Come with a very small group (2-4 people max)

Come prepared to eat! 

The a la carte menu changes every week, so you can check Azalina's website if you’d like to know what she’ll be serving. This is what I had this past Sunday night: 

Asam Laksa

This sour and tangy tamarind based noodle soup with a healthy dose of spice has mackerel and was topped with slices of cucumber, chile, red onion and pineapple. Asam laksa is very delicious, but don’t just take my word for it, CNN listed it as the #7 most delicious dish in the world in 2011. 

Mee rebus 

This is another popular street food dish, with yam, potatoes, tomato and spices, hand made noodles, fritters, drenched in a very rich and sweet curry like gravy and garnished with peanuts and herbs and a hard boiled egg. Pure comfort. 

Sweet potato dumplings

These chewy dumplings had a dash of coconut cream and some fresh sprouts. 

Azalina’s Pop up

at

Wise Sons Deli 

3150 24th St 

San Francisco

March 10, 6-9 pm.

Sweet Potato Poha Recipe

Not long ago Chef Suvir Saran tipped off Facebook followers, letting us know his poha recipe that was on Tasting Table and urging us to try it. I know how good it feels to have people cook your recipes and so does cookbook author and food writer Marlena Spieler so we both took him up on it. Neither of us had ever cooked with poha before. Poha are rice flakes used in a variety of Indian recipes, especially for breakfast. They cook up light and fluffy and are very mild. Like hash brown potatoes, they make a great blank canvas for spices, aromatics and vegetables. 

Marlene Spieler shopping at Vik's

Planning to cook an Indian dish makes a fine excuse for lunch at Vik's Chaat House in Berkeley. Marlena and I met up for bountiful chaat, pani puri and a luscious special with creamy eggplant and okra then we headed over to the adjoining shop for further culinary adventures. I stocked up on fragrant curry leaves, coconut flakes, thick poha flakes, chiles and black sesame seeds while Marlena ogled the pickled mango and lime and picked out some beans. It's easy to get inspired in an Indian market! 

I found Suvir's recipe fairly easy to follow, though I adapted the instructions a bit and bumped up the crunch factor by adding more coconut and peanuts.  The preparation takes a little effort but the actual cooking goes very quickly. 

To prepare poha you simply rinse the rice flakes in cool water then gently heat them up in a pan with whatever ingredients you like. This recipe uses sweet potatoes, peanuts, coconut and plenty of red onion but I've seen much more basic recipes too. I served this poha dish as a side dish, instead of rice with veal chops.

In addition to being versatile, poha is very economical too, an enormous 2 pound bag cost only $1.49. I enjoyed the poha leftovers with a fried egg on top and it was heavenly. Now go see Marlena's post and recipe.



Sweet Potato Poha adapted from a recipe by Suvir Saran & Tasting Table

Serves 4 

Ingredients

1 Tablespoon rice bran oil or vegetable oil

12 curry leaves, roughly torn

1/2 teaspoon black mustard seeds

1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds

1 dried red chile

1/8 teaspoon asafetida

1 medium red onion, halved and thinly sliced

1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt, divided

1 medium sweet potato, chopped into roughly ½-inch dice

1/2 cup roasted and salted peanuts, roughly chopped

1/2 cup unsweetened large-flake dried coconut

1 serrano pepper, finely chopped

2 cups thick poha rice flakes, rinsed under cold water and drained

Juice of 1 lime, plus 1 lime cut into wedges

1/2 cup roughly chopped cilantro

Instructions

Heat a large skillet or wok over medium-low heat, add the coconut and cook until crispy and golden. Remove coconut from the pan and set aside. Return the pan to the stove and add the oil, curry leaves, mustard seeds, cumin seeds, red chile and asafetida and cook, stirring often, until the cumin seeds are golden brown, about 2 minutes (be careful--the mustard seeds will pop).

Add the onion and ½ teaspoon of salt and cook, stirring occasionally, until the onion is soft, 3 to 4 minutes (if the onions begin to brown, reduce the heat). Stir in the sweet potatoes and cook, stirring occasionally, until they are cooked around the edges, 7 to 8 minutes. Add the serrano pepper, cooking until the sweet potatoes are tender about 5 minutes, add a couple tablespoons of water to keep the sweet potatoes from sticking to the pan if necessary.

Add the poha and remaining 1 teaspoon of salt. Gently stir the poha into the sweet potato-onion mixture to incorporate it without breaking the delicate rice flakes. Drizzle the water around the sides of the skillet, cover and reduce the heat to low. Cook the poha until it is warmed through, about 5 minutes. Remove the cover and add the reserved coconut, chopped peanuts, and the lime juice use a fork to fluff the mixture and combine. Taste and adjust the salt if needed. Sprinkle with the cilantro and serve with the lime wedges on the side.

Enjoy!

Veggie and Herb Cream Cheese on Everything Bagel, Topped with Smoked Salmon, Radish, and Chives

It is said that Albert Einstein defined insanity as, "doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results."

I am, perhaps, insane.  Every spring, once I spot a container of potted herbs being sold at the farmers' market, I snatch one up.  How can I resist? So vibrant and lush, brimming with parsley and basil and thyme and rosemary and sage and cilantro and chives, one cannot help but be reeled in by their scent, their color, and the promise of delicious food to come.

Then I prance back home with my container.  Visions of herbs flavoring breakfasts, lunches, and dinners dance in my head.

And then each herb withers away.  I think I somehow manage to over-water and under-water all at once.  Usually cilantro goes first.  Or parsley.  Then the chives.  And then the rest follow suit, each meeting their own demise.  All except the thyme.  That, apparently, likes me.  Its affections are not unappreciated.

So there they are - my dreams of plucking fresh herbs right from the container on the deck lying shattered on the ground, replaced by the reality of having to purchase them from a store instead.

This plays out every year. It won't be too long until that container is spotted once again at the farmers' market.  And I of course will try, try again.  The chives and basil came from a store this time.  However, I remain optimistic that the future will be sprinkled with my own fresh herbs.  Perhaps this optimism is indeed insanity.  It is all so subjective.

Ingredients
1 block cold cream cheese
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1/4 cup chopped chives
1/2 cup chopped basil leaves
2 scallions, chopped
1-2 tablespoons minced jalapeno
3 stalks celery, minced
1 cup baby spinach
1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
2 teaspoons lemon juice

everything bagel, toasted
smoked salmon
radishes, sliced
handful chopped chives

Instructions
Beat the cream cheese and butter in a stand mixer.  Then toss in the herbs, scallions, jalapeno, celery, spinach, lemon juice and zest.  Beat again until everything is incorporated.  Spread on toasted everything bagel.  Top with pieces of smoked salmon, radish slices, and more chives.

A Place at the Table: Hunger in America & Beyond

Certain issues are very near and dear to my heart and none more so than hunger. Having worked in a homeless shelter, I got to know people who struggled to get enough to eat on a daily basis and it was an honor to be able to feed them. Ironically the homeless shelter I worked at was in a very wealthy county. But hunger is something that the richest and the poorest countries have in common and it doesn't just affect the homeless. And it will take public effort to make the changes necessary to see that hunger is wiped out. 

A Place at the Table, a film addressing hunger in the US is being released today, March 1. I got a chance to preview it and found it very moving with portraits of people struggling in our midst. It looks at just some of the reasons that hunger exists in the US. Perhaps not surprisingly, politics and subsidies are an important part of the picture. The film aims to increase our understanding of the problem it also points to some solutions. Though the current debate on raising the minimum wage is not part of the film, it's worth taking a look at too. Should anyone working full time making minimum wage still have a tough time putting food on the table? As taxpayers we are effectively subsidizing the big corporations that pay minimum wage in the form of programs like Medicare and food stamps. And we are subsidizing big agribusiness rather than family farms with farm subsidizes that do little to address hunger. 

Another effort to draw attention to hunger is Oxfam's latest research study looking a the policies of the ten largest food and beverage companies. They draw the connection between these companies who collectively make $1 billion dollars a day, and the millions of people in developing countries who supply the labor, land, water and other commodities needed to enable them to make their products and their profits.  

Solutions start with knowledge and taking responsibility---we all have a part to play and that includes our politicians and the brands we buy. I hope you will find a way to help reduce hunger in America and beyond. Here are some ways to get involved:

Voice your support for America's anti-hunger programs

Contribute to the No Kid Hungry campaign through Share our Strength 

Change the way food companies that make top brands do business

I donate to my local food bank and ask family to donate to it instead of buying me holiday gifts, what do you do to help end hunger? 

Whale-Shaped Crackers with Cheddar and Nori, an Ode to the Whale

In terms of cetacean appreciation, dolphins get the glory.  They are so cute and friendly and sleek.  Jumping out of the water to show off their spins and spyhops.  Equipped with a fancy echolocation system to navigate.  And can even come in the color pink, a fact that Max is super in love with.  Okay okay, dolphins are really awesome.  And yes, I'm pretty taken with the pink dolphins as well.

But whales are awesome too.  This weekend is the start of the Festival of Whales here in Dana Point, marking the migration of the gray whale (though blue whales have strangely been spotted recently as well).  We are totally obsessed with both whales and the festival.  Like, lets cut whale shapes out of construction paper and string them together to make banners to hang up kind of obsessed.  Like, lets turn our food into whale-shapes obsessed.  Like, watching Blue Planet over and over and over again obsessed.  I've even done some research into the gray whale's diet, pondering ways to incorporate  it into whale-party food.  I'm such a dork.

All lumpy and big and grungy, they might not be as chic and beautiful as their dolphin relatives, but they are just as lovable. From the narwhal, an animal about which I'm half-convinced doesn't actually exist but is just a figment of someone's imagination...to the humpbacks with their renowned singing and their own version of pop music...and to the blue whales, being the biggest living thing EVER - the whale, in all its diversity, is due for some love.  So this is our ode.  Our ode to the whale (see previously, ode to ground beef).

Last year, we made these.  In celebration of our devotion to this cetacean and our town's festival.  This year we made crackers - a sonnet expressing our love, but in an edible form.  Whole wheat, buttery, sesame seed filled crackers topped with cheese and a sprinkling of nori goma furikake.  Seth introduced this combination of cracker, cheddar, and the nori, and we have been hooked ever since.  The cheese can also be seen as an homage to our pure and utter cheesiness. I wasn't kidding about being a dork.

Ingredients
3 cups white whole wheat flour
1/4 cup roasted sesame seeds
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 cup cold butter, cut into small pieces
1 - 2 cups ice water
whale shaped cookie cutter
good quality cheddar, sliced
nori goma furikake

Instructions
In a mixing bowl, whisk flour, sesame, baking powder, salt, and peppers.  Rub the butter into the flour using your hands or pastry cutter, until the mixture looks like coarse sand.  In the bowl of a stand mixer, very gradually, and on low speed, add the cold water, stopping once a dough forms.  You want the mixture to hold together and to no longer be dry. Take half the mixture and put in fridge.  Roll out the other half on a silpat or parchment until about 1/8 to 1/4 inch thick.  Use the cookie cutter to make whale shapes.  Sprinkle with just a bit of fleur de sel and place in 375 degree oven for 10-15 minutes, until golden and crisp.  Repeat with the rest of the dough.  To serve, top with a slice of cheddar and a sprinkle of nori.