Vegetarian | Gourmandistan

Camille Glenn’s plum tart, or Marian Burros’ plum torte?

August 16, 2013 by Steve

It’s a very tasty plum tart. Buttery, jammy yet still light. We got the recipe from a late 20th century Louisville Courier-Journal clipping (the back side of the undated article talks about Seinfeld leading the ratings so we know it had to have been published somewhere in the 1989 to 1998 time frame). And Michelle’s mother’s handwritten note marked it as a Camille Glenn recipe. Indeed, the “Classic Plum Tart” calls for “cognac vanilla,” a signature Glenn ingredient. And yet, […]

Categories: Cake, Cooking, Food, Fruit Desserts, Old cookbooks, Plums, Recipes, Vegetarian

Nectarine peach chutney mostarda tautology redundancy

August 12, 2013 by Steve

Call this sweet, sassy, make-meat-more-savory sauce peach mostarda or nectarine chutney. Call it nectarine mostarda or peach chutney. Either way, you’ll quite possibly enjoy it as much as we have. Nectarines are to peaches as Channing Tatum is to Steve: basically the same thing, just without all the fuzz. (Steve acknowledges there may be additional differences between Channing Tatum and himself.) Indians and Italians may disagree, but some of their own authorities seem to think chutneys and mostardas are basically […]

Categories: Cooking, Food, Jams & Preserves, Peaches/Nectarines, Recipes, Vegetarian

Breaking fried corn out of its Southern Belle stereotype

August 4, 2013 by Steve

While the American South certainly has a number of strong, smart and standout women (an excellent example can often be found in Gourmandistan), the region still unfortunately nurtures some particularly painful flowerings of Southern womanhood, a few of whom have started to get their comeuppance. But we’re not here to hand out faded roses—we just want people to stop buying (and sugaring) Silver Queen corn and its even sweeter siblings. While many of our non-United States friends may believe the grain […]

Categories: Cooking, Corn, Food, Peppers, Recipes, Vegetarian

Blackberry chocolate chip ice cream makes you beg for a briar patch.

July 29, 2013 by Steve

Blackberries, it seems, would prefer you not pick them. That must be why in addition to hundreds of tiny sharp thorns ready to embed themselves in your skin, blackberry bushes arm themselves with an array of other nasty surprises. Poison ivy, snakes, spiders, hornets and wasps are only some of the things your fingers may brush while reaching for that plump purple berry. One taste of this ice cream, however, and you’ll be championing the return of Br’er Rabbit. (Hopefully this time […]

Categories: Blackberries, Cooking, Food, Fruit Desserts, Ice cream, Recipes, Vegetarian

Bee suits, bittersweet, brambles and blackberry jam

July 27, 2013 by Steve

We are having a wonderful year for wild blackberries. Steve, determined to make the most of it, has been tramping out to a patch every morning for a couple of weeks. It’s a lovely spot, surrounded by sugar maple, tulip poplar and sassafras trees, and Steve doesn’t mind the hike through our (and, to be honest, our absentee neighbors’) overgrown old farm fields to get to them. He doesn’t mind spending an hour or so shuffling around a tangle of […]

Categories: Blackberries, Cooking, Food, Jams & Preserves, Recipes, Vegetarian

Sweet Cherry Mostarda, the new Mmm in Michelle’s life

July 22, 2013 by Steve

Steve would like to think he’s the tastiest dish in Gourmandistan. Unfortunately, his illusions are often interrupted by sights and sounds suggesting he’s not, mostly around mealtimes. His latest rival arrived as a result of an unwise impulse buy of sweet cherries at last Saturday’s market. Steve snatched up both boxes without even looking at them, as these were the first locally grown sweet cherries we have ever seen around here. At home, he discovered that not only were half […]

Categories: Cherries, Cooking, Food, Italy, Pickles, Vegetarian

Poppin’ tags this blueberry lemon tart (it is f*cking awesome)

July 19, 2013 by Steve

Everybody likes pop. You might be a hip downtown aesthete, a strangely-haired Hoosier, a B-girl, a King or perhaps just a jiggly pile of dough. At least for last week, “pop” in Gourmandistan simply referred to Blueberry Lemon Tart. As we near the end of local blueberry season, Michelle felt like making at least one last blueberry dessert. She turned to a recipe from Alice Waters’ Chez Panisse Fruit, remembering how she liked this combination of blueberry and lemon curd. […]

Categories: Blueberries, Cooking, Food, Fruit Desserts, Lemon, Pies & Tarts, Recipes, Vegetarian

Blueberry Surprise Cake: a tasty surprise witness to unbelievable testimony

July 3, 2013 by Steve

As an attorney, Michelle is keenly aware of the unreliability of eyewitnesses, preferring the certainty of written documents to sworn statements which often color fact with fanciful opinion. Steve, who has himself coached “testimonials” from video subjects (“Would you say this hospital is one of the finest in the state?” “Yes.” “I meant would you say that to the camera.”) can be troubled by “true stories.” Which is probably why he started to poke holes in Michelle’s childhood recollection of […]

Categories: Blueberries, Cake, Cooking, Food, Fruit Desserts, Old cookbooks, Recipes, Vegetarian

Cherishing the chore of (sour) cherry jam

June 4, 2013 by Steve

There are some who shirk hard labor, thinking it never leads to any reward. Some embrace whatever physical challenge is placed before them, knowing their efforts will lead to what is best in life. While Crom knows Gourmandistanis are not opposed to labor-saving devices, we also recognize that sometimes you have to put in the work. That is why Saturday saw Steve sitting at the kitchen table for three straight hours, pitting cherry after cherry after cherry until his hands […]

Categories: Cherries, Cooking, Food, Fruit, Jams & Preserves, Recipes, Vegetarian