Strawberry and Labneh-Stuffed Morels

Sometimes you just luck out. Although we had high hopes for finding morels this warm, rainy spring, life conspired to keep us from having much time to go foraging. We made one brave effort just as the spring ephemerals were popping up but despite our dedication that day (including crossing our still chilly creek and discovering the hard way that it is deceptively deep in places, then fighting through multiflora rose on steep slopes), none were to be found. I blame the deer.

Then on Easter when we were walking up to do some work in the orchard, when we weren't even looking, there they were. A patch of morels where we had never before seen any. I walked right past, but fortunately, Jim spotted one and said "hey, isn't that a morel?"  He didn't have to ask twice. Boy, did he score big points that day. I didn't bother to get the camera, I just scooped up all that I could find. Just enough for one meal but more than I'd ever found before.

I have been saving up tons of morel recipes for that day all shroomers dream of: hitting the motherlode and finding hundreds of morels. Not that I'm greedy; it's just that all the recipes seem to call for more morels than I can find. Something about the happy hormones that were triggered by our find that day must have also tripped the creativity switch in my brain. Inspiration struck for the perfect appetizer: labneh-stuffed morels. I know a lot of folks stuff them with cream cheese, but I'm on a labneh kick. It serves the same function texturally but doesn't feel so excessively rich. I still feel like I'm eating something comforting but reasonably healthy. The slight tang makes it seem like a grown-up version of cream cheese. And being yogurt-based, it doesn't trigger those lactose problems that come with middle age. The only drawback: it can be hard to find in a small town (Ashevillains: find it at The Fresh Market).

I sliced the morels in half, then sauteed them briefly in butter (always cook your mushrooms). I then piped the labneh into each half (by the way, if your morel is not hollow inside, it's not a morel). Thanks to the lovely old farmer from South Carolina who sells his fruit directly to diners at local restaurants (talk about farm-to-table), we had a gallon of gorgeous, tasty strawberries left from our Friday night pizza run. On to the labneh they went.

Yum! Decadent and healthy at the same time. Sometimes life is so freaking good!

Cranberry Salsa to Eat and Drink

No, not another Christmas post. Well, we did first start eating cranberry salsa when we were looking for a festive side dish to take to a vegan party around Christmastime. I tried several recipes but the one that has worked the best has been one I found on Cooks.com. My only variation from their recipe is that I chop everything by hand rather than using a food processor, so my salsa stays nice and chunky.

Having recently discovered that Greek yogurt makes a great substitute for sour cream, we decided to press our luck and see if it would support our new favorite salsa. Yes! It does a great job. Even turns a subtle shade of pink.

The combination of salsa and Greek yogurt makes for a terrific chip dip or just saves a step when piling toppings on to various Mexican dishes. Here's what it looks like when topping one of our quick and easy standbys: tostadas with refried black beans, spiced sweet potato puree, and sauteed kale with garlic. Although it looked spectacular and tasted pretty good, I think we may have overdone the mix of flavors just a bit. The salsa would probably have done better jazzing up a less complex tostada (maybe just refried beans and cheese).

Still, doesn't that look festive? But wait, there's more. One of the reasons we created a dipping version of the salsa is that on its own, it does tend to be very juicy. Drips are a major hazard when dipping chips in cranberry salsa. Stain city. We started to wise up and strain the salsa. That reduced the drip risk but also inspired yet another recipe. This time: a drink.

Cranberry Salsa Margarita on the Rocks

1 oz. tequila
1 oz. cranberry salsa juice
2 oz. club soda
splash of lime juice
splash of orgeat

Combine the ingredients in a rocks glass and add ice. So easy.

This drink has quickly become one of my favorite warm-weather bevvies. It's not too strong, not too sweet, and best of all, makes me feel virtuous for recycling the salsa juice. Grab a bowl of blue corn tortilla chips and enjoy a cranberry salsa margarita out on the deck as you watch the sun set. Could life be so bad?

Fried Chicken

I'm not a big fan of chicken. No big hatred of it; I just find it boring. Lately, however, I've been having a real craving for fried chicken. Maybe the summer-in-springtime weather is giving me some sort of salt craving or maybe after 16 years in the South, I'm finally starting to eat like a local. Whatever the reason, the fates conspired to turn craving into reality when our local healthy supermarket had half-price peanut oil, the general store had a sale on Lodge cast iron skillets, and Bon Appetit published an article on how to make skillet-fried chicken.

I followed the recipe carefully, this being my first-ever attempt at fried chicken. The day before cooking, I cut up a fryer into 8 pieces, rinsed them, and coated them in a dry rub of kosher salt, pepper, and several other spices . An overnight stay in the fridge coated with the dry rub was supposed to help with keeping the chicken juicy and the skin crisp while frying.  I dipped each piece in a buttermilk  and egg bath before dredging in a flour mix that had yet more salt and pepper. Despite the enormity of the skillet, I had to fry the chicken in two batches.

Using a digital thermometer, I regularly checked the oil temperature to keep it around 325 degrees. I highly recommend wearing oven mitts anytime you have to go near the skillet as getting spit on by hot oil is not fun. The silicone handle cover from Lodge was well worth the 3 or 4 bucks we spent on it.

I couldn't believe how quickly it started to look like real fried chicken. Just as advertised. I used the probe to check the internal temperature of the chicken (165 degrees) before removing my golden brown pieces of eight. Immediately they went on to wire racks to drain and I patted them down with paper towels to soak up any extra oil.

By the end of the process, the kitchen was a mess, I was covered in grease, the house smelled like a fast-food restaurant but by god I had made fried chicken! And it was good. Too good. Finger-licking-good. I think it was a little too salty even for me, so I'd probably cut down on the kosher salt next time. And despite my efforts, the skin still ended up being more greasy than crispy, so I didn't eat much of it after the first piece of chicken. The meat, however, was the most flavorful, juicy chicken I can remember having in a long, long time.

And now that I have broken in my huge cast-iron skillet, maybe I'll tackle making the perfect pecan sticky buns.....

Christmas Crunchie

An even more successful experiment from the kitchen this winter was my attempt at making a Crunchie. No, that's not an exercise (although we certainly needed more exercise after polishing off the Crunchies). When we lived in England, we got hooked on Crunchies. Probably the only Cadbury chocolate product that I truly crave, it's a crunchy, honeycomb candybar dipped in chocolate.

Each year for Christmas, I buy one to put in Jim's stocking. Usually, I have good luck finding them at CostPlus World Market but they seemed to be lacking in the usual Brit food this year (couldn't get a plain HobNob to save my life). So, what's a gal to do but make her own?

I had collected some recipes last year for honeycomb candy but hadn't gotten around to making it, fearing the horrendous mess it might make judging from the stories many other novice honeycomb makers reported. The recipe is quite simple but there is a point where the candy can boil over in spectacular fashion (think science project volcano), so if you choose to attempt this at home, be sure to use a much bigger pot than you think you'll need. And don't even try it if you have one of those glass-top stoves that doesn't take kindly to molten sugar all over it.

I'm happy to report that my experience was a good one. Not only did I not create a mess in the kitchen, the honeycomb was delicious. Too delicious. I had to dip it in chocolate just to stop eating it. And that only worked while I was waiting for the chocolate to dry. I boxed some up to put in the stocking and then proceeded to hide the rest, lest Jim discover it before Christmas morning or I eat it all on my own.

Christmas morning came and I knew I'd succeeded in recreating the Crunchie when Jim declared it the best present of all. And I got the gift of leftovers (something that never happens when there's just one Crunchie in the stocking).

Buddha's Hand Redux

This past winter, I once again lucked upon a Buddha's Hand in one of our specialty grocery stores.

Despite it being essentially a juiceless lemon, I'm drawn irresistably to its shape and its scent. I didn't have time to make candied lemon peel this year, so I went with a popular but quicker use for this crazy citron: Buddha's Hand vodka.

Although we don't drink much vodka and tend to roll our eyes whenever we see the flavored vodkas in the liquor store (toasted marshmallow vodka--really???), it seemed like this might be one flavor worth putting in the mix for our cocktail experiments. And it could hardly be easier: slice the Buddha's Hand, scrape away the excess pith, add to bottles, and fill with vodka.

After letting it sit for 30 days, we gave it a try. Still a very harsh vodka taste but it had promise. Back to the bottles for a bit more time to let the subtle Buddha's Hand flavor try to overcome the dominant vodka.

A month later, it's still harsh but getting better. I don't know if it will ever be good on its own but I think it can be a decent mix-in. One combo we found that definitely did not work was a gin-based drink. Probably will work better with something sweeter. Anyone have any good suggestions? We have enough to practice with for quite awhile.

If nothing else, it sure is pretty to look at--and the Buddha's Hand peel is really tasty after being soaked in booze for a couple of months....

Spring is here

The ducks are back, earthworms are getting it on in the driveway, the beaver is bodysurfing the creek after a night of chopping down hazelnut canes, the frogs were leaping all over the rain-soaked road last night (Leap Day, of course)....

Checked on the bees today. The weak hive didn't make it (no surprise here--simply not enough bees to make it through the winter). But the bees in the strong hive, a.k.a., the New Girls on the Block, are ramping up fast. I'll have to split them before long to head off any inclinations toward swarming. Love seeing the queen doing her thing with lots of brood already in process and loads of pollen coming in. The bees are also robbing the dead hive of its remaining honey stores so it will not go to waste.

These 70-degree days make me think it won't be long before the snakes are back and then it won't be long before we see the box turtles again. Ahhhhhhhh.....Spring!

Leap Day/Sweet Audrey

Thank goodness for Leap Year or I would be out of luck for getting even one post up in February. It's been a crazy month. We've experienced both the coldest and the warmest temperatures of the winter in the past few weeks. Mostly, it's been an extraordinarily mild winter and that is turning into a ridiculously early spring. Perhaps the weird weather has something to do with the antics of our dear buffalo. Click on the following to see them in full lounge mode (those two lumps to the right of Eschol are the girls flopped, warming their bellies in the sun).

After Effie's recent innovation in yoga poses and Eschol's questionable intervention, I really wanted to write about Audrey. She has always been our sweetest, calmest buffalo. She will happily soak up all the attention you want to give her and doesn't seem to care if she's on the bottom of the pecking order. But when Mr. Headbutt McRandypants is busy tearing the doors off of the barn (3 more since the last post) and rolling them downhill into the ditch, we tend to focus on him. Even Effie has been more rambunctious than usual, joining up with Eschol to push Audrey away from the hay until they've had their fill.

Fortunately, Audrey is no dummy. When the others get pushy, she walks away. She knows that in the morning I'm mucking out the barn while they're distracted with eating, so she comes over to see me and is rewarded with lots of love and attention--the kind she rarely gets when the others are around because they get so jealous. Not only do I love being able to positively reinforce her affectionate nature, these stolen moments help me get her accustomed to being handled all over. That contact should help once we get to milking.

And not to worry, she gets plenty to eat. She is very savvy about going in early or staying late at the hay trough to get what she needs and she's always been more adept than the others at seeking out fresh forage. Of the three, she's the only one who will eat anything out of my hand, having figured out early on that if I have a handful of something green, it's worth scarfing it down.

A couple of weeks' back, I was hanging out at the main gate, watching the buffs up in the barn devouring the hay I'd just put down for them. As usual, Audrey was being forced to wait outside for her turn. She spotted me at the gate and did the most cartoony leap into the air, giving a big shake of her head, then proceeded to run down the hill towards me. I can't tell you how happy she looked. If you've ever had a dog that greeted you when you came home like it was the best day ever just because you showed up, that's what it felt like. But 1400 pounds of dog running downhill toward you. Fortunately, I know Audrey well enough to know that she won't run me over, so I could just bask in the expression of pure joy. She got a lot of tummy and dewlap rubs that day.

I wish I could capture her sweet expression on camera but the photos never do her justice. Take my word for it. She's wonderful. And since the weather has turned warm and the grass has started to green up, the others aren't being as mean to her so we're all feeling much better about life.