Texas Book Festival this weekend

We're just back in town and still a bit road weary. I'll have more recipes soon, but wanted to pass along this info first, before the weekend gets going. The Texas Book Festival takes place tomorrow and Sunday at the Capitol in downtown Austin.

There is a long list of authors from across the spectrum who will be participating, but the best part to me is the cooking tent, where cookbook authors will speak and demonstrate.

Rebecca Rather will be making recipes from her new book, The Pastry Queen Parties. You can also check out Lydia Bastianich, Guiliano Hazan, and Ellie Krieger. There will be panel discussions with Austin City Limits performers (who are also cooks) and "Inquiries into the Nature of Slow Money: Investing as if Food, Farms and Fertility Mattered." That's a lot to feast on.

2009 Texas Book Festival
Saturday, 10/31 & Sunday, 11/1
main site
schedule
authors list
how to attend

Station Break

We're making a break for the mountains this week. But stay tuned. I'm taking some really good reading material and will be back with more recipes soon. Here's a taste of what's in my book bag...

• Ratio by Michael Ruhlman

• Golden Door Cooks at Home by Dean Rucker and Marah Stets

• Falling Cloudberries by Tessa Kiros

• and the latest (and last) issue of Gourmet, Delicious, Olive, Donna Hay and Martha Stewart Living.

Tapioca with Tayberries

Here's a recipe with inspiration from all over. With this week's announcement of the loss of Gourmet magazine, I thought it was time to try out a clipping I'd pulled from July's Gourmet and share it with you. Their recipe combines small tapioca pearl pudding and a fresh strawberry and fennel purée. I loved the idea of tart berries with sweet tapioca. But I decided to use large pearl tapioca instead.

Inspiration #2: I brought home a jar of June Taylor's amazing tayberry conserve after the conserve class I took from her while in San Francisco. I wanted to try it in a dessert and tapioca seemed like the perfect balance for the zing of the tayberries. In case you're wondering what a tayberry is – it's a cross between a blackberry and a raspberry with the deep red raspberry color. You can order it here.



Inspiration #3: I ran across this post on Vanilla Garlic discussing the different kinds of vanilla beans from Beanilla. Even though I'm a longtime vanilla lover and have several kinds in my baking cabinet, I had no idea there were this many sources and varieties of vanilla. I got so excited by Garrett's post that I ordered some of each to experiment with. This is my first recipe using one and I picked the Tonga bean to try first. Tonga is in the South Pacific and these highly aromatic beans are organic and apparently rather rare. When I opened the beaker they came in, I was blown away by their size and smell. These beans aren't like the dried up little things you see in the grocery store. They are at least 8 inches long and have a tremendous amount of seeds to scrape inside. They are luscious.

Inspiration #4: Heidi Swanson's 101 Cookbooks post on her father's tapioca recipe. It is simple and straightforward and so good – the best I've tried, in fact. Her recipe uses small tapioca pearls though. I wanted to try the big, fat ones, so I infused them longer (overnight) in milk with the vanilla bean.

The result is a tapioca pudding with big vanilla flavor perfectly enhanced by the incredible color and ultimate berriness of June Taylor's tayberry conserve. One note, I tried layering the tapioca over the berry layer while the tapioca was still warm from the pan. It sunk into the berries making a mess. So I cooled the pudding first in the fridge and then layered it on top for cleaner, but still wabi sabi, layering. The ratio of how much conserve to how much pudding you use is entirely up to you. It does make a flavorful and rich dessert, though, so small portions are fine. Tapioca is filling. I made four servings and still had almost half a jar of conserve and some tapioca left. (I'm excited to see what else I can do with it.)

Tapioca pudding with tayberry conserve

3 cups whole milk
1/2 cup large pearl tapioca
2 egg yolks, lightly beaten
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup sugar
1 vanilla bean
one (8 ounce) jar of June Taylor tayberry conserve



Combine 1 cup of milk and the tapioca pearls into a container. Cut vanilla bean lengthwise in half and then scrape your knife down it's length to scrape out the seeds. Put the seeds into the container with the pearls and stir together to distribute the seeds. Add the scraped vanilla beans as well. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

Whisk together the eggs yolks, salt, sugar and 2 cups of milk. Put the infused tapioca pearls, milk and vanilla beans into a thick-bottomed pot. Add in the egg mixture and whisk to combine.

On medium-low heat, very slowly bring the mixture up to just under a boil, while stirring continously. Lower heat to a low simmer and continue cooking and stirring for approximately 20 minutes, until the pearls are translucent and the pudding has thickened.

Remove from heat and let cool to room temp or refrigerate for later assembly.

Layer approximately 3-4 tablespoons of tayberry conserve into the bottom of each serving glass. With a clean spoon, layer tapioca on top of the conserve. You can use the handle end of a teaspoon to poke down into the tapioca to release air bubbles that get trapped in the pudding. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Serves approximately 4-6, depending on serving size.

Adapted from Gourmet (July 2009) and 101 Cookbooks.

Say it ain't so! No more Gourmet!

News today that Condé Nast is shutting down my favorite American food magazine, Gourmet. It's incomprehensible that they are keeping the dumbed down Bon Appetit and it's design director's disdain for "pretty food photography." What a disappointment. (I recently canceled a free subscription to Bon Appetit. I signed up for it for the single purpose of reading Molly Wisenburg's new column – a single shining beacon in an otherwise dark forest.) But I just couldn't take another issue of their food photography.)

Since Ruth Reichl took over Gourmet, they have been one of the few sources for in-depth articles on our food and where it comes from. Articles like these from Barry Estabrook in his Politics of the Plate column and others will be sorely, sorely missed...

The Price of Tomatoes

Carbon 101

Genetically-Engineered Crops

Conscientious Carnivore

Having spent my career in publishing, I understand some of the forces at work here. I can only hope that this pool of writers, editors, designers, photographers and stylists can come together in some other form to continue delivering this information to us.

Today's reaction from Reichl here from the Los Angeles Times.

New York Times: Reichl plans to write her own book.

New York Times: Closing the book on Gourmet

Email your reaction to Condé Nast here.

There is one small thing to look forward to in all this mess... a new 10-episode PBS series will begin airing this month in which Reichl explores cooking schools all over the world. The series begins October 24 in Austin. Check your local PBS station to get your fix.

Roasted Corn Salad

Now that fall is in the air, or in Austin, around the corner at least, I've got comfort food on the brain. We tried La Condesa not too long ago and in addition to their tasty tacos, we had a little bowl of roasted corn soup. It was simply roasted corn kernels in a rich, buttery broth. Simple, but so good.

Ever since, I've had roasted corn cravings. This salad comes from San Francisco chef Elizabeth Falkner. It looked like a great way to use roasted corn. With arugula, avocados, tomatoes, cucumbers, pumpkin seeds and a fresh vinaigrette made from the sweetness of some of the puréed roasted corn, lime, sherry vinegar and a little unexpected hit of warm cinnamon, it was fantastic. The corn in the dressing really takes it to another level. This one's going into rotation with our favorite salads.



Roasted Corn Salad

5 ears of fresh corn, husks and strings removed
1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons olive oil
salt and pepper
1/2 cup roasted, salted pumpkin seeds
3 tablespoon fresh lime juice (approximately 1 lime)
2 tablespoons sherry vinegar
1 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon hot sauce
1/8 teaspoon cinnamon
1 1/2 pounds baby arugula
2-3 ripe avocados, peeled and cut into bite-sized chunks
2 large red tomatoes, cut into bite-sized chunks
2 large orange or yellow tomatoes, cut into bite-sized chunks
1 hothouse cucumber, cut into quarters lengthwise and sliced
3 ounces queso fresco or ricotta salata, crumbled

Preheat oven to 500 degrees. Put the ears of corn on a rimmed baking sheet and drizzle with 2 tablespoons of oil. Season with salt and pepper. Roast for about 25 minutes – turning 2-3 times during the roasting to brown on all sides. Remove from oven and let cool. When cooled completely, cut the kernels from the cobs and set aside.

In a blender, put 1/2 cup corn kernels, lime juice, sherry vinegar, sugar, hot sauce, and cinnamon. Purée until smooth. With the machine on, slowly drizzle in 1/2 cup of olive oil and blend until emulsified. Pour the vinaigrette into a bowl.

In the bottom of a large, shallow salad bowl, make a bed of the arugula. Sprinkle with tomatoes, cucumbers, avocados and the remaining roasted corn. Sprinkle the top with the roasted pumpkin seeds and crumbled cheese. Serve with vinaigrette.

Serves approximately 6-8 as a side salad.

Adapted from Elizabeth Falkner in Food & Wine (August 2000).