monicaSPEAK

Chef Monica Pope writes about eating & cooking where your food lives

Revelations… July 22, 2010

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Local Potatoes

Green Plum Cooking School – Saturday, June 19th, 2010

We have lots of local potatoes this summer.   This has not always been the case in summers past.  I used to get a small handful from a few growers, not enough to make mashed potatoes for two people.  This year is bountiful.

And, so, have potatoes, make Potato Salad!  This one will have fresh Shell Beans and a Lime-Yogurt Sauce.

Lisa is running around bringing me supplies I’ve forgotten, so Cal helps with Googling about speckled shell beans.  There is some confusion in the class about butter beans vs. speckled beans vs. lima beans and I want to get to the bottom of it.  At first, Cal says a speckled bean is a butter bean, but then later amends this to say butter beans are sometimes called limas.  Just as I thought…they’re all the same!  I had Benjy cook the beans before class (no reason for us to watch pots boil…again).  I am, however, cooking the potatoes in front of the audience.

Speckled Shell Beans

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Simple As Socca… July 21, 2010

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Socca - Chickpea "Crepe"

Green Plum Cooking School – Saturday, June 12th, 2010

Socca recipe, by Jackie Burdisso

125 g chickpea flour (grams, really, I can barely do American math; it’s 4.5oz)

1 ¼ cups water

3 tbls olive oil

salt & pepper

pinch of French attitude

I’ve dragged Jackie Burdisso upstairs to guest chef today’s class (Jackie is the owner of Maison Burdisso, home of the best Parisian macarons ever – available here at the Midtown Farmers Market).

A few months ago, I demonstrated our chickpea fries with red curry-sambal-ketchup.  During that class, Jackie came upstairs and we had this impromptu discussion about panisse.  Jackie described how to make it – you pour chickpea batter into a special saucer, let it firm up, and then turn it out; you then bread it with flour and fry it in olive oil.  That was interesting and all, but not what I was after.  What I wanted her to tell us about was something called socca — a flat, crispy chickpea cake, almost like a crepe or thin flatbread.  I asked Jackie what it’s served with and she repeated (more than once), just salt and pepper, and sometimes a little olive oil.  I pressed her and she finally said, “Rosé wine”….ah, that’s what I was looking for!

It all seemed so simple.  But I definitely wanted Jackie’s French expertise to help us through.  We are pouring a Texas Rosé today.  It would have been a good thing if my assistants had counted the glasses before pouring the wine.  Jackie abstains, which is one more reason I believe she isn’t really French.  We joke that her name and her family’s gravestones are all in Italian or in Italy and that she isn’t really French. While I am bitching about not getting a glass of wine, my daughter Lili shows up to tell the audience that I am allergic to Tequila, which never fails to get a laugh.  In actuality, if I drink Tequila, it is as if someone goes into my body’s breaker box and starts switching all the breakers off; I feel fine, but I can’t stand up.  The crowd is roaring.  It really isn’t that funny.  Jackie shares that she allergic to rosé, which I think is bullshit.

I think the socca might be too simple (and I’m not sure Jackie can carry an entire class on her own), so I am making something, too.  I have cranberry beans and amaranth from our new grower, The Secret Garden.  Apparently, it really is a secret garden because there is no way to get there but to follow someone.  It is 17 acres and the Leung family farms it by hand.  Amaranth is a weed, seed, leaf and plant with many varieties.  It is high in protein and grows in tropical and subtropical regions, ours being one.

Cranberry Beans with Amaranth

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Beet-ing Food FOBIAS… July 20, 2010

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Beets, Glorious Beets



Green Plum Cooking School – June 5th, 2010

For my entire career, I’ve been dealing with people’s intense feelings about beets.  If you read this blog with any regularity, you’ve heard me go on about this.

My customers either really like beets or really, really, really hate beets.  I now refer to these feelings in Dr. Phil-speak:  I call them “Family of Origin Beet Issues.” Or FOBI(AS).  FOBIAS usually start after someone’s mother or grandmother forced them to eat a canned beet.  Then there are those who wrinkle their noses just thinking about having to cook them and getting “dirty.”

I see it as my job to continue to push your FOBIA buttons, like I continue to push everything (just ask my mother).   So, today, we’re doing Beets – Three Ways.  As the class starts, I – and the audience –  realize at the same time that I may have pushed it too far!  I tell them, “Don’t worry, once I plate these beets, you’ll see how my mind works.”   Funny, but this is the last full sentence I utter for the rest of the class.

The first recipe I make starts with a pesto.  But not a regular old pesto – this one calls for bread soaked in vinegar in place of cheese.  We are using marjoram as the main herb in the pesto.  Marjoram is in the mint family and tastes like oregano.

Marjoram Pesto

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Fast, Easy & Cheap…Monica Pope-Style May 20, 2010

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Endive Spears with Bleu Cheese, Criminis & Candied Pecans (Photo Courtesy t.wolf photography)

Green Plum Cooking School – Saturday, May 8th

NOTE:  There will NOT be a cooking class on Saturday, May 22nd.  We’ll see you again on May 29th!

You may have seen my word t-shirt, “fast, easy, cheap” – my ironic commentary on what everyone wants in their food these days – well, today I have to be at least one of those (fast).  I only have 30 minutes (instead of my usual hour) to make good and good-for-you food.  I have to scoot to the Highland Village Farmers Market for two cooking demonstrations as part of their 7 Chefs in 7 Weeks Series.  Right after that, I’m headed to an interview on Cleverley’s radio show.

The recipe I’m doing today is a riff on my favorite salad on the t’afia menu:  the endive & crimini salad with blue cheese, candied Texas pecans and a white balsamic-white truffle dressing.  Most of the ingredients in this salad are local.  Today, I’m taking a great salad and showing how to fashion it into an hors d’oeuvre — an elegant (and fast) one at that.  I’ll take an endive spear, schmear it with the bleu cheese, top it with the chopped criminis, dress it with the white truffle-white balsamic dressing and finish it with a candied pecan.

I begin with the dressing.  This dressing was a personal challenge I took on to show the chef boys how to do truffle oil.  I explain to the class that whenever I do special events, some (or all) of the chef boys always bring truffle oil and micro greens.  You know what a dog does when he gets out and roams the neighborhood, right?  Well, that’s what the chef boys do with truffle oil — piss on their food basically – and all you can remember about the dish is the overwhelming truffle oil.  I have June and her son helping me today and I basically implicate him in my sweeping chef-boy-accusation since he is a chef boy who has just moved back from Chicago.  He takes the abuse like a man.

This dressing has shallot, wholegrain mustard, white truffle oil and grape-seed oil; the acid is white balsamic vinegar.  Lisa Googles and finds out that white balsamic is not true balsamic vinegar.  It is made with a different process and ends up having a very different taste profile.  I find it to be a little more refined than white vinegar and it doesn’t impart that dark balsamic color to your dressing that regular balsamic does.

At this point, I realize I have forgotten the thyme and I ask Nicole to go down to the herb container on the patio to find it.  I caution her that it looks like rosemary but smells like thyme and it is on the outer perimeter.  We don’t know what this herb is, actually; we’ve been calling it “mountain thyme,” which is a joke since we’re only 50 feet above sea level.  Then I remember we’re in a hurry today.  Someone makes a joke about Mountain Time.  Ha-ha…no time for jokes, either.

Herbs growing on t'afia's garden patio

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Delicious Drama May 14, 2010

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Green Plum Cooking School – Saturday, May 1st

Moroccan-Style Grilled Cheese Sandwich

It has been crazy wild around here since my appearance on Top Chef Masters.  As you may know, I managed to win the Quickfire challenge with a Moroccan-style Grilled Cheese Sandwich.  The best part is that I won $5,000 for the charity I was playing for, Recipe for Success.  Of course, this is the season that the Quickfire Challenges don’t contribute any points towards your final score.  Kind of like when, back in 1996, I won Best New Chef from Food & Wine Magazine, and the next year was the year they started putting the Best New Chefs on the cover.  For some reason, this kind of thing always happens to me.

The night my episode aired, we had a watch party at t’afia; a good customer told me that, if I won anything, she was going to match it as a donation to Recipe for Success (ooh, I hope she can afford $5,000!).  Since then, I have been overwhelmed by how supportive and generous people have been — my wallet is full of checks for Recipe for Success…$50, $100, $150.  I am excited that people were moved to give and are stepping up to make change in the lives of our children.  Both Gracie and I say thank you from the bottom of our hearts!

The actual Top Chef Masters challenge was to do a grilled cheese sandwich that reflected me as a chef, that really represented “my” food.  Some folks are having trouble connecting the Moroccan Grilled Cheese to what they perceive as “Monica Pope food.”  But Coastal Mediterranean cuisine has always been my thing.

In the Top Chef Masters studio kitchen, they take you around to the pantry and coolers so you can assess the ingredients on hand; there’s a cheese fridge, a lettuce fridge, a miscellaneous pantry, breads, etc.  We were also allowed to bring some signature ingredients with us as long as they fit in a 17” x 24” metal bin; I stuffed my suitcase with all sorts of things, including pomegranate molasses.  From the start, I had my eye on the loaf of date-walnut bread and I immediately came up with this Moroccan-style grilled cheese with feta, farmer’s cheese and a melt-y white cheese.  I made a cumin butter (to toast the bread with), sprinkled some cinnamon, used more fresh dates and voila.  I also grabbed three micro herbs — cilantro, basil and mint — to make a little accompanying salad with an orange blossom water-honey dressing.  I finished the plate with a swizzle of a pomegranate molasses-maple syrup mixture.

So, for class today, I am going to re-create my TCM Quickfire Challenge sandwich.  Luckily, I’ve got a posse of women sous chefs today that I motivate to grate and slather all these grilled cheeses and to pick and clean and dry lettuces because we’ve got a full class!

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To The Top of the Class You Go, Joe! May 3, 2010

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Joe's Twice-Baked Cauliflower

Green Plum Cooking School – Saturday, April 17th

After being judged on Top Chef Masters, it’s now my turn to judge.  I’ve judged two kids’ events this month:  Sharpstown High School’s Teen Iron Chef competition and Travis Elementary’s “Chef’s Night” contest.  At Travis Elementary, all grades were involved and their assignment was to make a healthy snack or meal, with extra points for those who used the most items from the school’s incredible garden or other locally-sourced ingredients.  The kids did great, surprisingly so.  Lance Fegen (from The Glass Wall in the Heights) was also one of the judges as was Scott Tycer’s wife, Annika (owners of Textile and Kraftsmen Bakery; Scott was at home nursing a basketball injury).  The garden at Travis Elementary is really wonderful and was spearheaded by our friend and Houston photographer, George Hixson.  My only wish is that the kids would have done more with the food from the garden. The kids did focus on using less than five ingredients and made healthier substitutions (like low-fat dairy, whole wheat pastas and yogurt instead of mayo), which was good.

Local Cauliflower

For today’s class, I was inspired to make one of the dishes from a student at Travis Elementary:  Joe’s Twice-Baked Cauliflower.  I loved how brave Joe was to use cauliflower and make it in a way that kids would love it (who can resist anything mac n’cheesy?).  Of course, he did a healthy version with low-fat milk and cream cheese, kind of a like a bechamel.  I autographed his recipe and gave him two thumbs up.  I’ve adapted Joe’s recipe, Pope-style:  I’m ramping it up a bit by using Cabot’s cheddar powder and the three cheeses I used in my Top Chef Master’s Quick Fire-winning grilled cheese sandwich (feta, Monterey jack and mascarpone).

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Seeing Red (In A Good Way)… April 23, 2010

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Red "Tabouli" with Red Quinoa, Red Beets & Red Clover

Green Plum Cooking School – Sat., April 10th

You might have heard me chant this mantra before:  What Grows Together, Goes Together.  Another of my mantras (this one from my old Boulevard Bistrot days) is Diversity is the Mother of Invention.  I’m not sure that either statement could hit home with my class any more than it did on this Saturday.

I am sure you are familiar with the classic Middle Eastern tabouli salad made with bulgur and lots of parsley, mint, tomato, lemon juice and olive oil.  Well, instead of doing that I am using what I have — which is red quinoa and beets.  Quinoa is a super food:  it has all eight essential amino acids, which makes it a complete protein.  Pretty cool for a grass!  Everyone thinks quinoa is a grain (because it eats like one) but it’s really a relative of beets, spinach, Swiss chard, and lamb’s quarters.  But you can cook and use it just like a grain; we cook it for about 15 minutes, just like pasta.  You have to rinse or soak it prior to cooking because it is coated with something called Saponin.  Saponin has a purpose in nature — its bitterness repels insects and birds to protect the grass while it is growing.  While Lisa is telling us all about quinoa, I am wondering what purpose my bitterness serves.

While the quinoa is boiling, I work on the beets (these have already been boiled for about 45 minutes to 1 hour).  You know beets are ready when the skins come off easily as you rub it with your fingernail.  I choose not to wear gloves to peel the beets to make a statement.  Many of my customers have what I call family of origin beet trauma. Someone at some time made you eat a beet, probably a canned one at that, and you just didn’t, and still don’t, like them.  In fact, you hate them!  You think they taste dirty.  And you certainly don’t want to get dirty (or pink as it is with me) from working with beets.  But, if you do like them, typically you ask me to prep them for you anyway.

Yep...sometimes you get a little dirty (and red)

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Local Food, Trendy? Whatever It Takes… April 11, 2010

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Mild Coconut Curry with Local Vegetables

Green Plum Cooking School – Sat, April 3rd

Today, I’m making a mild coconut curry with local vegetables.  Just so you know, the Pope don’t do “mild,” or so I’m thinking.  I’m afraid it’s going to be boring.  The recipe calls for green peppers, squash, eggplant, corn, green beans — you get the idea, summer vegetables, most anywhere.  Here in Houston, we’re smack into spring, which anywhere else would be summer, but the whole point of this dish is that you can utilize any vegetables you find at the farmers market right now — pick five or go for the sky as your limit.

The recipe also calls for lentils, of which I have four varieties down in the t’afia kitchen, so I bring them all up.  The only thing I’ve prepared ahead of time is to roast some small beets, mainly to see if I could actually get them to cook in an hour and I also didn’t want them to discolor the curry by cooking them with the other vegetables.  Pink curry is… well, pink…and sometimes that color doesn’t quite translate.  Also, when we did beets last year when we were “cooking with Alice,” trying to fully cook beets during a one hour class was one of my only failures; we ate very al dente beets that day!

We start with lilies, of which I have many (that’s why I did a five-lilies soup for Easter). You know, we named our child after the lily because she makes us cry with joy, in Yiddish the word is kvell. But, of course, we chose the Lili Taylor (indie actress) and Lili Fini Zanuck (Hollywood producer) spelling because I’m a little bit country and a little bit Hollywood!

The allium genus consists of hundreds of varieties commonly known as onions, garlic, leeks, scallions, ramps and so on.  They are of great importance in the kitchen and form the base of most stocks and sauces, the aromatics of braising liquids, the underpinnings of well-made soup – basically, all things good in the kitchen.

I open the first bag of lentils and promptly drop the crimson legumes.  I take a deep breath and decide not to cry over spilled lentils, but mention my crying on Top Chef Masters.  I begin to cook the lentils and the potatoes together — I have local red potatoes and four types of lentils (crimson, black, white and green).  The black lentils are referred to as beluga because they resemble beluga caviar, that’s great marketing when you can make a lowly legume seem like an extravagant ingredient, right Oleg?

Potatoes & Lentils

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The S – E – X – Y Food Class… April 6, 2010

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We Call It Food Porn....Not Much That's Sexier Than That.

Green Plum Cooking School – March 27th

This morning, I have a group of fifteen women who have come early for Breakfast with the Pope (one woman in the group bought an auction item that includes breakfast with me, a tour of the market and seats in the cooking class).  Most of the women had not been to the market before.  I try to give them a little history — mine, the restaurant and the market.  One woman keeps asking questions, so I just turn the whole hour with them into a little Q & A.

In class today, I am doing Buttermilk Panna Cotta, something that usually takes two hours to set and I am going to do it in an hour or less. I’ve got to get going!  I love panna cottas, of all kinds:  goat’s milk, toasted almond, mascarpone, crème fraiche, you name it.

I place the cream in the pot (the buttermilk doesn’t go in yet to get cooked; it goes in after I pull the pot off the stove).  As the cream heats up, I measure fourteen tablespoons of sugar in my hand.  I use my cupped palm to measure tablespoons, that’s how we roll upstairs.  I grab a half-pint to go container to measure cups when I need to.  I split the vanilla bean down the middle and scrape the seeds out and place both the sugar and vanilla beans in the hot cream to infuse and for the sugar to dissolve.  I then remove the pot, add the gelatin leaves (I add an extra leaf because I’m worried about this setting up in the shorter time period, but we definitely don’t want to end up with a rubbery product like we get in most restaurants).  I use a whisk to bring it together and then add the buttermilk. I strain the whole mixture and have Nicole pour it into our clear cups.  I like using a see-through cup to see the white mixture as I don’t usually turn the panna cotta out, I just top it with a simple compote or syrup — today we’re using local strawberries.

Buttermilk Panna Cotta

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I Say Dumpling, You Say Empanada… April 3, 2010

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Potato Lentil Dumplings

Green Plum Cooking School – March 20th, 2010

Anything fried is pretty darn good, right?  Like the fried Oreos or fried Coke at the Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo.  I do admit that Lili and I did have a fried Oreo at the Rodeo a few years ago.  I’m not some food extremist but novelty food isn’t everyday food and it’s certainly not something I need to eat again.

That’s all to prepare you that we are frying today in class.  We are making Potato Lentil Dumplings – which is more like an empanada, really.  I start the class on time but June and Karin walk in late.  Humph.  They were sitting downstairs since 8 am.  I say, “After all that, you’re late!”   Lili prances by and says, “Mommy, don’t be too hard on them.”  Humph.

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