Festival of Light

The Corcoran College of Art + Design Advanced Lighting class brings you the 2011 Festival of Lights in Rockville Town Square. Students and lighting industry professionals will be working together in teams all day to create temporary themed lighting installations in the Square!

While you are waiting for the sun to set, come up to the Rooftop for lighting talks and activities and great local music. There is a minimal admission charge, and food and drink will be available for sale.

Once it gets dark, walk through the Square with the student led teams, hearing about the installations and seeing Rockville Town Square in a whole new "light"!

See you there!

Corn and Lobster Chowder

Corn and Lobster Chowder

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Corn-and-Lobster-Chowder-106800

Soup is one of those dishes that can be made quickly in a pinch - store bought broth and precut or frozen vegetables definitely speed up the process. Last night I had the luxury of breaking a soup into its individual parts, and pulling as much flavor as possible out of each of those components. Was the difference noticeable? Who knows. I can tell you the personal satisfaction was significant.

This is a simple recipe. Start with a fat, add onions, add stock and aromatics, add more vegetables, top with lobster. Season to taste. Done.

Or not. Start by thinking about the stock. The recipe calls for chicken broth - but this is corn and lobster soup - no chicken in the name. It makes sense to use chicken broth - it adds some richness without overpowering the other flavors, but its the other flavors that are so important to the soup. So - to increase the corn flavor, I cooked the corn on the cob, cut off the kernals and tossed the cobs in the broth. All of that milky corn sweetness was transferred to the broth.

As for the lobster, I am a chicken. I hate it that I don't have the guts to throw the lobster in the pot myself, and have to ask the fish monger at the store to be my lobster hit man, but there it is. I had two lobsters steamed and brought them home. As delicious as the meat is, the shells and juices are equally valuable. I opend up the lobsters over the broth, draining all the delicious juices into the pot, salvaged the sweet meat and threw the shells in the stock to add as much briny seafood flavor as possible. The chicken broth is now but a memory - adding lovely color and richness, but truly overshadowed by lobster and corn.

And the rest goes back to being simple. The fresher and sweeter the corn, the better. Fresh off the cob can't be beat - every bite ends in sweetness. I used red bell pepper instead of yellow to add a bit of color - since the soup isn't pureed color consistency is not a major issue. I also used very thinly sliced leek instead of scallions - just what was on hand. I didn't add any heat, but next time I think I will throw in a bit of cayenne - if the corn is sweet enough, it really can stand up to it, and the half and half will help with the balance. Too hot and the corn will be lost though, so it will be important to taste as I add. A handful of chopped parsley (added after I pulled the shells and cobs out)added more color, flavors and a bit of thickening to the soup. The flat leaf was the right choice for this soup - curly would have been too peppery.

Finally, season to taste. Possibly the least helphul phrase known to man. I added smoked salt and pepper. Tasted, added a bit more smoked salt, until I was at about two teaspoons. Probably could have added a bit more, but the smokiness was tastable, and I hadn't overtaken the sweetness of the stock, so I quit while I was ahead.

Start to finish, this version took about two hours (and one glass of wine). I would say, with store stock, lobster tales and frozen corn, probably you could cut it to an hour and the results will be fine. As for the satisfaction...

Beef, Borscht and Beyond

Beef Borscht

My earliest memories of borscht are my Mom taking the container of purple liquid with the occasional beet chunk out of the refrigerator, adding some hard boiled egg, and pouring it in a bowl. It is a wonder I ever tried borscht again.

Many years later, a neighbor of ours, freshly immigrated from Moscow, served me a warm version of that same purple concoction. This time, however, the soup was rich and velvety, brimming with melt in your mouth beef and bright, fragrant herbs. And so began my love affair with beets and borscht.

The recipe I finally have settled on starts with short ribs. I used boneless - that's all they had at the store, but on the bone would add more flavor. I browned the ribs and then simmered them in beef stock with cloved onions and dill for an hour and then with beets, tomatoes, potato, carrots, leek, caraway seeds, chicken stock and water for another hour. This time I added beer to deglaze the skillet after browning the ribs - I'm happy to report the beer added a yeasty flavor that complimented the caraway nicely. I finished the soup with lemon juice, fresh dill, salt and pepper and topped each bowlful with a dollop of sour cream.

And now for the beyond. What to do with the leftovers. The easy answer is - eat them. But when you have leftover horseradish mashed potatoes too, you start to get creative. My solution - pull the solids out of the soup and place in a casserole dish. Cook down the soup liquid to a syrup and pour over the solids. Mix in fresh chopped dill and top with the horseradish mashed potatoes. Voila - Psychedelic Shepherd's Pie.

Ancho Chili Turkey Soup

After eating turkey for the last four days, I have to say I was less than excited about the prospect of turkey soup. However, the remaining turkey parts, leftover gravy and the need to reclaim my refrigerator from said leftovers, beckoned. So, I embarked on a painstaking search for an acceptable turkey soup recipe (ok, I used my Epicurious app on my Iphone). I settled on one that that suggested to me that with enough chili and cumin our beleaguered mouths and stomachs might not immediately recognize the same main ingredient they had been subjected to repeatedly since Thursday.

First let me say, that recipe was an extremely loosely defined term with this particurlar soup. More of an idea really - I liked the idea of spicy, smoky flavors. That is where we parted company. I already had made stock from the carcass, so I was way ahead of the game recipe wise. By way of preparation, I soaked a couple of dried anchos in a cup of boiling stock, then pureed it. To thicken the stock I made a roux with a butter/oil combination and flour, added in the onions, then when softened, the garlic and red chilis. A little white wine deglazed the pan (beer may have been better, but I was in the mood for a glass of wine), and in went the stock (mixed with the ancho liquid). I added in the leftover gravy too (no real need for it since I threw in most of the leftover turkey meat). After a good bit of simmering and tasting, I threw in frozen succotash (a dish served on the first Thanksgiving I believe) and seasoned with smoked salt. The spicy paprika I had planned to finish the soup with was unnecessary - the chilis spiced things up just fine. Tortillas served on the side added crunch and a bit more salt.

As hoped for, the turkey provided texture and some reminiscence of flavor, without just being more of the same. I would say four days of turkey is enough for awhile, but by next November we will certainly be ready to trod down the turkey path.

Turkey stock

This year, our Thanksgiving meal began and ended with soup. Before, a lot of preparation, between, family, friends, lots of laughter and plenty of turkey, and after, exhaustion.

We started with chestnut soup. Roasted chestnuts pureed with veggies and herbs in homemade chicken broth and swirled with thyme cream. It's a rich soup, so I served it in a teacup, set on a saucer. And then we waited.

For the last ten years our turkey has perched on our grill rather than in our oven. While the results are juicy and delicious, the timing is less than predictable, with outside temps playing a part in the overall cooking time. To make life easier this year, I spent a bit more on an organic turkey - not for it's organicness, but for it's pop up timer. Hah. Guess what didn't work. Money well spent. A push or two on the bird and a thermometer in the thigh are a better tell anyway. Smartest move this year - buying a disposable roasting pan, putting a cutting board in it and carving the turkey. No lost juices and no mess. Ok, one out of two on the money well spent thing.

Dinner and cleanup was a group effort. I played no part in the creation of the desserts this year - a time saving relief for me, and a culinary relief for our guests. "mans got to know his limitations" - mine is pie crusts. Unless they are actually supposed to have the consistency of rubber, I fail miserably at pie crusts. Pumpkin whoopee pies were also a hit with the kids, and some of the not kids.

Last year, as we were enjoying our meal, our dog Ginger decided the trash can was not the best place for the turkey carcass - it was much better dragged out of the trash and gnawed on the kitchen floor. This year, I made stock. By the time the carcass was done simmering even Ginger wouldn't have wanted it. All the flavor from the meat was transferred to the liquid, fresh herbs and a bit of onion and lemon made for a really flavorful broth. Sorry Ginger. One meal done, and the promise of another already begun. More to be thankful for.

Cioppino (Fisherman's Stew)

Cioppino

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Cioppino-106263

I love San Francisco. I love everything about it - the amazing hills, the barking of the sea lions at the wharf, Irish Coffee, fabulous hot chocolate at Giardelli's, the Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz, MOMA, I could go on forever. Ok, maybe one more thing. Cioppino. Invented in San francisco by local fisherman, using their catch of the day. Cioppino comes from the dialect used in Genoa, Italy and means to chop. Italian fishermen settling in San Francisco in the late 1800s developed this wonderful stew as a means to use what was left of their catch.

Any assortment of seafood is fine here - as long as there is plenty! I used halibut, clams, shrimp and scallops. I love crab, and were there company coming it would have been in the pot, but for the three of us I saw no point in dealing with extra utensils to get the crab out of the shell, or the extra cost.

As for the red components of the stew; my mantra - if you wouldn't drink it, don't cook with it - a good, dry red wine should be used here. I also like to err on the side of too much when it comes to anything tomato - it is hard to find highly flavored tomatoes, so a little extra never hurts!

This particular recipe also calls for a combination of chicken broth and clam juice for cooking liquid. I have still never seen a chicken swimming in the ocean, so there will still be no chicken broth in my seafood stew. Last week I had made seafood broth from clam shells, parsley, garlic etc - it took about 45 minutes, made more than enough for last weeks recipe and the cioppino, so that's what I used.

Finally, I would suggest, wherever possible, to finish this stew with fresh herbs, not dried. There is so much flavor and acid in here that the brightness of fresh parsley and basil will really make a difference.

Oh, and as we sat eating our stew, there was an empty bowl placed in the middle of the table. For what you ask? Why to save the clam shells and shimp shells for the next batch of seafood broth, of course.

Matzoh Balls with Chicken Soup

Matzoh Balls in Chicken Soup

Happy Passover! As Jews all over the world contemplate the struggles of those without the freedoms we take for granted, solace is found, perhaps universally, in a familiar form; chicken soup. Maybe the seasonings and vegetables change with the locale, but warm, inviting broth with a generous dose of chicken, stays constant.

Seems like an easy enough soup to make. Heck, in a pinch, pop a top and you've got chicken soup. Just ignore that voice in the back of your head saying "man there's a lot of salt in this" and "I just don't get the sense of Mom in this soup".

For this particular soup, I needed a head start. I have found in the past, that if one of several aspects of this soup are bland, the whole thing falls apart. So this time, I decided to break out each component and deal with it separately. First, the chicken.

Day 1. Make roast chicken with lemon, rosemary, garlic salt. (1 C Kosher salt with grated lemon rind, chopped fresh rosemary, minced garlic). Clean and pat dry the chicken. Put 2 TBSp of the salt mixture in the cavity plus the juice of one lemon and the squeezed lemon rinds. Rub the whole bird with olive oil, and cook for 60 - 75 min @ 450 deg. As soon as it is cooked, and the juices run clear at the thigh, remove from the oven, and sprinkle with another Tbsn or two of the salt mixture. Let sit covered for about 20 minutes. Meanwhile, deglaze the roasting pan and use as gravy. Enjoy - this dish makes my mouth water just thinking about it. SAVE THE CARCASS!!!! Put the carcass and any accumulated juices in a saucepan, cover with water and simmer for a couple of hours. Strain and save. Make sure you save at least two cups of this chicken meat for the soup - you do not want to rely on the cooked chicken meat from the broth making for flavor.

Day 2. Make brown chicken broth. Roast the chicken parts, carrots, celery, leeks, onions at 450 for an hour. Then move to a soup pot, cover with water, and add your bouquet garni of choice. Since I already had some broth flavored with lemon, rosemary and garlic, my bouquet garni consisted of fresh rosemary sprigs, flat leaf parsley and bay leaves. Since my amazing Boss went to Egypt and brought me back a huge container of really high quality saffron, I added a bit of crushed saffron in too. All this simmered for about 3 hours and was strained and saved. The chicken and cooked vegetables were not saved - I know, I am a bad, wasteful person. I also tasted that cooked chicken and decided it had given all of its flavor to the broth and was simply a shell of its former self.

Day 3. Make the Matzoh Balls. I have been using a version of this recipe from the "New York Cookbook" for about 10 years:

http://www.cooking.com/Recipes-and-More/recipes/Carol-Wolks-Prize-Winning-Matzo-Balls-recipe-6250.aspx

The secret ingredient is Vodka! Selzer makes them light, vodka adds to the flavor. Don't skimp on the salt here, make sure all the ingredients are well mixed. And the less you touch the matzoh balls the better - wet hands, roll them off the spoon quickly and into the boiling water.

Next, cut up your soup veggies. I used carrots, celery and leeks. Saute them in butter until the colors are bright and they are slightly tender. Add in the chicken meat from day 1, and just cook a little longer until it is heated.

Combine the chicken broth from Day 1 with the brown broth from Day 2, for a rich, flavorful, mahogany colored broth. At this point, all players are still separate, and will remain so. Once the matzoh balls are done, plop two into a soup bowl, add the cooked vegetables and chicken, and then ladle on the broth. I saved whatever matzoh balls were left over with a little broth, and the remaining broth went in the freezer for the next soup creation.

Happy Holidays!