Monthly Archives: June 2009

An Ode to Cowgirl Creamery Cottage Cheese

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Cottage cheese that will change your mind about cottage cheese.

My early recollections of cottage cheese are not the best of ones.

Like so many of you way back when, I ate it — but not happily.

It was, of course, diet food, associated with canned cling peach halves or bare burger patties alongside a forlorn leaf of iceberg lettuce. We ate the white, creamy curds because they were supposed to be good for us, because we were counting calories, because we wanted to feel virtuous.

We certainly didn’t spoon them into our mouths because we wanted to.

But I do now.

That’s because I’ve discovered a cottage cheese that actually makes me revel in eating cottage cheese. It’s the clabbered cottage cheese crafted by Cowgirl Creamery of Point Reyes Station.

It starts with organic non-fat milk from Marin County’s Straus Family Creamery. Clabbered cream (similar in taste to creme fraiche) is then added. The result is a creamy, rich cottage cheese. Unlike the standard mass-produced ones that have a sort of sour milk-taste to them, Cowgirl Creamery’s has a pure, fresh milky flavor.

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Spanish Flavors

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Tender pork flavored with rosemary, white wine, and pomegranate juice.

Antonio Banderas. Penelope Cruz. The architecture of Antoni Gaudi.

Sangria. Cava. Tapas. And melt-in-your-mouth Iberico ham.

I love all things Spanish.

When I spied the new “One Pot Spanish” (Sellers Publishing) cookbook by Spanish cooking authority Penelope Casas, it brought back delectable memories of my trip to Spain long ago, when I got my fill of seafood paella, briny olives, and bracing gazpacho.

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My Kind of Bread

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Bread -- made with oodles of chocolate.

Yeah, yeah, yah. I know I’m supposed to eat more whole wheat, whole grain, whole lotta fiber-fabulous bread.

But can you blame me for choosing this “Double Chocolate-Honey Bread” instead?

After all, it’s got all the best characteristics of your favorite artisan loaf — but with cocoa powder suffused throughout, and big chunks of gooey deep, dark chocolate hidden inside.

The recipe is from the new “Kneadlessly Simple” (Wiley) by veteran cookbook author Nancy Baggett.

It’s a bread book all about making loaves using the slow-rise, no-knead method that’s all the rage now.

To be honest, I haven’t been all that tempted by this new trend. So ya don’t have to get your hands dirty by kneading dough. Instead you have to figure out what exact time to stick the dough in the refrigerator, when to take it out for the first rise, then when to put it in a pan for the second rise, and lastly, when precisely it’s ready to go into the oven.  Advanced calculus was easier than this.

Dough, just after the first rise.

When it comes to chocolate baked goods, though, I’ll go to great lengths. So for this chocolate bread, I was willing to give it a go. And the results were so extraordinary, I’d gladly put myself through these timing gymnastics again.

This is definitely not a cake, even if from the outside it might resemble a tea loaf of sorts. There’s no delicate, tender crumb here. This is honest-to-goodness bread with a sugary, crisp hard crust and a dense, yet soft interior that’s shot through and through with chocolate. If you like the French tradition of nibbling on a baguette topped with a piece of good dark chocolate, you’ll find this bread a pure slice of heaven.

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Good Eats & Drinks

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Chef Chris Cosentino of Incanto. (Photo courtesy of Michael Harlan Turkell)

Nosh on a special three-course menu from the Italian countryside every Sunday and Monday evenings this summer through Aug. 31 at San Francisco’s Incanto.

Executive Chef Chris Cosentino changes the prix fixe “Cocina Povera” weekly, highlighting a specific region each time. Price is $30, or $39 with two wine pairings included.

Chef Alessandro Cartumini of Quattro. (Photo courtesy of Chris Schmauch)

Four of Northern California’s best chefs will be serving up specialties at the 27th annual Vintage Affaire June 27 at a spectacular Atherton private estate.

Enjoy the creations of Alessandro Cartumini of Quattro Restaurant and Bar at the Four Seasons Hotel Silicon Valley in East Palo Alto; Daniel Patino of Michael Mina’s Arcadia in San Jose; Xavier Salomon of the Ritz-Carlton, Half Moon Bay; and Cal Stamenov of Bernardus Lodge in Carmel Valley. More than 25 of California’s best wineries also will be pouring special vintages.

Live and silent auctions will give guests a chance to bid on rare wines, wine dinners, and special vacation packages.

Tickets are $300 per person. The event benefits Palo Alto’s Vista Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired. During the past 26 years, this gala has raised nearly $6 million for the center clinic, counseling, and computer training services.

In this stagnant economy, restaurants and hotels are realizing that more than anything, diners want options and values.

That’s why all Ritz-Carlton Hotels around the world are introducing a new bar menu that invites guests to linger, share, and relax. It’s also an attempt to show that even in these tough times, you don’t have to sell the family jewels to afford a bite to eat and a drink to sip at this chain of luxury hotels.

Southern-style barbecue pork sliders. (Photo courtesy of the Ritz-Carlton)

Look for smoked salmon and arugula egg rolls, calamari in remoulade sauce, comforting crab cakes, barbecue pork sliders, and an array of cool cocktails. Items range from $10 to $20.

For another deal, head to Urban Tavern in San Francisco, June 8-12, when the downtown gastropub will allow diners to “pay what they think it’s worth.”

Yes, you got that right. Diners can enjoy up to a three-course meal at lunch. At the end, they’ll be asked to pay what they think the meal was worth. The server will then ring up that amount, plus tax. Lunch can include food, soft drinks, coffee, and tea, but not alcohol.

The offer is limited to 100 diners per day. Reservations are required.

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Ginger Time

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One scoop? Or two?

Yes, I have a thing for ginger.

Big-time.

Whether it’s pickled, fresh, crystalized, or dried, I can never get enough of it. That sweet-heat on the back of the throat wins me over every time.

So you can just imagine my delight when two new ginger products landed on my front porch for sampling.

First up, the new Haagen-Dazs “Five” ice cream flavors. There are seven flavors — each of them containing only five ingredients: milk, cream, eggs, sugar, and one wild card for flavor. The five-ingredient concept is played up to denote purity and simplicity. The ice cream comes in vanilla bean, milk chocolate, mint, coffee, brown sugar, passion fruit, and ginger.

Guess which one I opened first?

That would be correct.

The mouth-feel of these ice creams is wicked good — rich, smooth, and creamy as all get out. But then you expect no less from Haagen-Dazs.

The ginger one had a musty-ginger flavor. It had fairly subtle heat, too. Perhaps, too subtle for a true ginger addict like yours truly.

I had high hopes for the brown sugar one. After all, it tastes exactly like brown sugar. But let’s face it, how much brown sugar would you really want to eat? After one taste, that’s pretty much enough.

The vanilla bean was the epitome of purity — very vanilla-like. The milk chocolate made me think of my childhood — in a good way. It reminded me of eating cups of Carnation frozen milk chocolate out of paper containers with a tiny wooden spoon.

My favorites were probably the coffee (very perky tasting), the mint (incredibly cool and refreshing), and the passion fruit (like a tropical island on a spoon).

Itty bitty, but with a huge taste.

Next up, the Ginger People’s new Ginger Snaps. A 5.3-ounce box is $5.50.

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