Monthly Archives: October 2010

Five Heavy-Hitting Cookbook Authors to Visit the Bay Area

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Maybe those of you in the South Bay haven’t had a chance to eat the fried chicken and popovers at Wayfare Tavern in San Francisco yet. But you can still meet its chef-owner up close and personal.

Tyler Florence will be in San Jose at 5 p.m. Oct. 19 at Sur La Table in Santana Row for a Q&A session and a book signing of his latest cookbook, “Tyler Florence Family Meal” (Rodale Books).

The new cookbook is a collection of recipes he makes for family, including his wife and kids, as well as restaurant colleagues.

Attendees are encourage to pre-purchase the cookbook, available beginning on Oct. 12.

His fellow Food Network darling, Rachael Ray, also will be stopping by Sur La Table in Santana Row in San Jose at 3 p.m. Dec. 11.

Ray will be signing copies of her new cookbook, “Rachael Ray’s Look + Cook” (Clarkson Potter), filled with 100 recipes, each with step-by-step, full-color photos that illustrate how to create the dish.

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A Visit to Saison 2.0

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Perhaps no restaurant epitomizes today’s necessitated bent toward creative entrepreneurship better than San Francisco’s Saison.

Last summer, much like so many budding tech impresarios of yesteryear,  Chef-Owner Joshua Skenes and sommelier whiz Mark Bright, cloistered themselves away to improvise on what would become a makeshift once-a-week restaurant. Their location wasn’t a garage, but what was once a historic stable that is now the Stable Cafe, which leased its kitchen and rear dining room to the dynamic duo.

From the spacious but far from state-of-the-art kitchen, Skenes turned out elegant, four-star, fine-dining fare served on the best china to jeans-clad diners who sat at bistro-style, slat chairs before cramped, bare wood tables.

It wasn’t long before word spread, important restaurant critics came calling, top food magazines started taking notice, and investors wanted, well, to invest.

The result this summer is version two of Saison — with a lot more waitstaff, a fancy Molteni stove in the kitchen, a large hearth on the redone patio for open-fire cooking, and actual upholstered, cushy banquettes in the dining room the shade of washed denim.

The restaurant has gone from pop-up to permanent. It now serves dinner five nights a week.

It’s a fitting stage for this young chef and young sommelier to show off their talents. Skenes earned rave reviews when he was at Chez TJ in Mountain View, then impressed the likes of Michael Mina so much that the San Francisco mega chef tapped Skenes to open his Stonehill Tavern restaurant in Monarch Beach, CA. Bright also has a Mina connection. At 17, he started working at Mina’s Aqua restaurant in the Bellagio in Las Vegas. On his 21st birthday, he became part of the Bellagio sommelier team, before being asked to become the opening sommelier at Restaurant Michael Mina in San Francisco.

My husband and I had a chance to check out the remodeled space last week, when Skenes invited us in as his guests to celebrate our anniversary, throwing in a few extra dishes for the occasion.

One eight-course menu is offered each night for $98; with an additional $78 for wine pairings. Big spenders can get a real bird’s eye view of the cooking by sitting at the chef’s counter at the back of the kitchen for a personalized 14- to 20-course dinner that runs $300 to $500 per person, depending upon ingredients used.

A dish before it goes out to the dining room.

We sat in the dining room, where Bright was eager to have us try a surprise — his own wine, the first he’s ever made.

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A Cookie Epiphany

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My new -- and old -- favorite oatmeal cookies.

I love my Auntie Stella for many reasons.

For her love of life and contagious laughter.

For the way she can dissect the games of Nadal and Federer with gusto.

For her uncanny ability to spot and pick out every speck of dreaded green onion or cilantro in any dish she eats.

And for her cherished Christmas presents to me when I was a child.

You see, my Auntie Stella used to work for the company that distributed Snoopy and all the other Peanuts characters collectibles.

Every Christmas, I’d find under the tree, something bearing Snoopy’s likeness — sleep shirts, a coin bank, ornaments or a big plush dog, which I carried everywhere for the longest time.

Along with the Snoopy presents, there was also another regular treat from her under the tree.

It was a festive-wrapped cardboard box, which my aunt would dole out to each of her relatives. Inside were freshly baked Danish cookies from a local bakery that were lined up in rows like tiles. There were probably about five different kinds of cookies inside. But there was one that my oldest brother, Alan, and I always reached for first. They were rectangular ones with rounded edges, and a crisp, nubby texture.

I wasn’t even sure what was in them. I just ate them happily, adoring the way they crumbled in my mouth.

When my aunt retired from her company, which had a partnership with the bakery, the cookie box at Christmas time went by the wayside.

I never experienced those particular cookies again.

Until now.

When I baked a batch of oatmeal cookies using a recipe from “The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion” (Countryman Press).

There are many variations of oatmeal cookies in this wonderful cookbook. In the past, I’d often used the one for “The Essential Chewy Oatmeal Cookie.” But this time for a change, I decided to see how “The Essential Crunchy Oatmeal Cookie” recipe compared.

Dried white mulberries.

For even more variation, instead of raisins, I substituted dried white mulberries, which I had toted home from Australia. But you also can find them at specialty stores in the Bay Area, including the Spanish Table in Berkeley.  The tiny, dried berries have a wonderful, sweet, date-like flavor.

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A Welcome (and Delicious) Red Wine Stain

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Red wine stains usually send shivers of horror through hosts and hostesses.

Visions of our best white tablecloths or favorite eggshell-hued couch being ruined for life tend to torment us.

But here’s one case where the staining power of your favorite red varietal is welcomed, indeed.

Take a close look at that plate of pasta above. No, it’s not whole-wheat pasta. In fact, those noodles started out as regular beige-colored strands. Take another look. Go on. You might even notice a bit of burgundy-purple tint to the noodles. It’s not your eyes playing funny tricks on you. And it’s not my meager Photoshop abilities at work, either.

Nope. It’s the magic of Zinfandel wine. An entire 750-ml bottle to be exact.

“Zinfandel Spaghettini with Spicy Rapini” is a genius dish from the new cookbook, “Michael Chiarello’s Bottega” (Chronicle Books). The book, of which I recently received a review copy, is filled with more than 100 recipes for Southern Italian specialties by Chiarello, chef-owner of the wildly popular Bottega restaurant in Yountville.

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Glam Truffle Popcorn and the Winner of the Food Gal $100 Giveaway

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Ahhhhh. I love the smell of black truffle popcorn in the afternoon.

It smells like pure decadence.

You have to admit there is something a little naughty about dressing up lowbrow popcorn with truffle oil, of all things.

Oh, I know, some of you are so over truffle oil. And the purists out there scoff that many of the ones on the market have no actual truffle in them.

But there’s no denying the haunting quality of the heady aroma of the pricey tuber.

Now, you can enjoy the uptown combo of popcorn and black truffle oil in a convenient kit by San Francisco’s 479° Popcorn.

The “Pop It Yourself Kit” ($45) comes complete with a 32-ounce jar of heirloom popcorn: Shaman Blue, Yellow Topaz, Dakota Black and White Diamond; a 16.5-ounce canister of La Tourangelle Black Truffle Oil (grapeseed oil infused with “black truffle aroma”); 2 packets of Gourmet Black Truffle Sea Salt (made with Mediterranean sea salt and shaved italian black truffles); 10 paper popcorn cones; and instructions.

The "Pop It Yourself Kit.''

The company, named for the precise popping temperature best for popcorn, was founded by husband-and-wife, Andy and Jean Arnold. All of their popcorn products are certified organic and purchased from small suppliers.

After I received a sample kit, my hubby has been begging me to make the popcorn every weekend. Dare I confess that sometimes we even enjoy a huge bowl as our lunch?

The quality of the kernels is unparalleled. There’s a real freshness to them that you don’t find in supermarket ones.

Pop some up, then drizzle on some truffle oil and sprinkle on some truffle salt. I defy anyone who makes a batch not to devour it. Once you get a whiff of the truffle oil hitting the hot, fresh popcorn, you just surrender to it.

Contest Winner(s): Now, for something else a little decadent — a $100 CSN gift card giveaway, good at any CSN online store.

As you recall in this latest Food Gal contest, I asked you to tell me about the best food-related gift you’ve ever received. Your answers touched my heart, made me laugh out loud, and were just priceless to read.

It was hard to pick just one winner. So, I didn’t. Besides the grand prize winner who will receive the $100 gift card, I’m adding second- and third-place winners, who will each receive a culinary-related book from my vast collection.

Thank you all for participating. Without further adieu, here are the winners:

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