Easy Recipes

Ive never been one to buy a lot of cookbooks. While I love to pore over the pages for inspiration, or drool over the glossy pictures, I have trouble making a purchase. Sometimes Ill talk myself out of it, figuring that although the pictures draw me in, realistically Ill only end up making one or two of the recipes. But even with cookbooks I love, cookbooks that make me daydream about the author becoming my best friend and inviting me to dinner parties, the books stay on the bookstore shelves. Because if I start with buying one cookbook, where and how will I stop? So I stick to the library.

The Slow Mediterranean Kitchen, an amazing cookbook by Paula Wolfert, trumped my cookbook-purchasing hesitation with just one recipe. I checked her book out of the library, made the Herb Jam with Olives and Lemons, and walked over to the bookstore and bought my own copy. Ive since made another half dozen of the recipes, and theyve all been wonderful.

I cant pretend that this herb jam isnt a good bit of work. While some of the entries in this cookbook earn their "slow" designation because of a long simmer, or a few hours in a cool oven, this one is slow because it takes a lot of labor. Youve got to clean and stem a whole mess of herbs and greens, steam them until they soften and shrink disappointingly, chop them up, and then saute them with olive oil and a few spices until they become a smooth paste. But the results are like nothing Ive ever tasted.

Wolfert adapted this spread from a traditional Moroccan recipe, in which local greens and herbs are cooked over charcoal embers. The jam has a "green" flavor, but its also got a surprising depth from the cooking method and smoked paprika (which replicates the traditional charcoal smokiness). The herbs soften and mellow, adding flavor without their customary sharpness. The original recipe calls for adding some oil-cured olives, but the complex flavor of the greens is so lovely that you dont need the distraction.


Moroccan Herb Jam
adapted from Herb Jam with Lemons and Olives, Paula Wolfert, The Slow Mediterranean Kitchen
makes about 1 cup (I often make a double batch)

In addition to being delicious as written below, this recipe can easily accommodate other additions. Ive replaced the celery leaves with some Asian celery greens, swapped out chard for spinach, and added the celery-sharp lovage leaves that grow like weeds here in the Northwest. All make for delicious herb jam.

4 large garlic cloves, halved
1 lb spinach leaves, stemmed (or baby spinach, or chard)
1 large bunch flat-leaf parsley, stemmed
1/2 bunch cilantro, stemmed (~1/2 cup)
1/2 cup celery leaves, or lovage
1/4 cup olive oil
1 1/2 tsp smoked Spanish paprika (Pimenton de la Vera)
1 pinch cayenne (if using sweet Pimenton, omit if using hot)
1 pinch cumin
1 Tbsp lemon juice, or more to taste
salt

Set a steamer basket above simmering water. Place the greens and garlic, and steam until tender (about 10 minutes -- you may need to do this in batches). Set the garlic cloves aside. Press the greens into a strainer to wring out the excess water, and finely chop.

Set a heavy skillet over a medium flame, and heat 1 Tbsp of the olive oil. Press the garlic cloves into the oil, and add the Pimenton, cayenne, and cumin. Stir until sizzling and fragrant (it should take less than a minute). Add the greens and cook, stirring occasionally and mashing a bit with a wooden spoon, until they have begun to break down and become somewhat dry, smooth mixture (~20 minutes). The color will darken a bit.

Remove from heat and let cool. Stir in the remaining oil, making a smooth spread, and season with salt and lemon juice to taste. Serve with flatbread, crackers, or sliced crusty loaves. The flavor improves if you make it a day ahead of time (stir in the lemon juice the day youre serving), but I seldom want to wait.

I tend get my hackles up over use of the word "special." It so often smacks of faint praise, or overcompensation. Its possible Im a bit of a hater. But recently my friend Brian helped me come around. As good friends and neighbors, we end up eating a lot of meals together (and sharing too-good-not-to-bring-next-door bites of many more). And there have been times during these meals where hell just pause, savoring everything about a singular mouthful, and then pronounce it special.

Maybe its the fact that Brians a particularly dear friend, or the total wide-eyed sincerity with which he shares this reaction. Whatever it is, its helped me get over my surliness and embrace the word. Because hes right. Some things truly are special. Like this cake.

I first saw this cake posted on Bon Appetit, and figured that it was the sort of thing best left to the professionals. But then I saw it on a beloved blog, and thought perhaps it was within the mortal realm. And then I made it, and I shared it with my neighbors, and we moaned out some expletives about how holy crap good it was.

Amazingly, its not even all that complicated. The cake itself is just a simple two-bowl chocolate cake — you dont even have to remember to soften butter or anything. But there are a few simple steps that take it beyond. First off, the cake is scented with juniper berries (thankfully sold in bulk at the local natural market down the street), which manage to both deepen and cut through the chocolate with their unique woodsy vibe. Then you make a sauce that manages to be both milky-sweet and rich and tangy at the same time. And then — even better — you firm up the cake in the freezer, dredge it in sugar, and give it a quick pan-fry to yield a delicately caramelized crust. The end result makes you question all of your previous cake-making. Why isnt chocolate always paired with juniper? And milk jam sour cream served on everything? And seriously why isnt every cake caramelized prior to serving? None of these tweaks is all that difficult, and all are within the grasp of pretty much any cake-baking home cook. And the end result is really, really special.


Chocolate Juniper Cake with Milk Jam Sour Cream

adapted from Oxheart, via Bon Appetit 
serves ~10 (you can also halve the recipe and bake in an 8-inch pan instead)

Cake:
2 heaping teaspoons juniper berries
1 3/4 cups flour
1 2/3 cup sugar (plus more for caramelizing the cake)
1/2 cup plus 1 Tbsp cocoa powder
2 tsp coarse salt
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 cup buttermilk (if unavailable, substitute soured milk)
3/4 cup neutral oil, like vegetable or grapeseed
2 large eggs

Milk Jam Sour Cream:
1 cup sour cream or creme fraiche
1-2 Tbsp sweetened condensed milk (if youd like to make your own milk jam, boil down 2 cups milk with 1 cup sugar until youre left with a darkened, sweetened cup, ~45 minutes — and, as a bonus, leftover milk jam or sweetened condensed milk keeps for a while and is great stirred into your coffee)

To make the cake: Preheat your oven to 350° Farenheit. Grease a 9x13 pan, line the bottom with parchment and grease again, then dust everything with flour. Set aside.

Heat a dry skillet over a medium heat, then dry-toast the juniper berries until they become oily and fragrant (this will barely take a minute). Let cool slightly, then grind in a spice grinder.

In a large bowl, sift together the ground juniper berries with the flour, sugar, cocoa powder, salt, and baking soda. In a separate bowl, whisk together the buttermilk, oil and eggs until well combined. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry, and fold or whisk until just combined (dont over-mix). Quickly transfer to your prepared pan, smooth the top if needed, and bake until a tester comes out clean, ~35-40 minutes. Remove from the oven, let cool, then transfer to the freezer until solid, at least two hours and up to three weeks (if the latter, wrap well in plastic).

To make the milk jam sour cream: Stir the sweetened condensed milk or milk jam into the creme fraiche/sour cream to taste — you want something thats lightly sweet, but still quite tangy.

To finish the cake: Remove the cake from the freezer, turn out onto a cutting board and discard the parchment. Trim off the edges, then slice the cake down the middle, so that you have two rectangles of about 4-inches in height, then slice each rectangle crosswise into 1 1/4-inch bars.

Pour out some granulated sugar onto a plate, grab a pair of tongs if youve got them, and heat a pan over a medium heat (the recipe recommends nonstick, but I did this with a regular steel pan and it was fine). Roll each cake bar in the sugar, so that theyre well-coated with a thin-yet-thorough dusting. Working in batches, transfer the cake slices to the skillet. Let caramelize on each side, turning to expose the next side when the side in the pan has melted and caramelized (once your pan is hot, itll take less than 30 seconds per side). You can also caramelize the short ends if you are quite obsessive, but its not necessary. Serve straight from the pan, with a dollop of milk jam ladled over the top.