O'Keefe Cafe

Restaurant Review

O'Keefe Cafe This is a lovely place to sit outside on a warm day and have a very expensive lunch. Most of our items were excellent, but I can't forgive the Carrot Gazpacho served in a hot bowl on a hot saucer which was very unpleasant. The chocolate cake is superb but skip the apple tart. At $9.00 a dessert, you owe me!

Flambéed Thai Bananas

The Altitude Adjustment Section
You know, not all desserts are baked. Here is a recipe for a dessert made in a pan at the last minute that will knock your socks off.

Ingredients
I tablespoon white sesame seeds
3 tablespoons shredded coconut
2 large firm under-ripe bananas
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 tablespoon fresh ginger
2 teaspoons orange zest
2 tablespoons sugar
Juice of 1 lime
6 tablespoons Cognac

Procedure
In a small, hot, dry skillet toast sesame seeds and set aside. Now in same pan add shredded coconut and cook till it gets brown — 1 minute or so. Set aside, too — that stuff is for later! Now peel bananas and cut in half-length wise. Place a 12 inch skillet over medium high heat and add butter, ginger, and orange zest. When the butter begins to bubble, add banana slices, cut side down. Sprinkle on the sugar, add lime juice, and cook till sugar caramelizes — about one minute. Now carefully remove bananas to warm serving tray and sprinkle with sesame seeds and coconut. Return frying pan to the heat and add Cognac. As soon as it is hot, light alcohol with a match, to the amazement of the other guests. Don't worry, the flames only last a moment. Immediately pour sauce over bananas and serve with a lime wedge.

Spring Onion Cakes

Seasonal Recipe of the Week
Spring onion cakes from Hong Kong are a breakfast treat worth knowing about. It’s like a puffy pancake with a crisp scallion filling. I like to add other stuff to the mix like smoked salmon or sun-dried tomato. I say have fun with it, and the technique is so simple you will be customizing them before you know it.

Ingredients
6 ounces A.P. flour
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 ounces Crisco, or traditionally lard
4 tablespoons ice water
1 tablespoon cooking oil
3 ounces scallions cut into 1/4 inch dice
1/2 teaspoon soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon sesame oil
oil for deep frying

Procedure
In a mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, salt, and Crisco or lard. Mix with your fingertips till dough looks crumbly. Now add the cold water and combine to form a smooth dough. To prepare filling, heat oil in a sauté pan and sauté the scallions for 1 minute. Add Soy and sesame oil and remove from heat. Drain off excess juice. To make cakes, roll the dough out into a 9 inch circle on a surface sprinkled with a little flour. Sprinkle onions over pastry. Roll up into a log and cut into 5 equal pieces. Now roll each piece into a 3 inch-circle. Deep fry onion cakes in hot oil till crisp and golden brown. Cut each cake in quarters and serve immediately. Great with Chinese plum jam or homemade chili jam.

New Dehli Grill at Sunset Gas Station

Restaurant Review

New Dehli Grill Go figure, the best Indian restaurant in town is out on the Old Las Vegas Highway in the back of a gas station! Trust me, it's really good. We skipped the cheap and cheerful lunch buffet for $7.99 when one of the guests warned us to be sure the chicken was really cooked and headed to the cute dinning room in the back. The menu is big and interesting, there are lots of vegetarian choices, they make the Panir from scratch, and it wasn't oily. You even can dine on the open patio and watch people cry while gassing up.

Hazelnut Crisps

The Altitude Adjustment Section
Whenever Lexi is here, I feel I have to make healthier things, so here is an easy recipe for Hazelnut crisp from Local Flavors by Debra Madison, who never lets me down. And you can make the dough ahead, freeze it and slice and bake to order. She notes in the recipe, and I confirm, a little chocolate drizzle on top of these cookies doesn’t hurt!

Ingredients
1 cup toasted hazelnuts
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 egg yolk
1 1/4 cups A.P. flour

Procedure
Grind the hazelnuts in food processor with sugar till fine. In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream butter, brown sugar, and salt till fluffy then add vanilla and egg yolk. Stir in hazelnut and flour. Roughly shape dough into log and wrap in plastic. Now you can roll it further and make it thinner about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour, preferably longer. To bake cookies, preheat oven to 350. Cut log into 1/4 inch to 1/3 inch slices and place on ungreased cookie sheet or on sheet lined with parchment paper. Leave 2 inches between cookies. Bake till lightly browned on top, 12-15 minutes. Cool on rack and store in airtight container. Don’t forget the optional chocolate drizzle on cooled cookies!

Grilled Eggplant-Tomato Dip and Fava Bean Spread

Seasonal Recipe of the Week
So here is an idea, go to the farmer’s market, or if you are lucky enough, go to your garden and pick some tomatoes and eggplants and herbs and make a dip. Easy, fast and delicious, make some pita crisps or croustades, then
open some wine — that’s entertainment. Here are 2 great dip recipes:

Grilled Eggplant-Tomato Dip

Ingredients
2 cups wood chips, hickory or apple wood
1 1/2 pounds of eggplant (2 medium) skinned and cut into 1/3 rounds
2 ripe tomatoes (1 1/2 pounds) cut into 1/3 rounds
1/4 cup olive oil
3 tablespoons Tahini
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 tablespoons roast garlic puree
2 teaspoons tamari or soy sauce
1 1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 teaspoons toasted sesame oil
1 teaspoon Tabasco sauce
1/2 cup finely chopped flat leaf parsley
2 teaspoons finely ground and toasted cumin seeds

Procedure
Light up your outside or stovetop grill or smoker or heat up your oven to 450. I have a gas grill, so I soak 2 cups of wood chips in water for one hour, and then sprinkle them on top of the fire and I'm ready to go. Brush the tomato and eggplant slices with olive oil and place on the grill rack preferably about 6 inches above the flame. Turn till lightly browned, about 10 minutes total. Now cool to room temp and coarsely chop tomato and eggplant. In a food processor, combine chopped vegetables with tahini, lemon, garlic puree, salt, sesame oil, and Tabasco and process till almost smooth. Transfer to a bowl and refrigerate for at least 1 hour or overnight. Serve at room temp with chopped parsley mixed in; adjust salt and pepper to taste. Sprinkle top with cumin seed. Don’t forget something to dip with, besides your fingers.

Fava Bean Spread

Ingredients
1 pound fresh Fava beans in the pod
1/3 cup freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano
1/3 cup olive oil
3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh mint
2 tablespoons chopped basil
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 cloves garlic peeled and chopped 1/4 teaspoon salt
Freshly ground black pepper

Procedure
Remove the beans from the pods; you should have 1 1/2 cups. Bring a small pan of water to the boil. Add the beans and cook for 3-5 minutes till tender, stirring on occasion. Drain, rinse, and cool to room temperature. In a food processor, combine all ingredients. Stop and scrape down sides of the bowl so you get a smooth puree. Adjust seasoning and serve immediately. This is best if it is never refrigerated. It can sit at room temp for 2 hours.

Cleopatra's Cafe

Restaurant Review

Cleopatra's Cafe This new cafe in the infamous Lowe's parking lot off Zafarano is nothing to get excited about. I felt the same way I felt when I ate at their original location in the Design Center. I appreciate their use of local lamb in the kabobs, but it's too bad it was overcooked and had no seasoning. The Fava bean falafel sounded interesting, but was bland and mushy. I understand the Moussaka is excellent. Maybe they need to work the kinks out, and get some consistency in their food. For the moment, I would rather keep driving and go to the Southside Plaza Cafe for my Middle Eastern food cravings.

Passion Fruit and Vodka Jell-O Shots

Refreshing Beverage of the Week
Okay, it all started at my friends Vince and Diana’s Summer Solstice party. Right when you think you can’t eat or drink another bite, the hosts bring out the frozen hot shots. Jalapeño tequila, need I say more? "What’s that?" I ask. "Oh just try one!" And the rest is history. As much as I love little cookbooks, I also love strong, crazy, little drinks. It took me years to learn what all college kids know: I love Jell-O shots. So here is a great little recipe for a passion fruit and vodka jelly shot. Danger, Will Robertson! Danger!

Ingredients
1 sheet gelatin leaf — more common in Europe or professional kitchens
1 ounce sugar syrup
2 ounces fresh passion fruit pulp (or I use “Pure” brand passion fruit puree)
2 1/2 ounces vodka

Procedure
Soften the gelatin in cold water. Now heat the passion fruit and sugar syrup till just hot, squeeze out excess water from gelatin and add and stir till dissolved. Cool mixture and stir in Vodka. Pour into 6 shot glasses refrigerate for at least 3 hours or till set. If you can’t find gelatin leaf you can use 3/4 teaspoon powdered gelatin, which you need to soften in the passion fruit liquid first and then cook to dissolve.

Chocolate Malted Muffins

The Altitude Adjustment Section
And now for a chocolate muffin recipe, not too sweet, for my very sweet Welsh friend Claire, who is about to embark on a muffin business in Hastings on the Hudson in New York. She is already a great baker but needed to add a chocolate muffin to her repertoire. So I headed to my old favorite The King Arthur Whole Grain Cookbook for this special recipe for chocolate muffins made with malt and other healthy things. This recipe makes 1 dozen.

Ingredients for muffins
1 cup whole barley flour
1/2 cup whole wheat or white whole wheat flour
1/2 cup bread flour
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa
1/4 cup malted milk powder
1 cup light or dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1 1/4 cups buttermilk
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup chocolate chips

Ingredients for glaze
6 tablespoons light brown sugar
2 tablespoons malted milk powder
2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa
1 tablespoon corn syrup
1/4 cup plain yogurt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Procedure
Preheat oven to 375. Line muffin tins with paper liners or spray pan with non-stick spray. Whisk together the dry ingredients. In a separate bowl combine butter, buttermilk, eggs, and vanilla. Now just combine wet and dry till blended by hand and stir in chips. Scoop batter into muffin tins and bake 25 minutes till toothpick comes out clean.

To make glaze, combine all ingredients into small sauce pan and bring to a simmer stirring often. Drizzle on cold muffins. The hardest part of this recipe is gathering your ingredients, but most health food stores should have everything you need. Remember to store flours in your fridge, if you have room, to increase their shelf life. But they are best used at room temperature.

Fried Eggplant Soaked in Salt and Milk, no less!

Seasonal Recipe of the Week
Eggplant soaked in milk, how could it be? Well if you've ever noticed how bitter eggplant can be, this solves that problem. Here is a great, easy recipe, it’s all about technique and it’s from Paula Wolfert's book called World of Food, and with local eggplant soon to appear, now is the time to master this recipe.

Ingredients
1 pound narrow eggplants, preferably Japanese
2 teaspoons coarse salt
1 to 2 cups milk
Oil for deep frying (Wolfert suggests olive oil)
Flour for dredging
Salt. Pepper, and cinnamon
Granulated sugar, optional

Procedure
Peel the eggplants and cut them into 1/2-inch thick rounds. Place the rounds in a colander and sprinkle them with the salt. Weight them down — I use a plate — and let them sit for at least 1 hour. Rinse them, place in a bowl and cover them with milk (which will draw out the salt) and let sit till you are ready to fry. Preheat oven to 250. Heat your oil in a deep pan to 375. Meanwhile drain the eggplant and pat dry on paper towels. Season the flour with salt, pepper, and cinnamon. Dredge half the slices and shake off the excess flour by shaking them in a strainer over the sink. Now add them to the hot oil one at a time so they don’t splash and burn you. Fry them till they are crisp and brown on both sides, around 7 minutes. Drain on paper towels and place in the oven to keep warm. Repeat with remaining slices after checking the oil is back up to 375. Serve at once, sprinkled with a little sugar if desired. Note — because of the salting and soaking process these eggplant slices will absorb hardly any oil during frying. So there!

New Time slot for "Mouth of Wonder"

New's Flash!
As of Next Saturday July 12th, "Mouth of Wonder" will be on at a new and improved time on KSFR 101.1 FM. Tune in from 10:30-11:00 for 30 minutes of amusing food porn!

Pepe's Tacos

Restaurant Review

Pepe's Tacos This is a real deal, cheap and cheerful Mexican Taco joint on Cerrillos road right next to Los Portillos, which has the same owner. The menu is huge and on the wall and full of authentic dishes. The Cubano sandwich was tasty and very heavy, as it should be. The Chicken tacos were excellent, but after this lunch I had to take a nap!

Chocolate Pudding Mix from Scratch

The Altitude Adjustment Section
You know, Mother of Rula thinks chocolate pudding is one of the 5 basic food groups. She always has it in little bowls in her fridge — yes she is always prepared. This got me to thinking how much better would this taste if she did not use the store-bought kind, but made it from scratch instead. So I did my research and came up with a recipe from Better than Store Bought to make your own mix and then cook it to order. Bernice, I am bringing some over to your house for a test run!

Ingredients for dry mix
2 1/4 cups instant dry milk
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup cornstarch
2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa
1/4 teaspoon salt

This makes 4 one cup batches each cup is enough for 4 servings. Just whisk it all together in a bowl and divide it equally into 4 zip lock bags. This will keep for months stored in a closed container at room temperature.

Ingredients to make pudding
1 batch dry mix
1 cup water
1 cup milk
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Procedure
In a medium-sized, heavy-bottomed saucepan, pour one packet of dry mix. Now gradually stir in the water and milk. Bring to a boil over medium heat stirring constantly. Simmer 1 minute stirring hard so it doesn’t burn. Remove from heat and stir in butter and vanilla. Strain into 4 individual serving dishes, cover top lightly with plastic and chill.

Oaxacan-style Mole Sauce

Seasonal Recipe of the Week
And now for something completely different... a recipe for Mole sauce
which is made with unsweetened chocolate and lots of other yummy stuff.

Ingredients
12 ounces whole dried anchos and pasilla chiles
1 dried chipotle
Water
6 tablespoons sesame seeds
1 teaspoon anise seeds
1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds
4 tablespoons peanut oil
3/4 cup walnuts, chopped
6 garlic cloves, unpeeled
6 whole Italian plum tomatoes
4 cups chicken stock
1 medium onion, chopped
1 day-old corn tortilla, quartered
3 ounces unsweetened chocolate
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
6 whole cloves

Procedure
Break stems off chiles and remove seeds. Rinse chiles. Toast chiles until fragrant in a heavy skillet, turning them frequently. Transfer chiles to a large saucepan and cover with water. Simmer over medium heat for about 30 minutes until softened.
While the chiles simmer, toast sesame seeds over medium heat in the skillet. Don't let them burn. Spoon the seeds into a blender.

Toast the anise and cumin seeds in the skillet until fragrant and add them to the blender.

Pour 1 tablespoon of the oil into the warm skillet and stir in the nuts. Sauté until lightly colored and fragrant. Add the nuts to the blender.

Wipe out the skillet and increase heat to medium-high. Scatter the garlic cloves in the skillet, turning the cloves occasionally so that they soften and darken on all sides. Remove and set-aside until cool enough to handle.

Add tomatoes to the skillet, turning occasionally as they soften and darken. The skins will split a bit during the process. Remove the tomatoes and set them aside until cool enough to handle. Remove the skins from the garlic and tomatoes and add both to the blender.

Pour 1 cup of the stock into the blender. Purée the mixture for 2 minutes. The sauce will become smooth but a little grainy. Pour the sauce into a large bowl. Drain chiles lightly from their cooking liquid, reserving 1 cup of the liquid. Place the chiles and about 1/2 cup of the reserved liquid in the blender and purée. Pour the chiles into the bowl with the tomato sauce.

Add 1 more cup of stock to the blender with the remaining sauce ingredients and purée for 2 minutes. This mixture, too, will become smooth but a little grainy. Pour it into the bowl and stir together.

Wipe out any tomato residue from the skillet and add the remaining oil. Warm the oil over medium heat. Spoon in the sauce and fry it for about 10 minutes, stirring up from the bottom constantly. Mix in the remaining stock and reserved chile cooking liquid, reduce the heat to low, and simmer for 30 minutes. Divide sauce into two containers, as 1/2 will be enough for any recipe that serves 6 to 8. The sauce can be made ahead and refrigerated for 1 or 2 days, or frozen for several months.

I know this is complex but it's worth trying. Or you can buy the Mole concentrate in any bodega around town, thin it with chicken stock; add some peanut butter and stir, that’s good too!

Classic Cole Slaw and Potato Salad (my way)

Seasonal Recipe of the Week
This is an early blog entry for those who are wanting to do coleslaw and potato salad for the 4th of July, I offer these 2 classic recipes:

My Coleslaw recipe

Ingredients
1 small green Cabbage
1/2 small Red cabbage
3 Carrots
1 Granny Smith apple
1 Macintosh apple
1/2 cup Golden raisins
1 teaspoon ground Ginger
1/2 teaspoon Dry Coleman's Mustard
2 cups Mayonnaise
1/2 cup Sugar
1/2 cup Apple Cider vinegar
1 tablespoon Celery seed
1/2 teaspoon Salt
1/4 teaspoon fresh ground black Pepper

Procedure
This recipe makes 12 servings. It can easily be cut in half. The cabbage can be hand-cut or put through the slicing blade of a food processor. The carrots should be grated and the apples cut into a small dice (I leave the skin on for color). Combine all the dressing ingredients together and mix with the cabbage and fruit. Taste to adjust seasoning. It is best to make slaw a few hours in advance to give the cabbage a chance to soften.

My warm German Potato salad recipe

Ingredients
6 baking potatoes
1/2 cup sherry vinegar
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon Black pepper
1 pound chopped bacon diced
6 eggs
3/4 cup chopped scallions
1/2 cup chopped red onion or Vidalia onion

Procedure
Cook potatoes in boiling salted water till tender and then peel and cut into cubes. Add vinegar and seasonings to hot potatoes. Fry up bacon till crisp and remove from the pan. Boil eggs till soft boiled (at this altitude, that's about 12 minutes). Combine potatoes with bacon and soft-boiled eggs and about 2 tablespoons of the bacon fat. Add the chopped onions and scallions. Adjust seasonings and serve warm. Look on the bright side — there is no mayo! This makes 8-10 servings.