It doesn't get any better than this

If there’s a better dessert any simpler than strawberry shortcake, I don’t know what it is.

Our food appreciation classes are tooling around central Europe on their virtual world culinary tour, but I couldn’t resist all the strawberries showing up lately in the grocery store. So we took a break from our foreign travels to whip up one of my favorite classic U.S. desserts: strawberry shortcake.

We don’t go for that sugary, spongy stuff the supermarkets sell for shortcake. No, to my mind a genuine strawberry shortcake depends on a biscuit with perfect crumb, a biscuit with just enough savoriness to show off the ripe berries with a sweet dollop of whipped cream.

But before you get to the biscuits, you’ll want to macerate your strawberries in a little sugar. Trim and cut 1 pound of strawberries into bite-size pieces, then toss them in a bowl with a tablespoon or more of granulated sugar. Set them aside while you prepare your biscuits. The sugar will draw the juices out of the berries–you’ll want that to pour over your shortcake later.

For the biscuits, whisk together in a large mixing bowl  1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour, 1 tablespoon granulated sugar, 3 teaspoons baking powder and 1 teaspoon salt. Into the mix cut 6 tablespoons butter into small pieces. This is your shortening, and the really fun part for the kids, because you need to “cut” that butter into the flour, meaning pinching the flour and butter together with the tips of your fingers until the mix resembles beach sand.

This takes a bit of practice. Some of the kids want to grab handfuls of flour and butter. So I work right alongside them, pinching, pinching, pinching. Each kid gets a turn, and in a few minutes it’s perfectly done.

Now into the dry mix stir 3/4 cup milk. The milk activates the baking powder, causing the biscuits to rise in the oven. The dough may be a little sticky at this point. If so, just sprinkle in some more flour. The key to a great southern biscuit is not overworking the dough. You just want to incorporate all of the ingredients, then turn the dough out onto a floured work surface and knead it a couple of times until it holds together.

Pat the dough out to a thickness of 3/4 to 1 inch–thicker of course will result in taller biscuits. In our classes, we used a paper drinking cup with the bottom cut out to cut the dough into rounds. This made 15 2-inch biscuits, a perfect size for our classes. But if you want fewer biscuits but larger, just choose a bigger biscuit cutters.

Place the biscuit rounds on an un-greased baking sheet and bake in a 450-degree oven until the tops begin to show just a bit of brown, about 13 minutes. Set the biscuits aside to cool.

To assemble the dessert, mash the macerated strawberries with a potato masher. Slice the biscuits in half, or pry them in half with a fork. Spoon a generous portion of berries and their juices over the bottom half of the biscuit. Top this with a dollop of vanilla-flavored whipped cream. Then place the top half of the biscuit over the whipped cream, or cock it to one side for show.

I’ll bet you’ve never had a springtime dessert better than this.

It takes a tough kid to make a tender schnitzel

Our food appreciation classes have landed in Austria on their virtual world culinary tour and we went straight for a classic dish: Wiener schnitzel. That means veal cutlet in the Viennese style, traditionally pounded thin with a mallet, then dredged in bread crumbs and fried.

Many people object to veal–the meat of a male beef calf–because of the way it is raised. Too often the calves are confined to small crates, prevented from moving to keep their flesh tender. They may be deprived of iron to keep the meat pale.

Veal is a natural consequence of the dairy industry. Cows must give birth in order to produce milk and half the calves they bear are males, which do no good in the dairy barn. Despite the controversy surrounding veal, we don’t want to shiled our kids from the issues, but rather teach them how to make better choices without eliminating entire chapters from the culinary lexicon. So we bought our veal from Whole Foods, which assures customers that its veal calves are raised on pasture, where they can romp with other cows.

But if you still have a problem with veal, you can substitute chicken breast in this recipe. (I don’t know of a vegetarian option.)

Figure 1 pound of veal cutlets for four to six persons. First you’ll need to make some bread crumbs. Two thick slices from a country-style loaf should do. Tear the white part from the crust in small pieces and bake these in a 350-degree oven until they are completely dry and show the first signs of browning around the edges. When they’ve cooled, you can chop them fine, or run them through a food processor.

Next, use a tenderizing mallet or another heavy object such as a rolling pin to pound the veal cutlets thin. They will of course grow wider and longer as they get thinner. For our classes, we placed the cutlets between sheets of plastic wrap to keep our mallet clean.

Schnitzel with red cabbage and Caesar salad

To fry the cutlets, you’ll want a large, heavy skillet filled with cooking oil to a depth of about 1/8 inch. Nearby, make a dredging assembly line. We used three aluminum pans for this, one containing about 1 cup all-purpose flour seasoned with salt, the second containing 2 eggs beaten with a bit of water, and the third containing our bread crumbs. Heat the skillet over moderately high heat until the oil is hot and shimmering, then dredge one of your cutlets first in the flour, then in the egg mix, then in the bread crumbs. Lower the cutlet into the oil and fry until golden on both sides. You’ll probably want to fry two cutlets at a time. Drain them on paper towels and hold in a warm oven before serving.

We used our portable butane burner for this so that we could set up the entire dredging and cooking operation on our prep table in front of the kids. In smaller groups, the older kids can take charge of the dredging and frying, but they must be very careful around the hot oil.

You can serve the finished schnitzel with almost any kind of side dish: french fries, braised cabbage, spaetzle. Use your imagination, but by all means include a wedge of lemon. Our kids could not get enough.

Spaetzle: messy but good

Marco Polo notwithstanding, most food cultures seem to have some version of a noodle in their culinary arsenals. Germany may have the messiest. Called “spaetzle”–or “little sparrows”–this noodle starts with a sticky dough that falls somewhere between pancake batter and library paste and must be pressed through holes into a pot of boiling water.

What? You say you don’t care for clouds of steam billowing up your sleeve? You aren’t ready to make a gooey, sticky mess out of your favorite box grater? Pish, posh. Spaetzle, it turns out, are quite delicious and worth a little extra pain in the kitchen. Think of a noodle that’s almost a pastry, flavored with a bit of nutmeg.

The great dilemma in non-German culinary circles is that most kitchens are not equipped with the standard spaetzle making tool, which looks like a long grater or a plain with large holes. It typically comes with a metal cup to hold the dough, the cup sliding back and forth over the holes. The holes cut the dough, which then dribbles into the boiling water to form the “little sparrows.”

Some cooks improvise by pressing the dough through a colander. I think the holes in most colanders are too small, so I opt for my box grater. You have to hold the box grater at an angle over the boiling water so that the dough falls through the opening and not onto the opposite inside wall of the grater.

Once you’ve got all that figured out, making the actual spaetzle is a snap.

In a large mixing bowl, combine 1 cup all-purpose flour with 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper and 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg. In a second bowl, beat two eggs with 1/4 cup milk. Pour the egg mix into the dry ingredients and stir until a smooth, sticky dough forms.

Over a large pot of boiling water, using a stiff rubber or plastic spatula, scrape portions of dough against the large holes of a box grater (or your favorite spaetzle tool), allowing the dough to dribble into the water and cook. Repeat this process until you’ve used all of the dough. When the noddles are fully cooked, drain them into a colander.

For the finishing touch, melt about 4 tablespoons butter in a large skillet. Over moderately high heat, add the spaetzle and cook, tossing frequently, until the noodles show just the slightest hint of browning.

We served the finished noodles with some brown gravy. They make an ideal side dish to a typical German meal of sausage and braised red cabbage, in which case they are even better dressed with a little gravy.

No trick to making this delicious side dish

It’s hard to believe anything as simple as cooking red cabbage in a pot could taste so good. But red cabbage may be one of the most underrated of vegetables. With so much nutritional value–to say nothing of the stunning visuals it brings to the dinner plate–we should find more occasions to use it.

“This is your brain on cabbage,” I told the kids in my food appreciation classes. And the cross-section of a red cabbage sliced in half does look a bit brainy. At least I thought so. “I think it looks like the inside of a cathedral,” said one of the more precocious kids.

In any case, what you’ll need to make a family-sized helping of this delicious side dish is little more than a red onion, a red cabbage, some red wine and red wine vinegar and a few spices. It cooks best in a heavy lidded pot. I can’t think of anything to go better with a gamy dish such as venison tenderloin, or perhaps your favorite German sausage.

Start by chopping the onion into medium dice and sauteing in olive oil (or bacon grease) over moderately high heat until softened, about five minutes. I like to season the onion aggressively with salt to draw out the liquid. Then add 1/2 head red cabbage, roughly chopped. Stir in 1/4 cup red wine (we used a non-alcoholic wine in our classes) plus 1/4 cup red wine vinegar. Add 1 apple, peeled and grated, and a bouquet garni consisting of 4 whole allspice berries and four peppercorns tied up in cheesecloth. Push this to the bottom of the pot so that it’s submerged in the liquid.

Bring to a boil, then cover, reduce heat and cook slowly for about 45 minutes, or until the cabbage is cooked through and tender. After removing from the heat, fish out the bouquet garni and discard. Then for the finishing touch, stir in 1 1/2 tablespoons dark brown sugar and 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon. You can make this less sweet if you want. But red cabbage really calls for cookie spices to bring out its innate flavors.

I don’t know any kid who doesn’t like red cabbage cooked this way. You could almost serve it for dessert.

It's not all about beets

Could borscht be the best soup ever?

My earliest memories are of a restaurant version somewhere: treacly sweet and garishly red. No thank you. The soup we made in our food appreciation classes last week, in contrast, groaned with all sorts of vegetables and a depth of flavor that only hinted at beets.

I’m convinced that the borscht we’re most familiar with–that shockingly red beet puree–sprang from the imagination of a restaurant chef. I found nothing of the sort in my primary source–Please to the Table–an award-winning collection of recipes and food lore from the former Soviet Union. In fact, the author’s first version of borscht–a traditional Ukranian soup–starts with pork or ham.

We made the vegetarian version (except for the chicken stock). Sure, it was red. But it was also so much more. The kids were crazy for it, asking for second and third helpings. How many other ways do you know to get children to salivate over cabbage, carrots, green pepper, celery, tomatoes–and, yes, beets.

Normally my recipes describe ingredients as part of the narrative. But there are so many in this soup, I will list them first. In fact, the most difficult part of this soup may be shopping for the ingredients. Maybe the best plan is to make a large batch and freeze some for later.

You’ll need the following:

6 Tbs butter

1 large onion, finely chopped

1 large carrot, peeled and grated

1/2 large green pepper, cored and cut into small dice

1/2 small cabbage, shredded then coarsely chopped

1 medium beet, peeled and grated

1 rib celery, cut into small dice

1/2 tart apple (such as Granny Smith), peeled and cut into small dice

2 medium boiling potatoes, peeled and cut into small dice

4 cloves garlic, minced

1 6-ounce can tomato paste

2 quarts chicken stock

bouquet garni, consisting of 1 bay leaf and 8 pepper corns tied in cheesecloth

1 tsp sweet paprika

salt and pepper to taste

1/2 tsp sugar or more to taste

juice from 1/2 lemon

chopped fresh dill for garnish

sour cream

Melt the butter in a heavy soup pot over moderately high heat and add the onion, carrot and green pepper. Cook until the onion is soft, about 5 minutes, then add the cabbage, beet and celery. Cook a few minutes more, stirring frequently, then add the apple, potatoes and garlic. Stir in the tomato paste and mix well, then add the chicken stock and the bouquet garni.

Bring the pot to a boil, then lower the heat and cook 25 minutes, or until the vegetables are cooked through and the soup is quite aromatic. Remove the bouquet garni and stir in the paprika, salt, pepper, sugar and lemon juice.

Ladle the soup into large bowls (this soup does not need to be piping hot) and garnish with chopped dill. Serve with a sour cream on the side. Kids are not wildly enthusiastic about sour cream. But what do they know. In my opinion, borscht is best with a big dollop of sour cream in it.

Personal composting operation

D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray says his administration is all about making the nation’s capital more sustainable. But in at least one important aspect of the food chain, that’s just lip service. The District of Columbia, my home town, is a dismal failure when it comes to municipal composting.

A recent article in the  Washington City Paper points out the glaring absence of any large-scale composting facilities in either the District or the surrounding area. American University, trying to be a good citizen had collecting its food scraps campus-wide–500 tons annually. But recently its composting program had to shut down because the facility where the scraps were being hauled–Recycled Green, in Woodbine, Md.–closed its gates. So did other Maryland facilities, meaning organic waste would have be hauled at least 100 miles to Delaware.

A local composting service–Envirelation–also was stung by the Recycled Green closure. Two other facilities it used in the past also have been forced to close after running afoul of Maryland storm water runoff regulations. I’m quite familiar with Envirelation–I got a big load of their finished compost for my garden two years ago and we saw a season of monster vegetables. Now owner Walker Lunn fears he could be forced to shutter his company at any time.

In terms of grown food sustainably, compost is the beginning and end all. As the Chineses and other Asian cultures have known for centuries, you cannot take nutrient out of the soil for long without replacing them. Chinese farmers maintained the nutrient cycle by using any organic material they could get their hands on and spreading it on their fields–including human feces. We moderns, on the other hand, have completely forgotten this fundamental principle. We routinely flush valuable nutrients down the toilet and instead rely on chemicals and elements mined from the ground.

That simply can’t last forever. You can’t have sustainable urban agriculture without compost.

What’s the solution? I don’t expect my neighbors to abandon their toilets any time soon. But at the very least, Mayor Gray and his hirelings could start a conversation about how we can better utilize the other organic materials at our disposal. Last I heard, all those leaves and yard trimmings people put at the curb in plastic bags are going straight to the landfill. Surely, there must be a place within the D.C. borders where we could compost these and other organics instead.

City’s like San Francisco and Portland, OR, have started city-wide composting programs. Why can’t we?

Squishing grated turnips with your hands

Touring Northern Europe, my food appreciation classes recently got their hands deep into the food. They were making sauerrueben, a version of fermented turnips very much like sauerkraut, but t0 my mind much better. Sauerrueben has a nuttiness and depth of flavor most sauerkrauts lack. Tossed with sauteed onions, it works great next to a Polish sausage, for instance.

All you have to do is grate some turnips and add salt. Truly, this is more a formula than a recipe. For every five pounds of grated turnips, mix in 3 tablespoons pickling salt (or substitute sea salt or kosher salt–no chemicals allowed, including iodine). You can make more or less, depending on your needs.

What you see in the photo above is one of my students mixing the turnips with her hands. This is the most fun part, although the kids are crazy for peeling and grating turnips as well. Anything involving a kitchen tool will keep them focused for hours. But there’s nothing like squishing sloppy, grated turnips through your fingers to get the juices flowing–literally.

We are fermenting our turnips–about 10 pounds–in a ceramic crock made for that very purpose. Otherwise, I would use a plastic bucket from the paint store. You just need a tight-fitting ceramic or glass plate (or a piece of non-resinous hard wood cut to size) to lay over the top of the turnips. Salt draws the water out of the turnips, creating a brine that should cover not only the turnips, but whatever object you are using to hold them down. For good measure, place something heavy–like a plastic jug filled with water–on top to weigh everything down and keep it submerged.

What happens next is a kind of culinary miracle. A procession of bacteria will multiply in your brine, creating lactic acid that inhibits noxious organisms. The bacteria feed on the turnips to survive. So you might say that the finished sauerrueben–or any fermented food, for that matter–has undergone a process of rot.

Sounds rather unpleasant, and there is a bit of odor to go with the fermentation. But it sure tastes good. Just put your crock in a cool dark place for a few weeks, covered with a tea towel. And I love teaching kids how our ancestors dealt with food preservation before they had refrigerators.

The bacteria are happiest in an ambient temperature of around 68 degrees Fahrenheit. Check on their progress periodically. You’ll know your sauerrueben is done by tasting.

You can store your finished sauerrueben in the refrigerator, which will slow the fermentation process to a crawl. I’ve had it as much as two years later and it was not only edible, but incredibly delicious.

This is one science experiment you can definitely eat for dinner.

Pierogies lightly browned in the skillet

Call them dumplings. Call them Polish pot stickers. Call them whatever you like. Pierogies are just plain delicious, and kids have a blast making them.

This is the first time we’ve attempted a stuffed dumpling in our food appreciation classes and pierogies–a huge favorite in Eastern Europe–do take a bit of practice. The trick is getting just the right amount of stuffing onto a circle of pasta dough so that when you fold the dough closed, the stuffing doesn’t ooze out the edges. Then you have to pinch the edge several times all around to make sure the dumpling doesn’t open up when you boil it and spill its contents into the water.

Otherwise, there’s nothing terribly complicated about making the components for pierogies: along with a pasta dough much as you would use for Italian pasta, there’s a stuffing, in this case a very traditional potato and cheese mix. Pierogies can also be filled with sauerkraut, mushrooms or other savory items.

We chose to roll our dough flat with a rolling pin, but if you have a pasta machine, you might want to use it instead. Eventually, you want your dough to be on the thin side of 1/8 inch. A thinner dough makes more delectable pierogies–plus the thinner you roll the dough, the more pierogies you’ll have.

Start by making your dough. You’ll want it to rest an hour or even overnight before using. In a large mixing bowl, mix together 2 cups all-purpose flour and 1/2 teaspoon salt. In a separate bowl, beat 1 large egg, then whisk in 1/2 cup water. Add the egg mix to the flour and mix thoroughly. If it’s too sticky at this point, add more flour. Use your hands to shape the dough into a ball, then pour it out onto a floured work surface and knead the dough about five minutes, or until it is smooth and elastic. Cover with plastic and allow to rest.

Cutting circles of dough for pierogies

While the dough is resting, peel 1 large Russet potato and cut it into 1-inch dice. Cook the potato in a large kettle of salted water. (This will later become your water for cooking the pierogies.) When the potato is cooked through and soft, remove it from the water and drain in a colander. Place the potato in a mixing bowl and mash thoroughly. When it is cool enough to handle, add a like amount of farmer’s cheese (or substitute cottage cheese or ricotta) and mix thoroughly with your hands.

On a floured work surface (or in your pasta machine), roll the dough to a thickness of 1/8 inch or even a bit less. As you’re rolling the dough, you might want to flip it over from time to time and dust it with flour to make sure it doesn’t stick to your work surface. When you have finished rolling it, cut the dough into circles with a 3-inch biscuit cutter. Save the scraps–they can be rolled again to make a few more pierogies. You should end up with about 30 in all.

Use your hands or a mechanical scoop to place a small ball of filling on one of the discs of dough. Holding the disc in one hand, use the thumb of the other hand to press the dough into place as you fold the disc in half to close the dumpling, making a half-circle.

Placing filling on the pasta dough

The trick at this point is not getting any of the filling onto the edges of the pasta disc, which means practicing a bit until you get a feel for how much filling each dumpling requires and carefully pressing the filling with the side of your thumb into the crease as you close the dumpling.

Now, while continuing to hold the dumpling in one hand, use the thumb and forefinger of the other hand to pinch the edge closed. Don’t be afraid to pinch fairly hard, pushing the filling back toward the crease. Once you’ve pinched the edge closed, go back around and pinch it a couple more times to make sure the seal is good and tight. (You can find videos of this process at YouTube.)

Pinching the pierogie closed

Once you have your pierogies assembled, you can cook them in the same kettle of salted water you used for cooking the potatoes. Use a large amount of salted water for this. It should be at a rolling boil before you add the pierogies. Cook them in batches, perhaps 10 at a time. After you’ve added the pierogies to the water, give them a stir to make sure they don’t stick to the bottom of the pot. Make sure the water returns to a boil. The dumplings will be done in about three minutes, when they are all floating at the surface. Use a slotted spoon or other tool to drain the dumplings well as you remove them from the pot and place them on a sheet pan to cool.

You can hold the pierogies for several hours after they’ve boiled. Just cover them with plastic. (They could also be frozen before boiling for use later). The final step, just before serving, is to fry the pierogies to a delicate crispness in butter. Again, do this in batches using plenty of butter (at least 2 tablespoons) in a heavy skillet or saute pan over moderately high heat. You don’t want to burn the butter or the pierogies. When the dumplings are lightly browned on one side, flip them over and brown the other.

Serve with plenty of sour cream, either as an appetizer or as a side dish with your favorite Polish sausage and sauerkraut.

Pierogies are not the easiest assignment for an elementary school cooking class. But the kids in my classes really impressed me with how well they followed each of the steps. They did a great job folding the dumplings. And of course they were crazy about the final result. They were dying for seconds.

D.C. Public Schools Chancellor Kaya Henderson: Hot over cafeteria deficits

Hinting at a major shakeup in D.C. Public Schools’ cafeteria operations, Chancellor Kaya Henderson says she does not believe food services chief Jeffrey Mills and his staff are capable of getting multi-million-dollar deficits under control.

In a recent letter to D.C. Councilmember Mary Cheh (D-Ward 3), Henderson rejected suggestions that D.C. schools run their own food services, rather than outsourcing those operations to contractors, saying, “I do not have confidence that my current food service staff has the capacity to manage a self-run food service program, even at a small scale.”

Cheh, author of the city’s “Healthy Schools Act,” had suggested that Henderson undertake a pilot program to test the in-house approach. But Henderson wrote, “To date, we have had significant challenges managing the few contracts we have in place. Our team has not demonstrated proficiency in human capital management or project management.”

Apparently, Henderson has lost patience with Mills, who was hired little more than two years ago amid high hopes that DCPS could vastly improve the quality of school meals while also bringing the food service budget more into balance. Saying food service was “not a core competency” of the schools, former Chancellor Michele Rhee ordered cafeteria operations outsourced to a large food service management company. Chartwells won the bidding and under Mills’ direction food quality markedly improved. But deficits once again soared out of control, creating $14 million in red ink at last count.

Mills has tried to blame the huge budget shortfalls on waste and inefficiency on Chartwells part, as well as a weak contract. He has argued that the schools could do better by ditching Chartwells and bringing food service operations back in-house. But Henderson and her top echelon of managers have refused to give Mills’ plan an audience. Instead, Henderson ordered Mills to put the contract up for bid again.

The latest proposal foresees dividing the district’s 121 schools among several different contractors with strict provisions for food quality. Currently, Chartwells serves most of the district’s schools, but caterer Revolution Foods has been providing meals to seven schools, while another seven get their food scratch-cooked by chefs from D.C. Central Kitchen.

Mills has pointed out that most of the nation’s large school districts manage their own cafeteria operations. Experts agree that providing meals in-house also is more economical than outsourcing those services to for-profit corporations–in theory at least.

For instance, Chartwells’ average cost per meal here is $4.21, compared to $3.06 for D.C. Central Kitchen and $2.87 per meal for Revolution Foods, according to Mills. Officials said Chartwells runs up the cost with numerous contractor fees, and by paying inflated prices for many supplies and ingredients. Mills’ plan called for severing ties with Chartwells and eliminating food service deficits by 2016.

In addition to Cheh, many parents and food activists support Mills’ vision of a school district that makes its own meals. An on-line petition to that effect recently gathered more than 200 signatures. It was delivered to Henderson this week. Henderson has agreed to meet with a committee of parents and food access organizations that currently advises Mills’ staff.

But Henderson sounds like she’s already looking for someone to replace Mills. “Before I am willing to in-source food service, even as a pilot, I must have complete confidence that the team I have in place puts DCPS in the best position to be successful,” Henderson wrote Cheh. “Along with monitoring our new food service contracts, my efforts in food service will be devoted to ensuring we have solid management in place in the coming year.”

Not much room for vegetable gardening here

The developer who bought our house recently e-mailed asking if we’d be available to consult on installing vegetable beds for the prospective condominium owners. Sure, I replied, and I gave him a bunch of suggestions pending a meeting and walk-through at the property.

But shortly thereafter a landscaping crew showed up and in short order the lawn where our huge kitchen garden had once been looked like something from Woodlawn Plantation. You can see the results in the photo above.

What our garden used to look like

As you can see, this is a far cry from the garden we used to have. With the landscape newly sloped–eliminating what used to be a kind of plateau that accommodated eight large beds–its hard to see where in the new configuration anyone might put similarly-sized planter boxes.

Well, I suppose you could construct some much smaller beds. But would anyone want to?

In the world I live in, the conversation has been all about turning lawns into gardens. In other words, not wasting valuable space and toxic fertilizers growing grass when the same area can produce huge quantities of food. During the growing season, we hardly spent any money at all at the grocery store. And we had lots of frozen and canned produce to eat during the winter.

Our former garden encouraged some of our neighbors to plant their own vegetables. But I’m sure a like number are now thrilled to see our shaggy bit of acreage spruced up in the more conventional mode.

In with the new: lots of shrubs and mulch

That has to be good for property values, right?

What do you think?