To Receive our E-Newsletter via email - Please subscribe to our mail list.

Return to www.kitchenwindow.com

Copyright 2011 - Kitchen Window and Acorn Advisors.
Kitchen Window reserves the right to correct errors. Prices subject to change.

================================

Newsletter - Text Version

“Sunsational Summer Salads”

Salads are year-round fare, but especially desirable in the summer where gardens and farmers’ markets overflow with the best produce of the year. It’s a great time to embrace “Buy Fresh, Buy Local” and salads are a natural choice for the fresh harvests underway now.

IN THIS ISSUE, we feature three salads with delicious, fresh dressings that sparkle and bring out the best in all of the ingredients. Salads beg for improvisation, play the plate with combinations of what’s ever around – there are no wrong combinations!

Crisp, Cold, and Clean

Leafy greens, of all kinds and colors, have recently transformed our salad life from pale iceberg chunks into something endlessly interesting and definitely more nutritious. Flat or curly, red or green, baby or mature, the range of leafy greens available to our kitchens is amazing. Investigate the possibilities at hand by highlighting a single variety of greens in your salad, or with a creative mix of textures and colors.

CRISP and COLD – Moving from the garden to the table may involve a walk of a few steps, or some complex logistics involving time and distance. Keeping tender greens viable and plate-worthy is tricky. Whole head lettuces will stay fresher longer than bagged leaf lettuces. Choose young lettuce heads that look vibrant and are without any signs of browning. Like florists’ flowers, greens need to be hydrated and chilled at all times.

Similarly, bagged mixes of lettuces should display fresh green colors, no yellowing, no pooling of moisture, or signs of decline. We’ve been known to unabashedly root around the salad shelves in search of the freshest date – those bags are usually on the top shelf and in the back!

Refrigerate greens until just before using. In summer weather tender leaves wilt quickly. If plating your salad, place the plates in the refrigerator prior to assembling the salad.

CLEAN – It’s essential that your greens are impeccably clean! Heads of lettuce capture dirt and natural garden bacteria as rain splashes and as the heads develop. It’s important for food safety reasons to wash and rinse any freeloaders away.

The "Dirty Dozen" list identifies fruits and vegetables that retain the most pesticides. The ranking includes "lettuces" among the dirty dozen, with fresh spinach lying just outside the cutoff. This information points us toward choosing organic versions of greens and washing them well.

RECIPE: Leafy Green Salad with Lemon-Basil Goat Cheese

We consider this salad the perfect light lunch. Fresh, fresh greens are drizzled with a simple balsamic vinaigrette and accompanied by thin baguette slices along with a medallion of goat cheese glazed with a garlicky lemon dressing of its own. The crunch of the greens alternated with the smoothness of the goat cheese resulting in pleasingly different textures. The tangy plate was a mouth-watering event that proved perfectly satisfying.

Recipes from Raising the Salad Bar by Catherine Walthers. Copyright © 2007. Reprinted with permission of Lake Isle Press, New York, NY. All rights reserved.

Knife Technique: How to Chiffonade Basil

Many fresh herbs such as basil, mint, and sage, present well in thin ribbons known as a chiffonade. The thin cuts effectively release the herb’s fragrant oils. The narrow strips will wilt quickly, so cut at the last minute for a fresh garnish.

Remove basil leaves from stem and stack.
Roll the stack of basil leaves in a tight roll.
Slice the roll in paper thin slices.

Zesting Tips – Buy organic lemons, that are unwaxed, and, store in the vegetable drawer of your refrigerator loosely wrapped. Zest only the colored portion of the fruit; that’s where all the oils reside. Zest over a glass bowl to capture all of the “spray” while zesting.

Etiquette Note: When eating salad, proper etiquette suggests cutting larger leaves or vegetables into bite-sized pieces for easier eating. You may use the side of the salad fork for cutting, or a fork and knife. Do not cut the entire salad at once, but cut bite by bite.

Tools for this Recipe:

• Microplane Citrus Zester - Comfortable in the hand, this zester releases the best of oranges, lemons and limes.
• Wusthof 6” Cook’s Knife - The knife that serves so many purposes in the kitchen, easy on the hand, just the right size.
• Lettuce Knife - Serrated and sharp,this knife helps reduce browning and avoids metallic tastes on food.

Oil and Vinegar Do Mix!

Ok, oil and vinegar don’t mix literally, but their flavors do in the perfect vinaigrette! They are the yin and yang of the salad world, opposing liquids that complement each other in perfect harmony on the salad plate.

The Perfect Vinaigrette – With some vigorous shaking or stirring, oil and vinegar can combine for a few seconds in an emulsion, albeit, temporarily. The perfect balance of oil to vinegar is 3:1, three parts oil for every one part vinegar. From here, the type of oil, the kind of vinegar, and the choice of seasonings customize the experience.

OLIVE OIL
Olive oil is the default standard for vinaigrettes and with good reason. Olive oil exudes a natural fruitiness and clean taste.

EVOO – This acronym is common parlance for Extra Virgin Olive Oil and is from the first pressing of olives. Its acidity is less than 1%, and has superior taste. Cold-pressed olive oil is preferable since heat can damage some of the delicate flavors.

Know Your Olive Oil Terms – “Virgin Olive Oil,” and “Pure Olive Oil” are names for lower quality olive oils; avoid them in the kitchen. “Light” and “Extra Light “ refer to the color of the oil, not a lighter caloric content. Lightly colored oils are often preferred out of habit, but light olive oils lack taste and many aromatic characteristics.

Using Olive Oil – Due to its high level of monounsaturated fats, olive oil claims a nutritional high ground. Used in moderation, (120 calories per tablespoon), olive oil is universally recommended as a substitute for butter, and other saturated fat sources. Experiment with different olive oils from different regions and different producers; you'll notice and enjoy the differences. 

Other common cooking oils such as canola, soybean, or safflower, may also be used for vinaigrettes. These plants yield a light tasting oil nearly neutral in flavor. Other oils such as avocado, walnut or other nut oils will lend their distinctive personalities to vinaigrettes.

Save seasoning oils such as sesame oil or hot chili oils for flavorings and not as the primary oil for a vinaigrette.

VINEGAR
Vinegar is one of those naturally fermented foods possessing great dimension and versatility.

Vinegar, whose name is derived from the French phrase, “vin aigre.” meaning “sour wine,” commonly starts as grape or other fruit juice and develops its acidity and piquancy courtesy of a two-step fermentation process.

Balsamic vinegar is a delicious, nearly magical, form of vinegar that has been aged to perfection. There are two types of balsamic vinegar, “Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale,” and “Condimento Grade.” The former begins with a reduction of grape juice to 30% of its original volume. Like other vinegars, the juice goes through fermentation processes, but differs from everyday, "condimento grade balsamics” by virtue of a special aging process that passes the liquid through different wooden casks and a curing time that may be 12, 18 or 25 years in length. True “tradizionale balsamics” are made only in the Modena or Reggio Emilia regions of Italy and reflect their rarity in the price point.

Other common vinegars such as apple cider vinegar, or rice wine vinegar may also be used in vinaigrettes. White, distilled vinegar seems to be overly harsh for salads.

Because of its strong acidic nature, vinegar will last indefinitely and does not require refrigeration. The environment is inhospitable to bacteria and sports an acidity pH of 2 – 4.

Lemon juice is a good substitute for vinegar just as vinegar is often a good substitute for lemon juice.

Mix-Ins –
Perfectly lovely on their own, oil and vinegar vinaigrettes gain further dimension with a few additions. Some classic favorites include minced shallots, pressed garlic, salt, and freshly ground pepper. Herbs that take to vinaigrettes include tarragon, thyme, basil, or oregano. Splashes of citrus juice and/or zest add a flavor sparkle to the finished salad. A teaspoon or two of stone-ground Dijon mustard imparts another wonderful enhancement. Salt and pepper may be added to the vinaigrette, or better yet, sprinkled on top of the salad in a final flourish of fleur de sel and freshly cracked peppercorns.

RECIPE: Tomato and Arugula Salad with Grilled Steak and Portabella Mushrooms

Salad becomes supper with the hefty additions of grilled steak and portabella mushrooms. The mild bite of arugula matches the bold flavors of the grilled toppings, with tomatoes adding color and a cool bite to the encounter. The balsamic vinaigrette used with this salad features not only balsamic vinegar and olive oil, but also a bit of minced garlic and freshly squeezed lemon juice for added dimension. Substitute thin slices of grilled chicken or shrimp for an equally adequate entrée.

Recipes from Raising the Salad Bar by Catherine Walthers. Copyright © 2007. Reprinted with permission of Lake Isle Press, New York, NY. All rights reserved.
.
Recipe Notes:
What is Arugula? Arugula is a leafy green originally popularized in Italy centuries ago, and once considered an aphrodisiac. The small leaf has a strong, peppery taste that gives a salad some added flavor dimension.

Tools for this Recipe:

• Salad Spinner - Wash salad greens and vegetables well, then spin dry for maximum freshness. 
• Tomato Knife - Tackles beefsteak and cherry tomatoes alike easily. Pronged tip moves slices to plate.
• Small Whisk - A small whisk is perfect for making emulsions of small amounts of vinaigrettes.

The Fork – a Newcomer to the Table

Today, we eat with forks like they’ve been around forever! Evidently, this has not always been the case. The eating fork, as a standard part of a table setting, became popular in Western culture as recently as the 1500s in Italy. Back then, it was considered polite to bring your own table service when dining elsewhere. Originally a design reminiscent of a pitchfork, the use of a fork was initially limited to that of a carving fork, something to spear meat while cutting. The fork developed from two tines, to three, then today’s four.

The use of forks migrated from Italy to Northern Europe and Great Britain becoming commonplace in those regions in the 1700s. The “fork trend” was initially viewed as a bit sissified and was slow to be adopted because of that. What was once an elite, effete fad became the expectation in Europe and immigrated to the United States in the early 1800s.

Which Fork to Use?
Dinner forks are the largest fork in a place setting, typically have four tines, and are placed just to the left of the plate.

Salad forks are generally smaller than dinner forks to match the smaller size of the salad plate. Salad forks may have three or four tines. The leftmost tine is often larger and sturdier for cutting purposes. This special tine may also have a useful point or hook for spearing unruly foods. The salad fork is set to the left of the dinner fork and is removed from the table when salad plates are removed.

Tines up, Tines down – Eating with a fork is still evolving! If you use your dominant hand to wield the fork and eat with the curved tines up, you’re eating American style. If your preference is with the fork in your other hand and tines down, you’re eating Continental style.

The Next Fad in Forks?
Being so new on the scene, “the fork” is still evolving. Perhaps one of these innovations will be the standard sometime soon:

Spork = Spoon & Fork
Knork = Knife & Fork
Spife = Spoon & Knife
Sporf = Spoon, Fork & Knife

RECIPE: Potato and Green Bean Salad with Dill Pesto

What a delicious way to eat your vegetables. Early new red potatoes merely need scrubbing, no peeling, and fresh green beans are snapped and steamed to their tender point. The two veggie allies are dressed with an oil, vinegar, and herb puree that lights up each bite. A hint of mustard and garlic lend their power to the dill and parsley partners. It’s a sauce that would complement a whole range of summer vegetables – the perfect follow-on to a farmer’s market visit.

Recipes from Raising the Salad Bar by Catherine Walthers. Copyright © 2007. Reprinted with permission of Lake Isle Press, New York, NY. All rights reserved.

Potato Salad Tips

Best Potatoes for Potato Salad - For this salad, or another variety of potato salad, much of the success is based on choosing the right potato. Choose a low-starch potato such as new red potatoes, Yellow Finn, white or purple round potatoes, or any of those know as “waxy.” High-starch potatoes such as the russet tend to absorb water and disintegrate during boiling.

Boiling Potatoes – Boil potatoes with their skins on; this helps keep the potato from disintegrating. Choose similarly sized potatoes, or cut them to be uniform in size for more even cooking.

What are haricot verts?
Seemingly suddenly, the term “haricot verts” is everywhere. Directly translated, the French term means “green beans.” Green beans are the immature pods of beans of which there are more than 130 varieties bred for the pod and less for the bean. The French variety, true “haricot verts” are thinner and longer than the typical stateside green bean.

Tools for this Recipe:

• OXO Vegetable Brush - Scrub any dirt away from fresh potatoes with this easy on the hand vegetable brush.
• Norpro French Bean Slicer - Make quick work of a pile of fresh beans with this trimmer and slicer.
• Chef’n Garlic Zoom - Roll back and forth and mince garlic. It couldn't be easier to add garlic to any recipe.

COOKBOOK REVIEWS:

Raising the Salad Bar by Catherine Walthers. Copyright © 2007. Published by Lake Isle Press, New York, NY.

Vegetables and fruits are the catch-of-the-day right now. If you’re looking for inspiration, this book provides plenty of ideas for turning all that’s fresh into a delicious side salad or the main entrée. The book spans green salads, whole grain salads, meat-focused salads, and new great ways with vegetables. Scattered throughout the recipe offerings are more then 70 homemade dressings. These dressings adapt to a variety circumstances with ease, and make the transition from garden to table a success every time.

Summer’s fresh fruits and vegetables make it easy for all cooks to shine!