first day of spring...

Headed out the door last night to the McEvoy launch party for my "Wine Country Cooking" book at the Ferry Terminal. McEvoy just does it right. They make the best olive oil and last night it was used to make delicious food from my book! Fun party with lots of people who wanted their books signed. After the last book was closed, I ran out the door. Gary Danko picked me up out front to go to Berkeley to the Parsi New Year (Indian New Year) dinner at Chez Panisse. We had a 9:00 reservation and we just made it! We started with a lovely plate of Bombay potato balls, fried curry leaves, and steamed semolina bread with avocado chutney. I am still dreaming of the chutney that Niloufer Ichaporia King, author of "My Bombay Kitchen," chef for the night, made. Alice came running over, elated! "The kitchen garden on the White House lawn..." was all she could say! Alice was beaming. She's been talking about this since Bill Clinton was in office. Anyway today, the first day of spring, all over the news, there it was, Michelle Obama and 26 5th grade students broke ground on an organic garden being planted on the White House lawn. Now that's ground breaking! And a great start to a fabulous spring!

sunday on pine

Sunday's class was even better. I've spent a lot of time in the Piedmont teaching but that isn't where my love of focaccia al formaggio started. It started long ago when I was on the Ligurian coast and ate dinner at a place called Manuelina in Recco. Never forget it! NEVER! There were the little buckwheat corzetti with brown butter and toasted hazelnuts! Thoes were delish but the focaccia al formaggio, I will never forget. The dough is made with yeast and butter, LOTS of butter, kind of like a yeasted puff pastry. Mine is definitely a variation but about one-tenth of the work. Check it out! You will be on the next plane to Genoa! Or to my cooking class on Pine!

FOCACCIA AL FORMAGGIO

2 teaspoons active dry yeast
1/4 cup plus 1 cup warm water
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
3 cups unbleached bread flour
Salt
12 ounces taleggio cheese, coarsely grated
1/3 cup finely grated aged pecorino cheese

Whisk together the yeast and 1/4 cup water and let sit until creamy, about 20 minutes. Add the remaining 1 cup water, the olive oil, flour, and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Knead on a lightly floured surface until smooth and soft, 7 to 8 minutes. Place in a well-oiled bowl and turn the dough over to coat the dough. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place until it doubles in volume, about 1 1/2 hours.

Place a pizza stone or tiles on the bottom shelf of the oven. Heat the oven to 500°f for at least 30 minutes.

Divide the dough into 4 pieces and form each piece into a round ball. On a well-floured surface, roll 1 piece of dough at a time into a 9-inch circle, 1/8-inch thick. Transfer 1 piece to a well-floured pizza peel or paddle. In a bowl mix together the Taleggio and pecorino. Spread one-third of the cheese mixture on the dough, leaving a 1-inch border. Brush the edges of the dough lightly with water. Roll another ball to the same size and place on top. Crimp the edges to seal well. Pinch a hole in the second piece of dough in the center.

Bake the focaccia on the hot stone until light golden and crisp, 7 to 10 minutes. Repeat with the remaining dough and cheese filling, making 1 more focaccia. Serve immediately.

Makes 2 focaccie and serves 10

cooking on pine

Last weekend I did a Saturday/Sunday class in my own kitchen! Now that's not just any kitchen, that's the same kitchen where I shoot my TV show. 10:00 AM arrival. Have a hot cheddar light-as-a-feather scone made by yours truly slathered with herb butter I whipped up. Then we talk about the recipes, divide up into teams and cook a 4 or 5 course lunch paired with wines. Most of the dishes were from my newest cookbook, "Wine Country Cooking." One of the the dishes we made was spicy feta dip paired with the crispy flatbread. The dip takes about 3 minutes to make but the flatbread took a little coaxing. End result.... Well.... you can see for yourself! We sipped Robert Oatley rose of sangiovese. Combo made in heaven!

SPICY FETA

1 1/4 cups Greek yogurt, drained in a paper-towel lined sieve for 4 hours
Salt
10 ounces feta cheese
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 to 3/4 teaspoon cayenne
1 teaspoon sweet paprika
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon extra-virgin olive oil
Imported black olives as a garnish

Place the yogurt, 1/4 teaspoon salt, and the feta in a bowl and mash together with a fork to make a smooth paste. Add the garlic, cayenne, paprika, and 1 tablespoon olive oil and mix well. Alternately, this can be pureed in the food processor or blender.

Spread the puree on a serving plate. Drizzle with the remaining 1 teaspoon olive oil and garnish with olives.

Serves 6

feet in the sand

Just back from Turks and Caicos in the Caribbean. What's not to love... sunshine, the finest, most beautiful white sand beaches, rum galore and conch! I went to the coolest place for lunch one day called the Conch Shack, my kind of place. The real thing and no jive. Reggae playing, hunker down with a rum punch at a picnic table and dig your feet into the sand while you wait for for the fishermen to get your conch fresh out of the water. Now that's about as fresh as you can get. Have some patience or have another rum punch! Out come big baskets of hot crispy fried conch. Totally fun, totally the real thing. Back in SF now and craving that sunshine and a basket!

100% blue agave

I know, I know, I just came out with "Wine Country Cooking!" I love the stuff and think that wine IS food and shouldn't be separated from the whole dining experience. If I hadn't studied cooking, I definitely would have gone to Davis to study oenology! But then again, I also like tequila and my next book is all about the stuff! Yeah, yeah, yeah, you had a bad experience in college and you're never going to touch it again!? Know what? You just drank the wrong tequila! You should have picked up a bottle of 100% blue agave tequila like Partida, 7 Leguas, El Tesoro instead of that caramel colored junk disquised as tequila. Because 100% agave tequila undergoes two distillations, it's one of the purest spirits made. And guess what!? No popping aspirin the next day and no regrets either! You'll remember who drove you home! Pub-date is Cinco de Mayo, also known as the fifth of May, and rumor has it, you can pre-order on Amazon and you'll get it much before Joey, your tequila-lovin' neighbor down the street. Thirty-five cocktails from the very best tequila bartenders in the country and twenty-five recipes for food, all containing tequila. Check out the photo of my research! (I love my job!) Williams-Sonoma bought 10,000 advance copies. This is going to be a big one! So, what are you waiting for?

personally persimmons

When you get something right, you just know. This season I couldn't get enough persimmons. Didn't matter whether it was fuju or hachiya. Fuju are the round ones shaped like a tiny orange pumpkin. You buy these while they are firm to the touch. As you can see I even used them in a Persimmon Upside-Down Cake. Peel them, slice them and use them in salads too. I love the sweet crunch. Hachiya couldn't be more opposite. They're more elongated with kind of a point at the bottom. If you eat them when they are still firm and crunchy, you'll die! Well not really but it won't be the best sensation. You buy these when they're really ripe and feel like jelly. Then they are sweet and best used in a persimmon pudding. But I feel awful telling you this because both the hachiya and the fuju are almost out of season. Before they are going, going, gone, you HAVE to make this salad. Easy as pie and totally delicious.

Green Bean, Persimmon and Hazelnut Salad

1 pound green beans
1 Fuju persimmon, peeled and thinly sliced
½ cup hazelnuts, toasted and peeled
1 ½ tablespoons red wine vinegar
3 to 4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Bring a pot of water to a boil. Add the green beans and cook until tender yet crisp, 4 to 7 minutes. Drain and run under cold water. Add the persimmons and hazelnuts.

In another small bowl, whisk together the vinegar and olive oil. Season with salt and pepper.

Pour the vinaigrette over the green beans and persimmons and toss together carefully.

Serves 4 to 6

persimmon this

I love my job.... What's not to love? I can go out to dinner every night and justify it, it's my job! I can drink wine every night and justify it, it my job!
Did I mention that my new favorite place to eat is Ad Hoc in downtown Yountville. It's kind of like eating at Chez Panisse Downstairs (which is where I am eating tonight... I am so excited!) You don't really have choices and the food is so fresh, flavorful and simple. Totally my kind of dinner. Probably the only difference between Chez and Ad is that Ad Hoc dinner is pretty much served family style. You have to like that kind of thing.
I ate there Friday night. One word... Delicious! The first course was a soup of creamy chickpeas and black cabbage. This is the same cabbage grown in Tuscany and used to make ribollita. They call it cavolo nero.
The meatiest short ribs followed. They were served with the creamiest puree of roasted butternut squash and potatoes. On the top were crispy shallot rings without a trace of oil. And then dessert was not-too-sweet upside-down Fuju persimmon cakes topped with homemade vanilla ice cream.
It made me think about the delicious recipe I have for upside-down cake and I thought, why not persimmons.

PERSIMMON UPSIDE-DOWN CAKE

16 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 pound fresh Fuju persimmons, peeled, halved and pitted
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups granulated white sugar
3 eggs
1 1/4 teaspoons vanilla extract
3/4 cup whole milk
Pinch of cream of tartar
1 cup heavy cream
1 tablespoon confectioners’ sugar

Butter a 9-inch cake pan. Place the pan over medium heat and melt 4 tablespoons of the butter and brown sugar in the bottom of the pan. Overlap the persimmon slices on top of the melted butter and brown sugar.

Preheat the oven to 350°f . For the cake, sift the flour, baking powder, and salt together. Cream the remaining 12 tablespoons butter and granulated white sugar together in a bowl until light. Separate the eggs and add the yolks, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add 1 teaspoon of the vanilla and mix well. Add the milk and the dry ingredients alternately to the batter, folding well after each addition. Beat the egg whites to form soft peaks. Add the cream of tartar and continue to beat until stiff peaks form. Fold the whites into the cake batter. Spread the batter over the persimmons and bake until a skewer inserted into the center comes out clean, 60 to 75 minutes.

Cool the cake for 10 to 15 minutes and run a knife around the edges of the pan to loosen it. Turn the cake over onto a serving platter and let it sit another 5 minutes. Remove the pan.

To serve, whip the heavy cream until soft peaks are formed. Sift the confectioners’ sugar on top of the cream, add the remaining 1/4 teaspoon vanilla, and fold together. Serve with the cake.

Serves 8 to 10