Food On The Web

Check out my latest web discoveries:

Zingerman's Deli
Crop Mob
Sweet Preservation
Restaurant-ing Through History
Sharpen This
Sustainable Food Jobs
TasteSpotting
Rural Bounty
World-Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms
Sustainable Table

There's hundreds more where these come from. I've been developing an archive. Drop me a line if you're interested in something in particular. I can probably help you out.

Homemade Mozzarella And Lobster Ravioli

We spent Saturday in the kitchen. First we made mozzarella for a caprese salad with farm-market tomatoes and balcony-garden basil. And it actually came out this time. Next we made pasta dough then, while that was resting for an hour, we whipped up the filling: cooked, chopped-up lobster tail, ricotta, minced garlic, finely chopped oregano and parsley, and a little butter, lemon juice, and brandy. While the filling cooled, we made sheets out of the pasta dough using our mixer's pasta attachment. Then we laid out one sheet, filled it with filling, laid another sheet on top, making sure to push all the air bubbles out, and cut. We repeated, repeated, repeated until we had way too much for one meal -- but that's a-okay cuz it'll make for a second (and potentially a third) down the road. Oh and we topped the cooked ravioli with a bit of brown butter. Decadent and delicious.

You'll notice in the photo below showing the ravioli on a rack prior to boiling that some of the ravioli are oddly shaped. These blobs are the first ones we made. Our second, third, and fourth attempts resulted in actual squares.

Braciole And A Balcony Garden Update

We made braciole on Sunday. That's the Italian version of the French roulade. Ours was flattened-out flank steak rolled around a paste of herbs, garlic, and breadcrumbs. First we seared it on our tiny electric (and balcony-friendly) grill then we braised it in the oven in tomato sauce for hours. Mmm, mmmmm, mmmmmm... Speaking of the balcony, the garden's still putting along. It doesn't get full sun all day so things are a bit stunted, but hopefully we'll get some harvestable goods before summer ends. So far there's been arugula and French breakfast radishes. I'm crossing my fingers and toes that the Silvery Fir Tree Tomato plant has a growth spurt soon. I really want to try those.

Paris Redux

Photos finally. (By the way, I'm having trouble with captions in Blogger. If you want to know what something is, leave a comment and I'll get back to you. Sorry!)