Bubble and squeak is a British dish composed primarily of pan-fried cabbage and potatoes. Over time, people have varied the ingredients. Regardless, it's great comfort food. Rooted in the peasantry, it's a no waste dish perfect for refrigerator clean up with leftovers. Such was a recent batch of mine, made with vegetables unceremoniously plopped together in leftover mashed potatoes. Fried with butter in oil in a cast iron pan, it rose like a phoenix of deliciousness.
After I fell in love with Instant Pot cooking, my old pressure cooker has been in storage. So I brought it to work to put to use. Initially I used it for staff meals. Then it became handy for prep work where time and space was constrained. My staff cooks seemed intimidated by it, expressing hand-me-down stories of exploding pots - or maybe terrorists using these things as cheap, homemade bombs. The technology is unexceptional but it serves its purpose. Rather than how a slow-cooking circulator performs, these work in the opposite way, reducing time in preparing braised items from hours to minutes. What is remarkable are the intensity of flavors these pots can deliver. They take practice but they really proved their value over the years as the the ultimate one pot cookery thing.
Do you have coriander seeds, or cumin, mustard, caraway, cardamom in bulk? Are you out of store bought four ounce jar melange that cost too much? Or maybe you received a package in the mail like I did from my scavenger friend Tim , who messaged me about moles. All the while telling me about his mom's garden in Pennsylvania, which he couldn't visit due to the pandemic. That special care package I got was a world of chilies, like Aleppo, Espelette and New Mexico varieties along with marinating spice blends. So quite often I meander over to Lior at La Boite for inspiration, where his recipes can give you hints on mixing and grinding your own spices. Make your own signature sazòn to sprinkle umami flavors on your next dish.
The pandemic has taught me a lot about patience, including its importance in the kitchen. During some of my free time, I started a home bakery. The skills I picked up as hobby has allowed me to continue to learn and repeatedly practice repeatedly.... tinkering and tweaking my range of breads and baked good.
While hand rolling croissants this weekend for clients, I was amazed at my processing speed. Concretely, I didn't have to stay up passed midnight to roll and cut them. That's awfully nice, given that I am sometimes tired. Thinking about the wonder of efficiency I had mysteriously manifest, I considered the path that had brought me here. Honestly, it started with a lot of patience. Inotherwords, I gained time by not rushing.
Enough of blowing my own bugle. Here is an interesting interview with Louis Lamour of Bouloulam (Boulangerie Louis Lamour). I cracked my baking teeth using his great video tutorials on the quintessential French baker's repertoire of must-learn skills, namely around baguettes and croissants.
Download APIECE CROISSANT FORMULA
During the pandemic isolation period, I finally found the time to understand how to make jams, without using pectin. With reduction in sugar I was able to make some fabulous jams, Italian plum, blueberry and even fig. And though I did try the pectin for one of my sister's recipe for pumpkin and quince jam, I found it's not so shelf stable and gets moldy...
Lahmajoun is an Armenian type dish akin to a pizza. My first time trying it was in Montreal, eating it at a place known for lahmajoun, Chez Apo. The friend who introduced me to it, Chef Michele Forgione, recently reconnected. He was curious if I had any interesting lahmajoun recipes. I did not, but I did have YouTube. Here is a version that looked (and proved) terrific. What was so lovely was its quick process and fast bake. Firing up my Baking Steel, it only took a few minutes. But the time to savor it? Make a few lahmajoun and take all afternoon. So delicious.
As I woke up this morning to my cats meowing for breakfast, I received a DM from a friend in Sitges, Spain. She had sad news. Thierry Delabre was gone. He was a friend, a mentor, an inspiration. Spending the morning mixing a croissant dough and loaves of bread, tears fell. Heavy heart, eyes stinging, it hurt to know he's no longer here. Whether in France or wandering elsewhere, in the world on online, he was there for me, for many of us.
Thierry was an inspired magician of dough, hydration and major ferments. His explorations involved tinkering, iterating, moving from one corner to another to get things right. We first connected on social media. What drew me to him was his balance of humor and seriousness. I watched, learned, and admired this French brother of bread, a man deeply connected to baking and food, but also the people that inhabit this world. Lately he'd almost promised an interview, but then was busy, and joking told me to stop calculating with Bread Storm.
"Bread stormis for stupid Americans 
... We don’t talk with % ratio in France 
" One of his last messages to me.
Paix, mon frere de pain.... from your American friend who is stupid with love and loss now that you're gone. We'll miss you.
Each new bread formula raises my anxiety, as in "how am I gonna do this?" Two things calm me, methods and inspiration. Here's a method I use to allay fear, benefit of Mick Hartley of Bethesda Baking fame. So far as inspiration, my baking muse for Levantine leavening is Lev Lior Sercarz, the spice guru whose Jerusalem bagels and Yogurt challah have me delighted.
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