One of the delights of shopping at the farmers market is the baby lettuce I’ve been getting from Blue Heron Farms.  These small heads of Little Gem lettuce look like miniature romaine. They’re just as crisp and crunchy at the heart, too, but the leaves are tender and sweet.

Lettuce this good cries out for a simple treatment.  It should be the star of the salad bowl.

I’ve been serving it in a Caesar with a garlicky dressing made with Greek-style yogurt in the place of eggs. Normally, I don’t like to mess with classic recipes. But Caesar salad has been subjected to so much interpretation that I don’t feel too bad cheating on the dressing as long as the end result is as good as this one.

It’s not that a traditional Caesar dressing is that hard to make, but I’d rather not use raw eggs and barely coddling them is a little tricky.  A moment too long in the simmering water, and the yolks get too firm to whisk with the oil.

Yogurt solves that problem.  It also reduces the fat in the dressing and makes a nice emulsion. The key is to use non-fat Greek-style yogurt, which has the right texture, neither too thick or too thin.  It’s fairly easy to find in ordinary supermarkets now.

The dressing whirls together in a blender or food processor in no time.  I like it with the traditional anchovies, although Asian fish sauce is a good substitute in a pinch.  If you absolutely cannot abide the taste of salty fish, however, add a bit more Worcestershire sauce.

Use just enough dressing to lightly coat the salad.  You don’t want to obliterate the great fresh taste of the lettuce.

Chicken is not usually the first choice for grilling at my house.  We’ve eaten far too many dull, dry chicken breasts over the years.

Yet a whole chicken was one of the best things we grilled this year.  It was rich, juicy and intensely flavored.

The secret is the classic Italian method of cooking chicken under a brick– or al mattone.  The skin gets incredibly crisp and the meat stays moist.  Add a lively rub of garlic and rosemary and it’s irresistible. Continue reading A chicken on every grill, Italian style →

Most Oktoberfest menus are pretty predictable – oceans of beer, mountains of sausage, sauerkraut, and maybe freshly baked pretzels.

Santa Cruz, though, takes pride in leaning off-center.  The music at Santa Cruz Mountain Brewery’s fifth annual Sausagefest last weekend was country.  Frauleins sported elaborate tattoos with their flirty barmaid drindls.  And the popular Penny Ice Creamery served beer ice cream.

There weren’t a lot of takers  for the Devout Stout-flavored ice cream early in the evening, but I couldn’t resist.  A scoop in a pint jar with a little of the same beer was the best thing I had all night.  It was thick, creamy and lightly sweet with flavors of coffee, caramel and a pleasantly bitter hint of burnt sugar.  Even before I left, I knew I was going to have to try to make it at home.

It turns out that beer ice cream isn’t that rare.  Mentions can be found all over the Internet.  Most of the recipes don’t sound very appealing, however.  Some don’t bother to cook the eggs.  Others add molasses or chocolate to round out the beer flavors.

I decided to riff off a basic French-style vanilla ice cream.  First, I reduced some good dark beer with a little brown sugar to make a syrup and cook off most of the alcohol.  Then I substituted the beer syrup for some of the cream in the formula.  It turned out even better than I hoped.

The secret to good beer ice cream, of course, is good beer.  A can of Bud just won’t do. But any well-crafted stout or porter is worth a try.

The artisan Devout Stout is a wonderful, dark and deeply flavored brew.  I would have used it if we could have found any in all the usual places.  When we didn’t, I turned to that reliable supermarket standby, Guiness Extra Stout, for the first batch.

It was very nice although a little rough around the edges.  If I hadn’t tasted the Devout Stout ice cream, I would have declared it a winner.

Still, I knew the ice cream could be better.  So I snagged some Black Butte Porter, my husband’s favorite, for the next try.  Smoother and more nuanced, it was just right.

The only thing better than this ice cream is a float made with the same beer.  Give it a try. You’ll be amazed.

I can’t believe I nearly missed the best figs of the year.  I was out of town on family business during the height of the fabulous fruits’ late summer season in September. When I got back, the local harvest was almost over.

With any luck, however, luscious fresh figs should be available for another week or so in farmers markets and through the fall at specialty grocers. Let’s hope this week’s rains don’t wipe them out.  It would be a shame to miss at least one more opportunity to enjoy this easy fig tartlette.

The little tart is so simple that it hardly requires a recipe. The combination of buttery puff pastry, jammy figs and salty Gorgonzola is irresistible and works as well as an appetizer as dessert.  The figs soften and become even sweeter in the heat of the oven, so no sugar is required, although a little drizzle of honey after baking is a nice touch. Continue reading Season’s last chance for figs →

One of the pitfalls of being a food writer is that terrific dishes far too often fall by the wayside while I’m pursuing new flavors and ingredients.

That was the case with this pasta, which combines some of my favorite Mediterranean flavors.  For years, while I was still working in hard news, this was my go-to pasta dish.  I made it for friends and family alike.  The proportions and techniques were so familiar, I could whip it up without referring to the recipe. Continue reading An old favorite revived →

The first granola bar I ever tasted came from a natural foods bakery in Oakland.  It was a tempting combination of chewy bar cookie and enough crunchy whole grains to make me feel virtuous about the indulgence.

I bought them whenever I could until the store that carried them went out of business.  I pined for something similar but no other commercial granola bar has even come close.  Most are hard bricks that taste little better than sawdust and are suited only for emergency rations in my book.

Recently, though, I’ve been working on my own recipe, prompted by a hike with a friend who was working very hard to make her calories count.  Not for her the chocolate chip cookies I usually bring along on hikes, even though they’re loaded with oats and granola, too.

For Sara, I came up with something new – a whole wheat blondie packed with as much good granola as possible without losing the moist, chewy foundation. Continue reading Granola blondies hit the trail →

Hummus often is the easiest dish to skip at a party.  It’s that creamy beige dip in a plastic tub that someone picked up at the store on the way to the host’s house.  It’s pleasant enough if the processor hasn’t used too much citric acid as a preservative but hardly worth the calories when there are more exciting choices on the table.

At least that’s what I always thought until I was coaxed into sampling the garlicky hummus offered at a farmers market in Santa Clara.  Who knew that such a silky, seductive dip could come from pureed chickpeas laced with mellow garlic and spices?  I was hooked. Continue reading Garlic hummus fit for a party →

Real barbecue is the antithesis of grilling.  There’s nothing quick and easy about it.  To properly cook a pork shoulder over smoldering coals for hours until its tender, moist and humming with smoky flavor takes patience and attention to detail.

So it’s no wonder we only pull out the smoker now and then.  Every time, we bite into pulled pork straight out of the smoker, though, we regret that we don’t do it more often.

It’s hard to beat the taste of well-marbled pork cooked until the outer layer becomes deep brown and crusty.  Pile it on a bun with tangy, crunchy cole slaw and life doesn’t get much better.

This is a can’t-miss dish for a party.  And just the thing for the waning days of the summer vacation season. Continue reading A feast of smoky pork →

The way this summer has gone, it looked like there never was going to be a good time to try out my idea for adult versions of the commercial (and trademarked) Popsicle.  But the weather seems to have settled into a nice run of warm days at last and I’ve been experimenting with making ice pops with a kick.

These frozen bars are milder versions of a couple of refreshing summer cocktails made with fresh juice.  It took a little tweaking to get the flavor right while reducing the alcohol enough that the pops would freeze.  They’re supposed to be fun, not seriously intoxicating, anyway.

For my models, I drew on Lynchburg Lemonade, named after the Kentucky home of the Jack Daniels distillery, and a generic peach daiquiri recipe.  I substituted lemon juice and homemade simple syrup for sour mix in the potent lemonade recipe and stuck to fresh peaches rather than “peach-flavored” liqueurs in the daiquiri.

The results are fresh tasting and fruity–with just enough liquor to make the flavors more interesting.

These are easy to whirl together in the blender and freeze in the ice pops molds readily available in most cookware stores these days.  Let them freeze overnight and you’re ready for an impromptu party, complete with frozen drinks.

Tomato season got a slow start this year but my favorite vegetable finally has hit its stride.  Ripe and juicy heirloom tomatoes overflow the tables at local farmers markets and their bright, intense flavors are just the ticket for a terrific gazpacho.

This dish was inspired by the VitaMix blender I finally broke down and bought this summer.  (What can I say?  The demonstrators at Costco were incredibly persuasive.) Continue reading Gazpacho season is here →