Monday, April 19, 2004

Let me explain... About the recipes. You see, I have this theory (hotly disputed by at least one or more of my friends) that any one can be a great cook. I don't claim that it's just about knowing how to read, though that helps. (But isn't required--my 2 1/2 year old can cook, properly assisted.) It's about knowing how things taste. And being able to recall flavors. And I'm pretty sure (though I'm sure some know-it-all neurologist will dispute me) that anybody (who cares to -- will is important, here) can develop that ability, which I think of as having an intuition about food. It does take practice. Most people are not genius cooks overnight. And I'm not a genius cook. People like Ferran Adria and Charlie Trotter and Thomas Keller get that label. I am a really good home cook with a knack for making simple food with great flavor. And so, I tinker, a lot, with recipes, menus, you name it. One of my many incredibly annoying spousal habits is that when we have people over for dinner, I only make things I've never made before. It drives Husband crazy--and then most of the time, he loves the food. And if he doesn't, believe me, he tells me. I have a wonderful critic in house (seriously--he's always right. Almost.) So the recipe from the weekend, the banana bread, is an adaptation of one that I liked ok, from a good book, Mollie Katzen's Sunlight Cafe . It's all breakfast foods, and props to my darling friend Jerry for giving it to me for Christmas last year. (He's my favorite snobby New York foodie, and the happy victim of my successful plot to prove that L.A. does, indeed, have great food that is not, repeat not, consumed in a strip mall. But that's another story.) The problem with Mollie's (may I call you Mollie, Miss Katzen?) recipe was the soy powder. I loved the idea of a banana bread that wasn't a total sugar bomb, cause I buy into the "don't eat a lot of sugar and starch if you don't want to weigh 400 lbs." theories. Atkins, no. But cut out the white stuff a la Oprah, in my experience, you will lose weight. (I'm not so good at cutting out the white stuff, but that too is another story.) So less flour, less sugar, more protein is all good by me. But I found the texture of Mollie's version kind of, to quote Dido, yucky. Too moist, too heavy, and way too much soy taste (and I LIKE soy.) So....the answer (and I was lucky, and got it on the first try) was ground blanched almonds (sold as almond flour, at Surfa's, i.e., really finely ground.) If you are still reading, you'll probably be interested to know that the reason that ground almonds were on my mind (and in my freezer--put there so as not to attract those evil pantry moths, or go rancid, as nuts are wont to do) was Passover. I am as Waspy as Wasp can be (not quite as Waspy as W, but really close--take that all you people who've fallen for that BS Texas cover!) but I made a damn fine Passover flourless chocolate cake--by adapting a recipe that came from the greatest pseudo-Wasp of all, poor besieged Martha Stewart. (And Martha-whose own recipes I've never really found to be all that great--adapted the cake from someone else...and so on, and so on. One of these days, I'll post that recipe, too. It was fantastic--generally fantastic, not just "hey--it's Passover and this doesn't taste like sawdust or matzoh" fantastic.) In any case, that cake's key ingredient--for both flavor and texture, was almond meal. And that's how my small brain turns. Another reason for the recipes--they're my own way of paying homage to the great Julie of the Julie/Julia project, who, believe it or not, was the first blogger I ever read, and whose genius idea continues to boggle and inspire my mind nearly every day. I cannot wait to read her book. comment []9:05:45 PM   trackback []