Socca!

Socca will always have a very special place in my heart. Way back in the day, when I was 20, I took off on an a fairly epic journey. I drove with Jenny back to her school in Philly via the Southwest and then flew to travel around Europe for a month by train before meeting my study abroad group in Roma. Everything about it was totally brilliant, except that I was really hungry all the time.

I was vegan and fairly insistent about not bending the rule even the tiniest bit while travelling. Let's face it, I was 20, and when you are 20 you are naturally self-righteous. But I paid the price for it those first three weeks and I was getting more than a little bit cranky living on the road and eating only baguettes. I was on my way to Nice, when I read about their intriguing street food in the guidebook. Socca! Socca is a vegan (gluten free even) flatbread sold by street vendors all through this beautiful town. I went straight for the first vendor as soon as I arrived. It did not disappoint. Warm and peppery, this pizza like dish melts in your mouth and makes you feel totally content. The street vendors make it in these metal barrel BBQs so it has this smokiness to it. Plus it makes it that much more the perfect hobo food for the lost vegan girl riding the train around. I make this delight at home whenever I'm feeling nostalgic.

 

This is Mark Bittman's recipe for Socca, I use it for reference when I make mine. Since I am watching my calories, I only used 3 Tablespoons of olive oil and it's still good but doesn't melt in your mouth like the real thing. He's not kidding about the pepper, the more the better. I usually skip the rosemary and onion in favor of a teaspoon of cumin, which is how I enjoyed it in Nice.

Socca (Farinata)
Time: 45 minutes

1 cup chickpea flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon, at least, ground black pepper
4 to 6 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 large onion, thinly sliced, optional


1 tablespoon fresh rosemary leaves, optional.

1. Heat oven to 450 degrees. Put a well-seasoned or nonstick 12-inch pizza pan or cast-iron skillet in oven. Sift chickpea flour into a bowl; add salt and pepper; then slowly add 1 cup lukewarm water, whisking to eliminate lumps. Stir in 2 tablespoons olive oil. Cover, and let sit while oven heats, or as long as 12 hours. Batter should be about the consistency of heavy cream.
2. If using onion and rosemary, stir them into batter. Pour 2 tablespoons oil into heated pan, and swirl to cover pan evenly. Pour in batter, and bake 12 to 15 minutes, or until pancake is firm and edges set. Heat broiler, and brush top of socca with 1 or 2 tablespoons of oil if it looks dry.
3. Set socca a few inches away from broiler for a few minutes, just long enough to brown it spottily. Cut it into wedges, and serve hot, or at least warm.

Yield: 4 to 6 appetizer servings.

To impart that same BBQ smoky flavor, I make mine in a cast iron skillet:
 

Socca is excellent on its own, but it's fun to dress up too. Here I've made it like a pizza, mimicking my favorite vegan pizza from carmelita. This is white beans pureed with truffle oil, porcini mushrooms, pecans, roasted garlice, and water cress. Yum.

 

And since I am definitely not a vegan anymore -- I actually gave up soon after leaving Nice nearly 14 years ago -- I thought I'd try it out with one of my favorite combinations: havarti and tomato. This was better than the toasted havarti and tomato sandwich I made a few weeks ago.

 

Shiritaki Ramen

Top Ramen is a favorite of mine. But I'm trying not to indulge too much because it's a bit high-cal and low-nutrient, so I've been making a variation with Tofu Shirataki noodles.

I put some onion whips and fava bean leaves from the garden, as well as peppers, tomatoes, and quorn faux chicken for flavor.

These are the whips and fava leaves.

 

The final dish. I'm really enjoying Better than Bullion's No Beef Broth for soups.
 

More Adventures with Watercress

We thoroughly enjoyed the first batch of watercress, but what really inspired me to buy it a second time is this pizza we had with Elizabeth and Sean at the Carmelita Happy Hour - which no one should miss - it was a flatbread with sunchokes pureed with truffle oil, hen of the woods mushrooms, pecans, roasted garlic, and topped with a watercress salad. So amazingly good.

Here's my version below:
 
I couldn't get sunchokes, but it's a newman's own four cheese, topped with rehydrated porcini mushrooms, slivers of garlic, pecans, and waterdress dressed with white truffle oil. Delicious.

And of course we had to have it our favorite way from last time again - pink lady apples, pecans, and gorgonzola.
 

A new favorite, truffle oil dressing, with hazelnuts, and pecorino.
 

And on top of ramen to add a little pepper to the soup :)
 

The Full English

I am a huge fan of the full English breakfast. I love the variety, heartiness and ingenious use of leftovers, this is a breakfast designed to get you through a full day of hard work. The leftovers usually appear in vegetables from the night before often as bubble and scrape, which is a mash up of potatoes cooked in the roast with greens made into a patty and fried. Unfortunately, the full English is a bit of meat fest. It usually has two kinds of sausage, bacon, bubble and scrape, beans, tomatoes and occasionally mushrooms! Oh, and of course a fried egg! Hearty is no joke here.

But a vegetarian version can be lighter fare for a day when you know lunch will be late or dinner early.

This one features roasted tomatoes, peppers, and shitake mushrooms for the vegetables.
 

Spinach, sauteed with white beans and garlic sub in for beans and bubble and scrape, though i added half a hash brown patty for good measure. And what would breakfast be without morningstar veggie sausage?
 

Vegan Shoes

I've been needing new shoes for several months now, but have resisted the temptation to buy new leather ones. My early sources for vegan shoes were either payless -- which has lots of cute ones, but I worried about longevity of the product and overall comfort since I walk a lot -- or style shoes from vegan boutiques, which also look uncomfortable and are pretty pricey. So I was at a bit of an impasse until I discovered REI, which is actually carrying quite a number of vegan shoes.

I knew about one pair going into the store, but the sales guy was all about helping me find more. He brought over 7 possible pair for me to try on (none of which were flip flops or crocs). Honestly, it was like how I remember shoe shopping at Nordstrom used to be when I was a kid. Totally awesome. We even found a pair for Charlie!

Here are the shoes we bought:
 
On the left are Charlie's Keen Coronados. They are made of canvas. In the center are Jambu Planets, this company is a bit of a mystery as they just appeared at REI with 5 or 6 different shoes, the inside of which are all stamped "man-made," but REI refers to them as nubuck leather. I checked with the company, it turns out their nubuck is synthetic and all their shoes are vegan and use recycled plastic in the sole. VERY COOL! The pair on the right are Clark's waterproof adventure ballet flats. They also had a similar mary jane shoe. I don't think these are vegan on purpose, but are vegan for the waterproofing, but we'll take it.

 

I felt really good about these purchases not only because they are vegan and support a local store (even if it is a bit of a corporate giant these days), but it was a good mix of supporting a vegan shoe line and supporting a vegan product in a big name shoe line. And after spending nearly all of my shoe budget on Dansko's for the past ten years, they seemed very reasonably priced. I've been really happy with my shoes too, but Charlie isn't as keen on his Keens. I'm hoping he'll keep them though because they are super, super cute.

Other Big Accomplishments - or Why I am on a Diet

Reflecting on my post about getting a medal for doing well in school it occurred to me that it correlates perfectly to why I have to diet now. There is a stark contrast between running pre-grad school vs. running now, I looked at my running log and crunched some shocking numbers.

Here are the stats:
In the 2 years before I started my grad program, I ran 1,242 miles.
In the 2 years since I started school (and working full time), I ran 635. Note that 83 of those I've run since joining the office diet bet and my decision to go one class per quarter for spring, summer, and fall.

Honestly, I think I am sharing this because I wanted to show off my other medals, because deep down nothing is cooler than getting a medal. My friend Amol says we run so we can eat junk food, which is kind of true, but I think I am more keen on the medals. And obviously I didn't give up the junk food until recently despite slacking on the running.

This is my homage to my first (and only) full marathon. I'm not going to lie. Running a marathon pretty much sucks. I tear up just thinking about doing it again.
 

Here are my numbers from every half marathon I've run. This is truly my preferred distance. My best race was the one with my name on it. I ran a 2:07. Which is no Boston Qualifier by any means, but it's a 9:45 pace and something to be proud of at that distance. I ran that the month before I started grad school.

 

These are all the short distance races I've run in, plus some numbers from the Chilly Hilly Bicycle Ride - which is chilly, hilly and brutal, I'm not sure that I could be talked in to doing that again. The 2:45 half sign is there because I was helping to pace the Seattle Half. For that you only run a 10k.
 

And for the grand finale, my running medals! They sparkle. Also now that I look, I realize one of them isn't here. For the Nike Women's Marathon, a hot fireman in a tuxedo hands you a Tiffany necklace when you finish. I should sign up for that race again.
 

A Solstice Miracle

For the most part, I blog on weekend mornings when I should be studying (or running), and then I schedule my posts throughout the week. Yesterday's post was written on Sunday morning, which has been officially named the darkest day in June for all time in Seattle. As most of you are aware, life in Seattle is only made possible by the gift of gorgeous summers with endless daylight. When you are experiencing a truly dark, as in the newsman tells you science confirms it's dark, day on June 20, things are dismal.

After writing about my garden on Sunday, it was a tad warmer and brighter yesterday, so on a break from class Monday night, I added that paragraph about how at least we are able to harvest some things, so gardening is not a total waste of time, before the post went up. But today, glorious sunny and over 70 today, a miracle has occurred. When I surveyed my plants, I did not have the same depressing sense that I needed to check my plants into the ICU, in fact they showed awesome signs of survival.

I have a cherry tomato growing. Sun Golds' seriously are the ultimate. Normally I just like them for taste, but this is a true survivor that belongs in any Seattle garden.
 

In the best of years, I struggle with peppers. Let's face it, Seattle summers can be sunny, but they usually aren't hot. Even last year with the 100 degree days, I only got a few tiny peppers. But check this bad boy out. Not even phased by dark 45 degree days. This is they Gypsy pepper. Buy one. If it has good flavor, this will be the only pepper plant I ever bother with.
 

And perhaps most surprisingly, this zucchini is sending out flowers and forming a fruit. Wow. Totally unexpected.
 

Don't get me wrong, I have been doing my absolute best to baby these plants through the worst June in Seattle history. Normally I would not grow them in containers on the front cement, they would be in the colder raised beds. But this is the hottest spot. I trim the yellow leaves off and I spray them with blossom setting spray whenever it isn't raining.
 

I have even fashioned small greenhouses for the most sensitive plants.
 

Even more surprising were the backyard discoveries. We have never gotten apples, yet look at these ugly things on top of the bird feeder baffle. Wow.
 

We also have not had much luck on the raspberry frontier in years past, but we have many on there way and this beautiful tree above them is setting blossoms. So pretty.
 

This is my surprise harvest from tonight. Spring onions, Italian dandelion greens, borage, greek oregano, marjoram, arugula blossom, parsley, sorrel, mint, and lemon verbena. Plus, we ate a stirfry that included spring onion, onion scape, and snow peas from the garden. Delicious.
 

Garden Update

The one sunny weekend we got to enjoy recently made me feel a bit more optimistic about gardening this year, enough that I took these pictures. But now we are back to the gray, cold, rainy and just plain dismal days. One cucumber has died, my zucchinis are yellowing and the tomatoes are just standing still. It's very depressing because I can't help them. I've made mock greenhouses out of plastic containers, but we'll need to buy a full on greenhouse with a heater if this is the region's weather future.

Here's some updates on plants I posted before. This shows about a month's worth of growth, so while things are looking better, you can see that this cold weather has severely stunted the garden's progress.

I should note though before you read the depressing report below, that we have been eating some food from the garden. The herbs are awesome: sage, sorrel, mint (i have other plants besides the new Kentucky below), thyme, chives, and oregano. Edible flowers we've enjoyed include arugala, sage blossoms, chive and onion scapes. I also have an Italian dandelion that is growing like a champ (of course) and we've eaten the leaves in several salads or green combos. We've also had overwintered chard, collards, and onions. Yesterday I harvested snow peas. We've eaten some fava leaves and will have beans shortly. Kale is on it's way. Yesterday we ate young borage leaves - which are a bit fuzzy, but taste like crunchy cucumbers. Soon we will have borage flowers. Some plants will continue to thrive in this cold weather. And the hyperextended spring has meant more morels and fiddleheads at the forager stand.

Kentucky Mint - big enough to harvest now, but normally mint is a plant you keep in a container in a vain attempt to contain it. I bought this plant as a start in early April. In other year's, we would be eating mint pesto to keep up with the crop.
 

Purple podded peas. They are beautiful. And the flowers are like sweet peas. We will get a few as you can see and we will actually get them on time for peas, but the wind knocked over the top growth this week and snapped the vines, so we won't get many. Have we ever had heavy wind like that in the middle of June before? That was not a gardening scenario I was prepared for.
 

These lettuces are nearly big enough to harvest a few leaves. I bought these as starts in early April. Can you imagine how much we would pay for lettuce in the store if growing seasons were always like this? Normally a lettuce crop is about 45 days from seed planting to full heads. These went in the ground as 3 inch starts 2 months agree and have grown about 2 inches. Wow.
 

A bean sprout - some hope for summer? I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
 

Starting a new blog

I can't seem to get enough of blogging these days, so I started a second one: http://bigislandanniversary.blogspot.com/ to plan our 10th Anniversary trip. Hopefully this will morph into a travel blog of some sort.

I was inspired to do this by Charlie's co-worker Tiffany, who started a blog to plan a big event trip. I was thinking it was a good way for me to visually share travel ideas with Charlie, who often listens patiently as I ramble on from the guide book, and then says "what do you mean?"
My communications prof said to communicate verbally with visual people you need to use words that imply sight, like "My view is this," "The way they see it is this," but I'm so auditor-illy inclined that I immediately start resorting back to "I hear you," "What you are saying is this."

So pictures are the new plan, because I want this trip to be awesome for both of us. I'll record all the things "I hear" about doing on the island here, so Charlie can "see" them and tell me what he thinks. And since you all can too, send us your advice!! Because it is a big island and we want to enjoy all of it.

 

My big accomplishment

I haven't graduated yet, but I was inducted into the National Honor's Society for Public Administration students. I ordered a medal to go with my certificate because I used to earn them all the time running races, but haven't since I started school. So this is my big medal for the last 2 years :)
 

Pea Vines

Pea vine is hard to find outside of asian grocery stores, but it's excellent stir-fried with garlic and mirin. It has a delicate flavor that combines peas and lettuce with the heartiness of spinach. Emily often orders this dish off the secret menu at Chinese Restaurants and I got really spoiled with the quality of the greens. She has told me that the pea vine dish is actually a good indicator of the overall quality of the restaurant.

 

I have to admit that the greens I bought (above) at the farmer's market were not nearly as good as the ones I've enjoyed with Emily. I think my first mistake is that I bought ones with flowers - they looked so magical I didn't think of their significance - but the reality of flowering vines is that the stem is too mature to be stir-fried in this manner. But my dish was completely edible and Charlie said he didn't mind the stems.

I bought a second bunch later with no flowers.
 

And I really enjoyed them the second time round.
 

Sweet Kitties

Django sits on my jacket so I can't leave in the morning.
 

Django and River are best buds. In fact they are sleeping in a similar position next to me right now. Jill made that awesome seahawk colored crochet blanket on our bed, but the cats love it so much they are willing to wrestle us for it. So it only gets to warm our feet at night.
 

When I was a girl, I had another cat that looks just like Django only he had all black pads on his feet and a black nose. I used to think that was perfect, but now I'm quite charmed by Django's pink and black pad combination.
 

Fave and Ravioli with an Egg on Top

Fava beans are a tasty delight. They grow well here and I love to watch them get tall and big, plus they are good for the soil. Unfortunately, the final product is a bit laborious to shell. I think there are recipes that use the whole pod, but I prefer the beans on their own. But their big pods are fuzzy and unique enough to make shelling them interesting. Some of the bigger beans need to have their second skins removed, which can be both fascinating and annoying, but if you don't they pucker in the roasting and diminish the flavor a bit. Just a bit. You can see in this photo that I got lazy and didn't do this with the whitish looking ones. These are sauted with shallot and green garlic.

 


Then served a top ravioli with a fried egg and parm to make the sauce.