Favorite Cookbooks: Monica Bhide

A few weeks back I highlighted Monica Bhide's new cookbook, Modern Spice. Remember her Baked Chile Pea Puffs stuffed with peas, paneer cheese, chiles, and garlic? So. Good. Monica and I got to chatting a bit over email, and I asked her if she'd do a favorite cookbooks list for us. For those of you who aren't familiar with Monica's work - phew, it's hard to keep up. She has written for just about every publication you can imagine - The New York Times, Bon Appetit, Food & Wine, The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Salon.com, National Geographic Traveler. And those are just a handful of the domestic titles - she writes internationally as well. She was born in India, now calls D.C. home, and traded in a corporate career to be a full-time food writer and cooking teacher. For those if you interested in that transition, I linked to an interview Monica gave (and a couple other related links) down below.

MONICA'S COOKING STYLE (in her own words):

I think I have a very easy going cooking style. I don't like to cook things that are very complicated and require hours of slaving in the kitchen. I have young kids, a full-time career and this keeps me very busy. My focus is always how to take good ingredients and bring out the best in them without messing with them too much! I don't like to recreate dishes from restaurants in general preferring mostly to create my own creations. I am a voracious reader and love to browse through books to look for ideas on dishes, usage of herbs or spices and love to be in other people's kitchens watching them cook. It really is the best way to learn.

FAVORITE COOKBOOKS (the ones she turns to most often for recipes and inspiration):

- Come for Dinner, Leslie Revsin - The late Leslie Revsin was actually the first woman chef at the Waldorf Astoria. I had always enjoyed reading about her but wondered how simple this amazing chef's recipes would really be. When I got my hands on this book, I was really stunned - simplicity married to intense flavor is really the charm of Leslie Revsin's recipes. Her approachable recipes reflect her innate understanding of ingredients and how gracefully they can come together. This book enables you to easily create classic dishes with Revsin's twists like a roasted tomato gazpacho with cumin.

- Savoring India, Julie Sahni - Julie Sahni is a cooking teacher and leading authority on Indian cuisine and has written this book. It has all the earmarks of a Williams-Sonoma publication-- it is simply divine! It is a gorgeous book with sumptuous recipes and mouth-watering photos. The book spans the Indian spectrum, bringing recipes from the deserts of Rajasthan, the beaches of Goa, and the emerald lagoons of Kerala. I often pick it up when I am homesick! It reminds me of my India.

- Taste Pure and Simple, Michel Nischan - Chef Michel Nischan's recipes showcase the essence of his philosophy: Use pure ingredients and get intense flavors. Chef Nischan, well known for his rich French style of cooking, changed course about ten years ago when he found out that his young son, Chris, had juvenile diabetes. "I got rid of processed sugars, cream, butter, and processed flours. It caused me to totally rethink my entire way of cooking," he says. His younger son Ethan, then 2, was diagnosed with the same disease. The chef made it his life's work to educate people on how to cook more healthfully. "It was hard back then," he says. "It was 1994 and fat was in - 'The flavor is in the fat' and 'No fat, no flavor' were the catchphrases." His first book, Taste Pure and Simple (Chronicle, 2003), became an overnight bestseller, second only to Harry Potter on Amazon! I adore this book for its simple yet flavorful recipes - sounds clichéd I know, but its true.

- Fat, by Jennifer McLagan - I know you only like to focus on vegetarian recipes but this really is one of my all time favorite books. The minute I read it, I knew it would win an award. It is amazingly well done and totally non-apologetic in its praises of fat and why different types of fat are essential to one's health. Fat is clearly controversial--but this book is really worth a read. The book has sections on butter, pork fat, poultry fat and beef and lamb fats and since many of these are not commercially available, McLagan shows readers how to render each fat.

- Blue Eggs and Yellow Tomatoes, Jeanne Kelly - When I first got this book, its gorgeous cover caught my eye and it was the beginning of a beautiful relationship! The recipes are inviting not only because of the gorgeous pictures but also because they offer simple ingredient lists and the instructions are clear and easy to follow. In particular, I love the Hummus with Jalapeno-Cilantro pesto, Black beans with orange and chipotle, and Asparagus and peas with green garlic - YUM. All this and desserts too! You simply will not go wrong with this book.

- How to Cook Everything, Mark Bittman - Mark's books have helped me every time I have struggled with the dilemma of - how exactly does one cook "insert vegetable name." I really like the simplicity and common sense of his approach in his books and one of the best things is that they are not intimidating. I read them and feel smarter and not stupider ( which I do feel when I read chefs books sometimes - I always walk away with the sense of "I could never do that."). Although this book has been parsed into smaller volumes (How to Cook Everything: The Basics; Holiday Cooking, etc.), I recommend buying the original.

- 660 Curries, Raghavan Iyer - I have always enjoyed Raghavan's books so when this one came out, I ordered it right away. It lives up to its promise to be extensive and very intense! This book will make you rethink the word and concept of "curry." Yes, there are traditional dishes like Mangalorean Chicken Curry with tamarind and coconut milk, Slow cooked creamy black lentils with whole spices and Eggplant with roasted chiles and tomatoes. But, ah, there is so much more - Cashew stuffed baby eggplant, Eggplant with apples and fennel, Unripe mango with pigeon peas, Cauliflower and spinach in a black-pepper-coconut milk sauce.. I could go on and on, there are over 600 recipes in this collection (as the title suggests.) Oh and for the lovers of Bend it Like Beckham, there is a lovely recipe for "Bolly Cauli" the cauliflower dish the heroine of the movie is, um, forced to make!

A big thanks to Monica for taking the time to share with us. For those of you interested in more links to her work...

- Monica's weekly spice column on the Washington Post website. (I Spice)
- Interview with her about being a freelance food writer (bizzia.com)
- Monica on Salon.com

Orzo Super Salad

I thought we could chat a bit about orzo salads today. Do you see one at just about every potluck or group picnic you go to? Or is it just me? Whether or not you like orzo salads, you have to respect them to a certain extent. I mean, after surviving the perils of transport, they often assume their position on whatever table beckons, and then endure hours upon hour exposed to the elements. A tough job for any salad. So, inspired by a bag of whole wheat orzo I had on-hand, I decided to take a stab at a new version. One that is less pasta-centric than most, made from ingredients that can handle a ride around town on the back of a ten-speed or scooter. One that can handle some time at the beach or park. I used the whole wheat orzo as the base and then packed in as much super-nutritious goodness as I could - almonds, avocado, cucumbers, sprouts, asparagus, feta and baby broccoli.

And I have to tell you, it turned out great. A little crunch from the almonds, cucumber, and asparagus. A little creaminess from the feta and avocado. A bit of zip from the lemony dressing. And so much green!

I'm sure this isn't the last orzo salad I'll make this year. I'm thinking that the next one will likely be with slow-roasted tomatoes, once the summer crops arrive. But I'm always open to suggestions and ideas.

Giant Black Bean Salad

Let's go find summer. There are many times, particularly this time of year, when I turn to Wayne and say these four words. To find summer might mean taking a short stroll west, just far enough to sneak out from under the fog bank. Other times it requires getting in the car and escaping San Francisco altogether. We often go north to Napa or Point Reyes or Stinson Beach. Other times we head south to Pescadero, a little town set back from the coast a couple of miles - home to Harley Farms Goat Dairy and Phipps Country Store & Farm. The last time I was at Phipps a bin of their huge, glossy, black beans caught my attention. These were beans that looked like large black beetles. I bought a bag, and made this salad - black beans and toasted almonds tossed with a honey-jalapeno-lime dressing served over baby arugula and finished with a bit of crumbled feta.

I think this is an example of how you can introduce an element of surprise and delight simply by playing with one element - in this case size. More specifically, the size of the beans. It has the potential to take the ubiquitous black bean salad into fresh territory. I took a bowl of the cooked beans to a friend's house and at a glance she thought I had a bowl full of black olives -when cooked they are the the size of my thumb, from the knuckle up. Super fun.

I think the beans were some sort of black runner beans (out of stock on their site), but don't let it deter you if you can't find the exact bean. I suspect black valentines would be nice here or midnight black beans - neither nearly as large, but still wonderful heirloom beans. I'm tempted to make this salad again using these Ayocote Negro, which I haven't used before.

Also, it probably goes without saying - it is worth it to cook up a pot of beans from scratch for a salad like this. The thing is, the beans are the star, so you want them to have great texture and flavor. But yes, you can substitute canned black beans and the sky isn't going to fall ;) The salad will still be good, a bit mushier, but still tasty.

Summer Squash Gratin

Someone was asking me in the comments the other day about my food routines. They were curious about how often I shop, my favorite stores here in SF, when I cook - that sort of thing. I'm also curious about your food routines, so I thought I'd share mine in the hope that you would share a bit about yours as well. I should also work a recipe in here, so I decided to highlight a decadent, crunchy-topped summer squash gratin I made last week. It was inspired by a mountain of summer squash I encountered at the farmers' market - yellow squash, green squash, patty pans, globes, and others I couldn't even identify. The gratin recipe features lots it, thinly sliced, with new potatoes, an oregano pesto, and brown-buttered breadcrumbs all baked at high-temperature until the squash is tender and the top is crunchy. I used a mix of yellow and green squash, but you can certainly experiment with whatever you have on hand, or whatever your garden might be producing.

So, the cornerstone of my food routine is a weekly trip to one of the nearby farmers' markets. I stock up on whatever looks good, and typically that means lots of vegetables, a dozen+ farm-fresh eggs, some tofu, seasonal fruit, almond butter, bread, etc. If I end up running low on anything between markets I walk over to Bi-Rite Market and pick it up there. They source ingredients from many of the local farms around here, and even grow some of their own crops now.

Once or twice a month I like to go to Rainbow Grocery or Whole Foods and stock up on pantry staples. I hit the bin section for interesting whole grains, flours, beans, lentils, and that sort of thing. Beyond that, if I'm at the Ferry Building I love to stop in to see what is available at Boulette's Larder - beautiful, rare, artisanal sugars, spice blends, grains, oils, and vinegars. I always come across something special and inspiring there.

As far as beverages go - I love to visit Keri at Biondivino. She carries lots of the small Italian wine producers I like. Or I'll pick up a few bottles after chatting with Josh over at Bi-Rite - I walk there, so that keeps my purchasing in check. Wine can get heavy ;) Wayne is in charge of most beer runs, and lucky for us, one of the best destinations for artisan beers is a short five minute walk - Healthy Spirits. Wayne is also the barista and tea brewer around here - we buy a lot of Blue Bottle beans, and order tea from Sebastian at In Pursuit of Tea.

So, generally speaking, I'm mindful of what I buy, I shop close to home, and (stating the obvious) I cook quite a bit. A few people have asked how much I spend on food. I think I cook on the cheap - kinda. I'd never try to represent myself as a bargain shopper, but because I don't spend money on meat, fish, or poultry, it is easier for me to spend money on great olive oil, eggs, or perfect cherries - and still come out ahead financially. I happily pay $6 - $8/ per dozen eggs, and good cheese is another higher-ticket item for me, but I typically use it as some sort of accent. Most of the organic grains and flours I buy cost between $1 - $2 per pound. Stunning, heirloom beans come in at about $5 per pound. And as anyone who has done it knows - cook a pound of dried beans and you have a whole lot of food on your hands. The organic summer squash I used in this recipe today cost $2 per pound.

I'm sure I'm forgetting things, but if that's the case I'll add as I remember (forgive me!)

Onto the gratin - all you squash growers have got to give this one a go this summer - it is as decadent as I get, plenty of olive oil and butter here, but sooo worth it.

Buttermilk Summer Squash Soup

This is a simple soup I made the other night with the summer squash left over from the gratin we talked about last week. Nothing fancy, just a pureed summer squash soup with a buttermilk twist. I used a hint of red pepper because, quite honestly, I often prefer it over black pepper. I used a bit of rosemary for depth, some potato for body, garlic, shallots - and aside from the buttermilk, nothing too far beyond the usual suspects. And I have to say, while I heartily enjoyed the soup as a main component of our dinner, I enjoyed the leftovers even more the following day.

There was plenty of soup leftover, so when Wayne and I decided to throw our cameras in the car and head toward Pt. Reyes for an impromptu photo excursion, I decided to pack a picnic lunch for us. The leftover soup was poured into a large Mason jar, and it ended up being the ideal companion for a day-old chunk of walnut bread that we brought along as well. We found ourselves a shady picnic table in the heart of the little town of Tomales, and the nice ladies at the Tomales Bakery donated a couple of spoons to our cause.

I have to say, it was a near perfect California lunch - wildflowers in bloom everywhere, clear skies, good food, breezes coming off the ocean a few miles west, a vintage cornflower blue Karmann Ghia parked in the grass on the corner, neighbors chatting as they picked up their mail from the post office. And I think it must be little moments like these that keep me from straying too far from the place I've called home (nearly) my entire life.

Red Pesto Ravioli

This one is for Wayne who has a real soft-spot for sun-dried tomatoes. He says to me - they are to tomatoes what espresso is to coffee. No doubt, there are many things to like about sun-dried tomatoes. I too appreciate their intensity of flavor. And I love their pretty-ugliness - all those blackened wrinkles and that rusted-red patina. Every time I cook with these little tongues of flavor I scold myself for not using them more often - this time in particular. I made a walnut-studded red pesto sauce by casting sun-dried tomatoes in the role basil typically plays. I tossed the pesto with goat cheese raviolis and and served them on a bed of baby spinach. I happened to have some left-over oven-roasted tomatoes on hand, and grabbed for those as well. Their sweetness played off the goat cheese, spinach, and pesto so nicely, but you can certainly leave that component out if you're trying to pull things together quickly, and don't want to bother heating the oven.

The key to a recipe like this is sourcing good tomatoes. Not all sun-dried tomatoes are created equally. I regularly come across bags full of dried tomatoes that are more like crisps than anything else. No good - pass on those. Look for slightly plump, pliable, chewy, sun-dried tomatoes. They are far easier to work with and taste better.

You can serve this warm or at room temperature. The spinach ends up wilting a bit under the hot raviolis - just what you want.

Dorm Food Ideas

I was hoping I could tap into the collective wisdom here to help a fellow reader and cook. I received the following email from a young man who will be returning to college in New York in a few weeks. You can probably sense where this is headed, here's the email:

"...I have a favor to ask of you. As a college student, I have five weeks until my summer food-nirvana is abruptly ended by the horrors of dorm food and required meal plans. This morning, when looking through 101CB for a recipe or two, I began to wonder what advice, recipes and tactics you might have for those of us in such a position. I'm convinced that your younger readers, many of whom, like me, are stuck in dorms with infrequent access to a kitchen, would benefit greatly from a blog write-up on simple, fast and easy foods that are manageable, healthy and tasty options for the otherwise stomach-cringing college student. Whadda ya say? With lots of appreciate and goodness from N.Y..."

It has been some time since I lived in the dorms - what is allowed? For example, are toaster ovens, crock pots, or panini grills fair game? My guess is no. I remember having access to a microwave, and the bagel toaster in the cafeteria, but I suppose it must vary from college to college. Are there any great books on the topic?

If you have any ideas or suggestions for our epicurean scholar please share them in the comments. Anyone who can work some creative magic at a salad or sandwich bar, let's hear your tricks and tips. Let's send him back to school with some ideas and inspiration. -h

Almond Soba Noodles

I know many of you enjoy the otsu recipe from Super Natural Cooking - soba noodles, a fiesty dressing, some pan-fried tofu for good measure. Well, I did a riff on it the other day. My family met up at Baker Beach, a stretch of sand with a stunning view of the Marin Headlands. With giant pelicans soaring over-head and the Golden Gate bridge just to our right we spent a few hours lounging in the sand, enjoying lunch. Or, in the case of my little nephew, eating sand. The noodles? I tossed soba noodles with a spicy Thai-curry and almond sauce, and topped them with some sauteed tofu and pea shoots.

This is my sister Heather, holding Jack, who is playing peek-a-boo...with himself. I get to see him again tomorrow when we are having a party to celebrate his first birthday.

I should mention, so you don't get discouraged - if pea shoots are hard for you to find, swap in whatever vegetable you like. I was primarily trying to work some vegetable/greens into the noodles, and pea shoots are what I happened to have on hand. Go for something quick-cooking, so you can make it in the same pan as the tofu.

Carrot, Dill & White Bean Salad

I bought a single bunch of bushy-topped carrots the other day. At first glance it was a good looking cluster - bright orange in color, vibrant greens still attached. But it was on second glance that I noticed the tiny carrots nestled beside their larger brothers and sisters. Some of the smallest carrots were no thicker than a knitting needle, not much longer than my pinky finger. I snacked on those after a quick rinse. The bigger guys I put to work in this dill-flecked white bean skillet salad. Nothing too complicated - warm, coin-shaped slices of golden, pan-fried carrots, white alubia beans and chopped dill tossed with a tangy-sweet lemon shallot dressing. It tastes good the day you make it, even better the day after. And although it's certainly not as pretty, in my opinion, it might have tasted best on day three as the shallots infused the beans and the lemon mellowed.

Look for young carrots with their greens still attached - you can get a good sense of whether the bunch is fresh or not. On the bean front, I cooked the alubias from scratch, but you can use well-drained canned white beans if you want to throw this together on a whim.

Summer Squash Gratin

Someone was asking me in the comments the other day about my food routines. They were curious about how often I shop, my favorite stores here in SF, when I cook - that sort of thing. I'm also curious about your food routines, so I thought I'd share mine in the hope that you would share a bit about yours as well. I should also work a recipe in here, so I decided to highlight a decadent, crunchy-topped summer squash gratin I made last week. It was inspired by a mountain of summer squash I encountered at the farmers' market - yellow squash, green squash, patty pans, globes, and others I couldn't even identify. The gratin recipe features lots it, thinly sliced, with new potatoes, an oregano pesto, and brown-buttered breadcrumbs all baked at high-temperature until the squash is tender and the top is crunchy. I used a mix of yellow and green squash, but you can certainly experiment with whatever you have on hand, or whatever your garden might be producing.

So, the cornerstone of my food routine is a weekly trip to one of the nearby farmers' markets. I stock up on whatever looks good, and typically that means lots of vegetables, a dozen+ farm-fresh eggs, some tofu, seasonal fruit, almond butter, bread, etc. If I end up running low on anything between markets I walk over to Bi-Rite Market and pick it up there. They source ingredients from many of the local farms around here, and even grow some of their own crops now.

Once or twice a month I like to go to Rainbow Grocery or Whole Foods and stock up on pantry staples. I hit the bin section for interesting whole grains, flours, beans, lentils, and that sort of thing. Beyond that, if I'm at the Ferry Building I love to stop in to see what is available at Boulette's Larder - beautiful, rare, artisanal sugars, spice blends, grains, oils, and vinegars. I always come across something special and inspiring there.

As far as beverages go - I love to visit Keri at Biondivino. She carries lots of the small Italian wine producers I like. Or I'll pick up a few bottles after chatting with Josh over at Bi-Rite - I walk there, so that keeps my purchasing in check. Wine can get heavy ;) Wayne is in charge of most beer runs, and lucky for us, one of the best destinations for artisan beers is a short five minute walk - Healthy Spirits. Wayne is also the barista and tea brewer around here - we buy a lot of Blue Bottle beans, and order tea from Sebastian at In Pursuit of Tea.

So, generally speaking, I'm mindful of what I buy, I shop close to home, and (stating the obvious) I cook quite a bit. A few people have asked how much I spend on food. I think I cook on the cheap - kinda. I'd never try to represent myself as a bargain shopper, but because I don't spend money on meat, fish, or poultry, it is easier for me to spend money on great olive oil, eggs, or perfect cherries - and still come out ahead financially. I happily pay $6 - $8/ per dozen eggs, and good cheese is another higher-ticket item for me, but I typically use it as some sort of accent. Most of the organic grains and flours I buy cost between $1 - $2 per pound. Stunning, heirloom beans come in at about $5 per pound. And as anyone who has done it knows - cook a pound of dried beans and you have a whole lot of food on your hands. The organic summer squash I used in this recipe today cost $2 per pound.

I'm sure I'm forgetting things, but if that's the case I'll add as I remember (forgive me!)

Onto the gratin - all you squash growers have got to give this one a go this summer - it is as decadent as I get, plenty of olive oil and butter here, but sooo worth it.