Salmiakpastiller

Strong candy, beautiful Finnish packaging

If you hadnt guessed from my Piparkakut recipe, I enjoy Finnish food, culture, and people. I had a chance to visit in 2003 traveling from Helsinki to Mantyharju to Rovaniemi to Pyha in Lapland and back. A beautiful trip filled with lakes, trains, reindeer, hiking, coffee, beer, and lots of great food. My travel companion and I stayed with Jaakko Matilla who led us berry picking in the countryside. Afterwards I pulled together a blueberry pie with the small blue berries (like the Maine variety) that no one has ever forgotten. The rest of the trip was filled with herring (creamed, pickled, fried, and stuffed in bread) and lots of liquorice treats.

Lapin Kulta, a not so fancy beer I enjoyed in Finland, 2003

Jaakko is visiting NYC this week, and Ive been treated to an impressive ring of ruis rye bread from Nordic Breads NYC. Im told is better than the kind in Finland. Jaakko also brought a bag of Salmiakki, or should I say Super Salmiakki candies. Salmiakki contains ammonium chloride (salmiac) which gives the already aggressive flavor of black liquorice a salty flavor. The candies are beyond chewy. The texture is more like a hard gummy candy that clings to your teeth and tongue with a vengeance. The flavor is only slightly sweet, nearly savory, liquorice with a bite of table salt taste and an unexpected menthol minty flavor. Im eating them in small quantities. The flavor lingers on for an hour or more, jammed in my molars.

Reindeer in Lapland.

I havent traveled abroad in a few years now. Jaakko has made it clear that NYC and Americas new foodie tendencies toward organic foods, CSAs and sustainably produced foods would be welcome in Finland. Ive been elected to help. I cant make promises but its a thought to grow on. Finland must be doing okay. Jaakko tells me that you can split a whole or half reindeer meat share.

Duck Tales Roasting a Whole Duck

Oh duck. I have taken your beauty, but given you delicious flavor from moist cooking

Shop Rite in Midwood Brooklyn is a super-duper market. It has a meat department one city block long. Somewhere among the 100s of cuts of pre-packaged meats I found a pile of ducks. I grabbed a mid-sized 6lb whole duck and checked out. From that duck I was able to make 2-3 pounds of luscious dark roasted meat, 6 oz of pure rendered duck fat, 2 handfuls of duck cracklings, 1 quart of duck stock, and a duck liver, heart, and kidneys I have plans to turn into some paté. Expect a few of those recipes soon.

What a long neck my duck had

I hate when people use the flavors of other foods to describe another. Tastes like chicken, cant get any less creative. Duck does not taste like chicken. Sorry to rely on the cliche, but duck may be the "pork "of the poultry world. It has a stronger richer flavor then turkey, Cornish hen, or even chicken. Moist, and hopelessly fatty from a thick layer of fat under its skin.

Having no idea how to roast a duck. I instinctually searched for a recipe on Epicurious. The duck wasnt cheap ($18), and I wasnt going to dry it out or burn it away with a somewhat reliable or not internet recipe. Gourmet magazine had my back. I sought the most complicated multi-step recipe. Easy and fast wasnt going to cut it. I settled on braising (moist heat to cook the meat), chilling (to prevent meat from cooking further while roasting) before roasting shortly (to crisp the skin). The product was a perfectly luscious (I think!), but less than butcher shop brown attractive duck. I will definitely be leaning on this process from now.

If you havent tried duck, and are anxious to spend $20, 8 hours, and lots of residual oven heat on a strong flavored meat you may dislike look for duck legs or breast first. Im sure they have them at places like the giant shop rite.

Roast Duck With Ginger Marmalade Glaze

1 5 1/2 - 6 1/2 lb Long Island duck
sea salt
1 carrot, sliced length wise into medium strips
6 green onions, chopped in half, root ends removed
1/2 cup sugar
hot water
1 tblsp powdered ginger
1/2 tsp coriander seeds
1 large pinch red pepper flakes

Glaze
2 tblsp marmalade
1 tsp soy sauce
1 tblsp red wine vinegar
1/2 tsp powdered ginger
1 pinch cayenne

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare duck by pricking skin all over with a fork, which allows the fat to drain out. Place duck in a roasting pan. Note that a pan with higher sides is better than the one Im using. With breast up, and cavity towards you gently separate skin from meat with your hand. Be careful not to tear the skin, which I did. I needed to use a knife, making a slit above the cavity to get under the skin. Im not sure why this step is necessary, you arent going to shove butter or herbs under the skin as you would a turkey, but I do as Im told.

My hand inside a duck

Coat the skin and cavity with salt and rub. Place carrots and scallions in the cavity of the bird. Sprinkle ginger, coriander, and red pepper on top of duck, along with sugar around the bird. Add hot water (shrinks the skin, again dont know why, doing as told), within an inch of the top of the roasting pan. Cover the pan tightly with foil, and place in oven.

Flavor rubbed

After 1 hour remove from oven. Carefully peel back foil. Using a wooden spoon placed in the ducks cavity and a spatula, carefully flip the duck breast side down. Re-cover roasting pan with foil and cook for another hour until meat is tender. The wings on my duck actually fell off. A snack for me! Move duck into a bowl full of ice cubes. Strain remaining fluids and save. Thats some rich duck stock and fat for another dish. Chill duck in fridge on ice for 2-3 hours until cavity feels cold.

Not so elegant after 2 hours of cooking in hot water, but moist

Meanwhile prepare glaze by mixing the marmalade, soy sauce, vinegar, ginger and cayenne pepper in a small sauce pan over medium heat. Stir until bubbling. Once the marmalade melts turn remove from heat.

Remove duck from fridge, and pat dry. Heat oven to 500 degrees. Place a piece of foil on the bottom of the roasting pan. Place duck breast side down on top of foil. Brush glaze over the bird. Roast for 15-20 minutes until browned. Remove bird from oven, flip, glaze the breast side, and return to oven. Roast for another 15-20 minutes until browned. Remove from oven, and let rest. Its finally ready. You and everyone in a one block radius will know by the delicious smell. I couldnt help but tear into my duck, eating a leg off the bone. The rest I shredded and served on sandwiches with cucumbers, mayo, and pickled ginger carrot relish. You could also carve and serve the breast for a formal meal.

Rainbow Cookies

Happy rainbow cookie will make you WORK

Rainbow cookies nearly defeated me. To make them requires almost 1 lb almond paste, 6 eggs, 2 lb of butter, lots of steps to make the batter, 3 rectangle pans to bake, many steps to assemble, and so much patience. Multiple steps means multiple ways to screw up, and once youve messed up a few steps youre going down a creek without a paddle. You can see the struggle in the photos, but I did not give up.

The cookies tasted fine, but not perfect. I found the recipe in the May 2o11 issue of Bon Appétit. You may also notice my cookies are yellow, red, and blue rather than the Italian reg, white, and green. I made the cookies to match my composting diagram for Prospect Farm. I brought the cookies to Compost for Brooklyns Block Party to highlight the layers of trench compost. Each cookie acted as a mini trench compost diagram. A cute idea that some appreciated, and had some asking is this made of dirt?

Rainbow Cookies
2 tblsp plus 2 cups unsalted butter, at room temp
6 large egg white
6 large egg yolks
1 1/3 cups sugar, divided
12 oz almond paste (not marzipan), chopped
2 3/4 cups plus 1 tblsp flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp red food coloring
1/2 tsp yellow food coloring
1 tsp blue food coloring
3/4 cup orange marmalade
4 oz bittersweet chocolate

Whip 6 egg whites until soft peaks form. Add 1/3 cup sugar and continue to beat until firm peaks form. Chill. Meanwhile line three 9 x 13 inch rectangular baking pans with foil, allowing foil to overhang length-wise. Grease foil and sides of the pans with 2 tablespoons of butter.

Add 1 cup of almond paste and sugar to a mixer and beat at medium speed for 5 minutes. Increase speed to medium high and slowly add 2 cups of butter. Beat until fluffy. Add in yolks, one at a time until combine. Add salt and flour, being careful not to over mix. Fold egg whites in two additions by hand with a spatula. Lots of work, eh? Take a breather.

Uggh, I hate artificial colors, but its a tradition.
You can use green in place of blue to, so Italian.

Preheat oven to 350. Divide batter into 3 bowls. Add 1 color of food coloring to each bowl, and fold until evenly colored. Now youre ready to bake. Transfer each colored batter into one prepared pan. Spread evenly, and place in oven. Bake for 9-12 minutes. Rotate pans half way. Remove cakes from the oven when batter is just set.

Yellow layer will go up, over, and on top of the marmalade covered red layer

Meanwhile melt marmalade. The recipe suggests you strain the peel parts out, but I think its fine to leave it in. Brush half of the marmalade on top of the red layer. Lift the yellow layer up using the overhanging foil. Flip top-side-down over the red layer. Peel foil back. Brush the top of the yellow layer with remaining marmalade. Lift the blue layer up using the overhanging foil. Flip top-side-down over the yellow layer. Do not peel the top layer of foil. Place a cookie sheet on top of blue layer. Carefully flip all layers on to the cookie sheet. Place another cookie sheet over the red layer. Weight down with cans, and chill for 4 hours or up to one day. Congratulate yourself on completing the hardest part of making rainbow cookies. You are out of the woods.

Ready to chill? The layers are.

Melt the 4 oz of chocolate over in a double boiler (or a heat proof bowl such as stainless steel or tempered glass, over boiling water) or in a microwave. Whichever you prefer. Remove cake layers from fridge, and peel back top layer of foil. Brush half the chocolate over the red layer.

Take your time, and the results will line up neater then mine. Less trimming equals less waste.

Place uncovered in freezer for 15 minutes to harden the chocolate. Remove from freezer. Place wax paper on top of chocolate layer. Replace cookie sheet over waxed paper, and carefully flip so blue layer is now up. Peel back foil on the blue layer. Brush remaining chocolate over blue layer. Freezer, uncovered for another 15 minutes until hardened. Cut the cookie into 1/2 - 3/4 inch slices. Serve! Finally! I kept mine in an airtight freezer container until they were ready to be served.

Fig Bars

Fig Bars better than you remembered

Loving a food is nice, calling it your favorite is serious. You crave it, you dream about it, you go out of your way to bring it to your life. That was the way I felt about Fig Newtons before I cut out processed foods or most things with corn syrup. If youve ever eaten the brown clump plastic wrapped fig bars often stacked in lopsided piles at the register of NYC delis youll know there arent too many good commercial replacements. THEN this recipe came to my life and offering a newer better kind of fig bar. Try remembering your favorite part of the fig newton, and then imagine it made 10x times better with butter, rich dried fruits, and a touch of almond. I adapted this recipe from the allrecipes website. It still has quirks, but its good enough to pass on.

Fig Bars

(makes 40)

1 cup unsalted butter (2 sticks)

1 1/2 cups sugar

3 eggs

1 tblsp vanilla

1 tblsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup almond flour

3 cups flour

2lb figs

1 lb raisins

1 lb dates

1/2 apple, cored and chopped

1/2 orange with peel, chopped

3/4 chopped pecans or walnuts

1 tsp cinnamon

Cream butter and sugar with a mixer until light colored and fluffy about 7 minutes. Add eggs incorporating each into the batter before adding the next. Add vanilla, baking powder, and salt. Mix until combine. Add half of the flours and gently mix until mostly combine. Add the remaining flour and mix until flour is just barely combine. Cover and chill for 90-120 minutes, or overnight.

Add figs, dates, and raisins to the bowl of a food processor. Run until dried fruits form a paste. Add in apple and orange, and run until smooth. Add nuts and cinnamon, and run food processor one final time until nuts are chopped up.

Preheat oven to 375. Remove dough from refrigerator. Roll about 1/8 inch thick on a lightly floured surface. Spread dried fruit paste down the center. Fold in dough in half over filling, and seal. *Cut into rectangles 1 x 2 inches with a knife or pizza cutter. Move to an ungreased cookies sheet with a spatula, spacing 1/2 inch apart. Bake for 12-15 minutes until bottoms are golden brown. Serve to adults and children, and be prepared to accept compliments.

*Note: You may have extra dough, the quirk of this recipe I have not worked out. I found the extra dough made nice cookies on their own.