Somehow I think I didn't cook as much in January as December. Perhaps my memory is faulty; in retrospect I cooked a lot in early January and then I went through a lull.
Let's take a look back and see.
I think January started off pretty strongly. I had a large bag full of fennel fronds after making fennel gratins for Christmas. I also had a new cookbook, Tenderheart, by Hetty Liu McKinnon. I noticed that she made a pesto from fennel fronds, and she did it a little differently than my standard pesto recipe in that she used pepitas (pumpkin seeds) instead of pignoli (pine nuts). I had some pumpkin seeds languishing away and decided to use them up. At first I wasn't convinced, but the pesto improved with age. I still think I prefer pine nuts.
I also thought McKinnon's proportion of garlic to fennel frond was a little high, but that could have also been a factor of my garlic and my fennel. At first the pesto tasted strongly of garlic and made my eyes water. But I left it to rest a few hours, which allowed the allicin in the garlic to mellow, and the balance of flavors improved immensely. I've grown fond of the numerous variation on pesto that I've tried over hte year and tend to keep on hand now. Some, like this one, appeal to my frugal self -- "look I'm not tossing the fennel greens" -- but they offer wonderful flavor profiles and easy techniques for sprucing up a plate of vegetables or a simple piece of chicken or fish. I use them more than true basil pesto right now, but that could just be because my basil crop didn't do all that well last summer.
That first evening I used the fennel frond pesto with pasta and seared sea scallops. I may have added slightly too much parmesan, fearing the the pesto was still excessively garlicky, so the color suffered. Dinner was delicious anyway.
The next morning I dabbed fennel pesto on my scrambled eggs with some grated radishes and a scattering of pickled red onions. This was a revelation in flavors, everything harmonizing and playing off each other nicely. I've continued eating this combination since, it makes my mornings feel like spring even though we are in the depths of winter,
The big hit from Tenderheart was McKinnon's recipe for Garlicky Chili Oil. I've been slathering it on everything and am finishing up my second batch. Perhaps I've been a little excessive, but it is that good. She also has a recipe for Chili Crisp that sounds fabulous, but haven't made it yet, mostly because I am so besotted with all the components of this oil.
I also made McKinnon's version of celery soup. Here served with a drizzle of chili oil. I had recently grown bored of my previous celery soup recipe and this was a welcome change, even when using pale, anemic, winter celery from the grocery store. I think I still need to play with this recipe, or explore recipes a bit more. Celery soup is a good basic as celery itself is something I find I need only in small quantities, and then I am trying to use up the rest of a bunch before it goes bad, although celery does make a nice stir-fry, one I loved as a child. I wonder if my mother stir-fried celery as a way of just using it up before it went bad as well?
Still on a Tenderheart kick, I used McKinnon's recipe for hoisin sauce and a hoisin-glazed roasted cauliflower. Roasted cauliflower is something I do regularly in season, and I've been making my own hoisin for years, since I first learned I had celiac disease, when the only gluten-free hoisin I could find tasted nothing like the stuff I had been buying previously in my local Asian market. I still make hoisin, but felt my version was rather one-note and basic. I wanted to try a new recipe and I really liked the one I found in this book. This may well become my new base for hoisin, although I will probably tweak it a bit here and there.
During the big snow I was craving "brown food", slow-cooked, braised, warming dishes. I made myself a pot of chili and a big batch of chicken paprikas, which has been one of my favorite comfort foods since childhood. I also made Nigella Lawson's Oxtail Bourguinon, from Cook, Eat, Repeat. This made a large batch as I had 4 pounds of oxtail in the freezer. All that cooking meant that warm and comforting meals went into the freezer and I just finished off the supply this week. Perhaps that is why I have not been cooking as much recently. Anyway, that is the oxtail pictured above, with lots of carrots and mushrooms. It was very good, but not perhaps my favorite oxtail stew. I'm not 100% on that, as it has been a few years since I routinely made oxtail stew or soup. Something else that may need to change.
I also harvested an armful of bok choy before the snow, not being sure how it would weather the single digit temps. Luckily we had enough snow that it stayed under its snow blanket the entire time and survived just fine. I am still eating winter bok choy and broccoli raab. One of the new dishes I tried was a recipe for stir-fried bok chow with crispy tofu from Nik Sharma's new book, Veg-Table. This was supposed to be the January book from my cookbook club, and so far it is the only recipe have tried, although there are several that look tempting. They just haven't appealed to my winter-dining cravings for stews and long braised meats.
Anyway the bok choy was really simple, stir-fried with onion, garlic and a simple sauce made of soy sauce (wheat free tamari for me) and Chinese black vinegar. I loved the flavor the black vinegar added and it reminded me I do not use black vinegar enough, The tofu was cut in cubes, coated with bread crumbs and sesame seeds, and fried, yielding a crispy crust and a tender middle. The combined flavors were wonderful, with the textural differences of crisp and soft, and the bright savory flavor of the bok chow also enhancing the very mild tofu. The tofu would also be good with a dipping sauce, but I found it a little bland on its own. I think, once again, my seasonal tastes tend toward something more deeply savory; this might well be the kind of light meal I crave once the weather brightens.
