Yet more fooding

[starlady]

# Heirloom Tomato Salad with Burrata - I'm still not clear on the difference between mozzarella and burrata, so I always just buy fresh mozzarella. I used dried oregano and couldn't find opal basil in Berkeley Bowl, and this was still delicious. Also, stored separately, the two halves of the salad keep pretty well. It is still delicious four days later.

# Cornmeal Shortcakes with Peaches, Mint and Soured Cream - This recipe is complicated (somehow I didn't register the need to puree the peaches in the last step and when I read it I was like, "OH COME ON") but well worth it. I would actually recommend increasing the peaches, since the biscuit recipe yielded twelve biscuits but the peaches, after pureeing 1/4 of them, only yielded about five scant servings' worth. I also wound up using dried mint because I forgot to buy fresh, which worked fine, but I would be really generous with it - about 1 Tbsp or so. I used a Meyer lemon rather than a regular one, in which case I would not be scant about the 1 Tbsp of juice to sour the cream (but I would be careful with a conventional lemon). I only used 6oz mascarpone and it was plenty.

# Mama Elsa's Stuffed Zucchini - I love this recipe. I always use fresh tomatoes when they're in season and it is delicious. OM NOM NOM. The one trick is that you basically have to cook the stuffing until it's almost dry - I leave the heat at medium-high throughout, and I always think that I could have left it slightly longer. And, this being Racheal Ray, don't stint on the salt.

# Yellow Tomato Gazpacho - I added practically no water and it was everything I wanted, even though I had to patch the yellow tomatoes out with some random cherry tomatoes I had lying around. Delicious.

# Basil Lime Cooler - I am drinking one of these now. I think it either needs more lime or to use gin, but it's pretty good and pretty easy. Also, since we all know my motto during cooking is "Fuck that!" instead of straining the syrup I just picked the basil leaves out with chopsticks and called it good. Then the chopsticks double as drink stirrers. WIN. ETA: I made it with gin and it basically tasted like a gin and tonic. I like gin & tonics, so I was okay with that, but I actually suspect the real issue is that I did not use enough/young enough basil for the simple syrup. Don't be shy with the basil in the simple syrup! Go for like ten full-size leaves.

Comments

[laurashapiro]

Dude, I wanna come to your place for dinner!

[starlady]

I have been eating really well lately, I'm not gonna lie. :P

[juniperphoenix]

The heirloom tomato salad sounds super yummy, but alas, I think its link is broken. :(

[starlady]

Ah, I left it empty accidentally. Fixed now!

[juniperphoenix]

Thanks! It sounds delicious.

[ninj]

All of this sounds really interesting. It's neat that you have time to do this.

[starlady]

I like cooking because I never feel guilty about taking time away from work to do it. And also this summer I have had a lot of free time. Freer than normal, anyway…

[ninj]

This is all great. I'm starting to get into cooking a little. I got bored with what I was making, and I want to be healthier. I think you're efforts are still too far up the fancy scale for me, but they look and sound so yummy.

Anything that gives someone a break from the grind of their lives is an A+ for me right now.

[rushthatspeaks]

Mozzarella is, at least theoretically, about the same texture throughout the whole sphere. Burrata is a balloon of harder, chewier mozzarella surrounding a softer, runnier mozzarella, so that when you bite into it you get an explosion of both textures of cheese. It does not keep well at all because it dries out, but a really good burrata is, bar none, the best cheese I've ever had. (That said, in this country you're only going to get half-good burrata because it doesn't keep and it doesn't travel and it ought to be made of buffalo milk and this cheese in its natural habitat is, all by itself, almost reason enough to move to Italy, but a half-good burrata is still better than most other cheeses.) Should you find some, expect to pay a ridiculous amount, eat it the same day, and then realize that they were undercharging.

I paid $8 for 3/4 lb. of burrata about halfway up the quality scale last week. WORTH IT SO HARD.

[serene]

Everything rushthatspeaks says, with the addition of a certain buttery tang to the inside of burrata that's like OMG! to me.

[starlady]

That sounds really good! I shall have to try it at some point.

[starlady]

Well, then I'm glad I paid about the same for the fresh mozzarella, because just from the packaging I can tell that Berkeley Bowl's burrata is probably not even halfway up the quality scale.

[wild_irises]

I've been making a version of the tomato salad all summer, but yours has some refinements I could add.

And I have been looking for a gazpacho recipe that doesn't insist on tomato juice.

So I loved this post! Also, the basil lime cooler sounds fab.

See you in the Berkeley Bowl!

[starlady]

Wait, a gazpacho recipe where you add tomato juice? Hmm. I think I had one of those, but I prefer just using tomatoes.

[wild_irises]

I made very successful gazpacho from that recipe (yay!) but I gotta say I think the recipe sucks.

She tells you to keep all the juice from the coarsely chopped tomatoes, and then never tells you what to do with it. The grammar is such that I thought I was blending half the tomatoes with the other veggies, and then leaving the others coarse, but it turns out I should have blended half of everything in one batch and the other half of everything in another batch. (And a food processor worked fine, even if a blender perhaps works better.)

I absolutely don't get squeezing out the "excess" liquid. You use the tomato water to get the texture right and then you squeeze out the liquid? I tried it, didn't like the results, and put the liquid right back in, along with the juice from the chopped tomatoes (and never used any tomato water) and it was just fine.

Things I did like: I like the chopped veggies as a garnish, and also the fresh cilantro and cherry tomatoes (though I used cherry-sized chunks of other tomato). I liked the flavor. I like the drizzle of good olive oil at the end. I'll save the recipe, but still ...

[starlady]

…Squeezing?

I suppose the tomato water is mildly confusing, and ditto the ingredients halves, but I have to admit I didn't find it a problem at the time.

[kindkit]

I made the Basil Lime Cooler today (in fact I bought vodka and basil specifically to make it) using a much higher proportion of basil leaves. I made a half recipe of the syrup and put in about twelve large basil leaves. The resulting cocktail is delicious.