Jenn Cuisine » Photography

Chicken Quesadillas, Gluten Free

Jenn — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 06:10:24 +0000

Ever since my husband made me breakfast quesadillas the other week, I’ve been craving them ALL the time. We’ve seriously eaten quesadillas in some form or another about once every 3 days. We even made them for my in-laws! But don’t worry, not every one was for breakfast! I guess we just fell in love with not only the taste but the incredible ease of throwing them together. I think we may take a little break from corn tortillas now (because there are other tasty foods to try), but we’ve had a lot of fun with all of the different types of quesadillas that we’ve made in the past few weeks.

This particular quesadilla is a variety we made one night for dinner – yes, it’s bright daylight out when we eat dinner, I love it so much! The sun doesn’t set til around 9:30 pm and it’s not dark til 10. I never realized what a difference just an extra 5º in latitude makes. I, for one, love it. I love that we are having late & warm summery days where we can just do a quick dinner that doesn’t require a lot of cooking time, and we can have all of the windows wide open, enjoying the soft (or quite tumultuous as the case may often be) breeze rolling through and admiring the scenery (did I ever mention I live in view of some of the most amazing mountains I’ve ever seen?). I wasn’t really sure what to expect, but compared to my past few summers in the midwest which were very humid and involved more than a few 90F days (and no views of mountains at all!), so far summer here is shaping up to be quite nice!

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Maple Buckwheat Chocolate Chip Pancakes, Gluten Free

Jenn — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 12:29:52 +0000

There was a time once while I was young, when very briefly I thought my sister was nuts for asking my dad to put chocolate chips in her pancakes. ”Chocolate chips and maple syrup? Yuck!” Well, let me emphasize the briefness of that thought – maybe for half a second or so, until I realized my sister was a genius. She converted my whole family to chocolate chip pancake lovers, and maple and chocolate perform a harmonious symphony that allows the taste buds to dance and rejoice as if heaven had literally shown itself right then in that single glorious moment.

This may seem like an obviously awesome combination to you, but how many dishes do you see blending maple and chocolate together? I for one do not see many – in fact I cannot even remember a time when I tasted these two flavors at once that wasn’t at breakfast. It’s a shame really, because I think chocolate and maple tastes a lot better than current foodie fads such as chocolate and bacon. In my mind bacon needs a sweet fruit like strawberries to counter the salt and fat, not chocolate. But that may just be me. But chocolate and maple? Perfect. Especially a dark chocolate which lends just a hint of bitterness.

These aren’t dark chocolate chips, but they are still good. Along with peanut butter, my sister-in-law gave us a ginormous (yes, that’s my new word) bag of chocolate chips. It’s so funny to me that I cannot find them in a store here because well, the major company that makes them is only a skip and a jump away…. And then the crushed hazelnuts and pistachios added for a nice dimension, a little bit of texture and the nuttiness offset the very sweet quite well. And after all, who doesn’t love candy for breakfast?

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Le Printemps Commence!

Jenn — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 22:25:22 +0000

It is Springtime! The cool rains gently fall, coating the earth a thin damp blanket that threatens the sun’s best attempts to show its face after the long harsh cold. I hang my head staring hopelessly out the window, mourning the end of a depressingly brief cameo of the sun’s warm glow, strangely not comforted by the rhythmic pattering of drops rattling against the panes. However, the ground responds to the steady storm by ushering forth its best efforts to welcome the coming warm weather, painting a Seurat-esque watercolor of flowers that dot the landscape with a vibrancy I previously thought only existed in my imagination. Even in the rain, the earth shows her beauty, even in the smallest of ways with something as humble as a flower. The petals embrace the falling water, soaking it in, their cheerful color a stark contrast against the gray skies.

Spring is a time of renewal, laughter and my favorite, fresh bright colorful produce. I still cannot get over the quality and freshness of the foods ones can buy here – seriously, this was my lunch last week – lettuce with carrots, radish, and local garlic & herb goat cheese -

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Photoshop to the Rescue: Non-Ideal Lighting

Jenn — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 02:02:12 +0000

Everyone knows that the best situation for photographing is during the day with a great amount of natural light flooding through the windows that can be shaded or diffused as needed but nevertheless shines a pure white color on your delicious freshly made food. If food blogging isn’t your career (and even if it is), it can be hard to cook and photograph during great natural light. For me, I am often confronted with the very non-ideal, especially during the long nights of these winter months. If it’s not made and cooked before 4 pm, there just isn’t enough natural light around. And when people don’t get home to eat until 7, making dinner at 3 in the afternoon is just a bit impossible. I’m going to show you a bit of what I mean with this picture of my classic Swiss fondue, which was accepted at 3 of 4 food photography sites (foodgawker, photograzing, refrigerator soup – rejected by tastespotting), despite the crazy awful lighting that I had to deal with.

The problem – crappy lighting: If you have some money to spend you can invest in a studio area and purchase your own lights and an external flash or two. But what if you don’t? And what if snapping a shot of delicious cheese fondue as you are making it isn’t conducive to moving your entire cooking operation to a whole new area? And what if after 5 minutes of not tending to it the fondue is no longer going to look as awesome? I often think bakers have it easier, because a cookie on a plate is pretty much going to remain unchanged 5 minutes later, and so is able to be a bit more portable and allows for more time to snap a shot. But not melted cheese, no way. When I made this fondue I was able to take exactly 12 frames, and that was even with my husband’s help. All of this means that I am often forced to use the lighting available in my kitchen – that means either fluorescent overhead lights, or an incandescent over the stove, or a combo of both.

The setup and the compromises: To take this shot, my husband dipped an apple slice in the not quite ready fondue and held it in the air while I photographed. Yes, I used a fondue fork to stir here because I am lazy and hate doing dishes lol. That’s pretty much it. He did this exactly twice. I chose the fluorescent lighting over the incandescent because it was a lot brighter, which helps me to battle the longer exposure times. While a tripod helps, I like to take pictures with my camera vertical and my tripod def. doesn’t accommodate that or the several angles I would approach food as I move around quickly. So no tripod. I use a high ISO setting (400), a shallow DOF by using a low f-stop (5.3), set my white balance to fluorescent, hold my breath (to keep from moving as much), and snap a shot. I was able to keep my exposure down to 0.1 s, and even then it is hard to stay still well enough. I must thank my husband for holding the apple slice still too. A blurry image is something photoshop will never be able to fix, so make sure your image is in focus. The other compromise is just take an underexposed shot and correct it later in photoshop. Sometimes this works (well sorta), sometimes it doesn’t. I have had rather limited success with this.

The result – crappy photo: Even doing all that, because of the nature of the lighting, I got green cheese (see pic on the left). Totally unappetizing when looking at that photo, no one wants to eat green food (when it’s not produce). It was so yummy to look at in person, I want my photo to capture everything I remember seeing when I was standing right there. Also, the glare from the direct overhead lighting makes the cheese on the apple way too shiny. That doesn’t help the mouthwatering factor either. But the cast is not just green. There’s a little blue in there, there are things that a single color can’t completely fix.

The solution – photoshop correction: Unfortunately I don’t have a standard formula to fix photos in photoshop. It’s a lot of trial and error, small tweakings and manipulations until I get something I am happy (or at least happier) with. But I will explain as best as I can.

1. If you remembered to shoot a quick pic with a grey card, you can use photoshop to correct your lighting. This can help a lot. But you have to remember to do it. A grey card is your best option for fixing lighting issues/color casts, especially if you have mixed sources that your auto-white balance feature can’t handle well.

2. If you didn’t remember, then you need to get a bit more creative. When I open up my RAW image file in photoshop elements (cause I’m poor and can’t buy the full version), I am presented with a number of meters that I can change before I even get into the full program. I use these extensively especially for lighting adjustment. The first thing I do is to get rid of all of the automatic adjustments and start with the exposure, and then the brightness (yes, they are two very different things). Then, I start playing with shadows and contrast (I upped shadows and reduced contrast to negate some of the glare on the apple). Not until I have adjusted the lighting situation do I even start looking at the color. You can also do most of this in the levels adjustment, which allows for quite a bit more precision.

3. There are a gazillion ways to adjust color in photoshop, and depending on my mood/what I want, I may use several of them. For example here, I first adjusted the overall hue to a little more red and away from the green, desaturated the overall color a bit (to keep the cheese from being so glaringly bright), and then upped the saturation of the red because those beautiful local cortland apples were bright red – absolutely gorgeous. After this I opened up the levels again and went into each of the RGB channels – I ended up adjusting all three channels to some extent, incorporating a bit of warmth and a more purplish tint to really help the cheese. I also reduced the color noise to help counterbalance the ISO of 400 that I used to get this image.

Moral of the Story – Even the cheapo version of photoshop can be a great tool for post-processing image adjustment when you have to shoot under less than ideal conditions. But nothing, I repeat, NOTHING, can fully make up for poor lighting. For example, this picture would never have looked the same in a poor amount of fluorescent lighting:

Of course, my fondue picture would have been tons better taken with an adequate amount of a neutral colored light, either from natural sunlight or with the right lighting setup. That being said, a few things in photoshop provide a decent band-aid if you have the patience to play around a little. While looking at both photos side by side you can really see the reds/purples that I added; the right photo definitely does a better job of capturing the fondue the way I remember it. It’s not perfect by any means, but it is definitely better than the original.

I am no professional and am definitely still learning, so I’d love to hear how you use post-processing to help fix up some of your photos!

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Buttered Bacon Brussels Sprouts

Jenn — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 19:48:51 +0000

Some people say that they hate a certain veggie, but sometimes I think that just means that you haven’t eaten it the right way. For example, I typically can’t stand cooked carrots. No idea why, because I love them raw and especially in salads. But for some reason, ever since I can remember, cooked carrots have pretty much been the bane of my existence. Notice that you don’t see too many posts here highlighting carrots lol. However, I very recently learned that it’s not necessarily the carrots’ fault. The problem is that whenever I ate carrots as a kid, they were typically boiled with maybe a little salt/pepper and that’s it. Uggh. I have since learned that it is not necessarily the carrot that I don’t like, but how it was cooked. I think the same can be said for a number of other veggies that many tend not to like, such as brussels sprouts, a veggie I happen to love when cooked properly.

Why is it that so many people detest these cute miniature looking cabbages that grow on stalks? If you don’t like brussels sprouts, the reason is probably because when you’ve eaten them they’ve been overcooked. When cooked too long (i.e. boiled forever), a compound called sinigrin is released resulting in a bit of a sulfuric quality that lends an unpleasant bitterness. So the trick? Don’t overcook them. This is easier to do if you cut them up or separate the leaves like in this sauteed brussels sprouts recipe. But, if your friends/family are still skeptical, this is the perfect way to doctor them up – because after all, what doesn’t taste awesome when accompanied by bacon fat and butter?

A couple of weeks ago at Thanksgiving I got to try an awesome brussels sprouts dish made by my sister-in-law’s husband that I absolutely loved. I could not get enough of these delicious little green veggies, and was determined to do my best to make a relatively close copy of this dish when I got home. I don’t have his recipe, but I know the main ingredients that went into the dish and so decided to create my own version. I love the balance of flavors in this dish. The richness of the bacon and butter makes this dish so satisfying, and the cranberries and maple flavor add just a hint of sweet while the balsamic adds just a little tang, all the while still allowing the brussels sprouts to shine through. This is going to be a new regular veggie dish in our household for sure.

Printer Friendly Recipe

Ingredients:
1/4 lb. maple bacon
2 tbs. butter
1/2 onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
2 c. brussels sprouts, quartered
splash of balsamic vinegar
1/4 c. dried cranberries
salt/pepper to taste

Directions:
1. Cook bacon in a skillet until crispy. Set aside on a paper towel, keep the leftover hot bacon fat in the pan.
2. Keep the pan on medium, and add in the butter until melted. Add the garlic and onion and cook until softened.
3. Add the brussels sprouts and a healthy splash of balsamic. Saute for a minute or so and then cover the pan and let cook until brussels sprouts are cooked through (i.e. you can poke them with a fork). Remove from heat, add dried cranberries, salt and pepper, and of course bits of crumbled crispy bacon. Enjoy!

***A little food photography note:
Take your time to take your photos. Wait til you have daylight if you can and don’t have fancy lights or a devoted studio area. But most of all, take your time. This is easier said than done when photographing food of course, especially when you have very hungry people waiting on you to serve them. But if you get the chance, take the time to think about the dish you are photographing in. Set up your tripod if you need to. Stand back for a few seconds and walk around your shot. Find the light.

Let me repeat that one. Find the light.

Take the time to know everything about the light. Where is it coming from? What color is it? What shadows are being created? Is there any glare or shine I need to be aware of? Is there enough light? One cannot easily just rush through these questions. At least I cannot rush through these questions well. The answer to each one of these questions may warrant a need to change a setting on the camera.

Find the best angle. Look through your viewfinder to see if it really looks through the camera like you envision it in your head. Be cognizant of every element within your photo – the shapes and colors that each piece contributes. Rearrange if you need to. Look for a balance of color. Make sure you aren’t too close and that you can get a perfect focus.

Then, and only then, start opening the shutter.

The difference in the quality of photos that you will get is quite dramatic. For example, compare these two different shots of this same exact dish – the first was how the dish was served to everyone and taken very quickly under incandescent light and rushed, and the second was taken today when I heated some leftovers up for lunch. Besides the obvious great advantage to a shorter exposure time when more ample light is available (the first picture was over .25s long), everything about the 2nd picture, where I allowed myself the time to think a bit before snapping away, is just so much improved in every way:

I am still quite the amateur with photography. But the single most important lesson I have learned when it comes to taking a good photo is that patience goes a long way.

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Roasted Butternut Squash and Pomegranate Salad

Jenn — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 00:00:42 +0000

One of my friends suggested that this should be called “Hello Fall, I love you” salad, and I think she is right. With roasted butternut squash, fresh pomegranate seeds, toasted pecans, and gruyere cheese, this salad epitomizes several of my favorite flavors of the season. Pomegranates are in season now (so is squash), and I use them in just about everything that I can. All of these flavors are pretty distinct, but complement each other very well in this dish. The butternut squash is the mildest of the flavors, but adds a nice mellowness to the salad. I love pairing pomegranates with the squash here. Pomegranate seeds have a really bright tart flavor that adds a little punch of zing, let alone a gorgeous contribution of color that makes this salad just appear warm and bright. They really do shine like little jewels on the plate.

These flavors can work in other dishes besides a salad – for example this morning we made a hash with the butternut squash, spinach, some bacon, eggs, and pomegranate - simple and quick, yet perfect.

Pomegranates can be a bit umm..messy to open up though. I recommend slowly breaking apart pieces of the pomegranate with your hands, rather than just slicing straight in, which is the most surefire way to get bright red juice everywhere, like below – Who dunnit?

Mr. Pomegranate in the kitchen with a knife!

Ha sorry, I know it’s corny, but I just couldn’t resist…..I used to love that board game as a little kid lol. I’m titling this photo “Death by pomegranate” ….but yumm that blood red juice is delicious! This is one of the few photos where I was actually intending for that grainy look, which I got by shooting with a very low f-stop so that only the tip of the knife was in focus, having a high ISO and then applying reduce noise in photoshop to smooth out the grainyness a bit. I’m a bit unhappy thought hat it is a bit dark. I haven’t been able to set up my tripod yet, so longer exposure times are going to have to wait until next week…

Printer Friendly Recipe

Ingredients:
For the Salad (for 4) -
1 head romaine lettuce, chopped
One pomegranate, deseeded
1 butternut squash, peeled deseeded and chopped into bite size pieces
salt, pepper, evoo
1 c. pecans
2 oz. gruyere cheese, shredded
For the Dressing:
4 tbs. extra virgin olive oil
2 tbs. pomegranate juice
2 tbs red wine vinegar
1 tbs. lemon juice
salt
pepper
thyme

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350F. Place squash on a baking pan and generously salt and pepper, and drizzle with olive oil. Bake for at least 30 min, until tender (i.e. you can eat it with a fork).
2. Lay out pecans on a baking sheet, and broil until toasted. On “lo” broil, this is around 5 minutes. Check often and take care not to burn them. When they are done you will know by taste though, as they will be only slightly browned but will no longer taste “raw”.
3. To make the dressing, combine dressing ingredients together and vigorously whisk together.
4. Assemble each plate with lettuce, squash, pecans, cheese, and pomegranate seeds, top with dressing. Enjoy!

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Creamy Smoked Cheddar & Broccoli Soup

Jenn — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 03:43:16 +0000

To tell the truth, I really didn’t feel like cooking today. Getting up this morning to a chilly breeze and frost everywhere didn’t help with my motivation either. In fact, all I really wanted to do was just curl up back in bed and stay there, where it was nice and warm under the down comforter. That feeling carried through the entire day too. I was just dragging all day. Do you ever have those days? They are rough for sure.

So dinner was to be simple tonight. Simple, and comforting. Mmmm broccoli and cheese. You can’t get much more comforting than broccoli and cheese together. In fact, the mere idea of enjoying a bowl of cheesy broccoli soup was enough motivation to get me through the day and get everything done that I needed to.

I’m not going to go through a long introduction for this one – cheesy broccoli soup needs no fancy remarks. But this soup, like so many of my favorite comfort foods, touches more than the taste buds. It transports one to a place of calm and happiness, erases all one’s cares and worries, if for only a brief few minutes. Though I must say that a smoked cheddar is awesome in this soup. Definitely splurge for the smoked cheddar rather than plain if you are thinking about making this soup, it makes a world of difference, and then it blends really well with the nutmeg and paprika that I added in. Oh, and this is super filling. Which is a good thing!

Printer Friendly Recipe

Ingredients:
2 shallots, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tbs. butter
1/2 tsp. paprika
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
black pepper
1 head broccoli, cut into small florets.
4 c. veggie broth
12 oz. grated smoked cheddar cheese
1 c. heavy cream
2 tbs. cornstarch dissolved in 2 tbs. water

Directions:
1. Heat up a pot and saute shallots and garlic in butter until translucent and fragrant. Add in spices.
2. Add broth and broccoli to pot, and bring to a boil. Then turn down to a simmer and let simmer until broccoli are well-cooked and soft (about 15 min).
3. Slowly add cheese, one handful at a time, and continue stirring. Turn heat down a bit more so that soup remains hot (steaming) but does not come back to a boil (that will risk the cheese getting clumpy). Once all incorporated, while stirring, add in the heavy cream and then the cornstarch.
4. Serve in bowls and granish with blanched broccoli florets if you like. Goes really well with some bread too.

Photography Note – Now that we have “fallen back” an hour, daylight has become a rare commodity. On top of that, living with my family these few months means I have no space to set up a place for pictures – no designated table, no reflectors, no place to put up my own lighting if I purchased any. This is the best I could do using all fluorescent lighting in our kitchen. When I use the incandescent light over the stove (which gives better color than fluorescent) everything comes out so shiny that it really looks no good. So I chose more diffuse fluorescent over more direct incandescent. Was this the right choice to make? Ha or maybe the right choice is to make lunch instead of dinner so it’s still daylight out…

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Waxing Philosophical about Cooking in the Mountains – Jenn Needs to Bake!

Jenn — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 21:19:21 +0000

Ah, beautiful, isn’t it? I love being in the mountains. I mean, just LOOK at this gorgeous color!

The mountains are just beautiful. Calming. Relaxing.

Are you relaxed yet? We are!

As you can probably tell, I’m not really completely roughing it, not if I can find a great coffee shop with access to beautiful wifi. Being here in the midst of nature is great though, and it gives you lots of time to think. One thought that has been forming in my mind for a bit is about baking. Specifically, how I need to experiment and do more of gluten free baking.

I always say I am not a baker, but really that is silly. Baking is just like any other skill – one needs experience. And the science of baking is a lot of chemistry – one of the major facets of my profession. I had so much fun making these awesome peanut butter and banana muffins for my guest post on ZOMTBakes, I’ve realized that I really need to become more knowledgeable in the area of gluten free baking.

So, I plan on doing some reading (some chemistry actually, haha), about starches, and how various ingredients/techniques affect the end result. I have a feeling this will require a bit of experimentation too, haha. But when I get back from my lovely vacation, I am going to start a new series on this blog, about my baking adventures. About the various gluten free ingredients, and what does/doesn’t make a successful gluten free creation.

To start, I have basically organized my pantry into categories of gluten free ingredients – what I call starches, flours, and “glues” – I’ve started to figure out a few things about baking through my various successes and failures – for example, I’ve found rice flour is good for some things but not others (like homemade pasta), or bean flours need to be used in limited quantities because their flavor is very strong. I find more and more that the starch:flour ratio is more important than necessarily which type of flour you use, and as a general rule at least 3 different GF ingredients are needed to give anything any type of expected consistency. Here are the ingredients I typically work with, because they are relatively accessible and affordable -

Starches -
Arrowroot powder
Cornstarch
Tapioca flour/starch
Potato starch

Flours:
White rice flour
Brown rice flour
Quinoa flour
Sorghum flour
Buckwheat flour
Chickpea flour
Soy flour
Almond meal (homemade)
Walnut meal (homemade)
Corn meal

“Other“:
Xanthan gum

I would like to develop a mixture of an “all-purpose” GF mix that I could use for a number of various recipes, rather than creating an entire recipe from scratch out of several ingredients each time. This is going to be my next project once I get back.

But until I get back (I hope to find internets again to share with you some of the great food we have made out in the mountains), I leave you with some great scenes of Fall:

What are your favorite flours or GF ingredients to use???

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Strawberry and Bacon Balsamic Salad

Jenn — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 00:37:12 +0000

This was the salad that I served with the soufflé. Light and simple (I know, who calls anything made with bacon light? ha. But it does feel like a light side dish). I added just a few slices of cheese to dress the salad up a bit, but it really didn’t need it since the soufflé had so much cheese in it already. To make the strawberries seem sweeter without adding any sugar, I macerated them in some lemon juice. The acidity from the lemon juice helps pull the sugars out from the strawberries to make them taste sweeter than if you just bit into one. Lime juice works really well too for this, and also adds some flavor to the fruit! I really love the strawberry & bacon flavor combination. The sweetness of the strawberries and their soft texture are contrasted perfectly with the salty and crunchy taste of the bacon. And a quick fresh homemade balsamic adds just the right amount of zing to pull it all together.

Printer Friendly Recipe

Ingredients (for 4 servings):
juice of one half lemon
about 2 cups strawberries (3-4 large per person)
1 head of big green leafy lettuce
6 slices of bacon, cooked to your liking
thin slices of Muenster cheese
For the dressing:
juice of one half lemon
2 tbs. balsamic vinegar
2 tbs. extra virgin olive oil
fresh basil and rosemary
salt/pepper

Directions:
1. Slice strawberries and set aside in a bowl. Squeeze lemon juice all over strawberries, and let set for an hour.
2. When ready to serve, plate lettuce, tear bacon into bite size pieces, add strawberries, and thin slices of cheese.
3. Make the dressing by mixing together all the dressing ingredients and mixing vigorously for 30s or so with a fork or whisk to form an emulsion.
4. Pour dressing over salad and eat.

Photography Note – Now that we have moved, I really need to find a place to set up my photos again. Also, we are eating dinner later, and it’s getting dark earlier, so natural light seems to be in short supply these days….Need to build a light box! So I apologize for the direct incandescent light, it’s what I’ve got to work with for the moment…

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Salad of Gorgonzola Stuffed Poached Pears

Jenn — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 03:49:12 +0000

I also made this appetizer dish for the Independence Day celebration with my family – it isn’t really “4th of July” or “red white and blue” themed, but it IS delicious! The poached pears were sweet and contrasted the pungent gorgonzola cheese well. The peppery watercress (and the watercress I bought WAS peppery!) added yet another dimension of complexity to the dish, and the crunch of the curly endive and candied walnuts complemented the soft “melt in your mouth” texture of the pears and cheese (oh wait, the cheese was already melty!). It looks like a simple dish, but was made with love and was a huge hit (well, except for Grandpa – who saw the lettuce and exclaimed “That’s rabbit food – I don’t eat rabbit food” haha – but he did like the pear at least!).

While pears are normally a winter time food (no, I could not buy them at the farmer’s market), this dish is all about being fresh and light for summer. Well, I take that back. I think this dish could work really in any season, flavor-wise. I apologize to the locavore gods for buying a fruit out of season!

I’m sure that many many people have made poached pears and put cheese on them before, but I didn’t look up any recipes or anything for inspiration even! It was all in my head and then transferred to the plate, and I was quite pleased with the result!

I know the ingredient list looks forever long, but do not be intimidated! There are just steps like any other recipe, but nothing is hard I promise – though it does take a little planning and time – this was a dish made with a labor of love. Sometimes a tasty dish and a chance to share that with your family are just worth the time and effort and love you put into it. I feel like when I share my food, I am sharing a little piece of myself. The food I make is an expression of my soul, and few things make me happier than to know that others took pleasure in tasting what I had to share.

And so without further ado….

Salad of Gorgonzola Stuffed Poached Pears

Ingredients (8 Servings):
For the Candied Walnuts:
1 cup walnuts
1/2 cup sugar
For Poaching the Pears:
1 bottle sherry
1/2 cup maple syrup
water
4 pears
For the Gorgonzola Stuffing:
2 onions, THINLY sliced
1 tbs. EVOO
3 tbs. sugar
chopped tarragon and sage (fresh)
8 oz. gorgonzola dolce cheese (or the mildest variety you can find – the gorgonzola is meant to be distinct here but is not meant to be the only star of the meal)
For the Salad:
1 bunch watercress
1 head curly endive or other crunchy green of your choice
1/2 cup chive blossom vinegar (or a red wine vinegar would work too)
1/2 cup EVOO
salt & pepper

Directions:
1. The first thing is to candy the walnuts – you can make a large batch of these and keep them for a long time, and they are super yummy with a lot of good uses. Toast your walnuts, then melt the sugar in a pan and stir in the walnuts. Elise at Simply Recipes has some really good clear directions on making candied walnuts. Lay them out on a plate and let them cool.
2. Next is to start the pears poaching – first peel the pears and cut them in half, and cut out the cores. Place them in a pot (one large enough to house all 8 halves), and pour into the pot the bottle of sherry and maple syrup, and add any water needed to bring the level just high enough to cover the pears. When poaching the pears, I turned the heat on to medium, and brought the liquid *just* to a simmer, and then kept it barely at a simmer the rest of the time. Total cooking time depends largely on the size of the pears and the ripeness of the pears (the more ripe they are, the less time it will take, etc.). I’d say plan on 15 minutes, but it could take at least double that time depending on your pears. You can tell when they are done by checking them with a fork. If you can stick a fork in them easily, then they are done. Otherwise, let them go a bit longer. You don’t want to overdo them though, then they will turn to mush. So this requires you to check on them a little bit.
3. Meanwhile, while the pears are poaching, I would go ahead and start the onions. Cook them in a small pan with 1 tbs. EVOO on medium, until the onions soften. Then add the sugar in, give it a good stir, and cover for about 10 minutes until they caramelize and brown. I checked on them every few minutes to make sure that things weren’t sticking to the bottom too much.
4. Mix the onions and fresh herbs and 1/2 a cup of the candied walnuts with the gorgonzola – the cheese is really creamy, so this shouldn’t be difficult at all. This is going to be the “stuffing” for the pears.
5. When the pears are done poaching, remove the pears from the liquid and place them in an oven safe dish, core side up. Keep the poaching liquid though! Reduce the liquid down to about 1/2 a cup. The pears will probably cool some during this time but it’s ok because they are going to be going into the oven soon enough.
6. Mix up the salad dressing – reduced poaching liquid, vinegar, EVOO, salt and pepper. I would also plate your salads (the greens) now too. That way as soon as the pears are done you can plate and serve immediately.
7. Turn on the broiler in the oven. Spoon about a 2 tbs. sized bit of gorgonzola stuffing into the well where the core of the pear used to be. Do this for all 8 halves. Pop the dish into the oven, and broil for just a couple minutes until the cheese gets all melty and gooey.
8. Take the pears out of the oven, plate on your salads, top with more walnuts if desired, and add your dressing! I also spooned little bits of any leftover gorgonzola stuffing onto the salads as well.

Photography Note - I know this pic is a bit overexposed. But after comparing it to the other properly exposed pics, this one just brought forth the mood a bit better. Though I have noticed that WordPress seems to wash my pictures out when publishing posts – for example, view the pic in the editor compared to on the published site – the one in the editor is how the original picture file looks. Any ideas on how to fix that issue?

What happened to the RSS? Yes, unfortunately we had to switch to partial feeds - but it's just one short click to see the recipe!