Reaping the bounty of pie cherries - making homemade maraschino cherries

I knew TH was the girl for me when I opened up her kitchen drawer and found a well worn cherry pitter. Over the years we have had several cherry trees grow, some die, but most bear amazing fruit. One of the trees that was labeled dwarf at the nursery is now 20 feet tall and we can only get a few of the low hanging branches.  The rest go to the care and feeding of the crows.

Our pie cherry tree is finally bearing fruit. It is still small, but this year was festooned with beautiful little pie cherries, the ones that really do look like the color of Jolly Rancher candies.  TH netted the tree to keep the sparrows off the ripening fruit and last night, I picked all the fruit - one precious pint.

Iranians love cherries in rice dishes and refreshing sharbats (fizzy water drinks flavored with fruit syrups).  However, my mother argues that the pie cherries here are not the right ones.  Iranians love Morello cherries and those are not seen in residential nurseries as much as the more commonly grown Montmorency.  

When I was growing up, my parents would fill up the car with blankets, a hot pot of tea, some cheese, bread, herbs and cold meatballs and drive North to Mount Baker, Washington where they had finally located the correct type of cherry.  The owner of the orchard graciously allowed my parents and their friends to picnic on the grounds and go out and pick pounds and pounds of Morello cherries.  They would return to home laughing and joking about their day. They would later doled out their cherries to friends who weren't able to join them. The moms would  start the process of making jam and syrups for the following years dishes.

As a teenager, I always avoided going with my parents.  It was too boring, or I used the excuse of the Monday test.  Today I wish I had gone with them. The orchards have most likely been redeveloped into a strip mall, however the memories remain.

Last year I split a bottle of Luxardo liqueur with my friend Paola, to make maraschino cherries. I didn't get around to it, so I used this tiny stash to try the recipe.  I wanted to keep the stem intact, so I had to figure out a way to pit the cherry and keep the stem.  I figured it out, while they are not pretty, I think they will be tasty.

            The real deal.                                                                    Maceration Nation.

The recipe is simple, step by step I used Melissa Clark's method, but I did sterilize my jars and lids.  While these will remain refrigerated, its good sanitary practice.

                                                                 The final product.

Good Appetite's Maraschino Cherries, from the NYT Food Section, July 2007

1 cup Luxardo liqueur
1 pt fresh pie cherries (Morello if you can get them), pitted and if you are a rock star, leave the stem intact
2 or 3 8 oz mason jars
2 or 3 new lids and rings

Wash lids and rings and jars in hot soapy water, rinse well and place in preheated 250 degree oven for 15 minutes to sterlize.  They can be held at temperature for longer if necessary.

Place liqueur in stainless steel or non-reactive pan and bring to a simmer. Add cherries and let simmer for 3 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool for 5 minutes. Pour into jars, leaving 1/2 inch headspace, place lid on jar, screw on ring and place in fridge to macerate.Leave for at least two days before tasting.

Should make 2 to 3 8 oz jars to keep or give away.

I'm going to try mine with some chocolate ice cream and whipped cream and with a Manhattan on the side.

Awaken and make Nooneh Berenji -Rice cookies for No Ruz

Some of the mother's famous cookies. I will get to them all soon. Patience people.

The Equinox happens tonight; officially it is the start of the Persian New Year, but a tad too late in Seattle  for anything but a few phone calls and kisses around the family. Tomorrow night, I will be going to my parents for a dinner replete with all the traditional foods – the kuku sabzi, the sabzi polo and the smoked white fish with herbs (mahi bah sabzi). Yes, it’s all about herbs and green, a meal that Kermit the frog would love.  However, this is just the start,  the holiday continues with open houses galore – “Aid Deedany”, where you go visit your relatives, the older ones first out of respect, and then you move on to see your friends far and wide. In Iran, it is a two week process, here we try and do it in a few weekends.  Most of the visits are after dinner – usually tea, fruit, ajil and an array of cookies.  My parents are hard to pin down during these few weeks; they are out and about doing the rounds. Good for them. Spring is a great time to start emerging from the Seattle Slumber.  The Slumber is the time between November 5^th and March 20^th, when most of Seattle goes into seclusion to only come out for special occasions – winter beer releases, Husky basketball games or to piss me off in line at the airport.  Now is the time for all good people of Seattlandia to get out of your house and attempt to become one with your friends and neighbors, use this as a great excuse.  I miss you all, really.

My mom makes a nice array of cookies for the holiday (pictured above).  Persians are not big on chocolate, nor cheesecake or any strange concoction that we are likely to call dessert at the big table.  They are big into orange blossom, rose water, honey, cardamom, almonds and walnuts along with delicate fruit flavorings.  Some of their inspiration comes from the French with pate au choux and mille feuilles, but mostly are just plain Persian.

Cookies getting ready to hit the oven.

One of my favorites is “nooneh berenji” or rice flour cookies. These are amazingly delicate and powerful little cookies that melt in your mouth. You would have no idea that they are rice flour, they have a nice subtle rose water flavor with a little cardamom added for punch.  They do not travel well, but they are worth picking up at a Persian grocery store when you can find them. If you don’t have one around, try making them. A plus is that they are gluten free. Since I am not a fan of making things with ingredients that are not easily found within a reasonable roaming radius of home, these are pretty swell. It does require learning how to clarify butter, which is something I had never done before, but a New Year means learning new things, doesn’t it?

Fancy cookie press made my Mr. S.

Nooneh Berenji – Rice Cookies topped with poppy seeds
Makes 5 dozen

This recipe requires two things – one is learning how to clarify butter and the other is to have a wooden cookie stamp. If you don’t have one on hand, I would just roll cookies into a ball, make a tiny indentation and then press the poppy seeds into the indentation. My mom has a little collection of the cookie stamps, they are made from wood, a husband of a friend of hers likes to make them.  You can find glass and pottery ones at Amazon, Williams-Sonoma and some specialty cookware shops around your neck of the woods The trick is not to press down too hard, you want the cookies about ¼” thick after stamping.

Ingredients

1 ½ cups (3 sticks, ¾ lb.) unsalted butter
3 egg yolks
1 – 1 ¼ cup white rice flour (portion them as one cup with a ¼ cup measure in reserve)
1 cup confectioner’s (powdered sugar)
1/3 cup rosewater
½ t cardamom
1/4 cup blue poppy seeds

Melt butter over medium heat, let cool. Skim the foam from the top of the melted butter and then either carefully pour to avoid transferring the solids at the bottom to a clean container or sieve the rest of the melted butter through cheesecloth lined strainer.  If you are still unsure, please refer to David Lebovitz’s awesome tutorial on the subject.

Prep a baking sheet with parchment paper or Silpat. Preheat oven to 325 F.

By hand or in a mixer, combine butter with egg yolks added one at a time. Really you are not creaming because the butter is not really in a solid form, but you do want them well combined.  Next add rose water to butter and egg mixture. Mix until combined. In a separate bowl, mix dry ingredients together, starting with one cup of rice flour and the confectioner’s sugar and cardamom.  Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and mix at a low speed until combined. If the dough seems sticky or wet, add additional rice flour by the tablespoonful until a little more manageable and easily handled without overworking the dough.  Remove dough from bowl and start making 3/4” ball from dough and test cookie press to make an imprint. If the imprint works without cracking the dough, then the dough is the perfect consistency. If there is too much flour, add a tablespoon of water, and if it is too sticky, add a little bit of rice flour.  

Once you are happy with the consistency you can start making cookies.  If you are at a good stopping point, wrap the dough up in saran wrap or a zip lock bag and place in fridge for up to two days.  Let come to room temperature before starting to make the cookies.

To make cookies - start rolling the dough into balls, place onto prepared baking sheet with 2” between each cookie and start stamping. Press or sprinkle 10-15 poppy seeds (is that a smidgen) in the center of each cookie.  Check around 8 to 10 minutes, depending on your oven, once they begin to get a little golden on the edges, take out and cool on a cookie sheet.  Once cooled,  store in a sealed container for up to two weeks.

11.15.2010

TH and I have spent some time these past few days talking about the journey to food. Not how many food miles our cabbage and broccoli have endured before they get to our table, but more about how far you are willing to travel for food. Also discussing what makes the journey something you are willing to endure.

Some of the journeys seem insane, some moderately demented and some reasonable.  Everyone has a story and every food has a story. The next few days I am going to share some of them with you.

Bowls of full of memories - pear-ginger granola

My short term memory seems to be going, or I should say, there is so much going on it is easy to lose the little things in the all the stuff flying around the interwebs and our lives.  I can tell you my long term memory is great, just ask TH. I am famous for bringing up things in an argument that happened 15 years earlier. Its a gift I picked up from my father, just ask my mother.

I can also remember the provenance of each bowl in our kitchen.  Bowls are my weakness - cafe au lait bowls, hand thrown bowls, and old stoneware bowls, some found locally, some brought back from various trips around the world. In my opinion, most every meal, save a good steak can be eaten in a bowl. Desert island dwellers take heed, a spork and a bowl will save your life, although a coconut will do in a pinch.

Okay, enough with the bowl lust, let's talk about filling that bowl.

A few weeks ago, I had the great honor of meeting Melissa Clark at a book reading.  I have read many of her columns, but hadn't really familiarized myself with cookbooks. Her new cookbook, In the Kitchen with a Good Appetite: 150 Recipes and Stories about the Food You Love , has both great recipes, but even better stories behind each recipe.  One recipe that I have been making over and over again is her olive oil granola recipe. Like all good cooks and scientists, I first made the recipe by the book, and then started to modify it to my tastes.

Dang, this stuff is good and so far, everyone else who has sampled it has agreed.

The olive oil is an interesting twist on the neutral flavored oils used in most granola. I was my usual skeptical self.  I was worried about the taste overpowering the rest of the ingredients, but when paired with maple syrup, it works. I used a few different types of oils and settled on the Trader Joes Extra Virgin Olive Oil which has a nice flavor and a little lighter in color. The recipe also calls for 1 teaspoon of salt, do not skip this, you need it as a foil for the sugar and maple syrup. I used Secret Stash Salts' flavored salts, but if you can't get ahold of this wonder ingredient, please use a flaky sea salt. Unlike most granolas, this recipe does not make a chalky granola nor an oily one, it is perfect granola for munching out of hand or as a topping for greek yoghurt or for crisp. Melissa suggests serving it with fresh ricotta and fresh berries. I also tried a combination of fruits and nuts, using basically what I had lying around in the pantry. It is a great granola to use up odds and bobs in your pantry.

Pear-Ginger Granola (adapted from Melissa Clark's Olive Oil Granola Recipe from the book -  In the Kitchen with a Good Appetite: 150 Recipes and Stories about the food you love (Hyperion, 2010)

makes ca. 7.5 cups of granola, which depending on your family could last nearly one day or a week, give or take

Approximate time to make recipe from start to finish ca. 55 minutes, active time 15 minutes

3 cups thick cut oatmeal (I used Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free oats), but regular cut (not quick cook) oatmeal should be fine

1 cup unsweetened flaked coconut

1 cup pumpkin seeds, hulled

1 1/2 cups sliced almonds, raw

1/2 t ground cardamon

1/2 t ground cinnamon

1/2 t ground ginger

1 t flaked sea salt, I used Secret Stash Salt almond cardamon salt or vanilla salt, depending on what I had lying around

3/4 cup maple syrup, I used grade B, dark maple syrup

1/2 cup olive oil, extra virgin, but not too dark

1/3 cup light brown sugar, packed

1/2 cup uncrystallized candied ginger, cut into a small dice

3/4 cup dried pears, cut into a small dice

Directions:
Preheat oven to 250 Degrees F.

Take a large piece of parchment paper and cut it to fit an 11 x17 inch jelly roll pan  with about an inch of overhang on the sides.

In a large bowl, measure out oatmeal, coconut, pumpkin seeds, almonds, and brown sugar and mix well. In another bowl, mix together cardamon, cinnamon, ginger and salt until combined. Add spice mixture to large bowl of ingredients and mix to combine.  Mix together the maple syrup, oil and brown sugar and stir until dissolved. Add this to the oatmeal/spice bowl and using a large spoon or your hands and make sure the oatmeal,coconuts and seeds and nuts are coated with the syrup/oil mixture.

Place granola mixture onto jelly roll pan and place in oven to bake, stirring every ten minutes until the granola has taken on a lightly browned color and some of the syrup has cooked off, this should be approximately 35 minutes at 250 degree oven.

Remove from oven, and let cool in tray.

When cool, mix in chopped fruit.

Store in an air tight container.

To the tenth

I am honored to have a guest post on Andrew's Eating rules blog - please check it out.