Life in Cowtown

In a totally bizarre twist, the company where I currently work is outsourcing our entire dept to… wait for it – the United States. The irony is not lost on me….    but apparently it’s a sound business decision as they can use economies of scale with their existing departments and become a bit leaner in these difficult times. I am personally not too worried as good people are hard to find, and I’m pretty good.

But it has made for a less than stellar work environment lately. People are noticeably upset, worried, stressed, and in general not pleased. Why am I largely escaping this condition? Mainly because I’ve been a contract worker for the last few years, and am used to living with large degrees of uncertainty. Lets face it, if a company wants someone gone, they hardly need many excuses to accomplish this fact, and whether one is a contractor or a full-timer, there are no guarantees in this world.

But I did have a couple of weeks of emotionally strained times, and when I feel blue, even a bit, many tasks suddenly become less important. You know how people that have a health scare suddenly become crystal clear about their priorities? That’s what stress does to me. All of a sudden, eating, sleeping, reading and cooking become the few things that are mandatory and much else falls by the wayside.  Okay, showering’s in too, I suppose, but that’s it!

My routine becomes very predictable – work, exercise, home, and then the eating-reading-sleeping in a lovely cycle of stability and comfort. That way I can conserve my precious emotional reserves and not lash out from stress. It’s a good technique if you can swing it.  On the weekends I do the minimal housekeeping and shopping, preferring to spend the bulk of the day lazing around the sun-filled house and either cooking or baking.

The last two weekends were all about baking. Bread, specifically. See I’ve spent most of my life firmly in the cooking camp, being very unprecise by nature and throwing together the very odd loaf or two but generally abstaining. And then, inspired by the very famous, very successful no-knead bread by Jim Lahey, I decided to give other breads a try. Surfing a baking forum or two, I purchased a copy of the iconic The Bread Bakers Apprentice, made sure I had some yeast in the cupboard and went to town.

The fist hundred pages or so, are reserved for the overview of what makes good bread, which was fascinating and invaluable reading. From flour to hydration to shaping the loaves, I learned an abundance of neat things. Like did you know that the bread continues to develop its flavor as it cools?  And that if you cut into it too soon and let out all the steam you’ll lose out on some flavor development, so it’s best to let it cool for 20 – 30 minutes before digging in.  The rest of the book is full of recipes: from cinnamon buns, challah, french bread, baguettes, pizza dough, ciabatta, foccacia, sourdoughs and more. The book is very light on rye breads and whole wheat breads, but I guess there is a book dedicated to that out there, that’s now on my list.

Many breads are two day breads, where you make a starter out of flour, water and yeast, stick it in the fridge, then mix up bread proper, rise, shape, proof and bake. The process is ludicrously easy if you’re already puttering around the house, just walk up to it, deflate it, turn it perhaps and go on your merry way. The baking is also neat, with an improvised steamer that gives your bread great ‘oven spring’ which is a quick rise as it hits the heat and steam.

It’ s hard to believe how much fun I had, and how good the results were. Check it out:

This is a no-knead bread that started the whole thing.  It’s a slow ferment bread that takes 2 minutes to put together, and makes a very good loaf. 

The ciabatta has a golden crumb, an airy interior and a lovely nutty flavor.  FYI: This recipe needs more water than written, as it is,  the dough would be too dry. Luckily I found this out the easy way, by googling the recipe first and seeing how it did for other bakers.

The baguettes are as good as a bakery. Soft inside, with a wonderful flavor they are an awesome daily bread. Or dipped in soup. 

The foccacia is one of the best things I’ve ever eaten. Soft, flavorful, soaked in herb oil and flaked with salt and cheese on top, it’s nothing short of bliss. I chopped up a quick bruschetta to eat on top of it, and I made a dinner out of it.  It’s to die for, and I don’t say that lightly.

The only thing that didn’t work as it should have is the cinnamon buns.  For some reason they didn’t rise like they should, so while being soft, rich and delicious, they were shy of the cinnamon bun nirvana. But I’ll get ‘em yet.

So that’s been my life for the last two weeks. Lots of stressful events, and lots of bread to balance it out. The orange kitty is still on the loose, and I’ve given up trapping him myself, as I don’t want him to associate my house with traps, or he’ll stop coming by to eat. As it stands, he comes by every evening, right around suppertime, and waits patiently to be noticed. Then he gets plenty of food and water and gets to hang out on a yoga mat so his paws don’t have to freeze. That’s about as far as we’ve gotten.  He is running away less now though, so perhaps he’ll let me touch him yet.

PS If you’d like to try your hand at any of the recipes, let me know and I’ll post one up.

Growing up I barely appreciated soup. Sometimes we had it for supper, and I always felt like it was a lesser meal than a solid entree. Very much a meat-and-potato child at heart, I much preferred a ‘real meal’ to soup, and even my mother would never serve salad as anything other than a lovely side dish. Soup was for lunches, and even then I’d rather have something more filling.

When I was a teenager I spent less and less time at home, being always out with friends doing various nefarious things.   Often meals were skipped, rushed or on such a budget that a dollar worth of fries would have to suffice.  Shortly after turning twenty I moved out, and joyfully took over cooking my own meals, which consisted of a great deal of roast chicken and pastas. But slowly a certain lack appeared in my soul, a void of sorts, and that void cried to be filled up with soup. I’m sure my mother was surprised to learn that both her kids often chose soup as a meal, upon arriving for lunch or dinner, after disdaining it for many years. 

Of course my favorite soups are all hearty, no wimpy broths or purees here, they are all chock full of veggies, grains and potatoes, with meat providing mainly the broth. They are very much a main dish affair, needing nothing more than a good crust of bread, sprinkled with cheese and broiled, if you’re feeling luxurious.

A few of my childhood soups are now firmly ensconced in my repertoire, a couple I have yet to master, and one I’ve made not once, but twice in the last two weeks.  It’s a humble split pea soup, cooked with a smoked ham hock for a rich, golden broth, with smoky undertones.  The ham hock needs  a couple hours of simmering, so it’s perfect to make on a lazy weekend afternoon.  It’s filling and delicious, perfect for our first cool fall evenings. 

It starts with a simple pot of water and one smoked ham hock. You can skim the scum thoroughly or lazily, your choice.

 (If you’re a vegetarian, I’d start with your favorite stock, the soup will take less than an hour, and you really should add a teaspoon of smoked paprika to the sauteeing veggies below. )

The ham hock needs at least two three hours to simmer, I start adding stuff when the meat is almost falling off the bones, at the two hour mark.  The first ‘stuff’ to get added is about a cup of split peas. A cup will be good for a medium pot of soup. A regular large pot will need two cups. This is about where a half a tablespooon of salt will go in.

The split peas will take about 30-40 minutes to cook, which gives you time to prep some veggies. I typically use leeks, carrots, celery and a couple cloves of garlic. 

Veggies get a brief sautee on medium high heat in a teaspoon of butter. If they start to lightly caramelize on the edges, that’s not a bad thing.

Dump them into the pot, and add two medium diced potatoes. Some people think this is a travesty. I say those people are very misguided.   At a fine dice the potatoes will cook for about 15 – 20 minutes, and the soup is ready. (If you’re like me, this is where you’ll fish out the ham hock, strip the meat off the bone and plop it back in the soup.)

This is a soup that should be refrigerated, if for no other reason than to be able to skim the decent layer of fat that the ham hock produced. I always fail, and have a bowl as soon as its ready, then stick the cooled pot in the fridge, and wait for the next day to eat the rest in a guilt free fashion.

You know how I said I’d post this on Monday? Well, I lied. I’ve had a cold all week, starting Saturday actually, a nasty sinus one. Since I’m not a person to bravely soldier on when sick, I generally turn into a baby and medicate, sleep and shower my days away. I didn’t even go to work one day, when I was so high on Tylenol Cold I thought watching the news was enlightening. But it’s starting to fade and I can function like more of a human being now, so without further ado, let’s continue exploring the mysteries of the Russian store.

Inevitably somewhere in the store you will come upon a large fridge. This fridge will contain a number of indispensable items dear to the Russian soul. A number of them will have been fermented. This is THE place to come for real sauerkraut. Lightly fermented, crispy and delicious it should be used within a week of purchasing. Try it next time you’re making a German supper or eat as a side dish with a thin drizzle of sunflower oil. No it’s not pretty, but it’s real kraut and it sells fast. You can serve it as a side or make them amazing German meals with bratwurst or go French with choucroute garnie.

Pail of sauerkraut

If you’ve ever been to Montreal and had the pleasure of eating at Schwartz’s, you will fondly remember the barrel pickles served with the mountains of tender brisket. You can find those pickles here, also in a barrel (or pail as the case may be), and they will be just as good as you remember them. Simply ask the nice people behind the counter for ‘solyonie ogurtsy’. To write the name phonetically is difficult as the Russian language has a few indispensable extra letters. You can specify regular or low salt pickles, and while both are delicious, low salt pickles are my personal favorite. Crunchy, dilly, and with a perfect flavor they accompany half of my dinners and make a great snack. They are called ‘malossolnye ogurtsy’ and even if you just copy and paste the name onto a piece of paper, they’ll sort you out.  (This photo did not turn out, so I’m borrowing from http://www.domsovetof.ru/publ/29-1-0-979).

You can see the liberal borrowing of foods from other cultures in these stuffed eggplant slices and halvah on the counter. And speaking of foods borrowed from other cultures, if you happen to spot a container of what look like julienned carrots in the fridge – grab them. They are indeed julienned carrots, but marinated in a mixture of oil and spices. The recipe hails from Korea, brought over by their many immigrants and renders the carrots fragrant, spicy and wonderful. It’s one of my favorite side dishes of all time, and given the fact that the store was sold out, I am not alone.

Russians love their fish. There is a veritable love affair with all sorts of fish – freshwater fish goes into a simple soup called ‘uha’ which is delicious if prepared carefully, ocean fish gets canned, made into savoury pies or smoked, and sprats are considered veritable picnic food. Salmon gets made into a sort of gravlax and tiny fishes are smoked and eaten as a substitute for beer nuts. If you’re not opposed to very rich fish, buy a smoked mackerel below. They are sliced across into thick slices and served with a bland side, like potatoes sprinkled with dill. The fish is tender and very smoky, but delicious. You’ll also see jars of salmon caviar and less often black caviar.

Smoked mackerel

For a single serving snack try a tiny smoked fish – they are literally nibbled on with beer after removing the fins and head (yes with your hands), kind of like peeling a shrimp.

Kinda like beer nuts

A huge draw for me, a person relatively disinterested in dessert, is the sweets section of the store. Call it nostalgia, or simply a call for quality, but I am so bitterly unimpressed with all commercial baked goods and desserts that I typically abstain from them completely. You know the stuff I’m talking about – the gross overly sweet cakes with gobs of fake frosting, the dense heavy pastries that hit your stomach like a brick, the fillings that are thick with gelatin and can pull out tooth fillings. I love quality desserts in small portions, something you can eat one bite at a time and lose yourself in contemplation of life’s goodness. Many Russian desserts fit the bill.

These small ‘walnuts’ are cookies filled with dulce de leche.

A perfect size

This is a honey cake – layers of honey dough and real cream filling in between. The trimmed layer crumbs cover the cake in a fluffy pillow. This version had raisins in it and was not my favorite.

This is my favorite cake of all time – the Napoleon. (I don’t know what’s up with the name….) It’s a layered cake also, with thin crumbly phyllo-like pastry and an amazing cream layered gently in between. It’s texturally a bit similar to baklava which I also adore, if that helps to explain it. It’s usually light, delicious and addictive.

Most homemade cakes in the store are sold by the slice, and some are boxed up and professionally decorated for parties and more formal events.

The pies below need little introduction, they are simply fruit pies with a variety of fillings in tender dough with a sprinkling of icing sugar. These were cherry which are not my favorite flavor and they were still pretty good.

Well folks, this concludes our edition of the Russian store tour, I hope this helps to lift the veil of mystery of the store and entices someone, anyone to venture in and try something new.