Salted Focaccia with Rosemary

In early October MiL and sFiL visited for MiL's birthday. Since MiL is by far the coolest and most thoughtful MiL ever, she brought me an awesome little tasty treat.

But not just any tasty treat. You see, whenever time happens upon a traditional gift giving occasion most people seem to fall back on the tradition gender role-type gifts. Men get ties or tools, women get bath stuff. And ya know, bath stuff is great. But I've got a hole shelf-full at this point. (OK, not anymore. I've used it all up by now. I'll take more bath stuff now...but that's not my point.)

Sure it seems appropriate, and we chicks always react the same way, "Oh thank you! You shouldn't have. No, really, you shouldn't have! Oh yes, it does smell amazing! Wherever did you find such an intoxicating scent?"

But you want to know what we're really thinking? "Holy crap this smells like someone dipped road kill in gardenias/vanilla/lavender."

Seriously.

But that's not what kills me about generic gift giving - it's the complete lack of originality. (And because some bath stuff really does smell freakin' awesome.) It's that people won't take the time to think of a gift someone might really appreciate. Now, I'm not one of those people that rushes out to buy a gift at the slightest hint of an occasion. I do birthdays and I do Christmas, and even then it's pretty tame - but the gifts I do buy I buy for a reason. It's not - oh hey, that's cute and less than fifteen bucks, I'll buy them that. It's truly something I think they will really enjoy, it's me showing them how much I appreciate who they are and what they mean to me. Or it's something that they really wanted and asked for explicitly. That always makes gift giving crazy easy.

Now, all that rambling was about MiL bringing me a pretty little present when she visited, because MiL takes the same care and attention to gift giving (just like my mother, I'm blessed to have so many lovely ladies in my life) that I do. It's obvious that she's really thought about the person she's purchasing for. Now, obviously this was a 'just because' gift and completely unnecessary (I never think a gift is mandatory, not for any occasion. Not even birthdays or Christmas. I'd much rather just have the company of good people.) and for that it was even more appreciated, because MiL is just such a nice person.

Now, what is this fabled gift you may ask? Actually, what you're probably thinking is "Get the frig on with it SB before I go do more important things like check my Facebook page for the eighteenth time today." Well, her lovely gift was this:



Oh yeah, that's right - 18 year balsamic. This shit hits your tongue and angels sing. It's a pedicure and someone cleaning your house for you at the same time. Oh yeah. It's that good.

So at this point you must be asking, "What the crap does all this gift giving and vinegar gots ta do with focaccia, SB?"

Well, I'll tell you.

It's freakin' tasty ass vinegar and I had crap for olive oil. Everyone knows when you've got prime balsamic you can't bastardize it with a bunch of other garbage. (Mr. TA likes to dip french fries in balsamic...odd, but tasty.) So, my plan was to buy some choice olive oil and make some homemade focaccia. And then, I would sit down in a completely silent kitchen, the scent of fresh baked focaccia lilting through the air - sunlight in my face and a song in my heart and I would eat the whole goddamned loaf of bread in one sitting, dipping every morsel into the vinegar of the gods.

Only problem was I couldn't find a decent olive oil. I'm not mixing my precious baby balsamic in some friggin' Bertolli. No sirree. So, when Mr. TA and I went down to Paso Robles for our anniversary this month I was elated to find a whole store completely dedicated to olive oils. I tried about 5 and settled on one that was perfect. Fresh and crisp with just a little grassiness. It took Silver in some competition in Los Angeles this year. It was outstanding. It was hugely out of the price range I'd usually consider for non-essential items, but I'd been looking forward to this for a really long time.

So, I bought a bottle and carted it home, anticipating my gluttonous encounter with bread and vinegar.

How was it?

Amazing. It was everything I hoped and dreamed it would be. I'd never paid that much money for a bottle of olive oil in my life, but it was the perfect accompaniment to the sweet balsamic and salty focaccia. A luxury I'm so glad I allowed myself. The flavors melded together yet remained independent, mingling on my palate so cleanly. It was vinegary-olive oily-bready nirvana.



Then I cleaned up my kitchen later that night and knocked the bottle of olive oil off the counter and shattered it on the floor.

Yeah...

I was speechless.

But hey, my floors are hella shiny now.

And the focaccia? The best, easiest bread in the universe. Light and fluffy, crunchy with salt - perfect for dipping and easy to whip up in under two hours. In fact I've already made it again today.

And hey, it goes really well with balsamic vinegar and olive oil...just so you know.



Salted Focaccia with Rosemary
Adapted from King Arthur Flour

1 1/2 cups (12 ounces) warm water
3 tablespoons (1 1/4 ounces) olive oil (plus additional for drizzling)
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
3 1/2 cups (14 ¾ ounces) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
1 tablespoon instant yeast
2 teaspoons course Kosher salt, for sprinkling on top
1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary

1) Lightly grease a 9" x 13" pan, and drizzle 1 to 2 tablespoons olive oil in the bottom.

2) Combine all of the ingredients, and beat at high speed with an electric mixer for 60 seconds.

3) Scoop the sticky batter into the prepared pan, cover the pan, and let it rise at room temperature for 60 minutes, till it’s become puffy.

4) While the dough is rising, preheat the oven to 375°F.

5) Gently poke the dough all over with your index finger.

6) Drizzle it lightly with olive oil, and sprinkle with salt and rosemary.

7) Bake the bread till it’s golden brown, 35 to 40 minutes.

8) Remove it from the oven, wait 5 minutes, then turn it out of the pan onto a rack. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Sesame Beef Buns

Have you ever been surfing the interwebs, minding your own business, ignoring the laundry to be folded, and run across a recipe that just screamed "Make me! Put me in your tummy!"? Well, such was the case with this recipe.

I know, what you're thinking, "SB, what in the heck were you thinking? It's MSN! Those people don't know a recipe from a cup of playdough!"

And you know what?

You'd be right.

Whoever developed this recipe obviously never tested it.

In conception this recipe sounds pretty delicious, savory beef mixture wrapped in a very slightly sweetened yeast dough and baked to perfection. Right? Wrong.

I realized this while I was making the dough. I don't know why I didn't think about the fact that 1/3 cup water, plus 2 eggs, plus 3 tablespoons oil is way too much liquid for 1 3/4 cups flour...but I didn't. Cuz I'm fun like that. So, after tinkering away and fixing the dough ingredients and totally changing the filling recipe I made my own.

Cuz I'm fun like that.

Sesame Beef Buns
Makes about ten buns

Dough

1/3 cup warm water
1 package (2 1/4 tsp.) active dry yeast
3 1/2 tablespoon(s) sugar
2 cups plus 1 tablespoon unsifted bread flour
1/2 teaspoon(s) salt
2 large eggs, warmed to room temperature and beaten
2 tablespoon(s) vegetable oil
1 tablespoon sesame oil

Filling

1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 tablespoon peeled, finely chopped fresh ginger
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
3/4 pound ground beef
2 tablespoons oyster sauce
2 tablespoon soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 cup finely chopped green onions
1 tablespoon toasted sesame seeds

Black sesame seeds, (optional)

Egg Glaze

1 egg, beaten
2 tablespoons milk

In small bowl combine water, yeast, and 1/2 tablespoon sugar; stir to dissolve yeast. Let stand until foamy -- about 5 minutes.

In medium-size bowl, or bowl of your stand mixer, combine 1 1/2 cups flour, the remaining 3 tablespoons sugar, and the salt; stir in yeast mixture, eggs, and oil, mixing until combined. Add remaining flour 1/4 cup at a time until a soft dough forms.

Turn dough out onto floured surface. Knead dough, adding as much of remaining bread flour as necessary to prevent stickiness, until smooth and elastic -- about 8 minutes. (Or switch the the kneading hook on your mixer and let it go to town for about 5 minutes)

Place dough in oiled bowl and turn to bring oiled side up. Cover with plastic wrap and clean cloth and let dough rise in warm place, away from drafts, until double in size -- about 1 1/2 hours.

Meanwhile, prepare filling:

In large skillet, heat oil over medium heat; add ginger and garlic and cook 30 seconds. Stir in beef, oyster sauce, soy sauce, and red pepper flakes. Cook until beef browns. Remove from heat and stir in green onions and sesame seeds. Set aside.

Grease 2 baking sheets or line with parchment paper. When dough has doubled, punch down and shape into a 10-inch-long log. With serrated knife, cut log crosswise into ten 1-inch-thick slices. On lightly floured surface, roll out one slice to a 4-inch round. (I found it easier to weigh each piece of dough. Mine were 65-70 grams each.)

Roll out or press just around the edge of round so that the middle is slightly thicker and the round is 5 inches wide. Fill center of round with 1 heaping tablespoon beef filling; gather up edge to form a pouch and pinch together tightly to seal bun. Turn bun over and gently shape into a ball; place seam side down on greased sheet.

Repeat with remaining slices and filling. Cover beef buns with clean cloths or plastic wrap and let rise 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, prepare Egg Glaze.

Heat oven to 350 degrees F. Brush buns with Egg Glaze and sprinkle, if desired, with sesame seeds. Bake 15 to 20 minutes or until well browned. Cool buns on wire rack; serve warm.

DIY Macro - Lightbox

There once was a bird in California.

(Some might even say she was sweet)

All summer long she chirped and sang, enjoying the bounty of the abundant crops surrounding her home and taking pictures of all she could find.

But then, as Fall set in, a terrible thing started to happen - the sun started setting earlier and earlier until one day it was only a quarter after five in the evening and it was so dark she had to turn on the light in her kitchen to cook dinner.

The bird was very upset you see, because she could no longer take pictures of her food without the natural light of the sun.

(The bird had an intense loathing of yellow pictures and flash photography.)

But then she had an amazing idea! A light box! Then the bird could take lovely photos all winter long without a need for that silly old sun!

But could she? Would it be too hard or expensive to create such a lovely contraption?

She never should have worried - it was easier than pie! With a nice big cardboard box, some tissue paper, and a light - ta da! Pictures!

Alright, now that I'm finished being a complete jackass I'll tell you how to make one too.

I was born and raised in Washington - the lovely state that gets 8 hours of dark in the summer, and 8 hours of light in the winter. It's a pain in the ass come November and it's dark by 4:30 pm. You feel like you live in a cave. So, when Mr. TA and I moved down to California I figured that it wouldn't be nearly so bad. After all, we were a thousand miles farther south.

Yeah...not so much.

Now it's dark by 5:15.

Whooo.

45 more minutes.

Mr. TA doesn't even get home from work until 5:30 most of the time, and I'm sure as heck not going to serve him a cold dinner I prepared an hour earlier just so I could take a picture of it. Mr. TA works a very long day and he deserves a nice hot dinner when he gets home. Unfortunately by that time it's so dark I can't even get a decent photo with my tripod. Mr. TA thinks I should just use the flash or turn on a light...Mr. TA also just doesn't really get my aversion to doing that. Even if my aversion is simply that I think it looks like ass when people do that.

My first attempt at salvaging some photos was to try to take a picture of the leftovers the next day.

Yeah...not so much.

I don't care if you're goddamn Thomas Keller - you can not make leftover Lentil and Orzo Soup look any better than dog poo the next day. (OK, that's a lie. Thomas Keller can do anything.)

And then it hit me - build a light box you stupid bird. Duh. It's cheap, it's easy, and it works.

Because who wants to take a picture like this:



When you could take a picture like this:



I've slowly been improving my photography over the last few months, so now that I can continue to take photos through the winter hopefully I'll be able to really get better.

How to Make a Light Box

1 large cardboard box
6 sheets white tissue paper
heavy duty tape
knife/razor blade
a light source
ability to not shank oneself while making the box

1. Cut off two of the flaps of the box, opposite each other.Set the box on it's side so that the two remaining flaps are vertical. Cut out the sides and top of the box. Your finished product should look like this.





Also, if possible, you should include a shot of the dirty ass rug on your kitchen floor. I think it really adds to the photo.

2. Using two sheets of tissue paper per side, cover the cut out sides and tape in place. Your finished product should look like this:





3. Cut a piece of white, non-reflective poster board to the width of the your box. Secure one side to the inside bottom of your box, and the opposite side to the back of the box. It should look like this:



I'm fricken ghetto so my posterboard doesn't reach all the way up the back of the box to the top like I want it to, but this isn't really a big deal. Most of my shots are really close up anyways.

4. Now you get your light source. I went to my local hardware store and picked up this baby for $9.49 + tax.



It's pretty sweet. (That's my Napoleon Dynamite voice)

It uses a regular light bulb and has a clamp.

Which is sweet.

Then you clamp it on to something and shine it either from the side:



In which you're cow shaped salt shaker from your grandmother will look like this:



But, you have to make sure you alter the white balance on your camera. That's the difference between a yellow cow and a white cow. And no one wants a yellow cow.



Or you can clamp your light on the chair you're using for support because you have to do all of this in your second bedroom which really isn't a bedroom at all it's more of a repository for all Mr. TA's GI junk that won't fit anywhere else and because there's no room to put it anywhere else you have to use the stupid chair. Whew...



In which your cow shaped salt shaker from your grandmother will look like this:



Pretty snazzy, eh? I was impressed myself.

Don't forget to change your ISO setting though. I was using a really high setting previously because I was operating in really low lighting, but if you keep a high ISO you'll end up with a lot of noise. Here's the difference between ISO set at 400:



And ISO at 50:



They may look the same, but if you click on them to look at them full size you'll see the difference. The clarity is so much better at 50.

Long story short, a light box will really save you through the winter if you rely on sunlight for your photos. I know I will very happily get back to blogging my little heart out now that I can take decent photos again.

In fact, tonight I made Lettuce Wraps.



There are so many things you can do with such a simple project. Obviously this is the amateurs solution, but I don't think there are too many hobby bloggers like myself that are willing to run out and buy hundreds of dollars worth of equipment or take a damn flash photography class just to snap a couple shots of whatever culinary delight they're shoving in their mouth at the moment. This is the perfect solution for me, it may not be for you.

I do urge you to give it a try though.

I know I'm going to have fun taking pictures of all sorts of things this evening...

Like the tea tin I brought back from Disney World when Mr. TA and I went to Florida



Or the naughty little secret I keep hidden inside



I know, isn't it wrong? Candy corn? It's so awful...and sooo good...


Well, you know what happens when someone can't keep a secret right?

They get their head bitten off...



It's the candy corn version of sleeping with the fishes.

Oh, what's that? You can't keep a secret either?

Well, I can fix that!



Oh, well...I guess I shouldn't leave any evidence, huh?



Surely he'll never tell of my indiscretions...