gastrokid

Wine in a baby bottle

Does wine really taste better in baby bottle?

This Parisian restaurant thinks so and is succeeding in sending plenty of adults back to the teat. Bet the conversation regresses after a few bottles as well.

- Matthew

Gastrokid column on Williams-Sonoma

The latest Gastrokid column for Williams-Sonoma kids is now live.

We're playing with kiddie cocktails for Spring.

Check it out.

- Matthew

Chorizo scrambled egg breakfast burrito

This thrown-together breakfast burrito (is there any other type?) inhabits the same spiritual home as Hugh's eggs de la vera but I use Spanish chorizo to deliver the spicy pimentonny kick.

Dice four half-inch slices of Spanish chorizo and set aside.

Beat three eggs with a drop of milk and add to your warm but not hot non-stick skillet. Slowly raise the heat and just as the eggs are thickening add the chorizo. This will release the oils and infuse the eggs.

Cook until eggs are scrambled to your liking and serve in a warmed tortilla with sliced tomato and a sprig of fresh cilantro.

My kids had already eaten breakfast when I threw this together and I had to fight them off me and barricade myself in my office so they wouldn't mug me for it!

- Matthew

Holiday Family Meal - Bacalao con salsa tomate y cebolla

That's salted cod with tomatoes and onions.

This was the last meal of the vacation and I'd been saving the cod that I scored earlier in the week at Pollenca's Sunday market. The man selling it cut it off in 2 inch squared chunks for me and then I took it back to the villa where we were staying and soaked it cold water for 24 hours, changing the water every four hours as per his instructions.

Then I patted the cod dry and put it to one side as I....

roasted three sweet red peppers in the oven then placed them in a brown paper bag until they cooled. Then I peeled the peppers and cut them into strips.

Next I chopped one large Spanish onion, thinly sliced six cloves of garlic and sauteed them together for five minutes before adding one large (30oz) tin of tomatoes, a tablespoon of pimento and the roasted peppers.

I reduced the sauce over a medium heat for five minutes until I had a thick sofrito. Next I added half a bottle of white wine, and about two cups of hot water.

When I'd brought it all to a boil I reduced the heat back to medium and added the cod and simmered the whole sauce for 45 minutes.

I served it with sauteed potatoes and green beans but this dish is rich and tasty enough to serve just with bread.

- Matthew

European ban for six food additives?

This just in:

The UK' Foods Standard Agency has called for a European-wide ban on six artificial food colourings:

The FSA wants the European Union to enact legislation to ban the e number additives and, in the meantime, has advocated that food manufacturers stop using the additives voluntarily.

Here's what the FSA says should be banned:

Sunset yellow (E110) - Colouring found in squashes

Carmoisine (E122) - Red colouring in jellies

Tartrazine (E102) - New colouring in lollies, fizzy drinks

Ponceau 4R (E124) - Red colouring

Quinoline yellow (E104) - Food colouring

Allura red AC (E129) - Orange/red food dye

The End of Mushy Peas?

So says the Daily Telegraph in its story about the UK's "Food Standards Agency is meeting to consider whether it should tell food manufacturers to strip the additives from fizzy drinks, sweets and processed foods."

As we wrote earlier this week, a new scientific study says there is a definitive links between certain e numbers as hyperactivity in children.

Apparently, the FSA "warns their removal could lead to the demise of some products such as mushy peas and Turkish delight. Without tartrazine, or E102, mushy peas appear grey rather than green."

The end of this?

That information alone is enough to make any kid hyperactive.

- Matthew

Pollensa Traditional Market - Artichokes, Lettuce, Bacalao and Snails

Yep, snails.......live snails, sliming their way around a large wooden vat. Dylan, along with a bunch of other young vacationing kids, happily picked them up and played with the snails but wasn't so keen on the idea of cooking them.

White wine, lots of herbs and garlic was the cookig tip of the old man selling the caracoles. But with no-one in the family seeming that keen on experimenting I moved onto other quarries.

The Pollensa market offered a bit of everything and we scored some great artichokes which we steamed and served with a olive oil, garlic and balsamic dip as an accompaniment with grilled pork chops and rice.

Just as we were leaving the market I found a guy selling salt cod - bacalao. I picked up two whole fillets that he cut into chunks and headed home to soak and prepare for a feast. More of that meal later.

- Matthew

Artificial colouring E-Numbers as harmful as leaded gas for children - report

There's a headline to make you choke on your morning cornflakes.

It refers to a new study undertaken for the UK's Food Standards Agency (FSA) study by Southampton University,which suggests "seven colourings, including tartrazine and sunset yellow, could affect children's intelligence by up to five IQ points," according to the Daily Telegraph.

The FSA is set to meet this week to consider "recommendations from its officials that manufacturers should voluntarily remove six of the E numbers from their products while further research is carried out on the seventh, sodium benzoate."

Here are the e-numbers of most concern.

Spanish Vacation-Inspired Recipes: Chicken and Cilantro with Pimento Potatoes

We've been back in Mallorca for the last week enjoying some great local food while also attempting to cook some authentic Spanish fare ourselves.

My first effort was chicken breasts pan-fried and lightly braised in a semi-sparkling local Mallorcan white wine, topped with fresh cilantro and served with pimento potatoes.

The villa we were staying at had great outdoor eating space situated in a natural sun trap so while the rest of the family lapped up some early April rays I got cooking:

Here's how I made the dish.

Marinate the chicken (six breasts) for one hour in the fridge in olive oil, six cloves of garlic (thinly sliced) and the juice of one lemon (I snipped ours from a lemon tree at the house....you might have to buy yours from a store!).

While marinating start making the potatoes.

First peel and thinly slice six large potatoes (you can use a mandolin but I did it the old-Spanish lady way - outside in the sun holding the potato and then slicing back towards my body. Precarious but authentic). Salt the potatoes liberally. Next dice one large Spanish onion and slice into strips two red peppers.

In a 14 inch (approx) skillet, heat a decent dose of olive oil (at least two tablespoons). When hot, add the potatoes, turn to make sure all over covered in oil and cook on a medium high heat for five minutes. Next, add the peppers and the onion to the mix and reduce the heat to medium. Keep turning with a wooden spatula as you want the potatoes to cook through but not burn. Add a healthy dash of Pimenton de la Vera and black pepper.

Keeping sauteeing the potatoes, onion and peppers until they are cooked through and lightly caramelising (about 25 minutes). This can be prepared before you cook the chicken and then reheated prior to serving.

Now to the chicken which you've taken out of the fridge and let sit for 10 minutes. Heat a large skillet with a touch of olive oil until it is almost smoking. Add the chicken, reduce heat to medium and brown for five minutes. Add any remaining marinade along with a quarter bottle of white wine (we used a tasty dry semi-sparkling white). Cook until chicken is done (the wine will ensure it remains tender) and then sprinkle with fresh cilantro.

Serve with the potatoes and a salad.

- Matthew

Easter Lamb Leftovers Tagine-Style

We cooked leg of lamb for Easter and we prepared it Jamie Oliver-style - stuffed with a pancetta, sage, garlic and rosemary paste.

Cooked at 400 degree F for just over 90  minutes, the 7lb leg was great for both kids and adults. What I mean is that it was medium-well on the outside and pinky-medium inside.

We had tonnes of leftovers and, rather than contemplating cold lamb, I decided to cook a second meal - a Moroccan-inspired tagine - straight after the first.

All it took was cubing the leftover lamb, adding it with an onion, sliced, garlic, sliced, half a bottle of red wine, a cup of water, a tablespoon of Pimenton de la Vera (Spanish smoked paprika) and two teaspoons of fresh Harissa (that we had scored from our local farmer's market a few days earlier).

After half an hour simmering over a medium heat I added two small cans of diced tomatoes, a preserved lemon (quartered) and a healthy dose of salt and pepper and then further simmered the tagine until the sauce thickened around the lamb cubes.

After letting it cool and refrigerating, we ate the tagine tonight with some sauteed broccoli rabe. For variety you could add chickpeas to the Tagine or serve over cous cous (full disclosure: we're trying to cut back on carbs at night).

Either way, it's delicious.

- Matthew

Kid's Parties - A Mini Rant

What is it with kids food at hosted birthday parties?

Dylan went to a party this weekend hosted at a local indoor adventure playground/jungle gym. The kids scamper around like crazy, climb through rope mazes and generally act like daredevils for an hour until the birthday "lunch" is served.

Nevermind no vegetables or fruit in sight.....this "spread" barely offered up any protein (a single hot dog). The owners have their food budget down to a fine art apparently because each child was served four (count em) Pringles to accompany their hot dog.

The only food of colour on their plates was the three servings of candy, cake and ice-cream all washed down with equally sugary drinks.

Of course all our kids love playing in these gyms (and of course they think three sugar courses is great too!) but surely places catering to kids should make a better effort no?. All my friend Ed and I could do was look on in horror at the sugar rush playing out in front of us.

Let the campaign for decent kid's food at organised parties begin. Now where's that extra cake from the party bag?

- Matthew

Whatever Floats Your Goat

Never let it be said that kids don’t love wasabi, truffles, or mold. At a recent gathering at our house, we served a platter of three types of goat cheese:
Cypress Grove Truffle Tremor, a fresh chevre made with real black truffles
Sweet Grass Dairy Lumiere soft ripened goat cheese
Westfield Farm Capri Wasabi, made with real wasabi rhizome.

We put it out for the adults, intending to eat it leisurely while the kids did what kids do on a warm spring day. But within moments four children, ranging from 20 months to 6 and half years old, dropped their frisbees, jump ropes, light sabers, and pacifiers, and descended on the platter, demolishing every last bit of goat cheese in a mere 10 minutes. The mild sweet heat of the wasabi: beloved. The funky black truffle: beloved. The musty blue: beloved. The leisurely aperitif and cheese moment: gone.

Afterwards, a certain 6 and a half year old girl said it best: “I love blue goat cheese. The black parts are the best. That’s where the mold is. That’s where all the flavor is.”
—Hugh

Easy Salmon Spread Makes for an Affordable Bagel Feast

Our family has a serious smoked salmon habit. And not just any salmon. Nope, our kids have decided the store-bought farmed stuff just doesn't cut it. Instead they crave the hand-sliced oak smoked salmon we get at our local farmers' market here in Cardiff.

It's something we didn't have to work hard to cultivate (kids love the saltiness of smoked salmon) and I certainly admire their good taste but boy does it put a dent in the weekly food budget when you've got a five and two-year old demolishing a pack of top-grade smoked yumminess on a weekly basis.

So, in order to keep the budget in check I've sold them on the tastes of homemade, chunky smoked salmon spread. The oak-smoked variety is great but I've found hot-cured cut of fish is even better - something about slightly peppery taste works really well with the cream cheese I mix it with.

The spread is that simple - take about 2 oz of smoked salmon, tear the fish into little strips and then stir into three-quarters of a regular "slab" of Philly cream cheese.

Serve with bagels or on toasted sourdough bread. A taste of salmon heaven at half the price.

- Matthew

Market Report: Rue the Rhubarb

I risked bodily harm this weekend, riding my bike to the Hollywood farmer's market in weird 80ish degree heat in search of rhubarb. People were bleary eyed, blinded by the sun, addled by the heat. The place was packed. I asked at one stall, where the guy said he'd seen it sold once last year by some other guy. At the Larchmont market another guy asked another guy who said he hadn't seen it for a while. He said he knew guys who knew guys who sold straight to restaurants.

Why was I looking for rhubarb? To do one of those two for one gastrokdad/kid moves: make an ice cream topping/slash cocktail ingredient. I wanted something to put on ice cream to serve to the kids and something to mix with prosecco to serve to the adults. No such luck. At the asian greens stand I saw a wholly different opportunity: cocktail makings for the parents. Thai basil. Ginger. Lemongrass. Thai bird chiles. At another stand I saw kumquats. I muddled all of the above with some sugar. I poured in a 1.5 ounce shot of rum. I shook it with some ice. I strained it over some other ice in a glass. I topped with soda water. I served it to grownups. It was tart, sweet, hot, aromatic, delish. The kids ate kumquats. They were tart/sweet. It all worked out on the first long hot day of the year.
—Hugh

8 Is Enough (octopus legs, that is)

Regular gastrokid readers know we love Mark Bittman. You might also know that we love octopus, which I nominate to be candidate for next chicken of the sea. Bittman and Octopus come together in this excellent New York Times story and even more excellent video of Bittman boiling up some pulpo, Galician style (basic recipe: simmer an octopus for an hour and a half then eat). We watched it with the kids earlier in the week, and they loved it (especially the slimy sucker and tentacle trimming scenes) and just might be sold. But they already are big fans of smoked paprika, which is the finishing touch to this tentacular spectacular feast.
—Hugh

A Breakfast Surprise

3 and half year old Desmond has turned out to be quite a sour puss, or acid freak, or tartist—however you prefer expressing a preference for all things acidic. I mean this in that vinegar drinking, sour lemon sucking, mustard sandwiches for breakfast sort of way. Yes, that's right, he's taken to requesting mustard sandwiches for breakfast. Not as his primary breakfast, mind you, but as a sort of breakfast dessert. The extreme reverse of savory followed by sweet. After his oatmeal and smoothie are gone, he's taken to grabbing the yellow mustard, and giving it to me in the hopes of a last little acidic lift to the morning meal routine. The classic American hotdog variety stuff (not Dijon). Spread on bread. Nothing more. I tried a bite the other day and I have to admit it does have a sort of invigorating, eye-opening effect. I'm not about to ditch my 5 gallons of coffee start to the day, but I do indeed salute the power of sour.

Mustard Breakfast Sandwich
2 small slices of french bread
1 tablespoon yellow mustard

Build it.  Eat it. Start your day.

—Hugh

Fish Tales - Teaching Your Five Year-Old to Look Out for Bones

We had mackerel this evening for dinner - three fish scored and braised in a soy, mirin, rice vinegar, garlic and ginger sauce.

Rather than fillet the fish before cooking (a finicky process in the case of mackerel) I decided to cook them whole and then serve the meat off the bone. Of course that means the odd bone may slip by so we've been teaching Dylan (aged 5)  to look for bones on his plate and feel for bones in his mouth.

A risk? perhaps....but how else is he going to learn to enjoy fish without being scared off bones for ever?

Is there a better way? Let me know how you approach getting your Gastrokids to enjoy fish and understand that bones are sometimes involved.

- Matthew

Easy Lunches - The DIY MTB

Saturday lunchtime can be a trying time - you don't always want to eat out and yet you don't want to repeat the same ol' weekday soup and sandwich routine.

This weekend I hit on way of having sandwiches without it feeling boring. Let me introduce the make your own fresh MTB (mozzarella, tomato and basil) baguette.

A coincidence of culinary planets coming into alignment made this possible. First, we had fresh mozzarella in the fridge along with a new bunch of aromatic basil and some cherry tomatoes. Next, our local deli had freshly baked crusty baguettes.

Finally, both Dylan and Zelda agreed that the proposed lunch was a good idea.

Given the vagueries of who will eat what and in what combination on any given day, I simply tore the baguette up into sandwich-style portions, offered a choice of mayo or olive oil and balsamic vinegar and then let em make their own MTB.

Minimum argument and maximum satisfaction - just what you need to start the weekend.

- Matthew

The Stealthy Gastrodad

This week's The New York Times food section has an amusing story by Keith Dixon a foodie father who had to alter his cooking habits to avoid waking his light-sleeping baby. "I am the silent chef," he begins, and then goes on to detail modifications to his evening cooking routine that both allowed baby to sleep and yielded culinary satisfaction for him and his wife: do noisy prep work ahead of time, use silicone not metal utensils, embrace quiet techniques like braising, use the exhaust fan as a white noise generator (we've done that), and, while he doesn't write this, presumably no cocktail shaking. The acoustics of cooking, plus low-decibel recipes for fennel and fish soup with pernod and roast chicken with shallots, thyme, garlic, and bacon confit. Good stuff. You never know where foodie fatherdom will take you.
—Hugh

iJam - Great Spoof Food Marketing from Spain

This is where my day job as a social media consultant and my Gastrokid life converge.

I was trawling some favourite blogs today and came across a link to this site promoting the new iJam (or iHam) - an innovative and very tongue-in-cheek take on jamon de serrano marketing from Spain.

Take a look at the site and marvel at the time and effort that has gone into this Apple spoof - complete with a downloadable PDF or how to eat jamon and also a "Guided Tour video of the new iJam.

All products available now at a carniceria near you!

- Matthew

40 Minute Family Meal: Cedar Planked Salmon and Salad

Last night was one of those rare instances where work schedule, sunlight, a stocked refrigerator, and the moods of the children converged to create an environment, albeit fleeting, in which a family meal could transpire without stress, conflict, without factory farmed vegetables, without overfished fish. And, miraculously, it took fewer than 40 minutes start to finish.

Here's how:
We had a perfect piece of wild Alaskan king salmon we'd bought from the
fish guy. It was a good pound and a quarter, skin on, filleted. I had a sheet of cedar that only needed a ten minute soak. 15 minutes later on a medium hot gas grill, it was perfectly cooked and just smoky enough. A generous sprinkling of salt was all it needed. Divided four ways, with most of the skin going to 6 year old omnivore Vi, the richh fish satisfied us all.

We had fresh local arugula and fennel from the farmer's market. A quick rinse and spin of the arugula, a thin slicing of the fennel bulb, and it was ready to be dressed.

We keep my wife's secret salad dressing (okay, not so secret: shallots chopped fine, some olive oil, some canola oil, some salt, some pepper, some red wine vinegar... not too much! You want it a bit tart, but not discernibly sour) pre-assembled in a jar, ready to be shaken and deployed when a salad needs to be made.

We had parmesan, which shaved over the lightly dressed salad brings it all together.

We had some good rustic bread, that required only the quickest toasting.

We had wine.

They had water.

We were happy.

This is a recipe you can't measure.
—Hugh

The Breakfast Club: Truffled Popcorn

It rained much of the weekend here in Los Angeles and the kids were getting a little squirrelly, which I guess explains how I found myself at 9 in the morning making them popcorn. I figured, there are worse things to feed a kid, and what could be wrong with serving them such a minimally processed food. A whole kernel is about as whole food as you can get (okay, so it wasn't organic and it's part of the whole subsidized corn industrial complex, but it had been raining all weekend and I had a rebellion fomenting! What else was I going to do?) So I popped it up and it sure smelled good and I was a little peckish myself and wanting just a bit more than the lightly salted effect that the kids were satisfied with. My parents had kindly gifted me a small glass of black truffle oil over the holidays, so I drizzled some over the popcorn while hot. I know it's a far cry from the real thing, and I think Papa Anthony Bourdain, or some other fellow called it the ketchup of the upper class, but, man, it adds some satisfying super savory umami to the whole crunchy, salty, toasty equation. Violet smelled it and requested some and promptly declared her love for truffled popcorn. I highly recommend it. It's gotta be better for you than butter, right? I'm betting that at the very least it's superior in all ways to Cap'n Crunch.
—Hugh

Kimchi in Space? What Would You Take With You?

Hilarious story in the NYT about how South Korean astronauts crave kimchi - the spicy red-peppered cabbage that is the nation's staple dish - so that scientists have now perfected a form of kimchi that can be eaten in space.

Writes the NYT:

"Three top government research institutes spent millions of dollars and several years perfecting a version of kimchi that would not turn dangerous when exposed
to cosmic rays or other forms of radiation and would not put off non-Korean astronauts with its pungency."

“This will greatly help my mission,” astronaut Ko San, said. “When you’re working in spacelike conditions and aren’t feeling too well, you miss Korean food.”

That got me thinking - what is the one food I would have to have in space?

My taste buds tell me it's paella....or fresh coffee.

What about you? I've started a new forum over on Gastrokid.com to kick a space wish list around.

Let's compile a favourite foods in space and maybe NASA chefs can get cracking!

- Matthew

Gastrokid Griller Casting Call

Is your kid a budding pitmaster? Are they ready for primetime? Then check out this casting call email we got from the people behind a forthcoming Bobby Flay Food Network show. We've bolded the pertinent section below. It looks like they're open to talented teenage gastrokids and their parents. Unfortunately Desi and Violet are still too young to be promoted beyond the cold prep station in our kitchen, tho the other day Vi deftly  soaked a cedar plank in water for 20 minutes. But that doesn't necessarily make for thrilling TV.

GRILL IT! WITH BOBBY FLAY ON THE FOOD NETWORK!

Are you a Master Griller? Are all barbeques held at your house? If you’re a serious griller (charcoal or gas) and have the skills to prove it, then live out your culinary fantasy on Bobby Flay’s new half hour GRILL IT! series on the Food Network.

To apply, please create a 3-minute VHS Tape or DVD in which you cook us your favorite dish.  Tell us how you created the recipe and the ingredients you use. All applicants must have a terrific personality and must illustrate why you’d make a fantastic candidate for GRILL IT with Bobby Flay! Unlike “Throwdown with Bobby Flay” there’s no winners or losers, instead GRILL IT! shows people how to grill with a well-stocked kitchen.

All applicants must live in the U.S and be 18 and over (although quick-witted teenagers with parents’ permission can apply).

To be considered, please mail your submission tape, original recipe and photo of yourself to the address below no later than March 15th.

ATT: GRILL IT!
110 Leroy Street
New York City, NY 10014

Questions? Email us at grillitwithbobby@gmail.com

—Hugh

Spaghetti with Chop Sticks? Why Not?

We've been encouraging Dylan and Zelda to experiment with their "training wheels" chopsticks in recent weeks.

It's tricky to master but both of them have been having a valiant go.

Last night, Jowa cooked a rather tasty pasta dish - wholewheat spaghetti with pine nuts, goats' cheese and broccoli (I'll post the recipe once I've dragged it out of her!). Dylan, who is now an expert at setting the table for family meals, immediately sought out the chopsticks for him and his sister.

And why not? After all that practice on rice and cellophane noodles why waste the talent when spaghetti is involved?

Admittedly the goats' cheese sauce made things a bit slippery and those pine nuts had to be negotiated by hand but if they can master that dish then it might soon be time to take off those training wheels and let them loose with the real things.

- Matthew

A Gastrokid Book and Update

Just in case you've been wondering why blogging life seems to have been a little slack here at Gastrokid....well, there's lots of interesting stuff going on that now, finally, we can share with you.

First, we have a book deal with Wiley Publishing to write the Gastrokid cookbook. Hugh and I are very excited....and very busy trying to juggle work, home, the Gastrokid blog and hitting our book deadline!

Then there's a fun new Gastrokid column that I am writing for the new Williams-Sonoma kids website. Check it out and let us know what you think.

Finally, a note about the Gastrokid social network. Yes, as we often do, we dived into the Gastrokid community with a lot of enthusiasm but not a lot of extra time to make it a success.

So for all of you who have joined the community so far and been a little underwhelmed we apologize. Here's how we intend to make amends.

Starting next week, we're going to put our community at the front and centre of Gastrokid.com by making the network our home page. You'll still be able to read all our blog posts on that main page but hopefully, by highlighting the contributions of you the members of the Gastrokid community, we'll attract new Gastroparents to the site and start building a truly collaborative site where we can all trade recipes, tips on picky eaters and ideas for great Gastrokid-friendly restaurants.

So get involved and tell your friends about Gastrokid. After 18 months, Hugh and I are enjoying Gastrokid more than ever. And we want you to enjoy it as much as we do.

- Matthew

Crock Pot Confidential - Adventures in Slow Food (Sort Of)

Let's get this disclaimer out of the way straight away: I was not wholly convinced when Jowa said she wanted a slow cooker/Crock Pot.

Perhaps it was the suspicion that I faced a future of flavourless stews that put me off. But then again I could see the logic in creating delicious dishes all in one pot and still having time to play with the kids.

So the Crock Pot arrived and our experiments have begun. First up - pork loin with zucchini and carrots in a tangy orange juice braise.

Okay, I'm not going to bother with the recipe at the moment because, while it has promise, we need to improve it (cutting down on the orange juice and adding some ginger and spice I suspect).

But I'm not deterred. In fact I'm kinda excited to experiment in with our very own take on Slow Food so to speak.  So, before I scour the Net looking for new recipes, I thought I'd ask the Gastrokid community for recipe ideas?

Let me know and I'll get slow cooking.

- matthew

Market Report: Rivers Edge Chevre

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Despite the unpredictable fluctuations on the kid food pickiness meter in our household, love of cheese remains a constant (in all forms: string cheese, mac and cheese, cheese crackers, and the occasional washed rind super stinky cheese; here we’re not picky). And with the arrival of Three Ring Farm goat cheeses at our farmer’s market, we all have cause to rejoice. We are united in our love of their Rivers Edge Up in Smoke fresh chevre croutin wrapped in a maple leaves spritzed with bourbon. If there’s such a thing as fresh smoke flavor, this cheese has it. Such intensity is a lovely counterpoint to the milky sweet fresh chevre. If you’re careful in unwrapping the maple leave so that it stays intact, it makes a cool organic looking platform for the cheese and is particularly hilarious to kids. We got ours at the Larchmont Village Farmer’s Market here in Los Angeles, and I’m told they have it at the original La Brea boulevard location of La Brea Bakery. You can also order online here (you gotta love a cheesemaker that has pictures of its goats on the website).
—Hugh

Fungi foraging for the family

At $400 to $500 a pound, truffles are one of nature’s edible treasures. Rather than wasting your child’s time on board games like Life and Monopoly (both of which teach questionable lessons) why not cultivate a skill that is likely to improve your child’s discriminating nose as well as your rate of return. Haba’s Truffle Snuffle ($18.99)is a role-playing game of sorts, where the child (or shameless adult) straps on a simulated pig snout and assumes the job of truffle hog by sniffing out valuable truffles against a ticking clock.

If you are committed to developing your child’s palate, this may or may not be a playful detour from the hard road of cheese tastings and juice box pairings. However, on the off chance that this diversion might just cultivate a swine-like ability to uncover hundreds of dollars worth of mushrooms hiding just below the terra firma…well, it never hurts to dream big.
-Eric, Gastrodad Guest Contributor

Mini Mixology: Pomegranate Ginger cocktails

Our pomegranate decoration on the fireplace mantle was starting to look a little weary, so I decided to get the remaining juice from the 6 or so pomegranates rather than waste them all. Juicing a pomegranate is a messy affair, so potentially staining that you’re best off doing this yourself and not enlisting the help of the kids. And you’re even better off wearing an apron. I cut them in half and squeezed them over a fine mesh strainer set over a bowel [um....think you mean bowl, no Hugh? - matthew]. I reserved the seeds for garnish and the like, and reduced the juice by half in a saucepan for a nice tart and acidic syrup, about 1/2 a cup total. I took a thumb-sized knob of ginger and peeled it and ran it through the garlic press into simple syrup (a cup of sugar dissolved in a cup of water). I mixed the two together and ended up with an incredibly flavorful, wonderfully spicy concoction. For the adults: I mixed an ounce of this, two ounces of gin, half an ounce of lime juice. For the kids: omit the gin, replace with water (club soda if they like bubbles). Serve over ice. Happy hour fun for the whole family.
—Hugh

 

Bittman's Bitten Blog

Mark Bittman certainly has started his new blog, Bitten, with a bang.

There's some great recipes for Super Crunchy Fried Chicken (mmmm) and Italian-style Vegetable Pancakes, and I like the "What I ate last night" category.

Given all the other projects Bittman has on the go, how is he going to find time to post a recipe every day as he promises in his intro? Simple, as he explains, he'll be raiding his Minimalist column archives to help bolster his blogging habit.

Now that's what I call a smart use of leftovers.....

- Matthew

How Much Food Do You Waste?

UK consumers throw away 6.7 million tonnes of food each year - that's about 1/3 of the fresh food bought in British supermarkets each year.

Yikes, that's a food fact that I found hard to believe until I waded through the detritus of my own fridge yesterday and had to cast aside green beans, mushrooms and even some moldy peppers that we bought weeks ago and still hadn't used.

I don't know about you guys but I'm a little liberal when it comes to past-by dates on vegetables - how bad can three day-old green beans be after all? Especially when they've been flown in from Peru in the first place (and yes I realize this is also a problem). But I draw the line at 10 days...or when there is too much mold to cut away!

It's good then to discover a new website called Love Food Hate Waste dedicated to raising awareness about undue waste and with leftover recipes to boot!

Mushy banana pancakes anyone?

- Matthew

Hold the Tuna....and the Mercury

Mmmm......just when you thought it was safe to introduce your children to the joys of sushi along comes a NYT report into the exceedingly high levels of mercury found in Manhattan tuna sushi/sashimi.

Writes the NYT:

Recent laboratory tests found so much mercury in tuna sushi from 20 Manhattan stores and restaurants that at most of them, a regular diet of six pieces a week would exceed the levels considered acceptable by the Environmental Protection Agency.

This issue is so serious to NYT readers that it warranted an editorial "maki" on the topic.

It explains:

Though some mercury in the atmosphere occurs naturally, roughly two-thirds is produced by industrial sources — especially coal-burning power plants. It settles into the water in a form called methylmercury, is absorbed by bacteria and then makes its way up to the very top of the food chain — to humans.

What's the real risk to our kids? Well my own two much prefer a good California roll to be honest and even little true Tekka lovers probably aren't getting through the red-zone six pieces a week.

But, as the NYT editorial puts it: "It is a reminder of how interconnected all life on earth really is. The mercury that worries us in the tuna we eat is the very residue of the way we live. The only way to reduce the one is to improve the other."

- Matthew

Cookery Lessons Back on the Menu in English Schools

Whether it's to do with fighting childhood obesity or just that all the celebrity chefs have made cooking a more identifiable career goal than medicine but the UK government have decided to make cookery classes (or home economics as it was known when I was in school) compulsory for all children aged 11-14 in England.

Which begs the question - what should be the representative type of food British kids should learn to prepare....and want to eat themselves?

Perhaps a good curry would fit the bill......as long as the teachers do a better job of hot chilli instruction than this family....

Ducks Vs. Pigs

We took some prosciutto to a party recently. The party was the blissful, adults-only kind; the kind where candles are perched, aflame, on low tables, unguarded; where spirits and unedited language flow freely; in other words the kind far too seldom in our filial rounds these days. And so to this escape, we took two types of prosciutto: some danged good Italian prosciutto di parma as well as some American duck prosciutto from our very own Hudson Valley (both bought at one of our favorite food shops, Joan’s on Third). The next day’s leftovers (which, coincidentally, rhymes with hangovers) made a perfect addition to family brunch. I did my usual pimenton scrambled eggs (scrambled eggs cooked in a butter/olive oil mixture to which a good jolt of Spanish pimenton de la vera, or smoked paprika, has been added) and then gave the kids a taste of the pig prosciutto and the duck prosciutto. My kids love classic Italian prosciutto and wolfed that down first with typical gastrokid gusto. They hit the duck prosciutto with same ferocity. For about three chews. Then the gaminess overtook the briny sweetness of the duck and both the kids spit it out. Pigs win. (or, do they lose?)
—Hugh

Gastrokid Gastrovid Recipe: Fast Bouillabaisse (aka Faux-abaisse)

The other day, my often hyper-picky 3 year old son Desmond expressed a desire for fish soup (he’d seen it on LIttle Bear) and I jumped at the chance to introduce him to something new and good. The fact that I picked the legendary and time-intensive fish stew bouillabaisse is perhaps final proof of my insanity, but I managed to come up with a fast, family-friendly version that clocks in at just under an hour from prep to serving, and has the primary flavors and textures of the classic version. So when you’ve got an hour instead of a first class ticket to Marseille, this time-efficient approximation will just have to do:

1 pound white fish fillets (we used mahi mahi)
1 can of tomatoes
1 onion, roughly chopped (plus two chopped leeks if you happen to have ‘em on hand)
2 fennel bulbs, chopped
4 cloves garlic, chopped
olive oil
pinch of saffron
white wine
salt and pepper

Sautee the vegetables in olive oil until tender, crumble in saffron, deglaze pan with white wine. Season with salt and pepper. Add tomatoes with juices and simmer until tender, about 30 minutes. Add fish until thoroughly cooked through, another 10 minutes or so. Puree with an immersion blender.

Fake-o Aioli
This is perhaps my favorite part of the dish. Make too much for the added benefit of having to slather it on sandwiches the next day.

jarred mayo
squeeze of lemon juice
tablespoon olive oil
pinch saffron (crumbled and steeped in a tablespoon or so hot water)

Mix it all up and spread on toasted rustic country white and serve.

And after all that, Desmond just had a salad.
—Hugh

E Numbers Demystified

Is there anything more confusing than figuring out the effect E numbers in food could have on our kids?

After all, with so many scare stories about unnecessary and dangerous additives in kids' food you'd be excused for thinking every single E number is bad when, in fact, some ingredients are simply given an E to help classify them.

Take E162 for instance -  beetroot juice to you and me. Or E300.... vitamin C.

But take a look at this lot and you'll want to always check the label of the food you buy. Top of the "must avoid" list is this rogues gallery:

• E142 – green S. It’s been linked to cases of the allergic reaction, urticaria. It’s found in desserts, ice cream, mint sauce, sweets, tinned peas and gravy granules and is already banned in many countries.
• E132 – indigo carmine. This colouring has been linked to increased skin sensitivity. It’s used in products such as sweets, biscuits, ice cream and baked products.
• E213 – calcium benzoate. This preservative is linked to allergic reactions, particularly in people who already suffer from asthma.
• E220 – sulphur dioxide. This preservative is found in cordials, wine, soft drinks, dried fruit and vinegar and has been associated with provoking asthma attacks.

How do I know this? All thanks to a great site called Explore E Numbers, that's how. The site is packed full of relevant info on E numbers and the editors update it regularly with the latest research.

- Matthew

Gastrokidvid Recipe ABC: buttered cinnamon-sugar tortilla

It's so easy it almost cooks itself. We use corn tortillas, but any will do. You'll see I went a bit overboard with the cinnamon here, which Desi didn't much like, but Vi loved it.
—Hugh

Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall's Free Range Chicken Quest

Do you know where your last chicken came from?

If it was free-range then breathe a sigh of relief. But if it was a supermarket bird then you might want to reconsider your dining options in the future.

I write this after spending the last couple of evenings watching a UK TV show - Hugh's Chicken Run - presented by River Cottage chef Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall detailing the horrors of modern broiler chicken farming.

I'll spare you the details here but you can read more about Fearnley Whittingstall's Chicken Out campaign on You Tube and on his River Cottage site.

The goal of the campaign is to change how Brits eat chicken - specifically by urging the major supermarket chains to only stock free range birds.

Trust me, one look at how these industrially-reared chickens are raised and you'll never eat non-free range again.

Gastrokid Gastrovid Recipe: Eggs de la Vera

Here's a video recipe of our household's favorite egg dish. It takes about 5 minutes from prep to serving.

to serve two kids the recipe is:

4 eggs, beaten
a tablespoon of butter
about the same amount of olive oil
1/2 teaspoon or so pimenton de la vera, aka spanish smoked paprika. We use the dulce or sweet version

In a medium pan over high heat melt the butter, add the olive oil. Let it heat up until smoking. Add the smoked paprika and let it sit for maybe ten seconds. Add the eggs and let them cook for 15 or 20 seconds or so. If the pan is hot enough the eggs will set very quickly on the bottom, tilt the pan slightly and drag the cooked eggs toward the high side, the runny eggs will descend and start setting. Do this several times until the whole mess is setting up, turn em over, cook it through. Salt it. Plate it. Serve with hot buttered toast.
—Hugh

40 Minute Family Meal - Anchovy Tomato Pine Nut Pasta

What follows is a bit of a culinary detective story.

We spent a weekend at a friends' house not too long ago. On arrival after a long child-frazzled car journey (sound familiar) our friends served an absolutely delicious spaghetti with a slightly pungent but also tangy and sweet tomato sauce.

The ingredients were anchovies, pine nuts, garlic and raisins. And - get this - it took them no more than 20 minutes to prepare. I know because I was still sipping my first post-family trip glass of wine when the food was conjured.

So now it's our turn to try and replicate the dish. We know it was Jamie Oliver inspired but we couldn't find it in the latest Oliver family cookbook we had. So I went online and tracked down his Pasta con acchiughe e pomodoro reproduced in Epicurious.com.

Here's how we made the dish.

We took:

A handful of pine nuts
A handful of raisins
two small (15 oz) cans of tomatoes
12 salted anchovy fillets (from a jar)
Enough spaghetti for four

Then we:

Got the spaghetti going...and we toasted the pine nuts for a couple of minutes. Then we added the anchovies, raisins and pine nuts to the tomatoes and cooked on a medium heat  for 10 minutes until the anchovies had dissolved into the sauce.

We drained the pasta and tossed it in the sauce.

We served, ate and marveled. You will too.

- Matthew

Gastrokid Pub Lunch on Boxing Day - The Pelican in Her Piety

There's something about the state-sanctioned gluttony of Christmas Day that makes getting out of the house the next morning for a walk on a beach or a hike through the hills a real necessity.

In the UK, a Boxing Day walk is a fixed tradition whatever the elements might throw down. So last week we bundled the kids into the car and drove half an hour from our home to Ogmore on Sea on Wales' "Heritage Coastline".

Refreshing, exhilarating exercise was our stated goal but we had a hidden agenda....a  rewarding pub lunch at the end of our walk. Indeed, so many Boxing Day sojourners reward their activity with a lunchtime trip to the pub that you might be excused for suspecting it's the Gastropub lunch and not the fresh air that is the real Boxing Day tradition.

Our Gastro grail was the Pelican in her Piety, a yellow-facaded good food and family-friendly pub that dates back to at least 1741 and commands an impressive view of the ancient and now ruined Ogmore Castle. There, steak and mushroom pie, Welsh lamb Cawl (stew), homemade Lasagne and and local baked ham awaited us.

First though we had the outdoors to "enjoy".

The wind howled and the rain sleeted down as we wound our way through country roads where flocks of sheep huddled in wet, woolly resignation. Miraculously though, by the time we reached the beach the rain had gone and the weak winter sun was peeping through.

As the kids collected stones, made sandcastles and scaled the craggy rock formations I looked across the estuary of the River Ogmore to nearby Merthyr Mawr, an impressive stretch of sand dunes where more adventurous folk than us were riding horses and taking the longer hike back up the valley and towards the Pelican......where we should be I quickly concluded!

Chilled and cheeks flushed we retreated to the warmth of the pub's open log fire and a fine lunch. With mini-portions of the main dishes to keep the kids happy, and with a glass of wine to take the edge off the elements, we all agreed the Boxing Day walk is a tradition worth preserving.

- Matthew

The Details

The Pelican in Her Piety - Ogmore-by-Sea, Bridgend, Vale of Glamorgan CF32 0QP. Telephone 01656 880 049

Ogmore Castle - The ruins are open year round to the public.

40 Minute Family Meal - Tilapia with Green Beans and Herby Tomatoes

Like most of the Christmas celebrating world our family is craving fairly simple fayre after a week of measured gluttony.

This is where this super-quick and easy fish bake comes into play.

You'll need:

Three or four tilapia fillets
garlic - sliced
fresh cherry tomatoes
enough green beans to feed four
dried thyme
sweet basil
salt and pepper to taste

Preheat the oven at around 375 degree Fahrenheit (about 180 centigrade). In a roasting pan, add the beans (topped and tailed), garlic, tomatoes and coat liberally with olive oil. Sprinkle the herbs on top.

Bake for 10 minutes, remove from oven and move the beans around to make sure they are cooking evenly (you'll want them slightly carmelized by the end of the cooking). Add the tilapia fillets on top of the vegetables and drizzle with olive oil, salt and pepper.

Return pan to oven and continue to bake for 10 minutes.

Serve with rice or potatoes and enjoy a light alternative to the hard slog of holiday eating.

- Matthew

Chalk it up to the holidays

Over the five days following the eve of Christmas eve (when I started prepping the 14 hour 20 dollar pork roast), on our new gastrokid gastropub-style kitchen chalkboard, I wrote down just about everything we ate over the holidays, and it's a little terrifying. My rough count totals around 40 food items of note (that does include drinks, though, which easily adds 10 items to the list as there was a fair quantity of bubbly opened and cocktails invented, it being the season for such bibulous activities).

here's what we consumed, drinks first:
barbera
garnacha
isoceles
prosecco
champagne
nero d'avola
fresh pear gin and soda
pomegranate ginger cocktails with rum, bourbon, or gin (virgin versions for the kids)
kir royale
pappy van winkle
a macchiato, and other coffees
hummus
candy canes
pork shoulder
arugula fennel and orange salad
smoked escolar
spring hill jack
cherry pie
blueberry pie
blackberry pie
takeout indian
marzipan
gingerbread cookies
waffles
bacon
scrambled eggs with pimenton de la vera
egg and cheese casserole with green chiles
chocolate grand marnier cake
branzino
scallops
octopus
almond butter and jelly sandwiches
katsu-don
udon (mistakenly written as ramen on the board)
almonds
olives of 2 kinds
3 more kinds of cheese, whose names have since been forgotten

Kid favorites: almonds, olives, eggs de la vera, candy canes.

Adult favorites: pork shoulder with salsa verde, Pappy Van Winkle, smoked escolar

Recipes to follow in the New Year.
—Hugh