Maple Walnut Biscotti

In my family, one either likes biscotti or they don't. My Dad and I have always been fans of the Italian cookies, the crunchier the better. (So much nicer to dip into coffee or tea if they don't immediately fall apart!) I have made them now and again, and he and I are pretty much the only consumers. Mr Minx has always contended that he does not care for the cookie. Until now.

I wanted to get a head start on making biscotti for Christmas, along with all the other various cookies we always bake, and thought I'd try a new recipe. I found one from King Arthur Flour that sounded great--maple walnut. I love both flavors, and we happened to have both ingredients on hand. I still had some of the little sample bottles of Runamok Maple syrup that I picked up at the Summer Fancy Food Show last year, each containing about 1/4 cup. The recipe called for 1/4 cup of syrup, so it seemed like kismet. But the only flavor we had a full bottle of was the Rye Barrel Infused one. Which of course tastes and smells like rye whiskey. So I sloshed in a wee bit of Old Overholt, too.

These biscotti are super crunchy, with a subtle maple flavor and a hint of something-something from the rye. Mr Minx ate several without my prompting, proclaiming them "very good." Perhaps he is coming around to enjoying super crunchy cookies and won't turn up his nose at them in the future. Or maybe I just got these exactly right for his tastes. In any case, they're certainly something I plan on baking again. Dad, of course, loved them too.

Maple Walnut Biscotti (adapted from King Arthur Flour)

1 cup walnuts, coarsely chopped, toasted
2 large eggs
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1/4 cup Runamok Rye-barrel infused maple syrup
1 tablespoon rye whiskey
1/3 cup butter, melted
2 1/2 cups AP Flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
Coarse sea salt, preferably Maldon

Preheat the oven to 350°F.

Line two baking sheets with parchment. Spread the walnuts on one sheet in a single layer and toast for 8-10 minutes in the preheated oven, until they're light brown and fragrant. Allow nuts to cool. Reserve baking sheet and parchment.

In a bowl, beat the eggs, sugars, maple syrup, and rye whiskey. Add the butter, beating well to combine. Add the flour, baking powder, and salt. Stir in the nuts.

With floured hands, pat the dough into two rectangles each about 10" long x 4" wide and 1/2" thick on the parchment-covered baking sheet. Wet your fingers and smooth the tops. Sprinkle with sea salt.

Bake dough for 30 minutes. Remove baking tray from oven and let cool for about ten minutes.

With a serrated knife, slice the loaves into 1/2" thick slices. Place the slices, standing upright, if possible, in a single layer on the second parchment-lined baking sheet. If you need more room, use the sheet that the dough was baked on as well.

Bake for 18-20 minutes, turning once if biscotti are on their sides, not at all if you were able to get them to balance upright.

Allow cookies to cool completely before storing in an airtight container.

Makes about 3 dozen cookies.



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Crispy Glazed Tofu Bibimbap

Yes, yes, another recipe using that yummy Makrut lime leaf-infused maple syrup from Runamok. I can't help it - it's good stuff, and it gives a balancing sweetness to foods without adding any processed sugar. We've been trying to cut back on the white stuff this month, and maple syrup has really come in handy to curb our sugar cravings.

And it's also another crispy tofu recipe. It's getting so I don't even want to eat soft tofu anymore, because the crispy stuff is just so. damn. good. Seriously. (I know you don't believe me. Just try it.)

Crispy Glazed Tofu Bibimbap

1 14-oz box firm or extra firm tofu
Corn starch
Salt
Vegetable oil for frying
1 teaspoon gochujang
2 teaspoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons Runamok Maple Makrut Lime leaf-infused maple syrup
Steamed rice
Slivered carrots
Cucumbers, peeled, seeded, and cut into half moons
Sugar snap peas or snow peas, steamed
Soft-boiled eggs (optional, see recipe below)
Sesame oil
Chopped scallions

Remove the tofu from its carton and pat dry. Wrap in a double thickness of paper towels and place on a plate. Put another plate upside-down on top, then weight with a jar or can. Refrigerate for at least 3 hours, changing the towels once or twice.

After the tofu has been pressed for several hours, remove the last application of wet towels and pat the tofu dry. Cut the block in thirds widthwise to make three approximately 5" square x 1/2" high slices. Cut each square in half to make 6 rectangles, then cut each rectangle diagonally to form 12 triangles.

Put several tablespoons of corn starch in a plastic zip top bag and add a big pinch of salt. Shake to combine. Add tofu pieces, one at a time, and coat with cornstarch. Pat off excess cornstarch and place each triangle on a dry plate.

Pour two tablespoons of oil in a large skillet and heat until a drop of water hisses and spits. Add the tofu in one layer. Cook until lightly browned on bottom, 3-4 minutes. Using tongs, turn the pieces (some will want to stick together - turn them together if that's the case, you can separate them later). Cook another 3-4 minutes. Flip again to get bottoms browner, then repeat. At the end of 15 or so minutes, your tofu should be nicely browned on both sides. Remove pieces to a paper towel-liked plate to drain.

In a small bowl, combine the gochujang, soy, and maple syrup. Using a pastry brush, brush the glaze over one side of the tofu pieces, making sure to coat them thoroughly.

To serve: Place some steamed rice in a bowl. Top with pieces of tofu, carrots, cucumbers, peas, and halved eggs (if using). Drizzle with a bit of sesame oil, garnish with chopped scallion, and serve.

Soft-Boiled Eggs

2 large eggs

Put enough water in a saucepot to cover eggs plus a little more. (But don't add the eggs yet!) Bring the water to a rolling boil, then gently add the eggs using a slotted spoon or spider. Set your timer for 7 minutes.

While eggs are cooking, put cold water and some ice cubes in a bowl. When time is up, immediately remove the eggs from the pot of boiling water to the ice bath. Leave the eggs in the ice bath for several minutes, until well chilled.

Gently peel eggs. Cut in half and use as garnish. The whites should be solid, and the yolks runny.

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!



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Thai Lettuce Wraps

If you're a regular reader of Minxeats, you've probably noticed that I tend to cook with and promote various specialty food products in the warmer months. That's because I've recently been to the Summer Fancy Food show and either picked up some samples to play with at the show, or were sent products to try. One of my favorite products from the show this year was Runamok Maple Syrup, which comes in 10 varieties (including smoked, rum-barrel-aged, cardamom-infused, etc.) and is really quite delicious stuff. I'm not a big pancake/waffle eater, so I've been trying out recipes that use the syrups in a more creative way.

The Makrut Lime Leaf-infused syrup really speaks to my creative nature. If you're familiar with Thai food, you're probably familiar with makrut lime leaf (also called "kaffir" lime); its aromatic citrussy flavor is a staple in that cuisine. My thoughts naturally turned to using this syrup in Asian-inspired dishes, like this one for pork lettuce wraps. It's kinda Thai, inspired by the spicy meat salads known as larb. It comes together quickly, and apart from the maple syrup and Thai basil, uses ingredients found in most grocery stores.

Of course, you can still make the dish without either the syrup or the basil. Just substitute regular maple syrup for the Runamok and add the finely grated rind of 1 lime. There's no substitute for Thai basil, IMHO, so just don't worry about that part.

Thai Pork Lettuce Wraps

2 teaspoons vegetable oil
6 scallions, chopped (divided use)
1 lb ground pork
1/2 bell pepper, diced
Handful of green beans, chopped
2 1/2 tablespoons Runamok Maple Makrut Lime Leaf Maple Syrup
2 tablespoons fish sauce
2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon lemongrass paste (I like Gourmet Garden, found in produce sections of most major supermarkets)
4 cloves garlic, crushed
1 tablespoon chopped cilantro
1 tablespoon chopped Thai basil
2 teaspoons sriracha, or to taste
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
Salt
1 head Boston or butter lettuce, leaves separated, washed and dried thoroughly
Lime wedges for garnish

Heat the oil in a large saute pan and add 4 of the scallions. Cook over medium high heat, stirring frequently, for 2 minutes. Add the ground pork, breaking it up with a wooden spoon or spatula and stirring regularly. Cook for 5-7 minutes, until the pork is starting to brown and is mostly broken into small pieces. Add the bell pepper and green beans and cook for about 4-5 minutes.

In a small bowl, combine the maple syrup, fish sauce, lemongrass paste, garlic, herbs, cilantro, and ginger. Pour over the pork and vegetables in the pan and mix well. Turn the heat down to medium-low and cover the pan. Cook for 10-12 minutes, until the pork absorbs most of the sauce.

Taste for seasoning. Add salt, if needed (you could also add more fish sauce).

Put the lettuce leaves in a bowl. Put the cooked pork in another bowl. To eat, put spoonfuls of pork mixture into lettuce. Squeeze over a bit of lime, and more sriracha, if desired.

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!



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Apricot-Cardamom-Pistachio Ice Cream

Last summer, we made a lot of frozen desserts. We had borrowed a friend's ice cream machine (which we still have - oops!) and were cranking out a new flavor every weekend. Now we have our own fun little Cuisinart Ice Cream Maker, and we hope to start using it regularly.

This summer's inaugural batch used up a selection of apricots that had been purchased at the farmers' market across from my office. I bought them on Tuesday for Mr Minx to eat, but he kept forgetting. By Saturday, one of them was rotten, and I needed to do something with the rest so as not to lose my investment (they weren't cheap). I also wanted to involve one or more of the Runamok Maple syrups that I picked up at the Summer Fancy Food Show in June. One of them is infused with cardamom, and I knew cardamom and apricot went well together. I also wanted to add a bit of texture to the ice cream and knew pistachios would work with both of the other players. The next question was how best to use the cardamom syrup so it didn't get lost in all that cream.

The answer was pretty simple: I used it to candy the nuts. While I did add a big pinch of ground cardamom to the ice cream itself, it was subtle. The candied nuts supplied stronger hits of the sweet spice, which made each bite more interesting.

It might seem like there's a lot of sugar in this ice cream, but apricot puree is tangy. You can probably reduce the sugar to 2/3 cup, but don't go any further than that, as less sugar will affect the way the ice cream freezes.

Apricot-Cardamom-Pistachio Ice Cream

For the nuts:
1/2 cup pistachio nutmeats
2 tablespoons Runamok Maple Cardamom Maple Syrup
1 1/2 teaspoons butter

For the ice cream:
6-8 fresh apricots (to make about 1 cup of puree)
2 cups whole milk
3/4 cup granulated sugar
5 egg yolks
1 cup heavy cream
1/8 teaspoon ground cardamom

To make the nuts: Prepare a sheet pan with a piece of parchment or a silicone baking sheet/Silpat.

Heat the Runamok Maple Cardamom-infused maple syrup and butter in a small saucepan over medium-high heat until bubbly. Add the nuts. Stir the mixture constantly until the nuts are glazed and most of the moisture is evaporated. Don't cook much beyond this point - you don't want the caramel to be hard, otherwise it will be hard and potentially tooth-sticky once frozen.

Remove the nuts from the heat and immediately spread out onto the sheet pan, separating them with a fork. Allow to cool. They should still be tacky to the touch when cool.

To make the ice cream: Wash the apricots thoroughly. Cut in half, discard pits and stems, and whiz the flesh in a food processor to make a puree. Strain to remove skins, if desired (I left them in). Refrigerate puree until ready to use.

Place the milk and sugar in a sauce pan and heat over medium-high heat until just starting to bubble around the edges. Do not let come to a boil, and definitely don't let it burn.

While the milk is warming, whisk the egg yolks in a large bowl. Using a ladle, dribble some of the hot milk into the eggs in a thin stream, whisking constantly. After about half the milk has been whisked in, pour the egg and milk mixture back into the pot with the remaining milk. Cook over medium-low heat until thick enough to coat a spoon, whisking all the while.

Strain the custard and stir in the heavy cream. Refrigerate until cold.

Combine the cold custard with the cold apricot puree. Freeze the mixture in an ice cream maker according to manufacturer's instructions. Once the consistency starts to visually resemble soft serve ice cream, start dropping in the nuts, a few at a time, until all are incorporated. Scoop the ice cream (it will still be quite soft) into a covered container and freeze until firm, at least 2 hours.

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!



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Runamok Chicken and Waffles

One of my favorite parts of the Summer Fancy Food Show is the new products aisle. Some of the products are truly tasty and seem promising, others not so much. My favorite of the "truly tasty" variety was Runamok Maple. Maple syrup is a bit of a mini-trend at the SFFS - there were at least twice as many maple vendors this year as last, but the total number was still very small.

I grew up eating Mrs Butterworth's on my pancakes, and trying real maple syrup for the first time was a bit of a revelation. Not only is the real stuff not as thick as the fake stuff (which gives tar a run for its money), but the flavor is also much more subtle. (Imitation maple gets its flavor from the lactone soloton, which is found in the herb fenugreek, used widely in Indian cooking. If you've ever found a curry to taste like maple syrup, it's actually the other way around - your "maple" syrup tastes like curry.)

Runamok Maple is definitely the real thing. It's hand-tapped maple sap, concentrated to remove much of the water, then boiled into the golden elixir that many of us know and love. And while Runamok Maple sells this "plain" syrup, which they bottle as the Sugarmaker's Cut, they also flavor their maple. Some are aged in barrels recently used to hold rye, bourbon, or rum, which imparts a distinct boozy taste to the syrup. They also have a line of syrups infused with things like hibiscus flower or elderberries. And then they do an amazing pecan wood smoked syrup that might be odd on pancakes, but works great in a cocktail or in place of bacon in our maple bacon chicken and waffles.

We fiddled around with the original recipe, substituting Runamok Pecan Wood Smoked Maple Syrup for the bacon. Because not everything needs to have bacon in it. No, I'm serious.

Runamok Chicken and Waffles
Serves 4-6

For herbed cornmeal waffles:
1 cup yellow cornmeal, preferably stone ground
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 ½ cups 2% milk
½ stick melted butter, cooled
2 scallions, finely chopped
8 sage leaves, finely chopped

For chicken:
4 skinless, boneless chicken thighs
1 cup chicken broth
1 cup water
2 stalks of celery, finely chopped
2 bay leaves
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon black peppercorns

For gravy:
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons flour
2 cups of the stock left over from cooking the chicken (if there's not enough left, add regular chicken stock to make up the difference)
1/4 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons Runamok Maple Pecan Wood Smoked maple syrup
1 tablespoon Runamok Maple Bourbon-Barrel Aged maple syrup
Salt and freshly ground pepper
2 tablespoons chopped scallions for garnish

To make waffles: Preheat waffle iron. Preheat oven to 250°F and place a baking sheet in the oven.

Combine cornmeal, flour, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl. In another bowl, beat the eggs, then whisk in the milk and butter until combined. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and stir until combined. Stir in the scallions and sage.

Spoon batter into waffle iron according to manufacturer’s directions. Cook until golden and crisp. Place cooked waffles onto the baking sheet in the oven. Repeat until all waffle batter is used.

To make chicken: Combine all ingredients in a pot. Bring liquid to a boil, then turn the heat down and let simmer until chicken is cooked through, about one hour. Set chicken and the resulting stock aside.

To make gravy: Melt butter in a saucepan over medium heat and whisk in the flour. Cook for about 5 minutes, stirring regularly, to create a light blonde roux. Raise heat and whisk in chicken stock; bring to a boil. After a minute or two, when stock has thickened to gravy consistency, lower heat to medium and stir in the cream and maple syrups. Season with salt to taste and lots of freshly ground pepper.

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!



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Chicken and Waffles

I never did "get" the concept of chicken and waffles. Crisp fried chicken accompanied by crisp waffles--and syrup--seemed an incongruous (and messy) pairing to me, so when we encountered the pulled chicken and gravy version at Rocket to Venus, I thought we found one that might work. Unfortunately, it suffered in execution. What I felt that dish needed - besides 90% less gravy - was good gravy. (Good gravy!) Of course, the maple syrup element probably needed to be added (so the waffles don't get lonely), but the thought of maple syrup AND gravy just wasn't cutting it. Then I thought, why not put maple syrup IN the gravy?

Because that's weird.

I then considered flavors that worked well when combined with maple and with chicken. When I was a kid, my dad used to make waffles with bacon in them, a glorious combination when bathed in maple syrup. My mom liked to make a chicken dish that involved bacon, along with heavy cream and scallions. The common denominator in these two recipes is, of course, the almighty bacon, so I knew that everybody's favorite porky substance could potentially be a bridge between the maple and the chicken. What am I saying, "potentially?" Of course it would work to unite the two flavors together, along with lashings of cream for richness and scallions for a fresh green bite!

I love it when a plan comes together. The maple syrup worked beautifully in the chicken gravy, without making it overly sweet. It was fabulous over waffles, but would be damn good over biscuits as well.

Chicken and Waffles with Bacon Maple Gravy

1 tablespoon butter
2 tablespoons flour
2 cups rich chicken stock (preferably homemade)
2 slices of cooked bacon, chopped
1/4 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons pure maple syrup
salt and pepper
2 cups chopped cooked chicken
your favorite waffle recipe
2 tablespoons chopped scallions

In a medium saucepan over medium-high heat, melt butter and whisk in flour. Cook for about 5 minutes - stirring regularly - to create a light blonde roux. Raise heat and whisk in chicken stock; bring to a boil. After a minute or two, when stock has thickened to gravy consistency, lower heat to medium and stir in the bacon, cream, and maple syrup. Season with salt and lots of freshly ground pepper to taste. Stir in chicken. Cook until heated through, another 3 minutes or so.

While the gravy is cooking, make up a batch of waffles using your favorite recipe. Keep them warm on a cookie sheet in a 250F oven until ready to serve.

To serve: Place waffles on a plate. Spoon sauce on top, but do not drown. Garnish with scallions. Serves 2-4.

Posted by theminx on Minxeats.com.