Pies Please

My friend Christine is an avid home baker. We met a few years ago when her husband and I were working at the same firm. His desk was next to mine, and he would regularly rave about her cakes, shortbread, and pies - particularly her peach pie. She recently confided in me that she used Crisco (*yikes*) to make her pie crusts, and didn't like the idea of using hydrogenated oil, so she wanted me to show her what fraisage was all about and how to use it to make all-butter pie crust.  Since we hadn't seen each other in months, we made plans yesterday to have lunch and make pies together.

I had picked up some beautiful zucchini earlier this week, so I decided to make a Vegetable Torte.  Christine settled on making her almost-famous Peach Pie.  So after some lunch and much needed coffee, we put on some serious chick music  a la Carol King, Juice Newton (Oh yeah, because Angel of the Morning is a classic thank you very much), Christina Aguilera, Etta James, etc.. and got to work.

Christine's delectable Peach Pie

Now, I've made butter pie crust a million times.  I've never actually even tried any other types of fat (though I might try lard the next time I make a meat pie). I'd been using fraisage ever since I read about it in the July 2004 issue of Cooks Illustrated.  Thing is, I've never taught anyone to do it, and as I discovered, that's a totally different thing.

First I pulled out two cutting boards, two knives, two of everything so that Christine and I could work alongside each other.  Then we diced up our butter and put it in the freezer to get nice and chilled.  That went smoothly, and while we waited, we logged onto the internet to see what the latest cover of US Weekly was all about.  After spotting it in the checkout line, we just had to know what was going on with Jessica Simpson's weight.

Butter chilled, we set up to cut it into the flour.  Because Christine doesn't have a food processor, we decided to do everything by hand so it would be as close as possible to the way she would make the recipe at home.  Now here is where we hit a little snag.  Christine was using my wire pastry cutter and I was using a plastic bench scraper.  The wires of the pastry cutter weren't doing a very good job of cutting through the cold hard butter.  So I finished cutting my flour and butter, then handed Christine the bench scraper so she could cut hers.  In the meantime the butter in both our bowls were approaching room temperature.  When we added the water, it didn't seem to be getting absorbed by the flour and was difficult to tell how much water we needed.  I thought that if we continued with the fraisage, it would help to blend the water into the dough.  So I quickly fraisaged my dough then helped Christine with hers.  All the while, both our doughs were sitting out at room temperature getting warmer and warmer.  They seemed crumbly and dry so we tried to incorporate more water into them, but they still didn't seem to absorb anything.  By the time we were gathering the doughs into discs, mine had started sticking to the table, and Christine's was so dry it was crumbling apart.   I knew things didn't feel or look right, but we stuck them in the fridge and hoped for the best.  Meanwhile we both prepared our fillings, and did a little Facebook-ing.

When it came time to roll the doughs out, I was embarrassed to find that it was a little disastrous.  Sure, we managed to get the crusts into the pie pans, and the pies both actually turned out delicious, but the road getting there was not exactly the smoothest, and the crusts probably were not as flaky as they could have been.  Both our doughs were crumbly and had no elasticity.  There just didn't seem to be enough moisture even though we had kept adding water.  My dough only began to take shape once the butter started to melt.  Then it was greasy and started to stick to the table, but I couldn't move it dust underneath with flour because it was so brittle.  Christine had similar problems with hers.  Even though the pies turned out, I was disappointed because I was afraid that Christine went home with the impression that what we did was more complicated and difficult than it actually was.

Vegetable Torta (click to go to recipe page)

So what went wrong?  More importantly, how could I have fixed it?  Today I was determined to figure it out.  So alone I went about making butter pie crust again - this time, paying extra attention to how the dough felt and looked at each step (and taking photos!).  First, I realized teaching someone to do something always takes longer than simply doing it yourself.  Obvious, I know.  It also occured to me that rule number one of making butter pie crust is to keep the butter COLD, and even at the first step of cutting the flour and butter together, we took so long that the butter had come to almost to room temperature.  Today after cutting my butter and flour together, I put the mixture in the freezer for a few minutes just as a precautionary measure, but I might have saved us some grief if I had done this yesterday when I realized the butter was getting too warm.  The second mistake was in the way I demonstrated the fraisage. The butter already approaching room temperature, we should have tried an alternative method using a bench scraper or rubber spatula.  Instead, we used our hands, which just caused the butter to melt further.  The fraisage just worked the melted butter into the flour more, and inhibited its ability to absorb moisture.  By this point there was not much that could have been done to save the dough.

So using what I learned from yesterday's mishaps, making pie crust today went as smoothly as can be (Whew!).  I ended up using it to make a deep dish Cardamom Pumpkin Tart, which I can say with absolute certainty (and Boyfriend will back me up on this...) had the flakiest crust I'd ever made. It would have been even better with fresh pumpkin, but it I really needed to use up a can of pumpkin puree which I had sitting around since Thanksgiving 2007.

Cardamom Pumpkin Tart (click to go to recipe page)

So the next time I have someone over for a workshop day, I think I'll take a cue from the way they taught us in culinary school.  Instead of working on our doughs at the same time, I should have demonstrated the recipe for Christine first, then helped her with her dough.  This way she could have seen the whole process first, then I would have been able to pay more attention to what I was doing during the demonstration, and to what she was doing when it was her turn. Oh well, live and learn...Now all I have to figure out is do I want Peach Pie or Cardamom Pumpkin Tart with my coffee?

The Recipes:

All Butter Pie Crust

Torta Salata

Cardamom Pumpkin Tart

Recipe: All Butter Pie Crust

Pie crust is made actually made up of tiny particles of fat each encased in a dough of flour and water (or another liquid).   It is this combination of flour and water that actually makes the dough elastic enough to roll.  Problems arise if the butter gets too soft while you are cutting the ingredients together.  It will start to coat the flour particles (instead of the other way around), causing them to actually repel the water and not form the dough properly.  Even if you manage to bring it together into a disc and chill it, the resulting dough will be greasy and difficult to work with.  It won't be elastic enough to roll and as the butter softens again it will bleed out and stick to your work surface.  Believe me, I learned this the hard way.

Don't worry, it's not as difficult as it sounds.  The biggest challenge in making all butter pie crust is simply keeping the butter COLD.  The less you handle the dough the better, since the heat from your hands will cause the butter the melt.  This is where a food processor comes in really handy since it makes quick work of cutting the ingredients together, thereby reducing both the amount of contact you have with the dough and the amount of time the butter is at room temperature.  If you don't have a food processor, use tools like a pastry cutter (don't bother with the wire kind, which won't cut through ice cold butter) or a bench scraper to cut the ingredients together.  Then use a rubber spatula or plastic bench scraper to blend the dough.  I actually go with the hand method most of the time because cleaning the food processor is such a pain anyway.  If you need to, just chill your ingredients in the freezer between each step to make sure everything stays nice and cold.

Ingredients for a single 9" pie crust:

(for a double pie crust, simply double the recipe)

1-1/4 c. flour
1/2 tsp. table salt or 1 tsp. coarse kosher salt
1-1/2 tsp. sugar (optional, for sweet pies)
8 Tbsp. butter, diced
3-4 Tbsp. ice water, plus more if needed

Procedure:

1.    Chill the pieces of butter in the freezer.

2.    Cut the ingredients together, starting with the butter and flour:

Using a food processor:  Combine the flour and salt in the bowl of a food processor.  Sprinkle the butter cubes over the flour mixture and just pulse a few times until it starts to resemble to texture of wet sand, with pieces of butter no bigger than a small pea. Pulse a few times more, adding just enough ice water for the dough to start to clump together.

By hand:  In a bowl or on a flat work surface, sprinkle the pieces of butter over the flour and salt mixture.  Using a pastry cutter, or bench scraper, quickly cut the butter into the flour until there are pieces no bigger than a pea.  Check to make sure the pieces of butter are still firm, and chill the mixture in the freezer if needed before adding the water.  Sprinkle the water over the butter flour mixture and cut it into the dough, adding more as needed until the dough begins to clump together.

Butter cubes sprinkled over flour

Butter and flour cut together

Dough after cutting in water

3.   Fraisage.  Though it is not necessary, using a technique a known as fraisage to blend the dough will help you achieve a flakier crust when using only butter.  The traditional way is to turn the dough out onto a floured surface, and using the heel of your hand, to smear the dough a little at a time against the board.  I find the heat of your hand causes the butter to melt too quickly so I prefer to use a plastic bench scraper.  You can also transfer the dough to a large bowl instead, and use a rubber spatula to smear the dough against the side of the bowl.

4.    Rest the dough.  On a lightly floured surface, gather the dough into a disc (or two, for a double crust pie) by  gathering up the sides with one hand while pressing on the top with the other.  Wrap the disc in plastic wrap. You can  flatten the disc a little more once it's wrapped - the plastic wrap helps to hold it together.  Refrigerate at least 30 minutes before rolling.

Forming the dough into a disc

wrapped disc of dough

5.    Roll your crust.  If the dough has gotten too hard from chilling, let it sit for a few minutes at room temperature.  Unwrap it, and on a lightly floured surface, use your rolling pin to press gently on the disc from the middle outward.  Flatten it out until your knuckles touch the work surface.  Then, starting from the middle, roll first away from you, then toward you.  Rotate the dough (or your rolling pin) 45 degrees and roll again, from the middle outward.  Continue rotating and rolling until the dough is about 1/8" thick.

pressing on the dough

rolling the dough away from you

then toward you

final dough, rolled about 1/8" thick

Rolled dough is smooth and elastic, encasing layers of butter visible underneath.

6. To transfer the dough to the pie plate, you can either roll it onto the rolling pin and unroll it over the plate, or fold the dough in half, then half again and unfold it over the pie plate.

rolling dough onto rolling pin

transferring folded dough to pie plate

7. For best results, refrigerate the prepared pie plate and let the dough to rest for another 30 minutes before filling or blind baking. This will also improve the texture of the crust and reduce shrinkage during baking.

Recipe: Torta Salata (Vegetable Torte)

This is one of my favorite almost vegetarian recipes.  It's really simple, and is a great way to make a hearty meal out of couple pounds of vegetables.  Almost any firm vegetable will work, as long as it is not too wet.  I usually use zucchini, which I salt to draw out the moisture, then drain before using.  Whatever you use, make sure you season the vegetables before using them, and that you have enough to tightly fill the pie plate.  The egg and cheese mixture adds a nice creamy texture, and binds the whole thing together.

Torta Salata with Zucchini, using all butter pie crust

For the pastry, I usually like to use puff pastry, but you can use a regular pie crust, or omit the pastry altogether.  Here is the recipe using zucchini, which is adapted from Savoring Italy, by Robert Freson.

Ingredients for a 9" torta:

a single 9' pie crust or puff pastry crust

1-1/2 lbs. zucchini, sliced into 1/4" discs

2 whole eggs

3 egg yolks

1/2 c. ricotta cheese

3 Tbsp. grated parmesan cheese

a pinch of nutmeg

kosher or other coarse salt

pepper

additional egg wash (optional)

Procedure:

1.  Lay the slices of zucchini out in a single layer on a cooling rack or cookie sheet lined with several paper towels or a clean cotton towel.  Generously sprinkle with salt and set aside.

2.  Meanwhile prepare your pastry crust and line the pie plate.  Set aside in the refrigerator.

3.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

4.  In a medium sized bowl, beat together the eggs and egg yolks.  Gently mix in the cheeses, and season with a pinch of nutmeg, salt, and pepper.

5.  Using paper towels or a clean cloth towel, blot the zucchini dry then arrange them tightly in the prepared pie plate.  Pour in the egg mixture so that it fills in the gaps and just covers the vegetables.

6.  Brush the edges of the pastry with egg wash, if desired, and bake the torta for 40-50 minutes until the center is firm and the top is golden brown.  Cool for 3 minutes before cutting.

Zucchini Torta Salata fresh from the oven

Ideas and Variations:

This torta is also delicious using swiss chard stems or asparagus in place of the zucchini.  To prepare swiss chard or asparagus for use in this recipe, simply blanch them for a couple of minutes in generously salted boiling water, then cool in ice water.  Drain, then cut into 1-2 inch lengths and assemble the torte as directed above.  If you are using asparagus be sure to trim or peel the tough ends from the asparagus before blanching.

Try using Homemade Ricotta instead of store bought.

Recipe: Cardamom Pumpkin Tart

Here is a slightly Asian spin on an American favorite. It's a recipe I came up with on the fly one Thanksgiving when I was cooking at Boyfriend's sister's apartment. I started with a recipe for pumpkin pie from the America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook, which called for nutmeg and a host of other spices, some of which our host didn't have. So I had to improvise. She happened to have cardamom, which she liked to use in her apple pie. So I decided to use just use some cardamom and ginger, and it was a surprise hit. One guest said she usually didn't like pumpkin pie, but liked this one. I like to use a deep dish tart pan with fluted edges, which works great with both flour and graham cracker crusts.

Ingredients (for a 9" deep dish tart or pie):

1 recipe 9" pie crust

1  15 oz. can  pumpkin puree

1 cup  dark brown sugar

1/2 - 1 tsp.  ground ginger (optional)

1/4 tsp.  ground cardamom

1/2 tsp.  table salt (or 1 tsp. coarse kosher salt)

2/3 cup  heavy cream

2/3 cup  whole milk

4  large eggs

Procedure:

1. Blind bake the crust:  Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F, and position the oven rack to the lower-middle position.  Prepare your crust and line the tart pan or pie pan.  Line the crust with parchment or aluminum foil and weigh it down with pie weights or dried beans.  Bake for 15-25 minutes until golden.

preparing the tart pan

crust ready to be blind-baked, with beans for pie weights

2.  Meanwhile prepare the filling.  Timing is important here, since the filling must be warm, and poured into the crust when it's hot out of the oven.  In a medium saucepan, over medium heat stir together the pumpkin puree, brown sugar, spices, and salt.  Stirring continuously, cook the pumpkin until it's thick and shiny.

3.  Whisk in the cream and milk, and simmer a minute or two, stirring to prevent the mixture from scalding.  Remove from heat and set aside to cool while you beat the eggs.

4.  In a medium bowl, whisk the eggs until they are well blended.  Temper the eggs by adding half the warm pumpkin mixture, whisking to combine.  Add the rest of the pumpkin and whisk until all the ingredients are blended together.

5.  When the crust is ready, remove the weights and liner, and immediately pour the filling into the hot crust.  Raise the temperature of the oven to 400 degrees and bake the tart for 25 minutes until the crust is golden brown, the filling is puffed up, and the center just barely wiggles when you move the pan.  If you overcook the pie, the filling will crack.

fresh from the oven

6.  Cool completely before serving.

if needed, rest the tart pan on a large can to unmold

7.  Try serving the tart with fresh unsweetened whipped cream drizzled with honey (or try sweetening the whipped cream with a little honey instead of sugar).

T minus 16 Hours and Counting...

Well, I headed it off as long as I could, but I knew at some point I would have to work brunch.  I'm not much of a morning person.  OK, I am NOT a morning person.  On a normal day, I barely manage to drag myself out of bed by 10 a.m.  Then I putt around the house for a few hours in my pajamas before heading off to work.  It probably has a lot to do with the fact that I'm usually up until 3 or 4 a.m. writing.  So when the new schedule went up last week, I breathed a sigh of resignation at not only being assigned the brunch shift on Saturday, but a double shift to boot.  It had been in the wind for a while.   Gloria and Flaca had been working doubles on Saturday and Sunday for a long time and eventually my turn had to come around.

Gloria and Flaca, keeping entertained while working a double shift....

So, Friday night after my dinner shift I tried to be diligent and get to bed at a reasonable hour, but Boyfriend's co-worker had lent him a bootleg of Grand Tourino which we ended up watching until 3 a.m.  In reality, Boyfriend fell asleep before the movie ended.  Anyway, four hours later, I hit the snooze button a few times, then finally stumbled out of bed.  7:30 in the morning, what the f---?  walk dog...no time for coffee...what? frost on my car? ugh...

 

The drive to work was faster than usual (I bet only serial killers willingly get up this early on a Saturday) and I was the first to arrive.  As I walked into the prep kitchen, there was the cleanup crew, dressed in their street clothes and ready to be relieved of duty.  You have no idea how depressing it was to realize that I had said goodnight to them only eight hours earlier, and would see them again in another 16 hours.  That's right, 16 hours. I chose not to think too much on it and just get to work.

 First I went upstairs to the service kitchen and turned on the fryer because it takes forever to heat up.  Back downstairs, I ran into the pastry cook as we were both heading to our boiler room/ locker room to get changed.  She is another recent FCI grad who currently has a two hour commute from Jersey, so I guess I should stop my pissing and moaning now.  Once changed, I grabbed a cutting board and headed back up to the service kitchen to find that it had started to fill up with smoke.  What the...? I thought, then realized that there was NO OIL IN THE FRYER.  Duh.  Of course, the cleanup crew empties the fryer and cleans it every night.  I quickly shut the fryer off and propped the back door open.  As I turned on the exhaust hood, a cold blast of air came in from the open door.  The exhaust hood at work is so powerful that in the winter, our kitchen is actually cold.  I lugged a 5-gallon container of fresh oil up the stairs and emptied it into the fryer, then went back down to get a second one.  Then I turned the fryer on again.

Shortly afterward, Gloria the grill cook arrived and started coaching me on the prep for my station.  I quickly realized that the brunch garde manger station would be better named the "everyone else's bitch" station.  My prep list included making clarified butter for all three stations, poaching home fries and french fries for the grill station, making salads and dressing for the egg and grill station, and making potato gallettes, slicing salmon gravlax, picking and chopping herbs and mixing herbed creme fraiche for both the egg station and mine.  The only prep that was solely for my station was cutting up fruit for a fruit salad, and carmelizing apples and slicing bread for french toast.

Truthfully the prep was easy compared to dinner.  Still, being my first shift on the station, we did hit a few snags.  The first and most time-consuming thing I had to do was poach home fries and french fries - about five gallons of french fries, and maybe eight gallons of home fries.  Of course, the pilot on the fryer had gone out and the fryer wasn't hot.  Gloria helped me to re-light the pilot and tried to explain to me in "Spanglish" that I had to let the pilot burn for about 2 minutes, then turn the fryer on.  This I misunderstood as simply turning the temperature gauge up.  Duh again.  After another twenty minutes of the fryer not heating up, I remembered that I actually had to turn the pilot knob to the "on" position.  Oh, did I mention that the restaurant had run out of regular coffee and I was trying to squeeze as much residual caffeine out of the decaf as possible?

So with a little help from Flaca, who was now on the egg station, I got set up in time for service, then stood around a lot.  Saturday brunch at the restaurant is pretty slow, and with the garde manger only responsible for four plates, and making sides of fries and salads for the other stations, it was totally do-able.  In the meantime I tried to get a little prep done for dinner service.  I made a list, then put some large beets on the back burner to simmer, and some baby beets in the oven to roast.  I squeezed a quart of lemon juice, and cut some lemon wedges for our oyster plate.  At around 1:30 Wil, who was going to be on garde manger with me that evening, arrived and I gave him a copy of our prep list so he could get started downstairs.  He only started the week before, but had a few years experience and was quickly getting the routine down.

The plus side of working a double shift actually, is that it makes the mid-day transition much easier.  The restaurant doesn't close between brunch and dinner.  We served a limited mid-day menu, so at 3:00 the dinner crew has to set up their stations and be ready to serve the mid-day items while the brunch crew is packing up. It's utter chaos.  Isn't there a law in physics about two masses being unable to occupy the same space at the same time?  Yeah, it's like that.  So working a double actually meant that I could start transitioning my station before the end of brunch.  By 2:50, I had all my brunch prep packed up, and the station re-arranged for dinner service.  Wil brought up all our supplies, set up his workstation, and by 3:30 we were charging forward with dinner prep, and by 6 p.m. we were ready for service.  Or so I thought...

On our menu we've always had a salad that featured beets and a roasted tomato tart.  With the cold weather, it hasn't really been a big seller.  This week we actually had to use a lot leftovers for family meal and discarded what we couldn't use.  So I held back a little on our prep, fearing that we might have too much leftover again.  Wouldn't you know it? We sold a couple during mid-day, then once service started, it seemed like practically every table that came in had at least one.  At around 8:00 I started panicking (internally, hoping that no-one would notice).  In just two hours we had sold the number of beet salads we normally sell in an entire evening.  I racked my brain to figure out how we could stretch our prep or make more.  We were running low on large beets - impossible to cook more since they take at least 2 hours.  We were also running low on tarts, but I figured all the components were ready so it would be easy to assemble more if needed.  At 8:30 we were down to two tarts so I ran down to the walk-in to get some more roasted tomatoes. Under normal circumstances this would have been an easy fix - less than five minutes to assemble another 6 tarts - but when I got to the walk-in the tray of roasted tomatoes was gone.

It turned out the saute station was running a special featuring chopped roasted tomatoes, which meant there were no more whole roasted tomatoes in the house.  And by now we had sold the last two salads.  How can I make this happen? I thought.  We can't '86' the salad with three more hours of service left to go.  So I left the station in Wil's capable hands, and under the supervision of our sous chef,  so I could peel and roast more tomatoes.  Turns out even if we made more tarts, it wasn't going to happen.  In my frugality, I hadn't cooked enough large beets and we only had enough for one more order anyway.  Still, we couldn't expect Flaca to start from scratch the next day so I continued to peel a full tray of tomatoes for her to roast in the morning.  I felt like my fellow line cooks were looking at me like I was an idiot.  My sous chef even half-jokingly gave me a slap on the wrist.  It was every cook's worst nightmare, and I was determined never to let it happen to me again, but given the unpredicatability of the biz, it probably will.

So, after sixteen hours on my feet without a break, I finally left the restaurant a little after midnight.  I didn't feel particularly tired, although I had started to do my I'm-talking-a-lot-because-I'm-over-tired-but-don't-realize-it routine.  But I was starving, and shortly after I arrived home, Boyfriend arrived with a burger and fries for me from the local diner.  How did he know? I literally inhaled the burger and wasn't able to finish the fries.  Then as usual I planted myself at the desk, and logged onto the laptop to do a little writing.  After writing a few lines, I actually woke up to the realization that I had fallen asleep, mid-sentence, mouth agape and head rolled aside on my shoulder.  That's when I turned to Boyfriend who was sitting on the couch reading and said, "Hey, do you need to use the computer?"  Because I could really use that couch.

Recipe: Ale Braised Beef Stew

Unfortunately for Boyfriend, my work schedule no-longer affords us the luxury of eating dinner together every evening, let alone making home-cooked meals.  He's no whiz in the kitchen, and the options for take-out in our neighborhood are really limited. So a couple times a week, I try to prepare some homemade "TV dinners" for us.  The tricky thing of it is, they have to be things that taste just as good, if not better, after sitting in the fridge and being re-heated later.

Stews are obvious winners for heat-and-eat meals. In culinary school we were taught to make Boeuf Bourgignon, Lamb Navarin and  Coq au Vin - all essentially braised stews.  While their ingredients differ, they are all prepared using similar techniques. I love making stews.  It's always a good exercise in layering flavors and textures, and incorporates several essential cooking techniques.  At home, one of our favorite stews is this beef stew braised in a nice mellow brown ale.

Ale Braised Beef Stew

Ingredients, Serves 4-6:

for the braise:

1-1/2 lbs.  beef shoulder steak, trimmed and cut into 1" - 1-1/2" pieces

salt & freshly ground pepper

vegetable oil

1   large onion peeled and diced (approx. 10 oz.)

1  4" length carrot, quartered lengthwise (approx. 5 oz.)

1  stalk of celery cut into 4"  lengths (approx. 2 oz.)

1 Tbsp.   tomato paste

2 Tbsp.  all purpose flour

1  12oz. bottle of brown ale, such as Newcastle or Smithwicks

1   generous bunch of fresh thyme

2 - 3   bay leaves

for the vegetable garnish:

2  cups  yukon gold potatoes, peeled and diced (approx. 3 medium potatoes)

2 cups   carrots, peeled and large diced (approx. 10 oz. or 1-1/2 large carrots)

1 cup   celery, large diced (approx. 2 stalks)

Procedure:

Step 1 - Braise the meat

1.  Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.  Generously season the meat with salt and pepper.  Heat enough oil in a dutch oven or large saucepan to coat the bottom. It should be hot but not smoking.

Seasoning meat

2. Working in batches so that you don't crowd the pan, brown the meat on all sides. If you crowd the pan, the meat will steam instead of brown. If you leave too much space the oil and brown bits (known as "sucs") stuck on the bottom of the pan will burn.

browning meat

3. After removing the last batch of meat from the pan, add a tablespoon of fresh oil, if needed, and cook carrot sticks until they are slightly browned. Lower the heat, then add the onions and celery sticks. Season with a pinch of salt and sweat the vegetables until the onions are soft and not quite translucent.

4. Add the tomato paste and cook for 2-3 minutes, stirring to coat the vegetables.

Vegetable-tomato paste mixture

5. Return the meat to the pan and sprinkle the mixture with flour. Stir everything together and cook for about 2-3 minutes more. This method is referred to as "singer" (pronounced SAN-jay). The flour acts as a thickener, and cooking it before adding the liquid removes any raw flour taste.

Coating meat and vegetables with flour

6. Add enough of the ale to almost cover the meat and vegetables, scraping up the brown bits ("sucs") from the bottom of the pan. Raise the heat to bring the liquid to a simmer. Simmer on low for about 5 minutes to cook off some of the alcohol.

deglazing with Smithwicks ale

7. Add the thyme and bay leaf and give the pot a stir just to make sure there is nothing sticking to the bottom of the pan. Cover and put it into the oven for 60-90 minutes, checking periodically to make sure the stew is not boiling to rapidly, but maintaining a bare simmer.

Meanwhile prepare the vegetable garnishes.

Here is where you may say, "What? Don't you just cook the vegetables in the pot with the meat? Why go to all the trouble of cooking the vegetables separately?" Well, here's the thing. I used to use a recipe that said, oh, cook the meat for such and such a time, and add the vegetables during the last half hour of cooking. Well, cooking the vegetables slowly for a half hour means that all their flavor (not to mention their color) gets lost into the liquid and while they may absorb some of the flavor of the meat, in the end all the components of the stew just taste the same. Also, you want to be able to cook your meat until it's melt-in-your-mouth tender. If you add the vegetables too early and the meat is not done, then the vegetables just turn to mush. Personally, I like my vegetables to have a little bite and to preserve some their flavor and color. So I add the large chunks of carrot and celery in the beginning to flavor the braise, then remove them later (the onions just disintegrate into the stew anyway) and add diced carrots, potatoes, and celery that have been cooked separately. This way I can make sure each component is perfectly cooked and seasoned before bringing them together for their final hurrah. By the way, in school they made us cut all our vegetable garnishes into "cocottes" or little football shapes, which I think is wasteful phooey. At home I just cut my veg into bite size pieces, about the same size so they cook evenly.

1. To cook the potatoes, put the diced potatoes in a saucepan and cover with cold salted water. Make sure to use a good amount of salt, and if you wish, you can add some sliced onions and garlic, and a few sprigs of thyme for additional flavor. Bring the water to a rapid boil, them immediately remove from the heat. Let the potatoes sit in the water until they cool to room temperature. As they cool, they should continue to cook, so DO NOT put them on ice. By the time they cool, they should be cooked through.

blanching potatoes

2. To blanch the carrots and celery, bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. And I mean salted - the water should taste like sea-water. Add the carrots, and cook until al dente. For me after the water returned to a boil, it took about 3 minutes. Remove the carrots from the boiling water, and place them immediately in a bowl of ice water to stop them from cooking further. As a general rule, the amount of time it took the carrots to cook, will be the same as the amount of time it will take for them to cool fully in the ice water. Repeat with the celery. The celery took a little longer, probably 5-6 minutes after the water came back to a boil. A blanching basket comes in really handy for this, but I don't have a blanching basket at home, so I use a steamer basket. I simply put the steamer basket in the bottom of the pot, dump the carrots in, and when they were done, I use a pair of tongs to grab the handle of the basket and lift everything out.

blanching carrots

a steamer basket doubles as a large "spider"

carrots, cooling in ice water

cooked vegetable garnish

Assemble the stew:

1.  Once the meat is tender, remove the bundle of herbs, and large chunks of carrot and celery.

2.  Transfer the pot to medium heat on the stove top. Check your potatoes. If they are still underdone, drain them and add them to the stew first and simmer until they are cooked through.

3.  Add the cooked carrots and celery and adjust the seasoning.  If you are saving the stew for later, simply divide it into portion sized containers and refrigerate.  If you are serving the stew right away, simmer for about 15 minutes more until the vegetables are hot and have absorbed some of liquid.  You will notice that there is not a lot of liquid - just enough to coat all the ingredients and form a puddle at the bottom of the bowl to soak up with a nice crusty piece of sourdough bread.

simmering vegetables briefly with meat