Good morning, GUSaroos!!! Sorry for the long absence and I'll be in and out of the diary today since I'm under the gun on getting my brief finished. Hopefully will have my hands on the transcript today so I can fill in the blanks.
Welp, Metro North commuter train from New Haven to Grand Central remains a potential death trap. My opera buddy and I traveled in on Saturday to meet friends and see an off broadway play down in Chelsea. Instead of Grand Central, we were to get off at 125th Street in Harlem because our friend would meet us there. Great ride in, get to the station, a few folks ahead of us and the door shuts on this young woman. Holy crap!!! We're all shouting -- no frigging conductor to be seen, train starts moving, we're screaming and pulling her back in -- thank god.
One guy's girlfriend had already gotten off and we had no cell service because you pretty much get into tunnel land. There were 5 of us just from our section. Get off at GC, the guy is ahead of us and giving what for to the engineer who says it isn't his fault!!!! We joined in with the young woman explaining how she could have been killed. Another guy in uniform shows up -- says he wasn't on that trip but wanted to know what the hell happened since the engineer was covering ass.
Went to three different booths in GC to lodge a complaint and got paperwork. Contacted friend who was headed back cross town and we took a cab. Great cabbie who just gave us two blank receipts and told us to stick it to Metro North. Hahahahaha!!!! No one injured so we could start a great weekend.
Our NYC friend is a retired professor (genius) like my opera buddy. Gorgeous apartment in west side 100s St. He prepared a great lunch then off we go sanely on the subway to Chelsea to meet his step-daughter at the theater. $35 seats so you know we weren't on Broadway. The play is by an Obie and Pulitzer prize winner, Doug Wright and was about Henrik Ibsen in his dotage and a sculptor. We all enjoyed the production and acting but the two professors took umbrage at the interpretation of Ibsen. My opera buddy friend taught Ibsen plays for 40 years and even took courses in Norwegian at the Univ. of Wisconsin when it wasn't destroyed by Walker.
Hours of talking about Ibsen plays and good dinner and then step daughter and I walked about Columbia Univ. campus at about 11 p.m. to midnight. Lovely. No tragedies on the Metro on the way back!!!! So that was my joyous break from the law. And I'm downloading all of Ibsen plays -- which I haven't read since I wrote my thesis on Little Eyolf back in the '80s!
Because our host made amazing soups, soup is on today's menu.
Cauliflower Soup
WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS:
For a creamy cauliflower soup without cream, we relied on cauliflower’s low insoluble fiber content to produce a velvety smooth puree. To ensure that cauliflower flavor remained at the forefront, we cooked the cauliflower in seasoned water (instead of broth), skipped the spice rack entirely, and bolstered the soup with sautéed onion and leek. We added the cauliflower to the simmering water in two stages so that we got the grassy flavor of just-cooked cauliflower and the sweeter, nuttier flavor of long-cooked cauliflower. Finally, we fried florets in butter until both browned and used each as a separate, richly flavored garnish.
Serves 4 to 6
White wine vinegar may be substituted for the sherry vinegar. Be sure to thoroughly trim the cauliflower’s core of green leaves and leaf stems, which can be fibrous and contribute to a grainy texture in the soup.
INGREDIENTS
1 head cauliflower (2 pounds)
8 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 8 pieces
1 leek, white and light green parts only, halved lengthwise, sliced thin, and washed thoroughly
1 small onion, halved and sliced thin
Salt and pepper
4 1/2 – 5 cups water
1/2 teaspoon sherry vinegar
3 tablespoons minced fresh chives
INSTRUCTIONS
1. Pull off outer leaves of cauliflower and trim stem. Using paring knife, cut around core to remove; thinly slice core and reserve. Cut heaping 1 cup of 1/2-inch florets from head of cauliflower; set aside. Cut remaining cauliflower crosswise into 1/2-inch thick slices.
2. Melt 3 tablespoons butter in large saucepan over medium-low heat. Add leek, onion, and 1 1/2 teaspoons salt; cook, stirring frequently, until leek and onion are softened but not browned, about 7 minutes.
3. Increase heat to medium-high; add 4 1/2 cups water, sliced core, and half of sliced cauliflower; and bring to simmer. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer gently for 15 minutes. Add remaining sliced cauliflower, return to simmer, and continue to cook until cauliflower is tender and crumbles easily, 15 to 20 minutes longer.
4. While soup simmers, melt remaining 5 tablespoons butter in 8-inch skillet over medium heat. Add reserved florets and cook, stirring frequently, until florets are golden brown and butter is browned and imparts nutty aroma, 6 to 8 minutes. Remove skillet from heat and use slotted spoon to transfer florets to small bowl. Toss florets with vinegar and season with salt to taste. Pour browned butter in skillet into small bowl and reserve for garnishing.
5. Process soup in blender until smooth, about 45 seconds. Rinse out pan. Return pureed soup to pan and return to simmer over medium heat, adjusting consistency with remaining water as needed (soup should have thick, velvety texture but should be thin enough to settle with flat surface after being stirred) and seasoning with salt to taste. Serve, garnishing individual bowls with browned florets, drizzle of browned butter, and chives and seasoning with pepper to taste.
TECHNIQUE
CREAMY BY NATURE
Most soups made from pureed vegetables contain cream for a simple reason: to mitigate the effects of insoluble fiber. All vegetables have both soluble and insoluble fiber, but only the soluble kind fully breaks down during cooking, which contributes viscosity to the soup. Insoluble fiber remains intact, and the best that the blades of a blender can do is break it down into smaller bits. But cauliflower has a leg up on other vegetables. It’s very low in overall fiber—and only half of it is insoluble. This means that cauliflower is easily pureed into a silky-smooth soup with no cream at all.
TECHNIQUE
VARY COOKING TIME TO COAX OUT CAULIFLOWER’S DIFFERENT FLAVORS
While developing our recipe for cauliflower soup, we discovered that cauliflower’s flavor changes dramatically depending on how long you cook it. Shorter cooking times bring out its cabbagelike flavors, while longer cooking times turn it nuttier and sweet. Too much cooking drives off all its flavor. To bring the full spectrum of possible flavors into our soup, we cooked some of the cauliflower for 15 minutes and the remainder for 30 minutes.
15 MINUTES: The punchy, cabbagelike taste and the sulfurous odor of a compound known as carbon disulfide are dominant.
30 MINUTES: Carbon disulfide dissipates, allowing the sweeter, nuttier flavors of other substances known as thioureas to break through.
60 MINUTES: After an hour, nearly all the flavor has dissipated, leaving the cauliflower bland and flavorless.
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