Edible Tulip

Sorrel Cream Sauce for Grilled/Pan-Fried Fish

Most people know arugula as the smallish, longish, bittery, lemony salad leaf which is too bad because sorrel is so much better. It's a bit hardier, a bit earthier, has more bite, more pucker, more to chew on, so to speak. I find arugula sort of obnoxious. It's been exploited to the point of being used for its affiliations. You walk into a fancy coffee shop that sells hot pressed sandwiches and you know one is going to include arugula greens with chicken breast. Sigh. Yawn. Anyway, my point is that if you like the taste of arugula, and it's not for everyone, then I'm pretty certain you'll enjoy the experience of sorrel. I eat green peppers raw as I would a nectarine, circling the core, tossing only the stem. And I like my apples as hard and as sour as they come, fresh from the branch, eye peeling assertiveness. So, this is my kind of heavenly herb. One year, a long while back, I was delighted to find a patch of something edible growing in the shade in the perennial garden at my parents country house in the hills outside of Creemore. It had a tight root and stem base but blew out from there in an array of oblong fluttering green. It has a short period of grace before it turns hostile. I think most everything I love shares that characteristic. Early to late Spring is its glory period. Pick it while you can or ask a vendor at a local farmer's market if they have any. They should, it grows in any unfertilized field and grassy expanse. When it starts to flower whorled spikes of red, and the leaves become purple, it will be too bitter to eat, so just leave it be until next spring.

I love it shredded and tossed into salads, the surprising element in an otherwise traditionally simple salad of mixed tender lettuces. It's brazen and bold just so you know I told you so. Sorrel is derived from the Teutonic word for "sour" so take that as a hint. It's not easy for many to love it raw but I can attest that almost everyone thinks its perfect when it's mildly steamed and tossed with butter and cream to make a fish sauce. As you know, I like food that takes about 5 - 10 minutes to prepare. Finicky things are not my forte. This fish dish is the work of minutes. 

Sorrel is tart and acidic. Choose an oily fish to pair with the sauce: rainbow trout, sea bass, mackerel, salmon. 

Sorrel Sauce

1 1/2 cups sorrel

4 filets of fish

Sea salt

Freshly ground pepper

1 tsp olive oil

1/4 cup unsalted butter

1 egg yolk

1 tbsp whipping cream 

Recipe Instructions

Wash the sorrel thoroughly and spin dry. Chop the leaves into coarse pieces.

Season the fish fillets with the salt and pepper. Add the olive oil to a heavy bottomed frying pan over medium heat. When the oil gets heated through, add the fillets skin side down. When the flesh is becoming opaque and white, flip the fish over for another minute. Transfer to a warm platter.

Place the butter in the bottom of the frying pan and heat until just melted over a medium flame. When the butter begins to froth, toss in the sorrel, which will wilt and turn a gray green. Remove the pan from the heat and let cool for one minute. Beat in the egg yolk, season to taste with salt and fresh pepper, and then stir in the cream. Spoon over the fish fillets and serve with baby potatoes tossed in olive oil and coarse sea salt.

Note: sorrel can be used in recipes that call for wilted spinach, i.e. omelets and soups. It has healing properties that aid in digestion and stave off scurvy. It's also packed with vitamins C and A. So get foraging and let me know where you find any growing wild. I bet there's some on the hillsides around the community gardens at High Park.

Repost: Rummaging for Ramps

The following was first published in April 2004. It's a repost on Ramps, or Wild Leeks. I wonder if they are still edible. It's getting late in the season. I didn't get around to foraging wild leeks this year, despite the ubiquity of their presence all over the brown mulch covered hillsides on the Mingay Tract in Creemore. I wonder about them, from my 3rd floor desk overlooking Fran's Diner, staring face first into varying tiers of beige brick, as they shoot, prosper, flail, wither in 6 short weeks. I did try to dig one out of the ground one afternoon to see the size of its bulb but if you don't have a good digging tool on you, and I didn't, then you have to scratch through enough dirt for a hen to be happy, and you'll still result in breaking the stem from the bulb and a week's worth of dirty fingernails. The roots are stubborn.

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As soon as I get up north I'm heading out to the dense woods and getting down on all fours with a trowel and a plastic bag. The leeks are generally in full thrush by mid-May in Ontario. By mid-June they're usually getting tough and woody and rather dried out.

A sure sign of spring’s arrival in Ontario is the large clumps of malodorous green leaves in our wooded areas. These are the edible herbaceous spring ephemeral known as wild leeks or ramps (Allium triococcum, Ait.). Allium is the ancient name for garlic from Latin and the bulb of the wild leek, although flavoured like an onion, has a distinctly garlicky zing when cooked.

In late April look for leaves that coil to form colonies that push through the latent ground cover of mulch. The leaves eventually expand and resemble lily-of-the-valley clusters. They appear in patches and thrive in damp soil. You will need a small spade to loosen the earth around the base of the plant so you do not destroy the tender bulb. The bulb is encased in a thin netting which can easily be removed by rubbing your fingers together with the bulb between them or by pulling off the sheathe while running the bulb under cool water. Use both the leaves and the bulb in any recipe that calls for leeks, cooking onions, green onions or garlic.

Long before farmers and harvesters referred to the practice of responsible food production as sustainable agriculture, early settlers already understood the simplicity of re-growth. They used to replant the roots that extend from the base of the bulb so the ramps would continue to grow and flower. The wild leek plant flowers in late summer when the edible bulb has grown too mature and bitter to use. Cherokees and other tribes pickled the wild leeks to extend the life of the bulb and considered them a delicacy. Wild leeks have also been a large part of the regional cuisine of Southern Appalachia. Entire towns get together to celebrate spring by hosting Ramp Festivals known as “Dancin’ and Stinkin’ ” (due to the pungent aroma the wild leeks give off when eaten raw). And finally, on a medicinal note, an ancient folklore remedy suggests rubbing the juice of a crushed bulb on an insect sting to reduce redness and swelling. A timely remedy matched to the arrival of our Ontario honeybees.

Risotto with Ramps

6 leek bulbs, white part only, cleaned and sliced thin
1 Tbsp. olive oil
1 cup Arborio rice (Italian rice)
3 cups vegetable broth
½ cup dry white wine
½ cup radicchio, sliced thin (if available)
½ cup fresh Parmesan, grated
3 Tbsp. Italian parsley, chopped
1 Tbsp. fresh squeezed lemon juice
Salt & pepper

Cook the leeks in the oil in a large saucepan until tender. Add the uncooked rice. Stir over medium heat for 5 minutes. Meanwhile, bring the broth to a boil in a medium saucepan, reduce and simmer.

Add 1-cup broth to the rice, stirring constantly until it is absorbed. Add the wine and let absorb. Continue adding ½ cups of broth until the rice is slightly creamy and just tender. Just before serving, add the radicchio, the lemon juice, the Parmesan and top with the chopped parsley. Season with salt and pepper.

Serves 4 – 6.

Junk Shop Finds -- Pictures and Pitchers

Today was the day I was going to start eating my way up the block on Yonge Street. As with most plans, as soon as you make them, something comes up and veers everything off course. In this case, my dog got sick yesterday, we spent several hours at an emergency clinic, and unwilling to leave him alone, I took the day off. So I'm not even anywhere near Yonge Street and eating a Caribbean roti is about the furthest thing from my mind. Fingers crossed this whole blood in urine thing is an antibiotic treatment away from optimal health for Simon. He's been in the black swampy sewers that hide themselves in the wetlands in the ravine and I'm hoping, because the other diagnoses were much more serious, that he simply picked up a little bacterial bug that decided to hang around in his nether regions a little past due date.

Given the vet bill, it looks like I won't be eating out for, well, the foreseeable future. So, I'm turning my focus to Where To Find Good Things Cheap in Toronto and Refurbished Relics. I tend to find thriftiness a great trait in a person, creative thriftiness even more attractive.

In addition to urban antique stores and sidewalk sales, check out estate sales at auction houses (Ritchies in Toronto, in most small towns held each Saturday morning) where you can often buy a lot for $1 which might include a box of books, old kitchen appliances, picture frames, glass bottles, etc.

1. An antique wood carved picture frame. 50 cents. Refurbished with a piece of mirror cut to size.

2. An enamel jug found in a junk shop for $2 that has become my favourite wide-mouthed vase.

 

What's For Lunch on Yonge Street?

Toronto, how I've missed you.

In the short block north from my office, I can get a tattoo, enjoy a jerk chicken dinner for $2.99 (if I was male, I'm sure I could also get a jerk to go if you know what I mean), and browse adult porn at Kinky Times. Yonge Street is an odd stretch of commerce, prostitution, and panhandling, a street the blends government offices with homeless shelters, a street flooded with public servants and those they serve. I stand in line to get a coffee and I chat with the young boy who is all bitching and complaining about having to go up to the second floor. I know what he's talking about, it's where the provincial courts are. It's like trailing a migration pattern watching the young men flock to the entrance to the correctional services. The street outside is sketchy and melancholic. It will exploit you the moment you look away. It's a neon strip, a sleazy tack of fly paper, a short story in a Raymond Carver novel. The narratives are dark and they are dirty. I am not a street urchin comfortable with oily embraces. I often turn away. I do not groove to the urban hum of bass from open windows. I steel my glance to the pavement, away from the crazies, the pimps, the teenage trannsexuals.

But they are here, and they are living large, on Yonge Street, and combined with the student population just south at Ryerson, the staff at Women's College Hospital on Grenville Street, and the various government offices along College and Bay street, it's a transient hive that expands exponentially during the day, specifically at lunch hour. I figured there must be good eats out there. Good, cheap, hole-in-the-wall food. Food that might reflect the complexity of the people and the location in itself. I took a walk north to Maitland and spotted Caribbean jerk, Nepalese, Napolitan pizza parlours, Korean Barbecue, Persian/Iranian, Middle Eastern, Halal, Thai, Mexican, and too many Japanese sushi and fusion Asian joints to list. Next week I begin my Yonge Street culinary exploration.

** In the realm of sharing good finds: Grace at 503 College Street (new spot in the former digs of Xacutti) is having an incredible Thursday night barbecue deal. For $10 you can savour a plateful of chef Dustin Gallagher's slow-braised pork shoulder, char-grilled chicken, and house-made sausage, sided with roasted Indo-spiced corn on the cob, coleslaw, and potato salad. A complimentary domestic brew is included. Only after 8 pm. And first come, first served.

"Mixing Up The Ingredients For A Great Picnic" in Oneonta, NY

In just a few short weeks, I've gone from country girl fending off wild beasts and insouciant thugs in small town Ontario near Georgian Bay to living in one of the ritziest neighbourhoods in Toronto (first I found my dream apt there and second of all it has the best dog walking for 300 miles, okay, maybe 3 miles, but still - foxes, birds, bunnies and, yup, SKUNKS) and working as a public servant. I'm not complaining about the government job, in fact, I'm enjoying it immensely. It's nice working on a team entirely made up of men. They don't make snide comments or get all passive aggressive out of the blue. The things I don't love about the provincial government offices are threefold: 1, the A/C is out of control. If they turned the temperature up a few degrees then people wouldn't put space heaters under their desk. They should be leading the efforts on reducing energy consumption in office environments. 2, communal washrooms remind me of what sloths we really are. Well, not me, but most people. Who can feel good about herself all afternoon after she tinkles all over the seat, leaving it for someone else to sit in, and leaves a bloody or stooly mess in the toilet not bothering to flush, or flush again. I feel a bit nauseaus as I even think about having to go to the restroom but a fear of a urinary tract infection keeps me from holding all day until I can make a break for home. 3, the outfits. The place is a cesspool of older women in baggy polyester beige suits and younger women in totally inappropriate (thank you for showing me you did not put on underwear today) leggings. Stockings are not pants. Especially, when you are 80 pounds overweight. I am sorry to sound judgmental but coming to work at an office for the government is not a Saturday afternoon at the mall. 

A few weeks ago I got an email from a food writer and reporter from a newspaper in the "heartland of New York State" called The Daily Star. She was writing a piece on picnic foods and wanted to feature my potato salad recipe using apple cider vinegar. This is one of the reasons I write a food blog, to exchange recipes, to share age old ideas surrounding good food and beverages, and to create a bit of an online modern "oral food culture". I liked her article so I'm linking to it here.