So-Easy Sides for a Thanksgiving Marathon: Day 2 What’s cooking? Roasted Butternut Squash with Fried Apples and Spiced Pecans

We’re on a roll, people. Thanksgiving arrives in less than a week, no matter how hard you might wish it would wait just a few more days. And everyone’s got a few houseguests, so there are sheets to change, towels to wash, menus to plan. If only you didn’t love them so much...

Amid the flurry of shopping and cleaning and cooking, it’s really easy to forget about things like... the table setting. THE TABLE SETTING???!! OMG, I HAVE TO SET THE TABLE...

So I want you all to calm down. The Kitchen Goddess has your back. And while I won’t be coming over to your house to help, I do have links here to a couple of my favorite posts, with heartfelt recommendations about candles and napkins and table decor. Nothing brilliant, mind you, but some ideas, and God knows, we could all use someone else’s thoughts these days.

On the subject of table setting, I’m one of those people who think that – surely – something in the yard will work. Something free. And you’d be surprised at how a little of that cheap but sparkly leaf-shaped confetti from places like Party City will dress up the table and add a little fun. Take a look here: Table Settings & Napkin Folding

The second thing many people forget about are the candles. I’m a little over-zealous on this topic, but with good reasons:

1. Everyone looks better with a little candlelight.

2. Candlelight is prettier and more flattering than electric light.

3. Candles are a symbol of hospitality and hope, and we could all use a little hope.

Here’s a link to my full post on candles – with pointers on use and storage – which I hope will inspire you: Candles

* * *

And now on to the food. Yesterday, I wrote about cauliflower, a white vegetable. Today, we’re moving on to orange, and my favorite orange veggie, butternut squash.

The easy way

Last year, the Kitchen Goddess discovered – belatedly – that her grocery store stocks pre-cut butternut squash. I say belatedly because it was after chopping it herself. And while I don’t go for pre-cut stuff like celery and onions, I will make an exception for butternut squash, if only because it turns my hands orange. Now, whether or not you buy yours whole and chop it yourself or luck into the pre-cut stuff at your grocery store, butternut squash is a magnificent food.

The hard way -- but not that bad.

First off, it’s a great source of fiber and vitamins (A, C, and E) and minerals (manganese, magnesium, potassium). Roasted, puréed, or mashed, its sweet, nutty taste becomes even richer with cooking, and it pairs well with any number of spices and fruits. Like apples. Fried apples. Can’t you just taste the combo?

Today’s recipe is from Food & Wine magazine, whose writers assure you the whole thing can be done in an hour. But I’m pretty sure they’re assuming either that you bought the squash already diced or that you forgot to start the timer until after the squash was cut. Whatever. It’s well worth the little bit of trouble to cut it up yourself if you can’t buy it cut. Beyond that part, the dish can easily be completed in an hour. Once you have the squash in the oven, there’s plenty of time to peel, dice, and cook the apples.

And now, a confession. The Kitchen Goddess got hold of this recipe and thought how nice it would be with some sugared/spiced pecan bits as a garnish. And the rather large inventory of nuts in her fridge turned the thought into a mandate. So you don’t have to add them, but they do contribute texture and flavor. And while the KG made her own (see recipe below), you could easily grab some at your market or a fancy food shop.

Roasted Butternut Squash with Fried Apples and Spiced Pecans

Adapted from Robert Stehling in Food & Wine magazine, November 2002.

Serves 6-8.

Ingredients
2 pounds of butternut squash, peeled and cut into ¾-inch dice (If you buy it whole, get an extra few ounces to allow for the loss of skin and seeds.)
7 tablespoons unsalted butter
1½ tablespoons fresh dill, finely chopped
Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
1¼ pounds Granny Smith apples (about 2 large), peeled, seeded, and cut into ¾-inch dice
1½ tablespoons brown sugar (light or dark)
½ teaspoon cinnamon
Optional garnish: sugared/spiced pecans, chopped (recipe follows)

Directions
Preheat the oven to 425º.

Melt 4 tablespoons of the butter. In a large bowl, toss the diced squash with the butter and the chopped dill. Spread the squash in a large, rimmed baking pan and season lightly with salt and pepper.

Roast the squash 30 minutes, stirring once midway through the roasting time. It should be very tender and starting to brown.

While the squash is roasting, melt the remaining 3 tablespoons of butter on high in a large skillet (preferably non-stick). Add the diced apples in a single layer and cook on a high setting, without disturbing them, for 2-2½ minutes, then turn them over as best you can and continue to cook them, undisturbed, another 2-2½ minutes.

In a small bowl, stir together the brown sugar and cinnamon, and sprinkle it over the apples. Stir the apples another 2 minutes on medium-high heat, until lightly caramelized.

When the squash has finished roasting, toss it in a large bowl with the fried apples and serve warm or at room temperature. Garnish with chopped sugared/spiced pecans.

Sugared/Spiced Pecans

Adapted from Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything (2008).

Ingredients
Neutral oil for greasing the pan
2 cups water
2 cups sugar
1 pound pecan halves
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground clove
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
½ teaspoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon ground fennel or fennel pollen
1 teaspoon Aleppo pepper (or ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper)
1 teaspoon salt

Directions
Pre-heat the oven to 450º. Liberally grease a large, rimmed baking sheet with a neutral oil (peanut or grapeseed or canola).

In a deep skillet over high heat, stir together the water and sugar until the sugar dissolves. Bring the syrup to a boil and add the nuts and the spices. Stir well to combine.

Reduce the heat to medium and cook the nuts, stirring frequently, for 15-20 minutes, or until most of the water has evaporated and the syrup is very thick.

Turn the heat to its lowest setting (to keep the syrup from solidifying while you remove the nuts) and use a slotted spoon to transfer the nuts from the skillet and onto the oiled baking sheet. Let the excess syrup drip off the nuts while you’re still holding them over the skillet.

Roast the nuts in the oven for 10 minutes, turning them once or twice with a spatula. Let the nuts cool before handling. (You may have to use a spatula to scrape them off the baking sheet.) Store in an airtight container for a week or two.

So-Easy Sides for a Thanksgiving Marathon: Day 1 What’s Cooking? Roasted Cauliflower with Tangy Whipped Cheese Sauce

Every year, the Kitchen Goddess goes a little nuts trying to find new ways to fill your Thanksgiving plate with veggies. And last year, one of my friends pointed out that these ideas don’t actually emerge from the KG’s thought process until rather late in the game – the point at which you’ve already made many of those critical menu decisions, and the KG’s fabulous suggestions only muddy the waters. So this year, I thought I’d start waaay earlier. But you have to walk before you can run, and the word “early” has always been a bit problematic for me. So here we are a full two days before the usual launch point. It’s the best I could do this year.

I did have a focus this time around on dishes that will at least ease the stress level in your kitchen. No elaborate processes or hard-to-find ingredients, no unfamiliar terms, no special garnishes that require a trip to God-knows-where. And each a refreshing take on a veggie that will pique the interest of your Thanksgiving guests.

So without further ado, I present to you a whole cauliflower. Yessiree. You take that sucker, trim the leaves and stem, and roast it whole. But first, you give it a nice warm bath in wine and a bit of flavoring. Whew – you could make a sponge taste good with that bath. Okay, maybe not a sponge. But the cauliflower is tender and perfectly seasoned throughout. The subsequent roasting adds a browning and a bit of flavorful crust.  My skeptical hubby practically inhaled it.

And then there’s the cheese sauce. No cook-ee, no worry. Make the whole thing in a food processor, and drizzle a little olive oil on top. Serve at room temp. (If you don’t have a food processor, you’ll have to wait for tomorrow’s recipe.)

Kitchen Goddess note on cauliflower: Yes, it’s good for you, and a great low-fat, low-carb substitute for rice or potatoes. But did you know it’s also popular with mathematicians for its fractal dimension? (Careful what you’re thinking – the KG is a mathematician.) Uh-huh. That means two things. First, every branch, or “module,” is similar to the entire cauliflower. And then, as modules become more distant from the center, the angle between them is 360º divided by the golden ratio. Aren’t you glad you asked?

Back in the real world, here it is – the first of the Kitchen Goddess’s so-easy sides. It’s adapted from the pages of Food52.com’s Genius Recipes, one of my new go-to sources. To help you have a happy, stress-free Thanksgiving!

Roasted Cauliflower with Tangy Whipped Cheese Sauce

Adapted from Alon Shaya in Food52’s Genius Recipes.

Serves 4-6.

Ingredients
For the cauliflower:
1 whole head cauliflower (white, orange, purple, or even a fantastic Romanesco)
6 cups water
2½ cups dry white wine
⅓ cup olive oil, plus more for drizzling
¼ cup kosher salt
3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 tablespoon Aleppo pepper (can substitute crushed red pepper flakes)
1 tablespoon sugar
1 large bay leaf

For the cheese sauce:
4 ounces fresh goat cheese
3 ounces cream cheese
3 ounces crumbled feta cheese
⅓ cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons olive oil
Finely ground salt such as sea salt or Maldon salt

Directions

Before you start on the cauliflower, take the three cheeses for the sauce out of the fridge and set them aside. And now that you’ve done that,...

Remove the leaves on the cauliflower and trim the stem back to where the florets start.








In a large pot, combine the water, white wine, olive oil, salt, lemon juice, butter, Aleppo pepper, sugar and bay leaf. Stir well to combine until the sugar and salt dissolve. Bring the mixture to a boil.

Slowly and carefully – no splashing! – lower the cauliflower into the broth, and spoon some of the broth over the top. (It doesn’t matter if it’s crown up or down, as you’ll be turning it occasionally.) Reduce the heat and simmer the cauliflower for 20 minutes, turning it over occasionally. When it’s done, you should be able to pierce the center easily with a knife.

While the cauliflower is poaching, preheat the oven to 475º.

When the cauliflower has finished poaching, turn off the heat and, using a sieve or a couple of slotted spoons, carefully transfer the cauliflower to a rimmed baking pan. Drain the cauliflower well before putting it into the oven. Roast 35-40 minutes at 475º, rotating the pan after 20 minutes.

While the cauliflower is roasting, put all the cheese sauce ingredients into the bowl of a food processor and pulse until smooth. Add salt to taste, and transfer the sauce to a small bowl. Drizzle a small amount of olive oil on top. Kitchen Goddess note: You can make the cheese sauce up to a day earlier, and refrigerate it. Bring it out 30 minutes before serving.






When the cauliflower is well browned, move it to a plate and drizzle it lightly with olive oil. Serve with tangy cheese sauce.

And come back tomorrow for number 2 of my So-Easy Sides.

Did Somebody Say “Gesundheit”? What’s cooking? Shakshuka with Goat Cheese and Broccoli Rabe

While working on this dish, I started thinking about how many cloves of garlic I’ve chopped in my life. Surely thousands. And yet I’m not significantly better at it than ever. Not like those chefs who ninja their garlic in nanoseconds and turn out perfectly even, teeny-tiny dice. I watched a video posted by one of my food blogger friends, and it was truly impressive. I’m not going to give you the link because it would make me look bad, and that’s not what this blog is for. This blog is for making me look GOOD.

On the other hand, I heard Ruth Reichl (former editor of Gourmet) speak not long ago about her new cookbook, and she says she’s never had a cooking lesson, so her knife skills are hopeless. My kind of woman.

So in the run-up to Thanksgiving, we all need to be conserving our strength for the Herculean tasks to come. And as usual, the Kitchen Goddess is working on a few nice side dishes for you that will make veggies the star of the show. But in the meantime,...

Shakshuka! Sounds like someone sneezed, doesn’t it? Instead, it’s a terrific dish for a Sunday night supper or when you just want something straightforward that doesn’t dirty a bunch of bowls/pans. Conceptually, it’s a lot like a frittata in the sense that you can pump it up with whatever veggies you’ve got on hand, add some cheese, change the herbs, toss in some olives, etc. And it’s quite good reheated the next day for lunch.

At its most basic, shakshuka (also spelled shakshouka) is a dish of eggs poached in tomato sauce with onions, peppers, paprika, and cumin. It’s a staple of North African cuisines – Libyan, Tunisian, Algerian, Moroccan, and Egyptian – where it’s often served for breakfast; but it’s sufficiently hearty, especially with the various additions, that it’s also served at the evening meal, especially in winter. According to Wikipedia (who else?), shakshuka is also popular in Israel, where it was introduced by Tunisian Jews who immigrated there in the 1950s; and it’s strikingly similar to the Turkish dish, menemen.

So here’s the version the Kitchen Goddess served this week. What I liked most about it is the way the sweetness of the caramelized onions and peppers balanced with the bitterness of the broccoli rabe and the goat cheese. And my hubby sneaked a second helping when I wasn’t looking. So try mine or see what’s in your fridge that’ll make it your own.

Kitchen Goddess note: Broccoli rabe – pronounced rahb – is a relatively bitter green, more popular in Italy than the U.S., but it has gained popularity over the last few years. Its use in France goes back to the 16th century. As you might expect, it’s packed with vitamins and cancer-fighting agents. It’s also a good source of protein, and one of the best sources of vitamin K, which protects against osteoporosis. 

This is a “saucy” dish, so you’ll want to serve it with something to sop up the juices – a crusty sourdough, pita, and naan all come to mind. It’s a one-dish meal, so you won’t need anything else.

Shakshuka with Goat Cheese and Broccoli Rabe

Adapted from Melissa Clark in The New York Times.

Serves 4.

Ingredients

Broccoli rabe

1 bunch broccoli rabe (also known as rapini)
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 large onion, halved and thinly sliced
1 large red bell pepper, halved, seeded, and thinly sliced
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1-2 teaspoons minced garlic
1½ teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon sweet paprika (option: smoky paprika or a combination)
½ teaspoon Aleppo pepper (or ⅛ teaspoon cayenne pepper)
1 28-ounce can of whole plum tomatoes, with juice, coarsely chopped [Kitchen Goddess note: You can chop the tomatoes before adding them to the skillet, or add them to the skillet and chop them there, or use a potato masher on them. Or buy canned chopped tomatoes. The KG likes her tomatoes to be less uniformly chopped, but then you knew she would.]
4 ounces fresh goat cheese, crumbled
¾ teaspoon kosher salt
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
6 large eggs
Optional garnishes: chopped Italian parsley and chopped cilantro, hot sauce

Mise en place -- this recipe is a lot easier if you have everything ready.

Directions
Bring a pot of well-salted water to a boil and drop in your broccoli rabe for 5 minutes. Drain it well and chop it into pieces about an inch long. Reserve.

Preheat the oven to 375º.

Put a large, oven-proof skillet over medium/medium-low heat and add the olive oil. Add the onion and bell pepper and cook, stirring frequently, about 15 minutes. You want the vegetables to soften, and for the onions to get golden, not brown. Stir in the tomato paste and the garlic, and continue to cook, stirring, another minute. Add the cumin, paprika, and Aleppo pepper, and continue to cook, stirring, another minute.

Stir in the chopped tomatoes with their juices. Simmer the mixture for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until tomatoes have thickened. Add the crumbled goat cheese and stir. (It’s okay if the goat cheese isn’t thoroughly mixed. Mix it as much as you’d like.) Taste the sauce for seasoning.

With a spoon, hollow out a small area in the sauce, about an inch from the edge of the skilllet, and crack an egg into it. Do the same with the remaining eggs, spacing the eggs evenly around the skillet. Season the eggs lightly with salt and pepper.

Transfer the skillet to the oven and cook at 375º for 7-9 minutes, depending on how runny you like your eggs. Sprinkle with parsley and cilantro.

Oops! I forgot the parsley and cilantro. Ah, well...

Serve with hot sauce and some type of bread. The Kitchen Goddess recommends crusty sourdough, naan, or other flatbread.

No Tricks – Just a Holiday Treat What’s cooking? Rosemary Shortbread Cookies with Tomato Jam

I read somewhere that most children think Halloween is the most important holiday after Christmas/Hanukkah. Makes perfect sense to me. After all, who doesn’t like pretending to be someone or something else and getting candy as a reward? Even the spooky/scary part is fun for many, because deep down, you know it’s not real fear, but excitement.

For me, the scariest part about Halloween is sticking my hand inside the giant pumpkin. I’ve mentioned before that the Kitchen Goddess isn’t fond of slimy or gooey, and hardly anything beats slimy and gooey more than a pumpkin’s innards. So I really have to brace myself before the annual pumpkin-carving ritual.

And it is a ritual. No one else in my family – and that would be my husband – seems to have any interest in buying the beast, deciding on the face, and gutting/carving the flesh. Just saying it that way makes me feel a little creepy. But I love Halloween even if no little ’weeners show up at our doorstep. More candy for me.

These days, I also have to send Halloween cookies off to New Jersey. One batch for the grandkids and another for the hospital staff where my younger son is a third year resident. I figure it can only help his popularity to show up with a tin of cookies now and then.

Once Halloween is over, though, the real pressure sets in. It’s the start of the holiday season, with all sorts of demands for hostessing and gift-giving. (I refuse on principle to use the non-verb “gifting.”) So today, I will get you started in that regard with a recipe for terrific shortbread cookies and a savory tomato jam you can use to turn those cookies into delicious tea cookies. It’s a combination from the kitchen of David Lebovitz, whose book, The Perfect Scoop, is my bible for frozen desserts.

I found this recipe on Epicurious.com, where it received almost universal raves, for the cookies alone or as sandwiches with the marvelous tomato jam. The cookies are buttery but light, with a really sophisticated flavor that’s only mildly sweet. And the tomato jam is also terrific with a sharp cheese.

Rosemary Shortbread Cookies with Tomato Jam

Adapted from epicurious.com and Ready for Dessert: My Best Recipes, by David Lebovitz

Makes 40-44 cookies, or 20-22 cookie sandwiches.

Ingredients
2 cups (260 grams) all-purpose flour
¼ cup (40 grams) yellow cornmeal or polenta
½ teaspoon salt
10 tablespoons sugar
6 ounces (1½ sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 ounces Crisco
2 large egg yolks
1½  tablespoons fresh rosemary leaves, finely chopped
1 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
Tomato Jam (see below)

Directions
In a mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, cornmeal, and salt. Set aside.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the sugar, butter, and Crisco together at medium speed, just until smooth. Add the egg yolks one at a time, beating until well combined, then mix in the chopped rosemary. Add the dry ingredients in a couple of batches, mixing until the dough is smooth and holds together.







Divide the dough in half and place each half on a sheet of wax paper lightly dusted with flour. Using your hands and the wax paper, mold each half into a log about 6-7 inches long and 1¾-2 inches in diameter. Wrap the wax paper around the logs, and place the logs in the fridge until firm, at least an hour. (You can refrigerate the logs overnight, but if you do, wrap them again in Saran Wrap to keep them from drying out.)




When you are ready to bake, preheat the oven to 350º, with racks positioned in the upper and lower thirds of the oven. To make the dough easier to slice, stick the logs into the freezer for 5-10 minutes.

Line a couple of baking sheets with baker’s parchment. Slice the logs into disks about ¼ inch wide, and place the disks on the parchment about ½ inch apart. Bake about 12 minutes, rotating the pans halfway through. Keep an eye out as the time grows short, because they can get overbrown quickly. You want just the edges of the cookies to brown lightly.

Kitchen Goddess note: The KG must be more hot-blooded than she thought, because at some point the logs got a bit soft from holding them while she sliced, producing “disks” that were slightly off-round. Undeterred, she simply mashed them into shape, which meant that some of the disks had more of a mound shape. But they still developed a flat side in the baking, and made perfectly decent sandwiches. And they still tasted great. The lesson here is not to get your knickers in a twist over the shapes, as long as they’re reasonably round.

Let the cookies cool in the pan for a few minutes, then transfer to racks to cool completely before making them into sandwiches.

To make into sandwiches, spread 1-1½ teaspoons of the jam on the underside of a cookie, then add a second cookie, with the flat, bottom side into the jam. You can store the filled cookies in an airtight container for 3-4 days; or you could store the cookies without jam – again, in an airtight container – and add jam when you’re getting ready to serve. Also, you can make the dough and store it in the freezer for up to a month.

Tomato Jam

Adapted from epicurious.com and Ready for Dessert: My Best Recipes, by David Lebovitz

Makes 2 cups.

Ingredients
2¼ pounds ripe tomatoes (about 5 large)
2 cups sugar
2 or 3 fresh grinds of black pepper
⅛ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon Aleppo pepper (optional)
1 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon juice

Directions
Bring a large saucepan of water to a boil. With a paring knife, core the stem end of each tomato, then cut a shallow X on the bottom.

Place the tomatoes, one or two at a time, into the boiling water for about 30 seconds, then remove with a slotted spoon and let cool. The skins will have loosened, so once the tomatoes are cool enough to handle, peel the skins off. Discard the skins and the water.

Cut the tomatoes in half horizontally and gently squeeze or spoon out the seeds and juice. Dice the tomatoes into ½-inch pieces.

Put the diced tomatoes in the saucepan and stir in the sugar, pepper, and salt. Cook over medium heat for about 1 hour 15 minutes, stirring frequently with a wooden spoon to keep the tomatoes from sticking to the bottom of the pan.

Once most of the liquid has evaporated – i.e., you can draw the spoon across the bottom of the pan and the jam doesn’t immediately come back together – remove it from the heat and stir in the Aleppo pepper and lemon juice. If, during the cooking, you see foam  rising to the top, you may want to skim it off with a large spoon. (Removing the foam makes the jam clearer.) If you like to use a candy thermometer, the jam should reach 220º when ready.

Ladle the jam into clean jars. Cover tightly and let it cool before refrigerating. It’ll keep at least six months in the fridge. Or you can process it like preserves and it’ll keep outside the fridge for a year.

Happy Halloween!

A Meal for the One-Handed What’s cooking? Swiss Chard and Mushroom Tart with Whole Wheat Pastry

This post took forever because I couldn’t figure out what to call it. Mostly I came up with a lot of weak humor:

Falling All Over Again
You’ve Got Nailed
Shoulder to Shoulder
A Stitch in Time Adds Nine
The Slings of Misfortune
What Goes Around the Back Then Comes Around the Front

My friends and a few readers know that almost exactly five years ago, I performed a balletic leap out of my shower and onto the tile floor of our New Jersey bathroom. The resulting fall sent me into surgery to reconstruct my rotator cuff, and robbed me of a trip to the Amalfi Coast. A year and lots of physical therapy later, I made it back to Italy and have been fine ever since.

Then this year, we went to Sicily, where we wandered through wineries and ruins for a week. Our group rented a house for a second week, and that’s where my beloved tripped and fell on his shoulder. So we cut the trip short and returned to New Jersey where the same darling surgeon performed his magic on my hubby.

So now the shoe is on the other foot – or, better yet, the sling is on the other shoulder. The patient must be the nurse, and the nurse must be the patient. And when you have these ups and downs, it’s a good thing to store the memories. My husband and I are recalling, from our new vantage points, what life is like with a person in a sling. A person who can’t tie their shoes or cut their meat or even get dressed without some help. A person who might be a bit crabby now and then, because it’s hard to get 8 hours of sleep – or even 5 or 6 – when you can’t roll over in bed.

Even more, we’re reminded that the nurse must be patient, and the patient must let himself be nursed. The change in perspective has been illuminating for both of us, and we’re getting along much better than either of us anticipated.

* * *

One big improvement this time around is that the person cooking the meals is the Kitchen Goddess. So my imagination has been tested to produce meals that can be eaten with one hand – and not the dominant one, at that. I embraced the challenge. The best news has been that extending our stay in New Jersey gave me two bonus trips to my favorite farmers’ market. On my last foray, I picked up a big bunch of Swiss chard from the organic farmstand, and a bag of mushrooms from a guy who forages locally in the Garden State. A little digging on epicurious unearthed this delightfully healthy – vegetarian! – yet filling galette that originally showed up in Bon Appétit.

And what a hit it was with my poor, one-armed mate, who managed to eat it sort of like a pizza. The whole wheat flour in the crust produces a mild sweetness that works really well with the earthiness of the chard and mushrooms. And whatever you do, don’t skimp on the herb salad topping, as it balances the forest notes with a little bit of sunlight and crunch.

Kitchen Goddess note: A galette is the country cousin to a tart, made without the use of a tart pan and a bit frumpy looking because the crust is simply folded up around the filling. For my money, the galette is much more fun because you don’t have to worry about it looking perfect. You’ve seen recipes for galettes on this blog before, but mostly for desserts, although my Roasted Tomato-Bacon-Goat-Cheese Galette is another amazing and savory variation.

The crust for this galette calls for whole wheat flour, but you don’t have to use it. For a 100% all-purpose flour crust, click here to see the ingredients and methodology. But just between us girls, the Kitchen Goddess thought the whole wheat flour made the crust seem more substantial than usual. And although she grumbled and muttered to herself at having to buy even a small a bag of whole wheat flour, she now plans to use the rest for making more savory galettes. And maybe some interesting cheese sticks. Hmmm...

P.S. Don’t forget to allow an extra hour for chilling this pastry dough.

Swiss Chard and Mushroom Galette with Whole Wheat Pastry

Adapted from Bon Appétit, April 2014.

Serves 4.

Ingredients
For the whole wheat dough:
1 cup (120 grams) all-purpose flour, plus extra for dusting
1 cup (113 grams) whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon kosher salt
½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into tablespoons, each tablespoon cut into fourths, then chilled well
¼ cup Crisco, chilled
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar, chilled
1 tablespoon vodka, chilled
3 tablespoons cold water

For the galette:
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, divided
4 ounces mushrooms (preferably maitake or crimini mushrooms, or a mix), sliced thinly
1 large garlic clove, minced
1 large bunch (12-14 ounces) Swiss chard, center ribs removed, and leaves ribboned or cut into bite-size pieces

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 cup ricotta
2 tablespoons pine nuts, toasted
¼ cup milk
1 cup mixed fresh herbs [KG note: The KG used Italian (flat-leafed) parsley, mint, dill, and chives; other possibilities include cilantro, basil, and tarragon. Make your own special mix. Just make sure the herbs are fresh.]
Zest of 1 lemon, and 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
Flaky sea salt

Special equipment: baker’s parchment; large, rimmed baking sheet

Directions
For the whole wheat dough:

Put the flours and salt in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse 4-5 times to mix the ingredients and add air to the mix. Add the cold butter and Crisco and pulse another 12-15 times until the butter/Crisco is well distributed and a few pea-sized chunks remain.

Sprinkle the vinegar, vodka, and water around the flour/fat mixture and pulse just until the mixture begins to hold together in a clump. (If necessary, you can add another tablespoon of water, but I have not had to so far.)


Gather and press the dough into a ball, then knead it lightly until no dry spots appear and the texture seems consistent. Form the dough into a disk, wrap well in cellophane wrap, and chill at least 1 hour (up to overnight).

For the galette:
Preheat oven to 400º.

In a large skillet over medium-high heat, bring 1 tablespoon of the oil to a shimmer, and add the mushrooms. Cook, stirring frequently, for about 5 minutes, until the mushrooms are golden. Transfer the mushrooms to a bowl and set aside.











Reduce the heat under the skillet to low and add a second tablespoon of oil. Add the garlic and cook, stirring, for 30 seconds. Do not let the garlic burn. Raise the heat to medium and add the chard. Cook, using tongs to turn the greens until they are well wilted and evenly covered with the oil, about 4-5 minutes. Remove the skillet from the heat and season the greens with salt and freshly ground pepper.






Cut a piece of baker’s parchment the size of your rimmed baking sheet and dust it with flour. Remove the dough from the fridge, and roll it on the parchment to about ⅛ inch thick. Trim the dough to a circle 12-13 inches in diameter, and move the parchment/dough to your baking sheet.

Spread three-quarters of the ricotta onto the dough, leaving a border of 1½ -2 inches all around. Sprinkle the cooked chard on top of the ricotta, and the mushrooms on top of the chard. Dollop the remaining ricotta around on top of the mushrooms, and toss the toasted pine nuts over all.

Fold the border of dough up and over the filling. Brush the exposed area of dough with the milk to encourage browning.

Bake the galette 35-40 minutes, until the dough is nicely browned, rotating the pan halfway through the baking time. Let the cooked galette cool on the baking sheet for a few minutes.

While the galette is cooling, whisk together the lemon juice and the remaining tablespoon of oil, and toss it with the herb salad. Top the galette with the herbs, the lemon zest, and a sprinkling of sea salt.

And watch that you don’t trip!