the leeks.

Its official. School is underway. I have half English classes and half how-to-be-a-teacher classes. I'm even taking a class on assessment! (Writing a test is harder than it looks, if these first few weeks are any indication). Monday night is still cooking night though, just no escaping that. So, for the first Monday night cooking of the semester, we got grandiose.

I realize that sorta looks like an combination pizza/omelette, but that's just due to my poor photographing (which was due to the fact that it was 11pm and I was too hungry to make it look good). This, my friends, was far more rich and delicious.

It all started, as it often does, with Miss Molly, aka orangette and her column in this month's Bon Appetit. She proselytizes about leeks. Now, I had never really thought twice about leeks but I was sold-- on the vegetable, on Belgium, and on both the recipes included at the end, one for leek confit and one for Flamiche Aux Poireaux (Belgian leek tart with aged goat cheese)(which my dashboard translator translates as "Cake of leeks With Leeks". Either way).

So, I go to the farmers market that Saturday morning (in the rain, nonetheless. It was, actually, packed and delightful) and lo and behold, one woman on the end has leeks that I pluck from the pile and pack in my bag between the raspberries, new potatoes, and apples from my childhood bus route. I left the farmers market with that satisfied comfort that some find in church and children find in chocolate milk.

The tart calls for a cup and a half of the first recipe, leek confit. So, I figure I'll make the confit, take it to the parents Sunday night as a surprise appetizer, and use the rest in the tart the next day.

Monday, I was forced to the grocery store to buy more leeks, because my family demolished every last speck of the confit. Scouts honor, it really really is that good. My roommate ate it out of the pan with his fingers while I was trying to make the tart, and scoffed at me for wanting to adulterate it with crackers when I suggested he not use his fingers.

The tart recipe calls for aged goat cheese (which I didn't know existed) which I went to Morgan and York for. The recipe recommends a specific one, which I was not smart enough to bring the name of in to the store with me, so instead I bought one that was a small, hard little round that started with a 'c' and was $7. The stuff was super pungent but perfect, particularly on crackers with the confit.

Molly's Leek recipes, from Bon Appetit.

Leek confit

• 1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter
• 4 large leeks (white and pale green parts only), halved lengthwise, cut crosswise into 1/4-inch-thick slices (about 5 cups)
• 2 tablespoons water
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Melt butter in large pot over medium-low heat. Add leeks; stir to coat. Stir in water and salt. Cover pot; reduce heat to low. Cook until leeks are tender, stirring often, about 25 minutes. Uncover and cook to evaporate excess water, 2 to 3 minutes. Serve warm. DO AHEAD: Can be made 1 week ahead. Keep chilled. Rewarm before using.



Leek tart

Fair warning alert-- crust needs 2 hours in fridge. Do not start this a 6pm if you want it for dinner, unless, like me, you don't really mind eating after 10.

Crust:

• 4 tablespoons (or more) ice water
• 3/4 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
• 1 1/2 cups unbleached all purpose flour
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) plus 1 tablespoon chilled unsalted butter

Filling:

• 1/2 cup whole milk
• 1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
• 1 large egg
• 1 large egg yolk
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup crumbled aged goat cheese (such as Bûcheron), rind trimmed I used the little goat round I bought and about half a small log of fresh goat cheese.
  
• 1 1/2 cups Leek Confit

Crust:
Combine 4 tablespoons ice water and cider vinegar in small bowl. Blend flour and salt in processor. Add butter and cut in using on/off turns until mixture resembles coarse meal. With machine running, slowly add water-vinegar mixture, processing until moist clumps form. If dough seems dry, add ice water by teaspoonfuls.

Gather dough into ball; flatten into disk. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate at least 2 hours. DO AHEAD: Can be made 3 days ahead. Keep refrigerated. Allow dough to soften slightly at room temperature before rolling out.

Position rack in center of oven and preheat to 375°F. Roll dough out on lightly floured work surface to 12-inch round. Transfer to 9-inch-diameter tart pan with removable bottom. Press dough onto bottom and up sides. Fold in overhang and press to extend dough 1/2 inch above sides of pan. Line pan with foil and dried beans or pie weights. Bake until dough looks dry and set, about 30 minutes. Remove foil and beans and continue to bake until crust is pale golden, 20 to 25 minutes longer. Remove from oven and cool while preparing filling. Note: I found the bake time on this to be waaaay to long. My crust was almost burned, and I took it out early. I would say that about a 10-15 minute pre-bake should be more than sufficient, and then to watch every five minutes for golden-ness.

Filling:
Whisk milk, cream, egg, egg yolk, and salt in medium bowl to blend. Sprinkle 1/4 cup cheese over bottom of warm crust; spread leek confit over and sprinkle with remaining cheese. Pour milk mixture over. Bake until filling has puffed, is golden in spots, and center looks set, 35 to 40 minutes. Transfer to rack; cool slightly. Remove pan sides. Serve warm or at room temperature.

And if that is not a perfectly decadent way to start off the school year, I don't know what is.

My super sweet dinner

Was delicious. That's mango-chicken sausage (sounds, how you might say with disdain, "interesting", but really, it is good. I was a skeptic myself, but it was the demo at work for all of fourth of July weekend, and one can only avoid the demo for so long... I became a believer) with sweet and hot mustard, the left over chickpea-beet-mess from last night, fresh ear of sweet corn, and a bottle of Tj's Bavarian Hefeweizen.
Two things I need to tell you about:
1. In case you don't drive down Packard in to Ypsi almost every day like I do, in the past week or so, a farm stand has popped up on the corner of Packard and Boston, between Hewitt and Golfside. It is a bizarre place for it, but I was pretty excited about it, A, because its real produce, and B, because working midnight shifts rarely allows for me to get up in time to get to the market, and these guys are there all afternoon. I finally remembered to stop today, on my way home from reading MFK Fisher's The Gastronomical Me (don't even get me started on her, she's another post in and of herself) at the lake all afternoon. Now I'm super excited about it, because the produce is obviously fresh, and real and you can tell, AND, I got 2 tomatoes, 2 yellow squash, 2 Zucchini, and an ear of corn for $4. That ear of corn was fresh, and juicy (yes! juicy!) and sweet, so sweet like a Michigan sunset through the trees, that is to say, exactly the way it should be.

2. The other thing I think you should know is that Trader Joe's beer is delicious. Now, I realize that I must sound like I'm paid to endorse TJ's products, but, I'm not. ( I wish). In fact, just to set the record straight, there a quite a few products I really don't like at all, outstanding among them: Green tea Mints (taste like chalk); Identity Crisis Chips (yes, thats really what they're called) which have a clearly moronic name and taste, well, confused and bland. I will not try and sell you a bottle of Charles Shaw, our cranberry tea tastes like your grandmother's prized perfume, and all of our pre-cooked meat is either dry or over salted or both.
Now then.
All of Trader Joe's brand beer is $5.99 a six pack. Other beer that I like is at least $8 (Bells, Dark Horse, Unibroue, Red Stripe, Blue Moon) (Oh, I guess I like PBR too. But I think Pabst can have its own category, as much as I love it, its more of a large cold shot than "beer".) Anyhow, its not just that they're cheap. It that they're really really good. I would recommend a lot of them-- Fat Weasel, BrouCzech Dark, Trader Jose's, but, when it comes right down to it, my favorite, by far is the Bavarian Hefeweizen. If you're not really sure what hefeweizen is, start here, because ours is one of the best I've had (I love Corner Brewery-- their Hef sucks.) A hefeweizen is a wheat beer, like Oberon, and thus often considered a summer beer (though I buy it all year round). The best I can do is to say that it's like Oberon, but more complex. As is traditional for Hef's, it has notes of not only citrus, but banana and clove, and all this without being sweet at all--Just light, fruity and delightful. And, while it can be intimidating to try beers you've never heard of with silly names (fat weasel? Jumping cow? Trader Jose's? What?) there's really no need to fret, because Trader Joe's lets you buy all beer by the bottle (make yr own sixer!) so you really have no excuse.

Produce and beer. So now you know.