A Visit to the South 47 Farm, Crispy Baked Root Vegetable Fries and Orange-Tangerine Cocktail

I somehow managed a trip to the South 47 farm here between Redmond and Kirkland before they closed for the season. Even though it is literally a hop skip and jump away from where i live, i have never been to the farm stand and bought veggies from there (Ive been there last year for the corn maze). This summer I took the bus and went to different farmers market but this lovely farm so close to home completely skipped my mind. Last week my friend M and I decided to check out this place. It was a typical Seattle rainy day but still we went! We were really happy with all that we got and were making plans to come here every other week or so. It did cross our mind that the farm may be closed for winter, but we still hoped that's not the case. Well, unfortunately it is and now we will have to wait till next spring to go there again.

I got some nice fresh collard greens, potatoes, golden and purple beets and apples. I soo wish now that i had grabbed some of those beautiful winter squash too.

The golden beets looked soo nice and colorful that I wanted to make something that left the color in it as it is. I also had some sweet potatoes in hand, so I decided to put together the beets, some carrots, potatoes and the sweet potatoes together to make some crispy fries. Dont ask me what the Orange-tangerine cocktail has to do with all these. Nothing!! I just had oranges and tangerines and have been wanting to make a fresh drink of some sort. And i think the colors of the fries and the cocktail look soo bright for a fall-winter time in Seattle!

Crispy Baked Root Vegetable Fries

1 carrot – thinly sliced into strips 1 potato – thinly sliced into strips 1 sweet potato – thinly sliced into strips 1 golden beet – thinly sliced 1 purple beet – thinly sliced 1 tsp olive oil salt to taste

 

Preheat the oven to 350F. Toss the veggie strips in olive oil and salt and lay them out on a baking sheet. Dont crowd them too much or else they will turn out soggy and not crispy. Bake on the middle rack. Once it starts browning a little, turn the oven to broil so that the fries crisp up a little. Take them out, let them cool and enjoy!!

Orange-tangerine Cocktail

3 California oranges, squeezed 2 Tangerines, squeezed 1 tbsp key lime juice 1 tbsp lemon juice 2 oz Triple Sec (orange liqueur) 4 oz vodka mint to garnish

Mix all the ingredients together. I don't have a cocktail shaker, so i just stirred them together. While serving, add a few pieces of ice and garnish with mint leaves. Serve and enjoy!! :)

Update: LOL!! trust me to mix up the name of the fruit i used…it was tangerine that i used and not nectarines. Thanks Mallugirl for that question, otherwise it wouldve stayed in my blog as it is and kept people wondering how i squeezed the nectarines!! Note to self: do not attempt to post when you are not keeping well!

Restaurant Review – Chantanee Thai Restaurant

Chantanee has been on our list of “suggested by friends” and “well-heard of” restaurants that we have wanted to go for like ever but somehow never managed to and Im glad we finally made it! One thing Ive realized is that whenever we plan well ahead to go to any particular restaurant, it somehow always gets jinxed. We will end up in a totally different end of the city and/or will be too tired to drive all the way to that restaurant or sometimes we (its usually me) are not in the mood for that particular cuisine or sometimes just plain lazy to get out of the house and we end up ordering take-outs. This time also something similar happened. We were to go to the other side of the bridge, but it just got too late and I was very adamant that we are not going to eat again at Maggiano’s or Olive Garden or Azteca or California Pizza Kitchen or even Boom Noodle where we’ve been many times.

So, without any reservations, we headed to Chantanee in Bellevue downtown. It was a Monday evening, so we were pretty confident that we won’t have to wait much. And thats exactly what happened. We did not have to wait and were promptly seated. We chose to sit in the bar area and not in the main dining area. It was not intentional, but we were shown a table there and then asked whether we would like it there or the dining area. Since it was a proper table and not the bar stools and the counter, we were ok. Now when i think about it, we should have probably chosen the main dining area as i felt the table that we sat on was a little small to hold all the food we ordered.

Our first impression was good – we loved the ambience. What caught my eyes were the nice silk/satin napkins with metallic napkin rings that had two red chilli peppers. It somehow made me want to eat nice spicy food that night. The menu was like a textbook with soo many pages on it, that it took us some time to even go through all of it. Best part of the menu was that most of the entrees, except the ones that were specifically meat or seafood, could be ordered with veggies or tofu or veggie-fish or meat or seafood. I love it when i have a lot of options to choose from than picking the sole veggie option on the menu.

We started with a plate of steamed veggie pot stickers ($8.00) for appetizers and a drink for me “Armillita Chico - Tequila Por Mi Amante , Fresh Lime, Orange Flower, House Made Grenadine. Wordyness aside, its a strawberry margarita, but no salt!” ($11.00). The pot stickers were really good – in AJs words “ i never thought i would like anything non-meat in a pot sticker”. Well that says it all!

For the main course, I ordered the Spicy Eggplant – Stir fried veggies with eggplant, home made chili paste and basil ( $9.00) and the Asparagus with Oyster Sauce – Stir fried asparagus with veggies, garlic and oyster sauce ($9.00) and i got the oyster sauce substituted with mushroom sauce. Im a sucker for eggplant and will love it any form, but the spicy eggplant here did not do that to me. First of all, inspite of it saying that it was “spicy” and me ordering a 4 star spice rating, it wasn't spicy enough and some of them not cooked enough to my liking. The asparagus dish was really good. The asparagus was cooked well but still nice and crunchy and the sauce had been absorbed well. Loved it with the plain jasmine rice i ordered.

AJ was going to go for the Sweet and Sour Duck Sizzling Platter but i suggested the Honey Coriander Duck Sizzling Platter - Deep fried-slow cooked duck with coriander, five spices served on a bed of spinach ($18.00) and he loved it. This is definitely recommended and will be ordered for sure when we go again! Im really sorry about the picture, i got a really blurred one and you just cannot make out which is the duck and which is the spinach.

Now comes the best part of the dinner, the dessert!!! Most of the times I go to restaurants for the desserts. I sometimes even feel offended when we go out with friends and someone asks for the check even before considering desserts. At Chantanee, we had the Kumquat Chocolate Spring Rolls with Coconut Ice cream. It was soo heavenly and such a great finish to the evening. I generally love the citrus-chocolate combo and in this dessert the kumquat flavour was very subtle but still there to enhance the flavour of the chocolate. The coconut ice cream was from a local dairy and it was yummy with the spring rolls. Aaahh..i feel like having some of it right now!!

 

Even though, it was a little expensive at around 80$ for the two of us for an everyday eating out, it was definitely worth it and im sure we will be going there again!!

Moroccan Orange and Almond Cake

Aahh, so finally i baked!!! After a long long time…may be a couple of months. We were kinda trying to cut down on all sweet and fatty things and we pretty much did manage to do that. I stayed away from desserts for a very long time which is a great accomplishment for someone with a sweet tooth like me. And then came Diwali and I have gotten back into the rut of eating sweets almost everyday now. Well, someone has to finish all the sweets that were made for Diwali ;) !! One more reason for baking today is that I finally managed to clean the oven after what i call the “mysore pak disaster” happened and i had a layer of mysore pak all around the insides of my oven. Don't ask me how, why and all. It just happened!! So, after 2 long hours of a cleaning effort my oven is now sparkling clean (almost). So, don’t i have to bake something to celebrate that ?!?! (you all know that's just an excuse right?)

I got this huge bag of California oranges a couple of days ago and wanted to bake something with it. I love oranges – to make fresh juice, grate the rind and use it for cooking or just to eat slices of it – i just love that fresh smell of orange!. So, now having decided to bake something with oranges, i went through my huge collection of cookbooks and saw this recipe of Moroccan Orange and Almond cake in one of them. Read through the recipe and found it pretty interesting. A quick check of whether i had all the ingredients at hand and the cake came into being!!

Moroccan Orange and Almond Cake

Adapted from “Perfect Baking” with some modifications of mine

For the Cake 1/2 Orange – i used California oranges 4 oz butter, softened 1/2 cup bakers sugar 2 eggs, beaten 1 tsp almond extract 1 cup almond meal 1 cup semolina 1 1/2 tsp baking powder confectioner’s sugar for dusting For the spiced syrup Juice from 1 1/2 oranges 2/3 cup bakers sugar 4 cardamom pods 1/2 tsp grated ginger

 

To make the cake: Grate the rind from one orange, reserve some for garnish and squeeze the juice from one half. In a medium mixing bowl, beat together the orange juice, butter, sugar and almond extract till fluffy and creamy. Add the eggs one by one and beat well. In a separate small mixing bowl, mix the almond meal, semolina and baking powder. Fold this mix into the creamed mixture and spoon it into a greased 9” round baking pan and bake in a preheated oven at 350F for 35 mins or until a skewer when inserted comes out clean. Let it cool in the pan for 5-10 mins.

To make the syrup: In a small sauce pan, add the ingredients for the syrup and stir on low heat until sugar has dissolved. Increase the heat and bring to a boil. Simmer and let it thicken till it forms a syrup like consistency. Strain and keep aside.

Once the cake has cooled, turn it out onto a serving plate. Using a skewer make some holes over the surface of the cake while it is still warm and drizzle 3/4 of the strained syrup over it. Let it stand for 15 mins or so. Dust with confectioner’s sugar and cut into slices. Serve with more syrup on the side.

Rava Laddoo and Khoya Peda for Diwali

Diwali was always the funnest festival – new clothes, tons of sweets and even more fire crackers – those days were fun!! Its now the second diwali that im celebrating away from family. But it is special in its own way as AJ and i get to celebrate this together and we have our friends with us, who have become our family now :) This time we had a small diwali celebration with sweets and dinner at our place on Saturday and also got to go to two more Diwali parties where we met lots of people, wished each other and had even lots more sweets. I was literally on a sugar high that night!

I started the sweet making process a couple of days ahead and this year, i managed to make a few more sweets than last year. On the menu was – Rava Laddoo, Mysore Pak, Khoya Peda, Coconut Burfi, Spicy Diamond Cuts ( Namak Para ) and Dahi Vada. For dinner we had Puris with Spicy Aloo Bhaji, Paneer Koftas in gravy and rice.

Rava Laddoo

Rava / Semolina – 2 cups Sugar – 2 cups Ghee / Clarified butter – 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 cups Cardamom powder – 1 tsp Cashew nuts – 15-20 Raisins – about a handful

 

Heat a kadhai on moderate heat and roast the semolina till it gets a very pale golden brown colour and the aroma of roasted semolina comes. Dont let it burn or blacken. Keep stirring to avoid that from happening. Grind it along with the sugar, till the sugar is just about powdered. That way the semolina is not all that finely ground.

Heat a few tsp of ghee in the kadhai and fry the cashews and raisins. Keep them aside. Heat the remaining ghee in the kadhai on medium heat till it gets hot but not smoking. Remove from heat and mix in the semolina-sugar mix, cardamom powder and the fried nuts and raisins. Mix well. When it comes down to a temperature cool enough to handle it, make lime sized balls out of it, pressing it firmly while you do it. This should be done before the mixture cools completely.

This quantity of ingredients will yield about 25-30 laddoos.

Khoya Peda

I had read about making Khoya Pedas this way from somewhere. I didnt remember the exact proportions, but since this is not a burfi or something that needs to set and then cut out into pieces, i roughly used some proportions and it worked out well. This is probably the easiest version of any peda recipes.

Khoya / Mawa – 12 oz, available in any Indian grocery stores in the refrigerated section Sugar, powdered – 2 cups, approx Cardamom powder – 1 tsp or to taste Pistachios, crushed – for garnish

 

The khoya that you get in Indian grocery stores is generally a block, like a block of paneer, so you will need to grate it so that it evens out and is easier to mix with the sugar and cook. Grate the khoya, mix it well with the sugar and heat it in a non-stick kadhai on medium heat. Keep stirring, or else the sugar will tend to brown when it remains in contact with the heated bottom of the kadhai. Let all the sugar melt and let the mixture loosen up a little bit and get thickened again. You will know it as the difficulty level of stirring changes. As the mixture begins to leave the sides of the kadhai, add the cardamom, give it a quick mix and remove from heat. When it is cool enough to handle, make small balls out of the mix and flatten it a little between your palm. Press in some ground pistachios for garnish and enjoy!

I just added some food colour for the different coloured pedas, you can also add saffron to get that colour.

Perfect Fall Dinner - Spiced Pumpkin Soup

The weather is getting all nice and cold and the fall colors are there everywhere. It is just soo beautiful, especially when there is some sun, making the leaves look even more beautiful. For the next one week, Seattle is going back to its normal state – rain, rain and more rain. And we are having soup, soup and more soup. Tomato-basil, Asparagus-cauliflower, Lentil-Kale, Minestrone and the list goes on.. Last week when we went grocery shopping, I just couldn't take my eyes off those beautiful pie pumpkins and bought one to make soup. The canned pumpkin puree is the easiest to handle, but im allergic to some of the preservatives in it ( i think). Last year, twice when i had something made of the canned pumpkins, I had a mild allergy attack. Well, im not gonna take any more chances to make sure it is true or not!

This is a pretty easy recipe, once you have the pumpkins all mashed n ready. Save the seeds from the pumpkins, slightly toast them and use as a garnish. It gives a nice little crunch as well.

Prepping the pumpkin : Cut the pumpkin in half and remove the seeds and strings. Place it cut side down on a baking sheet lined with a foil and bake in a preheated oven at 400F for about 40 mins or so. The pumpkin flesh will be nice and smooth and mashable and the skin will come right off when you pull it. Use as much of the pumpkin as you need and freeze the rest for later.

This is a cute little painted pumpkin that i bought.

Spiced Pumpkin Soup

1 small pie pumpkin, prepped (see notes above) 1/2 red onion, finely chopped 2 cloves garlic, minced 2 tsp pumpkin pie spice 1 tsp cumin powder 1 –2 tsp ground nutmeg 3 –4 tsp paprika ( vary depending on the spiciness you need) 1 1/2 cup low fat milk salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste 2 tsp olive oil toasted pumpkin seeds, for garnish

 

Heat the olive oil in a soup pot and saute the garlic and onions in it. Add the pumpkin mash to it and let it cook for a few minutes. Add the spices one by one and let it mix in well. Finally, add the milk and let it come almost to a boil. Add salt and freshly ground pepper as well.

While serving, top with the toasted seeds and sprinkle some more nutmeg on top.