Wednesday, 12 February 2025 16:11
Written by Madelaine Bullwinkel

BEYOND ORANGE JUICE

On most days, all of us would start the day with a glass of bottled orange juice rather than taking the time to squeeze juice by hand. Either way, we are relying on the convenience of refrigeration to keep this tropical fruit fresh tasting for an extended period of time. As a result we've forgotten what an orange really tastes like.

The reassuring fact that your favorite brand of orange juice always has a familiar taste indicates it is an industrial product, not from an orange found in nature. Orange juice from concentrate (OJFC) has been cooked to remove the fruit’s water and flavor. The resulting syrupy mush has spent up to two years swishing around in a four story ‘tank farm’ before being mixed with 300+ chemicals and frozen into a cylinder.

Refrigeration also enables not from concentrate (NFC) orange juice to taste fresh after being stored as long as a year in six story high tanks with the capacity of several Olympic-size swimming pools. Pasteurization protects NFC juice from bacteria but also gives it a ‘cooked’ taste and reduces its nutritional value, mainly its Vitamin C.

The third alternative is fresh squeezed juice refrigerated on site at your local supermarket. You have to rely on the cleanliness of the equipment used to produce it and accept the addition of citric acid to extend its shelf life beyond 2 to 3 days. Too soon, natural yeasts in the unpasteurized juice will begin to ferment the sugar and alter its taste.

Since I can't pick a ripe orange off a tree, I prefer to purchase, cook and consume the whole fruit. Before the first electric refrigerator arrived in American kitchens in 1918, citrus fruit was preserved as marmalade by cooking it with sugar. Marmalade is unusual because it combines combines and balances the fiercely competing tastes of its juice, pulp, bitter pith and distinctive floral oil in its peel. One or two tablespoons of orange marmalade provides a refreshing whole orange kick when spread on toast, dabbed on hot oatmeal or slathered on a slice of rye in a ham and cheese sandwich.

The Thirty Minute Marmalade recipe that follows calls for two pounds of oranges and a cup of sugar. It takes thirty minutes to make and yields two cups of brilliant orange marmalade that will keep for months in the refrigerator. Let orange marmalade wake you up in the morning!

Friday, 17 January 2025 17:16
Written by Madelaine Bullwinkel

PLEASE PASS THE CASHEWS

My list of New Year’s resolutions just got shorter. This past holiday season I became a confirmed snacker. My resolve was shattered by the contents of a set of small brown paper gift bags each stamped with the Manga-inspired logo of a squirrel framed by a full moon. The squirrel held the image of the bag’s contents: cashews from Vietnam.

These nuts were huge and extra crunchy. They smelled of caramel and their warm cashew flavor lingered on the palate. The cashews in each bag were naturally flavored with .5% salt; some were spiced. They were all sourced by Auralynn Nguyen, a California-based floral artist, who’s startup cashew business is Superior Nut Product.

Auralynn was visiting her father in Saigon early in 2020 when Vietnam’s communist regime imposed a strict Covid-19 lockdown, an experience that was uncomfortably isolating. It had the positive effect of reinforcing her attachment to Vietnam’s rich culinary heritage. She has found expression for this passion as an importer of some of the country's finest artisanal products.

To select cashews that were superior to those sold in the States, Auralynn rode on a motor bike from Saigon one-and-a-half hours north to farms in Vietnam's cashew-growing region on the northwest border with Cambodia. She sought out small producers of other distinctive products that showcase Vietnam's tropical flavors. Packed among the bags of cashews in Superior Nut Product's first Christmas Basket this year were dark, rich Marou chocolate bars, a bottle of tangy pomelo-scented honey and a jar of refreshingly hot green, salt-cured Kompot peppercorns.

Aside from snacking, Auralynn’s cashews make an exceptional garnish for soups, salads, noodle dishes and fruit desserts, added whole or coarsely chopped. I recommend folding the following Cashew Pesto (made with store-bought cashews) by the tablespoon into rice or pasta and then strewing Superior Nut Product cashews on top.

Happy New Year snacking!

Monday, 25 November 2024 17:39
Written by Madelaine Bullwinkel

WINTER THERAPY

Winter announced its arrival in Chicago last week with a blast of cold air and four inches of slushy snow. This rude entry is not uncommon in our region, but it is always a shock to the system. My response? I prepared a comforting pot homemade soup.

Onto the chopping block went all the vegetables I had on hand: a stalk of celery, two carrots, an onion, a head of garlic, slices of ginger root. A quick trip to the local grocery to buy a leek, a turnip and a carton of mushrooms completed my list of stock ingredients. From my snow-covered garden I rescued two stalks of thyme and a handful of parsley. They all got rinsed, trimmed, roughly chopped and loaded into a heavy eight quart pot.

As these vegetables and herbs sweated over low heat, their reassuring scent filled the kitchen and winter's cold receded. I added two quarts of cool water, a bay leaf and some salt then turned up the heat. After a half-hour simmer, this broth was ready to receive any vegetable I chose to feature. But first, I drank a soothing cupful and declared victory.

The wet snow had melted away by the next morning, and I harvested the patch of sorrel that had survived under its winter blanket. I rinsed and removed the stems and let the leaves wilt in butter with shallots and a crushed clove of garlic. (A pound of a root vegetable or hard shell squash could have taken its place.) This mixture then simmered in three cups of the vegetable broth. I thinned soup with a mix of broth and heavy whipping cream to measure one cup before a final seasoning with salt and pepper. I have been serving myself a cupful every evening with dinner. The rest of the broth is in the freezer, waiting to become soup after the next snowfall (possibly this week).

You may be wondering what became of the mass of limp vegetables remaining after I drained the stock pot. I removed the garlic and herbs stems, puréed the rest, thinned it with broth and seasoned it with a blend of curry spices. Recycling these vegetables is a work in progress. Stay tuned for a definitive recipe.

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