Cherry Pistachio Crisp

Dear readers, as you are my witnesses, I'm hereby confessing a minor addiction to sour cherries. After a year-long wait for sour cherry season, I've put up a pitcher of sour cherry liqueur that'll be ready in a few short months (and early tastes have been very, very promising) and I've made a couple pies as well. It seems I can't get quite enough of them. I've even fancied myself the sour cherry connoisseur: when a (rather gruff) farmer declared last Sunday at the market that no one could taste her sour cherries because they're too tart to eat raw, I happily (and loudly) piped up that I eat them raw all the time and had no idea what she was talking about. As you may have guessed, we made fast friends. Needless to say, I scurried right along to the next stand.

After two juicy, bursting weeks of our very short sour cherry season, I'm still high on the cherries, but less excited at the prospect of another pie-dough endeavor. The result is mighty tasty, but it involves just a few too many minutes hovered over the counter piecing together shards of butter-flour and hoping for a semblance of evenness. This time, with a pound of sour cherries in the fridge and an appetite that was burgeoning by the minute, I opted for the easy route: cherry crisp.

You won't see any criticism of crisps on this blog, no siree: D&R are HUGE crisp fans. Apple crisp is practically a weekly staple in our house during winter months, and if you don't blink you can catch one of us -- let's be honest, both of us -- picking the buttery oat clusters off the top as we linger with guests over the end of a dinner party. We're both pretty addicted.

Given the fleeting nature of sour cherry season, I wanted to make a crisp that'd be particularly memorable. Enter Martha Stewart, who had the great idea to include chopped pistachios in the crumble topping. The pistachios add soft, mellow richness that accentuates the sharp, almost shrill tanginess of the sour cherries. It's a lovely combination.

Since I only had a pound of sour cherries, I added to the mix a couple nectarines that were begging to be used. Their softer texture was a welcome contrast to those pearl-like sour cherries and the crunchy pistachio crumble. I'll definitely be making this again. That is, if I can get my hands on some sour cherries...

Sour Cherry Pistachio Crisp adapted from Martha Stewart

• 1 pound pitted fresh or frozen sour cherries • 3/4 pound nectarines, pitted and roughly chopped • 1/2 cup chopped unsalted pistachios • 1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose, white whole wheat, or whole wheat pastry flour • 1/3 cup old-fashioned rolled oats • 1/4 teaspoon baking powder • Salt • 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened • 3 tablespoons packed light-brown sugar • 3/4 cup granulated sugar • 3 teaspoons cornstarch • Pinch of ground cinnamon

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375. If using frozen cherries (though I don't know why you would this time of year), spread them in a single layer on a baking sheet and let stand at room temperature until almost thawed but not mushy, about half an hour. Drain and reserve any accumulated liquid (you can reduce it for a sauce some other time -- too precious to throw away!)

2. Mix pistachios, flour, oats, baking powder, and 1/4 tsp. salt in a medium mixing bowl and set aside. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, mix butter, brown sugar, and 1/4 cup sugar on medium speed until creamy.

3. Add pistachio mixture into butter mixture and mix on medium speed for about ten seconds, until mixture forms small and large crumbs. Set aside.

4. Stir together cherries, the remaining 1/2 cup of sugar, cornstarch, cinnamon, and a pinch of salt in a medium bowl until cornstarch coats cherries and sugar has been incorporated. Pour into an 8-inch square baking dish. Sprinkle crumb topping onto cherry mixture, and bake until topping turns golden and cherry juices bubble, about 50 minutes. Let cool at least 15 minutes before serving (Martha recommends an hour, but who can wait that long?) Serve with vanilla ice cream if you have on hand -- it's a whole other ballgame with the creamy vanilla on top.

Andalusian Gazpacho

Please welcome my friend Jeremy, who was bold enough to suggest guest-posting on my blog and kind enough to follow through. He brought over a jar of this gazpacho and when I dunked a spoon in for a taste, I ended up finishing half the jar. It's the perfect summer soup, and I'm thrilled to be featuring it on NDP.

The height of summer means the height of tomato season, and in our house that means gazpacho season. Now, this means different things to different people. Some are partial to a soup that could easily be mistaken for salsa. Others are all about the cucumbers or the bell peppers. I've even heard people refer to a perfectly lovely watermelon soup as gazpacho, though I'd like to think any self-respecting Spaniard would scoff at this. For my money -- and we'll get to how it doesn't need to be a lot of money in a minute -- this easy-to-make gazpacho is the way to go. My spouse and I came upon the basis for this recipe (from Epicurious) some years ago, and over time we've adapted it and turned it into a staple of our summertime repertoire.

All in you're talking about 15 minutes of work for a gazpacho that puts the tomatoes right where they belong: front and center. It's substantial enough with a hunk of fresh baguette to make for a great mid-week meal just sitting at the coffee table. It's refined enough, topped with fresh chives, to lead off a small dinner party. And it's casual enough to serve spoonless in teacups or shot glasses for larger gatherings. It's just about a perfect summer soup, which is why we perpetually have a big jar of it in the fridge until tomatoes go out of season. And did I mention it'll keep for close to a week?

Andalusian Gazpacho

Ingredients 1 2-inch-long piece baguette 3 garlic cloves, or to taste 2 teaspoons salt 2 tablespoons Sherry vinegar, or to taste 1 teaspoon sugar 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin 2 1/2 pounds ripe tomatoes, cored and quartered 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil Garnish: whatever's around, but finely chopped (bell peppers, chives, cucumbers, parsley...)

Thoughts on Ingredients

Fresh baguette is probably best, but in the name of economy, we find this is the perfect place to use any stub that you might have leftover from lunch or shoved in the freezer for whatever reason.

For god's sake, please use fresh garlic. Don't try to substitute powder or any of that crap that comes in jars or wrapped in plastic. The early garlic, out now (or coming soon) to a farmers' market near you, is awesome.

Coarse kosher salt works great.

Don't try to substitute for the Sherry vinegar. We've tried, and the gazpacho doesn't quite pucker the same way without it. Sometimes labeled with the Spanish "vinagre de Jerez," Sherry vinegar can be hard to find at Safeway or Giant or the like, but Whole Foods usually has it. If not, and I hate how snobby this sounds, try Dean & Deluca or Fairway.

Use second tomatoes. You don't need gorgeous, perfect fruit when it's about to hit the bottom of a blender. At our local farmers' market, tomatoes go for $3.50-$4.00 per pound, but seconds are only $1.50, and if you choose wisely (firm with a blemish is fine, borderline rotten is not) finding enough for this recipe should be a cinch). As for variety, we're yet to find one that doesn't work, though I have to admit, I'm partial to the heirlooms later in the season.

Don't bother with a garnish unless it's fresh.

Directions:

Start by soaking the bread in a glass of water for a minute or two, then squeeze it dry and dump the water. The Gourmet recipe calls for trimming the crust, which I do. My spouse doesn't trim the crust, however, and frankly I can't taste much difference nor detect any real change in mouth-feel.

Gourmet tells you to mash garlic to a paste with salt using a mortar and pestle. We just crush the garlic with the side of our chef's knife and then chop it.

Blend the garlic, salt, baguette, vinegar, sugar, cumin, and half the tomatoes. We use a blender, because you're going to want to let the soup chill in a glass container, but a food processor works, too. Blend until the tomatoes are very finely chopped. Add the remaining tomatoes with motor running, and then ever so slowly, pour in the oil in a steady stream, blending until totally smooth. Don't rush -- taking your time with the oil is key to a velvety gazpacho

The garlic takes some time to come to the fore here, but when it does, it kicks, so resist the temptation to overdo. Refrigerate for a few hours, or until cold. Garnish and serve.

Maple Walnut Oatmeal with Peaches

My breakfast habits usually vary from season to season. I tend to alternate between Terri and Kendall's go-to oatmeal recipe (oats, water, agave syrup, wheat germ, and flax seeds) and toast with an egg and fake bacon during the winter. During summertime, though, it's all about yogurt. There are few things I love more than yogurt -- especially that uber tart and rich stuff that I make at home -- and I eat it very, very often during the hot months. Until this week. See, I bought a little container of good organic yogurt and a gallon of organic whole milk, stepped up on a stool to pull down my yogurt maker from its above-the-fridge hiding place, and set out to make some yogurt, but for some reason, the batch emerged looking nothing like yogurt and everything like watery curds. My big yogurtFAIL kind of killed my buzz. That's when I remembered the half tub of oatmeal leftover from wintertime, sitting on the fridge all by its lonesome. So I threw some in the microwave and called it a morning.

But then I decided, as long as I'm breaking my breakfast routine, I may as well go nuts. I remembered something a friend once told me, about how oatmeal can actually be a thoroughly luxurious food. Channeling her mention of luxury, I added a generous tab of butter I got at the farmers' market last week to my oats and water. After heating the oatmeal through, I tossed in some fresh cut peaches, a glug or two of really good milk from the market, a teaspoon or so of maple syrup, and -- wait for it -- just a slight drizzle of walnut oil. The result was simply divine. The walnut oil played up the nutty sweetness of the maple syrup, while the subtly sweet richness of the butter and milk provided contrast for those perfectly bright peach slices. I don't usually do double-flips over oatmeal, but this is one recipe that'll have me reaching for that tub of oats, even when there's edible yogurt in the fridge.

Maple Walnut Oatmeal with Peaches (serves 1)

1/2 cup oats, not instant 1 cup water about 1 tsp. butter, optional (I've made it several times without, and it's plenty tasty) 1 1/2 tsp. maple syrup 1 tsp. walnut oil a couple glugs of milk

In a large, covered microwave-safe bowl, microwave oats, water, and butter (if using) for 3 minutes. If doubling recipe, cook 5 minutes. Remove bowl from microwave, uncover, and add remaining ingredients. Stir to incorporate and serve hot.

Feta Phyllo Torte

Feta Phyllo Torte

Of all the incredibly culinary feats out there (and there are plenty), one of which I'm truly in awe is the ability to consistently serve vegetarian food that fees like a main dish. As I've written before, one of the challenges to purely vegetarian cooking is that often, everything on the table looks like a side dish, and there's no one thing that, when brought to the table, elicits the oohs and ahhs of, say, a whole roast chicken. There are a few people who are particularly excellent at this. One is Deborah Madison, author of Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone (one of my favorite cookbooks to read; I often find myself leafing through it while killing time at Barnes and Noble). Madison understands the challenge of creating a "wow factor" when serving vegetarian entrees, and she conquers that challenge seemingly effortlessly. Her books are endless sources of inspiration for meatless entertaining.

Another, though she may not intend to be (given her well-publicized love of meat) is Melissa Clark, a food columnist for NYT and recipe writer extraordinaire. Reading Melissa's column, I not-infrequently stumble upon a really new idea for a vegetarian entree. One excellent example is her cornbread and broccoli rabe strata, a vegetarian Thanksgiving main that doubles as a side for the turkey eaters. Another, for a phyllo feta torte, was published just a couple weeks ago, and after reading her recipe, I had an undeniable urge to rush into the kitchen and make it, immediately.

Originally called "No-fear Phyllo Torte," Clark's recipe originates in a dinner party hosted by a lauded French literature professor and his Greek wife, for whom phyllo is second-nature. Clark claims intimidation, but her recipe proves her an equal master of this domain. In the torte, made in a bundt pan for a particularly impressive presentation, thin, crisp layers of butter-soaked phyllo cloak a tender filling of feta, cottage cheese, dill and nutmeg. Sound like a spinachless spanikopita? Think again: the finished product is drizzled with honey before serving, for an irresistible hit of sweet to balance the rich, salty torte. Stop me from drooling.

Clark was intimidated when she first saw the torte emerge from the oven, and wondered whether she needed to be Greek in order to make it successfully; I had an all-out panic attack when, just before serving the torte, I realized that I had used salted butter in place of the unsalted butter called for in the recipe. It didn't matter; I had used less salty Greek feta in the filling, which offset the extra salt in the crust. Other changes I made to Clark's original recipe include swapping out some of the cottage cheese for extra feta (since cottage cheese generally gives me the creeps, and 3 cups sounded like a lot), upping the level of dill and nutmeg for added kick, and cutting the butter from 3 sticks to 1 (because who needs 3 sticks of butter in anything? and 1 was more than enough to coat the whole torte and make the insides crispy). Other than those changes, I found this recipe absolutely to die for and would make it again in a flash. I actually served it with some homemade rhubarb chutney, which I'll blog in a future post, and I was really pleased with the combination. The tanginess of the rhubarb brought out the acidity in the feta and the chutney provided a nice textural contrast to the torte. An all-out thumbs up from this happy eater -- I recommend you give this a go; your guests will be thankful -- and maybe even intimidated.

Sonia's Phyllo and Feta Torte with Dill and Nutmeg Time: An hour and a half, plus cooling adapted from Melissa Clark, inspired by her husband's friend's wife Sonya, via The New York Times

Time: An hour and a half, plus cooling

1 1/2 pounds Greek feta cheese, crumbled (I used feta from a local Mediterranean market, but TJ's carries Greek feta that's pretty good) 2 cups cottage cheese 3 large eggs 1/3 cup chopped fresh dill 1/4 cup grated Romano cheese (I used Parmesan, which was what I had on hand) 1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 1 1-pound box phyllo dough, thawed overnight in refrigerator if possible 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted

Greek honey, for serving (Clark says this is optional but I say it's a must).

1. Heat oven to 375 degrees. combine feta, cottage cheese, eggs, dill, 2 tablespoons Romano, the nutmeg and pepper in a food processor and pulse just to combine (Clark says you can also use a large bowl and a fork). Clark also says the mixture should be chunky, but I made mine smoother.

2. Sprinkle remaining 2 tablespoons Romano into a Bundt pan. Drape a sheet of phyllo on top of Bundt pan, poke a hole into phyllo with your finger where center tube is and push phyllo into pan to line it. Do this with another phyllo sheet, but place it perpendicular to first sheet. The first couple of sheets will seem disorderly and may collapse some, but as you start layering them, the process will get easier and the sheets will keep their shape. Continue adding phyllo sheets in alternating directions until all sheets are used. Edges of phyllo should hang over edges of bundt.

3. Scrape cheese filling into pan, and fold edges of phyllo over filling. Using a sharp knife, poke many holes (at least 20) in dough that reach all the way to bottom of pan. Then pour melted butter over the torte; some will seep into holes, but a fair amount will pool on top of torte, which is fine. I actually poured the butter before poking the holes, and my torte tasted perfectly delicious, so fret not.

4. Place Bundt pan on a baking sheet and bake for about 1 hour 15 minutes, or until torte is puffy and golden brown. Allow torte to cool in pan for 1 to 2 hours before inverting onto a plate and slicing. Serve warm or at room temperature, with honey and/or sweet chutney.

Yield: 10 to 12 servings.