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The San Francisco Treat July 10 2015
You may remember the jingle, Rice-a-Roni, a San Francisco Treat!. I was in San Francisco last weekend and am happy to report the food scene has moved well beyond rice packets. In fact, San Francisco may just be my number two food city, behind New York City of course!
I had the pleasure of dining at Saison, where Chef Joshua Skenes is doing something amazing with food. Our table was a front row seat looking in to the pristine kitchen. The highlights of the meal for me were a battle creek trout complete with its roe and crispy skin, and a beet from their farm which had been cooked over the open fire. It tasted just like barbecue. A meal at Saison is definitely a splurge, but well worth it. The attention to detail is above and beyond and they do not miss a beat.
The other food highlight of my visit to San Francisco was a visit to the Ferry Building. The Ferry Building is home to the local Farmer’s Market three days a week and also has food stalls from many local food artisans. It is a great place to go to see what is up and coming in the food scene. California has a great climate for farming and artisans who care a lot about how their products are made. The Ferry Building Marketplace is a perfect way to showcase these products to the rest of the world. We did our best to taste a bit from everyone and made a fantastic picnic. We had coffee from Blue Bottle, cheese from Cowgirl Creamery, bread baked fresh from Acme Bread Company, chocolate from Dandelion Chocolate and fresh cherries and tomatoes from the Farmer’s Market. That made for a feast!
This trip out west has become an annual tradition for my family. I look forward to visiting San Francisco again next summer or perhaps sooner!
Happy Friday,
Julie
The Knead for Bread March 20 2015
Recently at Julie's Beet the topic of conversation has been good bread, so we thought we would share our findings with you. As quoted by James Beard “Good bread is the most fundamentally satisfying of all foods; and good bread with fresh butter, the greatest of feasts.” and we couldn't agree more.
Our first preference was to bake a loaf at home. We started out with a beginners recipe which requires no special ingredients, equipment or technique, although like any good bread it did take some time. This recipe was created by Jim Lahey from Sullivan Bakery and is one of the easiest but still tastiest recipes out there. It's called the No-Knead Bread. The recipe was original published by the NY Times and still remains one of their most popular recipes to date. However, one of our favorite illustrations of the recipe is here:- So easy a four year old can make it! It truly is a great easy recipe and the bread turned out delicious, especially right when it came out of the oven.
Moving to the other side of the difficulty scale is Chad Robertson's bread recipe. Chad is a world renown baker and runs a famous bakery called Tartine Bread in the Mission area of San Francisco. His loaves of bread consistently sell out within an hour. If any of you are planning on making a trip down there soon, please bring us back a loaf :) He has published his famous technique which has been perfected across years of baking in the book Tartine Bread. The basic bread recipe alone is 38 pages!! It's hard to believe combining flour, water and salt could become that complicated. Creating your initial starter can take up to a week! This being the case, we're sorry to report, we haven't tested the recipe yet, but we'll be sure to update you on how it goes. For now we are still studying the book. If you are interested in learning more, here is a link.
Well, as we are all quite busy and may not have the time to bake any bread, we've rallied up our favorite bakeries in New York City.
- Maison Kayser: There are a couple around the city, but our go to is the one at 921 Broadway. Their Olive Bread is the best!
- Sullivan Street Bakery: 533 W 47th St, New York, NY 10036. They are famous for their Pane Puglise.
- Il Buco Alimentari E Vineria : 53 Great Jones Street, New York, NY 10012. Best Ciabatta around and dipped with 5 Olive Oil is the perfect pairing.
- Bouchon Bakery: Columbus Circle, Rockefeller Center, Las Vegas, Beverly Hills & Yountville. Have a baguette or an epi bread and pile on your favorite condiments.
- Lafayette Bakery: 380 Lafayette Street, New York, NY 10003. A great place for breakfast, brunch, lunch, dinner & bread. You can even pre-order online.
Hope everyone is having a great week and happy eating!
The Team at Julie's Beet
