They littered the ground all along Stanwood, Denver, and Remington streets on my route to Maryland Elementary School.  It was customary to announce your approach behind fellow students by pelting them with the large green orbs.  The nuts seemed to have been created especially to be launched by nine-year-old boys.  Two inches across, perfectly round, and with a slightly rough texture that we imagined made it possible to throw curveballs with them.  The ripest ones were best because if they could be made to explode on impact they left an indelible stain and a smell that followed the target around school all day. I have been both victim and perpetrator numerous times.

Today I use the sweetmeats for far more peaceful purposes such as cakes, breads and salads, though when no one is looking I occasionally test my aim out on the flood plain behind my house.  Still haven’t mastered that curveball.

If you are fortunate enough to have one or two of these magnificent trees in your neighborhood, this is the time of year when you want to be trying to beat the squirrels to the walnuts.  Of course they have the advantage of being able to climb up into the trees and out onto the smallest branches pursuing their winter stashes, but we have the benefit of opposable thumbs and buckets to carry many more at once, so it’s a fair fight.

Before you gather too many, break a couple open with a hammer to make sure the kernels are full (those are the parts we eat, but don’t eat them yet).  Crops from even the best trees are unpredictable, and sometimes the kernels fail to fill.  Trees that supplied bushels one year may yield only a few good nuts the next, so best to check before you go through all the effort.

The best nuts are picked from the trees, but most people wait for them to fall to the ground – it’s just easier that way.  Choose only ripe nuts, which can be identified when their color changes from bright green to a yellowish shade, and the husk can be dented with your thumb.

A few pointers about husking them: where gloves and an apron, and do it outside.  Some people find the pungent smell objectionable, though I kind of like it despite the aforementioned childhood trauma.  The staining reputation of the walnut juice, though, is legendary and well deserved.

Remove the hulls with a hammer or by stomping underfoot (don’t use the running-over-with-a-car method you may have heard of) and wash the nuts thoroughly with a garden hose.  Lay them out to dry on old window screens in a cool, dry, well-ventilated place (I use my garage).  They will be ready in about two or three weeks, and you can tell they are well cured by cracking one or two, and checking the kernels snap crisply.

As for storage, the University of Minnesota Extension office advises: “After curing, store unshelled nuts in a well-ventilated area at 60°F or less. Cloth bags or wire baskets allow adequate air circulation and discourage development of mold. Try to keep the relative humidity fairly high, ideally about 70%. Nut shells will crack and the kernels spoil if nuts are stored in too dry an area.”  Really, though, just put them in your hall closet.

The walnuts I didn’t throw at my friends thirty-odd years ago (some might say thirty very odd years), always ended up on our holiday table, in a plastic bowl fashioned to look like a slice of a walnut log, and my father would crack the shells and fish out the meats for the kids.  I can still taste them.

Shiitake and Wild Black Walnut “Tartare”

In my first book, A Cook’s Journey: Slow Food in the Heartland, I profiled Dragonfly Neo-V, the organic, vegan restaurant of Chef Magdiale Wolmark in Columbus.  In it, he shares a recipe for Shiitake and Wild Black Walnut “Tartare.”

Magdiale grows his own shiitake mushrooms for this dish on a log in the back yard, and forages for the black walnuts that are prolific in central Ohio, thus the name.

This is a great dish to serve at your next party – everyone will be pleased with the combination of intense flavor & high nutritional value, something true of all the food at Dragonfly Neo-V.

For the Tartare:

1 cup fresh shiitake mushrooms, rinsed, stemmed and chopped
1 tablespoon fresh parsley, chopped
¼ cup wild black walnuts
1 tablespoon tamari*
½ teaspoon minced ginger
1 pinch salt

For the condiments:

1 dozen capers
1 teaspoon Walla Walla onion (or other very sweet onion), diced
3 homemade pickled vegetables such as okra, green cherry or “bread & butter”**
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
6 thin “croutes” or crostini, drizzled with sesame oil and grilled

In a food processor, pulse the walnuts until they are very finely ground, not quite a paste.  Add parsley and Shiitakes and pulse 6 or 7 times until shiitakes are minced.  Very important to stop here – as mushrooms lose water, the mixture will begin to bind.  Add ginger and drizzle in tamari while pulsing 2 or 3 more times.

Remove mixture and form into a patty, served with condiments and toast.

*Tamari is a form of soy sauce, originally a byproduct of making miso.  It is readily available at any Asian market, and now even many mainstream grocery stores.

**Home pickling is fairly easy, but if you must substitute with prepared ones, choose interesting flavors from a purveyor you trust.

This year, a dear friend has turned my attention to the wines of Ladera. They specialize in just the sort of libation I want to pour beside the fire, focusing almost exclusively on Cabernet from just two proprietary vineyards: Howell Mountain and Lone Canyon. Vineyard manager Gabriel Reyes and winemaker Karen Culler are busy there right now, as harvest and crush approaches at the end of a troublesome growing season. Still I have no doubt that the end product, which we won’t see for a few years and probably will want to age for a few more, will be stellar. As evidence, I offer the 2006 Ladera Cabernet Sauvignon Howell Mountain

via One winery from two vineyards | press-citizen.com | Iowa City Press Citizen.

Wright County Egg and the rest of serial offender Austin “Jack” DeCoster’s operations are not farms, but factories. They’re the textbook example of everything that’s unhealthy and unsustainable about the industrial model that has hijacked American agriculture.

via Nourish Network Eggs Got You Scared? Here’s the Scoop.

Terroir is, quite simply, the totality of a wine's origin. It is the term for describing the effects on the wine of such disparate yet interrelated aspects as soil, weather, wind, climate, water and all the minutia that make a wine characteristically Bordeaux (or Mendoza, or Napa, or Marlborough, etc.). It is the overall placeness of the wine. Since the etymology of the word is from the French (by way of Latin) “terre” meaning “earth,” perhaps the closest we could get in English would be “earthness.”

Every region, and every subregion, and every individual vineyard has characteristics that make it unique. It may have soil of a certain type and subsoil of this or that mineral. Some vineyards are parched dry, others have moisture but drain well. If they are too wet, they are likely to be turned to some other use. Many are on hillsides, which affects not only drainage but also exposure to sun and wind depending on the face of the slope. Some wind makes for strong, durable vines, but too much can buffet and damage grape clusters. Direct sun ripens grapes quickly, but they need frequent cooling so the sugars develop character and intensity.

Read the rest in Table Wine @ the Iowa City Press Citizen

Few herbs are as surrounded by mythology and folklore as basil. Its origins are debated, but most seem to think it came from India where besides its innumerable culinary uses, a devout Hindu has a leaf of basil placed on his breast when he dies, as a passport to paradise. It is famous in Christian history as well as the herb Salome used to cover the smell of decay from John the Baptists head. In Haitian Voodoo practice the herb is a powerful protector, and a Romanian man is engaged when he accepts a sprig of basil from a woman.

All this trivia is of little use though, when faced with bushels of the stuff that we all pull out of our gardens the afternoon before we expect the first heavy frost of autumn. Get a jump on that by beginning your “puttin' up” now. You can blanch and freeze it all with a quick dip in boiling, salted water followed by an instantaneous plunge into ice water – then drain, pat dry and freeze in Ziplocs, but that only postpones the inevitable pesto, and pesto is best with fresh leaves. A voluptuous pesto is of course a good way to reduce the volume quickly and have something everyone loves to show for your efforts.

Read the rest at Huffington Post.

Its popularity in the U.S. waned, especially after the increase in German immigration, bringing with them their expertise in brewing beer from the abundant grains of the Great Plains. In northern Spain, however, the passion for Sidra, as the Spanish call hard cider, never went out of style. This despite the inexplicable decades-long banning of its production by Generalisimo Francisco Franco after the Spanish Civil War. It was especially true in the north, in the Basque and Galician regions, where the best Sidra is still made today.

The best Sidra is made from one ingredient: Apples. Today many large-scale producers add things such as residual sugar, artificial carbonation, grape juice or preservatives. The finest is still nothing more than fermented apple juice, served fresh and slightly chilled.

via See what real hard cider is all about | press-citizen.com | Iowa City Press Citizen.

A classic method in tropical climes for centuries, this method is still relatively unknown in the States, but we are familiar with some methods that operate on the same principle, which uses a grill’s high heat on an enveloped piece of meat, fish or poultry to steam it in its own juices.  Many use foil, or multiple sheets of wet newspaper, or cook sweet corn while it’s still in the husk (popular here in Iowa).

The advantage of the banana leaves is that you get the best of both worlds: the healthy, juicy speed of steam with the rich aroma and flavor of smoke from the grill.  Plus there’s no sticking to the grill, despite the lack of added fat.

Banana leaves are easy to find in just about any Asian grocery, and many Mexican bodegas carry them as well.  They usually come frozen, but they thaw very quickly just sitting on your counter, or overnight in the refrigerator, and I have re-frozen leftovers two or three times with no noticeable loss of quality.

Simply put, all you need to do is season a boneless, skinless filet of line-caught Alaskan salmon (never use Atlantic or farmed – visit here to find out why) with salt, fresh cracked black pepper and a squeeze of fresh lemon juice.  Cut a square out of the large banana leaf that is roughly 9-times the area of the fillet, and wrap as you might a burrito or an old-fashioned paper envelope (see illustrations).

To put it in recipe form…

Banana-Leaf-Wrapped Salmon Fillet

1 8-ounce fillet of salmon, boneless and skinless, Alaskan line-caught King, Coho or Sockeye
Kosher salt and cracked black pepper to taste
1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
1 12″ x 12″ square of banana leaf

Season the fillet with salt, pepper and lemon to taste.  Wrap as shown in banana leaf and grill over high heat for 4 minutes per side or too desired doneness.  The leaves should be charred, and for best flavor the interior of the salmon should still be a bit moist-orange, about 125 degrees f.  Time will vary somewhat because no two grills are alike.

Let rest one or two minutes and then serve on the unfolded banana leaf (but warn your guests not to try to eat the leaf itself – it’s quite fibrous)

Any number of accompaniments could go along side it.  Pictured here the salmon is “naked,” with sides of Iowa’s legendary sweet corn and some sliced heirloom tomatoes.  In case you’d like to get even more adventurous though, try it with this tropical twist on the classic Southwestern pico de gallo.

Mango-Cherry Pico de Gallo

2 ripe mangoes, peeled, pitted and diced
1/2 pound pitted black cherries (fresh is best, but frozen is OK)
1 medium red onion, minced
1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1 or 2 serrano chilis, minced (or to taste)
1 each red and green bell peppers, diced
Juice of 2 limes

Toss together the mangoes, cherries, onion, cilantro, chilis, peppers and lime juice.  Refrigerate, stirring occasionally for 1 hour or up to 1 day.

Perhaps no dish conjures up more images of Spain than paella. Steeped in history and distinctive spices, to prepare this dish is to summon the soul of Spain and the spirit of her people.

For the uninitiated, paella (pronounced “pie-AY-ya”) is kind of a rice casserole, traditionally prepared in a special kind of pan (from which it takes its name) over an open fire. And it’s prepared by men.

Food carries a very strong cultural imperative in Spain, and customs are not swept away merely for the sake of political correctness. Throughout Spain, there are exclusive all-male clubs dedicated entirely to cooking and to the pleasures of the table.

Paella has at least 400 years of history, and its origins are in the province of Valencia, on the southeast coast. There, they grow the medium-grain Valencia rice that absorbs flavors wonderfully and is the key to the dish. The first paellas were made by peasants, using their native rice and whatever was available–often snails, onions, and that curious import from the New World, the tomato.

Since then paella has evolved into an enormous variety of dishes in every region of Spain, as well as the Caribbean, Central and South America, and the Philippines. Many use saffron, but not all, and the countless combinations of ingredients include all manner of shellfish, game, fowl, mushrooms, and finfish.

The traditional method, using the wide, shallow, heavy-bottomed paella pan, cooks slowly over a well-regulated fire. Where Americans might have a clambake, Spanish families have beach cookouts where paella is made amid plenty of wine-fueled arguments about the right way to do it. Controlling the fire, stirring enough but not too much, when to add which ingredients so they cook completely without overcooking; all this is debated throughout the process because every Spanish cook claims to make the best paella. This method takes practice and patience, but is quite rewarding for all who partake.

Now for those who are looking for a shortcut, here’s a simpler method that cooks the rice and the seafood/chicken/chorizo mixture separately so it doesn’t require the constant attention of the traditional method. Breaking with tradition is not a sin of which I am often guilty, but I have to admit that this does produce quite a tasty dish … even if I would be shunned by my fellow male chefs in Spain.

Ironically the New Orleans Oyster Festival, postponed from its original 2006 premier by Katrina and Rita, had its inaugural – and likely final – run last week. No one has anything optimistic to tell us about the future of the Louisiana oyster beds. More bad news comes when you talk to shrimpers, longline fishers, trawlers, and on and on.

Soon-to-be-outgoing BP CEO Tony Hayward is saying that it will “pay all legitimate claims” made by the people whose lives their carelessness ruined, but looking at the Exxon Valdez spill for precedent, Exxon tied them up in court for 2 decades and eventually paid a mere 10% of the total claims. So no, I don’t think anyone believes Mr. Hayward.

And so it comes down, as it always does, to the strength, goodwill and generosity of the American people to try and help the victims of still more corporate carelessness.

The first of what I am sure will be many opportunities arrives this week. Jimmy Galle, owner of bay Area seafood supplier Gulfish, has organized Dineout for the Gulf Coast, a 3-day benefit at many of the best restaurants around the country. The short-term goal of The Gulf Coast Oil Spill Fund, administered by the Greater New Orleans Foundation, is to make emergency grants to nonprofit organizations helping the victims of the oil spill. The long-term goal of the fund is to address the long-term economic, environmental, cultural effects of the disaster, and strengthen coastal communities against future environmental catastrophes by investing in solutions.

Maybe you can’t afford to send thousands of dollars. Maybe you can’t afford the time it would take to go down there and lend a hand. Most of us want to help in those ways, and most of us simply cannot. This is a small way you can help – go to dinner, eat some good food for a good cause.

Let the profiteers and politicians haggle over the blame game. We’ll keep taking small steps toward recovery. Only a fool fights in a burning house – it’s time to help the people.

via Kurt Friese: Dine Out for the Gulf Coast.

Barbecue may, in fact, be the original way to cook. Historians believe man’s ancestors first ate cooked meat by scavenging in the aftermath of forest fires. More recently, Spanish conquistadors “exploring” tropical islands were fascinated by the aromas coming from the small green-wood grills New World natives called barbacoa. From these origins came the huge variety of barbecue that exists around the world. No other country, though, pursues the ‘cue with such passionate abandon as the United States.

via The Secret of True ‘Cue | Nourish Network.