savory french toast

Necessity is the mother of invention, and I find that phrase to be most true in the kitchen. Eating in season means that when something is in, we have a lot of it. A lot of turnips. A lot of snap peas. Too many radishes!

Well, those three are currently in abundance only in my spring-dreaming mind. In winter, at least while the farm stand is closed, we have too many eggs. Now that we milk Jingle once a week, we have plenty of milk and cream, too. That leads to cheesemaking, which creates whey, which we turn into loaf after loaf of homemade bread (the whey lends an addicting sourdough tang).

It all collided one night recently with a hunk of bacon, and transformed out of necessity into savory French toast. I threw it together almost without thinking--my only logic was need. What to do with all this milk? Need to use bacon. Have leeks. Need something sharp for contrast. 

So when we actually sat down to eat the french toast, in a haphazard fashion as it came off the griddle, I was totally blown away. I think I said "this is so good, just so good" to Tim about ten times in surprise.

I'm usually a sucker for sweet French toast with maple syrup and whipped cream, but I skipped a second piece of the sweet stuff for a third piece of savory that time. It was just that good.

Not French toast, but another recent abundance-fueled experiment: homemade neufchâtel, a soft French cheese

For the French toast 
1 cup whole milk
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon flour
Butter for frying
6-8 slices of hearty bread

For the toppings 
bacon slices
1-2 leeks, trimmed, washed, and diced
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
parmesan cheese, thinly sliced

In a shallow baking dish, whisk together (carefully) the milk, egg, and salt. Scatter in the flour, whisking constantly. Set aside.

Heat a medium-sized skillet over medium-high heat. Add the bacon slices and cook, turning over once or twice, until crispy. Remove and set aside. Turn the heat down to medium and add the leeks to the hot pan. Sauté--in the bacon grease, yes!--until soft and more richly green. Then add the red wine vinegar and cook a minute or so more until the liquid is gone.

Now go back to the toast. Heat the butter in a griddle or frying pan over medium-high heat. Meanwhile, soak the bread slices in the milk-egg mixture for about 30 seconds, then flip and soak for 30 more--the time here, though, will depend on the freshness of the bread. When the slices are thoroughly soaked, transfer them to the griddle. Cook about 1 minute on each side--the time here, too, will depend on the thickness of the slices--until golden brown, crispy on the outside, still soft in the middle but not squishy.

Plate the toast. Layer with slices of parmesan cheese, then heap with leeks and bacon (I snipped the bacon up with scissors into little crumbles).

Serve with a bowlful of spicy greens.

Some thoughts: Next time, I want to try mustard, perhaps instead of (or with, if I'm feeling bold) the vinegar. I'm sure it wouldn't hurt to smear the toast with more butter before layering on the parmesan cheese. Right?! And the possibilities for cheese and meat are pretty much endless--as long as the cheese is sharp and the meat is crispy, you just can't mess this up.

slow-cooker pork

Tim and I love to cook--that's been established. But while we do happily spend at least an hour most evenings cooking dinner, we also relish those nights when dinner time rolls around and dinner is already done. There's no post-work prep, almost no clean-up, and dinner is just as good, possibly better, than the dinners that take us hours to prepare.

What is this magic? A squat little kitchen gadget that sits on our counter all day, making no noise at all, looking for all the world like it's doing nothing, when inside it's transforming a Boston butt or picnic roast into fall-apart carnitas, succulent stew, tender braise.

Maybe because it's winter, a season for stews and meaty feasts, I'm newly obsessed with our slow cooker. We originally just used it for picnic or Boston butt roasts (the tougher cuts that need slower cooking), but we've since branched out and now love slow-roasted fresh ham.

Here are my top three favorite recipes so far. 

Pork carnitas 

I make no claims of authenticity--I just threw together spices that sounded good. But the meat was tender, the flavoring intense, and the juice dripped everywhere: the sign of a good taco. 

One 2-3 pound pork shoulder roast 

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 teaspoon oregano

1 teaspoon ground cumin 

1 teaspoon chipotle chili powder 

3 cloves garlic, minced 

One 14.5-ounce can diced tomatoes (or a similar amount of frozen roasted tomatoes) 

Put the roast in the bottom of the slow cooker. Rub it with the olive oil, then with the spices. Pour in the canned tomatoes (or put the hunk of frozen tomatoes next to the roast; it will thaw). Cover and turn the slow cooker on low. Let it all cook for 5-6 hours. 

Once the meat is falling apart, pull it apart with a fork. There will be a good, juicy amount of hot tomato liquid in the bottom of the pot; throw the pulled pork back into the liquid, turn the slow cooker down to warm, and let it stew until it's dinner time. 

Serve with warmed corn tortillas, cilantro, yogurt, and lime juice. 

Pork roast braised in milk

I first tried this recipe because it sounded so strange and because we have an abundance of milk. The pork's tenderness and flavor is unmatched, and there's the added bonus of the milk broth, a drinkable savory treat. And I just recently learned a sweet trick for the broth: if you find curdled milk odd (and yes, the milk in this recipe should curdle), just blend up the sauce with an immersion blender after removing the meat. Voila! 

2 tablespoons olive oil 

One 2-3 pound shoulder roast

A mix of dried herbs like oregano, rosemary, sage, or basil 

16 ounces (approximately) whole milk
Salt and pepper to taste

Heat the olive oil in a frying pan over medium high heat. When the oil is just about to smoke, put the meat in the pan and brown it all the way around.

Move it to the slow cooker, add the herbs and milk, cover, and cook on low for 5-6 hours. The meat will be tender, falling apart, and the milk curdled. This is okay! Good, actually. If it bothers you, though, whizz it up with an immersion blender.

Salt and pepper it, then serve over brown rice or polenta (to really jazz up the polenta, make it with a cup or so of the milk mixture).

Five-spice pork 
Thanks to Fine Cooking and a Chinese-food-themed Superbowl party, we just recently discovered this super easy pork dish. We've made it twice so far, with a few adaptations to the original recipe and homemade five-spice powder, and I'm in love. It's rich, surprisingly semisweet, and deeply flavorful. Both times we've made it, we've marinated the meat in the sauce overnight. That's not necessary, though; it just made day-of prep time as simple as dumping it all in the slow cooker.   

1/3 cup Mirin cooking wine
1/2 cup soy sauce
1 tablespoon Sriracha
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon minced ginger
1 teaspoon five-spice powder
One 2-3 pound pork roast
1 large onion, diced or sliced 

Mix all the ingredients except for the pork in a medium bowl. Cut the pork into about 2-inch strips or cubes. Add to the sauce and marinate overnight, or add all to the slow cooker right away.

Cook on low heat for 5 hours or on high heat for about 3. An hour or so before you want to eat, add the diced onion.

Serve over brown rice.