Grilled Corn with Spicy Miso Butter and Furikake

Camper Mike's corn!

Camper Mike’s corn!

Ryan and I were camping in the Eastern Sierras recently at a gorgeous locale called Silver Lake (also the name of our neighborhood in Los Angeles so I guess it was meant to be).  My friend Sienna, who you may recognize as the talented artist, food stylist and Hudson Workshops founder, her hubs Dallas and their mini-them, Dakota have been vacationing there for a while so this year we decided to tag along.  And thank god we did.  This was some postcard camping, boating, fishing and hiking at its finest.

Our neighbor at the campground, a happy well-fed man named Mike rolled in with his family to celebrate his 40th birthday and upon smelling the bacon I had sizzling on the camp stove, he promptly came over to say hello.  We got to talking about food (what else!) and both quickly discovered that we were crazed for it.  He showed me photos of his homemade grilling rigs, filled in Ryan on all the best fishing spots in the area and gave us some corn his coworker grew that was kicking around in his camper.  In some ways he reminded me of my dad, in others like every guy I grew up with in Wisconsin.  I like guys like Mike.  And the corn wasn’t too shabby either.

Sunset on Silver Lake

Sunset on Silver Lake

Ingredients:

6 ears of corn

Cooking spray

1 stick butter, softened

2 tbsp sesame oil

1 tbsp miso (white or red)

1 tbsp gochujang*

Lime

Furikake**

Directions:

Heat the grill or grill pan to medium high heat.

To make the miso butter, mix together the butter, sesame oil, miso, and gochujang.  If you are making a large batch of this, you can use the food processor and the butter doesn’t have to be softened.  This compound butter freezes well so you can wrap it in small bundles and keep in the freezer for future use.

Shuck the corn and spray it with cooking spray.  Grill until slightly charred, turning the cob so that it is cooked evenly, about 10 minutes.

Remove the corn from the grill and rub with the spicy miso butter.  Squirt some lime juice  and give them a nice dusting of furikake.

*Gochujang is a Korean chili paste that’s in like everything they make.  It’s delicious and you should go on the interwebs and buy some if you don’t have access to it where you live.

**Furikake is a Japanese dry seasoning that has sesame, seaweed, salt, sugar and dried fish. It is traditionally sprinkled on rice which is delicious.  Clearly also awesome on corn. Again, interwebs it if you can’t find it in your town.

Sienna Fishing for Trout

Sienna Fishing for Trout

 

 

Peach and Thyme Clafoutis

It’s stone fruit season, hell yeah!!!  Peaches are one of my all-time favorite fruits and this time of year I tend to put them in everything.  This week alone I’ve already planned some recipes sweet, savory and alcoholic: Old Fashioned Peach Pie, Grilled Peach and Carrot Salad with Carrot Top Mint Pesto and Boozy Peach Slush, to name a few.

Clafouti is traditionally made with cherries and I managed one in a few weeks back with some beauties from my buddy Pete’s CSA.  Yesterday, though, the peaches at the Los Feliz Farmer’s Market were sweet, juicy and on point, so that’s what I used.  This is a delicious custard dessert best served luke warm with a dusting of powdered sugar and some whipped cream or crème fraîche.

Serves 6

Ingredients:

¼ stick butter, room temperature

1 ¼ cup milk

¼ cup sugar

3 eggs

1 tbsp vanilla

Splash brandy

Pinch salt

2 tbsp fresh thyme, chopped

½ cup AP flour

4 ripe peaches, sliced

¼ cup brown sugar

Whipped cream or crème fraîche, for garnish

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Butter an 8-cup baking dish and set aside.

In a blender, add the milk, sugar, eggs, vanilla, brandy, salt, thyme and flour.  Blend until smooth.  Pour a ¼ inch layer of the mixture into the prepared dish and bake for approximately 3-5 minutes to set the batter.  Remove the baking dish from the oven and spread the peaches evenly throughout.  Top with the brown sugar and pour the rest of the batter over the peaches.  Bake for until the clafouti has puffed up, is golden brown and a knife inserted into the center comes out clean.  This takes approximately 35-45 minutes.

Serve the clafoutis warm with a dollop of whipped cream or crème fraîche for added extravagance.

 

Strawberry Rhubarb Fool

People from cold climes have many reasons to be jacked up over Springtime; no more long johns, baby birds, mud pies and our tart friend rhubarb.  Growing up in Wisco, it grew wild outside our farmhouse and so we would end up with loads of rhubarb jam for the rest of the year.  I don’t really remember my mom cutting it with strawberries, rather I think she just added a butt load of sugar to sweeten it up.  Here’s my take on the English dessert, fool, which uses cooked fruit or jam as a base to be layered with custard or whipped cream.  It’s so easy Mr. T be yellin’ “I pity the fool that doesn’t make this fool!”

Serves 4

Ingredients:

½ lb rhubarb

½ lb strawberries, hulled and quartered

½ cup sugar

Pinch salt

1 small vanilla bean, scraped

Juice of 1 orange

1 cup heavy cream

1 tbsp sugar

Directions:

Wash the rhubarb and trim away the tough ends.  Cut in half, put in a bowl filled with cold water and soak for 20 minutes.  This will help to retain its color while cooking.

After the rhubarb has soaked, slice it into ½ inch pieces and put into a medium saucepan.  Add the strawberries, sugar, salt, vanilla and orange juice and bring to a boil.  Reduce the heat to medium low and cook until the rhubarb is tender, about 7-10 minutes.  Only stir a few times so that you do not break up the rhubarb.  Transfer the mixture to a bowl and refrigerate for 1 hour or until it is thoroughly cool.  This can also be done 1 day ahead of time as well.

Either using a stand mixer or by hand with a whisk, whip the heavy cream and 1 tablespoon sugar until soft peaks form.

To assemble the fools, start by first layering the strawberry rhubarb mixture into the bottom of a glass.  Top with the whipped cream, then another layer of the strawberry rhubarb mix and then a final layer of whipped cream.

"Nice job on the fool, fool!"

“Nice job on the fool, fool!”

 

 

Golden Beet Blue Cheese Dip

Beets and blue cheese are damn tasty together and they live quite nicely in this dip that is a crowd-pleaser with vegetarians and dirty meat eaters.  Stick a chicken wing in and you’ll know what I mean.  By the way, check out how pretty this ceramic bowl is!  It was made by my friend Tina who runs Little Cat Pottery in the Highland Park neighborhood in Los Angeles.  She also took the photo, so basically all I did was show up and make some dip.
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