Not your garden-variety carrot cake

I must confess that this entry in the weekly baking series had me a little nervous, and I even considered lying by omission with respect to one of the key ingredients when I brought it into work on Monday. I mean, I’m a massive fan of the lowly parsnip and consider it utterly inoffensive, but I know people can have weird knee-jerk reactions when it comes to vegetables, especially in baked goods. I’ve known people to freak out over plain old zucchini bread.

But I obviously worried over absolutely nothing, because I can’t even adequately describe what a huge hit this was with the coworkers. The “parsnip” prominently displayed on the accompanying Post-It note doesn’t seem to have deterred anyone, and people were gushing and demanding the recipe for days after. And who could blame them, when these muffins are so fantastically spicy, chewy, sweet and moist that the cream cheese frosting I offered on the side really was viewed as superfluous?

So what possessed me to mix parsnips into a carrot cake recipe in the first place? It was a lucky impulse born of nostalgia and facilitated by the fact that, just as I do with cranberries, I hoard parsnips this time of year. They start showing up in supermarkets right before the holidays before disappearing rapidly again in January. Don’t ask me why, since I think they’re lovely even after Christmas has passed, but produce buyers can be short-sighted that way.

I had been intending to make carrot cake for the past month or so, since our anniversary. My prior love of carrot cake for its own sake was amplified when it unexpectedly became our wedding cake thanks to the very obliging host of the B&B His Lordship and I had eloped to. We hadn’t planned on having one and had in fact gone all-out at dinner, but were surprised and touched when we got back to our room and found the prettily decorated top tier of her friends’ anniversary cake, which the host had brought home for us from their party. It made a great breakfast the next morning, and ever since I’ve had a special craving for carrot cake this time of year.

While I was pulling the carrots out of the vegetable bin, I saw the parsnips and thought what the heck. Parsnips are practically the same as carrots anyway, and although they’re pretty rare, I had heard of parsnip cakes before. Just to play it safe, I went with a 50-50 ratio and added the resulting shred to my favorite carrot cake recipe, which is already fabulously easy and delectable.

Do you notice the parsnips? Well, not unless you really concentrate. They’re so pale that they disappear into their speckled surroundings once baked, and all you see are the sturdier carrots. If you focus, you can taste their distinctively spicy sweetness behind the cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves, but the non-cognoscenti could just as easily assume that was a pinch of cardamom or ginger instead. If you’re really skittish about the parsnip thing, or want to try this in May when there’s nary a parsnip to be found, you can make it with all carrots instead, and I promise you’ll love them just as much.

If you do fancy an adventure or want to sneak some additional variety into your kids’ or your coworkers’ diets, though, try this out! It’s fun, and who says you shouldn’t play with your food?

Carrot-Parsnip Spice Muffins
(Adapted from Carrot Cake in America’s Test Kitchen’s The New Best Recipe)
Makes 2-3 dozen muffins

1 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 cup “white” whole wheat flour
1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 1/4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1 1/2 cups grated carrots (about 3 medium)
1 1/2 cups grated parsnips (about 3 medium)
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
4 large eggs
1 1/2 cups canola or grapeseed oil

For the frosting (seriously optional):

8 ounces softened cream cheese
5 tablespoons softened unsalted butter
1 tablespoon sour cream
1/4 cup honey
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup confectioner’s sugar

Adjust the oven rack to the middle position and preheat oven to 350F. Line 2-3 muffin tins with paper liners.

In a large bowl, whisk together the flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices.

Combine the sugars and eggs in a food processor fitted with the metal blade and process until the brown sugar has completely broken up and distributed throughout, about 30 seconds. With the machine running, add the oil through the feed tube in a steady stream, and continue processing until the mixture is light in color and resembles mayonnaise.

Add the liquid mixture to the dry ingredients and fold until the flour is mostly incorporated, then fold in the carrots and parsnips.

Fill the tins with the batter half to two-thirds full, depending on how many muffins you would like to end up with and how ample their tops. Bake until a skewer inserted into a muffin comes out clean, 25-28 minutes. Cool the muffins completely in their tins.

In a food processor, combine the cream cheese, butter, sour cream, honey and vanilla. Process until well combined, then add the powdered sugar and continue processing until smooth. If the frosting is not sweet enough, add a bit more honey and pulse again.

Ice the cooled muffins with the frosting, or serve the frosting alongside as a spread. Unfrosted muffins will keep at room temperature for a day, but frosted ones and any leftover frosting should be covered and refrigerated.

Notes:

If it seems as though I’m using a lot of this “white” whole wheat flour, which is made by King Arthur and a few other vendors, it’s because I really love the stuff. Not only is it a snap to swap out some of the white flour in a recipe and add some extra nutrition value without any textural harm at all, but the extra wheatiness really plays well in recipes with a lot of spice, like this one. If you don’t want to go that route, simply use 2 1/2 total cups of all-purpose flour instead.

I didn’t want any embellishments this time, but if you’re a fan of walnuts and/or raisins in your carrot cake (I like the former but can seriously leave the latter), you could stir in 1 to 1 1/2 cups of either or both along with the carrots and parsnips.  In that case, you will probably also have to add at least 5 more minutes to the baking time.

In the future, I may try making this entirely with parsnips. If it’s a success, I’ll definitely report back.

Onion soup is one of the supposed betes noires of vegetarianism. They will tell you that it can’t be done without meat stock, and more specifically without beef stock — homemade from roasted beef bones, of course. They will tell you to give it up, because a vegetarian-friendly onion soup by definition will be bland, feeble, and worse than nothing.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

It’s just a matter of expanding your definitions a bit and being a little more creative. While this version is not identical to the beef-based original, it is no less deep, dark, and wonderful. Even better, it’s fast and easy enough for even your most harried mid-week dinner, especially if the weather is as miserably damp and grey as it has been around here lately. The only downside is that slicing this many onions will make you weep quantities of tears Ron Howard would sell his last remaining hairs to evoke and quite likely will stink up your house. It’s a small price to pay for this level of heartstring-plucking warmth (which, again, Opie would kill for).

You could go whole hog and gratin the tops of individual portions with shredded Gruyere, or serve alongside a grown-up grilled cheese made with artisan bread and the fancy cheese of your choice. It would also meet with my full approval were you to be moved to whip up a batch of these:

Cheese Biscotti

Vegetarian Onion Soup
Serves 2-3 as a main course, 4 as a first course

2 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
8 cups thinly sliced onions (see note below)
1 cup apple cider
4 cups vegetable stock
2 teaspoons dried thyme
Salt and pepper to taste

Heat the butter and oil in a large heavy pot over medium-high heat until the butter is barely starting to brown. Add the onions, tossing to coat with the fat, and cook, stirring intermittently, until the onions are seriously browned and caramelized, around 15 minutes.

Deglaze the pan with the cider, scraping the bottom thoroughly to pick up all the yummy solids. Add the stock, thyme, salt and pepper, partially cover the pot, and simmer until the onions are meltingly soft, 20-30 more minutes.

Notes:

I favor a combination of yellow onions, red onions and shallots. I think this gives the soup a little more nuance, but if plain old yellow is all you have, go right ahead and use those. I would not use very sweet varieties like Walla Walla or Vidalia, since as lovely as they are for other things, they tend to make an insipid soup, and you’re already getting sweetness from the cider.

I use the “chicken” flavor bouillon concentrate, but if you have good homemade veggie broth, by all means use that.

She most certainly did make the trek on a wretchedly rainy Saturday to the dangerously-nearer-than-before Penzey’s boutique, wherein she proceeded to plunk down more than $80 on spices.

What? I just moved! I needed to restock! Not to mention, the holiday season is coming up! Don’t judge.

By the way, was I exaggerating when I said I clean out their chile section whenever I go there?

No I was not.

Yes, I do like it hot.  QED.

So anyway, you might be wondering what I did with this embarrassment of spices when I got home.  Well, the first thing I did was make a curried egg salad sandwich for lunch.  The second thing I did was to make these fantastic cupcakes for afternoon tea, because spotting the poppy seeds on the Penzey’s shelves reminded me that I’d been craving them for weeks.  The cupcakes also gave me an opportunity to crack open the little jar of dried orange peel and intoxicating Mexican vanilla extract, both of which are absolute necessities for my holiday baking.

While these were cooling, we took the Monster out for her walk, and of course the heavens chose that precise moment to crank up the rainfall to 11. Normally that would put me in a vile temper, but I came home to ferociously strong and milky tea, snappy little cakes, a pantry full of future deliciousness, and an excuse to trot out the totally awesome poppy pin I got at the Museum of Opium in Thailand. I have absolutely nothing to complain about.

Except perhaps the project this shopping spree spun off, namely finding a storage solution for my spicy bounty. On our way out of the store, His Lordship declared the current arrangement — a big covered bin into which all the zip bags and little jars are unceremoniously tossed — unacceptable. If anyone has any suggestions that do not involve me wasting hours transferring spices into little jars I don’t even have the shelf space for, I’m all ears.

Poppy Seed Cupcakes
(Adapted from Brown Sugar Lightning Cake in Sally Schneider’s The Improvisational Cook)
Makes 10 jumbo cupcakes, or 12-16 normal ones

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
Scant 1/2 teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons poppy seeds
2 large eggs
1 cup granulated sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons dried orange peel, rehydrated in 2 teaspoons boiling water
Zest of one lemon
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 350, and line the appropriate number of jumbo or regular muffin tins with foil or paper liners.

In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, and poppy seeds.

In a large bowl, beat the eggs with the sugar and zests until pale and light. Whisk in the liquid mixture, then fold in the dry ingredients until just incorporated.

Scoop the batter into the muffin cups, filling no more than halfway. Bake 20-25 minutes for regular cupcakes or 25-30 for jumbo cupcakes, until golden and springy and the proverbial skewer comes out clean when inserted in the middle of a cupcake. Cool the cupcakes in their tins on a wire rack.

Notes:

If the cake recipe has a vaguely familiar ring, it’s because the endoskeleton is the same basic one that supports the olive oil cake I wrote up last month. Like Alton, I adore a multitasker, and this recipe is as adaptable, quick and foolproof as any you’ll ever find.

I favor cupcakes not because I have a weakness for cute food, but because they cook faster than full-sized cakes, and leftover individual cakes are easier to share with coworkers or friends than a partially-eaten cake. If you have neither concern, bake the batter in a buttered and floured 9-inch round pan for 35-40 minutes.

Speaking of ginger — and with me, you pretty much always are — I’d like to share one of my favorite fall desserts and/or breakfasts: poached pears.

A perfectly ripe pear is an autumnal joy all by itself, but when the pears are not quite ripe or are a little on the grainy side, poaching them erases all sins. Using a plain light syrup gives you a soft, unpretentious result reminiscent of the canned pears we probably all loved as kids, but adding grown-up flavorings to the liquid or using wine or juice instead of water elevates the simple fruit to heights of sophistication.

Naturally, ginger is one of my favorite additions to the poaching syrup, but that’s just the start. Although I once thought nothing could supplant allspice in my “where have you been all my life?” affections, lately I can’t keep my hands off the jar of Szechuan peppercorns. These little pink gems look like miniature red popcorn kernels, smell like a cross between citrus and roses, and add just the right hint of delicious mystery. To play supporting alto to their trilling soprano, I add an equal amount of black peppercorns, rendering a subtly challenging syrup that makes both the pears and your tastebuds go “hmmm”.

As a bonus, any syrup left after you’ve fished out the last of the pears can be mixed with fizzy water to yield a subtly spicy pear-and-ginger soda, or stirred into unsweetened iced tea for a flavor Snapple only wishes they’d thought up.

Pears Poached with Ginger and Szechuan Peppercorns
Serves 4-6, not counting leftover syrup for beverages

1 cup granulated sugar
1 thumb-sized piece of ginger, peeled and sliced
1/4 teaspoon each Szechuan and black peppercorns
3 cups water
1 quart Seckel pears or 6-8 full-sized pears

In a large saucepan, combine the sugar, ginger, peppercorns and water. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes.

Meanwhile, peel the pears, cut in half, and remove the cores with a melon baller. If using full-sized pears, cut into eighths. Seckels can be left in halves.

Tip the pears into the syrup, return to a simmer, and continue cooking until the tip of a sharp knife easily pierces the pears all the way through. Let the pears cool to room temperature, then fish out the peppercorns and ginger.

Cover and refrigerate until ready to serve in your prettiest bowls, with or without ice cream, for dessert, or with yogurt and granola for breakfast. Use any leftover syrup in your favorite beverage application.

Notes:

I am a fiend for the tiny, cute Seckel variety, which make for a particularly elegant presentation, but pretty much any variety will work. In this batch, I mixed Seckels and big red Bartletts with no ill effects. Very firm varieties like Boscs will hold together really well, although you will sacrifice some of the creaminess that makes a poached pear so soothing.

You can bump up the quantity of ginger or black peppercorns to your heart’s content. Whatever you do, though, don’t add more Szechuan peppercorns unless you like your desserts with a side of Novocaine. The same compounds in Szechuan peppercorns that give them their addictively floral fragrance also make them a topical anaesthetic in larger quantities. Any more than I’ve indicated here will numb your tongue for hours.

If you can’t get Szechuan peppercorns, you could get a similar, if less dramatic, effect with a couple of star anise or a cinnamon stick plus half a vanilla bean in addition to the black peppercorns.

Swamp water? Toxic waste?

Whatever it is, it doesn’t look very appetizing, doesn’t it?

Well, this is another of those cases where looks are inversely proportional to yumminess. It’s an infused syrup for homemade ginger ale, and if you’re as ginger-obsessed as I am, it’s beauty incarnate. This syrup makes a turbo-charged version of ginger ale, a bubbly drink so intensely spicy and punchy that your head will reel in the best possible way. It’s simultaneously refreshing and electrifying, with a deeply addictive slow, sweet burn.

I love ginger so much that I make this summery cooler year-round, but it recently occurred to me that its bilgey appearance and diabolical bite couldn’t be more perfect for your Halloween party. Depending on the size of your bash, I’d double or triple the batch, and serve it out of a glass vessel suitable for a mad scientist’s lab. If your party is of the strictly grown-ups variety, you could mix in some rum for the aptly-named Dark and Stormy.

Ginger Ale Syrup
(Originally from Jean Georges Vongerichten, but see below)
Makes around 2 cups syrup, enough to serve 6-8 (assuming I feel like sharing)

1/2 pound fresh ginger, peeled
Inner parts of bottom third of 2 stalks lemongrass
1-2 dried Tien tsin peppers or other small infernal chiles, left whole
3/4 cup sugar, preferably raw (demerara or turbinado)
Seltzer or fizzy mineral water

Chop the ginger into half-inch chunks, and thinly slice the lemongrass stalks. Place both in a food processor and pulse until very fine, but not pureed.

In a small saucepan, combine the ginger mixture, chiles, sugar, and 2 cups of water. Bring to a boil, then lower heat and simmer vigorously for 15 minutes.

Let cool to room temperature, then strain through a fine-meshed strainer. The syrup will theoretically keep in the fridge for days, but it’s highly unlikely it will last longer than 48 hours once you’ve tried your first sip.

To serve, pour 4-5 tablespoons of syrup into a large ice-filled glass, and top off slowly with the seltzer or mineral water. Stir gently with a chopstick or long spoon to distribute the syrup.

Notes:

The original recipe came from Jean Georges Vongerichten, but I found it some time ago after following so convoluted a trail of hyperlinks that I’m really not sure how authentic it was even before I started tweaking.

If you don’t have access to a food processor, as I didn’t when I first tried this, grate the ginger and mince the lemongrass instead.

It’s that time of the year again, in more ways than one. Early fall seems to be my usual time for disappearing and/or reappearing here, since it’s my usual time for starting new things, like degree programs, jobs, household projects, not to mention finally making an honest man out of His Lordship. It’s also the time we get a sizable shipment of dried figs from my father-in-law, which I’ve previously documented.

This cake, which marks my renewal of the Sunday baking and blogging tradition, is apropos of all of that, since it was inspired by a dinner out last weekend to commemorate our anniversary, the start of my new career, and our return to the East Coast.

We resume our narrative at a big-deal local restaurant named after an eating implement, which originally witnessed the very-long-in-coming decision to de-sin our relationship. While the meal was enjoyable and the company was naturally delightful, one of our “small-plate” desserts (a trend about which I have very mixed feelings) was quite the let-down. In principle, it sounded like the perfect not-too-heavy ending: an individual olive oil cake with Marcona almonds, garnished with figs. In practice, the cake was dry, crumbly, and tasted of neither olive oil nor almonds. The only saving grace was that the figs in the accompanying garnish were fresh and very nicely presented.

With the first bite, I knew I could do it better, since I already had a great and easy olive oil cake in my repertoire. I had figs that, while not fresh, were so lovingly grown and processed that they were still brightly green and tender, which reminded me of a old-favorite recipe for figs and apricots reconstituted in a honey-lemon syrup. I didn’t have almonds, but since they had added nothing at all, I quickly dropped that element altogether.

My path clear, I proceeded to do it better the very next day, on the first try, in about an hour and with minimal kitchen messing-up. Unlike the original, this cake is moist and beautifully springy in crumb, and delicately perfumed in ways that really do hint at sun-dappled groves. The glistening green-and orange compote instantly clicked with the cake and added even more Mediterranean flair, not to mention perfect fall color.

Not a bad way to make a comeback, one-upping an award-winning institution. Sometime soon I’m going to try improving on the rather bland butternut risotto I had as an entree, after a faultless appetizer of wild mushrooms en croute and a Calvados sidecar that made me want to rush across the Ben Franklin to stock up on hassle-free apple brandy for future cocktail applications.

Olive Oil Cake with Honeyed Fig-Apricot Compote
(Adapted from Sally Schneider, The Improvisational Cook and The Moosewood Collective, Sundays at Moosewood Restaurant)
Serves 8

For the cake:

3/4 cup each “white” whole wheat flour and all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
Scant 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
2 large eggs
Zest of one large lemon
1 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup each milk and yogurt (preferably Greek)
1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

Preheat the oven to 350 F. Butter and flour a 9-inch cake pan, lined with parchment paper.

In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt. In a glass measuring cup, thin the yogurt down with the milk, then whisk in the olive oil until emulsified. (I’ll warn you, it won’t look at all pretty.)

In a large bowl, beat the eggs, lemon zest and sugar by hand until frothy and and the sugar is starting to dissolve. Whisk in the flour mixture until mostly incorporated, then stir in the swampy-green yogurt and oil emulsion.

Scrape the batter into the cake pan and bake about 45 minutes, until the top springs back when gently pressed, or until a skewer inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool the cake for five minutes in the pan, then invert, peel off the parchment, and cool completely on a rack.

For the compote:

3 cups boiling water
1/3 cup honey
2 cups dried figs, sliced into eighths
1 cup dried apricots, quartered
Juice of one lemon (the same one zested for the cake)

While the cake is baking and cooling, mix the honey and water in a medium saucepan. Add the fruit, bring to a boil, and simmer until the fruit is tender and the syrup has reduced and thickened, about 20-25 minutes. Remove from the heat and stir in the lemon juice.

Once the cake has cooled, serve generous slices with the compote on the side.

While it’s best the day it’s baked, the cake will keep well for several days at room temperature, tightly wrapped in plastic. Any leftover compote can be spooned into a small container and schlepped to work the next day with a single serving of even more yogurt, turning your Monday morning into an entirely different experience.

Notes:

A good, but not great, olive oil is what you’re aiming for here. You want one that is fruity and flavorful, but don’t waste your $40-a-bottle, murky-green unfiltered Tuscan early-harvest on an application that will bake out most of its divinity. Save that one for salads, and grab the $5 a bottle California estate stuff from Trader Joe’s instead.

I use the “white” whole wheat flour both to add flavor and to make the cake marginally healthier — although with no butter and all that “good” fat, it’s already about as good-for-you as you can make a cake that’s still absolutely delicious. If you don’t have it on hand, go ahead and use a total of 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour instead.

You can use 1/2 cup of buttermilk instead of the yogurt and milk, although I don’t know about you, but I’m much more likely to have yogurt around during the last-minute, MUST HAVE CAKE NOW occasions when this recipe comes in particularly handy. Likewise, regular plain yogurt is fine instead of the Greek yogurt, but I usually stock the Greek kind, and there’s something particularly appropriate about using it in a cake based on olive oil.

Incidentally, the cake is equally wonderful in the summer with fresh berries or nectarines, preferably macerated with a tiny bit of sugar in orange juice or white wine.

Those of you in the southern latitudes might be sick of wintry food and have probably already moved on to mircrogreens and asparagus, but up here it’s still freezing and miserable and there’s still need for comfort. I can think of few dishes more comforting when the weather’s horrid than shepherd’s pie, and this one has the additional benefit of being kind to the sheep.

Yes, once again, it’s a recipe based on lentils. Don’t knock them. Lentils are cheap, delicious, nutritious, and cook quickly. Here they make a perfect stand-in for the usual beef or lamb, since they have a similar texture and a deep and substantial savoriness that’s perfect against the fluffy starchiness of the potatoes.

If it’s more than nominally spring where you are, you can tuck this away for six or seven months. Otherwise, please give this one a try now, especially if you’re having a bunch of guests over, since it can be assembled well ahead and baked when they arrive in need of warmth and welcome.

Vegetarian Shepherd’s Pie
Serves 6-8

1 cup lentils
1 large bay leaf
2-3 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 cups each finely diced onion, celery and carrots
2 cups diced cremini or white button mushrooms
1/4 cup tomato sauce
1 large sprig fresh sage
1 large handful fresh parsley
1/2 bag frozen peas
Salt, pepper, and splashes of soy sauce to taste
5-6 medium Russet or Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and diced
3 tablespoons butter, plus additional for dotting the top

In a medium pot, boil the lentils with the bay leaf in just enough liquid to keep them covered until just tender, adding more boiling water if necessary. Be sure not to drain the lentils once they’re cooked.

Saute the onion, celery, carrots and mushrooms in the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat until the vegetables just begin to caramelize. Add the tomato sauce, the lentils with their liquid, and the fresh herbs, leaves torn roughly by hand. Simmer until the liquid has mostly evaporated, then season with salt, pepper, and soy. Stir in the frozen peas and turn off the heat.

Bring a large pot of water to the boil, and salt well. Boil the potatoes until tender, then drain and mash or put through a ricer. Stir in the butter.

Butter a 9 x 13 glass baking dish. Decant the lentil filling into the dish, then spread the mashed potatoes over the top evenly. Create ridges or swirls in the mashed potatoes and dot the top with tiny bits of butter to promote browning.

Place the pie on a baking sheet to catch any drips, and bake the pie at 375 F until the potatoes are browning nicely and the filling is just starting to bubble, 20-30 minutes.

Let sit for a couple of minutes, then serve.

Notes:

You can cut the recipe back at will, by half or even thirds. This just happens to be the amount that fits in my baking dish, and I like the leftovers so much that I don’t mind eating this for several days, which is contrary to my usual low tolerance.

The lentil variety doesn’t matter as much as in some other recipes. You can use whatever you have and prefer. In fact, I often mix brown lentils with French green or black beluga, since the brown ones will break down more and stick the filling together, while the firmer lentils will provide extra texture.

This recipe is easy to make vegan, since the only dairy is the butter in the mashed potato topping, which could be replaced with olive oil.

I have been madly in love with Jacques Pepin’s mother, and more importantly with her reckless ingenuity, ever since I read The Apprentice.  I immediately knew I’d have to try her every-known-rule-breaking cheese souffle, and it was everything I had hoped and more.  I have made all kinds of variations on it since, and it has become a favorite dinner with a simple salad. Naturally, it’s a perfect brunch dish as well.

It’s flatter than a traditional souffle and just a smidge heavier, somewhere between a traditional souffle and a frittata, but it’s so beautifully, perfectly eyes-closed easy and no-compromises delicious that nothing whatsoever is lost.  For all its luxuriousness, it’s also quite a recession-friendly dish, since eggs are cheap and while it’s amazing with imported Gruyere, it’s also great with less exalted domestic cheeses.

It’s the most sublime way of using up all kinds of leftovers, too.  Previous incarnations have included pepper jack with green onion, and aged gouda with cremini mushrooms sauteed in Marsala.

Cheese and Asparagus Souffle
(adapted from Maman’s Cheese Souffle, in Jacques Pepin’s The Apprentice)
Serves 4-6

6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) unsalted butter, plus extra for greasing the dish
6 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 cups milk
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
7 large eggs, well beaten
2 1/2 cups (approximately 6 ounces) grated cheese, preferably Gruyere
1 bunch fresh asparagus, roasted or steamed

Butter a 6-cup gratin dish and set aside.

In a saucepan, melt the 6 tablespoons butter over medium heat, then add flour and whisk over the heat until fully absorbed and starting to simmer. Whisk in the milk, and continue stirring until the sauce is thick and smooth and comes to a boil, 1-2 minutes.

Pour into a large bowl and allow to cool for 10 minutes.  In the meantime, preheat the oven to 400F.

When the sauce has cooled, fold in the eggs and cheese. Slice the lower stalks of the asparagus thinly and stir into the egg mixture, reserving the tips for garnish.

Pour the mixture into the buttered dish and bake until puffy and well browned on top, 30-40 minutes.  Serve immediately, garnished with the reserved asparagus tips and accompanied by a simply dressed green salad.

The deflated leftovers are delicious cold or reheated the next day.

Notes:

The original recipe called for five extra-large eggs, but the time I mistakenly made it with an extra egg, I preferred the additional lightness.  Since I  have to make a special point of buying extra-large but always have large on hand, I’ve scaled the recipe for the equivalent of six extra-large eggs.

I had milder Madrigal instead of Gruyere on hand, so I substituted Parmesan for the last half-cup to add sharpness.  Do the same if you’re using standard American swiss or cheddar.

If you saw these lumpy, fuzzy, brown-splotched things in the bargain bin of your local market for $1.50 a bag, you’d think their next stop was the compost heap and you’d walk right past, wouldn’t you?

Oh, but you’d be wrong.  Sadly, sadly wrong, since these less-than-beauteous things are quinces, and pretty is utterly irrelevant when it comes to quinces.

What you would have walked past, my friend, is the bargain of the year, because fresh quinces are usually upwards of a buck apiece, assuming you can even find them.  When I saw these, I squealed like a schoolgirl presented with a new pony, took advantage of the produce staff’s ignorance, and snapped up five pounds for the laughable total of three dollars.  I haven’t been able to find them this cheap in years, which is why I haven’t, until now, been able to make preserves to ease my often-unrequited longing for this headily-perfumed rosy fruit.

Why would you want to go to the trouble of making preserves in the dead of winter, when you’re all burned out from the holiday baking push?  For one thing, quinces are so high in natural pectin that you can get a wonderfully thick, versatile jam for barely more work than making applesauce.  Besides being a lovely spread redolent of sultry nights at the Alhambra, it can be added by the spoonful to lend its hint of mystery to your apple, pear or berry desserts for the rest of the year.

Even better, turning the jam into the toothsome paste traditionally served with Manchego is simply a matter of letting it dry out in a flat vessel, and it keeps for ages in the fridge. Make your own, and the next time you want to put together a schmancy cheese plate, you can tell Whole Paycheck to shove the insane prices they charge for imported dulce de membrillo.

Let us, then, take a delicious lesson from the humble quince, and remember that is not the surface that matters, but the true beauty that is found within.

Quince Preserves

Makes 4 cups jam and one quarter-sheet pan of dulce de membrillo

10 quinces (around 5 pounds)
4 cups granulated sugar (approximately; see instructions below)
Half of a large vanilla bean, split
1 lemon

Wash, peel and core the quinces, chopping roughly. Remove the zest of the lemon in long strips with a peeler, and place with the quinces and vanilla bean in a large pot. Pour over enough water to just cover the fruit, and bring to a boil.  Cover the pot, lower the heat to a simmer, and cook until the fruit is tender, around 45 minutes.  Remove the vanilla bean, but don’t worry about the lemon strips.

Drain the quinces and puree in a food processor or with an immersion blender until smooth, or run them through a food mill if you have one. Measure into a large pan, adding 1 cup sugar for every 1 1/4 cups puree.

Heat on low, stirring, until sugar dissolves, then add the juice of the lemon.  Increase the heat just enough to barely sustain a simmer (more of a blorp, really) and cook for 60-90 minutes, stirring frequently, until very thick and salmon-colored.  If you find that you’re getting a lot of splatter, you can lay two chopsticks or wooden spoons across the top of the pot and setting a lid loosely over it, which should help minimize the mess while leaving room for evaporation.

Spoon the finished jam into clean, sterilized jars.  At this point, you can heat-seal the jars for shelf stability, or simply refrigerate them.

To set as dulce de membrillo, pour into a small, shallow, parchment-lined pan and leave in an oven at the lowest setting for 1-2 hours, or as long as it takes to solidify all the way through. Cut into squares, dust with granulated sugar and store in an covered container in the refrigerator.

Notes:

Should you not be so fortunate as to find quite this many cheap quinces, the recipe can be scaled according to however many you do have.

If you’re not in a rush and want to cut back on the stirring, you can cook down the puree in your slow cooker over several hours, or even overnight.  If His Lordship hadn’t already been using the slow cooker for a pork roast, I would have done so, in order to free up the big stock pot for dinner prep.

Don’t throw away the vanilla bean after you’ve fished it out; dry it and bury it in a container of sugar to scent the sugar, or if you’re feeling really ambitious, make your own vanilla extract by covering it in vodka — or better yet, bourbon — in a small glass bottle.

I no more hold with New Year’s resolutions than I do with the stupid, pointless holiday itself, but I do find myself wanting to eat slightly healthier this time of year purely out of fat and sugar fatigue.  The impulse will wear off by the next major holiday (either my birthday or Chinese New Year, depending on the year), I assure you.

Until then, this is one of my favorite dinners, just right for these post-holiday, undo-the-damage, back-to-work busy days. Lentils are healthy and frugal, so if you are the sort who makes resolutions about either diet or finances, this fits both bills. If you’re also of a superstitious bent, Italians eat lentils in order to attract prosperity in the new year, and since all the economic signs point to a crappy 2009, it might not hurt to try observing the tradition.

This is a lazy modification of mujaddarah, a lentil, rice and caramelized onion dish found around the Levant. To save time, and also because I utterly adore and completely depend on it, I cook the rice separately in the rice cooker while I make the lentils and onions on the stove, then I mix the two together in roughly equal proportions.  Doing it this way also means that any extra rice is plain and therefore suitable for other uses — say, rice pudding, if your holiday crapulence recovery time is quicker than mine.

This is a wonderfully satisfying main course with or without the optional garnish of hard boiled eggs, and it also makes a great side dish for a simply roasted chicken, fish, or other protein if you’re not a vegetarian.

Cheater’s Mujaddarah
Serves 4 as a main dish, or 6 as a side dish

2 cups basmati rice
3 whole allspice berries
1 cup lentils, preferably green or black
2 garlic cloves, smashed and peeled
1 large bay leaf
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 large onions or 4-6 large shallots, sliced as thinly as possible
1 teaspoon ground allspice
1-2 teaspoons soy sauce
Salt and pepper to taste
Hard boiled eggs for garnish (optional)

Cook the rice with several pinches of salt and the allspice berries in a rice cooker or on the stove, as you prefer.

Combine the lentils with the garlic and bay leaf in a medium pot. Cover with water, bring to a boil.  Reduce heat to a vigorous simmer and cook until tender, 20-30 minutes.  Remove the garlic and bay leaf but do not drain, since the lentil liquid will be used for flavoring and moistening the rice later.

In a large skillet, cook the onions in the olive oil over medium-high heat until completely browned and beginning to crisp at the edges.  Set aside a few tablespoons of onions for garnishing the final dish, and add the ground allspice to the remainder.  Deglaze the pan with 1 to 1 1/2 cups of the lentil cooking liquid, then drain the lentils and add to the pan with 1 teaspoon of soy sauce and several grinds of pepper.

Turn off the heat and stir in half to all of the rice, depending on your prefered proportions.  Add additional soy and/or pepper to taste.

Serve topped with the reserved onions and quartered hard boiled eggs, if desired.

Notes:

Soy is not at all customary in this dish, but it adds depths of flavor salt alone does not, and compensates for the fact that the lentils and rice didn’t cook together.

No matter how many onions I caramelize for this dish, it never seems like too much, so if you’d like to up the quantity, you have my wholehearted blessing.  Red onions or shallots will produce an even sweeter, darker garnish, but plain old yellow onions work fine.

If you want to be exhaustively virtuous, you could use brown rice in place of the basmati.