It's All In The Sauce

One of the best techniques you can learn is how to sear roast and make a pan sauce. This is a simple method and will dramatically improve the quality of your home cooked meals.

Any meat can be seared and then roasted including fish. This is best done in a heavy cast iron pan that is oven safe.

Preheat your oven to it's highest temperature which is probably 500 degrees. Be warned that this technique can create quite a bit of smoke. A hood vent should be used or you'll need to open some windows!

Season your meat with salt and pepper. Heat your skillet on the stove top until hot. Add 2 tablespoons of olive oil and swirl to coat the pan.

Place meat in the pan and leave untouched until well browned. Flip and repeat on the second side. Approximately 2 minutes per side. Carefully move the pan to the preheated oven and roast until desired doneness. Transfer the meat to a heated platter and tent with foil.

Place the hot pan back on the burner and begin your pan sauce by deglazing the pan with 1/2 cup of white wine, add 2 tablespoons minced shallots and cook until the alcohol burns off. Add 2 tablespoons of Dijon mustard and 1/2 cup of stock. Season with salt and pepper and lightly thicken with either 2 tablespoons of butter or heavy cream.






Last night I used this technique to make pork chops. Total cooking time was only 15 minutes and the sauce was delicious! Mastering this simple technique will turn your family meals into restaurant quality.


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Location:Whidbey Island

White Thanksgiving

We are stuck inside the house for a few days after getting a bunch of snow! Highly unusual when the normal temperature is 49 degrees in November. The power is on and we have plenty of food, wine and cleaning projects to keep us occupied!



It looks like we will be smoking a turkey breast on The Big Green Egg this year. We will have mashed potatoes, squash, and green beans. Will brine the turkey and then make a spicy chili rub and use Alder Wood for the smoke.

With temperatures dipping below 20 degrees today, we are worried about some of the plants in our garden. Rosemary certainly doesn't like the cold snap and my precious Agave are only hardy to 25 degrees.

The sun came out today, eagles are soaring and the mountains are beautiful. A far contrast to the storm yesterday.






We drove to Langley against my better judgement stopping to help stranded motorists along the way. I went to see Madhu and spent a blissful 90 minutes getting one of her famous massages.

Today I learned of the passing of our neighbors Jack Russell Terrier, Rowan. He was always at our house begging for Dan to throw the ball. He had so much energy even as he got older and one must wonder if his little heart didn't wear out. He will be missed for sure.






May he rest here in peace on top of the bluff where he patrolled the rabbits, snakes, squirrels and mice for so many years. A trip up to Lyle's garden won't be the same without him showing us around.

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A Little Bit of Whidbey History

Deception Pass Bridge

Joseph Whidbey, master of H. M. S. Discovery under the command of Captain Vancouver, discovered Deception Pass in 1792. In so doing he proved that Whidbey Island, thought by the early Spanish explorers to be part of the mainland, was in reality an island.

The first contact between the island indians and the white man occurred when Whidbey's party landed in Penn's Cove. Here more than 200 Skagit indians stared in rapt astonishment at the white skin of the visitors. Vancouver unbuttoned his tunic and shirt to show the indians that he and his men were not painted with ashes as the indians thought.

For almost a century after Vancouver's arrival there was little historical activity on the island. It remained undisturbed and the indians had continued to live in the manner of their ancestors. They lived in buildings made of split cedar shakes, using Rush mats on the ground. Many of their tools and utensils were contrived from stone and their dug canoes were formed from large cedars. The unusual form of dress was a blanket held around the shoulders by a bone pin, although some wore shirts of skin. Many of the men were tattooed and some women wore nose pieces of polished bone or wood. (still the prevailing style in Seattle to this day)

It wasn't until 1850 that Isaac Ebey took up claims on the prairie outside of what is today, Coupeville. Ebey was so prominent among the pioneers that the indians considered him to be the HYAS-TYEE or great chief. It was because of his importance among the whites that he was murdered by the Haidah's in 1857. This was a case of eye for an eye, Ebey being slain in retaliation for killing of the Haidah chief at Port Gamble. Ebey was shot at night as he opened his door in answer to a knock. Severely wounded he staggered outside, was killed and beheaded by the indians. The Haidahs departed taking his head with them. Two years later the head was covered in Canada; it was interred with Ebay's remains on the family farm where a memorial now stands. The body was later moved to Sunnyside cemetery near Coupeville.

At the turn of the century Whidbey Island became a strategic defense position for the United States. Fort Casey came into being for the defense of Admiralty Inlet. In 1890, construction of, Fort Casey, the last fort of its kind began on the bluffs west of Coupeville. As part of a three-fort defense system, the fort was built by the U.S. Army to protect the entrance to Puget Sound. Along with Ft. Casey, the other two forts – Fort Flagler and Fort Worden on the Olympic Peninsula – made up the "Triangle of Fire;" Fort Casey was best known for its 10-inch disappearing guns that sat high above the head of Admiralty Inlet. Four hundred troops eventually manned the fort after its opening in 1901, however they never fired the guns, which could lob shells more than 10 miles, in warfare. In 20 short years, the fort had become the fourth largest military post and undoubtedly the most beautiful.

Fort Ebey, just north of Fort Casey, was built in 1942-43 to help protect Puget Sound military bases from the Japanese Imperial Navy. Battery 248 was in a perfect position for gun emplacements and provided an important radar site. Six-inch guns were installed to help defend ships heading toward Deception Pass, although no enemy ships ever entered the Sound. Ft. Ebey was decommissioned shortly after the war but remained a place to conduct training. Efforts to prepare the fort as a state park began in 1965.

Just prior to the U.S.'s involvement in World War II, the Office of Chief Naval Operations charged the local naval district with finding the perfect location to re-arm and refuel planes defending the Northwest. Among five contenders, Crescent Harbor in Oak Harbor was chosen as the spot because PBY seaplane takeoffs and landings would be a breeze.

After Dec. 8, 1942, Pearl Harbor's invasion set off the construction frenzy with almost 200 men working through all weather conditions to finish the base. Farmers even turned over titles to ancestral farmlands so that runways and hangars could be built.

Construction of Ault Field, just north of downtown Oak Harbor, began in March 1942. It was far enough from populated areas to conduct operational training flights with live munitions. With favorable weather conditions and room to grow, Naval Air Station Whidbey Island was born.

Dan and I have had the opportunity to see a lot of military activity. Here are a few pictures he has taken on the Island:

Navy Prowler touching down at The Outlying Field

F16's doing a fly by the house

Fort Ebey today with a view of the Olympic Mountains

You Got Crab?

Dungeness crab is plentiful on Whidbey Island and the season opens just after July 4th every year. Each person is allowed to set one trap per day and then pull it within 24 hours. The limit is six crabs per person per day. Only males that are at least six inches wide are kept. The crab is cleaned, boiled, and then ready to crack. One Dungeness crab weighs in at over two pounds and yields at least one pound of meat.

When we first moved to Whidbey, everyone we knew just cracked crab and ate it plain as they went along. This was fun at first, but then you get crab fatigue and begin to wonder what you might be able to do with it. Over the years we have made many different dishes using crab. Here are a few of our favorites:

As a stuffing for ravioli!

Angry Crab is always spicy and messy!

Crab cakes are everyone's favorite treat!

Crab and avocado salad!

At then end of the day, the cooking is the easy part. Getting up at 6:00 am when the tide is right, tying chicken legs to the traps, driving the boat down to the launch site, and throwing the traps over the side of the boat is hard work. And hours later, you have to go back out and collect the traps, brave grabbing the crabs without getting pinched, and cleaning and cooking them. Many weekends, we decide to pass on going out on the water and head down to the store and buy a crab for $6.99 per pound. Luckily our neighbor Lyle always shows up at our door with a bucket of cooked and cleaned crabs hollering, "you got crab"?

Walla Walla Wine Wine Woman Woman

For those of you not familiar with the Pemco Insurance advertisements and their Helpful Guide to the People of the Northwest. I am Northwest Profile #96. Walla Walla Wine Wine Woman Woman! Please visit the site for a full description at:

http://www.werealotlikeyou.com/#profiles/96wallawallawinewinewomanwoman

"It’s all about pairings: A chardonnay with a local trout. A cabernet with a filet mignon. Walla with Walla. The only person in the world who would pair wine with a “sweet” onion."

We usually visit the Walla Walla Valley each year during the crush. Upon moving to California this year, many of my friends have asked about Washington wines and what I can tell them about them. Here is a list of my favorite wineries:

We will just start with the best Leonetti Cellars - IF you can find it. They have a private air strip where people in the know fly in each year and pick up their reserved shipments. If you ever see it on a wine list and it is a VERY special occasion, you should give it a try.

The next group are small, very special wineries focused on big reds with lots of body. These are still expensive wines and hard to find but well worth the effort

• Delille Cellars
• Januik Cellars
• Dunham Cellars
• Cayuse

The next group are still very special and have smaller case counts but deliver on sheer genius!

• Andrew Will
• Seven Hills
• Whitman Cellars
• Reininger
• Nelms Road
• Walla Walla Vinters

Now let's get down to the every day wines. Bottles you can find across the country that offer good value and still give you a feel for why Washington wines are VERY different from California grapes:

Chateau Ste. Michelle is a very large bottler in Washington. They make a broad range of wines and offer some excellent wines such as there award winning Eroica.

Columbia Crest is always rated as top value wines in Wine Spectator especially in the whites.

And now for my favorite Washington winery:

L'Ecole No. 41 - made in Walla Walla in an old school house. Absolutely the best wine club and the nicest people. You can read their history yourself at the website:

http://www.lecole.com/

I would highly recommend ordering a bottle and experiencing the big, bold, and balanced wines that are differentiating Washington wines today.

Now that is Walla Walla Wine Wine Woman Woman! Enjoy. And NEVER taste and drive!

Paella In The Sky

The Straits of Juan de Fuca bring in some incredible storms. One cloudy night last summer, my neighbor Lisa made an amazing Paella from a recipe posted by the Spanish Table. Whidbey Island clams and mussels straight from the beach, local chorizo and organic chicken thighs.

Lisa has the most amazing Paella Pan but any pan that you can use of a grill would work. This dish always seemed so complicated to me until I saw Lisa whip it together in a few minutes. Of course she is always so organized and makes entertaining look easy!

Here is the recipe from The Spanish Table and you can find all the ingredients on their website.

http://www.spanishtable.com/

PAELLA: There are many, many “paella” recipes. Originally paella was a dish

made in Valencia using chicken, rabbit, snails and three kinds of fresh beans.

Now, paella is almost always associated with seafood, chicken and vegetables.

There is no right or wrong recipe, only the recipe that pleases you. Paella

ingredients vary from place to place, and time to time, depending on local

traditions and the ingredients available. Anything from fresh garden produce to

holiday left-overs can inspire a cook to create an original version of this one-dish

feast! The dish was named after the pan it is cooked in, a Paellera, which is also

used for a variety of rice dishes, such as arroz negro, as well as the Spanish pasta

dish: fideuá. This is only one recipe, use your imagination and the ingredients at

hand, varying the ingredients can make Paella an everyday dish:

½ cup uncooked Valencian Rice per person

1 cup chicken stock per ½ cup of rice, more if using Bomba

5 threads saffron per person, dissolved in ½ cup white wine

4 tablespoons, or more, olive oil, to cover bottom of pan

1 piece of chicken, such as a thigh, per person

½ to 1 soft chorizo, such as Bilbao or Palacios, per person

½ teaspoon Spanish sweet pimentón (paprika) per person

1 clove garlic per person, minced

¼ cup chopped onion per person

c cup grated tomato (cut in half, grate and discard the skin) per person

2 shrimp or prawns per portion

2-4 small clams and/or mussels per portion

red piquillo peppers cut in strips

artichoke hearts, green beans or peas

cooked judíon beans (called garrofón in Valenciano) – optional

lemon wedges for garnish

Heat stock and keep warm. Toast saffron gently in a small pan. When aroma is

released, add white wine. Allow to come to a boil then remove from heat.

Heat paella pan over medium heat, add olive oil and fry chicken.

When chicken is golden and the juice runs clear, add garlic and onions and saute

until translucent. Add chorizo and cook until heated.

Add the rice, stirring until well coated with oil (about one minute). Add the

paprika and grated tomato. Stir, add saffron flavored wine and hot stock. Bring

to a boil, scraping the bottom of pan, then add piquillo pepper and add artichoke

hearts, green beans, cooked judíon beans or peas.

Adjust heat to maintain a slow boil. After about five minutes, add the seafood.

Cook another 15 minutes, or until rice is done.

Sprinkle with chopped parsley, garnish with lemon wedges and serve.

Traditionally, Paella is not stirred during the second half of the cooking time. This

produces a caramelized layer of rice on the bottom of the pan considered by many to be

the best part. With a large pan, it is difficult to accomplish this on an American stove and

you may prefer to stir the Paella occasionally or move the pan around on the burner(s).

Another alternative is to finish the Paella by placing it in the oven for the last 10-15

minutes of cooking. Paelleras can also be used on a barbeque, over an open fire (the

most traditional heat source), or on a counter-top grill.

Hummingbird Cake

The hummingbirds have arrived back on the island and I can't help but dream of Hummingbird Cake. This cake is from Saveur Magazine and is an excellent recipe for the famous southern cake.

http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Hummingbird-Cake-1000070102