Paws-itively Delightful Dog Treats (Recipe)

Scout and Luke know that if they want to be in the kitchen while I'm cooking they have to "go to bed" and wait politely in their baskets in the corner. They are eager taste testers and floor cleaners, and love to have a front row seat any time I'm trying out a new recipe, and I've yet to find a more appreciative or forgiving audience. This recipe is especially for our furry friends- and even our dainty and selective foster dog gives these puppy treats her wag of approval. If you'd like to let your pooch try them out, they will be for sale outside of the Davis Food Co-op tomorrow afternoon as part of a bake sale to benefit the victims of the Haiti earthquake. If you can't make it, but still want to try the cookies, this recipe is about as easy as it gets, and lacks the preservatives, additives, and sodium in commercial dog treats- your dog will thank you!

Scout's Favorite Peanut Butter Puppy Treats

(Makes about 100 medium-sized cookies)

Ingredients:

2 cups whole wheat flour

2 tablespoons baking powder

2 cups peanut butter
1 cup plain, all natural yogurt

1 cup milk

(substitute organic ingredients if you so desire!)

Step 1: Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Set out two medium sized bowls.

Step 2: In one bowl, stir together flour and baking powder. In the other bowl, stir together milk, yogurt, and peanut butter.

Step 3: Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients, stirring at first, then mixing with hands. Add small handfuls of flour until dough is no longer sticky, and has a smooth, spongy texture.

Step 4: use a rolling pin to roll dough 1/3 inch thick. Use cookie cutters to create dog treats of different shapes and sizes.

Step 5: Place the cut out treats on a baking sheet, and bake until they the cookies are golden-brown (~15 minutes)

Step 6: Get your dog to show off some tricks, and then reward her with a delicious treat!

A 'Super Bowl' di Arancini (recipe)

On Sunday we headed off to watch the Super Bowl with some friends. As an appetizer, I decided to make Arancini. Arancini means "little oranges" in Italian, and they are the dish I miss the most since since moving home from Italy. The breaded balls are traditionally filled with risotto and cheese, but sometimes contain meat (sausage or pancetta) or vegetables (such as peas or diced mushrooms). The arancini in Italy were about the size of real oranges- a single one would be enough for lunch, and I liked how the rice, cheese, and entire meal came in such a tidy and delicious package. It was nice to order one and be able to eat it single handed while walking down the street. They were easier to find in southern Italy-Napoli and Siracusa, but I remember eating them in Rome as well, and I have never found anything quite the same in America. I actually love arancini so much that I was afraid to make them- it's intimidating to try and replicate something so wonderful, and I wasn't sure I would actually be able to make them hold together and fry them without ruining them. Well, the good news is- it can be done! Since I was attempting appetizers, I settled on the simple risotto and cheese varity, and made them about the size of golf balls, rather than the baseball sized ones I remember so fondlly. They were not as daunting as I imagined, and were worth the effort! The recipe below is for the small, vegetarian arancini that I just described. I plan to try large ones with different fillings next.

Arancini
(makes 20-25 individual balls)

Ingredients:

Several cups of Olive oil
or alternate cooking oil (not extra virgin- it becomes bitter when used with high heat)
2 shallots, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
3 teaspoons dried basil leaves, ground
freshly ground salt and pepper
1 1/3 cup dry Arborio rice
2 cups vegetable stock
2 cups water
2 eggs
2 1/2 cups breadcrumbs
Provolone cheese, diced into 1/2 inch cubes (20-25 total)

Step 1: Heat a medium sized saucepan over medium heat. Add olive oil, once around the pan. Saute shallots, dried basil, salt, pepper, and garlic (until fragrant, with shallots turning translucent ~2 minutes), then add dry rice. Stir, mixing shallots, garlic, oil and rice, and continue to cook for 2 minutes more.

Step 2: Add 1 cup vegetable stock. Turn heat to medium-low, and simmer. Stir constantly, until liquid is nearly gone. Then add the next cup of vegetable stock. Continue to stir, and reduce liquid once more. Then add water, 1 cup at a time, continuously stirring until liquid is nearly absorbed. (you can reduce 4 cups of stock if you prefer, but I didn't want it to be too salty) Risotto should be creamy, but individual grains of rice should be just tender- not mushy. The whole process of reducing and stirring to cook risotto should take about 20 minutes.

Step 3: Set risotto aside in a bowl or dish and let it cool to around room temperature. Add eggs, and 1/2 cup breadcrumbs to risotto, stir to evenly mix. Pour 2 cups breadcrumbs into a bowl for breading.

Step 4: Run hands under water until just damp. Pick up a small handful of risotto-egg mixture in one hand. Gently squeeze it and form it into a golf ball sized sphere that will hold its form. Take one cube of cheese, and press it into the center of the ball. Pinch/pat risotto into place to fill hole. Roll stuffed risotto ball in the bowl of bread crumbs, coating with a thin but even layer. Place ball onto a dish or cookie sheet. Repeat this process, making a total of 20-25 arancini. It works best to rinse/dampen hands between each ball.

Step 5: Place a sauce pan over the burner, and fill with olive oil so that the oil is about 1 1/2 - 2 inches deep. Heat over medium heat to around 350 degrees. I don't have a thermometer for this- but I know the temperature is correct when small bubbles are continuously rising, and the balls immediately sizzle when dropped into the oil. The balls should not be falling apart or sticking to the bottom (oil is too cool). They also should not be blackening, and the oil should not be smoking, popping, or emiting a burning/stinky smell (too hot).

Step 6: Cook arancini in batches. Gently drop 4-5 arancini into the oil, and cook for 2-3 minutes. They need to cook all of the way through, and the cheese needs to melt. The outside should become crisp and firm. Use metal tongs or a slotted spoon to remove arancini from the oil, and place them on a plate, on top of a couple of paper towls to drain any excess oil. The arancini should be golden brown, with a crispy shell.

Step 7: Allow to cool for 1-2 minutes atop paper towels. Serve hot (cheese inside should be melted). If you are not going to eat/serve immediately, heat the oven to 200 degrees, and put a baking dish or tray inside as you start to cook the arancini. After they have drained for a couple of minutes, transfer them to the warming dish inside of the oven until you are ready to serve them or take them to your party. Enjoy!

(A guy at an Italian deli once told me that these also reheat in the microwave fairly well- but I didn't try it because there weren't any left).

variations: as mentioned above, you can make any type of risotto for this recipe. I have had arancini with mushroom risotto and with lemon-Parmesan risotto before. Red pepper flakes, pesto, or sage are nice herbs for seasoning. They are also good stuffed with peas, sausage, or other favorite foods.

Santa Rosa Hiking and the Russian-River Brewery

Today the fam met up with our friends Melissa and Ana and drove over to Santa Rosa for some hiking and a visit to a local brewery.



Melissa found Foothill Regional Park, right by the town of Santa Rosa where the brewery is located. We drove over to Sonoma County to the park, and while it was raining intermittently, it was a nice hike. Climbing up into the rolling hills and landscape of the north bay we quickly left highway 101 behind us and were soon peeking over hilltops towards free range cattle, forests, and rolling hills of vineyards. The landscaped was decorated with young, gnarled oak and the occasional madrone and manzanita tree. In the rain, the green of new winter grass made for a beautiful hike. (So much so, I forgot to take pictures and instead have just copied these instead.) Before the land was made into a state park, three lakes were created and stocked with fish. These still greet you at the bottom of the park, when you first enter and begin climbing into the hills and are still used for recreational fishing. The perimeter of the park offers a great, but quick, ~3 mile hike and it is definitely worth checking out if you are ever in the area, which you should be...

So why the Russian-River Brewery?

Some of you may have seen an earlier post about my experience at the Davis Food Co-op a couple of weeks ago when I asked an employee about the empty row of Pliny the Elder bottles of beer. After asking an employee to check in back if there was any more, a case was brought out from the storeroom. At this point, what began as a Reg and myself standing in the beer isle had added three others also hovering around. The employee opened the case asking, "Is this going to be enough for you?" revealing three bottles of Pliny the Elder inside. I reached down grabbing two bottles., one for Reg and one for myself, and replied, "Yes, this should be just fine. Thank you." By the time I had finished saying fine, a hand had reached into the box and removed the final bottle. The now small crowd which had gathered around the un-boxing uttered a collective sigh and began to scatter. As Reg and I finished to shop, no less than three times were we asked hastily, "They have Pliny?" "When will they have more?" "Do you know where else I could find that?" We returned home and enjoyed our Pliny, perhaps a bit over hyped but a really good beer none-the-less.

Pliny the Elder is a double IPA, and a pretty damn good one at that. However through two key actions, (1) making a very good beer and then (2) have purposefully inconsistent and spotty distribution, the brewery has made Pliny the Elder a real hot item. Chris, a friend of mine who had introduced me to the brew has also told me about a limited release of Pliny the Younger which was going down all this week for SF Beer Week starting on Friday the 5th. Pliny the Younger is a triple IPA and a strong 11% ABV, or in other words, a great sipping brew. So of course we wanted to get in on this release of the Younger, the brewery figured they had enough to last all week... they sold out on Friday. ALL of it was gone on the first day. However we still wanted to go to the brewery and try their other brews and still do the hike so away we went.

The brewery was still packed and we waited about 20 minutes for a table we only got because someone grabbed us as we were walking around and said they'd give us theirs when they were done. Score. When we sat down we were treated to some good pizza (I know, a lot of pizza this week. But the smell was so good, and we were so wet and hungry, we couldn't pass it up.)

The other cool thing about this brewery is, besides making the hot Plinys, they also do some really interesting brews featuring fermentation in old wine barrels to give the brews a whole new flavor. Unfortunately the one I really wanted to try, Beatification was not currently available. That brew features no added yeast whatsoever. Instead it is uses only the wild mix of yeasts from the air (akin to sourdough) and is aged in old oak barrels that no longer contribute oak or wine flavor but rather have their own unique mix of yeasts. We'll be going back to try that another time.

The brews we did try consisted of:

Russian River Porter (41 BU's, Bitterness Unit)- Not bad but not great, smooth like on nitro but it wasn't and seemed a bit flat.

Happy Hops (32 BU's)- a "hoppy pale ale", but really not that hoppy. Like a traditional english pale ale.

Blind Pig IPA (72 BU's)- this is more like it. Lots of that pine flavor but not killer hops. If IPAs are a bit too hoppy for you sometimes, this has a flavor like the Elder (95-100 BU's) but not as much bitterness.

Concesecration (10% ABV, 17 BU's) - This was a cool one. A dark sour ale fermented in Cab Sauvignon barrels. I liked this one but Melissa and Reg favored the other.

Supplication (7% ABV, 27 BU's) -

The ladies liked this one. A dark ale aged in French oak Pinot Noir barrels with three strains of yeast and sour cherries. Pretty cool to try these out.

In the end though, as you can see in the picture posted above. We came home with a growler of Pliny the Elder.

A New Foster Dog...

Also, this evening after returning from the hike we picked up a new foster dog. The SPCA just got her today, and we having been looking forward to taking another foster. She is a very sweet, small, cuddler, but unfortunately has very matted hair which makes he shy away in pain when you pet her on the head. She is going to the groomer Monday and I don't think she will be around long based on her very sweet temperment.

Acclimation and Beer

I'm spoiled rotten. Why? Because every delicious thing that you have and will read on here has been tasted, savored and enjoyed by yours truly. Something I'm very grateful for and indeed, I do my duty of the dishes after every meal. Which yes, is not an equal trade but Reagan is happy with it and I'm good with that. However, there comes the rare occasion I actually cook. Sure I'll grill some meat on the BBQ as part of a meal but sometimes I get ambitious and decide to try something new. Below I've included a brief update about those "busy dogs" of ours and some foods I've prepared for our little family. I hope you enjoy.
Acclimation
After dog class last weekend, Reagan and I had a little chat about our most genius and deviant little dog, Luke. Named of course, for his knack for escaping from any attempted confinement. Lucas has come a long way, from the Costco 8lb packs of pastas that were pulled off of a counter and shredded throughout our entire apartment to the occasional and apparently tasty SOS pad he has consumed when provided an opportunity. Yes, he even is a model project for his dog class. His trainer often tells defeated dog parents of how a dog so defiant, smart and close to death was rescued and through hard work and perseverance brought back to be an *almost* model dog citizen. A tribute to Reagan's hard work no doubt. However, as we discussed when leaving the class last weekend, overall he has improved by leaps and bounds, but we also wondered, how much have we changed our expectations along the way? Have we become acclimated to a constant state of anxiety ridden behaviors that we have no choice but to think of as normal? How have we changed our behavior in the time that we have changed his?

It is with no doubt clear to any dog owner that most of the problems dogs have are a manifestation of our inconsistent or confusing behaviors, however, by training ourselves we shape our dogs' behavior into how we would like them to be trained. Last week I realized that Luke had also taught me a new trick that I was not consciously aware of. Previously, finding a brown box on my door step has always been a good thing. Whether a new shiny go-fast car part or a batch of good luck with finals cookies from Mom, a brown box on your doorstep is a little like a surprise Christmas (even when you know what it is.) So when I came home last week and saw the brown boxes outside our door, grabbing my key and hurrying inside leaving the packages outside to discover the destruction within. It hit me, what once was an innocent surprise has become a warning: Someone has knocked on our door, the dogs have freaked, your house may or may not be intact on the other side of this door, enter at your own risk...

The destruction actually wasn't so bad. All they managed to get their paws on was a Costco pack of paper towels that we thought was out of reach (though you can never underestimate package delivery induced psychosis.) Only one roll had been removed and distributed with great precision throughout the house and Lucas had donned a tutu fashioned out of the plastic wrapper. I'm not sure how this tutu would help him protect our house but I appreciate the fact he's trying to do something. . . It would appear that Luke is now Pavlov and I am his dog.


Beer of the Season
The package which had incited the frenzy restored my prior happy feelings about brown paper packages as it contained my first shipment of Reagan's Christmas present to me, a beer of the season sampler. Featuring my favorite of the four, a Mercury Brewing Company ale from Ipswich, Massachusetts. The Ipswich Nut Brown Ale an English brown ale that isn't overdone with too much sugar and much better taste than a similar ale like a Newcastle brown. They also included a good English pale ale from Mercury and then two nice brews from the Mendocino Brewery, the Black Hawk Stout and Red Tail Lager. I'm impressed with the quality of the beers and am eagerly anticipating the next shipment.

Fugassa
As I mentioned before, Reagan does work late and occasionally she has to put up with my cooking. One thing I made recently that I was particularly pleased with was some fugassa. Fugassa as my Grandparents call foccacia in their Sant'Olcese dialect, is downright delicious and the other day when missing family, I decided to make some from scratch. My grandmother makes it for me with salt and olive oil because that is how I love it, but you can add all kinds of olives, onions and cheeses to it. For this batch I made them both with salt and olive oil but cut some fresh rosemary from our garden to mix into the dough of the second loaf. Buonissimo!



Ingredients

1 cup warm water
1 tablespoon active dry yeast
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
4 cups bread flour, plus extra for dusting
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
optional- freshly diced rosemary leaves

Step 1: put the warm water into a warmed bowl, add yeast, and stir to dissolve. Let stand 3 minutes, or until foamy.
Step 2: add the salt and sugar, stir to combine. Add the flour and olive oil mix, first with a spoon, then using your hands, until the dough comes together into a ball that no longer sticks to your fingers.
Step 3:transfer dough ball to a work surface and knead for 10-15 minutes, occasionally dusting the dough with flour until the ball is smooth and firm.
Step 4: Lightly oil the large bowl. Place dough inside, and cover with a clean dishtowel. Put the bowl into a warm area and let rise for 2 hours.
Step 5: Punch the dough down and divide it into 2 equal pieces. Shape each piece into a ball. Return to the bowl, cover, let rise for 30 minutes.
Step 6: Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Oil 2 baking sheets (11 x 17). Place each dough ball onto a baking sheet. Flatten it to fit the sheet. (I would let it rise again here, though I didn't this time.) Using your fingers, poke indentations across the entire surface of each piece. Drizzle with olive oil. Sprinkle with fresh, chopped rosemary leaves.
Step 7: Bake for 14-15 minutes, until golden brown on top and bottom. Serve warm.


Pizza
Just pictures tonight, but Reg had to work late, and so dinner was on me. The always reliable pizza. MmmMmm.