Veggie Garden Doesn´t Need to be Fancy

What I am having for salad today.

Found ripe tomatoes under these wild-growing vines.

We call it "espinafre" (etragonia tetragonoides), but it is not the same as American spinach (Spinacia oleracea). The Brazilian (or the New Zealand spinach) espinafre is used in a similar way as an American counterpart, but just not raw in salads, as it contains oxalic acid (just like sorrel or rhubarb). It is safe to eat, though. For the salad, you may try Japanese spinach, also known as "horenso".

You can grow Mediterranean herbs in Brazil too: oregano, marjoram, thyme, basil, sage, peppers. Besides this little plot, I have scattered around parsley, green onions, Japanese chives, rosemary, mint, wormwood, and many other wild medicinal plants, some edible.

What´s in my Backyard

Chia plants blooming. At R$100/kg, I better get my own supply.

Alfavaca, basil-like rougher leaves that can be used to season meat just like it would bay leaves. Easy to grow, I brought some seeds from Campos, State of Rio. I had never heard of it before.

I paid R$6.90 for a single long loofah with a hope of getting the seeds. They came all mashed, except for 3. I first sowed on a plastic cup and later transplanted them by the fence. This is the only survivor, but the loofahs are curving themselves, so I can tell they are not going to be the same as the one I bought.

Tangelo of some kind. Half an orange makes a meal.

Japanese Nira (Allium tuberosum) grows vigorously. It is good in omelets or in pork dishes. Not used in Brazilian cuisine.

What Happened on the Farm in August

What Happened on the Farm in August:

Failed Ciabatta: I blame it on Brazilian flour, which is poor in gluten. The best flour contains 9% protein. And there is no gluten available for purchase.

Puppies born on our farm on the coldest day of the year. Just about 50 degrees Fahrenheit at night.

In old farm days, we used to buy wheat, corn, oyster shells, salt all conditioned in large cotton sacks. My father kept many of them so we could wash them (for several days, scrub, soak, wash, scrub, rinse, wash, bleach) for later use as a rug or rag.

Another bread-making failed attempt. I believe that the day was too cold for the dough to rise properly.

At least the pizza was good. But don´t be fooled by this photo. The use of banana leaves on the bottom didn´t work. I went back to placing the aluminum pizza tray on top of the charcoal.

These semolina bread loaves turned out great!

But not so for Jim Lahey´s No-Knead bread recipe. The terrible Brazilian flour again! None of my high hydration dough recipes work.

My Father´s Cat

My father was a cat lover. In his rare recounts about his childhood, once he told me that he went to someone´s house and saw so many cats that he had never seen before. "Wherever my eyes rested, there was a cat". He lived on a farm his whole life, so I questioned him not having cats. "Yes, we had one or another, but when we had kittens, my parents would get rid of them. After he became the owner of his own farm, he raised as many cats as they would be born or would show up here. My sister and I thought him to be abused by the cats as they would crawl all over him even when standing up chopping onions for dinner.
The one on the photo is a male cat, about 6 years old, that used to jump into my father´s office seat. They used to share the same small cushioned chair. He said "Look at this cat: he is pushing me out from the seat. I have only the tip of it to sit on." And my father didn´t shoo him. He would let him sit there as if he was the master.
About 10 days after my father passed away, Meow Cat ChooChoo (a name given by his grandchildren) disappeared. He made one or another brief appearance once or twice but was away for the whole 2 years. Last June, about 10 days after my father´s death anniversary, ChooChoo sneaked into the house and would run away at our presence. Even though he was a bit scared, he would come to eat the best leftover food we reserved for him. I caught and took him to a vet to be treated for some respiratory problems. After he took all the antibiotic pills, he disappeared again for weeks.
ChooChoo showed up again a few days ago all beaten up with his black hair all reddish. I said to my daughter that he may have gone to my neighbor´s hairstylist, as the girl got few strands in a weird burned red color, indicating a bad job.
So hard to pick him up, to give him medicine, to keep out of the house that this time I am not taking him to the vet unless his coat gets worse.

Am I a Real Expat?

What if you were born to a family who didn´t speak much the country´s language and ate different foods? How about the books being flipped backwards? And how about bearing a weird last name that nobody new how to spell? Not to talk about being bullied at school for looking different?
If all these were not enough, how about moving to a different country in early adulthood and struggling to learn a new language? Making irreversible mistakes for not knowing the culture? For many years, walking around deaf, blind, and specially, mute. And too, becoming invisible.
How about, after several years of living abroad, coming back to the birth country half-illiterate, unemployed, penniless, and without the knowledge of how the country has changed, and I no longer fit? How my american M.A. worth nothing?
After I came back, I saw the life fleeing in such a speed that I became old just by crossing the border. I no longer belong to the nest I once left. This took me to a second trip back to the US (this time now in Florida) for three more years, when I finally was forced to come back to Brazil for losing almost everything due to divorce.
I am an eternal expat, regardless of where I live. I am preparing myself for my next move (I got the expat bug) - somewhere in the planet - preference for a country that I already speak the language. It´s so hard to become fluent, to be able to express my inner feelings and looking authentic.
About being an expat is that, for most of us, we don´t become fluent enough and never get a firm grip of the culture. We can never be a local, an insider, even though we try so hard to be embraced by the host country. On their eyes too, we are an expat, with a luggage ready to depart at any time, for any reason, as our roots are not there.
The tragic side of being an expat, is that we breed more expats. I have a girl born in the US who can´t really speak the English language but doesn´t want to leave here for she is used to this place.
It doesn´t matter what the passport says about your nationality, what really counts is how your heart feels your home is.
The expats, though, have only one country: the planet Earth!

Note about my blog: I write this blog not limited to, but specially for Americans familiar with lifestyle in California, as I try to re-live or to preserve things that I learned to love while living in the Bay Area (baking, cooking, Asian food, nature, farming, lifestyle, values, and so on). I don´t know much about the rest of the country - pardon my ignorance (just not much travelling within the US as I was not a tourist, but a resident and behaved pretty much like a local. How pretentious was I...)

Ramen Noodle Frenzy

This is how turned out my own recipe developed for homemade ramen noodle, adapted from several other recipes.

And this is my bowl of hot ramen, with egg(s) straight from the hen's nest, spinach (which grew spontaneously outside of my veggie garden fence) sauteed in garlic and sesame oil, green onions from the backyard, and pickled bamboo shoots again from the farm harvested last February. I forgot to garnish it with purple basil leaves, but no problem! - Japanese dishes don´t use any basil.

RECIPE for Noodles:
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup semolina flour
1/2 cup warm water
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
Dissolve baking soda in water and add to the rest of the ingredients. The dough must be very stiff, almost dry, but without any loose flour. Semolina flour takes a while to absorb water, so go easy on the water. Let it rest 5 to 10 minutes before proceeding. Meanwhile, I worked on broth (recipe below). After making sure that the dough is not too dry or too wet, I rolled out and cut it on a humble Atlas pasta machine. The recipe somewhere said it would yield 4 portions, but really, it was good for 2 people only, as we went back for some more.

RECIPE for Broth:
Chicken breast with bones and skin on
Carrots, chayote, onion, fresh ginger, dried shiitake mushroom.
Boil chicken breast, remove scum. When halfway done, add other ingredients until soft.
Strain. Shred chicken breast into bite-size. Discard the rest. Return it to boil, season with a sprinkle of fish powder (Hondashi brand), wakame seaweed, soy sauce, mirin, a pinch of sugar.

For toppings:
Spinach leaves sauteed in garlic and sesame oil (de-li-sh!)
Half boiled egg
Green onions
Shredded chicken breast
Bamboo shoots pickle (some use fermented one - I don´t have it but will find a recipe to make it next year).

Now the kitchen is a total disaster! I can´t even think about cleaning it up. It´s cold today, and all I want is to go to bed for a well deserved Brazilian Father´s Day after lunch nap...zzzzzz

Macheesmo...

Macheesmo is a phrase that Nick (the site owner) "came up with that simply means having confidence in the kitchen". I think it is so funny as "machismo" in Portuguese means "men being superior to women", but I am sure he didn´t mean that. Anyway, I follow some of his recipes and have great success with semolina bread and English muffins, the pictures can tell everything.
The semolina bread recipe I just doubled, but everything else I followed as directed. It turned out fabulous, slightly dense in the middle, not so crunchy shell - the taste and texture were superior to any other home-baked bread I´ve done so far. The semolina flour really makes a difference. Note: semolina flour in Brazil resembles that of regular flour, but not so fine, with white opaque color, much drier. My next adventure will be semolina pasta. Has Nick any recipe?
The English muffin recipe I did not let it rise a second time as I also watched the Culinary Institute of America video. But what I thought to be wise is to stick the muffins into the oven to finish up cooking. I have had many underbaked goods in the past, and that is an experience I don´t want to repeat. So the tip was very good. I actually opened one of them without baking, and indeed, it was slightly raw.
While the English muffins were in the oven, I fixed the Hollandaise sauce and boiled fresh eggs I got that morning directly from under the chickens. It was the first time I used a splash of white vinegar to boil eggs and the whites didn´t spread in the pan. Another success! I am so glad. Happier yet when I dug my fork into the Eggs Benedict. I was able to replicate the ones I used to eat at Royal Cafe, in Albany, California.

Full Steam

Full steam, or should I say "full smoke"? I am back baking full power. Not always in my wood-fired oven, sometimes due to time crunch or because sometimes I need a more reliable oven. To tell you the truth, I have not mastered the wood firing system and I can´t trust myself the oven is going to be ready by the time the dough is. That´s why making pizza is so easy - you can keep feeding the fire until the pie is ready to go.
This time I played with new recipes such as sweet potato bun, pesto potato bread, semolina bread, hamburger bun, and the two great findings: focaccia made from overnight poolish (www.breadcetera.com) and English muffin, which it is not strictly baking, but it is bread. The recipe from www.macheesmo.com directed to stick the fried muffin into the oven so to finish cooking. Great tip! It made superb Eggs Benedict. Semolina bread was also from the same guy. I had never been able to make such a nicely dense bread in texture, yet light in taste. This was good with mortadella (better kind of bologna).

Sweet Potato Buns from http://blogmaetocomfome.blogspot.com.br/2013/05/pao-de-batata-doce.html (In Portuguese)

Pesto Potato Bread from don´t know where recipe...

40-Minute Hamburger Buns from http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/40-minute-hamburger-buns

Focaccia from http://www.breadcetera.com/?tag=focaccia

We Go (coco)Nuts!

What if you have more coconuts than you can drink their water?



Yes! We primarily plant coconuts for the water it stores in young green fruit.
And...what if the coconuts are becoming riper and the water inside is drying out, while its pulp is getting thicker?




The only solution is to use the ripe pulp to make sweets and baked goods.

This one is called "queijadinha" - cheesecake, but it is actually made with grated coconut and just a little bit of cheese.



RECIPE:

4 eggs
1 cup sugar or sweetened condensed milk
2 TBSP butter
4 TBSP grated cheese (we use "meia cura", mild parmesan-like cheese)
200 grams fresh grated coconut (or hydrated dry coconut flakes)
1 cup coconut milk (or milk)
3 TBSP white flour
1 tsp baking powder

Beat the above ingredients item by item, until all incorporated. Bake at 375 F.
Now, the country cooking will throw all ingredients, and perhaps omitting the liquid, and leaving out flour and baking powder, for they prime the real taste of coconut.

Green Papaya Compote

What should we do when we have soo many green papayas on the tree?




Green Papaya Compote, of course!




We don´t have real winters in most of Brazil, so no need to preserve seasonal fruits or vegetables - we have them all year round. When we do, it is because we want to eat it for our afternoon snack (we call it "afternoon coffee" - café da tarde). Green papaya compote is one of the most popular, as papaya trees can grow anywhere taking up little space.

RECIPE: get a fully grown green papaya (not baby one, but before it starts to ripen) from the tree. Let it stand one night to draw out milky sap. The next day, peel it, cut it into pieces. Thicker pieces make creamier ones. Let the pieces soak overnight in water with one teaspoon of baking soda (for a crispy outside and creamy inside). Add sugar (less than a kilo of sugar for a kilo of green papaya) and about 2 cups of water to make syrup. Cook all the ingredients together with cinnamon sticks and cloves. Optional: add 2 fig leaves for aroma. This is a homemade recipe. You can have syrup in various degrees of thickness, color, or sweetness.

Green Fig Compote

I have a young purple fig tree with lots of green fruits...





So I had a good idea!





Made into green fig compote and served with Gorgonzola cheese...



Today I sliced the figs, placed over crackers, and sprinkled with Gorgonzola cheese for our afternoon tea at the church. It was rather an exotic plate for the type of cheese. Brazilians usually like to combine homemade preserves with fresh farmer´s cheese.

RECIPE: A bit laborious but well worth it. Pick green figs with gloves (or the milky sap may cause allergy), wash them, and put into boiling water for 10 minutes. Put them into the freezer until rock hard. Under the running water, peel each fruit (unless you don´t mind the skin). Drop peeled figs, some whole, some cut into half (your choice), cover with water, and add coarse sugar (granulated sugar is fine) to your taste. Usually, 1 kilo of fruit calls for 500 grams to 1 kilo of sugar. I used something in between. I allowed the fruits to cook and added a little more water to keep the syrup level at fruit level (that is, plenty of syrup). To make the compote taste and smell like figs, I added 3 leaves while cooking. Very often, we make green papaya compote (same process) but add fig leaves for the aroma. We like to add cinnamon sticks and cloves.

Turmeric Time

That´s how most of us know store bought turmeric - as a yellow powder






But it actually comes from a gingerlike root - Curcuma Longa





It starts from a plant like these - the leaves should be dry (mine are not quite yet)





Dig the small roots out to your joy!





Such a delight to see these wonderful "gold from the earth" - as it is known in certain parts of Brazil - sunbathing




For culinary use, I can just smash it, cut it, or grate it into the cooking rice or stews. But if I want to store it in a powder form, I heard, I need to boil, dry, and grate. Some people just sun dry it before grating. In either case, you will be rewarded with bright yellow tainted palms just like Moroccan women.

Morning Run

I can´t believe I have been running 3 miles most mornings for months now. I just haven´t had time to post it here - of course, too busy running. Well, it actually takes only 40 minutes every morning. I started slowly walking at a city park until I lost some weight (diet oriented by a dietician - two spoons of rice, palm-size piece of meat, and lots of salad, and things like that. No sugar or fatty meat for 6 weeks. It worked. I shed 10 pounds and even though I went back eating like a plowman, I am still able to keep my optimal weight. Sometimes I think that I could curb more of my appetite for novelty foods and lead a zen-like lifestyle. My pursue of simplicity hasn´t gotten to my stomach yet.
I started on this road in November - Summer in the South Hemisphere. Gentle rolling hills, no many cars, but lots of dogs (four checkpoints done by mutts), including mine that insist on following me. One of these days, one of them got killed by a car. All I said to the driver was "please, haul it from here". I used to run on a dirt road, but my dogs used to harass passersby, especially dangerous for motorcycles or bicycles. I was so distraught that I gave up the whole activity for months until I found the city park, and later, the paved country road near my farm. So I leave the farm by car and park by the road. But my dogs are smart. They discovered my little secret and sometimes they get to the starting point even before me.
My region doesn´t have much natural beauty. But I really enjoy my morning run. I can see (besides the dogs) birds (toucans too), a reservoir, some trees, and at the end of the paved road, a small Catholic church, a bar, and three houses (five people live here). On the back of the church has the most magnificent building of all: four giant wood-fired ovens! All roasted chicken, lamb, and pork are done in this facility for many church annual fairs.

Okra

Okra plant. Pods clinging too long...they may get woody. Not all Brazilians like okra - slime is to blame - nonetheless, the rest of us is absolutely crazy about it. To avoid getting it slimy, I heard you can add vinegar or lemon while cooking or washing, I am not sure. I do none of them. My strategy is to fry in hot oil, without stirring too much. Cutting into bigger pieces and patting washed okra dry also helps. Okra goes well in tempura, deep-fried coated with cornmeal, fried like potato chips, smothered with tomatoes, and combined with shrimp or chicken. We, country people, hundreds of miles away from the beach, eat smothered chicken with okra which is previously fried and added at the end (to avoid slime). Yeah, we can pickle okra too. I also eat it raw, sliced in diagonal, with soy sauce and drops of lemon. It can´t get any simpler.

Smothered Chicken in Fresh Turmeric, Mustard Leaves and Okra

My neighbor Rosa gave me a freshly butchered chicken that minutes before was freely running around her house. It was a payback for something that I don´t remember what. We trade goodies so often that it became part of our routine.
The free-roaming chicken was never part of my diet growing up. The first time that I saw it on a pot, I thought it was strange: skinny long legs, speckled yellow skin, though, and very little meat to eat. I have noticed lately that farm-raised chicken has been smelling strong, with soft slimy flesh, with fat marbling the breast fillet. So when my neighbor told me she would give me one from her stock, I watched as many videos possible on how best to cook it. While I used a crockpot to make the stock, I marinated the rest of the meat in garlic, onions, salt, and pepper overnight. (Brazilian cuisine is not much more than garlic-onion based seasoning.) In a large casserole, I fried the pieces until golden brown. I stepped out of the kitchen and plucked the roots of turmeric. I had never gotten turmeric roots before, so I was not sure I would find any. What a nice surprise to collect small, yet dark yellow roots that smelled earthy. I added small amounts of hot stock and ran again to my veggie garden to pick up some mustard leaves, cilantro, parsley, and green onions. Some more hot stock to pick up fresh corn, which was badly attacked by a bird from the parrot family. In the small patch of okra bushes, I have more pods than I can pick or eat. In an hour, lunch was late but ready. Such a delicious, substantial meal that I need a nap now.

Coffee Roasting Steps

This is a 2 - 3 year old coffee tree. Almost all coffee farmers harvest their coffee cherries by hand. It needs to be done in a fairly short period of time, as they may dry out in the tree or fall on the ground, yielding inferior quality. In most of Brazil, ripe cherries are first dried in the sun. This process produces coffees with less acidity and more body compared to the wet process.

Processed coffee beans are the result of ripe coffee cherries which are harvested and processed to remove the skin, pulp, and parchment, but still not roasted.

I learned to heat up the roasting pot first and then to load it with half of its capacity so to speed up the first batch.

Then we turn, turn, and turn the round roasting pot from 20 to 45 minutes until it starts smoking. At this point, neighbors go crazy for the enveloping aroma of roasting coffee...

As soon as start smoking, there is a split second in which we need to take the pot out of the flame to spread the coffee beans over a large sieve. At this moment, the coffee beans should be covered with shiny oil, and then they are perfectly roasted. One needs to shuffle or fan the beans so as not to over roast with their own accumulated heat. To achieve perfection, I am learning to roast imperfectly batch after batch.

This is a modern version of a coffee grinding machine, an electric one. The older one is done by a hand-cranking device. We like our coffee finely ground, with medium acidity and a great body. We usually drink it strong and sweetened with cane sugar.

Home roasted coffee is done only in rural areas where a great amount of smoke can be produced. It is becoming rare as time passes. Giving home-roasted coffee is a good gift and such a great one that everyone wants some. Just like any other things made by farmers´hands.