The Perfect Pantry®

Puff pastry (Recipe: asparagus and cheese tart)

I'm having fun updating some favorite posts from the archives, like this one, from the days when I didn't photograph the food I cooked. If you missed these posts the first time around, please enjoy them now. With photos and new links, too.

Pâte feuilletée.

POT FEH-YOU-TAY.

Just the thought of making something with such an elegant name scares the bedoodles out of me. If I hadn't watched Julia Child on television, smearing the butter and folding and turning and folding and turning again, making it all seem so utterly doable, I never would have tried to make puff pastry from scratch.

I did make it.

One time.

Then I discovered frozen puff pastry. Someone else does the smearing and folding and turning for you. Imagine that! Puff pastry any time, without devoting an entire day to making it.

Raisins (Recipe: spinach, golden raisin and parmesan tart)

 

Guest post and photos by Peter in Brazil, chef and co-owner of Pousada do Capão

Raisins were an integral ingredient in my New England culinary upbringing. The California Sun Maid was a pantry icon, on a par with the original 1950’s versions of Vermont Maid, Betty Crocker, the Campbell's twins, Uncle Ben, and Aunt Jemima before their numerous plastic surgeries.

The brown bread that accompanied our favorite hot dogs and beans on Saturday night (i.e., bath night) had to have raisins. My father always threw a handful into the breakfast cream of wheat. Hermits weren’t hermits unless studded with those plump, sweet beauties. And nothing was better than snacking right from the box.

In my innocence, though, I knew nothing of the exotic pleasures of golden raisins.

Discos (Recipe: goat cheese-olive empanadas)

I'm ready to sell our little log house, and move back to the city.

I'm ready to give up my herb garden, the one right outside the kitchen door.

I'm ready to say goodbye to my wonderful kitchen with -- finally -- enough counter space, and to the fire pit Ted built so we could cook paella and toast marshmallows for s'mores.

I'm ready to live without my beloved screened porch, the site of winter grilling and summer aioli-making, with a table that seats 12, or 14, or sometimes 16.

I'm ready to give it all up, to live closer to a supermarket that carries Goya frozen foods.

Not even all Goya foods.

Just one.

Discos.

Wait... you haven't tried them?

Pie crust (Recipe: empanaditas)

When I was born, my parents took inventory.

Ten fingers. Ten toes. Eyes, ears, nose.

DNA. RNA. PIE.

Wait a second. PIE?

Right away, my parents sensed that something was missing -- the PIE gene, the one that governs the ability to bake fruit pies, cream pies, sweet or savory lattice-covered perfectly-crimped-edges pies.

After extensive testing, the diagnosis was confirmed; indeed, I lacked the pie gene. Oh, I could make a tasty enough filling, but when it came to marrying filling to pastry, I couldn't quite pull it together. I'd always forget an ingredient, or my pie would look great, but the bottom disintegrated. Or the filling escaped from a hole I didn't create.

For years I suffered the indignity of never being asked to bring dessert to a party or potluck. And when I entertained, I would pooh-pooh pie, telling my guests that I just wasn't in the mood to bake, or that I really preferred ice cream or a fruit salad.

And then, in the refrigerator aisle of my local market, right next to Paul Newman's lemonade, I found help for my affliction. Pie crust, ready to unroll and bake!

Could it be that simple? Yes, it could.