Gjelina Restaurant

It is autumn in Los Angeles.  The intense blue sky was crystal clear and particulate free courtesy of the hot Santa Anna Winds.  Although summer has clearly passed and the days are becoming very short, this day was quite hot, in the high 90’s.
I made dinner reservations at Gjelina some 3-4 weeks ago, highly recommended unless you want to take your chances at one of two large communal tables that are always full, based on the buzz from some of my foodie friends.
Located on the artsy, restaurant studded Abbot Kinney Boulevard in Venice, Gjelina is so happening, there is no name or address numbers posted on the outside of the building.  I let my instincts or ‘the force’ if you will guide me to the right doorway.  The accommodating hostess led us through the packed interior including an open appetizer prep bar, out back to a private walled patio with banquets, small tables and a fire pit.
It was an eclectic crowd, peppered with art gallery types, young couples, and celebratory groups.  The menu of appealing choices is for sharing.  Gjelina ascribes to a philosophy of using as much sustainable, local, and organic food as possible, so the produce is seasonally appropriate.
We ordered:
Rocket (wild arugula) with sweet corn, cherry tomato, endive, lemon, and pecorino
Haricots Verts with charred tomato, feta, mint, and sesame
Wood roasted cauliflower with garlic, chili, parsley, and vinegar
Mushroom, goat cheese, and truffle oil Pizza
Artichoke and goat cheese ravioli with leeks, brown butter, balsamic, and parmesan
Brewed mint iced tea
Strawberry, rhubarb crisp with cornmeal topping, served with house made vegan coconut sorbet
Coffee
I thought every dish was seasoned well, not overly salty like so many trendy places.  The vegetable dishes all had a balance of acid with the green fresh flavors, and some oil to smooth the palate.  Wood roasted cauliflower was a fantastic choice for an autumn dinner by a fire pit.  The pizza was irresistible with just enough mild flavored goat cheese and earthy truffle oil.  I like to order ravioli  when we eat out, when someone other then I has made them.
We decided not to order wine, since we were getting up early the next morning, although this menu could have taken on a red or white.  Buttery, with the right balance of acid and sweet, corn meal topped strawberry rhubarb crisp was so good I came home and made some myself.  Try this recipe it is yummy and easy.  I think several of the other menu items could also made easily at home

Individual Strawberry Rhubarb Crisps
Filling
¾ cup sugar
2 pints of fresh strawberries
2 large stalks of rhubarb (about two cups sliced)
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons corn starch
Zest from the lemon
Topping
¾ cup corn meal
½ cup light brown sugar
3 tablespoons all purpose unbleached flour
Zest grated from one orange
½ teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon salt
7 tablespoons unsalted butter
Wash and hull the strawberries, lay them on a towel to dry and then slice them in half.  Wash the rhubarb stalks and slice them in half lengthwise and then in half inch dice.  Combine the fruit with the sugar in a frying pan.  Place the pan on low heat and as the sugar melts, add the lemon juice, lemon zest, and cornstarch.  Gently stir the fruit occasionally, until the sugar dissolves and the mixture begins to bubble and thicken.  This only takes a few moments.  Remove from the heat.
Divide this filling evenly amongst 5 large ramekins. 
In a medium bowl, combine all the topping ingredients except the butter.  Cube the butter into ½ inch squares and add it to the bowl.  Cut in the butter until the mixture is sticking together a bit, but still course.   Distribute the topping evenly over the tops of the ramekins.
Place the ramekins on a large baking sheet to catch any drips, and bake for about 20 minutes in a preheated 400º oven.  Remove the strawberry rhubarb crisp from the oven when the filling is beginning to bubble up around the nicely browned topping.  Serve the crisps plain, with ice cream, or sorbet.

Garnet Yam Cake With Brown Sugar Icing

This recipe is an Oldie but Goodie. My son Mitchell’s favorite, this moist bundt cake covered in a thickly drizzled maple flavor icing is beautiful on the cake plate and delicious. It is the perfect dairy-free desert for autumn occasions, from Rosh Hashanah, to Thanksgiving, to Chanukah.

Cake

2 cups of mashed Garnet yam

2 & 3/4 cups all purpose flour

2 teaspoons cinnamon

1 & 3/4 teaspoons powdered ginger

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 cups sugar

1 cup vegetable oil

4 extra large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

Margarine or non stick spray for greasing the pan                                                 

12 cup Bundt pan

Icing

2 cups sifted powdered sugar

3/4 cup brown sugar, packed

1/2 cup Rich’s dairy-free whip

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted margarine

1/2 teaspoon vanilla  extract

Wash the Garnet yams and bake in a preheated 400º oven for 2 hours. I choose the fattest, unblemished yams I can find and place them in an aluminum foil tin to catch the oozing sugar droppings from the yams as they bake.  2 to 4 large yams will yield the 2 cups of yam needed for the recipe. You can just eat any left over with dinner. Cool the yams and scoop out the bright orange pulp. Measure the yam and mash with your gloved hands or a potato masher. Place the yams in the bowl of your mixer.

Preheat oven to 325º and place the oven rack in the middle of the oven. Combine the flour, cinnamon, ginger, baking powder, baking soda, and salt into a medium bowl and set aside.  Place the mixing bowl in the mixer and beat yams until smooth on medium low speed. Next, add the sugar and oil to the yams, and starting on the lowest setting, beat until smooth.  Add the eggs 2 at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the flour mixture and blend on low speed until just combined. Stir in the vanilla.

Grease a 12-cup Bundt pan, making sure to get the grease into every nook and cranny of the design for an easy release. Fill the prepared pan only 2/3 full. If your Bundt pan is less than 12 cups, (many of the newer designs are not 12 cups) and you have left over batter, you can grease and fill individual small loaf pans with the extra batter. Bake cake until a tester comes out clean, about 1 hour and 5 minutes or less if your pan is smaller. Cool cake in the pan on a rack for 15 minutes. Invert and turn cake out onto the rack to finish cooling.

At this point, you can wrap the cake well and freeze it for up to two weeks, then defrost and ice just before your occasion. For the icing, sift the powdered sugar into medium bowl. Stir the brown sugar, Riche’s Whip, and margarine in a small heavy bottomed saucepan over medium low heat until margarine melts and the sugar dissolves. Increase heat to medium high and bring brown sugar mix to a boil. Lower the heat and simmer 3 minutes, occasionally stirring and swirling pan. Remove from heat and stir in the vanilla. Pour the brown sugar syrup over the powdered sugar. Whisk icing until smooth and lightened in color. It will be very liquid. Cool the icing until luke warm, whisking occasionally. It will thicken as it cools. When the icing is not quite cold and  falls like thick ribbons from a spoon,  slowly pour it over the top of the cake very thickly. The icing will drip down the sides in thick rivers. I pour directly from the mixing bowl in a back and forth motion slowly rotating the cake as I go. Let the iced cake stand for at least one hour before serving.  It keeps refrigerated for two days.

Spinach Bulemas

SPINACH BULEMAS

Bulemas or Boyus, depending on what town your grandparents came from, are spirals of stuffed dough, baked in the oven until crisp.  Spinach and cheese filling is my favorite.  Yeast dough is stretched until, it is a long rectangle, then filled, rolled into a cylinder, sealed at the ends, and coiled into a nest.  They are traditionally served as part of a Sabbath or Holiday lunch. They freeze and reheat very well.

Leek and Ground Beef Patties

Kufte de Prassa

KUFTE DE PRASSA

Leek and Ground Beef Patties 

Somewhere between a meatball and patty is a kufte.  Made with ground beef, they are light and fluffy with a delicate crisp exterior, and redolent with the taste of autumn leeks.  Serve this recipe as one of the starters for a traditional Jewish New Years celebration.  They can be part of an appetizer buffet, or individually plated with a lemon wedge garnish and perhaps a dollop of hummus.
You can make the kufte that morning, refrigerate, and then reheat in a 350ºoven for 15 minutes before serving.  Kufte may also be made a week ahead and frozen in an airtight container.  Defrost in the refrigerator the night before and reheat as indicated.  Serve hot.
This makes about 48 kufte, two, or three per person.  Leftovers are delicious the next day.  Serve with rice and salad.

Stuffed Veal Breast

FENNEL AND PISTACHIO STUFFED VEAL BREAST

Stuffed veal breast is hard work to make.  It is a large unwieldy piece of meat, hard to fill with stuffing, and harder still to carve successfully.  Veal breast is my husband’s favorite. I make it every Passover and change out the panko crumbs called for in the recipe with crumbled matzo farfel.  All of that aside, the spectacular presentation, the succulent meat, and delicate flavor are worth the effort.

Pastelicos (meat and rice borekas)

 

PASTELICOS WITH MEAT AND RICE
Pastelicos are triangular borekas with a savory meat and rice filling.  As with other Sephardic pastry, you can find versions in different shapes, with different dough and different spice blends.  This is the recipe my mother always made, but with the addition of the cinnamon and allspice.  A Pastel is a pie in Ladino or Judeo Spanish, and these individual small ‘pies’ use the suffix indicating smallness.  Crispy, savory, and beautiful, they are great hors d’oeuvres for parties and special holiday dinners.  I always make them for Rosh Hashanah, Jewish New Year and Sukkot, Feast of the Tabernacles.  Be sure and count more then one per person when planning how many to bake.
Filling
2 pounds ground chuck meat
2 large onions finely chopped
2 tablespoons oil
1 cup finely chopped parsley
1 teaspoon salt
Freshly ground pepper
2 teaspoons cinnamon
2 teaspoons allspice
½ cup toasted pine nuts
1/3 cup long grain rice
1 and ½ cup water
Dough
4 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup ice water
3/4 cup safflower oil
Topping 
1 beaten egg
½ cup sesame seeds
Preheat a large sauté pan until hot.  Add the oil and then the onions and turn the temperature down to medium.  Occasionally stir the onions with a wooden spoon, sautéing on medium heat until sweet and golden.  Push the onions aside and add the ground chuck and sauté until browned and starting to stick.  As you stir the onions and chuck meat, break it up with your spoons, so it becomes crumbly with no large chunks of ground meat intact.
Stir in the parsley; add the seasoning, and the pine nuts.  Next, mix the uncooked rice with the meat and onions.  Add the water to cover the mixture and place a lid on the pan.  Reduce the heat to low and let steam until all the water is absorbed and the rice cooks, about 15 minutes.  Cool the filling down before using.  It is best to make it the night before and refrigerate.  This much filling will require 2 batches of dough.
For the dough measure the flour into a bowl and add the salt.  In a two cup glass measuring pitcher, combine the liquids.  Beat the liquids with a small whisk to emulsify.  Pour the liquid into the flour and stir with a fork.  When the dough holds together, use your hands to finish gathering the dough into a ball.  All the flour will incorporate and the dough should be soft and pliable.  Separate the dough into 42 to 44 walnut size pieces.  Roll each small piece into a smooth ball.  With a rolling pin, roll each ball into a circle, no bigger then 3 inches in diameter, taking care not to go over the edges with the rolling pin and make them thin. 
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and prepare 4 rimmed baking sheets.  Place a heaping teaspoon of filling in each circle.  Close the filled circles by folding the dough in a triangle shape.  Place the Pastelicos on the prepared baking sheets.  Brush all the Pastelicos with beaten egg and sprinkle with sesame seeds.  Bake in a 400 degree oven until golden and crispy about 15 to 17 minutes.
After the Pastelicos cool, they keep well for two days in the refrigerator or I freeze them in airtight containers.  Reheat in a 300 degree oven for 10-15 minutes to re-crisp.

BAMYA WITH BEEF STUFFED KOOBA

Okra Stew with Ground Meat Dumplings

My vivacious friend  Nina is an Israeli American whose family was originally from Romania.  Her husband is originally from Iraq.  As a result, Nina knows how to make all of the most amazing Israeli, Iraqi, Romanian, and Sephardic dishes.
Nina’s recipes are in her head, from a lifetime of cooking seven days a week.  I had this idea to get together, cook, and write down instructions in English along with measurements, so I could make her recipes accessible to the average home cook.  We set aside a day from 9 a.m. until 2p.m.
We made Green Bean and Tomato Stew with Beef, Beef Koubideh Kabob, savory Mushroom Borekas with puff pastry and Okra Stew.  These dishes brought back food memories from childhood,

Friday Night Menu

Wine:  for regular Shabbat  Teal Lake 2008 Shiraz
Wine: for special occasion, Casa da Corca, Douro, reserva 2005
Challah
Lime marinated grilled lamb shoulder chops
with Bobby Flay's Cascabel Chili Fig sauce
Roasted squash blossoms with toasted bread crumbs

Saute of fresh figs, mushrooms, and fennel
Basmati rice pilaf with pistachios and scallions
Stone fruit crisp