Coleslaw, Delicatessen-Style

 
Good-old American coleslaw hails from … (wait for it!) … Holland. “Koolsla” in Dutch is pronounced exactly like coleslaw (double “o” in Dutch sounds like the long O in “rose”). Koolsla is the shortened form of “koolsalade” -- cabbage salad.

 I make coleslaw the New York German deli way, with little mayonnaise, but tangy sweet and sour.

Any smooth-leaved green variety of cabbage seems to produce good coleslaw. Sweetness in the cabbage gets lost with all the seasonings added to it by the time the dish is completed. Savoy cabbage, though I love it for other things, in my experience doesn’t make particularly good coleslaw. Red cabbage produces a spectacular, if unorthodox, coleslaw. It serves well on a holiday buffet table. Specialty slaws for fancy and restaurant fare include slaw made from shredded Brussels sprouts.

 The recipe serves six as a side dish, with easily stored left-overs.

1 medium head of green (or red) cabbage or 3/4 of a medium-large head
1 medium-large carrot
2 tablespoons mayonnaise (“real” preferred)
1 tablespoon Dijon-style mustard
6 tablespoons white vinegar
4 tablespoons sugar
1-1/2 teaspoons salt, plus more to taste

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

Discard any tough outer cabbage leaves. Cut off cabbage’s bottom inch. Cut the head in half through the stem and cut it again into quarters. Set a quarter on a board and cut away the core and any big ribs on the exterior.

 Shred cabbage finely crosswise, either with a sharp knife on a cutting board, with a mandolin slicer, or in a food processor fitted with a 2-millimeter slicer blade. As you shred it, place cabbage in a very large bowl for mixing.

 Peel carrot and shred it, using the coarse side of a grater or the food processor fitted with a grater blade. Add it to the cabbage.

 Add mayonnaise, mustard, vinegar, sugar, salt and pepper. Mix well. It will be dry at first. Let it sit 15 or 20 minutes, mixing from time to time, until the cabbage softens and the juices increase. Taste and adjust salt, vinegar or sugar as desired.

 Coleslaw is best if allowed to chill for an hour or more, or even up to several days, covered. Mix well and taste before serving and adjust salt, vinegar or sugar if needed. 

Pad Thai Noodles

Pad Thai noodles, non-shrimp version

The recipe serves six.

 1/2 pound Thai dry flat rice noodles, 1/8-inch wide

2 eggs, beaten

12 fresh shrimp, peeled, deveined, tail shells left on (optional, increasing the meat if not using)

1/2 pound raw chicken breast or pork, thinly sliced

1/2 of a (1-pound) cake of tofu, firm style, in 1/2-inch cubes

3 large cloves garlic, finely chopped

3 scallions, including most of the green part, diagonally sliced 1/2 inch long

5 tablespoons peanuts (dry roasted), crushed or chopped slightly

2 cups fresh bean sprouts, rinsed

3 tablespoons coarsely chopped fresh cilantro (coriander) leaves

4 tablespoons freshly squeezed lime juice

4 tablespoons Asian fish sauce (available in Asian groceries)

4 tablespoons palm or brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon ground red toasted pepper or 1/4 teaspoon cayenne plus 1/4 teaspoon paprika

3-4 tablespoons vegetable oil (not olive oil)

1 red chili pepper, seeds removed, shredded or 1/2 teaspoon roasted Thai pepper flakes)

Lime wedges plus several sprigs of cilantro (coriander) leaves for garnish

Break noodles into 4-inch lengths. Soak in warm water at least 20 minutes, until softened. Drain. Beat eggs in a small bowl. Prepare the other ingredients from shrimp through cilantro leaves and set out in separate piles on a platter before cooking. Mix lime juice, fish sauce, sugar, and toasted red pepper, or cayenne plus paprika, in a small bowl.

Heat oil in a wok or large frying pan and gently stir-fry the garlic until pale golden. Add chicken or pork and increase heat and stir-fry until color is almost changed. Add shrimp, if used, and continue to stir-fry just until shrimp turn bright pink. Add the tofu. Stir and fry 15 seconds. Add lime juice mixture, stirring briefly to dissolve.

Add drained noodles and stir through the mixture 20-30 seconds (the noodles should start to become tender). Push noodles to one side in the wok. Add a little oil to the emptied part of the pan, and pour in beaten eggs. As they set, gently scramble them, keeping them separate from the noodles. Place most of the bean sprouts and scallions plus half the peanuts and chopped cilantro on the noodles. Stir these and the scrambled eggs throughout the noodles. Taste a noodle, and add fish sauce or salt if needed.

Serve immediately on a large plate or platter, sprinkling on the remaining bean sprouts, peanuts, scallions, chopped cilantro leaf, and red pepper or pepper flakes. Garnish with lime wedges plus several sprigs of cilantro. Diners should squeeze a little lime juice on their noodles.

Fruitcake Bars – A Relatively Easy Family Favorite Treat

Here, after the holidays, as we eat the last of this season’s fruitcake bars, I realized I should get the recipe onto the blog so that family, and others who might be interested, can access it. I didn’t want to risk misplacing it, as happened for several years with our Lekerli recipe (see my blog post of December 6, 2020).

Many years ago on short notice just before Christmas I was asked to make a holiday food item for my wife’s church choir pot-luck brunch. Traditional fruitcake was out of the question because of the time needed to make and age it. The choir event was the next day. I worked with what we had in the kitchen and threw together a heavy, fruit and nut-packed batter and baked it in a sheet cake pan. I cut the cake into bars, sprinkled them with bourbon and arranged them on a platter, and off they went to church. The approach used several of the tricks of making classical fruitcake that I had learned from my mother as well as numerous shortcuts. Finally, and subversively, I used liquor in it for a church that then still frowned on drinking. The bars were a hit. Ever since, and with a few modifications to the recipe, my wife or I have made our Fruitcake Bars almost every year. There are extended family members and several friends who wait eagerly for this annual Christmas treat. 

Note, if avoiding the use of liquor to wrap the bars (that in the raisins will have cooked off during baking), store the container with the bars in the refrigerator.

Lekerli – German-Swiss Honey-Spice cookies from Basel

Basler Lekerli (or Läkerli) are glazed rectangular or diamond-shaped spice cookies that my family love around Christmas. The cookies are tedious and tricky to make, and thus are particularly special for the holiday. It has become a tradition with us, though not because of any Swiss background. The cookies keep for weeks, and improve in both flavor and texture with storage.

Lekerli are the German-Swiss counterpart, developed in Basel, to the originally Bavarian Nuremberg honey-spice cookie, Lebkuchen. Both date back about seven centuries. I found the recipe in a small Swiss cookie cookbook at the book store at World Health Organization in Geneva, where I was doing a work project in the mid-1980s. The book, fortunately, was the French translation, which I can read, of an originally German language regional cookbook, which I could not have read. With some adaptations that I made to the recipe for our local conditions and preferences, it became a favorite, which I baked nearly annually for decades.

When we moved to Athens from Atlanta, the recipe, typed on a single page of paper, disappeared in transit. My wife, Christina, tracked down a copy through a complex communication and locating an old friend of hers who, she recalled, had liked our cookies and photocopied the recipe. Our new copy is a printout of the pfg-transmitted copy of our original, which Sylvie had photocopied. Having just made the Lekerli as a project with several of my grandchildren, I’m now getting it on my recipe blog to keep it accessible.

Basler Lekerli

Mix together in a large bowl:

3 1/4 cups flour

1 1/2 tablespoons cinnamon

2 1/2 teaspoons nutmeg (fresh grated is best)

2 teaspoons ground cloves

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

In a separate bowl:

2 1/2 cups chopped almonds (with skins)

6 tablespoons candied orange rind, coarsely chopped

6 tablespoons candied lemon rind, coarsely chopped

Grated rind (zest) of 1 lemon

3 tablespoons orange juice

In a large pan, bring to a boil:

3/4 cup honey (strong flavored, such as wildflower honey)

3/4 cup sugar

Once the mixture has boiled, remove pan from the heat and stir in the almond mixture. Then transfer this all to the bowl with the flour mixture and combine using a strong wooden paddle. This can be difficult. The dry mixture can be kneaded with the hands once it is cool enough to touch.

Place one half of the dough (broken up and scattered) on the bottom side of a greased cookie sheet or greased parchment (not waxed paper) on the cookie sheet bottom. Roll the dough 1/4 inch or thinner, using a waxed paper sheet on top of the dough or lightly dusting dough with flour while rolling. Cut off ragged edges and fill in any gaps so as to get a large rectangle of dough. 

Repeat for the other half of the dough. 

Bake in a 315-degree oven until golden brown, 15-17 minutes. Remove from oven. While still hot, run the edge of a sharp knife underneath the edges of the dough to separate it from the parchment or the pan.

For each sheet of cookies, make the glaze (recipe below). This can be done separately for each sheet of dough, or together (glaze recipe doubled) once you’ve done this a time or two. When glaze is cooked, quickly paint the top of the still-hot baked dough (stick it back in the oven for a minute or so if needed) evenly with glaze using a pastry brush. The glaze will get cloudy and look like icy snow.

Using a sharp knife, cut the still-warm cookies into diamonds (1 1/2-inch wide lengthwise strips then 1-inch wide strips on a diagonal) or cut crosswise into rectangles 1 1/2 inches by 2 inches. Allow cookies to cool thoroughly. Lift them off the pan or parchment with a sharp spatula. Let them dry for a little while. Store in tightly covered tins,

Let ripen for at least a week for best flavor and texture. 

GLAZE for each half of the dough:

6 tablespoons sugar

3 tablespoons water

Boil in a pan without stirring (but gently swirl the pan occasionally) until the syrup first begins to spin a thread when a little is dripped from a spoon. Do not overcook. Brush quickly on a baked sheet of Lekerli.