Local peaches and my salad for Chop't

I don't use this blog to write critical reviews of restaurants. Owning a restaurant is tough enough that I never felt the desire to attack someone else's hard-earned livelihood. However, I see no reason not to sing the praises of the places that I feel are doing a good job, and that I'd like to support, especially when they ask me to help promote their use of local foods. One recent day, I was sitting at my desk eating lunch - a salad from Chop't, like I often do. Seriously. I'm eating, and scrolling through personal emails, and there it is in my inbox, an email from Chop't asking if I'd want to contribute salad ideas for their seasonal offerings of local peaches from New Jersey. I looked down at my desk at my half-eaten bowl of salad, and burst out laughing. I guess they had the right person for the job.

In case you don't eat lunch out in NY, Chop't is sort of a lunch-time favorite around these parts. The lines are notoriously long, but the salads are pretty addictive, and since they rotate the speacials with the seasons the menu never gets stale. The New York Times recently wrote about how popular chopped salads are among the office dwelling set. It's true, I like my salads chopped up. I even thought about getting a mezzaluna for a while so I could make them at home. Then I realized I like my fingertips as well, and decided I'd leave the master chopping to the pros.

Chop't asked me to compose a salad using the seasonal menu, which right now means peaches. I started thinking of the one I make every summer - peaches and tomatoes. Not exactly a novel combo, though. I considered something Southern inspired. I did live in Georgia briefly - the home of the peach. Peaches and cornbread? Peaches and bacon? Then one night, as I tried to entice some friends to come over for sangria on the weekend, I realized Spain! Peaches are in sangria... peaches and spicy food are a good match...peaches in a tapas-inspired salad! I made one at home to try it out. I started with arugula (my favorite), I added peaches and red onion (I had pickled ones at home), manchego cheese, tomatoes (Chop't has roasted ones, even better), then started to make a red wine vinaigrette (a nod to sangria). It was good, but it was missing something that would make the Spanish influence more obvious. I opened the spice drawer, and saw my little box of smoked paprika (pimentón in España). I reworked the dressing to be a smoked paprika vinaigrette, which was a little spicy, smoky and tart. It's addictive, and I can't believe I haven't made one before. I think it would improve almost anything you pour it on. Now I just have to figure out how to get an hour long siesta into my work day, to enjoy my salad in the park.

Smoked Paprika Vinaigrette

I'm not a big fan of exact recipes for salad dressing. You really have to taste as you go, and adjust for your personal preferences. Here's a good blueprint to start:

• 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 3 tablespoons sherry vinegar
• 1 teaspoon smoked paprika (or more to taste)
• A drizzle of honey
• Salt and Freshly ground pepper to taste

Measure all ingredients into a bowl. Give it a good whisk until the oil and vinegar start to emulsify, aka look like salad dressing. Taste it. Adjust the flavor as needed. If you want it smokier, add more paprika. You want it more tart, add more vinegar. But do each addition a little at a time, whisking after each change, and tasting. The dressing will keep in a closed jar in your fridge for a few days. Pour it on anything. Just don't pour it in your sangria.

Pissaladière-inspired tomato tart

Summer is officially over, but a few juicy red tomatoes who don't want the party to end can still be found hanging about the greenmarket. This is the perfect time to bake something with them now that temperatures have cooled off a bit. That's why my recent attempt at making a pissaladière one Sunday afternoon started looking more like a tomato tart. They were simply stealing the show. Just because the calendar says the season has officially changed, does not mean that everything on our plates has to instantly turn over as well. I actually hate when people rush the seasons. Christmas decorations in the drugstore for sale right after Halloween are just as silly to me as being served pumpkin soup on a balmy 84 degree day in September. That's why I suggest you ease into the season, even if you're as excited for Fall as I am. Make sure you search the market for any last summer produce, cause you should use what's left of it while you still can. Last weekend, in an effort to think of a fun football watching snack, I decided I was going to try to make a pissaladière, which is a type of "pizza" from the South of France (actually I think that without cheese or tomatoes calling it a pizza is a stretch). Pissaladière sometimes is made into a tart shell  and I had prepped the shell about a month ago for such a purpose and left it in my freezer. I took the shell out of the freezer and blind-baked it while I prepared the filling. The recipe I was following was from the Rose Bakery cookbook that had a modern take on the dish. However, just to compare, I pulled out a Cook's Illustrated magazine a friend had given me with a recipe for pissaladière, done the more traditional way, on a pizza-type of dough, free-formed and with anchovies, not tomatoes. I was really tempted to go traditional, but I figured I had all winter to make one that way. I found gorgeous tomatoes at the market on Saturday, and ate a good portion of them with nothing more than a sprinkle of sea salt, while the juices dripped down my hand. The rest were destined for this dish.

The filling is pretty simple to assemble once you cook the onions down until they are caramelized and jammy. That takes about 30 minutes, meanwhile pitt and chop some olives and slice your tomatoes. I actually took some hints from the Cook's Illustrated on cooking the onions, figuring someone probably got paid to figure out the nuances of the best method of cooking them down, and I loved the addition of brown sugar. After all was said and done, and the tart was filled and baked, it was an exciting flavor combination with the sweet onions, the briny olives and the bright flavors of the tomatoes. It was a beautiful presentation too, perfect for a side dish at a Sunday dinner perhaps, or an ideal lunch. For football, maybe I should have gone with the pizza-dough method, rather than the tart, because football food should be finger-food, even if it is French inspired.

Pissaladière Tomato Tart Adapted from Rose Bakery and Cook's Illustrated. If you don't feel like making a shortcrust tart dough, try the filling on a pizza dough stretched into a long rectangle and adjust baking times.

1 blind baked tart shell (use any shortcrust pastry dough you prefer) 3 tablespoons olive oil 2 lbs. yellow onions, sliced about 1/4 inch thick 1 garlic clove smashed (not chopped or it will burn) 1/2 teaspoon of salt 1 teaspoon brown sugar pinch of ground cinnamon (optional, but adds something interesting) 1 tablespoon water 1 handful olives, pitted and chopped (black olives are traditional, but I used a mixture) 2 tomatoes, sliced few sprigs of fresh thyme

Prepare tart shell, if using by blind baking while you prepare filling.

Slice the onions, and heat olive oil in a large saute pan until hot, but not smoking. Add onions, garlic, salt, brown sugar and cook on med-high heat for about 10 minutes, stirring often. They will look wilted at that point and be starting to brown. Reduce heat to low and cook, until onions are jammy and golden brown, about 20 minutes longer. Take off heat and add the cinnamon and water and stir til incorporated.

While onions are cooking chop and pitt olives, slice tomatoes, and pull prep thyme. (Stretch the pizza dough on a sheet pan, if you're using that instead of tart shell.)

Fill tart shell or cover pizza dough with onions once they're cooked. Lay the tomato slices in on top and sprinkle the whole thing with the thyme leaves and the chopped olives.

Bake the tart at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for about 20 minutes, or until tomatoes look wilted a bit. If using pizza dough, bake until crust is cooked.

Watermelon-Habanero-Lemonade

Forget everything you know about spicy foods. Chili heat, in the form of a cold beverage is a different sensation altogether. I'm not saying it's easier to handle, or better or worse, I'm just saying it's probably a feeling you're not familiar with. And, if nothing else, you should give it a try because it'll surprise you. Drinking (or eating) foods that are cold in temperature, but packing an unexpected punch of serious Scoville-scale heat from one of the world's hottest chili peppers was new to me, and a bit of a trip. Similar to the way hearing unexpected news can become all you can think about, watermelon-habanero-lemonade may consume your thoughts after you give it a try.

I got the idea for this drink from my friend Daniel, who is constantly tackling big culinary projects. He said he was inspired by a drink he saw at Cosi, that lunch chain that is all over NYC. He said it was a big hit at a BBQ he brought it to, and after asking nicely, he agreed to share it with me. I set out to make this drink excited to try my hand at my first watermelon beverage. The color and the natural sweetness are just too enticing to not want to drink it. Besides, half the time you get a good piece of watermelon it's dripping down your face anyways, I figured putting it in a glass would look a bit more dignified. Has anyone else noticed that watermelon juice seems to be the Summer 2010 trendy cocktail ingredient of choice? Dan added some optional rosewater, but I don't care for the flavor, so I omitted it. If you happen to like the flavor of old-lady perfume, go ahead and add it, your drink will seem extra fancy and exotic.

I only have an immersion blender, so this process took a little longer for me then it needs to for you, if you have access to a blender just whizz it all up quickly. Basically there's not much to it after pureeing, except straining the watermelon pulp out of the drink, so it retains that beautiful color and isn't chunky looking. I used half a habanero, because I can't handle foods that are too spicy without frantically looking for dairy products to put out the fire, but I think next time even I could have handled letting the habanero steep a little longer before straining. I didn't add any alcohol to my batch, but I'm sure most of you know would want the added kick, and almost anything you have on hand, vodka, tequila, or rum would work nicely here - little paper umbrella optional. Make sure you drink up quick though, because watermelon juice does not keep long before the smell, not just the heat, will be surprising to you.

Watermelon-Habanero-Lemonade                                                                                 Makes about 3 quarts.

• 1/4 seedless watermelon (due to differences in size and sweetness best to have more on hand)
• 1/2 habanero pepper (seeded and deveined, handle carefully)
• 1 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 6-12 mint leaves
• 6 cups room temperature water
• Optional: 2 teaspoons rose water

Cube the watermelon, being careful to use only the red part and avoid the white part near the rind.

Remove seeds and ribs from habanero and dice (be extremely careful when cutting and handling habaneros -- wash your hands well after touching them and avoid touching your eyes).

Combine the watermelon and habanero with the other ingredients in a blender (or if using an immersion blender, a large pot). Blend everything to a fine puree and allow to steep for a few minutes. Test for sweetness, heat, minty-ness, watermelony-ness. Adjust accordingly, and re-blend if needed.

Strain out the pulp by draining first through a fine mesh sieve. This may require you to push the juice through the sieve with a back of a spoon as the pulp builds up in the sieve.

Chill well in the refrigerator and serve in a tall glass filled with ice (it really is important that it be served ice cold). A sprig of fresh mint or a lemon slice looks awfully nice as a garnish to a tall glass of this stuff.