Preserved Lemon Salt

Sean loves preserving things- whether it be pickled, fermented, or in salt. Preserved lemons are traditionally salt-cured, and he made a jar of them last year. Salt-preserved lemons are pretty easy to make, as they’re essentially lemons cut in half and then scored, stuffed in a sterilized jar, and completely covered in kosher salt. These need to sit for a couple months in their juices before they’re ready to be used, and most recipes call for just a little at a time. When we finally finished our jar, he scooped out almost a half of a cup of salt and let it dry over night.

The result? Preserved Lemon Salt. It’s pretty spectacular.

Stay tuned for some highlights! We’ll be using this stuff, for sure.

The Love Apple, Taos, NM

Shortly before heading off on our honeymoon to ski in southern CO and Taos, NM, we posted about our upcoming trip on Facebook. Our dear friend Grace, esteemed blogger of Grace(full) Plate, emphatically suggested The Love Apple, so we added it to our dining itinerary.

The Love Apple, another name for the tomato, is located in an historic Catholic church that was built in the early 1800’s. You enter a beautiful courtyard and are greeted by a blackboard introducing you to the local farms, cheese makers, and other purveyors. Signs like this make me excited to dine, so before even entering or looking at their menu, I was enlivened by this place.

The menu has something for everyone, and the wine list is well above average. We ordered a couple glasses of wine while deciding on our food and which bottle of wine we were going to order. Our first shared dish was the Sangre de Cristo Flour Tortillas, made in house daily with locally sourced flour. These were delicious, served with harissa, homemade creme fraîche, and cilantro lime relish.

Next, we shared two salads: the Raw Beet, Avocado, and Southwestern Ruby Grapefruit Salad

And the Local Green Salad with Pomegranate, Pecans, and Warm Goat Cheese.

Both salads were first and foremost nutritious and delicious, but the combinations of ingredients was inspiring. I especially enjoyed the breaded and fried goat cheese disk and, though I see it infrequently, never tire of this particular presentation.

For an entrée, he ordered the Housemade Baked Tamale and Oaxacan Style Mole which was a tamale filled with sautéed local greens and sweet corn, topped with red chile mole, a fried egg, and creme fraîche. He loved the combination of flavors, thought the mole was exceptional, and thought the egg was perfect and made a nice addition.

I went with the Grilled Ruby Rainbow Trout, which was served wrapped in a corn husk with lime compound butter. It was topped with chipotle creme and rested on top of a quinoa-piñon fritter (hiding behind the tail and missed by my camera), and cilantro lime relish.

I ate every single bite of food on my plate. The fish was perfectly cooked and moist, the fritter was a fun way to have grains on the side, and Sean’s wine choice was a superb accompaniment.

This charming old church was such a peaceful setting for dinner, I opted in to dessert. The theme of The Love Apple seems to be “house made,” so when I heard of the housemade spiced chocolate gelato, I said, “Yes please.”

Thank you, The Love Apple, for being an oasis of great food amongst a dessert of mediocre food in the southern CO, northern NM region. We’ll certainly tell everyone we know visiting the area to enjoy a meal from your kitchen.

The Burger Stand at the Taos Ale House

As the website says, The Burger Stand at the Taos Ale House is a brewpub with a diverse selection of small batch handcrafted beer and eclectic and delicious burgers. It’s a great place for burgers and beer in a town that pretty much closes up shop at 5 or 6 pm. There are few places in Taos that are, in the opinion of A Bolder Table, worth frequenting, and the Ale House is one of them.

We ordered a couple pints of locally brewed New Mexican beers, and then went to the burger Stand counter to order burgers off of a nicely varied menu. There’s something for everyone here.

While we waited, we perused the extensive condiment selection. They have at least a dozen sauces and accouterments to add to your burger, which got us pretty excited for our meal.

We had to try the green chili and cheese fries, and honestly, it’s the only thing we had that was disappointing. The green chili was good, but the fries were obviously pre-made and packaged, not hand cut as I had anticipated, and the cheese sauce tasted processed. So, those are my gripes. Moving on…

The Quinoa and Arugula salad was good and the dressing on the side as well.

My burger was great. Sean ordered one of their veggie burger options, but I neglected to get a photo. It’s always nice when places make veggie burgers in house, and The Burger Stand goes above and beyond by making two completely different veggie patties. I went with a turkey burger version of the Fire Burger, topped with avocado and habañero cactus jam. It was delicious, especially after a full day crushing the steep slopes at Taos Ski Valley.

We really liked this place, and went back the next night for a beer before heading out to dine at The Love Apple.

Martha Stewart’s Buttermilk Biscuits

My man really likes Martha. She’s his go-to-gal when looking for baking recipes, so it was quite natural that her recipe be the one he made to provide us a vessel upon which we could enjoy his homemade jams and preserves.

He followed her recipe exactly (link here: Martha Stewart’s Buttermilk Biscuit)

After rolling out the dough, he asked me for our biscuit cutter, which we don’t actually own. No worries! I read once in Cooks Illustrated that a mason jar lid ring is a great substitute for a biscuit cutter, and it is.

These were delicious biscuits and we’re ready to make a second batch this week.

Skip the cleanse, just cut out the added sugar!

I really enjoyed this story on NPR and wanted to share: FROM DETOX TO ELIMINATION DIETS, SKIPPING SUGAR MAY BE THE BEST BET

Cut back on sugar, folks. It’s hiding in all kinds of places and we really don’t need to consume it at all. Take a little more time to make things from scratch.