Clotted cream, or Devonshire Cream, is an all time favorite in this household. Forget a simple scone (and tea time for that matter), we’ll smear it onto cinnamon raisin toast, a hearty whole wheat soda bread, and just about any cracker-like formation at any time of the day. The biggest problem I have finding it, even in New York City, is that the good stuff (ie that imported from Devon, England) is hard to come by and fairly expensive for a mere 1-6 ounces. While high quality heavy cream isn’t that much cheaper, the taste of this homemade version is world’s better than any clotted cream I have been able to get my hands on State-side.

Clotted cream is similar to butter in that the fat content of the cream clots (hence clotted cream), but varies in that it is heated low and slow for several hours to bring the clots to the surface, rather than butter, which is agitated to form clots. The result is a slightly sweet and luxuriously smooth butter-like cream substance, or simply, clotted cream. It remains creamy when cold, though will still melt when smeared onto warm toast.
This super rich version is made with heavy cream from jersey cows (the cow breed, not the state). Many believe the higher the fat content of the cream you start with, the better your results. Do not attempt to make this with low-fat or ultra-pasteurized creams (remember: you need fat for this product!). Although a good quality organic full fat heavy cream (or whipping cream) will do, pasture-fed cows will produce the best quality clotted cream with a taste that will change with the seasons.

Brits will tell you clotted cream is best on scones at high tea, but I recommend you try it whenever the mood fits.

NOTE: Don’t let the long cook time throw you from making this recipe. It’s all undisturbed low-heat cooking followed by a night in the fridge.

Clotted Cream
Makes about 1.5 cups. Active time= about 10 minutes. Inactive time= 10 hours plus overnight.
2 cups heavy cream (raw cream or a good quality full-fat organic)

1) Preheat oven to 180 F. (This might just be a setting called “warm.”)
2) Place heavy cream in a heavy bottom ceramic, cast iron or enamel pot, about 8 inches by 13 inches. (You want to keep the cream shallow, but not so shallow it burns, 1-3 inches up the side is good.) Cover the pot and place in the center rack of the oven. Leave undisturbed 8-10 hours, until a dark yellow crust has formed on top of the cream.
3) Uncover and allow the cream to cool. Recover and place in the refrigerator overnight.
4) Using a spatula, pull the clotted cream from the dish and transfer to a storage container. Use leftover cream in baking applications. Use clotted cream in 4-5 days.

When I was young I had a book by Steven Kroll called, That Makes Me Mad! about a young girl, Nina, enraged with the world around her. You follow Nina through her pains: when she’s told “something delicious” is for dinner and it turns out to be her least favorite dish, it makes her mad. When her newborn brother gets more attention, it makes her mad. When adults ignore her wonderful attempts at attention, it makes her mad.

Basically, none of us want to be lied to or ignored. It’s something I think many of us have forgotten today.

I remember this book was one of my favorites and I distinctly remember toting it around in the car on trips. To this day when things make me mad I think of little angry Nina. I have mentioned the book to others, but no one else seems to have read it. Sometimes I think I should make the grown up version of this book, but maybe that would be too depressing.

If I did write it, a few pages of my adult That Makes Me Mad! would cover rising food prices, global warming/ the environmental crisis, and other current chatter– That Makes Me Mad!

D forwarded me this article from CounterPunch about rice shortages in Haiti and how the country could once feed itself– before the U.S. stepped in to “help.” It’s happened in other countries and well, That Makes Me Mad! The scenario often goes something like this:

Open trade borders
Artificially low-priced U.S. crops filter into country
Local farmers are driven out of business and move to cities
City populations grow
Joblessness and poverty increases and quality of life is reduced
Corporations move in to “make use” of once used farmland; Build polluting industry; Pollute the land and hire unskilled workers on the cheap (ie ex-farmers– who more often than not are not allowed to unionize)
Countries become “civilized” through industrialization
Land is destroyed and made toxic and we once again distance our understanding of sustainable land use

When is the U.S. going to stop subsidizing mono-cultures, ultimately artificially lowering prices on single commodities, like sugar, rice and corn, and put their money where it actually helps?! Subsidize items like corn and you create a huge surplus. (Because hey, if I’m a struggling farmer trying to make it, I’m going to grow whatever the government is paying big bucks for.) What to do with a huge corn surplus? Export it at prices other countries cannot compete with, turn it into high fructose corn syrup, figure out how to feed it to livestock, put more oil into it than it actually produces to make ethanol, and in general filter it into just about every processed food made, creating obesity throughout the land and making the health care industry (with funding from big Ag) a happy camper.

All of this make me very, very mad!

How about sustainable agriculture methods? Make organic fruits and vegetables more affordable for people– not corn syrup! But as so many people say, I guess the poor broccoli has no multi-million dollar spending lobbyist in Washington fighting for it, huh? I created this one, above right, for the purpose.

So it all seems really big and unbearable, right? Rather than change a light bulb, why not support a local sustainable farmer? Join a Community Supported Agriculture program (their prices are often less than non-organic prices at conventional supermarkets). Or here is another option: Don’t support Big Ag (not because you don’t want to support farmers, but you want to change where subsidies go!)! Read labels on products you buy, stay away from high fructose corn syrup, and in general, ingredients you can’t pronounce or don’t know how they are grown or produced– soy lecithin, not a soybean.

For months D and I have been eating our way through beets. About eight pounds every three weeks for four months. As D proclaimed time and again, “there are only so many beets a person can take.” That person is obviously not me. Still, it is true there are only so many pounds of beets a single person can consume when her partner in eating has sworn them off. After a recent Passover dinner I managed to squeeze a variation of this salad on the menu. D sleeps content knowing the beets are exorcised from the refrigerator.

While I know these storage babies would keep another few months in the fridge, I also know once Community Supported Agriculture season hits us June 5, we’ll be finding a home for more blushing beauties. (Note to D: Prepare yourself.)

Over the months, to hide the offensive vegetable from D, I was able to work them into pizza, gnocchi, ravioli (beet-blue cheese filling tucked into whole wheat orange zested pasta), chocolate cake, soups (of course a borscht as well) and even pickled them for holiday gifts handed off to D’s father, who shares my love of beets. I contemplated ice cream most recently, but bowed out of that thought when all the fresh mint began hitting my senses.

Over months of experimentation, the above salad was one application where I managed to get D to enjoy his beets without sausage, pesto or chocolate poured on top. It is a favorite dish of mine because it doesn’t involve a multi-step process with the beets, just roast, slice and chill.

This salad is a colorful reminder that Spring is here, a bounty of vegetables await us, but we can make do with our storage supplies until Mother Nature decides to kick in. I think it is best with a little crumbled cheese, feta or goat, tossed into it. For Passover I made due without the cheese, substituting a tahini-citrus dressing for creaminess, also good. A number of herbs work equally well depending on taste, what is around or what you are serving this with: cilantro, purslane, parsely, celery tops or basil.

Beet and Orange Herb Salad
Serving Size= 4 persons. Cook time= 1.5 hours. Active time= 15 minutes.
4 good sized beets (a little smaller than a fist), golden or red
2-3 navel oranges (grapefruit, clementines or tangerines would work too)
1/4 cup crumbled feta or goat cheese
1/2 cup packed mint, chopped
2 teaspoons fresh ground cardamom
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
juice of 1 lemon
2 tablespoons olive oil

1) Preheat oven to 350 F. Scrub beets under running water, remove greens, reserve for another use. Place beets on a pan over a large sheet of tinfoil. Sprinkle beets with olive oil, salt and pepper. Wrap the beets in foil, bake 45 minutes, turn, bake another 45 minutes or until a fork punctures both sides easily. Remove from oven, unwrap and let cool 5 minutes. Using two paper towels, work the the skins off the beets by pushing and sliding the paper towels around, starting at the tops and working around the beets. Slice beets into bite size pieces, about 1 inch long by 1/2 inch thick. Refrigerate while prepping the remaining ingredients.
2) Slice top and bottoms off oranges. Lay oranges flat then work around the orange slicing off the skin. Slice into bite size pieces, about the same size as the beets. Place in serving dish.
3) Add cheese, mint, cardamom, salt, pepper, lemon juice and olive oil to oranges. Toss to incorporate. Add beets and toss briefly to just incorporate trying not to let too much of the beets bleed into the oranges or cheese. Serve at room temperature or slightly chilled.
NOTE: Try a variety of other herbs. Instead of cheese, add 2 tablespoons tahini. Add croutons to make the dish a light dinner or lunch.

Just Braise disappeared for a bit, but I assure you we kept eating. My energy has been focused on a food literacy project in NYC public schools and re-writing dairy pages for a non-profit. Once published, I’ll share my extensive knowledge of the dairy world with everyone. Until then, I have self-dubbed myself the NYC Milkmaid.

I assure you readers have not missed much. In the past few weeks dishes were sometimes brisk, consisting of leftovers, frozen soups and toasted bagels (we all have our days). While delicious, let us just say it was nothing to write home about. Can you blame us? As T.S. Eliot said, April is the cruellest month. What is a foodie to do when those root vegetables no longer look as crisp and inviting as they once did? What happens when dreams of spring greens appear so close yet feel so far?

We turn to the sea.

As I may have overly noted again and again, I live deliciously close to a handful of fish markets. I implore any of you who live remotely near to these dying markets (butchers, fish mongers and assorted now “specialty” markets) to shop these stores. The quality is often far superior than any supermarket and the workers (often the owners or extended family) know what they are selling and take their products seriously. When were these fish caught? Answered. How was this beef raised? Answered. Where was this pasta produced? Answered. It brings us back to the small stores so quickly falling through the cracks that are truly needed to connect us to a sense of community.

When D and I walked by one of these markets and saw the large handwritten sign, “Soft Shell Crabs are IN,” we knew we needed them. I stopped by a few hours later to pick some up and joked with the husband-wife team who own the place about prepping these babies:

Me: “What do you think is the best way to do these up?”
Husband: “Fry them! These babies are fresh! You know how I know? I made them last night, deeeelicious.”
Wife: “You didn’t make anything! You never make anything. You kidding me?”
Husband: “Well I ate them!”
Wife: “Yeah, you sure ate them, it’s about all you know how to do!”
Husband: “I know how to clean ‘em. I clean ‘em real good. I’ll clean them for you honey, you’ll see.”

Okay, so it was less of me joking and more listening in on an awkward domestic dispute about household chores.

But I had my soft shell crabs (with a free lemon I was told I would “definitely need”), I had my recipe, care of my bickering suppliers, and I had some homemade mayonnaise eagerly awaiting the chance to be turned into tartar sauce. (The mayonnaise is another story of love and loathing.)

In fact, the crabs were so fresh-tasting of the ocean, that after D and I finished off one each for dinner and then leftovers for lunch the following day, I bought four more to make crab tacos the next day! When they are back again I promise to pick more up and saute them in butter and lemon. (Soft shell crabs are blue crabs that have grown, shedding their shells. The waters have to be warm enough for them to grow. Soft shell crabs are now available from Florida to North Carolina. By the end of June we will have more local North East crabs. It’s a long and delicious season!)

My favorite application of the soft shell crab was in the above sandwich. I love the way the crab looks like it is ready to walk out and pinch you. As our spring greens have yet to grace our tables, we bulked up these sandwiches with some creamy avocado slices, a great balance to the crispness of the bread and zesty sauce.

You can ask your fish provider to clean the crabs for you. To clean yourself, simply cut off the eyes at front, remove the lungs from the sides, and the little bit of slime out the rear. Go here to see how The Minimalist does it.

Fried Soft Shell Crab Sandwich
Active time= about 15 minutes. Serving Size= 4 people
For the Crabs:
4 soft shell crabs
1 egg
2-3 dashes Tabasco sauce
2 cups whole wheat flour (or mixture flour and cornmeal)
1 teaspoon Old Bay
vegetable oil to fill 1 inch up the side of the pan

1) Begin warming the oil on medium-high heat.
2) Place the egg and Tabasco in a bowl wide enough to fit a crab, scramble until combined. In another bowl, mix the flour and Old Bay until combined.
3) Once the oil is hot enough (test by placing the end of a chopstick in, if it bubbles, it is ready) dredge each crab in the egg, then transfer to the flour and toss until well coated. Transfer the crabs one at a time to the hot pan. Do not crowd the pan. Fry 2-3 minutes each side until lightly browned, set aside on a paper towel to dry and sprinkle with another dash of Old Bay.

For the Tartar Sauce:
1 cup mayonnaise
juice of 1 lemon
2 teaspoons horseradish sauce
2-3 dashes Tabasco sauce
1 tablespoons dill relish (or chopped pickles)

1) Mix all ingredients to combine.

To Assemble the Sandwich:
Toast your preferred bread until golden (I used sourdough). Smear each slice with a hefty dosage of tartar sauce, splay sliced avocado along the sauce and top with a crab and the second slice of bread. For easy handling, cut the sandwich in half.