Duluth in two days

I was touring Minnesota last week (yes, it was cold), and I visited several towns.  Yes, Minneapolis is a cool city, and I've already talked about what I like in the Fargo/Moorhead area, but today I want to tell you about an oft-overlooked little city called Duluth.  I think this place will probably suck in the winter, because the fog and icy wind coming off Lake Superior was already getting a little old after two days, but it's a lovely lakeside town with a charming downtown area and a friendly population. If you go,...

7 West Taphouse

We went here for lunch, and then came back for the huge beer list at night! Fried cheese curds, onion rings, creative burgers, and lots of local brews make this really worth visiting.

Lake Superior Bakehouse

This place was our savior on a cold, gray morning before teaching at 9am (and after post-concert drinks at 7 West). Great breakfast sandwiches, baked goods, coffee, and tea.









Tweed Museum, UMD  

Bent Paddle taproom

Right across the hall from where I was teaching flute class and performing a recital, there was a great little museum with modern pieces and classical European art, all presented in an educational, interactive setting.  What an inspiring setting in which to learn!




Beer

I was not in town long enough to enjoy some of Duluth's delicious local beer in their original homes, but there are a ton of breweries in the area: Bent Paddle (which is on tap all over the city, and it is delicious), Fitgers, Black List, Canal Park, and Lake Superior are all in Duluth, and surrounding towns have a few to contribute, as well.  Beer is so appropriately loved here that there is a "Beer Trail" that serves as a directory to them all.

Curried yogurt sauce

Last week I was in Minneapolis for a concert, and I ate some Indian food at Malabari Kitchen near the university. It was all good, but by far my favorite item was a yogurt curry, which was really just a runny, spiced yogurt sauce which was meant to be eaten as a digestive with rice at the end of the meal. It was bright, tangy, and delicious, and as I was cooking up some brown rice and mung beans for lunch after I got back, I thought it would be the perfect compliment.

This recipe at least gave me some clue of what goes in a yogurt curry, and the photo looked exactly like what I ate in Minneapolis, but I cannot imagine acquiring all of these ingredients easily, and I didn't particularly feel like cooking the whole thing (boiling dairy products never goes well for me). So I heavily adapted the recipe and came up with a respectable copy that is easy to make and is delicious as a sauce over lentils or mung beans and rice (as I did below). 

Kerala Yogurt Curry

Makes about 2 cups

1 cup plain yogurt

½ cup water

1 teaspoon lemon juice (or more, to taste)

½ teaspoon prepared mustard

½ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon each: curry powder, turmeric, and cumin

1 teaspoon freshly grated ginger

1 serrano pepper

½ small garlic clove

Black pepper to taste

Combine the yogurt, water, lemon juice, mustard, salt, and powdered spices in a small serving bowl and set aside.

In a mortar and pestle or food processor, mash the ginger, serrano, and garlic into a paste with a little drizzle of olive oil. Stir into the yogurt mixture and serve room temperature or cold. 

corn + peanuts = delicious

I have long been a fan of food writer/photographer Heidi Swanson, and I even reviewed her cookbook, Super Natural Everyday, here on this blog a while back.  Her latest in-print creation is Near And Far, and it is a glorious, if slightly strange, melding of travel diary and recipe collection. What's strange about it, from my perspective, are the recipes, which basically amount to warm and cold salads, dips, and soups.  Many of them are great, but need to have rice or pasta added to round out a meal.  Case in point, her Vaghareli Makai, which is basically Indian stir-fried corn and peanuts.  It's so delicious and simple it's ridiculous!  But you need to put some rice underneath it for lunch or dinner.  I also added steamed green beans, because I had them and thought it would be tasty.  It was.

So, here's my version:

Vaghareli Makai

Serves 4

1 medium serrano chile, stemmed, seeded (if desired), and sliced
2 medium garlic cloves, peeled and sliced
One 1-inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and sliced
¼ teaspoon ground turmeric
¾ teaspoon sea or kosher salt
1 tablespoon peanut oil (or other neutral oil)
1 ½ teaspoons yellow or brown mustard seeds
3 cups corn (frozen fine; rinse under warm water and drain)

1 cup steamed green beans
½ cup roasted peanuts
1 cup chopped cilantro

2 tablespoons toasted sesame seeds

3 cups cooked jasmine or brown rice, for serving
lemon or lime wedges, for serving

With a mini food processor, grind the chile, garlic, ginger, turmeric, and salt to a paste.

Heat the oil in a wide skillet. Add the mustard seeds and cook, stirring until they pop, which will take a minute or two. Stir in the corn kernels and cook a few minutes, stirring frequently, until they just start to feel tender, which will take a couple of minutes.

Stir in the peanuts, green beans, half of the cilantro and the chile paste. Cook for another minute then taste. If desired, for additional heat, add more of the chile paste and perhaps a bit of salt.

Serve the spiced corn over rice, topped with the remaining cilantro and sesame seeds  Serve with lime or lemon wedges--don't skip this step!

Even with an extra hour of sleep, I could use some coffee

We always complain when the time changes, don't we?  Sunday we got an extra hour, but it's not good enough, because now it's too dark in the morning.  In the spring, we get more light at night, but we lost a whole hour!  Damn it, life is hard. Whatever your current whining session, coffee will fix it.  I'll help you out,if you happen to be in any of the following select cities: 

Great American Coffee Houses

 Houndstooth Coffee, Austin. TX

Happy Coffee Co. , Denver, CO

Ipsento , Chicago, IL

Boxcar Coffee,  Boulder and Denver, CO

Joe Bean . Rochestrer, NY

 Café D’Bolla, Salt Lake City, UT

Cognoscenti . Los Angeles, CA

Render Coffee, Boston, MA

Gimme Coffee, New York, NY

Sqirl, Los Angeles, CA

Bad Wolf Coffee. Chicago, IL

Kaffe 1668, New York, NY

Daylight Mind, Kona, HI

Coava  Coffee, Portland, OR

Jubala, Raleigh, NC

Barista Parlor, Nashville, TN

Fourbarrel, San Francisco, CA

Commonplace Coffee Roasters. Pittsburgh, PA

Barista, Portland, OR

Volta Coffee, Gainseville, FL

Spyhouse Coffee, Minneapolis, MN

Pavement, Boston, MA

Colectivo  Coffee, Milwaukee, WI

Sunergos, Louisville, KY

Heart Roasters, Portland, OR

Anodyne Coffee Roasters, Milwaukee, WI

Artifact Coffee, Baltimore, MD

Panther Coffee, Miami, FL

Milstead & Co., Seattle, WA

Peregrine Espresso, Washington, D.C.

Ultimo Coffee, Philadelphia, PA

 Go Get Em Tiger, Los Angeles, LA