Desperately Seeking Yufka

It always starts off as something simple.
A few of years ago I found an interesting pastry in the supermarket inside Footscray’s little Saigon. Its handmade in a filo style called Emek Yufka. Its a little thicker than commercial filo, round and just ever so slightly cooked. Over the last few years we have grown to love the versatile and tasty pastries that can be made with it. At the moment we are making kohlrabi, leek and parsnip strudel. Its the kind of pastry that you would love to be able to make but I lack the experience and skill or even courage to try to make it. Then three weeks ago the supermarket announced that due to the end of lease it was closing and our beloved Emek Yufka proved to be an elusive little number to find elsewhere.
Yufka, now the word itself started to stir a few questions. Forgive me if I go a bit Woodstock [40 years] but you really don’t know what you’ve got till it’s unavailable.
You may know Yufka, but to me this was starting to become a serious quest. A little digging around showed it to be one of many traditional Turkish pastries. It is available from quite a few other sources but Emek Yufka was something special. It cooked up better than any of the others so the hunt was on. Then luckily on Thursday I saw that the deli manager of the supermarket that is closing had moved to the small Polish/Baltic deli near the Hopkins St entrance of the market and she kindly ordered it for me and now after two weeks of withdrawal symptoms we and you can now get Emek again. This virtual quest took me to tribal villages with earth ovens, street food in Istanbul and to then Bas Foods at 423 Victoria St Brunswick.

This is a Turkishish Mediterranean Wholesalers with hookahs and teapots, loads of extraordinary teas, spices even fresh sweetbreads and even Gullac, this being the mythical dessert served at the circumcision of Suleiman the Magnificent.

I love the store but Bas Foods Yufka just doesn't compare to Emek for me.

They do sell the flour and the rolling pins to make it so now the challenge is on. The lady on the phone told me Emek Yufka is hand made by 70 year old ladies who start really early each morning but I have not had time to go to to the factory yet

[20 Waratah Street Campbelfield Melbourne tel 93592006]

In the meantime to see how Yufka is made in the traditional way click on these links they are amazing.
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/2118082/yufka_a_an_kad_nlar/
http://www.videosofturkey.com/video_details.asp?id=122
This one is the best when you have no rolling pin

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/3105095/yufka/

For a bit of the history and an extraordinary food blog called The Culinary Anthropologist click here http://www.culinaryanthropologist.org/2008/05/flipping-gozleme.html
I will post on Gullac soon.

Classic Hits Choucroute

Choucroute has hit the menu. Robert Courtine in his superb book The Hundred Glories of French Cooking traces the origins of the Choucroute to central Europe where he observes in a very patronising but rather endearing Parisian way, that soured cabbage sometimes hangs a little heavily over that particular culinary landscape. In Hungarian and many other mittel European kitchens, soured cabbage finds itself wrapped around stuffings of pork, veal and aromatics but in the classic Choucroute Garnie, its a medley, with as many variety meats as the cook can muster. Sausages, smoked pork, blood sausage, white pudding all add a layer of fat to both your waistline and also to the flavour. Don't get me wrong I like fat as much as any European but we have to remember that this is Australia and while its cold outside there is not a metre of snow around the barrels of mythical sauerkraut over the cellar. At least not here in Birregurra [9 degrees C today] So to keep the complexity of flavour provided by the chorus of preserved meat without the need for a triple bypass, we merely cut the charcuterie into very small dice and feature but one meat cooked to order in our version.
The cabbage both preserved and fresh is cooked with a small dice of smoked sausage, white pudding, Toulouse sausage, air dried ham, juniper berries, peppercorns, apple, dried mountain berries, garlic, Riesling, stock and smoked turkey. Red cabbage with the red meats, white with the white. When cooked they can be combined without the red cabbage bleeding into a blurr. This is topped with a slice of pork neck [scotch fillet] that has been cured with juniper and smoked paprika and slowly baked in the wood oven with just a little smoke.

Whats next for the menu any suggestions?

Compostulation

Many visitors to the garden at Sunnybrae this month might think we have giant rabbits or badgers digging holes and making piles of dirt all over the garden. City slickers with minimalist gardens will also feel a little uneasy by the seemingly disordered state of the vegetable garden. But for us this is pay-dirt month, the month when all the organic waste from the kitchen from the previous year is revealed as compost. We don’t have an elaborate system for making compost but simply make a couple of large heaps with all the garden and kitchen organic wastes mixed with some mulch, straw, and sheep manure. We turn it over once a year and the result is about 30 cubic metres of what is priceless to us, well rotted compost. This is distributed all over the garden during winter in preparation for new plantings.
There has been a lot of chatter about the nutritional virtues of organic food in all the different forms of the media this month. A study by a British Standards authority was picked up by a news editor [or 30] and became a global story bringing out all the usual arguments about organic versus genetic versus conventional food production. We do organic because it’s easier. There is very little disease or pests in our garden as long as the plants are weeded and do not suffer from a lack of water. I am reluctant to use any heavy duty chemicals. I’m not saying its better or more nutritious but I do think food tastes better when tended with care and harvested at the right time.
Our cooking is also based on minimal interference with the natural flavours of our ingredients. I can’t see the point of de-hydrating something only to sprinkle it on to a liquid to create a surprising sensation in the palate of an unsuspecting diner. But that’s another story. I purchase some organic, some conventional and some imported produce that is not available here. The descision is not political but seasonable and what I think is reasonable. Too much psychobabble is published to preach and sell a position. We are in the country on fertile land and do what we can to get the most out of our situation.
Ten years ago the limits to what we could grow were tempered by the amount of time we could afford to spend on the garden as we had 4 good dams always full and overflowing in the middle of winter. Now we have the same 4 dams at less than 20% capacity. So planting is now based on how much water we can use.
This is the game plan for 2009-10.
Garlic lots more than last year. This will keep the beds tidy for a decision about how much summer produce can be planted after it’s picked.
Tomatoes about 200 plants. This is where most of the water will go.
Artichokes built up from new cuttings into 3 large beds. This has taken 3 years to achieve by taking the suckers from the pants and dividing them. We have a variety that is pure heart.
A new herb garden to include summer savoury as well as all the usual suspects.
An emphasis on melons this year with Ogden and Charentais to feature.
Re-establish the lost Physalis beds that include Cape gooseberry and ground cherries.
More edible succulents and hardy salad greens.
A new bed for table grapes.
And plant out whatever self seeds like the tomatillos.
The fruit trees that really suffered last year have had about 2 truckloads of mulch from across the road, when they thinned out some scraggy trees in their plantation,spread around them. The olives have been trimmed.
The asparagus will soon come into life. We can see buds on some of the trees.
Spring is nearly upon us.