use real butter

Recipe: breakfast torta

Sometimes things come to a head that you have no control over and suddenly you find yourself treading water. I try to avoid situations like these. I try to avoid unnecessary stress, but every now and again there are external factors that are out of my hands. It’s been like this for the past week or so – a rollercoaster of sorts, but everything is fine here at Butter Headquarters. We can always count on Kaweah to bring us back to what is normal.

she recently got a bath and smells like lavender

When there are deadlines or when my brain won’t shut off at night, I tend to neglect things like getting enough sleep or drinking enough water. Sometimes I forget to eat and then I stuff myself with junk food late in the day. They are all bad habits and thankfully, I only revert to that mode when it’s crunch time. Despite my ambivalence toward breakfast, I do try to eat something in the morning to avoid the late afternoon gorging when you realize you haven’t eaten anything yet all day. It’s easier to do when you have breakfasts to look forward to. Last fall when I was at the Sacramento airport at puke-thirty in the morning for my flight home, I zombied through the concourse in search of something to quell the urge to hurl. Standing in front of the Dos Coyotes menu board, I ordered a breakfast torta. Never had one before, but you know what? It was really good.

you’ll need: tortas, refritos, bacon, chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, eggs, mayonnaise, garlic, lime, avocado, and cheese

That torta was so satisfying that it lingered in my mind for several weeks. Then I forgot about it. But passing through the same airport just this past weekend, it jogged my memory. I needed to make a breakfast torta of my own. I’m a fan of condiments and figured I could make some chipotle mayonnaise for that creamy, spicy component. It adds a nice zing to the sandwich and can be as strong or as mild as you want it. It was simple enough: mash up garlic into a paste, purée the chipotle peppers (with a little adobo sauce), squeeze some lime juice, stir it all into the mayonnaise and add salt to taste.

mashing minced garlic into a paste

chipotle pepper purée

add desired quantities to the mayonnaise

squeeze lime juice into the mix

What you end up with is a pale orange-pink spread for your sandwich. If you decide to put it in a squeeze bottle, make sure the bottle tip is large enough to let chunks of pepper and garlic through. I buy my tortas from Costco because I bought them by accident one day and happened to love the texture. They freeze well and are great for toast or sandwiches. I have no idea how these compare to authentic tortas, but I’m sure someone out there has an opinion to share. Toast or don’t toast, that is completely up to you.

chipotle mayonnaise

slice the torta

**Jump for more butter**

Recipe: sesame tofu

I had the opportunity to enjoy several meals with my parents this summer, because of their extended stay in Boulder. It became so routine that my parents would sometimes order Chinese takeout and supplement it with some of their own Chinese dishes. On one occasion, Mom had ordered sesame tofu. Believe it or not, I had never had it before. It was good, albeit greasy in that Chinese restaurant way. A few weeks ago, I had a sudden craving for sesame tofu and said to myself (as I always do), “I bet I could make that.”

sesame seeds, red pepper flakes, ginger, green onions, tamari, sesame oil, honey, rice vinegar, cornstarch, tofu, garlic

Don’t you just love when you find out how easy it is to make a recipe at home? And the more experience you have with cooking and baking, the more accessible recipes become. Not only does it demystify cooking, but you also understand what goes into your food and ultimately, into your body. Plus, you get to tweak it to your liking! I’m all about customization, don’t you know.

The first step is to press the extra-firm tofu. It always sounded so tedious to me, but it’s quite simple. Wrap the block of tofu (extra-firm) in paper towels and place it on something flat. Then set a heavy flat-bottomed something or other (bowl, plate, etc.) on the tofu to help press out liquid. While gravity and pressure do their things, you can prepare the sauce.

pressing the tofu

sesame oil, rice vinegar, tamari, minced garlic and ginger, honey, hot pepper flakes

adding tamari to the mix

stir the sauce together and warm it on the stove

While the sauce is on a low simmer, mince your green onions and then unwrap your tofu if it has been pressed for 20 minutes. 20 minutes is not a magic amount of time. I actually pressed the tofu for 30 minutes because I was shooting two recipes at the same time. Oh well. Pat the block of tofu with dry paper towels and dice it. I cubed mine to just under 1-inch cubes… more like 3/4-inch cubes.

mince the green onions

towel it off

large dice

**Jump for more butter**

Recipe: shredded kale salad

Over the holidays when I was recovering from my cold, but still essentially useless, I rifled through my sizable yarn stash and decided to put a dent in it. I wanted to make something for my friend, Kat, who is moving away this very week. Knowing how sorely out of practice I was, I made a trial run which ultimately had some inconsistent tension and resulted in a scarf that I’d be willing to wear, but was too flawed (in my opinion) to gift to someone.

the trial run scarf

I made the test scarf blue because I prefer cooler hues and because I needed to save my green yarns for Kat’s scarf. Green is her favorite color and I happened to have a lot of different funky novelty yarns in greens. It’s a remnant scarf which means you use up the remnants of various skeins of yarn. When I was done with the tassels, it reminded me of a rainforest. And she loved it, which is what really mattered.

kat’s scarf

Even though I’m pretty much recuperated, I am finishing up one last remnant scarf for another friend. It makes me realize how impatient I am to sit down and work on these things when I’m back to normal, because I much prefer being on my feet. So I am forcing myself to hurry up and get it done lest it be forgotten in my yarn bin for another two years.

kaweah likes to keep me company and doze on the couch

But you know, there are days when it is just too nice to pass up getting out under those bluebird skies. Our winter blues are the best kind, really. Erin agrees with me.

i kid you not

After our hike, Erin and I met two other girlfriends in Boulder for a late lunch at Oak. I really like their food, so much so that I reproduced their shredded kale salad at home. I have been loving on winter greens salads for the heartier texture, the slight bitterness, and most of all – because I can make a big batch and enjoy the salad over the course of a few days instead of preparing a salad fresh each time!

olive oil, orange, apple, red wine vinegar, salt, almonds, kale, togarashi

Oak’s version of this salad uses Parmesan cheese, but I omitted that because I wanted to keep this light. They also put candied almonds in their salad (which tastes great) as opposed to the seasoned almonds I had on hand. I think next time I’m going to use baby kale. It’s so tender that I could skip the step of stripping the leaves from the ribs.

strip the leaves from the ribs

roll the leaves up and slice thin (chiffonade)

If memory serves me well, Oak uses a simple oil and vinegar dressing. I wanted mine to have an orange juice base. But you know what? It’s a salad. That means you do whatever you want to it. Of course, I have to say the orange juice dressing is lovely… unless you have a thing against oranges in which case, I am sad for you.

place the vinegar, orange juice, and salt in a bowl

whisk in a steady thin drizzle of olive oil

pour over the kale

**Jump for more butter**