Goat Tang

I'm on a goat milk kick.

A confluence of events has led to this current state. First, the obvious: goat cheese is great. Second, perhaps less-obvious, goats are great. What really got the ball rolling was my friend, Matt, who pointed me to LaLoo's goat milk ice cream. Telling me about it, he looked heaven-ward and nearly drooled while saying "It is sooooooo goooooood". Which is how I found myself purchasing a pint of Rumplemint for the bargain price of $7 at Whole Foods. It is very good... but don't expect ice cream. This is a treat in its own category, nestled somewhere between a post-dinner cheese plate and brownie a la mode. It's got a goat-cheesey tang that I detect near the back of my tongue as it melts in my mouth. I can't wait for cobblers to get in full swing. Goat milk ice cream will lend a sophistication to such homey summertime desserts.

However, at $7 per pint, goat milk ice cream is not a sustainable habit for me. So I bought a quart of goat milk (for about $3.50, we're doing better already) and did some internet research to come up with a recipe. Three egg yolks and two vanilla beans later (now the cost must be a wash), I had myself a pint or so of homemade goat milk ice cream. After ripening overnight in the freezer, it's safe to say that it's okay... not as good as LaLoo's, but it has potential. The texture is excellent. It's not overwhelmingly rich, and not at all icy. The problem with thae recipe I used is that its creator was trying desperately (it seems) to cover up the goat-y flavor, to drown it in vanilla and custardy-eggs and sugar. That needs some tinkering with before I reach bargain goat milk ice cream nirvana. Bring on the goat tang!

In the meantime, I had a few cups of leftover goat milk rattling around my fridge. Scones lept to mind. I had some candied ginger in the cabinet and a few Meyer lemons in the fridge, so I pulled out Nancy Silverton's "Pastries from the La Brea Bakery" and set to work. I browsed all the scone recipes and decided that the proportions of butter-flour-liquid she uses are all similar, regardless of the liquid. So I just substituted the goat milk for the cream.

It worked beautifully. It goes with the lemon-ginger because this is a pastry that borders on savory. Just like with the ice cream and the cheese, the scone has got a subtle tang at the finish that makes your tastebuds sort of sit up in wonder. These scones really are delightful. They're not dense or dry like the ones so often found out in the world. They are layers of flakiness that makes them seem kind of ethereal. The ginger gives a hint of spice, but nothing overwhelming. Its intensity seems to be mellowed by the surrounding pastry. The lemon zest complements both the ginger and the goat milk with a floral bouquet of refreshing citrus. If you can't find Meyer lemons, you might try a combination of lemon and orange zest, finely chopped together, or use regular lemon zest for a more lemon-y punch.

To make the scones,
First, mix together your dry ingredients:
2 1/4 c (270g) all purpose flour
1 Tablespoon baking powder
1/3 c sugar

Then cut in 1.5 sticks (6 oz) cold butter and the lemon zest. I used a pastry cutter to get it going, then rubbed the butter into the flour with my fingers until it resembled a coarse meal. You want flakes of butter to remain intact, so that they melt as little buttery pockets (like with the bobka).

Stick the bowl into the freezer and wash some dishes to distract yourself for a bit. This is kind of like pie crust- you want to keep the butter cold!

After about 10 minutes, take out the bowl, stir in the chopped candied ginger. Fashion a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in 1/2 c. goat milk (or cream, or buttermilk). Fold the dry ingredients into the wet ones with your hand, moving the bowl in a circular direction until the dough starts to come together. If it's not coming together, you can add a few Tbs more liquid, but don't get too crazy. Instead, have some confidence and believe that this is going to work (it will). Dump it out on work surface and fold it on itself a few times until it comes together well (see? I told you it would). Don't overwork the dough.

Roll it out or form it with your hands to be about 3/4" thick. Cut into desired shapes. Because I'm against overly large pastries, I used a 2.5" round. (Monster pastries have taken over. No one needs a 1/2-lb scone. I want a scone to accompany my morning bowl of oatmeal, not as an entire meal to itself.) Re-form any scraps by gently gathering them and then cut out more scones. Avoid re-kneading the scraps or you'll work too much flour into the dough and melt all the buttery pockets you lovingly created.

Brush the tops with a bit of milk/cream/butter/egg, as you please. Bake in the middle of the oven at 400F for about 15 min, or until they begin to brown.

Notes:
I rolled mine out thin, to about 1/4-1/2". While this made many more scones than the recipe promised (they said 8, I got at least 16), it also makes them look more like thick cookies, less like scones. So be sure to roll them thick.

What's next for goatmilk? Good question. I'm thinking of a lemon-rosemary scone, or a polenta poundcake recipe from Moosewood that I think it would be interesting to try in as well. And there will always be the ice cream...

Traditional, twisted.

I made marmalade a few weekends ago. The meyer lemons I’ve been buying at People’s are so floral and sweet that I’ve been eating them straight up. And the oranges… and the grapefruit... It’s citrus season! I couldn’t NOT try marmalade.

This being my first attempt, I got two books on preserves and jams. Perused them, then decided that I prefer to read the useful-but-detailed instructions and the science behind jam-making AFTER I make my mistakes. Plus I watched a 2-minute video online, which I naively thought was sufficient to give me an idea of what set jam would look like. So… I made a ruby red grapefruit-orange-lemon marmalade that’s tasty, albeit with a very stiff set. Then I made a meyer lemon marmalade that tastes... not unlike a bunch of lemons. Seems like the sweetness and the floral notes that I covet in the meyer lemon grew wings and flew out of the pan as quickly as they could.

Both are bitter, that's the MO of marmalade. Nary a sliver of pith sneaked into the gooey mixture, maybe the pith's bitterness oozed out of the pip bag, where I included it to develop the pectin? I need to test these marmalades on my favorite Irishman, who is a jam-and-marmalade fanatic.

Until then, I have 8 jars of marmalade waiting to be given purpose. So I made sugar cookies filled with lemon marmalade, hoping that the sweetness of the cookie would balance the tartness of the jam. It did okay...the richness of shortbread might stand up better to the preserves.

Half the dough went toward this experimental lemon sandwich, half went to the traditional frosted sugar cookie. And I might have been convinced that the lemon cookies were pretty good. Good, until the old standby stole the show back from this interloper.

Sugar cookie recipes are all pretty much the same. There are slight variations in butter or eggs, it seems one balances the other. Some leave out the cream of tartar. The older recipes I've found use less butter. This recipe is adapted from my favorite of mom's cookbooks: the 1970s orange hard-back Betty Crocker cookbook. There are two sugar cookie recipes in there: the Traditional (here, minus the cream of tartar) and the Deluxe (more butter, powdered sugar, cream of tartar).

A side-by-side bake-off revealed that I am, after all, a traditional sort of girl.

Traditional Sugar Cookies
3/4 c butter
1 c sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
2.5 c all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cream of tartar (optional)

Cream together butter and sugar until light. Add vanilla, then eggs- 1 at a time. Mix until incorporated. Combine dry ingredients in a separate bowl and add in 3 batches, mix just until combined. Chill dough at least 1 hr, overnight is better. Roll out on a well-floured surface, cut out cookies. Bake at 350.

If you take the preserves-filled route: spread marmalade/jam between 2 raw cookies. Use a fork to seal the edges so that jam doesn't leak out everywhere. Bake it as a sandwich.

If you take the frosting route: Cream 1 stick butter and 1 tsp vanilla together in a mixer, add powdered sugar to taste along with 1-3 tablespoons milk to achieve desired consistency. It usually takes about 1 of those cardboard boxes of confectioners' sugar for 1 stick of butter. Frost when cookies are cool.

Here's a better view of the marmalade cookies:




post script: Not all is lost on the marmalade front. A versatile condiment, the orange one goes with everything from roasted pork tenderloin, to mashed sweet potatoes, to butternut squash.

Eggplant! Hold the chocolate.

My favorite eggplant story: a good friend of mine took a bite of a sandwich stuffed with a medley of roasted vegetables (including a thick slice of eggplant) and proclaimed, “This pork chop is amazing!”

If you’re not a big vegetable eater, don’t let the poor lighting in the photo above scare away your appetite. It is easy to settle into a dinner centered on this ragu and find in it a satisfying winter meal; it is warmth and comfort without a hint of aggression.

Why do some people gravitate to eggplant if it's on a menu? I've heard it said that, in cultures where chocolate is not readily available, women have been known to crave eggplant. While I am inclined to believe this, a few Google searches offered no corroboration. However, “crave eggplant” turned up some 63,000 hits. Also, there are a surprising number of recipes out there for cubes of eggplant sautéed in oil, then dipped in chocolate. I was looking for “eggplant in lieu of chocolate”, not “eggplant in chocolate.” In the case that you are one tempted by the unusual, this combination didn’t get rave reviews by those who tried it. The most interesting thing I learned is that eggplant and its relative the tomato both contain trace amounts of nicotine.

No matter how you slice it, I love it and crave it- roasted or sautéed, salted or not, stuffed or pureed.

This recipe capitalizes on eggplant’s ability to soak up the flavors around it, and here the flavors meld together beautifully. Simple preparation leads to a dish complex in texture- the tomatoes fall apart a bit and lend slight acidity, the eggplant softens but holds its shape, the roasted peppers add a hint of something almost sweet. The whole mess thickens up as the eggplant absorbs the water. Try it on a heap of red quinoa with toasted pine nuts. Toss the leftovers with pasta and shaved parmesan. Decorate grilled polenta cakes with the ragu and feta cheese. Spread it over homemade pizza.

Next time…I already bought the ingredients for next time.

Recipe adapted from Gourmet, February 2008

1 medium eggplant, cut into 1/2" cubes
1 cup onion, chopped
2 tsp chopped garlic
1/2 tsp dried oregano
3 T olive oil
1/2 c. roasted red peppers, chopped
3/4 c. water

Toss the eggplant with 1 tsp salt in a colander and let it sit for 30 minutes to drain. If you've got a meyer lemon rattling around your house, squeeze half of it over the eggplant- it brightens it up and adds a sublte undertone of floral tang. After the eggplant has drained, grab handfuls of it and squeeze to get out the excess moisture. Transfer the eggplant to a plate and blot it with a paper towel.

Cook the eggplant, onion, garlic, and oregano in olive oil over medium heat with a dash of salt and a few grinds of pepper. Give it a few stirs and cook until the eggplant and onion are soft, then add the tomatoes, roasted red peppers, and water. Simmer everything together, covered, stirring occasionally until the eggplant is very tender and the tomatoes have fallen apart a bit (about 10 min). At this point, the ragu should have thickened up. If it gets too thick, no worries, just add a tablespoon or two of water.

When it's done, add some chopped flat leaf parsley for both flavor and color.

To serve with red quinoa, while the ragu cooks, bring 1 1/2 c. salted water to a boil. Add 1 c quinoa and simmer on low heat 20-30 min. The grains will sprout. Let it stand 5 min off the heat, then fluff it with a fork.

Yes, that's an egg on my pizza. And I'm happy to see you

What goes into a good egg sandwich? Toasted sandwich bread slathered with mayo, cradling a fried egg topped with molten cheese that oozes onto the plate upon slicing? A juicy tomato in the summer, or an avocado? Add a side of spinach salad- that's what I call lunch.

Sometimes, though, inspiration calls for a bastardization of said culinary delight.

Today, that inspiration came in the form of pizza. We made pizza one night this weekend and I had some leftover tomatoes, which, really, only improved with age as they were marinating with basil and garlic for the past few days. Add to that an assortment of cheeses. And some baby spinach... the pizza was practically crying out for an egg to be cracked on top.

This, while I'm sure is not novel, has struck me as an interesting idea for some time. In the beginning, I wanted to make it like an Italian take on the breakfast burrito with egg and small pieces of either bacon or proscuitto. Tomatoes instead of the salsa. I think potatoes would be too heavy, but if I had hash browns sitting in the fridge, I don't doubt that a few would make it on there.

But it was lunch, and I didn't have bacon. Or hash browns. And, truth be told, I wouldn't change anything about this. Breakfast, lunch, or dinner, it would be satisfying and delightful at any of those meals.

Crust:
360 g. flour (3 cups)
2 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp instant yeast
3 T olive oil
1 c water, room temp

The night before:
Mix together dry ingredients. Add water and oil. Knead. Place in a bowl oiled with remaining 1 T oil and set in a cool spot in a covered bowl (this winter trick works brilliantly in a coastal San Diego apartment with relatively poor insulation and heat that is left off all night for fear of burning the place down). I don't know what my average night time room temp actually is, I'd guess in the low 60s F?

If it's a cool day, leave it on the counter until you're ready to use it. If it's warm, throw it into the fridge. Keep an eye on it, if the dough has risen a lot, stick it in the fridge until about 1.5-2 hr before you want to use it, then take it out and bring to RT, turn your oven on to 475F while you think of it. If you don't have a pizza stone, put a baking sheet on the bottom rack while the oven heats up.

20 min before you're ready to make pizza, divide the dough into 2 or 3 rounds. Let the rounds rest to relax the gluten.
Shape pizza on parchment by either stretching it out with your hands or by using a rolling pin. If you're doing battle with the dough, try letting it rest some more then stretch it out again.


Topping:
For the tomatoes, mix together:
1 28-oz can diced tomatoes, drained.
Add lots of dried oregano. At least 2 tsp.
Salt, to taste. Start with 1/4 tsp, you might need 1/2 or more
Pepper, fresh ground
Red pepper flakes- a good shaking if you like it hot
Olive oil- more of this than you might think. Drizzle it in there. You will need at least 1 T., maybe more.
1 minced clove garlic (optional)
It's hard to screw this up, feel free to play.

Assemble the pizza:
For extra deliciousness, spread a clove or two of garlic over the bottom of the pizza. Or, for more subtle flavor, halve a clove and crush it a bit, then rub the dough with the exposed surface of garlic.

Spread the tomatoes lightly over the crust. It won't be a solid layer of tomatoes by any stretch. You don't have to use them all.
Fashion a well in the center of this tomato topping.
Crack an egg into the well.
Grate a combination of mozzarella and cheddar on top of the pizza. (Go easy. A little cheese goes a long way in its melted state.)
Put baby spinach on top of everything.
Drizzle with olive oil. (Do this after the spinach is added, it will prevent the leaves from getting as browned as mine did).
Sprinkle with salt.

I bake it on the parchment, since I don't have the skills to slide the pizza from a baking peel directly onto the pizza stone (yet). It should take about 8-12 min. If you time it right, you can get it so that the cheese is melted and starting to brown, but the yolk is still runny.

Next time? Carmelized onions.

Sweet Tart three times fast

Not one to make excuses, I'll simply apologize for unposted missives of late.

I busied myself with an apple tart several weeks ago for the following reasons. One, I love apples. Two, I have been meaning to work on my pie crust technique. Three, we were having fondue for dinner, and I wanted to contribute something that's not overly decadent after a potentially heavy meal.

Being a relative novice at pie dough, I wanted to approach this exercise well-equipped with at least an understanding of where I would go wrong. So I turned to the Pie Crust section of my new Christmas gift, "CookWise". A wealth of information! Shirley Corriher, the author, points out that flakiness and tenderness don't necessarily go hand-in-hand. A dough that produces a flaky crust needs pockets of butter that will melt, creating airy spaces within the dough (this same "butter pocket" technique is critical to bobka). A dough that produces a tender crust needs to have the fat broken up into many tiny pieces, such that it coats (tenderizes) the flour well. I decided that my goal (it's good to have goals) was a flaky crust. And I wanted one that's very thin, highlighting the fruit over the crust.

Next- flour, fat. I used a mix of whole wheat pastry and all-purpose flour with the thought that the pastry flour, which has less gluten, would lead to a more tender crust and would also provide a nuttiness to the finished dough, and I added sugar to tenderize the dough. I followed her lead in the fat department.

120 g w.w. pastry flour (1 c)
60 g unbleached all-purpose flour (1/2 c)
3/4 tsp sugar (this also helps to tenderize the dough)
1/4 tsp salt
8 T butter, cold
2 T crisco
approx 5 T ice-cold water

Mixed together dry ingredients, cut in the fats with a pastry cutter, still leaving large chunks of butter and then put the bowl in the freezer for 10 min.

Took it out, dumped everything on a cutting board, and rolled over it with a rolling pin a few times to flatten the butter, making large flakes, rather like dried potato flakes. Then I added the water 1 T at a time until the dough came together.

Shaped the dough into a 4" round disk and put into the fridge for about 30 min while I readied the apples.

The Apples:
I used 2 Braeburn and 3 Granny Smith apples (both large). Peeled and cored them, reserving peels and cores. I sliced them as thin as I could, squeezed just a bit of lemon over them and sprinkled with 2 tsp sugar. Tossed the apple mixture with my hands, set it aside.

I rolled out the tart crust as thin as I could get it, trying not to over-flour or over-work the dough. I didn't want to destroy all those lovely butter pockets, and I didn't want to build up gluten, which will toughen the crust. It was nice and thin, so I folded it in half, then half again and transferred it to the greased tart pan.

Arranged the apples in there in concentric circles, on their sides, slightly overlapping, and piled a few extra up by the border of the tart pan. I folded about an inch of crust on top of the tart, and crimped it every inch or so. Brushed the whole thing with melted butter and sprinkled with 2T sugar, then put it on the baking stone in a preheated 400F oven.

Baked for about 50 min, rotating every 15 min to ensure even browning.

Apple Glaze:
Meanwhile, with those leftover bits of apple: put them into a pot with a bit of water, maybe 1/2 cup, and 1/2 cup sugar, plus 1" of a split vanilla bean (scrape the seeds out into the pot), 2" of cinnamon stick, and a sprinkling of ground cinnamon. Boil that up while the tart bakes- about 30 min, it will reduce to a syrupy glaze. Strain it through a mesh colander or cheesecloth, pressing down on the apples to get out all the juices.

The best bit:
What do do with the leftover scraps of pie dough and apples? I gathered the scraps and pieced them together in the cups of my mini-muffin tin, which I greased with the extra melted butter. I chopped up the extra apples and sprinkled them into my little dough cups. Sprinkled sugar all over that and popped it into the oven, under my tart.

The crust is good and flaky, the tartlettes stand up well on their own, and they're so cute! I wish I had a whole batch of these. I can just imagine a few on a plate with a little dollop of whipped cream. Oh, or better- a cube of sheep's milk cheese and a cube of cheddar. Well, the family gets the big tart, and the tartlettes are the baker's treat. Shhh...

Toasted oatmeal

"Things that are supposed to be good for you should keep the secret of their good intentions strictly to themselves!" - Bert Greene's grandmother

Oh, oatmeal, you are both nutritious and delicious.

I tucked "Geene on Greens and Grains", by Bert Greene, into my bookshelf when I started collecting cookbooks in earnest several years ago. I'm not sure that it's still in print. The copyright is 1984-1988. The recipe collection is interesting and diverse, from bran muffins to onion marmalade to carrot rice pudding, the man clearly had a love of food. Even if you never try a recipe, the book is worth its salt for the food writing. The reader is treated to a conversational and comprehensive overview of over 30 veggies/roots/fruits and some 20 grains, along with humorous personal stories and recipes of his own or from friends, each featuring the food in question. He writes in a way that makes you think, "yeah, I should try that."

Almost as an aside in the Oats section, he tells us that "some kitchen savants believe that all oats taste best if they are lightly toasted prior to serious cookery, whether that be for a morning meal or for a midnight snack of oatmeal pancakes."

Right you are, Kitchen Savants. Toasting the oatmeal brings out a delicious nutty quality in the grain. It only takes a few extra minutes, but the taste is a world of difference. I go through phases of making this, during one of which my upstairs neighbor stopped me to ask, "what is it that you make every morning?" Then, "It smells so good!"

Aside from toasting, the other secret to comment-worthy oatmeal is ingredient quality. After extensive testing, it's clear that oatmeal tastes best when prepared with organic oats. These are easily found at natural foods markets (Peoples or Whole Foods). The organic rolled oats are a bit thicker than the Quaker variety, and it makes for a better (chewier) bowl of oatmeal. For that very reason, at least pass on the quick oats if you can't find bulk organic oats.


Oatmeal for one:

1/3 heaping cup rolled oats
1 cup water, cool
Pinch salt (1/8 tsp kosher salt was my measured pinch, and I like it salty)
Fruit of your choice. I like raisins, cranberries, apricots (chopped), freeze-dried strawberries when I can find them. Fresh fruit, of course, also delicious- just add it after the oatmeal is done cooking.

1. Toast Oats
Put the oats in a saucepan over high heat. Let them sit there for about 20-30 seconds while the pan gets hot, then shake them. Let it sit again, this time only 10 seconds and shake again. Do this for 2 minutes. They will become fragrant after 30 seconds (strangely reminiscent of popcorn), you need to shake them more frequently once you can smell them toasting to prevent burning. Burned oats are bad oats, but a few browned or blackish flecks are normal. You'll know if you really burn them.

2. Add Water
Have the water on standby. After a few minutes of toasting, pour in the water and bring to a boil. Once boiling, add salt and dried fruit, then reduce the heat to low, stirring often. Cook for about 5 minutes.

3. Let Stand
If you have the patience, turn off the heat and let it sit for about 2 minutes for the oatmeal to thicken up a bit. If you are a perfectionist, cover the pot while it stands. If you're lazy, it will be just as good uncovered.

Some people are against salt in their oatmeal. Most like sugar. Some like butter and cream. Some, nuts. As always, do as you please, but I assure you that if you want to swim in the pool of oatmeal, this is a good platform to jump in from.
The recipe can easily be doubled.

Cranberry almond crostata

About a year and a half ago I had the good fortune to take a trip to France and Italy. My last few days were spent in Italy with my friend, Valentina, in the company of her generous and welcoming family and friends. Our last afternoon in town, Valentina's mother had everyone over for an amazing feast. She spent the whole day preparing a multi-course meal like I had never experienced before- I still remember waking up to the smell of braising meat. Amidst the many pleasures of the day was a crostata with raspberry jam. Both Valentina and her mother have mastered this Italian pastry. A crust like a cookie and a jam filling, it dances in the mouth with elegance. As good for breakfast as it is for dessert.

Hidden in the back of the November issue of Gourmet magazine this year was this recipe for a cranberry almond crostata. It would be easy to overlook, socked away in the back as it was. But on seeing it, my mind wandered back to that summer by the Italian beach, when I was listening to stories told my entertaining old men who speak as much English as I speak Italian. The combined forces of their inflections and gesticulations and my wine consumption held us engaged in conversation. I knew I'd bake this dessert.

My go-to excuses for baking were tapped out, what with Thanksgiving over, no parties on the horizon, and the lab recently fed with pumpkin bread (I like to leave the window of opportunity open for them to believe that some of my free time might be spent reading scientific journal articles). But I love everything this recipe has to offer. Cranberries. Almonds. Butter. Jam. What's not to love? Staring into my fridge one night, bathed in cool light as a heap of veggies stared back at me, the "my cranberries are going to go bad soon!" excuse leaped at me. Relieved, I set about toasting almonds.

The result? A pleasant tart-and-sweet filling ensconced in a buttery, slightly nutty crust. I used half apricot jam, half orange marmalade, and would use all apricot next time, and I'd be sure to roll the crust as thin as possible such that it doesn't overwhelm the delicious insides. The crostata shelf life is relatively short, so be ready with a reason if you go to the trouble of making it. But with a brief oven-revival before serving, and a scoop of vanilla ice cream you might stretch its opportunity to please a few extra days. It's too fancy to be every-day comfortable, and not quite as cookie-like as Valentina's family crostata. It has its place and time, and was a good experiment, but apparently my work is not done yet.

Adapted from November 2007 Gourmet

1. The Almond-and Butter Crust

Toast and cool 1/4 lb almonds, then pulse them in a blender with 1/4 c. flour.

Beat together 3/4 c. softened butter and 1/2 c. brown sugar with a mixer for about 3 mins. Beat an egg in a little cup and scoop out 1 T of the egg, the dump the remainder of the egg into the butter-sugar mix. Return that reserved 1T egg to the cup and refrigerate it, covered, for later.

Next, add 1/2 tsp vanilla extract and 1/8 tsp almond extract, and mix it well. Finally, add the zest of 1 lemon, 1/2 tsp salt, the almond mixture, and 1 3/4c. flour. Mix it on low speed or by hand with a big spoon until it just forms a dough. Phew... divide the dough evenly in two, shape into disks with a diameter the length of your hand, wrap in plastic and refrigerate until firm (at least 30 min, according the the experts).

2. The Sweet-and-Tart Filling

Start with 10 oz of fresh, washed, and picked-over cranberries and bring them to a boil with 1/4 c. orange juice, 1/2 c. apricot jam (or marmalade), 1/2 c. brown sugar and 1/4 tsp salt in a medium pot, uncovered. Simmer and stir until the cranberries plump up and some of them burst with a complete loss of integrity and the whole mixture starts to thicken up. This should take 5-7 min. Once you're satisfied, cool the filling to lukewarm by putting it in the fridge for a bit.

3. The Assembly

Preheat the oven to 375F with a foil-liked baking sheet on the middle rack.

Butter your springform pan.

Roll out one round of dough and try to cut it into even strips, 1/3 - 1/2 inch wide. Freeze the strips to firm them up for easier handling while you work on the bottom crust.

Roll out the other half between 2 sheets of parchment or between sheets of saran wrap. Transfer it to the pan and arrange it such that it covers the bottom evenly and comes up about 1/2" in the pan.

Pour your filling into the dough shell and arrange about 5 strips, spaced 1" apart, across the top, then arrange more strips diagonally across the first set. Brush the lattice top with the egg you saved from the crust preparation and sprinkle with 1T granulated sugar.

Bake on the hot baking sheet "until pastry is golden and filling is bubbling, 50-60 min." Keep an eye on it and cover loosely with foil if the crostata is browning too quickly.

Cool completely in pan on a rack, 1.5-2 hr, to let the juices thicken, then serve.
I mentioned the ice cream, right?