Raised on the Farm

Food Processor Carrot Cake

It’s September. The obvious topic for the month in our family is…

Carrot Cake!

“Seriously?” you might ask. Yes, for real.

Mom did make desserts in the farm days. She was partial to pies, cream puffs and a French delicacy known as floating island-mounds of poached meringue floating in a sea of crème anglaise. The latter two sweets made great use of eggs, one might note. When she made a cake, it was usually angel food, a partnership between her and Duncan Hines. Followed inevitably by my grandmother bemoaning the hours of her cake mixless youth, spent beating all of those egg whites by hand. And while I loved baking cakes, it was one of those situations where the process was more fun than the product…

There was, however, always a cake on the table for family birthday parties. I remember requesting marble cake as a kid; later Mom made me big luscious coconut cakes with lemon filling, fluffy frosting and toasted coconut sprinkles. You know someone loves you when she tackles a whole fresh coconut for your birthday! Other popular choices included chocolate or Boston cream pie, which is actually cake. These were feathery, tender sponges, with butter or fluffy frosting.

When my husband joined the family, we discovered that his birthday cake of choice was…uh… carrot cake. No one in our kitchen had ever made a carrot cake-neither feathery nor fluffy! And while “carrots” had endowed it with a “health glow,” the typical carrot cake was actually fat and sugar laden as well. It fell to me to make the carrot cake each September-I was the one who married him, after all. My first try was dense and heavy, too many raisins and nuts, too much oil and sugar; a bit like fruitcake, without the saving grace of bourbon. (Actually, in retrospect, I should have tried that.) And the frosting? Sugar with a side of cream cheese. Need I say, it was not a popular cake with the fam, and each September I tried to fine-tune it. Using some whole grain flour; cutting the oil and sugar; fewer raisins and nuts; adding pineapple! While the family thought the pineapple was an improvement, the birthday boy nixed it. Pineapple did NOT belong in his carrot cake. In other words, there’s been a load of carrot pressed through the grater in search of a carrot cake recipe we could all happily eat.

I had settled recently on a recipe of my own devising, made with apple butter, when I opened my weekly Food 52 email missive and saw a link to “Donna Hay’s Food Processor Carrot Cake.” Now, while I had never heard of Donna Hay, I impulsively decided that if she was making carrot cake in the food processor, she could seriously become my new BFF. No grating! No chopping! Donna Hay, as it happens, appears to be an Australian one woman Food Network, having produced too many cookbooks, television shows and magazines to count. And she evidently knows her way around carrot cake. If Food 52 finds her trustworthy, I figured I could, as well.

Not to say that I didn’t tweak the recipe, of course. The final cut here is a cross between Ms. Hay’s (https://www.donnahay.com.au/recipes/food-processor-carrot-cake) and my own recipe. Reduced sugar, whole sprouted and ancient grain flours, raisins (they just have to be there.) Chopped in the food processor, though, the smaller pieces distribute more evenly through the cake. I also added some almond milk, because the batter was simply too thick. Chalk it up to hard won carrot cake intuition developed from decades of struggling with this cake, I simply knew it needed more liquid. Ms. Hay’s frosting was so lightly sweetened that it actually tasted like cream cheese rather than a bag of confectioners sugar; I added a touch of butter and citrus peel for additional flavor. The resulting cake was moist and light- did you catch that? Light! And tasted precisely like carrot cake was probably always supposed to.

Living in Arizona, we are down to three local family members celebrating birthdays and don’t need a huge full size cake. So the recipe as written here is based on half the original. Donna (see, we’re on a first name basis now!) bakes a full size cake in a deep springform pan, while I make a single 9-inch layer. I typically cut the layer into halves and stack them with frosting between and on top, resulting in half of a typical double layer American style cake. A full sized two-layer cake can be make by doubling the recipe.

September no longer intimidates me with thoughts of carrot cake, and it’s a real shame my mom will never get the chance to try this new and improved offering. If only it hadn’t taken me 35 years to figure the darn thing out…

Print Recipe

Food Processor Carrot Cake

Easy to prepare moist and spicy carrot cake with low sugar cream cheese frosting.

Prep Time15

Cook Time30

Total Time45

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Servings: 8 people

Author: Adapted from Donna Hay

Ingredients

2 large carrots cut into 1-inch pieces
1/4 cup walnut pieces
1/2 cup brown sugar packed
1/4 cup raisins
1 1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour can substitute half white whole wheat, half all purpose
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup vegetable oil I use avacado
2 tbsp Greek yogurt
1 large egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup almond milk milk of choice can be substituted

Cream Cheese Frosting

4 oz cream cheese I use Neufchatel
2 tbsp fresh ricotta or cottage cheese I use lactose free cottage cheese
1 tbsp butter softened
3 tbsp confectioner's sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp grated lemon zest

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 325° F. Coat a 9-inch round cake pan with non-stick spray and line the bottom with a parchment paper round.
Combine the carrots and nut pieces in the food processor and process until finely chopped.
Add the remainder of the ingredients and process, scraping the work bowl as needed, until a well combined batter forms. This should take only seconds.
Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan and bake for 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. The top of the cake should spring back when pressed.
Cool the cake on a rack, still in the pan. Turn out when cool and peel away the parchment paper.
To make the frosting, combine the cream cheese, fresh cheese, sugar, zest and vanilla in the food processor. Process until well mixed and creamy.
The cake can be frosted and eaten as a single layer, or cut into two half circles and stacked with frosting to make a two-layer cake. Refrigerate leftovers.

Smoky Grilled Vegetables with Haloumi and Olive Chermoula

Steaks, chops, burgers, sausage, BACON! Yes, considerable quantities of meat were served on the farm. In the early years, the folks raised both cattle and hogs. Daddy was comfortable enough with the whole mess to butcher a hog himself, memorable because I was permitted to poke around in what would later become the cracklins…which my mother didn’t let us eat anyway; perhaps because I had poked around in them, more likely because they were fried and contained copious amounts of fat. Or because they were actually intestines presented under the much happier moniker of “pork rinds,“ perhaps? And Daddy certainly knew his way around butchering chickens, tying several by their feet onto the clothesline, before giving them the Marie Antoinette treatment. Cattle were sent out to a processing house, returning home in innocent, neatly labeled butcher paper packages to reside in the freezer until eaten.

Given this background, it’s a bit of a shock that I am… well… somewhat squeamish about preparing meat. I suspect there would be many more vegetarians if meat had to be raised and killed in order to eat it. As a home economics teacher, it always cracked me up that students did not know that meat is the muscle of an actual animal; several vegetarians were born each year during the “meat unit.”

I ate a largely vegetarian diet for several years; not a particularly good one, relying substantially on pasta, cheese and eggs. Might have been a few veggies mixed in there somewhere… And no one was fooled-my husband and kids chowed down on meat in any situation in which it was offered. Like, for instance, my husband’s clandestine visits to the Taco Bell on the route home from work. We returned to a meatier diet on the advice of the dietician after my daughter’s diagnosis of Type 1 diabetes.

Today? Plant based diets are everywhere. While one group questions the carbs, others question the meat. The issues of health, agriculture and sustainability have juxtaposed at this unique moment, causing people to more closely examine what they are eating. Meatless meals have grown beyond fad status-they are now downright chic. Several restaurants in our city offer only vegetarian or vegan menus. Heaven help us, even fast food purveyors are filling buns with realistic meatless patties doused in special sauce. Personally, we have come to a place where we eat two or three meatless dinners a week, this time featuring more whole grains, legumes, nuts and seeds, along with the requisite vegetables. Often, small amounts of meat or cheese are used, primarily as a condiment rather than as entrée.

One meatless dish we prepare that was greeted with enthusiasm by the whole family was simple grilled vegetables with sliced cheese and good bread. A variety of vegetables to suit everyone’s taste could be included, and the veggies developed a delicious smoky char from the grill. This recipe is an adult take, vegetables marinated with abundant herbs and topped with an olive chermoula. The browned Haloumi cheese cubes become chewy croutons, and the crispy chickpeas offer up the perfect crunch. This is a versatile dish, which can be served on its own, over a whole grain of choice, or with good bread on the side. It’s a great late summer meal.

While we still eat meat, the husband does much of the knife wielding. I might add though, that I continue to chop a mean vegetable.

Print Recipe

Smoky Grilled Vegetables with Haloumi and Olive Chermoula

Lightly charred vegetables with an olive and herb dressing, Haloumi croutons and crisp chickpeas

Prep Time30

Cook Time15

Course: Main Course

Cuisine: Mediterranean

Servings: 4 ser

Author: Mary Kay Allen

Ingredients

1/2 cup garlic infused olive oil
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
2 tsp freshly grated lemon zest
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp thyme leaves
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground pepper
1 tsp chili flake
3 lbs. vegetables, sliced for grilling; eggplant, red bell pepper, zucchini, red onion, portobello mushroom
3 tbsp chopped green olives
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
2 tbsp chopped parsley
6 oz Haloumi cheese
1/4 cup crispy chickpeas

Instructions

Combine olive oil through chili flake in a
medium bowl and whisk until well blended.
Remove and reserve 1/3 cup of the mixture to make the
chermoula, and brush/pour the remainder over the sliced vegetables. Marinate up
to several hours.
Combine the reserved marinade with the olives, cilantro, parsley
and 2 tablespoons water to make the chermoula.
Prepare a gas or charcoal grill for the vegetables. Start
them over the hottest area to char, then move around to the edges of the grill
to soften and become tender.
Slice the Haloumi into ½-inch and brown on all sides in a medium
hot skillet.
Arrange the vegetables attractively on a platter and spoon
the chermoula over them. Place the
browned cubes of Haloumi randomly over the vegetables. Sprinkle with the crunchy chickpeas and serve.

Balsamic fig and Fennel Salad

Okay. You knew it was coming.

It’s July, and we all realize what fruit just came into season.

Yep, it’s the annual fig recipe.

I genuinely just can’t help myself. But this time, they are featured not frozen, not baked, but in their most sublime form, which happens to be fresh. This time around my favorite summer fruit is being tossed into a juicy salad.

I suspect that salads were served on the farm…

And I would love to reminisce about them. Problem is I simply refused to eat salad as a kid. I didn’t dislike the vegetables; well, at least not all of them…Okay, I confess, I didn’t like classic salad vegetables all that much. At the time salad was composed largely of iceberg lettuce, that much maligned pale green specimen, which really didn’t have much flavor. I remember, too, that both my parents were quite fond of the leaf lettuce mixes grown in my father’s spring garden. Probably right next to the rows of cucumbers, tomatoes, radishes and carrots…

I might have been coerced into eating this amalgam, though, had it not been for the substance people insistently poured on and tossed to coat the vegetables. That would be the salad dressing. What did Mom use to dress the salad? No recollection. I simply abhorred whatever salad dressing was applied and given the choice, gave a pass on the whole dish. Salad was, however, a set piece when dining out. One unforgettable dinner at a fine dining establishment featured the waiter serving individual salads by stating the dressing ordered by each diner. Mine was set before me with a sardonic eye roll and the disdainful phrase, “salad…dry.”

Happily, the nature of salad has evolved and my dubious taste buds have matured (well, somewhat) since childhood. Salads now have varying taste profiles; choices of both salad greens and dressings have widened considerably. I’m still picky about salad dressing, but I will now eat several varieties, of which my favorite is undoubtedly balsamic vinaigrette. Which is good, because balsamic vinegar is a fabulous flavor pairing with fresh figs. The fig’s sweetness combines delectably with the bitterness of arugula, and is tempered by the funk of goat cheese and nutty richness of pistachios. Having served it at a recent dinner party, I can recommend it as a salad that both salad enthusiasts and questioners embraced.

Remember, the season for fresh figs is fleeting.* So when you see them, take a container home and get ready to toss the salad.

Print Recipe

Balsamic Fig and Fennel Salad

Prep Time30

Cook Time25

Total Time55

Course: Salad side dish

Servings: 4 servings

Author: Mary Kay Allen

Ingredients

Roasted Fennel:
1 large or 2 small bulbs of fennel
1- tablespoon olive oil
½ teaspoon salt
Pinch of freshly ground pepper
½ teaspoon fresh diced or crumbled dry rosemary
½ teaspoon fennel seed
Dressing:
2 teaspoons good quality balsamic vinegar
3 teaspoons red wine vinegar
1- teaspoon agave nectar or honey
¼ teaspoon salt
Pinch of freshly ground pepper
¼ teaspoon fresh diced or crumbled dry rosemary
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
Salad:
3 cups baby arugula washed and spun dry
3 cups red lettuce torn into bite size pieces, washed and spun dry
6 figs washed and quartered
2 ounces crumbled goat cheese
¼ cup lightly toasted pistachio nuts

Instructions

Heat the oven to 375° F. Slice the fennel into thin wedges, about ¼-inch, through the stem end and leaving intact; this will hold the fennel wedges together. Toss the fennel wedges with the olive oil and combined spices to coat. Spread the fennel slices on an oiled or parchment lined baking sheet and roast until tender, about 20-25 minutes. Set aside to cool.
For the dressing, whisk together all ingredients except the olive oil. When well combined, slowly drizzle the oil into the mixture and whisk until emulsified.
Combine the lettuces in a large bowl and toss with half the dressing. Spread the lettuce out in a shallow serving dish. Arrange the roasted fennel wedges and quartered figs attractively on top of the lettuce. Scatter the goat cheese crumbles and pistachio nuts evenly over the salad. Drizzle with remaining dressing or serve on the side for guests to add as desired.

*If you HAD to substitute an alternative fruit for the figs, plums or apricots would probably be good bets.

Jerk Halibut with Fruit Salsa

We grew, raised and harvested beautiful produce, meats and poultry on the farm. While none of us could truly be considered a forager, my dad did enjoy hunting game birds. He relished the time spent with his brothers and his various hunting dogs, and our plates were occasionally graced with quail and pheasant. No one in any fairness though, could be called a fisherman. I vaguely remember one family reunion held at Kentucky Lake. After a long day spent on the lake bristling with poles, bait, and boasting, fish landed at the kitchen door, suspiciously cleaned and wrapped professionally in butcher paper…

The fact that we lacked fresh fish did not deter my mother in any way. Now, this was the sixties. I cannot imagine that anyone was prattling on about Omega-3s and the need to eat fish on a regular basis, yet somehow this belief was firmly fixed in my mother’s menu planning philosophy. (Along with liver on a weekly basis, which is another story.) Most of the time I consider my mom to be a fairly inspired cook for the era. Her preparation of fish was not one of those shining moments.

Neither was the frozen fish available at the grocer’s anything like today’s frozen fish. No flash freezing on the boat or vacuum sealing for this catch. It was harvested, delivered ashore at some point, and eventually transported to a processing facility. No matter the variety, it all came out in identical cardboard packages, long and rectangular, with a stylized image of supposedly whatever fish was inside. When thawed, it was limp and soggy, any semblance of firm cellular structure long gone. In retrospect, how inspired could a dinner be which starred this sad protein?

The weekly preparation was always the same. The fillets were baked in the oven with a bit of butter, lemon, dried herb and sliced olives. That was it. It’s pretty easy to understand how a Midwestern farm girl could decide that seafood wasn’t really food worth eating. Which was the attitude I carried with me when I left the farm for the big wide world. Save the ocean-don’t eat fish!

Fortunately the seafood menu offered by the big wide world considerably expanded my view of how delicious fish could be. From the eastern seaboard to the coasts of Oregon, California, Mexico and Italy; from the isles of Fiji, New Zealand and Thailand, I’ve enjoyed freshly prepared seafood in a multitude of preparations. Now when eating out, a firm menu choice must wait until I hear a description of the daily seafood special. More often than not, that will be what I order.

While I live in a desert, large bodies of fish bearing saltwater are closer to me now than when growing up on the farm. I am lucky indeed to have several high quality fishmongers within fifteen minutes of my home, with firm, plump selections of fresh seafood. Fish and/or seafood are now on the menu at least once, sometimes twice, in the week. Grilled, broiled, pan sautéed, and steamed, but uh… not baked. While baking fish could perhaps be successful, my memory of baked fish leaves something to be desired…

Which brings me to the fish we are serving this evening. White fish like halibut are like blank canvasses, just waiting for someone to spice them up. Which is precisely what jerk seasoning does. And of course once you’ve gone the jerked route, hot and sweet salsa on top is an absolute necessity. The black rice underneath is the perfect complement, nutty and chewy.

While grilling is a year round option in the southwest, this recipe is traditional hot weather fare in most locales. The fruits used in the salsa are classic summer varieties too, so now is the time to get grilling. You can catch it or buy it, just don’t bake it!

Print Recipe

Jerk Halibut with Fruit Salsa

Prep Time30

Cook Time15

Total Time45

Course: Entree

Servings: 4 servings

Author: Mary Kay Allen

Ingredients

1 ½ lb. halibut filets/steaks or other meaty fish suitable for the grill
2 teaspoons jerk seasoning purchased or homemade
Fruit Salsa
1 cup diced fresh pineapple
1 ripe mango peeled and diced
2 Kiwi fruit peeled and diced
4 large strawberries hulled and diced
½ cup diced red onion
3 tablespoons chopped cilantro
½ jalapeno pepper seeded and diced (leave the seeds in if more heat is desired)
Salt and pepper to taste
1 cup forbidden black rice or other rice of choice

Instructions

Prepare a gas or charcoal grill to a medium hot flame. Sprinkle the fish with the jerk seasoning and rub in. Store in refrigerator until ready to grill.
Prepare the rice according to package directions.
Combine all ingredients for the fruit salsa in a medium bowl, stirring well. Set aside until ready to serve.
When the rice is done, set aside to steam in the pan while the fish is cooked. Place the pieces of fish on the grill grate directly over the fire. Grill to doneness preferred. A general rule for cooking fish is to allow ten minutes per inch of thickness. If the surface appears grilled before the center is done to your liking, move the fish to the edges of the grill to slow the cooking.
To serve, plate individual servings of rice. Place a fish filet atop each serving of rice and ladle on generous spoonsful of fruit salsa.

Rich Yeast Coffee Cake with Streusel

Will Pedal for Coffeecake

I spent much of my time as a farm kid cruising the country roads on my bike.

Learning to bike ride on the farm differed a bit from what I observed my peers to be doing in town. They pedaled jauntily down the thoughtfully provided sidewalks, training wheels attached to their two-wheelers. In place of training wheels, I had a dad who was of the “toss ‘em in and let ‘em sink or swim” philosophy. I’m not sure of my mom’s view on the training wheels, but what I do know is that my dad seized the moment when my mom and grandmother went off for one of their ladies’ getaway weekends.

Across our front yard was a ridge with a gradual downhill slope, ending in a row of trees at the bottom. At the top of the ridge, Daddy would prop up my brother’s hand-me-down bike, (yes, a boy’s bike) plop me on the seat, and give me a push. Adrenalin flowed as the bike careened down the slope, with me inevitably steering it into one of the trees. Plop, push, careen, crash. Repeat. Repeat until I could begin to demonstrate some wobbly balance on the bike. This activity was the focus of the weekend, as biking competence was required by the time the ladies returned from their weekend away. When Mom and Grandma got home, Daddy proudly sent me out to the road to demonstrate my hard won biking prowess. Where I shakily pedaled for a moment or two, lost my balance and fell in the ditch. Which was awash with poison ivy. Mom had a cow, rushing me into a hastily run bath to wash off the toxin. Which must have worked like a charm, as I didn’t develop any poison ivy blisters at all. Mom, on the other hand, was covered with blisters within a few hours. Daddy got the last laugh, as it appeared that I had inherited his ability to survive poison ivy exposure with none of the dire consequences.

My biking improved, which was a good thing as I enjoyed my mother’s coffeecake immensely. Every now and again in the summer, Mom would pack up a breakfast picnic of her streusel coffee cake, freshly cooked bacon, orange juice and hot coffee to be eaten at a little brook, perhaps a half mile from our farmhouse. And of course, we got there on our bikes. It was a picturesque spot in which we kids could inhale our breakfast before clambering down to the creek side to explore, leaving Mom some luxurious time for eating and contemplation.

Baking this coffeecake demanded an investment of time and effort. The recipe was based on the Rich Yeast Batter adapted from the Betty Crocker Picture Cookbook, circa 1950 . While Mom probably doctored it up with whole-wheat flour and wheat germ, what impressed me was that she had to beat the finished batter for 100 strokes prior to rising! The streusel with which she topped it provided the sweetness, as the cake itself was richly flavored with yeast and spices, but not much sugar. As so often happens with childhood favorites, this recipe set the bar for my taste in coffee cake.

While I have made a sourdough coffeecake for years, I discovered that I could bake a version of Mom’s with better flavor and nutritional balance, while cutting back on the time investment. She made the whole shebang by rising early in the morning, but my lazy self played with making the batter the night before and baking it in the morning, which worked just fine. No need to lose sleep over rising yeast batter! In characteristic fashion, I changed a few other things, too… like substituting oil for shortening, changing up the flour mix, increasing the spices, adding vanilla, substituting dates for sugar in the streusel…you know, just a few alterations. Amazingly after all that, it tastes just like I remember on the creek side.

Should you make it, you have permission to just eat it at home, no bike ride required.

Print Recipe

Rich Yeast Coffee Cake with Streusel

Prep Time30

Cook Time25

Total Time55

Course: Breakfast

Servings: 12 servings

Author: Mary Kay Allen

Ingredients

1-½ cups flour (I used a mix of sprouted wheat spelt, and whole-wheat pastry
flour; a blend of white whole wheat and all-purpose would work well)
¼ cup ground flaxseeds/flax meal
¼ cup almond flour
½ teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon salt
2-¼ teaspoons instant yeast
2/3- cup almond or other alt milk
¼ cup brown sugar
1 large egg
¼ cup vegetable oil I use avocado
½ teaspoon vanilla
Streusel
¼ cup almond flour
¼ cup flour
1- tablespoon brown sugar
1- teaspoon cinnamon
3 tablespoons butter cut into bits
3 large Medjool dates pitted and chopped
1 to 2 teaspoons water

Instructions

The night before, combine the flour, flax meal, almond flour, cinnamon, salt and yeast. Stir to mix well. In a second bowl beat together the almond milk, brown sugar, egg, oil and vanilla, until completely blended. Beat 100 strokes, until the batter smooths out. Cover and let rise for 1 hour. Prepare a 9-inch square baking pan by greasing or spraying thoroughly with cooking spray. At the end of the hour, stir the batter lightly and spread evenly in the baking pan. Cover with saran and refrigerate overnight.
In the morning, remove the batter from the refrigerator and allow sitting at room temperature for about 45 minutes. In the meantime, preheat the oven to 350° F. and prepare the streusel. In the work bowl of a food processor, combine the almond flour, flour, brown sugar and cinnamon. Add the butter bits and chopped dates. Pulse to combine, until flaky. Add the water one teaspoon at a time, pulsing after each addition, until the streusel is moist and crumbly.
Sprinkle the streusel evenly over the batter and bake for 25-30 minutes. Remove and cool slightly before slicing.

Farm Girl Goes Urban

For a young farm girl, traveling 25 miles down the road to the city of Dayton was a significant venture. A small distance by today’s standards, but surface streets of that day weren’t designed for efficiency. In actuality though, the principal expanse of the day’s journey was not about physical distance; it was about cultural distance. Life on the farm was insular; isolated in many ways. There was a vast multitude of people as well as happenings in the world, both of which were totally outside my experience. Which, I suppose, is one of the reasons my folks decided to raise us on the farm. Must maintain the innocence…

Every now and again though, Mom and Grandma would dress me to the nines in dress, hat, gloves and patent leather shoes for a trip “downtown.” I have no memory of why we were going, probably shopping. I was too busy gawking at all the lofty ornate buildings, along with every person whose appearance was different from my own. Of which there were many. The experience was honestly scary, due to my ignorance of where the heck all these different people came from. It never occurred to me to ask any questions concerning these thoughts, perhaps because I subconsciously understood that the times didn’t encourage such inquiries…

I could forget my concerns though when we arrived at the decidedly upscale dining room of Rike’s Department Store for lunch. At which I perpetually ordered the “little chicken.” This item from the kid’s menu was served in a ceramic ramekin, shaped like a chicken. The head and wings formed the lid. I never tired of lifting it off to reveal a little mound of steaming hot mashed potatoes covered with creamed chicken. If only such simple delights made my day today!

There was, though, a different sort of downtown trip that we made with just Mom, who I tend to forget had experienced a more sophisticated life before moving to the farm. Forget dress up and upscale. We would duck into an exotic dark little stairwell, and descend into a kitschy underground Chinese restaurant, complete with gaudy paper lanterns and stylized Chinese wall characters. In retrospect, there was absolutely nothing authentic about this spot, but it was my proper introduction to some of those different people, and to food that wasn’t meat, potatoes, and vegetable, each confined to their assigned space on the plate. I was eating egg foo young, basically scrambled eggs with some canned bean sprouts and soy sauce and feeling pretty darn worldly for a little farm kid.

In our farm kitchen, stir-frying came into vogue sometime in the late sixties-early seventies. Mom did not invest in a wok; she just used her electric skillet. Her claim to fame in Chinese cuisine was a dish she called chicken velvet, which she often prepared for guests. No idea where she got the recipe. In fact, I’m amazed to learn that “velveting chicken” is actually an authentic Chinese cooking method used to lock in the juices and keep the chicken moist and tender. Who knew? The strips of cooked chicken were combined with canned bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, candied ginger and green beans. While the only authentic thing about it was the cooking method, it made a delicious meat and vegetable entrée fit for company.

My version today offers a nod to Mom’s, though I eschew the “Chinese” vegetables for fresh seasonal vegetables. If a can of water chestnuts just happens to be residing in my pantry, I toss them in for old times’ sake, but they are completely optional. Her recipe didn’t include a sauce either, which I’ve added. One should feel free to tinker with the proportions of meat to vegetables, too. Given my current practice of less meat, more vegetables, I’ll be reducing the amount of chicken and increasing the amount of vegetables the next time I prepare it.

I can say honestly now that I’m a world traveler who has met numerous peoples and experienced many cultures and cuisines of the world. I can drive ten minutes from my home today and order what is probably a much more authentic Chinese meal. But I wish that little Chinese restaurant still lived underground in Dayton, and that Mom and I could duck in one more time. That is not to be, so I guess I’ll head to the kitchen to “velvet” some chicken

Print Recipe

Chicken Velvet

Prep Time30

Cook Time15

Total Time45

Course: Entree

Cuisine: Asian

Servings: 4 servings

Author: Mary Kay Allen

Ingredients

1 lb. chicken breast sliced on the horizontal into 1/8-inch thick pieces
2- tablespoon cornstarch divided
1- tablespoon dry sherry
2- tablespoons water
½ teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1- tablespoon sherry
1- teaspoon sambal oelek
1- teaspoon sesame oil
3 green onions split lengthwise and sliced into 1-inch long strips
1- tablespoon minced fresh ginger
3 to 4 cups stir-fry vegetables cut into 1-inch pieces (good choices include red bell peppers, asparagus, mushrooms, fresh green beans, broccoli, carrots, celery, etc.)
1 can sliced water chestnuts drained (optional)
3 tablespoons avocado oil or other oil with high smoke point
½ cup chicken broth
¼ cup sliced almonds
Cooked rice for serving

Instructions

In a medium bowl, combine the chicken slices, 1 tablespoon of cornstarch, sherry, water and salt. Set aside. In a small bowl, combine the soy sauce, sherry, re3maining cornstarch, sambal oelek, and sesame oil. Set aside. Have all vegetables prepared and ready for stir-frying.
Heat 1 tablespoon of the oil over high heat in a wok or large skillet. Add half the chicken and cook, stirring constantly, until the chicken loses its raw appearance. Remove to a large bowl. Repeat with additional tablespoon of oil and remaining half of chicken.
Heat remaining tablespoon of oil over high heat and add the green onions and ginger. Stir-fry for 30 seconds, and then add the remaining vegetables. Stir-fry for 3 to 4 minutes, adding the broth midway through. When vegetables are just crisp tender and broth reduced by half, add the chicken back to the skillet. Pour the reserved sauce mixture over and stir until the sauce thickens and becomes translucent. Sprinkle with the almonds and serve over rice.

Double Pecan Pancakes

Questions abound when it comes to “diet.” What to eat? When to eat? When not to eat? But the big ones are all about the carbs. There are those who eschew them altogether, eating one of the currently popular low carb diets. For me, carbs are non-negotiable, given that high-protein-low-carb leaves me starving. All day long. My gall bladder turned to Swiss cheese thirty odd years ago and I prefer digesting my food, which is why high-fat-low-carb leaves me nauseated, my stomach full of miserable indigestible fat. No! Not another bite of avocado/coconut oil/nut pie!

Eating a good balance of complex carbs, in combination with fats and protein at each meal, works best for me. I do not eat carbs by their lonesome. The grains still nestle in their little coats of bran, and are soaked prior to cooking. The great majority of baked items are homemade, using sourdough fermentation and whole grain flours. And of course, fruits and vegetables are carbs-at least five servings daily, and yes, I consume the starchy ones too.

But not all carbs are complex… Enter the demon sugar. The sugar industry evidently pulled the wool over our eyes for quite a few years. Of course, we were willing participants; lose the fat and up the sugar in my processed foods of choice? Heck yeah! But the truth about added sugar has popped out of the bag and refuses to be pushed back in, meaning that I’ve had to make some tweaks in my recipes and daily diet, particularly at breakfast.

Yes, hard as it is, I’ve cut back on the added sugar. (My taste buds will still be in recovery when I die.) I also employ a number of techniques to s-l-o-w down the rate at which those carbs enter my bloodstream:

New recipes routinely have the sugar cut or eliminated, and I strive to keep added sugars in my own developed recipes within a range of one to two teaspoons per serving, depending on what I am baking. Can’t really call ‘em “sweet rolls” anymore…
I substitute flaxseed meal for a couple tablespoons of the cereal grains when making steel cut oats or polenta to decrease the carbs and increase the healthy fats. Added hemp or chia seeds provide a protein boost. Pseudo grains like amaranth already have a good carb to protein balance, as well as having complete protein. Note the discussion of porridge? More complex grains, fewer rolls… sigh. And the heaping tablespoon of brown sugar to sweeten those bowls of goodness is gone as well; I do allow myself a single forlorn teaspoon of honey and fresh berries on top.
Emphasize what sweetness there is in a recipe by adding enhancers like vanilla, lemon or orange zest, rum or brandy, and warm spices, like cinnamon.
Plain unsweetened yogurt gets a single teaspoon of lemon curd or honey with chopped pecans. Tartness is good for you.
Muesli/granola is made with half oats/half seeds, nuts, coconut, and flax. Yes, there are granolas made with all seeds, nuts, coconut and flax, but I’m inclined to want to hang onto my teeth, thanks very much.
When I do indulge in one of my now not so sweet rolls, I pair it with an egg.
Real sourdough bread is a slow digesting carb source. The list of ingredients should include nothing more than flour, water and salt, with some indication that there were many hours of fermentation before baking.
I have no problem “borrowing”-well, actually filching-some of the secrets of low carb baking. But instead of trashing all the grain flour, I just substitute nut flour for part of it. As in the pancakes recipe I’m sharing today.

I’ve been making these tweaks for a while now, making me think back to my mom’s approach to sugar in my childhood. Which prompted me to look up what good old Adelle Davis, Mom’s nutrition guru, had to say about sugar:

“Almost every food we eat forms sugar either directly or indirectly during or after digestion…he or she receives all the sugar he or she needs from natural sources. Unfortunately we tend to rely too much on refined sugar to satisfy our hunger since it is absorbed rapidly into the bloodstream and gives a temporary boost to the blood sugar level. However, apart from being used in the body to provide energy it has no other value; it contains neither vitamins nor minerals.”

http://www.adelledavis.org/press/the-great-sugar-debate/

She said this about fifty years ago… Which was why we consumed plain yogurt, whole-wheat toast, bran muffins, NO SODA, etc., etc. on the farm. I am actually quite grateful that I never developed a taste for soda. One full sugar soda has three times my supposed daily allotment of added sugar by today’s standards. An addiction I didn’t develop! Thanks, Mom!

The pancake recipe includes a few of these techniques to slow the digestion of the carbs and keep my stomach happy for the morning. Whole grain flour in combination with nut flour*, and the addition of flax meal and hemp hearts adds healthy fat and protein. The extracts pump up the perception of sweetness. I’m happy to say that these little cakes are fluffy, stack beautifully, (though my personal portion of two pancakes makes a rather pathetic stack) and are jam-packed with pecan flavor. I generally top them with a drizzle of syrup, chopped pecans, and blueberries. If you require them to be more carb virtuous, applesauce and cinnamon with pecans makes a nice topping as well.

These keep my body fueled and contented for an entire morning, no sugar high or mid-morning tummy grumbling allowed!

Print Recipe

5 from 1 vote

Double Pecan Pancakes

Prep Time10

Cook Time20

Total Time30

Course: Quick Bread

Servings: 16 pancakes

Author: Mary Kay Allen

Ingredients

1½- cup buttermilk or sour milk
2 eggs
1- teaspoon vanilla extract
½ teaspoon maple extract optional
1- tablespoon maple syrup
2 tablespoons melted butter or oil
1- cup white whole-wheat flour pastry flour if available
½ cup pecan meal/flour or other nut flour
2 tablespoons flaxseed meal
2 tablespoons hemp hearts
1 ½ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon soda
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon cinnamon
Maple syrup or applesauce for topping
Chopped pecans for topping

Instructions

Pre-heat a griddle to 350° F. or large skillet over medium heat.
Combine the buttermilk, eggs, extracts, syrup and butter/oil in a medium bowl and blend together thoroughly. In a large bowl, combine the remaining dry ingredients and mix well. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in the wet mixture. Blend gently, not over mixing. It’s okay of there are small lumps in the batter.
Lightly grease or coat the griddle with cooking spray. Ladle the batter by ¼-cupful onto the griddle, spacing to allow for spreading. When bubbles appear on the top and the bottoms are nicely browned, flip the pancakes. Bake for several minutes until golden on the bottom, then remove to a platter. Continue until all the batter is baked.

*Pecan meal can be made in the food processor or purchased online, or another type of nut flour can be substituted.

Trade in the Cabbage, Please!

My farm boy dad was an experienced gardener, having been raised on a farm with nine siblings to be fed. He was never happier than when in his vegetable garden, and he brought produce into the kitchen with great satisfaction. I do believe, though, that he took the ultimate pride in the firm heads of cabbage, with their tightly furled leaves and bright green color. Dad loved cabbage, but it was an unrequited love, as cabbage was particularly tough to digest for someone with his gut issues. Long before terms like IBS and fodmaps were part of the vernacular, eating cabbage kicked him to the curb repeatedly. But he ate it and other items that caused him pain and bloating, because… well, I guess because that’s just what we did in those days.

By the time I was a young adult, the beginnings of my own IBS had emerged. Unlike my dad, I had the whole cabbage thing figured out, along with legumes, and avoided them like the plague. So, driving with my husband last week to pick up our CSA veggie share, it should not have been a surprise when I mentioned that we would be hitting the produce-trading table with the week’s cabbage share. Suddenly, he began to wax nostalgic about… cabbage rolls. For those not familiar with cabbage rolls, they consist of a blanched cabbage leaf stuffed with ground meat, rice and seasonings, which is cooked long and slow in a bath of tomatoes and their juices. I believe they originated in Eastern Europe, but they are quite popular in the Midwestern United States. From my perspective, they are little bloat balls of doom.

Now my husband is regretfully tolerant of my dietary adjustments, but I have learned that when the longing for a forbidden item hits, I need to nip it in the bud, pronto. Attempting to snatch victory from the jaws of cabbage roll defeat, I suggested that we could make meat-and-veggie rolls by stuffing a more acceptable vegetable, like maybe chard. It actually had the advantage of being a softer leaf that would not require the extra step of blanching to relax it; he’d never know the difference, they’d be even more delicious than cabbage rolls, etc., etc. This appeared to work, so now I had to actually make chard rolls.

So who knows what goes into a chard roll? I decided to think more like a Greek than an Eastern European. Chard shares similarity in taste to spinach, which goes well with lemon, and feta might be good tucked in there somewhere. Heck, I like lamb better than beef, and yummy things like olives and pine nuts would be right at home in a vegetable meat roll. Right? Luckily, this proved to be true, because the chard rolls turned out to be so-o-o much better than cabbage rolls! The chard leaves became silky, imbued with the lush flavors of broth and lemon. The meat stuffing had the richness of lamb and pine nuts, with tang provided by olives and feta. These rolls, conceived in desperation, were the best meat rolls I could imagine. It matters not whether you are an aficionado of cabbage rolls; you should try these. BTW, I don’t fool myself that the cabbage roll craving won’t show its face again, but I will worry about that when it happens. In the meantime, I’ll be making these…

Print Recipe

Greek Style Chard Rolls

Prep Time45

Cook Time45

Total Time1 30

Course: Entree

Servings: 4 servings

Author: Mary Kay Allen

Ingredients

1/3- cup rice parboiled in 1 cup water: 10 minutes for white rice, 20 for brown rice
1 Tbsp. garlic infused olive oil or 1 clove diced garlic with 1 tablespoon olive oil
½ cup diced fennel
½ cup diced onion
2 Tbsp. pine nuts
¼ cup finely chopped Kalamata olives
½ cup chopped parsley
¾ tsp. salt
¾ tsp. pepper
½ tsp. dried oregano
½ tsp. fennel seed
1 Tbsp. dried dill
½ cup crumbled feta cheese
1 lb. ground lamb 85% lean
1 egg beaten
2 bunches chard
1-½ cups chicken broth
2 Tbsp. lemon juice

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350° F.
Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium high heat. Add the fennel, onion, pine nuts and garlic, if using. Sauté, stirring occasionally until the vegetables begin to soften and the pine nuts begin to toast. Stir in the olives, parsley, salt, pepper and spices. Remove from heat to cool while you prepare the chard.
Wash the chard leaves, then slice out the part of the stem beneath the leaf, leaving just the leaf. Spray a 9x13-inch baking pan with cooking spray. Stir the feta cheese crumbles and egg into the cooled vegetable mixture, then combine thoroughly with the ground lamb. Place several tablespoons of the meat mixture at the top of a chard leaf. Fold in the sides of the leaf over the meat, then roll up to enclose the meat. Repeat with remaining chard leaves and meat mixture until chard leaves are used. Make any remaining meat mixture into small meatballs. Arrange the chard rolls and meatballs in the prepared pan, pushing them tightly together as pictured. Combine the broth and lemon juice and pour over the rolls. Cover the pan tightly with foil and bake in preheated oven for 45 to 60 minutes, until chard is done and meat mixture has expanded to fill the rolls. Serve hot.

Panettone Morning Buns

So… I was a bread baker wannabe born to a couple of hot roll mix mavens. My grandmother’s delicious “homemade” raisin bread was actually hot roll mix with added sugar and raisins, while my Mom’s “Super Sandwich Bread” was hot roll mix with raisins, grated carrots, sunflower seeds, sharp cheddar and bacon bits. The two of them certainly kept their semi-homemade recipes true to form-Grandma’s was simple sweetness and Mom’s was, in comparison, a health bomb. Not my personal favorite health bomb…

We had a few family recipes passed down from prior generations, but none of them were really bread, even for the holidays. Mom did bake a treasured almond roll for breakfast, which is still our tradition, but it was adapted from a then recent recipe called Starlight Sugar Crisps, still available on many sites online. (https://www.justapinch.com/recipes/dessert/cookies/starlight-sugar-crisps.html ) But I longed for beautiful coffee rings, savarins, braided and swirled breads. I saw it as my job to pick up the cultural bread slack around the place. Armed with my treasured bread book, I made my best attempts at baking complex ethnic breads. Mind you, I had no connection to these ethnicities, no passing-the-skills-down from generation to generation. My family is primarily English and Irish, with a bit of German thrown in (or so I’ve been told), but my ancestors came eons ago, apparently without any prized European bread recipes in hand. Also, what I didn’t know at the time was that my beloved bread book (yes, I still have it!) was written for Americans. Easier methods, more of an American product.

After leaving the farm, I seldom made bread. Busy with college, first jobs, grad school and then my own family, bread was an afterthought. We purchased it at the grocery store like all sensible Americans. A massive metamorphosis occurred when my husband, our two young children, and I took a trip to Italy, where my husband had spent his early childhood years. While commercially produced bread had stolen the market there as well, a small artisan bread movement was underway and I discovered seriously good bread. The kind that one really should be eating if one is eating bread. The kind that takes at least 24 hours from start to finish, using pre-ferments or natural yeast leavens. The kind of bread with a soft but chewy interior laced with holes, all concealed inside a heavenly crisp crust. I overdosed on this stuff for almost three weeks, wondering how I would ever learn to make it at home. Because there was no question, if I couldn’t buy it, I would have to learn to make it. I was not going to waste my calories on lousy factory made bread for even one more day.

Which was not true, of course, because first I had to locate a book that actually took the place of an Italian grandmother. I found such books while still in Italy! Written in Italian… have I mentioned that I don’t read Italian? A bit of research on my part yielded Carol Field’s amazing book, The Italian Baker. (https://www.amazon.com/Italian-Baker-Revised-Countryside-Its…/dp/1607741067) In English. Mercifully, Carol had completed my journey by spending time in bakeries across Italy, along the way writing a beautiful book, which replaced the Italian grandmother. Country loaves, ciabatta, focaccia, sweet rolls-I learned to make them all. Then, within a few years, the artisan bread movement had arrived in the states, and I could buy such bread locally. But I continued to bake it for special occasions.

These days, being retired, I make the great majority of the bread we consume at about half the cost of the artisanal loaf. I’m mighty glad that artisanal loaf is available though, because every now and again I just want to go out and buy it.

I don’t mess around with my daily bread recipe too much. Sourdough spelt whole wheat. But I am now the proud owner of multiple bread books by well established artisan bakers, and have learned a great deal about the science of bread making. When I play with bread recipes, it may take several attempts, but I know which ingredients to put where for my desired result. I thoroughly enjoy developing my own recipes from classic dough templates. Today’s morning bun is a cross between an English hot cross bun and a Roman bun. Typically eaten around the Lenten/Easter season, the English filled them with raisins and the Romans stuffed them with whipped cream. My version takes a U-turn to intersect with the delectable flavors of panettone, yet another Italian bread. My signature almond paste, fiori di sicilia (orange and vanilla flavoring) and yes, brandy to take it over the top. This is a rich roll, not as sweet as most morning buns, but definitely one of my favorites. You won’t find it, even in a European kitchen, but you can make it in your own!

About the hot roll mix…

When Mom moved into a retirement residence, she no longer had the equipment or ability to bake. But she still liked to eat. And yes, she still loved Super Sandwich Bread. Lucky for me the store still carried that cardboard box of premixed roll ingredients!

Print Recipe

Panettone Morning Buns

Prep Time2 30

Cook Time30

Total Time3

Course: Bread

Servings: 1 dozen

Author: Mary Kay Allen

Ingredients

Sponge:
½ cup warm water
1 envelope 2 ¼ teaspoons instant yeast
2-½ tablespoons sugar
2 eggs plus 1 egg yolk
1 ¼ cups sprouted whole wheat or white whole-wheat flour
Dough:
2 ounces almond paste
2 tablespoons brandy
¾ teaspoon fiori de sicilia or ½ teaspoon vanilla plus 1-teaspoon orange zest
1 cup all purpose flour
¼ cup plus 2 tablespoons almond flour
½ teaspoon salt
1/3 cup butter softened and cut into bits
2 tablespoons finely diced candied orange peel
¼ cup tart dried cherries diced
2 tablespoons sugar
¼ cup lightly chopped pine nuts

Instructions

Mix all sponge ingredients together thoroughly in large mixer bowl. Cover and let rest for 45 minutes.
To the sponge, add the almond paste, brandy, extract, flours and salt. Beat together thoroughly, then add the butter and blend until smooth dough forms. Stir in the candied orange peel and cherries. The dough will be soft. If using a stand mixer, switch to the dough hook and scoop the dough from the bowl edges into the center of the bowl. Knead for 3 minutes. Alternately, scoop the dough out of the bowl onto a lightly floured surface and roll to coat lightly with flour. Knead until dough is smooth. Place in a bowl lightly sprayed with cooking spray, then spray the top of the dough to prevent drying out. Cover and let rise until puffy, 1 to 1 ½ hours.
Turn the dough out onto lightly floured surface and pat into a ball. Divide the dough into 12 even pieces and round each into a ball. Combine the remaining sugar with pine nuts. Dip the top of each bun into the nut and sugar mixture. Place on baking sheet either lightly greased or covered with parchment. Cover loosely and allow to rise until puffy, around 1 hour. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Bake the buns for 25 to 30 minutes, until lightly browned. Remove to cooling rack.

Pasta Class

For most folk, the image of a kid in a candy shop would not be a child in a big ol’ farm kitchen, festooned with oodles of noodles. But it fits my story as a young kid on the farm. Homemade hand cut egg noodles, which my mother had hung to dry over every free surface in the room-counters, tables and chair backs. Now this just happened to leave the neatly cut ends of the l-o-n-g noodles at about the height of a small farm girl… While I’m sure she cautioned me to leave them alone, inevitably I’d manage to sneak in unseen to tweak off the yummy ends of that soft dough, leaving a row of ragged edges like a set of snaggle teeth. Was I in trouble? Probably. But not so much so that I recall ending the error of my ways…

Noodles were a staple on the Midwestern dinner table, usually served as part of “something and noodles,” such as chicken and noodles or beef and noodles. I never learned to make them; by the time I was old enough, Mom was too busy on the farm or had returned to full-time work. She simply didn’t make them any longer. And what was never mentioned was the fact that egg noodles are actually pasta.

Italian American food was not a particularly familiar cuisine on the farm. My mom did make a basic spaghetti sauce, but it was always served on the long dried strands of pasta found in a box on the grocery store shelf. But after leaving the farm for the wider world, and as that world began to offer a broader selection of cuisines, I came to know fresh pasta as a highly desirable commodity. I simply never connected the simple egg noodles of my childhood with fresh pasta, because we didn’t eat it that way. And the idea of making it at home seemed quite daunting…

The fact that my husband had spent his early childhood in the south of Italy only multiplied the intimidation factor. His nickname as a kid was “the spaghetti boy.” We acquired an Italian pasta machine years ago and he would on occasion make fresh pasta. That seemed to suffice until several months ago when I saw a class being offered at Hayden Flour Mills https://www.haydenflourmills.com where I purchase many of my grain products. The company mills an ancient variety of wheat known as Sonoran white wheat, originally brought to the area by the Spaniards as they moved north through Mexico to claim land and establish missions. Highly digestible, I use it in many of my baked goods.

A life-long need to make pasta suddenly bloomed, so I registered for the class. Picture a gaggle of multi-aged women around a big wooden baking station. Gab and flour were both flying freely; eggs were breaking and dough was kneaded. We took turns learning how to thin and cut the dough, feeding through the pasta machine. We cut and stamped tortellini and used a cavarola board to make cavatelli. My fear melted away, as I discovered this process was actually pretty easy, particularly for someone who has baked for years. I was also reminded that camaraderie makes learning reinforcing. Many kudos to Emma and Jill, our instructors at the mill, for making the afternoon both fun and functional.

I drove home with a pound of various shapes of pasta, including half a pound of yes; you guessed it, egg noodles. Checked out the pantry, finding the ingredients to turn those scrumptious strands of dough into this recipe. So as we head into a new year, do I think you should make this pasta dish or even make your own pasta? Sure if either of those appeal to you. You can certainly make the dish with convenient fresh pasta from the refrigerated section of the grocery, or even dried pasta. But more importantly, try something you’ve always wanted to do, but thought you couldn’t. Accomplishment feels pretty satisfying.

Print Recipe

Pasta with Butternut and Bacon

Prep Time45

Total Time45

Course: Entree

Servings: 4 servings

Author: Mary Kay Allen

Ingredients

1 poblano pepper
2 cups diced butternut squash
2 teaspoons olive oil
3/4 teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon pepper
¼ teaspoon dried oregano
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
¼ teaspoon cumin
½ teaspoon dried rosemary crushed
5 slices bacon
8 ounces fresh or dried pasta of choice
1 tablespoon flour
½ teaspoon salt
pinch pepper
1 cup milk or alt milk
¼ cup grated pecorino or parmesan cheese
¼ cup chopped cilantro

Instructions

Turn the oven on to broil. Place the poblano pepper on a baking pan and broil until blackened, turning to broil all sides. Remove from the heat and place in a paper bag to steam. Once cooled, scrape off the blackened skin, remove seeds and dice the flesh. Set aside.
Heat the oven to 425° F. Toss the butternut squash with olive oil, salt, pepper, oregano, cayenne, cumin and rosemary. Spread out on a baking pan either sprayed with cooking spray or covered with parchment. Bake for 20 minutes, stirring once, or until browned and tender. Set aside.
Begin heating a large pot of water with 2 to 3 quarts of generously salted water. Slice the bacon in ½ inch strips and sauté in a medium skillet until browned and crisp. Remove to a paper towel to drain. Pour off the bacon fat, leaving one tablespoon in the skillet. When ready to make the sauce, heat the bacon fat over medium high heat until sizzling, then stir in the flour until smooth. Gradually add the milk, stirring constantly until it comes to a boil. Turn heat down and simmer sauce for 1 minute. Add the grated cheese and season to taste. Stir in the diced poblano.
When the water is boiling, cook the pasta according to the recipe or package directions. When al dente drain the pasta, reserving ½ cup starchy cooking water. Toss pasta with the sauce, butternut squash and bacon slices, adding starchy cooking water as needed to thin the sauce.