Honey Panna Cotta with Olive Oil and Pine Nuts

There’s a newish restaurant in Baltimore that you have to visit. It’s called Bottega, a BYOB 20-seater with a northern Italian menu, and the first time I ate there, the one-man kitchen had run dry of about a third of the menu. In my mind, that was an excellent rather than a bummer situation. The ingredients, their farmers, the food, and the service are special, and I don’t think that anything communicates that quite so well or confidently as does abiding by smallness. There’s a lot to be said for enoughness and the choice to be out when you’re out. Like, you have zero uncertainty about the quality of the entirety of your offerings, and your efforts are so intentional and so focused, that a disappointed diner isn’t possible. Smallness—as opposed to the rote production that characterizes its opposite—could be the trick to the sort of success I keep experiencing at Bottega.

Simplicity might be the other side of the smallness coin—Bottega has that too—and it was the restaurant’s simplest dessert that was one of the best finishers I’ve had in seriously forever. They’re currently offering a ginger-lemon panna cotta, infused with both flavors only barely, and it was purely, completely delicious—unmuddled. Set just a skosh more than pudding and a million miles south of jello, panna cotta is a straightforward cream dessert that is disarmingly good. Weirdly good. When we ate there last week, I’d been considering baking some fussy tarts and fancy cakes for fun this weekend, but Bottega’s panna cotta righted my course and all. So, inspired by Bottega's general excellence and specific deliciousness, here’s a panna cotta riff with a pretty tasty honey profile, complemented by olive oil, salt, and pine nuts if you so choose. It’s small, simple, and delicious—there’s not much else you need.

(OH. And if you find yourself in Baltimore, totally please go to Bottega. My favorite savory dishes have been the venison pappardelle and the speck with stracciatella; literally everything has been good.)

Honey Panna Cotta

Adapted from Alice Medrich’s Pure Dessert

Makes about 8 servings

Use the best dairy and honey to be found, y’all. I mean, we always say that, but since there are so few parts to this dessert, it’s especially excellent to use your favorites since every ingredient is discernible. Medrich cautions us to measure granulated gelatin very carefully, since even a hair too much could wrestle the panna cotta into jello territory.

3 sheets sheet gelatin OR 2 1/2 teaspoons granulated gelatin

1 1/4 cups cold whole milk

3 cups heavy cream

1/3 cup mild, delicious honey

1/4 teaspoon fine-grain sea salt

Honey, olive oil, salt, and toasted pine nuts for garnish

1.  Pour the milk into a small bowl. Sprinkle the gelatin over the top, don’t stir, and let soften for about ten minutes.

2. In a medium saucepan, heat the cream, honey, and salt until steaming, but but not boiling; stir a few times to ensure it does not scorch. Remove the cream from heat, add the milk and gelatin to the pot, and whisk vigorously to dissolve the gelatin.

3. Set a large bowl with a spout over a larger bowl filled with ice and a bit of water. Pour the hot cream mixture into the spouted bowl, and allow it to cool to 50 degrees F. Divide the cream mixture between your ramekins or jars, cover with plastic wrap, and allow to set for at least four hours, preferably overnight.

4. When ready to serve, top your panna cotta with a spoonful of honey, a drizzle of olive oil, a sprinkle of sea salt, and a couple of pine nuts. Panna cottas will keep, covered in the fridge, for about a week.

Plum and Pine Nut Galette

The damson and black plums for this tart were piled high at the farmers’ market last weekend, along with a few green and red varieties and the bare beginnings of Maine’s apple season. While the start of summer drives me rather nuts with desperation about which juicy fruits to get my deprived hands on first, the fall transition has a lovely sort of ceremonious appeal--measured and familiar, instead of rushed. We’re expecting pears this weekend at the market, along with spinach, gourds, and more apples, and it’s that even rolling out of fall fruits that keeps me motivated to bake with produce before bourbon, custards, and creams totally take over for the winter.

This galette is a lovely end-of-summer ode. The fruit is beautiful and barely sweetened, and the pine nuts add a bit of savory depth and a toasty crunch. If you have a tart dough waiting in the wings already, then it comes together in just a few easy steps too, perfect for when the new, wonderful WWOOFer is distracting you with stories of Labrador or when Dave is laying the smackdown about dishes. And while it’s hot, hot, hot everywhere and folks are lamenting the use of the oven this time of year, it’s starting to cool off here and I’m a complete sucker for baking fruit to its juiciest peak anyway. For the next few weeks it’ll be a toss-up between plums and pears around here, but it’s a late summer dilemma that brings out some of my favorite kinds of baked goods.

Plum Pine Nut Galette

Adapted significantly from Gourmet (1999!)

For the Crust
From Apt. 2B Baking Co. and I Made That!

Makes enough for two, but you’ll only need one for this recipe. Feel free to substitute in your favorite crust recipe instead!

12 ounces pastry flour
1/2 teaspoon fine-grain sea salt
8 ounces (two sticks) very cold butter
4 to 6 ounces ice water
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar

1.  On a clean counter, dump your flour and salt; mix it around with a bench scraper. Chop one stick of butter into quarters, and cut it into the four with your bench scraper. When butter is about the size of lima beans, cut in the second stick, pulling, folding, and tossing with the bench scraper as you go, until the butter is about the size of quarters. Add the vinegar to the ice water.

2. Using your fingers, flick the water onto the butter-flour mixture, gently folding with the bench scraper all the while. You have added enough water once the mixture holds together when squeezed; it should be very shaggy.

3. Next, push the butter into the flour. Using the heel of your palm, push a small section of the dough down and away from you; this creates long layers of butter in your dough, which translates to long flaky layers in your crust. Use your bench scraper to scrape up the smear, and put it a bowl. Repeat until all the dough has been smeared and you have a bowlful of long, buttery layers. Push these into one mass, divide in half, wrap each in plastic, flatten into disks, and chill at least two hours, or better yet overnight.

For the Filling
2.5 pounds plums of your choosing
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1/4 cup toasted pine nuts
1/4 cup demerara sugar, divided
1 egg
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
1 tablespoon butter, cut into small pieces
1.  Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Roll out your pie dough to a 14- or 15-inch circle. Trim the edges so they’re even, slide onto a piece of parchment paper on the back of a cookie sheet, and pop into the freezer while you prepare the rest of your ingredients. This cooling step will help you fold or pleat the dough more easily in a bit.

2.  Cut the plums into half-inch slices. I cut some of my plums into quarters and the bigger ones into sixths, so it just depends on your plum size. Set aside. In a food processor, grind the toasted pine nuts with the flour and just two tablespoons of the demerara sugar. Mixture should be finely ground, but not powdered.  

3.  Remove the dough round from the freezer and, leaving it on the back of the cookie sheet, spread ground nut mixture across the bottom, leaving a three-inch border. Starting at the outside edge of the ground nuts, arrange your plum slices into one, tightly fit ring with all the plums facing the same way. Make the inner ring, then the final third ring in the middle. If you have extra plum slices, go back and fill in any gaps or wider spaces. And if you’re using different plum varieties, try to alternate the varieties in every other slice or one variety per ring. Don’t worry if you can’t!

4.  Fold tart dough up and over the plums, pleating or pinching as you go, then put the whole thing into the freezer for at least one hour. This will help the dough keep its shape when it’s popped into the hot oven. Once the tart has fully chilled, brush the crust with your egg wash. Mix the remaining two tablespoons of demerara sugar with the cinnamon. Sprinkle a heavy layer of the sugar-cinnamon mixture across the crust, then sprinkle the remaining over the fruit itself. Brush any stray granules off the parchment so they don’t scorch in the oven. Dot the tart with butter and cover the tart very lightly with a sheet of foil, and bake for a total of 45 to 50 minutes until crust is dark golden brown and juices are bubbling. Remove the foil about halfway through baking so that the crust can color. Allow to cool for about 20 minutes, and serve.

Pine Nut Rosemary Cookies

Dudes, trust:  These cookies are the jam.  I have a friend who jokingly refers to them as "roasted chicken cookies" (I hope you're already sold) because rosemary is so elemental to oven meats, and another friend who started talking to me about pesto after he had them, but these aren't the unclassifiable troll child of a savory-sweet marriage that friendly jokes make them out to be -- these are an awesome cookie reinvention.  They're also a completely crossable bridge between savory and sweet, falling deliciously short of being overwhelmed by either flavor.  And as we know, savory-sweet land is, of course, the most addictive land of all.   

Bonus summer-awarded points for level of ease too!  While I am generally uninterested (disinterested?) by claims of ease in the kitchen, on this fifty-first day of heat above 98 degrees in the swampy wonderland that I call home, I'll grasp onto anything that minimizes my time in the kitchen.


Pine Nut Rosemary Cookies
Via Martha Stewart

I'd say these are pretty customizable too.  If you're not a fan of pine nuts, try hazelnuts and a pinch or so of cardamom instead of the rosemary, or maybe walnuts with thyme.  Lemon thyme is supposedly budding in everyone's backyards these days, and I think that could make a bright substitution for the rosemary.

1 tablespoon + 1/2 teaspoon finely chopped fresh rosemary
1/4 cup pine nuts,* toasted + extra for topping cookies
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger (remember, trust!)
1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
10 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
1 cup + 2 tablespoons granulated white sugar
2 tablespoons good-quality olive oil
3 tablespoons heavy cream (I used half-and-half)
1 large egg, lightly whisked
About two tablespoons raw or turbinado sugar for sanding

1.  Preheat oven to 325 degrees F., and line two cookie sheets with parchment paper.  Finely chop rosemary some more in a food processor. Add pine nuts, and pulse until coarsely ground, about like the consistency of coarse corn meal. Transfer to a large bowl; whisk in two cups of the flour, baking soda, ginger, and salt, and set aside.

2.  In another large bowl, cream butter with white sugar on high until light and fluffy, two to three minutes (may take less time if your kitchen is of hellish temperature). Slowly mix in oil. Reduce speed to low. Mix in flour mixture in three increments, and then add cream. Using a fork, mix until well combined.  Mix in egg, then final 1/4 cup of flour.

3.  Using a 1 1/2-tablespoon ice cream scoop, scoop balls of dough onto cookie sheets, leaving at least an inch between each mount. Very slightly flatten tops, top each with a pine nut or two, and then shake some raw sugar on there.

4. Rotating halfway through, bake cookies until edges are golden, about 13 minutes.  Let cool on sheets for ten minutes, and then transfer to wire racks to let cool completely. Cookies are best if eaten the same day, though they'll be fine for a day if store in an airtight container.

* Moment of Science:  Instances of "pine mouth" have reportedly been on the rise in recent years, so to avoid turning your mouth into a piney wonderland, be sure to use pine nuts that are neither rancid nor imported from China. Thems the rules.