I have a little problem. I'm addicted to cookbooks, food writing, recipe collecting, and cooking. I have a lot of recipes waiting for me to try them, and ideas from articles, tv, and restaurants often lead to new dishes. I started losing track of what I've done. So now I'm taking photos and writing about what I've prepared—unless it's terrible in which case I forget it ever happened.
Long, long ago, in a time before I made most things from scratch, my favorite salad dressing was Briannas brand Poppy Seed Dressing. Kurt would occasionally grab a bottle of the Blush Wine Vinaigrette of the same brand, but if I got to the shelf first, it was Poppy Seed that landed in the shopping cart. For years, I’ve been whipping up all sorts of homemade vinaigrettes, creamy parmesan dressings, Caesar salad dressings, and whathaveyou, and I had all but forgotten about my old favorite poppy seed. Then, along came a story about poppy seeds in the April issue Saveur magazine. Included in that story was the recipe for Poppy Seed Dressing which was first made popular in the 1950s by Helen Corbitt. Poppy seed dressing is sweet, tangy, and somewhat creamy without being too thick. It’s perfect with butter lettuce, and it's a great match for cucumber and tomato.
Although it took me a few months to get around to making this dressing, it ended up being worth the wait. In August, our friends who live in Dublin were visiting Austin for a week. They brought us beautiful food gifts of Irish, cold pressed, extra virgin rapeseed oil and rapeseed oil with chile. This plain rapeseed oil, which is another name for canola oil, has a rich, nutty flavor, and it made the homemade poppy seed dressing extra flavorful. To make the dressing, poppy seeds were cooked for a few minutes until toasted, and then sugar, white wine vinegar, dry mustard powder, salt, pepper, and grated onion with the juice were added. The mix was cooked just until it came to a simmer, and then it was poured into the blender pitcher. Rapeseed oil and olive oil were added, and the dressing was pureed until smooth. You can store the dressing in the refrigerator for about five days. It may need a quick stir before using.
I always loved that poppy seed dressing from the grocery store, but this homemade version was better by far. The flavors were so fresh and bright. With locally grown, just-picked vegetables and homemade dressing, this simple salad was unbelievably good. I’m glad to have reconnected with my old favorite type of salad dressing, and now I’ll be making my own often.
I’ve been eating a lot of delicious, fresh, raw tomatoes this summer. I joked that I could eat caprese salad every day, and then have pretty much done just that. I keep bringing home fresh mozzarella and heirloom tomatoes and plucking leaves off my basil plants. It’s a perfect combination, but I finally decided to change it up and do something else with tomatoes. I had this recipe for warm tomato dressing from Living magazine from last year, and it’s a versatile sauce. It can be made in advance and then re-warmed for serving. In the magazine, it was shown as a topping for roasted fennel, and that’s how I served it. It would also be great with chicken or over polenta or with other roasted or grilled vegetables. I used some pretty, little pear tomatoes but any kind of cherry-type tomatoes will work great. They’re cooked with wine and balsamic vinegar and take on a sweet and tangy flavor.
I have to confess that I didn’t read the recipe very carefully when I was writing up a shopping list. I skipped right over the word ‘red’ next to wine in the ingredient list. When I started cooking, I realized we had no red wine in the house, and I had to use white wine instead. As you can see in the photos, the dressing still became a deep, red color from the balsamic vinegar. So, to make the dressing, the tomatoes were cooked in a skillet with a little olive oil for a few minutes, and then garlic, wine, and balsamic vinegar were added and cooked until the liquid was reduced by half. A little splash of red wine vinegar and salt were added at the end, and sugar was to have been added as well but I skipped it since I thought the sauce was sweet enough. To serve, I spooned the warm dressing over wedges of roasted fennel.
The mellow, roasted fennel was a well-matched vehicle for the tomato dressing, and the reduced and intensified balsamic and wine gave the dressing a nice, agrodolce kind of flavor. Of course, I’m always looking for ways to add spiciness, and I think some crushed red pepper would be an interesting addition here. I’m glad I tried something new because those heirloom tomatoes won’t be around much longer, and I needed to start kicking my caprese habit. And, this kind of cooked dressing could even be made with canned tomatoes later in the year.
