When the pros come to town Meal #1.

When my Brother and Sister in Law come to town it is always a culinary delight. They are both LA uber chef's. My wife's brother, Chris Kidder, has been cooking on the highest level for over 15 years. He is probably best known for being the Chef de Cuisine at LA institution Campanille when they won the James Beard Award for being the best restaurant in the US. These days in true LA fashion he works as a personal Chef for an LA power couple. In the last couple months besides entertaining movie stars he has cooked dinner for the likes of Michelle Obama and Tipper Gore. Chris's, wife, Kim Sklar Kidder, is one of LA's finest pastry Chef's. These days she is mostly cooking pastries for my niece and nephew but her resume includes pastry chef for La Brea Bakery and later pastry chef for LA hot spots AOC and Lucques. Normally, I am the Lord of my kitchen but when Kim and Chris come to town, I get out of the way and let them make the magic.

I tried to document some of the delicious food we had during there visit. I'm going to do a few posts with menu's and recipes of things we had while they were staying with us. This is truly a special time for eating as it is also the peak of harvest from my garden.

As much as possible, everything we ate, I grew, was grown locally or Kim and Chris brought with them from their local Cali Farmers market.

Sunday Night Dinner Menu

Grilled locally handmade sausages

Roasted home grown potatoes and mustard green salad

Cremed local Sweet Corn and butter

Star Valley (local) cucumbers with home grown mint, basil, and chive salad with rice wine vinegar

Roasted local carrots and onions

Utah Watermelon

Kim's Cali peach and blueberry crisp

Dinner was incredible, tons of delicious fruits and vegetables, as is the season. The following blogs will give some recipes for some of the different dishes we created.

www.newwestknifeworks.com

The Petty Knife Goes Camping

One of the best parts about living in Jackson Hole is that we are surrounded by amazing camping options. You can go into the back country, the national park campgrounds, national forest or BLM land. You can go along a river, a creek, in the snow or in the mountains. I've even had a few campers in my backyard. This past weekend we went to a campground in the Red Hills. I really love this area because of the striking red hills that look like they belong in Moab, it is a complete contrast to the lodgepole pines and forest just a 15 minute drive away.

Here are some highlights from the trip:

Nature's cooler

We sipped the chilled beverages while enjoying this creekside view.

What camping trip would be complete without a delicious meal of local goods? We sauteed bell peppers, onions, local shitakke mushrooms from Mountain Valley Mushrooms and locally made Italian sausages from Cosmic Apple.

The key players.

The Petty Knife gets the job done.

Great for cutting mushrooms and limes too!

Sautee those goodies on a trusty Coleman stove.

Not too long until this is ready.

Then sit back and enjoy! This is a former New West KnifeWorks employee from back in the day when the knives were all made in Corey's backyard.

So the moral of this story is that the Petty Knife is a great companion for camping. Grab your favorite New West KnifeWorks knife and start making your Labor Day camping plans now. Get going!

Happy Chopping,

Lindsey

New West KnifeWorks Knife Sighting!

Last weekend our friends got married in Teton Village, Wyom. and I spotted two New West KnifeWorks knives!

Sighting #1

There was a whole roasted pig. Unfortunately, I failed to bring the camera up to where the pig was being roasted, but here is a photo from another pig roast I found on the internet:

This looks exactly like the set-up that I saw.

Want to roast your own pig in this style? Check out this website. Let me tell you, this pig was a big hit as entertainment being roasted and as a meal. While I was browsing the cooking area I spotted a Phoenix Petty in the popular Cocobolo color. It turns out the knife was a gift that day to the chef from the groom as thank you for roasting this feast. What a great idea!

Sighting #1

In my opinion no wedding is complete with out some sort of cheese platter. I am yet to meet a cheese that I did not like. This party not only had a great appetizer spread of locally made snacks, but a tasty and abundant cheese platter. And what did I spot doing all the hard work of cutting those delicious dairy morsels? A Fusionwood Chopper. This knife cut through brie, manchego and gouda like they were all butter. Side note, the Fusionwood Mini Chopper would also perform well in this situation.

The Fusionwood Chopper gets the job done on the cheese platter.

Finally, I have to tell you that there were some delicious locally made cupcakes! They were so tasty and easy for people to just grab one and go back to celebrating.

The cupcake "cake."

To summarize, if you are looking for a great thank-you gift for a friend this summer no need to look farther than the Petty. Also, if you want your party to be a huge hit don't forget the cheese platter and Fusionwood Chopper (or Mini Chopper). Finally, cupcakes are not just for kids, and should be included in gatherings when ever possible.

Hurray for Pickles

All my life I have not like pickles. I find them to be too tart, too soggy, too floppy, too weird, too just plain un-tasty. Then one day while slaving away as an intern someone brought in a giant jar of home canned pickles and garlic. With great hesitation I tried yet another pickle, but much to my surprise they were delicious! I couldn't stop eating them, they might as well have been Ruffles Sour Cream and Cheddar potato chips. Fast forward to summer 2009 when I learned how to make refridgerater pickles. Ever since that summer I wait eagerly for the local farmer's market to have pickling cucumbers and last Saturday was my lucky day! So let me tell you how to make a great refrigerator pickle, trust me it is super easy and leaves lots of space for creative license.

To start, head out to your local Farmer's Market. On Saturday I went to this one.

Browse the goods and select your favorites potential pickles.

I try to find ones that are similar in size so that each one is consistent in textures and flavor, but hey variety is the spice of life so try different sizes too!

Get home and find your favorite pickling recipe.

Rinse off the cucumbers thoroughly, no one likes dirt with their pickles.

Collect your ingredients.

Remember, be creative, try new spices and veggies. For this recipe I did not include the onions because I don't like them (are you starting to see a pattern here?). I did throw in some celery seed and dill. I also didn't have a full cup of apple cider vinegar so I topped it off with white vinegar.

Put all the ingredients (minus the cukes) in a pot and boil for five minutes.

While the liquid boils, get out your New West KnifeWorks knife of choice.

As always I choose the Petty. However a Fusionwood Chopper would work great in this situation, as would a Chef knife for the fancy chefs out there.

Put the pickles in the jar, loosely packed and not all the way to the top. Then just pour the liquid over the pickles.

Now the hard part, put the jars in the refrigerator and wait 24 hours...then, yum!

To summarize, I still don't care for pickles unless they are homemade. So head out to your local farmer's market and make some delicious refrigerator pickles, you won't be disappointed. Hurray for pickles!

One Stop Shopping

New this year in our town is a People's Market, it is on Wednesdays near our Town Square. From what I can tell, it is a farmer's market that has a little of everything (jewelry, herbs, fresh veggies, dog accessories and treats, pizza, seafood, the list is endless!) and goes the distance to promote buying local. Oh wait, first I have to tell you that while driving to the People's Market we had an earthquake, it was a bit of a surprise but being a San Francisco native I didn't think twice and a little earthquake wasn't going to keep me from my fresh produce.

People's Market with Snow King Mountain in the back, afternoon thundershower also looming.

I have a method when I go to farmer's markets. First lap, browse by each stand. Second lap, buy! On the first lap I saw a few things that I liked, beer, cheese, jewelry, live herb plants and mushrooms. I have had the delectable mushrooms from Mountain Valley Mushrooms before so I made an exception to my usual rule and stopped off for half a pound. I can't remember the type of mushroom, just that I asked for the best ones for grilling and received two big mushrooms! On the second lap I picked up

cheese after sampling the Idaho product.

This is sheep's milk cheese from Lark's Meadow Farms and let me tell you, it is creamy and sweet with a touch of salt. I have just been nibbling away at the block since Wednesday, no crackers or fruit needed. Yum!

Back at the homestead my dog inspected the afternoon's work

cheese, mushrooms and earrings.

So to re-cap, I survived an earthquake, added to my jewelry collection, satisfied my cheese addiction and found something for dinner. Not bad for a Wednesday afternoon.

P.S. One of the best parts of the People's Market is the live music and lawn you can relax on while drinking a beer and enjoying local treats.

Just another Wednesday afternoon in Jackson Hole.

Popsicles for Adults

Here we go, my first every published blog post.

I'm not much of a cook, my boyfriend (who also used to work for New West KnifeWorks, back in the day when each knife was hand crafted in Corey's backyard studio) is the one who does the slicing, dicing and cooking. On the other hand I am pretty handy with dips, appetizers and anything liquor based. Last summer my culinary school student sister came to visit and whipped up half the recipes from Gourment magazine's July 2009 issue (I am fairly certain she shed tears when she found out that the publication was discontinued). I was so inspired by the tasty delights that I purchased the magazine, needless to point out I have not re-created a single item. Though for the past twelve months one particular recipe article has always been in the back of my mind: boozy ice pops. That's right, popsicles with alcohol, what could be better on a hot summer day? With summer here and a girls night tonight what better chance to put this updated, childhood treat to the test?

I made two flavors, Peaches and Cream and Watermelon Margarita

First, the Peaches and Cream, here are the ingredients:

On Saturday I finally made it to one of my favorite summer activities, the Jackson Hole Farmers Market. Unfortunately, the trip was short lived because of a summer thunder and lightening storm that blew all the tents away (we literally helped a vendor chase his tent into the tourist traffic, tackled it and folded it up). While I was dodging flying tents I was able to make it to a brave fruit vendor and bought three peaches for my popsicle project.

The plan is easy

chop with your New West KnifeWorks Petty Knife , put ingredients in the blender,

pour liquid into the popsicle molds, freeze and wait...

Next I made Watermelon Margarita popsicles

As I mentioned I am not much of a chef, so I by skipped the directions of straining the puree through a fine-mesh sleeve. So we'll see tonight how that worked out. For this flavor of popsicle I used our New West KnifeWorks The 9 chef knife. I must admit that I am one of those people that is horrified of loosing a hand to a giant chef knife, but I braved it so that we can all enjoy these boozy pops.

Also easy to make

the ingredients

put ingredients in blender, pour liquid into molds

put in your refrigerator, wait 24 hours

and enjoy with friends!

P.S. The liquid from the watermelon margarita popsicles makes a delicious margarita!