Newish Cheese

Dunbarton Blue is one of our latest cheeses here at Z&H, it is an earthy, cheddared-blue, open air cured, with essence of an English cheddar, and a subtle flavor of a fine blue cheese.

Our current wheel has very delicate veining but we understand this varies from wheel to wheel.

Not widely available yet, Dunbarton is named after a Wisconsin township and the cheese maker has been tinkering with the recipe for more than a year. He makes the cheese by hand in a small, 300-gallon artisan cheese vat in his small creamery between Shullsberg and Darlington. The dairy is renovating the original cave - surrounded by earthen walls on three sides with a rock wall foundation -- and plan to age the next batch on site.

Come in and try this subtle wonder.

The Z&H adventure.

Just a note. Z&H is looking for for food lovers to join our 'team'.

Mole Poblano Recipe...using Taza Chocolate

Mole Poblano. Mole Poblano is Mexico's classic dark mole sauce; it's the one most Americans think of when they hear the word 'mole'. The addition of Taza Chocolate (sold here at Z&H), helps give this sauce its remarkable color and depth of flavor.

Ingredients:

• 9 mulato chiles
• 7 pasilla chiles
• 6 ancho chiles
• 1 cup plus 9 tablespoons lard + additional as needed
• 5 tomatillos, husked and cooked until soft
• 5 whole cloves
• 20 whole black peppercorns
• 1- inch piece of a Mexican cinnamon stick
• 1 teaspoon dry Mexican oregano
• 1 tablespoon seeds from the chiles, toasted
• 1/2 teaspoon anise seeds, toasted
• 1/4 teaspoon coriander seeds, toasted
• 8 tablespoons sesame seeds, toasted
• 4 garlic cloves, roasted
• 3 tablespoons raisins
• 20 whole pecans
• 20 whole almonds, blanched
• 1/4 cup pumpkin seeds
• 2 corn tortillas, torn into pieces
• 3 stale French rolls, cut into 1-inch slices
• 2 plantains, peeled
• 1 bunch thyme, chopped
• 1 cone piloncillo
• 6 - 7 cups chicken stock, as needed
• 1 1/2 ounces Taza Chocolate Mexicano, chopped

To prepare:

1. Clean the chiles by removing stems, veins and seeds; reserve 1 tablespoon of the seeds. Toast chiles in a dry skillet until crisp, about 10 to 15 seconds, turning once; make sure they do not burn. Put chiles in a nonreactive bowl, cover with hot water, and set aside for 30 minutes.

2. Drain chiles, reserving the soaking water. Puree the chiles in a blender with enough of the soaking water to make a smooth paste. It may be necessary to scrape down the sides and blend several times to obtain a smooth paste.

3. In a heavy casserole heat 1/2 cup lard over medium heat and add chile puree (be careful it will splatter). Cook for about 15 minutes, stirring often. Remove from heat and set aside.

4. Puree tomatillos in a blender. In a coffee or spice grinder, grind the cloves, peppercorns, cinnamon, and toasted seeds. Add seed mixture and garlic to the pureed tomatillos and blend until smooth. Set aside.

5. Heat 6 tablespoons lard in a heavy frying pan. Fry each of the following ingredients and then remove with a slotted spoon: the raisins until they puff up; the almonds and pecans to a golden brown; the pumpkin seeds until they pop. If necessary, add enough oil to make 4 tablespoons and fry the tortilla pieces and bread slices until golden brown, about 15 seconds per side; remove from the skillet with a slotted spoon. Add raisins, almonds, pecans, pumpkins seeds, tortillas, thyme and bread to the tomatillo puree and blend, using 1 to 2 cups chicken stock, as needed, to make a smooth sauce. This may have to be done in batches.

6. In a heavy casserole, heat 3 tablespoons oil over medium heat. Add chile puree, tomatillo puree, piloncillo and Mexican chocolate (it will splatter). Cook over medium heat for about 15 minutes, stirring often.

7. Add remaining 5 cups chicken stock, cook over low heat for an additional 45 minutes, stirring often enough to prevent the mixture from scorching on bottom.

Pizza Stones

Is it us or do Pizza Stones scream CHRISTMAS!? And they were essentially invent by Julia Child.

We love happy customers

"The Thanksgiving food was extraordinary!!!!! Thank you so much for making a great family gathering possible for us. The turkey was the best ever -- it could have been on the cover of a magazine -- I did just what you said -- beautiful and moist. The ham was the best I have ever tasted. And, all the trimmings were what I dream about when I think of Thanksgiving dinner.
I hope you had a great holiday with your families. Thank you so much for what you do."

That made our day.

Happy Thanksgiving

We would like to thank everyone who chooses to spend time with us at Z&H. We have a lot to be thankful for this year, and the many new friends and great people we have met makes each day terrific. We hope that everyone has a great day and we will see everyone on Friday. We call it 'sandwich Friday', you need fuel to shop.

Brining the Bird

We have an excellent brine for your holiday birds, and a question we get everyday is, Why Brine? Simply put, it makes the bird more succulent. But there is science as well. Delicious science. Roasted turkey breast suffers a sad fate when cooked even a few minutes longer than necessary: dryness. And because turkey is so lean it is a pronounced dryness. The solution is simple. Soaking your turkey in a brine—a solution of salt and water—will ensure a moister and juicier bird.

Moisture loss is inevitable when you roast a bird. Heat causes proteins in the fibers to denature, resulting in some shrinkage and moisture loss. Normally, meat loses about 30 percent of its weight during cooking. But if you soak the bird in a brine first, you can reduce this moisture loss during cooking to as little as 15 percent.

Brining enhances juiciness in several ways. For one, muscle fibers simply absorb liquid during the brining period. Some liquid gets lost during cooking, but as the bird is more juicy at the start of cooking, it ends up juicier. Brined birds typically weigh six to eight percent more than they did before brining, proof of moisture uptake. Another way that brining increases juiciness is by dissolving some proteins. A mild salt solution can dissolve some of the proteins in muscle fibers, turning them from solid to liquid.

Of all the processes at work during brining, the most significant is salt's ability to denature protein. The dissolved salt causes some of the proteins in muscle fibers to unwind and swell. Water from the brine binds directly to these proteins, but even more important, water gets trapped between these proteins when the bird cooks and the proteins bind together. Some of this would happen anyway just during cooking, but the brine unwinds more proteins and exposes more bonding sites. As long as you don't overcook the meat, which would cause protein bonds to tighten and squeeze out a lot of the trapped liquid, these natural juices will be retained.

How long to brine depends on the size and type of bird you've have. A whole turkey will require much more time for the brine to do its thing. In fact, any bird that's brined for too long will dry out and start to taste salty as the salt ends up pulling liquid out of the muscle fibers. Turkey is the ideal candidate for brining; Keep your bird refrigerated during brining, rinse it well afterwards, and don't overcook your holiday friend. If you need more liquid to completely submerge the bird, measure more and add it, along with the proportionate quantity of salt.

In addition to kosher salt, Z&H brine has a treasure trove of herbs and spices as well as turbinado sugar. All this adds flavor as well as moisture to your bird without masking the taste. Try the Z&H brine this year. It will become a new tradition.