A Month-of-Appetizers: Umami It

Yesterday I mentioned having an array of tastes if serving several appetizers. One of those tastes may have been unfamiliar to you: umami.

Back in the day, I was taught in science class that there were four flavors: sweet, sour, salty, and bitter. Our tongues supposedly had areas where taste buds specialized in those flavors. Or something like that. It was a looooong time ago!

For generations people, most people, accepted the conventional wisdom. But some sophisticated palates recognized that there was this one taste that didn’t fit. Some scientists argued that if they couldn’t classify it, it just wasn’t real! Are you kidding me??? As far back as Escoffier, the taste was real and realized in his veal stock.

It took a Japanese scientist to unravel the mystery taste which he named “umami” meaning something like, “delicious”. The flavor comes from high levels of glutamate, an amino acid.

Umami is a meaty, savory flavor. It is that taste in seaweed, potatoes, mushrooms, anchovies (below the salt taste), green tea, and tomatoes, for example. Breast milk is an umami taste!

Today, we’re going to get your umami on with baked potato skins and savory grilled mushrooms, so you get a two-fer with this post. Three, if you count the baked potato soup.

Baked Potato Skins (serves 4)

2 potatoes

olive oil

sea salt

2 strips of bacon, cooked crisp and crumbled

4 tablespoons sharp cheddar cheese, grated

4 tablespoons plain Greek yogurt

1 green onion, thinly sliced

Heat oven to 400°. Wash potatoes and dry thoroughly. Make an X on each side of each potato and bake for about an hour, until just tender. Remove from oven and turn heat up to 450°.

Cut potatoes in half long-ways and let cool enough to handle.

Scoop out potato middle leaving about ¼ inch of potato attached to the skin. (Use the scooped out potato in this potato soup recipe http://bit.ly/ytRRcZ.)

Rub each potato, inside and out with a small amount of olive oil, just to coat the surface lightly. Sprinkle all sides with salt. Put back into oven on baking sheet. Bake for about 10 minutes on each side. Remove from oven.

Fill each potato cavity with cheese and bacon. Return to oven and broil until cheese is bubbly. Top each potato skin with yogurt and onion. Serve immediately.

Savory Grilled Portobello Mushrooms (serves 4)

2 Portobello mushrooms

2 tablespoons savory butter, very soft

(Recipe at: http://sharonarthurmoore.blogspot.com/2010/12/tweet-me-well-good2tweat.html)

Heat grill to medium high. Prepare a grilling basket or skillet with non-stick spray.

Clean mushrooms. Place gill side up in the basket or skillet.

Spread one tablespoon of savory butter in each mushroom as evenly as possible. Grill until tender (about 5-10 minutes).

Cut each mushroom into quarters and serve with a fork for squeamish folks who don’t use their fingers!

DH’s Rating: Baked Potato Skins: 5 Tongues Up. What’s not to love about potatoes, cheese, and onions?

DH’s Rating: Savory Grilled Portobello Mushrooms: 5 Tongues Up. This is one of his favorite appetizers. We often serve it at our parties.

A Month of Soups: Loaded Baked Potato

DH loves baked potatoes for dinner, either as an accompaniment or as dinner by itself (loaded with goodies, of course). Whenever I am making a bunch for guests, or even just us, I bake up a few extra so I can make this soup or its plainer cousin. We like all kinds of potato soup, even cold vichyssoise. But for you, here’s the deluxe hot potato soup!

First, though, for the best soup, you must bake the potatoes in the oven not in the microwave. Real baking seems to change the flavor as well as the texture.

First, set the oven to 425°. While the oven is heating, I wash the potatoes well, dirty little things that they are, and dry them off. Cut a small x on each side. I coat my hands with a bit of olive oil and give each potato a massage. Last, I roll each potato in a dish with fresh ground sea salt so there’s a nice little coat on each. I learned that bit from Alton Brown.

Once the potatoes are baked, I cut them into big chunks and do a rough mash. Now follow the recipe below to have your very own bowls of this terrific soup.

Loaded Baked Potato Soup (serves ~6-8)

6 large potatoes, baked

1 medium onion, diced

1 T butter

1 T olive oil

¼ pound steak, diced

6 c Half-and-Half, divided

1½ c sour cream

¾ c sharp cheddar, grated, divided

2 green onions, sliced diagonally

6 slices of bacon, crispy-cooked and crumbled

1 T chives

Mash the potatoes, skin on, to make bite size chunks. Set aside the biggest chunks in a bowl. In another bowl, keep the smaller chunks. They should be about equal amounts.

Put the larger chunks in your food processor or blender with ½ cup of the Half-and-Half. Puree. Set aside.

Sauté the diced onion in the sizzling oil and butter in a Dutch oven or large pot. Stir to keep from burning. Remove the onions when they are translucent. Put in cubes of steak and brown on all sides. If you want your steak less rare, cook longer. Remove the steak to another bowl.

Put onions back in the pot. Add the Half-and-Half and potato puree and the bowl of small chunks of potato. Simmer over low heat for 30 minutes. Add sour cream and ½ cup of the cheese. Stir until well blended. Put soup into bowls and sprinkle with green onions, cheese, bacon, chives, and steak chunks.

DH’s Rating: 4.5 Tongues Up. His only complaint--too filling! Hey! Did I claim this was a diet food?