Scallion pancake with garlic scapes - Chinese restaurant style

If you're like me, sometimes you say to yourself, "Sure, everyone loves Chinese restaurant scallion pancakes, but how do I ward off vampire attacks?"

Well friends, today I have a recipe for you: make scallion pancakes, but substitute garlic scapes for the scallions. And wild garlic scapes are going crazy in north Texas right now. 

What are garlic scapes?

Garlic is a member of the Allium genus, along with onions, scallions, shallots, chives, and others. The garlic we buy in the store is a bulb, and, if planted, will grow a round-stalked green plant that eventually forms another bulb on top. This bulb is actually a cluster of "bulbettes" each of which will eventually form a flower. These bulbettes can break off the main cluster, fall to the ground, and grow a new garlic plant; it's the primary way garlic reproduces. 

In commercial garlic farming, farmers will pick the green plant before it can form this top bulb. You see, if the plant focuses energy on reproduction, it will drain the garlic bulb below the ground for energy. Garlic farmers don't want that, as they want to keep that bulb big and heavy to sell. Picking the green plant will force the bulb (the garlic) to retain it's energy and stay large. 

Recently, people have realized that the picked green plant, called a garlic scape, is a wonderful vegetable in it's own right: with a mild garlic flavor, a texture similar to leeks or scallions, and a zesty green freshness. Though only available in the early spring, you can find garlic scapes at farmers' markets and higher-end grocery stores, where they easily command prices of $10 a pound. Or you can also forage them on your own, for free. 

About the dish

Unlike many of my recipes, this dish requires a lot of time and effort, but it's well worth it. Just like in the best restaurants, these pancakes come out with an incredible balance of flavors and textures. They are crispy on the outside, flakey throughout, and super dense and a little chewy inside. The taste is predominantly garlic, as you would imagine, paired with warm spices and that delicious greasy flavor you can only get from fried foods. 

Though these take a lot of work, you can make extra and freeze them at about 3/4 of the way through the prep work, saving you a bunch of time in the long run. 

Garlic scape Chinese restaurant style pancakes

Makes 4 large (serves 6) or 6 medium (serves 4) appetizer-sized pancakes. Can be halved or quartered. Dish can be prepared up until frying and frozen for later. 

4 cups of all-purpose flour, plus 1 cup

2 large handfuls of garlic scapes

4 scallions, optional

Frying oil of your choice

2 tbs. sesame oil

1 tbs. salt

1 tsp. sugar

Chinese five spice powder

White pepper, optional but suggested if not included in your 5 spice mix 

Sichuan peppercorns, optional

Hot water, as hot as you can touch with your hands

For the dipping sauce

Dark soy sauce (or regular if you don't have dark)

Rice vinegar

Chili oil and/or chili garlic sauce or paste, optional

Sesame seeds, optional

Sesame oil

1. Mix 4 cups of flour, the salt and the sugar in a large bowl with just enough hot water for the flour to come together into a sticky dough ball, about 1.5 - 2 cups. Mix it in a little at a time.
2. Scrape the dough ball out onto a floured surface and to kneed until it comes together and firm up a bit. If you don't work with dough enough to get a feel for it, try 7 minutes of vigorous kneeding. Add more flour to your hands or the work surface, if needed, but try not to add too much or the dough won't be flakey. 
3. Return the dough ball to the bowl and let rest for at least 30 minutes, while you prepare next steps. 
4. Separate the heads of the garlic scapes from the stalks and leaves. Halve or quarter the heads, based on size, and mince the stalks and leaves.
   
   
   
   
   
5. The garlic, while flavorful, tends to get a bit soft when cooked. I like to finely chop a few scallions in, for crispness. If you are using scallions slice them into thin coins and add to the chopped garlic.
6. Add 3/4 of a cup of frying oil and a generous glug of sesame oil to a sauté pan and heat to medium high. Add in some of the garlic scape heads/bulbs, for extra flavor, and stir till fragrant.
   
   
   
7. Whisk in about 1/3  a cup of flour and reduce heat. Continue to whisk until the flour is complete emulsified with the oil, and both are a warm tawny color. Remove from heat.
8. Prepare the dipping sauce: mix equal parts dark soy sauce with rice vinegar. Mix in a drizzle of sesame oil and chili to your taste, if using. Optional: Sprinkle with sesame seeds and/or minced garlic and sliced scallions. 
9. Once your dough ball has sat for 30 minutes, divide it into 4 or 6 pieces. If you divide into 4, each pancake will be about 9in in diameter; if you divide into 6, each pancake will be about 6in in diameter. 
10. Roll out the portion of dough into a rounded rectangle about 1/8 in thick, is ok if it gets a little thin in the middle, it's even ok if it gets a small hole or two. 
11. Using a pastery brush, thinly spread the dough sheet with the flour and oil mixture over the surface of the sheet. It should go close to the edge, but not drip off.
12. Sprinkle with Chinese 5 spice powder, white pepper and ground Sichuan pepper, if using. 
    
    
    
    
    
13. Generously cover the sheet of dough with the garlic and scallions.
14. Working from the long side, start to roll up your sheet of dough into a tube. Don't worry if your roll isn't tight, or if some garlic pokes through, or if some air gets trapped inside. 
    
    
    
    
    
15. Grab each end of the tube and raise in the air. GENTLY bounce up and down like a jump rope, pulling slightly on each edge, to stretch the tube.
16. Lay the tube of dough to rest, and brush the top side with more oil/four mix. Roll the tube into a spiral, like a cinnamon bun, keeping the oil side inside the coil. Set your "bun" aside to rest. Repeat the process with each chunk of dough. 
    
    
    
    
    
17. Sprinkle flour over your rolling surface and with your first spiral of dough and garlic. Use a rolling pin to roll out the spiral to about 1/4 inch thick. You don't really have to worry about runaway garlic, but if you want to, you can remove any that poke through. 
18. Repeat for each spiral. At this point, if you don't plan on eating each pancake right away, you can separate them with freezer paper and freeze in a zip-lock bag.
19.  Heat plain cooking oil a large sauté or cast-iron pan to medium high. Add the flattened spiral pancake to the oil and fry for about 2 minutes. Flip the pancake, and fry for another 2 minutes. Repeat the process for 1-2 minutes more per side, till golden brown and cooked thorough. Repeat for as many pancakes as you like, allow each to cool slightly on paper towels, cut and serve right away with or without the dipping sauce. 

Thanks to Inga Lam's video on scallion pancakes, which I borrowed heavily from when creating this dish. 

This one was my favorite because it came out looking like a certain famous spaceship we all know
but can't legally use the name of :D

Honeyed spruce (or pine) needle cookies. Yes, you CAN eat your Christmas tree!

Preparing for the holidays, I have made several huge messes in the kitchen, which my husband has lovingly cleaned up for his exhausted wife. I love cooking, but I get extremely flustered and tired when I'm trying to prepare multiple meals at the same time!

I think my husband was looking forward to a break in the mess, but fate interviewed, and oops! I did it again! At least I cleaned up after myself this time!

Beautiful fresh blue spruce

Sow Thistle Chips: Like Kale Chips made from Weeds

Final product: tasty! Like a cross between a kale chip and a crispy seaweed snack!

This is the perfect plant for harvest,
but I don't take the dark green, older leaves.

So my husband and I bought a house a few months back, and the entire backyard is weeds, including edible chickweed, purslane, henbit and prickly sow thistle.

Sow thistle generally isn't one of my favorites. But in my backyard figured the growing conditions were ideal: rich soil and partial shade. Plus, with all the rain we've been having, I suspected the plants would be juicy and not the usual tough and stringy. And they were actually really good, just a slight amount of bitterness, like baby kale. 

Sow thistle is a non-native invasive plant, a true weed, so you really don't have to worry too much about sustainable harvesting. If you follow my blog, you know I am a big fan of invasivore eating - basically like locavore eating, but with a focus on invasive species.

Foraged Ramp Pakoras with Tomato Onion Chutney

Apparently this is the first Indian dish I have made for this site, which is strange as Indian is actually the cuisine I prepare most often, about once a week. Indian food is great, especially if you like vegetarian. It can seem daunting to start preparing Indian cuisine, because of the long list of spices and seemingly difficult ingredients, but it's well worth it. And you can get everything you need in one trip to an Indian market. The spices keep for a while, as do things like gluten-free besan (chickpea/garbanzo flour) and basmati rice. Plus the seasonings used, like ginger and turmeric, are incredibly good for you--we are only just starting to fully understand all the health benefits.

Vegetarian Buffalo "Chicken" Mushroom

Buffalo "Chicken" mushrooms are the perfect wild food to bring to your next World Cup, or other sporting event, party. As a foraged, vegetarian take on the popular chicken wing, they are tasty, quick to make, and very approachable to people not used to wild foods.

Laetiporus cincinnatus (the white chicken mushroom)
grows in "rosettes" at the bases of trees.

Plus, the chicken mushroom itself is abundant, often very large (great for party food), and easy to ID, which helps ease the mind of anyone who is mycophobic (afraid of wild mushrooms).

It looks like 2014 is going to be another banner year for Laetiporus growth, especially Laetiporus cincinnatus, the so-called "white chicken" (because it has a white, as opposed to yellow, underside). So go out and hike--the bright orange colors will jump out at you, if you are observant! Enjoy nature, and bring back a fun treat for yourself and all your friends.

Vietnamese-Style Summer Rolls with Black Locust

Black locust blossoms are a tasty treat that are only available for about a week out of every year, right now! Check out my page on how to safely ID black locust. So if you live in the northeast, don't miss out, they are ready for harvest right now!

The beautiful flowers have an indescribable ambrosia scent, and a flavor that's like the sweetest of sweet peas mixed with flowers and a hint of vanilla. They are one of the freshest tastes I can think of, spring-like and bright-tasting.

Vietnamese summer rolls seemed like the natural recipe to try with these blossoms. Unlike the spring rolls or egg rolls of take-out Chinese fame, summer rolls aren't fried. They are filled with fresh herbs (usually mint, basil and sometimes cilantro), and raw veggies sliced thin. Summer rolls are gluten-free, using rice wrappers and cellophane noodles (made from mung bean starch). They are light but filling, and with very minimal cooking they are perfect for a hot night.

Though traditionally made as an appetizer, a few of these is a very filling meal, and without a lot of calories. As attractive finger foods, they are also great as party and picnic fare, and since they are served cool, you they travel well -- take them with you and avoid fast-food or the junk they serve on a plane.

Foraged Recipe: Black Locust & Ricotta Crostini with Wild Mint

Some flowers taste like flowers. Others have a floral quality, but taste primarily like something else. The black locust is one of these, its flowers taste like the sweetest of sweet spring peas, though they have a slightly crunchy texture--like celery.

Around here, black locust blooms are only available for about 2 weeks out of the year, in the late spring. Aside from being delicious, they have the advantage of being very abundant, hard to over-harvest, easy to pick, and pretty easy to identify. Check out my identification post here.

Black locust is frequently used as other edible flowers are used: in baking, or to make syrups. I really don't like to bake, and I wanted to make something that would highlight the pea-like flavors, rather than the floral taste. I also wanted something fresh to celebrate the end of spring. Peas and mint are a pretty classic combo, and cheese makes everything better, right? With wild mint in season, this pretty little appetizer (also good for a light lunch) seemed like a slam dunk. It tastes good, and is attractive an exotic enough to convert even the most hesitant non-forager.

Foraged Knotweed Salsa Verde Recipe

Ok, ok. I absolutely promise that this is my last knotweed post for the year. They are definitely past their prime size, and I had to be very picky and choosy about which stalks I took. And this year the season is a week or two late, usually knotweed is done by early May.

Knotweed at this height is at the end of its season.
It can be eaten before it starts to branch, but must be peeled.

The idea for this recipe came while I was craving salsa verde. At the restaurant  I couldn't shake the feeling that it was familiar, and not just because I had had salsa verde many times in the past. Tomatillos have a zesty freshness, a flavor that combines vegetable flavors with a citrusy kick--a taste I thought was very similar to the lemony flavor of knotweed!

Once done, honestly the flavor is nearly identical to tomatillo-based salsa verde. Even my husband, who doesn't care for knotweed, really enjoyed this recipe. And for you localvores out there, knotweed is a great way to get the flavor here in the Northeast, in the spring, when tomatillos would need to be imported.

Foraged Japanese Knotweed & Ramp Sushi with Garlic Mustard "Wasabi" Recipe

Beautiful, isn't it?

This dish came about a bit by accident. My husband loves to make sushi, and he does a fantastic job. We had some ramps, and decided to use them in place of scallions.

Then I thought of modern fusion sushi dishes, that use cucumber, rice wraps, etc. in place of nori. I really wanted to try it with ramps, since I love new ways to use them raw--besides the ubiquitous "slice and toss into salads". Raw ramps have an intense oniony sweetness, sweeter than the newest, youngest pearl onions, so sweet as to be almost berry-like.

The only thing better than one wild ingredient is two wild ingredients, and my thoughts immediately turned to knotweed. After all, it's Japanese, right? Get it? See what I did there? I crack me up.

Finally, most of the wasabi we get in the States is just colored horseradish anyway, and what foraged item tastes like horseradish? Yup, garlic mustard root.

So all the ideas flew together pretty quick, and I ran out to the park on my lunch break to gather the knotweed and garlic mustard (we did a ramps trip earlier this week).

One word of caution: you really have to enjoy the taste of raw knotweed to like this recipe, but if you do, then the crunchy tartness of the knotweed, mixed with the sweet oniony-ness of the ramps and the stickiness of the rice is really, really good. Alternatively, you could use pickled or blanched knotweed, for a milder flavor and softer texture.