Grapenut pudding, for the unfamiliar, is a popular New England dessert made of Grape-Nuts cereal, developed at some point in the early 20th century. (Grapenut ice cream is also a delicious specimen of the local repertoire.) There are two recipes that are predominant — one primarily custard, and one primarily grape-nuts.

Over the weekend, I tried, for the first time, to make grapenut pudding on my own, and I added the extra challenge of making it non-dairy. The recipe appearing on Yankee Magazine’s website, of the custard style, was my starting point. While it tasted okay, I ultimately deemed the recipe a failure because the grapenuts failed to stay dispersed within the liquid, creating two unpleasantly discrete pudding strata.

I’m going to dig up my grandmother’s recipe and start there next time.

Attention all lovers of the City of Brotherly Love: Kosher Community Surveys needs your opinion for their Philadelphia Area 2006 survey.

Congregation Nusach Hari B’nai Zion of St. Louis will be hosting its second-annual Kosher Chili Cookoff this Sunday, according to this press release. I’ve always wondered how to properly assure kashrut at such a community-wide event — not only do the organizers require that meat be purchased through the shul, and that their rabbi approve all other ingredients brought to the competition, but they even provide all the cookware and utensils.

For attendees, the $5 entrance fee will get you tasting rights until all the chili’s gone.

As a new free service on the Kosher Blog, I’d like to announce Kosearch.org. It features two highly-tailored custom search engines (powered by Google Coop) that only draw from websites that actual Kosher Bloggers have personally added.

The first search is just for informational resources — essays, shiurim, rabbinic Q&As, certifiers’ websites.
The second search is just for online kosher products and services — fully kosher retail sites, or portions of retail sites with kosher products.

We already have a few hundred sites identified, but I realize that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Use the comments (or the Contact Us link on the left) to submit websites (full sites or particular URLs) that you’d like to see included.

(Kosearch site also available at search.kosherblog.net)

According to the latest KosherToday newsletter, Duncan Hines cake mixes will be going back to a pareve formulation. The Manischewitz mixes were a decent alternative, but I probably won’t be using them if Duncan Hines is available.

In the same vein as my favorite culinary magazine, Alton Brown’s Good Eats takes the science of cooking seriously. His series of episodes on rice, in particular, struck a chord with me. Now-obvious bombshell number one: you gotta cook rice in the oven. There’s just no better way to keep everything at a consistent temperature. Bombshell number two: when cooked properly, brown rice actually tastes good.

Why the sudden proclivity toward brown rice? I’ve been doing my darndest to eliminate processed flours and sugars from my diet, so simple, reproduceable dishes made of whole grains are now at the top of my recipe file.

Alton’s base recipe for brown rice (quoted below) is very straightforward. Note that medium- or short-grain varieties are critical. Long grain simply will not work. (In these parts, Whole Foods has the best selection of smaller-grained rices, but Shaw’s at least carries short-grain Nishiki-brand brown rice in the Asian food section.)

• 1 1/2 cups brown rice, medium or short grain
• 2 1/2 cups water
• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Place the rice into an 8-inch square glass baking dish.

Bring the water, butter, and salt just to a boil in a kettle or covered saucepan. Once the water boils, pour it over the rice, stir to combine, and cover the dish tightly with heavy-duty aluminum foil. Bake on the middle rack of the oven for 1 hour.

After 1 hour, remove cover and fluff the rice with a fork. Serve immediately.

His recipe is surprisingly resilient. I’ve successfully used olive oil instead of butter, used chicken broth in place of the water, butter, and salt, and doubled the recipe for larger gatherings. I’ve successfully left the freshly prepared rice on the warming tray until Shabbat dinner, and frozen leftover rice for reheating later in the week.

His recipe also cries out for embellishment. One simple option: add the zest of a lime and a dried chile or two to the cooking liquid, and serve with Mexican fare. What follows is something a bit more complex, but worth the effort. The cranberries and sage make it a healthful replacement for stuffing alongside that yom tov or Thanksgiving turkey.

BROWN RICE PILAF
• 1 1/2 cups brown rice, medium or short grain
• 2 1/2 cups chicken or vegetable broth
• 1/2 cup dried, sweetened cranberries
• zest of half an orange
• 2 Tbsp. olive oil
• 1 medium onion, finely diced
• 2 stalks celery, finely diced
• 8 oz. sliced mushrooms
• kosher salt
• 4 fresh sage leaves, thinly sliced

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Place the rice, zest, and cranberries into an 8-inch square glass baking dish, or a 1.5 qt. ceramic dish.

Bring the broth just to a boil in a kettle or covered saucepan. Once the broth boils, pour it over the rice, stir to combine, and cover the dish tightly with heavy-duty aluminum foil. Bake on the middle rack of the oven for 1 hour.

While the rice is cooking, heat the olive oil in a large skillet on a medium flame. Add the diced onion, celery, and a heavy pinch of kosher salt, then saute until soft and golden, about 15 minutes. Empty pan into a large bowl, then add sliced mushrooms with another heavy pinch of kosher salt. Saute until mushrooms release their juices and then cook off, about 10 minutes. Add mushrooms to bowl.

Remove rice from oven. (At this point, I let the rice sit, covered, for 1 hour, because I’m unsure of Alton’s intent in repeating “after one hour.”) Remove cover, pour cooked vegetables and sliced sage over rice, and toss everything together. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Serve immediately, or keep warm until ready to eat, or freeze pre-portioned quantities and reheat in the microwave.