Last summer, as a passionate yet clueless new gardener, I delighted over everything my small, South City garden produced. From the zucchini which grew to the size of woody baseball bats seemingly overnight to the mint which spread like weeds (I later realized mint is a weed), I hauled anything remotely edible to my kitchen as I lovingly tried to put it to use. Having the best luck with my basil and tomatoes, for months, I gorged myself on caprese salads: so fresh, fast and delicious. But then September came and my excitement for my go-to salad began to waiver. And then there was October, and although I was tempted to just cook the tomatoes down to a sauce, I urged myself to continue to eat them raw, knowing I would kick myself over the winter when all the grocery store offerings tasted so bland. But when November came, and my kitchen was still infiltrated with green tomatoes ripening on every windowsill, I knew that I couldn’t do it. I was going to be the first person in the history of the world to actually die of a caprese salad overdose.

That’s why when I was assigned Cindy Pawlcyn’s Cindy’s Supper Club: Meals from Around the World to Share with Family and Friends to cook from, I felt myself immediately drawn to her introduction for her Turkish tomato salad. She writes, “If you have tried too many panzanella and caprese salads like I have, you will find this colorful, refreshing salad a nice change.”

Her book, featuring recipes from countries all over the world, has so many enticing dishes to try, but since my tomato plants were already in the ground, I knew adding a new tomato salad recipe to my arsenal needed to be my first priority.

As any summer salad should be, this one is easy to put together and isn’t excessive on ingredients so the fresh produce can shine. Finding some of the ingredients proved to be a bit tricky, though. As if she knew sumac, an acidic and slightly sour Turkish spice, would be hard to find, Pawlycn includes a simple substitute: lemon zest. After making some calls; however, I was able to locate the spice at Jay International Food Co. A giant bag of the beautiful magenta-colored spice cost me next to nothing, and now I have enough of it leftover to get me through the summer.

The other tricky ingredient was the pomegranate molasses. Since pomegranates grow abundantly in the Mediterranean, finding the molasses in Turkey is probably a cinch. Yet, as hard as I tried, I couldn’t find it anywhere in St. Louis. The closest I found was a pomegranate jelly from Schnucks. Afraid it would be too sweet and not the right texture, I mixed it with a bit of sorghum and the dressing ended up tasting great.

Next time, though, if I still can’t find it, I might try crushing some pomegranate seeds into regular molasses. The rest of the salad came together in seconds and tasted slightly sweet, slightly sour and pretty much perfect. It also looks beautiful on a plate, which will be great when I make it to bring to summer barbecues.

Tomato Salad with Sumac, Feta and Tarragon
Serves 6

Dressing

1 clove garlic, smashed
Juice of ½ lemon (about 1 Tbsp.)
2 Tbsp. pomegranate molasses
2 tsp. ground sumac*
Leaves from 2 or 3 thyme sprigs
½ cup plus 1 Tbsp. olive oil
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Salad

6 perfectly ripe heirloom or other delicious tomatoes, cut into slices or wedges
1 cup small, colorful cherry tomatoes, halved if large
2 shallots or 1 small red torpedo onion, thinly sliced
Freshly ground black pepper
½ cup crumbled mild feta or shaved ricotta salata cheese, for garnish
Leaves from 2 or 3 tarragon sprigs, for garnish

• To make the dressing, in a small bowl, whisk together the garlic, lemon juice, pomegranate molasses, sumac and thyme. Gradually whisk in the olive oil in a slow, steady stream and continue to whisk until well emulsified.
• Season with salt and pepper and reserve until needed.
• Arrange the tomato slices on a platter or on individual plates. Sprinkle with the cherry tomatoes and shallots, separated into rings.
• Drizzle with dressing, then season with pepper and garnish with cheese and tarragon.

* Available at Jay International Food Co., 3172 S. Grand Blvd., St. Louis, 314.772.9393

Reprinted with permission from Ten Speed Press.

When cooking for a crowd, what’s your favorite salad to make in the summer? Tell us about it in the comments section below for a chance to win a copy of Cindy’s Supper Club. We’ll announce the winner in next week’s By the Book column.

And now, we’d like to congratulate Hao, whose comment on last week’s By the Book has won her a copy of Michael Chiarello’s Bottega. Hao, keep an eye out for an email from the Sauce crew. 

Restaurateur Dave Bailey, owner of Baileys’ Chocolate Bar, Rooster, Bridge and Baileys’ Range, is expanding again.

In a press release, Bailey relayed, “Ten years ago, right before I opened Baileys’ Chocolate Bar, I knew that I wanted to open several restaurants (a burger restaurant, a dessert bar, a breakfast joint, a beer bar, and more), but opening a vegetarian restaurant was at the top of that list. At the time, I didn’t have the right space, I didn’t have the right menu, I didn’t have the right staff … but now I do.”

The vegetarian restaurant, set to open in early fall of this year, will be named Small Batch. Located in Midtown Alley on Locust Street, a block from Pappy’s Smokehouse in the old Ford Motor Building, the restaurant will feature a 25-foot marble bar, a mezzanine level with seating for 34, and large windows on the ground floor that open to create an open-air sidewalk patio.

Peter Clark and Stephen Trouvere, Bailey’s executive chefs, are working with Bailey to create a menu that crosses ethnicities and is, as Bailey described, “designed to provide satisfying and vibrant food that will make sure that the meat is not missed.”

In addition to vegetarian fare, the bar at Small Batch will focus on American whiskeys and bourbons. Starting June 1, Small Batch’s website, www.SmallBatchSTL.com, will become live.

In addition to Bailey’s new restaurant, he has moved the bakery out of Range into the same building that Rooster occupies. The bakery will continue to provide fresh breads, desserts and ice creams for all of Bailey’s restaurants. Starting Monday, the bakery will also be making pastries, muffins and loaves of bread available for purchase at Rooster on Mondays through Fridays. In place of the bakery at Range, there is now three more bathrooms and 40 additional seats.

— photo by Jonathan S. Pollack

{Over the past 38 weeks, I’ve ordered some pretty decent mocktails, rediscovered my childhood love for lemonade and volunteered to be DD countless times. But enough is enough! In the twilight hours of my pregnancy, (besides thoughts of the actual baby), I can’t help but obsess over the food and drinks I’ve been missing.}

{A happy hour where I can’t eat the food or drink the alcohol sounds more like the definition of sadness. Therefore, I’ve been avoiding Café Mochi’s Tuesday through Saturday hour of joy for months now. With a great patio walking distance from my house, half price nigiri and sushi rolls, and beer and cocktail specials, spring weather (and this baby) couldn’t have come at a better time. I can almost taste spicy tuna being washed down by a cold Sapporo.}

{Attending a Cardinals game is one of my favorite summertime activities; sitting in the center of a row and having to self-consciously squeeze through people’s knees every time I get up, is less fun – especially when I’m nine months pregnant. Why is beer delivered to your seat but not nachos and ice cream? I can’t wait for the moment when I can summon an ice-cold Schlafly brew without even moving a muscle.} 

{Don’t get me wrong, pregnant women can eat steak, but not how I like it: medium-rare so that when I slice it, blood oozes out all carnivore-like. A center bite of a filet mignon followed by a sip (or, let’s be honest, two or three glasses) of a rich and spicy cabernet sauvignon causes me to viscerally groan in anticipation.}

Sauce Magazine and Left Bank Books couldn’t be more excited to have Michael Pollan as our guest for our next Sauce Celebrity Chef Series event held on Thursday, May 9. From noon to 2 p.m. at Moulin event space, Pollan will chat with us over lunch about his latest book Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation. Pollan will also sign copies of the book and answer questions from the audience.

Globally, through his award-winning books such as The Omnivore’s Dilemma, In Defense of Food and The Botany of Desire, Pollan has been, slowly but surely, changing the way people think about food. Named one of TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in 2010, Pollan is an advocate for change in food policy (And believe it or not, he knows a thing or two about how to make good food!).

Tickets, available here, are $55 and include lunch and a copy of Cooked. Ticket sales close on May 7; do not delay!

In mid-April, The Scoop reported that the soon-to-open vegetarian restaurant Tree House had hired John Intrieri as its executive chef. The lunch and dinner spot, located at 3177 S. Grand Blvd., has since hired Victoria Lopez (pictured) as its head pastry chef. Lopez attended Le Cordon Bleu in Atlanta, Georgia, before moving to St. Louis in 2009. Since then, Lopez has worked at Black Bear Bakery on Cherokee Street and Bixby’s in the Missouri History Museum. Her familial Puerto Rican influences work their way into her desserts, adding another dimension to Tree House owner Bay Tran’s Vietnamese background and Intrieri’s South American and Italian roots. All three are first-generation Americans and are excited to call on the cuisine of their respective heritages, along with their familiarity of American culture, in order to offer a menu with truly global flavors.

Look for Tree House to open by mid to late May.

In honor of spring’s arrival, husband-and-wife chef team Wil and Lisa Fernandez-Cruz are hosting their first annual Calçotada Festival on Sunday, May 19th at Starr’s, located at 1135 S. Big Bend Blvd., in Richmond Heights. Calçotada is an idea borrowed from a yearly traditional festival bearing the same name that originated in the town of Valls, situated in Catalonia, Spain.

After a long winter, the festival celebrates the advent of spring and the fresh food that comes with it. This is achieved by wood roasting calçots (spring onions native to Valls), sausage and lamb, and dipping them (without utensils) into an earthy romesco sauce (all while drinking porróns of free-flowing rosé). Lisa was first introduced to the festival while working at Savoy in New York City, which celebrated Calçotada for nearly 20 years. When Savoy closed, Lisa moved to its sister restaurant Back 40, which also celebrated the festival. “We would bring in loads and loads of people – it’s just the most fun event ever. It’s like everyone coming out from under their rock in order to celebrate spring with so much food and wine,” Lisa said.

The Fernandez-Cruz’ moved to St. Louis from NYC late last summer to be closer to Lisa’s family and to open The Restaurant at the Cheshire, where the two worked as executive chef and executive pastry chef. Weeks ago, Lisa realized that this spring was going to be the first in many years that she didn’t celebrate Calçotada. “One of my friends suggested I throw the party here, and I wanted to, but I knew our house wasn’t big enough.” That’s when she and Wil decided, why throw a party just for their friends when they could throw an event big enough so that the community could come, too.

After six months working for The Cheshire, both Lisa and Wil left their posts, with Wil now running the kitchen at Washington U.’s fine-dining campus restaurant Ibby’s. “Our first six months here were pretty much nonstop work, and we didn’t have a chance to meet anyone in our community,” Lisa explained, adding how both she and Wil were raised in big families where food was always a communal celebration. “We just figured the St. Louis community would enjoy doing the same thing. It’s kind of something I want to pass on. Maybe people will feel inspired and throw their own Calçotada parties next year.”

This inaugural event starts at 2 p.m. on Sunday, May 19. The Fernandez-Cruz’ don’t have an end time in mind – perhaps when the rosé runs dry. Tickets are $50 and include food and all-you-can-drink rosé. Seating is communal, both indoors and outdoors, but if groups want to sit together, they can indicate so on the ticket order, available here.

— photo by Ashley Gieseking

In May, StL Culinary Tours hosted its first food tour; just this month, Dishcrawl added St. Louis to its food tour circuit (The first tour is tonight.); and now there’s a new tour hitting the streets: Savor Saint Louis.

Savor Saint Louis is a project by the Smith family, owners and operators of The Royale Food & Spirits. Savor’s first culinary tour kicks off this Saturday at 11 a.m. on the cobbled streets of the Central West End. The tour lasts three hours and involves one specialty sample dish at five featured restaurants. Tickets for this Saturday’s tour cost $44 and can be purchased here. Tours will continue every Saturday in a variety of historic St. Louis neighborhoods.

Out of Sauce’s stack of French cookbooks , I chose French Bistro by Bertrand Auboyneau because I don’t have a lot of experience cooking French cuisine, and this cover, compared to some of the others, looked inviting. There’s something about a red bistro table that says uncomplicated.

But like the age-old adage, don’t judge a book by its cover. When I started flipping through the pages, filled with gorgeously plated, rich French cuisine, I realized that while the recipes, themselves, didn’t sound all that difficult, obtaining the ingredients was going to be another story. I know I can find beef tongue, monkfish, mullet and pigeon if I look hard enough – but I didn’t want preparing dinner to turn into a week-long scavenger hunt, so I opted for the most familiar-sounding recipe: veal chop served with a creamed morel sauce.

The recipe’s first step was to rehydrate the morels the day before making the veal, but I reasoned, why do that when I can just buy the morels fresh? After all, I had, coincidentally, chosen this recipe smack dab in the middle of morel season. However, not only are wild morels tough to find (Unless you’re Madame Charcuterie, ahem, who likes to blow up Sauce’s Instagram feed with photos of morels but refuses to help a sister out and disclose the location.), fresh morels are also hard to find at the grocery store. I eventually found the right dried morels at Whole Foods, and boy, oh boy, now I know what my next get-rich-quick scheme is going to be: professional morel forager.

The recipe called for three and a half ounces of dried morels, but I believe it should be three and a half ounces of rehydrated morels, since an entire bag of them dried (running at a whopping $20 a bag) only weighed one ounce.

The veal was also, surprisingly, a bit difficult to find, but after making a few calls, I finally located some at Straub’s.

Once I had my ingredients together, the cooking part took no time at all. Literally in 10 minutes, I had prepared a fantastic French meal. I also cooked up some garlicky, rosemary mashed potatoes too, just in case the massive amount of butter and cream I already used with the cream sauce didn’t make me feel fat enough.

Veal Chop in a Creamed Morel Sauce
Serves 4

4 14-oz. (400g.) bone-in veal chops
3½ oz. (100g.) dried morels
2/3 cup (150 ml) milk
7 Tbsp. (100g.) butter, divided
2 shallots, chopped
¾ cup (200 ml) heavy or double cream
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
Freshly ground nutmeg

• A day ahead, rehydrate the morels by soaking them in a scant ¼ cup of milk. Cover and place in the refrigerator overnight.
• To prepare the meat, brown the veal chops in a skillet with half the butter for 5 to 6 minutes on each side. Set aside in a warm place.
• In a separate sauce pan, fry the shallots until lightly browned in the remaining butter. Stir in the cream, and cook for 5 more minutes.
• Add the morels to the sauce, and simmer over low heat for another 5 minutes.
• Return the veal chops to the skillet, and cook for 2 to 5 minutes, depending on desired doneness. Remove the chops when cooked to satisfaction, and arrange on plates.
• Reduce the sauce if necessary, and adjust seasoning. Don’t forget to add a little ground nutmeg just before serving.

Reprinted with permission from Flammarion Press.

What’s your favorite spring vegetable and how do you like to use it the most? Tell us in the comments section below for a chance to win a copy French Bistro. We’ll announce the winner in next week’s By the Book column.

And now, we’d like to congratulate Brandy, whose comment on last week’s By the Book has won her a copy of French Brasserie Cookbook. Brandy, keep an eye out for an email from the Sauce crew. 

The Sweet Divine has had a busy couple of years. Two years ago, the mobile sweets truck rolled onto the streets of St. Louis serving cupcakes, muffins, cake pops, whoopee pies and more to sweet-toothed St. Louisans. Last year, owner Jenna Siebert opened a brick-and-mortar shop at 4521 S. Kingshighway Blvd., in addition to her truck. The shop recently closed and this Saturday is reopening at its new location in Soulard at 1801 S. 9th St.

Why the move? Seibert needed more space. Seibert explained to The Scoop that her new location has double the kitchen space and, what she’s most excited about, a separate, temperature-controlled room for cake decorating. “Now I’ll never have to worry about my icing melting,” she said. In addition to more room for baking, the shop will also have seating for up to 15 people; the old location had only a counter for ordering. Seibert is also expanding her offerings. She will now serve different types of coffee drinks, quiches, more pastries, “and, of course, cupcakes,” she said.

While the shop won’t have any specials for cupcake lovers on opening day, there will be plenty of special events taking place right outside its doors. At 2 p.m., hordes of runners participating in the Tap ‘N’ Run 4K will be racing through the streets of Soulard, offering much entertainment as they complete three full beers at beer-chugging stations along the race course. If a drunk run doesn’t satisfy your intellectual side, stop by The Sweet Divine at 7 p.m. for a cupcake and a break with the Bard. Shakespeare Festival St. Louis’ Shake38 (a 38-play Shakespeare marathon), will be performing A Midsummer Night’s Dream right in front of the shop.

The Sweet Divine’s hours on Saturday are from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. Check back with its Facebook page for hours during the week.

{Grilled Steak Salad}

Friends and business partners Stephen Savage, Lou Groff and Jared Ater are opening their upscale sports bar The Wheelhouse as early as tomorrow, Thursday, April 18. The bar and restaurant, most recently occupied by The Pasta House Co., is located at 15 N. Central Ave., in Clayton.

Savage noted that one of the hardest parts about opening their new spot was deciding on a name. As to the name The Wheelhouse, Savage cited his employee handbook, which defined it as: “A popular term referring to an area of expertise or a particular skill.” For Savage, Groff and Ater, operating a bar is their wheelhouse, Savage noted, as witnessed when the three used to manage Harpo’s together, in Columbia, Mo.

In addition to 34 TVs for sports watching and a menu filled with cocktails, beer and wine, the food menu is what the owners of The Wheelhouse hope will set their bar and restaurant apart from other sports bars. The menu will be prepared by executive chef Nick Del Gaiso, who is the former sous chef at Scape. Del Gaiso attested that almost every product on The Wheelhouse’s menu, from the salad dressings to the smoked jalapeños, is made in-house. The menu features soups, salads, appetizers, wraps, burgers, sandwiches and entrees.

When doors are unlocked on April 18, The Wheelhouse will be open daily from 11 a.m. to 1:30 a.m., while the kitchen will close at 10 p.m. A Sunday brunch is also in the works.

For a sneak peek at what’s in store, head to our Facebook page.

— photo by Michelle Volansky