Garlic Scape and Salmon Frittata

This is a summer favorite in the Kosher, She Eats kitchen. We grow our own garlic scapes and jalapeños and Kosher Hubby cold smokes his own salmon. (Yes, I know... overachievers.) One Sunday morning we decided to forgo our usual cheesey eggs (another KSE kitchen invention) and make frittatas with whatever was in our fridge. I will share the 'recipe' and preparation instructions below but first some ideas and explanations.What are garlic scapes? There are two main varieties of garlics and many sub-varieties. These two main varieties are hard-neck and soft-neck. Soft-neck garlic looks just like a mutant, large blade of grass. The magic is below ground with the garlic clove. Hard-neck garlics are neat because they give you TWO edible products. The first is the scape, which if left unpicked will become a flower with little bulbils (teeny tiny garlics). However, you can cut them off and eat them. They taste like a cross between garlic and green onion. Obviously, the second product you get from a hard-neck is the garlic clove. Here's a picture of our Kosher puppy with our garlics from last season. You can see the scape begins to curl and are fully curled when they are ready.Okay, ideas... this is sort of a kitchen sink dish. You can put what ever you want in here. We choose jalapeños, scapes, cheddar cheese, and smoked salmon because that is what we had in the house. You can use other types of peppers (hot or sweet), regular garlic, mushrooms, onions, spinach, goat cheese, whatever you want!How many eggs? Well... it's a safe bet to do two eggs per person. It depends on how many people, how big your pan is, and how hungry you are. For the larger size pan that we have, we would recommend six eggs. I am not going to put a quantity below, you can toss as much or as little in as you want!As for pans... we used our older non-stick skillets and no additional oil or spray however, this recipe calls for them to go into the oven SO there are a few caveats.1. Non-stick in the oven decreases the lifetime of the pan. We decided to designate a couple of our pans for oven usage, knowing that they will have to be replaced sooner. Fortunately, non-stick isn't too expensive.2. NO PLASTIC HANDLES IN THE OVEN!!Other option: you can, instead of using a non-stick pan, heavily coat a stainless steel pan with oil/butter/non-stick spray. The goal here is to have the frittata slide right out at the end and not make a mess. You will cut this like a pie, so staying together is a virtue for this recipe. We love this pan (this size is the smaller size we use) - Professional Non-Stick Restaurant Frying Pan Size: 8"- the rubber handle is removable![ingredients]Preparation:

1. Set your oven to broil
2. Dice jalapeños and chop scapes then toss them in the pan with butter to sauté. Sauté for approx. 5 minutes.
3. Crack your eggs into a bowl (NOT THE PAN) and beat them together with approx 1 tablespoon of milk or cream (or half and half if you are out) per egg.
4. Pour the egg mixture into the pan with the veggies and let cook for a minute or two and then layer the salmon on top.
5. Grate cheese on top of the mixture. Add as much as you like.
6. Here's the tricky part... when to put in the oven - let the eggs cook until they begin to set up on the outer ring of the pan. It is now time to put it in an oven. Put it on the top rack, right under the broiler.
7. Keep watch on the frittata and pull it out when it begins to get golden brown on the top.
8. Pull the frittata out and serve immediately. You can top with chopped chives or dill. We did one of each and really enjoyed both!

The process in pictures: See it starting to set up/cook on the sides? Time for the oven! Post oven... no flipping necessary! Those are chives! And that is dill!

Kosher Cheeses

With all these recent (ok two...) dairy recipes we have been trying, I got to thinking about Kosher cheeses. Kosher Hubby and I don't use cholov yisroel cheese (if that is Greek to you, that's ok, I'll explain below) but we try to steer clear of animal rennet. So let's talk cheese.What makes cheese Kosher?

Ok. So first and foremost... if the animal that makes the cheese is Kosh... then so is it's milk. However, there are two types of cheeses... soft and hard. Soft cheese (cream cheese, cottage cheese, even brie) are what they call "acid-set." They add bacterial cultures to milk and it forms soft curds (with liquid whey). These are usually Kosher,  most folks will still look for a hechsher because of the production equipment. It is the hard cheeses that pose some issues.

Hard cheeses are rennet-set. This means they add rennet enzymes to milk then firm cheese curds form with liquid whey. There are so many shades to this conversation but let us say this... rennet comes from the stomach of animals, most often from cows.  Additionally, there are some artificial rennets out there.

Just to add another dimension, some folks ban cheeses that are not made by Jews/Jewish companies. It comes from issues around understanding if the rennet came from a Kosher cow (aka when slaughtered, was it un-diseased). It is literally called gevinat akum (non-Jewish cheese).

What is Cholov Yisroel?

Cholov Yisroel is an extra stringency involving milk and milk products. In this case, every thing from start to finish (milking to packaging) was supervised by an observant Jew. This is to ensure that there are no unseen problems and make sure that your dairy products are of the highest kashrut standards. There was, at one time, fears that a farmer might mix in some milk from a non-kosher animal (horses, pigs) to the cow or goat milk. There are many groups that observe this stringency, including Chabad.

Where can I find yummy Kosher cheese?

Good question! Well, one way is to make it! Perhaps Kosher Hubby and I will make mozzarella one day for the blog. He has done it in the past and said it's delish! But for ease of use, you can buy a lot of good cheese out there. A favorite in the Kosher, She Eats home is Tillamook Kosher Cheddar. We call this "egg cheese" in our house because we love it on eggs in the morning! It's no longer easy to find true Italian Parmigiano that is Kosher any more. Here's an article on the death of this delicious cheese. As mentioned in the article Parmigiano has a nice cousin, Grana Padano. You can find it in stores or here though it is not easy to come by and expensive. The Cheese Guy is awesome. He has TONS of varieties. I haven't tried his brand personally but as far as cheeses I enjoy... check out the Parmesan and Pecorino. He's got a great selection. Here is another site with a decent selection of cheeses. Zabar's has some kosher cheeses too. And one last site with kosher cheese options.

Here is a really good article about how cheese is made and about the Kashrut of cheese: Say Cheese! I really recommend reading it! Great details on most of what I addressed here!