Cooking with Paula Lambert, and lots of cheese

Last week during my trip to Phoenix, I was lucky enough to attend a cooking class with Paula Lambert, a cheesemaker extraordinaire who lives in Dallas.

Paula started making her own cheese before it was cool. A trip to Italy inspired her, and in 1982, she opened up The Mozzarella Company in Dallas’s Deep Ellum neighborhood. Today she has an online shop, two cookbooks (one is called Cheese, Glorious Cheese), and accolades from The James Beard Foundation and national food magazines.

I’d heard of her when I lived in Dallas. In the same room with her, though, I was kicking myself for not visiting her shop more often. She’s funny, smart and charismatic. She really doesn’t seem to notice that she’s a big-deal cheesemaker, and you’re a home cook who doesn’t even know how to pronounce “marscapone.”

Anyway, the cooking class, no big surprise, focused on cheese. It was held at the Phoenix home of Barbara Fenzl, a chef who offers cooking classes under the name Les Gourmettes Cooking School. Each class is small and intimate, conducted in Fenzl’s kitchen.

My mother-in-law is a frequent guest at Fenzl’s classes, and she’s the one who brought me along. About a dozen of us sat in chairs in the breakfast nook while Paula prepared the cheese-centric menu.

First up was warmed goat cheese with sun-dried tomato coulis…

Then pea soup with mint and marscapone….

And poached salmon with feta mayonnaise, served with arugula salad with fennel, orange and ricotta salata.

Finally, for dessert, a deliciously messy angel-food marscapone berry trifle.

I didn’t take any pictures while she was cooking, because I felt conspicuous. (The whole “approaching strangers with my camera” fear reared its head.) The photos above came afterward, when we ate everything in Barbara’s dining room.

Each dish was delicious, but I especially loved the salad. Fennel is still pretty unfamiliar to me, and its delicate licorice taste matched really well with the bright citrus. The goat cheese appetizer was great too, and so simple — a warmed spoonful of goat cheese, smeared on bread with a tangy tomato sauce. (Think I may use slow-roasted tomatoes instead, seeing as how sun-dried aren’t carried at my local supermarket. Or maybe… tomatillos?)

Paula gave me permission to reprint the recipes below, so here they are, after the jump.

Arugula, fennel and orange salad with ricotta salata
Copyright© 2007 by Paula Lambert, Cheese, Glorious Cheese, all rights reserved
Serves 4 to 6

Ingredients

1 bulb fennel
2 oranges
1/2 small red onion
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons sherry vinegar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
About 5 ounces arugula (7 cups)
1/2 cup shaved ricotta salata, feta, or, if you live in Mexico and can’t get either of those, queso añejo

Cut the root end, the stalks and the fronds off the fennel. Cut the bulb in half vertically. Place the cut side downward on the chopping board, and slice the fennel into very thin slices.

To prepare oranges: remove the peel with a knife, by first cutting off the bottom of the orange so it stands by itself on the chopping board. Then cut off the peel on the sides of the orange by proceeded from the top of the orange down to the bottom. Turn the orange and continue slicing away the peel, removing all the bitter white pith. Using a knife, remove the orange wedges without the interior membranes. To do this: cut inwards to the core of the orange with the knife against the membrane, and immediately turn the knife and cut outward from the center, in one fell swoop. Remove any orange seeds.

Cut the onion in the thinnest possible slices. Transfer the fennel, orange and onion to a medium bowl.

Combine the olive oil, vinegar, salt and pepper in a small bowl, and whisk to emulsify the dressing. Pour the dressing over the fennel-onion-orange mixture and stir to coat. Transfer to the refrigerator and marinate for at least 30 minutes.

At serving time, place the arugula in the salad pour, and pour the marinated fennel-orange mixture over the greens. Toss well. Sprinkle ricotta salata (or queso añejo) over the salad and toss again. Serve chilled.

Warmed Goat Cheese with Sun-dried Tomato Coulis©
Copyright© 2007 by Paula Lambert, Cheese, Glorious Cheese, all rights reserved
Serves 4

*Hoja santa is a large green herbal leaf that permeates the cheese with a minty-sassafrassy flavor. In Mexico, it’s used for wrapping chicken and fish that are then steamed in banana leaves. If you can’t find the hoja-santa wrapped goat cheese, you can take a chunk of goat cheese and roll it in nuts, or breadcrumbs.

Ingredients

12 sun-dried tomatoes, dry rather than oil-packed
1 clove garlic
4 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 baguette
1 5 oz. disc of hoja-santa wrapped goat cheese*

For the tomato coulis, place the sun-dried tomatoes in a small bowl, cover with hot water and allow to plump for at least 30 minutes. Drain the tomatoes and discard the soaking liquid. Place the tomatoes, garlic and olive oil in the workbowl of a food processor. Process until the tomatoes are finely chopped, scraping down the mixture occasionally. Set aside at room temperature.

Preheat the oven to 375F. Put the baguette directly on a rack in the oven to warm.

Place the leaf- or nut-wrapped goat cheese on a small, non-stick baking pan. [Note: you can also slice the goat cheese first, if you’re in the mood.] Bake for seven to 10 minutes, until the goat cheese softens and begins to bulge out at the bottom.

Pour the tomato coulis onto a serving plate, and spread it out to cover the plate. Remove the goat cheese from the pan using a flat, metal spatula and place it in the center of the plate on top of the tomatoes. Remove the baguette from the oven, and slice it thinly into 1/4-inch slices. Place the bread in a separate bowl or basket.

Just before serving, cut a wedge out of the goat cheese and position it to the side, so that the warm goat cheese inside the leaf oozes out. [YUM.]

Serve immediately with sliced baguette.