Helen Roberts & the Kikkoman Test Kitchen

Chef Helen Roberts is the manager of culinary development and public relations at Kikkoman. She works on consumer recipes using the whole range of Kikkoman products from soy sauce to panko bread crumbs to soy milk and beyond. She used to work in product development and was hired because of her amazing ability to taste subtle differences in 16 different soy sauces! At the time she was hired, she had never even tried Japanese food.


I recently got to visit Helen and her test kitchen in downtown San Francisco. What a treat! Helen is friendly, enthusiastic and has a great sense of humor, and so it was no surprise to see that her recently renovated test kitchen in San Francisco is cheerful and lively as can be. The kitchen has a big island, two stoves and a large refrigerator. It also has a big flat screen television with cooking shows on all the time and the radio set to "old school." By the way, is there anything better than cooking with Prince playing in the background?


I had a great time cooking with Helen, whipping up some recipes for Valentine's Day. She was working on a version of a recipe she swears convinced her husband to propose to her. She fills puff pastry shells with a cajun spiced cream sauce (made with soy milk) and shrimp sauteed in butter. Helen made us a snack to nibble on while we cooked and shared tips with me such as use a splash of soy sauce in the water when you blanch vegetables instead of salt.

I made one of Helen's recipes for crab stuffed mushrooms which came out beautifully which is a testament to her skills, because I was so distracted chatting that I did not follow the directions as well as I should have.


The other recipe I made was from 1984, and it was not created by Helen. It shows how much tastes change. The original recipe for Artichokes with Zesty Blue Cheese Dip called for only one tablespoon of blue cheese! Needless to say, it needed a little more. Ok, a lot more. I've adapted it here if you'd like to try it. Helen's office mates liked it a lot. I think it's a great choice for Valentine's Day, after all, it has plenty of heart.

Note: since this recipe calls for boiling rather than steaming, and I found the artichokes I used cooked very quickly. If you prefer, you can cook the artichokes any way you like.

Artichokes with Zesty Blue Cheese Dip(adapted from the Kikkoman Kitchen)
4 servings

Ingredients

4 medium (about 8 oz. each) artichokes 

Water
1/2 cup mayonnaise 

1/2 cup finely chopped fresh mushrooms 

2 Tablespoons minced green onions
6 Tablespoons crumbled blue cheese 

2 teaspoons Kikkoman Less Sodium Soy Sauce 

Grated peel and juice of 1/2 fresh lemon

Instructions

To prepare artichokes, slice 1 inch off tops; discard. Cut off stems even with base; remove small outer leaves. Trim off sharp leaf tips (about 1/2 inch) with kitchen shears or paring knife or scissors. Rinse artichokes under cold water. (To prevent darkening, rub lemon half on cut edges of artichokes.) Arrange artichokes upright in saucepan. Add water to depth of 2 inches. Bring water to boil; reduce heat and simmer, covered, 20 minutes, or until leaves pull out easily.

Meanwhile, combine mayonnaise, mushrooms, green onions, blue cheese, less sodium soy sauce, lemon juice and peel.

Drain artichokes; cool enough to handle. To serve, spoon the blue cheese mixture into a bowl, and serve with the artichokes.

Enjoy!

My visit to General Mills

Last week General Mills invited around 50 bloggers to come visit their corporate headquarters. I was a little wary. After all, I'm not a big consumer of packaged foods, but the lure of seeing the test kitchens and photo studio proved incentive enough, and I was in!

The evening I arrived there was a welcome reception and dinner at the Mill City Museum. The museum has terrific interactive exhibits about the mill, and there was also lots of early advertising and packaging from Pillsbury and Gold Medal brands. I particularly liked seeing the ruins of the old factory and dramatic views from the observation deck, that really give you a feel for the history of the city and how important milling was.

The next day bright and early,we headed to the test kitchens. They have 16 stations and test and develop 2000 recipes a year! Not all the test kitchen staff was present, but I was told they have about 15 employees. It was a dream kitchen, light and airy with huge glass windows looking out on the manicured landscaping. I can't imagine a nicer space to work on recipes. If I worked at General Mills, those kitchens would spoil me so I'd never want to cook at home, ever again.

In terms of the products, I can't say I fell head-over-heels in love with anything. I just don't eat much cold cereal or snack food, (products which Michael Pollan likes to call "food like substances" due to how processed they are). My favorite product was probably the Progresso Creamy Tomato Basil soup. It had very few ingredients, a fresh basil and tomato flavor and pleasing texture.

Though I buy imported Italian tomatoes for sauce, I also buy Muir Glen fire roasted tomatoes because they are very consistent and add a terrific smoky flavor to soups, stews and sauces. I learned that Muir Glen is planting some heirloom varieties of tomatoes and handpicking them for limited edition cans. I can't wait to try them when they become later this year. If you're interested in heirloom canned tomatoes too, join the "Tomato Connoisseurs Club."

Overall I was impressed with how General Mills is clearly responding to consumers demand for products that are organic, gluten-free, and with no artificial flavors and colors. I told them I wasn't even interested in trying anything made with sucralose, to me it leaves a nasty aftertaste. And while it was too sweet for me, the Cascadian Farm organic dark chocolate granola was an interesting product introduction. I suggested they consider cocoa nibs instead of dark chocolate, you never know, it could happen...

Next up--a visit to the photo lab...

Test Kitchen Tales

I became a recipe developer by accident, and not by design. I posted some of my favorite recipes online and not long after I was contacted by various companies and publishers to help create recipes for them as well. It's been wonderful to do something I love and make a living at it.



My process is the same as it always was, I am inspired by any number of things, it could be the season, an ingredient, a place, even a memory. I do lots of research, reading recipes in cookbooks, on blogs, magazines, and even asking friends and family for help. I create an outline of what I intend to do and take it into the kitchen. I cook and take notes and then I taste. I also have an official taste tester, Lee. Between the two of us we discuss and dissect and I tweak the recipe to get it to the point that I am satisfied.



While in New York last month I got to spend some time with recipe developers at Saveur, Everday Food and Gourmet. I saw their kitchens, tasted their food and chatted with them about how they get the job done. Some of the kitchens were large, some were small. All had cookbook shelves and counters for notetaking. Their process involved more group critiques than mine and I learned Gourmet recipes can take a month and a half to create! I have never gotten as much as a week per recipe from any of my clients.



Generally speaking, one thing I don't have to do is convince anyone about my recipes. Here's a kitchen story told to me by Gourmet test kitchen editor Gina Marie Miraglia Eriquez. The staff at Gourmet was unconvinced of the value of pressure cookers. Only after making a certain recipe, without admitting the use of the pressure cooker, were they won over; that recipe is in this month's edition on page 98, it's for Tuscan Lamb Shanks with White Beans.



After a quick browning of the meat and sauteing of the vegetables all the ingredients including unsoaked beans(!) are placed in the pressure cooker and 30 minutes later? Done! Having tasted it I can tell you it's a winner. So was this ridiculously good recipe for Banana Upside Down Cake, another clear favorite among attendees to the Gourmet Institute.