Pumpkin Pie of A Different Sort

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Not your average pumpkin pie. No, siree.

This is my kind of pumpkin pie.

Indeed, it’s made for folks like me who don’t really feel the love when it comes to traditional pumpkin pie.

I dunno, but the time-honored one has always been a little too one dimensional for me.

But “Pumpkin Swirl Ice-Cream Pie with Chocolate-Almond Bark and Toffee Sauce” is anything but that. It’s from “Bon Appetit Desserts” (Andrews McMeel Publishing) by Barbara Fairchild.

It’s a decadent graham cracker crust filled with vanilla ice cream swirled with pumpkin puree mixed with autumn spices, then topped with a mound of whipped cream and craggy pieces of dark chocolate studded with almonds. Serve big wedges with a warm toffee sauce.

Seriously, does plain ol’ pumpkin pie even compare to that?

I think not.

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Amber Dhara Makes Its Mark In Palo Alto

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Shrimp Assamese flavored with galangal, tamarind and lime leaves -- a a dish from North-East India.

A budding new Indian restaurateur recently remarked to me that the establishment he most hopes to compete with is Amber India.

It’s easy to understand why.

The Indian restaurant group, which started more than 13 years ago with its first Amber India restaurant in Mountain View, practically pioneered the art of modern Indian cuisine in the Bay Area.

Weeks ago, it opened its fifth restaurant, Amber Dhara in downtown Palo Alto, in the former location of Junnoon, another modern Indian eatery. If that weren’t enough, you can look for a second Amber Dhara to open in San Francisco’s Mission District in January.

The look of the Palo Alto place hasn’t changed much. Heavy silk drapes and peach banquettes cocooned in dark wood still lend a glam, exotic ambience.

Last weekend, I was invited in as a guest of the restaurant to try some of the new dishes. Amber Dhara, explains Corporate Executive Chef Vittal Shetty, emphasizes small plates and little-seen regional Indian specialties. Think roti ($3.75) — but made with nine grains to give it a deeper, heartier flavor; and “Duck Two Ways” ($20) with a spice confit duck leg plus a seared breast in orange curry. There’s also a range of specialty cocktails, including the “Ginger Sutra” with fresh ginger, vodka and jaggery, which I couldn’t resist.

A tangle of mung lentils, pomegrante seeds and sweet pear slices.

We started with the moong lentil salad ($7) — a vibrant mix of full-throttle crunch from pomegranate seeds and crushed peanuts, as well as sweet Anjou pear slices. A zingy key lime vinaigrette tied it all together.

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A Kale Salad To Stand the Test of Time

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A kale salad that won't wilt on your holiday table.

We all think we can multitask with ease.

We try to learn Spanish while sweating on the Stairmaster — and trying to write the great American novel in our head. We try to watch our favorite TV shows while balancing our checkbook — and knitting a sweater. And during the big holidays, we try to cook 10 dishes simultaneously from scratch that will all go on the table miraculously at once.

At times like that, there’s only one true salvation — kale.

Yes, the hardy green comes to the rescue when we’ve got just one too many cooking tasks to attend to.

In Melissa Clark’s “Raw Kale Salad with Anchovy-Date Dressing,” the veg is a lifesaver as it forms the basis of a salad that can sit quite happily on the table for hours without any worse for wear. It won’t get soggy like spring mix. It’s far more interesting than iceberg. And it actually gets tastier as the leaves start to wilt a little.

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Changing the World One Mushroom at a Time

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Nikil Arora proudly shows off the oyster mushroom kit he helped develop

If you’ve ever doubted the power of education to inspire, just consider University of California at Berkeley grads, Nikhil Arora and Alejandro Velez.

Classmates at the Hass School of Business, Arora, 24 and Velez, 23, were on their way to lucrative careers in investment banking and business consulting after graduating two years ago. But they turned their backs on that after listening to a visiting lecturer talk about how poor, malnourished women in Columbia and East Africa were growing mushrooms in coffee grounds to supplement their diet.

Instead, they maxed out their credit cards to start their own business. Their Oakland-based Back to the Roots turns mountains of discarded Peet’s coffee grounds that would have ended up in the landfill into gourmet oyster mushroom kits now sold at Whole Foods and on the Back to the Roots Web site for $19.95 each.

Mushroom kits in their special display case can be found in all Whole Foods.

In the process, Arora and Velez have created an innovative enterprise that even prompted Business Week to name them among the most promising social entrepreneurs in the United States.

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Patxi’s to Open in Campbell, Unique Chefs of Compassion Event & More

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Time for deep dish. (Photo courtesy of Patxi's)

Patxi’s Opens This Afternoon in Campbell

Get ready for some deep deep dish.

Patxi’s Pizza, which specializes in Chicago-style deep dish pies, is opening its seventh Bay Area location at 4 p.m. today, 1875 S. Bascom Ave. in Campbell in the Pruneyard Shopping Center.

What’s more, from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. Nov. 21, the Campbell locale will hold a grand opening with complimentary samples.

The first Patxi’s (pronounced pah’-cheese) opened in Palo Alto in 2004 by William Freeman and Francisco “Patxi” Azpiroz, who previously worked at the legendary Zachary’s Pizza in Berkeley. The restaurant features four types of pizza (stuffed, pan, thin, and extra-thin), as well as three types of dough (regular, whole-wheat, and a new gluten-free one).

The new Campbell location has special meaning for Freeman, too. “I have deep roots in the Campbell area –my family has farmed land here for a century, and my dad grew up on a walnut and apricot farm on Lawrence Road,” he said in a statement. “So this is a real homecoming for me.”

Exec. Pastry Chef Carlos Sanchez of Parcel 104 picks his ingredients from the food pantry. (Photo courtesy of West Valley Community Services)

Chefs of Compassion

So many chefs are used to cooking with every gourmet product at their disposal.

But what happens when four Bay Area chefs are charged with making a showstopping dish from ingredients found only in the West Valley Community Services food pantry?

You’ll find out if you attend the “Chefs of Compassion Cooking for a Cause” fund-raising event, 5 p.m. Nov. 19 at the Addison-Penzak JCC of Silicon Valley, 14855 Oka Road in Los Gatos.

Executive Chef Chris Schloss of Cin-Cin Wine Bar in Los Gatos; Executive Pastry Chef Carlos Sanchez of Parcel 104 in Santa Clara; Executive Chef Jay Essadki of Morocco’s Restaurant in San Jose and Mountain View; and Executive Chef Nanci Wokas of Cooking with Class will each be preparing one of four courses at this dinner, which will help fund West Valley Community Services hunger and homeless programs.

"Breakfast for Dinner'' by Carlos Sanchez of Parcel 104. (Photo courtesy of West Valley Community Services)

Yours truly will be one of the judges, charged with picking the winning dish, along with Tracy Lee, founder of Dishcrawl; Sheila Himmel, former Mercury News restaurant critic; Linda Zavoral, Mercury News travel editor; and Abby Schwartz, South Bay manager of Yelp.

Tickets are $100 per person.

Chef Daniel Humm Returns to Campton Place for One Night

Chef Daniel Humm of New York’s Eleven Madison Park is returning for one evening to the establishment where he got his start — Campton Place in San Francisco.

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