This is sort of a cheat post because this isn't really cooking. It's what I make usually for an appetizer or a snack for people. But last night I pretty much just ate it for dinner, so I guess it qualifies as something I should write down here for yall. It's a good summertime thing anyway.
Cut up one avocado with my totally awesome avocado slicer tool that I know I've described before. It's just so neat! You slice open and pit the avocado then use this tool to scrape out the delicious insides into neat slices. Totally worth the $9.99 or whatever it cost over at Cook's Warehouse. Tossed the avocado slices with the juice of one lime and a bunch of salt and pepper. Lay the slices attractively on a plate. Cut one large ball of mozzarella into small even slices. Toss the slices with a generous 2 tablespoons of olive oil and plenty of salt and pepper. Lay the slices of mozzarella on the opposite side of the plate from the avocado slices so the lime juice doesn't mix into the cheese. Slice up one, perfect summer tomato. If you don't have an actual, delicious garden tomato either skip it or get some of those little grape tomatoes. Lay the slices of tomato between the avocado and the mozzarella and drizzle just a little olive oil over it. If you have good bread around, like a nice, crusty baguette or something, now is the time to slice it up to eat with the avocado, mozzarella and tomatoes and also to mop up the delicious olive oil left over. And don't forget to open up some wine. You might as well just take the rest of the night off anyway.
See? It's cheating because it is easy but it also comes highly recommended. I probably eat this every other day of the week when avocados are good. Don't even get me started on how often I drink the wine.
Monday, July 30, 2007
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Mashed potatoes and dinosaur kale
Everybody knows how to make mashed potatoes, right? There's probably a thousand different ways to do it and if you are somebody who makes them you probably already have a preferred methodology. But I got excited about making them recently and I don't know if you've noticed, but there is quite a derth of potato recipes on this blog. That's because I don't really like potatoes. They bore me. But right now I am extremely interested in mashed potatoes and I plan to make them again very soon. If you haven't made them lately, give it a shot! It's so easy it'll have you wondering why you don't do it every single day. Or if the reason you don't do it every single day is because the little bastards are not particularly nutritious, take note that I cooked some very healthy dark, leafy greens alongside and that sort of mitigates the butter-salt-starch whammy of mashed potato perdition. Also, potatoes are a great source of Vitamin C! It's true, look it up! How else do you think the Irish avoided scurvy all those years?
Peeled up 4 large-sized Yukon Gold potatoes. This type of potato is often only available on the smallish size so you may need more than 4. It was probably just shy of 2 pounds total. After peeling, cut into even-size chunks and put them in a pot to boil under they were tender. This really only took about 15-20 minutes. Drained them and left them in the pot to mash up with about 2 tablespoons of butter, cut into small pieces. You could definetely add more butter, but since we put a load on top after mashing was complete, that was a good place to stop. We didn't have any whole milk in the fridge so we used skim and then also some half-and-half. It was probably about 1/2 cup of liquid altogether. Just keep on mashing the potatoes up with the butter and liquid dairy product of your choice, then add a ton of salt and pepper. Taste it to make sure there is enough salt because it's just incredible how much salt you have to put in before you can even notice it. Mash, mash, mash until it is of a consistency that you enjoy. Then add more butter on top and eat them. Seriously--that's all you have to do. Boil peeled chunks of potatoes until soft, drain them and then mash them up with butter and milk, salt and pepper. And then you will have mashed potatoes. The next day you can fry leftover mashed potatoes in a pan until heated through and add minced pickled jalapenos with the shredded cheese of your choice. Or with pieces of bacon and sauteed mushrooms. It's like ghetto potato galettes. Perhaps I should call them ghetto-lettes?
The nutritional redemption of your meal can come in the form of dark, leafy greens. I bought a bunch of dinosaur kale at the market, mostly because it has the word "dinosaur" in the name. The same day I also bought a fruit called "dinosaur pluots" so I guess I'm pretty easy to market to. Cut off the stems of the kale and took out the central rib, which is a little bit too tough to cook well. Sliced up the kale into ribbons and washed it well (it can be kind of sandy). In a large high-sided pan, heated 3 tablespoons of olive oil and added 4 thinly sliced cloves of garlic (it was my beloved Ohio hardneck garlic, actually) and about 1 tablespoon of red pepper flakes. When the garlic was soft and getting a little bit golden, added in the kale and stirred well until it was reduced in size. Then turned down the heat and covered to cook, occasionally stirring. Added about 1/3 cup of chicken stock after about 15 minutes of cooking and uncovered the pan to reduce the liquid somewhat towards the end of cooking. It probably took about 20-25 minutes for the greens to cook. They were spicy, garlicky and full-flavored, which makes them a perfect partner for mellow mashed potatoes.
Peeled up 4 large-sized Yukon Gold potatoes. This type of potato is often only available on the smallish size so you may need more than 4. It was probably just shy of 2 pounds total. After peeling, cut into even-size chunks and put them in a pot to boil under they were tender. This really only took about 15-20 minutes. Drained them and left them in the pot to mash up with about 2 tablespoons of butter, cut into small pieces. You could definetely add more butter, but since we put a load on top after mashing was complete, that was a good place to stop. We didn't have any whole milk in the fridge so we used skim and then also some half-and-half. It was probably about 1/2 cup of liquid altogether. Just keep on mashing the potatoes up with the butter and liquid dairy product of your choice, then add a ton of salt and pepper. Taste it to make sure there is enough salt because it's just incredible how much salt you have to put in before you can even notice it. Mash, mash, mash until it is of a consistency that you enjoy. Then add more butter on top and eat them. Seriously--that's all you have to do. Boil peeled chunks of potatoes until soft, drain them and then mash them up with butter and milk, salt and pepper. And then you will have mashed potatoes. The next day you can fry leftover mashed potatoes in a pan until heated through and add minced pickled jalapenos with the shredded cheese of your choice. Or with pieces of bacon and sauteed mushrooms. It's like ghetto potato galettes. Perhaps I should call them ghetto-lettes?
The nutritional redemption of your meal can come in the form of dark, leafy greens. I bought a bunch of dinosaur kale at the market, mostly because it has the word "dinosaur" in the name. The same day I also bought a fruit called "dinosaur pluots" so I guess I'm pretty easy to market to. Cut off the stems of the kale and took out the central rib, which is a little bit too tough to cook well. Sliced up the kale into ribbons and washed it well (it can be kind of sandy). In a large high-sided pan, heated 3 tablespoons of olive oil and added 4 thinly sliced cloves of garlic (it was my beloved Ohio hardneck garlic, actually) and about 1 tablespoon of red pepper flakes. When the garlic was soft and getting a little bit golden, added in the kale and stirred well until it was reduced in size. Then turned down the heat and covered to cook, occasionally stirring. Added about 1/3 cup of chicken stock after about 15 minutes of cooking and uncovered the pan to reduce the liquid somewhat towards the end of cooking. It probably took about 20-25 minutes for the greens to cook. They were spicy, garlicky and full-flavored, which makes them a perfect partner for mellow mashed potatoes.
Monday, July 16, 2007
Chicken with garlic sauce, braising greens & roasted mangolds
I went to Columbus, Ohio for a conference last week and got to spend a lot of time wandering around the city, which really impressed me. It looked like it would be great for bicyling around and there was a really nice bookshop and many cool little neighborhoods. But perhaps my favorite part of this neat little town was the North Market which was near the Short North neighborhood. It was really cool--the permanent part of the market kind of looked like a smaller version of the Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia (as described in the "what I ate in Philly" post). You could find all kinds of wonderful, locally produced, organic/free range produce, meat and dairy. There was also a great farmer's market going on right outside that day and it featured some beautiful vegetables, so as we walked around I couldn't help picking some up even though I knew I would have to fly home holding them on the plane, thereby fully completing my transformation into my mother. I talked to some of the farmers and they took such obvious pride in their work and their fine looking produce--it was really a pleasure to discuss food with them. I stopped to buy some braising greens from one stall simply because they looked so beautiful and like such an unusual mix--he told me what everything was, but I don't really remember now. I think there were dandelion greens, maybe some varieties of endive & escarole, perhaps some little chards, definetely some burgundy amaranth...can't remember what they all were, but they were delicate and beautiful so I bought them. Then my eye was caught by these cute little yellow roots called mangolds that I was told were related to beets--they were available in a detroit dark-ruby hue or golden yellow, so I took the yellow ones. These farmers let us taste the arugula microgreens they were growing, the flavor was an intense, superconcentrated spicy-nuttiness. They told me to go check out the garlic from another vendor, so I did and bought some fragrant hardneck garlic from him. That was about all I thought I could handle for not actually being in a town with my own kitchen. For immediate sustenance, we found coffee and a delicious pretzel roll stuffed with pancetta and some type of soft cheese...true to form for this market, the bread was freshly made right there, the pancetta and cheese were locally produced...I think I might be in love.
Last night I braised my braising greens--I realize not everybody had access to the Columbus Farmers Market this weekend, but you can use any type of dark green--kale, chard, beet, turnip or mustard greens...if you can find small, young delicate ones, that's great, but you may only be able to find the older, thick stem ones. Just trim the stems and cut out the central stem "vein" as well, if it looks too thick. Then roll up your greens and cut the rolls into slices--this makes a chiffonade that will help your green cook more quickly. But if you are lucky enogh to find delicate baby greens, by all means, use those! You do not need to trim or slice them at all if they are young and tender. Heated 3 minced cloves of my precious hardneck garlic in olive oil, then tossed in my beautiful mixture of greens. Tossed with the garlic and olive oil over medium high heat until they shrank down (if you are not a regular green cook, you will be shocked at how much they shrink down). The greens began to put off liquid which started to evaporate out in the heat--at that point I added 1 cup of chicken stock, salt, pepper, turned the heat down and covered them to cook for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally to make sure they didn't burn. While that was going on, I took my golden mangolds and trimmed off all but the top inch of their greens and put them whole in a small pan in a 350 degree oven to roast. I eventually added some water to the pan to keep them from getting too toasty. This is usually how I cook beets so I just did the same thing for the mangolds. When they were soft (it took awhile--maybe 30-40 minutes) I peeled off the skins and sliced them up. Meanwhile, I had put up two cups of bhutanese red rice to steam in my beloved rice cooker. The only reason I used this rather exotic rice was because I was pretty much all out of my usual brown rice, but I wanted something with a similarly nutty flavor, and I remembered that someone once gave me a packet of this fancy rice that was hanging out in my cupboard. It's really good, actually, if you see it for sale someplace, pick it up and try it. It cooks much faster than brown rice and has a pretty red color. While the rice, greens and mangold were all cooking away happily to themselves, I sliced 2 skinless, boneless chicken breasts in half to make them more thin, then pounded them lightly to equal width. Sauteed them in olive oil, salt and pepper until lightly brown and cooked through, then set aside. In the same pan, I added 1 tablespoon of butter to the remaining olive oil and chicken juices, then after it was sizzly, added 4 cloves of my Ohio hardneck garlic, sliced very thinly. After it was golden and soft, I sprinkled in flour, probably no more than about 2 tablespoons. After that was absorbed and had thickened my butter mixture somewhat, I added 3/4 cup of chicken stock, stirring it until it became a velvety texture, then removed it from heat and added 2 teaspoons champagne vinegar, stirred in well. Put chicken on the red rice, drizzled a little sauce over the top and put the greens and roasted mangold slices next to it. It was a regional Ohio feast.
Last night I braised my braising greens--I realize not everybody had access to the Columbus Farmers Market this weekend, but you can use any type of dark green--kale, chard, beet, turnip or mustard greens...if you can find small, young delicate ones, that's great, but you may only be able to find the older, thick stem ones. Just trim the stems and cut out the central stem "vein" as well, if it looks too thick. Then roll up your greens and cut the rolls into slices--this makes a chiffonade that will help your green cook more quickly. But if you are lucky enogh to find delicate baby greens, by all means, use those! You do not need to trim or slice them at all if they are young and tender. Heated 3 minced cloves of my precious hardneck garlic in olive oil, then tossed in my beautiful mixture of greens. Tossed with the garlic and olive oil over medium high heat until they shrank down (if you are not a regular green cook, you will be shocked at how much they shrink down). The greens began to put off liquid which started to evaporate out in the heat--at that point I added 1 cup of chicken stock, salt, pepper, turned the heat down and covered them to cook for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally to make sure they didn't burn. While that was going on, I took my golden mangolds and trimmed off all but the top inch of their greens and put them whole in a small pan in a 350 degree oven to roast. I eventually added some water to the pan to keep them from getting too toasty. This is usually how I cook beets so I just did the same thing for the mangolds. When they were soft (it took awhile--maybe 30-40 minutes) I peeled off the skins and sliced them up. Meanwhile, I had put up two cups of bhutanese red rice to steam in my beloved rice cooker. The only reason I used this rather exotic rice was because I was pretty much all out of my usual brown rice, but I wanted something with a similarly nutty flavor, and I remembered that someone once gave me a packet of this fancy rice that was hanging out in my cupboard. It's really good, actually, if you see it for sale someplace, pick it up and try it. It cooks much faster than brown rice and has a pretty red color. While the rice, greens and mangold were all cooking away happily to themselves, I sliced 2 skinless, boneless chicken breasts in half to make them more thin, then pounded them lightly to equal width. Sauteed them in olive oil, salt and pepper until lightly brown and cooked through, then set aside. In the same pan, I added 1 tablespoon of butter to the remaining olive oil and chicken juices, then after it was sizzly, added 4 cloves of my Ohio hardneck garlic, sliced very thinly. After it was golden and soft, I sprinkled in flour, probably no more than about 2 tablespoons. After that was absorbed and had thickened my butter mixture somewhat, I added 3/4 cup of chicken stock, stirring it until it became a velvety texture, then removed it from heat and added 2 teaspoons champagne vinegar, stirred in well. Put chicken on the red rice, drizzled a little sauce over the top and put the greens and roasted mangold slices next to it. It was a regional Ohio feast.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Shrimp couscous with fava beans
When we were young, dumb and living in Milwaukee, Brian and I used to make this thing for dinner sometimes...it was couscous with lima beans, lemon, and maybe shrimp if we had gone shopping at Sendik's recently. It wasn't very good--I know we used packaged couscous and I probably bought precooked shrimp because deveining scared me--and it was just a total mess to look at. But for some reason we were really into it and made it often. Probably because it was full of melted butter and salt. When I asked Brian what he wanted for dinner on his birthday he said something about wanting shrimp couscous, which I thought was cute because it had been a really long time since I had thought of making it. So I thought about all the components and how to improve on an idea while maintaining the nostalgia.
I started with the lima beans--I actually like lima beans quite a bit although I realize they are a polarizing ingredient. I found some good looking fava beans at the market and decided they would consititute an improvement on the original so I bought about 3/4 pound of favas in the shell. Do you know how to prep fava beans? It's a pain in the ass. You get these big, green seed pod looking things and you shuck them and inside are large, pale green beans, like peas in a pod, which they basically are. Then you take each bean and skin it to reveal the bright green, delicious fava bean inside. It is time-consuming and probably explains why I don't make them very often. But they are really delicate and wonderful in flavor so it is worth it for a special occasion. After the labor of love involved in preparing fava beans, it's great to follow up with the equally annoying task of shelling and deveining shrimp--I did this with just over 1 pound of shrimp and between that and the fava beans it was a prep-work intensive meal indeed. So that was two improvements--fresh fava beans for frozen limas and fresh shrimp for precooked. Next I looked at the couscous--instead of the small grained box of yore, I toasted 2 cups of large, pearl couscous in butter until they became brown and nutty, then poured 1 ¾ cup of fresh chicken stock over the top, brought to a boil, covered and simmered until the liquid was all absorbed. After it was done cooking, kept the lid on but removed it from heat to prevent burning uintil everything else was ready to go. Minced up a ton of garlic--about 7 or 8 healthy-sized cloves. Put a shocking amount of butter (I think something like 4 tablespoons, maybe 5) to melt in a pan and added the garlic when it was sizzly, reserving about 1 clove worth. When the garlic was lightly golden and still tender, removed from the pan and set aside along with most of the butter it cooked in. Put a teensy bit more butter into the pan and added 2 zucchini that were chopped into small cubes. I made them pretty and also improved the final texture by peeling them in stripes--you know, instead of peeling them totally, just peel a strip down so you have a green-white-green-white pattern on the squash. It looks pretty and also keeps enough peel on for texture but gets rid of some of it to prevent an overwhelming peeliness when you take a bite. Then to make small zucchini chunks you cut the squash in half, then each half gets sliced into thirds. Cut the thirds crosswise into little chunks, and voila! Put the zucchini in the hot pan with the added butter and the reserved minced garlic. Sauteed over medium-high heat until the zucchini got a little golden in places, then added the fava beans, salt, pepper and about 1/2 cup of chicken stock. Cooked down until the stock was totally reduced off and the fava beans were tender, about 5 minutes. Removed from pan and set aside covered until everything else was done. Wiped out the same pan, returned to stove and added the garlic and shocking amount of butter from before. When it was heated up added the peeled, deveined shrimp. Tossed them over medium-high heat just barely until they began to get a bit opaque, about 2 minuntes. Added a teensy bit of chicken stock--probably only a few tablespoons--then when the shrimp were pinkish and pretty much done through (about 3 more minutes), added 2 tablespoons each of finely minced fresh parsley and dill. Stirred the herbs in thoroughly, then took off heat and added zest from 2 lemons and the juice. Mixed everything up together well, then put a mound of couscous on the plate, topped with the shrimp and then the fava bean-zucchini around the bottom. We had a good wine (read: not two-buck chuck)--some Argentinian wine called High Altitude which was a malbec/cabernet sauvignon.
Jeremy and Melanie came up for angel food cake later, which I did not make, but I did decorate it with whipped cream and raspberries and blueberries so at least it looked pretty. Happy birthday, Brian!
I started with the lima beans--I actually like lima beans quite a bit although I realize they are a polarizing ingredient. I found some good looking fava beans at the market and decided they would consititute an improvement on the original so I bought about 3/4 pound of favas in the shell. Do you know how to prep fava beans? It's a pain in the ass. You get these big, green seed pod looking things and you shuck them and inside are large, pale green beans, like peas in a pod, which they basically are. Then you take each bean and skin it to reveal the bright green, delicious fava bean inside. It is time-consuming and probably explains why I don't make them very often. But they are really delicate and wonderful in flavor so it is worth it for a special occasion. After the labor of love involved in preparing fava beans, it's great to follow up with the equally annoying task of shelling and deveining shrimp--I did this with just over 1 pound of shrimp and between that and the fava beans it was a prep-work intensive meal indeed. So that was two improvements--fresh fava beans for frozen limas and fresh shrimp for precooked. Next I looked at the couscous--instead of the small grained box of yore, I toasted 2 cups of large, pearl couscous in butter until they became brown and nutty, then poured 1 ¾ cup of fresh chicken stock over the top, brought to a boil, covered and simmered until the liquid was all absorbed. After it was done cooking, kept the lid on but removed it from heat to prevent burning uintil everything else was ready to go. Minced up a ton of garlic--about 7 or 8 healthy-sized cloves. Put a shocking amount of butter (I think something like 4 tablespoons, maybe 5) to melt in a pan and added the garlic when it was sizzly, reserving about 1 clove worth. When the garlic was lightly golden and still tender, removed from the pan and set aside along with most of the butter it cooked in. Put a teensy bit more butter into the pan and added 2 zucchini that were chopped into small cubes. I made them pretty and also improved the final texture by peeling them in stripes--you know, instead of peeling them totally, just peel a strip down so you have a green-white-green-white pattern on the squash. It looks pretty and also keeps enough peel on for texture but gets rid of some of it to prevent an overwhelming peeliness when you take a bite. Then to make small zucchini chunks you cut the squash in half, then each half gets sliced into thirds. Cut the thirds crosswise into little chunks, and voila! Put the zucchini in the hot pan with the added butter and the reserved minced garlic. Sauteed over medium-high heat until the zucchini got a little golden in places, then added the fava beans, salt, pepper and about 1/2 cup of chicken stock. Cooked down until the stock was totally reduced off and the fava beans were tender, about 5 minutes. Removed from pan and set aside covered until everything else was done. Wiped out the same pan, returned to stove and added the garlic and shocking amount of butter from before. When it was heated up added the peeled, deveined shrimp. Tossed them over medium-high heat just barely until they began to get a bit opaque, about 2 minuntes. Added a teensy bit of chicken stock--probably only a few tablespoons--then when the shrimp were pinkish and pretty much done through (about 3 more minutes), added 2 tablespoons each of finely minced fresh parsley and dill. Stirred the herbs in thoroughly, then took off heat and added zest from 2 lemons and the juice. Mixed everything up together well, then put a mound of couscous on the plate, topped with the shrimp and then the fava bean-zucchini around the bottom. We had a good wine (read: not two-buck chuck)--some Argentinian wine called High Altitude which was a malbec/cabernet sauvignon.
Jeremy and Melanie came up for angel food cake later, which I did not make, but I did decorate it with whipped cream and raspberries and blueberries so at least it looked pretty. Happy birthday, Brian!
Thursday, July 05, 2007
Fourth of July
I usually spend the Fourth of July in Wisconsin. That means I might cook a little but probably my mom is doing most of it. This year I didn't go for a visit--not that anyone would have been there if I had since all my family decided to go to China or Rhode Island or something--so I stayed here in the dirty dirty and cooked for my own damn self. We made a ton of food. I'll try to describe it as well as I can & hopefully won't forget anything.
I made guacamole, which was probably the best decision I made all day long. I used the hilarious, gigantic lava rock mortar and pestle that Marilyn & Steve gave me when they moved. Seriously, you should see this thing--it's just really big and silly looking. I believe it is traditionally known as a "molcajete" but in my household it is affectionately known as "where the hell did you get that thing?" (Brian). Minced up about 1/4-1/3 cup of yellow onion. Cut HELL out of my finger doing it too! Marilyn sharpened my knives for me right before she moved and you know how it is when your knives are super sharp but you're still thinking they're dull and then, whoops, you lose a fingertip. I held it under the faucet and made Brian ask Jeremy what I should do. He came upstairs with a beer in hand and a couple bandaids and did his doctor thing. It still hurts though. Anyway, put the onion in the lava rock bowl with about 1/3 cup chopped up grape tomatoes, juice & zest of 1 lime, juice of 1/2 lemon, salt & pepper to taste, and about 2 small hot peppers, minced up. I'd tell you what kind, but I don't know for sure because I got them from my boss who is growing them in his yard. They are small and light green and not too hot. Have you noticed, by the way, that these are all ingredients that would really hurt if you got them into a cut finger? Yeah, anyway. Used the only kitchen gadget in the world worth mentioning (digital meat thermometers are NOT gadgets; they are lifesaving devices), which is an avocado scooper. You slice an avocado in half, take the pit out, then use this thing to slice through the skin and give you nice pieces of avocado with no waste. Anyway, I added 3 sliced up avocados to the ingredients in the lava rock mortar, then pounded everything up with the lava rock pestle and voila! Guacamole. We ate it with blue chips, which I think go particularly well. I wouldn't recommend using the lava rock though--it makes you look silly and you can get better results with a bowl and mixing spoon.
I made these ribs which I made a couple years ago for the 4th at Angelica & Marc's old Kentucky home. The recipe has improved considerably since then. Mixed up 1/4 cup orange juice, 1/4 cup soy sauce, 1/4 cup dark brown sugar, 2 teaspoons cumin, 2 tablespoons red pepper flakes, 4 minced garlic cloves. Poured it over about 3.5-4 pounds of ribs that I had thoughtfully separated from the rack already (said Melanie "I like how they are in pieces!"). Marinated these in the fridge until it was time to cook, which was at least 3 hours. I guess you could leave them to marinate as long as you'd like. Poured the whole mess, marinade and all, into a glass dish and stuck it in the oven at 325 degrees for about 45 minutes. This is because I only have a little baby size grill. If I had a real grill I would maybe find a way to make ribs in a slow smoker kind of way. Sorry. These are cheater ribs and are meant to make sure we don't all die of trichinosis. Look it up. I made a sauce by boiling down the marinade with worcestershire sauce, tomato paste, mustard and something else. More brown sugar, I think. I don't remember the sauce part very well, but you can just go ahead and use whatever kind of sauce you like, homemade or jarred. Anyway, put the cooked up ribs on a hot grill to get them sort of smokey and brushed them with the sauce, which, as I said, can really be whatever sauce you like since I don't remember much about making it. Take the ribs off when they are sticky and shiny and charred in a good way and toss them in a little more sauce if you want to get messy.
We also had brats, mostly because of Wisconsin nostalgia. One of our neighbors (not Jeremy or Melanie) was like "oh, look, brats!" and Brian said "where are YOU from?" like all surprised that someone who is from Atlanta would know what a brat is. It was funny. Also, sadly, I was not able to quantify the basic difference between a brat and a sausage when asked. Having thought about it since, my response now is that all brats are sausages but not all sausages are brats. Anyway, we actually found some real Johnsonville brats over at the Publix grocery (which is an experience akin to finding Leinenkugels on draft at Manuel's Tavern up the street) and it was all on Wisconsin after that. Here is how you need to cook your brats: 1.) Miraculously find a Miller High Life tall boy in your fridge 2.) Pour half the tall boy over your brats in a pot, cover with more water if necessary 3.) Drink the other half of the tall boy while your brats boil up for about 15 minutes or so 4.) Slap the brats on the grill until they are deliciously browned all over 5.) Eat and discuss the finer points of Wisconsin (fish boils, socialism, Rollie Fingers, mini golf...).
We enjoyed not one but two different types of beans. Melanie made these really excellent baked beans but I don't know how she did it. With a slow cooker, I think. I know they had molasses and onions and mustard in them but I'm not sure of the logistics. I made green beans--very simple. Just quickly boiled them, made Brian drain them and then tossed them right before serving with a dressing made of 3 tablespoons olive oil and juice of about 1 lemon, plus the zest and salt and pepper. There was also corn on the cob and that had the lime-chile butter on it that I described a few posts ago when we went on the bicycle picnic. Same thing.
For dessert we made cherry chocolate chip ice cream. Melanie made about 1/2 cup of a fresh cherry puree and I chopped up about 3/4 pound of cherries into little pieces. I also chopped up a 70% cocoa content dark chocolate bar into little teensy pieces. Mixed 1/2 cup of granulated sugar with 2 cups heavy cream, 3/4 cup whole milk and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Poured into my ice cream maker along with the cherry puree and about 1 tablespoon grenadine. After it had been mixing for 20 minutes, added the cherry pieces and chocolate chunks. When it comes out of the ice cream maker it is pretty soft so I stuck it into the freezer to harden up a little bit. It was really, really delicious.
I made guacamole, which was probably the best decision I made all day long. I used the hilarious, gigantic lava rock mortar and pestle that Marilyn & Steve gave me when they moved. Seriously, you should see this thing--it's just really big and silly looking. I believe it is traditionally known as a "molcajete" but in my household it is affectionately known as "where the hell did you get that thing?" (Brian). Minced up about 1/4-1/3 cup of yellow onion. Cut HELL out of my finger doing it too! Marilyn sharpened my knives for me right before she moved and you know how it is when your knives are super sharp but you're still thinking they're dull and then, whoops, you lose a fingertip. I held it under the faucet and made Brian ask Jeremy what I should do. He came upstairs with a beer in hand and a couple bandaids and did his doctor thing. It still hurts though. Anyway, put the onion in the lava rock bowl with about 1/3 cup chopped up grape tomatoes, juice & zest of 1 lime, juice of 1/2 lemon, salt & pepper to taste, and about 2 small hot peppers, minced up. I'd tell you what kind, but I don't know for sure because I got them from my boss who is growing them in his yard. They are small and light green and not too hot. Have you noticed, by the way, that these are all ingredients that would really hurt if you got them into a cut finger? Yeah, anyway. Used the only kitchen gadget in the world worth mentioning (digital meat thermometers are NOT gadgets; they are lifesaving devices), which is an avocado scooper. You slice an avocado in half, take the pit out, then use this thing to slice through the skin and give you nice pieces of avocado with no waste. Anyway, I added 3 sliced up avocados to the ingredients in the lava rock mortar, then pounded everything up with the lava rock pestle and voila! Guacamole. We ate it with blue chips, which I think go particularly well. I wouldn't recommend using the lava rock though--it makes you look silly and you can get better results with a bowl and mixing spoon.
I made these ribs which I made a couple years ago for the 4th at Angelica & Marc's old Kentucky home. The recipe has improved considerably since then. Mixed up 1/4 cup orange juice, 1/4 cup soy sauce, 1/4 cup dark brown sugar, 2 teaspoons cumin, 2 tablespoons red pepper flakes, 4 minced garlic cloves. Poured it over about 3.5-4 pounds of ribs that I had thoughtfully separated from the rack already (said Melanie "I like how they are in pieces!"). Marinated these in the fridge until it was time to cook, which was at least 3 hours. I guess you could leave them to marinate as long as you'd like. Poured the whole mess, marinade and all, into a glass dish and stuck it in the oven at 325 degrees for about 45 minutes. This is because I only have a little baby size grill. If I had a real grill I would maybe find a way to make ribs in a slow smoker kind of way. Sorry. These are cheater ribs and are meant to make sure we don't all die of trichinosis. Look it up. I made a sauce by boiling down the marinade with worcestershire sauce, tomato paste, mustard and something else. More brown sugar, I think. I don't remember the sauce part very well, but you can just go ahead and use whatever kind of sauce you like, homemade or jarred. Anyway, put the cooked up ribs on a hot grill to get them sort of smokey and brushed them with the sauce, which, as I said, can really be whatever sauce you like since I don't remember much about making it. Take the ribs off when they are sticky and shiny and charred in a good way and toss them in a little more sauce if you want to get messy.
We also had brats, mostly because of Wisconsin nostalgia. One of our neighbors (not Jeremy or Melanie) was like "oh, look, brats!" and Brian said "where are YOU from?" like all surprised that someone who is from Atlanta would know what a brat is. It was funny. Also, sadly, I was not able to quantify the basic difference between a brat and a sausage when asked. Having thought about it since, my response now is that all brats are sausages but not all sausages are brats. Anyway, we actually found some real Johnsonville brats over at the Publix grocery (which is an experience akin to finding Leinenkugels on draft at Manuel's Tavern up the street) and it was all on Wisconsin after that. Here is how you need to cook your brats: 1.) Miraculously find a Miller High Life tall boy in your fridge 2.) Pour half the tall boy over your brats in a pot, cover with more water if necessary 3.) Drink the other half of the tall boy while your brats boil up for about 15 minutes or so 4.) Slap the brats on the grill until they are deliciously browned all over 5.) Eat and discuss the finer points of Wisconsin (fish boils, socialism, Rollie Fingers, mini golf...).
We enjoyed not one but two different types of beans. Melanie made these really excellent baked beans but I don't know how she did it. With a slow cooker, I think. I know they had molasses and onions and mustard in them but I'm not sure of the logistics. I made green beans--very simple. Just quickly boiled them, made Brian drain them and then tossed them right before serving with a dressing made of 3 tablespoons olive oil and juice of about 1 lemon, plus the zest and salt and pepper. There was also corn on the cob and that had the lime-chile butter on it that I described a few posts ago when we went on the bicycle picnic. Same thing.
For dessert we made cherry chocolate chip ice cream. Melanie made about 1/2 cup of a fresh cherry puree and I chopped up about 3/4 pound of cherries into little pieces. I also chopped up a 70% cocoa content dark chocolate bar into little teensy pieces. Mixed 1/2 cup of granulated sugar with 2 cups heavy cream, 3/4 cup whole milk and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Poured into my ice cream maker along with the cherry puree and about 1 tablespoon grenadine. After it had been mixing for 20 minutes, added the cherry pieces and chocolate chunks. When it comes out of the ice cream maker it is pretty soft so I stuck it into the freezer to harden up a little bit. It was really, really delicious.
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
Lemongrass & ginger roasted chicken
We have been having some weird weather here...it was actually sort of cool outside yesterday and today it is misty and maybe even cooler. I can't remember it being like this in July here before. So it seemed OK to roast a chicken--normally I can't be bothered to heat up my kitchen like that during a Georgia summer. I had inherited some lemongrass from Marilyn--she and Steve moved to Michigan this weekend and I got a wide variety of stuff from their apartment as they cleaned it out such as guitar picks, postcards of New York City, a pregnancy test, a lava rock mortar & pestle...and lemongrass. I haven't really cooked with lemongrass before but I had this chicken in my fridge so I thought I would try to infuse it as it roasted.
Tied up the legs with a piece of kitchen twine (we've discussed the importance of trussing a chicken/turkey before, right?). Stuffed the cavity of the chicken with 3 stalks of chopped lemongrass, a 2" piece of sliced, fresh ginger, 5 cloves of messily chopped up garlic. Stuck it breast-side up on a v-rack set in a roasting pan, put it in a 400 degree oven for about 15 minutes, flipped it over for about 20 minutes, and then flipped it back to breast-side up and basted it frequently after that. Tried not to lose any of the ginger/garlic/lemongrass stuffing as I flipped it about. After about 25 more minutes, used the baster to draw a lot of the juices/grease out of the bottom of the pan and checked the temperature at the the thickest point of the thigh with the digital meat thermometer (if you are not familiar with my love for digital meat thermometers at this point in our relationship then we really don't know each other very well). When the thermometer registered 165, I hauled it out of the oven and let it rest for a minute on a cutting board. Meanwhile, put 10 peeled, whole garlic cloves in the bottom of the roasting pan with 2 sliced yellow summer squash and tossed them around (remember, remove as much of the chicken juice as possible so you don't get overly greasy vegetables). Turned up the temperature to 425-450 and roasted the vegetables very quickly--probably took only about 15 minutes--tossing them frequently so they didn't burn. Carved up the chicken and made a sauce by pouring some chicken juices into a pan with a teaspoon of brown sugar and 2 tablespoons of soy sauce. Reduced it down and poured over the sliced up chicken. Surrounded the sliced chicken and sauce with the roasted summer squash & garlic. The chicken ended up getting a really distinct gingery and lemongrass flavor in the meat and it was also a lot more moist. Success!
Jeremy and Melanie came up for dinner which we were actually able to eat on the porch because it wasn't hot as balls for once. We also had brown rice and broccoli in a soy-ginger-sesame sauce, but something was wonky with my beloved rice cooker because the rice wasn't done when it was supposed to be. So we kind of ate in stages, which was annoying, but whatever.
Tied up the legs with a piece of kitchen twine (we've discussed the importance of trussing a chicken/turkey before, right?). Stuffed the cavity of the chicken with 3 stalks of chopped lemongrass, a 2" piece of sliced, fresh ginger, 5 cloves of messily chopped up garlic. Stuck it breast-side up on a v-rack set in a roasting pan, put it in a 400 degree oven for about 15 minutes, flipped it over for about 20 minutes, and then flipped it back to breast-side up and basted it frequently after that. Tried not to lose any of the ginger/garlic/lemongrass stuffing as I flipped it about. After about 25 more minutes, used the baster to draw a lot of the juices/grease out of the bottom of the pan and checked the temperature at the the thickest point of the thigh with the digital meat thermometer (if you are not familiar with my love for digital meat thermometers at this point in our relationship then we really don't know each other very well). When the thermometer registered 165, I hauled it out of the oven and let it rest for a minute on a cutting board. Meanwhile, put 10 peeled, whole garlic cloves in the bottom of the roasting pan with 2 sliced yellow summer squash and tossed them around (remember, remove as much of the chicken juice as possible so you don't get overly greasy vegetables). Turned up the temperature to 425-450 and roasted the vegetables very quickly--probably took only about 15 minutes--tossing them frequently so they didn't burn. Carved up the chicken and made a sauce by pouring some chicken juices into a pan with a teaspoon of brown sugar and 2 tablespoons of soy sauce. Reduced it down and poured over the sliced up chicken. Surrounded the sliced chicken and sauce with the roasted summer squash & garlic. The chicken ended up getting a really distinct gingery and lemongrass flavor in the meat and it was also a lot more moist. Success!
Jeremy and Melanie came up for dinner which we were actually able to eat on the porch because it wasn't hot as balls for once. We also had brown rice and broccoli in a soy-ginger-sesame sauce, but something was wonky with my beloved rice cooker because the rice wasn't done when it was supposed to be. So we kind of ate in stages, which was annoying, but whatever.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Pasta caprese
Apparently this is going to be a big summer for picnics for me. My energetic and fun-loving work collegues decided that we should have a potluck picnic wherein you bring food that somewhat represents your ethnic background. I made Byron come along with me even thought he doesn't work with us--it's just a good idea to get him out of the office sometimes. He brought (among other things) pimento cheese because his ethnic background is Decatur, Georgia. I brought pasta caprese because I thought it might travel well to the picnic environment, even though it is typically a dish that you should make and eat immediately. I tweaked the recipe somewhat to be a do-ahead sort of thing but I will tell you how to make it for real.
Chopped up a pint of small, grape tomatoes and let them sit in about 1/4 cup of olive oil, juice of 1 small lemon, 2 minced, small garlic cloves, a pinch of red pepper flakes, 1 teaspoon sugar, salt and pepper. Chopped up 2 balls of fresh mozzarella--the better your mozzarella is the better this dish will be. I used the large, ovaline size of mozzarella balls. If you are NOT making this ahead of time (and I would recommend that), stick the mozzarella pieces in the freezer for about 10 minutes before you toss it with the hot pasta so it doesn't turn into a melty clump. Chop up as much basil as you can get your hands on--my plant is still growing so I only had about 1/4 cup but you could use as much as 1/2 cup chopped basil if you really like it. Boil up a 1 lb package of penne pasta, drain it and toss it while still completely hot with the tomato mixture. Toss toss toss. Then add the basil and your mozzarella that has been in the freezer. Toss toss toss. That's it! You're done! Now go to your damn picnic and alienate all your friends! That's what I did anyway.
Chopped up a pint of small, grape tomatoes and let them sit in about 1/4 cup of olive oil, juice of 1 small lemon, 2 minced, small garlic cloves, a pinch of red pepper flakes, 1 teaspoon sugar, salt and pepper. Chopped up 2 balls of fresh mozzarella--the better your mozzarella is the better this dish will be. I used the large, ovaline size of mozzarella balls. If you are NOT making this ahead of time (and I would recommend that), stick the mozzarella pieces in the freezer for about 10 minutes before you toss it with the hot pasta so it doesn't turn into a melty clump. Chop up as much basil as you can get your hands on--my plant is still growing so I only had about 1/4 cup but you could use as much as 1/2 cup chopped basil if you really like it. Boil up a 1 lb package of penne pasta, drain it and toss it while still completely hot with the tomato mixture. Toss toss toss. Then add the basil and your mozzarella that has been in the freezer. Toss toss toss. That's it! You're done! Now go to your damn picnic and alienate all your friends! That's what I did anyway.
Friday, June 22, 2007
Fried green tomatoes
We went to the botanical gardens with Clark and Krista then forced them to come over to our house for dinner. The gardens have a bunch of sculptures of giant insects right now and it's fun to walk around with people that actually know something about art because they can seriously critique (krista = sculptor, clark = art professor & all-around art nerd, brian = brian). It makes me feel extra-sciencey.
I had found really perfect green peanuts at the DeKalb market that afternoon so I had to buy them. Problem was that I was dead-set on making squash gnocchi for dinner. How to unite these disparate elements into one cohesive meal? Southern + southern. Boiled peanuts, then fried green tomato salad and gnocchi.
It is so easy to make fried green tomatoes. Cut up 4 medium green tomatoes into 1/4 - 1/2" slices. Mixed together 3/4 cup cornmeal with 1 teaspoon each salt and pepper (actually, that's just a guess, I have no idea how much salt and pepper). Melted 1 tablespoon of butter with 2 tablespoons olive oil over medium-high heat. Dredged the tomato slices in the cornmeal mixture and added to the hot butter-olive oil mixture once it was sizzling hot. Flipped the slices over once they were browned and golden about 3 minutes per side. It took about 3 batches to get all the tomatoes done in my size of skillet--you may have more luck in a larger one. Once they were done, put them between layers of paper towel to drain and kept them hot in the oven. Meanwhile, sliced 5 radishes into thin matchsticks, did the same thing with 1/2 a cucumber. Put them into a salad of mixed baby greens. Tossed the salad with a dressing of 3 tablespoons olive oil, 1 tablespoon each red wine vinegar and champagne vinegar, 1 teaspoon sugar, salt and pepper. For each plate, put 3 fried tomatoes on top of a scoop of salad and put a dollop of goat cheese on top of the tomatoes, then a small handful of pine nuts on top of the goat cheese. Except that Krista and Brian hate goat cheese so really just Clark and I had it like that.
The boiled peanuts were unusually delicious. This is because they were really really good peanuts to start off with. When I was picking them out at the market the lady standing next to me said approvingly that I was doing it correctly. I boiled them in extremely salty water with 3 crumbled bay leaves, 2 tablespoons red pepper flakes and about 5 cloves of garlic, cut into chunks. I am doing the garlic like this from now on because when I drained the peanuts (tossed them in 1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar, 2 tablespoons chile oil) the chunks of garlic were super mellow and soft and seriously? Awesome.
Sadly, the gnocchi kind of sucked. I have covered how to make these before (I think it is in a post from November or something if you are interested) but I hadn't realized that acorn squash were so shitty compared to my usual sweet kabocha squaash. Well, they totally are. No flavor at all this time of year in winter squash. And I should have known better! Totally out of season and I tried to do it anyway. I'm sorry Barbara Kingsolver, did I learn NOTHING from your book that I read and loved? I guess not. Idiot.
I had found really perfect green peanuts at the DeKalb market that afternoon so I had to buy them. Problem was that I was dead-set on making squash gnocchi for dinner. How to unite these disparate elements into one cohesive meal? Southern + southern. Boiled peanuts, then fried green tomato salad and gnocchi.
It is so easy to make fried green tomatoes. Cut up 4 medium green tomatoes into 1/4 - 1/2" slices. Mixed together 3/4 cup cornmeal with 1 teaspoon each salt and pepper (actually, that's just a guess, I have no idea how much salt and pepper). Melted 1 tablespoon of butter with 2 tablespoons olive oil over medium-high heat. Dredged the tomato slices in the cornmeal mixture and added to the hot butter-olive oil mixture once it was sizzling hot. Flipped the slices over once they were browned and golden about 3 minutes per side. It took about 3 batches to get all the tomatoes done in my size of skillet--you may have more luck in a larger one. Once they were done, put them between layers of paper towel to drain and kept them hot in the oven. Meanwhile, sliced 5 radishes into thin matchsticks, did the same thing with 1/2 a cucumber. Put them into a salad of mixed baby greens. Tossed the salad with a dressing of 3 tablespoons olive oil, 1 tablespoon each red wine vinegar and champagne vinegar, 1 teaspoon sugar, salt and pepper. For each plate, put 3 fried tomatoes on top of a scoop of salad and put a dollop of goat cheese on top of the tomatoes, then a small handful of pine nuts on top of the goat cheese. Except that Krista and Brian hate goat cheese so really just Clark and I had it like that.
The boiled peanuts were unusually delicious. This is because they were really really good peanuts to start off with. When I was picking them out at the market the lady standing next to me said approvingly that I was doing it correctly. I boiled them in extremely salty water with 3 crumbled bay leaves, 2 tablespoons red pepper flakes and about 5 cloves of garlic, cut into chunks. I am doing the garlic like this from now on because when I drained the peanuts (tossed them in 1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar, 2 tablespoons chile oil) the chunks of garlic were super mellow and soft and seriously? Awesome.
Sadly, the gnocchi kind of sucked. I have covered how to make these before (I think it is in a post from November or something if you are interested) but I hadn't realized that acorn squash were so shitty compared to my usual sweet kabocha squaash. Well, they totally are. No flavor at all this time of year in winter squash. And I should have known better! Totally out of season and I tried to do it anyway. I'm sorry Barbara Kingsolver, did I learn NOTHING from your book that I read and loved? I guess not. Idiot.
Friday, June 08, 2007
Broccoli leaves
I have discovered something amazing—apparently there is a little farmers market in Decatur, right on the way home from work! I can’t believe I didn’t know about it before! It’s really tiny, only a few stalls, but it will be great for finding exciting local produce to take home and cook up. I found the market in the parking lot of my bank where I had stopped to get cash in order to buy biodiesel for my car. While there I picked up some organic, locally grown dark green leafy vegetables. I cooked them up with brown rice and tofu. Today I am seriously a hippie.
The man who sold me the broccoli leaves told me that he simply stir fries them for a long time in olive oil and that’s how it goes. I was intrigued by broccoli leaves—I really like broccoli, so it’s exciting that there is a whole other part of it that I can eat. I prepared them much as you do with chard—clean well, cut out the stem because it is too tough, then roll up the leaves and cut them into a wide chiffonade. Heated 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a tall sided pan and put in the leaves—they seem like a lot but cook down very quickly. I moved them around in the pan a lot and they turned bright green and I thought they might be close to done, but I tried a bit and no way. They need awhile to cook. So I just kept the heat on medium-low and stirred them every now and then. They got a bit darker and shrank down in mass some more before they were tender enough to eat. They probably took about 25 minutes. Salted and peppered them and that’s it! I also cut up into cubes the awesome Trader Joe’s teriyaki pressed tofu and heated it up in some of my favorite sauce (veri veri teriyaki). Put the broccoli greens and the tofu with sauce over brown rice and sprinkled black sesame seeds over the top of everything.
The man who sold me the broccoli leaves told me that he simply stir fries them for a long time in olive oil and that’s how it goes. I was intrigued by broccoli leaves—I really like broccoli, so it’s exciting that there is a whole other part of it that I can eat. I prepared them much as you do with chard—clean well, cut out the stem because it is too tough, then roll up the leaves and cut them into a wide chiffonade. Heated 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a tall sided pan and put in the leaves—they seem like a lot but cook down very quickly. I moved them around in the pan a lot and they turned bright green and I thought they might be close to done, but I tried a bit and no way. They need awhile to cook. So I just kept the heat on medium-low and stirred them every now and then. They got a bit darker and shrank down in mass some more before they were tender enough to eat. They probably took about 25 minutes. Salted and peppered them and that’s it! I also cut up into cubes the awesome Trader Joe’s teriyaki pressed tofu and heated it up in some of my favorite sauce (veri veri teriyaki). Put the broccoli greens and the tofu with sauce over brown rice and sprinkled black sesame seeds over the top of everything.
Lemon chicken
This is actually the first thing that I ever remember cooking. I think I was in middle school. My friend Sonia and I were allowed to make dinner for her family and I remember getting all excited about that. I also thought, at the time, that this was possibly the most delicious thing in the whole world. So, I decided the other day that I would try to recreate it. I remember the steps that I took to make it but didn’t really remember the proportion of ingredients; when I made this the other day I only used one small lemon, I think it needs at least a lemon and a half to really get the flavor right.
I cut one whole skinless, boneless chicken breast into 4 pieces and flattened them to even width. I wish I had a meat pounder, but instead I had to beat them with the palm of my hands which made me feel weirdly abusive. Coated the pieces of chicken with a mixture of ¼ cup flour, ½ teaspoon salt and 1 teaspoon black pepper. Heated 2 tablespoons of olive oil over medium high heat and added the chicken when it was hot and sizzly. Turned the chicken several times to get all sides and even golden-brown and to cook through—took about 8 minutes over high heat. Removed from pan and set aside. Let the pan cool down somewhat then tossed in about 2 tablespoons of butter. When it was hot and melted, added ½ yellow onion, evenly minced. Cooked onion over medium and gentle heat to get it completely soft and golden-yellow but not at all brown. When it was well cooked, added 1 more tablespoon butter to melt and then ¼ cup of flour. Mixed this to make a roux, browned it lightly then started adding chicken stock. This is where I’m not sure about the proportions. I know I added at least 1 cup of liquid for sure but it wasn’t enough so I’m pretty sure I ended up adding about 2 cups all together. Add it a bit at a time and integrate it to make a smooth sauce. I like it to be not too thick so I ended up adding a lot of liquid. It’s really a matter of personal taste—if it seems to be the consistency that you like, you can stop right there. After I mixed in my about-2-cups of chicken stock and got the sauce very smooth, I turned off the heat and added the juice of one lemon. Again, in retrospect, I would add the juice from at least another half a lemon and also the zest, in order to get the flavor boosted up. So, if you make this, do that. Returned the chicken pieces to the sauce and served it over brown rice.
I cut one whole skinless, boneless chicken breast into 4 pieces and flattened them to even width. I wish I had a meat pounder, but instead I had to beat them with the palm of my hands which made me feel weirdly abusive. Coated the pieces of chicken with a mixture of ¼ cup flour, ½ teaspoon salt and 1 teaspoon black pepper. Heated 2 tablespoons of olive oil over medium high heat and added the chicken when it was hot and sizzly. Turned the chicken several times to get all sides and even golden-brown and to cook through—took about 8 minutes over high heat. Removed from pan and set aside. Let the pan cool down somewhat then tossed in about 2 tablespoons of butter. When it was hot and melted, added ½ yellow onion, evenly minced. Cooked onion over medium and gentle heat to get it completely soft and golden-yellow but not at all brown. When it was well cooked, added 1 more tablespoon butter to melt and then ¼ cup of flour. Mixed this to make a roux, browned it lightly then started adding chicken stock. This is where I’m not sure about the proportions. I know I added at least 1 cup of liquid for sure but it wasn’t enough so I’m pretty sure I ended up adding about 2 cups all together. Add it a bit at a time and integrate it to make a smooth sauce. I like it to be not too thick so I ended up adding a lot of liquid. It’s really a matter of personal taste—if it seems to be the consistency that you like, you can stop right there. After I mixed in my about-2-cups of chicken stock and got the sauce very smooth, I turned off the heat and added the juice of one lemon. Again, in retrospect, I would add the juice from at least another half a lemon and also the zest, in order to get the flavor boosted up. So, if you make this, do that. Returned the chicken pieces to the sauce and served it over brown rice.
Picnic
I went along on a ride to a picnic that was held by Atlanta’s InTown Touring Club. Byron had promised that he would schedule it for a time when I could actually make it (it seems like I haven’t been able to get to any of the club rides so far but I would have been pissed if I’d missed the picnic). We all met up at Grant Park where Katie, Brian and I had selected a good spot—lots of shady trees and plenty of room to play whiffle ball. Two grills were trucked in on bicycle as well as a ton of other stuff. They were like pack animals lugging all this food and cooking supplies to our picnic site. People brought some really yummy snack type foods and delicious sides. We grilled all kinds of stuff—sausages, fancy hot dogs, veggie burgers and teriyaki chicken. I also grilled up red peppers and eggplant, as I usually do: cut into strips or rounds, marinate in balsamic vinegar, olive oil, dash of worcestershire, salt, red pepper flakes. But the most interesting thing was the corn, here’s how it worked:
Cut 6 ears of shucked corn into 3 pieces each—actually, one or two were too small so they only got cut into 2 pieces. The idea is to make mini corns. Put them around the perimeter of a hot grill and flip them frequently, keeping a good eye on so they do not burn. They turn a nice, deep golden color pretty fast, but if they start charring, pull them off and wait until the grill cools somewhat. You want some browned parts but not charcoal corn. Move them around the grill as necessary; pull them off when the kernels are soft when you poke them—probably about 10-12 minutes. Ahead of time, not at the picnic but in my own kitchen, I melted 4 tablespoons of butter and tossed in 1 teaspoon of paprika, ½ teaspoon chili powder and 1 teaspoon of cayenne when the butter was hot. Poured this into a little container to combine with the juice and zest of one lime. Added salt and pepper to the mixture and covered the container to take with me to the picnic. When the corn was finished grilling and still hot, I tossed the corn pieces with the chili-lime-butter mixture. People seemed to like it a lot.
Cut 6 ears of shucked corn into 3 pieces each—actually, one or two were too small so they only got cut into 2 pieces. The idea is to make mini corns. Put them around the perimeter of a hot grill and flip them frequently, keeping a good eye on so they do not burn. They turn a nice, deep golden color pretty fast, but if they start charring, pull them off and wait until the grill cools somewhat. You want some browned parts but not charcoal corn. Move them around the grill as necessary; pull them off when the kernels are soft when you poke them—probably about 10-12 minutes. Ahead of time, not at the picnic but in my own kitchen, I melted 4 tablespoons of butter and tossed in 1 teaspoon of paprika, ½ teaspoon chili powder and 1 teaspoon of cayenne when the butter was hot. Poured this into a little container to combine with the juice and zest of one lime. Added salt and pepper to the mixture and covered the container to take with me to the picnic. When the corn was finished grilling and still hot, I tossed the corn pieces with the chili-lime-butter mixture. People seemed to like it a lot.
Monday, June 04, 2007
what I ate in philly
This is not a usual post, but I haven't cooked in a while as I've been out of town, so I thought I'd let you all know some very important information: I ate really really well in Philadelphia. Read on for details; if it's a recipe you want you'll have to come back tomorrow.
Day the first. Jocelyn picked me up via rail at the philly airport (which, by the way? really easy to get in and out of) and we realized an immediate need for food. Walked pretty much straightaway over to a narrow little Belgian bar called Eulogy (136 Chestnut Street). I ordered a Delerium and about a pound of mussels in white wine. They came with delicious crusty bread and I stuffed myself. We also had fries--golden, doubled fried, perfect wedges of potato.
Day the second. Awakened with thoughts of breakfast and so made our way to Sabrina's Cafe (910 Christian Street) where we split this enormous, towering behemoth of stuffed challah french toast. It had farmers cheese inside it and strawberries and was seriously the size of a small dog. They cut it in half and it was still huge. Delicious. Also had some decent potatoes, although they were clearly of the home fries variety instead of the hash brown type that I generally prefer. I'll tell you what though--their turkey bacon was WEIRD. Wide, flat and pink. Like a cross-section of tounge. That french toast was happening though. Later in the day we somehow found ourselves hungry again and so walked to Govinda's (1505 South Street) to get vegetarian cheese steaks. I'm not really eating a lot of meat right now (thinking a lot about sustainability and feed lots are bothering me again) and Jocelyn's a vegetarian anyway, so it seemed like we should hit up a meatless option for this classic. Govinda's makes vegetarian and vegan cheese steaks and hoagies and they are really good. We got ours with real cheese and we also got a golden tofu wrap--the tofu was marinated in tamari, ginger and tahini then wrapped with basmati rice in a whole wheat shell. Sounds strange but it totally worked--besides we were hungry. For dinner we didn't go out--we picked up sushi from Whole Foods and made a salad--oh I lie! Here's a recipe after all: juice one lemon, shake in a jar with olive oil, salt, pepper and parmesan cheese. Toss into a salad of spinach, baby greens, tomatoes, chick peas and diced raw zucchini. We hit up The Foodery for dinner beverages, which we decided should be called the Drinkery. It's a little corner store by Jocelyn's apartment that looks like your average bodega but when you walk in you realize that the walls are lined with refrigerators that have singles of every beer you want and about a million that you've never heard of. It's really neat. You can assemble your own Franken-6-pack-stein. I got a weird orange blossom cream ale (I know, I know, I was asking for it. But I was curious!) and also a belgian something. So that was really cool.
Day the third. For breakfast we just went to the coffee shop that Jocelyn is in the process of auditioning to be "hers." It had good coffee and decent pastries so we were set for awhile. We had planned to go for $10 vegetarian dim sum for dinner but we got hungry and so just made it a late lunch. We wandered around Chinatown looking for a place that she had been to before but ended up at a different $10 vegetarian dim sum place that I'm not sure of the name. Maybe H.K. Golden Phoenix, or something like that? Anyway, couldn't tell you, but we were the only people in there. Our waitress was really sweet and she kept bringing us food from this little elevator--it was funny, the kitchen must have been upstairs so you'd put in an order for something, wait a few minutes, then see a little light go "ding!" and the elevator would descend, and then she'd open the door and there would be your food! It was fun. We got all kinds of stuff, but the highlights were the (veggie) roast pork dumplings and also these coconut/sweet potato paste deep fried triangles. Oh my lord, it was so delicious. I would eat there every day if I lived in Philly. If I could find it again, that is. Later that night we went to Nodding Head Brewery (1516 Sansom Street)and I got a decent beer and then a great beer--the great one was their Nodding Head Grog, which was dark and chocolate-malty.
Day the fourth. Breakfast found us at Beau Monde (624 South Sixth Street), a creperie. Unsuprisingly, we ordered crepes--mine was nutella and banana and I think Jocelyn got lemon curd and berries in hers. They take their crepes pretty seriously there. Also got some decent bacon and really good fried potatoes--again, however, not hash browns. It seemed OK though, because we were in a french, excuse me, a BRETON, restaurant. The waitress tried to get me to add sorbet to my crepe combo and I think I looked at her funny and said something about it being breakfast time and not sorbet time. It was weird, I thought. 9 in the morning and you want me to eat cold sorbet atop my nice breakfast crepe? Keep it to yourself, lady. For lunch we ended up at Reading Terminal Market (51 N 12th Street) which is a lively public market with a bajillion food vendors to choose from. We got latkes and matzo ball soup from Hershels East Side Deli inside the market and then went to the Flying Monkey Patisserie where we procured a dark chocolate cupcake with lavender buttercream frosting.
Also of note in Philadelphia is a very fine kitchenware store in the Bella Vista Italian neighborhood called Fante's (1006 S 9th Sreet, also check them out at http://www.fantes.com/). They had everything you could ever want crammed into this store and the staff was incredibly friendly and knowledgeable. I highly recommend them for any kitchen-y needs.
Day the first. Jocelyn picked me up via rail at the philly airport (which, by the way? really easy to get in and out of) and we realized an immediate need for food. Walked pretty much straightaway over to a narrow little Belgian bar called Eulogy (136 Chestnut Street). I ordered a Delerium and about a pound of mussels in white wine. They came with delicious crusty bread and I stuffed myself. We also had fries--golden, doubled fried, perfect wedges of potato.
Day the second. Awakened with thoughts of breakfast and so made our way to Sabrina's Cafe (910 Christian Street) where we split this enormous, towering behemoth of stuffed challah french toast. It had farmers cheese inside it and strawberries and was seriously the size of a small dog. They cut it in half and it was still huge. Delicious. Also had some decent potatoes, although they were clearly of the home fries variety instead of the hash brown type that I generally prefer. I'll tell you what though--their turkey bacon was WEIRD. Wide, flat and pink. Like a cross-section of tounge. That french toast was happening though. Later in the day we somehow found ourselves hungry again and so walked to Govinda's (1505 South Street) to get vegetarian cheese steaks. I'm not really eating a lot of meat right now (thinking a lot about sustainability and feed lots are bothering me again) and Jocelyn's a vegetarian anyway, so it seemed like we should hit up a meatless option for this classic. Govinda's makes vegetarian and vegan cheese steaks and hoagies and they are really good. We got ours with real cheese and we also got a golden tofu wrap--the tofu was marinated in tamari, ginger and tahini then wrapped with basmati rice in a whole wheat shell. Sounds strange but it totally worked--besides we were hungry. For dinner we didn't go out--we picked up sushi from Whole Foods and made a salad--oh I lie! Here's a recipe after all: juice one lemon, shake in a jar with olive oil, salt, pepper and parmesan cheese. Toss into a salad of spinach, baby greens, tomatoes, chick peas and diced raw zucchini. We hit up The Foodery for dinner beverages, which we decided should be called the Drinkery. It's a little corner store by Jocelyn's apartment that looks like your average bodega but when you walk in you realize that the walls are lined with refrigerators that have singles of every beer you want and about a million that you've never heard of. It's really neat. You can assemble your own Franken-6-pack-stein. I got a weird orange blossom cream ale (I know, I know, I was asking for it. But I was curious!) and also a belgian something. So that was really cool.
Day the third. For breakfast we just went to the coffee shop that Jocelyn is in the process of auditioning to be "hers." It had good coffee and decent pastries so we were set for awhile. We had planned to go for $10 vegetarian dim sum for dinner but we got hungry and so just made it a late lunch. We wandered around Chinatown looking for a place that she had been to before but ended up at a different $10 vegetarian dim sum place that I'm not sure of the name. Maybe H.K. Golden Phoenix, or something like that? Anyway, couldn't tell you, but we were the only people in there. Our waitress was really sweet and she kept bringing us food from this little elevator--it was funny, the kitchen must have been upstairs so you'd put in an order for something, wait a few minutes, then see a little light go "ding!" and the elevator would descend, and then she'd open the door and there would be your food! It was fun. We got all kinds of stuff, but the highlights were the (veggie) roast pork dumplings and also these coconut/sweet potato paste deep fried triangles. Oh my lord, it was so delicious. I would eat there every day if I lived in Philly. If I could find it again, that is. Later that night we went to Nodding Head Brewery (1516 Sansom Street)and I got a decent beer and then a great beer--the great one was their Nodding Head Grog, which was dark and chocolate-malty.
Day the fourth. Breakfast found us at Beau Monde (624 South Sixth Street), a creperie. Unsuprisingly, we ordered crepes--mine was nutella and banana and I think Jocelyn got lemon curd and berries in hers. They take their crepes pretty seriously there. Also got some decent bacon and really good fried potatoes--again, however, not hash browns. It seemed OK though, because we were in a french, excuse me, a BRETON, restaurant. The waitress tried to get me to add sorbet to my crepe combo and I think I looked at her funny and said something about it being breakfast time and not sorbet time. It was weird, I thought. 9 in the morning and you want me to eat cold sorbet atop my nice breakfast crepe? Keep it to yourself, lady. For lunch we ended up at Reading Terminal Market (51 N 12th Street) which is a lively public market with a bajillion food vendors to choose from. We got latkes and matzo ball soup from Hershels East Side Deli inside the market and then went to the Flying Monkey Patisserie where we procured a dark chocolate cupcake with lavender buttercream frosting.
Also of note in Philadelphia is a very fine kitchenware store in the Bella Vista Italian neighborhood called Fante's (1006 S 9th Sreet, also check them out at http://www.fantes.com/). They had everything you could ever want crammed into this store and the staff was incredibly friendly and knowledgeable. I highly recommend them for any kitchen-y needs.
Monday, May 21, 2007
Greek salad and mixed grill
I don't know how authentically greek this actually is, but it is at least greek-esque, what with all the feta and olives. My friend Krista made this salad at her house a couple weeks ago and it was so delicious that I tried to duplicate it at home. She didn't put any chickpeas in hers but I thought it would be an acceptable deviation. Your best bet is just to get her to make it for you, but this one I made last night worked out pretty well.
I got a bag of mixed baby greens from the DeKalb Market and dumped them in a big salad bowl. I sliced grape tomatoes in half, using about 1/2 of a pint container. Cut half a hothouse cucumber into quarters lengthwise and then sliced the quarters into 1/2" chunks. Sliced in half a small red onion, then cut paper thin slices from the halves. Crumbled up about 1/2 a block of feta cheese--I'm not sure how much it actually was. Couldn't have been more than 1/3 cup. Pitted and sliced 10 Kalamata olives. Drained and rinsed very well a can of chickpeas and set aside about 3/4 of the can to use on the salad. I guess you could just use all of it if you really liked chickpeas. Put all these vegetables and other ingredients on top of the greens in the salad bowl, not bothering to toss yet, just letting them chill there until it was time to eat. Juiced one lemon and poured it into a glass jar with a lid. Added about 4 tablespoons good olive oil and a liberal grinding of pepper and salt. Closed the lid tightly and shook it up in the jar until it was emulsified. I waited to dress the salad until the rest of our dinner was ready, then right before we ate I poured the dressing over everything and tossed it all up until it all ingredients were mixed up and the dressing covered everything.
Jeremy and Melanie brought up chicken and delicious spicy chicken sausages so we marinated the chicken in teriyaki and boiled up the sausages like brats before slapping them on the grill. I sliced one small eggplant into rounds and marinated them in salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, balsamic vinegar and olive oil. I cut 4 very small, yellow crookneck squash in half lengthwise (they were so tiny! little baby squash--no longer than 5 or 6 inches, adorable!), and 2 red peppers into strips. These I marinated separately from the eggplant in olive oil, salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, minced garlic, 1 teaspoon dried thyme and a little bit of minced red onion left over from preparing the salad. First up I grilled the chicken breasts, then the eggplant, then peppers and squash (grill cut side down on the squash to get attractive char marks), then sausages. As always, checking with instant, digital meat thermometer for safe temperatures. Please tell me you have one of these. They are wonderful things and have many applications, only one of which is grilling. You can also use them to annoy your spouse, by jabbing the pointy end into their stomachs and saying "I'll take your temperature!" I'm not saying any of us were doing that but if anyone was, it was Jeremy.
Also, we had boiled peanuts before dinner. I made them like I usually do, which is to cover fresh, green peanuts with water, add about 3 tablespoons pickling spices, 2 crumbled bay leaves, 2 tablespoons red pepper flakes and an assload of kosher salt, probably about 4 tablespoons, depending on how many peanuts and how much water. You want it to be briny. Boil them until they get soft, drain and drizzle olive oil over them and sprinkle with a little vinegar. They are better with chile oil, but I didn't have any on hand.
I got a bag of mixed baby greens from the DeKalb Market and dumped them in a big salad bowl. I sliced grape tomatoes in half, using about 1/2 of a pint container. Cut half a hothouse cucumber into quarters lengthwise and then sliced the quarters into 1/2" chunks. Sliced in half a small red onion, then cut paper thin slices from the halves. Crumbled up about 1/2 a block of feta cheese--I'm not sure how much it actually was. Couldn't have been more than 1/3 cup. Pitted and sliced 10 Kalamata olives. Drained and rinsed very well a can of chickpeas and set aside about 3/4 of the can to use on the salad. I guess you could just use all of it if you really liked chickpeas. Put all these vegetables and other ingredients on top of the greens in the salad bowl, not bothering to toss yet, just letting them chill there until it was time to eat. Juiced one lemon and poured it into a glass jar with a lid. Added about 4 tablespoons good olive oil and a liberal grinding of pepper and salt. Closed the lid tightly and shook it up in the jar until it was emulsified. I waited to dress the salad until the rest of our dinner was ready, then right before we ate I poured the dressing over everything and tossed it all up until it all ingredients were mixed up and the dressing covered everything.
Jeremy and Melanie brought up chicken and delicious spicy chicken sausages so we marinated the chicken in teriyaki and boiled up the sausages like brats before slapping them on the grill. I sliced one small eggplant into rounds and marinated them in salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, balsamic vinegar and olive oil. I cut 4 very small, yellow crookneck squash in half lengthwise (they were so tiny! little baby squash--no longer than 5 or 6 inches, adorable!), and 2 red peppers into strips. These I marinated separately from the eggplant in olive oil, salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, minced garlic, 1 teaspoon dried thyme and a little bit of minced red onion left over from preparing the salad. First up I grilled the chicken breasts, then the eggplant, then peppers and squash (grill cut side down on the squash to get attractive char marks), then sausages. As always, checking with instant, digital meat thermometer for safe temperatures. Please tell me you have one of these. They are wonderful things and have many applications, only one of which is grilling. You can also use them to annoy your spouse, by jabbing the pointy end into their stomachs and saying "I'll take your temperature!" I'm not saying any of us were doing that but if anyone was, it was Jeremy.
Also, we had boiled peanuts before dinner. I made them like I usually do, which is to cover fresh, green peanuts with water, add about 3 tablespoons pickling spices, 2 crumbled bay leaves, 2 tablespoons red pepper flakes and an assload of kosher salt, probably about 4 tablespoons, depending on how many peanuts and how much water. You want it to be briny. Boil them until they get soft, drain and drizzle olive oil over them and sprinkle with a little vinegar. They are better with chile oil, but I didn't have any on hand.
Monday, May 14, 2007
Cheddar biscuits with ham & chives
I am going to tell you how to make these biscuits except I am going to tell you how to make them with MUCH LESS SALT! I made these for a Mother's Day party that a friend from the dog park hosted. She has a really gorgeous house and let a bunch of us childless dog park people come over with our grubby pets and mess it up on Sunday. I think it was a really cute idea to have a Mother's Day brunch for us dog mothers...even my mother who is an actual, real, human mother who doesn't normally go in for "whimsy" or "fun of any sort" thought it was funny. Anyway, I made these biscuits to take over which was actually a good idea but they were far too salty as I had underestimated the power of ham. So, learn from my mistake and don't bother putting any salt in the dough at all if you'll be using ham. If omitting the ham, you'll need a smidge of salt but not much because the cheese flavors it a bit as well.
I had the guy at the DeKalb Farmer's Market deli counter slice me two big pieces of (incredibly salty! learn from mistakes!) smoked ham. He adjusted the slicer to get them about 1/2" thick each. I only ended up using one of them--cut the 1/2" thick piece of ham into teeny tiny little cubes and fried them up to get a bit crispy in a pan, then set aside. Probably was not even a 1/4 cup of teeny ham cubes all total. Finely grated about 1/2 cup of sharp cheddar cheese and set that aside as well, along with about 1/3 cup of minced fresh chives. Began preheating the oven at 450 degrees and greased up a couple of baking sheets. In a big bowl, mixed very well 2 cups of flour with 3 teaspoons baking powder, and 1 teaspoon baking soda. Cut up about 4 tablespoons of cold butter (you can use less, but should use at least 2) into tiny, ham bit-size chunks and integrated them into the flour mixture. You can use a food processor if you have one. I don't, so I cut it in with my hands by picking up butter chunks and rubbing it into the flour. It's tedious, but whatever. Your biscuits will thank you. Get all the butter really well integrated--it turns the flour grainy and piecey, but there should not be any butter left visible. Then added 1 cup buttermilk, 1 teaspoon cayenne, and the cheese, chives and ham bits. Mixed until it just barely stuck together in a ball. As with the lemon pancakes we made at Easter time, this is the thing with foods in the quick bread family--you do not overmix them or push them around or harrass them or they become tough and don't rise up in the oven or go to college and make a decent living. So just stir the wet and dry ingredients until they are barely incorporated and starting to cling together, then turn out on a floured surface and knead super lightly a few times. I was making these in drop biscuit form, rather than cutting them out with a biscuit cutter, so maybe I didn't actually need to knead at all. Not sure about that. If you wanted to cut out these biscuits instead, you would add less liquid--maybe 3/4 cup. Anyway, I dropped the biscuits in little spoonfuls onto my greasy baking sheets--they made about 18 or 20 total. Popped them in the super hot oven for just shy of ten minutes, then hauled them out. They were puffed up nicely and looked really pretty. Then I stupidly put them into a container and walked them over to the dog mother's day brunch and they got all squished because they were still hot. But they tasted good, if unattractive. Oh, and salty. You may have noticed that I left that out--seriously, I was nibbling on a leftover one just now and I think I have instant hypertension.
I had the guy at the DeKalb Farmer's Market deli counter slice me two big pieces of (incredibly salty! learn from mistakes!) smoked ham. He adjusted the slicer to get them about 1/2" thick each. I only ended up using one of them--cut the 1/2" thick piece of ham into teeny tiny little cubes and fried them up to get a bit crispy in a pan, then set aside. Probably was not even a 1/4 cup of teeny ham cubes all total. Finely grated about 1/2 cup of sharp cheddar cheese and set that aside as well, along with about 1/3 cup of minced fresh chives. Began preheating the oven at 450 degrees and greased up a couple of baking sheets. In a big bowl, mixed very well 2 cups of flour with 3 teaspoons baking powder, and 1 teaspoon baking soda. Cut up about 4 tablespoons of cold butter (you can use less, but should use at least 2) into tiny, ham bit-size chunks and integrated them into the flour mixture. You can use a food processor if you have one. I don't, so I cut it in with my hands by picking up butter chunks and rubbing it into the flour. It's tedious, but whatever. Your biscuits will thank you. Get all the butter really well integrated--it turns the flour grainy and piecey, but there should not be any butter left visible. Then added 1 cup buttermilk, 1 teaspoon cayenne, and the cheese, chives and ham bits. Mixed until it just barely stuck together in a ball. As with the lemon pancakes we made at Easter time, this is the thing with foods in the quick bread family--you do not overmix them or push them around or harrass them or they become tough and don't rise up in the oven or go to college and make a decent living. So just stir the wet and dry ingredients until they are barely incorporated and starting to cling together, then turn out on a floured surface and knead super lightly a few times. I was making these in drop biscuit form, rather than cutting them out with a biscuit cutter, so maybe I didn't actually need to knead at all. Not sure about that. If you wanted to cut out these biscuits instead, you would add less liquid--maybe 3/4 cup. Anyway, I dropped the biscuits in little spoonfuls onto my greasy baking sheets--they made about 18 or 20 total. Popped them in the super hot oven for just shy of ten minutes, then hauled them out. They were puffed up nicely and looked really pretty. Then I stupidly put them into a container and walked them over to the dog mother's day brunch and they got all squished because they were still hot. But they tasted good, if unattractive. Oh, and salty. You may have noticed that I left that out--seriously, I was nibbling on a leftover one just now and I think I have instant hypertension.
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
Chicken tortellini soup
Oh, I have covered chicken soup TO DEATH! I know it, you know it, all five people who read this know it. But wait! This time I put tortellini pasta in it! Mm-hmm, it's true! Also, I took a "less is more", precision soup-making approach...and I think the end result was a different soup than ones I have made in the past. Refine refine refine.
I don't know how you would make soup without a chicken. We roasted it on Monday night, so I had a nice looking leftover chicken carcass to boil up. If you are not a chicken eater or a chicken roaster, I suppose you could skip this whole first step and use vegetable stock or chicken stock. There are some good brands out there, I imagine. I have seen some good looking organic, aseptically packaged ones on the shelves at the grocery store. Anyway, I first stripped down my left over chicken and reserved the meat from the thighs and breast and stuck it in the fridge and forgot about it. Then I covered the leftover chicken bones and meat with water in my big cast iron dutch oven pot and let it heat up while I chopped up the rest of the ingredients for the stock. Tossed in 2 bay leaves, then about 6 garlic cloves. I didn't really peel or chop them very carefully because I knew I would be straining the stock anyway. Then a 1" piece of ginger, cut up into chunks, and 3 carrots (left unpeeled) and 4 stalks of celery, both also poorly chopped. Can you sense a theme? Stock making is the easy-going step--no need to carefully trim the veggies! It all boiled happily together for about an hour, whereupon I strained it through a fine-mesh colander into a container and set it aside to wait.
To make the soup: Back in the same dutch oven, I melted 2 tablespoons of butter and added 1/2 of a sad-looking onion. It was from Jeremy & Melanie's house and was looking a little bit tired but I trimmed it up and carefully sliced it into small, attractive bits, then added to the hot butter. I also carefully diced 2 stalks of celery and 2 carrots and added those to the pot after the onion had become soft and fragrant. Stirred this mirepoix over medium heat until it was soft, then added in 2 yukon gold potatoes, diced. Poured back in my stock and added some salt. When everything had been boiling together for about 10 minutes, I added 1/2 a package of mixed cheese tortellini, let it go for another 5 minutes and added about 1/4 cup of green peas. Cooked until the tortellini were done through, then removed the soup from heat and stirred in 1 tablespoon white wine vinegar and the diced chicken meat from earlier. I actually forgot about the chicken until the last minute--I was dishing up the soup and Brian was poking around in the fridge, and he says "hey, what's the chicken for?" and I said, "oh shit, that's right!" We know how to have fun around here.
I don't know how you would make soup without a chicken. We roasted it on Monday night, so I had a nice looking leftover chicken carcass to boil up. If you are not a chicken eater or a chicken roaster, I suppose you could skip this whole first step and use vegetable stock or chicken stock. There are some good brands out there, I imagine. I have seen some good looking organic, aseptically packaged ones on the shelves at the grocery store. Anyway, I first stripped down my left over chicken and reserved the meat from the thighs and breast and stuck it in the fridge and forgot about it. Then I covered the leftover chicken bones and meat with water in my big cast iron dutch oven pot and let it heat up while I chopped up the rest of the ingredients for the stock. Tossed in 2 bay leaves, then about 6 garlic cloves. I didn't really peel or chop them very carefully because I knew I would be straining the stock anyway. Then a 1" piece of ginger, cut up into chunks, and 3 carrots (left unpeeled) and 4 stalks of celery, both also poorly chopped. Can you sense a theme? Stock making is the easy-going step--no need to carefully trim the veggies! It all boiled happily together for about an hour, whereupon I strained it through a fine-mesh colander into a container and set it aside to wait.
To make the soup: Back in the same dutch oven, I melted 2 tablespoons of butter and added 1/2 of a sad-looking onion. It was from Jeremy & Melanie's house and was looking a little bit tired but I trimmed it up and carefully sliced it into small, attractive bits, then added to the hot butter. I also carefully diced 2 stalks of celery and 2 carrots and added those to the pot after the onion had become soft and fragrant. Stirred this mirepoix over medium heat until it was soft, then added in 2 yukon gold potatoes, diced. Poured back in my stock and added some salt. When everything had been boiling together for about 10 minutes, I added 1/2 a package of mixed cheese tortellini, let it go for another 5 minutes and added about 1/4 cup of green peas. Cooked until the tortellini were done through, then removed the soup from heat and stirred in 1 tablespoon white wine vinegar and the diced chicken meat from earlier. I actually forgot about the chicken until the last minute--I was dishing up the soup and Brian was poking around in the fridge, and he says "hey, what's the chicken for?" and I said, "oh shit, that's right!" We know how to have fun around here.
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
Grilled red potatoes
Yesterday was really nice. I got out of work at least an hour earlier than usual. Brian is in his "no work, no school" temporary state, so he was hanging around, and both Jeremy and Melanie were home early for some reason too. This is why we could all be found drinking beers on the porch by 5 pm on a Monday. We got very loungey and nibbled on edamame and pretzels as our cocktail hour stretched on, but eventually figured we'd eat something that could be considered real dinner. Of course once you've been drinking on a sunny porch while the rest of the city battles rush hour, the last thing you want to do is go anywhere to get specific dinner supplies...no, you'd much rather just grill whatever happens to be lying around the house. Melanie had a bag of small red potatoes languishing in her apartment and so we thought we'd try grilling them, and it worked really well:
Took most of a 3 pound sack of small red potatoes and scrubbed them well. Sliced them in half, except that we left one whole as an experiment. Jeremy took them down to their apartment to microwave (we have limited technology in our house), which I believe took 3 minutes. They have a very powerful microwave though, so maybe on a conventional one it would be more like 5 minutes. Anyway, the goal was to cook them a bit so they would not be too long on the grill. They offered just a little resistance when I jabbed one with a knife. Covered them with a 1/3 cup mixture of olive oil and canola oil, then added 1 tablespoon each vindaloo powder and chile powder, and 2 teaspoons each of paprika, red pepper flakes and salt. Mixed it all up really well with the potatoes and let them sit until the grill was hot. Realized I had an orange pepper hanging around in the fridge, so I sliced that into 8 thick pieces and stuck that in with the potatoes as well.
When the grill was hot we tossed on veggie burgers and a bit of flank steak that had been marinating in teriyaki sauce (by the way? the Soy Vey brand called "veri veri teriyaki" is sort of awesomely delicious). When those were done, I hauled them off and put all the potatoes on, lying them cut-side down, along with the pepper strips. The pepper strips were done much faster, so I just pulled them off as they got browned and soft. The potatoes grilled very well--they don't burn easily but get lovely char marks on the skin parts. I think they took about 10 minutes of grilling, with frequent turning and moving around to make sure they got evenly done. And the flavor of grilled potatoes is excellent--a little bit smoky and spicy from all the marinade ingredients. I usually find potaotes insipid, so this was a nice surprise.
Took most of a 3 pound sack of small red potatoes and scrubbed them well. Sliced them in half, except that we left one whole as an experiment. Jeremy took them down to their apartment to microwave (we have limited technology in our house), which I believe took 3 minutes. They have a very powerful microwave though, so maybe on a conventional one it would be more like 5 minutes. Anyway, the goal was to cook them a bit so they would not be too long on the grill. They offered just a little resistance when I jabbed one with a knife. Covered them with a 1/3 cup mixture of olive oil and canola oil, then added 1 tablespoon each vindaloo powder and chile powder, and 2 teaspoons each of paprika, red pepper flakes and salt. Mixed it all up really well with the potatoes and let them sit until the grill was hot. Realized I had an orange pepper hanging around in the fridge, so I sliced that into 8 thick pieces and stuck that in with the potatoes as well.
When the grill was hot we tossed on veggie burgers and a bit of flank steak that had been marinating in teriyaki sauce (by the way? the Soy Vey brand called "veri veri teriyaki" is sort of awesomely delicious). When those were done, I hauled them off and put all the potatoes on, lying them cut-side down, along with the pepper strips. The pepper strips were done much faster, so I just pulled them off as they got browned and soft. The potatoes grilled very well--they don't burn easily but get lovely char marks on the skin parts. I think they took about 10 minutes of grilling, with frequent turning and moving around to make sure they got evenly done. And the flavor of grilled potatoes is excellent--a little bit smoky and spicy from all the marinade ingredients. I usually find potaotes insipid, so this was a nice surprise.
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
Black beans with chipotle peppers and sundried tomatoes
It's been a really long time since I've posted anything...but it's not like I haven't been cooking. It's more like I've been making the same things over and over again. I've been tweaking my caesar salad recipe and continually making udon noodles with tofu. At least one or two roast chickens in there too, and some grilling adventures. But the problem is you can't write about the same stuff over and over again! So this is something I made last week in a weird fit of wanting black beans, and it was brand new and not the same old thing, so here it is:
I unearthed a nasty old bag of dried black beans from the back of the cabinet. You know, those little plastic tubes of beans that look all dusty inside. Rinsed well 2 cups of dried black beans and put them in about 4 cups of water to boil, along with 2 bay leaves, 1 tablespoon epazote and 2 cloves chopped garlic. No, I did not soak them. I don't believe that it actually matters whether you soak them or not. Maybe if you are in a hurry and you remembered to put them up the night before or something, then maybe it shaves 20 minutes off your cook time. But you can just go ahead and cook them up without soaking too. I partially covered the pot and did something else for about an hour and a half, checking occasionally and added more water once, then drained them off once they were pretty close to tender. Some people like to keep the bean water for further cooking but I didn't worry about it. I had a chicken stock simmering on the stove top, so I added 2 cups of that liquid, along with the onions floating around in there to my drained beans. If you don't have a chicken stock going, just saute 1/2 a minced onion in olive oil until lightly golden, toss in your beans, then add vegetable stock or packaged chicken stock or whatever you have handy. You don't want too much liquid--you're not making bean soup. Then I opened up a can of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, minced up two of the peppers and added those to the pot along with some of the sauce. They have a nice, hot, smokey flavor. I wanted to put in tomatoes but I had none on hand, neither fresh nor canned. So I minced up about 1/4 cup of sundried tomatoes and put those in, figuring they'd rehydrate nicely. And guess what? They totally did! They're a little sweeter and have a nice texture, and it's a better match for the spicy chipotle peppers than fresh tomatoes would have made. After about another 20 minutes or so of everything cooking up together, I added a splash of worcestershire and took them off heat. I packed them away in the fridge because we had chicken soup that night. I just felt like making beans.
However, this was a good thing because the next night I was really hungry and grumpy from work and didn't want to take forever with dinner, so I just put some tilapia in a pan with hot butter, then poured over a mini can of coconut milk, and dusted the top with paprika, salt and pepper. I heated up the black beans (flavor had improved overnight in the fridge) and we had them with lime wedges alongside the fish. I'm pretty sure I diced up an avocado and put that on top of everything too. Anyway, it was delicious.
I unearthed a nasty old bag of dried black beans from the back of the cabinet. You know, those little plastic tubes of beans that look all dusty inside. Rinsed well 2 cups of dried black beans and put them in about 4 cups of water to boil, along with 2 bay leaves, 1 tablespoon epazote and 2 cloves chopped garlic. No, I did not soak them. I don't believe that it actually matters whether you soak them or not. Maybe if you are in a hurry and you remembered to put them up the night before or something, then maybe it shaves 20 minutes off your cook time. But you can just go ahead and cook them up without soaking too. I partially covered the pot and did something else for about an hour and a half, checking occasionally and added more water once, then drained them off once they were pretty close to tender. Some people like to keep the bean water for further cooking but I didn't worry about it. I had a chicken stock simmering on the stove top, so I added 2 cups of that liquid, along with the onions floating around in there to my drained beans. If you don't have a chicken stock going, just saute 1/2 a minced onion in olive oil until lightly golden, toss in your beans, then add vegetable stock or packaged chicken stock or whatever you have handy. You don't want too much liquid--you're not making bean soup. Then I opened up a can of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, minced up two of the peppers and added those to the pot along with some of the sauce. They have a nice, hot, smokey flavor. I wanted to put in tomatoes but I had none on hand, neither fresh nor canned. So I minced up about 1/4 cup of sundried tomatoes and put those in, figuring they'd rehydrate nicely. And guess what? They totally did! They're a little sweeter and have a nice texture, and it's a better match for the spicy chipotle peppers than fresh tomatoes would have made. After about another 20 minutes or so of everything cooking up together, I added a splash of worcestershire and took them off heat. I packed them away in the fridge because we had chicken soup that night. I just felt like making beans.
However, this was a good thing because the next night I was really hungry and grumpy from work and didn't want to take forever with dinner, so I just put some tilapia in a pan with hot butter, then poured over a mini can of coconut milk, and dusted the top with paprika, salt and pepper. I heated up the black beans (flavor had improved overnight in the fridge) and we had them with lime wedges alongside the fish. I'm pretty sure I diced up an avocado and put that on top of everything too. Anyway, it was delicious.
Monday, April 09, 2007
Lemon pancakes with banana topping
I don't want anyone to start thinking that we're particularly religious around my house--although we both grew up Catholic, we're not really any type of faith anymore. For example, we didn't go to church on Easter. As Brian would point out, it's stupid to only go one day a year, sort of meaningless in the big picture. You should probably just go the week AFTER the holiday if you're going to go at all; at very least you'll get better parking and at very best you won't be a hypocrite. However, there is nothing hypocritical about regular observation of the holy tradition of Easter brunch, and with that in mind we decided to make pancakes and invite some heathen friends over.
Grated the zest off one lemon (have I told you all about organic lemons yet? Use them if you can because pesticides pervade the oils in lemon peel so thoroughly that you cannot possibly wash them off) with a microplane (have I told you all about microplanes graters yet? Best damn graters out there), juiced the lemon and set aside. Mixed 4 cups flour with 2 tablespoons baking powder, 2 teaspoons sugar, 1 teaspoon salt. Separated 3 eggs and had Molly work out her aggressions by beating the whites separately into a fluffy froth. When they were quite fluffy, added 2 cups milk, the yolks of the eggs, a drizzle of melted butter and the lemon juice and zest. Mixed very well and slowly added to the dry ingredients, being careful not to overbeat once the wet got into the dry. Pancakes are fragile creatures. You should beat them as minimally as possible after you have combined dry and wet to keep them from becoming tough. It's important to mix very well the separate groups, but once they've been combined, just barely incorporate them and then set aside or you will have juvenile delinquent pancakes that drive hotrods and hang out on street corners smoking cigarettes with their hotpants girlfriends. I'm just saying. Heated up a very large, flat griddle and melted butter all over it. When it was sizzly, added pancakes in 1/4 cup dollops, smoothed them into roundish shapes and watched them puff up beautifully. Kept warm in the oven until it was time to eat.
Banana topping is made by cutting up 5 bananas into chunks and dumping them into a pot with a bit of butter to toast. Browned them slightly, then added 2 teaspoons sugar, 1 teaspoon each cardamom and cinnamon, and 1/2 teaspoon each nutmeg & allspice. Mixed up until bananas were falling apart slightly but still keeping shape, then added 1/4 cup orange juice. Cooked another minute or two then removed from heat to serve with pancakes.
We also had vegetarian breakfast sausage, a frittata that Molly brought and really really good, totally from scratch Bloody Marys made by Katie. Later on Brian and I ate jelly beans from Malley's candy company in Ohio, so it was a completely successful Easter.
Grated the zest off one lemon (have I told you all about organic lemons yet? Use them if you can because pesticides pervade the oils in lemon peel so thoroughly that you cannot possibly wash them off) with a microplane (have I told you all about microplanes graters yet? Best damn graters out there), juiced the lemon and set aside. Mixed 4 cups flour with 2 tablespoons baking powder, 2 teaspoons sugar, 1 teaspoon salt. Separated 3 eggs and had Molly work out her aggressions by beating the whites separately into a fluffy froth. When they were quite fluffy, added 2 cups milk, the yolks of the eggs, a drizzle of melted butter and the lemon juice and zest. Mixed very well and slowly added to the dry ingredients, being careful not to overbeat once the wet got into the dry. Pancakes are fragile creatures. You should beat them as minimally as possible after you have combined dry and wet to keep them from becoming tough. It's important to mix very well the separate groups, but once they've been combined, just barely incorporate them and then set aside or you will have juvenile delinquent pancakes that drive hotrods and hang out on street corners smoking cigarettes with their hotpants girlfriends. I'm just saying. Heated up a very large, flat griddle and melted butter all over it. When it was sizzly, added pancakes in 1/4 cup dollops, smoothed them into roundish shapes and watched them puff up beautifully. Kept warm in the oven until it was time to eat.
Banana topping is made by cutting up 5 bananas into chunks and dumping them into a pot with a bit of butter to toast. Browned them slightly, then added 2 teaspoons sugar, 1 teaspoon each cardamom and cinnamon, and 1/2 teaspoon each nutmeg & allspice. Mixed up until bananas were falling apart slightly but still keeping shape, then added 1/4 cup orange juice. Cooked another minute or two then removed from heat to serve with pancakes.
We also had vegetarian breakfast sausage, a frittata that Molly brought and really really good, totally from scratch Bloody Marys made by Katie. Later on Brian and I ate jelly beans from Malley's candy company in Ohio, so it was a completely successful Easter.
Wednesday, April 04, 2007
Udon noodles with black bean sauce
So I was trying to recreate a dish that I order at Saigon Cafe--udon noodles in a black bean sauce with fried tofu. Holy crap, it is so delicious. I get that and a bubble tea for lunch and I'm pretty happy. Anyway, what I made at home the other day is absolutely NOTHING like the inspiration...but I think it turned out OK anyway. I was just experimenting and it ended up being pretty tasty. I guess Saigon Cafe has some kind of deal with the devil over there, not to mention a whole lot of authentic thai and vietnamese cooks in the kitchen.
First I fried up some tofu as usual. For the record--I actually like un-fried tofu just fine. Brian has texture issues so he prefers it fried up. Soon he will have fat issues if he doesn't watch it. Heated about 4 tablespoons canola oil in a heavy pot until sizzly, added 1 block of extra-firm tofu that had been cut up into 1" chunks (I have covered this issue before--the more you dry off your tofu the better it will fry up. I didn't dry it very well this time). Just tossed it all into the hot oil and let it brown on one side for about 3 minutes, then flipped all the pieces for total tofu-surface browning. Turned off the heat and drained all the oil (or as much as possible), then returned the pot to the stove and added 2 tablespoons teriyaki sauce and a little soy sauce, stirred it with the browned tofu over medium-high heat until the sauces made a shiny glaze, then removed all the tofu to a dish and set aside. I ended up just using the same pot to boil up 1 1/2 cups water and dropped in 2 packets of udon noodles. I don't know how other people find these. I find mine at the DeKalb Market, in the refrigerated section, right next to the miso & other Japanese products. They are a brand that claims in english to be "the best noodle!" but the rest of the packaging is in Japanese characters so I can't read it. Maybe Alan could. They come with a packet of soup mix that is really salty. Udon noodles are big, soft, thick noodles that are ususally packaged fresh and don't need more than 3 minutes of cooking. Soba noodles are a good substitute. Anyway, I boiled them in less water than normal and went ahead and added the salty soup mix that comes with. In a wok, I sauteed 1 clove minced garlic, then poured in the noodles and their cooking liquid. I let the liquid reduce down, then stirred in 2 tablespoons black bean paste. Then I tossed in the tofu and mixed everything up well. After about 1 minute, I added 1 head of thinly sliced baby bok choy (including both green & white parts). After this got wilty (another 1 to 2 minutes), I took everything off heat and we ate it then drank a lot of chardonnay while cleaning the apartment.
(Note to survivalists: If you wanted to make something like this in the wilderness, you get some tofu and black bean paste from your trip into town to the one organic grocery store, also picking up fresh green beans or snow peas, if they have them. Also get a can of water chestnuts if you can find them. Ask the meth-addled townie behind the register to locate them for you. Then you would saute the green beans along with the garlic to get them a little browned but still crunchy, then add drained water chestnut along with the fried tofu. I don't know what you do about the udon noodles! Maybe you can use any other type of pasta or even ramen? It would be different but still pretty good, I bet.)
First I fried up some tofu as usual. For the record--I actually like un-fried tofu just fine. Brian has texture issues so he prefers it fried up. Soon he will have fat issues if he doesn't watch it. Heated about 4 tablespoons canola oil in a heavy pot until sizzly, added 1 block of extra-firm tofu that had been cut up into 1" chunks (I have covered this issue before--the more you dry off your tofu the better it will fry up. I didn't dry it very well this time). Just tossed it all into the hot oil and let it brown on one side for about 3 minutes, then flipped all the pieces for total tofu-surface browning. Turned off the heat and drained all the oil (or as much as possible), then returned the pot to the stove and added 2 tablespoons teriyaki sauce and a little soy sauce, stirred it with the browned tofu over medium-high heat until the sauces made a shiny glaze, then removed all the tofu to a dish and set aside. I ended up just using the same pot to boil up 1 1/2 cups water and dropped in 2 packets of udon noodles. I don't know how other people find these. I find mine at the DeKalb Market, in the refrigerated section, right next to the miso & other Japanese products. They are a brand that claims in english to be "the best noodle!" but the rest of the packaging is in Japanese characters so I can't read it. Maybe Alan could. They come with a packet of soup mix that is really salty. Udon noodles are big, soft, thick noodles that are ususally packaged fresh and don't need more than 3 minutes of cooking. Soba noodles are a good substitute. Anyway, I boiled them in less water than normal and went ahead and added the salty soup mix that comes with. In a wok, I sauteed 1 clove minced garlic, then poured in the noodles and their cooking liquid. I let the liquid reduce down, then stirred in 2 tablespoons black bean paste. Then I tossed in the tofu and mixed everything up well. After about 1 minute, I added 1 head of thinly sliced baby bok choy (including both green & white parts). After this got wilty (another 1 to 2 minutes), I took everything off heat and we ate it then drank a lot of chardonnay while cleaning the apartment.
(Note to survivalists: If you wanted to make something like this in the wilderness, you get some tofu and black bean paste from your trip into town to the one organic grocery store, also picking up fresh green beans or snow peas, if they have them. Also get a can of water chestnuts if you can find them. Ask the meth-addled townie behind the register to locate them for you. Then you would saute the green beans along with the garlic to get them a little browned but still crunchy, then add drained water chestnut along with the fried tofu. I don't know what you do about the udon noodles! Maybe you can use any other type of pasta or even ramen? It would be different but still pretty good, I bet.)
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Caesar salad & steaks with compound butter
It was Jeremy's birthday yesterday so we celebrated with extra-special dinner plans. He is fond of caesar salad (really, we are all fond of caesar salad, so that worked out well) and it seemed like it would be fun to grill something so we decided to go retro with a strip steak and salad combo for dinner.
Melanie & birthday boy picked out 3 pounds of beautiful NY strip steaks. Seriously, they were perfect. I covered them liberally with salt, pepper and a good drizzling of olive oil and we let them rest at room temperature until the grill was ready.
Caesar salad isn't difficult but it relies heavily on timing well with the rest of the meal because it must be served immediately. So I prepped as many ingredients as I could but did not assemble the salad until the steaks were done grilling. First we made garlic croutons. Melted 3 tablespoons of butter with 2 tablespoons of olive oil and sauteed 4 cloves of minced garlic until soft but not browned. Sliced 6 pieces of good italian sandwich bread into 1" chunks. This created a little drama with Brian who was sad to see all the bread get used up until he remembered (deus ex machina!) that he had plenty of bagels in the fridge. It was like a little one act play. You can probably use any kind of bread that suits you--this is just what we happened to have lying around. Tossed the bread with the butter-olive oil-garlic mixture in a roasting pan, added salt, pepper, 1/2 tablespoon of red pepper flakes and 1 teaspoon of oregano. Popped it in the oven at 350 degrees and said to Melanie "Ha ha, now I'm going to forget about it!" Of course I forgot about it and remembered in a panic about 10 minutes later; fortunately they were not burnt but I think they easily could have been. Set them to crisp up on paper towels. Meanwhile, Melanie and I washed a large head of romaine lettuce and chopped it into 2" pieces. You don't want huge, unwieldy bits of lettuce while you are trying to enjoy a caesar salad. We also cut a garlic clove in half and rubbed it all over the inside of a wooden salad bowl to get it ready to have the salad tossed in there.
Here's the part where you should be ready to go with eating dinner as soon as you're done putting this together. For the dressing, I brought a small pot of water to a rapid boil and put in 2 eggs. Let them sit in there for 60-80 seconds (keep a good eye on the clock!), then scooped them out and cracked them into the salad bowl. Made sure to scrape out any egg white that had lightly cooked and clung to the shell and got that into the bowl as well. Beat the eggs very well with a fork until they were well mixed up, then slowly added 2 tablespoons of lemon juice. Continued to beat with the fork and slowly incorporated 6 tablespoons olive oil. When than was all mixed up, added a dash of worcestershire sauce and then about 2 tablespoons of well-minced/mashed up anchovy filets. Added salt and lots of black pepper, mixed well again, then added the romaine lettuce and tossed up from the bottom. This takes a little while. Toss toss toss. You want to make sure the dressing gets evenly mixed up with all the lettuce. Then taste a piece to make sure it doesn't need more salt and pepper, then top with the garlic croutons and a ton of fresh shaved parmesan cheese. Serve tout de suite.
Meanwhile, the steaks were getting finished up on the grill. The only trick is to flip them a lot and keep a close eye. Try to use a really hot grill at first so you can get cool looking cross-hatch marks on them. When the steaks were done, we served them with pats of delicious butter on top. Mashed up 3 tablespons of butter with 1 tablespoon of capers, 1 tablespoon minced parsley and 1 minced garlic clove with my mortar and pestle. Just kept mooshing it until it was all well combined, then scraped it out and put in in a plate in the fridge to chill until it was time to eat. Put a dab on top of each hot steak--a perfect accompaniment to garlicky Caesar salad.
Melanie's mom had made Jeremy a chocolate pound cake for his birthday. We had it after dinner with vanilla ice cream and strawberries and it was indescribably delicious.
Melanie & birthday boy picked out 3 pounds of beautiful NY strip steaks. Seriously, they were perfect. I covered them liberally with salt, pepper and a good drizzling of olive oil and we let them rest at room temperature until the grill was ready.
Caesar salad isn't difficult but it relies heavily on timing well with the rest of the meal because it must be served immediately. So I prepped as many ingredients as I could but did not assemble the salad until the steaks were done grilling. First we made garlic croutons. Melted 3 tablespoons of butter with 2 tablespoons of olive oil and sauteed 4 cloves of minced garlic until soft but not browned. Sliced 6 pieces of good italian sandwich bread into 1" chunks. This created a little drama with Brian who was sad to see all the bread get used up until he remembered (deus ex machina!) that he had plenty of bagels in the fridge. It was like a little one act play. You can probably use any kind of bread that suits you--this is just what we happened to have lying around. Tossed the bread with the butter-olive oil-garlic mixture in a roasting pan, added salt, pepper, 1/2 tablespoon of red pepper flakes and 1 teaspoon of oregano. Popped it in the oven at 350 degrees and said to Melanie "Ha ha, now I'm going to forget about it!" Of course I forgot about it and remembered in a panic about 10 minutes later; fortunately they were not burnt but I think they easily could have been. Set them to crisp up on paper towels. Meanwhile, Melanie and I washed a large head of romaine lettuce and chopped it into 2" pieces. You don't want huge, unwieldy bits of lettuce while you are trying to enjoy a caesar salad. We also cut a garlic clove in half and rubbed it all over the inside of a wooden salad bowl to get it ready to have the salad tossed in there.
Here's the part where you should be ready to go with eating dinner as soon as you're done putting this together. For the dressing, I brought a small pot of water to a rapid boil and put in 2 eggs. Let them sit in there for 60-80 seconds (keep a good eye on the clock!), then scooped them out and cracked them into the salad bowl. Made sure to scrape out any egg white that had lightly cooked and clung to the shell and got that into the bowl as well. Beat the eggs very well with a fork until they were well mixed up, then slowly added 2 tablespoons of lemon juice. Continued to beat with the fork and slowly incorporated 6 tablespoons olive oil. When than was all mixed up, added a dash of worcestershire sauce and then about 2 tablespoons of well-minced/mashed up anchovy filets. Added salt and lots of black pepper, mixed well again, then added the romaine lettuce and tossed up from the bottom. This takes a little while. Toss toss toss. You want to make sure the dressing gets evenly mixed up with all the lettuce. Then taste a piece to make sure it doesn't need more salt and pepper, then top with the garlic croutons and a ton of fresh shaved parmesan cheese. Serve tout de suite.
Meanwhile, the steaks were getting finished up on the grill. The only trick is to flip them a lot and keep a close eye. Try to use a really hot grill at first so you can get cool looking cross-hatch marks on them. When the steaks were done, we served them with pats of delicious butter on top. Mashed up 3 tablespons of butter with 1 tablespoon of capers, 1 tablespoon minced parsley and 1 minced garlic clove with my mortar and pestle. Just kept mooshing it until it was all well combined, then scraped it out and put in in a plate in the fridge to chill until it was time to eat. Put a dab on top of each hot steak--a perfect accompaniment to garlicky Caesar salad.
Melanie's mom had made Jeremy a chocolate pound cake for his birthday. We had it after dinner with vanilla ice cream and strawberries and it was indescribably delicious.
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