The Best Bite: Adventures in Deliciousness

My Disappearing Act

2009-03-10T22:46:00.006-04:00

A lot of people are either wondering what’s happened to me or they’re just sick of looking at that baby corn picture. Well, I got knocked up with twins and my foodie blogging career went the way of my girlish figure.

In my first trimester, I had horrible morning sickness and got by pretty much only on saltines. Second trimester was a little bit better: saltines and Kraft mac n’ cheese (I know, I’m appalled too.) By the third trimester, my appetite was back in full force, but I was so hugely pregnant that I couldn’t stand on my feet long enough to fix a bowl of cereal, let alone a respectable cassoulet.

And I’m not even going to talk about all the cooking I didn’t do when they were born.

The babies are nine months old now. They’re gorgeous and sweet and wonderful and amazing and perfect and all the other adjectives that parents usually use. They’re the most delicious little things I’ve ever cooked up (even edging out the bacon for the top spot.)

Between the full-time job and the more-than full-time nippers, my kitchen time is spent pureeing carrots and sweet potatoes or loading baby bottles into the dishwasher. So, the dutch oven sits there, collecting dust and wondering if I’ll ever braise again. Sure, I do the occasional roast chicken and our new grill is a magical wonderland of speedy meal ideas, but take snaps? Write about it? Post? It’s just not in the cards right now.

I’m going to remain on hiatus for a bit. Cooking is definitely more of a passion than scrubbing poop out of footie pajamas, so I’ll be back. There’s still a lot of eating to do.

Baby corn makes me angry.

2007-10-30T10:59:00.002-04:00

When I was a kid, I loved baby corn. It had nothing to do with the taste or the texture, but was really centered around the fact that it's a Lilliputian version of a standard sized vegetable. It was adorable. I'm sure the folks at Hershey would call it "fun sized" and, when I was 7, "fun-sized" was the key to complete vegetable satisfaction.

But as I've gotten older, my horizons have expanded, and taste has long bypassed cuteness on the Food Priority Scale. And I've grown to detest baby corn. Really detest it. I am vehemently anti-baby corn. I don't dislike baby corn in the way that I dislike black licorice and olives, two things that I respect and I continue to try to force myself to learn to like. I can understand why people would like olives and black licorice. Not so with baby corn.

It's not so much the taste of baby corn that I find so offensive, it's more its existence. Baby corn has no reason to be. It doesn’t taste like real corn. Its not even really known for it's taste (which is bland and pickled and wholly un-corn-like), but mostly for the texture it adds to salads and stirfries. It has no impressive nutritional value, which I think is pretty much a requirement for vegetables. Its not worthy of the corn moniker.

You don't see broccoli coming out with "baby broccoli" (broccolini is a whole 'nother vegetable) or parsnips pushing "baby parsnips." Baby carrots tried to get in on the baby action, but they're really just regular sized carrots cut small and they humbly pack a complete carrot punch. I can muster up respect for baby spinach and baby peas, because they're tasty in their own right. The only good baby corn has accomplished in it’s life is that scene in Big, where Tom Hanks nibbles the kernels row by row. And that stops being funny after you see it twice.

Baby corn has proven itself a completely superfluous vegetable. We just don't need it. It's not like normal sized corn is so unwieldy that fully-mature kernels won't fit on your plate. Granted, you can't eat the cob on a normal sized ear, but I'm not sure cob-eating should be a priority. I think deliciousness should be a priority. And baby corn just isn't pulling its weight on that front.

(Cartoon courtesy of Natalie Dee. Go admire her stuff.)

This is what my childhood tastes like.

2007-10-24T19:31:00.000-04:00

Everyone has tastes that bring back a specific time and place. I’m sure scientists have some fancy name for it, like “taste memory” or some such equally emotionless phrase that doesn’t even remotely begin to capture the shock of remembrance that eating something you haven’t had since you were knee-high to a Lego dredges up. One minute I’m an expensive-kitchen-appliance-owning-adult and then -shazam!- a bite later and I’m a 7-year old clomping around in my mother’s silver pumps, stepping on scattered Lite-Brite pegs.

This precious Noodle Kugel recipe is one of a handful of recipes that sends my tastebuds into a total timewarp. I made it recently for a friend’s daughters, thinking it would be a sure way to win them over. And I was thrilled that it worked and that they loved it, but I was even more amazed at the memories the mere scent of it baking stirred up: Rosh Hashanah dinners with my grandparents, my mother teaching me to cook, family gatherings where no one could get a word in edgewise because everyone was talking at the top of their lungs trying to be heard.

If you’re not familiar with the wonderful world of Noodle Kugel, you’re in for a real kid-pleasing treat. Although it’s sweet, it’s traditionally served as a side dish next to a roast chicken or a brisket (my family was a lot of things, but Kosher wasn’t one of them.) It’s almost a Jewish macaroni and cheese (sans le fromage.) The noodles poking out of the custardy middle get all toasty and crisp, the streusal topping adds another slight bit of crunch.

As a grown-up, I’m tempted to play with the recipe; I want to ditch the sugar and try to make it savory, maybe adding some caramelized onions and gruyere. I want to tweak and futz and play, but I can’t bring myself to change a single thing. Because then it wouldn’t be my mother’s Noodle Kugel and it wouldn’t taste like my childhood.

Mom's Noodle Kugel
Serves 8-10 as a side dish

Kugel
1 8oz. package of wide noodles
3 Tbsp. butter (her recipe never specified salted or unsalted, but I used unsalted.)
3 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
2 cups milk
1 tsp. vanilla
3 Tbsp. apricot or plum preserves

Streusel
2 Tbsp. butter
1.4 cup plain bread crumbs
1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1. Preheat the oven to 350-degrees and grease an 8"x12" baking dish. Bring a pot of water to a boil and cook noodles until very very al dente. Drain noodles and toss with butter in a large bowl.

2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs, sugar, vanilla, and salt. Stir in milk.

3. Add egg mixture to noodles and pour into the prepared baking dish. Dot with preserves and then bake for 45 minutes.

4. Meanwhile, make streusel: melt butter over low heat (I used the microwave) and stir in breadcrumbs and cinnamon. Sprinkle kugel with streusel and bake for another 15-20 minutes until the top is crisp and the custard is set.

Your call is important to us. Please continue to hold.

2007-10-21T19:08:00.001-04:00

I hate being on hold. It really gets my goat. If my call really were that important to you, then I wouldn't be sitting here waiting for some attention, while you force your e-z listening music upon my innocent little ears. But being on hold is a fact of life.

And so it is, that I've had to put you, my beloved readers on hold, while I catch up on life. I've not had a lot of time for cooking lately, let alone writing about cooking. But, to prove how important you are to me, I wanted to provide you with this delightfully brilliant link to entertain you until I can get my next piece cooked, tasted, written, and posted (hopefully later this week; this isn't like a year-long sabbatical I'm talking.)

Eat these and tell me which one you like better.

2007-10-15T14:44:00.000-04:00

It was a short sentence, only four words, so it couldn’t help but get right to the point: “blind taste test, please.”

This concise articulation was the work of Anonymous, who posted the comment on the 10/6 entry, in which I confidently waxed on about the tastier, chocolatey-er, and superior-in-every-conceivable-way brownie the expensive Scharffen Berger chocolate produced. Anonymous wasn't so sure I was right. She was skeptical. She wanted scientific proof that I wasn’t swayed by my snooty, foodie, preconceived chocolate notions in turning my schnozz up at the supermarket stuff. She had a point, I never actually did a side-by-side, blind taste test. Anonymous totally busted me.

So lets do it, let the grocery store Baker's chocolate face off, mano a mano, against the artisanal Scharffen Berger. Gloves off, blindfold on, let's find out if the pricey chocolate is worth it. Let's prove to "Anonymous", if that's her real name, that I like what I like because I really like it, not because I like the idea of it.

In one corner, we have young upstart Scharffen Berger, only on the chocolate scene since 1996 and produced in small batches by producers who keep a close eye on every single cacao bean that finagles its way into the bar.

And in the other corner, we have the widely available Baker’s, owned by Kraft. Baker's doesn’t include a single fact on its website about the quality of the chocolate or the origin of the cacao beans used, instead choosing to share relevant tidbits like: “The amount of the Baker’s Chocolate consumed in a year (lined up in squares) would span the length of the Grand Canyon nine times!” Superfluous exclamation marks really steam me.

I don’t think you have to ask who my money was on. But let the games begin.

The guidelines were simple: two batches of the same brownie recipe (Baker’s one-bowl brownies ), one using each brand of chocolate. It's a pretty good recipe, super fudgy, which made it a bit messy and difficult to cut attractively (although that could just be the fact that I'm completely lacking in food presentation skills.) All the other ingredients (butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla, flour) would be identical. No nuts, no coffee, no other flavorings.

A friend administered the blind taste test, taking extra care that I didn't peek. I tasted one brownie. I cleansed the palate (Poland Spring). I tasted the other brownie. They were shockingly close. But I tried them both again and decided one had fruitier and caramell-ier notes than the other. It turned out to be the Scharffen Berger.

But I really was surprised at how close they tasted. I detected the subtle differences, only because I was looking for them. Could it possibly not be worth shelling out the big bucks for baking chocolate?

I decided to take the question to the masses. A random sampling of 15 coworkers happily partook of the blind taste test and chippped in their two cents. It was a mix of men and women, foodies and non-foodies. I was really surprised that 11 went for the the Baker’s as the tastier chocolate treat and only 4 opted for the Scharffen Berger. And most seemed like they could go either way. Either I'm spending too much money on chocolate, or working in advertising may be harmful to the taste buds.

The moral of the story is pretty much the same as the moral of this story:: homemade brownies are delicious. But this moral includes the addendum that you can get away with the cheap chocolate if your audience is a bunch of hungry, pre-lunch, baked-goods-starved advertising creatives. Or pretty much anyone else.

I have been duly smacked-down, Anonymous. Keep those comments a-comin'.

Invisible Pudding

2007-10-12T17:05:00.000-04:00

Fresh off my shortbread success, I thought I'd continue to rock Nick's world through my dazzling use of sugar. But once again, my pitiable photography skills lead to a less than esthetically pleasing entry. I took several pictures, I swear, but given the nature of the serving vessel, you can barely see the comestible in question, which is a deliciously creamy, refreshingly cool Coconut Mango Pudding.

I thought I'd be all elegant and class up the joint by serving it in wineglasses, instead of the recommended ramekins (plus, I don't actually own ramekins.) It looked lovely in the wineglasses, but when I took the birds-eye shot, I just got an eyeful of coconut, which was blindingly white with the flash on and exceedingly dull with the flash off. From the side, the pudding looked murky, dulled through the pretty stained-glass looking painted wineglasses my Dad made for us years ago. I took one or two snaps of a spoonful of the stuff, but they were blurry and it wasn't long before I was so overwhelmed by the pale creamy orange-colored, mango-scented deliciousness that I tossed the camera aside and greedily got to gobbling.

It was gone quickly, and I realized I had no solid proof that it ever actually existed, save for some dirty wineglasses and a mango carcass. Was this destined to be the Mr. Snuffleupagus of desserts? All I can hope is that you're awed by the simplicity of the preparation, the poetry of the ingredients, and the potentially elegant, if unphotographable, presentation.

Coconut Mango Pudding
Makes 6 Servings
adapted from Bon Appétit, June 1997

1/2 cup fresh orange juice
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
2 teaspoons unflavored gelatin
1 12-ounce mango, peeled, pitted, cut into chunks
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup whole milk
1/3 cup sugar
1/2 cup grated coconut

1. Mix citrus juices in small saucepan. Sprinkle gelatin over. Let stand 10 minutes. Stir over low heat until gelatin dissolves. Let stand until just cool but not set.

2. Combine mango, sour cream, milk, and sugar in blender (I highly recommend the hand blender for this.) Blend on high speed until smooth. Add gelatin mixture and blend well.

3. Pour into six 6-ounce soufflé dishes or custard cups. Wine glasses work really well too. Sprinkle generously with coconut and chill until firm, at least 3 hours.

A Boring, Yet Beautiful, Story

2007-10-09T21:22:00.001-04:00

Sometimes food isn't funny. Sometimes there's no ridiculous tale that inspires the meal du jour, no bungled technique resulting in gut-busting hilarity, no dramatic Man-of-La-Mancha-esque quest for elusive ingedients. Sometimes there's no sloppy plating, no blurry half-assed photo, no life-lesson learned. Sometimes food is a like a European art house film, beautiful to look at with no story to tell, just some artfully sad clowns chain-smoking unfiltered Gauloises and speaking longingly of "mon amour perdu."

Dear readers, this is the sad state of affairs we find ourselves in today. Fortunately, it is much tastier than a European art house film. These crumbly delicacies are redolent of pine-y rosemary and creamy butter that was born and raised in Denmark and came to this country seeking a better life. And all we can do, is gaze lovingly upon the fruits of our (well, my) labor, at a perfect cookie that can only be packed up and given as a gift because it's too pretty not to show off.

I wasn't even intending to write anything about this Rosemary Shortbread recipe, since it clearly has nothing to say, but I was really proud of myself for actually producing something that was as pretty as it is yummy. AND for taking a decent picture (don't get used to it.) The only change I made to the recipe was pressing the dough into a butter tart pan, which is how those semi-professional looking crimped edges magically appeared. Now, if you'll excuse me, if I don't go cook something sloppy right now, I might start applying for jobs as a professional pastry chef. And I guarantee that would be chock-full of laughs.

A-HA!

2007-10-06T21:55:00.001-04:00

I thought I found it. The ultimate brownie recipe. It was in a special holiday baking issue of Martha Stewart Living, about five years ago. It was chocolate-y, but not overly sweet. I baked them constantly and went so far as to call them Life Changing Brownies. Friends, coworkers, and loved ones agreed: this was truly an extra special brownie. I even boasted to the owner of a chain of bakeries known in four countries for his brownies, that mine were truly enviable.

But the years passed, and I realized that the Life Changing Brownies weren’t as perfect as I’d first imagined. They’re lighter and cakier than they are fudgy and dense. And sometimes a girl needs an intensely rich choco-bomb to get through a tough client meeting.

So I started to do some research and unearthed an entire universe of heated Brownie Debate: the Fudgy vs. the Cakey. The discussions were fervent and impassioned and I found so many recipes, that they all started to look the same (mostly because they're all pretty much the same.) I stocked up on chocolate and went into the lab (well, the kitchen), where I tried recipes from Scharffen Berger chocolate, Cook’s Illustrated, and Ina Garten. I assure you, this was difficult and grueling research. But the results were worth it: the different brownies varied in minor ways, but they were moist, rich, chocolate-y and delicious, across the board.

Then, I had an epiphany.

There is no world’s best brownie. Brownies, by their very intrinsic nature, are an amalgamation of the worlds most innately divine ingredients: chocolate, butter, sugar. You can’t lose. Even brownies at their worst, tough and dry or with a slight chemical undertone like those powdered mix brownies, aren’t horrible. They’re certainly better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick. But you have to admit that some brownies are better than others.

Then, I had another epiphany.

I graduated from the widely available grocery store Baker’s chocolate to the more high-end Scharffen Berger right around the time I discovered the Life Changing Brownie recipe. But today, I made a batch of rich, fudgy brownies for a friend’s daughters. Three kids under the age of 4 probably wouldn’t notice the subtle fruitiness of Scharffen Berger, wouldn’t appreciate its deeply layered chocolate flavor. So, I went back to Baker’s.

The brownies came out beautiful. Fudgy and rich looking, with that perfectly crisp brownie crust on top. But they taste strangely one dimensional. There are none of those subtle nutty, cinnamon-y, and caramel-y notes that brought all those other brownie recipes to the apex of brownie magnificence. The answer, my friends, lies not within the recipe, but within the chocolate.

Another Fantastic Brownie Recipe
adapted from Christopher Kimball's The Dessert Bible
Makes 16 brownies

4 oz. unsweetened chocolate
10 Tbsp. (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter
3 large eggs
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 3/4 Cups granulated sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1 1/4 Cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp. powdered instant espresso
1 Tsp. cinnamon

1. Preheat the oven to 350-degrees. Generously grease an 8"x8" pan with butter.

2. Melt the chocolate and butter in the microwave on 50% power for two minutes. Whisk together the eggs and vanilla in a medium bowl. Add the melted chocolate (mixture will thicken considerably.) Add the remaining ingredients and mix with a rubber spatula.

3. Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and tap the pan pretty hard on the countertop several times to get rid of air bubbles in the batter. You need to smack it down hard enough to dislodge any bubbles, but not so hard that brownie batter gets on your ceiling.

4. Bake 40 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out with just a few fudgy crumbs attached. Check them at 35 minutes. It's important not to overbake them; you're better off underbaking them. Let cool in pan, then flip brownies onto a cutting board, where you can cut them and serve them to the drooling hordes.

Job opening. Apply here.

2007-10-01T16:22:00.000-04:00

My cousin thinks I’m certifiable. She just can’t fathom how I can toil away all day, trying to make the world a better place through advertising, and then get home at 8 o’clock at night and start chopping and dicing and roasting. I tell her that it’s stressful trying to sell people things they don't want. Cooking is relaxing.

But she got me thinking: how can I toil all day and then get home and start cooking? Advertising is stressful. I deserve someone at home, making dinner for me. The solution is clear: I need a manservant.

I'm not picky. I will accept either a Mr. French type or a scantily clad, well-oiled muscle man who can make a decent bearnaise. I prefer someone who will do light housework as well, including figuring out what to do with this box of wires, cables, and chargers from old electronics that I feel obliged to keep.

The pickings are pretty slim on Craigslist for manservants (menservant?) They're also on the meager side for butlers, house boys, valets, and serfs. But I am realizing other, more pressing issues with the MSP (manservant plan), the biggest one being that we live in 820 square feet. Nick and I like to spread out, so that doesn't leave a lot of space to keep a manservant. Plus, this manservant will probably want to be paid something and I'm not in a position to do that (Sigerson Morrison has the right of first refusal on my paycheck.)

So, it seems like the only way to get dinner on the table is to prepare it myself. No, I'm not trying to recreate some 1954 “perfect wife” fantasy. No, I'm not trying to re-enact that old Enjoli commercial. I'm just hungry. And if I'm making dinner, then it ain't gonna be the Manwich.

It will be something like the following recipe for fish glazed with a honey-soy mixture. Simple and truly delicious. I served it on a bed of sautéed sweet potatoes and Chinese cabbage (I love the sweet/salty mixture of the soy glaze with the sweet potatoes), but don’t feel like you have to get fancy. Unless your manservant is making it for you.

Perch with Honey-Soy Glaze
Serves 2

3 tablespoons honey
2 1/2 tablespoons soy sauce
3 tablespoons fresh lime juice
1 large clove garlic, minced
6 scallions, white and light green parts trimmed to 1” pieces.
1 Tbsp. vegetable oil
Salt
2 6oz-8oz. fillets of perch or other firm fleshed, white fish

1. Whisk together honey, soy sauce, lime juice, and garlic in a small bowl.

2. Pat fish dry and sprinkle with a little salt. Heat oil in a 12-inch nonstick skillet over medium-high heat until very hot (but not smoking.) Add fish and cook on one side until browned, about 3-4 minutes (depending on weight of fillets.) Turn fish over and brown another minute. Add soy sauce mixture and simmer, covered, until fish is almost cooked through, about 3 more minutes. Remove fish and set aside.

3. Add scallion to sauce and boil, stirring occasionally, until glaze is thick and reduced, about 5 minutes. You should have about 1/4 cup of glaze. Perch the perch (oh, how I wanted to use that!) on your plates and drizzle with glaze.

Not for the Lactose Intolerant.

2007-09-25T19:18:00.001-04:00

I once worked with a great producer who told me about her theory of the Dairy Buffer. It's pretty simple, as far as theories go: any food is improved by adding dairy to it. For example, a burger is delicious, but a cheeseburger is a real treat. Pie is good, but pie a la mode is better. Baked potatoes are nothing without sour cream, tortilla chips are pointless without cheese, and whipped cream can do no wrong. Peas? Parkerhouse rolls? Polenta? Butter, butter, and more butter.

The Dairy Buffer theory isn’t fool proof; so far, I haven’t found the right dairy partner for sushi and spring rolls. But for the most part, it’s pretty spot on. And the type of dairy doesn't matter. Cheese, butter, sour cream, yogurt, creme fraiche, the Dairy Buffer does not discriminate.

I was thinking about the Dairy Buffer, while contemplating these gorgeous late-summer apricots that were starting to get a little wrinkly in the fridge. I wanted to turn them into some fabulous dessert, but pies and cakes and tarts all seemed too fussy. And they’re so yummy on their own, all they needed was a little something….dairy! Yes! I didn’t have any ice cream or whipping cream on hand and for once, butter wasn’t gonna cut it. But I did have some fresh goat cheese.

Fresh goat cheese isn't as...um, goat-y as aged goat cheese. It's actually pretty mild, with a slight tang. Whipped with some honey, it was an interesting counterpoint to the apricots. Naturally, by "interesting", I mean "damn good." I roasted the apricots, to concentrate their sweet apricot-ness and also to combat my frustrating stone-fruit allergy. If you’re not a fan of the goat, then sub mascarpone or ricotta. It'll definitely be good - the Dairy Buffer says so.

Roasted Apricots with Honeyed Goat Cheese
serves 4

1 lb. fresh apricots
3 Tbsp. crème de cassis
6 oz. fresh goat cheese
2 Tbsp. honey
Raspberries for garnish (highly optional)

1. Preheat the oven to 350-degrees. Coat an 8”x8” baking dish with cooking spray. Halve the apricots and remove pits. Toss the apricots with the crème de cassis and lay them, cavity side up, in the baking dish. Roast for 30 minutes, until they get a little shriveled and wrinkly and seem brighter in color. The crème de cassis will get sticky and concentrated.

2. While the apricots roast, whip together the goat cheese and the honey.

3. Serve with a mini-dollop of goat cheese in each apricot. Garnish with raspberries and drizzle with the concentrated crème de cassis.

Blogging is making me fat

2007-09-23T13:49:00.000-04:00

I have been saddled with the Eastern-European, potato-eating, worry-wart peasant metabolism. My metabolism is so freaked out that I won’t be able to get through the winter, that I will waste away to nothing, that it clings desperately onto every last calorie it meets. In recent years, my metabolism has expanded it’s area of concern from just winter to encompass all the seasons.

Despite repeated assurances that there is no chance of my wasting away to nothing, my metabolism persists in it's storage efforts (on the off chance that I did actually waste away to nothing, no one would likely notice, since they’d be so preoccupied watching the pigs fly.) Blogging has sent my peasant metabolism into an over-the-moon, glorious tailspin. Always on the hunt for more to write about, I’ve been feeding it such a wealth of wonderfully delicious calories that it’s gone into hyper-storage overdrive. Which basically means my jeans are getting tight.

It is in these times of impending chunkiness that I turn to an old friend: Cooking Light.

Cooking Light has a surfeit of excellent “lightened” recipes that actually taste like food you’d seek out when the fit of your Honeys isn’t an issue. But don't be fooled: the main reason a lot of Cooking Light’s recipes fall into the “light" category, is because the suggested serving size is miniscule, barely bite-sized. These are not the kinds of serving sizes that people who have been driven to seek “light” recipes normally abide by. If we found skimpy servings satisfying, we wouldn’t be in the market for “light” recipes, now would we?

In Cooking Light’s defense, their creations are lower in fat and calories than regular versions of the same things. And at least the presence of the nutrition information encourages me to stop and think about how much I’m packing in. This is one of my favorite Cooking Light recipes, because you could conceivably eat two of their so-called servings and still maintain a very reasonable calorie count for a satisfying dinner.

I love this recipe because it tastes a lot like the excellent chicken satay served at our local Thai place. The accompanying cucumber salad is also really tasty, and plays the perfectly cool, crisp, slightly sweet foil to the peanut sauce. Served with a side of rice-noodles, this is a excellent meal that won't convince your tastebuds that you're eating light, but it should be able to pull one over on the metabolism.

Chicken Satay
Courtesy Cooking Light, July 2005
Serves 4

Chicken:
1 pound skinless, boneless chicken breasts, cut into 8 strips
1 tablespoon light brown sugar
2 1/2 tablespoons low-sodium soy sauce
2 teaspoons ground fresh ginger (the magazine recommends bottled ginger, but I keep a knob of ginger in my freezer - it lasts for ages - and just use the microplane to take off as much as I need for a given recipe)
1 teaspoon grated lime rind
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper
2 garlic cloves, minced

Peanut Sauce:
1 tablespoon light brown sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons low-sodium soy sauce
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
2 tablespoons natural-style, reduced-fat creamy peanut butter
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper
1 garlic clove, minced

1. Combine chicken and next 6 ingredients (through 2 garlic cloves) in a medium bowl. Let stand 10 minutes.

2. In a separate medium bowl, combine 1 tablespoon brown sugar and the next 5 ingredients (through 1 garlic clove), stirring until sugar dissolves.

3. Thread chicken strips onto each of 8 (8-inch) skewers (I didn’t bother with the skewers). Place chicken on grill rack coated with cooking spray; grill 5 minutes on each side or until chicken is done. Serve chicken with sauce.

Nutritional Information (serving size: 2 skewers and 1 tablespoon sauce)
CALORIES 205(20% from fat); FAT 4.5g (sat 1g,mono 0.4g,poly 0.4g); PROTEIN 29.3g; CHOLESTEROL 66mg; CALCIUM 26mg; SODIUM 672mg; FIBER 0.8g; IRON 1.5mg; CARBOHYDRATE 11.2g

Cucumber Salad
Courtesy Cooking Light, July 2005

1/2 cup rice vinegar
1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon minced seeded jalapeño pepper
1 teaspoon grated lime rind in a large bowl.
3 cups thinly sliced English cucumber
1/2 cup thinly sliced red onion

1. Combine all ingredients in a large bowl. Toss to coat.

I’m Stuffed!

2007-09-20T15:26:00.001-04:00

I’m not a vegetarian. I swear. I couldn’t possibly be more in favor of eating animals. Delicious, tasty animals. But when I looked back over the last four and a half month’s worth of recipes, I realized that you, my loyal readers, might be having a hard time buying my non-vegetarian-ness. Granted, there are my obsessive bacon entries, but there are also 12 entries in the “vegetables” category and only 1 or 2 in every other category. Obviously, I need to do something to reinforce my carnivorocity and convince you that this is not a blog about eating your greens. Unfortunately, this entry is not that.

It's not really my fault; my intention was to write about these gorgeous lamb steaks I picked up at the farmer's market last weekend. But the lamb guy at threw in an obscenely huge zucchini, just because he was trying to unload it. Despite Nick's well-documented disaffection for all things courgette, I couldn't not turn this 18" zucchini into something delicious. So, I did what anyone with a foot and a half long zucchini would do. I took it home and made a lot of really bad sex jokes.

Once that was out of my system, I stuffed it with quinoa, feta, and pine nuts. The original plan was to serve this with the lamb steaks, but the stuffed zucchini was a hearty enough meal in itself, alongside a tomato salad. So the steaks were set aside for another night and, alas, you’re stuck with another vegetable recipe.

To make up for yet another veggie-centric posting, I'll leave you with this, guaranteed to make any 4th grader laugh:

What’s zucchini’s favorite game? Squash.

Quinoa Stuffed Zucchini
Serves 4

1 obscenely large zucchini or 2 normal sized zucchini
2 Tbsp. olive oil
1 medium onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 Tbsp. fresh oregano, minced
3 Tbsp. pine nuts, toasted
1 egg, lightly beaten
3 cups quinoa (prepared from 1 cup dry quinoa and 2 cups water)
2 oz. Greek feta, crumbled
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Preheat oven to 375-degrees.

2. Trim the ends and cut the zucchini in half. Using a melon baller, scoop the pulp out of the zucchini, leaving a ½” thick shell.

3. Heat the olive oil over medium heat. Sauté onion until softened, about 5 minutes. Add garlic and sauté for another two minutes.

4. Toss onion mixture, oregano, pine nuts, with the quinoa. Add egg and mix quickly, so the egg doesn’t scramble among the other warm ingredients. Season with salt and pepper and fold in the feta. Fill the zucchini shells to heaping with quinoa filling.

5. Bake shells for 30 minutes.

Would you like something to drink?

2007-09-14T13:59:00.001-04:00

This is one of a collection of Betty Crocker recipe cards from 1971 (you can see the entire collection here).

On the reverse is a recipe for the depicted Man-Pleasing appetizer, which is horseradish spiked beef bouillon, with a celery stalk (cleverly referred to as a “swizzle stick”.) I think if I served this libation to my man, he would not find it terribly appetizing. It might even encourage him to stop being my man. Maybe he would go be the man of someone who doesn't consider soup a beverage.

But what really bothers me about this Man-Pleasing Appetizer, is the striking resemblance it bears to this Weight Watcher’s recipe from 1974. The potable on the left is also beef bouillon served in a glass with a celery "swizzle stick" (courtesy of Candyboots):

So is bouillon a satisfying man-snack, a suitable substitution for beef jerky and buffalo wings? Or is it a thirst quenching pitstop on the road to sylphlike willowy-ness? It can't possibly be both, can it? Is the bouillon lobby playing both sides of the fence?

A Letter of Apology

2007-09-13T11:58:00.000-04:00

Dear Swiss Chard,

I am sorry for the disrespect I showed to your Vitamin-K-rich leaves recently. It was not my intention to cause you any harm, emotional or physical, or to imply that you required an excessive amount of seasoning in order to attain edibility. I hold your collection of vitamins, minerals, and fibers in the highest esteem. My bones, my colon and I are indebted to your vast nutritive properties. I have the utmost respect for your slightly bitter, slightly salty flavor and I am committed to making sure people don't confuse you with your cousin, Spinach.

I look forward to many fruitful years working together.

Best wishes,

Andrea
The Best Bite

Sauteed Chard
Serves 4, as a delicious, nutrient dense side

3 tablespoons pine nuts
1 large bunch green or rainbow chard
2 Tbsp. olive oil
1 medium white onion, minced
2 tablespoons golden raisins
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
Juice of 1/2 lemon

1. Heat a small frying pan over medium heat and toast the pine nuts until fragrant. Set aside.

2. Rinse and drain the chard. Pull the stems off the greens. Chop the stems and set aside. Cut the greens crosswise into 1-inch-wide slices and set aside.

3. In a medium saucepan, heat the oil over medium-high. Add the onion and raisins, and cook until the onion is translucent. Add the garlic, and cook until fragrant, 1-2 minutes. Add the chard stems and cook until they start to soften. Add the chard greens and reduce the heat to medium. Cook until the chard wilts, probably not more than 10 minutes. Stir in the lemon juice and the pine nuts, season with salt and freshly ground pepper, and serve immediately.

The Obligatory Tomato Recipe

2007-09-10T18:19:00.001-04:00

Am I the only one totally sick of salad? Am I the only one dreaming of slow-cooked stews and meaty feasts? Enough with the summer produce already, produce so gorgeous and colorful and tasty that it doesn't need much more than a sprinkling of salt and olive oil to reach complete vegetal nirvana. Enough with the abundance of perfect zucchini and tomatoes and peaches and corn. Dammit, I want to actually cook when I'm cooking. I want to work with ingredients that need me, like butternut squash and ugly little celeriac.

Yes, I mourn the loss of potential beach days. Yes, I will miss wearing flip-flops to work. And yes, yes, yes, I will completely regret writing these words when I have snot frozen on the end of my nose. But I've had it up to my eyeballs with salad as of right this very second.

The tomatoes, however, are posing a problem. They’ve been just about as gorgeous as tomatoes have a right to be. Sweet and fat and properly tomato-y. It would be a crime not to give them a proper shout-out, almost disrespectful to the effort they've put into being delicious. So here is one more salad recipe, because I know that come January, this is the salad that will occupy the majority of my occipital lobe, where I file all my food fantasies.

This is my variation on the classic Greek salad. Unlike the American version of Greek salad, I prefer it lettuce-free, the way the Greek peasants traditionally went for it (I assure you, the romaine in the photo is strictly garnish.) Unlike the Greek peasants, I ditch the olives because I’m not a fan (I’ve tried. I will continue to try, but it’s just not happening.) I serve it with warm pita chips (not sure where the Greek peasants stand on those.) Maybe it's more Greek-ish than actually Greek.

If you can’t get your hands on luscious, straight-from-the-farm, end-of-summer tomatoes, then don’t bother. Order in Thai and eat it straight from the container, because that’ll be the equivalent of the kind of authentic Greek experience you’ll get if you make this with listless supermarket tomatoes. Otherwise, it's a glorious tangle of summer flavors, enough to almost love salad again.

Greek-ish Salad
Serves 6

2 lbs. extra fabulous tomatoes, cut into 1” chunks
¾ tsp. salt
3 Tbsp. red wine vinegar
1/2 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
3 tsp. minced fresh oregano leaves
1 medium clove garlic, minced
Pinch sugar
6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/3 red onion, sliced as thinly as humanly possible
1 English cucumber, halved lengthwise
3 oz. feta cheese, crumbled
fresh ground black pepper to taste
4 pitas (I prefer whole wheat) toasted and sliced into sixths, so they’re sort of chip-like.

1. Toss tomatoes with ¼ tsp. of salt, and set aside. The salt will draw the water out, so it doesn’t wind up diluting your vinaigrette later.

2. Whisk together the remaining ½ tsp. salt and the next six ingredients (vinegar through olive oil). Set aside.

3. Toss the onion and cucumber together. Drain liquid from tomatoes and add those to the onion and cucumber. Drizzle with enough vinaigrette to moisten and toss, adding more vinaigrette if necessary. Season with pepper. Crumble feta over salad and serve with toasted pitas.

Behold the Indian Feast!

2007-09-05T20:36:00.001-04:00

Can two dishes plus rice be considered a feast? They can if you’re the one making it.

Indian food is a pain in the ass to cook. Most recipes have so many steps, that the prep requires a load of prep: spices need toasting, onions need chopping, tomatoes need dicing, chicken needs skinning. Those two dishes can take hours to make. But Indian food is top of my favorite cuisines list, with its exotic spices, complex flavors, fragrant sauces. Why should restaurants get to have all the fun? Which is where Suvir Saran’s “Indian Home Cooking” comes in.

Suvir Saran is a pretty well-known chef in New York, and he’s cooked stellar upscale Indian at a couple of great places, including the wonderful Devi, where I had a great meal (with wine pairings). So I was delighted and a little bit mystified when I spotted the very talented Mr. Saran manning the steam tables in our very mediocre corporate cafeteria.

Here is how I imagine this came to be, but I could totally be making it up: “Indian Home Cooking” is published and some adroit publicist has a stroke of genius: send Suvir Saran to corporate cafeterias to cook his amazing food, armed with stacks of books. It's an excellent idea, really: we corporate drones are, quite literally, a captive audience. What the adroit publicist did not bank on was the restaurant-obsessed groupie who yelled “It’s Suvir Saran!” and waved maniacally across the cafeteria.

I can’t help it. It just came out. I wasn’t expecting to see a Michelin rated chef near the sporks. His eyes got really big and he looked scared. I bought my Indian lunch, and a copy of the book to boot (hats off to you, adroit publicist!). But Suvir is a man of strength. He can handle a fan base. He recovered and graciously autographed my book. He even gave me his email address and suggested I come into Devi as his guest. Obviously, he didn't think I was that much of a freak.

I never took Suvir Saran up on the offer. Partly because I wanted to cook something from “Indian Home Cooking” before I contacted him, but mostly because I was afraid he would think I was just trying to mooch a free meal off of his goodwill (which was pretty much the plan). But I liked that I had the option. I was truly disappointed at news of Devi’s shuttering last week. Now, if I want to eat his food, I have to make it myself. So that's what I did, preparing his Lahori Chicken Curry and Chilled Smoky Eggplant with Yogurt and Cilantro in tribute.

Suvir's recipes (I feel like we're on a first name basis; he gave me his email address) are actually reasonable for a home cook. And they're even reasonable for an American home cook, who might not have "12 cardamom pods" and "9 whole cloves" just sitting around (they lose their punch quickly, so use them stat or store them in the freezer.) Yeah, there's a lot of prep just to get your mise en place set, but that's just the nature of this kind of highly spiced cuisine. The chicken was really tasty and was a brighter, less-greasy version of the chicken curry available from our local take-out joint.

But the eggplant. Oh. My. God. The. Eggplant. Creamy and silky and smoky. Rich, but still seemingly virtuous. You can take Suvir's advice and roast your whole eggplant directly on the flame of a gas burner, but if you're like me, you'll switch to the less stressful oven roasting method when the eggplant catches fire and a flame shoots up from it. (Although I had taken the batteries out of the smoke detector.) It is a little more work than usual, for what amounts to a side dish. But it's worth every bit of effort, at least until my buddy Suvir embarks on his next restaurant gig. Or comes back to our cafeteria.

Chilled Smoky Eggplant with Yogurt and Cilantro
Courtesy Suvir Saran
Serves 4-6

1 large eggplant
2 Tbsp. canola oil
1 medium red onion, diced
1 tsp. salt
2 cups plain yogurt
1" fresh ginger, peeled and minced
1/2 fresh hot green chile, minced
2 Tbsp. chopped fresh cilantro
1/4 tsp. garam masala

1. Roast the eggplant on a cookie sheet in a 500-degree oven until blackened, about 20 minutes. Let cool and peel the skin off. Cut off and discard the stem. Put the eggplant into a bowl and mash with a potato masher.

2. Heat the oil over medium-high heat in a large frying pan. Add the onion and salt, and saute until the onion is translucent, about 5 minutes.

3. Add the mashed eggplant and cook, stirring often, until the dry, about 10 minutes. Take the pan off the heat and let cool for about five minutes.

4. Whisk the yogurt until smooth in a large bowl. All the eggplant and all the remaining ingredients and stir well. Chill until cold. Taste for salt and serve cold.

Whither radicchio?

2007-09-02T18:07:00.000-04:00

Recipes are like friends; some you’re willing to go a little more out of your way for than others. Spinach Salad with Grilled Red Onion and Tahini Vinaigrette never seemed like it was going to be my BFF. It had been on my radar for a while, but it took the proper planet alignment in order to claw it’s way onto the table: a leftover jar of tahini (courtesy of Virginia T. Habeeb) happened to coincide with a fortuitous trip to the farmer’s marker (baby spinach! red onion!) and a gut-bustingly large Indian lunch. Fate had determined that a light dinner was on the cards and this was the light dinner it was meant to be.

I loved the idea: caramelized red onions and mild baby spinach tossed in a nutty tahini vinaigrette and served in bowl-like, purple radicchio leaves. But the radicchio was a problem, namely because I didn’t have any. There was none at the farmer’s market. None at the crummy grocery store 5 blocks from my apartment (hardly a shocker) and none at the overpriced-but-cute gourmet shop another two blocks beyond that.

I had to make a crucial decision: how important was the radicchio? It’s not like I was trying to make spaghetti and meatballs without meatballs. But the radicchio sounded good. My mental tastebuds imagined how the bite of the leaves would balance the sweetness of the onions. I wanted the radicchio, but I’d already been to three places and walked a mile in search of it.

Part of living the car-free life, means that the number of errands I can run or the distance I can travel in a day is limited to how far my hot-pink Pumas are willing to take me. Today, they weren’t very willing. I went home, radicchio-less.

The salad was great. The dressing is creamy, but still light (mixing it in a blender is a must) and the onions (I broiled) are fantastic. The recipe makes quite a bit of dressing, and I used the leftovers as a marinade for notoriously-bland tilapia a few days later with stellar results.

But I couldn't shake the feeling that those sweet onions and the nutty dressing could have used a bitter counterpoint. It needed radicchio. I guess I'll have to look a little harder next time.

Spinach Salad with Grilled Red Onion and Tahini Vinaigrette
Courtesy Bon Appétit, June 1996
Serves 10

1/2 cup water
1/4 cup white wine vinegar
3 tablespoons tahini (sesame seedpaste)
2 tablespoons coarse-grained mustard
1 teaspoon honey
1 small garlic clove, minced
3/4 vegetable oil

2 large red onions

12 cups (packed) baby spinach,trimmed
10 large radicchio leaves

1. Combine first six ingredients in blender and blend well. Gradually blend in oil. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

2. Cut onions lengthwise into 1/2-inch-thick wedges, leaving root ends intact. Place onions in 15x10-inch glass baking dish. Pour 1 cup vinaigrette over onions, coating evenly. Let marinate 3 hours. Chill remaining dressing. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Chill onions.)

3. Prepare barbecue (medium-high-heat) or preheat broiler. Sprinkle onions with salt and pepper. Grill or broil onions until golden, turning occasionally, about 12 minutes. (Can be made 6 hours ahead. Let stand at room temperature.)

4. Place spinach in large bowl. Toss with enough vinaigrette to coat. Season with salt and pepper. Fill radicchio leaves with spinach. Top with grilled onions. Pass remaining dressing separately.

Welcome to Minnesota!

2007-08-28T20:32:00.001-04:00

Sorry for the hiatus on the posts, but I've just returned from a whirlwind weekend in food mecca Minneapolis. Seriously. I had the good fortune to eat at the truly fantastic 112 Eatery , which could not only hold it's own in New York, but it'd give some other joints the serious Smackdown Royale.

But I have to admit, as embarrassing as it may be, that the highlight of my Midwestern culinary journey was the Minnesota State Fair. I swear I'm not being facetious. First of all, it's really no wonder that there's an obesity epidemic in this country. Obesity is delicious. It is breaded and it is fried and it is on a stick.

For those as naive as I was about the cuisine of Minnesota's indigenous peoples, hotdish is a casserole. How they get the casserole to stay on the stick has undoubtedly kept our scientists busy for years. But now that the casserole is firmly on the stick, perhaps they will turn their attention towards that pesky cancer thing.

Not all the food at the Minnesota State Fair is on a stick. Some is on display:

One of the true delights was seeing the harem of winning Dairy Princesses, whose heads are carved out of 90lb. blocks of butter (it's salted; I asked.)

And finally, here's got to be the absolute best use of millet ever. This is from the crop art display. It's made up entirely of crops: corn, beans, and grains. It is a portrait of Tom Selleck. And, yes, his name is spelled wrong.

But I don't want you to think that I'm mocking the wonder that is the Minnesota State Fair. I honestly, truly, fantastically loved it. I loved the deep fried pickles (dipped in ranch dressing.) I loved the deep fried cheese curds (dipped in ketchup). I loved Minnesota's Largest Pumpkin (990 lbs.) and Minnesota's Largest Boar (1200 lbs.) A lot of it was probably the kitsch value, since I don't see too many foot-and-a-half long green-beans at the Grand Army Plaza Farmer's Market, but the whole thing was so deep-fried and so on a stick and so wonderfully American that I can't wait to go back. And I'll definitely try a stick of hotdish next time.

Everything Happens for a Reason

2007-08-19T18:53:00.000-04:00

The Pistou sat there. It was getting increasingly annoyed with me. Every time I opened the refrigerator, I could hear it practically spitting at me in a French accent: “Why do I just sit here? Why do you not use me? Am I not good enough for your ridiculous American recipes? Pah!”

The Mint Pistou was the remainder of the Ugly Soup episode, the superfluous byproduct of Gourmet’s original recipe. It was tasty, a blend of fresh-from-the-garden (someone else’s garden, of course) mint and parsley, a scallion, and some of my favorite extra-virgin olive oil, a French version of pesto. The soup didn’t need it, but the pistou didn’t deserve to sit there and rot. It didn’t ask to be born.

Fortunately, the Superfluous Pistou collided with a summertime hankering for shrimp kebobs. Could I repurpose the pistou into a marinade for the wild jumbo fresh shrimp I just shelled out $15.99 a pound for at Whole Foods? Either this was going to be a brilliant marriage of flavors or a colossal mess. After the Rainbow Chard Incident, my confidence was shaken, but thankfully not stirred.

The pistou, in it’s original state, was too thick to act sufficiently as a marinade, but some lime juice took care of that. And since cooking would dull it’s original bright flavors (even more than sitting forlornly in the fridge did) I added some shallot and garlic to punch it up. Despite the grilling, the mint flavor shone through and brought out the shrimp’s sweetness.

Voila! The Superfluous Pistou has become indispensible! I have discovered the reason for it's existence. And, to it's snooty French delight, I 'll definitely make it again.

Mint Pistou Shrimp Kebabs
Serves 4

Note: Since shrimp and vegetables tend to cook at different rates, it makes more sense to skewer them each separately and combine in a bowl, as they come off the grill.

3/4 cup loosely packed fresh mint leaves
1/2 cup loosely packed fresh flat-leaf parsley sprigs
1 large scallion, chopped (1/2 cup)
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons water
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 Tbsp. fresh lime juice
1 small shallot, minced
1 clove garlic, minced
1 1/2 lbs. uncooked shrimp, peeled and deveined, tails on
1 medium red onion
1 medium zucchini
1/2 lb. crimini mushrooms

1. Cut onion and zucchini into 1 1/2” pieces. Wipe mushrooms with a damp paper towel and cut tips off stems.

2. Pulse mint, parsley, and scallion in a food processor until finely chopped. With motor running, add oil in a stream, then add water and salt, blending until incorporated. Whisk in lime juice, shallot, and garlic.

3. Toss the shrimp with enough pistou to generously coat. Marinate 30 minutes. Skewer on soaked wooden skewers or metal kebob skewers.

4. Toss the vegetables, in separate bowls, each with enough pistou to coat. Marinate 30 minutes. Skewer the onions, mushrooms, and zucchini on separate soaked wooden skewers or metal kebob skewers.

5. Preheat grill or grill pan to medium. Coat with cooking spray. Grill shrimp skewers until pink, turning once. Timing depends on the size of the shrimp you use, but you probably won’t need to grill for longer than 3 minutes per side for colossal sized shrimp. Brush with additional pistou before turning. Grill zucchini and onion skewers until tender and caramelized, about 5-6 minutes each side. Grill mushrooms 2-3 minutes each side. Brush all with remaining pistou. Once cooked, serve on skewers, or slide off skewers and toss together in a serving bowl.

Mind if I have a taste?

2007-08-19T15:58:00.000-04:00

The danger with eating in restaurants, is that everyone gets something different. Which sounds like a good idea, until the food arrives, and you look around and realize you’ve made a dreadful, irreversible mistake: you’ve ordered wrong. Sometimes, you can blame the pressure; you’re overwhelmed by a bevy of inspiring choices, weighing the delights of braised shortribs vs. butter poached lobster vs. gruyere mac & cheese. But the shortribs come with spaetzle! And the lobster comes with roasted plums! And the mac & cheese comes with mac & cheese! And suddenly the waiter is looking at you expectantly and everyone else has ordered and you need to make a decision, stat, and you hear yourself blurt out something that wasn’t even in the running to begin with, like the organic roasted chicken with pan juices. The waiter retreats kitchen-ward, menus tucked tightly under his arm, leaving you feeling bamboozled by your own indecisiveness, doomed to drool over every meal but your own.

Of course sometimes food envy sneaks up on you. Your choice seems solid. That is, until the entrees arrives and absolutely everything on the table is bewitching - except for what’s in front of you. But no matter what brings food envy on, the outcome is the same: silently seethe with jealousy, hoping your dining companions will offer up a best bite. There’s always the old “does anyone want to taste this?” ploy, in an effort to inspire reciprocation, but there’s no guarantee of success. But now, there’s the Freeloader Fork, food envy’s most formidable foe yet.

With thanks to the ever-vigilent Daily Candy for spotting this gem, the Freeloader Fork has an extendable handle, up to 2’ long, letting you reach across tables, round and square, to dip into the most alluring eats, with or without the owner’s approval. Naturally, you should apply some basic subterfuge; a simple “Hey, is that Charro!?” or “Look! Posh Spice is eating a corndog!” should shift their attention long enough for you to get the Freeloader Fork in and out, undetected. After all, you don’t want to be seen as a freeloader.

It also helps count calories. Watching your girlish figure? Let your tablemates order dessert, and just use your Freeloader Fork for a little sample. After all, didn't Cathy teach us that if we didn't order it, it has no calories? But my favorite use of the Freeloader Fork, as seen in the product copy, is “poke people at a safe distance,” because clearly we don’t have enough tools for that. I was a little disappointed there wasn't a poking illustration included.

A scorching case of food envy can flare up at any moment and modern medicine has yet to find a cure. So, until the FDA approves the proper ointments or caplets or nasal sprays, all I can advise is having the proper tools on hand in order to ease the symptoms.

Gee, your trash smells terrific.

2007-08-16T19:37:00.001-04:00

Tonight, I left work at a shockingly early 5:35pm. I dashed home, thinking I’d have just enough time to whip together a gourmet meal and still make it to our 8pm co-op meeting on time. Sure, there’re yesterday's leftovers in the fridge, but I had a free hour and a bright bunch of rainbow chard! It would be churlish not to cook! Churlish, I say!

Once in the door, I diced onions and minced garlic and chiffonaded chard. I boiled water and threw in some whole-wheat pasta. I danced around the kitchen to Peter, Bjorn, and John. I readied half a cup of dry white wine and diced up some leftover roasted tomatoes.

“Maybe this one won’t be spectacular enough to blog about,” I thought, “but at least I get to use the chard. And how delighted Nick will be to not get stuck with a Lean Cuisine!” (which has become the standard co-op meeting night dinner.) I seasoned my vegetables. I seasoned my pasta water. I thought about how chefs say “seasoned” instead of “salted” and how very chef-like I was for using the proper terminology. Proud of my chef-ness, I boldly tossed everything together and added a generous blizzard of parmeggiano. And then I tasted it. Really salty. Too salty. Lip-curdling salty. It tasted like the ocean, solidified.

This meal was in critical condition, but I'm not one to panic (total lie. I am SO one to panic.) I set about doctoring, adding more wine and some lemon. But you can’t desalinate pure salt. Even if you use the word “season.” And that old wives tale about throwing in a peeled potato in to soak up salt? What a load of grade-A bunk. Who the hell are these old wives, anyway, spreading around that kind of hogwash? I want that job.

I tried everything to save my gorgeous rainbow chard and pasta, everything, but it was D.O.A. Into the trash it went, although it still smelled so delicious, so very delicious. This is the first time I've had to toss a failed cooking project. It was a blow to my ego. And Nick got stuck with a Lean Cuisine. Which was underseasoned, just so you know.

Take that, Cousin Mary.

2007-08-14T19:27:00.000-04:00

I’ve made a lot of lemonade in my time, including mint lemonade, raspberry lemonade, and lime-y lemonade. But when Carolyn admiringly mentioned that her Cousin Mary had served lemonade flavored with fresh basil, I was instantly furious.

You see, Cousin Mary doesn’t know this, but she’s my arch-nemesis. She’s one of those people who’s always making her own bread and growing her own vegetables and keeping pet ducks to teach the kids what its like to keep pet ducks. Her kids eat sushi and speak nine languages; I think the 7-year old is up for a Pultizer. Mary does all these things rather effortlessly and at the same time, she’s nice and funny. I bet she can sew. So why would someone so seemingly fabulous qualify as an arch-nemesis?

The answer is obvious: I’m insanely jealous. Mary’s daily accomplishments are so breezy and second-nature, all the duck-raising and vegetable-growing and child-rearing. I’m lucky if I use the asparagus before it rots. The Basil Lemonade put me over the top. I was slightly comforted when I googled “Basil Lemonade” and came up with a whole host of recipes, any one of which Mary could have been inspired by. But I think it’s safe to say, bitterly, that Real Simple and Gourmet got the idea from her.

I decided to go mano a mano, lemon a lemon with Cousin Mary. I wanted to one-up her lemonade. I wanted to prove to Carolyn who the undisputed lemonade champion really is and win back her thirsty heart. I wanted to give Cousin Mary the Smackdown Royale (in the nicest, most homemade way possible, of course.) But I needed stronger ammunition than lemons and basil. I had to up the ante, if I was going to return Carolyn's culinary affections to their rightful owner (me.) So I made the only move left: I added vodka.

My first try was kind of a cheat; I muddled the leaves in lemonade, but took the lazy girl's route: Crystal Light. I actually don't mind Crystal Light; it's not as good as the real thing, but it certainly does what it says on the tin. Unfortunately, the basil flavor was pretty understated and the mouthful of wet greenery that came with every sip wasn’t terribly appetizing. Steeping the basil for a few hours in cooled simple syrup produced pretty much the same, wimpy basil flavor, but with the added annoyance of having squeezed 23 lemons. Including the fresh basil in the simple syrup from the get-go was my “a-ha!” moment. Enough basil flavor to know it’s there, but not so much that you feel like you’re eating a lemonade Caprese. Plus, my ingenius combination of half bottled lemon juice (way too acidic and sharp on it's own) and fresh squeezed lemons saved some work. A shot of vodka in the glass, and a frosty Basil Lemonade Cocktail was delivered to Carolyn’s side. She was delighted and I felt triumphant.

Shall we tally the score? Cousin Mary gets a point for the Basil Lemonade concept, a point for introducing it to Carolyn, a point for squeezing every single lemon herself, and two points for making her own bread (unrelated but still impressive). I get a point for persevering to find the best method and fifty-six points for adding vodka.

Final score:
Mary: 5
Me: 57

Good game, Cousin Mary. You're a worthy adversary. I'm just praying you don't demand a rematch.

Basil Lemonade Cocktails

2 cups fresh basil leaves, packed
1 cup granulated sugar
5½ cups water
1½ cups lemon juice
Vodka (optional, but totally fabulous)

1. Combine basil, sugar, and 2 cups of the water in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil, stirring once or twice until sugar dissolves. Let cool 30 minutes and then chill for 1-3 hours, so the basil flavor steeps into the syrup. Pour syrup through a strainer, pressing on basil leaves with a spoon to extract all syrup. This will make about 2½ cups of basil syrup.

2. Combine remaining 3½ cups of water and lemon juice. Add syrup, ½ cup at a time until you reach your desired sweetness (I used almost all of it). Stir and chill.

3. To serve, fill tall glasses with ice. Add 1½oz vodka to each and fill to the top with Basil Lemonade. Stir and then garnish with basil sprigs (or mint, if you run out of bail, like I did; see photos) and lemon slices.

How ugly is ugly?

2007-08-13T08:49:00.001-04:00

Silly me! I totally spaced and forgot that I employed my low-quality photographic skills while assembling Ugly Soup, so here are the snaps. First, a lovely one of the summer squash burbling happily away in the chicken stock.

And here’s the completed soup with a less-than-artful swirl of Mint Pistou, just before serving. I suppose that, in addition to my food photography, I need to work on my swirling.

Now you can see for yourself that Ugly Soup isn't frightfully grotesque, but Slightly Unattractive Soup was a far less interesting name. Besides, I think we've all seen enough Ugly Betty promos to know that beauty is only skin deep. It's all about flava.

Ugly Soup

2007-08-10T15:03:00.000-04:00

Food should be pretty. As the Italians say, “we eat with the eyes first.” Perhaps this is why unattractive dishes like this and this tend to be less popular at buffets and potlucks. Although I suspect they wouldn’t do much better in the cafeteria at the Perkins School for the Blind. But when you’re cooking and the image you have in your head of the beautiful magic the ingredients will create together bears zero resemblance to the pot-full of bleached sludge you end up with, ugly cooking is ok. Especially if you know the ingredients are fresh and delicious and you don’t have anything else in the apartment to make for dinner.

This is what happened with this soup. I started with this Gourmet recipe, but played with the quantities and ingredients, adding in a couple of extra things along the way. When I was done, it looked like grout thinned with chicken stock. But it was delectable, velvety and packed full of caramelized summer squash. Rich enough for a meal, but cream-less, so it still felt kind of virtuous. And I was delighted to have happened upon an ideal use for my crisper full of aging vegetables. It was excellent reheated the next day as well, slightly mellower and still yummy but, alas, no prettier.

I did make the Mint Pistou Gourmet recommends garnishing the soup with, but it proved too much work for too little deliciousness. If you happen to have some fresh pesto in the house, a small dollop on top of each serving will be tasty and might even add a bit of polish, but this is never going to be the supermodel of soups, so don't get your hopes up.

I’m posting a pretty flower picture of instead of the soup, because the camera broke when I took it. Ok, I’m kidding. The camera is fine, and the soup isn’t so atrociously ugly that it’s a turn off. To be perfectly honest, it's not even that ugly; I just needed a good angle for this piece. I promise you’ll enjoy it if you make it. Unless it comes out like this. Then throw it away and promise never to set foot in the kitchen again.

Ugly Soup
Serves 6

4 Tbsp. unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 medium onion, diced
½ teaspoon salt
1 large garlic clove, minced
1 ½ lb yellow summer squash, halved and thinly sliced
2 carrots, thinly sliced
¾ lb. yellow-fleshed potatoes peeled, halved, and thinly sliced
4 cups chicken stock
1 cup corn, fresh or frozen
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Melt butter in a 6- to 8-quart heavy pot on medium-low. Add onion and salt, stirring occasionally until softened, 6-8 minutes.

2. Add squash and carrots, and let cook for another 7 minutes. Add garlic and cook for 30 seconds. Add potato and stock and bring to a boil. Add corn, reduce heat to low and simmer, partially covered, until vegetables are very tender, about 15 minutes. Remove from heat.

3. Puree soup with a hand-blender until smooth. Add a little water or stock to thin it, if it’s become too thick. Return to heat and simmer for 3 minutes. Season with salt and pepper, and serve.

Meet the people who hate me!

2007-08-08T19:58:00.000-04:00

The people of Delta flight 528 hate me: the young mother of two, the older man in a faded yellow polo, the businessman glaring at me over his Blackberry, the lady who is who is either a forty-something with bad skin or a seventy-something with great skin. I have failed to charm the flight attendant as well, probably because I’m shoveling forkfuls of General Tso’s Chicken into my mouth. The aroma is driving everyone wild with desire. This might be more effective than that pheromone perfume that came out a few years ago.

I’m not sure why. This is not a noteworthy General Tso’s chicken, cited in a foodie forum, from some amazingly-authentic-yet-obscure Atlanta Szechuan dive. This is rubbery, airport, fast food, General Tso’s. It’s soggy, overbreaded, and coated in a sickly-sweet pepper flecked sauce. The accompanying fried rice exists only for texture; bubble wrap packs more flavor per square centimeter. And the mixed vegetables swim in a gluey gravy, although they are surprisingly crisp-tender.

But you’d never guess I wasn’t relishing every bite; and doused with a hearty helping of soy sauce, I actually might be relishing every bite. I’m ravenous. It’s been a gruesomely long day of travel and meetings, with nary a moment for a meal (shameful!). And there's not a lot of stupendous food choices in Concourse A of William B. Hartsfield International Airport. Then I realize: this is the kind of thing most people eat on a regular basis. I look around at the people who hate me, wondering if they’re jealous because of hunger or genuine food envy?

Then, a stroke of luck: someone has a peanut allergy and the flight attendant informs us, in a most confidential tone, that peanuts will not be served. A cloud of irritation hangs over coach class (I’m sure first class will be allowed to roll around naked in piles of peanuts if they choose.) and the community ire shifts from me, despite the lingering scent of General Tso’s legacy.

I finish my greasy meal, hunger sated. Next time, I’ll smuggle some good Southern cooking on board: maybe some saucy barbecue ribs or biscuits and gravy or crispy, crackly fried chicken. Maybe all of it. Because if they're going to hate me, I might as well give them something worth hating me over.

Sorry, Nick.

2007-08-04T16:05:00.000-04:00

I think is starting to Nick dread my cooking. Not because I try to sneak bacon or zucchini in wherever I can. Not because he detests clean-up duty and trying to figure out where everything goes. Not even because he harbors resentment towards the space our ever-expanding collection of kitchen equipment takes up. Occasionally, he’ll shake a microplane or a pair of tongs or a dutch oven accusingly at me, demanding to know “is this really necessary?” (it is), but I know deep down he considers himself lucky to be on the receiving end of my hobby.

But the thing that’s going to put him over the top, is the smoke alarm. I can’t seem to embark on any sort of cooking project, small, medium, or large, without setting the stupid thing off. It doesn’t help that we live in a small space and it’s not far from the stove. Even the simplest, non-smoke generating sautés cause the damn thing to start its ear-splitting blare, as a mechanical voice within calmly warns “fire. fire.”
And every time I set it off, the scene is the same: Nick’s cat-like reflexes spring into action, as he whips the ladder out of the closet and springs upward to silence the cacophony. I suppose if I started timing him and telling him it was “fitness”, he’d probably really enjoy prying the smoke alarm from the ceiling, but as it is, he just mutters my name and gives me the exasperated glare. I’ve become very familiar with that glare, and this recipe isn’t helping.

This Balsamic Marinade is one of my favorites, pleasantly simple and surprisingly yummy. I usually use it on flank steak, but asparagus marinated in this one is excellent as well. If you have an outdoor grill or access to one, that’s the way to go. Since we remain grill-less, I usually broil it or use a grill pan, but both set the smoke alarm blaring and Nick clambering for the ceiling within a matter of minutes. I suppose if I were smart, I’d turn the thing off before I get cookin’, but I can never seem to remember. I hope I’m redeemed by the fact that Nick gets a tasty meal for his troubles; he could have married someone who raised ferrets for a hobby. And at least our smoke alarm works.

(It doesn't taste nearly as blurry as it looks in the photo. This is a pre-cooked shot, since by the time the smoke alarm had gone off and Nick had given me the exasperated glare and it came out of the broiler, I had completely forgotten about the camera. And, as I think we’ve previously established, I’m a shit photographer anyway.)

Flank Steak with Balsamic Marinade
serves 4-6

3/4 cup balsamic vinegar (save the aged stuff for your salad; supermarket balsamic will do just fine here)
1/4 cup olive oil
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 heaping Tbsp. minced fresh rosemary
2lb flank steak

1. Toss all ingredients together in a large ziploc bag. Let meat marinate for an hour or two in the refrigerator, turning over once or twice.

2. Pull meat out of marinade and discard marinade. Here's where it gets tricky. Cooking times obviously vary, depending on weight and how you prefer your meat cooked. I’ve had success by broiling or grilling 3-4 minutes per side, for medium rare. Let meat rest for 10 minutes before serving, to redistribute juices.

Why do peaches hate me?

2007-07-31T19:11:00.000-04:00

I’m not sure what I did to anger peaches, but they are pissed at me. So are nectarines, cherries, and plums. They reveal their animosity whenever I nibble at their deliciously fat selves by making my lips and tongue swell up. I can handle the Barbara Hershey-in-Beaches lips, the unbearable itchiness less so.

My doctor tells me that I’m not allergic to stone fruit, per se, but to the trees they grow on. I’m not sure why this difference is even worth the breath to point it out, since the result is that in the summer months I just have to find my fruity goodness elsewhere. But when the farmer’s markets are teeming with plump stone fruit and the general public is gaily dabbing at their peach juice-dabbled chins, I am ridden with jealousy, driven crazy with desire. Must. Eat. Peaches.

Alas, all is not lost. Once cooked, I can gorge myself silly on summer’s finest. The aforementioned doctor says that cooking the fruit kills whatever enzyme I’m allergic to. So, I’m resigned to a life eating drippy peaches and cherries poached and grilled and sautéed, or in crisps and cobblers and pies. There are worse fates.

As a result, I’ve become quite the exceptional Cobbler and Crisper, if I do say so myself (bring it on Bobby Flay!). This variation was inspired by some rosemary shortbread I made last year; I was a little shocked at how amazing the rosemary + butter + sugar combo is, and adding peaches just furthered the deliciousness quotient. I find peeling the peaches unnecessary, but if you’re in the mood for excessive, useless work, then feel free to add that step. The pine-y rosemary adds a light, herbal note to the crisp, making this fabulously easy dessert kind of impressive and pretty unbeatable.

The peaches, they may be angry. But I will make them love me.

Peach Rosemary Crisp
Serves 6

8-10 ripe peaches, depending on your topping-to-fruit ratio preference
2 Tbsp. creme de cassis (optional)
5 Tbs. unsalted butter, cut into bits
2/3 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup flour
1 Tbsp. fresh, minced rosemary

1. Preheat oven to 400-degrees. Cut peaches in half and remove pits (the riper they are, the easier this will be. but the firmer they are, the better they'll hold their shape.) Cut peach halves into bite-size 1" pieces.

2. Spray an 8"x8" pan with nonstick cooking spray. Toss the peaches and the creme de cassis together, in the pan, and pat them down to a relatively even layer.

3. Put the butter, brown sugar, flour, oatmeal, and rosemary into a medium bowl and, using your hands, pinch the butter into the other ingredients, until it's all evenly combined and has a crumbly texture. Top the peaches with the delicious crumbly-ness.

4. Bake for 30 minutes. Serve hot or warm, topped with a generous scoop of vanilla ice cream or gelato.

Maybe math doesn’t suck.

2007-07-23T19:09:00.000-04:00

It’s been a rocky road for math and me. We had a tense relationship from fractions through the algebra years. Integers didn’t help and it got really ugly during my head-spinning foray into geometry. The Pythagorean theorem still makes me break out in hives. But it’s been a long time. Math and I have grown up a bit and developed a cordial truce, based pretty much on salad.

If you’re unsure of the correlation between math and salad, you obviously make as lousy and unbalanced a vinaigrette as I used to. Vinaigrette is one of those cooking cornerstones mastered on the first day of culinary school before tackling weightier subjects, like ice. But not having been to culinary school, or ever really put much thought into it, I spent years combining vinaigrette ingredients in random proportions, completely unaware of the disservice I was doing my greens.

And then math stepped in.

The basic ratio for a good vinaigrette is one part vinegar to three parts oil. If you’re using a particularly strong vinegar or something else highly acidic, like lemon juice, it’ll probably taste more balanced at one part vinegar to four parts oil. Those ratios, 1:3 and 1:4, aren't advanced math, but you can't deny their mathness.

Get your oil to acid ratio right and you can futz with flavors like shallots, herbs, garlic, and sugar. Dijon mustard is a great flavoring and it’ll help your oil and vinegar emulsify (but that’s science. My relationship with science is still a little shaky, so let’s not go there).

Once you see the math-powered light, the horizons of vinaigrette expand beyond salad greens. It's fantastic drizzled onto grilled or roasted meats, just before serving, and tossed with vegetables, beans, and grains (or any combination thereof.) As a mayo replacement, vinaigrette makes a less expected pasta or potato salad and an interesting sandwich condiment. This Basil Vinaigrette, a variation on a Bon Appetit recipe, ranks tops in the official Best Bite Kitchen, and I've used it for all of the above. It’s great tossed with sweet summer corn and tomatoes (as in the snappy photo).

Thank you, sweet, sweet math. I'm glad we stuck it out.

Basil Vinaigrette

1/4 cup chopped fresh basil
2 Tbsp. chopped fresh mint
2 Tbsp. white wine vinegar
1 scant Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
2 tsp. packed light brown sugar
1 garlic clove
1/4 cup olive oil
Salt and pepper

1. Blitz all ingredients through olive oil, with a hand-blender or food processor, until smooth. Add salt and pepper to taste and then get your serve on.

Who knew?

2007-07-22T17:33:00.000-04:00

I can make white rice and brown rice and jasmine rice and risotto. I can make fried rice, wild rice, forbidden black rice, and Bhutanese red rice. But, apparently, I can not make Uncle Ben’s instant rice:

This is the result of following Uncle Ben's directions to a T. Perhaps Uncle Ben enjoys his rice in a single solid rubbery clump. Or perhaps this is the result of my failing as a cook. But the theory that makes the most sense is that this is just a crap product, masterminded by mad scientists who have sent Uncle Ben to bed early and taken over his kitchen to see whether or not we're stupid enough to believe that rice was meant to be instant. Yeah, we're stupid enough.

A Creative Review

2007-07-19T20:26:00.000-04:00

Since I spend my non-blog life as a copywriter, I’m also a copy-reader. I read the copy on ads. I read the copy on websites. I read the copy on the mouthwash, the high-performance sports beverage, the whole-grain pitas, and the imported tomato chutney. Someone wrote that copy, so they deserve the respect of a proper read. Or at least a desultory scan. Sometimes, the copy is even worth reading.

The copy I’ve been looking forward to reading most though, is the copy on the back of my beloved Vosges Haut Chocolat’s new bacon studded chocolate bar. Seeing that copy firsthand would mean I’d finally managed to scare up one of these hard-to-find pork-flecked lovelies. So, when I eventually got my hands on one, I dove into the copy, anticipating the chocolately, bacony goodness that lurked within. The copy promised “a deep milk chocolate with bits and pieces of Applewood smoked bacon and just a sprinkling of Alder salt.” Ah, love at first read. I tore into the silver foil.

Yes, the chocolate is milky and deep.

Yes, the Applewood smoked bacon appears as bits and pieces.

But when I got to the salt, I ran into some issues with the copy. This copywriter clearly has a different definition of “just a sprinkling” than the one I‘m familiar with. There is more than just a sprinkling. There is a generous dousing.

I’m not going to claim heartbreak; Vosges does a decent job of elevating a decidedly Homer Simpson-y combination to a much more sophisticated level. But the salt/bacon proportions are too out of whack to make the bacon bar crave-able. The first thing you taste is that rich, creamy, Vosges milk chocolate. The second thing you taste is crunchy grains of salt. That's also the third thing you taste. The bacon is just a minor note that pops in at the end. Definitely disappointing, since bacon, not salt, gets top billing in the product name. It even ranks higher in the copy. And the ingredients list. But I can't blame the copywriter entirely. If the packaging were rewritten more honestly, I'm not sure Mo’s Salt Bar (with just a sprinkling of bacon) would take the marketplace by storm.

Mo's Bacon Bar just hints at the loving relationship chocolate and bacon can have. It's worth sampling, if you've never tried these two great tastes together. Just try not to read the copy.

Some Recent Best Bites

2007-07-13T11:53:00.000-04:00

There’s a lot of food in this world and I intend to taste all of it. And, hopefully, share the best best-bites with you. In order for a restaurant dish to earn a place on the Recent Best Bite Roster, it must be an exciting taste sensation that’s reasonably do-able at home. My hope is that maybe these restaurant best-bites will inspire you to use ingredients you may be familiar with in a new way or try something new altogether.

Here’s a quick sampling of what and where some of my favorite tastes du jour are.

The Grady @ Willie’s Dawgs – Who needs a new spin when you can do an old classic really well? This new Brooklyn joint has a menu-ful of variations on hotdogs and toppings, and the Grady epitomizes sloppy, All-American, frankfurter goodness. It’s an all beef hotdog, topped with grilled peppers, caramelized onions, jalapenos, mustard, mayo, and ketchup on a homemade Challah roll. If you can wrap your lips around a best bite of this, you’re in for a treat. The sweetness of the onions and the peppers balance the smoky dog and the other condiments. The mayo lends a nice creaminess. The Challah roll is nice, but it mostly acts as a vehicle to transport the ingredients from the foil wrapper to your mouth, which is not a bad thing at all. The Willie (dawg wrapped with bacon and cheddar on a Challah roll) is also swoon-worthy, but how much can a girl write about bacon?

Albondigas @ Las Ramblas - We ate a lot of really nice things at this tapas place in Manhattan, but this was my favorite do-it-yourself-able dish. The albondigas, a tasty Catalan take on the meatball, is full of roasted garlic and manchego and nestled lovingly in a creamy oregano dressing. The meatballs were flavorful and seasoned perfectly and the oregano dressing is a not-so-subtle hint that perhaps oregano has a higher calling than backup singer in tomato sauce.

Bruschetta @ Morandi – Bruschetta refers to the toasted bread, not necessarily the topping of tomatoes that we usually think of. And the folks at Morandi are doing an excellent bruschetta variation: toasty bread, hot off the grill, with fresh ricotta, pine nuts, and honey. It was an excellent starter, but it would make for a lovely, not-too-sweet dessert as well. I just loved the simple combination that coalesced into a taste greater than the sum of its parts. I suppose you could argue that assembling this one at home is more about knowing how to shop, then to cook, and I wouldn’t disagree with you. Mostly because my mouth would be too full.

That's the best and brightest of what I've been stuffing my face with. Let me know if you have a recommendation and I'll add it to my "Must-Bite" list!

Virginia T. Habeeb To The Rescue!

2007-07-11T18:01:00.000-04:00

We’re getting a jump start on summer’s dog days this year. Not even halfway through July and New York City has completed its annual transformation into the fetid stew it normally reserves for August. My curls have erupted into a frizzy halo and, while I fantasize about this kind of weather in January when the mercury strains to climb into the teens, it’s really kind of unbearable outside.

When it gets this bad, I can’t even contemplate cooking. No stove. No oven. Even the microwave’s pushing it. This is where Virginia T. Habeeb comes in. I know Virginia T. Habeeb probably about as well as you do, which is to say not at all. But a recipe for Shrimp with Avocado-Sesame Sauce, from her Pita the Great, turned up when I was rifling through Fresh Direct’s recipe archive a few months back and I’ve fallen in love with her mix of shrimp, avocado, and tahini. It’s turned up on our dinner table several times since then, getting slightly tweaked along the way, but always (hopefully) staying true to Virginia T. Habeeb’s vision.

Shrimp with Avocado-Sesame sauce makes for excellent weeknight grub, since it’s really more mixing than cooking, and can be assembled while listening to the opening credits of most hour-long legal dramas. Tahini is a Middle Eastern paste made up of ground sesame seeds, that’s usually in hummus or baba ghanoush. But Virginia T. Habeeb really stumbled onto a winner when she combined the nutty flavor of tahini with sweet shrimp and creamy avocado, and the addition of lemon juice and parsley emphasize the Middle Eastern flair. Virginia T. Habeeb’s original recipe was slightly different; she didn’t include onion or tomatoes and she left the shrimp whole. But whether you do it up Best-Bite stylee or take the Habeeb route, this an interesting twist on standard salad fare and an excellent light meal.

Thank you, Virginia T. Habeeb, for providing just what I needed, when the mere thought of the kitchen was giving me prickly heat. And I hope you'll write and tell me what the T stands for.

Shrimp with Avocado-Sesame Sauce
Adapted from Virginia T. Habeeb’s Pita the Great
Serves 4

1 medium ripe avocado, peeled and mashed
3 tablespoons tahini
1 clove garlic, minced
¼ cup fresh lemon juice or more, to taste
Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
2 to 4 tablespoons water
1 1/2 pounds cooked medium shrimp
½ cup finely chopped fresh, flat-leaf parsley
1 cup grape tomatoes, halved
¼ cup finely diced Vidalia or other sweet onion
1 head romaine lettuce
4 whole-wheat pitas, cut into wedges

1. Mix the avocado, tahini, garlic, lemon juice, salt, and pepper in a large bowl; add water gradually (up to 4 tablespoons) until the mixture is of a thick pouring consistency. Taste to correct seasonings.

2. Chop shrimp into bite size chunks and toss with parsley, tomatoes, and onion. Add dressing and mix to coat.

3. Divide romaine evenly among plates and top with generous spoonfuls of shrimp. Serve with pita wedges.

Roving Kitchen Reporter, #3

2007-07-09T19:00:00.000-04:00

I like to think of myself as something of an everyday gourmet. My whole schtick is that it takes only a quarter ounce of extra effort to make a meal exceptional, whether you’re whipping up a speedy weeknight meal or a painstakingly planned dinner party. I adore fresh and seasonal food. I love glamming up macaroni and cheese (try using a rich nutty cheese like Brebis Ossau) or burgers (add roasted garlic and chopped fresh sage to the meat) or salads (bake tablespoon size mounds of grated parmeggiano reggiano at 350-degrees on a greased cookie sheet for 5-minutes. Peel crisps off and top salad with them).

But I have a secret. A deep, dark, horrible secret.

And, secret, thy name is processed cheese food powder. It’s my personal Kryptonite. Whenever I’m near Cheetos, some strangely powerful, alien force overtakes me. My vision goes blurry. The world around me fades. Voices sound like the teacher in the Charlie Brown cartoons. And, when I snap out of it, my fingernails are stained bright orange and I scramble to hide the empty bag. It’s like Sybil, if the abusive mother were replaced with trans-fats.

I can’t even be in the same room as a bowl of wonderfully artificial Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. I delight in its fluorescence. I try to fight these inclinations, taking the gastronomic high ground, but an internal struggle rages: is it possible to reconcile my admiration for Thomas Keller and Alice Waters with my dark, deep longing for cultured milk solids?

Oogie’s Gourmet Popcorn is a step in the right direction. The folks at Oogie’s are bridging the gap between epicurean delight and cheese-flavored trash with seven varieties of popcorn, including “Sundried Tomato and Parmesan”, “Asiago and Cracked Pepper” and “Smoked Gouda.” My favorite is the “Romano and Pesto”, a tasty snack that smacks of basil and is physically impossible to stop eating, if you're not turned off by green popcorn.

I suspect the “epicurean delight” part of it, the part of it that makes me feel like I’m not eating crap, is limited to the use of words like “gourmet,” “cracked pepper,” and “smoked”. “All natural” helps too. It’s just the right combination of ingredients and copy required to appease my addiction. The chowhound in me isn’t humiliated to be seen in public, mowing through a bag of the stuff. And my dark-side is sated by the addictively tangy, powdered goodness that coats every fluffy kernel.

Maybe I’m wrong, maybe Oogie is just an enabler. Once I'm elbow deep in the bag, I suppose there’s nothing dignified about it. It’s cheese-flavored popcorn. Really good cheese flavored popcorn. But the label says "gourmet," and that's good enough for me.

Is it worth it?

2007-07-05T21:44:00.000-04:00

Cooking is a lot of work. It’s exhausting. It’s not even so much the cooking part that’s exhausting, it’s all the damn prep work: devise a menu, put together a shopping list, gather the ingredients, and peel, chop, mince, and dice until you’re about to pass out. And then, start cooking. Of course, this begs the question: is it worth it?

This is the thought that plagued me as I contemplated Michael Symon’s recipes for corn crepes and barbecue sauce. Dainty corn-based crepes stuffed with barbecue-doused chicken seemed like the ideal 4th of July meal, the perfect nod to both American food and my every-meal-has-gourmet-potential ideal. The kind of paean our forefathers deserve.

For a fraction of a second, I contemplated getting a manicure instead. But, as usual, my food-love beat the pants off my pampering-love, and I got started on my shopping and chopping. These two recipes aren’t hugely complicated, but they can be time consuming, especially since you can only make one crepe at a time and I was doubling the recipe for a crowd (I suppose technically you can do more than one at a time, but my crepe skills have only been honed so far.) They both have long ingredient lists that require some up-front prep. Add that to the appetizer, side, and dessert I was also planning and it was one long, exhausting day.

As I was nearing the end of the cooking, around the time the guests were due to arrive, I was zonked. Why do I do this to myself? Maybe they can eat, and I can just go to bed. I hope they clean up and lock the door behind them.

But the food, ah, the food. Thin, slightly sweet, honey colored crepes held the shredded meat of a store-bought rotisserie chicken (my one concession to biting off more than I can chew), both dressed with spoonfuls of perfectly tangy barbecue sauce. The kind of meal that John Hancock and the boys could have really used, after a tough day of independence declaring.

And when my guests were cheerfully tucking into platefuls, when I scooped up the first fantastic bite myself, I was just bursting with accomplishment. I love cooking and I love feeding people. It gives me the warm fuzzies. So yes, it is worth it. But it’ll be even more worth it when I can hire a staff of prep cooks to do the peeling, chopping, and mincing for me.

(NOTE: Both recipes by Michael Symon courtesy of The Soul of a Chef)

Corn Crepes

1/2 cup corn kernels
1/2 cup flour
2 eggs
4 oz. milk
1 tsp. corn oil
1/4 tsp. salt
Pepper to taste
1/2 cup red bell pepper, chopped
1/2 cup green bell pepper, chopped
1/4 cup scallion, chopped

1. Puree all ingredients in food processor until combined.

2. Pour a tsp. of oil onto a small hot saute pan. Ladle in 2oz. of batter and let cook until lightly browned, 2-3 minutes. Flip crepe, cooking for another minute. Cool on rack. Repeat with the rest of the batter.

BBQ Sauce

1 Tbsp. butter
1 cup chopped red onion
2 Tbsp. minced garlic
2 Tbsp. minced jalapeno
1/2 cup espresso beans, mashed with the flat side of a knife (I put them in a Ziploc bag and gave them a good whack with a mallet.)
4 oz. Worcestershire
4 oz. tomato paste
1 oz. apple cider vinegar
1 oz. balsamic vinegar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
2 oz. apple cider
4 oz. veal stock
1 Tbsp. chile powder
1 tsp. cumin
1 tsp. coriander

1. Melt butter in saucepan and sweat onion, garlic, and jalapeno.

2. Add remaining ingredients and cook on very low heat for an hour. Push sauce through strainer to remove solids.

To Serve: wrap two ounces of shredded chicken and a tablespoon of sauce in each crepe. Heat for 10 minutes in a 400-degree oven, or until heated through. Garnish with more barbecue sauce and sour cream.

Happy July 5th!

2007-07-05T12:51:00.000-04:00

Holidays just up the blog-induced stress ante. I love sharing my culinary adventures with you, truly I do, but after spending July 4th cooking myself silly and then playing Dazzling Hostess, it was all I could do to drag my ever-expanding tuchas onto our plush pillowtop mattress and pass out, let alone plunk myself down in front of the computer and start blogging. So, here’s a brief recap of our July 4th menu, with recipes, photos, and general patriotic merriment to follow. Much thanks to our forefathers for providing yet another excellent reason to cook.

- Hummus + pita chips: homemade hummus is simple to make and a lot tastier than most of the store-bought stuff available. Just chuck some chickpeas, tahini, lemon juice, garlic, and olive oil in a blender and whizz it up. Fold in a handful of fresh, flat-leaf parsley and you’re good to go.

- Corn Crepes + Barbecue Chicken: I’ve never made barbecue sauce before, and I wanted to see if it was worth the effort. The results were excellent. The sauce and the corn crepes are from Michael Symon, of Cleveland’s Lola. He fills the crepes with duck confit; I went for the much thriftier roast chicken.

- Broccoli Slaw: A cool, crispy counterpoint to the crepes and tangy barbecue sauce, spiked with lots of fresh cilantro and a touch of celery seed.

- Berries with Fresh Ricotta & Crème de Cassis: Sounds oh-so-fancy-pants, but it couldn’t possible be easier. Whip a couple of tablespoons of crème de cassis into about 16oz of fresh ricotta, chill to set, and dollop generously on fresh berries.

I promise to share more details, as soon as the pictures are downloaded and I can free myself from this mountain of advertising that needs writing.

Just Try It.

2007-07-02T12:44:00.000-04:00

For some reason, I feel pressure to make you like the foods you think you don’t like. I’m convinced that if you don’t like rhubarb, you’ve never had well-prepared rhubarb or if curry isn’t your thing, then you’ve just not tried the right one. And I will serve you perfectly prepared rhubarb and exquisitely executed curry and the sun will break through the clouds and beam great epiphanic rays upon your head and your life will change forever and I’ll be able to take all the credit for it.

I’m not sure why it’s so important to me that you like rhubarb and curry (or tapioca or tomatoes or avocado). There are things I don’t like (olives and black licorice) and, no matter how many times I try them, the old taste buds still aren’t having it. So if I haven’t been able to change my black licorice or olives tune, I’m not sure why I’m so convinced I can make Carolyn see the joy in beets (Come on, Carolyn. They’re sweet, they’re hot pink, they go with every outfit. What’s not to like?).

Nick gets stuck with the “just try it” treatment the most. He’s lucky he’s not a picky eater, so there aren’t too many things I can foist unwillingly upon him. But there is zucchini. I cleverly infiltrated it into dinner the other night with my Zucchini Basil Muffins, but why-oh-why doesn’t he appreciate the crispy, green summer squash full on? Has zucchini wronged him in some way? Did zucchini boil his bunny?

I am determined. I will show Nick the zucchini light.

And I will do it with Zucchini Carpaccio, the latest trend in the fast-paced zucchini-sphere. Recipes for Zucchini Carpaccio have popped up in cooking doyenne Patricia Well’s latest book, in unbearably adorable Parisian blogger Clotilde Dusoulier’s new book, in Gourmet, and on the Food Network. The recipes are variations on the same concept: thinly sliced raw zucchini marinated in a vinaigrette and sprinkled with some salty cheese for balance. Perhaps this kind of unadulterated zucchini exposure is what Nick’s been missing.

Zucchini Carpaccio is simple enough to wing, sans recipe. I sliced up a zucchini, as thinly as my below-par knife skills allow (I really need a mandoline.) Drizzled it with a lemon vinaigrette and scattered some salty, Greek feta and red onion slices across the top. A 15 minute steep in the vinaigrette later, I presented my beloved husband with my beloved vegetable.

The verdict? He liked it. He ate the whole plateful and said, “I liked it.” Now, I’m not fooling myself, I know that “I liked it” isn’t swooning with undying passion. But I’m making headway. Even if I still don’t like licorice.

Zucchini Carpaccio
Serves 2, as a light main course

1 medium zucchini, sliced as thinking as your knife skills (or mandoline) allow
2 oz. fresh feta
a few slivers of red onion, to taste
1 Tbsp. fresh squeezed lemon juice
1 tsp. Dijon mustard
½ tsp. sugar
¼ tsp. kosher salt
3 Tbsp. olive oil
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste

1. Lay the zucchini slices out on two plates. Scatter the feta and red onion across them.

2. Whisk together the next five ingredients and drizzle over the zucchini. Cover with plastic wrap and let sit for 15-20 minutes. Before serving, add a few grinds of black pepper to each plate.

Green Garlic Won't Blow Your Head Off.

2007-06-28T18:40:00.000-04:00

The concept of “garlic soup” sounds like it would ensure a vampire-free future for all who sampled it. But this isn’t necessarily the case, I learned, when this week’s haul from the farmer’s market included a few bunches of “spring garlic.” Spring garlic, sometimes referred to as green garlic or young garlic, is basically garlic, jr. The long, green stalks are picked before the bulb has a chance to fully form and develop the papery skin around each clove, so the whole thing is edible.

I’ve never cooked with spring garlic before, and while I’d read about it’s mildness compared to fully-grown garlic, the pungent, powerfully garlicky aroma was a little disconcerting. I had an appointment with my trainer early the next morning and the last thing I wanted to do was show up with the essence of garlic emanating from my pores.

I needed the advice of an expert. And when it comes to produce, it doesn’t get much more expert than Alice Waters, the luminary of the seasonal cooking movement. Unfortunately, I don’t have Alice’s cell number, but her book, “Chez Panisse Vegetables,” is no shabby second. She suggests showcasing green garlic by pureeing it in a soup, with potatoes. She assured me that it's not powerful enough to blow our heads off (although she didn't quite put it that way.) Coincidentally, the Amateur Gourmet recently made the same recipe and wasn’t too impressed. But the recipe sounded so lovely and I had the ingredients in the house so I made it anyway. Although it turned out that I didn’t have all the ingredients in the house.

I only had 32oz. of the 48oz. (or 1.5 quarts) of chicken broth the recipe requires. I hate to make changes to a recipe before I’ve tried it as written. But, I hate more to leave the apartment on a breezy Sunday evening at 6:30pm, when I’ve got the music going and I can conceivably get dinner done in time to sit on the roof and watch the sunset. So substitutions were made, white wine was used, and the result was wonderful. Creamy, but not too rich. Mild but still garlicky, without garlic’s spicy bite. And perfect, served alongside Zucchini Basil Muffins and an early summer sunset. And my head? Still intact.

Green Garlic Soup
Based on Alice Water’s recipe from “Chez Panisse Vegetables”

5 Tbsp. unsalted butter
24 young garlic plants, 1/2 inch in diameter at the root end, white part only (8 oz.), halved lengthwise
¾ cup water 
1lb., 6 oz. small, new potatoes, peeled and quartered 
32 oz. chicken broth
16 oz. white wine 
½ cup heavy cream 
1 ½ tsp. salt 
2 – 2½ tsp. white wine vinegar 
Freshly ground black pepper

1. Melt the butter in a 6-quart non-corroding pot. Add the garlic and ¼ cup of the water. Bring to a simmer, cover tightly, and cook for 15 minutes.

2. Add the potatoes and remaining ½ cup water. Cook at a simmer for 20 minutes. Add the broth and the wine, cover the pot, and allow to bubble gently for another 20 minutes.

3. Using a hand-blender, puree the soup until smooth. Stir in the cream and salt. Add the vinegar, 1 teaspoon at a time, tasting the soup after each addition before you add the next. (Some vinegars may be strongly flavored than others.)

4. Pass the puree through a medium-fine sieve into warm bowls. Grind black pepper generously over each portion and serve.

I could never get over-baconed.

2007-06-26T19:47:00.001-04:00

But if I give Nick one more pork-centric plate, he’s going to hurl it at my head (after eating everything on it, of course.) So, in the interest of avoiding damage to both my Calvin Klein dinnerware and my cerebral cortex, I prepared a light, baconless dinner that included savory zucchini basil muffins. I found the original recipe on Chowhound, when I was in search of a use for the most recent additions to my crisper, a trio of dark green zucchini.

Zucchini requires a little duplicity on my part, since Nick isn’t a big fan. I am, so I insist upon cooking with it, avoiding things that showcase it, like tians and ratatouilles, and tending towards the slightly more demure. And it doesn’t get much more demure than muffins.

I’ve wanted to make a savory muffin, something that could be an ideal sidekick for summer soups and salads. I made a few minor tweaks to the recipe, subbing 1/2 whole-wheat flour, adding some dry mustard for a mini kick (a kick-lette, if you will), and upping the all-important cheese quotient. The zucchini-ness is subtle enough not to put off Nick, and present enough to satisfy my zucchini fix. The basil is a nice addition, and I think it would work well with thyme too. And you know what it would be even better with? Bacon.

Zucchini Basil Muffins
Makes 12 muffins.

2 cups shredded zucchini
1 tsp. salt
2 eggs
3/4 cup milk
2/3 cup vegetable oil
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 Tbsp. baking powder
3/4 tsp. dry mustard
2 Tbsp. minced basil
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese

1. Toss shredded zucchini with 1/4 tsp. salt and set in a colander in the sink to drain.

2. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Butter and flour a 12-cup muffin tin, or use my favorite, Pam with Flour.

3. In a large bowl, beat eggs and then stir in milk and oil.

4. Combine flour, sugars, baking powder, mustard, and remaining salt with a whisk, to aerate.

5. Add dry ingredients to egg mixture and mix, just until flour is moistened (batter won’t be completely smooth). Gently mix in zucchini and basil. Fill greased muffin cups about 3/4 full and sprinkle with cheese. Bake 15-20 minutes. Serve warm.

It's not gonna kill you.

2007-06-25T10:59:00.000-04:00

I’m still annoyed at Natasha Chen because in the 9th grade, she pinched her nose and said “Ewwwww, that’s gross,” as I unwrapped my tuna sandwich. I was affronted, deep down to my still-socially-awkward-13-year old core. I wasn’t affronted in defense of tuna, because no one likes everything, and that’s ok, but calling someone else’s food gross is just plain rude.

I decided then and there that I would never, could never, call anyone else’s food “gross.” It would not only be rude, but it would mean I was closing myself off from what could turn out to be at best, a potentially delicious experience or at worst, a good story. This was, no doubt, the foundation of all of my equal-opportunity-eater bravado, although I will reluctantly admit, when poked with something sharp, that my very American palette means that I approach some things with a few ounces of trepidation. And some things aren't even trepidation-worthy; I'll never eat insects, no matter how fabulous the dipping sauce. But if someone else chooses to, then I can respect that. Because Natasha Chen probably wouldn't.

And when I recently dragged Nick off to deepest Brooklyn for dim sum, Natasha Chen's words still lurked in the dark recesses of my brain pan. In the heart of Brooklyn’s Chinatown, where nary a word of English is spoken, we found the place we were looking for. After a minor kerfuffle (centered mostly around the fact that neither Nick nor I speak Cantonese), we were sitting at a huge round table, with a Chinese family. We set about pointing and choosing and devouring filmy shrimp dumplings and sticky rice studded with sausage and deep-fried sesame seed balls full of sweet red bean paste. We chomped our way through baked buns overflowing with roast pork and scallion tinged pork shiu-mai. And then, as so often happens at the end of a meal, we were full.

But it all looked so good. Just one more. A cart approached us, with plates of beef wrapped in thick rice noodles and covered in a sweet soy sauce. Yes, please. And a final steaming plate was plunked down in front of us. That’s when I spotted the chicken feet poking out of the noodles.

Now chicken feet are standard fare in China and at authentic Chinese restaurants all over the world. The Chinese family we were seated with gobbled them up by the plateful, even their two-year old happily gnawed away. Asian civilization has survived for millenia, chomping their way through chicken feet aplenty.

But I was having a hard time with this. I reasoned with myself: chicken feet are not what I ordered, so I shouldn’t be expected to eat them. They’re just not something I grew up with. No one will notice if I (the only white girl in the entire establishment) discreetly slide them under the table cloth. Or maybe I can get Nick to create a diversion and I can toss them in my handbag.

The 2-year old across the table eyed me warily. She knew I was, pardon the expression, chicken. I just couldn’t wimp out; it was wrong, it was rude, and Natasha Chen’s words rang in my ears, in that tinny way that voices from past do in movies. I couldn't take responsibility if this kid across the table grew up and thought it was ok to call someone’s tuna sandwich “gross”.

So I ate the chicken feet.

And I survived. There was practically no meat on them and they’re very bony, but the sauce was pretty good. No harm, no foul. To be perfectly honest, I didn’t eat them all, but I was very proud of myself for being open minded. And you know what? They're really not gross at all, once you get past your preconceived chicken foot notions. They taste like chicken.

As we paid the bill and headed out of the restaurant, something struck me: Natasha Chen came from a Chinese family. Do they eat chicken feet? Does she eat them too? Or does she just wrinkle her nose and called them “gross”?

Makin’ Bacon, The Epilogue

2007-06-19T20:12:00.001-04:00

I love iPhoto. Nick downloaded all the bacon snaps from his highly advanced digital camera and they went scurrying into iPhoto, the way a good little digital photo should. And then we watched a slideshow of the entire bacon-makin’ process set to “Bizarre Love Triangle”. I’ll tell you, you haven’t lived until you’ve watched a slow-motion slide show of your home-cured pork product set to British alternative/dance music sensations, New Order. It was very beautiful and touching. Much better than “Cats.” This is clearly how Jimmy Dean got inspired to build his multi-million dollar breakfast meat empire.

And thinking about it, it is kind of a Bizarre Love Triangle, between me and Nick and the Bacon. He didn't realize he married the Crazy Bacon Lady. Sunday afternoon saw my home-cured goodness put to use in Spaghetti Amatriciana, Marcella Hazan style. Future bacon related plans include [but not limited to] bacon vinaigrette, an assortment of bacon-infused chowders, and bacon brownies. Yes, I said bacon brownies.

A few years ago, I had the most amazing dessert at Blackbird in Chicago: a chocolate semi-freddo, with a waffle, and bacon pieces. The semi-freddo and the waffle were tasty, but add a little piece of bacon to and it turned into an absolutely sublime experience. A recipe for bacon brittle has a host of shocked cooks hoarding their porcine confection from family and friends. And now, there's a bacon candy bar (although word on the street is that its not bacon-y enough). There’s something good happening here. It makes sense, because isn't everything improved by a touch of bacon?

Scallops? Yummy, but wrap them in bacon and they’re fabulous. Sprinkle bits of bacon on fresh vegetables, potatoes, or salad, and its always a winner. Fry up some bacon as you’re starting a stew or a soup and the smokiness just takes the whole thing to a new level. And I know it’s so 1973 dinner party, but dates stuffed with almonds (or blue cheese) and wrapped in crispy bacon makes for a stellar snack, to which, I suspect, even Escoffier would gleefully surrender his fastidious French taste buds (Escoffier was a big pig proponent). So why should dessert be exempt from the Bacon Makes Everything Better rule?

Makin’ Bacon, Part Deux

2007-06-17T12:56:00.000-04:00

Shit. Shit. Shit. I screwed up the bacon. I was supposed to remove it from the cure on Saturday, but it still felt a little squishy. And if it feels squishy, my trusty recipe instructs, leave it for another day or two. So, I did.

I took it out of the curing liquid, rinsed it off, and roasted it for a couple of hours in a very low oven. The whole apartment got this really mouthwatering, bacon-y aroma. When I pulled it out of the oven, errant peppercorns clung to the glistening fat and the meat was gorgeously pink. I sampled a snippet and the first thing that hit me was the extreme saltiness. Barely edible saltiness. I’ve-ruined-the-bacon-and-will-have-to-write-about-it-and-everyone-will-know saltiness. I’ll-be-excommunicated-from-the-church-of-the-pig saltiness. Happily, the flavor hiding under all that salt is amazing. If you can overlook the tear-inducing saltiness, this bacon kicks the pork butt of every store bought bacon ever, in the history of bacon. But overlooking tear-inducing saltiness isn’t exactly a concession most people can make, even my oh-so-supportive husband. Even me.

Fortunately, the two wise men who wrote the trusty recipe suspected that it would someday fall into my inexpert clutches and include instructions for blanching it in simmering water to remove extreme saltiness. So, cursing all the while, I brought a pot of water to a simmer, and sliced the over-brined bacon into thick slices. I plunged them in, fingers crossed, hopes high, knowing it probably wouldn't work, knowing I'd probably be stuck with 3lbs of bacon-shaped sodium chloride.

But it worked.

Nick and I had absolutely delicious BLTs for lunch, with unctuous, meaty slabs of bacon hanging out. You can see the best bite, right there in the middle. I didn't miss the smokiness I've always associated with bacon. And now that it's no longer a salt-lick, the slightly garlicky, peppery, porky goodness is in the spotlight. It doesn't shrink when you cook it and the outside crisps up beautifully. The Famous Food Writer that inspired my Bacon Bender said I'd never go back to the watery, shrinking store-bought stuff again. I suspected the FFW would be right, but the extent of the FFW right-ness was surprising.

All I want to do is eat handfuls of this seriously ass-kicking bacon, bacon worthy of entry into Competitive Bacon Championships. Bacon that I made. Is it rude not to share?

Recipe Test Drive

2007-06-15T10:57:00.000-04:00

(This entry concludes Mint Week. But just because Mint Week is drawing to a close, we shouldn’t forget the refreshing thrills we’ve shared this week. Cue Air Supply music.)

I love vegetables. I could easily be a vegetarian. Except that meat is really tasty. I believe that if we weren’t meant to eat animals, they wouldn’t be so delicious. But one of the things I love about vegetables is that self-satisfied feeling I get when I’ve eaten them, since they’re good for me. Oddly, a strip steak doesn’t inspire the same look-at-me-fighting-the-cancer-causing-carcinogens pride.

At the top of my “Vegetables I Luv" list is sugar snaps; I was smitten with their alliteration, but it’s their scrumptiously sweet crisposity that stole my heart. I suspect vegetables wouldn’t have such a bad rap with the under-fives if parents started with these babies. They don’t need a lot of tarting up in order to show off; they shine whether steamed, sautéed, or tossed oh-so-casually into pasta, risotto, stir fries, or salads.

So, given my extreme fondness for the sugar snap in all forms, I couldn’t resist last week’s recipe in New York Magazine: Pichet Ong’s Sugar Snap Pea Salad with Parmesan, Almond Puree, and Mint (of course). This Pichet Ong fellow is a pastry chef who just opened up a place of his own here in N to the Y-C, which includes some savory foods in addition to his collection of much ballyhooed desserts. I'd like to try the place, since I enjoy much ballyhooed desserts, but until then I'd get a little Pichet sampler via this recipe.

The Verdict
The snap pea salad itself is excellent and it doesn’t require any Advanced Culinary Skills. The sugar snaps are blanched before being tossed with a lemony vinaigrette and some chopped mint. They’re served atop an almond puree and given a light sprinkling of parmesan. The resulting salad is fresh and moreish. Since the ingredients are so simple and light, it’s easy to piggishly power through the whole salad yourself, guilt-free (I do not recommend doing this, as the husband will be annoyed and you will have to watch a lot of soccer to make up for the indiscretion.)

The almond puree sounds more high-falutin’ than it actually is; simmer sliced almonds in milk until they’re soft, whiz it all around with a hand blender, and Bob’s your uncle. The puree is easy to make and totally superfluous. The flavor is very subtle, and by subtle I mean completely bland. At first, I thought maybe I’d futz around with the puree for a dinner party, since “almond puree” sounds so very professional-chef, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized it was gilding the proverbial lily. The sugar snap salad doesn’t need a puree. It doesn’t elevate it or add layers of flavor. It just gives you more utensils to wash. So, unless Pichet plans on popping over to Best Bite Manor to do the dishes, I'm chucking the puree.

A puree-free version of the salad easily earns a place in the weeknight rotation; it’s an appealing celebration of springtime goodness, the kind of thing that makes you think these vegetarian people might not be so off the mark. But I can’t shake the feeling that it might just be a teensy-weensy bit better with some bacon. Just like everything else.

We Should Send Fava Beans to Afghanistan

2007-06-14T10:32:00.000-04:00

(Mint Week Continues. It’s taking me longer to get through all this mint than I thought it was, so we’re either going to have to turn this into Mint Month or just start chugging mojitos. Vote here.)

When it comes to homeland security, I think we can all take a lesson from fava beans. Those bad boys are safeguarded by not one, but two hearty layers of defense. Layer one is a spongy, 6” pod, which you have to tear open to get at the beans, usually between 4 and 6 per pod. Layer two is a waxy skin, traversable only by a good blanching in some boiling water, after which the beans need a little coaxing to slither out. These cousins of the much-maligned lima bean are a really pretty bright green with a creamy, mild flavor. Since they’re only available for a few weeks in the spring, fresh favas are quite a treat.

But are they worth the work? You buy a pound of fava beans and you de-pod and blanch and shell and wind up with a fraction of that. And the last thing I want to do when I get home from another stressful day writing ads that will never be produced, is to start wrestling with my vegetables. Lord knows I have enough vegetable-related tension in my life. Could I have my beans and eat them too? Could I come up with a more stupid last sentence for this paragraph?

The answer was a salad that was half fresh fava beans, half frozen peas. Frozen peas aren’t as toothsome and tasty as fresh peas, but after breaking down the favas' tight security barriers, I wasn’t about to get started shelling peas. We’d be eating dinner around breakfast time.

We had this light, springy salad alongside Poached Salmon with Mustard Sauce and some of Sullivan Street bakery’s amazing bread, drizzled with olive oil and toasted under the broiler. It was light, flavorful and totally mintelicious. Only forty more pounds of mint to go.

Fava Beans, Peas, Mint, and Feta
Serves 2

1 lb. fresh fava beans
1 cup frozen peas, don’t thaw
1 cup loosely packed fresh mint, chopped
½ lemon
1 ½ Tbsp. Extra virgin olive Oil
½ cup feta cheese, crumbled
Salt & Pepper to taste

1. Put a medium sized pot of water on to boil and the shell the fava beans. Have a bowl of ice water standing by, to plunge the blanched beans in, to stop them cooking. Plunk the favas into the boiling water for about a minute, then scoop them out with a slotted spoon and get ‘em into the ice water. Do the same with the frozen peas, also for about a minute.

2. Drain the favas and the peas and toss them in a medium sized bowl with the mint, the cheese, the juice from ½ lemon, and the olive oil. Toss it all together.

3. Add salt and pepper to taste, and more lemon juice or olive oil, if you taste it and think it needs it.

In Defense of Mint

2007-06-12T14:22:00.000-04:00

(Bacon Update: The bacon is ready for action, but I haven’t had a chance to do anything with it yet. Will post on that as soon as I have a chance to use it. This work thing keeps getting in the way of my culinary adventures. Hhmph. In the meantime, lets get minty…)

If I were mint, I’d be pissed. Mint may be the most underappreciated of all the herbs. It’s been reduced to a breath-freshening artificial flavor that shows up in candy canes and wintergreen bubble gum, bearing only a passing resemblance to its actual namesake. Restaurants seem to use mint mainly as a dessert garnish or in cocktails. Granted, there are summer rolls and Babbo’s Mint Love Letters, but it too often gets stuck playing Jan to attention-hungry basil’s Marcia. Why aren’t home cooks embracing the minty fresh goodness?

Poor mint. Poor unloved misunderstood mint.

Its high time someone stood up for mint, gave it the savory-food respect it deserves, made mint cool again. My mission is pretty clear. So, in tribute to all that mint has done for us, from the breath freshening to the garnishing and beyond, I’m designating this week Mint Week. (Confession: I admit I’m only doing this because I have a ton of fresh mint at home that needs to be used before it starts getting slimy. If I had a ton of Funyuns at home that needed using up, this entire week would be Funyun Week.) Maybe the Discovery Channel will replace Shark Week, with Mint Week. It's so much more civilized.

First stop? Roasted Lamb with Mint Sauce. I am firmly in the anti-jarred mint sauce camp. It’s not that difficult to chuck a handful of ingredients in a food processor or blender and anyone that tells you otherwise is probably a jarred mint-sauce salesman. I started with Mark Bittman’s Mint Pesto from “How to Cook Everything” and wound up adding more mint, easing up on the oil, and replacing the pine nuts with toasted almonds (because that’s what was in the Nut Cupboard).

The result was more saucy that pesto-y. It’s a fresh tasting, spring-y addition that really punched up the leg of lamb I had marinated in cumin and pomegranate molasses. And it was just the right amount of mint-y, mint-y in a savory food way, not in a curiously strong way. All in all, a proper salute to what mint is meant to be.

Mint Sauce
Makes about 1 1/2 cups

1/4 cup sliced almonds
3 cups loosely packed mint leaves, rinsed and dried
1 medium clove garlic
3 Tbsp. freshly squeezed lemon juice
3/4 cup vegetable or canola oil
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

1. Toast the almonds in a dry skillet, until just fragrant.

2. Put the almonds, the mint, the garlic, the lemon juice, and 1/4 cup of the oil in a food processor or blender and pulse until blended.

3. With food processor or blender on, stream in the remaining oil, until a creamy sauce forms, scraping down sides of the work bowl occasionally.

4. Use immediately or freeze for up to a month.

Two Days to Bacon!

2007-06-08T15:07:00.000-04:00

My bacon related eagerness hasn't waned. We only have two more days before we get to experience the Joy that is Homemade Bacon. In the meantime, I wrote some poetry in tribute to my future breakfast meat:

Three Haikus for New Bacon

I open the fridge
Your pink, piggy goodness taunts.
Are you bacon yet?

My almost bacon
Must suspect his tasty fate.
He sits by the eggs.

Despite ad campaigns,
My bacon has a first name.
Not Oscar Meyer.

The asparagus is stressing me out.

2007-06-07T12:07:00.000-04:00

Am I the only person who suffers from Extreme Vegetable Panic? I’m always seduced by bushel after peck of the fabulous farm-fresh vegetables at the greenmarket on Saturdays. I load up the fridge with (season permitting) snap peas and ramps and strawberries and leeks and corn and tomatoes and rhubarb and kale and just-picked baby lettuces, delighted at how well we’ll be eating during the week. And then comes the week.

On Monday, I go to work and there’s some sort of major crisis. We’re gonna lose the account! The client meeting is tomorrow! If we don’t have a new campaign in the next six minutes, the planets gonna blow! Tuesday and Wednesday are much the same and my produce starts to wilt or rot or dry out or whatever form of slow death is appropriate to its genus. By Thursday, I’m desperate to leave work before midnight so I can shell and sauté my fava beans and toss them with fresh goat cheese and mint before midnight. Sometimes I’m successful. Other times, I have no choice but to throw away their sad little corpses.

This is my weekly routine. And I’m not capable of ignoring the lovely, fresh things at the farmer’s market, because they’re always flaunting their lovely freshness at me. I’m terrified of joining a CSA, because I’m sure every week would end with a major vegetable-induced meltdown.

This week’s victim? Asparagus. One pound. But I wasn’t letting this one go down without a fight. I left work at 9:15. Walked in the door at 10:09 and, with barely a smooch on Nick’s cheek, set about stemming and blanching it and making a Spaghetti Carbonara to mix the bright, green stalks into. We ate at a quarter to 11. By that time, I was too tired to even eat that much and I collapsed into bed shortly thereafter. But I slept well, because this week I won the battle against my Extreme Vegetable Panic. Next week’s another story, though.

Spaghetti & Asparagus Alla Carbonara
Serves 4

1 lb. fresh asparagus
1 lb. spaghetti.
1/3 lb. bacon, diced
1 clove of garlic, smashed
4 eggs
1 ½ cups fresh grated parmeggiano reggiano
Lots of fresh black pepper

1. Set a large pot of water a-boilin’ on the stove. Add lots of salt, once it comes to a boil.

2. Snap the ends off the asparagus; if you bend the stalk, the woody part will snap off naturally at exactly the point where you should be eating it. The fresher the asparagus, the more you’ll get to eat of it. (Now, can you see why I was freaking out?!). Cut the stalks into 1” pieces and plunk it into the boiling water until it’s just barely tender, not more than 3 minutes. Scoop it out with a slotted spoon and get it right into a bowl of ice water to stop the cooking.

3. Get the spaghetti going in the same boiling water you blanched your asparagus in.

4. Put the diced bacon in a skillet and cook on medium. When some of the fat has been rendered out, add the garlic clove, moving it around occasionally, until the bacon is nice and crispy. Discard the garlic.

5. Break the eggs into a large bowl. Add the cheese and whisk it all together.

6. Drain the spaghetti and add it to the eggs, tossing quickly so the egg coats the pasta. Don’t worry about salmonella.

7. Add the bacon, the bacon drippings, and the asparagus. Toss, toss, toss. Season with lots of black pepper and some salt, if necessary. Serve with extra parmeggiano reggiano.

Makin' Bacon, Part I

2007-06-04T22:43:00.000-04:00

When I first told Nick that I planned on making bacon, he was baffled. “You can’t make it. It already exists. You just take it off the pig and put it in the pan.” While I’d like to mock my darling husband for his precious naivete, frankly, I thought exactly the same thing before I discovered that one could actually cure ones bacon by ones self in ones home, if one so desired.

Recently, I had the excellent good fortune of chewing the fat with a Famous Food Writer (more on that in future posts), and I was warbling on endlessly about my fondness for all things pig, especially bacon. FFW suggested I cure my own bacon, explaining that not only was it a cinch, but the bacon would be far superior to anything I could buy. FFW explained that I didn’t need a smoker, smoke is sort of a secondary flavor to the fatty, porky goodness; basically, all you really need are some easily accessible ingredients: a chunky piece of fresh pork belly, a bunch of salt, some sugar, and a week.

FFW suggested I start by making pancetta, but once cured, it needs to be rolled and hung it in a cool, humid, sunless place to dry for two weeks. Unfortunately, while we have more than our fair share of humidity, our apartment in June tends less towards the cool and sunless and more to the hot and sweaty, so the Pancetta Project will have to wait until the fall. No biggie, though. I’m happy to start with bacon and work my way through the profusion of international pork curing techniques.

For the bacon, I’d also need a special kind of pink curing salt, which I ordered from Butcher & Packer, and a few extras if I wanted to give my home-cured bacon a nice, savory flavor: a few bay leaves, black peppercorns, and garlic cloves. I finally had my Bacon Makin’ mise-en-place assembled, so I dredged two 1 1/2 lb. pieces of fresh-from-the-pig pork belly in the dry cure and left it the fridge to become bacon. Easy as pork pie.

Now, to wait.

The waiting part takes a long time. I keep peeking in the fridge and poking the pork belly to see if it’s bacon yet. It’s not. It’s barely been 24 hours. It’s exuded a little bit of liquid, which it’s supposed to, but it won’t be bacon for at least another six days. I do have a secret fear that it's not going to turn into bacon at all, that I've somehow bungled the whole thing and it's just going to get all moldy and fuzzy and science experiment-y and I'll have to post a confession here about my ineptitude as a bacon maker. Jees, I hope that doesn't happen. In the meantime, I’ll just keep fantasizing about the carbonaras and lardons and quiche Lorraines my future holds. And poking the pork belly.

P.S. I’m not posting the recipe because I’m sure that would violate some heavy-duty copyright laws and, just as my pork belly baconifies, I’d be hauled off by the FBI (Federal Bacon Investigators) for questioning in a humid, sunless room (ironic in that it would be so very perfect for drying pancetta) and never get to try my own bacon. But, if you’re interested, the recipe can be found here.

Roving Kitchen Reporter, #2

2007-06-01T19:54:00.000-04:00

Nick is not a picky eater. I am blessed that he’s happy with pretty much whatever concoctions I manage to whip up, as long as they don’t contain pickles (eggplant and polenta are his other edible adversaries, but we’ll save that showdown for another day.) But recently, I figured out that his pickle prejudice is limited to those made with cucumbers (maybe it’s the dill?). He’ll scarf down pickled onions, tomatoes, beets and any other brine-able vegetable. So last week at the farmer’s market, I stopped by the Rick’s Picks table and got a jar each of Phat Beets and GT 1000s.

Aside from the fact that Phat Beets would be a chow-tastically awesome rap name for me (can’t you just see me kickin’ it wit Kanye and Jay-Z? Awwww, yeah.), these babies are some good eatin’. They’re not your mother’s pickled beets. Well, they’re not my mother’s pickled beets, those old-school Jewish deli pickled beets that only had a faint beet-ness about them and no pickle-y punch. These pack a distinct tang, their sweet, little hot pink beet bodies soaking up loads of goodness from the rosemary tinged, vinegary brine. They were a nice addition to a goat cheese salad; I know goat cheese and beet salad is SO 2003, but just because something is on every menu in the world, it doesn’t mean it’s not longer delicious. Plus, the beet/goat cheese thing is a whole new world with such bad-ass beets.

If you’re going to spring for one thing from Rick’s, though, I have to heartily recommend the GT 1000s. These pickled curried green tomatoes float in a vaguely mustardy, totally flavorific juice. The curry flavor is pretty subtle, and they’re not spicy at all. We tried them on tuna sandwiches and turkey sandwiches, and I suspect they’d be an interesting foil to some super-sharp cheddar and buddy up nicely to a lamb-burger. I kind of want to put them on everything.

Rick and his picks have been around for a while, winning Pickle Awards, garnering Pickle Accolades, and dazzling the general Pickle press, but there’s nothing like tasting for yourself. It’s nice to know pickles could have such attitude. And maybe I'll even be able to con Nick into liking these.

It's pronounced "keen-wa"

2007-05-31T14:37:00.000-04:00

Carnivorously speaking, quinoa gets the shaft. It’s one of those “healthy” grains that meat-eaters generally lump into the domain of vegetarians, vegans, and the gluten-averse. While quinoa happens to pack boat-loads of protein, magnesium, iron, fiber, and riboflavin (and lord knows we all need more riboflavin) into every fluffy little whole-grain, its also an excellent accompaniment to meats of all kinds and therefore deserves some respect from the omnivorous among us.

Quinoa has a mild nutty flavor and a slightly crunchy texture that kind of “pops” in your mouth and it's super-easy to prepare. It definitely has blandness potential, but no more so than couscous or rice, and that actually points to its versatility. It’s fab tossed with either a fruity or herb-y vinaigrette, and served alongside burgers and hot dogs at a barbeque. I’ve served quinoa with lamb and beef, since it works really well with gravies and sauces. And most recently, I paired a veggie filled Quinoa pilaf with Sauteed Pork Medallions in a Mustard-Curry sauce with Tomato Chutney (As you can see in this lovely, poor-quality photo. I promise I'm working on upgrading my food photography skillz.)

The only reason I can imagine that it’s not the Most Popular Grain in School is that the Quinoa Growers of America aren’t springing for a Super Bowl spot or adequately financing the quinoa lobby. Or maybe they’re a bunch of gluten-averse vegans hoarding all the high-potassium goodness for themselves.

Quinoa Pilaf with Spinach & Carrots
Serves 4 as a side

1 Tbsp. olive oil
½ cup diced onion
1 large garlic clove, minced
1 cup quinoa
2 cups chicken stock
¼ tsp. salt
1 cup peeled baby carrots
2 cups fresh spinach, stemmed and washed or baby spinach leaves
Salt and Pepper to taste

1. Put the quinoa in a fine mesh strainer and rinse well, to remove the saponins.

2. Heat a medium saucepan and then add the olive oil. Sauté onion until translucent. Add garlic and sauté for another 30 seconds to a minute.

3. Add chicken stock, rinsed quinoa, and salt and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low, cover and simmer until most, but not all, of the liquid is absorbed and quinoa is tender, about 15 minutes.

4. Meanwhile, steam the carrots in the microwave until barely crisp-tender; put the carrots and a few tablespoons of water in a bowl, cover, and nuke for 2-3 minutes. Alternatively, you can use a vegetable steamer.

5. When there’s still a tiny bit of liquid in the quinoa, add the carrots and the spinach and toss. Replace cover and cook until spinach is wilted and carrots are tender. Add more salt, if needed, and pepper to taste.

The Roving Kitchen Reporter #1

2007-05-29T08:01:00.000-04:00

My favorite breakfast du jour is that Fage 0% Greek Yogurt. I like it with fresh fruit and a handful of cereal, some nuts, and a healthy squirt of ketchup. Ok, I don’t actually put ketchup on my yogurt, but I do always add honey, lots and lots of honey. So, as your girl in the field, here to explore new and exciting taste sensations and report back, I decided to try some artisanal honeys and see if they were any better than the standard issue supermarket honey bear.

I want to make it clear, up front, that I have nothing against the 'ol honey bear. I have not been unhappy with his performance as a sweetener, he’s been a dutiful friend for many years. But, in the name of research, I fired up the interweb and ordered a jar each of Wild Blackberry Honey and Macadamia Blossom Honey. I almost ordered the rosemary honey and the thyme honey and the lavender honey as well, because I’m a sucker for anything herb-related, especially when available in pretty, girlie packaging, but I wanted to take it slow and be sure not to O.H. (over honey).

I’ll admit that I went into this with mixed feelings. On one hand, I don’t have one of those highly refined palates that can pick out “berry notes” or “grassy notes” or “liquorice notes” in wines (unless someone else points them out to me first), so I was skeptical that spending $12, instead of my usual $3.79, on honey was going to be worth it. On the other hand, I still can’t get past the idea that if it’s expensive, it’s therefore more gourmet and more gourmet always equals better, right?

Several days later, the fancy honey arrived, all packaged beautifully and ready for some serious yogurt action. Unfortunately, both the blackberry and macadamia honeys had completely crystallized into solid masses. This isn’t a big deal, since honey doesn’t actually go bad, and all it takes is a few seconds in the microwave or a dip in a toasty water bath for it to regain its syrupy texture. Once it was restored to the proper consistency, I began my painstaking analysis.

The blackberry honey is light amber in color, not too different from The Bear. I was really surprised when I tasted it, how fruity it actually tasted, how well the....ahem, blackberry notes stood out. Perhaps my palate is more refined that I previously thought? Or maybe these bees just got somethin' on the standard honey bear filling bees, namely access to blackberry bushes? Whatever it is, the blackberry flavor is definitely there, but its not the first thing you taste. It kind of creeps in, after the initial hit of honey sweetness fades. The Macadamia Nut Blossom Honey is a lot darker in color, with a creamy macadamia-ness in the background that slinks in as an afterthought, like the blackberry. Both honeys certainly have more complexity and depth than The Bear; I'm not sure I'd even understand the concept of "complexity" and "depth" in honey if I didn't taste them all side by side. With apologies to The Bear, they both get a solid thumbs up.

It’s been a couple of weeks since my honey frontiers were expanded. The Bear sits in the cupboard, eyeing me bitterly when I reach for his neighbors. I’ve been swapping back and forth between the blackberry and the macadamia on my morning yogurt. I’ve tried them both in tea, used the macadamia blossom in a marinade for cod, and the blackberry honey with some rosemary on a roast chicken, all with pretty tasty results. But the big question is, were they any tastier than if I’d stuck with my old friend, The Bear? I kind of think they are, but I probably just think that because they were more expensive.

Hooray for Summer!

2007-05-25T12:03:00.000-04:00

It’s supposed to be 90 degrees in New York today. Since its Memorial Day weekend, the subway air conditioning hasn’t broken yet, and the trash hasn’t begun fermenting in the streets, everyone’s in that happy summer’s-finally-here mood. This general geniality has me happily anticipating all the fruits and veggies that come with the season, so I though I’d share one of my fave summery desserts: strawberries with balsamic vinegar. It’s super easy and the level of fabulousness it reaches really just depends on the quality of the ingredients you use.

Good balsamic vinegar is one of those things that is absolutely worth splurging on. Most supermarket balsamic is just crap; if your balsamic vinegar costs $2.89, then it’s probably just colored and sweetened wine vinegar. The real thing is, as my New Jersey cousins would say, totally awesome. The really old stuff costs a bomb, but doesn't need an ounce of embellishment; it's good enough to sip straight. This recipe calls for good balsamic, but doesn't require anything extra-fancy.

This is definitely a dinner party worthy dessert. Oh, and you cannot, as Nick suggested, get a delicious result from pouring balsamic vinaigrette over the fruit.

Balsamic Strawberries & Mint
Serves 6
1/3 cup balsamic vinegar
2 tsp. dark brown sugar
1/2 tsp. fresh lemon juice
3 pints strawberries, hulled and quartered
1/4 cup fresh mint, chopped
1 pint vanilla gelato, ice cream, or frozen yogurt
Extra mint sprigs

Combine vinegar, brown sugar, and lemon juice in small saucepan. Stir over medium heat until sugar dissolves and boil until syrupy and reduced to 1/4 cup, about 3 minutes. Transfer to a bowl and let it cool. Toss with strawberries and chopped mint. Divide ice-cream among 6 small dessert bowls, and top with the berries. Garnish with extra mint sprigs.

Must. Eat. Now.

2007-05-24T11:52:00.000-04:00

I am not pleasant when I’m hungry. And by the time I get home from work, I am very very hungry, so you can just imagine what a barrel of laughs I must be. So dinner needs to come together quickly and I’ve learned that it’s just as easy to pull together a fabulous quick dinner, as it is to pull together an average quick dinner.

Last night, on my way home, I stopped by Union Market, one of those places where it’s a really bad idea to go if you’re hungry. I drooled over the idea of a pint of Ciao Bella for dinner, but managed to walk out only with some tomatoes, smoked mozzarella, basil, and sea scallops. I like to keep a stash of fresh pesto in the freezer, whether I’ve made it or purchased it from Fresh Direct, because it lasts for ages and has a multitude of uses.

This meal is super-easy. Rachel Ray easy. It’s really all about the quality of the ingredients you’re using, and you really can’t go wrong with fresh sea scallops, as long as you don’t over cook them. Look for dry sea scallops, which aren’t called dry because they need moisturizing; it means they haven’t been pumped full of water, to plump ‘em up and make them look more appetizing at the seafood counter.

I’ve been told many times, in different restaurants, that Italians have this thing about not putting cheese on seafood dishes; something about fish coming from the sea not going with cheese that comes from the cow. Apparently, this goes back centuries. I think it’s a load of bollocks. I’m of the if-it-tastes-good-go-with-it school, and most things are greatly improved with a hefty shower of parmeggiano reggiano.

I walked in the door and started cooking at 8:16pm. I had this all ready by 8:42, and it would have been even faster had I not included a caprese salad. Ha! 26 minutes! Eat your heart out, Rachel Ray.

Whole Wheat Linguini with Spinach, Pesto, and Scallops
Serves two
3/4lb. dry sea scallops, adductor muscle removed
1/2lb. whole-wheat linguini
Salt & Pepper
2 Tbsp. olive oil
1 10oz box frozen chopped spinach
3 Tbsp. fresh pesto
1/2 lemon (but have the other half handy, in case you want to add more)
Freshly ground parmeggiano reggiano

1. Rinse and pat dry scallops. Season liberally with salt and fresh pepper.
2. Boil water and get your whole-wheat linguini going. Be sure to cook it for at least a minute or a minute and a half less than the package instructs. It’s best al dente, and you’ll finish cooking it in the sauce.
3. Heat a saute pan on high and add olive oil. Once oil is hot, gently lay scallops in it, being careful to let them stay exactly where they first hit, so you get a nice crispy, brown sear. After 3 minutes, turn the scallops, and sear on the other side for another two minutes (cooking time may be less, depending on their size). Reserve in a bowl, covered.
4. Microwave spinach, covered, for three minutes. Plunk it into a mesh strainer and press on it with a large spoon, to get all the water out. Alternatively, you can bundle it into a clean dishtowel and squeeze it.
5. Drain pasta, reserving some of the cooking water, just in case you need to thin the pasta sauce.
6. With the heat on medium, toss the pasta back into the pot, along with the pesto, the spinach, and the liquid that’s accumulated underneath the scallops. If the pasta seems too dry, add the reserved pasta cooking water, a little bit at a time, not more than ¼ cup. After a minute, remove from the heat.
7. Add the lemon juice and season with salt and pepper. Taste. Add more lemon, if needed.
8. Serve with scallops on top, and lots of parmeggiano reggiano.

P.S. I'm an idiot

2007-05-23T12:20:00.000-04:00

I’ve been reading Michael Ruhlman & Brian Polcyn’s Charcuterie: The Craft of Salting, Smoking, and Curing. I plan to put both their Fresh Bacon and Pancetta recipes into action, once my pink salt arrives from Butcher & Packer. Until then, I am content to flip through the book, marveling at the recipes and fantasizing about how impressed my dinner party guests will be when I present them with my homemade duck prosciutto. Ruhlman & Polcyn are so passionate on the joys of curing and smoking your own meat, and I was completely smitten with the idea of doing it myself after reading a section referencing the opening scenes in Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House in the Big Woods, when Pa would smoke venison inside a hollowed-out tree. Like any other girl of a certain age who fancied herself the next Melissa Gilbert, I loved the adventures of Laura and her family braving the late 1800s wilderness. And, naturally, this brought back, from the hazy abyss, the time my friend Carolyn and I attempted to recreate the maple candy that Laura and her sister Mary made.

It seemed so easy: Laura and Mary, would go out in the frigid Wisconsin winter, fill a cast iron pan with fresh snow and pour maple sap straight from the trees onto the snow. The sap would harden into a wonderful maple candy that they couldn’t get enough of. In the book, Laura and Mary were ages 4 and 6 (my memory might be a little rickety on this front, but I know they were both well under 10 during the maple candy story).

One snowy day, Carolyn and I decided to make maple candy of our own. We would be Laura and Mary, but with much more expensive shoes. We didn’t have a frigid Wisconsin winter handy, but the Brooklyn blizzard raging outside our window seemed like it would do in a pinch. We trekked outside and filled our large frying pan with fresh, untouched New York City snow. Back in the apartment, we broke out the Log Cabin and excitedly drizzled it onto the snow. In retrospect, I’m a little amazed at how disappointed we were when the syrup sunk right into the snow, instead of solidifying into the fabulous maple candy experience we were banking on.

But we were resolute. If 4- and 6-year old Laura and Mary Ingalls could do this, then 22-year old Carolyn and I could too. Naturally, we didn’t stop to think about their straight-from-the-tree sap vs. our highly refined, super-processed, extra-long shelf-life faux maple-flavored syrup-style product. It had become the late 1900s vs. the late 1800s. The city vs. the country. Us vs. the 4-year old. We had every advantage imaginable. No contest, right?

By now, we were so caught up in our determination not to be bested by a 4-year old, that piddly little things like common sense and basic science were chucked out our 2nd story window. We thought, perhaps, our Log Cabin was too thick, and decided to heat it up. Not surprisingly, the microwaved faux-syrup melted the snow and we were left with a pan of imitiation maple flavored ick.

Final score:
4-year old, 1
22-year olds, 0

Despite our keen sense of stupidity, Carolyn and I eventually did sample some real maple candy, but it was years later, on a trip to upstate New York, and it was professionally manufactured (presumably, by 4-year olds). It was disappointing, probably because we hadn’t made it ourselves, but we consoled ourselves with the fact the while Laura and Mary had homemade maple candy, we have Jacques Torres. And that’s no contest.

Let's Get Something Straight

2007-05-21T10:33:00.000-04:00

I just realized, rereading my previous posts (all two of them), that I may possibly be creating this impression that I am some kind of infallible culinary wunderkind. And while I totally dig the idea of anyone thinking I'm such a naturally gifted cook who can produce perfectly pouffy souffles in her sleep, it just ain't so. I'm very very fallible. And sometimes, I'm just stupid.

There was the time I was making the Madeira sauce to go over a mustard crusted beef tenderloin for a little new year’s eve shin-dig. The pressure was building: I still had to change my clothes and fluff and coiff and the guests were due to arrive at any moment. I added the tomato paste to the alleged sauce, but didn’t look at quantities and plunked the entire 6oz can in, as opposed to the two tablespoons the recipe called for. I’m no Mensa candidate, but it didn’t take me long to realize that my Madeira Sauce was now Tomato Paste Sauce. Lacking any alternatives, I tried to doctor it up, pouring in the rest of the Madeira and adding more of the other ingredients, and served it anyway. No one ate it, not even me.

One slightly more gruesome kitchen fiasco happened in a class I was taking at the Institute of Culinary Education on working with Phyllo Dough. Given the task of slicing apples for the apple strudel, I went at it with the confidence and speed of a professional. And, since I am not a professional, I proceeded to hack a large chunk of finger off. It was bloody. It was painful. It was the end of any future I had as a hand model.

I’ve botched plenty of other things, from the Fresh Pasta Debacle of `01 to the Great Bread Sauce Blunder of `05. And I'm not even going to recount the legion of leaden lumps I turned out when I began making bread. But the point is that I probably wouldn’t be so proud of the successes if I didn’t know that every single one of them had real potential to be failures. I’m sure I have plenty of clunkers waiting in my comestible future (I’m about to embark on a pancetta making project. That has trouble written all over it.), but that's part of the joy of being the Casual Cook. And, frankly, the duds make for much more entertaining cocktail party conversation.

WITFP

2007-05-18T13:33:00.000-04:00

Ok, now that I’ve got this food blog thing up and running, I feel pressure to chronicle every morsel that passes between my perfectly glossed lips. Hopefully, I’ll get over that soon enough. Until that happens, though, here’s a post on last night’s dinner, which was Whatever’s in the Fridge Pasta.

There’s an art to Whatever’s In The Fridge Pasta, because you can’t really throw in whatever’s in the fridge. You’ll wind up with Orecchiete with Non-Fat Strawberry Yogurt and Leftover Pork Fried Rice in a Diet Coke reduction. Whatever’s In The Fridge Pasta (henceforth WITFP) really only works if you have some decent things in your fridge. Fortunately, I had a pound of gorgeous sugar snap peas, which have been patiently sitting in the crisper for about a week, waiting to be noticed. I sautéed a shallot and half a red bell pepper, made a sauce from some leftover white wine, a touch of cream, ½ a lemon, and threw in some cannelini beans. Sounds a little fancy pants, but these are not terribly expensive or difficult ingredients, and they’re the kinds of things that have a relatively long shelf life (not to mention a zillion uses) so I like to keep them around. This is the kind of food most restaurants would like you to believe requires years of advanced culinary training in order to attempt, so they can give it a fancy name and charge you $19.

I grated some parmeggiano reggiano on top and dinner was ready to go. It was, like, a 19-minute meal, which was good, because I was so famished that I was about to start gnawing on my own arm. That’s one of the problems of working the hours I do. I often don’t get home until 8 or 8:30 and that’s when I start cooking. And I prefer to cook than to order in, since it’s usually a tad healthier and it takes the same amount of time. But by the time the food is ready, I’m about two exits past ravenous.

But last night, I couldn’t just dive into my big, steaming bowl of WITFP, because I was all concerned about taking a picture for the blog, so everyone could be hugely impressed by my restaurant quality 19-minute meal. I grabbed my cute, li’l digital camera, but it refused to turn on. The batteries had died (probably just to spite my growling stomach). Hhmph. Fine, I thought, I’ll just use Nick’s highly sophisticated digital camera. But Nick’s highly sophisticated digital camera was nowhere to be found. I looked in every room, every closet, every drawer, every shelf and couldn’t find the stupid thing. At this point, I was so hungry that my stomach was about to start eating itself and the hunger was affecting my brain function. In my altered mental state, it seemed perfectly reasonable that Nick’s highly sophisticated digital camera was hiding at the bottom of my bowl of WITFP, so I had no choice but to start eating in order to unearth it. The food was tasty and satisfying, but the camera was, shockingly, not lying in wait at the bottom of the bowl. So, I don’t have a photo to share with you of a best bite, but I can assure it was attractive, delicious, simple, and far less than $19.

As a post-script to my story, I did eventually find Nick’s highly advanced digital camera. He had put away in the closet, where it belonged. The nerve.

What is the best bite?

2007-05-17T12:47:00.000-04:00

When you’re eating, no matter what it is, from a carefully constructed sandwich to a thoughtfully orchestrated entree to some fabulously greasy take-out to a goopy ice cream sundae, and you manage to get the perfect balance of each flavor in the dish crammed onto your fork (or spoon or chopsticks or hands) and into your mouth at once, that’s the Best Bite. It’s when you can sample the dish the way the creator intended, and have an opportunity to learn which flavors work together and why some combinations become classic (like churros and hot chocolate, which are a stellar combination. Muchas Gracias, Espana!) When offering samples of food to friends, you want to give them a best bite, so they can experience every component of the dish together (and so you don’t have to part with another bite).

I’m writing this to share my love of, my passion for, my complete obsession with, The Best Bite. (And as much as I’d love to take credit for the genius behind it, my friend Charlie introduced me to the concept of the best bite, and it has consumed me ever since. Fortunately, I've consumed it too.)