The one thing I regret about not hosting a big holiday dinner is that we don’t get to make any soup from the turkey or ham bones. There is nothing better than a soup made from the real deal, instead of some sodium-soaked store-bought stock. Alas, desperate times and lack there-of require an instant fix now and again, so for this make-do chicken soup I combined chicken and beef stock after browning some skin-on and bone-in chicken thighs. The flavor is almost as good as if it had been boiling away all day. The addition of fennel salt was a boon, as was a dried and de-seeded guajillo pepper which quickly reconstituted itself in its hot bath. A trio of bay leaves (one of the most underestimated objects in the kitchen arsenal) rounds out the basic seasoning. Onion, garlic, celery, and carrots provided the rest. I boiled a pair of eggs for exactly seven minutes and thirteen seconds in a small pot of gently boiling water, then split them open to reveal their gold. A few sliced green onions and a generous pile of freshly-chopped cilantro rounded out the bowl. (If you’re groaning, I’m guessing I lost you at the eggs and the cilantro just threw you over the edge. That’s fine. Go.)
Inside the condo, all was light and warmth and jazz. An almost-Christmas compilation played in the background, and as this was the last time I would be over before the holiday mayhem I decided to get the bulk of the decorating done. (This year’s Boston Children’s Holiday Hour has been planned and loosely scheduled, as has my Holiday Stroll with Kira.) And on such a frightful evening, bringing out the lights and the garland and the mantle pieces lent it a coziness that would have otherwise been missing. Grateful for the activity to pass the time until Kira arrived, I assembled the smattering of holiday decorations that I’ve amassed over the years. I lit a few candles that smelled of pinecones and tassels (at least according to the Yankee Candle company) and the decorating work was done.
As it was cocktail hour, I sliced off a peel of orange and conjured a Negroni for the fall evening. It was time to set about to making dinner, and I chopped some onion and fennel for the risotto, opened the white wine, and lit the fire beneath the chicken stock.
Risotto is all about the continuous stirring and ladling of the hot stock. It’s slightly monotonous, which gives it a soothing aspect, and a cold night when the wind and rain were whipping about just outside the window, there was no happier exercise in which to indulge. The steam rose around me as the rice slowly took in the stock and flavors of the onion and fennel. The hard white-gray pellets softened and gave up their chalkiness, melting into a creamy but firm consistency, and by the time Kira rang the buzzer, it was almost complete.
I’ve cooked for Kira a few times, and it’s one of my favorite things to do. She has taken up the knife and pot and tried some new things on her own, but for the most part she enjoys the clean-up, while I do the food-and-mess-making. She taught me a few things about how to make a wrinkle-free bed, so it all evens out in the end. On this evening, I made the risotto and we feasted on that and the wine, and all was well with the world.
Outside, the storm raged. A steady downpour ripped the leaves from the trees, while the wind moaned and did its best to infiltrate whatever cracks or crevices age and time had worked to widen. Inside, we basked in the glow and heat of a dinner just cooked, and a multitude of candles giving light and warmth to every corner. This, then was fall. This was coziness. This was comfort. This would be how we made it through another winter.
Andy went all out last weekend to close things down for the season, mowing our overgrown lawn three times (to mulch and manage the field-like grass) and then getting things together for a super supper of chicken curry. As he was out procuring the supplies, I started the rice and then began preparing the chicken. We usually don’t tag-team cook, as he does things his way and I do things mine, but on this day I knew his back was hurting and I wanted to help him get a head-start.
I chopped up the carrots and onion, then seasoned and browned the meat – chicken thighs, skin-on and bone-in: the most moist and flavorful parts to use. (White meat and breasts are over-rated.) By the time the meat was done with its first round of cooking, Andy had returned with the rest of the groceries. I chopped up the garlic and ginger and started that, then let Andy take over to work his magic, with Thai chili paste, baby corn, tomatoes, pineapple and snow peas. He added a bit more fresh ginger too. To this, he poured in some coconut milk and let it simmer for an hour.
It was our best batch of chicken curry in a long time.
One of the best lunches I’ve ever had was a simple dish of fish tacos. We had just walked the Marginal Way in Ogunquit, Maine, and in Perkins Cove we stopped for a meal at MC Perkins. While they generally do things on a fancier plane there, I ordered the fish tacos, and what arrived was a quartet of the most delicious delights I’ve been lucky enough to eat. Maybe it was the walk along the Maine shore that made me so ravenous, or maybe it was the way we simply seem to enjoy food more when on vacation, but this
While they did theirs with a simple fried white fish and typical flour tortilla, it was the accents that made it shine: a glorious red cabbage slaw, some fresh jalapenos and cilantro, and a tasty remoulade that brought it all together. For years I’ve been trying to find a similar dish, but in upstate New York such magic is in short supply. With our fryer in full effect, this seemed as good a time as any to see if I couldn’t replicate it myself, and in case you don’t want to read any further I’ll break it down with a simple spoiler: it was fucking fantastic.
First up, the fish. After looking online at various options, I decided on a bastardized beer batter using 1 cup of flour and 1 cup of a Corona. One recipe I read called for a dark Mexican beer – an Equis Amber maybe? – but I wasn’t going out in the rain so a Corona would have to do. It’s one of the few beers I drink anyway; sometimes laziness dictates recipe substitutions. You mix them together, add some salt and pepper and smoked paprika, and let stand for about fifteen minutes – perfect timing to assemble the slaw.
Here’s what I used for the recipe:
1 pound thinly sliced or shredded cabbage (I found a bag of red and green cabbage with carrots at Trader Joe’s and all the slicing and chopping was done)
½ teaspoon salt
¼ cup thinly sliced & diced red onion
½ cup chopped cilantro
¼ of a jalapeno, finely chopped
¼ cup fresh lime juice
2 Tablespoons olive oil
Mix it all together and you’re done.
If you’re going for something healthier, you can probably omit the creamy sauce (though if you’re going for something healthy, a fried fish taco is rather pointless). I would advise indulging and adding this remoulade because it absolutely brings everything together. Again, I bastardized a mishmash of several online recipes, and the end result was, more or less, as follows:
½ cup mayonnaise
½ cup sour cream
Juice of half a lime
Tbsp of chipotle adobo sauce (or less if you’re shy in the company of some heat)
1 teaspoon of fresh garlic, finely chopped
Salt and pepper to taste
This remoulade should really be made earlier in the day so the flavors can meld, but in a pinch it will do immediately. Obviously, I wasn’t waiting. We fried up the fish, assembled the tacos, and all was right again with the world. (Thanks to Pati Jinich for the inspiration!)
Andy and I get our deep fryer out two or three times a year, and then schedule a week of deep-fried everything. We are currently nearing the end of another banner frying stretch, and if I don’t die from a heart attack we may make our first go at fish this weekend.
It began with a batch of lumpia, followed by regular fries and then sweet potato fries. Andy made his excellent turkey parmesan and I’m planning some sort of fried/wrapped banana treat. We’ll finish off with the fish for some fish tacos (always save fish for the last run because no one wants a fried banana flavored with fishy oil).
It’s so bad for you, but it tastes so good. The season of comfort food is upon us at last.
Fall is for soups. No other dish is so versatile and forgiving during times of cold weather. Simply making a pot of soup warms the soul – not only from the heat of the stove and ingredients, but from the methodical chopping and dicing and formulating that goes on when the soup is being made.
During a marathon of ‘Pati’s Mexican Table’ I caught a bit of her imploring us to not be afraid of the guajillo pepper – the dark red pack of dried vegetables that always looked so daunting to my lower-level cooking capability – and I decided to pick up a bunch and try it out.
There are several things I’ve picked up over years of watching the Food Network and CreateTV. One, the power of fresh herbs. This cannot be underestimated. For years I went without, or simply sprinkled some feeble decade-old bottle of desiccated blandness with little or no results. The simple addition of a few sprigs of flat-leaf parsley or some roughly-chopped cilantro or mint makes the final flourish to any dish a revelatory event. Two, the power of roasting things. Particularly nuts or seeds or spices. In this instance, the dried Guajillo pepper.
Pati throws a few on a heated skillet, lets them get a little darker in color, turns them, then adds them to some water. A pound of whole tomatoes and a single garlic clove on top of that and your soup base is pretty much done. Boil for ten to fifteen minutes, puree until smooth, then heat a little olive oil in a soup pot and pour in the puree. When it gets darker (about ten more minutes) add 6 cups of chicken stock. That’s it. The rest is all up to you. I added avocados, crème fraiche, queso fresco, cilantro and some tortilla chips. (I strongly advise that you fry your own tortillas – they’re so much better that way, and you can cut them into whatever size and shape you want.) She offers much better instructions and details on her enchanting website, along with additional options to stoke your hunger fire.
If I were a straight guy, Nigella Lawson would be my dream date. The accent, the eyes, and the talent with making some scrumptious stuff in the kitchen. She’s always struck me as one of the pretty people who was graced with an extra bounty of gifts with her talent for cooking. She definitely knew how to make a name and a brand for herself, and the rest of us took our inspiration from that in whatever way we could.
For me, it works best in something simple, like this dish of potatoes I recently saw her make. According to her, she had them in Australia, as one does, and brought her own twists to them. I did the same, as I made them mostly from memory, and mine is getting more faulty with each passing day.
Heres what I did.
Pre-heat oven to 425 degrees. Cut up six or seven yellow potatoes into uniform 1 inch pieces, leaving the skin on (that’s where all the nutrients are!) Douse in olive oil and cover with a few cloves of garlic, minced. Sprinkle some dried oregano over this, along with salt and pepper, toss together, and spread out on a baking tray. Bake for 25 to 35 minutes, turning once.
Now for the good part. After pulling the potatoes from the oven, put them into a serving dish while hot and sprinkle with a healthy dose of crumbled feta cheese. Add some fresh oregano if you have it, and dig in.
An Armenian specialty, Ghapama is a cozy fall rice dish baked and served in a pumpkin. Perfect for an October meal when pumpkins are in season, this incorporates dried fruit, cinnamon and honey into the rice, lending a sweet and tart tension to a hearty side dish. In all honesty, the flavors weren’t as tantalizing to me as the presentation, and there are a few things I’d do differently the next time I make this. First, the recipe:
Ingredients:
1 sweet (or cooking) pumpkin, hollowed out with the top saved (about 3 lbs)
1 cup rice
1 ½ to 2 cups water
4 Tbsp. butter (½ stick)
¼ cup each of dried apricots, plums, cherries – all chopped
¼ cup raisins
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
Dash of salt
2 Tbsp honey
½ cup chopped nuts (almonds, walnuts or pecans) – optional
¼ cup hot water
Method:
Bring the water to a boil, then add rice. Turn to low and cover for 8-10 minutes.
In a small pan, melt butter and cook fruits, raisins and nuts for 5-10 minutes. Add cinnamon and salt. When rice is half-way done and water is mostly absorbed, add the fruit mixture and mix. Line the interior of the pumpkin with honey then add rice mixture. Leave a little space at the top (it will expand) and replace the top of the pumpkin. Bake at 325 degrees for 1 ½ to 2 hours (until a toothpick slides easily into the side of the pumpkin indicating that it’s cooked).
How I would do it differently:
First, I’m not a fan of raisins and dried fruit, so perhaps this isn’t the best dish for me. Next time I try it I’ll decrease the amount of all of that and allow the rice to be the main element. Some recipes call for sugar in lieu of honey; I like the honey, but I may add some brown sugar to tip it just this side of sweet (and balance the tartness of the raisins and fruit). I’d also up the cinnamon a bit and maybe add some freshly ground nutmeg; this recipe is very forgiving, and the few I viewed online had several variations. Unhealthy as it may be, I’d also look into adding a little more butter to everything.
Those minor issues aside, this was a grand dish, especially in the presentation and serving. You cut out slices of pumpkin and allow the rice to spill over onto each, then serve the piece to your guest. If cut all at once, it fans out like some pungent fall flower. Even though I wasn’t an initial fan of the fruit, once I wrapped my head around what it should taste like, I began to enjoy it.
This is such a popular dish in Armenia that there’s a song written about it. For the benefit of all on hand, I did not try to sing it, but it certainly sounds fun.
When my Mom brought over a small bag of early garlic scapes from a nearby farmer’s market, I immediately sent out feelers over FaceBook and Twitter to find the best way to make use of them. My social media hive brain has occasionally been the source of inspired culinary experiments. Most of the recommendations were for a pesto, but I only had about six or seven scapes, hardly enough to even reach the food processor’s blade. Instead, I added them to a sauteed asparagus dish, where their delicate garlic flavor provided a scintillating accompanying flavor, and saved a particularly curvy one for a martini garnish. (A friend said I should stuff an olive with the scape, so I made double use of it as the olive holder.)
It was a stroke of genius. There was just enough flavor in the single cut end of a scape to subtly shade a single martini. The olive, threaded onto the surprisingly firm stem (no flimsy, hollow chive nonsense here) took on just the merest hint of garlic goodness. It was reminiscent of the three tiny drops of garlic olive oil that were once added to a martini I savored in Washington, DC. (At first I balked at the preciousness of the thing, the way the eye-dropper was so carefully placed, dotting the surface of the gin in three distinct spots. But the taste, while questionable at first, made such a difference. When it comes to altering the classic martini, a little goes a long way.) Here, a variation on the traditional olive martini with just a nod to a Gibson (the garlic makes a potent substitution for a cocktail onion) is a refreshing way of employing any extra-curly scapes that find their way into your kitchen.
I spent the early-afternoons of many a summer in front of the television, watching the NBC soap opera line-up of ‘Days of Our Lives’, ‘Another World’ and ‘Santa Barbara’. My grandmother had gotten me into ‘Days’ ~ the rest just naturally followed suit. They appealed to my ingrained love for all things dramatic. It also offered a cool respite from the hottest part of the day, and even as a kid I could appreciate the luxury of lounging in air-conditioned splendor, sipping languidly from a tall glass of sweetened iced tea, popping in a raspberry flavored piece of hard candy in-between sips.
These days, I’ve switched from soap operas to Real Housewives, from iced tea to prosecco, but the general idea of summer freedom remains. I paired this bit of bubbly stuff with a bowl of cherries, and it’s my new favorite thing. Sitting by the pool, lazily turning the pages of a book, and letting the day pass blissfully by…
Nobody wants to stand over a hot stove for anything more than ten or fifteen minutes during the warmer months, and that;s about the length of prep and cooking time for this easy summer pasta dish. I’m not going to bother with specifics – you can probably find it online, or Crotchety Carl can figure it out for you. This is just some olive oil, chopped onion, asparagus spears, a dose of prosecco, fresh parsley, then butter and freshly grated parmesan. It’s light, but surprisingly rich. Elegant and decadent. The very best parts of a coming summer.
(Important recipe note: it is mandatory to drink a glass or two of the prosecco while cooking. It won’t taste as good if you don’t.)
Andy has never been a big drinker, but every once in a while he enjoys a good cocktail. A Bombay gin and Fevertree tonic with a lemon twist or a glass of shiraz are his usual go-to’s, but last year he tried a Hemingway daquiri at Hawthorne, and was immediately enamored of it. Since that time he’s been on the hunt for another establishment that approximated the glory of that original Hawthorne experience, but most have failed (including yours truly, who followed the online recipe to the drop but still couldn’t quite replicate the magic of that first experience).
This year, I incorporated a stop at the Hawthorne before dinner (which was conveniently right next door) so he could get his Hemingway, and while it was no longer a listed feature on their cocktail menu, they were happy to oblige with this old-fashioned cocktail classic. I opted for the ‘Swan Song’ ~ with gin, rose vermouth, honey and bitters. (We will come back this summer to try the ‘Myra Breckinridge Swizzle’ ~ it’s got absinthe, which will go beautifully with the next show.)
Next door, the Island Creek Oyster Bar was where I’d made dinner reservations. I’ve been trying to get us reservations for the past several years, but always waited until the last minute to book a weekend night and it never worked out. Happily, the wait was worth it for the oysters and calamari alone.
Sated by the dinner and drinks, we climbed into an Uber and headed home. The next day was the traditional washing of the rings and we needed our rest…
It began with a little poll I posted on Facebook and Twitter:
Risotto in a slow cooker: blasphemy or brilliance?
On Twitter, 47% said it was blasphemy, 53% felt it was brilliance. The results on Facebook were almost diametrically opposite, with the majority considering it sheer blasphemy and extolling the stirring (and wine-sipping) process as an integral part of the whole experience. For the most part, though, it was a pretty even split. The only thing left to do was to try it for myself. I’ve only made risotto in the traditional manner a couple of times, and it was an exhausting, sweaty, and rather stressful experience, wine-sipping be damned. My arm was tired, my outfit was ruined, and it still wasn’t all that. If even a slight approximation could be achieved in a slow cooker, I’d consider it a success.
Since stirring was of paramount importance in the traditional method of preparation, I did stir the mixture about once every twenty minutes, and this turned out to be a blessing. A little over an hour after it had begun cooking, I went in for another stir and found the rice had soaked up the majority of the liquid and was dangerously close to being done. I sampled it and it was almost perfect – still firm and intact, but not the least bit chalky or overly chewy. I’d caught it just in time. I turned the slow cooker off just as it was going to the dry side. I added a few more tablespoons of the warm stock and wine mixture and stirred it in, along with some freshly-grated Parmigiano Reggiano cheese.
It held until company arrived half-an-hour later, at which point we quickly served it up as an appetizer because it simply wouldn’t wait. That tricky timing issue is one reason I don’t do risotto for guests, but the ease of this slow cooker method may mean it’s on our personal dining schedule a bit more often.
I’m told that corned beef and cabbage is a traditional St. Patrick’s Day dish, but I don’t like being traditional so I had this a few weeks ahead of schedule. (People scoffed at the notion of having it outside the safe window of St. Paddy’s Day because no one likes anyone to move into uncharted territory. Not even by a few days.) Too damn bad, I say. And I ate this like a beast. (Extra flavor bonus courtesy of this insanely-good Maine Crafty Ale Mustard, courtesy of Stonewall Kitchen.)
A few mistakes were made in this virgin voyage into corned beef territory. The first and most important lesson I learned, sadly a little too late, was that there’s no need for additional salt in a corned beef dish. Whoopsie daisy. (I’m still bloated.) The second, not as egregious mistake, was adding all the cabbage and potatoes and carrots into the slow cooker at the same time. According to the Martha Stewart recipe I used, the cabbage should be save for the latter part of the cooking process. This was not so bad – I cooked it all to the point that it all kind of blended together in the end. This is not a terribly-refined sort of dish. There’s room for roughness, space for spillover.
There was barely enough for a sandwich the next day – which is the third lesson I learned: the original size is going to shrink down quite a bit, so err on the side of more rather than less when picking out a cut (and go for the flat cut instead of the point – unless you like things really fatty). A next-day sandwich is the best part of this whole deal. The meat is tender enough to melt into whatever you use it for – added to some rye bread, a healthy layer of Thousand Island dressing, and some sauerkraut (used sparingly), it made for a fantastic meal.
My winter obsession with cooking dishes that have some heat to them continues with this post of a Chipotle Chicken Pasta Casserole courtesy of Pati Jinich. A short while ago I tweeted Ms. Jinich for any ideas on what to make with chipotles in adobo sauce and she came up with a trio of dishes – for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The Senor Breakfast sandwich was an instant success (and I’ve made it a few times since then). Her recommendation for lunch was this Chipotle Chicken Pasta Casserole, recipe here.
It’s a little more involved than I’m accustomed to making, but Ms. Jinich makes it doable and user-friendly enough even for someone like me. It begins with tomatoes and onion, which get cooked and blended with chipotles and adobo sauce to form a pungent sauce. Chicken thighs get browned in oil, then the dry pasta itself gets fried – an interesting twist that lends color and flavor and a delicious toasty smell to the proceedings.
Once fried, the pasta then cooks in the sauce and some additional chicken broth, at the end of which it becomes a perfectly-rendered consistency and firmness. The chicken gets nestled back into the casserole dish, your choice of cheeses is added to the top, and it goes into the oven to slightly solidify.
After it’s cooled for a bit, the all-important garnishes come into play – in this case some avocado slices, sour cream, and cilantro leaves for color. This casserole is so full of flavor, however, you need not indulge in anything other than the basic ingredients – they come together that beautifully.
Many thanks to Ms. Jinich for pointing me in the direction of all these chipotle recipes. If I’m feeling especially brave, I may have to give her dinner recommendation a whirl: Honey Chipotle Ribs.
As for this casserole, it’s perfect for a cold winter day, hearty and scrumptious and rich. Confession: I ate it for lunch, then dinner, and then again for breakfast the next morning. It’s that good.
