Ingredients come in and out of fashion just like, well, fashion. One of the ingredients that is enjoying a justifiable wave of popularity now, is the lamb shank.
When I was growing up, I had no idea what a lamb shank was. I remember someone on a television show, seeing them offered as lunch at the school cafeteria where she worked, and smiling broadly because she hadn't had them in so long... Then she got called away for a meeting and never had them. I remember her saying "bye lamb shanks" with this sad look on her face.
I asked my Nana if we could have them, and she looked at me like I was crazy. I think she didn't know what they were. It may have also been that , at that time, lamb shanks were considered "poor people food," and my grandmother just could not understand why any of us would want to eat like poor people. She would cry about the money she spent on food, but when we ate lamb, we ate chops, or we ate leg of lamb. We NEVER ate the cheaper cuts.
"Cheaper" cuts. HAH. I paid 8 bucks a pound for the lamb shanks in this recipe. I guess that's cheap for lamb, but if my Nana ever paid 8 bucks for meat, she got way more than a pound.
Lamb shanks are good for those of us who want little work, are willing to let the food cook away for a long time, and like good flavor. If you think about it, everyone , or just about everyone, loves osso bucco. Well, that's veal shank. Lamb shanks are as good, in a different way.
As it happened, last week I came across two recipes for lamb shanks, going in different directions. One used chick peas. Hmmmm. The other one used prunes. Hmmmm. I put it to plebicite. The prunes won.
This recipe appeared in the NY Times. I want to repeat it here, in case you dont' read the "paper of record," or don't read the food section. I DID make some changes (now there's a surprise), and there is an unusual ingredient that is worth hunting down.
The night before you are going to make the dish, take 2 cups of pitted prunes (more than half a pound), and soak them in two cups of dry red wine. If you are really "off the stuff," use pomegranate juice. It will surprise you how much liquid the prunes pick up, even if they are nice and soft. Also, the night before, sprinkle eight small lamb shanks with salt and pepper, and let them sit, uncovered, in your fridge.
The day of cooking, bring your oven to 300, and let the shanks come to room temperature. Chop up two cups of onions. You don't need surgical precision here. For me, this was three medium onions. You should also peel and mince, twelve - that's right, TWELVE cloves of garlic. You'll thank me. Get a jar of red peppers in oil, and slice three of the peppers into thin slices. Have ready, as well, two teaspoons of ground cumin, and a teaspoon of smoked paprika. That's the unusual ingredient I told you about. Buy some. You'll be glad you did. Then, pour some olive oil into a big heavy casserole (use a BIG one), and brown the shanks. Take your time. This is where you're gonna get your color for this.
Put the meat off to the side. Note that you'll have to do this in batches. There isn't a pan in the world that can handle 8 shanks at once (at least not on the retail level, where you and I can get them). You'll have a little fat left. Leave it, and sautee your onions and garlic in this, just until
they begin to soften. Then add the peppers and the spices. If you let this cook a few minutes, you will notice a wonderful smell coming up. That's the smoked paprika and you'll now know why I insisted on you getting this. Then add the lamb back, and the prunes, with the juice. You'll have to layer these on top of each other and that's fine.
The original recipe called for stove top cooking. I did most of it in the oven, however. I covered the pan, and put it into a 300 degree oven, for an hour and a half. At the end of that time, I moved the shanks around so that the ones underneath were on the top, and vice versa. After an additional hour, I checked them and decided to finish the dish on the stove. I put the whole pot on the stove, at medium low heat, and let it cook away for another thirty minutes. By that time, the meat was tender, falling off the bone, and the whole house smelled wonderful.
This stores beautifully, which is a good thing, because we have plenty. With Paula's potatoes, doesn't this sound like an extravagantly good dinner? It's up for dinner tomorrow. Maybe I'll save some for you....
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Cooking with Paula: Potato Casserole
I will say, up front, that Paula Deen is one of my favorite tv people in the world. She goes into that category of people who can show up at my door for dinner whenever she wants. I know we'll have a great time. If you've seen her shows, you know what I mean. This is a lady who truly TRULY LOVES being in the kitchen, and putting it forth for friends and loved ones (aren't they the same?). She also understands, that when we cut to the chase, what we all really WANT to eat is stuff that on one level is not good for us. Fact is, most things that are "not good," for us, are at least ok for us, if you don't insist on eating four pounds of them. So it is, with the dish that follows.
I will confess that these days, I really don't get to watch her tv show very much. I can't figure out programming on the food network anymore, and I frequently find myself doing something else. So when a friend told me about this recipe, I had to look it up. And when I did, it was clear that I had to make it. This is the ULTIMATE comfort food. Look at the ingredients: potatoes, including TWO KINDS. Cheese. Bacon. How could this be bad for you? I am coming more and more of a mind that if it makes you feel good, eat it. I could go for a big bowl of this stuff right now.
You will need 2 cups of mashed potatoes. Now, here's your first clue that this is comfort food. First of all, it gives you a chance to make extra mashed potatoes when you make them. Who doesn't love mashed potatoes? You also need sour cream. People say that Paula Deen is the queen of excess. Well, I'm going to out excess her. Her recipe calls for half a cup of the stuff. When I made it, I didn't measure. I just slathered it on. Maybe I used a cup. Maybe I used more. I don't care. You also need about a teaspoon of salt and a half teaspoon of fresh ground black pepper. Paula uses garlic powder, but I don't like the stuff, and I left it out. She calls for a red pepper, sliced thin. I can't bring myself to use the foreign grown peppers that we get this time of year, so instead I used three peppers from a jar of Italian peppers under oil, and a sliced red onion.
Now, things get good. You also need a stick of unsalted butter. Finally, boil yourself up four medium sized potatoes. I used yukon golds (my all purpose potato), and cooked them, in their skins, in salted water. When they were about 3/4 done, I let them cool, peeled them, and sliced them about a quarter inch thick. And... you need a nice amount of grated cheese. Paula calls for 1.5 cups of grated cheddar. I just took a block of colby cheese - about half a pound - and shredded it all.
Now, we start cooking. Preheat your oven to 350. Melt the butter in a pan, and cook the onion and pepper in it, at medium low heat, for about five minutes. Get a baking dish, and spread out the mashed potatoes. Spread the sour cream on them. Sprinkle the salt and pepper over that. Now, add the vegetables, but hold on the butter. Add the potato slices, on top of the vegetables. NOW pour on the butter. Finally, sprinkle the cheese over all of this, and put it in the oven for about thirty minutes.
While it's baking away, fry up a half pound of bacon. I repeat what I have said about cooking bacon: it will work much better if you add a little fat to the pan, and let it get started in that. The fat seems to draw out more of it, and gives you a nice, crispy final product.
Drain the excess fat off of the bacon, and when the casserole comes out, crumble it, or spread it, heck just get it on top of the cheese.
Now, is this good eating, or what? GO to it. It's supposed to serve six. Betcha you can't get that many servings out of it.
I will confess that these days, I really don't get to watch her tv show very much. I can't figure out programming on the food network anymore, and I frequently find myself doing something else. So when a friend told me about this recipe, I had to look it up. And when I did, it was clear that I had to make it. This is the ULTIMATE comfort food. Look at the ingredients: potatoes, including TWO KINDS. Cheese. Bacon. How could this be bad for you? I am coming more and more of a mind that if it makes you feel good, eat it. I could go for a big bowl of this stuff right now.
You will need 2 cups of mashed potatoes. Now, here's your first clue that this is comfort food. First of all, it gives you a chance to make extra mashed potatoes when you make them. Who doesn't love mashed potatoes? You also need sour cream. People say that Paula Deen is the queen of excess. Well, I'm going to out excess her. Her recipe calls for half a cup of the stuff. When I made it, I didn't measure. I just slathered it on. Maybe I used a cup. Maybe I used more. I don't care. You also need about a teaspoon of salt and a half teaspoon of fresh ground black pepper. Paula uses garlic powder, but I don't like the stuff, and I left it out. She calls for a red pepper, sliced thin. I can't bring myself to use the foreign grown peppers that we get this time of year, so instead I used three peppers from a jar of Italian peppers under oil, and a sliced red onion.
Now, things get good. You also need a stick of unsalted butter. Finally, boil yourself up four medium sized potatoes. I used yukon golds (my all purpose potato), and cooked them, in their skins, in salted water. When they were about 3/4 done, I let them cool, peeled them, and sliced them about a quarter inch thick. And... you need a nice amount of grated cheese. Paula calls for 1.5 cups of grated cheddar. I just took a block of colby cheese - about half a pound - and shredded it all.
Now, we start cooking. Preheat your oven to 350. Melt the butter in a pan, and cook the onion and pepper in it, at medium low heat, for about five minutes. Get a baking dish, and spread out the mashed potatoes. Spread the sour cream on them. Sprinkle the salt and pepper over that. Now, add the vegetables, but hold on the butter. Add the potato slices, on top of the vegetables. NOW pour on the butter. Finally, sprinkle the cheese over all of this, and put it in the oven for about thirty minutes.
While it's baking away, fry up a half pound of bacon. I repeat what I have said about cooking bacon: it will work much better if you add a little fat to the pan, and let it get started in that. The fat seems to draw out more of it, and gives you a nice, crispy final product.
Drain the excess fat off of the bacon, and when the casserole comes out, crumble it, or spread it, heck just get it on top of the cheese.
Now, is this good eating, or what? GO to it. It's supposed to serve six. Betcha you can't get that many servings out of it.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
You never know: jerusalem artichoke soup
One of the most interesting aspects of cooking for people, at least for me, is that you never know how your food is going to "go over." You go into the kitchen with a preconceived notion of how your dishes are going to turn out, and what their popularity is going to be. Sometimes, you're right. And sometimes, you are dead wrong.
Years ago, this happened to me when I made two versions of my "val d'aostana" dish. I made it how I learned to make it, with veal, and I made it with chicken. My motivation was very simple: I didn't want to spend the money to make the veal dish for twelve people. But I DID make enough for six.
The veal came back, nearly uneaten. Meanwhile, there were people scraping the corners of the serving dish on the chicken variation. I would NOT have predicted that. Now, while I might make the veal dish for us at home, when I serve it at parties, I always serve the chicken.
This past Sunday, we had our monthly dinner party. The menu included toasts with chickpea spread and homemade Tomato jam, as well as an Alsatian tart of onions and caviar. Then we had jerusalem artichoke soup with black truffle puree, followed by short ribs cooked in ancho chili and coffee puree (you'll find that recipe below), with polenta and escarole. We had a big salad, cheese, and then two desserts: a sorbet bombe of blood orange, passion fruit, and kiwi sorbets, and an apple cake with banana sorbet.
Ok, look at that menu and think for a minute: what is THE ONE dish that everyone is talking about. Think hard. Ready?
The soup. Yup. I am literally getting cards and letters talking to me about the soup. Now, I love soup. I don't think of soupmaking as an easy task, but I think of it more as the dish that people use to "sit into" the dinner. In other words, soup is "easy." It sets you up for the rest of the meal, when the "good stuff" is coming. For this party, however, it sure seems that the soup was "the good stuff. " I am very serious when I say that I could have put out bowls of that soup with bread and ended the meal right there, and people would have gone home smiling.
You never know.
Well, this being the case, I am giving you the soup recipe. It takes a bit of time. Perhaps the most time consuming aspect is finding the ingredients. Get thee to a farmers market. You'll find it easily.
You need 2.5-3 pounds of Jerusalem artichokes. These come in two shapes: one variety is long and thin. That's the one you will try to get. The other is real funny looking, sort of like a geometric puzzle. You can use these, but you're going to have to peel them, and unless you like getting your peeler into nooks and crannies, go for the longer ones.
Wash them and then use your parer to get the skin off. While you're doing this, have your oven preheating to 450. You need that heat for these babies. When they're peeled, dump them into a bowl with a few glugs of olive oil and some salt. Get your hands in there and turn everything until they're all covered with the oil and salt. Then lay them out on a baking sheet and get them into the oven. Plan on at least fifteen minutes, maybe longer.
While they roast, make your mirepoix (I am slowly beginning to love that word). Celery seems to work really well with jerusalem artichokes, so go heavy on that. I would say use two parts celery to each part of carrots and onions. I chop it all up nice and fine in the food processor, pulsing it. When it's pulsed to a fine point, put it into a big soup pot with a few more tablespoons of olive oil. Don't start cooking yet. Check your jerusalem artichokes by sticking a fork in them. You want them soft. Softer, perhaps, than a baked potato. Almost falling apart. They will brown and toast as this happens. Cover your hand with a mitt, and shake the pan a bit too, to make sure they don't stick. When they're soft , get them out of the oven (the longer ones will take less time than the crenulated ones. DOn't you like that word? Look it up).
Now, saute your mirepoix in the oil, with some more salt - just a little - until the liquid starts being released. Don't use too high a heat, you're not looking to brown the stuff, just soften it. When you hear the hard sizzle start softening, scrape the jerusalem artichokes into the pot, and then add broth. I started with a quart, and when I was done, I added a total of a quart of broth, and two cups of water. Just let this simmer away for maybe fifteen minutes. Taste for seasoning.
When you've done this, you should either let the whole pot cool down, or proceed to pureeing, using VERY small quantities. Pureeing hot soup is dangerous. Use a blender, and pulse it, pouring the pureed liquid off as you do it. You will have something that is sort of creamy brown in color (again, I thought the color would dissuade people from finding it tasty. My friends surprise me all the time. They do NOT eat with their eyes).
You are pretty much done with your soup at this time. I added a tablespoon of black truffle paste to each portion of a cup of soup, but the standard garnish, is a chopped artichoke heart. Use that if you like , or add a small bit of heavy cream or sour cream or something like that.
This was such a success that people may start calling me "signore Girasole, " which isn't a bad thing, except one of my buds is my sunflower. So, just make the soup, share it, enjoy it.
And remember "C'est la vie, say the old folks, it goes to show you never can tell."
And that's the extra credit question for today: what song does that come from and who recorded it?
Years ago, this happened to me when I made two versions of my "val d'aostana" dish. I made it how I learned to make it, with veal, and I made it with chicken. My motivation was very simple: I didn't want to spend the money to make the veal dish for twelve people. But I DID make enough for six.
The veal came back, nearly uneaten. Meanwhile, there were people scraping the corners of the serving dish on the chicken variation. I would NOT have predicted that. Now, while I might make the veal dish for us at home, when I serve it at parties, I always serve the chicken.
This past Sunday, we had our monthly dinner party. The menu included toasts with chickpea spread and homemade Tomato jam, as well as an Alsatian tart of onions and caviar. Then we had jerusalem artichoke soup with black truffle puree, followed by short ribs cooked in ancho chili and coffee puree (you'll find that recipe below), with polenta and escarole. We had a big salad, cheese, and then two desserts: a sorbet bombe of blood orange, passion fruit, and kiwi sorbets, and an apple cake with banana sorbet.
Ok, look at that menu and think for a minute: what is THE ONE dish that everyone is talking about. Think hard. Ready?
The soup. Yup. I am literally getting cards and letters talking to me about the soup. Now, I love soup. I don't think of soupmaking as an easy task, but I think of it more as the dish that people use to "sit into" the dinner. In other words, soup is "easy." It sets you up for the rest of the meal, when the "good stuff" is coming. For this party, however, it sure seems that the soup was "the good stuff. " I am very serious when I say that I could have put out bowls of that soup with bread and ended the meal right there, and people would have gone home smiling.
You never know.
Well, this being the case, I am giving you the soup recipe. It takes a bit of time. Perhaps the most time consuming aspect is finding the ingredients. Get thee to a farmers market. You'll find it easily.
You need 2.5-3 pounds of Jerusalem artichokes. These come in two shapes: one variety is long and thin. That's the one you will try to get. The other is real funny looking, sort of like a geometric puzzle. You can use these, but you're going to have to peel them, and unless you like getting your peeler into nooks and crannies, go for the longer ones.
Wash them and then use your parer to get the skin off. While you're doing this, have your oven preheating to 450. You need that heat for these babies. When they're peeled, dump them into a bowl with a few glugs of olive oil and some salt. Get your hands in there and turn everything until they're all covered with the oil and salt. Then lay them out on a baking sheet and get them into the oven. Plan on at least fifteen minutes, maybe longer.
While they roast, make your mirepoix (I am slowly beginning to love that word). Celery seems to work really well with jerusalem artichokes, so go heavy on that. I would say use two parts celery to each part of carrots and onions. I chop it all up nice and fine in the food processor, pulsing it. When it's pulsed to a fine point, put it into a big soup pot with a few more tablespoons of olive oil. Don't start cooking yet. Check your jerusalem artichokes by sticking a fork in them. You want them soft. Softer, perhaps, than a baked potato. Almost falling apart. They will brown and toast as this happens. Cover your hand with a mitt, and shake the pan a bit too, to make sure they don't stick. When they're soft , get them out of the oven (the longer ones will take less time than the crenulated ones. DOn't you like that word? Look it up).
Now, saute your mirepoix in the oil, with some more salt - just a little - until the liquid starts being released. Don't use too high a heat, you're not looking to brown the stuff, just soften it. When you hear the hard sizzle start softening, scrape the jerusalem artichokes into the pot, and then add broth. I started with a quart, and when I was done, I added a total of a quart of broth, and two cups of water. Just let this simmer away for maybe fifteen minutes. Taste for seasoning.
When you've done this, you should either let the whole pot cool down, or proceed to pureeing, using VERY small quantities. Pureeing hot soup is dangerous. Use a blender, and pulse it, pouring the pureed liquid off as you do it. You will have something that is sort of creamy brown in color (again, I thought the color would dissuade people from finding it tasty. My friends surprise me all the time. They do NOT eat with their eyes).
You are pretty much done with your soup at this time. I added a tablespoon of black truffle paste to each portion of a cup of soup, but the standard garnish, is a chopped artichoke heart. Use that if you like , or add a small bit of heavy cream or sour cream or something like that.
This was such a success that people may start calling me "signore Girasole, " which isn't a bad thing, except one of my buds is my sunflower. So, just make the soup, share it, enjoy it.
And remember "C'est la vie, say the old folks, it goes to show you never can tell."
And that's the extra credit question for today: what song does that come from and who recorded it?
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Hey shortie: Annalena makes ribs
Short ribs, to be exact. I cannot remember when short ribs started to appear on my "culinary horizon," but one day, it seemed that if you were a restaurant, you HAD to serve a short rib recipe. It made sense. Relatively speaking, short ribs are inexpensive, and they are very, VERY tasty. On the downside, they are extremely fatty, and the meat is tough. It needs long, slow cooking. If short ribs aren't done right, they can be a horror to eat. And believe me, I have had some HORRIBLE ones. There are restaurants, however, where they "get it." I know of one, for example, where they put the short ribs up for cooking when the restaurant closes, and leave them to cook at a ridiculously slow temperature, all night. The meat is extremely succulent and tender, falling off the bones. Falling off the bones so much, as a matter of fact, that they don't serve the meat on the bone.
Sometimes, you can have too much tenderness. Let's face it, and not be prim about it: there is something wildly satisfying about picking up a chop, or a leg , or something with a bone in it, and gnawing the meat off of it. Even if the meat is very tender, and there's no work involved, the licking of fingers, etc, somehow appeals to all of us. And why not? I have heard many theories about this appeal, but the one that I like the best, is that it allows you to show that you feel comfortable around people and, to twist what my friend David means when he says it wildly, "you're not afraid to get messy." When I serve food to my friends, I WANT them to get messy. I want them to dig in, slurp, make noises, crack bones if they have to, and just get every single molecule of flavor out of the food. So when I serve t his recipe, I put the bones into the meat, even if the meat has fallen off, as it usually does.
This recipe has a special appeal to me. Guy and I do a dinner party every single month, usually on the third Sunday. This was the first thing I ever cooked. I've modified it somewhat (there's a surprise, isn't it?), as I've learned more about cooking. I will include variations within this recipe. DO know that you have to make it at least a day, and preferably further ahead, of the day you want to serve it. I will explain why as we go along. It's worth the wait.
First, you need a braising sauce. This involves ancho chiles, which may take some work finding. Go to a Latino grocery. When you find them, bend them. They should be soft, instead of brittle. Anchos are dried poblano chiles (I LOVE the fact that, in Mexico, when a chili is in dried form, it has a name different from the fresh one. For example, a dried jalapeno is a chipotle. There are o ther examples. I wish we did more of that. We do it for plums and prunes, but what about other stuff? And I'm sorry, but "craisins" just does NOT cut it for dried cranberries). Get four big ones. What you will need to do is cut the stem away, and split them open and shake out as many of the seeds as you can. You will see veins inside the dried chili. Whether you cut them away or not is a question of how spicy you like your food. Anchos are pretty low on the heat scale in terms of chilis, but they DO have heat. If you do not like spicy, cut them away. If you are ok with it, as I am, leave them in. And if you just can't handle heat at all, ask around for some milder dried chilis, and use those instead. Just take a look at the size of the anchos first, and use that as a guide for what you will need. Boil two cups of water and pour it over the anchos. You need to do this to rehydrate them for what is to come. Leave it alone for twenty minutes, and then drain away the water, and save it. Now take those chilis, and put them in a blender, with a quartered onion, three chopped cloves of garlic, and if you like spice, 2 tablespoons of those canned,chipotle chilis I've written about before. . Also add two tablespoons of maple syrup, the juice of a lime, and a teaspoon of salt.
That's a lot of stuff in a blender. If you're concerned, then do this in two parts. Puree it until you have a fairly smooth puree, but don't worry about getting really smooth stuff. Put this to the side.
Now, to the meat. You will need anywhere between 6 and 10 pounds of short ribs, depending on what kind of ribs you use. I use a mixture of buffalo and beef, and so I need the larger amount. I need this because the bone/meat ratio on buffalo ribs, is much higher than on beef. It's interesting, because they are related animals, of course, but you can see that they are NOT the same by lookning at this cut. And you are going to need about a pound of meat on the bone per person, maybe more with the buffalo ribs, because this is going to cook down substantially, and of course, bones weigh a lot.
If you've learned anything from here, you will have salted those ribs and left them exposed overnight in the fridge. If you forgot, the day you're cooking them, pat them dry, sprinkle them with salt (don't be shy here: you could use up to two teaspoons). You will also need to have a few tablespoons of vegetable oil ready in a big pan. Get it nice and hot, and then carefully add as many ribs at a time as you can, and brown them. This is going to take a few minutes. Get as good and dark a color as you can, because from here on in, there is no chance for the meat to get brown and caramelized. As you brown them, move the meat to a roasting pan. OR, roasting PanS if you have a lot. You want to keep one layer throughout. Maybe separate buffalo and beef?
Ok, now you're going to do something that is very typical of Mexican cooking (to the extent I know anything about it). You're going to fry your spice mixture. Remember all that stuff in the blender? Well, move your head back (this is gonna spatter), and pour it all into the pan. Lower the heat, and stir for about five minutes. Now add the water, and also add - ready for this? - half a cup of good strong coffee (if you don't have coffee around when you're cooking, you can get by with a half cup of boiling water with a good tablespoon of espresso powder added. Truth to be told, that's about what I always use, and I double it). Stir this and bring it to a boil. Then, pour the stuff over your ribs. If you're using two pans, divide it of course, and do it equally.
Cover the pan or pans with foil, and put them in a preheated, 350 degree oven. You will need at least 3.5 hours for beef ribs. You may need less time for buffalo. check by seeing if the meat is coming away from the bones, after 2 or 2.5 hours. If it's close, take them out and continue with the beef.
Now, here is a step that I think is essential, and was not in the original recipe. The original recipe said "skim the fat and serve." Go ahead, try to do that. I guarantee you, you will be SWIMMING in fat from this recipe. I estimate that at least one third of the meat mass comes away in fat. If you try to skim that, you will lose your sauce, you will lose your patience, and you may very well lose your mind. So, what do you do?
Remember up above I said do it ahead of time? Hmmmmm? Well, let the stuff come to room temperature, then cover it and refrigerate it. The next day, you may be grossed out, but you will have tons of solid fat on the top of the dish, just begging you to scoop it away with a knife or spoon or something. You don't have to be a zealot here. If you spend all your time hunting down the little "globlets" of fat that escape the skimming process, you'll never get dinner on the table. You'll also notice that the fat has a decided orange color. Yup. Chili flavoring comes from oil. Oil is a fat. Fat dissolves oil. So you're taking some of that flavor with you. That's why you have to overflavor the dish at the start.
When you've cleared the fat, you will notice how soft and succulent (I love that word) the meat is. It WILL be coming away from the bones. Of course, you can't serve this cold like that - that would be gross - so put it back in the oven, with the foil cover, and reheat it for about twenty minutes.
If you are serving only beef, one large short rib is fine for a person. You would probably need about four buffalo ribs. If you combine the two meats, overfeed everyone, or offer smaller portions and seconds.
This is a very robust tasting dish. It is recommended with polenta, which is great. You could also serve it with hominy, or with that wonderful Sardinian pasta, fregola. Leftovers make a good pasta sauce, and they also make a wonderful "sloppy joe."
This is definitely winter, cold weather food. I love short ribs, but I can't imagine eating them in the summer.
They are now a tradition with us. Try them, and maybe they will become a tradition for you.
Sometimes, you can have too much tenderness. Let's face it, and not be prim about it: there is something wildly satisfying about picking up a chop, or a leg , or something with a bone in it, and gnawing the meat off of it. Even if the meat is very tender, and there's no work involved, the licking of fingers, etc, somehow appeals to all of us. And why not? I have heard many theories about this appeal, but the one that I like the best, is that it allows you to show that you feel comfortable around people and, to twist what my friend David means when he says it wildly, "you're not afraid to get messy." When I serve food to my friends, I WANT them to get messy. I want them to dig in, slurp, make noises, crack bones if they have to, and just get every single molecule of flavor out of the food. So when I serve t his recipe, I put the bones into the meat, even if the meat has fallen off, as it usually does.
This recipe has a special appeal to me. Guy and I do a dinner party every single month, usually on the third Sunday. This was the first thing I ever cooked. I've modified it somewhat (there's a surprise, isn't it?), as I've learned more about cooking. I will include variations within this recipe. DO know that you have to make it at least a day, and preferably further ahead, of the day you want to serve it. I will explain why as we go along. It's worth the wait.
First, you need a braising sauce. This involves ancho chiles, which may take some work finding. Go to a Latino grocery. When you find them, bend them. They should be soft, instead of brittle. Anchos are dried poblano chiles (I LOVE the fact that, in Mexico, when a chili is in dried form, it has a name different from the fresh one. For example, a dried jalapeno is a chipotle. There are o ther examples. I wish we did more of that. We do it for plums and prunes, but what about other stuff? And I'm sorry, but "craisins" just does NOT cut it for dried cranberries). Get four big ones. What you will need to do is cut the stem away, and split them open and shake out as many of the seeds as you can. You will see veins inside the dried chili. Whether you cut them away or not is a question of how spicy you like your food. Anchos are pretty low on the heat scale in terms of chilis, but they DO have heat. If you do not like spicy, cut them away. If you are ok with it, as I am, leave them in. And if you just can't handle heat at all, ask around for some milder dried chilis, and use those instead. Just take a look at the size of the anchos first, and use that as a guide for what you will need. Boil two cups of water and pour it over the anchos. You need to do this to rehydrate them for what is to come. Leave it alone for twenty minutes, and then drain away the water, and save it. Now take those chilis, and put them in a blender, with a quartered onion, three chopped cloves of garlic, and if you like spice, 2 tablespoons of those canned,chipotle chilis I've written about before. . Also add two tablespoons of maple syrup, the juice of a lime, and a teaspoon of salt.
That's a lot of stuff in a blender. If you're concerned, then do this in two parts. Puree it until you have a fairly smooth puree, but don't worry about getting really smooth stuff. Put this to the side.
Now, to the meat. You will need anywhere between 6 and 10 pounds of short ribs, depending on what kind of ribs you use. I use a mixture of buffalo and beef, and so I need the larger amount. I need this because the bone/meat ratio on buffalo ribs, is much higher than on beef. It's interesting, because they are related animals, of course, but you can see that they are NOT the same by lookning at this cut. And you are going to need about a pound of meat on the bone per person, maybe more with the buffalo ribs, because this is going to cook down substantially, and of course, bones weigh a lot.
If you've learned anything from here, you will have salted those ribs and left them exposed overnight in the fridge. If you forgot, the day you're cooking them, pat them dry, sprinkle them with salt (don't be shy here: you could use up to two teaspoons). You will also need to have a few tablespoons of vegetable oil ready in a big pan. Get it nice and hot, and then carefully add as many ribs at a time as you can, and brown them. This is going to take a few minutes. Get as good and dark a color as you can, because from here on in, there is no chance for the meat to get brown and caramelized. As you brown them, move the meat to a roasting pan. OR, roasting PanS if you have a lot. You want to keep one layer throughout. Maybe separate buffalo and beef?
Ok, now you're going to do something that is very typical of Mexican cooking (to the extent I know anything about it). You're going to fry your spice mixture. Remember all that stuff in the blender? Well, move your head back (this is gonna spatter), and pour it all into the pan. Lower the heat, and stir for about five minutes. Now add the water, and also add - ready for this? - half a cup of good strong coffee (if you don't have coffee around when you're cooking, you can get by with a half cup of boiling water with a good tablespoon of espresso powder added. Truth to be told, that's about what I always use, and I double it). Stir this and bring it to a boil. Then, pour the stuff over your ribs. If you're using two pans, divide it of course, and do it equally.
Cover the pan or pans with foil, and put them in a preheated, 350 degree oven. You will need at least 3.5 hours for beef ribs. You may need less time for buffalo. check by seeing if the meat is coming away from the bones, after 2 or 2.5 hours. If it's close, take them out and continue with the beef.
Now, here is a step that I think is essential, and was not in the original recipe. The original recipe said "skim the fat and serve." Go ahead, try to do that. I guarantee you, you will be SWIMMING in fat from this recipe. I estimate that at least one third of the meat mass comes away in fat. If you try to skim that, you will lose your sauce, you will lose your patience, and you may very well lose your mind. So, what do you do?
Remember up above I said do it ahead of time? Hmmmmm? Well, let the stuff come to room temperature, then cover it and refrigerate it. The next day, you may be grossed out, but you will have tons of solid fat on the top of the dish, just begging you to scoop it away with a knife or spoon or something. You don't have to be a zealot here. If you spend all your time hunting down the little "globlets" of fat that escape the skimming process, you'll never get dinner on the table. You'll also notice that the fat has a decided orange color. Yup. Chili flavoring comes from oil. Oil is a fat. Fat dissolves oil. So you're taking some of that flavor with you. That's why you have to overflavor the dish at the start.
When you've cleared the fat, you will notice how soft and succulent (I love that word) the meat is. It WILL be coming away from the bones. Of course, you can't serve this cold like that - that would be gross - so put it back in the oven, with the foil cover, and reheat it for about twenty minutes.
If you are serving only beef, one large short rib is fine for a person. You would probably need about four buffalo ribs. If you combine the two meats, overfeed everyone, or offer smaller portions and seconds.
This is a very robust tasting dish. It is recommended with polenta, which is great. You could also serve it with hominy, or with that wonderful Sardinian pasta, fregola. Leftovers make a good pasta sauce, and they also make a wonderful "sloppy joe."
This is definitely winter, cold weather food. I love short ribs, but I can't imagine eating them in the summer.
They are now a tradition with us. Try them, and maybe they will become a tradition for you.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Stroganoffs
I don't remember "chafing dish culture" from when I was a child,but I'm told that there was a time where it was all the rage to make dinner in front of your guests, and that involved "the chafing dish." This big, shiny metallic object would be brought out, and you would have some kind of sterno burner underneath it. The "hostess with the mostess" would then make some kind of chafing dish supper in front of her guests. Welsh rarebit was one of those dishes. If you went to dessert, cherries jubilee was the defining one. And there was beef stroganoff.
Somehow, that dish has fallen out of favor. I'm not quite sure why. It's a good dish, it's an easy dish. Yes, it is rich, but no richer than a lot of the things that we eat, on a regular basis. And I wrote "stroganoffs" above, because we all grew up with BEEF stroganoff, but the principles are fairly simple, and you can do it with anything. I did it with veal, and I think you could do it with pork or chicken too.
You will need three pounds of stew meat. Now, for chicken, this is probably chunks of chicken breast, but for any other meat, check with your butcher, and get something good. My veal comes from a farm where the animals are free ranging, and fed on grass, so it's red, rather than white, and very lean. You should salt it, and then let it sit on paper towel to dry out for about an hour before you cook. You will also need a pound of mushrooms. Button mushrooms are traditional, but I used creminis, because I like them. Slice them fairly thickly. You also need a few shallots, chopped fine, or half an onion, also chopped fine. You also need at least a cup and a half of a "thick dairy product." Traditionally, that's sour cream, but you could use creme fraiche or fromage blanc, as I did. Final things: some olive oil, and a cup and a half of stock. Here we go.
Get a big skillet and heat up two generous tablespoons of vegetable oil. When it's hot, saute the meat until it's browned. Do it in batches, and put it aside. Now, add the onions or shallots, and saute for about a minute. Add the mushrooms. Here's where the fun begins. Mushrooms give off a LOT of water when they cook, but you have to wait. You won't believe me, but after about five minutes, the juice starts coming out and picks up all of the meat brownings. Then, the water will go off. When that happens, i.e, when the mushrooms are dry again, add the stock, and, if you like, a few tablespoons of sherry . Stir this a bit, and let it reduce away over medium heat. It will take about ten minutes. (The resulting mushrooms are a treat by themselves, by the way). Now add the dairy and stir, and then add the meat. Heat it all up, and you are DONE.
You can do this, in less than half an hour. I know because I did. And you can make it ahead, and then reheat it . You need something like sour cream or the heavier dairy products, because the other ones will "break" at high heat and give you disgusting little clods of dairy that are hardly appetizing.
The only change I would make to this, is if you were doing it with chicken, I would use chicken stock instead of beef. Beyond that, all you might want to do is add some fresh herbs at the end to brighten the flavors, because this is a very hearty dish.
The recipe I worked with called for three pounds of meat to serve four. I don't know who they're serving, but I intend to get at least six servings out of this.
Again, turning to tradition, you eat this over egg noodles. Fine and dandy. I keep on thinking mashed potatoes. How about you? What are your ideas? Any thoughts?
Somehow, that dish has fallen out of favor. I'm not quite sure why. It's a good dish, it's an easy dish. Yes, it is rich, but no richer than a lot of the things that we eat, on a regular basis. And I wrote "stroganoffs" above, because we all grew up with BEEF stroganoff, but the principles are fairly simple, and you can do it with anything. I did it with veal, and I think you could do it with pork or chicken too.
You will need three pounds of stew meat. Now, for chicken, this is probably chunks of chicken breast, but for any other meat, check with your butcher, and get something good. My veal comes from a farm where the animals are free ranging, and fed on grass, so it's red, rather than white, and very lean. You should salt it, and then let it sit on paper towel to dry out for about an hour before you cook. You will also need a pound of mushrooms. Button mushrooms are traditional, but I used creminis, because I like them. Slice them fairly thickly. You also need a few shallots, chopped fine, or half an onion, also chopped fine. You also need at least a cup and a half of a "thick dairy product." Traditionally, that's sour cream, but you could use creme fraiche or fromage blanc, as I did. Final things: some olive oil, and a cup and a half of stock. Here we go.
Get a big skillet and heat up two generous tablespoons of vegetable oil. When it's hot, saute the meat until it's browned. Do it in batches, and put it aside. Now, add the onions or shallots, and saute for about a minute. Add the mushrooms. Here's where the fun begins. Mushrooms give off a LOT of water when they cook, but you have to wait. You won't believe me, but after about five minutes, the juice starts coming out and picks up all of the meat brownings. Then, the water will go off. When that happens, i.e, when the mushrooms are dry again, add the stock, and, if you like, a few tablespoons of sherry . Stir this a bit, and let it reduce away over medium heat. It will take about ten minutes. (The resulting mushrooms are a treat by themselves, by the way). Now add the dairy and stir, and then add the meat. Heat it all up, and you are DONE.
You can do this, in less than half an hour. I know because I did. And you can make it ahead, and then reheat it . You need something like sour cream or the heavier dairy products, because the other ones will "break" at high heat and give you disgusting little clods of dairy that are hardly appetizing.
The only change I would make to this, is if you were doing it with chicken, I would use chicken stock instead of beef. Beyond that, all you might want to do is add some fresh herbs at the end to brighten the flavors, because this is a very hearty dish.
The recipe I worked with called for three pounds of meat to serve four. I don't know who they're serving, but I intend to get at least six servings out of this.
Again, turning to tradition, you eat this over egg noodles. Fine and dandy. I keep on thinking mashed potatoes. How about you? What are your ideas? Any thoughts?
Friday, January 9, 2009
The basic black dress of Italian desserts:
which is really white. I am speaking of that wonderful dessert, panna cotta. Have you had it? Did you like it? If you didn't, I bet I know why. And you can fix that. And if you do, I can teach you how to make it. Several different ways. But we're going to start with a "semi-classic" way.
"Panna cotta" means, very simply "cooked cream." In a way, it is just that. Cream, good old heavy cream, is combined with sugar, flavoring and gelatin, and then allowed to set. And that's it. It's easy.
Or is it? There is a tendency in this dessert to add too much gelatin, and to turn it into a rubbery mess. Proper panna cotta should just "shiver" on the verge between a solid, and collapsing into a plate of cream. How many times have you had it, and thought it would serve as a really good handball? More often than you care to remember huh?
Well, let's solve this problem together, using our old adage: if you want to do it right: make it yourself. This is such an easy dish to make, that frankly, there is no excuse for not having it in the refrigerator AT LEAST once a week.
Ok, maybe the calories are an excuse, but we're talking about small portions here. Unless of course you eat them all. Which I can do.
Now, we start with a basic principle of gelatin chemistry. Gelatin is, essentially, dissolved animal proteins. Yup, it comes from boiling bones. It's a collagen family member. The same stuff that is at the tip of your nose and makes it feel rubbery, or the stuff in your earlobes that makes them soft (it's not what makes them sensitive when they get nibbled. That's nerve endings, and I'll leave an explanation of that to my friend Will in his blog. ASK).
When gelatin is in powder form, it is essentially long, single strands of protein. When heated, and then cooled, it forms a network sort of like a spider web. It traps the liquid it holds in between those places where there would be "holes" in the spider web. The tighter your web, the tigher, and bouncier, the gelatinized product. The looser, the softer. Too tight? You've got a ping pong ball. Too loose, and you've got a vanilla drink.
Generally, the "rule of thumb" for making a good gelatinized custard is a teaspoon per cup of liquid. Gelatin is sold in packages that contain just about a tablespoon (more on this in a minute). So, it is very convenient to make three cups worth of panna cotta at a time. That's about 8 normal servings. You may choose to eat more than one, and I encourage you to do that.
Now, on this tablespoon thing, some years ago, Cooks magazine published a very interesting article on packaged gelatin. They found that standards of measurement were less than "precise." Sometimes, a package had less than a tablespoon, sometimes, way more. Last night, for example, the package I opened was just short of what I needed. I took a chance, and it worked. If you're doing this for the first time,though, equalize the spoonful by opening a second package and making a level tablespoon.
Pour that tablespoon of gelatin into a small pot and add two tablespoons of water (a REALLY small pot). Let it sit for a minute, whilst you pour either three cups of heavy cream, or two cups of heavy cream and a cup of half and half into a larger pot. Add 1/2 cup to 2/3 cup of sugar. This has to be to your taste. I go with the lower amount. Also add a teaspoon and a half of vanilla. Heat up the cream or cream mixture until it just begins to bubble on the edges. Take it off the heat. Then, heat up that gelatin, just until it dissolves. Pour it into the cream mixture. Then, have eight small ramekins ready, and pour equal amounts into them. Let them come to room temperature before you refrigerate them.
These need to sit overnight. If you check after two hours, you'll think you failed. Check after four hours and you'll begin to be hopeful. Check after eight hours and you'll wonder why you ever worried. Run a knife around them, put a plate over them and shake. PLOP. You got dessert.
I love a plain panna cotta as it is. YOu can have a lot of fund doing things with the panna cotta though. It is traditional to serve it with fruit purees of some kind, both underneath it and over it. Raspberry and strawberry are beautiful against its stark whiteness, as is the lovely yellow orange of mango. Of course, with mango, you begin to get away from the Italianate sense of the dessert. Kiwis DO grow in Sicily, and you will see this served with kiwis as well. So, too, with figs, or with chocolate sauce or any of a multitude of things.
My favorite way to have it, however, is how I learned it from my friend, and the chef at Bellae Vitae, Raphael. Raphael serves it with a lashing of true old balsamic vinegar. The oaky, vanilla acid notes with the sweet vanilla cream is a wonderful combination. Perhaps that's all it needs. You can add cookies, or fruit, but the vinegar works the best. You wouldn't think so, but try it.
"Panna cotta" means, very simply "cooked cream." In a way, it is just that. Cream, good old heavy cream, is combined with sugar, flavoring and gelatin, and then allowed to set. And that's it. It's easy.
Or is it? There is a tendency in this dessert to add too much gelatin, and to turn it into a rubbery mess. Proper panna cotta should just "shiver" on the verge between a solid, and collapsing into a plate of cream. How many times have you had it, and thought it would serve as a really good handball? More often than you care to remember huh?
Well, let's solve this problem together, using our old adage: if you want to do it right: make it yourself. This is such an easy dish to make, that frankly, there is no excuse for not having it in the refrigerator AT LEAST once a week.
Ok, maybe the calories are an excuse, but we're talking about small portions here. Unless of course you eat them all. Which I can do.
Now, we start with a basic principle of gelatin chemistry. Gelatin is, essentially, dissolved animal proteins. Yup, it comes from boiling bones. It's a collagen family member. The same stuff that is at the tip of your nose and makes it feel rubbery, or the stuff in your earlobes that makes them soft (it's not what makes them sensitive when they get nibbled. That's nerve endings, and I'll leave an explanation of that to my friend Will in his blog. ASK).
When gelatin is in powder form, it is essentially long, single strands of protein. When heated, and then cooled, it forms a network sort of like a spider web. It traps the liquid it holds in between those places where there would be "holes" in the spider web. The tighter your web, the tigher, and bouncier, the gelatinized product. The looser, the softer. Too tight? You've got a ping pong ball. Too loose, and you've got a vanilla drink.
Generally, the "rule of thumb" for making a good gelatinized custard is a teaspoon per cup of liquid. Gelatin is sold in packages that contain just about a tablespoon (more on this in a minute). So, it is very convenient to make three cups worth of panna cotta at a time. That's about 8 normal servings. You may choose to eat more than one, and I encourage you to do that.
Now, on this tablespoon thing, some years ago, Cooks magazine published a very interesting article on packaged gelatin. They found that standards of measurement were less than "precise." Sometimes, a package had less than a tablespoon, sometimes, way more. Last night, for example, the package I opened was just short of what I needed. I took a chance, and it worked. If you're doing this for the first time,though, equalize the spoonful by opening a second package and making a level tablespoon.
Pour that tablespoon of gelatin into a small pot and add two tablespoons of water (a REALLY small pot). Let it sit for a minute, whilst you pour either three cups of heavy cream, or two cups of heavy cream and a cup of half and half into a larger pot. Add 1/2 cup to 2/3 cup of sugar. This has to be to your taste. I go with the lower amount. Also add a teaspoon and a half of vanilla. Heat up the cream or cream mixture until it just begins to bubble on the edges. Take it off the heat. Then, heat up that gelatin, just until it dissolves. Pour it into the cream mixture. Then, have eight small ramekins ready, and pour equal amounts into them. Let them come to room temperature before you refrigerate them.
These need to sit overnight. If you check after two hours, you'll think you failed. Check after four hours and you'll begin to be hopeful. Check after eight hours and you'll wonder why you ever worried. Run a knife around them, put a plate over them and shake. PLOP. You got dessert.
I love a plain panna cotta as it is. YOu can have a lot of fund doing things with the panna cotta though. It is traditional to serve it with fruit purees of some kind, both underneath it and over it. Raspberry and strawberry are beautiful against its stark whiteness, as is the lovely yellow orange of mango. Of course, with mango, you begin to get away from the Italianate sense of the dessert. Kiwis DO grow in Sicily, and you will see this served with kiwis as well. So, too, with figs, or with chocolate sauce or any of a multitude of things.
My favorite way to have it, however, is how I learned it from my friend, and the chef at Bellae Vitae, Raphael. Raphael serves it with a lashing of true old balsamic vinegar. The oaky, vanilla acid notes with the sweet vanilla cream is a wonderful combination. Perhaps that's all it needs. You can add cookies, or fruit, but the vinegar works the best. You wouldn't think so, but try it.
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Starting from scratch: banana pudding
One of the things that "burns Annalena's buttons" more than just about anything else in the food world, is packaged pudding mix. Have you ever read the ingredients on those things? OH GOD. It's a chem lab in a package. Yes, I know they're convenient. Yes, I know they're cheap. But, folks, for heaven's sake, do you REALLY need yellow food dye in your vanilla pudding, when good eggs will give it that lovely color too? And don't you DARE tell me for a minute "well, I can get low fat and low calorie ones." Give me a break. How many dishes of low calorie pudding do you put away when you eat it? And DON'T tell me "well, just one..." if the one dish is the size of a small boat.
Pudding is easy to make. It is fast to make, and it's so much better when you do it yourself. And people DO notice the difference.
At New Year's I tried a dessert that I had heard about for years,but had never eaten: banana pudding. I STILL haven't eaten it, because I couldn't get to the buffet fast enough. And people have been emailing me asking for it for next year. And people who weren't at the party are asking can I make it again.
And I smile and want to ask "what is it worth to you?" But of course, Annalena, being the saint she is, would NEVER call in chips like that, would she? Well, it all depends.
Seriously, puddings are such a snap to make that everyone should be making them. Perhaps not everyday, but often enough, especially if you have children. This is a really good way to get some milk into them.
Here's a recipe that makes a LOT of banana pudding. Now, I call for nilla vanilla wafers. I am really of two minds on this. People tell me that it's not banana pudding without them. I cringe at adding them, but I will say that, given what people expect, well... My instincts are to just crumble up homemade cookies and use the crumbs instead, but here, I will bow to vox populi. Don't expect it to happen again.
You start with 5 cups of milk. I use whole milk. I could see using 2% milk, and people tell me it will work with 1%. All I know is that Annalena's magic worked with the full good stuff. You will also need a cup of sugar, 4 large eggs, and 2 large egg youlks. Also, a half cup of cornstarch, 2 tablespoons of butter, a really generous tablespoon of good quality vanilla extract, and those cookies. Also, have lots of bananas ready. And avail yourself of the different varieites of bananas available. I like the little red ones best.
You start by making a slurry. In a bowl, add a cup of milk, the sugar, all of the eggs and the cornstarch, and whisk this around. Put it aside for a minute.
Now, get a BIG pot and pour in the quart of milk you have remaining. Bring that to a boil at a medium heat. When that happens, get the slurry and start whisking it into the hot milk, whisking and stirring constantly. When you've stopped pouring and have a free hand, lower the heat, and keep stirring. Watch for the pudding to thicken. You'll know when it happens. There is a clear change as it picks up a sheen, and bubbles like a volcano. When that happens, get it off the heat PRONTO. Get this custard into a bowl, and add the vanilla and the butter. Stir it all together.
Now, get a big bowl, or a 9x13 tray, and pour out and spread about 1/3 of the pudding. Get your bananas, and start slicing them into the pudding. You can cut them any way you like: coins, long slices, however you like it. This is up to you. If I use different types of bananas, I use different cutting techniques for each one. Then put a layer of cookies over that. Repeat this. I like to end with a layer of cookies, but you don't have to.
This now needs to be chilled. I would suggest you let it come to room temperature, and then when that happens, cover it, and put it in the fridge . You need a minimum of 2-3 h ours, but overnight is better. The next day, the cookies will have picked up some of the liquid and the flavor and will have spread some. The whole mess is something like a trifle, but much looser.
I guess this is supposed to serve 8,but there were people at our party who would have eaten this whole recipe themselves. Keep this in mind.
Puddings always seem to be a big hit when I make them. I wonder if there is some connection to when we were kids, when pudding always seemed to make things better. Who knows? Want to feel like a kid again? Go for it
Pudding is easy to make. It is fast to make, and it's so much better when you do it yourself. And people DO notice the difference.
At New Year's I tried a dessert that I had heard about for years,but had never eaten: banana pudding. I STILL haven't eaten it, because I couldn't get to the buffet fast enough. And people have been emailing me asking for it for next year. And people who weren't at the party are asking can I make it again.
And I smile and want to ask "what is it worth to you?" But of course, Annalena, being the saint she is, would NEVER call in chips like that, would she? Well, it all depends.
Seriously, puddings are such a snap to make that everyone should be making them. Perhaps not everyday, but often enough, especially if you have children. This is a really good way to get some milk into them.
Here's a recipe that makes a LOT of banana pudding. Now, I call for nilla vanilla wafers. I am really of two minds on this. People tell me that it's not banana pudding without them. I cringe at adding them, but I will say that, given what people expect, well... My instincts are to just crumble up homemade cookies and use the crumbs instead, but here, I will bow to vox populi. Don't expect it to happen again.
You start with 5 cups of milk. I use whole milk. I could see using 2% milk, and people tell me it will work with 1%. All I know is that Annalena's magic worked with the full good stuff. You will also need a cup of sugar, 4 large eggs, and 2 large egg youlks. Also, a half cup of cornstarch, 2 tablespoons of butter, a really generous tablespoon of good quality vanilla extract, and those cookies. Also, have lots of bananas ready. And avail yourself of the different varieites of bananas available. I like the little red ones best.
You start by making a slurry. In a bowl, add a cup of milk, the sugar, all of the eggs and the cornstarch, and whisk this around. Put it aside for a minute.
Now, get a BIG pot and pour in the quart of milk you have remaining. Bring that to a boil at a medium heat. When that happens, get the slurry and start whisking it into the hot milk, whisking and stirring constantly. When you've stopped pouring and have a free hand, lower the heat, and keep stirring. Watch for the pudding to thicken. You'll know when it happens. There is a clear change as it picks up a sheen, and bubbles like a volcano. When that happens, get it off the heat PRONTO. Get this custard into a bowl, and add the vanilla and the butter. Stir it all together.
Now, get a big bowl, or a 9x13 tray, and pour out and spread about 1/3 of the pudding. Get your bananas, and start slicing them into the pudding. You can cut them any way you like: coins, long slices, however you like it. This is up to you. If I use different types of bananas, I use different cutting techniques for each one. Then put a layer of cookies over that. Repeat this. I like to end with a layer of cookies, but you don't have to.
This now needs to be chilled. I would suggest you let it come to room temperature, and then when that happens, cover it, and put it in the fridge . You need a minimum of 2-3 h ours, but overnight is better. The next day, the cookies will have picked up some of the liquid and the flavor and will have spread some. The whole mess is something like a trifle, but much looser.
I guess this is supposed to serve 8,but there were people at our party who would have eaten this whole recipe themselves. Keep this in mind.
Puddings always seem to be a big hit when I make them. I wonder if there is some connection to when we were kids, when pudding always seemed to make things better. Who knows? Want to feel like a kid again? Go for it
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Translating from chef to home cook: Ryan's sausage ragu
There is a language that professional chefs use. You can hear it, sometimes, if you sit in a restaurant close to a kitchen and hear the "shorthand" that they toss at each other. It's much more apparent, in many restaurants, when you look at what they call "the Bible." Every restaurant has a list of recipes that they go to with frequency. Even a restaurant that prides itself on a changing menu needs some consistency. Chicken stock, for example, is such a common ingredient that there must be a standard way of making it. And everyone follows that "Bible." And it will be written in shorthand, with instructions that, perhaps, only restaurant staff will understand, or "the language of the kitchen," which professionals will understand, but which you or me will need translated.
I saw this in action not too long ago, as a friend and I got a recipe from one of our favorite chefs, for sausage ragu. One of the ingredients called for was "1 qt mirepoix." Ok, now you do NOT find mirepoix in the dairy section, between the milk and buttermilk. Mirepoix is a mix of finely diced onion, carrot and celery. And there is a "classic ratio" based on weight: 2:1:1 with onions being in the lead. And note that the recipe calls for "one quart." Wait. This is solids. Why quart? Well, the reason for that is that when you're cooking in a restaurant kitchen, you do NOT have measuring cups out there. Take a look at the prep work sometime. They use those plastic containers that we get take out food in. See what I mean? There was more in the recipe that a professional chef would have known. For example, the recipe called for simmering the ingredients for 2 hours. A restaurant chef, making ragu, knows that time is a fluid concept for these things. In fact, it takes much, MUCH longer. Maybe in transcribing the recipe, someone goofed, who knows? But a professional knows these things. So when you get a recipe from a professional chef or kitchen, proceed with a bit of care, and get in touch with someone (Like yours truly), who can take the recipe and translate it into a version you can use at home.
Anyway, I adore Ryan's cooking, and his recipe was clear enough for me to work with. I'm going to present MY version of it. Ryan will give you his, if you want to try reading "Cookese." Better yet, go to Barbuto and try it. It's worth it.
Start with a pound of hot sausage meat, and a pound and a half of sweet sausage meat. You can frequently get this, without the casings, at a farmers' market pork stand, or a good butcher. If you can't, buy enough sausage, run a sharp knife down each one, and pull out the meat. That's all you need to do.
Ryan's recipe then specified "brown the meat." It didn't tell you to add fat. Let me tell you: if you try to brown sausage meat without it, you will burn the meat, your pan, and your gut. Put a few tablespoons of oil in a big pot and when it's hot, add the ground meat. Stir it around (like I told you in Marcella's beef ragu), breaking it up, just until the pink is gone. Then put it aside, leaving the fat in there.
Now get your "mirepoix." You can make this by taking two peeled onions, two carrots that you scrape, and three stalks of celery, and cutting them into chunks. Drop everything in the food processor and pulse it until it's nice and fine. Add this to the hot oil, lower the heat, and cover the pot (this is called "sweating" the mirepoix, and that's what the recipe said : sweat the mirepoix for ten minutes. Again, a professional knows what this means. Maybe you don't. Now you do).
Sweating softens the vegetables without browning them. You want that here, because you're going to cook these for a while. If they brown, you will get a sweet, or even burnt sauce.
After the ten minutes, put the meat back in the pan, and add two cups of white wine. Use a dry one, and make sure it's something you'd drink. Raise the heat and cook it off. It won't take long. Finally, add a quart and a half of chicken stock, and also a large (28-35 ounce) can of tomatoes. Before you add the tomatoes, crush the solids with your hands. (the original recipe called for tomato puree. Again, this is a standard ingredient in a professional Italian kitchen, and again, those plastic containers come out. You and I have cans. Crushing the tomatoes with your hands will do fine.
Add all of this, and add a bit of salt. Now, the recipe did NOT tell you to do that, because every professional seasons as s/he goes along. So should you. Taste as you're cooking this. Bring the whole mass to a simmer, and lower the heat. Let it bubble away... for six hours.
Yup, for six hours. Stir it every now and then, but I'm not exaggerating. What you are looking for is a texture that is sort of like what you get with pudding: you want to be able to run a spoon down the middle of the sauce, and have it SLOWLY move back to the center of the pot. Anything softer and wetter than that is too wet. Another way to tell that you're "there" is if the stuff is beginning to stick to the bottom of the pot. When that happens, take everything off the heat and let it cool.
You'll get about seven cups of ragu out of this recipe, and you will be in heaven. What you have here, is one of those "money in the bank" recipes. Seven cups of sausage ragu will sauce up to 28 - yup - 28 - portions of pasta. So, freeze a lot of it. Eat some of it right away. If you want to try something other than pasta, put it on polenta. Or, if you want the ultimate sloppy joe, toast some bread.
This is good stuff. If you go through the recipe, you'll see that yes, it IS time consuming, but again, how much work did you have to do?
It's going to be cold and rainy and snowy in the coming weeks. You'll be indoors. Set aside a day and make this. Put some food in your freezer for those days when you KNOW you're not going to be able to make dinner. A plate of this, and a salad, should make anyone happy. And if they're not, dump them.
I saw this in action not too long ago, as a friend and I got a recipe from one of our favorite chefs, for sausage ragu. One of the ingredients called for was "1 qt mirepoix." Ok, now you do NOT find mirepoix in the dairy section, between the milk and buttermilk. Mirepoix is a mix of finely diced onion, carrot and celery. And there is a "classic ratio" based on weight: 2:1:1 with onions being in the lead. And note that the recipe calls for "one quart." Wait. This is solids. Why quart? Well, the reason for that is that when you're cooking in a restaurant kitchen, you do NOT have measuring cups out there. Take a look at the prep work sometime. They use those plastic containers that we get take out food in. See what I mean? There was more in the recipe that a professional chef would have known. For example, the recipe called for simmering the ingredients for 2 hours. A restaurant chef, making ragu, knows that time is a fluid concept for these things. In fact, it takes much, MUCH longer. Maybe in transcribing the recipe, someone goofed, who knows? But a professional knows these things. So when you get a recipe from a professional chef or kitchen, proceed with a bit of care, and get in touch with someone (Like yours truly), who can take the recipe and translate it into a version you can use at home.
Anyway, I adore Ryan's cooking, and his recipe was clear enough for me to work with. I'm going to present MY version of it. Ryan will give you his, if you want to try reading "Cookese." Better yet, go to Barbuto and try it. It's worth it.
Start with a pound of hot sausage meat, and a pound and a half of sweet sausage meat. You can frequently get this, without the casings, at a farmers' market pork stand, or a good butcher. If you can't, buy enough sausage, run a sharp knife down each one, and pull out the meat. That's all you need to do.
Ryan's recipe then specified "brown the meat." It didn't tell you to add fat. Let me tell you: if you try to brown sausage meat without it, you will burn the meat, your pan, and your gut. Put a few tablespoons of oil in a big pot and when it's hot, add the ground meat. Stir it around (like I told you in Marcella's beef ragu), breaking it up, just until the pink is gone. Then put it aside, leaving the fat in there.
Now get your "mirepoix." You can make this by taking two peeled onions, two carrots that you scrape, and three stalks of celery, and cutting them into chunks. Drop everything in the food processor and pulse it until it's nice and fine. Add this to the hot oil, lower the heat, and cover the pot (this is called "sweating" the mirepoix, and that's what the recipe said : sweat the mirepoix for ten minutes. Again, a professional knows what this means. Maybe you don't. Now you do).
Sweating softens the vegetables without browning them. You want that here, because you're going to cook these for a while. If they brown, you will get a sweet, or even burnt sauce.
After the ten minutes, put the meat back in the pan, and add two cups of white wine. Use a dry one, and make sure it's something you'd drink. Raise the heat and cook it off. It won't take long. Finally, add a quart and a half of chicken stock, and also a large (28-35 ounce) can of tomatoes. Before you add the tomatoes, crush the solids with your hands. (the original recipe called for tomato puree. Again, this is a standard ingredient in a professional Italian kitchen, and again, those plastic containers come out. You and I have cans. Crushing the tomatoes with your hands will do fine.
Add all of this, and add a bit of salt. Now, the recipe did NOT tell you to do that, because every professional seasons as s/he goes along. So should you. Taste as you're cooking this. Bring the whole mass to a simmer, and lower the heat. Let it bubble away... for six hours.
Yup, for six hours. Stir it every now and then, but I'm not exaggerating. What you are looking for is a texture that is sort of like what you get with pudding: you want to be able to run a spoon down the middle of the sauce, and have it SLOWLY move back to the center of the pot. Anything softer and wetter than that is too wet. Another way to tell that you're "there" is if the stuff is beginning to stick to the bottom of the pot. When that happens, take everything off the heat and let it cool.
You'll get about seven cups of ragu out of this recipe, and you will be in heaven. What you have here, is one of those "money in the bank" recipes. Seven cups of sausage ragu will sauce up to 28 - yup - 28 - portions of pasta. So, freeze a lot of it. Eat some of it right away. If you want to try something other than pasta, put it on polenta. Or, if you want the ultimate sloppy joe, toast some bread.
This is good stuff. If you go through the recipe, you'll see that yes, it IS time consuming, but again, how much work did you have to do?
It's going to be cold and rainy and snowy in the coming weeks. You'll be indoors. Set aside a day and make this. Put some food in your freezer for those days when you KNOW you're not going to be able to make dinner. A plate of this, and a salad, should make anyone happy. And if they're not, dump them.
And now for something completely different: ceviche
So, you've had all these hearty, stewy kinda dishes, and cookies, lately. What can I tell you? This is what I'm cooking lately. Maybe it's time for something fresh?
I LOVE ceviche. I don't make it often, but I DO love it. And as I think about it, this really is the season for it. I do use an "out of season item" in that I use fresh hot peppers, but I don't have to.
There is a myth that ceviche is easy. In concept it is. In practice, it is not. Ceviche, as all of you know, is a mix of raw fish, acid, and other additives, like onions, peppers, spices, and so forth. But.... how many raw fish types are there? How many acids? How many additives? Hmmm.
I will say this: my favorite types of ceviche are simple, and I never MIX fish types. And I almost inevitably use scallops. They're nice and firm, they hold their shape in the acid, and they taste good. I DO mix citrus. If I happen to have some of Kim and Eric's seville oranges around, I use those, but if I don't, I go with classic combinations.
Ok, let's get started. Now, again, this is a dish you want to make a LOT of, because people do respond well to it. Get two pounds of day boat scallops. It's really important to do that for this dish, because if you use the treated ones, they will leak into your marinade, and you will not be happy. The scallops will probably be large. Cut them in half or quarters, whatever is more convenient to you. Put them in a bowl, and add a sprinkle of salt.
My choice of acid is to squeeze the juice of a lemon, that of a lime, and that of a navel orange, together, into the bowl with the fish. I then turn the fish into the juice, using clean hands. Then I taste the juice for saltiness. It's interesting how people assume that, because the fish is from salt water, it's salty. Don't make that assumption. These critters have incredible filtration devices built into their bodies. They push out more salt than you could imagine. You have to get it back in.
Now, for additives. For me, a sliced up red onion, a sliced up green jalapeno pepper, and some jarred, skinned red peppers are essential. Just mix them all up.
Here's the dirty little secret I didn't tell you. You have to do this the night before you want to eat it. Many people make the assumption that ceviche can "cook" in the acid on the countertop for just a few hours. It can, but the marriage is not going to work. Try to let it work for overnight to get all of the flavors to mix together. You'll be glad you did.
To serve? Well, traditionally, you pile this on some shredded cabbage or lettuce, and I'm all in favor of that. I have seen it served in a martini glass, and anything served in a martini glass sits well with me. There are restaurants, especially those where the chefs are from Peru, where ceviche is an art form (try the Peruvian CREAM ceviches for something you won't find anywhere else), where they include popcorn in the mix. Frankly, I had my doubts, but it works real well.
You can use other fish. Try to stay away from really muscular ones (I was going to say oily ones, but I realize that's a personal prejudice, since I don't care for the oily fish). Shrimp work well. So do white fish like cod, haddock, hake, and their relatives. I am not much of a fan of salmon, but I'm told that salmon with a blood orange marinade is fabulous ceviche. Mackerel would probably work real well, or bluefish, if these are REALLY drop dead fresh.
THere isn't much of a calorie in these variations, so let's put this one into the temple food category, and have it balance the coconut cookies.
Right....
I LOVE ceviche. I don't make it often, but I DO love it. And as I think about it, this really is the season for it. I do use an "out of season item" in that I use fresh hot peppers, but I don't have to.
There is a myth that ceviche is easy. In concept it is. In practice, it is not. Ceviche, as all of you know, is a mix of raw fish, acid, and other additives, like onions, peppers, spices, and so forth. But.... how many raw fish types are there? How many acids? How many additives? Hmmm.
I will say this: my favorite types of ceviche are simple, and I never MIX fish types. And I almost inevitably use scallops. They're nice and firm, they hold their shape in the acid, and they taste good. I DO mix citrus. If I happen to have some of Kim and Eric's seville oranges around, I use those, but if I don't, I go with classic combinations.
Ok, let's get started. Now, again, this is a dish you want to make a LOT of, because people do respond well to it. Get two pounds of day boat scallops. It's really important to do that for this dish, because if you use the treated ones, they will leak into your marinade, and you will not be happy. The scallops will probably be large. Cut them in half or quarters, whatever is more convenient to you. Put them in a bowl, and add a sprinkle of salt.
My choice of acid is to squeeze the juice of a lemon, that of a lime, and that of a navel orange, together, into the bowl with the fish. I then turn the fish into the juice, using clean hands. Then I taste the juice for saltiness. It's interesting how people assume that, because the fish is from salt water, it's salty. Don't make that assumption. These critters have incredible filtration devices built into their bodies. They push out more salt than you could imagine. You have to get it back in.
Now, for additives. For me, a sliced up red onion, a sliced up green jalapeno pepper, and some jarred, skinned red peppers are essential. Just mix them all up.
Here's the dirty little secret I didn't tell you. You have to do this the night before you want to eat it. Many people make the assumption that ceviche can "cook" in the acid on the countertop for just a few hours. It can, but the marriage is not going to work. Try to let it work for overnight to get all of the flavors to mix together. You'll be glad you did.
To serve? Well, traditionally, you pile this on some shredded cabbage or lettuce, and I'm all in favor of that. I have seen it served in a martini glass, and anything served in a martini glass sits well with me. There are restaurants, especially those where the chefs are from Peru, where ceviche is an art form (try the Peruvian CREAM ceviches for something you won't find anywhere else), where they include popcorn in the mix. Frankly, I had my doubts, but it works real well.
You can use other fish. Try to stay away from really muscular ones (I was going to say oily ones, but I realize that's a personal prejudice, since I don't care for the oily fish). Shrimp work well. So do white fish like cod, haddock, hake, and their relatives. I am not much of a fan of salmon, but I'm told that salmon with a blood orange marinade is fabulous ceviche. Mackerel would probably work real well, or bluefish, if these are REALLY drop dead fresh.
THere isn't much of a calorie in these variations, so let's put this one into the temple food category, and have it balance the coconut cookies.
Right....
AND YET MORE COOKIES!!!
You must think that all I do is bake cookies. Indeed, sometimes I feel that way. Having escaped the tyranny of the Xmas cookie bake, you'd think I'd leave it alone. Well, not this year. It does seem that the cookies went over extremely well - so well, in fact, that I'm making some of them over again. Hence the chocolate cookie recipe yesterday. And now, another one.
One of the puppies loves chocolate. The other, like me, could leave it alone with a frown. I made these cookies as filler for the cookie tins. He saw them, and essentially cradled the tin in his arms for about an hour before I pried them loose. I don't think of them as anything fancy, but y ou know, they ARE good.
Coconut is one of those ingredients that seems to inspire very strong love/hate feelings in people. The texture bothers a lot of people, and there may be a coconut allergy out there. Me? I could eat it everyday. So could Guy. And so could my pup. So, now that they're home (I JUST SPOKE WITH THEM. I AM ON CLOUD TEN), I can offer the chocolate cookies, and these.
You're going to need a cup and a half of sweetened, shredded coconut. I've only found one brand that does this, so you know what you're getting. Heap the container high. You won't regret it.
You also need a bit more than a cup of flour, so heap it high. Mix it with a teaspoon of baking soda and a half teaspoon of salt.
You then need a stick and two tablespoons of softened unsalted butter. Also, half a cup of light brown sugar, and a quarter cup of white sugar. Finally, an egg, a large one, and a teaspoon of vanilla.
Before you make the cookies, you have to toast the coconut. Now, you can do this in a skillet on the stove top, but it's hard. You can do it in the oven, and it's easier, but you have to watch the coconut, because it goes from toasted to burned in a blink. You spread it out on a baking sheet, on a sheet of parchment, and put it in the oven for about 5 minutes, at 375. Keep an eye on it. If it begins to brown on the edges, take it out. It's done. If you leave it too long, you will go from brown to black, even when it's out of the oven. Really, all you're trying to do is bring the oils out for flavoring. Let that mass of coconut cool, while you get to work on the cookies.
Get all of those flour type ingredients mixed together in a bowl, and then put the butter and sugar in a mixing bowl, and whip it HARD. You want it very light and fluffy. This will take about 6 minutes, which is about as long as it will take for the coconut to cool. When the butter mass is fluffy, add the egg, and then the vanilla (and I reiterate: push the mass down as you need to). Then add the flour and the coconut, at lower speed. You'll have a very shaggy looking mess, from the coconut.
These cookies are small. Measure a heaping teaspoon of dough, and roll it into a ball. Once you do that, it will be easier to do it with your hands. Lay these out, about 20 or so, on a baking sheet. You're going to get about 80 small cookies, so have plenty of sheets and parchment ready.
Bake them, one sheet at a time, for about 8 minutes. Push it to ten if you like them REALLY dark, but be careful. They burn easily. I like them slightly underdone and chewy. And if you make and bake one sheet, while you are preparing the second sheet, this will move along much faster than you think.
These are a great cookie with ice cream - ANY kind. Also, if you have any left over and they go stale, you can make a great crust for a cake, or coconut custard pie, or just crumble them over ice cream, or pudding, or something like that.
Make 'em. I want everyone to make more cookies in 2009
One of the puppies loves chocolate. The other, like me, could leave it alone with a frown. I made these cookies as filler for the cookie tins. He saw them, and essentially cradled the tin in his arms for about an hour before I pried them loose. I don't think of them as anything fancy, but y ou know, they ARE good.
Coconut is one of those ingredients that seems to inspire very strong love/hate feelings in people. The texture bothers a lot of people, and there may be a coconut allergy out there. Me? I could eat it everyday. So could Guy. And so could my pup. So, now that they're home (I JUST SPOKE WITH THEM. I AM ON CLOUD TEN), I can offer the chocolate cookies, and these.
You're going to need a cup and a half of sweetened, shredded coconut. I've only found one brand that does this, so you know what you're getting. Heap the container high. You won't regret it.
You also need a bit more than a cup of flour, so heap it high. Mix it with a teaspoon of baking soda and a half teaspoon of salt.
You then need a stick and two tablespoons of softened unsalted butter. Also, half a cup of light brown sugar, and a quarter cup of white sugar. Finally, an egg, a large one, and a teaspoon of vanilla.
Before you make the cookies, you have to toast the coconut. Now, you can do this in a skillet on the stove top, but it's hard. You can do it in the oven, and it's easier, but you have to watch the coconut, because it goes from toasted to burned in a blink. You spread it out on a baking sheet, on a sheet of parchment, and put it in the oven for about 5 minutes, at 375. Keep an eye on it. If it begins to brown on the edges, take it out. It's done. If you leave it too long, you will go from brown to black, even when it's out of the oven. Really, all you're trying to do is bring the oils out for flavoring. Let that mass of coconut cool, while you get to work on the cookies.
Get all of those flour type ingredients mixed together in a bowl, and then put the butter and sugar in a mixing bowl, and whip it HARD. You want it very light and fluffy. This will take about 6 minutes, which is about as long as it will take for the coconut to cool. When the butter mass is fluffy, add the egg, and then the vanilla (and I reiterate: push the mass down as you need to). Then add the flour and the coconut, at lower speed. You'll have a very shaggy looking mess, from the coconut.
These cookies are small. Measure a heaping teaspoon of dough, and roll it into a ball. Once you do that, it will be easier to do it with your hands. Lay these out, about 20 or so, on a baking sheet. You're going to get about 80 small cookies, so have plenty of sheets and parchment ready.
Bake them, one sheet at a time, for about 8 minutes. Push it to ten if you like them REALLY dark, but be careful. They burn easily. I like them slightly underdone and chewy. And if you make and bake one sheet, while you are preparing the second sheet, this will move along much faster than you think.
These are a great cookie with ice cream - ANY kind. Also, if you have any left over and they go stale, you can make a great crust for a cake, or coconut custard pie, or just crumble them over ice cream, or pudding, or something like that.
Make 'em. I want everyone to make more cookies in 2009
Monday, January 5, 2009
And now, for some more cookies
One of the things that I tend to forget is how much people LOVE chocolate, because, frankly, I do not care for it. One of the chocolate cookies I made at Xmas, however, provoked such a positive response that I have to post it. It's not a very easy cookie to make, because it involves a lot of steps, but the chocolate lovers of the world really like this one really a lot. So here it is. It's called a chocolate truffle cookie.
You'll need four ounces of a v ery good quality chocolate, either bittersweet, or unsweetened. You will also need two cups of chocolate chips. I use a bittersweet variety, and I think you should too. Also, you will need half a stick of unsalted butter. What you do first is chop up that four ounces of chocolate, and combine it, with a cup of the chips, and the butter in a pan. Melt that over low heat. Keep an eye on it, stir it every now and then, and just make sure it's smooth and it doesn't burn. Take it off the heat, and let it cool
In a mixing bowl, combine a half cup of light brown sugar, a quarter cup of white sugar, 3 large eggs, and a pinch of vanilla extract. Mix this up really well, getting it nice and fluffy. Stir it down occasionally if you need to.
While that is mixing, combine a half cup of flour with a teaspoon of baking SODA (always using baking soda for chocolate recipes), and a half teaspoon of salt.
When the butter is all mixed up, then take that chocolate mixture and beat that in,to a uniform color. Then pour in the flour mixture, and mix until it's just combined. Finally, stir in the last cup of chips (I bet you thought I forgot, didn't you? Annalena forgets NOTHING).
This batter is too soft to bake. You need to refrigerate it for at least three hours, perhaps overnight. I WILL tell you that it is much harder to work with as an overnight chilled batter, but I think it is worth it.
When you're ready to bake the cookies, spread parchment paper out over at least three, and preferably four, baking sheets, if you have them. These cookies bake very quickly, and while you CAN wait until your baking sheets are cool enough to re-use, I like to get them "in and out."
Ok, enough of the jokes. Let's cook.
Make SMALL balls of the batter. The best way to do this, especially if you chilled it overnight, is to use a small melon baller, occasionally dipped in water and just scoop it out. Then form round shapes with your hands, and spread them out, say 12-16 to a sheet. Bake them in a preheated 350 oven, for 8 minutes or so a sheet. NO MORE than 8 minutes. You will think they are too soft. THese are called "truffle cookies" and they should be soft. And you need to leave them alone until they are fully cooled to take them off of the sheets. They are delicate, but once they firm up, they will hold their shape.
I have seen people fight for these cookies. More power to them. I made these last night for one of the returning puppies, and I can't wait to see his face when he 's confronted with 60 or so of his favorite cookies. Again, boys, welcome home!
You'll need four ounces of a v ery good quality chocolate, either bittersweet, or unsweetened. You will also need two cups of chocolate chips. I use a bittersweet variety, and I think you should too. Also, you will need half a stick of unsalted butter. What you do first is chop up that four ounces of chocolate, and combine it, with a cup of the chips, and the butter in a pan. Melt that over low heat. Keep an eye on it, stir it every now and then, and just make sure it's smooth and it doesn't burn. Take it off the heat, and let it cool
In a mixing bowl, combine a half cup of light brown sugar, a quarter cup of white sugar, 3 large eggs, and a pinch of vanilla extract. Mix this up really well, getting it nice and fluffy. Stir it down occasionally if you need to.
While that is mixing, combine a half cup of flour with a teaspoon of baking SODA (always using baking soda for chocolate recipes), and a half teaspoon of salt.
When the butter is all mixed up, then take that chocolate mixture and beat that in,to a uniform color. Then pour in the flour mixture, and mix until it's just combined. Finally, stir in the last cup of chips (I bet you thought I forgot, didn't you? Annalena forgets NOTHING).
This batter is too soft to bake. You need to refrigerate it for at least three hours, perhaps overnight. I WILL tell you that it is much harder to work with as an overnight chilled batter, but I think it is worth it.
When you're ready to bake the cookies, spread parchment paper out over at least three, and preferably four, baking sheets, if you have them. These cookies bake very quickly, and while you CAN wait until your baking sheets are cool enough to re-use, I like to get them "in and out."
Ok, enough of the jokes. Let's cook.
Make SMALL balls of the batter. The best way to do this, especially if you chilled it overnight, is to use a small melon baller, occasionally dipped in water and just scoop it out. Then form round shapes with your hands, and spread them out, say 12-16 to a sheet. Bake them in a preheated 350 oven, for 8 minutes or so a sheet. NO MORE than 8 minutes. You will think they are too soft. THese are called "truffle cookies" and they should be soft. And you need to leave them alone until they are fully cooled to take them off of the sheets. They are delicate, but once they firm up, they will hold their shape.
I have seen people fight for these cookies. More power to them. I made these last night for one of the returning puppies, and I can't wait to see his face when he 's confronted with 60 or so of his favorite cookies. Again, boys, welcome home!
Savory and sweet: Daisy's chicken with figs
There is something rather "exotic" about mixing fruit with savory elements. Somehow, we associate those combinations with far off places, the "orient," even though that word is out of fashion now. Yet, frequently, those combinations are much closer to home and they do fool people.
At our New Year's party, I made a dish that I learned watching the wonderful Puertoriccana, Daisy Martinez. I am not going to fracture the Spanish, I'm just going to call it "chicken with figs" because that's what it is. When we served this, people thought it was Persian, or from the mideast somewhere.
Interestingly , my lamb with apricots dish IS in fact middle eastern. I do not see a link between the two cuisines, but it is possible I am missing something. I am also told, by those more versed in this cuisine than I, that this may be Daisy's fantasia on a Puerto Rican dish, but it is not Puerto Rican.
Well, if someone will not claim it, I will. This is a wonderful dish. It's wonderful for parties, it's wonderful for dinner. Yes, it is time consuming, but it's worth every minute of it.
I have changed Daisy's recipe a little, and I'll tell you how I do. Also, I will give it to you exactly how she taught me, on her televsion show.
You need a somewhat long list of ingredients. You need bacon, about a half pound. Also a quart and a half of chicken stock, three tablespoons of flour, a third of a cup of cognac or dry sherry, two carrots, two stalks of celery, and a large onion. Finally, five cloves and two bay leaves. And that's what you need for the SAUCE. Then, you will need four pounds of chicken and a pound of dried figs.
This is a recipe that makes the full amount of sauce, but half of the chicken of Daisy's recipe. I like to cook the recipe down to make a thicker, almost glazey sauce, rather than a wetter one. If you have the space, the people, and the time, then double the amount of bacon , chicken, and figs given above.
When Daisy makes the recipe, she uses a full chicken. I find that I can't cook all of the parts of the chicken to a good even degree, so I use chicken thighs. They are "finger friendly," they stand up to overcooking (a risk here), and they taste good. You be the judge of what you want. Four pounds is about twelve thighs on the bone.
Ok, here we go. First, you have to cook the bacon. I have written that I find it much easier to cook bacon if I add a little olive oil first. I prevent burning that way. And that's what you should do here. Cut a half pound of bacon into bite sized pieces, and heat up about two tablespoons of olive oil in a very wide, deep skillet. Fry the bacon at medium heat until it's crispy. It will crisp up faster and nicer, if you drain off excess fat occasionally. When the bacon is crisp, then drain it on paper towels. We'll come b ack to it.
Pour off just about all of the fat - save maybe three tablespoons, and add the vegetables, cut into irregular chunks. No fancy stuff here. Sautee them until they begin to brown. This is going to take you in excess of five minutes, but not more than ten. Now, add the flour and stir it really well. You want the white color to disappear. This will not look promising, but it's fine.
Next step, which is very important, is to take that pot off of the flame, and add the cognac or sherry. You do this to avoid burning down your kitchen. After you've added it, put the pan back on the flame, and cook the liquid away. When it's gone, add the chicken stock. Stir this around, add the bay leaves and cloves, and bring it to a simmer. Then, add some salt, and let it cook away for thirty minutes.
What you are doing here is making a variation on "sauce espagnole," which is a nightmarishly time consuming classic of the French kitchen. This simpler v ersion is quite fine.
There is, however, a simpler way to do this, if you are making the dish for people who do not eat pork. Instead of cooking bacon, cook your chicken in that olive oil until it browns. Then put that aside, and use the chicken infused fat to cook the vegetables.
If you have room on the stove to do the next step, do it while the sauce is cooking. Otherwise, wait. What you now want to do is sautee those chicken pieces. Pat them dry (REAL important here), salt them, and then brown them in another few tablespoons of fat, skin side down, until it's nice and brown. Then flip them over and cook them a few more minutes. No need to be rigorous here, because there's going to be more cooking.
While the chicken is cooking away, get the figs, cut the little tough tip off of the top, and cut them into halves, lengthwise.
You now have your chicken, your figs, and your sauce. If you did the bacon free version, return the thighs to the pan. Drain the sauce through a sieve, right over the chicken pieces. Add the figs and, if you're using them, the bacon. Bring this to a simmer, cover it, and cook it at a low heat for an hour.
You CAN, if you like a thicker sauce, take the cover off and cook it exposed for the last fifteen minutes. But if you do this, keep an eye out to make sure that things do not scorch. It is very easy to do this (trust me on that point). After the hour, your sauce will be reduced, your chicken cooked through, the figs soft, the bacon infused with the flavor, and you'll be ready to dance up a samba that is unbelievable.
Well, maybe not the samba, but you get my point.
I cannot imagine serving this with anything other than yellow rice; however, I will be serving it over spinach pasta tomorrow, as my puppies come back from a trip to Argentina. I have missed them terribly, and it will be wonderful just to be sitting opposite them and seeing THEM, rather than my memories of them, for the first time in two weeks.
This is the perfect dish for this kind of "reunion." You can make it, store it, and reheat it, so when your missing ones come back, you can spend time with them, rather than with the food in the kitchen.
The dinner will be this chicken, pasta (perhaps jerusalem artichokes if Snoops wants them), some broccoli, a salad, and an ice cream parfait of tangerine sorbet, and vanilla caramel ice cream.
And I made cookies for you boys too. Your favorites. Welcome back home
At our New Year's party, I made a dish that I learned watching the wonderful Puertoriccana, Daisy Martinez. I am not going to fracture the Spanish, I'm just going to call it "chicken with figs" because that's what it is. When we served this, people thought it was Persian, or from the mideast somewhere.
Interestingly , my lamb with apricots dish IS in fact middle eastern. I do not see a link between the two cuisines, but it is possible I am missing something. I am also told, by those more versed in this cuisine than I, that this may be Daisy's fantasia on a Puerto Rican dish, but it is not Puerto Rican.
Well, if someone will not claim it, I will. This is a wonderful dish. It's wonderful for parties, it's wonderful for dinner. Yes, it is time consuming, but it's worth every minute of it.
I have changed Daisy's recipe a little, and I'll tell you how I do. Also, I will give it to you exactly how she taught me, on her televsion show.
You need a somewhat long list of ingredients. You need bacon, about a half pound. Also a quart and a half of chicken stock, three tablespoons of flour, a third of a cup of cognac or dry sherry, two carrots, two stalks of celery, and a large onion. Finally, five cloves and two bay leaves. And that's what you need for the SAUCE. Then, you will need four pounds of chicken and a pound of dried figs.
This is a recipe that makes the full amount of sauce, but half of the chicken of Daisy's recipe. I like to cook the recipe down to make a thicker, almost glazey sauce, rather than a wetter one. If you have the space, the people, and the time, then double the amount of bacon , chicken, and figs given above.
When Daisy makes the recipe, she uses a full chicken. I find that I can't cook all of the parts of the chicken to a good even degree, so I use chicken thighs. They are "finger friendly," they stand up to overcooking (a risk here), and they taste good. You be the judge of what you want. Four pounds is about twelve thighs on the bone.
Ok, here we go. First, you have to cook the bacon. I have written that I find it much easier to cook bacon if I add a little olive oil first. I prevent burning that way. And that's what you should do here. Cut a half pound of bacon into bite sized pieces, and heat up about two tablespoons of olive oil in a very wide, deep skillet. Fry the bacon at medium heat until it's crispy. It will crisp up faster and nicer, if you drain off excess fat occasionally. When the bacon is crisp, then drain it on paper towels. We'll come b ack to it.
Pour off just about all of the fat - save maybe three tablespoons, and add the vegetables, cut into irregular chunks. No fancy stuff here. Sautee them until they begin to brown. This is going to take you in excess of five minutes, but not more than ten. Now, add the flour and stir it really well. You want the white color to disappear. This will not look promising, but it's fine.
Next step, which is very important, is to take that pot off of the flame, and add the cognac or sherry. You do this to avoid burning down your kitchen. After you've added it, put the pan back on the flame, and cook the liquid away. When it's gone, add the chicken stock. Stir this around, add the bay leaves and cloves, and bring it to a simmer. Then, add some salt, and let it cook away for thirty minutes.
What you are doing here is making a variation on "sauce espagnole," which is a nightmarishly time consuming classic of the French kitchen. This simpler v ersion is quite fine.
There is, however, a simpler way to do this, if you are making the dish for people who do not eat pork. Instead of cooking bacon, cook your chicken in that olive oil until it browns. Then put that aside, and use the chicken infused fat to cook the vegetables.
If you have room on the stove to do the next step, do it while the sauce is cooking. Otherwise, wait. What you now want to do is sautee those chicken pieces. Pat them dry (REAL important here), salt them, and then brown them in another few tablespoons of fat, skin side down, until it's nice and brown. Then flip them over and cook them a few more minutes. No need to be rigorous here, because there's going to be more cooking.
While the chicken is cooking away, get the figs, cut the little tough tip off of the top, and cut them into halves, lengthwise.
You now have your chicken, your figs, and your sauce. If you did the bacon free version, return the thighs to the pan. Drain the sauce through a sieve, right over the chicken pieces. Add the figs and, if you're using them, the bacon. Bring this to a simmer, cover it, and cook it at a low heat for an hour.
You CAN, if you like a thicker sauce, take the cover off and cook it exposed for the last fifteen minutes. But if you do this, keep an eye out to make sure that things do not scorch. It is very easy to do this (trust me on that point). After the hour, your sauce will be reduced, your chicken cooked through, the figs soft, the bacon infused with the flavor, and you'll be ready to dance up a samba that is unbelievable.
Well, maybe not the samba, but you get my point.
I cannot imagine serving this with anything other than yellow rice; however, I will be serving it over spinach pasta tomorrow, as my puppies come back from a trip to Argentina. I have missed them terribly, and it will be wonderful just to be sitting opposite them and seeing THEM, rather than my memories of them, for the first time in two weeks.
This is the perfect dish for this kind of "reunion." You can make it, store it, and reheat it, so when your missing ones come back, you can spend time with them, rather than with the food in the kitchen.
The dinner will be this chicken, pasta (perhaps jerusalem artichokes if Snoops wants them), some broccoli, a salad, and an ice cream parfait of tangerine sorbet, and vanilla caramel ice cream.
And I made cookies for you boys too. Your favorites. Welcome back home
Cooking beef the Italian way
Well, already I am breaking my resolutions. I had promised to write this on Sunday, or even Saturday. And here comes Monday, and I'm only getting around to it. Sorry kids, I was busy cooking. I will make it up to y ou. I promise.
Have you noticed that, when you look at Italian cooking, it is almost void of those big steaks that we Americans seem to be so proud of, and eat so many of? Indeed, that is true. There is only one "steak" recipe in Italian cooking, "bistecca alla fiorentina," and many people with stronger historical cooking chops than I feel that this dish is a result of the British influence in Florence. Missing their "Sunday joint," the Brits who expatriated to Tuscany, and settled around Florence, developed this enormous joint of grilled meat. It is a steak of huge proportions. Two pounds is about as small as they get. I have seen them go to 3.5 pounds.
Now, you must keep in mind that when Italians cook a steak of this size, it is intended as a meal for EVERYONE. You share. Everyone gets a few slices of the steak. There is no such thing as a two pound steak for an individual . "Tagliata" is sliced steak. You get a few slices of top quality meat, with lots of vegetables.
There IS, however, a tradition of braises. Slow cooked, using cheaper tougher cuts of meat, that become wonderful. There is a generic recipe, called "stracotto." I am not sure what the "stra" adds to the name (I shall ask my Italian teacher), but "cotto" is cooked. "Stracotto, " traditionally, is a beef roast cooked in barolo. That is fine, in Piedmont, where barolo is the "lingua franca" of wine. Here in the US, or even in other parts of Italy, where barolo can cost you a neat hundred bucks for a bottle, this isn't really what you're going to use. And fortunately, you can generalize the recipe to other red wines. The two requirements are that they have a "nose," (that is, they have some fruit and some flavor), and they have a high alcohol content.
Interestingly enough, in researching this family of variants on stracotto, no one seemed to admit of using a French wine. There were either Italian wines beyond barolo, or California wines, one of which is zinfandel.
Zinfandel has a very high alcohol content. In fact, it may have the highest alcohol content of any red wine. It certainly has the highest one for American reds. And I happened to have a started bottle of zinfandel that I had to use. So, "stracotto al zinfandel" was born. It's good. Try it.
This is another one of those recipes that requires a lot of time, but very little work. I encourage you to make it. Again, it is a dish to be shared, and during these cold months of winter, it's a good one to share.
You will need a chuck roast of about four pounds. Also, you will need onion, carrots and celery, as well as a bit of tomato or tomato paste. You will also need olive oil, butter, and beef broth. Salt and pepper, of course. Equipment wise, you will need a frying pan that can hold the roast and you will also need a heavy pot, like a dutch oven, that can go into the oven and is just big enough for the roast.
Let's get started. Turn on your oven to preheat it to 350. While that's happening , get out your food processor, and chop up, very fine, and separately from each other, an onion, two carrots, and two stalks of celery. Pour out a cup and a half of red wine, and have a can of beef stock ready.
Pour out enough olive oil to slick your frying pan and while it's heating up, salt and pepper the roast. When the oil is hot, brown it all over. This will take you less than ten minutes to do. Now put it aside, and keep the pan separate.
Put two tablespoons of olive oil, and one of butter, in that dutch oven. Put the onions in before you melt the butter and cook them at low heat until they just take on a golden color. Then add the other vegetables, and sweat them for about five minutes.
While this is happening, add the wine to that frying pan,(after you pour off the oil) and bring it to a boil, stirring up from the bottom, and let it boil for a minute. Then, put the beef in the pot with the vegetables, and pour in the wine. Add the beef stock, to 2/3 -3/4 of the way up the roast. Add either a half cup of chopped canned tomatoes, or a few tablespoons of tomato paste. Cover the pot and put it in the preheated oven. Try to turn the roast every twenty minutes, for a total of three hours of cooking.
For the first hour, you will wonder what is happening. In the second hour, the house will begin to smell wonderfully, and as you turn the meat, you will see it taking on a glazed look. In the third hour, the liquid will reduce wonderfully and the meat will become very tender.
After three hours, take the pot out of the oven, and let it cool down. I like to then slice the meat, and let it sit in the remaining sauce for a day or so, or longer. You don't have to skim fat, or anything like that. Warm it up again when you serve it, in the oven.
For this, I can only suggest polenta and some greens. It's a pretty solid winter meal. Something we all need. And ultimately, if you look at the ingredients, not too bad on your waistline. So I guess it's sort of temple food, right????
Have you noticed that, when you look at Italian cooking, it is almost void of those big steaks that we Americans seem to be so proud of, and eat so many of? Indeed, that is true. There is only one "steak" recipe in Italian cooking, "bistecca alla fiorentina," and many people with stronger historical cooking chops than I feel that this dish is a result of the British influence in Florence. Missing their "Sunday joint," the Brits who expatriated to Tuscany, and settled around Florence, developed this enormous joint of grilled meat. It is a steak of huge proportions. Two pounds is about as small as they get. I have seen them go to 3.5 pounds.
Now, you must keep in mind that when Italians cook a steak of this size, it is intended as a meal for EVERYONE. You share. Everyone gets a few slices of the steak. There is no such thing as a two pound steak for an individual . "Tagliata" is sliced steak. You get a few slices of top quality meat, with lots of vegetables.
There IS, however, a tradition of braises. Slow cooked, using cheaper tougher cuts of meat, that become wonderful. There is a generic recipe, called "stracotto." I am not sure what the "stra" adds to the name (I shall ask my Italian teacher), but "cotto" is cooked. "Stracotto, " traditionally, is a beef roast cooked in barolo. That is fine, in Piedmont, where barolo is the "lingua franca" of wine. Here in the US, or even in other parts of Italy, where barolo can cost you a neat hundred bucks for a bottle, this isn't really what you're going to use. And fortunately, you can generalize the recipe to other red wines. The two requirements are that they have a "nose," (that is, they have some fruit and some flavor), and they have a high alcohol content.
Interestingly enough, in researching this family of variants on stracotto, no one seemed to admit of using a French wine. There were either Italian wines beyond barolo, or California wines, one of which is zinfandel.
Zinfandel has a very high alcohol content. In fact, it may have the highest alcohol content of any red wine. It certainly has the highest one for American reds. And I happened to have a started bottle of zinfandel that I had to use. So, "stracotto al zinfandel" was born. It's good. Try it.
This is another one of those recipes that requires a lot of time, but very little work. I encourage you to make it. Again, it is a dish to be shared, and during these cold months of winter, it's a good one to share.
You will need a chuck roast of about four pounds. Also, you will need onion, carrots and celery, as well as a bit of tomato or tomato paste. You will also need olive oil, butter, and beef broth. Salt and pepper, of course. Equipment wise, you will need a frying pan that can hold the roast and you will also need a heavy pot, like a dutch oven, that can go into the oven and is just big enough for the roast.
Let's get started. Turn on your oven to preheat it to 350. While that's happening , get out your food processor, and chop up, very fine, and separately from each other, an onion, two carrots, and two stalks of celery. Pour out a cup and a half of red wine, and have a can of beef stock ready.
Pour out enough olive oil to slick your frying pan and while it's heating up, salt and pepper the roast. When the oil is hot, brown it all over. This will take you less than ten minutes to do. Now put it aside, and keep the pan separate.
Put two tablespoons of olive oil, and one of butter, in that dutch oven. Put the onions in before you melt the butter and cook them at low heat until they just take on a golden color. Then add the other vegetables, and sweat them for about five minutes.
While this is happening, add the wine to that frying pan,(after you pour off the oil) and bring it to a boil, stirring up from the bottom, and let it boil for a minute. Then, put the beef in the pot with the vegetables, and pour in the wine. Add the beef stock, to 2/3 -3/4 of the way up the roast. Add either a half cup of chopped canned tomatoes, or a few tablespoons of tomato paste. Cover the pot and put it in the preheated oven. Try to turn the roast every twenty minutes, for a total of three hours of cooking.
For the first hour, you will wonder what is happening. In the second hour, the house will begin to smell wonderfully, and as you turn the meat, you will see it taking on a glazed look. In the third hour, the liquid will reduce wonderfully and the meat will become very tender.
After three hours, take the pot out of the oven, and let it cool down. I like to then slice the meat, and let it sit in the remaining sauce for a day or so, or longer. You don't have to skim fat, or anything like that. Warm it up again when you serve it, in the oven.
For this, I can only suggest polenta and some greens. It's a pretty solid winter meal. Something we all need. And ultimately, if you look at the ingredients, not too bad on your waistline. So I guess it's sort of temple food, right????
Friday, January 2, 2009
And now to the temple
Here, we combine some of Annalena's favorite things: underused vegetables, soup, and olive oil.
I was asked, many times over this holiday season, about my holiday baking. Honestly, boys and girls, women and men, if I had to give up one area of cooking completely, I would give up desserts in a minute. I do NOT enjoy making desserts. I find them agonizing, a "punctuation mark" that people really do not need. I am more of a savory eater myself. But the world being what it is, dessert is a necessary.
But if I could only cook ONE type of food, it would be soup. I LOVE making soup. You can make a soup as simple as can be (my type of soup), or complex, and really, this is one of those places where, contrary to belief, you can NOT get away with poor ingredients. You can make it rich, or lean. This one is fairly lean.
Leeks, in my opinion, are underused. They are too expensive in grocery stores, they look like a lot of work, and they take a long time to cook. SOMETIMES. Yes, if you get the humongous
"caveman leeks," that could crack a skull, they will take a long time to cook, and they take some work. If you are fortunate enough to find small, or medium sized leeks, make this soup.
Leeks have almost no calories. The only calories in this soup come from the chicken stock and the olive oil. If there are two hundred calories in a portion, there's a lot. The soup has so much flavor that you won't need a lot. And it's quick.
First, you will need four cups of finely sliced or chopped leeks. That's about 8-10 small ones. How you do it , is to make two vertical cuts down each leek, at 90 degree angles to each other. That is, cut a cross in the leek. Then use your knife to mince them. It will take less time than you think. You also need - now don't let me scare you - a bouquet garni - of a stalk of celery, cut in half, a sprig of rosemary, a few sprigs of thyme, and two bayleaves. A "bouquet garni" puts all of these in a piece of cheesecloth - go buy some, and get a good one - and then ties them together. You will also need two garlic cloves that you will slice thinly, and a quart each of chicken stock and water. Finally, four tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil (Incidentally, can we put a moratorium on the acronym EVOO this year? That is the only thing, short of Ms. Ray retiring, that would make me happy). Heat the olive oil and add the leeks. Lower the heat and cook them gently until they soften. Add a pinch of salt to this. Then add the garni, the stock and water, and the garlic. Bring this all to a simmer, and let it alone for twenty minutes.
Pull out the garni ,and you're done. Leeks have such a strong, wonderful fragrance and flavor, that you may very well feel like you're eating French onion soup. That being the case, you may want to toast some bread and put some gruyere or some other type of cheese on top of it. Serve t his with something else. It's a bit of a lean dish. If you serve eight people, you've got a half cup of stock and half a tablespoon of olive oil as your big calorie contributors. So, perhaps you want to eat the whole pot yourself? I give you leave to do so.
I will be back again tomorrow, with two wonderful, hearty recipes. One is Italian, and is actually a class of recipes called "stracotto," and the other, a wonderful Puerto Rican dish from Daisy Martinez, that I do not make often enough
I was asked, many times over this holiday season, about my holiday baking. Honestly, boys and girls, women and men, if I had to give up one area of cooking completely, I would give up desserts in a minute. I do NOT enjoy making desserts. I find them agonizing, a "punctuation mark" that people really do not need. I am more of a savory eater myself. But the world being what it is, dessert is a necessary.
But if I could only cook ONE type of food, it would be soup. I LOVE making soup. You can make a soup as simple as can be (my type of soup), or complex, and really, this is one of those places where, contrary to belief, you can NOT get away with poor ingredients. You can make it rich, or lean. This one is fairly lean.
Leeks, in my opinion, are underused. They are too expensive in grocery stores, they look like a lot of work, and they take a long time to cook. SOMETIMES. Yes, if you get the humongous
"caveman leeks," that could crack a skull, they will take a long time to cook, and they take some work. If you are fortunate enough to find small, or medium sized leeks, make this soup.
Leeks have almost no calories. The only calories in this soup come from the chicken stock and the olive oil. If there are two hundred calories in a portion, there's a lot. The soup has so much flavor that you won't need a lot. And it's quick.
First, you will need four cups of finely sliced or chopped leeks. That's about 8-10 small ones. How you do it , is to make two vertical cuts down each leek, at 90 degree angles to each other. That is, cut a cross in the leek. Then use your knife to mince them. It will take less time than you think. You also need - now don't let me scare you - a bouquet garni - of a stalk of celery, cut in half, a sprig of rosemary, a few sprigs of thyme, and two bayleaves. A "bouquet garni" puts all of these in a piece of cheesecloth - go buy some, and get a good one - and then ties them together. You will also need two garlic cloves that you will slice thinly, and a quart each of chicken stock and water. Finally, four tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil (Incidentally, can we put a moratorium on the acronym EVOO this year? That is the only thing, short of Ms. Ray retiring, that would make me happy). Heat the olive oil and add the leeks. Lower the heat and cook them gently until they soften. Add a pinch of salt to this. Then add the garni, the stock and water, and the garlic. Bring this all to a simmer, and let it alone for twenty minutes.
Pull out the garni ,and you're done. Leeks have such a strong, wonderful fragrance and flavor, that you may very well feel like you're eating French onion soup. That being the case, you may want to toast some bread and put some gruyere or some other type of cheese on top of it. Serve t his with something else. It's a bit of a lean dish. If you serve eight people, you've got a half cup of stock and half a tablespoon of olive oil as your big calorie contributors. So, perhaps you want to eat the whole pot yourself? I give you leave to do so.
I will be back again tomorrow, with two wonderful, hearty recipes. One is Italian, and is actually a class of recipes called "stracotto," and the other, a wonderful Puerto Rican dish from Daisy Martinez, that I do not make often enough
I'm baaack. With days of sin and temple days: first the sin
Yes, my lovelies, I have been away for a while. Blame it on the holiday season, the rotten economy, dealing with issues with a terminally ill cat, dealing with issues as my friends and I get to know each other better, but the fact is, Annalena has been on a bit of a sabbatical. I shall try to make it up to you by doubling my entries until I make up for what has been lost.
Last year, at this time, I did a series of entries on what Nigella Lawson, wonderful woman that she is, called her "temple day" food. As she explains it, "temple days" are the days you spend making up for the excesses of one or more days before.
May I have a show of hands? Has anyone had a day or more of excess over the last three weeks. Let's not lie now.
Hmmmm. Just as I thought. My readers are shy. Well, I shall start by giving you an excuse for excess, by special request from my friend Robert. My recipe for a chocolate chestnut cake.
This cake has been in my repertoire for at least ten years. And it has won a permanent place in the dessert buffet at our "no holes barred" New Year's Day party. Indeed, it has replaced every other chocolate cake that I have ever made at that party. People love it. And lest you recoil at the thought of "chestnuts," in the finished product, they add more texture and density than taste.
Thi sis a very rich, dense cake. I first saw it made on an episode of a television show based on chefs and teachers cooking at the California Culinary Academy. It was a beautifully made show to watch, although NOT to learn from. I remember that on the episode where I saw this cake made no mention was made of quantities, temperatures, and so forth. Naif that I was, I learned later that this was to encourage people to buy the cookbook that came with the show. I do recall that finding that cookbook was one of the most frustrating incidents in my life. NEVER buy a book as an advertisement from a television show, children. You will find it on line very quickly thereafter, probably pay less, and suffer much less aggravation.
I still have the book, but I only use two recipes from it. This is one of them.
I laughed when I first read it because it calls for "leftover champagne." Uh, have any of you ever had leftover champagne? Besides, everyone knows you use leftover champagne with grapefruit sorbet (this is true. If you make grapefruit sorbet, and you "happen" to have a bit around, use it. And if you don't, when you serve the sorbet, pour some champagne around it. It is BLISS).
So, "leftover champagne." I use white wine because, after all, champagne IS a white wine, yes? No one has ever said "needs a bit more of a yeasty nose," and if they had, they would wind up with a nose that looks risen, perhaps from yeast.
The preparation for the cake is a bit of work, but the finished product is HUGE, delightful, and you will be a big hit. People will fall at your feet worshipping you and you will get marriage proposals.
Well, maybe not. But they will love you. The original recipe says this serves 16. I think 20 is more like it, especially if you use the optional whipped cream, which I never do.
Okay, let's get started.
You need a pound of really good chocolate, chopped up. DON'T try to cheat with chips. Get a block of chocolate, and start chopping with a serrated knife. I use Schaffenberger semisweet chocolate, which in my view, is as strong as most bittersweet chocolates. Adjust your choice accordingly.
This chocolate comes in 9.7 ounce blocks. Rather than try to guestimate a pound, chop up two blocks. Shred it as fine as you can. You do this by pushing the serrated knife into the chocolate at a 45 degree angle, until it's all cut. You will also need half a cup of dry white wine (actually, any white wine will do), a stick of softened, unsalted butter, a half cup of heavy cream, a pound of chestnut puree (I get mine from an Italian grocery store. Try to get it unsweetened, but if you can't, no big deal). Also, 1.5 cups of granulated sugar, .5 cup flour and six eggs.
Get a BIG pan. A ten inch springform, or a twelve inch layer cake pan, would be ideal (I've made it in both. I like the springform better). Preheat your oven to 350, and butter the pan all over.
In a small pan , combine the chocolate, the wine, and turn the heat on low. Melt them together, stirring occasionally to keep the chocolate from burning. Then put this aside to cool
Get your electric mixer going, and combine the butter, the cream and the pureed chestnuts. You will not get a completely smooth product. That's ok. Do the best you can. Then add the chocolate mixer (I suggest turning off the mixer and pouring the stuff in, then turning it back on at a low speed. It won't take much. Then add the sugar. When that's combined, add the flour, a pinch of salt (I know, I didn't say that at the top), and finally, the eggs, one at a time.
Did you notice the eggs come in last in this recipe? Isn't that odd? Wish I could tell you why.
Ok, you have a big, heavy pot of batter. Run a spatula through it to see if it's even and uniform. It should be, and if it's not, stir it a bit more. Then pour this all into your prepared pan. Put it on top of a baking sheet, especially with a springform, because sometimes they leak, and bake it for about an hour, maybe an hour and a quarter. When it doesn't jiggle at all, it's done.
Let this cool. It will crack a little. Run a knife around the perimeter, and be ready to use some strength to do that. Release the spring, and let the cake sit until you're ready to serve.
A bit of whipped cream, sweetened with powdered sugar and vanilla, or perhaps some vanilla ice cream, melted or frozen, completes this if you feel it needs completion. Again, no one has ever complained to me about this cake being less than enough.
You may not want this now, and you may be asking "why didn't you give me this recipe LAST week, Annalena, you......" Oh well. Save it for next year. Or make it for the next birthday party you have. You'll make new friends.
Last year, at this time, I did a series of entries on what Nigella Lawson, wonderful woman that she is, called her "temple day" food. As she explains it, "temple days" are the days you spend making up for the excesses of one or more days before.
May I have a show of hands? Has anyone had a day or more of excess over the last three weeks. Let's not lie now.
Hmmmm. Just as I thought. My readers are shy. Well, I shall start by giving you an excuse for excess, by special request from my friend Robert. My recipe for a chocolate chestnut cake.
This cake has been in my repertoire for at least ten years. And it has won a permanent place in the dessert buffet at our "no holes barred" New Year's Day party. Indeed, it has replaced every other chocolate cake that I have ever made at that party. People love it. And lest you recoil at the thought of "chestnuts," in the finished product, they add more texture and density than taste.
Thi sis a very rich, dense cake. I first saw it made on an episode of a television show based on chefs and teachers cooking at the California Culinary Academy. It was a beautifully made show to watch, although NOT to learn from. I remember that on the episode where I saw this cake made no mention was made of quantities, temperatures, and so forth. Naif that I was, I learned later that this was to encourage people to buy the cookbook that came with the show. I do recall that finding that cookbook was one of the most frustrating incidents in my life. NEVER buy a book as an advertisement from a television show, children. You will find it on line very quickly thereafter, probably pay less, and suffer much less aggravation.
I still have the book, but I only use two recipes from it. This is one of them.
I laughed when I first read it because it calls for "leftover champagne." Uh, have any of you ever had leftover champagne? Besides, everyone knows you use leftover champagne with grapefruit sorbet (this is true. If you make grapefruit sorbet, and you "happen" to have a bit around, use it. And if you don't, when you serve the sorbet, pour some champagne around it. It is BLISS).
So, "leftover champagne." I use white wine because, after all, champagne IS a white wine, yes? No one has ever said "needs a bit more of a yeasty nose," and if they had, they would wind up with a nose that looks risen, perhaps from yeast.
The preparation for the cake is a bit of work, but the finished product is HUGE, delightful, and you will be a big hit. People will fall at your feet worshipping you and you will get marriage proposals.
Well, maybe not. But they will love you. The original recipe says this serves 16. I think 20 is more like it, especially if you use the optional whipped cream, which I never do.
Okay, let's get started.
You need a pound of really good chocolate, chopped up. DON'T try to cheat with chips. Get a block of chocolate, and start chopping with a serrated knife. I use Schaffenberger semisweet chocolate, which in my view, is as strong as most bittersweet chocolates. Adjust your choice accordingly.
This chocolate comes in 9.7 ounce blocks. Rather than try to guestimate a pound, chop up two blocks. Shred it as fine as you can. You do this by pushing the serrated knife into the chocolate at a 45 degree angle, until it's all cut. You will also need half a cup of dry white wine (actually, any white wine will do), a stick of softened, unsalted butter, a half cup of heavy cream, a pound of chestnut puree (I get mine from an Italian grocery store. Try to get it unsweetened, but if you can't, no big deal). Also, 1.5 cups of granulated sugar, .5 cup flour and six eggs.
Get a BIG pan. A ten inch springform, or a twelve inch layer cake pan, would be ideal (I've made it in both. I like the springform better). Preheat your oven to 350, and butter the pan all over.
In a small pan , combine the chocolate, the wine, and turn the heat on low. Melt them together, stirring occasionally to keep the chocolate from burning. Then put this aside to cool
Get your electric mixer going, and combine the butter, the cream and the pureed chestnuts. You will not get a completely smooth product. That's ok. Do the best you can. Then add the chocolate mixer (I suggest turning off the mixer and pouring the stuff in, then turning it back on at a low speed. It won't take much. Then add the sugar. When that's combined, add the flour, a pinch of salt (I know, I didn't say that at the top), and finally, the eggs, one at a time.
Did you notice the eggs come in last in this recipe? Isn't that odd? Wish I could tell you why.
Ok, you have a big, heavy pot of batter. Run a spatula through it to see if it's even and uniform. It should be, and if it's not, stir it a bit more. Then pour this all into your prepared pan. Put it on top of a baking sheet, especially with a springform, because sometimes they leak, and bake it for about an hour, maybe an hour and a quarter. When it doesn't jiggle at all, it's done.
Let this cool. It will crack a little. Run a knife around the perimeter, and be ready to use some strength to do that. Release the spring, and let the cake sit until you're ready to serve.
A bit of whipped cream, sweetened with powdered sugar and vanilla, or perhaps some vanilla ice cream, melted or frozen, completes this if you feel it needs completion. Again, no one has ever complained to me about this cake being less than enough.
You may not want this now, and you may be asking "why didn't you give me this recipe LAST week, Annalena, you......" Oh well. Save it for next year. Or make it for the next birthday party you have. You'll make new friends.
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