Greek Shrimp & Rachel Ray

In December, I entered a contest on Philly.com to win tickets to see Rachel Ray speak at the Free Library.  It was  a free event, but when higher profile people like a Food Network celebrity come, there are long lines and it is unlikely you will get a seat unless you are willing to get there really early and stand and wait. I figured if I by chance won the tickets, it would be worth going to.

I was completely surprised when I got a text saying I had won, and that a guest and me would have the chance to meet Rachel at a small reception before. Entry to the contest required an original, quick and easy recipe.  I used a recipe I refer to as “Greek Shrimp”.

 Excuse my hair, it was unseasonably rainy/humid that night. Rachel looks great, mais oui!

Rachel is high energy and goes a mile a minute on and off camera. It was super neat to meet her, and I enjoyed listening to her speak. My roommate (who I brought as my guest) and I were both given a copy of her latest cookbook, My Year In Meals. Rachel’s husband was also there, and although I have zero marriage experience and therefor little room to comment, they seemed like true “partners”.

I would like to think this recipe is “original”, but I’m sure there is a near exact version of it out there somewhere. It’s absolutely a recipe you can make “to taste”. If you want it hotter, add more red pepper flake, or maybe some chili oil. If it’s summer, and your basil plant is brimming, use basil instead of or in addition to oregano. Skip the garlic if you don’t like garlic.  Some chopped roasted red pepper might be a nice addition, too. Even better, if tomatoes are in season, use fresh tomatoes!

I’ve sung the praises of Whole Foods Naked Chicken already, but I also love their frozen cooked shrimp that you scoop out yourself. I’ve actually gone in and scooped out a single portion. They can be thawed quickly in a Ziploc under running water, and have never had that off, fishy flavor I’ve experienced with other precooked, frozen seafood.  My only suggestion is to be careful when reheating them, whether it is in a sauce or by sauté, because they are already cooked, and it’s all too easy to overcook shrimp.

If you have the time, you can put the shrimp and sauce with the feta on top in individual portions (like little crocks) into the oven under the broiler. The crust that forms on the feta is outrageously good, and it only takes a minute or two. Individualized portions also make a really nice presentation, and your guests can sop up the tomato sauce from the bowl with nice, crusty bread. Sprinkle with some chopped, fresh herbs for some additional color at the end, and don’t forget a drizzle of olive oil.

Greek Shrimp (serves 4)

1/4 cup olive oil

2 cloves garlic, chopped

pinch of red pepper flakes (or more if you like it hot)

1 lb. shrimp (16-20 count), peeled (tail can be left on or off)

1/3 cup ouzo (white wine, or vermouth also work well)

1 28 oz can chopped tomatoes (pref. san marzano)

3 tbs fresh oregano, chopped

8 oz. feta, crumbled

chopped fresh parsley, to garnish (optional)

Peel shrimp and season with salt and pepper. Heat oil in frying pain over medium-high heat. Sauté the garlic and red pepper flakes for about 30 seconds. Add shrimp, and cook for about 2 minutes, until pink. Remove shrimp from pan. Deglaze the pan with alcohol, and bring liquid to a simmer, for about a minute until slightly reduced. Add tomatoes and oregano, reduce heat, and simmer for 15 minutes, until sauce has reduced. Season with salt and pepper to taste, remembering that the feta will add some saltiness. Add the shrimp back into the pan until heated through. Divide the shrimp and the sauce into 4 portions, and sprinkle with crumbled feta and parsley.

Serve with hunks of crusty bread, or over orzo. Enjoy!

Grocery Store Frosting

My favorite person to sit next to at a birthday party is the person that doesn’t like cake frosting. Ideally, they aren’t a complete stranger, and offer to give me the frosting they don’t want to eat, but the point is, I love frosting. I also love cake. In fact, birthday cake makes my top five favorite foods.

In my family, we fought over who got the flower. You know, the icing flowers that are piled on to the four corners of the cake, to make it “classy”. For some reason I always thought that the pink, purple or blue frosting that had been piped into the shape of a rose tasted the best.

Buttercream is one of the simplest frostings to make. It can be as simple as two ingredients, butter and powdered sugar.  Even with just three ingredients, either vanilla or powdered cocoa, you can have a distinctively vanilla or chocolate buttercream.  Although I cannot deny that buttercream is absolutely delicious, what I really crave in a frosting is something lighter and fluffier; that sickeningly sweet, neon colored stuff that you can (or so I thought) only find at a grocery store bakery.

For years, whenever my birthday came around, I would request a store-bought cake. Not one of those $400-$500 Cake Boss style ones, covered in fondant and 18kt gold petals, but one of those  $9.99 ones you pick up off a shelf in the grocery store and pass back to the baker to pipe a name onto.  A Baltimore grocer, Graul’s, has my favorite.

Side note: Have you ever watched one of those cake shows and been completely disgusted by how much the cakes/fondant get handled? I’m sure they practice excellent food safety, seeing as they are on camera, but it still skeeves me out.

It finally occurred to me that I could probably make what I’ve always referred to as “grocery store frosting” at home.  Naturally I turned to the interwebs for help and in my first Google search for “grocery store frosting” I found my recipe.   The best part of finding the recipe was reading the reviews, and discovering there are other grocery store frosting enthusiasts out there. Most people look at me disgusted when I describe my passion for grocery store frosting, but the reviews confirmed I am not alone. 

 RAYvens cupcake w/ grocery store frosting

This recipe makes a lot of frosting, but it also keeps well, unrefrigerated even, in an airtight container. I lucked out recently and had three occasions to make cupcakes for within a week of one another, the Superbowl, a friend’s birthday, and my roommate’s birthday, so I used it for all three and none went to waste.  I always add a lot of vanilla, which makes it extra tasty.

Grocery Store Frosting

1 cup shorting

½ cup butter

1 ½ tbs vanilla (I add more like 2-3 tbs)

2 lbs confectioner’s sugar

1/8 tsp salt

4 tbs water (possibly a few extra)

In stand mixer, combine shortening, butter, vanilla, and water.  Add the sugar and salt and beat until well mixed. At this point, you may also need to add a couple extra tbs of water (make sure to add a little at a time, as you can always add more, but can’t take away). Turn mixer to highest speed and beat for 10-15 minutes.

Chocolate Dulce de Leche Bars

For someone that prefers cooking to baking, I do a lot of baking. One reason for this is because I love sweets. I often prefer making my own sweets to store bought because I know exactly what goes in them.   I try to avoid eating sweets that I do not deem “worth it”. I will turn down Oreos in anticipation of one REALLY GOOD homemade chocolate chip cookie. Oreos are delicious, but I would much rather have something homemade.

A lot of the baking I do is for others and entertaining. Bar cookies are great for entertaining because they can be cut up into one-bite squares that are easy to pick up and munch on, no extra plates or utensils required. Also, if you are with a group where people are watching what they eat, the one-bite squares provide the perfect end of meal sweet fix without being too calorific.  Of course, four or five one-bites adds up to one large dessert portion, but that’s up to the eater.

It can also be fun to put out a variety of little bites, perhaps make a batch of lemon bars, and a batch of something chocolate-y. If you volunteer to bring a dessert, small bites may be a good idea if you don’t know what others are bringing. They are easy to pack and transport, especially if you make them in a 9x13 with a lid.

Recently, I made a bar cookie with a shortbread cookie bottom and chocolate dulce de leche fudge top. I made my own dulce de leche because I didn’t feel like driving to Super Fresh, and Whole Foods didn’t stock it.  Making your own dulce de leche is pretty simple. Remove the wrapper from the can of sweetened condensed milk and place the can in large pot of simmering water. Make sure the water covers the can, and allow the can to simmer for about two and a half hours.  Check on it every half hour or so to make sure water is covering the can. You don’t really know it’s done until you open the can, but two and a half hours generally works. Allow the can to cool before opening.  You can also just buy a can of dulce de leche; most grocery stores have it.

Once they cooled, and before I sliced these, I sprinkled these with sea salt. I would definitely recommend doing this.  

My supper club enjoyed these, and I would definitely make them again.

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Chocolate-Dulce-de-Leche-Bars-242874

Note: I didn’t have an instant read thermometer, so I just judged when I thought the fudge mixture was  hot enough based on pulling the spoon through the mixture and seeing the tracks. It was pretty obvious.

Mac and CHZ

November 2012

My brother in law, T, is good for a lot of things. Number one, he keeps my sister, C, in line. Number two, he owns a meat smoker and knows how to smoke meat. He will tell you it’s not exactly rocket science, but I’m sure if I tried to smoke meat, whatever area I chose to do it in would quickly turn into a warzone. I’m totally comfortable with the grill, but a meat smoker is a whole other animal that I will leave to the experts and enthusiasts a la T.

I gather with C, T, and T’s mother, S one Sunday eve in October for a pulled pork feast. We figured it would be some one of the last chances to use the smoker as it is clearly an outdoor activity, and a most of the day outdoors one at that.  I’ve seen T up at 6 am in late January to get meat in the smoker and cooking, however, so the smoker is actually a year-round utility.

S made cowboy baked beans and cole slaw, and I made mac and cheese. C was on dessert duty. I think we all agreed by the end that it was one of the best meals we had put together to date. Everything just tasted so good together. Calorically, we each probably only needed a pork sandwich with a bit of cole slaw, but how could we deny our bellies the assortment of sides that naturally come to mind when we think smoked bbq?  

I’ve made mac and cheese so many times, and each one, it’s a little different. I have a couple different recipes I like to use, depending on the season. In the spring and summer, I tend to use a recipe that involves sour cream.  I started doing this because sometimes it was simply too hot to have multiple things on the stovetop and the oven going all at once.

http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Southern-Style-Macaroni-and-Cheese

In the fall and winter, I make it with a béchamel sauce.  There are lots of heavy ingredients in the Southern Style mac and cheese, but it still somehow seems lighter than the béchamel recipe that is rich, but equally delicate. I don’t even follow a recipe at this point when I make it, but this recipe is where I started when I first made it.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/grown-up-mac-and-cheese-recipe/index.html

The critical part of both of these recipes is using really good cheese. There is simply no substitute! Extra-sharp, aged cheddar is a must, or throw in some smoked Gouda, imported Italian cheese, or your favorite cheese you use to impress dinner guests.

When I made it for this dinner, I used a combination of smoked Gouda and extra sharp cheddar.  I also grated up the rest of a nice hunk of Parmesan from DiBruno that was in my cheese drawer.  I came up with the combination by sorting through the pile of odd bits in the cheese cooler at Whole Foods. There were some gems in there, and the sound of smoked Gouda in mac and cheese with smoked pork sounded like a plate of smokey delight. 

I occasionally lighten these recipes up, ie skip the heavy cream, use half and half, or just use whole milk, but I don’t think compromises should be made on the cheese. 

Brown Bread

September 2012

I understand Ireland is not known for fine dining and cuisine, but my time there proved to be some of the most fulfilling in terms of culinary indulgence.

Warm bowls of seafood chowder, succulent pints of Guinness, sharp cheddar cheeses, juicy 3 am kebabs (mind out of the gutter, now), my semester abroad was full of culinary delight, and I didn’t have to travel to Paris every weekend to find it.   Rather than worrying about whether or not my afternoon snack had the correct balance of proteins and carbs to pull me through to dinner, I shamelessly purchased Cadbury bars and washed them down with cups of strong tea. I scoured the aisles of Marks and Spencer for dessert-like yogurts, and unique biscuit varieties. I regular popped into Butler's to try a new truffle, and a cup of rich, creamy hot chocolate.  I followed up treadmill sessions at the gym with a pint and bag of crisps at the student bar next door. 

The food I long for most from my time abroad, however, is the bread---the brown bread to be precise. There are very few things as delightful as a warm slice of Irish brown bread, slathered in Irish butter and jam.  I didn’t bake any myself while I was over there, because why would I? McCambridge’s Brown Bread was everywhere, and probably the best store-bought bread outside an actual bakery I have ever had in my life.

No matter what I ate in Ireland, chowder, full breakfast, a curry, if there was brown bread and butter served along with it, it received my undivided attention. The morning I left to fly home, in the midst of tears and one of the most horrendous hangovers of my life, I experienced temporary euphoria when I realized they sold packages of McCambridge’s in duty free, and I bought every last one in the shop.  I  bought myself a few more weeks of heaven to ease myself back into American life.

If you are ever in Galway, I strongly encourage you to take a day trip out to Kylmore Abbey.  I got my brown bread recipe from a cookbook that is a collection from the kitchen at Kylemore Abbey.  I actually purchased it at a gift shop on the Aran Islands, but when we visited the Abbey and ate there, it was scrumptious. Those nuns sure know what they are doing in the kitchen.

The trick to make this extra tasty is to add a handful or two of whatever cereal you have around. I usually have some sort of muesli and cornflake combination, which works perfectly, but I think most fruit and nut/crunchy cereals would work. I don’t think if I would throw in Lucky Charms and expect the same results. I got this tip from Mary, a B&B owner, who made the best brown bread I had. 

I made the brown bread this last time as a part of a full Irish (or English) breakfast I made at home on weekend in honor of the Olympics.  I would like to make it more often just because.

Kylemore Abbey Traditional Irish Brown Bread

Ingredients

450g 1 lb 4 cups white flour

450g 1lb 4 cups wholemeal flour (whole wheat)

2 tsp bread soda

2 tsp salt

2 oz margarine

4 cup wheat bran

1oz wheat germ

20z oatmeal (old fashioned, not quick cooking)

2 eggs (sometimes I throw in an extra)

2 tbsp golden syrup (molasses works)

1 litre buttermilk

Method

Sieve the white flour wholemeal flour bread soda and salt into a bowl Add to the bowl any wholemeal flour that has not gone through the sieve Rub in the margarine Add the bran wheat germ and oatmeal and mix well Beat the eggs golden syrup and the buttermilk together add the liquid to the dry ingredients and mix to a loose dough Put into two 900g 2 lb well greased loaf tins pans and bake in a preheated warm oven 170c 325 gas 3 for 55 mins

Biscuits

My recent trip to Nashville has put biscuits on my mind.

I went to visit my friends M and M, who are expecting! Hanging out with a pregnant woman is wonderful because they love to eat and M was certainly not the least bit fussy about what we ate. We kicked off the weekend at Loveless Café, a Nashville institution, and also a personal favorite of M & M’s.  We ate lots of biscuits, on top of ordering regular breakfasts. 

Loveless is famous for their biscuits, as well as their country ham which I couldn’t resist ordering a side of, and you can even buy the mix in the airport. I thought about doing this, but then I thought about just how simple it is to make biscuits from scratch, and questioned why I don’t do make them more often. I love eating baguette aka white bread in the morning, so why not substitute crunchy, chewy baguette with a light, flaky biscuit every once in a while?

I also thought about some of my favorite biscuit recipes.   Biscuits made with crème fraiche, root vegetable potpie topped with sweet potato biscuits, sausage gravy and biscuits, biscuits with strawberries and cream---the list goes on. What I really love are Popeye’s biscuits. I think they coat them in crack.

We also had lunch at one of M’s favorite spots from college, and of course, I just had to get dessert when I saw this beauty:

The icing was called “beetroot icing” and the cake was buttermilk cake.  The icing didn’t taste at all like beetroot; it was pretty cream-cheesy, so I think beetroot was used pretty much just to get the electric pink color. The cake was super moist, and reminded me of carrot cake minus the spices.  I had a really nice, healthy, chopped salad, so the slice of cake was in order.  M helped me a little, too.

I want to share this recipe for biscuits, because it’s my favorite “special” biscuit recipe.  I love regular, old buttermilk biscuits out of the Joy of Cooking, but these are just a little different.

http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/creme-fraiche-biscuits

Supper Club

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Being young and single is an interesting time for a motivated chef. As much as I love and want to cook, I don’t always have people to cook for, and I can’t afford to constantly entertain larger groups.  I also certainly don’t always have the time or energy. I often have weeknight obligations, and if I get home from work late, pouring a bowl of cereal becomes an effort.

I began formulating an idea to form a “Supper Club” in the summer. My initial ideas were ambitious, developing theme menus, formal dining set-ups, coordinating every dish, but eventually I settled that I would just throw the idea out to my girlfriends by inviting a bunch of them over for dinner.  We picked a date the majority of us could meet, invited a few extra friends from our respective networks, I swiffered my apt floors, lit some candles, put out some cheese and crackers, crudités and dip, and we gathered. 

I made a big pot of chicken and dumplings from a recipe I found on williamssonoma.com, one of my favorite resources for shopping and meal planning. It was late September and beginning to feel like fall, so I chose something with apples and apple cider vinegar.  This recipe also caught my eye because it had dill, and I love dill, especially dill pickles.  I used boneless thighs and breast because I knew we wouldn’t be sitting at a table and it would be difficult to cut meat off the bone balancing plates while sitting on the couch. The night before I had done a Passover dinner with my sister, C and brother in law, T, so I was able to repurpose a pumpkin dessert I had made for that.

http://www.williams-sonoma.com/recipe/chicken-fricassee-with-dumplings.html

The real star of the show, however, was a Pinterest dessert a friend of friend brought.  B wrapped chocolate chips in crescent roll dough and baked them off---divine.

At the end of the dinner we all agreed to keep our “Supper Club” up, and a few weeks later gathered at the home of a few of the girl’s in our group for a lemony shrimp pasta.  We celebrated a second Thanksgiving together in November, and in January gathered twice, once for another delicious shrimp dish with feta, and a second time, a smaller group of us met for some of the best pizza in Philadelphia, Tacconelli’s. 

Second Thanksgiving Plate!

We are meeting tonight for fajitas. E, the hostess, is a vegetarian, so while she will prepare a vegetarian fajita option, K volunteered to take care of chicken for meat eaters. I am bringing a dessert, M is bringing an avocado salad, and others will be providing plenty of wine and maybe a few other treats.

I am sure plenty of groups of women do this all over the country, at all different ages, and in all sorts of cities and suburbs. I like to think, however, that our group is special, and I’m sure if you have a “Supper Club”, you feel the same about yours. I encourage everyone to try to do this, whether it is with a few friends, a lot of friends, coworkers, or family members. 

The important thing is that is a chance to share embarrassing stories, drink a lot of wine on a weeknight, and eat some really tasty food.  I don’t think anyone can say no to that.

Enchiladas Suizas

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January 2012

When I saw this recipe, it immediately appealed to me because it called for store bought rotisserie chicken. I love using rotisserie chickens.  Not that it is all that difficult to drizzle some olive oil, salt and pepper over a whole chicken and stick it in the oven myself, but rotisserie chickens have proved to be lifesavers in several situations and using them eliminates multiple steps.

I like to use the “Naked Chicken” from Whole Foods as it has no seasoning. In fact, I’m not even sure they put olive oil on it.  The nakedness of it allows me to dress it up however I like and not worry about any added flavors not playing nicely with whatever my culinary intentions are. I purchased one with seasoning at Acme once and it was actually really tasty in the chicken salad I made, but I like the Whole Foods one best.

When I got to Whole Foods, I found that whole chickens were actually on sale and $4.00 cheaper than the Naked Chickens. In an attempt to be thrifty, and after I convinced myself I would be totally willing to find multiple uses for the whole chicken, ie make homemade stock, I purchased the whole, uncooked chicken.

Fast-forward to the day I was to make the enchiladas and I found myself with no desire and/or time to cook the chicken.  I was coming back from a long day of shopping and simply could not be bothered. I stopped and picked up a rotisserie chicken and stuck the whole chicken into the freezer. 

These enchiladas were not my mother’s enchiladas.  First off, they were green, and any memories I have of my mother’s enchiladas are red. Second, they involved crème fraiche and Emmental cheese. I was intrigued by the recipe’s lack of “a can of enchilada sauce” and “shredded cheddar cheese”.  I’m also a total sucker for crème fraiche as well as any sort of Swiss cheese. 

I took the time to fry the corn tortillas before wrapping up the filling in them.   I worked at a Mexican restaurant in college and I don’t remember ever seeing them do this when they made enchiladas, but it certainly made the tortillas more pliable. I also toasted whole cumin seeds and ground them up myself because I didn’t have any ground cumin. I think toasting your spices always helps, but there were other flavors that took center stage in this recipe besides the spices.

I brought these over to a friend’s house. We baked them off, she made a salad, and we got to enjoy Girls on HBO with bellies full of green, ethnic confusion.  These enchiladas tasted even better the second, third, and fourth time I ate them. Yup, I can eat things multiple times and not grow tired of them. I don’t know if it’s a skill I’ve developed or a natural gift, but it certainly helps if you are a single that likes to cook large pots of things, but don’t always have people around to feed.

http://www.foodrepublic.com/2012/03/09/enchiladas-suizas-recipe-chicken

Potato Soup

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December 2012

Hello, my name Suzy. My last meal contained approximately 376 calories. I am a calorie freak.

I am neurotic about calories, calorie counting, and the nutritional value of what I put into my body. I have made an effort in the past year or so, however, to come to terms with my body, as well as just NGAF.  I believe the root of my obsession, besides coming from my own neurosis comes from the fact that I love food and all parts of food.  I love the science, where it comes from, how it’s made---and this includes how many calories are in things and what sorts of nutrition different foods provide.

I have also always been an athlete. I know that food is fuel, and you need to intake a certain balance and amount to maximize performance. As a ten year old at swim meets, I thought this meant a steady intake of pixie sticks and nachos had to be maintained throughout the 3 ½ hours before my 30 second race if I wanted to think about placing. As a college athlete, my food awareness turned into the harsh realization that Natty Light is not the correct carbohydrate to fuel 6 am five mile runs, and you never really burn off that Wawa turkey hoagie you eat at 3 am.

Most recently, I have made an effort to be more in tune with the seasons and changing up my diet according to the seasons.  This is as simple as buying whatever produce is on sale, because hey, they is more of it, so Whole Foods marks it down because they have more to get rid of. Or, yea, it’s the summer, I’m in a bathing suit all weekend, better have a salad for lunch.  

It’s been freezing out and I’m coming to terms with the fact that my body is craving meat and potatoes. And cheese. And bread. I don’t want berries with low-fat yogurt, or nice a piece of grilled fish. I want something rich, something warm. I have to walk .8 miles to the train station in thirty-degree weather, fill me up!

This past weekend I went with C and C’s mother-in-law, S, to German and Latvian Christmas bazaars. We ate lunch at the Latvian one, and it was incredible, hot dog, bratwurst, sauerkraut, potatoes, mustard, brown bread, and a beer, just what we needed on a blustery Saturday afternoon.  We were inspired to recreate the meal ourselves, and after a trip to Krakus Polish market in Port Richmond, we were all set up. I volunteered to make potato soup as a starter.

S Feeling overwhelmed at Krakus

The recipe is Pennsylvania Dutch and has been in my mother’s family for a long time. One of my most distinct memories of eating it is from high school. I had a long, awful basketball practice followed by SAT prep. I asked my mom to bring me something for dinner in-between and she brought me a can of Coca-Cola and a Tupperware of potato soup. I was so mad. Sixteen year old me wanted a fountain soda and grilled chicken sandwich from McDonald’s. I sat down begrudgingly at my desk in SAT prep before class and realized it was going to be the soup, or a stale pop-tart from the vending machine. The soup transformed my evening, and I had another bowl when I got home that night.

The best part about this soup is the rivels, or dumplings. I always add extra, and try to drop in a few extra big ones, but not too big. It’s also fairly light because you use milk, not cream. The recipe below is the original recipe, as my great aunt and great grandmother wrote it. Bring a Tupperware container of this to someone you love.

POTATO SOUP

Cube one potato/person

Chop celery and onions

Add big hunk of butter

Cover with water and cook until potatoes done and water cooked down.

Add one cup of milk/person

Rivels – Beat one egg and add to one cup of flour. Mix with fork or hands. Different size rivels are fine, just no big globs. (Double if making big pot)

Bring soup to boil and drop in rivels. Boil hard to cook rivels. Stir so it doesn’t scorch on bottom.

Salt and pepper to taste

Sherry Almond Trifle

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December 2012

I’ve always been interested in food. I come from a family where Sunday dinners always include double digit guests, more than one main course option, and nothing store bought. Most of my best memories include some sort of meal.

When I first started cooking, I stuck mostly to baking.  I liked anything that involved using the KitchenAid stand mixer, and my mother always had box mixes of something around for last minute sweet treat needs, so I started with those.  Ultimately, I received multiple bans from my mother’s kitchen for the messes I would leave behind, and I didn’t really get serious about cooking until later in college when I had a kitchen in my apartment at school.

Things really picked up when I studied abroad and had to do all my own grocery shopping and meal planning.  I had a specific budget, but I really wanted to try to cook dinner each night as I had plenty of time during the week seeing as I didn’t have lacrosse practice or a part-time job to interfere. The first couple weeks, I ate really well.  I got special cheese at the cheese monger, unique jarred sauces at the boutique grocery on high street, fresh fruits and vegetables at the farmer’s market.

By the end of the semester, I had decided my grocery allowance (thanks Mom and Dad) was better spent on other things (ie. alcohol and weekend trips) and I relegated myself to a balanced and economical diet of porridge, beans on toast, and iceberg lettuce. Regardless of the lack of joie de vivre in the kitchen in the final six weeks or so, my time abroad ignited an overall interest in food and cooking that would continue when I returned home.

One of the first “complicated” dishes I made was a traditional English trifle. It was Christmas, perfect time for trifle, and I was influenced by my surroundings the previous four months. I know it’s not PC to say my stay on the Emerald Isle inspired me to make an English dessert, but it did, so bugger off.

   

Boozey desserts are always excellent, and this one is no exception. I have made it every Christmas since, with some success and some failures in the process. One year I didn’t cook the custard long enough, so it never set, and the finished product was sort of a soupy, yet tasty, mess.  I over baked the sponge cake, which made it crumbly, and very difficult to roll up---although you couldn’t tell once it was all put together. Another year, I burnt the praline almonds twice before I got it right.

My biggest recommendation in making this is to do it in steps. You can, for instance, make the custard and sherry syrup the day before you make the cake, then make the cake and put it all together the day you intend to serve it. I have made it all in one day, but you have to make sure you get an early start.  The best part about making this is licking the saucepan and wooden spoon after you make the custard. Nothing beats warm custard.  

http://www.gourmet.com/recipes/2000s/2008/12/almond-sherry-christmas-trifle

Pastitsio

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December 2012

Food is one of the greatest gifts we can give to one another.  We literally cannot live without food.  Whether we make a donation to Philabundance, or surprise a friend with a cake pop when we know they are having a bad day, food can be the most joyous experience we pass on to another person.

Because I am passionate about food and cooking, it can be a very intimate thing for me. No, I don’t exactly feel intimate when I heat up leftovers and eat them at my desk at work, but in my eyes, food is one of the best and most personal offerings I can make another person.  I am very confident in my cooking skills and I try to be particularly thoughtful when preparing food for others.  This allows me to know that if I am giving food as a gift, it is something truly genuine.

Being into food and cooking at my age also brings up lots of discussion, particularly amongst nosey relatives, as to why despite my skills in the kitchen, I cannot lock down a man. I get it--- the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach--- but like I said, cooking for someone is very intimate and I am not going to put out for every stray that comes to the screen door.  I mess things up all the time in the kitchen! I drink too much while I’m cooking! My eyeliner runs! I sweat a little! I curse! A lot! I digress…

Recently, as a gift to my sister for her birthday, I offered to provide the food and cook for a dinner party she would host for her friends. I asked her what she wanted me to make, and she requested Pastitsio, a Greek lasagna.

The great thing about Pastitsio is that it can be prepared a day in advance and then cooked the day of.  Although preparation takes several hours, and is fairly messy, it is worth it for this dish. I made two pans of Pastitsio, a big salad with pears, goat cheese, and walnuts, and Galaktoboureko for dessert. 

Seeing as my sister, C, is a newlywed and in the full throes of nesting and desiring lots of home goods, there were lots of gift options, but I felt like doing this was the best gift I could give.  C is also much better at picking out small, unique prezzies than I am, so this figured out to be one big gift I could give her around the holidays to make up for all the things she had surprised me with throughout the year.  

I used a combination of ground beef and lamb, and also extra nutmeg and cinnamon. I have actually never used Kasseri cheese in this, because I can never find it, and most recently used Mozzarella as a substitute. In the past, I have used Puerto Rican soft cheese, which I though was the best, but I think any semi-soft cheese, will do.  I used about a cup of whatever semi-soft cheese in the béchamel then Parmesan on top, like the recipe calls for.  I never cut the fat when I make this ie use whole milk, heavy cream, the works. Finally, I do this in a lot of recipes, but I like a combination of fresh oregano and thyme with dried. 

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/pastitsio-recipe/index.html

Bolognese

November 2012

I have a love hate relationship with Bolognese. It’s mainly love, like, I want to lick the plate clean when I eat it, but there is also a bit of hate, when I skip over it on a menu because I convince myself I don’t “need the beef”. 

Who am I kidding? I always need the beef. No matter how unforgiving the midsection of whatever outfit I am wearing, or how much cheese I ate before dinner, or dessert I plan to indulge in after, I always need the beef if it is coming to me in the form of Bolognese.

I’ve made Bolognese several times.  The first time I made it, I used a lot of herbs-- thyme, basil, bay leaf, and it tasted a lot like Shepard’s pie filling. I also made it in the middle of July in Maryland. It was delicious, but that recipe was simply not meant to be my go-to Bolognese.

The second time I made it, I used lots of red wine, lots of tomato. This version was more like the Bolognese I was looking for, but it was just a little too red-- deep, heavy red.  I’ll remember that Bolognese as Soviet Bolognese.

The last time I made Bolognese, I think I finally got it right. I was inspired by a coworker, who shared the recipe with me. I made it right before Hurricane Sandy. I would like to think God had a hand in this one, like he knew I was going to be stuck in my apt for four days following, and would need something like this Bolognese to pull me through.

I think the white wine is what gets me on this. I love the acidity of the white more than the richness the red gave to the other Bolognese.  I supposed I could trying using a different red, but the milk is also something to consider in this, as it gives this Bolognese a silkiness that I don’t think would be possible in other combinations.

This Bolognese is also ridiculously easy---one pot! I added probably an extra cup of milk and extra wine as it bubbled away, just as I felt it was getting too dry.  I also used a lot of carrot, onion, and celery, and kept them in larger chunks than normal because I love the texture and taste of extra and larger bits of veg. Whole foods didn’t have pancetta, so I bought a piece of salt pork and ground it up in the food processor. I used 1 lb of ground beef/1 lb of ground veal instead of 1 lb of ground pork because Whole Foods was out of ground pork.  I probably used closer to a whole tube of tomato paste as well.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/mario-batali/ragu-bolognese-recipe2/index.html

Side story: One of my favorite Bolognese memories occurred in Florence. I was on holiday with L and she was just getting over a bout of stomach flu that started in Paris. We had spent our last day in Paris with her near death and me trying to be a polite friend by not stopping to eat or eating too much in front of her. We had taken the overnight train to Florence, and after a simple and light pastry breakfast, were starving by lunchtime. It was a beautiful day, and we sat down at a little restaurant off Piazza San Croce at an outdoor table. Although L ordered a normal lunch, she decided by the time it got in front of her that she was not ready to eat a real meal just yet. I had ordered a wild board ragu and simply could not control myself and gobbled the whole thing down in front of her. Sorry L, but I remember exactly how the ragu tasted to this day.

Dirt Cupcakes

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November 2012

I have many distinct food memories from my childhood. Many are wonderful, some not so pleasant.

The not so pleasant include not being able to eat Mexican food for years because I got the flu one day I had tacos for school lunch.  Another is the day in preschool when the snack was cutout shapes of American cheese. I hate American cheese and something about the thought of consuming a piece of American cheese that had been handled and left to sit out for so long and then jiggled in my face like it was somehow appetizing because it was the shape of a bear still makes me shudder.

Some of my most pleasant memories include cupcakes at school for a birthday, personal pan pizzas earned via Book It! or,  when I was really lucky, dirt pudding. Many times throughout the course of elementary school, a doting mother (or maybe father, who knows), would scoop chocolate pudding into little cups, top them with crumbled Oreos, stick a gummy worm on top and deliver those edible terrariums of delight to a classroom I lucky enough to be in. I reference school because that is the only place I can ever remember eating dirt. My mother was more the homemade chocolate chip cookie type, and I love her for that.

I recently had a tremendous craving for dirt.  Maybe it was because it was just before Halloween and my inbox was inundated with e-mails from cooking sites re: spooky desserts, many involving gummy worms. Either way, I began snooping around the interwebs, thinking I could evolve dirt into more “adult” dessert, and came up with dirt cupcakes.

There is actually nothing more adult about dirt cupcakes than dirt in any other form. I guess dirt cupcakes require using an oven, some cutting, and more than three ingredients, but they made me feel like I was eight years old again. I kept these really simple ie. semi-homemade. I used Kozy Shack Chocolate Pudding, a box of devil’s food cake mix, and a can of chocolate icing (homestyle of course).   Part of the reason I did this was because I was making them late at night after several glasses of wine at a sushi dinner and I didn’t feel like making a huge mess getting out everything from scratch. Also, in a tiny kitchen, box mixes sometimes just feel right.

Recipe is as a follows:

·      Bake cupcakes according to directions on box.

·      Once cupcakes have cooled, cut out top of cupcake, about an 1 ¼ inc deep, 1 in in diameter. Do not throw top away, although you will need to cut off excess cake so that it can be used as a “lid”. Put the “lids” aside.

·      Put spoonful of chocolate pudding in each cupcake and replace cupcake “lid”.

·      Ice cupcakes.

·      Crush up oreos by hand, or in food processor. Dip top of each cupcake into crushed oreos, or “dirt”.

·      Place a gummy worm on top.

·      Nom. Nom. Nom.