For a while now at Martha Stewart’s website, a cookie of the day feature has been running. I’m certainly no stranger to baking cookies, and I have enough recipes in my to-do list to keep me busy for months. Of course, that doesn’t stop me from adding more to that list. These are a couple of my recent favorites.
Add comment March 11th, 2008
Spring is apparently in the air, at least as far as retailers go. While I am more of a fall/winter girl, there’s something about the first signs of spring that are uncontrollably exciting. Just a few days ago, the ground here was uncharacteristically covered with snow, but today I found myself looking at new spring items at some of my favorite online stores.
Sur la Table’s Easter Egg Platter is just too cute. If not a uni-tasker, then certainly a uni-seasoner, this platter would be perfect for serving those springtime cut-out cookies. Check out the matching plates, too.
Also from Sur la Table, these Spring Ruffle Ceramics would add a little interest to the table. The yellow and green bowls and plates are great for mixing colors.
Williams Sonoma’s Nostalgic Easter Platter may just be my favorite piece I’ve seen this Easter season. The bunnies are inspired by Easter cards from the 1920s. There are also matching plates and ramekins.
Add comment March 10th, 2008
I have a very strong love for potatoes. I’ll eat them just about any way you can think of, that is except for tater tots. I never could like them, although that may be somehow connected to bad memories of school lunches. Anyway, of the many ways I love potatoes, potato soup is pretty high on the list.
2 comments March 9th, 2008
Recently, Paula Deen was in Oxford, Mississippi, at the famous Square Books to sign copies of her new cookbook, Paula Deen Celebrates. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to go because of my work schedule, but my sister made the short trip and procured a signed book for both of us.
There were about 500 people there to see Paula in the span of two hours, so there wasn’t much time for chatting. The line moved pretty fast, with just enough time for her to sign books before moving on to the next person.
Knowing how rushed it was made it a little easier to console myself for not being able to go. When Quinn and I met Alton Brown this summer, we actually had the time to talk to him. Perhaps some day, I’ll have that same chance with Paula. I am glad to have my signed copy of her latest book. I’m sure there will be many recipes made from it in the near future.
5 comments November 29th, 2006
On a recent trip to Memphis, Quinn and I stopped in Penzey’s Spices, a store I spied the last time we drove up there. When Quinn and I got married almost 6 years ago, a friend of his who really loved cooking sent us a wonderful gift of a collection of Penzey’s Spices. It now being almost 6 years later, those are of course all gone. Well, we’re restocked now.
The best part about this store is that next to most of their spices, there is a jar with a removable lid to allow you to smell them. By the time we had smelled shallot salt, four kinds of cinnamon, seasoning blends, peppercorns, and a miriad of every other imaginable (and some unimaginable) spices, our noses had distinct tingles. We also had a bag full of spices. Two of the aforementioned cinnamons, French sweet basil, shallot salt, vanilla sugar, vanilla beans, and “special extra bold” tellicherry peppercorns.
I think Penzey’s mostly sells through their print catalog and website, but if you have the chance do stop in, smell, and procure some for your own kitchen.
5 comments September 17th, 2006
We found some beautiful, fresh chicken at our local market and bought it with no plans in mind. Walking through grocery stores, we’ve seen manufacturers jumping all over the organic bandwagon. Some things are safer or amazingly better when organic (organic milk is so much tastier to me than a store-brand milk), but there are clearly some questionable products. Organic or “free range” meats are not as well regulated and usually don’t mean what you’d think. Looking for meat from animals raised antibiotic-free is more telling. If they don’t give the animals antibiotics, they have to treat them better to keep them healthy.
So, we had chicken and no plan. No problem. I narrowed the possibilities down by visiting Cooking Light’s website and searched for chicken. By narrowed, I mean down to 1878 recipes. I have a hard enough time picking where to sit in a movie theater — and don’t get Jennifer started about me and parking! After three pages of chicken recipes brought to us by the letters A and B, I noticed the “Sort results by” option and selected “member rating” so the 5 star recipes rose to the top. I still only made it to page three when I clicked on Chicken Cacciatore Sicilian-Style.
Moment of admission: I’d never eaten chicken cacciatore. Neither had Jennifer. The biggest consequence of this is that neither of us would have a frame of reference when we tried the dish. Another side-effect is that my MacGyvering would undoubtably lead to a nontraditional, non-Sicilian-style cacciatore. But it sounded so good. Undaunted (despite lacking a few ingredients), I began to cook.
We only bought chicken breasts, not the variety of chicken parts described in the recipe. Somebody likes her chicken on the thin side, so I pounded them a little to get the desired thickness. In a little olive oil, I sauteed the chicken for a couple of minutes on each side in two batches. With the chicken out of the skillet, the onions and garlic went in to saute for 5 minutes.
Another moment of admission: I can’t stand celery. Makes me cringe just thinking about it. Early in college, I had the honor of judging a junior high science fair. Of the many fine projects, one still stands out vividly. The youngster gave me a little strip of paper and asked me to taste it. Stopping just short of a full-fledged gag reflex, I ripped the paper from my mouth. “Ahh, sensitive,” the young lady said as she made notes on her cute little clipboard. Still collecting data. Nice. She lost points, though, as she had nothing to cleanse my traumatized palate. What was on the paper? Urea. Why did I react so? Genetics. Some people are predisposed to HATE CELERY.
So, in place of the cup of celery, I added another cup of onions. It’s Eating Onions Together, after all. I deglazed the pan with half a cup of red wine vinegar and added a slew of other wonderful smelling ingredients. I didn’t have olives on hand, but did have capers. I also only had a can of crushed tomatoes instead of chopped, but I knew I wouldn’t know what I was missing. I placed the chicken back into the pan, brought the mixture to a boil, covered and simmered for 20 minutes. Another 25 minutes of uncovered simmering and the chicken was just right, tender enough to cut with my wooden spoon.
While the chicken simmered, I cooked some fusilli, a cute little twisting spiral shaped pasta. The recipe called for macaroni or cavatappi, but the fusilli seemed a reasonable substitute. I spooned fusilli onto each plate and dished the cacciatori over top.
Reading up on what I had created, I learned that cacciatore means hunter in Italian and that, related to food, cacciatore is something cooked “hunter-style” with tomatoes and onions. The red wine in the sauce gives the dish a tartness that was surprising and pleasant. The chicken was tender and broke apart with a fork. It also reheated nicely making several handy meals in the following days. I’m looking forward to eating this dish at an authentic Italian restaurant sometime to see how close I got it. I imagine, though, that this is the type of dish which varies with the chef as well as the chef’s mood.
3 comments September 10th, 2006
Just before Mother’s Day, Jennifer acquired her new KitchenAid stand mixer. Every once in a while I see her glancing at it with an enamored look and hear a little sigh. There was an offer of a free ice cream attachment with the purchase of the mixer, which we gladly accepted. I had dreams of eating homemade ice cream throughout the summer. Well, there’s still a little summer left, so I thought I’d get on with it.
We saw a Paula Deen episode back then in which she made a simple butter pecan ice cream. I decided back then that I’d break in the ice creamer with that recipe. It’s not a traditional ice cream concoction by any stretch — there’s a box of pudding in it! And no cream! But, when in doubt, we trust Paula. She doesn’t make things that don’t taste good.
An admission.. it was late when I started this (Jennifer was mixing a cake batter) and I declared that I was going to wimp out on the pecans. They were supposed to be cooked in a tablespoon of butter in a saucepan. I knew this would unlock the pecany goodness within them. When I told Jennifer, she reassured me telling me it would be the 8:15 PM version of the recipe.
I mixed together a can of evaporated milk, 3 cups of whole milk, a teaspoon of vanilla extract, and a cup of sugar together in a big measuring bowl with a pour spout. I held the pudding out until I had the frozen mixer bowl out of the freezer and mounted on the mixer. I suspected that the mixture would be too dilute to thicken up as a pudding, but I didn’t want to take any chances on my first try. Other ice cream wisdom has the mixture sit in the fridge until it is closer to freezing temperature. Because of the pudding content (and Paula not telling me to), I didn’t chill the mixture, but poured it right into the mixer bowl, dasher already spinning.
The pecans were not to go in until 10 minutes into the mixing process. This gave me plenty of time to regret not preparing the pecans as Paula preached. It came to fruition when I realized that the ice cream was called butter pecan. I quickly melted butter and sauteed the pecans for a few minutes until Jennifer, several feet away, stopped what she was doing, took in a deep breath, and let me know I’d made the right decision. Since they were hot and the ice cream was thickening up, I put them in the freezer for a few minutes so as not to melt the ice cream when they were introduced.
I could tell that the ice creamer was just starting to lose its cool, but the contents were thick enough to transfer into a plastic tub and then into the freezer. In retrospect, putting the evaporated milk in the fridge the night before would chill the mixture and help the process.
It wasn’t completely set when we first tasted it, but that was more a factor of impatience (and the late hour) than the recipe. We tried it alongside a slice of Jennifer’s chocolate marble cake (which was oooh so good). The ice cream did taste remarkably like butter pecan ice cream from the store. The color was as rich as the flavor, both we think from the pudding. We enjoyed our first attempt with the ice cream attachment which is already in the freezer getting ready for round two.
4 comments September 5th, 2006
For a pre-Labor Day get-together, we pulled out all the cholesterol stops and fried up some chicken and hush puppies. There was also fish, but since we don’t eat fish I’ll skip right over that.
My sister was in charge of the chicken. She used Paula Deen’s method for the first time, and we all agreed that it was the best we’d ever had. Adding hot sauce to the overnight soak really added some wonderful flavor to the chicken. There wasn’t enough of the hot sauce to really make it hot, but the flavor was still there.
Our contribution was hush puppies. For those of you unfamiliar, hush puppies are little fritters made of flour, cornmeal, milk, and onions. There can also be a variety of seasonings and creamed corn. My great aunt, who was an incredible cook, made the best hush puppies I’ve ever had. Sadly, I don’t know her specific recipe, so I set out to find just the right one.
After looking through several, I decided I most liked Alton Brown’s version from I’m Just Here for More Food, an often used book in our kitchen. I used its basics and came up with my own version of his recipe.
For the dry ingredients, I combined 150 grams (you do have a kitchen scale, right?) of AP flour, 142 grams of cornmeal, 1 teaspoon of baking powder, 1/4 teaspoon of baking soday, 1/2 teaspoon of cayenne pepper, 2 teaspoons of salt, and a couple of turns of freshly ground black pepper.
When the dry ingredients are combined, add 1 & 1/2 cups of buttermilk and 1 small chopped onion. A little less onion is fine. Actually, I didn’t quite use all of the onion that Quinn chopped. In common Alton fashion, let the batter rest at room temperature for about 10 minutes.
I volunteered Quinn for the actual frying process. He dropped the batter by tablespoonfuls into the oil (about 340 degrees). Don’t worry about little stray gobs of batter. Those will fry up, too, and are quite tasty. When the hush puppies float to the top, try to turn them over. This won’t be easy, but it will help them get evenly cooked. After 3 minutes or so, they should be done. Use tongs, a spider, or a long-handle spotted spoon to remove them to a rack or a pan lined with paper towels. These will stay plenty warm at room temperature while you finish cooking. Cover them loosely with aluminum foil.
I must say that they were very good. Most of the ones I’ve had in the past were overdone. Golden brown is what we’re looking for, not dark brown. Just about 3 minutes is plenty of frying time. Everyone agreed with me, too, that the shorter cooking time was better. Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t turn down one like I’ve been accustomed to eating. Hush puppies are (dare I say) good eats.
5 comments September 2nd, 2006
Jennifer and I recently perused Square Books on the square in Oxford, MS, home to Ole Miss, her alma mater. I noticed a cookbook called Square Table which contained a collection of recipes from Oxford restaurants. As Jennifer’s birthday was only a month away, I didn’t point it out to her and was able to surprise her with it. Several recipes were from restaurants she loved during her college days but which have since closed. We’ll certainly be revisiting this cookbook for its time-machine possibilities.
Deciding on this cookbook for dinner, we took to its pages in search of just the recipe. Jennifer had already tagged four. We decided on a baked linguine recipe that sounded divine.
We browned two pounds of ground beef (we found fresh ground chuck from our butcher’s case that was beautiful) with some freshly minced garlic, about double the requested two cloves. Once browned, one can each of crushed tomatoes, tomato sauce, and tomato paste, a teaspoon of salt and two of sugar were stirred in and the wonderful mixture was allowed to simmer for 30 minutes.
It’s worth pointing out that this recipe does not call for any pepper. Pepper is such a ubiquitous spice (and one of our personal favorites) that it’s absence was noticed. Trusting the recipe, we followed it and were curious to see how it turned out.
We started working on the linguini while the sauce simmered. Twelve ounces of linguini boiled to al dente. With the pasta in the pot, we turned to a very special component. A brick of cream cheese, 16 ounces of sour cream, and two bundles of green onions (how could we kick off Eating Onions Together without some onions!?), chopped. These were mixed together, smelled (followed by an excited discussion), and set aside.
When the pasta was ready, we drained it and added it to a 9×13 pan. Jennifer received a beautiful Le Creuset pan recently and was excited to give it a try. It was a little less than 13″, so we used most of the pasta, filling the pan about halfway. The cream cheese, sour cream and onion mixture was spooned on top of the pasta and topped with the meat sauce.
After 20 minutes in the oven at 350, we removed the pan and added 1 cup of shredded cheddar cheese and eyeballed 1/2 cup of grated parmesan. Then it was back into the oven for 5 minutes to melt the cheese. We let it set the suggested 10 minutes before serving. Being a big Alton Brown fan, I’m familiar with his frequent saying, “your patience will be rewarded.” This is also why I’m suspicious of any meal that can be whipped together in 30 minutes. I have to say that taking photographs makes this waiting period much easier to bear.
We paired this meal with a chianti, the 2003 Classico made by Cecchi. When in doubt, a good chianti will compliment a pasta dish. To be honest, despite my love of wine, I’ve never had the olfactory skills to drink one and pick out the hints of lilac and elm bark with clear mineral tones. Mineral tones?! I have always had this suspicion that people just sit around a table (drinking way too much wine) and make these things up. However, I’m keeping an open mind and will try to hone my appreciation and super-sniffer skills. Does anyone have any recommendations for books or resources on wineology?
How was the linguini? Well, I think a rating scale based on “would we make this again?” is the best measure of a recipe. It balances taste and difficulty together.. if it’s torture to make, it’d better taste awfully good. The baked linguini is definitely a keeper. Jennifer and I discussed the similarities with lasagna while we were preparing it and while we were eating it, as well. Its components are somewhat similar to Jennifer’s lasagna recipe: pasta, meaty red sauce, and a cheesy layers. This baked linguini has one layer of each that all blended together a little during cooking and completely during the meal. The baked linguini was an involved production, but not as time-consuming as lasagna. It was definitely worth the effort.
The creamy layer was a huge hit, the first thing Jennifer commented on. It was a pleasant departure from a ricotta-based component. We didn’t miss the pepper in this dish. The seasoning in this dish were predominantly from the garlic and onions. At Alton’s recent seminar, he commented that he had minimized his spices down to about six items (although he didn’t list them). He went on to say that he was more concerned with simplifying food, echoing the sentiments of Hippocrates: first do no harm. I think this dish lives up to this wisdom.
Add comment September 1st, 2006
Jennifer and I have become aware of a trend. Trends abound in our lives, many dissociated from us, distanced by social or cultural boundaries, something noticed (perhaps clouded by myopia) from afar. But this trend involves something central to everyone’s lives, something we cannot escape: food.
Alton Brown recently aired a four-part series called Feasting on Asphalt in which he and a small crew motored across country on narrow roads avoiding interstates and their resulting homogenization. He was unsettled by his findings that American road food, the mom and pop diners, were being choked out of existence by the familiar and “safe” name brand chains clogging our highways. His experiences made us reflect on our own eating habits.
So this trend we’ve found is one of safe eating. Safe not from the cardiologist’s perspective, but a different kind of culinary security. Many years ago I overheard a cook and owner of a local restaurant in a small town say that it wasn’t important that his food be good, only that it be consistent. Change, it seems, is worse than bland. In my youth I scoffed at his declaration, but now I see the wisdom of it. It is safer for me to revisit a big chain restaurant and order the same item over and over, maybe the only thing I’ve ever tried, than to take a chance and order something I’ve never dreamt of before.
This trend of safety extends to the home kitchen as well. We have shelves of cookbooks, all purchased with great optimism, filled with the hope of so many delicious possibilities. Yet from these books, we mark the safest selections, ones we know that we will like, and those become the staple pages. The bindings of these books eventually weaken, flattening the books when opened to these favorites.
The saddest consequence of this trend of safe food is that eating becomes less personal, less important, less nourishing to our souls. I know of a family in a nearby house that never eats a home cooked meal. They openly admit that they eat out every night. They miss out on the bonding between people who create something as important as food, something that sustains our lives. I know they are not the only ones.
Jennifer found this delightful quote from Charles Warner’s 1871 book My Summer in a Garden:
“I know that there is supposed to be a prejudice against the onion; but I think there is rather a cowardice in regard to it. I doubt not that all men and women love the onion; but few confess their love. Affection for it is concealed… Happy is said to be the family which can eat onions together. They are, for the time being, separate, from the world, and have a harmony of aspiration.”
We were immediately smitten with the sentiment and based the name of our new blog from it. That, and we both love onions. And we love eating together. Not just the sitting down to plates of food, but sharing the process of cooking as well as the pleasures of consuming creations made together.
Jennifer speaks fondly and frequently of memories of eating at her grandmother’s home. Every meal there was served with a slice of onion. It makes me wonder if she was familiar with Warner’s words. If not, I believe that she embraced the idea.
Jennifer and I embark on a new culinary quest. We plan to share our experiences through these pages. Not everything we eat will have onions, not everything we eat will be home cooked, but we will try to break out of our safety zone.
Add comment September 1st, 2006