I'm Back...Again

I feel like my head is all over the place lately. I'd tried to return to my other blog, about life, but when you're not going off on European adventures, and you don't want to get super personal with the great wide world about people and feelings and such, it's hard to think up anything engaging to say. Historically, I'm guilty of starting things that I don't finish. Often. You may have guessed that about me. It's one of the things I like least about myself. Honestly, I'm afraid to publicize in any way that I'm considering re-starting this blog, because who would even believe me anymore? I've come and gone so often! It was just a few months ago that I'd announced I was re-starting Mandatory Fun, and then let it fizzle out. Again. Oy.

The kitchen is still my happy place, and I miss having a little writing space, even if it's "just" a cooking blog. I REALLY miss the sense of fellowship that I had with the French Fridays with Dorie crew, back in the day. Dorie has a new book coming out in the Fall. Who knows? Maybe the band'll get back together to cook through it.

Batman and I have our own side project of working through Dorie's Cookies, so I don't intend to follow the Tuesdays with Dorie group's schedule for that, but I thought the other day, "Oh, I'll catch up with what they've made from Baking, Chez Moi." Ha! Hahahahahahaha!

This is how many recipes I've missed. Unattainable goal, at this point.

Too much time has passed since I last kept up with them. I'll never make up the ground. I think I'm just going to look forward, and try to bake future recipes with the group. The problem with this is that I've been really tight with my nutrition and exercise lately, and weekly bake-alongs don't really jive with that. I MISS baking, though. I've been doing mostly Whole30 and paleo eating since June, and I feel like I need to figure out a way to bring things into balance. I have a history of compulsively inhaling all baked goods in my path, which Whole30 has given me much greater control over. We'll see how it goes. If I can't have a piece of cake and be done, I'll have to step away from the Doristas again. If I CAN, then awesome!

I'd tried in the past few months to cook along with the Food52 cookbook club, as well as the club from Tasting Table, but my efforts to eat primarily paleo (because it makes my body feel good), kept me from participating much. In case you're wondering, Mastering the Art of French Cooking is NOT paleo friendly. So much cream. So much cheese. Lovely, lovely cheese.

I'm rambling. Like I said, my head is all over the place. 

So here's my plan. I'm going back to how I started this blog. I'll cook as much as I can from one particular book for a month, and see if it wins me over. The books I pick will be ones that support my current nutrition goals. So, first up, after an exceptionally long hiatus:

This book has a comic book type format that's kind of cute to begin with, but when I actually used it to cook a recipe yesterday, it was a little hard to follow along. Maybe I just have to get used to it.

For the record, the Yankee Pot Roast smelled bomb while it was cooking. It was different from other pot roasts I've made in that it goes heavy on the balsamic vinegar (no complaints here), and calls for dried porcini mushrooms. I busted out one of my last bags of dried porcini that I packed when we moved back to the US from Italy, so I was a little sad that they were unnoticeable in the finished product. In general, I'd have preferred a load of more carrots in there. The flavor of the meat was really delicious, though, and both kids ate it.

Have I even mentioned on this blog that I've had a second kid? He's almost 2 now. LOL We'll call him Nugget, and he eats everything in sight. Literally everything. He was licking the dog's bowl a few days ago. Nasty. And Batman still won't eat anything. That's not true. He's actually getting a lot better about being willing to try things and admitting if he DOES actually like something. He's still the slowest eater to ever walk the earth, though.

As far as the pot roast goes, Conclusion: Liked it. Charlie Approved.

Gut-Buster

I made Daddy's Carbonara (pg 36 of The Food52 Cookbook), primarily because I had all the ingredients--spaghetti, bacon, eggs, parmesan, and the unconventional choice of peas, and secondarily, because I knew Charlie would eat it.

This really wants a lot of bacon. A pound. Holy moly. I used half, and it still seemed like more than was necessary.

The peas were fine. I don't know that they really added much, regarding flavor or texture.

I ate way too much of this. I love carbonara. Lately, I've been eating whole wheat pasta. Carbonara is all about luxurious caloric excess, and demands normal pasta, even though one of the notes for this recipe suggests that you could use whole wheat. Nope. I protest. This is not a meal that should be approached with any intention of cutting calories.

I asked Charlie how it tasted. He said, "Good. Delicious, actually. Why has it been so long since we ate this?" Because Mom has no self-control, my dear.

Conclusion: Liked it. Charlie approved.

In an effort to replace my heartburn-inducing lemonade addiction, I figured I'd try Mint Limeade (pg 362). Lime juice, mixed with mint simple syrup and club soda sounded like it might fit the bill with a bit less acid.

Turns out, this is a very strange flavor combination. I had one glass, and no desire to drink more.

Conclusion: Disliked.

Muffin Me

This'll be a quick one. On Saturday morning, Charlie and I baked Mom's Blueberry-Coconut Muffins (pg 32 of The Food52 Cookbook). I'd bought a big ol' container of blueberries at Trader Joe's earlier in the week. They weren't particularly good. When faced with questionable fruit, it doesn't take much to convince me to bake it. Charlie loves blueberries, and has always raved about anything I've baked that involves coconut, so these muffins were an obvious choice, even though coconut is not my favorite flavor.

Maybe everyone knows this trick, but I didn't. The recipe has you toss the blueberries with some flour, to keep them all from sinking to the bottom. Turns out, this actually works. I'm going to lock that away for all future blueberry recipes. 

There were no surprises here. We all went back for more.

Conclusion: Liked it, and Charlie-approved.

Food52: Steak for an Alexandria Kitchen Grill Pan

Whereas I found the name of "salad dressing" charmingly simple the other day, Steak for a Brooklyn Backyard Barbecue (pg 65 of The Food52 Cookbook) made me roll my eyes, just as all the snobby, posing, transplanted hipsters who act like they own the borough I was born and raised in do. I mean, man-buns? Who are these people? Okay, so the recipe didn't fill me with the same level of rage as the people do, but I feel fairly confident that the author of this recipe (since the recipes in the book were all taken from those submitted by people on the website) is a non-Brooklynite who thinks she's obtained a higher sphere of cool by moving to Brooklyn. These transplants loooooove making it known that they live in Brooklyn. Do they think it makes them tough? There's nothing gritty about Park Slope or Williamsburgh anymore. Oh, they annoy me. Primarily because they give so many dirty looks to those of us who are actually from the area, who dare to go out for breakfast without a fully planned and coiffed "outfit." Anyway, identifying the author as a transplant is the only way I can account for Brooklyn's presence in the title, since the location of one's barbecue has no impact on the outcome of the meat. It's not like this spice rub is a regional specialty. So weird. I digress...

Anyway, the meat is rubbed down with chopped mint, salt, paprika, garlic, and oil. Ideally, it is then thrown on the barbecue. I don't know how to light a barbecue. Don't tell anyone. If Matt's not home to do it, the barbecue isn't going to be used. So, I opted for our grill pan.

I understood as soon as I applied the rub that I was going to lose a lot of flavor. There was no way all that glorious garlic and mint would stay on my meat instead of adhering to the grill pan. I was right.

Ugly.

What did make it to our plates was delicious. Matt grunted, "Good meat." Charlie ate his, though he said, "It tastes strong." Because of the garlic? I don't know. He didn't argue about it--simply commented, so I didn't press him for details. I definitely want to try this again when Matt can give it the proper treatment on the bbq.

Conclusion: Liked it, despite the annoying title. Charlie approved.

Food52: Green and Pink

To accompany Lebovitz's steak on Saturday, I also made a simple salad, dressed with Food52's Salad Dressing (pg 39). I find it charming that the title is so simple. It's just salad dressing, but it's a damn good one. The dressing is a familiar blend of vinegar, oil, garlic, and dijon mustard. In addition to balsamic vinegar, it calls for white balsamic vinegar, which I didn't even know existed, but found easily at the supermarket. In the opening, they consider Worcestershire sauce to be one of the recipe's nice surprises. Personally, 1/4 teaspoon hardly seems like enough to impact the flavor. I certainly couldn't tell it was in there.

This came together easily, and I like that you just shake it up in a jar to emulsify it. It was tasty and balanced, and got me to eat two big portions of salad. Also have salad on the menu for tonight, because the recipe made a lot of dressing for someone who only likes the barest coating on her lettuce.

Conclusion: Liked it. 

On Sunday, I made Risotto Rosso (pg 347). As long as I add no green components to risotto, it's one of the few meals that I can consistently get Charlie to eat and enjoy without a fight. I've had good luck with mushroom, leek, chestnut, and saffron risottos, so I crossed my fingers and hoped that I could add Food52's version to the list of acceptable foods. Unlike the others, this one stains the rice pinkish with red wine before fattening the grains up with a mixture of beef and chicken broth. Additional delicious ingredients include pancetta (always a good start), shallots, mushrooms, and parmesan.

I was amused to find that the recipe gives preference to Carnaroli rice over arborio. This is the first risotto recipe I've seen that specifically asks for Carnaroli. While living in Italy, I mentioned to an Italian friend that I'd made risotto earlier that week. He asked what kind of rice I used (because these things matter to Italians. They have a lot of food rules.) I said arborio. His jaw dropped, and he quickly set me straight--that around Naples, risotto is ONLY made with Carnaroli rice. I had never heard of Carnaroli, but went straight to the supermarket and bought some. Is it different from arborio? I don't really know. It seems the same to me. Mauro says that arborio gets mushy faster, while Carnaroli maintains its integrity. I choose to believe him, and am now afraid to make risotto with anything else. I brought three boxes back to the US with me, and am carefully rationing them out. I opened my second box for this recipe. Time to start worrying about where I'll get more.

Anyway, back to the meal. Charlie was skeptical at first, because of the color. He asked what the "orange" things were, but once I convinced him it was bacon (which I used in place of pancetta), he cleaned his bowl. For the record, the bacon was not orange. I don't know what he was talking about. My only complaint is that we all wanted seconds, and there was none left.

We ate it before I remembered to take a picture. Oops. 

Conclusion: loved it.Charlie approved.

A Few Lovelies

I'm a few days late finishing up How to Eat. Woops. I lost track of the month. Oh well. I got two Charlie-Approved meat dishes out of it, so the extra few days were worth it.

The Chicken Patties (pg 439) from the "Feeding Babies and Small Children" section did not come out remotely how I expected them to, which is probably a good thing. I thought it would be a version of a cafeteria chicken patty, which, I'm ashamed to admit, I always loved. I'd probably think it was vile if I tasted one now, but in third grade, those things were awesome.

Gorgeous.

Nigella's starts with blitzing boneless, skinless chicken thighs in the food processor. She says you can substitute ground turkey, so I did, because it's easier, and I had a pound in the freezer from my handy local good-to-the-animals meat farm. Mix it up with pork sausage, nutmeg, bread crumbs, and parsley, make patties, and fry in a bit of oil. I used the whole package of ground breakfast sausage, because I wasn't sure how much the required two links would equate to. So, these tasted like breakfast sausage, which is to say that they were delicious. I made slider-sized patties, and Charlie gobbled his right up. Which reminds me, I have to throw the leftovers in the freezer so that I don't burn him out on them.

Conclusion: Liked it, and Charlie Approved.

One thing I've learned from this month with Nigella is that, under specific circumstances, Charlie will eat a drumstick. If I put the drumstick on his plate with the rest of his dinner, he won't touch it. However, if he climbs on Matt's lap--not mine, only Matt's--and Matt tries to take a bite of his own drumstick, Charlie will take and eat that one. Perhaps not the best etiquette, but we're just happy to see protein going into him. With this in mind, I made The Tenderest Chicken (pg 315). Chicken pieces marinate for 8+ hours in buttermilk, soy sauce, garlic, and mustard. When you're ready to cook, you wipe them down, then brush them with melted butter mixed with olive oil, salt, and pepper. It just tastes like roast chicken, and it was, indeed, quite tender. I poured the leftover butter solution on fresh brussel sprouts and roasted them in the stove with the drumsticks. Best brussel sprouts ever.

Conclusion: Liked it, and Charlie Approved. I'm not the hugest drumstick fan, but I'll be making them regularly, since boy-o will eat them.

Twice this week, I re-tested the Yogurt (pg 46) from Make the Bread, Buy the Butter, paying much closer attention to the temperature of the milk. I'm now certain that, the first time I tried this, I let my milk cool too much before stirring in the bit of live-culture yogurt. These two times, after an overnight rest in the oven, I opened the oven door in the morning, and voila! Yogurt. Warm yogurt, but yogurt nonetheless. I was reprimanded throughout childhood every time I left the milk carton on the counter, so I do psychologically grimace at the thought of letting it sit all night, but it's worth it. The flavor is nicer, without that sharp edge that can be in store-bought plain yogurt, plus, I'm no longer beholden to Fage. Even using organic milk, it's cheaper to make my own than buy Fage. I haven't actually strained the yogurt to make Greek-style yet, but I will.

Conclusion: Love it. It's simple, it's cheaper than store-bought, it tastes good, and I find myself eating more of it because I made it.

I ran out of peanut butter, so I made Reese's recipe. All you do is blitz peanuts and a bit of peanut oil in the food processor until you have the texture you want. Jennifer says to make it thinner than you think it needs to be, because it will firm up in the fridge. This was true. My one qualm is that she says homemade peanut butter is 80 percent the price of Jif. Maybe peanuts are just expensive in Texas, but my jar of peanuts cost nearly the same as the natural peanut butter I usually buy. A huge Costco-sized box of peanuts would be cheaper, I'd think, but the only container I could find was not.

Conclusion: Liked it, but I doubt I'll make it regularly. It costs the same here, so it's not worth the added step of pulsing it myself.

Lastly, Matt and I had date night last night, in which our friend took Charlie away for hours, and we cooked awesome filet mignon and mashed potatoes, drank wine, etc. Fun times. I planned to make creme brulee for dessert, but forgot to add the ingredients to Matt's grocery list, so I couldn't. Searching for a similar replacement that wouldn't require another trip to the store, I landed on Vanilla Cup Custard from Dorie Greenspan's Baking. All it needs is milk, eggs, sugar, vanilla, and some almond extract. Easy. Unfortunately, this tasted very eggy. Neither one of us was impressed, and Charlie only picked at his. We kept thinking up fruit sauces that would mask the egginess, which doesn't speak well of the custard's flavor.

Conclusion: Just okay.

Damn Hippies

As I threw together Jennifer Reese's Granola (pg 44-45 of Make the Bread, Buy the Butter), I self-righteously grumbled about how many extraneous calories are racked up by all the butter, brown sugar, maple syrup, and shredded coconut, compared to Ellie Krieger's version. Yes, there are certainly many calories here. Oh my lord, though. In terms of flavor, it blows Ellie out of the water. (Sorry, Ellie). This granola is addictive. It has a delightful salty/sweet element to it. It cooked for over an hour at a pretty low temp, so it turned gold without coming anywhere close to burning.

Conclusion: Loved it. Deeeeelicious.

With granola, one needs yogurt (pg 46). Reese's recipe seemed straightforward enough. Heat milk to almost-boiling, then let it cool until it's warm. Mix in some live-culture yogurt and let it sit overnight in a warm place. Supposedly, the next day, you have yogurt. I had milk.

Ew.

I want to try this one more time before I judge. I suspect I may have allowed it to cool too much to activate the cultures. I definitely won't be wasting money on organic milk again until I know it works, though.

With an abundance of granola on hand, I couldn't resist baking Granola Grabbers (pg 82) from Dorie Greenspan's Baking. These cookies throw calories on Reese's granola's calories. You add more coconut, more nuts, more butter, more brown sugar. Yummmmm. The cookies merge soft cookie with crisp granola, so it's chewy and crunchy. GENIUS!

Conclusion: I like them, but Charlie LOVES them. Score!

Now, back to Nigella. Cambodian Hot-and-Sour Beef Salad (pg 385 of How to Eat) was not-so-great. Strips of steak are stirred about in a mixture of fish sauce, lime juice, shugar, chilies, shallot, and mint, then dumped on lettuce. It was fine, but not very interesting.

Conclusion: Just okay. Salad needs to be really flavorful to make me eat it. I didn't finish my serving.

Fortunately, tonight's dinner ore than made up for it. One-Pan Chicken (pg 360) is just what it says. I used drumsticks instead of a whole chicken (cut up). Salt the chicken, chunks of red onion and red pepper, baby potatoes, unpeeled garlic then drizzle with olive oil and roast for a little under an hour.

Conclusion: Loved it, and Charlie actually ate an entire drumstick. Yay for protein!

Old Faithful

Balsamic Chicken with Baby Spinach and Couscous (pg 205 of The Food You Crave) has been one of my fallback "crap, I don't have time for this" recipes for several years now. It's easy. So very, very easy. Especially for a three-part meal that does manage to come together as greater than its individual parts.

Make couscous: Zip! Pound chicken breasts, add salt and pepper, then cook them through in olive oil. Remove from pan. Zam! In the same pan, add more oil, garlic, then the spinach. Wilt. Remove from pan. Zoom! Throw crushed tomatoes, chicken broth, and balsamic vinegar in the same pan, and cook it down for a few minutes. Layer the components, pour some of the sauce on top. Kapow! Done. And all it took was one pot and one pan.

 Conclusion: Like it's flavor, love it's ease.

I asked for a mini muffin pan for Christmas, thinking that maybe Charlie would be more interested in muffin items if they were scaled down to size. To test this theory, and in hopes that I'd get some small amount of a vegetable into him, I baked Pumpkin Pie Muffins (pg 21) today.

May I just say, it pisses me off when a recipe--especially for something like a muffin, which could be made in any quantity--doesn't use a whole can of pumpkin. What exactly am I supposed to do with less than half a can of pumpkin? Scale the recipe up to use the whole thing, Ellie. Come on.

Mama Muffin gives her babies a goodbye hug. I told her I was sending them to live on a farm.

Wastefulness aside, these muffins are good. I could use more spice (and more pumpkin. Ahem), but they were good. Not as good as my friend Hilary's mom's Pumpkin Bread, but it also has less butter and sugar.

Conclusion: Liked it, and I think they're Charlie Approved. He nibbled one throughout the afternoon, but he didn't spit it out. I guess that counts.

Things that Make Me Go "Mmmmm."

Ellie has found seafood redemption. After last night's crabcake bomb, I was a little hesitant to waste more expensive local seafood on her recipes, but I took my chances on Shrimp Scampi with Artichokes (pg 237 of The Food You Crave), because I'd already bought the ingredients.

The most time-consuming part of this recipe is shelling the shrimp. All you do is soften shallots and garlic in oil for a few minutes, then add the shrimp, white wine, lemon juice, frozen or canned artichoke hearts. Right at the end, add salt, pepper, and parsley.

Come to me, my lovely shrimp.

Conclusion: Loved it. This was great. Not okay, not good, but great. Easy and flavorful. Just about perfect. And, Charlie ate two shrimp. Woop woop!

My friend missed Charlie (they adore each other), so she invited us over for a lunch of tasty Persian food on Saturday so she could spend time with him. I had spare apples from that pie I didn't make over the holidays, so I made a recipe from David Lebovitz's Ready for Dessert that caught my eye the very first time I flipped through the book: Buckwheat Cake with Cider-Poached Apples (pg. 44).

Pulverized almonds are mixed in with the buckwheat flour, so the nuttiness really complements the cozy flavor of the buckwheat flour. On its own, the cake was good. With the poached apples, this dessert was three-thousand times more delicious. 3,000 is the result of a scientific calculation. My only small qualm is that Lebovitz says to spoon the apples and syrup over the cake. The problem is that the "syrup" is more juicy than it is syrupy, so it made the cake soggy. I prefer the apples and a slight drizzle of juice on the side.

Conclusion: Loved it. Buckwheat + almonds + apples = hearty perfection. Plus, Charlie really seems to enjoy buckwheat. He ate a lot of this cake.

Wow, that's two recipes in one post that included the word "perfect." Good stuff.

Round 'Em Up

I haven't really fallen behind on blogging about Ellie, but I did cook a number of her recipes in a short period of time, this could get long. I'll try to contain it. Short isn't my strong suit.

First, Cherry Vanilla Oatmeal (pg 36 of The Food You Crave). Dried cherries are cooked in the oatmeal, and once it's off the heat, stir in some cherry jam and vanilla extract. I usually put vanilla in the water before I add the oats. I'll add it after from now on. It retained much more of its flavor.

 Conclusion: Loved it.  Charlie Approved. He ate his whole bowlful. 

Three recipes made it into last night's dinner. Stuffed Turkey Burgers (pg 218) turned out okay, but it needed a lot of help. The burgers were stuffed with roasted red pepper and mozzarella. Good start. However, the ground turkey goes unseasoned. I don't think so. I added a bit of Worcestershire Sauce and a bit of BBQ sauce. Matt thought BBQ sauce was not the best choice, and some Italian spices would've been better. Ah, well.

Conclusion: Just okay.

Remember those radishes I bought last week? Orange, Radish, and Mint Salad (pg 129) seemed like an obvious way to use a few. I have to say, these Red Rocket Radishes (hehehehe...still funny) defied my experience of radishes and are mild and pleasant. This salad was crispy and refreshing.

Conclusion: Loved it.

I'm holding off judgment on Zucchini Parmesan Crisps (pg 251). I need to make them again, without adding salt "to taste." Holy mother, these were salty. I didn't even think I'd added that much. I hate it when things you can't taste say to add salt to taste. I still think this is a promising concept, in which you dip sliced zucchini in olive oil, then in a bread crumb and parm mixture, then bake. On his first taste, Charlie smiled and went, "Mmmm." Then his whole face contorted as the salt hit him and he launched the crisp across the table. He tasted the next, and the cycle repeated itself. Reading you loud and clear, little dude. Too salty. We couldn't eat them, either. Must give it another go.

Matt bought a pound of beautiful lump crab meat at the farmer's market this weekend, and we made the mistake of using half of it on Ellie's Crab Cakes (pg 240). They just didn't taste right.

I want to turn back time and rescue that crab meat.

Conclusion: Just okay. Bummer.

FFwD: Bubble-Top Brioches

I was very happy when the French Fridays with Dorie crew picked Dorie's Bubble-Top Brioches (pg 496 of Around My French Table) for this week, because I welcome any opportunity to bake bread. I love the smell of bread dough as it proofs, I love the physicality of kneading, I love the feeling of accomplishment as I pull it from the oven, and, of course, I love that first hot slice.

I haven't made a bread like brioche before. It's a sticky dough, with butter and eggs worked into it. To date, I've only baked crusty peasant loaves, so this was a little different. As I stared at the butter-streaked mess being mechanically kneaded by my KitchenAid mixer, I wasn't sure it was going to come together cohesively. I closed my eyes and decided to just go with it. As promised, ten minutes later, I had a nice, smooth ball of dough. Always trust in The Dorie.

The recipe wasn't hard, but it was inconvenient. It proofed for an hour and then needed to be refrigerated and de-poofed every half hour until the yeast slowed down. This took me about two and a half hours. It wasn't labor intensive, but the process did use up a giant chunk of the day. It's best left for a day when you have no plans to leave the house.

The dough sits in the fridge overnight. Three little balls of dough each go into 12 muffin tins, and then proof again. They get an egg wash, are baked, and come out of the oven beautifully browned and smelling buttery and rich. I immediately inhaled one. And then a second. And then a third.

In case you're wondering, three is too many. Two hours later, I still feel like I ate a boulder. I may pop yet. Consider yourself warned. Stop at two.

I will say, the finished texture didn't have "lovely spring and stretch," as Dorie said it would. A minor complaint about a tasty roll, but it tips me off that I probably didn't produce a perfect version.

I'm hoping that another Dorista made the loaf version of this recipe, because when I read it, I could not figure out how the logs of dough were meant to be placed in the loaf pan.

Conclusion: Liked it. Bread makes me happy. As with most bread-products, it's Charlie Approved.

Pears, Pears Everywhere

I've baked two lovely treats from Dorie Greenspan's Baking to use up a bunch of fat, juicy pears that my bro-in-law sent us. I've done pretty well--I only have five left. Woot!

First up, Brown Sugar Bundt Cake (pg 179). I'm glad I looked pears up in the index, because they're buried in the ingredient list, so I wouldn't have noticed them otherwise. This is a moist, tender cake. It's lightly sweet, and the pears retain their flavor. My only complaint is the prunes. I like prunes, but they were aggressive here, because all the other flavors are subtle. Next time, I'll use apricots or dates instead of prunes. 

Conclusion: Liked it, and it's Charlie-Approved. I popped it in the freezer, and am happy that it's there.

As a safeguard against my potentially dreadful goose pie (which actually turned out to be pretty good. Huzzah!!), and because I had pie crust in the freezer, I made Fold-Over Pear Torte (pg 348). A pie crust is pressed into a spring form pan. The edges are supposed to be higher than I managed to get them. Woops. Diced pears, diced dried apricots, walnuts, and lemon zest/juice are mixed together, then piled in the crust. A very wet batter (custard??) is poured in, then the sides of the crust are crimped over.

All our rum was gone (egg nog), so I couldn't include it. It would have been a nice addition to the vanilla and almond extract in the batter.

I asked Matt why he was making weird faces. He said he was trying to decide if he liked it. He landed on yes, and had a second slice.

Conclusion: Liked it. I suspect it was supposed to bake a little longer. It was very wet. Or maybe that's just the nature of pears. Not sure.

Bits and Pieces

Last week, before Christmas madness hit, Mom's Turkey Meatloaf (pg 216 of The Food You Crave) called to me as a potential way to get Charlie to eat meat. You know, same old story I always have. This loaf uses ground turkey, and the meat is flavored with bell pepper, Worcestershire sauce, and ketchup. Much to my surprise, this loaf didn't dry out. Giada de Laurentiis has a turkey meatloaf that I love, but she adds a whole butt-load of olive oil to prevent it from drying. I thought the oil was essential, but I guess it's not. I'm guessing that the first step of Ellie's recipe, where oats are soaked in milk, holds the key to the moisture retention. I may try Giada's recipe with this trick and see how it comes out.

The meatloaf was decent, but Giada's tastes better. Matt kept saying it could use feta and sundried tomatoes, which are the awesomest bits of Giada's recipe.

Conclusion: This was okay, and Charlie ate a decent portion. It was a little bland, but that could be why Charlie liked it.

We have loads of leftovers in the house, so it'll be a few days before I cook an Ellie dinner. I'm going to attempt to turn the goose remains into something like a shepherd's pie tomorrow. It's the best we can think of to do with it. Wish me luck.

I also have a million pears in the house. My brother-in-law very kindly sent us two cases of pears from Harry and David for Christmas. They're delicious and juicy, and all 14 are ripe at the same time. We finished one box, and I'm scouring my books for ways to bake and then freeze pear desserts, because I'd hate to waste any of them.

Spiced Red Wine-Poached Pears (pg 293) was an obvious choice for dessert tonight. I don't know how pears are normally poached, but it seems it would be a lot easier to dump enough wine in the pot to submerge the pears, instead of attempting to turn them every five minutes. Pears--especially cooked pears--are fragile little buggers. Mine looked pretty jacked up by the end of it. My biggest problem was that I over-reduced the wine sauce. It just about turned into jelly. It seemed okay when I took it off the heat, but by the time I gave Charlie his bottle and put him to bed, it had turned solid. It's a shame, because the sauce was necessary. Without it, the pears didn't seem to have a whole lot of flavor.

Conclusion: Liked it. The flavor of the sauce was good, and the pears poached to a perfect consistency, I just bungled the execution. I'd make it again.

I love me a toasted nut, and Spiced Mixed Nuts (pg 61) are no exception. The spices in question here are curry powder, cayenne, rosemary, and salt, with a bit of maple syrup to bind it all together.

Conclusion: Liked it. Still love Lebovitz's mix best of all, but this gets props for using less butter and sugar.

A Mixed Bag

I have to get back on track to blog more regularly. These posts are unwieldy. 

Matt is the king of homemade pancakes. Before I met him, I didn't even know you could make pancakes from scratch. I can rock a Krusteaz box, but I usually leave the pancakes to him. Blueberry Buckwheat Pancakes (pg 20 of The Food You Crave) nabbed my attention, because I still have a whole bag of buckwheat sitting around from when FFwD did buckwheat blini, and because I feel better about feeding some good flours to Charlie instead of delicious Krusteaz. Believe me, I love my Krusteaz, but they aren't especially nutritious.

With syrup, these pancakes were good. Without, they were a little buckwheat-bitter. Ellie only adds 1 tb of honey to the batter, and that's not really enough to sweeten it to the point where you'd want to eat it without syrup. I say the batter could also use a hit of vanilla.

Conclusion: Liked it, and Charlie Approved. The recipe made a lot of pancakes, so I happily now have a freezer full of them, for easy breakfasts.

For a nostalgic snack, I made a Chocolate Egg Cream (pg 307). I shouldn't have. Yuck. My favorite diner meal is a BLT-without-the-lettuce, fries, and a vanilla egg cream. I've never seen them outside of New York, and when I asked for one once in a "New York Style" diner in Rhode Island, the waitress made me repeat it 14 times, and then said she didn't know what I was asking for. Sigh. Before I blame Ellie for how bad this was, I may have used the wrong fizzy. I couldn't find any seltzer at the store. Weird, right? Ellie explicity says not to use club soda, so I settled on bubbly mineral water. Is that different than seltzer? This proportion of mineral tasted really harsh and was not nearly sweet enough. Boooo!

Conclusion: Dislike. If mineral water and seltzer are different, I blame me. If they're the same, I blame Ellie.

Between the anchovy paste, the capers, and the olives in Pasta Puttanesca (pg 158), there were many layers of briny flavor. When my Mom was visiting last weekend, she bought a bag of arugula at the Farmer's Market, which we didn't use for anything. Arugula isn't my favorite thing, and this fresh stuff was exceptionally peppery. I picked this recipe because you wilt arugula down into the sauce at the end, so it would use up some of my stash. The arugula actually worked well with the other flavors.

Conclusion: Liked it.

Finally, to accompany last night's roast chicken, I made Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Orange Essence (pg 267). With buttermilk, orange juice and zest, nutmeg, brown sugar, and a little butter, it looked good on paper. The outcome was unremarkable, though. I tripled the buttermilk, and it was still a dry mash. The buttermilk curdled a little when the orange juice hit it, so there were little flecks of white mixed into my potatoes. To top it all off, the orange flavor wasn't even especially pronounced.

Conclusion: Disliked.

Every year for the past few years, I've made marshmallows at the holidays, using Alton Brown's recipe, here. His marshmallows are off the hook delicious. Dense, chewy, vanilla-ey. They have an actual presence, and retain their shape in hot chocolate, so that by the end of the mug, you have chocolate-soaked creamy marshmallows that have managed to still retain their shape.

This year, instead of going tried and true, I figured I'd make Dorie's Marshmallows (pg 404 of Baking). I really need to stop turning to her for recipes that I already have perfectly wonderful recipes for. As with the chocolate chip cookies, these marshmallows were no match against the idea I already have in my head of the ideal.

The process was much different from Alton's. Dorie's involved egg whites; Alton's do not. Dorie's involved a scant 2 tb of corn syrup, Alton's uses a cup. Dorie makes up the difference with a ton of sugar. Alton says to coat them with a mix of corn starch and powdered sugar, which makes sense in terms of retaining sweetness. Dorie just coats hers in corn starch.

I love how they look, but they're no good.

I knew these would be different from Alton's, as soon as I dolloped spoonfuls out onto my pre-powdered cookie sheets (a presentation I learned from David Lebovitz's blog, as opposed to cutting the marshmallows into squares). The concoction was wet, instead of dense and sticky. Dorie's recipe produces light, melt-in-hot-chocolate types of marshmallows. Eaten plain, they have a weird under-taste that I can't identify. I'm not sure what to do with them. Matt ate one, wrinkled his nose, said, "It just tastes like sugar," and then asked me if I could still make my normal recipe, too. Yes, I sure can.

Later, I made a microwaved smore out of one, thinking that surely that would be a respectable use of them. This is going to sound weird, but after it's round in the microwave, the marshmallow reminded me of farts. Not good.

After a day, the marshmallows started to melt in their bag. I threw them out.

Conclusion: Hated them. What a bummer. Alton, I'm coming for you!

Let's Begin, Shall We?

I skipped right over the Crispy Chicken Fingers with Honey Mustard Sauce (pg 200) recipe in The Food You Crave whenever I flipped through the book, for one very simple reason. It sounds nasty. There's not much to it: after soaking chicken strips in buttermilk (she calls for just 15 minutes, but I did it for a few hours), dredge them in crushed up Corn Chex. Yick.

This time around, they caught my eye as a possible way to get Charlie to eat chicken, since Corn Chex are his new favorite snack. This is a fast recipe. I'll give it that. Apart from the soaking and the dredging, these only have to cook for eight minutes. Easy.

And you know what? It worked! Charlie took a few bites of a strip last night (I count that as victory, as he's never eaten any chicken, prior), and spent the rest of the meal clutching the chicken in his little fist. I think he forgot it was there while he picked around for blueberries. Then, unless he fed it to the dog when I wasn't looking, he ate a whole strip with his lunch. WOOP!

That is some ugly chicken.

I would not recommend this recipe to someone who doesn't have to feed a toddler. It tastes like Corn Chex on chicken. Normal people do not eat that and say, "Ooooh, chicken fingers!" However, if you have a fussy toddler, give it a shot.

I usually hate honey mustard sauce. I tried Ellie's recipe, and it was actually pretty good. Much better than anything I've had before, and it did help mask the cereal nature of my chicken.

Conclusion: For an adult, the chicken was Just Okay. The fact that Charlie ate it goes a long way in my book, though, and I'll probably make it again, for that reason.

In an attempt to elevate the meal ever-so-slightly, I made a side of Chickpea and Spinach Salad with Cumin Dressing (pg 132). This was quite nice. Chickpeas, parsley, and red onion are mixed up with their own dressing (lemon juice and zest, cumin, cayenne, etc), placed on spinach, and then the whole is topped with a dressing of yogurt, orange juice/zest, and honey. Ummm...how has it never occured to me to orange-ify my yogurt before? I could eat a bowl of that "dressing."

Conclusion: Liked it. Easy and flavorful. Charlie wanted nothing to do with it. He tried one unseasoned chickpea, spit it out, and then fought off the seasoned one I tried to pop in his mouth. Oh well.

Lastly, today I made Warm Spinach and Artichoke Dip (pg 70). This used skim mozzarella and reduced fat sour cream and cream cheese, but somehow or other, it came out tasting exactly as spinach artichoke dip should. My only gripe is that the whole mess is pureed before baking. Personally, I like some chunkiness in my dip. Not a big deal, though, because the flavor really was spot-on.

 Much to my amazement, Charlie liked this one, too! He poked at it at first when I gave it to him smeared on bread, but dug right in when I dolloped some on a plate and handed him a spoon.

Proof! Yes, it was that big of a deal. I needed to take a picture. 

Conclusion: Liked it, and Charlie-Approved. Victoryyyyy!

There's No Sauce in My Sauce

When I think of a sauce, I think of something that has a little body. Something in which the liquid, itself, has flavor. I do not think of some chopped up stuff mixed with oil and pasta water, which is exactly what Fusilli (penne, for me) with Roasted Red and Yellow Pepper Sauce (pg 188) turned out to be.

Perfect Vegetables' recipe for roasting peppers was more work than is necessary. Why core the pepper and slice it into flat pieces before placing under the broiler, when it works perfectly well to shove the whole pepper under the broiler and flip it a few times? I did it my way.

The one thing going for this recipe is how easy it is to prepare. Mix oil, chopped roasted red and yellow pepper, garlic, mint, capers (mine looked funky and had turned pink, so I used olives), and lemon juice in a bowl and let it sit for a half hour. Then stir it into the drained pasta, adding pasta water as necessary.

I stirred a mountain of parmesan cheese into this, just to make it taste like something, and it still wasn't enough. Matt added an additional mountain of cheese to his, beyond what was already in there.

Lame.

Charlie, however, ate a plate of the pasta, carefully picking off each and every bit of non-pasta matter. I'm hoping some pepper juices hitched a ride on the penne, into his system.

Conclusion: Just okay. If not for the fact that Charlie ate it, I'd never make it again.

FFwD: Matafan

I was not terribly excited about this week's French Fridays with Dorie recipe. Matafan (pg 356) are "fluffy mashed potato pancakes." Sounds good. I like latkes. My grandmother makes a mean mashed potato pancake as a good way to use up leftovers.

My hesitation about this recipe came into play when I read the instructions. Dorie describes a step, in which you squish dried out baked potatoes through a mesh strainer, as "tedious." I appreciate her honesty, but I'm not interested in tedious when it comes to a fried bit of mashed potato. Grandma's recipe is easy. Unless these blow hers out of the water (and really, how could they? We're talking about Grandma here), who needs tedious?

Being a sport, I stood over my bowl, forcing gummy potato through mesh. Oh, for a food mill! At least I had warning. As promised, it was a pain in the ass, especially when you take into account the additional aggravation of cleaning the strainer afterward. Oy.

Insert the curse word of your choice here.

Was the result different enough from regular mashing to warrant the effort? It was looser and airier. I'll give it that. I'd be curious to try the batter with regularly mashed potatoes and see if it mattered once eggs and whipped whites and milk and flour all got mixed in. I'll give it the benefit of the doubt and assume it would lose its "fluffy" distinction.

Turns out, I needn't have pitted Dorie against Grandma in a potato pancake death match. Their pancakes bear no relation to each other. Grandma's pancakes are, without question, fried mashed potatoes. Dorie's are more like breakfast pancakes. If I didn't know there was potato in there, I never would have guessed. Her comment that her husband puts syrup on his made a lot more sense to me after I tried one.

I planned to serve these as a side to meatloaf, but a particular toddler kept dragging me by the finger from the kitchen to the couch to watch Beauty and the Beast with him, so I was lucky I even got the pancakes made.

On a whim, I bought two duck eggs at the farmer's market last week, just to see what they were like. Dinner became breakfast once I realized the meatloaf wasn't happening. Potato pancakes, fried duck eggs, herbed goat cheese, and slow-roasted tomatoes (I was planning to mix them into the meatloaf). OH BABY, it was sooooo good.

This turned into a great pile, post-picture.

The pancakes were good, but I didn't find them all that special, for the time and energy, compared to regular flour pancakes. However, they worked some miraculous psychological trick on Matt, who normally scoffs at the idea of breakfast for dinner. When he was underway for seven months, I ate a lot of eggs for dinner. Easty, tasty, fast. It's the perfect last-minute meal, in my book. Not so, in Matt's. Regardless, he said last night that having a savory version of pancakes and eggs made a great dinner. If I were on my own, I probably wouldn't bother making matafan again. However, since it's a way to make everyone happy with dinner pancakes, I'll bring out the potatoes next time I have a craving.

Conclusion: Like it, and Charlie Approved! He ate two pancakes. Wahoo!

A Perfect Vegetable, Indeed

I'm a sucker for the concept of stuffed peppers. I mean, you end up eating an entire pepper! That's a pretty big score in the land of vegetable intake. In reality, though, the fillings are often unimpressive and bland. Perfect Vegetables offers three recipes for stuffed peppers. I made the one which I thought had the most potential to knock my socks off: Stuffed Bell Peppers with Spiced Lamb, Currants, and Feta Cheese (pg 195). Yes, please!

This dish was absolutely perfect, as written. I cut the recipe in half, to only stuff two peppers instead of four, but otherwise, I didn't mess with the measurements. The combo of cumin, cardamom, cinnamon, garlic, fresh ginger, cilantro, and red pepper flakes was just right.

The authors provided several suggestions for how to keep your peppers upright. They were so simple that I felt foolish for not coming up with them on my own. Their ideas included putting the peppers in cupcake tins, individual custard cups, or in a bundt pan. Durrr! How have I spent all this time balancing them in Pyrex dishes? Never again! The custard cups were exactly the right size, and worked--here's that word again--perfectly. 

Matt said that the only problem was that I didn't make any extra, and asked why I wanted him to starve. One of these days, I'll teach him what a serving is supposed to look like.

Conclusion: True love. I'm happy I froze half of the ground lamb, because now I can make this again with little hassle. Plus, it's sort of Charlie-approved. He ate several bites of lamb. He never eats meat. I was shocked. Then he got a big chunk of feta, and it turned him off from eating altogether. Still, I call it a success.

On a side note, Matt said that he's fine with me buying cookbooks as long as I use them. He's going hunting this weekend (when in Texas, do as the Texans do...), so we were joking that if he, by chance, happens to shoot a deer or a boar, we'll need to find a book to tell us how to cook it, because I've never in my life dealt with venison. He said that Dorie should write a book on cooking wild game, and that's when he announced that he's fine with me buying cookbooks if I use them. Use them? All I do is use them! I assure you, that has NEVER been his opinion before, and he knew it as soon as the words were out of his mouth, because he started laughing. Regardless, I'm pretty sure he just gave me the thumbs up to go hog-wild, right? MWA HA HAAA!!

The Family Meal: Clams with Paprika

I've met my writing goals for the past two days (go me!), so I felt free to write a quick post. Lunch today was Clams with Paprika (pg 330 of The Family Meal). Technically, this is a recipe for mussels, but I bought clams for dinner last night, not realizing that one of the component sauces of the dish would take over an hour to make. By the time I noticed that glitch, it was way too late to start cooking, so we ate leftover quiche. We have dinner plans tonight, so I threw this quick dish together for lunch.

This was super easy. Cook garlic in oil, add paprika, flour, water, and parsley, then throw the clams in for a few minutes, until they open. Unfortunately, I browned my garlic, which made the broth bitter. Even though I could taste the mistake, I still liked it, and could tell how good it would be if I hadn't messed it up.

I like pretty food.

Conclusion: Liked it.

Speaking of messes, I also baked a breakfast cake from Baking this morning, because Charlie is getting pretty sick of scrambled eggs, waffles, and french toast. Apple Nut Muffin Cake (pg 37) came together easily. It's a standard case of mixing dry ingredients in one bowl, wet in another, then mixing them together. There's lots of good stuff in this cake--an apple, raisins, oats, apple juice, milk, and normally, nuts. I omitted them, because hard things distract Charlie from eating. He spends too much time picking them out and studying them.

I need to rename this blog "Distracted in the Kitchen," or something, because I've been causing problem after problem these days. This time, I buttered my pan, but did not flour it, so the entire bottom of my cake ripped off. Oh well, still good.

Nurts. Maybe if I flip it over...

The clincher for me that sets this cake apart from other apple muffins I've tried, is that almond extract is used in addition to vanilla extract and cinnamon. I seem to like anything almond-flavored. It works really well with the earthy, oaty, apple flavors here. I've sliced the cake into individual servings and frozen them, to deprive my greedy mouth.

A-ha! No one will ever know!

Conclusion: Loved it. This a moist cake with a crunchy crust. I've never had such a crunchy crust on a breakfast cake before. Charlie-Approved.

The Family Meal: Pasta Bolognese

My only complaint about the Pasta Bolognese (pg 82-83) is that it took a lot longer to make than I expected. I am not a fast chopper, and 1.5-2 cups each of celery, carrots, and onions took a lifetime.

Ground beef and sausage browns in a heap of butter (like, A LOT of butter). The veg cooks in oil for a bit, until good and soft. The two are mixed together with canned tomatoes, tomato paste, and a pinch of sugar. Then, the pot simmers away for about two hours.

I'm guessing that I've never had an authentic bolognese sauce. I thought it was a heavy red sauce with some meat in it, but this was more meat than sauce. I have no clue how it would stack up against a perfect bolognese, but I do know it was delicious. It would be even better if I could get my hands on a decent Italian sausage. I went to two butchers, and couldn't find any sausage. I had to buy the supermarket brand. Yuck. I know fennel seed is supposed to be in Italian sausage, and it was visibly missing from this generic stuff, so I added some. I think it was a good call.

This sauce took a long time to make, but it was worth it. Charlie ate a whole plate! Meat, vegetables, everything. He didn't spit any of it back out. Scoooore!

Conclusion: Liked it, and it's Charlie Approved. It was very rich. I couldn't finish the portion I served myself. It freezes for six months, so we have plenty to store.