Turmeric Chicken with Sumac and Lime

When I first flipped through The New Persian Kitchen, I immediately flagged Turmeric Chicken with Sumac and Lime, primarily because I didn't need to buy anything except a lime, but it was different enough that I wasn't totally sure how it would turn out.

First, you coat the chicken with a hefty mixture of turmeric, salt, and pepper, and brown them on each side. You don't just brown them, though. You reeeeeally brown them. It says 7 minutes per side. I was afraid it would burn in that time, but it was fine. Then you add water and a lot of garlic, cover it, and let it braise for a while.

I was pleasantly surprised, when I lifted the cover, that the garlic water had mixed with the spices on the chicken and thickened into a sauce, and the chicken itself was completely, beautifully tender. The recipe calls for thighs, but I used breasts, because, despite the fact that every cooking show on earth tells me that dark meat is superior, I think it mostly tastes the same, but there is less of it, and you have to deal with all those gristly, nasty tendons and things. Please don't completely write me off. I'm sorry, Mr. Bourdain. And Colicchio. And all the rest of you. Ha!

Sprinkle with sumac, spritz with some lime juice, dress with the sauce, and dive in. The chicken and the sauce were very salty, so I'm glad I tasted it before slathering it on. With restraint, it was salty in the best possible way.

I always avoid eye contact and hold my breath whenever Batman tries something new. He's getting better about eating a variety of food, but it's been historically difficult. He accused me of putting vegetables in it to turn it yellow. I assured him there were no vegetables in the chicken. He tasted it, and declared it "really good! Salty! Like french fries!" I'd say there was a bit more of a spicy nuance there, but whatever--he ate it! No complaints!

He asked if it was Indian food.
I said, "No, Persian."
He said, "Does that mean it's from Paris?"
"I said, "No, it's from Iran."
He chewed, and nodded, and said, "Cool. I miss Paris. That place was really big, and we ate a lot of dessert there."

We sure did. Paris, in a nutshell.

Conclusion: Loved it. I wish that I'd made double, so I could have leftovers on a salad for lunch tomorrow. This will definitely be a repeat.

Bad and Good

The photo on the cover of The Food52 Cookbook is so well-shot, so accessible, so attractive, that it makes me want to eat Zucchini Pancakes (pg 77) immediately.

I made them for dinner last week. First of all, it broke my little adopted Neapolitan heart to pay $3.60 for 3 zucchini. That's $1.20 per zucchini! In Italy, I could get at least 2 kilo of zucchini for that price. At least. And their zucchini would be so fresh that they'd still have the flowers attached. I have produce problems in the US. (Operation: Learn to Garden goes into effect next week).

Much to my dismay, these pancakes were awful. Universally reviled. I hate when recipes instruct you to generously salt a vegetable to draw out the moisture, but then there is no mechanism by which to remove the salt. I have this same problem with eggplant recipes. I much prefer the Neapolitan method of drawing moisture from an eggplant (and it, presumably, would work for a zucchini, too), which is to put it out in the hot Italian sun for an hour. Or, another method they have is to soak it in salt water, and then squeeze all the water out. I can personally attest to the success of the water-soaking method. Anyway, I followed the instructions provided by the cookbook, and produced salt bombs. Apart from the salt, they were flavorless. We barely touched them. Bummer.

Conclusion: Hated it.

For a quick lunch, I made Yogurt and Spinach Dip "Borani Esfanaaj," In the Persian Manner (pg 304.) Delicious. I ate the whole thing. I gave a few bites to Matt, and when I was done with the rest of it, he licked the bowl clean. He actually licked the bowl. That counts as success.

Conclusion: Loved it.

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.

Food52: Blueberry Almond Breakfast Polenta

The recipe for Blueberry Almond Breakfast Polenta (pg 140) caught my eye nearly every time I've flipped through The Food52 Cookbook. One reason for this is that the picture accompanying the recipe is pretty and cozy and makes me want to eat it. The other reason is that I have two bags of polenta in my pantry that I never use, and I've been trying to do a better job of working through my grains. I have too many.

Bulked up with almond meal, flavored with cardamom, and sweetened with honey and blueberries, this is my kind of food. It almost had the satisfying appeal of rice pudding, but to a much less sweet degree. I loved it. It was a good thing that I halved the recipe, because I ate the entire pot (2 servings) over the course of the day, and would easily have eaten the entire 4 servings, if that was what was in front of me.

Hmmm...this bears a striking resemblance to the mushroom soup from the other day. I promise I'll stop cooking gray food.

My photo doesn't look nearly as delicious as the one in the book, but trust me. This is good stuff.

Conclusion: Loved it.

And now, I'm off to San Diego, to visit friends for a week. Until then!

FFwD: Croquants

I've never heard of Croquants (pg 410 of Around My French Table) before, but it turns out they're one of the simplest cookies that I've ever made. Chop nuts. Mix with sugar. Stir in egg whites. You don't even have to whip the whites into a meringue or anything. Straight from the egg and into the batter. Then stir in a little flour. Then bake. That's it.

I used salted cashews, because Dorie says they're her family's favorite. Who am I to argue with the experts? I also added vanilla, because why not?

Hello, my lovelies.

I'm in real danger of eating the entire output of this recipe. Dorie says that they're defined by their crunch texture. The edges of mine are crunchy, but the middles are chewy, and this is what is causing me to devise excuses to pass through the kitchen and grab another.

The bottoms of the cookies on my second tray burned slightly. These are so simple that the slight burn ruined the cookies. I'm pretty happy that I could, in good conscious, throw half out.

The remainder have to go to work with Matt tomorrow, because I'll take them down if I'm left alone with them for too long. They're so light, I don't even feel like I'm eating anything. Trouble.

Conclusion: Love them. Too much.

FFwD: Tartine de Viande des Grisons

Tartine de Viande des Grisons is a long and mysterious name for a simple tartine that the French Fridays with Dorie crew made this week. Bread? Check! Butter? Check! Bresaola? Check! Walnuts (or in my case, toasted almond slices)? Check! Olive oil? Check! That's it.

The deep red color of bresaola has often caught my attention at the supermarket here in Napoli, but I was never really tempted to buy it. I find the color off-putting. It's just SO red. I'm happy to have found this recipe, though, because it turns out to be delicious!

This is one of those recipes that tastes better than its individual parts seem to warrant. The butter, oil, and toasted nuts really pull the toast and meat together into one delicious bite of food.

Matt got home late from work the other day, so I put a tartine together for him while his soup re-heated. Instead of eating any soup, he turned the rest of the (sizeable) loaf of sourdough bread into tartines and devoured them all. Needless to say, we loved this. I thought it would be good, but I didn't anticipate how good!

Thanksgiving with Pioneer Woman

I've made a bunch of recipes from The Pioneer Woman Cooks: A Year of Holidays. Most of them are from the Thanksgiving section, but not all of them are.

First up, Drop Biscuits (pg 346, the Christmas section). I brought these over to a friend's house a few week's ago. She made soup and mulled wine. I made biscuits and dessert. I've had a hit-or-miss relationship with biscuits in the past. I always blame my failures on my Yankee-dom. These Drop Biscuits are simple to make (put the ingredients in the food processor. Whir. Scoop spoonfuls on to a baking sheet. Bake.) and turned out to be delicious. I need to make biscuits more often.

Conclusion: Loved them.

Matt and I haven't been overly impressed with our Thanksgiving stuffing for the past few years, so we decided to mix it up this year and use Ree's Basic Thanksgiving Dressing (pg 258). This uses three types of bread: cornbread, Italian bread, and ciabatta, and a host of standard stuffing flavors: celery, onion, parsley, thyme, rosemary, and basil. She uses dried herbs. In the future, I'd like to try it with fresh herbs. I think this was a good starting point. I felt it needed a bit more flavor, but I'm not totally sure what to do to it. I liked that the cornbread practically turned to breadcrumbs and coated all the other breads. There was a lot of different texture.

Conclusion: Liked it, but it needs some fiddling. We didn't salt it enough this time. Needs more oomph.

For the dressing, I made Ree's recipe for Skillet Cornbread (pg 268). This was easy to make, and it worked fine in the dressing, but I don't like it on its own. The cornbread is VERY salty and gritty. This may be why Matt undersalted the dressing--I warned him that the cornbread was salty. I like sweet, wet cornbread. This was the opposite. Different strokes for different folks.

Conclusion: Disliked, but it worked fine for the dressing.

I almost forgot about the Giblet Gravy. Matt is the Bird-meister, so he made the gravy. I was uninvolved, so I have no input regarding the process. All I can say is that it was deeeeeeelicious. I can never be without it again.

Conclusion: Loved it. 

I'm roasting a chicken tonight to use up our leftover dressing. For a side, I decided to try Ree's Cranberry Sauce (pg 256). This was a last-minute decision, and so I don't have the orange zest and juice that I'm supposed to. I threw in a splash of mandarinetto instead. Figured it couldn't hurt. I normally make a basic cranberry sauce with sugar, orange zest, and juice. The difference here is that, instead of sugar, Ree uses a cup of maple syrup.

I'm torn about what to think. I love the smokey maple flavor that the syrup gives to the sauce, but it's too sweet. It's possible that the orange zest and juice might have cut the sweetness a bit. I'm not sure. I may continue to play with this, cutting back on the amount of syrup used until the balance tips over a bit in favor of cranberry tartness. It's cranberry sauce. I want to taste the cranberry!

Conclusion: Liked it, but it needs tweaking.

A Year of Holidays: Broccoli-Cheese Soup

This is going to be a quick one. My friend from home is currently sitting on a runway in Paris, and I have to leave in a while to pick her up from the airport here in Napoli. HOORAY! In the two + years that I've lived here, this is only my second visitor who is not directly responsible for birthing either me or my husband. My friends are slackers.

So, I'm busting out this little post, because I'll forget about it in the next week, otherwise.

Pioneer Woman's Broccoli-Cheese Soup tastes exactly as broccoli cheese soup should. I replaced her 2 cups of half-and-half with 2 additional cups of milk (plus the 4 that's already called for), and didn't miss it for one second.

I did wish that I'd served this in a bread bowl, as she instructs, or at least had some bread with it, because I was very hungry by the time I went to bed. Like I said, though, the flavor and texture were perfect.

Charlie took his one taste and acted like I'd made him eat a spoonful of liquid waste. Very dramatic. Silly doesn't know what he's missing.

Conclusion: Loved it.

And so, I will now move on from the Halloween section. (This soup is suggested as pre-trick-or-treat fuel.)

FFwD: Osso Buco a la Arman

Finally! A French Fridays with Dorie recipe that gives me a sourcing edge over people who don't have access to an Italian supermarket. Ipercoop may not have duck or brown sugar or affordable avocado, but veal? They're up to their eyeballs in veal (which is kind of weird, because the adult beef offerings are poor.) Odds are good that veal is available in the already-cut meat section, any way you want it cut. As soon as I read Dorie's description of the veal shanks ("cut crosswise from a veal shank, thick slices of osso buco are round, with meaty nuggets surrounding a central hole, which is filled with marrow"), I thought, "Yep, I've definitely seen that at Ipercoop." Score: 1 for Italy. Or should I say, "GOOOOOOOAL!"

One of three. 3 euro a piece. Not too shabby.

On a side note, I'd like to mention how very, very grateful I am that I didn't have to walk up to a butcher with my google translation of "veal shank." I can never be sure that the words coming out of my mouth are appropriate. For example, when we first arrived here, I looked up the word "pecorino," because I love cheese and wanted to know what the word meant. Google informed me that it meant "doggy style." In disbelief, I contacted my Italian friend and interrogated her. Apparently, pecorinA means doggy style. PecorinO means cheese from a goat. Google has since corrected its mistake. I'm certain that it also makes errors when translating from English to Italian, so who knows what I'm actually saying to people. Always an adventure. I digress.

Armed with my shanks, at the last minute, I decided to invite some friends over for dinner. It felt like a meal that needed to be shared. Much to my delight, two of our favorite families came on short notice, and we had a wonderful, relaxed evening. "Sunday dinner" with the extended family (closest friends, in the military) is one of the many ways that Italy has steeped into my blood. It's one of my favorite customs, and one that I hope to bring home with me.

This was a perfect recipe to cook for company because all the cooking is done ahead of time. There aren't any last-minute steps. Take it out of the oven, break the meat apart so it looks like a stew, and bring it to the table. Dorie said to skim fat off the top, but mine somehow didn't look greasy enough to bother. The meat was so tender. I didn't even care when I had a mouthful of fat, because it literally dissolved. Dorie's Orange Rice Pilaf paired perfectly with the stew. Three shanks fed six adults. The only problem was that there were no leftovers. At all.

Last night, I caught up on Rice Pudding and Caramel Apples. I love rice pudding. It's one of those desserts that takes me right back to my Mom's kitchen. She always put raisins and a bit of cinnamon in hers, and I have to say, I missed them in this.

I compulsively made the pudding, because it struck me as a decent way to keep myself busy, and hopefully distract myself from stressing about the fact that everyone else we know who is Matt's rank and scheduled to move next summer heard from the detailer last week, receiving their next assignment. We haven't heard a peep. We're exhausted from the stress of waiting. So, rice pudding.

As I stirred, the phrase, "The solace of stirring," popped into my head. For a few seconds, I marveled at how perfect that phrase felt right at that moment, and that clearly I'd missed my calling as a poet. Then I remembered that that is a section title in Nigella Kitchen. My bad. Nigella, you were spot-on with that description. There is much solace to be found in stirring.

Due to my anxiety level, I had zero interest in making caramel and cooked apples. At first, I planned to put a layer of applesauce on my pudding, and then drizzle with caramel I bought in Brittany. I forgot about the applesauce, and just went with the caramel. It was good, but I didn't drizzle any on my second bowl of pudding, and missed the raisins and cinnamon the whole time I ate it. Sometimes, you just want Mom's recipe. This was delicious, and it was exactly the type of nursery food that I needed yesterday. Unfortunately, I ate so much of it yesterday that there's only a little bit left to see me through today's stressful wait. GRRR!

Beef Fajitas and Homemade Tortillas

I've gone fajita crazy. I cooked The Pioneer Woman's Beef Fajitas and Homemade Tortillas (pg 141 and 143 of A Year of Holidays) last week, and have been craving them again ever since. The ingredients are already on my grocery list to make again for dinner this week.

The meat sits in an easy-to-throw-together marinade of Worcestershire, garlic, lime juice, sugar, olive oil, and spices for several hours, then gets grilled. The veg (multi-colored peppers, onions, and mushrooms) are simply cooked in olive oil and butter. I was originally skeptical that there was no seasoning for the vegetables, but it turned out that the meat marinade provided plenty of flavor.

I didn't get as many tortillas out of my "walnut-sized" balls of dough as I was supposed to, and the tortillas, which I flattened in my tortilla press, were too small to wrap the food up like a fajita, but they tasted delicious and were a nice, soft, bendy texture. Next time, I'll know not to halve the recipe. The tortillas, used like tacos, disintegrated under the weight and wetness of the food, but as long as you're not a neat-freak, the deliciousness will compensate for the mess. If you have a problem with messes, you probably shouldn't be eating fajitas in the first place.

I inhaled these so fast that I didn't even think to snap a picture. Whoops.

Conclusion: Loved both recipes. I want more, right now. I may experiment with the ratio of corn to white flour in the tortillas, because I do prefer a cornier flavor, but that's just a matter of taste.

Let's Get This "Long Term" Ball Rolling

I recently asked Charlie to pick a recipe out of C is for Cooking. He went with Ernie's Fruity Frozen Fun Pops. I like the idea of these a lot more than either one of us enjoyed the outcome.

Blitz banana, canned crushed pineapple, plain yogurt, and a little sugar in the blender. Fill an ice cube tray with the mixture. Put them in the freezer, and when they're half frozen, stab them with straws.

These were annoying to eat, because the second they get a little melty, they fall off the straw and make slow-eating 4 year olds scream. Also, the straws that I used weren't sturdy enough to support the weight of the cube, so they bent. Refer back to the screaming 4 year old.

My biggest problem with this, though, was that the texture of the cube was unpleasant to eat. There weren't fruit chunks, but there was a lot of fiber from the pineapple, so you almost had to chew it. Not ideal.

Charlie barely ate his first one, and never wanted another. I felt the same way.

Conclusion: Dislike.

My first two forays into Pioneer Woman Cooks: A Year of Holidays have been delightful.

First up: Sticky Cherry Cake, from her Valentine's Day section. This cake uses canned cherries in the batter, and then the syrup from the can is cooked down with sugar and butter, and poured on top of the cooked cake.

Holy moly. This thing was rich, sweet, and delicious. The chewy, caramelized edges were the best part. For me, a little went a long way, and my family didn't eat much of it on the day I made it. However, our friends and their kids came for dinner the next day. We demolished the rest of the cake. One of the kids may have licked the pan clean.

Conclusion: Loved it. Sometimes you need something this decadently sweet.

The Chipotle Chicken Chili from the section for "The Big Game" is, hands-down, the best chicken chili I've had. I think that the element that sets it apart from other recipes I've tried is that, in the last few minutes, you add a mixture of beer and masa harina. This provides that nice, earthy, corn flavor, and also thickens the chili beautifully. I'm also a huge fan of the flavor that chipotle peppers in adobo give to any recipe, so this wins points for using them.

I realize this looks like a pile of cheese, with no chili.

Conclusion: I loved it. Matt loved it. Charlie ate an English Muffin.

Pasta and Zucchini and Booze-ahol

A bout of poor dinner planning paid off when I realized that I was in possession of the three ingredients necessary to make Rigatoni alla Pastora (Shepherd's Style Rigatoni with Ricotta and Sausage) from My Calabria. An added bonus was that all three ingredients (pasta, ricotta, sausage) are things that Charlie will eat.

This recipe was easy. Cook chunks of un-cased sausages. Add cooked pasta to the greasy sausage pan. Mix some of the pasta water into ricotta until it loosens up and becomes saucy. Add the pasta and sausage to the ricotta. Season to taste. Boom. Done.

Not a pretty plate of food.

This was heavier than I would prefer, and it made enough to feed an army. Matt and Charlie both loved it, though, and it was simple.

Conclusion: Liked it.

I served Parmigiana di Zucchine with last week's Dorie recipe. If you have a million pounds of zucchini in your garden, this will use it up. If you're going out of your way to procure zucchini, just go the eggplant route instead. The zucchini is lightly fried in olive oil before being layered with cheese and sauce, but it doesn't take on that same luxurious silkiness that eggplant does. I was aware that what I was eating was inferior to eggplant parm for the duration of the meal. It didn't help that Costantino suggests you serve this at room temp, which is a huge mistake, because the mozzarella is tough at room temp. No bene.

Conclusion: Just okay. A heap of it is still sitting in my fridge.

When the relevant fruits (mandarin oranges, which my landlord has a grove of, and strawberries) were in season this year, I used Costantino's recipe to make Liquore al Mandarino, as well as the Fragolino Variation. Italians, including Costantino, use grain alcohol for their liquore. Too many of my friends have produced undrinkable limoncello with grain alcohol, so I learned last year, using a different "mandarinetto" recipe that using a mid-grade vodka produces a muuuuuuch smoother and more delicious drink. I substituted vodka into Costantino's recipe, too, but used her proportions of fruit, alcohol, and sugar-water/syrup. Both flavors are deeeelicious. Love them.

FFwD: (Cheese) Filled Zucchini Blossoms

Fried zucchini blossoms are near and dear to my heart. Growing up, my Italian-American next-door neighbor fried batches of flowers from her garden all summer long to lure me and her daughter out of their pool. Now, whenever I visit my mom during the summer, Ann makes a point of frying zucchini blossoms for me, because she knows how much I love them. (During winter visits, she inevitably brings over cookies. She's a good neighbor to have.)

Years ago, I asked Ann for her recipe. She gave me a list of ingredients and told me to mix them together until the batter looked right. This will come as no surprise, but my first run at frying my own zucchini flowers was an epic failure. Matt will eat just about anything that's fried, and even he found them inedible. I haven't really tried again since then, so I was very excited to give Dorie's zucchini blossom recipe a try.

Technically, Dorie's recipe is for Shrimp-Filled Zucchini Blossoms. I'm sure that's delicious, but here in Naples, I've only seen zucchini blossoms come with one filling: cheese. In my ongoing effort to learn to duplicate things I love from my time here, I decided to follow Dorie's cheese-filled variation instead of the shrimp one.

Finding zucchini blossoms was easy. Italians are crazy for these things (with good reason). They actually sell fresh packs of them at the supermarket. Or so I thought. I didn't realize until I got home, that I'd actually bought fiore di zucca. Pumpkin. Not zucchini. Oh well, no big deal. I couldn't tell the difference.

I don't know what army I thought I would feed with this many flowers. We wasted quite a few.

Is club soda the same as sparkling water? I don't think so. I used sparkling water, because that is what the lady in my Italian cooking class uses. If it's good enough for Vera, it's good enough for me.

This batter fried up perfectly. These flowers were crispy and delicious. I'll always love Ann's zucchini flowers best, because they're made out of love, but this is now my go-to recipe when I need to fry flowers--or any other vegetable, for that matter--myself. The cheese filling was, frankly, better than a lot of what I've eaten at restaurants around here. Well done, Dorie.

After much prodding, Charlie tasted, then devoured an un-stuffed flower, while skeptically reciting Green Eggs and Ham ("You may like them, you will see..."). Score.

Matt said this was one of his favorite dinners in ages. All hail my beloved zucchini flowers!

Calabrese

Although I've been plugging along and enjoying recipes from My Calabria, I've (once again) been a delinquent blogger. Thanks for putting up with me.

Lo, these many days ago, on June 11, I cooked Tonno alla Menta (Fresh Tuna Pizzo Style with Wine Vinegar, Garlic, and Mint). Coat sliced tuna in flour, then fry briefly in some olive oil before removing it to a plate. Garlic, vinegar, salt, and mint leaves are whisked into the remaining oil, then poured over the tuna. Easy, fast, unusual, and it's meant to be served at room temp. The tuna should marinate in the sauce for at least 30 minutes, and supposedly improves the longer you leave it.

I don't think I've ever cooked a vinegar + mint combo. It was unusual, tangy, and very delicious. I'm a fan.

Conclusion: Loved it.

Unfortunately, that meal wasn't all grand. I'd also prepared Melanzane all'Insalata (Eggplant Salad with Garlic, Mint, and Hot Peppers). I was never much of an eggplant fan before moving to Italy, but I lo-o-ove them here. The eggplants are smaller, thinner, and much more flavorful than the hulking behemoths we get back home.  Not to mention that the Italian nonna's generous, extravagant use of olive oil works wonders when dealing with melanzane. I've often had an eggplant salad as part of an antipasti course in restaurants, and it's always good. I'd hoped that this recipe would turn out similar to those.

It didn't.

This was disgusting.

There's nothing appealing about that.

First of all, the eggplant are left whole, with slits down the sides, and boiled. Once cooked, they dry in a colander for an hour. Then, pour a mixture of vinegar, oil, garlic, hot pepper, mint and salt over the eggplant, and leave at room temp to marinate for 24 hours.

There was nothing good about this. The temperature, slimy texture, and hyper-vinegarized flavor were all totally gross. Neither one of us ate more than a bite. I wasted a lot of eggplant on this one. Not happy.

Conclusion: Hated it.

Another day, I made Pollo con Melanzane (Braised Chicken with Eggplant, Tomatoes, and Pancetta). I could do without the chicken in this recipe. The thighs didn't absorb any flavor. They just turned out as your standard chicken thigh. The sauce, on the other hand, was amaze-balls. It reminded me of an easy recipe that an Italian woman that I know here taught me, in which cubes of eggplant are fried in peanut oil, then mixed into tomato sauce, except (shh! Don't tell!) this was even more delicious.

This recipe has you fry the eggplant in olive oil, but I stuck with my Italian's peanut oil. I hate wasting so much delicious olive oil just to fry something.

Cooking pancetta and garlic in olive oil, browning the chicken thighs, pouring in some white wine and letting it evaporate, then adding tomato puree and cooking it down until the chicken is finished takes this sauce over the edge. I want to try this without the chicken. I'm sure the chicken fat adds some flavor to the sauce, but the chicken itself couldn't compete with the sauce. I served mine on cannelini beans, but this would be equally great on rice, pasta, or just on a plate.

Conclusion: Loved it (sans chicken).

Last, but definitely not least, I brought Polpette di Melanzane (Crispy Eggplant Meatballs) to a friend's bbq yesterday. (Can you tell that it's eggplant season?) This is an appetizer that I've had at restaurants, and it's one of my favorite new foods that I've eaten since moving to Napoli. I knew I was going to try this recipe before leaving this book, and this seemed like a prime opportunity.

I was surprised at how easy this was. Boil diced eggplant for 10 minutes. Drain, cool, and squeeze out the water. Then, you just chop it up (it's already pretty mushy), mix it up with breadcrumbs, grated cheese, parsley, garlic, and an egg, roll small balls in more breadcrumbs, and fry in olive oil.

Homina homina homina. FEED MY FACE.

They were so good fresh out of the oil that they almost didn't make it to the BBQ. They were still wonderful at room temp. Two people separately asked me for the recipe. Even Charlie ate one. If my kid will eat eggplant in this form, it'll be a new staple in my house. I had to call them meatballs, but he didn't notice foul play.

It's a pet peeve of mine when I follow the measurements and sizing instructions in a recipe and end up with a drastically different number of items. I am delighted to report that this recipe says it will make 32 1-inch meatballs, and that is exactly the number I got. Bonus points!

Conclusion: LOVED it.

Pasta, Pasta, Pasta

One element of Italian cooking that I absolutely love, and never knew about before moving to Napoli, is their affinity for carb on carb action. Beans with pasta? Bene! Potatoes with pasta? Even better. The beans/potato get all starchy and creamy and coat the pasta in the most satisfying (gut-busting) sort of way.

Pasta e Patate "Santo Janni" (pg 66 of My Calabria) turned out exactly how I hoped it would. Cook up some pancetta. Add potatoes to the pan and stir around to coat them in all that good fat. Add water and boil until the potatoes are mashable. Mash 'em, then add cooked spaghetti with some of the pasta water. Finish with some shredded ricotta salata (salty), and dig in. Easy and hearty. I loved it. Charlie loved it. High score, all around.  I mean, pancetta, potatoes, and pasta. How can it go wrong?

Conclusion: Loved it.

Scorze di Fagiolini con Ragu d'Agnello (pg 82) is unlike any sauce I've had before. It's supposed to use diced lamb, but I had ground, so that's what I went with. Cook the lamb for an hour in an onion/carrot/celery/garlic/rosemary-fortified tomato and white wine sauce. This took a while to cook, but that time was predominantly hands-off. It packed a lot of flavor for the amount of work put in, and was a new lovely way to eat lamb.

Matt thought it tasted like the Bolognese sauce we had in Bologna, which was very different from the Bolognese sauce we've had anywhere else (ahem, in the States). Did you know that Bolognese sauce is not tomato based? I didn't, until I had the real deal in Bologna. For that reason, I don't really see the Bolognese comparison, as it is a) not made with lamb and b) not made with tomato. Matt stands by it, though. Whatever it tasted like, it was good. Charlie picked the lamb off of his pasta. Shocker.

Conclusion: Liked it. 

Tilapia with Artichoke, Caper, and Cherry Tomato Sauce

It felt like it took a long time to prepare dinner tonight, but that's really only because it took me forever to clean the giant bag of brussel sprouts that Matt pulled from our garden. I've found enough little buggies and mystery matter (eggs? I don't know) hiding in loose leaves, that I'm psychotic about pruning the sprouts before cooking them. Regardless, the brussel sprouts had nothing to do with this recipe. The Tilapia with Artichoke, Caper, and Cherry Tomato Sauce (pg 246 of The Epicurious Cookbook) took very little time to prepare.

I was skeptical that the breadcrumb and parmigiano mixture would adhere to the fish without any egg, especially after I followed the instructions to pat the fish dry before dredging it, but it did, in fact, stick. Surprise!

I'm out of onions, so I left it out. I cooked garlic for a few seconds, then added in the halved canned artichokes, cooked it a few minutes, added halved cherry tomatoes and capers, cooked it a few minutes, until the tomatoes started to mush up a bit, then added in the water from the canned artichokes, some chicken stock, and a little butter. The mixture reduced for a few minutes, and dinner was ready. Perfetto!

Conclusion: Loved it. Easy and tasty.

Bookending Bologna

On Friday, two hours before we were scheduled to leave for the train station to head up to Bologna for the weekend, Charlie requested pancakes. This kid asks for specific food so infrequently that I decided, sure, let's have pancakes for lunch.

I've had Nigella's Cheesecakelets (pg 191 of Feast) in my head for quite a while, ever since I first saw her whip them up on her tv show. Despite the name, these don't much resemble cheesecake. They have cottage cheese in them, and she says that they remind her of her grandmother's cheesecake. Who am I to argue with an individual's food associations?

There's not a ton of flour involved (only 1/3 cup), especially when taking into account that there are 3 eggs. The eggs are separated, the whites whipped, then folded into the batter.

I found these pancakes to be impossible to handle. They stuck to the griddle and were very slow to cook through, meaning that I kept flipping too-wet pancakes to try to keep the glued-on bottoms from burning. It was a hot mess. Maybe it was my fault. Maybe my pan was too hot. I didn't heat the pan any differently than I normally do for pancakes.

I managed to get one to stay intact for Charlie, and he ate it (including cottage cheese) without complaint. I wound up with the torn up messes, and didn't bother cooking the remainder of the batter. The flavor wasn't unique or interesting enough to make this recipe instead of a normal pancake recipe, especially when taking into account how difficult they were to actually cook.

Conclusion: Dislike. Pain in the ass. I may try and slip some cottage cheese into our normal pancake recipe in the future though, for extra protein, since it didn't seem to bother Charlie that it was in there.

I made sure I had all the ingredients on hand to make Penne alla Vodka (pg 133 of Feast), because it seemed like it would be easy enough to throw together on Monday, after a day of travel. It was. This was very delicious, and it tasted like home. Not my actual home, because vodka sauce was not something my mother ever made, but my neighbors did, and I used to like ordering it in restaurants. Kids need vodka too. What? haha.

One thing I found odd, and that I'm not sure I would do again, is that, instead of adding the vodka to the sauce, which is the only way I've ever seen this made, Nigella has you mix butter and the vodka in with the drained pasta, prior to adding it to the sauce. This made it much more obvious that vodka was involved, which may be why she prefers it. I don't know. I think it tastes smoother and less jarring when mixed with the sauce. Also, on Monday night, I'd pulled out Charlie's pasta prior to adding the vodka, and he inhaled his entire plate of pasta and sauce. Last night, I tried to give him the leftovers (which included the boozified pasta), and we fought about it for two hours. In retrospect, I'm wondering if he could taste the difference. It's equally likely that he was just being a pain. The majority of our meals turn into fights, so who knows.

Conclusion: Loved it.

We adults ate Dominican Chimichurri Burgers (pg 152 of The Epicurious Cookbook) last night. The intro describes this as a "messy masterpiece." Messy, yes. Masterpiece? Let's not go crazy.

The basis of this burger--ground beef mixed with diced onion and red pepper, garlic, cilantro, oregano, soy sauce, and Worcestershire, topped with a mixture of mayo, ketchup, and mustard--was very good. I know, because I had the leftover patty for lunch today, minus all the extra unnecessary hooplah. The hooplah in question is sliced cabbage and shredded carrots cooked for two minutes until wilted (huh? Why? It was still crunchy. Not sure what the point of this step was.), grilled tomatoes, and grilled onions. I don't like all that messy crap on top of my burger. The whole thing fell apart while I was eating it. It's just a peeve of mine. The cabbage and carrot was especially unnecessary. Out with it!

Conclusion: Liked it, minus the toppings.

Another Round-up

I really need to start posting about these recipes closer to the time I've prepared them. Some are a little fuzzy in my memory. Maybe that should tell me something.

Peruvian Grilled Chicken (pg 143 of The Epicurious Cookbook) doesn't resemble any Peruvian chicken I've ever had. Once in a blue moon, for a treat, my dad's best friend would stop at a Peruvian chicken place and bring a few birds to my house, where we all descended upon them like a pack of rabid zombies. They were salty and juicy and delicious. Same goes for the ones we used to get when we lived in Norfolk. This version was tasty enough, when looked at objectively, but did not come anywhere close to being delicious enough to be called Peruvian chicken. It was, however, easy. Just marinate chicken parts overnight, then roast them in the oven for a half an hour at really high heat. It was good, but not great. It will not satisfy a Peruvian chicken craving.

Conclusion: Just okay. If it were called Soy Sauce Chicken, I might score it higher, but this is no substitute for the real thing.

Southwestern Lime Chicken (pg 145) is another marinate, then grill recipe. There are other spices in the mix, but the only two flavors that stand out are lime juice and soy sauce. If limey and salty, with a finishing touch of melted Monterey Jack, is your thing, then this is a recipe for you. I liked it. My chicken took a lot longer to cook through than the designated ten minutes. Another easy recipe that I'm glad to have in my pocket.

Sorry, I cut them all to make sure they were done, so it looks a bit dismembered.

Conclusion: Liked it. Can anyone tell me how to use a cast-iron grill pan without smoking out my house?

Thai Fried Eggplant with Basil (pg 273) is technically supposed to be a side dish. I probably should have paid attention to that fact prior to preparing it. This was mighty tasty (especially to my deprived-of-Asian-food tastebuds), and healthily veggie-laden (4 WW points, without counting the rice), but Matt and I were both starving by bedtime. Stomach-growling hunger. No good. However, the protein of your choice could easily be tossed into the wok and stir fried with the rest, so I'll know better next time.

Conclusion: Liked it.

Last night, as a side to a rotisserie chicken, I made Wild Rice with Pecans, Raisins, and Orange Essence (pg 354). Despite the fact that I cut a tablespoon of olive oil, and halved the pecan and the raisins, in order to bring the points value into a more reasonable range (7 pts), this was still very good. There's lots of good flavor here, with the zest and juice of one large orange (or 2 tangerines, in this case), balsamic vinegar, mint leaves, nuts, raisins, and green onions. It's meant to sit for an hour or two, then be served room temp, so it's another easy do-ahead recipe.

Conclusion: Loved it. This tastes extremely orangey, which I like. The whole "essence" business made me expect less flavor.

Lastly, as part of Charlie's Curious George themed birthday party, I made monkey and banana shaped cut-out cookies, using Nigella's recipe in Feast. I can't say I was very impressed. Matt and Charlie had a stomach virus earlier in the week, and I came down with it the night before his original party date, and was congested before that, so it's possible my tastebuds were off, but these cookies didn't have much flavor. They cut well and were fairly sturdy, but if they don't taste delicious, I don't need them in my life. Unfortunately, I wound up having to toss them out because we were all too sick to be interested in eating them before they went bad, and I didn't get a chance to make new ones for his belated party, this past saturday. If I had made new cookies, I would have used a different recipe.

My icing skills need some work.

Conclusion: Disliked. Don't care if they look cute. I want my cookies to taste good.

Fingers Crossed

Charlie was sick to his stomach all night. Around 5:30 this morning, Matt got sick, too. I figure it's only a matter of time before I'm taken down, so while I'm exposing myself to contagion, snuggling with wee man on the couch, I might as well catch up on a few recipes that I've neglected to post about. If I'm lucky, it'll distract me from the annoying voice of Annie on Little Einsteins. In general, I really like this show (and am always surprised and delighted when I'm listening to Ben Folds and Charlie announces, "That piano sounds happy"), but seriously. Annie has to be a producer's daughter or something. Her voice is nails on the chalkboard of my brain.

Last week, I made Roasted Lamb Chops with Charmoula (pg 62 of The Epicurious Cookbook). This was easy (score: 1). Blitz cumin seeds, parsley, mint (which I couldn't get my hands on), cilantro, garlic, paprika, salt, cayenne, and lemon juice in a food processor. Still running the machine, add olive oil. You're supposed to marinate the lamb in this mixture for 4-24 hours. I only marinated mine for the time it took me to prepare the rest of the meal. Still good. The recipe instructs you to place a rack on a baking sheet and roast the chops in the oven. My cooling racks are coated with something, so I wasn't about to put them in the oven. I grilled the chops on the stove instead. This seems faster and more straightforward to me, anyway.

Conclusion: I seem to love every lamb recipe I come across, and this one is no exception. Delish! 

I made Creamed Spinach from Nigella's Feast (pg 207) to accompany the lamb. Holy moly. I could have eaten the entire pot myself. With a stick of butter and a cup of heavy cream, this is way too caloric to be anything but a special occasion vegetable, but it is so, so good. It makes me laugh that Nigella says to "heat the butter -- using less if this amount frightens you." It did frighten me, Nigella. I used half a stick of butter, and didn't miss the other four tablespoons.

I've only had creamed spinach out of a can, and never liked it. This homemade version is rich and nutmeggy and cozy. I added a can of while beans to it, just for kicks, and Matt said he loved it with the beans, and didn't think he'd like it as much without the beans, for textural reasons. I could eat it either way.

Conclusion: Loved it. Dangerously delicious.

Back to Epicurious, I made Black Bean Soup with Cumin and Jalapeno (pg 220). In hopes that Charlie would taste some, I toned down the heat. Instead of using an entire hot pepper, seeds and all, I only used the flesh. I don't think including the seeds would have changed my opinion of this all that much, though. It was kind of bland. I might feel more favorably toward it if I wasn't already in love with Nigella's black bean soup from How to Eat. Nigella's is more time-consuming (though not that much more actual work), but it's also a lot more flavor.

Conclusion: Just okay.

Last night, I made Salmon Cakes (pg 25 of TEC). A few things concerned me during the process, but it all turned out ok. The salmon in my freezer had skin on it. I worried that it would be hard to cut the skin off, but it really wasn't. Then, after I was midway through cutting my second fillet into bits, I felt bones. Nooooooo! the fillets were supposed to be boneless. I felt around, picked a few out, and hoped for the best. Fortunately, I didn't find any while I was eating them.

The raw salmon is mixed with torn up bits of pita bread, mayo, an egg, coriander, cayenne, and lemon zest (though I used tangerine zest, b/c that's what I had). There's also supposed to be chives in there, but I didn't have any. Then you just make patties and cook them in a little oil for a few minutes. I worried that they'd fall apart. I worried that they wouldn't cook through. Everything worked perfectly.

Conclusion: Loved them. Crispy on the outside, soft, yet solid on the inside. Chives would make them even better. I might try them with only one pita bread instead of two. I think I'd prefer a different bread to fish ratio, assuming that messing with it doesn't impact how it sticks together. Really good, just as it is, though. It's supposed to be served with a lemon yogurt sauce, but I omitted that part b/c I'm doing WeightWatchers again. In case you care about point values of things, best I can tell, each patty is 7 points. I served it with a delicious 3 pt serving of Warm French Lentils from Barefoot Contessa's How Easy Is That? Yummy meal.

FFwD: Baked Apples Filled with Fruits and Nuts

I've never met a baked apple that I didn't like. It's possible that so much time has passed since my last baked apple that this week's French Fridays with Dorie recipe, Baked Apples Filled with Fruits and Nuts (pg 394) seemed especially wonderful, or maybe it really was that good, but I LOVED this.

I followed Dorie's directions to peel mid-way down the apple, make a shallow cut around the apple, where the peel begins, then rub the cut with lemon. This seemed overly fussy, and I doubt I'd bother in the future. She says it will keep the apple from splitting. Mine did remain intact, but it was an annoying step for a dessert that would otherwise be super-fast to set up.

Thanks to Diane for the tip to use the melon baller to carve out the apple core without breaking through the bottom. I was making a hell of a mess of it with a knife, until I remembered that I do, in fact, own a melon baller. That made life much simpler.

I packed the apples with a mix of honey, raisins, dates, dried cranberries, and chopped almonds, poured apple juice, butter, and the reserved apple peels into the pan. (Why use the peel? Does the pectin in the skin thicken the sauce a little? Is it a flavoring agent? Why, Dorie? Why?) I thought it would be a pain in the butt to baste the apples every 15 minutes, but it wasn't.

Yeah, boyeeeee!

I don't think my apples ever reached the desired consistency. I basted faithfully for the full 75 minutes, and they never quite became "spoon tender." I did need to use a knife and fork. There's only so much time I'm willing to wait for a stinking baked apple. 75 minutes appears to be my limit. They were golden, on their way to brown, by the time I pulled them out, so I'm happy I didn't wait any longer.

In addition to the delightful textural contrast of the nuts and fruit inside the not-quite-spoon-tender, but still soft apple, my favorite part was that some of the honey (or maybe it was the dates? Couldn't tell.) caramelized into stick-to-your-teeth, chewy surprises. Yum.

I revisited last week's Dressy Pasta Risotto for dinner, and used the last two spoonfuls of mascarpone left in the container to top the apples. Perfetto!

In addition, I caught up on the Goat Cheese Mini Puffs. I brought them, along with a lasagne and Dorie's Provencal Olive Fougasse (one of my favorite recipes from the book) to a friend's house on New Years Eve. She was providing the location for a party a mere 3 hours after her plane from Venice touched down. She supplied booze and space, guests brought food. It was an excellent trade.

I'm glad I made the puffs, to cross them off the list. I'd pick gougeres over these any day. They were fine, and the entire tray disappeared quickly, but I won't be making them again.