Food Reading

I don't know about you, but I've been doing a lot of food reading lately, possibly because I am fantasizing about cooking real meals again. Between toddler wrangling and being chronically ill, I just haven't had the time or the energy to devote to actual food, so I'm living vicariously through cookbooks, The Splendid Table, and just reading about food.

An example: I read The Saffron Kitchen, and, in looking for a little more information on the book and the author, I stumbled on My Saffron Kitchen, a blog on Indian food (yum!) and I even discovered there's a local caterer called Saffron Kitchen, though I'm not a huge pie eater - savory or sweet - so I simply found that an interesting aside. But worlds of reading and food collide in other unexpected ways, too. I've also been spending a lot of this summer reading Mark Twain. Btw, I wish I could say re-reading but in most instances, that is not the case. So then my ears perked up when I heard about Andrew Beahrs' book, which discusses Mark Twain as a locovore. Added it to my wish list.

You been reading anything lately that's food-related?

Need some inspiration

It's like a broken record. Been sick again lately, haven't cooked much of anything. In weeks. On a positive note, our grocery bill is down when the only eaters are one adult and a baby!

Now that I'm (mostly, hopefully) feeling better (again), it's time for me to relieve Michael of all the cooking duties he's taken over lately. Not that he doesn't enjoy it, but, y'know, just to give him a break so he can get to all the stuff I can't do around the house - man stuff. But I'm just not feeling inspired with cooking. We've started getting in to the habit of feeding Millie less baby food and more 'real' food - tiny portions and tastes of what we're having. But I'm just uninspired. Whatever we make, we have to take into consideration that the stuff she can eat has to be pretty simple - we want her to be able to taste the ingredient(s) / flavors and not alot of seasoning (and definitely no spice). It's gotta be relatively healthy, too, so we'll eat it...and I figure we can season our own portions separately (and add some heat, too).

We have a terrific baby cookbook, Karin Knight's The Best Homemade Baby Food on the Planet, but we've pretty much gotten all the miles we can out of it until she turns a year, and we're tired of running through her tried and true favorites - it's repetitive for us, so it's gotta be for her. So if you have any inspiring websites that do simple recipes, or if you have any recipes you want to share, that would be awesome. If it helps, her all-time top foods are:

• squash (any and all varieites)
• almost any fruit - blueberries, pears, peaches, apples. She just hasn't liked mango (!)
• chicken
• avocado
• ground turkey
• sweet potato
• bland dairy (cottage cheese, plain yogurt, or some colby, for example)

She eats a few other things -  carrots, green beans, peas, York Peppermint patty - just not as reliably. (And pasta / wheat is out). Part of our challenge is a short-lived one - once she's one, she can eat some additional things, like milk. And maybe she'll even have a tooth or two by then to tackle things that require teeth to tear apart. In the meantime we have come up with, I think, pretty much every combo of everything she eats that is mathematically possible - chicken & cheese 'meat'balls, avocado & ground turkey 'burritos', yogurt parfaits w/ fruit...So if you have thoughts or think of anything, let me know!

Goldilocks & The Chicken Curry

So, as you know, I am sick.

Again. For, I swear, the tenth month straight. I guess that's what 9 months straight without a single full night of sleep...and a baby in daycare will do to you.

So this week, I have hardly been eating, nevermind cooking anything. But I watched Michael forage for dinner tonight, grazing on this and that, and it struck me that that pretty much sums up how we've been cooking recently. We tend to have a lot of remnants of things. It seems like we cook a big dish and then one or the both of us get sick so it takes forever to polish off the leftovers. And then, of course, I know this is breaking news, but Millie doesn't eat a huge amount, so it's up to us to clean her plate.

Our fridge right now is the perfect expression of that: A Lot of Just a Little Left. There's the array of slightly nibbled fruits and veggies from Millie's meals. It's like Goldilocks comes over and takes a tiny bite out of everything & leaves the rest. She grazes on a wide variety of fruits & veggies (and a little chicken & dairy these days), but, obviously, doesn't finish a whole anything. Often we'll just make a big batch of something for her - steamed pears, butternut squash, blueberries, peas - and then freeze the rest. But when you've got half of one apple, two thirds of one banana, and, the most problematic, half an avocado, it's usually use or lose that night. Tonight, Michael had the remaining half of her avocado on top of scrambled eggs with salsa & toast. The only thing in our fridge besides half of every fruit and veggie from acorn squash through zucchini is an almost-gone thing of chicken curry I'd made last weekend. (And, especially since I've not been eating much the past couple of days, Michael's sick of having to bear the brunt of that).

I have been on a months-long quest to find a great chicken curry slow cooker recipe. I think the slow cooker has got to be the perfect vehicle, giving it time to develop flavor while not requiring me to babysit. But, sadly, I have yet to find one that meets my expectations. I've tried all four of the recipes in ATK's Slow Cooker Revolution, one of them at least twice, and so far, I still haven't found one that's just right. Some produced a very strange texture to the curry - sort of grainy, I guess? (Which I attribute to the tapioca they request that you add, and I recall thinking, "Alright. This is weird. But who knows? Maybe it works!" Nope.) One was downright watery. Now I'm no expert, but I'm gonna go ahead and wager that's a result of the 2 cups of water they request that you dump in the slow cooker with everything else. Anyone ready for some watered down chicken stew with a hint of curry in the background? And I mean, way, WAY in the background?

I swear, some of ATK's recipes are clever, useful, and reliable. But others? I want to take them by the ears and shake them, demanding "Did you even TASTE this? Or do you suffer from some taste-bud DEFECT?" I mean, seriously, what is their deal? Are there some exceptional rules of kitchen physics that work only in their special test kitchen and nowhere else?

It's not like I don't know what I want out of my chicken curry. I want Michael's consistently flavorful, slightly spicy chicken curry...just from a slow cooker. And one of the things that I thought was wrong with ATK's versions was that they, without exception, rely on curry powder and not curry paste. So when I stumbled on a slow cooker chicken curry recipe in a Woman's Day that used curry paste and didn't ask you to add weird sh*t like tapioca and water?

I'll wait while you formulate your guess as to what happened.

Disappointing. So, yeah, I'm still searching for that great chicken curry slow cooker recipe. And til I find it, I guess we're stuck trying to chew through 3-4 quart leftovers of 'not it' chicken curry.

P.S. - I can hear you judging. No, I don't subscribe to or read Woman's Day. I found that in the condo my 'rents stayed in over the holidays and, after flipping through it, I tore the recipes out. And since I don't have a real recipe this week, I'll leave you with this handy list of cooking tips from Cooking Light.

On Job Change and Spaghetti Sauce

You and I must be on the same wavelength.  Let's see...dreams of physical anthropology planned and dashed?  Check.  Museum career?  Check.  Current job as a trainer?  Check.  Philosophically waxing about 'dream job?'  Check.  I think I can confidently say that our friendship was meant to be. :)

I have been thinking about my career change too.  While mine was less forced than yours -- we made the choice to move to Salt Lake City -- it did feel forced in a way.  There were no jobs to be had in museums here, save for a gift shop attendant.  I was also looking forward to something that gave me a better work-life balance and something that didn't feel like moving mountain on a day to day basis.  I have now ended up as a trainer teaching soft-skills -- I teach the kind of management skills that I can confidently say did not exist in any of the museums I have worked in.  And yet, ending or shortening my museum career has been disappointing for me too.  I actually wrote in my journal this week about how working in a museum defined my identity for 10 years, and who am I without that?  I think it was the hope and dream of working in a museum that defined my identity, not the actual work.  Because, lord, teaching inaccurate history and booking port-o-potties surely did not mean that much.  

I find myself day dreaming about what my next step will be.  I'm getting to the age where that should probably include a baby...but I find myself day dreaming more about cooking, or reading, or going back to school (gasp!).  I think that I have a long career ahead of me...and do I want to spend the coming years doing what I'm doing now?  And if the answer is no, then how do I make that happen?  My job now requires me to read all sort of pseudo self-help articles and books -- how to change your habits, how to be more efficient, how to have crucial conversations -- and yet I find myself unable to execute even a plan for whatever my next step is. 

You took the strengths-finder test, right?  I've been thinking A LOT about my strengths, and how what I'm doing or what I could be doing will maximize those strengths.  My strengths are:

Learner

Responsibility

Connectedness

Context

Adaptability

So...what that means for me is: I love learning, absorbing material, but I also feel a responsibility to do something about it.  I'm also really good at following through on what I said I would do.  I think this has illuminated why I didn't feel like I was a "good" curator -- I like to move on and learn about new stuff, and I expect that people are as excited as me about the content.  Well, shoot, when you're teaching about how land investors in Phoenix took advantage of a whole slew of different people -- how can visitors get excited about that?  I digress.

What are your strengths, besides baking? How does that relate to what you're doing now, or what you want to do in the future?

And, I'll leave you with a recipe.  Clearly there are TONS of homemade spaghetti sauces out there.  Many of them consist of an extensive amount of ingredients.  I have married into a family that has a passed-down version of spaghetti sauce that is conviently the MOST delicious, and I think one of the most simple to make.  AND it only uses one pot!!  Wonderful.  I make it about once a month, and freeze it in servings for the two of us.  Josh does not like meatballs with pasta (I know, blasphemy!) so I take some out and freeze those separately, because he will eat meatball sandwiches.

Ransco Spaghetti Sauce with Meatballs

1 lb sweet italian sausage (or, whatever spicy-ness level you prefer, preferably uncased)

1 egg

1 cup (I think) italian breadcrumbs

Olive oil

Vegetabil oil

2 28 oz cans tomato puree (even the cheapest kind will still taste good)

2 small cans tomato paste

Salt/Pepper

Combine sausage, egg, and breadcrumbs in a bowl.  A note on the amount of breadcrumbs -- Josh's mom says to eyeball the amount of breadcrumbs so that it matches the amount of meat, meaning just dump in about a third of that can of breadcrumbs.  I come from the school of carefully making your own breadcrumbs, or at least using panko, but in this recipe, the can of flavored breadcrumbs worked wonderfully, and the eliminates the need to add in all sorts of other stuff.

Form meat mixture into meatballs, you'll probably get about 25, depending on the size.  Pour about an inch or so of mixture of olive oil and vegetable oil in your stock pot, or whatever large pot you have, and heat over medium heat.  You want the oil very hot so that when the meatballs cook when you drop them in, not absorb a bunch of oil.  I wait until I can the little lines forming in the oil (not sure of the scientific reason).

Drop the meatballs in, and cook for about 10 minutes, turning to ensure browning.  You're just browning the meatballs, not cooking them through.  Scoop out the meatballs one they are brown.

Pour in canned tomato puree and stir. Bring to a boil, and lower to simmer.  Return meatballs to pot and cook for at least 1.5 hours.  I cook it until I realize I've cooked it for 2.5.  Seems not to matter!!  Stir every once in a while to ensure the bottom doesn't brown.

So, the ingredients are really really simple, and every time I make the sauce I have the urge to add fresh herbs, garlic, whatever.  I resist the urge because as written, the recipe is so good.  But, if you feel the need, add stuff!  Its a flexible and forgiving recipe.

On the Having, Eating of Cake

Recently having had a cake in my house - a rare thing, perhaps twice a year - made us think about the saying "You can't have your cake and eat it too." It makes no sense. If you *have* a cake, what's there to stop you from eating it, too?

So we looked into it. (Thanks, Wikipedia!) And we found that it's frequently misunderstood, in exactly the way I describe above. But what it really means is that it's impossible to both have the physical object of the cake AND to consume the cake. Once you eat it, you no longer have it. And that gave me a really nice appreciation for this particular food idiom. You can either be in possession of something but not get to enjoy it...or you can consume it but then it's gone. It's very meditative.

I have been looking into studying vipassana, or mindfulness, meditation for a few years now, and while hardly a regular practitioner, there are some concepts from it that I think have proven incredibly useful tools for me. One of which is the idea that we so often live our lives rethinking about what has happened, or concerning ourselves with what might happen in the future, rather than experiencing the present moment.

I think that's always true of me, anyway, but particularly having switched jobs in the last year. I hesitate to say "having switched careers", because having left museum work, which I did consider a career, I was happy to land a job in something different that I didn't know a whole lot about. And I like doing training for now, but I'm not sure it's a "career" for me (and I even question whether I care about having something I can label as a "career" anymore anyway). But there was a lot of disappointment in letting my museum career go (I think especially since it wasn't exactly by choice). My last museum job I thought I had finally landed my "dream job," only to find the workplace was fraught with all kinds of issues that made it anything but. And then I think about how if I am to achieve my "dream job," I'm going to have to create it myself somehow...and what that "dream job" looks like now, I have no idea, but maybe it's something around food and writing. But then, just as I'm thinking, hey, just do what you love to do in your spare time and work will, er, work itself out, I came across the article "I Was a Cookbook Ghostwriter" in the New York Times this week. A cautionary tale. Not only did I really identify with the phrase "I realized then that what had seemed like a dream job...would hold more humiliations than I'd imagined," she also goes on to detail two paths. The path of the cook or chef personality who grows to such popularity as to merit a cookbook...only to be so overextended as to require a ghostwriter to craft and invent recipes that reflect their own outlook on food and cooking. And her own path as the ghostwriter, whose skills and contributions as the food writer she'd hoped to be go largely unacknowledged,  unrecognized, and end up being exploited in her "dream job."

I'm not really sure what the overall point of her article was, but here's what I took away from it: It almost seems like you can either do your dream work (but not necessarily for a job/career) or you can have your "dream job" only to find that means you can't possess the satisfaction and fulfillment that you thought would come with it. You can't have and eat the cake.

Puttin It to a Vote

I was just reading about Super Tuesday. Maybe that's why I'm in a voting mood, so let's decide once & for all, and I *might* have time to start slowly migrating content over to the new blog site this weekend after this busy week at work.

My top 3, in no particular order: (all end in .blogspot.com)
recipeblueprint
663recipes - as in there are 663 miles between SLC & PHX. Btw, when can we come visit again?!
quipsanddip

Things here are great, but it's a busy week. Work has been really hectic - we have a lot of trainings & project deadlines coming all at once this week - and I'm looking forward to the weekend, but that'll be busy too. I just joined a meetup group to meet some moms but I'm not sure it's a good fit for me. It's more structured than I would like (you *must* attend at least 1 meetup a month or be dropped, you *must* propose & plan at least one event for the group each month, blah blah blah). But I thought I'd give it a shot, so we have a playgroup in the park Saturday morning, then it's our friends Lianne & Saul's daughter's 1st birthday party at 11, and then Sara's taking me out for my birthday Saturday night. It'll all be fun, but I'm already tired thinking about it!

I was trying to think what to make for a little snack to bring to the playgroup. The snack is for the adults, not the kiddos. Since the meetup's at 9:00, I was thinking something brunchy - scones or muffins, maybe. Baked goods are much easier for something like this because you can just grab one and it doesn't require a fork or plate. I've made ATK's cinnamon streusel coffee cake before and it's always a huge hit. Bonus: the one recipe makes two cakes. But, that's not what I'm making because I just made it for my neighbors not that long ago. I'm going to make homemade granola because it's easy, it's snacky, it's not too heavy, and I have time to make it today and not worry about it spoiling before Saturday morning. Plus I can throw it on my yogurt in the meantime. Though the pictures of granola on Our Kitchen Sink look awfully enticing, I'd stumbled on Technicolor Kitchen's granola recipe first (via this recipe for blackberry coconut oat bars, which I'm still going to have to make. Soon!) so that's what I used. It's baking now and it smells very homey. I can smell the brown sugar and honey caramelizing. Mmmmmm.

I made a couple of adjustments, based on ingredients I didn't have.
2 c oats
1 t cinnamon
1 t salt
3 T + 1 t veg oil
1/4 c honey
1/4 c brown sugar
1 t vanilla
1/3 c almonds - didn't have any, subbed pecans
1/3 c hazelnuts - none. Didn't have anything to sub, so omitted and then went back and added a bit more oats to thicken everything up.
2/3 dried cranberries
I also tossed in a dash of orange extract.

Preheat oven to 325; line a baking sheet. I use silpat baking mats, but you can use parchment if you don't. Toss oats with cinnamon and salt. Here I deviated and just tossed together all the dry ingredients. She calls for sprinking the sticky oats with the nuts and cranberries, but I was too lazy for that. In a separate bowl, whisk oil, honey, brown sugar, and vanilla, then pour over oats mixture. Spread on the pan evenly. Bake for ? minutes, periodically taking out to turn with a spatula. Why the question mark on time? Because it's still baking. Her recipe calls for baking 10 minutes, then removing to flip and adding the almonds, then baking for another 5 before flipping again, then baking for another 10 and adding the hazelnuts...you get the idea. Since I had tossed everything together, I'm just going by smell here. Remove from the oven, cool completely, then add the cranberries (again, they're already in my granola, so there you go).

Birthday Dinner!

Michael had asked me what I wanted to do for my birthday and I wanted to do dinner and a movie. But since we still have no sitter, we had to adapt - we got Horrible Bosses from Netflix and Michael offered to make me dinner. Luckily he's a good cook!

He had found country style pork ribs on sale - and we had leftover chipotle chiles in adobo sauce, so tacos it would be. He used a barbecue spice rub on the ribs - Corky's barbecue seasoning to be exact, to which he added more garlic salt and black and white pepper. He then made the sauce by pureeing the can of adobo chipotle peppers with some cider vinegar, some soy sauce, and brown sugar. Remember, we just guesstimate the amounts, so whatever looks & smells good will work. Then all of that went into the slow cooker to simmer for, I dunno, I want to say about 6 hours. Once it's done, you shred the meat, and if you're lucky enough to have a fat separator, good for you - the sauce is easy. We do not, so it's more of trying to siphon off some of the fat & saving what you can salvage from the sauce. Serve on small flour tortillas with shredded cabbage, salsa, and a bit of queso fresco. The pork is juicy and flavorful, not too spicy. A girl couldn't ask for more. Well, besides second helpings...

For dessert, we had the lemon cake as promised. I made the one from Fine Cooking, with a couple of adjustments as noted below:
9 1/4 oz cake flour
2 3/4 t baking powder
1/4 t salt
1 3/4 c sugar
2 T finely grated lemon zest
3/4 c butter, softened
1 c whole milk, room temp
5 egg whites, room temp
1/4 c cream of tartar

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Butter and flour two round cake pans. Whisk the cake flour, baking powder, and salt together in a medium bowl - I don't sift, and it didn't make a lick of difference, I assure you.

Steal lemons from neighbor's lemon tree under dark cover of night. (She's a total bitch, so I bet she'd have an issue with me borrowing a few, even though she just lets them fall to the ground for her landscapers to pick up once a week). Pulse 1/4 cup of the sugar with the zest in a food processor until well combined. When it comes to the lemon zest, I do not own a microplane. I've always thought that it would be cool, but never been able to justify the purchase of one. So I make zest using a regular grater, and that works for me. Also, while the cake turned out absolutely delicious, it didn't pack quite the lemon punch that I would have liked, so I'd up the amount of lemon zest next time. The lemon curd filling (below) had the perfect lemony flavor, so it's not a big deal overall, but I'd just use more lemon zest in the cake itself in the future.

In a large bowl, beat the butter and lemon sugar with an electric mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy (about 1 1/2 minutes). Add the remaining 1 1/2 cups sugar and beat until smooth (about 1 1/2 minutes). Beat in a quarter of the milk just until blended. On low speed, add the flour mixture alternately with the milk in three batches, scraping the bowl with a rubber spatula; beat just until blended.

For the next step, I really wished I had had an extra mixing bowl and beater for my stand mixer, but I do not. Luckily, I'd read through the recipe, so I used my hand mixer for the previous step and saved the stand mixer for the egg whites...

In another large bowl, beat the egg whites with an electric mixer (with clean beaters) on medium speed just until foamy. Add the cream of tartar, increase the speed to medium high, and beat just until the whites form stiff peaks when the beaters are lifted. Add a quarter of the whites to the batter and gently fold them in with a whisk or a rubber spatula; continue to gently fold in the whites, a quarter at a time, being careful not to deflate the mixture.

Divide the batter evenly between the prepared pans. Smooth the tops with the spatula. Bake until a pick inserted in the centers comes out clean, 35 to 40 minutes. That's what Fine Cooking says. Now I don't know if it's because my oven is a total piece of sh*t or for some other reason, but 35-40 minutes was RIDICULOUS. I set it to check at 15 minutes, and I could smell them already. I checked and they were nearly done. I set the timer to check again after another 10 minutes, but after 5, the cakes had pulled away from the sides of the pans and were going to be overdone if I left them in any longer. Let cool in the pans on a rack for 10 minutes. Run a table knife around the inside of the pans and carefully invert each cake out onto the rack. Flip them right side up and let cool completely.

While the cakes cooled, I made the lemon curd filling:

1/2 c. butter
3/4 c. sugar
1/2 c. fresh lemon juice
3 T. finely grated lemon zest
Pinch salt
6 large egg yolks, room temp 

 

Assembly: You're supposed to cut each cake into halves so you have 4 cake layers and spread the lemon curd between each. I did not do that - I just used half the lemon curd in between the 2 cakes. The original recipe called for a lemon frosting, but several of the commenters noted that the frosting was gross and they'd substituted a cream cheese frosting (which I'm not a big fan of). I had been craving some fruity complement to the lemon. I was originally thinking cherries, but strawberries were in season and on sale, so I used them to make strawberry buttercream, inspired by Martha Stewart's recipe. However, Martha Stewart's recipe calls for whisking the whites & sugar overheat until "mixture registers 160 degrees on a candy thermometer." F that. I don't have a candy thermometer, and, more importantly, buttercream doesn't have to be that hard. Do a quick and easy version instead:

2 1/2 sticks butter, softened
2 1/2 c confectioners' sugar, give or take
pinch salt
1 t vanilla
2 T heavy cream (I used the whole milk I had on hand)
1 1/2 cups strawberries, pureed

Throw the butter into the mixer on medium until it's smooth and getting fluffy. Slowly add the confectioners' sugar - I didn't end up using all of it - it just depends on your texture / thickness preference. I'd gone ahead and measured out the 2 1/2 cups into a separate bowl and just added it in a little at a time until it was right because I know from making it before that it can come out way too thick if you use all the sugar, even taking into account that it'll thin out a little bit once you add the cream and vanilla. Toss in the strawberries. Even with all the strawberries, I wasn't getting enough of a strawberry flavor, so I added about 1 c strawberry preserves and kept mixing. Finally, add the vanilla & milk/cream and mix until blended.

It was probably the best birthday cake within recent memory.  The raspberry-filled chocolate cupcakes with rich vanilla icing I made for Michael one year were good and all, but this? This was better. The cake has a wonderfully light texture - almost on the verge of an angel food cake thanks to that folded meringue - and the lemon custard filling would be an excellent dessert all on its own. The strawberry buttercream is rich and flavorful. And since it didn't have chocolate, I could share it with Millie! She got to have her very first taste of cake (without any frosting). And you know what I'm going to do next paycheck? Go get a microplane because I will be making this cake again and again.

In Search of a Damn Good Lemon Layer Cake

My birthday's next week, and that means I get to make my cake and eat it too! Sweet! I'm looking forward to a low-key pre-birthday weekend of relaxing (since my actual birthday is on a Monday - booo!), but, if nothing else, I insist on a cake. There is nothing wrong with a bakery-bought cake, but I'm looking forward to finally having the chance to bake something myself.

In recent years, I made a white cake with raspberry filling and icing, a yellow cake with milk chocolate icing, and a spice cake with cream cheese frosting. This year I'm thinking a lemon cake, maybe with a cherry icing or filling, too. The last time I can recall that I made a lemon layer cake I was following a recipe from Southern Living for a lemon meringue cake. It was a near disaster, due to a classic case of not reading the recipe all the way through. It was after 1 a.m. by the time the cake layers had cooled (on a work night). When it came time to assemble the cake itself, I put the bottom cake layer on my tupperware cake stand, frosted it, added the next layer, and now, time to do the meringue. Let's see, turn the page to see the final step of the recipe, and...WHAT THE F*CK?! I'm supposed to have it on an oven-proof cake stand so that I can apply the meringue and then BAKE the finished cake so the meringue browns? Um. Who thought that up? Who has an oven-proof cake stand?! Recipe FAIL. I was able to save it from total disaster by whipping up a buttercream and throwing that on top, but it certainly wasn't the lemon meringue cake I had hoped for.

Btw, since then, folks have come up with much more sensible approaches to a lemon meringue cake, including this beauty from Food & Wine. Or these sweet little cupcakes from Our Share of the Harvest. Nevertheless, it's not a lemon meringue cake I'm after here - I'll save that for some other time. It's a lemon layer cake. I'm thinking I might use this recipe from Fine Cooking as my base, maybe using the lemon curd to decorate the icing instead of as a filling, since I'm craving a cherry or berry filling here.

I've had awful lemon cakes before - where the cake itself is dry, making the cake seem stale. There are the ones that lack true lemony flavor. Or the ones that get the cake texture or flavor right but then get topped with gobs of frosting that's way too sugary, ruining the whole effect. And it's a layer cake I'm after, not a lemon pound cake with a sugar glaze. So if you know of a good recipe, let me know! Otherwise, I'll let you know how the adapted Fine Cooking one comes out.

Magic sauce from 101 Cookbooks

Seriously this "magic sauce" is really good.  Good on all sorts of stuff -- veggies, salad, whatnot.

Operation Vegetables

We have been trying to eat a bit healthier.  I tend to be vegetarian when left to my own devices, with a bit of chicken or seafood thrown in the mix from time to time.  Josh is not a complete meat-potatoes kind of guy, but he is not a fan of most vegetables.  It has been a multi-year challenge to slowly expand his vegetable palette.  Sometimes I feel like this is a controlling way to approach food and my marriage.  Its a fine line between wife and mother when you're telling someone to eat their vegetables.  Creepy.

I'm not trying to do get him to eat vegetables for his health (although that is a positive side effect).  Its mostly a selfish effort on my part, because I like to eat vegetables and I don't like cooking multiple options for just the two of us.  I've been trying to cook a variety of vegetables, then let him try them at his leisure, and possibly incorporate them into the stuff he likes to cook.

Josh has discovered that he loves marinating various meats and then grilling them with vegetables -- success!  Last weekend, we didn't have a red pepper to grill with this recipe, and I even heard him request it for next time.  He makes up his marinades every time, but this one was so good, I wrote it down.  It has a fair amount of salt, but it brines the chicken a bit while its marinating.

Josh's Delicious Grilled Chicken and Vegetable Kabobs


Marinade:
Lime zest
1 t salt
3 T olive oil
1 t balsamic vinegar
1 T dijon mustard
1 T minced garlic
1/2 t sugar
dash mesquite seasoning
dash garlic salt
1 lb boneless, skinless chicken, cut into 1 inch pieces

Vegetables:
Red onion, cut into chunks
Red pepper, cut in 1 inch pieces
Small red potatoes (optional) (if using, cook for 5-7 minutes in microwave before skewering)

Combine all marinade ingredients with chicken.  Marinate for at least 30 minutes

Toss all veggies with 1 T of olive oil, salt, and pepper.

Skewer chicken on metal or wood kabobs, alternating with onions, peppers, and potatoes if using.

Grill until done, turning the skewers frequently to ensure even browning.

In response to being sick.

Have you tried this one?  Its from Real Simple, and uses stuff that you have around OR is easily replaceable.  I made it last time I was really sick, and used tofu or something like that instead.  It isn't as flavorful as the real thing, but does the trick in a pinch.  I'm the same way -- I like something spicy, warm, and soupy when I'm sick.

Eating When You're Sick

Millie has been ill lately, and though she seems to be on the mend, now Michael and I each have different iterations of some funk, too. Basically, at least one of us has been sick at any given time, pretty much since Labor Day. It's to be expected - the baby's in daycare, and there's lots of germs going around. Luckily, so far, anyway, at least Michael and I have managed to alternate being REALLY sick, one at a time. But it begs the question: what to make when you're sick?

I don't feel like eating much at all, but I do associate being sick with chicken soup (thanks, Mom!). And when I've got a bad cold, especially, I find myself craving Tom Yum soup. It's a flavorful, spicy, aromatic Thai soup that is both tasty, and, I'm convinced, therapeutic from the chicken broth and spices and herbs. I've always had it with chicken and shrimp, but from the recipes I've come across, it seems like you can substitute just about any protein you want. I've never made it myself, so I'd asked my friend Duan for a recipe, if she had a good one, since she's Thai and makes all kinds of yummy things. She sent me this one from Allrecipes with her additions of adding some Thai chilis for heat, and dropping in a tablespoon or two of coconut milk at the end to make it a little creamy. I think this one looks more along the lines of the only kind I've had and the kind I had in mind, though. The only problem is I have absolutely zero of the ingredients on hand for either one  - Galangal? Seriously? I mean, I get it. If you want to make the authentic recipe, you gotta use the authentic ingredients. But as much as I think some spicy chicken soup might help right now, I really, REALLY don't feel like going to the market, nevermind the stinky Asian market. (Seriously, it smells. It's the only place I publicly tossed my cookies when I was pregnant and had morning sickness.) So til I summon the energy and health to go to the Asian market, I might just get some Tom Yum takeout from the Thai place near us...

Breaking Bread

Your last post about the pleasures of making bread? No arguments here. There is something so rewarding about the patience it takes waiting for it to proof and rise, the restraint it takes to not overknead it, and the smell of baking bread wafting through the house. The first time I made bread, I made attempted rolls for Thanksgiving. Related: if you're ever going to make something for the first time ever, Thanksgiving, and especially Thanksgiving when you're the host is *not* the time to do it. They were AWFUL. I had no idea what I was doing. Fortunately, that was 12 years ago, and I've improved since then. And, perhaps equally important, I know my limits. I still won't attempt Julia Child's croissants.

One of the places I get bread-baking inspiration is The Fresh Loaf. Now you would think that since I have very little time for baking these days, I might be baking lots of bread, especially since doing nothing at all can make the best bread. But you would be wrong. The thing is my best shot at a window for bread making is first thing in the morning before Millie gets up, and at that hour, I find myself stumbling blindly into the kitchen for coffee rather than reaching for the stand mixer.

I did make prepare a bread recently, inspired by Food52's Grilled Bread with Thyme Pesto, to go with some pasta. (Because we needed a giant side of carbs to go with our main dish carbs. But, boy, was it yummy.) So here's my adapted recipe:

1 loaf crusty bread
1 clove garlic, minced
2 T olive oil
2 T melted butter
2 T roasted red peppers, chopped (we get whole roasted red peppers at Trader Joe's in a jar, but you could easily roast your own peppers, then chop)
1 T balsamic vinegar
1/2 t salt
1/2 t oregano
1 T basil (I should point out that if I had had fresh basil, I would've used about 1/4 c of that instead)
parsley

Heat oven to 400. Mix together the oil, butter, roasted red peppers, vinegar, salt, oregano, and basil together.

Heat thick-cut slices of bread (toast to your desired level). Immediately upon removing from the oven, spread with the red pepper garlic mixture. Garnish with parsley. Voila!

Bubble-top Brioches

I've been thinking about your post about the importance of family home-cooked meals, and how you feel lucky that your parents have passed that tradition on to you.  My parents passed that on to me as well.  There weren't very many nights that we sat down to have dinner together -- it was expected.  Now, as a childless person, I am far from the authority on these matters, but it seems to me that a family tradition like eating together trumps all the other weird eating habits that we may or may not have.  I mean, if she grows up thinking that peppermint patties are their own course, what's the harm?


I finished my first week of work at the new job, and I feel very much like a fish out of water.  It hit me on Friday that this was my life...this is my job, this is my commute, this is the house I come to (for now)...etc.  Living in SLC felt suddenly permanent.  Good news is that I'm the same cook/baker that I've always been, and somehow food, in this case, is providing me some sense of sameness, and that feels good.


Enter Bubble-top Brioches, from the wonderful Dorie Greenspan.  I've made this a few times, and they turn out delicious and comforting.  They also make breadmaking pretty easy and straightforward.  I really like making bread.  Waiting for the yeast to rise makes me feel calm, and I love seeing results incrementally through each step of the recipe.  I feel a bit Laura Ingalls Wilder.  Sidenote: I felt 'meh' about those books as a kid, and the only parts I loved and reread were the tales of stockpiling food.  I was interested in food then too, apparently.


Bubble-top Brioches
(Makes 12, I got 16)


1/4 cup warm water (110 to 115 degrees)
1/4 cup warm whole milk (you can get by 1% or 2%, at 110 to 115 degrees)
3 teaspoons active dry yeast, measured from two 1/4 ounce envelopes
2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
3 large eggs, room temperature
3 tablespoons sugar
12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 large egg, beaten with 1 teaspoon water (for glaze)


Combine 1/4 cup warm water and warm milk in bowl of mixer fitted with paddle attachment.  Sprinkle yeast over and stir to moisten evenly.  Let stand until yeast dissolves, stirring occasionally, about 8 minutes.


Add flour and salt to yeast mixture.  Blend at medium-low speed until shaggy lumps form, scraping down sides of bowl occasionally, 1 to 2 minutes.  Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating until blended after each addition.  Beat in sugar.  Increase mixer speed to medium; beat until dough is smooth, about 3 minutes.  


Reduce speed to low.  Add butter, 1 tablespoon at a time, beating until blended after each addition, about 4 minutes (I wasn't sure if this was total time, or after each addition of butter; but whatever, it was really thick and soft by the end of all this butter adding).  Increase speed to medium-high and beat until dough pulls away from sides of bowl and climbs paddle, 8-9 minutes.  


Lightly butter large bowl.  Scrape dough into bowl.  Cover bowl with plastic wrap.  Let dough rise in warm draft-free area until almost doubled in volume, about 1 hour 15 minutes to 1 hour 30 minutes.


Gently deflate dough by lifting around edges, then letting dough fall back into bowl, turning bowl and repeating as needed.  Cover bowl tightly with plastic wrap and chill, deflating dough in same way every 30 minutes until dough stops rising, about 2 hours.  Chill overnight.  (At this point, use the dough to make 12-16 brioches, or 6 brioches and 1 tart, or 2 tarts).


Butter 12 standard (1/3 cup) muffin cups.  Divide dough in 12 equal pieces; cut each piece into thirds.  Roll each small piece between palms into ball.  Place 3 balls in each prepared cup (dough will fill cup).  


Place muffin plan in warm draft-free area; lay sheet of waxed paper over.  Let dough rise until light and almost doubled (dough will rise 1/2 inch to 1 inch above top rim of muffin cups), 50 - 60 minutes.


Position rack in center of oven and preheat to 400 degrees.  Place muffin pan on rimmed baking sheet.  Gently brush egg glaze over risen dough, being careful that glaze does not drip between dough and pan (which can prevent full expansion in oven).


Bake brioches until golden brown, covering with foil if browning too quickly, about 20 minutes.  Transfer pan to rack.  Cool 10 minutes.  Remove brioches from pan.  Serve warm or at room temperature.

Re: Title

What about something that involves our respective different cities?  SLC - PHX recipes...or something of the like.  Just something to chew on.

Scrumptious Spicy Pork Chops

Now that we've finally made it through all the leftovers my parents had made us, we were craving something new. So last night Michael made these amazing pork chops.

There was no official recipe that he followed for these - just his usual "throw some stuff together and use it for a marinade" approach, which always turns out well, but is difficult to replicate precisely the next time. That's not a problem, but more of a way of saying I'm totally guesstimating on the amounts and proportions here.

Marinate thin cut pork chops for about 30 minutes in:
2 cloves garlic
2 T cider vinegar
2 T mirin
1 T brown sugar
2 T mustard - we didn't have any dried mustard or brown mustard (gak!), so we crushed up mustard seed & combined that with a bit of yellow mustard
sriracha (the amount depends on your preference for heat)

He grilled it for just a few minutes and it was juicy, flavorful, and had just a bit of a kick to it. We were hoping to use the leftovers for homemade banh mi, but, alas, there were no leftovers. Even if there had been more than one pork chop each, I'm pretty sure I could've eaten a short stack of these, so I'm not sure that would have worked anyway. Nevertheless, we'll definitely make lots more next time so we can have some homemade banh mi sandwiches, too.

The first time we made homemade banh mi, our friend Doug brought over the pickled carrots & daikon radishes, which he'd found already prepped in the deli section at Safeway. He saw it, grabbed it, and brought it over as a request that we make banh mi. We've never seen it at our Safeway (or Fry's), so I grab the pre-packaged stuff in the produce section at our Asian market when I'm there buying curry and coconut milk, but it's also easy to make at home (just see any one of the recipes in the link above) if you've already got the veggies on hand. Now, I have to say, even though I'm a banh mi fan, I like mine bastardized so I usually prefer my homemade banh mi to going out for it. Why? I'm not a big fan of the rice flour baguettes, so I use regular baguettes instead. Throw on some jalapenos, cilantro (unless you're one of the anti-cilantro folks out there) and, in my world, more sriracha, and you can call it done. Yes, ok, so there's traditionally mayo involved, but I'm leaving that off the list for you, too.

A Family Meal

Your last post mentioned family in the kitchen, and I’d been thinking a lot about that over the past couple of months. In a more figurative sense, though. When Millie first started eating solid food, it made me think about my own issues with food, and their origins in my own family. I started thinking about my own bad food habits, and how those might affect her. I started to catalog the food challenges ahead. Because now those challenges are not just my own. As I teach my daughter to eat, I think about what I feed her, how I choose to eat in front of her, especially as she so attentively observes every morsel that goes from our plates to our mouths. And I think about where these challenges began - where did I begin to think that dessert is "supposed to" follow dinner most nights? And sure, I could (and sometimes do) go down that pathway, trying to sort out the origins of my eating habits - what came from my parents, my southern upbringing, my own food preferences, and my own choices - but really, that all seems so...fruitless, I guess. Not only do I not have time to pull apart those threads, it doesn't get me anywhere.

Now that I have a child of my own, I am more than ever aware of how my choices and behaviors influence hers. And I hope to give her the tools to make good choices when it comes to food. So then what I find myself thinking about is finding ways to eat more consciously, to establish good habits now. 

But all of this thinking had a very real manifestation with my parents' visit this past week, the act of their cooking for us showed just how indebted I am to my family for giving me perhaps the best good food habit: the home-cooked meal. While they were here, they made every single meal. Every. last. one. They took care of all the meal planning, the grocery shopping, the prep work, and the storage of leftovers. They made every dish in quantity, thoughtfully planning to leave us with tons of leftovers so that we wouldn't have to worry about cooking or grocery shopping for a few days. (Actually, my parents probably made enough of everything that we don't have to cook again for a MONTH, but we're working on making room in our freezer for some of the leftovers so we can have a little variety).

As I sit here and look at the homemade chicken pot pie, the fresh green beans, and the baked apples, I think how lucky I am to have grown up with parents who valued making a home-cooked meal. AKA real food. Not the kind of home-cooked prepared meal that's "Add 1 lb. ground beef to Hamburger Helper." If you google "family recipes" these days, like I just did, you're most likely to hit an overwhelming number of bullshit recipes. Recipes that garner 4-star reviews from users. I can't remember what I was looking for around Thanksgiving, but I do remember that the first results page consisted entirely of recipes telling me to add 1 bottle of ranch dressing and a carton of sour cream and calling that done. There's a whole industry where folks sit around coming up with recipes that feature Campbell's soup or Velveeta or Kraft Mac'n'Cheese as the main ingredient. Look, I am not above canned diced tomatoes, heating condensed soup for dinner (especially when we're low on funds), or grabbing something pre-made from the store. But when I think about a meal, I think about the kinds of things my parents made this past week. Real food, made using real produce and real pantry staples like flour and spices. (Luckily, to counterbalance the counterfeit recipe sites out there, there are also great truly authentic, personable recipe sites out there just for that, too! Two of my faves are here and here. There's also room for fun, like here. And since I often love the LA Times food section, I'll toss in this one too). And what's really become obvious to me is it's not just, or even mostly, about what gets put on the table. It's about the act of gathering for a meal.

It sometimes seems like any time there's a family visit involved, everything revolves around meals. But in my mind, that's exactly as it should be. Every time I hear some statistic about how families rarely sit down to dinner together any more, I think "How can that be?!" It has just always been so intrinsically part of my upbringing to sit down together every night and have a meal together that I can't wrap my brain around how life could get in the way of such an important act. So even though I may try to steer my daughter away from having dessert every night, or drinking lots of sugary drinks, or whatever, in the years to come, I hope that I can do my best to demonstrate that the act of sitting down together to eat, even it's just Happy Meals, that that's what's most important. To eat together, and prioritize the family meal, is also a way of eating more consciously, and that is a good food habit we've already started.

Tomato Tart + a love for ATK?

I made this tomato tart from Baking Illustrated last Thursday, and I've been thinking about it ever since.  My parents came in on Friday and just left today, and I am going to make this tart tonight.  Its easy (relatively speaking for ATK) and what I really want is a slice of the tart and some salad.

First, a sidenote.  Do your parents overtake your house when they visit?  My mom pretty much takes over my kitchen.  It begins with us both in the kitchen, but then slowly she takes over -- loading the dishwasher, making coffee, rinsing dishes.  Its not bad, but when she leaves, there are always tools misplaced in various drawers.  She also leaves things cleaner than I do.  I thought that when I hit a certain age or stage of life, she would just sit back and let me do the work.  But I guess when it comes to the house, she will always be the mom.  And I appreciate it.

Onto the tart.  Beth gave me the book Baking Illustrated for my birthday a couple of years ago.  Let me just say that the book is 95% awesome and fool-proof.  That's my assessment for all things America's Test Kitchen.  I have mixed feelings about ATK.  There are times that I am ready to tackle an ATK recipe.  I am ready to read the detailed descriptions of why a certain pan or technique works, and then to follow the recipe exactly as it is written.  I would say that most times, the recipe turns out as promised.  Green Bean Casserole and Steak Au Poivre, and most things from my Best Chicken Recipes book come to mind.

And sometimes, ATK is too prescriptive for me, too stuffy.  I rebel at their carefully worded and daunting instructions.  I get annoyed when they call for an ingredient or a tool that I don't have, and I don't see the need for.  A tagine pot, for instance.  I honestly don't see why I need that.  But I digress....my point is that when a ATK recipe does not turn out (I made a thoroughly disgusting chicken stew last year that was so bad -- Josh and I went to Jack in the Box for dinner that night) I am beyond bummed out.  I am near inconsolable.  I am plain pissed I just spent time and brain energy making something that is gross.  And it makes me question ATK in general.  Its like ATK's failure (or let's be honest, it was probably my recipe failure) makes me question the meaning of life.  How they be wrong?  How could they work so hard at this recipe and be wrong????  AHHHHH WHAT IS THE MEANING OF IT ALL??  ..... I probably need to take it down a notch.....

I go cold turkey from ATK for a while and start cooking from my other books, or blogs, and then I slowly wind my way back to my tried and trusted recipes.  I am adding the tomato tart to this list.

My favorite (or two favorite things) about this recipe is the use of roma tomatoes and puff pastry.  Roma tomatoes are the bastard children of grocery store tomatoes.  They are usually so mealy and tasteless that its not even worth buying them.  For this reason, I usually stick to buying cherry tomatoes or something similar.  But, the romas are also the cheapest of the grocery tomato, and for the newly employed, that is something to pay attention to.  This recipe transforms the roma into a delicious tomato.  My other favorite is the use of puff pastry.  Puff pastry is delicious.  'Nuff said.

Short of writing it all down, I say crack open your Baking Illustrated book to page 247 to see the detailed description of how to form the puff pastry, and how to salt tomatoes.  It is well worth it.  I'll take a picture tonight and post it.

Dinner in a Hurry

So my theme for this week has been: What are your quick fixes for when you need dinner, and fast, but haven't had time to plan or prepare?

This week has been hectic - I've been busy with work, as has Michael, and we have family in town, so between cleaning our house and keeping an eye on the baby, it's been hard to get much done as far as dinner prep. We try to keep our fridge & pantry stocked with the basics - chicken broth, onions, garlic, spices (and in our house, staples also include tortillas and chips & salsa. And beer. Frequently also cookies). And we usually have frozen chicken, pork chops, and steaks on hand for just such occasions, but, unless they're thin cuts, you really have to be mindful enough in the morning before work to get them out of the freezer. Especially with the chicken breasts. We eat those all the time, but I'm convinced that the big bags of quick-frozen individual chicken breasts are really "chicken" "breasts" (or "tenders") but they're the only chicken that defrosts quickly, so, they'll have to do. Fortunately, we had some thin-cut steaks on hand, so one night, Michael defrosted those right after work, threw them on the grill with some peppers we had, added some salsa & voila! Instant fajitas. And then the leftovers from that became quesadillas the next night.

The next night, family was in town & tired from travel, so we went out for pizza. But when it's just me & Michael, we've been known to do pb&j, a quick salad with quick-sauteed chicken tenders on top, or soup. And when there's really, really nothing? Cookies. Chips & salsa. You guys?

So I have been waiting to post until I have made something, ANYTHING, and preferably something that tasted good.  The weather and my general mood conspired to make this near impossible.  We went skiing twice this past weekend.  The first day I took a header into the snow, and while I'm sure I wasn't concussed (is that an appropriate usage of that verb?), it sure felt like it.  Then, to get over my fear of skiing because of my fall, we went skiing on Saturday night, as it was dumping snow.  Skiing was actually fun.  It was sort of blind skiing, because of the blizzard-like conditions.  We were both happy and talking about how much fun it was! And then, the roads down to our house closed for avalanche control.  A mere 4 hours later, we returned to our house.  So....no cooking until yesterday.

The jury is still out on these peanut butter cookies.  It is Baking Illustrated's recipe for peanut butter cookies.  I did not have enough roasted peanuts for the recipe, so I subbed in half hazelnuts (of course, its determined by what's at the house...)  Now, to be honest, the peanuts may have been really old.  I don't remember buying them....but whatever, right?  Anytime I am faced by this conundrum while cooking, I imagine that whatever mistake I am making, or substitution I am forced to make, will turn out similar to the creation of penicillin.  Totally wonderful, but unplanned.  Alas, I think the old peanuts may have won out in this recipe.  Josh says they are good, I am undecided.  I see what you mean about the greasy cookie recipe.

Perhaps my next post will be about my total faith in all things America's Test Kitchen, and the deep disappointment I feel when ATK fails me.

So let me just say -- your post about what's on DirecTV made me laugh out loud.  I am shocked EVERYDAY when I turn on the TV to find many channels featuring shows about butts.  There is more than one show.  Titled Brazilian butts, or perfect booty.  How many do we need???  None is the right answer for me.

Onto the larger questions raised by your post.  What to name this?  I have no new ideas.  Although I really loved your riffing on suppository.  Repository always made me think of that too.  Archives is over used.  We are both historians.  But we both dreamed of being biological anthropologists....something about bones?  Or maybe something more obvious?  "Graduate School did not teach me how to cook."  "Graduate School led me to be poor."  I don't know, all bad.  I'll keep thinking.

And the issue about including recipes, and grammar, and style and what not.  I think we should include recipes so they can be re-created if wanted.  I've been wondering about the protocol of including recipes from sources.  In some ways, other recipe blogs that are out there are basically a mish-mash of their own recipes and riffs off of other's books and blogs sometimes.  I feel like as long as we give credit where credit is due, its ok to include the recipes of others.  It is a rare day when I cook something just as it was written, so in some ways, its like we're creating new recipes.

Thoughts?

What to Name This Thing?

You may enjoy the line of reasoning words that came into my brain last night as far as what to name our recipe blog. So, without further ado, my stream of consciousness:

Recipes, recipes. What is some of the phrases that come up again and again with baking? Well, not baking per se, because we both bake, but we also have to cook from time to time, as families cannot live by cookies alone. Mmmm. Cookies. Maybe I should go get another one of those Peppermint Patty cookies. Ok, so recipe names. Right. Hmm. Season to taste, pinch of salt, unsalted butter. This is getting me nowhere.

Brazilian Butt? Butt Lift? Really, DirecTV?! THIS is what's playing on most of my 300 channels?? It may be 3 a.m. but C'MON ALREADY!

Oh, right. Blog names. Well, we both came from museums. I do like "two disillusioned museum workers" but yeah, a little long. And we're both historians. We should do recipe histories! Oh, F*ckit. That takes research & stuff. And Four Pounds Flour is pretty awesome, anyway. And I'm sure there are others. But what are other things that imply that? Hmm....recipearchive, reciperepository (UGH! I HATE that word - it sounds too close to suppository). Recipeimprov, recipeproof. Yeah, I'm gonna have to go ahead and punch down that idea. Ok, you can just go ahead and kill me now. (Sorry for the puns!). Scratch baking? I dunno. Probably sounds too much like that awesome French restaurant here that we both love. There's all sorts of fancypants baking terms but neither of us is fancypants. Even though I do love the word profiterole.

OMG, there is a baking term "retarding." And tunneling! Tee hee!

Ok, I'm getting off track here. It's not just baking, it's not just baking. Proof positive - both of our first posts were about savory cooking. Recipe files, recipe trade, recipes from reformed museum employees...Hmmm.

Something that expresses more of what the blog is - a recipe trade loosely based on a theme. Note to self: we need to lay out the ground rules, probably so we're consistent. For example do we write out the recipes, or only when they come from a printed cookbook and aren't also available online from the original source of the recipe? So, for instance, the Double Chocolate cookie recipe from America's Test Kitchen that uses dutch processed cocoa that I referenced in yesterday's post *is* available at the ATK website, but only for subscribers (Booo!). However, one can find it online but not by ATK, so I feel weird about linking to someone else's re-posting of proprietary content. Though I don't feel weird about typing out the very same recipe from my ATK cookbook. Or do we provide links to the original recipe online whenever possible and note only substitutions & improvisational riffs? And PS - yes, I know we're a bad, bad food blog for not posting pictures of every step along the way but aside from my kitchen being butt ugly, here's how my baking went yesterday: Ok, so I've got the butter and sugar creamed. Oh no! I'm coming Millie, stop crying! Whew. She's all better. Where was I? Oh sh*t almighty. Is she trying to chew on my laptop power cord?!?! etc.So forgive me for no pictures at least at this moment in time.

Or something that reflects who we are. We're reformed museum-ers, we're historians, we are sarcastic bakers, we were both transplants to Arizona. Yeah, nothing coming to mind here that's concise enough for a proper blog title.

WHY IN THE HELL AM I GETTING POP UP ADS FOR AARP?!?! That is IT, people. I'm offline now. More thinking offline...

Peppermint Patty Cookies

Still inspired by having seen Mari last week, and finding a little time on my hands at home this afternoon, I decided to embark on a cookie experiment in honor of her. She loves York Peppermint Patties. As do I. Thanks to Mari me, my baby's first food was actually York Peppermint Patty, but I'll save that story for another time.

When I was with Mari last week, she made Monster cookies. We didn't have any M&Ms on hand, though the cookies did not suffer as a result. But it got me thinking: M&Ms are fine and all, but there are all kinds of similar candies you could use. M&Ms, Reese's Pieces, hey wait! Aren't there York Pieces?! The wheels were already turning. 

I decided to put my idea to the test and see if some York Peppermint Patty cookies could work. I had made chocolate peppermint cookies at Christmas, and while the peppermint was delish, the cookie vehicle for the peppermint was only so-so. Not as much chocolatey flavor as I wanted. But at least I had a head start on how to make that combo even better and incorporate these York pieces. 

I used Mark Bittman’s excellent Chocolate-Chocolate Chunk cookies, with the following changes:

Instead of the 1 ounce each semisweet & unsweetened chocolate, I decided to use 1 oz. of a Theo dark chocolate mint bar that was in my Christmas stocking and 1 oz semi-sweet dutch processed cocoa. Why the substitution? Two reasons. One, I had the Theo bar on hand and it would've taken me a year to eat the whole thing, so I'd been looking for a way to use it. And since it had mint, I figured it would be a way to balance the York Pieces I would be using in lieu of chocolate chips. And two, though I did want some hint o' minty in the cookie itself, I also wanted it to have a richly chocolatey base. And I knew from an America's Test Kitchen episode that they had extracted extra chocolatey flavor in their chocolate cookies by using dutch processed cocoa. (As always, the tipping point of the decision was that I had it on hand, too).

The other substitution was instead of 2 cups of chocolate chunks, I used 1 c. of the York Pieces and 1 c. semi-sweet chocolate chips. I decided to start with 1 of each because I wanted to do this as a test run to see just how choco-minty these cookies turned out to be so that I could tweak the recipe as needed for the future. By using only 1 c of the York Pieces, I could save the rest for a future iteration of this recipe. And you can never go wrong tossing in a few chocolate chips in a chocolate cookie. Side note: the York Pieces are yummy, but NOWHERE NEAR as delectable as the real thing. Stick to the real thing. Preferably the snack size, which have the ultimate ratio of dark chocolate to minty goodness. Ok, back to the cookies.

The cookies turned out pretty damn near spot on. The York Pieces don't bake quite as well as I'd like - the dye on the Pieces bleeds a bit, and there's not a whole lot I can do about that. The cookie has almost exactly the right amount of rich chocolate without being overpoweringly dense, the chocolate chips are nice little gems of melted chocolatey goo hidden in the cookie crumb, and the Pieces (along with the Theo mint chocolate) provide the minty flavor I wanted. 

The bad news is (1) I didn't have this really kick ass cookie scoop that Mari has, so dropping the heaped tablespoons onto the cookie sheet has suddenly become a total drag. And (2) making the Peppermint Patty cookies doesn't make me miss Mari any less. Though these cookies might be good enough to momentarily distract me from that. 

Southwest Sweet Potato, Chard, and Black Bean Chili

Have I become my mother?  My mother uses her freezer all the time, and is constantly pulling tupperware containers and bags out of it, saying "Look, its not that old, I made it (insert date that is at least three months ago)"  I have given her grief for years about that line...why would I want to eat something that is slightly old?  Oh yes, that sounds so appetizing, especially as I have watched her scrape freezer burn off the surface of whatever frozen block she is handling, and repeat, "really, Mari, its fine."  I have been against extensive freezer use for a long time, for absolutely no good reason except that she is and was such a prolific freezer user.  Much like I am against marathon running and long-distance biking; again, both perfectly great things to spend time doing, but they happen to be deep loves of both of my parents, and thus, something I cannot do. Ah...daughters.  See what you have to look forward to!!

Now, in the sake of being completely honest, I would be a wonderful, caring and excellent cook if I turned out like my mother.  I should be so lucky.  She is silly, thoughtful, and looks better than any woman I know in her natural graying hair.  And especially now that I feed more than just me everyday, I can fully appreciate how convenient it would be to pull something delicious out of the freezer instead of coming up with yet another meal.  She made dinner for me and my dad every night after a long day of work, year in and year out.  I now see that as the feat it was.

Today, I froze three containers of the following chili, and it totally fits the bill as something delicious to pull out of the freezer.  The recipe made a gargantuan amount, so I'm editing down the proportions.  Or, if your husband will eat this (mine would not due to the presence of sweet potato), feel free to double. I'm also editing some of the methods, because holy lord, it took WAY more pans and time than I like to use or expend.

I'm also calling this 'southwest' in ode to my former hometown of Phoenix, Arizona.  I miss you, Phoenix. It is spicy as is, and is delicious with a smattering of tortilla chips on top, and would be especially good with a lime squeeze.

Southwest Sweet Potato, Chard, and Black Bean Chili
Adapted from Chili Madness, by Jane Butel
Serves 4 (I think)

For the broth:
1 15 oz cans diced fire-roasted tomatoes
1 large onion, chopped
3 cloves of garlic, chopped (I always use less garlic than a recipe calls for)
2 cups chicken or vegetable broth/stock
1/2 teaspoon dried chipotle power (I used a smoked ancho chile chipotle powder and it was awesome)
sprinkle of cinnamon

For the chili vegetables:
1 pound peeled and cubed sweet potato or butternut squash (I could have written a complete post on how dangerous and annoying I think it is to deal with a raw, whole squash)
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1/2 can (15 oz) black beans, drained and rinsed
1/2 can (15 oz) garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed
1 small bunch of Swiss Chard, stemmed and sliced into 1 inch wide ribbons
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

For serving:
lime
tortilla chips

Heat a small stockpot or dutch oven without oil (use oil if you only have a non-stick pan).  Char the onions and garlic -- you want a smoky flavor -- over medium-high heat.  Add the broth, cinnamon and chili powder, and reduce the heat.  Cover and simmer for 5 minutes.

Add the canned tomatoes and continue simmering for 10 minutes, or until ready to serve.  Add salt if you want.

To prepare the chili vegetables, bring 2 cups of salted water to a boil in a large saucepan.  Add the sweet potato and oregano, cover, and simmer until tender or about 10-15 minutes.  Add the black beans, garbanzo beans, chard, and cumin, and cook, uncovered, until the chard is limp and tender, about 10 minutes.  You can drain the vegetables here, or not ( I did not because I am lazy and that seemed like a lot of work).

Divide the vegetables between individual bowls, and ladle the broth over the vegetables.  Top with lime and tortillas.

Home Sweet Home

Today is my first day back from Salt Lake City from visiting Mari & Josh, and it's one of those rare overcast days in Phoenix. On my last afternoon in Salt Lake, Mari & I were talking about how yummy soup & grilled cheese sounded for dinner, but because we had a big lunch, we ended up not making it. So between the clouds and wanting to just lounge around at home all day and bask in being back home, I decided to find a recipe to quench my craving for soup. When I stumbled on the recipe for "Homey Chicken Stew" in Slow Cooker Revolution by America's Test Kitchen, I knew that was gonna be it. Why? Homey! Right there in the name! Stew: close enough to soup. And, perhaps most importantly, I already had everything on hand - no need for a trip to the grocery store.

I love most everything by America's Test Kitchen, but especially Slow Cooker Revolution these days. With a 6 month old, it's hard to find the time to make a home-cooked meal, nevermind man the stove for the amount of time required to make some things, so the slow cooker has been a godsend. And until Slow Cooker Revolution, I thought my slow cooker was utter crap. Between the roasts that came out overdone and the recipes that called for more prep time than time stewing in the slow cooker, I was ready to toss it out as junk. Luckily, America's Test Kitchen tackled these problems and have transformed this former piece of sh*t into an appliance I now use weekly. So tonight I will finally quench my craving for flavorful, hearty, homemade soup stew.

3 lbs boneless, skinless chicken thighs, seasoned with salt & pepper
1/4 c vegetable oil
2 onions, minced
6 garlic cloves, minced
1 T tomato paste
1/2 t dried thyme
1/3 c all-purpose flour
1/2 c dry white wine
4 c chicken broth
12 oz red potatoes (2-3 medium), scrubbed & cut into 1/2" pieces* - I had only russet, so while I understand the reasoning for red, I substituted peeled russets here
4 carrots, peeled & sliced 1/4" thick
2 bay leaves
1 c frozen peas
1/4 c fresh parsley* - I had only dried, so I used that

Brown chicken in skillet (with 2 T veg oil) over medium-high heat on both sides, 5-8 minutes. Heat 1 T more oil over medium-high heat. Add onions, garlic, tomato paste, and thyme and cook until onions are softened and lightly browned, 8-10 minutes. (Here, my onions weren't browned yet but my garlic was already about to burn, so I truncated this step). Stir in flour and cook for 1 minute. Slowly whisk in wine, scraping up any browned bits. Whisk in 1 c broth, smoothing out any lumps, then transfer to slow cooker. It smelled AMAZING by this point.

Microwave potatoes and carrots with remaining T oil in covered bowl until vegetables are nearly tender, about 5 minutes, transfer to slow cooker. (This is another hallmark of this cookbook, urging cooks to use the microwave to give vegetables a head start or make the most out of aromatics to get spices to bloom before adding them to your slow cooker. It is GENIUS).

Stir  remaining 3 c broth and bay leaves into slow cooker. Nestle browned chicken and any accumulated juice into slow cooker. Cover and cook until chicken is tender, 4-6 hours on low. (Another tip from the cookbook is to disregard your slow cooker manufacturer's directive to cook chicken for 8-10 hours or on high; it's simply too hot to result in anything other than chicken that is rubbery and overcooked).

Transfer chicken to cutting board, let cool slightly, and shred into bite-sized pieces. Remove fat from surface of stew using large spoon and disregard bay leaves. Stir shredded chicken and peas into stew and let sit until heated through, about 5 minutes. Stir in parsley and season with salt and pepper to taste.

In honor of Mari & Josh, who love great beer as much as Michael does, I will be serving this with a warm beer bread.