Weekly Dish

You all know the craziness which is our life; I have made no secret of the tightrope between home, work, home-work, work-at-home, marriage, parenting, etc. across which we madly dash day-in, day-out, and sometimes in-between the two. I hope that it either makes you feel less alone (yay! other people live crazily too!) or relieved that your own life is not this stressful (whew, at least my life is not this crazy!). I also hope that you have an hour or two in your day like our 5-7 pm, the time I’ve come to affectionately call the dinner hour.

In order to preserve some semblance of sanity for all of us, we’ve tried to set aside those hours for the three of us to spend in and around the kitchen. We usually sit Josie in her high chair right in the middle of our small space, and feed her dinner while we get our own evening meal together. Before we were parents, our nighttime eating patterns were haphazard and casual, wandering into the kitchen whenever hunger struck, leisurely pulling dinner out of our pantry and fridge, without a lot of fuss. These days, if dinner isn’t well underway by the time Josie needs a bath, we’re in serious danger of going to bed on yogurt and granola, especially if there aren’t leftovers.

So, as we hear grown ups are prone to do, we’ve developed somewhat of a dinnertime routine. It is, by far, my favorite time of the day — I am with my very favorite people, doing one of my very favorite things. But also, it invariably gets done, this making of dinner, and usually, it is, if not very fancy, very satisfying and good for my food-loving soul. If I accomplish nothing else in the span of 24 hours, something from start to finish that I can look at and say, “I did that today,” I at least usually manage to make dinner for my family.

When I tell you that this past week started with not one, but two, disastrous meals in a row, I hope you understand that I mean it when I say that it nearly sent me over the edge. The week before, we’d started classes with a sick baby, which meant no childcare, two sleep-deprived teachers frantically trying to prepare for students while comforting, holding, rocking, and carrying around campus a puny, sniffly toddler. It was quite a week. We survived the weekend and hoped Josie was getting better, but on Sunday, her fever spiked, so we took her to the doctor to discover that she had an infection in each ear.

By Monday evening, when I sat on the stool in my kitchen, stirring the risotto, I was sorely in need of a victory. Onions, garlic, white wine, arborio rice, and a whole quart of chicken stock were in the process of dissolving my exhaustion when I noticed something small and brown on my spoon. And another beneath a grain of rice. And, then they were everywhere, tiny little bugs. Bugs. In. My. Risotto.

I panicked, David took over and cleaned the pot out while I put Josie to bed, and we had grilled cheese sandwiches — all in all not the end of the world. But on Tuesday, after I’d grated and juiced lemons, minced garlic and jalapenos, and measured out the wine for pasta sauce, when the same tiny bugs floated to the surface of the penne I was boiling, I have to say that I teetered on the brink of insanity. If David hadn’t restrained me, I might have thrown out the entire contents of our pantry and eated a bag of potato chips for dinner. For the rest of the week.
You can imagine the trepidation with which I approached the dinner hour on Wednesday, and I resolved to use only food out of our refrigerator: that usually means soup or eggs. With the leftover roasted potatoes from Sunday’s dinner, half a bag of mixed veggies I fished out of the freezer, and the chicken stock I made on Tuesday afternoon to replace what had disappeared down Monday’s drain, a hearty, warm soup came together on my stovetop, without a single insect in sight. It may not have been much to look at, but it was real, homemade food, and at the time, it tasted like the best potato soup I’d ever had. What follows is not so much a recipe, per say, but an instruction guide for how to use what you have on hand and emerge victorious. It was, for this home cook, the formula that saved my dinner hour, and consequently my week.

What’s-In-Your-Fridge Vegetable Soup

What you need:

• Fat: Rendering bacon fat adds a nice flavor to potato soup, and that’s what I did for this version, but a combination of butter and olive oil will work fine too.
• Vegetables to saute for flavor: onion, garlic, and carrot was my combination, but you could also use shallot, celery or bell pepper.
• Other vegetables: I used 2 cups of leftover roasted potatoes and half a bag of frozen broccoli, carrots, and cauliflower, but if you have two heads of broccoli, or a bunch of carrots, or mushrooms, use them instead. Just make sure to think about the flavor combo; if you want mushroom to be the dominant flavor, don’t crowd it with another strongly flavored veggie like broccoli.
• Liquid: Homemade stock is always in my freezer; I used chicken stock for the potato soup.
• Garnish: I finished the soup by stirring in 1 T. cream and 1/2 cup grated extra sharp cheddar cheese. It had been a bad week — you can always sprinkle with toasted nuts or a dollop of creme fraiche if you want to be fancier.

What to Do:
I feel silly typing up instructions because I’m sure everyone knows how to make soup, but I’ll tell you a few things that I think make a difference in the final product. First, the basic method: saute the flavoring vegetables over medium heat until they’re soft and beginning to brown; I start with onion and carrot and add the garlic after the other two are soft. Next, you add the other vegetables, coat with the fat and flavoring, and stir in the liquid.
What makes it good (in my humble opinion):

• Puree half of the vegetables. This will make the soup thicker without added fat or calories, but still leave you a rustic texture to the finished dish.
• Coarse salt with flavor, like sea salt, not the iodized stuff. A lot of salt, and sprinkled in a handful at a time, after each step in the process, not right at the end. Taste as you go to make sure you aren’t over-salting and that the soup has enough flavor. Salt is what will coax humble potatoes and cauliflower into deliciousness.
• Homemade stock. I know, I know, this seems like a lot of trouble. But I’ve started keeping a bag in my freezer for vegetable trimmings, and after about two weeks, it’s full enough to make a huge vat of stock that will last at least a month, maybe more. And if you have the remains of a chicken, even better. It really does make a big difference in the overall flavor of soup, in my opinion.
• Simmer for as long as you can. The longer the soup has to hang out on the stove, the more its parts will melt into one, happy, yummy flavor.
• Eat with plenty of crusty bread. It’s mostly just vegetables and water, so why not?

As I said, this is not rocket science. But it has been reliable for us, and, in this season of life, reliable is what we need. Thankfully, the bugs in the pasta were the low point, Josie’s ears are cleared up, and the soup restored normalcy and comfort to our dinner hours. A small victory, perhaps, but a sweet one.

Oh, I wish this post had a different title. I’ve been wanting to tell you about Josie’s forays into the world of solid food for some time now. You’ve all been so kind to be interested in her developments and to comment on how much she’s growing and to let me know that it’s okay that I devote a little bit of this space to talking about her and not just food, even though this is, technically, a food blog.

But, well, I really wanted to have some good news for you. I wanted to say how much fun it is to share the wonders of fresh fruits and vegetables with my little one. I wanted to tell you how much she loves to sit in her high chair, how she leans forward to welcome the spoon into her mouth, how she can’t wait for the next new food. Instead, I have only this to show you:

Some days are better than others—she seems to tolerate spinach and carrots better than anything else, and yogurt for breakfast is sometimes okay with her. But, very often, she turns her head from side to side, tightly closes her lips, and refuses. If she’s feeling particularly witty, she’ll perform her newest saliva trick and blow bubbles right as the pureed food meets her mouth for a fantastic fireworks display of vibrant green or orange (as you see in the photos above). We’ve tried it all, it seems: mashed avocado; applesauce, both freshly made and from a jar; carrots, in commercial baby food form and steamed and blended by hand; spinach; bananas; rice; oatmeal; yogurt; yogurt and oatmeal with pureed fruit mixed in; butternut squash; sweet potatoes. She seems to dislike it all equally, with rare exceptions.

She’s eight and a half months old now, and I’m starting to get discouraged. So I come to you, dear readers, to ask: What in the world do I do to convince my child to eat? Will she just eventually accept that food is part of her life? Am I worrying too much? Is her dislike of bland food somehow connected to the way I eat? I tend to like my food on the robustly flavored side, and my taste for seasonings seemed more pronounced when I was pregnant; the more well-seasoned, the better. That has not dissipated since I’ve been breastfeeding, so is it possible she has acquired a taste for more flavor than the average pureed fruit or vegetable has? Should we go straight to table food? Has anyone else encountered this problem, or is this my particular punishment for being a picky eater as a child? (So sorry, Mom!)

At this point, I’m willing to try most anything (well, within reason, of course; the point is to get nutrients into her body and to cultivate her taste for healthy foods, so I’m not willing to give her chocolate pudding or ice cream just so she’ll like it. At least not yet.)

She’s usually such a happy thing, disgruntled only for the expected reasons — hunger, discomfort, fatigue. Oh, and when we try to put a spoon in her mouth. So, if you have any ideas, I’d love to hear them. I want her to look like this when she sees food coming:

While we’re waiting for the happy, food-hungry Josie to emerge, we have needed food to sustain our own appetites, preferably of the hearty, comforting sort. More often than not this time of year, that comes in the shape of a warm bowl of pasta. Because locally grown broccoli is so plentiful right now, we buy it at the market every week, and this little dish has become something of a standby. I particularly like it with whole wheat penne or tiny shells; the toothsome noodles stand up well to the cloak of creamy, ham-infused sauce. Plus, it cooks quickly, so there’s time for, oh, I don’t know, dancing around a baby in her high chair begging her to open up. One day, I’m hoping I will feed her whatever I’m making, straight from the stove, with minimal cajoling, and we’ll have put this whole baby food stage behind us. I can’t say that I blame her all that much; I’d rather have this pasta than plain, pureed broccoli any day of the week. Wouldn’t you?
Oh, well, in the mean time, at least I won’t be starving.

Pasta with Ham, Mushrooms, and Broccoli

The trick to this being a quick recipe is the order of the steps: if you start the water to boil for the broccoli and pasta, by the time the noodles are done, your sauce should be ready too. In terms of flavor, this is a dish that benefits from frequent sprinkles of salt: don’t save the seasoning step until the end, instead, sprinkle a little in every time you add something new to the skillet.
1 head broccoli, chopped up into bite-sized pieces
16 ounces small pasta shells or penne rigate
4 ounces ham, diced (we used leftovers from a honey-baked ham)
1 t. olive oil
1 small yellow onion, diced
1 cup mushrooms, sliced
3 cloves garlic, sliced thinly
1 t. flour
1/2 cup white wine (if you don’t have wine on hand, chicken stock would probably work too)
1/4 cup milk
2 T. heavy cream
Coarse salt, to taste
Parmesan cheese, grated, for serving

Bring a pot of salted water to boil. You’ll use this pot for both the broccoli and the pasta.

Meanwhile, prep your ingredients: chop the ham, broccoli and onions, and slice the mushrooms and garlic.

When the water is boiling, add the broccoli, and blanch for about 3 minutes; it should be crisp-tender and bright green. Drain the broccoli and set it aside, but reserve the cooking water, putting it back in the pot. Let the water return to boiling, and add the pasta. Cook until al dente.
While the broccoli and noodles cook, heat the olive oil in a large, heavy skillet. Add the ham and cook over medium heat until well-browned. Remove the ham with a slotted spoon and set aside.

Add the mushrooms and onions to the skillet and cook over medium-high heat until the onion is beginning to turn golden. Add the garlic slices and stir them in, continuing to cook until all the vegetables are tender. Season well with salt. Rubbing it between your palms, sprinkle the flour evenly over the vegetables, stirring quickly to coat.
Pour in the wine, and cook over medium-high heat for a minute or two, then stir in the milk. Reduce the heat to medium. Season with salt. Keep stirring and cooking until the liquid has reduced by half, about 5-7 minutes. Stir in the reserved ham and broccoli, and finish with the cream. Cook for just a minute more. Serve the sauce over the pasta, and top with plenty of grated cheese.

…just in case I forget. I tend to do that. Forget, I mean, about dinner.

It’s just that I get so wrapped up in the flurry of holiday cooking that sometimes I turn around at 6 pm and glance gleefully over the roasted butternut squash resting on the stove, the sweet potatoes that have just been pureed in the blender, the discs of pie dough awaiting refrigeration, and I realize: we’re going to have to eat take-out for dinner. Again. Which seems absurd, since it seems like I’ve spent the whole day in the kitchen.

So, tonight, and most likely for the rest of the week, we’ll be having this soup. If you happen to have some already-cooked sweet potato on hand, it comes together easily; the only trick is to think about it before 6 pm (unless you typically eat around 9, as we sometimes do), so it will have some time to simmer. If you don’t already have sweet potatoes cooked, you’ll need a bit more time, but since your oven is already set to 350 (you know, for all of those fabulous Thanksgiving baked goods you’re working on), you can throw in the potatoes and garlic at any time, and then, with the chop of an onion, it’s just a matter of assembly.

The soup is good, hearty comfort food, and, as an added bonus, it’s also packed with all sorts of good-for-you nutrients. Which, let’s face it, is even more important this week, as our bodies are gearing up for the holiday of excess. The best part about the soup is that the potatoes and garlic lend their creaminess to the texture, so no cream is actually needed. To cut out even more fat (and to make this a vegetarian soup), you could also omit the bacon and cook the onion in olive oil instead. Or, leave out the stock altogether, and use the potato mixture in enchiladas or burritos.

Or, make an entirely different soup, based on what you have that you could throw into a pot, or make pizza or pasta or a 5-course meal, but, please, whatever you do, don’t forget about dinner. Your body will thank you, come Thursday, for not having spent the week surviving on snatches of cake batter and take-out. At least I know, from painful past experiences, that mine will.

Smoky Sweet Potato Stew

The bacon, chipotle, and maple syrup pack this soup with flavor, so if you don’t have stock on hand, don’t worry, water will probably be just fine. Same goes for the corn — I had it, I liked the crunch it added, but it certainly isn’t essential.

4 smallish sweet potatoes, scrubbed (or 2 cups cooked, mashed potato)
Olive oil
1 head of garlic
4 slices thick-cut bacon, diced
1 medium yellow onion, small-diced
3 T. chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, finely minced (less if you are heat-sensitive)
2 T. maple syrup
1 T. coarse salt plus more to taste
1 can black beans
1/2 cup corn kernels, scraped from the cob or frozen
1 cup beer (preferably something dark)
2 cups stock, chicken or vegetable (or water if you don’t have stock, and more, if you want a thinner soup)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Poke holes in the sweet potatoes, rub them lightly with olive oil, and bake them whole, on a foil-lined baking sheet, for about 2 hours. Set aside to cool.

When the potatoes have 30 minutes left, slice off the top of the garlic head, wrap in foil, drizzle with a little olive oil and sprinkle with salt. Roast for 30 minutes. Set aside to cool with the potatoes.

While the potatoes and garlic are cooling, cook the bacon in a large soup pot. When it’s done, remove with a slotted spoon and set aside. Pour off all but about a tablespoon of the fat, and add the onions. Cook the onions over medium heat, stirring frequently, until well-browned and very soft, about 15-20 minutes.

Turn the heat on the onions up to medium-high and add the syrup and the chipotle peppers in adobo. Stir and cook for a couple of minutes, then pour in the beer. Stir, scraping up any bits from the bottom of the pan, and cook for another 5 minutes, or until the liquid has reduced by half.

Meanwhile, peel the potatoes and squeeze the garlic cloves from the skin. Mash the flesh from the potatoes and garlic together, and add to the pot, stirring to combine. Stir in the black beans and corn and salt well. Add the stock and bring the soup to a boil. Reduce to a simmer, and let it cook for 10-15 minutes (or longer, depending on how hungry you are and how long it took you to remember about dinner). You may need to add more liquid to get the soup the consistency you like; ours was quite thick (and we liked it that way). Season to taste with salt. If you like, serve topped with a dollop of sour cream and a sprinkling of the bacon pieces. Will feed two hungry people for dinner at least 3 times (about 6 main dish servings).

As I have written here before, I do not winter well. Granted, I do not live in a climate with an especially long or harsh winter, but perhaps the perception of the deep south as a relatively warm place tricks me into thinking that I shouldn’t have to suffer winter at all. Adding to the illusion, cold weather doesn’t really kick in here until after Christmas, so I come up from a brisk, chilly holiday season thinking that spring should soon be on its way.

Only, I’d better get through January and February first. This winter has been especially cold and wet — it rained and stayed below 40 degrees every day for the first three weeks of the spring semester — but I’d braced myself to be prepared. After all, aren’t pregnant women chronically hot? I’m afraid carrying an extra person around with me has not made the wet chill in the air easier to endure as I’d hoped.

Just when I thought I could duck beneath the covers and stay until April, the Japanese magnolia in our front yard burst into purple and white blooms, showering the ground beneath with a welcome carpet of petals quietly announcing that the end must be near. Armed with this tiny bit of hope for warmer weather, I determined to make it through the next few weeks of blustery cold. To get me through and provide sustenance for our growing little family, David and I got into the habit of making soup on Sundays.

A fitting winter Sunday afternoon project, making soup requires leaving the stove on for hours at a time and ends with comfort food to last through the week. If you are just barely surviving winter where you are, I highly recommend this seasonal therapy. For me, it accomplishes several things at once: it warms me as I cook it, it warms me when I eat it, and it provides food for us on the nights when I just want to come home, put on my pajamas, and crawl into bed without standing over the stove. Soup has surely saved us from many a night of take-out (although we’ve had our share of those too). If you’re hankering for a warm bowl of something to tide you over until spring, head over to A Veggie Venture, where Alanna has been collecting soup recipes all month long.

This tortilla soup, adapted from the Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook, is not particularly difficult, although it does require a few preliminary steps before you throw everything into the pot to simmer. The complexly layered flavors reminds me a bit of a hot gazpacho: fresh with garlic and onions, rich with tomatoes and broth, smoky with the heat of the dried chilies. The onions and garlic I used were especially pungent; next time I make it, I might saute half of them to soften their bite just a bit.

A word about the dried chilies: the Lees call for a combination of anchos or mulatos and pasilla or guajilla chilies. I couldn’t find either of the latter two, so I substituted another dried hot variety, chiles de arbol. If you can’t find any dried chilies at all, I would recommend substituting roasted ones (poblanos would work well, I think, combined with a hotter pepper like a habanero or a serrano). Canned chipotles would also add an interesting note of smokiness and heat.

Whatever you do, don’t skip the toppings — they make the soup, in my opinion.

Vegetarian Tortilla Soup
2 cups corn or canola oil
4 whole dried chiles ancho (or other sweet-smoky pepper)
4 whole dried chiles de arbol (or other hot pepper)
10 soft yellow corn tortillas
Ground cumin
Chile powder
Seasoned salt
5 cups vegetable broth (you can substitute chicken broth for a non-veg version)
1 28-ounce can chopped tomatoes, with liquid
1 large yellow onion, diced
6 cloves garlic, chopped,
Kosher salt, to taste
Cracked black pepper, to taste

Toppings:
1/4 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup sour cream
zest and juice of 1 lime
1/4 t. chile powder
1/4 t. seasoned salt
Cilantro, chopped
Avocado, sliced

Heat about an inch of the oil in a soup pot. While the oil heats up, prepare the dried chiles: slit each one down its side, remove the stem and seeds, and cut into large pieces. (Kitchen shears are well-suited for this job). Add the chile pieces to the hot oil in batches, toasting for about a minute per batch. They should be a little soft and fragrant. Remove with tongs to a plate and set aside.

Add the rest of the oil to the pot and heat to about 350 degrees (medium-high on my electric stove). Meanwhile, cut 6 of the tortillas into thin strips; leave the remaining 4 whole. Line a plate with paper towels. Fry the whole tortillas one at a time for about 1 minute per side, or until crisp. Remove to paper towel-lined plate and season immediately with cumin, chile powder, and seasoned salt. Repeat with tortilla strips, which will crisp faster. Discard the oil.

To the pot (I used the same one), add 2 cups of broth, diced onions, chopped garlic, and the canned tomatoes and liquid. Sprinkle with a palmful of Kosher salt. Bring to a boil. Add the toasted chiles. Crumble in the whole tortillas. Simmer (bubbles just below the surface) until the liquid has reduced by about a fourth, about 10-15 minutes. At this point, you’re going to puree the soup in a blender. Here’s what I recommend: pour the hot soup into the blender and let it sit for a few minutes to cool.

Meanwhile, you can prepare the toppings: stir together the buttermilk, sour cream, lime zest and juice, and seasonings. Wash and chop the cilantro and/or green onions. Slice the avocado. Get out some bowls.

When you think the soup is cool enough not to explode your blender, place a dish towel over the top of the blender, and pulse a few times. If it appears to be behaving, puree until smooth. Return the pureed soup to the pot, add the remaining broth, and bring back to a simmer. Serve with a dollop of the lime cream, a handful of cilantro, slices of avocado, and a fistful of tortilla strips. Be warm and think lovely thoughts of a coming spring!

PS: Thanks to all who have sent pregnancy encouragement my way; your thoughts and words of kindness have brightened many a dreary, tired day!

I have posted many a recipe on this site that I have labeled “Comfort Food.” Dishes that merit this distinction, for me, need to accomplish two things: the cooking process itself should be slow, patient, comfort-inducing, and the eating experience must create warmth and happiness. These two categories cannot be separated, and my suspicion is that it’s because somehow I can taste the care that goes into comforting dishes. You’ll find that most of my comfort foods involve a good bit of stirring. As I have written here before, stirring is therapeutic in ways no other activity is for me. But also, the stirring process infuses the air with smells that remind me of other days: days shared with people I love, days spent cooking for those I love, days enjoying the simple process of creating a warming, delicious dish of food. This comforting cooking process should fill my house with feelings of calm and peace, and in these busy days especially, friends, I welcome the scents and sounds that bring those feelings.

A lot to ask from a simple dish of food, you say? Well, a body has to eat, but sometimes a soul also needs to cook.

When I saw that Ivonne (a long-lost sister I have only discovered in the last year–we are certain that our families, particularly the women, are kin, at least culinarily speaking) and her cohort, Orchidea, were requesting dishes of comfort, I set my sights on the ugly fall tomatoes at my farmer’s market and a hefty hunk of butter.

The process for this simple, simple sauce is neither complicated nor labor-intensive, but it does take time. I like to make it on a cold, dreary day, when I can curl up on the couch with a blanket and a book in between recipe steps. When it’s finished, David and I can sit down in a house filled with the rich scent of roasting tomatoes, and enjoy the way this velvety sauce coats our noodles and our tongues with a soft blend of tomato and butter.

Fresh tomatoes are my recommendation for the best flavor, but high-quality canned ones will do in a pinch. If you have tomatoes you put up from summer (I freeze batches of roasted ones), those will work too, but my favorite way to make this is to start with fresh tomatoes (I bought these out of a box that read “fall tomato rejects, 3 for $1″), roast them until they fall apart, and then simmer them with the other ingredients for a long, long time.

Angel Hair with Buttery Tomato Sauce

2 - 2 1/2 pounds tomatoes (should yield 2 cups tomato puree)
Olive oil
Coarse salt
Cracked black pepper
1/2 stick (4 T.) butter
1 medium yellow onion, quartered
2 carrots, peeled and cut into 4 pieces
1/2 pound pasta (I like angel hair for this dish)

Preheat the oven to 425. Wash and core the tomatoes, and cut them into large chunks (for medium-sized tomatoes, quarters work fine). Place them in a single layer on a greased baking sheet, close together, and drizzle with olive oil. Toss with your hands to coat the tomato pieces with oil. Sprinkle liberally with salt and cracked pepper. Roast. The time depends on you — I leave them for at least an hour and then check; they should be easily mashed with a fork and beginning to brown where the salt has landed. Remove and let cool. When cool, process in a food processor or blender to make a smooth puree.

In a medium saucepan, melt the butter over medium-low heat. Add the onion and carrot pieces. Cover with tomato puree and simmer (don’t boil!) for about 45 minutes, stirring occasionally.

When the sauce is almost done, cook the pasta to desired tenderness. Remove the vegetable pieces with a slotted spoon and serve them on the side. Plate up a mound of pasta with a ladle of sauce and a pat of butter. Eat, and be comforted.

Although I’ve still not felt much like experimenting with our meals, I am back to a regular menu-making routine. Last week was a healthy dose of cool-weather favorites. These recipes are old stand-bys, ones I turn to again and again when it turns comfort-food season. I hope you all are enjoying the fruits of this season, too, whatever form they take.

Mostly, mine comes in this form:

My mom’s spiced tea is the cure for whatever ails–soar throat, bad day, hurt feelings. I’ve been making it with decaf tea bags, so it’s also replaced my morning coffee routine.

Other fall favorites that are getting me through:

Aunt Jennifer’s White Chili: simple, hearty, satisfying, especially if you take the time to make homemade chicken stock.

Italian Sausage and White Bean Soup: I discovered this soup last winter, and as soon as the temperature dropped a little bit at night this year, I knew I wanted to make it again (and serve it to friends!)

Homemade Applesauce: Oh, yes, I know it has a lot of butter in it, but if I’m eating dessert, this must be better for me than sitting down with a tub of mint chocolate chip ice cream. Right?

I do hope to have some new recipes to share soon…in the meantime, thanks for being patient!

My husband has been so supportive since I’ve been in school. He’s indulged my study-break cooking frenzies, patiently cleaning up my messes and dutifully tasting every test recipe; he’s done an awful lot of laundry and cleaning of the bathroom; and he  rarely every complains. The job I’ve been reluctant to give up, of course, is the making of our dinners. David is completely competent and capable in the kitchen, so it isn’t that I don’t trust him to do it (though he gladly would), it’s just that for me, somehow, making dinner every night is the one chore that keeps me sane, that helps me to feel like a normal person whose life is not completely chaotic. It brings order to an otherwise out-of-control schedule.

But some nights I just don’t have it in me. And now that David is a full-time student too, our schedule has become even more unorthodox. Dinner, for example, on Wednesday nights is served promptly at 10 p.m., when David gets home from class. For the nights when I have so much to do before the morning that I can’t think how to fit in cooking dinner too, rather than turn to take-out (which we try hard not to do), I turn over the kitchen to David.

He has a couple of standard classic recipes that are his specialties, and I’m hoping to introduce you to most of them, one at a time. You’ve already become acquainted with his famous roast chicken. Number 2 on the list of his favorite things to make is carbonara. He first learned to make it in Italy (which he will tell you about in a moment), and he’s been fixing this hearty comfort food for me almost as long as I’ve known him.

Most people who make carbonara feel pretty strongly about their way of doing it, and David is no exception. But if you’re stuck in the kitchen at 5:30 without any clue about what to make for dinner, and you happen to have eggs, bacon, noodles, and some Parmesan cheese, this meal comes together in less than half an hour. Low-calorie, it is not, but what it lacks in nutritional value, it makes up for in taste. Certainly, we would not eat a meal like this every night (and usually when we plan on carbonara, I try to limit the fat content of the rest of our meals), but for nights when we’re busy and we need sustenance, this hits the spot.

Here are David’s unedited instructions. I quote word-for-word from the cook:
1. Boil water. Insert 1 pound noodles. (Note from Jennifer: Usually, we use the traditional fettucine, but this night we only had rigatoni, and we actually prefer it. The ridges hold the eggy sauce quite nicely.)

2. Get out: 3 eggs, bacon, Parmesan cheese.

3. In a bowl, whisk 3 eggs with 1/4 cup cream (or whole milk) and salt and pepper. Not tons of salt–the bacon and cheese are also salty. But pepper: use as much pepper as your wife will let you get away with.

4. Cook some bacon. If you like a lot of bacon, cook a lot. If you’re trying to be healthier, or you don’t like a lot of bacon, not so much. Completely up to you. (Note from Jennifer: chances are, if you’re trying to be healthy, you aren’t making carbonara. But who knows?)

5. Grate fresh Parmesan. A lot. You can never have enough. Not-fresh Parmesan is a Republican plot to make us all lazy and compliant. Have you seen Kraft’s political platform?

6. Think about Italy while you grate the cheese and wait for the noodles and bacon to cook. If you like, I will tell you the story of how I learned to make this. I once went to Italy with a group of artists. We had carbonara at this fabulous restaurant, and as we were lamenting the fact that you can’t get carbonara like that anywhere in Mississippi (because we were all from Mississippi), a member of our party — Father Canonici, a lovely old priest with deep Italian roots — shared this recipe with us. You know, the one I’m giving to you now in such specific detail. What can I say, I didn’t write it down, and my memory is fuzzy. What I do know is that you should never, ever put peas in carbonara.

7. Weird how this is so good with no garlic. (Note from Jennifer: I don’t know what this has to do with anything, but I was instructed to take it down. Remember: not my words!)
8. Make sure the bacon is cooked to a nice crispy texture. I don’t really like crispy bacon (a common source of contention at our house), but it works with the carbonara to keep things from getting all clumpy.

9. Keep a close eye on the noodles; you don’t want them overdone.

10. Drain the noodles.

11. Dump the noodles back into the pot.

12. Pour the egg-cream mixture on top of the still-hot noodles. Now, this is the important part. You want to mix it up so that the heat of the noodles will start to firm up the eggs a bit before returning the pot to the burner. You do this for two reasons: 1. You want the noodles to get nicely coated before the eggs get too done. 2. It will be easier to clean the pot when you’re done because there won’t be as much egg stuck to the bottom of the pan. This was learned the hard way.

13. Once the eggs have begun to stick to the noodles, return the pot to a low heat. Stir gently and constantly (keep in mind: the more you stir, the less scrubbing you’ll have to do after dinner).

14. Now is the time to sneak in more pepper when your wife isn’t looking.

15. Crumble the bacon. We do it with kitchen scissors because the bacon is still very hot.

16. After cooking and stirring for 5 minutes or so, add the cheese. You don’t want to add the cheese too early, or it will get lost.

17. Keep stirring. Check to make sure you aren’t getting cheese clumps all over your spoon.

18. Finally, now everything will start to come together and you can add the bacon at last.

19. Adding the bacon is sort of like when you’re making muffins and you don’t want to overmix your wet and dry ingredients. Fold gently. If you mix too much, it will all end up on the bottom.

20. Serve immediately.

21. When you’ve served up what you plan to eat tonight, immediately put the leftovers in a different container so you can start soaking the pot. Believe me, you’ll be glad later.

22. Talk about Italy while you eat.

There you have it, David’s words on carbonara. Enjoy!

What to do when torn between two fruits, ripe and ready for the picking the very same Saturday? Have them both, of course! Throw them together with long, tangy strips of citrus zest, a faint sprinkle of fresh nutmeg, and a bit of brown sugar. Bury them beneath a cloud of butter, oats, and sugar, and bake until the aroma of summer seeps into the sunny corners of your kitchen. Serve warm with coffee, and, if you need a spot of cool, a dollop of vanilla ice cream. I’ll take mine straight, thank you–straight from the bush/tree to my oven and then my mouth, adorned only with fresh slices of peach and a couple of raw berries.

Peaches and blueberries: simultaneously ripe for a reason.

Peach Berry Crisp

About 10 ripe peaches, pitted, peeled, and sliced
Zest of 1 orange
Zest of 1 lemon
1 pint fresh blueberries
1/8 t. grated fresh nutmeg (optional)
3/4 cup brown sugar, divided
1 1/2 cups + 2 T. flour
1/4 t. salt
1 cup sugar
1 cup quick-cooking oats
2 sticks butter, cut into small cubes

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Cover completely the bottom of a 9×12 pyrex dish with peach slices (10 medium- to small-sized peaches were enough for me). Sprinkle with the citrus zest (I like it in long strips for this dish, but grated works too), 1/4 cup brown sugar, 2 T. of flour, and the grated nutmeg. Add the berries and mix gently together until well-combined (I use my hands.) Make sure that the fruit mixure is in an even layer.

For the topping, you can use a food processor or a stand mixer with a paddle attachment. Stir together 1 1/2 cups flour, 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1 cup white sugar, salt, and oats. With the mixer (or processor) running, add the cubes of butter until small, coarse crumbles form. Spread this mixture evenly over the top of the fruit. Bake for about an hour; the filling will bubble at the edges, and the top should be light brown and crisp (thus, the name!).

Adapted from The Barefoot Contessa’s Peach and Raspberry Crisp.

This dessert is my contribution to Sweetnicks‘ ARF/5-a-day Tuesdays: blueberries are packed with anti-oxidants, among other fantastic health benefits (which somehow diminishes the amount of butter in this crisp in my mind…)

See that lovely tart in the picture? Yes, the one with the first-of-the-summer tomatoes, oiled and salted to bring out their sweet freshness, lying atop a bed of soft, buttery caramelized Vidalia onions. The one with the ooey gooey melted fresh mozzarella and the fresh basil leaves, wilted from the heat of the oven.

Would you like to know how delicious it tasted?

Yep, so would I.

Seconds after the photograph was taken, that lovely tart lay face down on my kitchen tiles, the victim of a violent combination: a super-slippery nonstick tart pan, an Orca oven mitt, and a slick plate. I turned to place the tart on a cutting surface to serve, just minutes before the next-to-last episode of LOST began, and, splat. Just like that, an hour’s worth of cooking and a market Saturday’s worth of tomatoes and onions lost to the not-so-recently mopped kitchen floor.

An hour later, Lebanese take-out assuaged my hunger, but the bitter taste of disappointment did not dissipate until morning.

Here’s the recipe anyhow; perhaps one day I’ll gather the courage to try it again and let you know how it comes out.

Tomato-Vidalia Tart
1 pie crust, refrigerated or homemade
3 small tomatoes, sliced into rounds
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 T. olive oil
Kosher salt
2 T. butter
1 medium Vidalia onion, sliced thinly into half moons
1/4 pound fresh mozzarella, sliced
1/4 cup basil leaves, chiffonade
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. In a small bowl, combine the tomato slices, olive oil, and 2 cloves of the minced garlic. Sprinkle with Kosher salt (about a teaspoon). Set aside.

Melt the butter over medium heat in a large skillet. Add the onions, and cook, stirring occasionally until they are golden brown (this process took me about 25 minutes, but it depends on the thickness and wateriness of your onions, so watch them carefully). When they are brownish, sprinkle liberally with Kosher salt.
Meanwhile, lay the pie crust over a tart pan; press into the sides and trim to fit around the edges. Sprinkle the remaining garlic clove evenly over the bottom of the crust. Bake for about 12 minutes, or until the bottom is beginning to brown. Spread the caramelized onions evenly over the bottom of the crust. Lay the tomatoes on top of the onion bed in two layers. Top with the mozarella cheese and half of the basil. Bake for another 8-10 minutes, or until the crust is brown and the cheese is melted. Top with the remaining basil. Be VERY careful removing the tart from the oven, and lay it on a safe surface to cut the pie into wedges.

I hope it’s good…maybe I’ll find out someday soon!

So, it turns out that I love to make gnocchi. After my frustrations with the little dumplings, I would never have thought I’d say that. But it’s true.

It also turns out, as luck would have it, that gnocchi works with another thing I love: sweet potatoes. After Ivonne’s recipe convinced me that gnocchi was doable, I decided to experiment a bit. My love of sweet potatoes has certainly not been a secret on this site, so this is one more recipe to add to the sweet potato collection.

For those of you who don’t know, gnocchi are little dumplings, usually made of potatoes and flour (although Ivonne convinced me that an egg is the magic thing to bind the dough together; I’ll never make gnocchi without the egg). They can be served with a sauce, or vegetables, or simply topped with butter and cheese.

For the sweet potato gnocchi? I opted for simplicity: a bit of garlic, a bit of freshly grated nutmeg, a bit of mascarpone, a bit of fresh Parmesan. All I can say is that I’m very sad I did not double the recipe to have leftovers. Yum!

Sweet Potato Gnocchi

2 medium-large sweet potatoes (about 2 pounds)
1 egg
1 t. salt
1 1/2 - 2 cups flour
3 T. butter
4 cloves garlic, sliced thinly
2 T. mascarpone cheese
1/4 cup grated Parmesan plus extra to serve
freshly grated nutmeg, to taste

Bake the sweet potatoes in the oven until they are easily pierced with a fork, about an hour at 350 degree works for my oven. Set aside until they are cool enough to handle. Peel and mash thoroughly with a potato masher or a fork. Be sure to get rid of any big lumps.

Mix the mashed potato with the egg; then, work in the flour with your hands, until the mixture sticks together and forms a dough-like ball (I started with 1 1/2 cups, but ended up using a little more than 2). On a floured work surface, knead the dough until it’s easily malleable but not sticky.

Form the dough into tennis ball-size rounds. Roll each ball into a long, snake-like coil, about an inch in diameter. Cut the coils into inch-long dumplings, sealing them with the back of a fork to make indentions. Put all the gnocchi in a bowl or on a tray, and refrigerate while you bring a large pot of water to boil.

When the water is boiling vigorously, add the gnocchi, one batch at a time, being careful not to overcrowd the pot. When they float, they’re done; remove with a slotted spoon to a colander to drain and finish cooking the remaining gnocchi.

When all the gnocchi are cooked, drain the water from the pot, and heat the butter over medium-low (I use the same pot). Add the sliced garlic, and cook until tender, about 3 minutes. Stir in the mascarpone and Parmesan. Season with grated nutmeg and Kosher salt. When the sauce is well-mixed, pour over the gnocchi to coat. Top each serving with extra Parmesan and extra grated nutmeg. Serves 2 hungry people.
And, to make this dish even more satisfying, sweet potatoes, although heavy on the carbs, are also packed with Vitamin A, B6, and C, making this gnocchi a good candidate for ARF Tuesdays over at Sweetnicks!