sinful things to do with tomatoes

what you see is roasted tomatoes, nicely caramelized in a 450-degree oven, sitting on top of saffron and smoked paprika scented rice. what you see is gorgeousness. let us all worship at the altar of tomatoes and rice.

this is a slightly revised version of mark bittman's tomato paella from the new york times food section. i've made this three times now: once when i was sick and could barely taste anything, once for my parents while i was home, and once for a couple of my roommates.

in the article that accompanies the original recipe, mark bittman says that you have to try it at least once with just tomatoes, and i would have to say that with respect to this paella, i've become a tomato purist. for the purposes of this post i'll be ignoring any issues regarding the authenticity of this particular paella, because when something tastes this good, you ignore pretentions like authenticity. this rice is pretty fantastic: the smoked paprika and saffron give the rice an earthy, unplaceable flavor and aroma that's balanced by the tomatoes. if you make this in the summer, with homegrown or locally grown tomatoes, i guarantee you that the tomatoes will taste like tomato-infused sunshine.

about the recipe: i would say that the saffron is indispensable - it's unbelievably better with saffron, so go to the grocery store and get some, even if it's really cheap. also, get the best tomatoes possible. i've upped the tomatoes significantly from the original recipe because i found the proportion of tomato to rice to be a little too low in the first go. also, i have no idea what kind of rice mark bittman was using, but my paella consistently takes about 45 minutes in the oven to finish itself off. however, the upside of this is that the tomatoes get roasted and start caramelizing because they're under hot heat for so long, so overall this is a big win. it's a snap to prep - which for me, lover of involved mises en place, is saying something - and once it's in the oven, it's off your mind and you can do something else.

as for additions: surely you could add anything to this, but would you really want to mess with a good thing? if you must, i tried fried egg today, which was pretty good - fried so it's crispy. i made the eggs sunny side up, which was good, but i wish there had been a bit more crunch to them to contrast with the softness of rice and tomato. there's not really any need for meat, unless you were to do up some good-quality bacon and cook the onions/etc in the rendered fat; or perhaps chicken thighs or something like that - but no weak meats like chicken breast, because the acidity of the tomatoes can only be balanced by a nice earthy meat. whatever you do, make sure that you leave the pan in the oven long enough to let the rice start to develop a bit of crustiness - i didn't do this in the most recent permutation, and i missed it. this will also maximize your tomato caramelization time, which is ideal.

tomato paella
3 1/2 cups stock or water
2 to 2 1/2 lbs ripe tomatoes, cored and cut into thick wedges
salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 large onion, minced
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 to 1 1/2 tablespoons tomato paste
large pinch saffron threads
2 to 2 1/2 teaspoons Spanish pimentón (smoked paprika) - i used smoked paprika from balducci's
2 cups spanish or other short-grain rice - i've tried both goya spanish rice and sushi rice, and slightly prefer the spanish rice
preheat oven to 450 degrees. warm stock or water in a saucepan. put tomatoes in a medium bowl, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and drizzle with 1 tablespoon olive oil. toss to coat.

2. put remaining oil in a 12-inch ovenproof skillet over medium-high heat. add onion and garlic, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and cook, stirring occasionally, until vegetables soften, 3 to 5 minutes. stir in tomato paste, saffron, and paprika and cook for a minute more. add rice and cook, stirring occasionally, until it is shiny, another minute or two. add liquid and stir until just combined.

3. put tomato wedges on top of rice and drizzle with juices that accumulated in bottom of bowl. put pan in oven and roast in the middle of the oven, undisturbed, for 35-45 minutes. the rice is done if it's dry and just tender - take a taste to make sure. you can add more liquid if the rice is dry but not done yet, though this shouldn't be a problem. when rice is ready, turn off oven and let pan sit for 5 to 15 minutes (it absorbs the liquids fully and gets a little stickier).

4. remove pan from oven. if you like, put pan over high heat for a few minutes to develop a bit of a bottom crust before serving.

[serves 4-6]

the way you cut the meat matters

* note: this platter is ~20" wide, and the big slices of beef are ~8" in diameter in the long dimension

ok, here's the lesson first, to be followed by the story: let meat be all that it can be, and it will reward you. the lesson is first because i didn't know where else to put this line, but i couldn't let it go. sorry for the gratuitous text.

we had christmas (or pre-christmas, since we happened to celebrate christmas both before and after christmas this year, but not actually on christmas itself) dinner at my cousins' house in new jersey, and my mom put me in charge of roasting the massive beef rib roast that she had purchased. i had a photo of it, but my camera battery is out, so i'll have to edit this post later.

my mother had also frozen said rib roast, because she had bought it several days before the day of the dinner. considering how long a turkey (a similarly large hunk of meat that is often frozen) takes to freeze, i thought that close to 14 hours in a cool car would be enough to thaw the 10-pound-and-change roast. not so. not so at all, my friends. the behemoth was only just starting to thaw when we arrived at my cousins' house.

luckily, i have a lot of expertise in expedited thawing of frozen meat, having had this phenomenon occur many times at lmf. under no circumstances will i ever condone the microwave thaw, so warm water baths it was. it's important not to let the water get too hot or you encounter the same problem as you have with the microwave: you start to cook the meat. of course, this rule gets relaxed as the time you have to thaw the meat decreases, but we'll just ignore that detail for now. change the water enough times, and you might just succeed in your thawing mission. well, dear readers, i thawed this thing for a straight two hours and it was still frozen inside. i don't even want to delve into the bacteria growth in meat that's encouraged by immersion in a warm water bath. i nuked the thing at 500F for 30 minutes, ok?

but never fear, i popped this thing into the oven anyway, even as the meat thermometer inserted inside decreased to 32 degrees fahrenheit. yeah. not so encouraging. but, i figured, with the cooking method - 30 minutes at 500F, then another hour at 350F - maybe it would all turn out fine. and it did! ok, the roast actually took closer to an hour and a half before, frustrated, i yanked the thing from the oven as soon as it reached the temperature for rare meat. and if you must know, i pulled the thermometer out of the center of the roast because i couldn't countenance waiting any longer. yes, i have patience issues.

i let the dratted thing rest for 15 minutes, well short of the recommended 20 minutes, and started slicing into it between the bones. and...it was perfect inside! the outer edges were well-done but tender, the interior was rare - it was a win for everyone. and it gets better: i started slicing it by dividing it between the bones, as i intended to cut each rib section into two pieces since there were 10 of us. for those of you keeping score, yeah, i unwittingly planned on an entire pound of meat per person. as soon as i realized that half of a rib section was still a ridiculous amount of meat, i started cutting each half into halves, ending up with four to six hunks per rib section. and that's hunks, not slices, people: because medieval-style hunks are way better-looking than pansy-ass delicate slices. slices are for yuppies. additional benefits of medieval-style chunks of meat: when you bring out the platter o' meat, it looks like you went hunting, not just to the supermarket; eating meat like a peasant (a peasant with knife and fork) is entirely more satisfying on a winter night than eating meat with your pinky crooked out. eating meat this way is not unlike eating a roasted chicken with your fingers - it's delicious, slightly guilty, decadent, but entirely pleasurable. eating meat this way convinces you that you're eating meat, not poultry, chateaubriand, caviar, shellfish, or anything fancy-schmancy: you're eating food.

meat muffins: what's in a name?

all morning my mom was talking about "meat muffins," which to you, i'm sure, sounds a bit strange. it sounds a bit strange to me, too! what exactly are they? are they muffins with meat in them? muffin-shaped meat? muffin-shaped ground meat, or some sort of steak crammed into a muffin cup? this would not be as out of the picture as you might think. the possibilities abound for a phrase as awesome as "meat muffin."

it turns out that she was talking about meat pies that i had made and written about here, which happened to have been made in muffin tins for ease of shaping. of course, my mom has even less patience than me, and her meat muffins were more like meat trifles (another great phrase!). there was a layer of biscuit/scone dough, then a layer of chickeny goodness (onions, garlic, ginger, chicken), then another layer of biscuit/scone dough. meat muffin or meat trifle, they were excellent, kind of like a mini chicken pot pie but with a cooler name. as much as we may not like to admit it, the name makes food taste better or worse than it actually is, just like some people think fiji water tastes better than other bottled waters because we trust the name more. would you rather eat a "meat muffin" or a "country style chicken pot pie with thyme biscuit topping"? maybe the masses will be eating their country style chicken pot pies, but i will be eating my meat muffins, and i will be happy doing so. "meat muffins"? love it.

all of this makes me miss my own meat muffins, which i remember fondly with their filling of ground pork and caramelized vegetables. maybe i'll make some this week. regardless, right now, i would eat any meat muffins, because saying "meat muffin" is fun.

r-e-s-p-e-c-t...

it's not what you think, but it's outrageous anyway. i'm not referring to your future loss of respect for me when i reveal that i love wendy's chicken products, brownies from a box, and kraft singles (each one of these un-foodie food loves is predicated on carefully-calibrated expectations that aren't really concerned with the pretentious gourmandism).

i'm referring instead to a matter of word choice - terribly poor word choice. i was reading a review of ko prime in the boston globe when i experienced a precipitous and large loss of respect for that newspaper: my brain registered having read the word "ginormous."* not only does this word look ridiculous, it's, well, not a word. if i were on the mit network and could check in the OED for you, i am 95% sure it would not be in the OED. seeing as a newspaper is a publicly accessible document that has wide readership, it's pretty much deplorable that (a) a writer would even think of using slang like that when any other word would suffice (say, "enormous") and that (b) the copy editor would not have caught that. and take note that the same sentence that contains the offending slang in it also contains the word "redolent." that is a real word, and one that could very well be describing food of some sort. "ginormous" is a word that a high schooler who doesn't know any better might use in passing conversation. "redolent" is not. i knew there was a reason why i don't read boston globe restaurant reviews. shame on you, boston globe.

*the offending word in its context:
Vegetable options include ginormous stalks of asparagus with hollandaise, and pea greens that are far too salty (a recurring issue here) but cooked perfectly and redolent of ginger; pea risotto, however, is overcooked.

a story about bacon

one day, a pound of bacon walked into the kitchen. it accidentally walked into a skillet, but jumped out after getting a little toasty. some onions took its place with a little thyme, and the whole group took a dive into pasta, finding eggs and cheese at the bottom. and the bacon liked the eggs and cheese so much that it jumped up and down so everyone could get eggs and cheese with their pasta.

it seems like many of my food stories are about bacon or some other pork product, huh? this will remain the status quo unless my roommates talk even more about anatomy classes and the resemblance of...yeah. no worries. i'm still a meatitarian, albeit one that very much likes vegetables.

this is the second time we tried a carbonara - the first time ending up not really that creamily eggy. this time, for some unknown reason, was pretty darn good - so good that i am even writing up the recipe! the basic procedure is to add the peas to the pasta when it's almost done, and i think that cooled the whole mixture enough to not curdle the eggs when mixed with it; then the hot onion mixture cooks it completely. that's my guess, at the very least.

the quality of the ingredients is key; we also tried to add enough veg to make it a little more balanced. this is not a carbonara with a whole lot of sauce - it's just sauce-y enough. we bought our bacon at whole foods.

carbonara with asparagus and peas
1 lb good quality thick-cut bacon
2 lbs onions (2-3 large onions), diced coarsely
a few sprigs thyme
1/2c white wine
1 bunch asparagus, chopped into 1" long pieces
1 bag frozen peas (about 2 1/2 cups)
1 pound pasta (shells, pipette, orecchiette, etc)
1c grated parmesan or other hard cheese (asiago, romano)
4 eggs
salt and pepper

1. fry the bacon on medium heat in a large (12") skillet. when it is done (chewy but not crispy), drain on a plate lined with paper towels. pour all of the rendered fat except for 1 1/2T into a bowl; reserve the fat in the bowl for future use. cut the cooked bacon into small 1/2" long pieces.

2. add the onions to the pan and saute until pale. add the thyme and continue cooking. when onions start to stick to the pan a little, add the white wine and let it boil off, stirring the onions occasionally.

3. whisk together the cheese and eggs in the serving bowl.

4. fill a large stockpot with water and heat for the pasta. add the asparagus and bacon pieces to the onion mixture and cook on medium-low. when the water boils, cook the pasta. when the pasta is about two minutes from being done, add the peas. when the pasta is done, drain, reserving about a half-cup of the liquid. turn the heat on the onion mixture to medium-high to keep it piping hot.

5. pour the drained pasta and 1/4c reserved pasta water into the egg mixture and stir thoroughly. add the onion and asparagus mixture and stir. if the mixture is too thick, add the remaining pasta water. season with salt and pepper.

[serves 6-8]

it's kinetic!

i was at tosci's for brunch today, and we got treated to a few great samples-for-eater-feedback. one was a "kinetic" tea ball (described as such by not one, but two people) - basically, some sort of longish tea leaf that's bound around a core of chrysanthemum flower. so when you drop the ball into hot water, it slowly unfolds - the guy at the counter described it as turning into a plant to an animal to a plant. pretty cool looking, and it was great chrysanthemum tea. the tea ball stays bound together, so it ends up looking like an exotic water lily like flower - this is the tea version of botticelli's venus. in all reality, it looks most like a medicine ball from spirited away - miyazaki could animate that thing and it wouldn't be out of place at all.

this other sample-for-feedback was even better, such that it deserves its own paragraph: a BAT. specifically, a bacon-arugula-tomato sandwich. tosci's has been using a ciabatta bread for their sandwiches that's really delectable - slightly glossy crust that's pretty thin, masking a slightly chewy interior that's like foccacia with more air pockets. it's easy to bite into, but doesn't totally compact when you eat it. ok, moving on. normally i don't really like arugula because it's so ubiquitous, but it was really good in this sandwich, providing a bit of flavor and a bit of crunch to offset the chewy bacon and the soft tomato. one side of the sandwich is spread with homemade mayonnaise that has lemon zest in it, and the other side is spread with a scallion oil - olive oil with bits of scallion in it. it's somewhere between a pesto and olive oil with some scallion mixed in it. it's also delicious, giving a softer, more muted oniony flavor to the sandwich. all in all, this sandwich is a winner - the best blt i've ever had, for sure. i found it a tad too salty, but i think a bit more lemon zest would do the trick - the lemon zest is key, because it balances the whole sandwich. god, that was good.

poundcake II

i vaguely remember having promised to update you all on the longevity of the pound cake. i also vaguely remember having forgotten - ok, i very distinctly remember having forgotten to do so. so with respect to elvis' poundcake, i'd like to report that the texture improved over the next several hours or so. its crusty exterior stayed crusty, but as egg-ful things are wont to do, it tasted much less eggy after the cake cooled and set completely. i think it had about a week's shelf life?

and onto bigger, better things, or at least, more chocolatey things: chocolate pound cake. i can't remember why i made a chocolate pound cake; i guess just because. this is a recipe i'd made before, generally in loaf pans to make a pound cake for chocolate raspberry trifle. i also wanted to test the efficacy of beating the butter and sugar to provide the cake's structure, and i have to confess and bite my tongue - it really helps. in fact, it's pretty amazing how much it helps. the chocolate pound cake that i made relies heavily on the butter and sugar for its tight crumb, and cake flour for its tenderness, and brown sugar for spicy caramel overtones. i would recommend billington's dark brown sugar for the best spicy caramel overtones - i'm pretty sure that 95% of said overtones come from this particular brown sugar, which i've used before to great effect in brown sugar pudding. this particular cake is fantastic plain, but if you need to fancy it up, just drip a chocolate glaze over it. don't bother with powdered sugar, which i hate with a passion on cakes and tarts because you just end up inhaling it and choking, just as you're about to take a bite. it's annoying at your dinner table when you're with good friends, and embarrassing in social situations as you cough and hack.

this is one of the few cakes that i would recommend using good ingredients for: get the cake flour, the valrhona cocoa (sold in bulk for not too much more than regular cocoa at whole foods), the good brown sugar, etc. don't skimp on beating the sugar and butter or your pound cake won't have as soft and beautiful a texture as mine did.

chocolate pound cake
2 1/4c cake flour (not self-rising)
3/4c unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder (i used valrhona from whole foods)
1/2t salt
1/4t baking soda
1c sour cream (8 1/2 oz)
2 1/4 sticks unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2c sugar
1 1/2c dark brown sugar, packed
6 eggs

2T butter, melted
2T cocoa powder

1. Do not preheat oven. Mix together the melted butter and 2T cocoa powder, then brush on a 12-cup bundt pan, making sure the entire surface is covered well. You can also use a 10-cup bundt pan but the bottom of the cake will not be flat.

2. In a bowl, sift together flour, cocoa powder, and salt. In a small bowl, stir together baking soda and sour cream.

3. In a large bowl, use an electric mixer to beat butter until homogenous. Add both sugars and beat until light and fluffy, about 10 minutes. Beat in eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition and scraping the bowl's sides with a rubber spatula each time.

4. With mixer on low speed, add flour mixture and sour cream mixture alternately in batches, beating until just combined.

5. Pour batter into the bundt pan, tap it a few times to get rid of the air bubbles, and put in the middle of cold oven. Set oven to 350F and bake cake 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean. Cool cake in pan 15 minutes and then turn out onto a rack to cool completely.

Pound cake keeps, wrapped in plastic wrap, at room temperature 1 week. Alternatively, pound cake may be frozen, wrapped well in plastic wrap and foil, 3 months.

[makes 16-20 servings]

elvis presley's favorite pound cake

given elvis' tendency towards the heart-unhealthy in his diet, i'd normally be loath to shill for food of the heart-clogging type, but this pound cake was just unusual enough to make the cut. i assure you that i do actually have a conscience, and that i don't actually run amok in my kitchen sneaking gallons of pork fat into everything...really. at least, this pound cake doesn't have any pork fat in it!

i read a bunch of reviews, looked at the picture, looked at the structure of the recipe. this one is unusual in several ways: it has no leavening, has a TON of eggs (7!), and a heck of a lot of sugar (3 cups!). so don't think this isn't unhealthy for you, but it's not the greatest trespass either. i was curious to see whether it really was to eggy, and whether the extreme mixing (almost 10 minutes on that butter) would be enough to leaven the mixture. i suspect that the beating of the eggs also contributes to the leavening, as does the thorough mixing of batter to develop the gluten.

the verdict: well, i suppose i'll have to update this tomorrow, after the pound cake has sat for longer than an hour - it's still warm. but so far, i can report that the texture is lighter than a typical pound cake, but that it is fine-crumbed, very slightly eggy, and very nicely browned on the exterior. i'd be interested to see how well it keeps, and whether the texture will change tomorrow. so far, i'd make it again - it's pretty easy to make, after all is said and done, and after you disregard the shocking amounts of things. keep in mind that it makes a bundt cake!

elvis presley's favorite pound cake (adapted from epicurious)
2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, softened, plus additional for buttering pan
3 cups sifted flour (not self-rising; sift before measuring) plus additional for dusting
3/4 teaspoon salt
3 cups sugar
7 large eggs, at room temperature 30 minutes
1 cup heavy cream

10-inch tube pan (4 1/2 inches deep; not with a removable bottom) or a 10-inch bundt pan (3 1/4 inches deep; 3-qt capacity)

1. put oven rack in middle position, but do not preheat oven. generously butter pan and dust with flour, knocking out excess flour.

2. sift together sifted flour (3 cups) and salt into a bowl (do not skip the sifting!!!). repeat sifting into another bowl (flour will have been sifted 3 times total).

3. beat together butter (2 sticks) and sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 5 minutes in a stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment or 6 to 8 minutes with a handheld mixer. beat eggs with a whisk (i really like my new kuhn rikon whisk, because it's really got the air-inducing factor going with its many spokes) in a pyrex measuring cup. add in several batches to the butter and sugar, beating well each time. reduce speed to low and add half of flour, then all of cream, then remaining flour, mixing well after each addition. scrape down side of bowl, then beat at medium-high speed 5 minutes. batter will become creamier and satiny.

4. spoon batter into pan and rap pan against work surface once or twice to eliminate air bubbles. place pan in (cold) oven and turn oven temperature to 350F. bake until golden and a toothpick inserted in middle of cake comes out with a few crumbs adhering, 1 to 1 1/4 hours. cool cake in pan on a rack 30 minutes. run a thin knife around inner and outer edges of cake, then invert rack over pan and invert cake onto rack to cool completely.

cake keeps, covered well with plastic wrap or in an airtight container, at room temperature 5 days.

[serves 10-12]

and a bonus! these are light, fluffy, slightly sweet, and everything you could want from shortcake. i made these with spiced plums.

best shortcake ever
2 cups all purpose flour
2 tablespoons sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons chilled unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
3/4 cup half and half

1. preheat oven to 375F. Whisk first four ingredients in medium bowl to blend.

2. add butter; rub in with fingertips until mixture resembles coarse meal. add half and half; stir just until dough forms.

3. knead the dough in the bowl with a large fork or a pastry fork, about 8-10 times until the dough becomes slightly more elastic - it should be somewhat discernable as a coherent mass, ie, your fork shouldn't just squish through the whole thing. it's important not to overmix.

4. mound small handfuls of dough onto a baking sheet and bake until a tester comes out clean, about 15 minutes. remove from oven and cool until warm, then top with fruit.

biscuits can be made 8 hours ahead; cool completely and store in airtight container at room temperature.

[makes 6 large biscuits or 8 smaller ones; vary the size as you like, but watch the cooking time, which will change accordingly]

tomato love and dilled chicken stew

so i found out a couple days ago that i got a full-tuition scholarship for this coming school year (!!!), and celebrated by cooking for the entire evening. i had chicken thighs that i needed to use, and i was envisioning chicken in a dill cream sauce as i walked over to star. i also wanted to try slow-roasting tomatoes - where slow means 6-8 hours slow.

the chicken with its dill cream sauce turned into something completely different, but the slow-roasted tomatoes looked like this coming out of the oven. the darker flecks are thyme, except around the edges of the tomato where it has caramelized. carrien and i plan to eat these on sandwiches or pasta. they smell wonderful when they come out of the oven, too - they actually smell like caramelized tomatoes.

the chicken with dill started out innocently enough - i bought onions, dill, thyme, celery, mushrooms, chicken stock, and some cream to go with the chicken. i intended to have chicken thighs, tender so the meat falls off the bone, with a thickish, chicken-based cream sauce with lots of onions and dill. so a cream sauce like that would generally be white, right? i don't know why i was in the mood for white food at the time, but it turns out that the browning of the chicken thighs at the beginning of the whole thing caused it to turn brown. this wasn't a problem, just surprising. i had cooked the vegetables in the rendered chicken fat, and then added the chicken broth and chicken thighs back in (classic braise-style), and i wanted the chicken to be more tender than it was in the chicken cacciatore, so i cooked it for a while. i'm not exactly sure how long it was, but it was probably about 2 hours, boiling away in the chicken-y sauce. i also wanted a sauce with some heft to it, so i let it simmer until the sauce reduced by a few cups. turns out, when you cook chicken that long in a more watery sauce, it falls off the bone for you. so i took all the bones up and the whole thing became a stew. where's the cream, you ask? i added it at the end with some sour cream and let the whole thing simmer a little bit more, to thicken it. i had also made some rice as the chicken cooked, and i had just started thinking about what size tupperware each one would need when i realized that i should just mix them. so there you have it - not what i was expecting, but equally good, if not better.

dilled creamy chicken and rice stew
3 1/2 lbs chicken thighs (about 8), patted dry and dredged in flour
1/2 bunch of dill, leaves picked off stems and chopped fine
2 large onions, sliced into thin strips, about 1/4"x1 1/2"
2 packages mushrooms, sliced thick
1 can chicken stock
1/2 bunch celery, sliced
sour cream and heavy cream
1 1/2c (dry) short-grain rice, cooked

1. heat 4T butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat. brown the chicken thighs on each side, until crispy on both sides. remove chicken thighs to a plate, and pull off skin and discard.

2. add onions to the skillet and reduce heat to medium. use a wooden spoon to scrape up browned bits off the bottom of the skillet. cook onions until translucent, then add celery. add half of dill and stir. let cook 10 minutes, then add mushrooms. cook 5 minutes, then add broth.

3. add chicken back into skillet (transfer to larger pot if necessary) and add remaining dill. add water if chicken isn't covered by liquid. let simmer until meat falls off the bone, about 2 hours. remove bones and cartilage and shred the remaining meat.

4. add cream (heavy and sour) to the mixture until it reaches the desired consistency, about 1 cup of cream total. add rice and stir. remove from heat and serve.

[serves 8-10]

oven-roasted tomatoes
4 lbs vine-ripe tomatoes, halved, cored, and seeded
5T olive oil
thyme (optional)

1. preheat oven to 200F. toss tomatoes with olive oil and thyme to coat. place on a baking sheet (crowding them is fine) in one layer.

2. roast tomatoes 6-8 hours, until tomatoes are caramelized on the edges but haven't fallen apart. let cool. keep the juices to cook with.

[makes about 1 1/2 to 2 cups]

chicken cacciatore

i was disgruntled because i hadn't cooked all week; if you know me, i get kind of grumpy and unsettled when this is the case. so since i had no plans for the weekend, i decided to make chicken cacciatore. i had made the joy of cooking version with rocco a few weeks back, and it didn't require much in the way of ingredients beyond mushrooms, tomatoes, herbs, and some chicken stock and wine. i decided, as i often do, to make a labor-intensive version of it. i looked at my joy of cooking - which i have to say, in my kitchen, serves more as a reference than a real cookbook - and noted the ingredients, then looked online at epicurious to see what the range of ingredients was from recipe to recipe. i found one that roasted the vegetables, which sounded really excellent, but the thing i liked a lot about the one rocco and i made was the thickness of the sauce - ie, the vegetables and the sauce are equally important.

essentially, i combined the two recipes, and modified them to the proportions that i like. i used a combination of fresh and canned tomatoes, to try to balance flavor versus my pocketbook. luckily, it's summer, so tomatoes are cheaper than they usually are. i also probably doubled the mushrooms: i like mushrooms. especially sliced thickly, which doesn't usually happen - most restaurants either use tiny mushrooms that don't need to be sliced, slice them thinly, or slice them in half. and i like mine sliced thickly. i also increased the amount of onions, because onions are good...

anyway, this recipe is somewhat time intensive, requiring a fair amount of mise en place. but the end result is more than rewarding - thick, satisfying, hearty, with a lot of depth of flavor. so if you're bored one day, you're craving comfort food, or you want to impress someone - go to it.

chicken cacciatore
2 10-oz packages baby bella mushrooms, sliced thickly (slices should be a little less than 1/2" thick, about four slices per mushroom)
2 large red onions, one sliced into thin rings, one diced
6 cloves garlic, minced finely
1 package fresh sage, chopped fine
1 package fresh basil, chopped fine
2 1/2 lbs fresh tomatoes, chopped coarsely
3T olive oil
2T balsamic vinegar

1 can tomato paste
1/2c red wine
1 28-oz can whole tomatoes in juice (not ground or diced)
1 can chicken stock

3-4 lbs chicken thighs (or mixture of chicken parts; not chicken breast)
flour for dredging
vegetable oil

salt and pepper

1. preheat oven to 400F. in a large bowl, combine half the mushrooms, half of the tomatoes, and the sliced onion to the bowl. add about a third of the fresh herbs and half of the garlic to the bowl. toss with olive oil and balsamic vinegar until evenly coated. spread on a large baking sheet in 1 layer and roast, stirring about every 10-15 minutes, until roasted and no liquid remains, about 1 to 1 1/2 hours.

2. heat 3-4T vegetable oil on medium high heat in a large pot. dredge chicken thighs in flour and fry until browned on each side. remove chicken to a plate when browned. add the minced onion to the pot with the remaining garlic, and saute about 10 minutes. add tomatoes and tomato paste. add red wine and turn heat down to medium, simmering the sauce about 10 more minutes. add the remaining mushrooms and the chicken stock. crush the canned tomatoes by hand and add to the pot. simmer the mixture for 10 minutes.

3. remove the skin from the chicken thighs and add to the pot. when the roasted vegetables are done, add to the pot. simmer over medium heat, stirring every 10 minutes or so, for at least an hour, until the chicken is ready to fall off the bones and the sauce is thick. season with salt and pepper and serve with pasta (i like barilla's pipette pasta - for this recipe, pasta with ridges is best) tossed with olive oil and fresh basil.

[serves 8-10, depending on how many chicken thighs you buy]

how could you not want to eat this?

this is a davio macaroon; if this doesn't inspire instant desire on your part, then you're a cold, heartless person. look at it! the coconut is all delicious-looking on the inside, no long tendrils of shredded coconut; the outside is golden brown and crispy, and you can see a bit of the translucency from the gloss of the batter; most of all the interior looks so pillowy and soft...this is a work of art.

best cheesecake ever

just a quick one here...i made this a while ago to eat while watching guys and dolls. i made two cheesecakes, one a classic cheesecake and one a dulce de leche cheesecake from epicurious. my cheesecake wisdom to you: (1) the best crust is a gingersnap crust. (2) if you want a caramel cheesecake, make it with real caramel instead of dulce de leche to get a sharper, more caramel-y flavor. (3) milk products added to the cream cheese always makes your cheesecake more tender. (4) if you don't prebake the crust, it will be softer because it soaks up moisture from the batter. (5) the water bath is key. do not skip the water bath. (6) cheesecake is all about the details - the ingredients being at room temp, the amount of mise en place before you can put the ingredients together, the cooling of the cheesecake with the oven off but propped open....do not skip over the details. (6) making your own dulce de leche is pretty fun.

the classic cheesecake was the best ever: tangy from the greek yogurt i used in place of sour cream, medium light, creamy but not too creamy, perfectly accompanied by the gingersnap crust. this cheesecake will never fail you. the dulce de leche cheesecake was also good, but the layer of ganache i used was too thick, and the flavor was a little muted and muddled. eat your dulce de leche on toast instead of in a cheesecake, or at the very least, use a gingersnap crust to contrast more with the caramel filling.

dulce de leche
1 can sweetened condensed milk (containing only milk, sugar, glucose and sodium bicarbonate)
1 large stockpot (the can should fit inside with lots of room to spare in terms of inches of water above the top of the can)
water

1. place can in pot.

2. fill pot with water. cover top of can with at least 1 inch of water.

3. heat pot until water is boiling. keep at a boil; boil three hours.

4. most important step: as water boils off, keep adding more water so that the can is always covered with at least one inch of water. if you do not do this, the can will explode. do not let the can explode.

5. let cool at least 1 hour before opening and using.

[makes about 1 1/4 cups]


best cheesecake ever!!!
crust
2 packages ginger thins (i used anna's brand from the local supermarket)
4-5T butter, softened

filling
2 lbs cream cheese, room temperature
1 1/4c sugar
4 eggs, room temperature
1c greek yogurt
1/2c whipping cream

10" springform pan, plus a large roasting pan into which the springform pan will fit

1. to prepare the pan, wrap the bottom in tinfoil and then lock it into the ring. place the pan on a large piece of tinfoil and wrap the sides in it, in order to prevent water from touching the pan. place the pan in the large roasting pan. preheat the oven to 325F.

2. for the crust: grind up the gingersnaps in a bowl by hand, or in a cuisinart. it should be finely ground - as fine as it can get, essentially. mix in the butter either by hand or in a cuisinart, and pulse until the mixture looks damp. if it's not looking damp, add a little more butter. press into the pan with your fingers, then compact it with a measuring cup or the bottom of a glass.

3. for the filling: using an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese in a large bowl until smooth. beat in sugar, scraping down sides of bowl occasionally. add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. beat in sour cream and whipping cream. meanwhile, boil enough water to fill the roasting pan to come 1 inch up the sides of the springform pan.

4. to assemble: pour filling into crust. pour boiling water into the roasting pan (in all honesty, i did not boil the water and it was ok). bake until filling is set and golden brown on top, about 1 hour 25 minutes. turn off oven and prop open oven door very slightly with a wooden spoon. let cake stand in oven 1 hour.

5. remove pan from water bath. remove foil (but do not remove cake from the pan yet), cover, and refrigerate to cool completely. to serve, slide a knife around the edge of the cheesecake to make sure it won't stick to the sides of the pan, then remove the sides. transfer to a plate.

note: can be prepared up to 4 days in advance, or frozen up to 2 months. if you freeze it, defrost it overnight in the refrigerator.

[serves 10-12]

review: cha fahn

cha fahn / 763 centre street, jamaica plain / 617-983-3575 / summer hours tues-sun 5pm- / $25 prix fixe on wednesdays / entrees 12-20

small plates
shrimp summer rolls with peanut dipping sauce
pan-fried spicy pork and kimchi dumplings
jasmine tea wilted kale with pine nuts and lemon soy dressing
asparagus, shrimp, and cilantro pesto on seaweed papers

main
szechuan noodles: chilled noodles in a spicy szechuan peanut sauce with fried tofu and crispy lotus roots
beef noodle soup: taiwanese style noodle soup with tender beef slices and spinach
tea-bathed chicken: sauteed chicken breast with a citrus and smoky tea-infused sauce, braised carrots, baby spinach, and pilaf
satay tofu: tofu cutlets with a bracing blend of peanuts, coriander, ginger, and soy sauce, braised carrots, baby bok choy, and pilaf
miso salmon: roasted sake-miso marinated salmon, asparagus, scarlot tea pickled ginger, and pilaf
skirt steak: seared skirt steak with a spicy korean sauce, crispy lotus roots, asian pear, daikon radish, wilted watercress salad and potatoes
garlic-lime shrimp: sauteed shrimp with garlic, ginger, and a soy-lime sauce, sauteed spinahc with golden raisins and pine nuts, and pilaf

for after
orange rooibos creme brulee with candied orange peels, and shredded chocolate
green tea mochi ice cream
seared banana with lychee sorbet
ginger spice tea cake, candied ginger, and wine-reduction berry sauce

-
above is the menu for when we went to cha fahn (yesterday). while a bit of the food is slightly overwrought, there is a huge upside to this place: a lot of great food, a lot of fantastic teas, a quiet atmosphere, and excellent interior design. we went to take advantage of the $25 prix fixe menu, which is above; there are also extensive sake and tea menus. between the four of us, we had most of the food dishes; three of us had tea, mine being a lapsang souchong.

part of the allure of this place is the focus on tea - for tea enthusiasts, who know that tea has as much nuance as wine, this is the only place that acknowledges and exploits the relationship between tea and food. chinese restaurants serve tea with every meal, but little thought goes into how the tea might affect the food, and vice versa. if this idea piques your interest, as it did mine, you will be happy at cha fahn.

i am not a tea expert, and thus can't tell you about the nuances of the tea that we had. however, i did love my tea very much - it smelled like a wood-burning fire, and tasted like a plant's impression of smoke. the food itself was excellent; i had the dumplings, the chicken, and the creme brulee. the dumplings were just barely spicy, at a level that could have been a little higher, but was entirely sufficient to capture the taste of kimchi (another nuanced food product that i cannot expound upon). what wasn't fabulous about the dumplings was that they were a little too salty, and i think a bit more ginger would have balanced them better; what was utterly fabulous about them was the way in which they were cooked - the combination of the cooking method and the texture of the dumpling skin rendered the dumpling bottoms delectably crispy, but not chewy. in this case, the fact that the dumpling skins were on the thin side (not as thin as wonton skins, thinner than dumpling skins) was essential.

i tasted miriam's summer rolls, which were quite good for summer rolls, and better than the ones you get at the typical thai restaurant. these summer rolls were a bit crispier, a bit crunchier, and it was apparent that the chefs were paying more attention to how cooked the shrimp were than at xinh xinh last week.

the entrees were excellent across the board. i think i would have preferred chicken with the bone in, rather than the breast, but the sauce was really citrus-y in a restrained way - i sometimes think of chinese food as a punch in the face, flavor-wise, but this sauce was definitely more carefully planned, along the lines of a japanese tea ceremony. the carrots were perfectly cooked (as someone who doesn't like raw carrots, this matters a lot to me and i always notice how well or poorly the carrots are cooked). the pilaf was also excellent - it had citrus and some unidentifiable spice in it.

in fact, my entree was probably the weakest. miriam's ginger-lime shrimp were fantastic - the ginger and garlic hit you first, then you got a little bit of cilantro, all complementing the flavor of the shrimp. on its own, the ginger-garlic-lime-soy sauce was overly salty, but paired with the shrimp it was everything you could ever ask of shrimp. the shrimp were also deftly cooked - still sweet and juicy. carrie's miso salmon rated a bit higher in my opinion - the miso paired perfectly with the salmon so that it balanced the salmon and brought out the flavor of the salmon, with hints of miso here and there. i would say, though, that josh's skirt steak was the best - absolutely perfectly cooked to order (rare, because there isn't any other way you should be eating your steak), tender, not stringy, flavorful....i don't know where cha fahn is getting their meat, but somebody should ask.

as i said before, the upside of this place is pretty great. and as the meal went on, it got better - average appetizers, excellent entrees, and really fantastic desserts. i love dessert, and i will always eat dessert because i like the idea of dessert. thus i am less affected by how much i like the dessert, despite my high standards. we had the ginger cake and the creme brulee, and while i felt that the ginger cake was probably just above average as a dessert, the creme brulee really hit it out of the park. i'm pretty sure it would be on my top ten list, along with desserts from chez panisse, alinea, aujourd'hui, and various other hoity-toity places. this is, without a doubt, the best creme brulee i have ever had. the texture was nothing short of amazing - silky, creamy, thick. the flavor was well balanced - not too much citrus, not too much tea, and not too sweet - and the bruleed top gave your tastebuds the occasional crunchy burst of orange-y, burnt sugary flavor. if i had a faster metabolism, i'd be eating this every day for breakfast. and it went perfectly with my smoky tea, although i'm not sure if the strong smokiness of the tea destroyed any of my tastebuds' ability to taste the entire range of flavors.

a note on the atmosphere and decor - the tables are carved chinese tables, with really comfortable red cushioned chairs in the middle of the restaurant, and super-high-backed chinese chairs at the tables along the walls. the lighting is ideal - that sort of glowy, softly warm, somehow bright light. and the bathroom is pretty awesome: black tile up to your shoulder, then a wide swathe of black-painted wall, then a wide swathe of white-painted wall to make the space seem taller. this is a place that is aptly called a tea room - it gives you the sense that you can linger over your food and your tea at a slower pace than the rest of your day.

fat and poor

that's what i'll be if i keep getting lunch at davio's. i got macaroons today - a steal at 2 for 75 cents. and you look at these macaroons, which have been piped into a pleasing shape, and they are delectably glossy and crispy on the outside, and really moist and wonderful on the inside. the outside is very much a traditional macaroon, but to be honest, the inside tastes very much like a chinese bakery pastry that consists of chopped peanuts and sugar inside a glutinous rice sleeve, which is then coated in flaked coconut. delicious.

fat and poor, folks.

odds and ends

i am currently drinking a cup of hot, honeyed, milky (assam) tea, my break from the editing work i'm doing on a professor's manuscript. mostly, with respect to food, i have an assortment of odds and ends:

xinh xinh / 7 beach street, chinatown / 617-422-0501 / 10am-10pm daily / cheap-entrees $6-10
i just went to a vietnamese restaurant, xinh xinh, at washington and beach that was really excellent. the people are really nice there, and the food is really well spiced for asian fusion food. better than almost all vietnamese or thai restaurants i've been to, in fact - it has average fresh spring rolls, but you can get your green tea hot or cold, and my chicken with ginger, onions, and scallions was truly spectacular. rarely have i had a dish with enough ginger to render it spicy, and this not only used a lot of ginger (not too much), but also fresh ginger. mmm. it's the sort of thing you could eat every day.

salty and sweet
parmesan muffins. parmesan muffins, you ask? yes. decidedly so. because if there were no parmesan in these muffins, they would have no opportunity to develop the delectably golden, crispy exterior that makes these so good. these muffins are salty-sweet, moist yet crusty on the outside. their main ingredients are zucchini, parmesan, and basil. zucchini muffins are one thing. the addition of parmesan is nice, but expected. but the introduction of the basil is spectacular, as is the abnormally high amount of sugar for savory muffins. in fact, i would say that the basil is secondary to the sugar, though ever since i visited shanghai last summer, i get the feeling that my capacity for salty-sweet is much higher than that of the average person. your average person cares a lot about the balance of salt and pepper; i care about the balance of salt, pepper, and sugar.

calzosas
last week carrie and i made calzosas, which we named in honor of the entirely american practice of combining real words into nonsense words. we wanted to make something kind of like a calzone and kind of like a samosa - the filling would be more vegetal like a calzone filling and less potato-y than a samosa filling, but would be the size of a samosa rather than a calzone. this definitely goes back to the pleasure of eating something with your hands. what makes a calzosa a calzosa, however, is that the wrapping is neither calzone nor samosa. instead, it's a phyllo dough. so i suppose these are closer to small bisteeya, huh? well, calzosa is more fun to say. ours had a filling of bacon, onions, apples, a bit of potato, peas, and ricotta cheese. the original idea was bacon, onions, and apples, with the ricotta to act as a binder. then the peas are to balance the heavier flavors, especially the bacon, and the potato was to add a bit of body and texture. we used both storebought and organic farm-raised whole foods bacon, and found that there is a definite and significant upside to the whole foods bacon. i would maybe try slicing it a bit thinner, but the whole foods bacon had a much better, more bacon-y flavor, and did not have any preservatives in it. there was simply more meat, and it was much better than the supermarket thick-cut bacon as well, which tends to be too thickly cut. it does take much longer to cook, though, but i'm willing to wait. luckily for us, the $6.99/lb price will keep us from eating too much of it.

portable barbecue
barbecue is a very summery sort of thing, and we were planning to spend a summer evening out in chelsea to see a free play in the park. i had bought some pork ribs earlier in the week because i had leftover marinade from the last time i made barbecued pork ribs, so i thought i'd do something with them for the play. the last time around, the marinade was too thick, so i thinned it with cider vinegar, and strained it to get rid of the pineapple pulp. i roasted the ribs without steaming them first, brushing them repeatedly until the sugar started burning, for about an hour. then i let them cool, and shredded the meat off the bone. my original idea was to combine the shredded meat with peas and pasta, with some sort of vinaigrette type of dressing, all towards the goal of making the ribs portable and not messy. i made the vinaigrette, but as i pictured it with the other ingredients, i will say that it was not an appetizing picture. what i wanted was something a little piquant and tangy to tie everything together, but i was just getting images of "oily" instead. so what i did was i started by mixing in some yogurt to make it creamy without using mayonnaise. that seemed still a little off, so i added the pan juices that i'd gotten from the ribs - i'd had to suck them off the roasting pan with a turkey baster so the ribs would roast and not steam. and that was it, and it was fantastic - a meaty, somewhat tangy dressing that bound everything together. the mistake that i made, i discovered later, was that i had burned some of the coriander seeds i put into the dressing, and while not wholly unpleasant, it tasted a bit like popcorn. if you make something along these lines, i would recommend using country-style ribs, bone-in. when you shred the meat you'll have to pay close attention so you don't leave bone shards in the meat, but the quality of the meat is much better. we used the curly macaroni with ridges, which worked well.

parmesan-basil-zucchini muffins
2 eggs
3/4c milk (we used buttermilk that was leftover from butter we made last week)
2/3c cooking oil
2 1/2c flour
1/4c sugar
1T baking powder
2t salt
2 cups shredded zucchini
6T minced fresh basil (this means 6T after it has been minced)
1/2c grated Parmesan cheese, plus more for garnish*

1. butter a 12-cup muffin tin (also makes 6 extra-large muffins). preheat the oven to 425F.

2. in a medium bowl, beat eggs, then add milk and oil. in another bowl, mix dry ingredients.

3. add dry ingredients to egg mixture, 1 cup at a time, and stir until it becomes a thick, moist batter.

4. stir in zucchini basil, and parmesan until just combined - do not overbeat.

5. spoon into tins and sprinkle extra cheese on top. bake 20 to 22 minutes, until golden brown.

*It's ok to microplane the parmesan for the batter, but for the garnish, use the finer-grating side of your box grater.

[makes 12 muffins]

another foray into the world of pork

as you know, i like pork. last week carrien and josh had gone to market basket to procure beef to grind it at home for burgers, and they picked up some pork ribs as well. ...unfortunately, by the time that i actually had the time to cook it, it had gone slightly green and iridescent, a good sign for something, i'm sure, but not meat. luckily, i had bought extra pork ribs at star to augment the ones in the fridge, and not that many people came to dinner, so it was fine.

i've been a little scattered with respect to cooking, having not been in the mood to do anything all that adventurous. accordingly, i'm afraid i was a little bit neglectful of what i made on friday evening: barbecued pork ribs, cornbread with corn, corn on the cob, onions, and ham in it, peas with thyme and onions, and apple "strudel" (really, apple turnovers). most of the neglect came from not really planning it out with respect to timing - oops. luckily, it all worked out anyway. i would say that if i did it over again, i would pay more attention to the ribs. i had picked out a recipe i used some time ago (maybe last fall?) but i couldn't remember exactly how much of the recipe i had used until after i made them the second time... it turns out that while i stuck more to the recipe this time - basically, you steam the ribs en papillote with pineapple juice for an hour, then baste them with the glaze on a grill for a short period of time - as opposed to the last time, when i had no pineapple juice and not much honey, so i just roasted them in the oven and kept basting them. luckily, it takes rather a lot to ruin pork, so i would say that the disappointment i felt was really from the fact that my expectation of the final product was not what i actually got. but in fact, both versions were good: the original version i made was crispier on the outside and benefited flavor-wise by the basting, while the second version was more punchy with the flavor and was really tender from its steaming in the foil packets. i would say that you would want to use a medium-fat pork rib if you're going to steam them, otherwise the fat doesn't have enough time to completely render out of the pork and they end up a little greasy. i would say that the consistency of the glaze was also a bit gloppier than i wanted because they were in the oven and not on a grill; also, i had added the pineapple puree to the glaze after i strained out the juice to steam the ribs in, which i think made the glaze slower to cook and crisp.

luckily the evening was not without a culinary hit - the strudel was really quite good. i didn't have a recipe except for the basics: apples for the inside and phyllo for the outside. making real strudel dough is fun, but really only if you have many people or it gets old quite fast. as a rule, i don't like adding spices to apples, which generally make them taste less like apples and more like canned apple pie filling, so all i did to the apples was really toss them with sugar and lemon zest, and saute them in a bit of butter until they were browned. then i wrapped small handfuls of the apples in phyllo, two sheets to each handful. a sprinkling of sugar, then they went in the oven for about 20 to 25 minutes - and presto! some really apple-y turnovers.

apple strudel
1/2 package of phyllo
6-8 large apples
~1/2c sugar - enough to coat the apples
1 lemon, zested and juiced
1 stick plus 1 1/2T butter

1. peel, core, and slice the apples (the slices should be on the thick side). place in a bowl and toss with the lemon zest and juice. toss the apples with the sugar.

2. melt half of the 1 1/2T butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat; when it foams, add half of the apples and saute until golden brown, stirring occasionally, about 10-15 minutes. let the apples get good and golden brown - they'll taste better. repeat with remaining apples and butter. let apples cool to room temperature.

3. preheat the oven to 350. melt and cool the stick of butter. unroll the phyllo and mound some of the apples on the top sheet. brush with butter and roll/fold up, making sure that all layers of phyllo are stuck together with butter. try to work relatively quickly so the phyllo doesn't dry out, or rip from the moisture in the apples. use two to three sheets of phyllo per apple packet. when done wrapping, brush the packet with butter on all sides, and place on a baking sheet. sprinkle the top with sugar. repeat with remaining apples.

4. when done making packets, bake at 350 for about 20-25 minutes, until they are golden brown. eat immediately. let any leftovers cool completely, then pack into an airtight container. to reheat, toast in a toaster oven - strudel can get soggy.

[makes 10-12 individual strudels]

top tens

i've been going through the rest of my posts, editing here and there for consistency, and i came across a top ten list of yore:

ten favorite restaurants in the boston/cambridge area, 2006
1. craigie street bistrot
2. pigalle
3. caffe umbra
4. sel de la terre
5. upstairs on the square
6. central kitchen
7. aujourd'hui
8. picco
9. rangzen
10. addis red sea

and given a chance to update that list, i would say this is what it is now, with some reasons:
1. craigie street bistrot (interesting updating of classical french food; impeccable technique)
2. pomodoro (best italian food i've ever had; best, and friendliest, service)
3. pigalle (really excellent french country food, excellent service)
4. restaurant pava (most interesting and successful flavor combinations; best bread)
5. sel de la terre (excellent french food)
6. rendezvous (more adventurous new american that occasionally misses its mark)
7. upstairs on the square (slightly overpriced, but really excellent new american)
8. central kitchen (close-to-home, unpretentious new american)
9. aujourd'hui (excellent, sophisticated upscale french)
10. miracle of science (best burger)

i would also venture to say that this list is more about what is excellent and what is memorable, so it changes over time according to what i've had recently, with some attention to meals past. another thread (alas, slightly inconsistent) is the likelihood that i would go there - so that takes into account cost, in a way. that doesn't mean that i would always go to aujourd'hui over miracle of science, but it does mean that i would go to pomodoro over pigalle, with respect to cost (i guess the cost issue is more important higher up on the list).

pork + ricotta = love

if pork and quenelles had a love child, i imagine that it would be these meatballs. not that i've ever tasted quenelles (a delicate sort of french dumpling that is made of a mild white meat or fish, and poached), but i've always thought that they would be a much more sophisticated version of chinese fish balls. these meatballs arose from pure opportunity, as i had exactly the amount of ricotta needed leftover from the homemade ricotta.

this recipe is especially excellent because each of the ingredients plays a clear role (note: this analysis may or may not be exactly correct, but it is generally correct). the binding ingredients are the eggs and the parmesan, while the ricotta and pork combine for flavor and texture. notably absent in this recipe is breadcrumbs, which are typical in most meatballs. however, the strained ricotta replaces the breadcrumbs (this is why you have to strain it - so that it doesn't render your meatballs unable to stick together) and the delicacy of its flavor contrasts extremely well with the pork, which is truly the dominant flavor. have you noticed how meatballs invariably taste like meatballs? these meatballs still taste like meatballs, but they taste undeniably like pork meatballs - there's nothing to muddle up the flavor. the ricotta gives the meatballs a very light texture that's still meaty - ie, there's something to bite into. they're not heavy like other meatballs, and the ricotta renders the meatballs edible hot or cold (ie, right out of the refrigerator for breakfast).

so essentially these are meatballs for people who like pork, and don't like heavy meatballs (where heavy relates more to their weight in your stomach rather than their fat content). the other really great thing about them is that by some combination of the circumstances of their ingredients and the fact that they are rolled in flour, they brown extremely well and tastily, without those little bits of meatball that stick to the pan and get ripped away, then burn. so these are meatballs for people who like flavorful, non-heavy, and easy to cook meatballs. despite the lengthy directions, these are pretty easy to make, and rather more rewarding than is normal for an out of the ordinary recipe.

pork and ricotta meatballs (adapted from the new york times)
1 lb ricotta (storebought or homemade)
2-3T sour cream if you're using homemade ricotta
1 1/2 lbs ground pork, room temperature (this makes it easier to mix into the ricotta)
1c parmesan
2 eggs
1t salt
freshly ground pepper
1/2c flour, plus more if needed
vegetable oil or corn oil (not olive oil, which has a low smoking temperature)
~3-4c mild, homemade tomato sauce (so as not to overpower the meatballs; do not use any sort of jarred or canned sauce - we made ours as we waited for the meatballs to chill)

1. if you're using storebought ricotta, weight the ricotta overnight to drain it of most of its liquid. Layer cheesecloth in a colander and put the ricotta inside. tie the ends of the cheesecloth together and weight with a plate and something that's moderately heavy (like a pound of butter); put the colander on a tray to catch the liquid and refrigerate. the resulting strained ricotta should be like tofu in appearance. if you're using homemade ricotta, let the ricotta come to room temperature and mix the sour cream into it with a spoon or in a food processor, to get rid of the lumps.

2. mix ricotta, parmesan, and eggs in a large bowl until well mixed. add ground pork, salt and pepper and mix with your fingers (not a spoon, and yes, it is messy) until it's mixed together well. don't worry too much about overmixing. cover the bowl and chill for 1/2 hour.

3. line a baking sheet with foil and put the flour on a plate. shape pork mixture into balls (we did ours at about 1 1/2" to 2" diameter) and roll in the flour, tossing gently in your hands to get rid of excess flour. place on the baking sheet and repeat until mixture is all used up. cover the baking sheet with plastic wrap and chill for at least half an hour, and ideally a full hour.

4. when you're ready to cook the meatballs, heat 1 1/2 to 2T oil in a large skillet over medium to medium-high heat (if your smoke detector is sensitive like ours is, use the lower heat). brown the meatballs and remove to a plate; cover loosely with a piece of foil to prevent heat loss. continue until you're done with the meatballs, adding more oil as necessary. take care not to break the meatballs apart when you turn them.

5. return all of the meatballs to the pan and add tomato sauce; shake pan from side to side to coat. keep heat on medium and simmer the meatballs in the sauce for 20-30 minutes, until meatballs are completely cooked through. adjust the seasoning and serve with pasta (you can also make the meatballs smaller and make them as an appetizer).

[serves 4-6]

a little speed (homemade ricotta)

no, not speed with respect to the homemade ricotta, but rather, with dinner made from the ricotta. however, despite the lengthy instructions, the actual production of the ricotta is very easy and short. most of the work is prep work. the best ricotta i have ever had was in a salad at chez panisse (the restaurant, not the cafe) - it was light, creamy yet with definitely definable curd, pressed into a triangular slice. i think it was drizzled with olive oil, which is, i have to say, a really excellent way to eat ricotta. but if my memory is failing me, then i definitely had ricotta drizzled with olive oil on bread at some restaurant in the past.

i was thus particularly excited about homemade ricotta because it looked so easy to make. i shouldn't have been surprised, as jessica and i made paneer in much the same way in our cooking class (paneer is a slightly different mix of milk and yogurty ingredients, and is pressed and weighted instead of allowed to drain). this ricotta is richer than supermarket whole-milk ricotta, even though it's also made with whole milk, but is a bit hard in the curd - i wonder if letting it drain less would have been more ideal.

the accompanying recipe that uses the ricotta is pretty fast (maybe half an hour at most) and is prety excellent. the rotini is key, unless you have a suggestion for another pasta shape that holds ricotta as well as it does. the bell peppers and shallots provide some counterpoint to the ricotta, and the pasta essentially acts as a starch...you could also just spread the ricotta-pepper mixture on bread.

homemade ricotta (adapted from michael chiarello)
1 gallon whole milk (or some mixture of 2% and whole milk)
1 quart buttermilk
1 package of cheesecloth
candy thermometer (optional)
herbs (optional)

1. combine whole milk, buttermilk, and herbs (if using) in a large saucepan (ideally, some kind of stockpot). heat over high heat, scraping bottom of the pot with a rubber heatproof spatula to prevent the milk from scorching. it will seem like the heat is too high, but it's not. it would be good to use a heavy-bottomed pot. set up a large-bottomed colander lined with a large piece of cheesecloth, folded to a thickness of 5-6 layers (it will be about 1 1/2 feet square).

2. when the milk is warm, stop stirring it (you can give it a stir very infrequently if you're a compulsive stirrer) so the curds can form.

3. when the milk reaches 175-180F, the mixture will curdle so that you can clearly see white curds and slightly cloudy clearer liquid (the whey) around the edges of the pot. the surface will look like a white raft of foam and curds. remove from heat immediately. place the colander in the sink and ladle the curds and whey into it, making sure you don't break up the curds. when most of the liquid has drained, tie the ends of the cheesecloth over the faucet and let the curds drain weighted by its self-weight for about 15 minutes.

4. scoop ricotta into an airtight container and let cool. when cool, cover and refrigerate. the ricotta will keep for about a week.

[makes 3-4 cups]


rotini with ricotta and red peppers
1 lb pasta
1 T olive oil
2-3 large shallots, chopped finely
2 red bell peppers, sliced into small 1/4"x1" batons
1 1/2 to 2c ricotta, either whole or part-skim, or homemade
salt and pepper, and a little bit of sugar

1. heat water in a large saucepan to boil, for the pasta. add 1/2T of olive oil to a medium skillet and heat on medium-high. add shallots and saute, stirring every now and then, until shallots are translucent, about 8 minutes.

2. add remaining 1/2T oil to the skillet with the shallots in it, and then add the bell peppers. saute until soft (but not too soft), about 10-15 minutes. when water boils, add pasta and stir every now and then.

3. if your ricotta is fairly hard (this will be the case with the recipe for homemade ricotta), add to the bell pepper mix in the skillet and heat to soften for about five minutes. keep the mixture warm over medium-low heat.

4. when pasta is done, drain and return to saucepan. add bell pepper mixture; if you have not yet added the ricotta, add it now. season with salt and pepper, plus a bit of sugar to balance the salt. serve while warm.

[serves 4-6; can be halved]

foodie peer pressure

This article is really kind of saddening. People should listen to their stomachs and just make what they want - chances are, it's what their friends want, too. This is from the NY Times:

Dinner at the Foodies’: Purslane and Anxiety
By KATHERINE WHEELOCK
Published: June 6, 2007

RICHARD FAULK still recalls, with a twinge of shame, the day he and his girlfriend, Jeanine Villalobos, served store-bought tortillas to guests.

“We were mortified that we hadn’t made our own,” he said.

The two, who live in Park Slope, Brooklyn, make most of the elements of the meals they serve from scratch, and spend whole days going to farmers’ markets, cheese shops and specialty stores. They would no sooner dress a salad with a store-bought vinaigrette than serve a suspicious-smelling piece of fish.

“We’re a little self-conscious about being the foodie couple,” said Mr. Faulk, who teaches at Berkeley College in Midtown Manhattan. “But we don’t make everything. I haven’t started curing my own olives or making my own cheese.”

Dinner parties have been fraught with performance anxiety for as long as people have given them. Soufflés, cribbed from the pages of glossy food magazines, have been attempted and botched. Painstakingly wrought amuse-bouches have received lukewarm receptions.

But for some hosts in the age of the armchair Boulud, even a laid-back dinner with friends can be a challenge to their sense of self-worth. They may not care whether they wear Gap or couture. Their place in the Hamptons might be a share. But they would no sooner serve their guests grocery-case Drunken Goat cheese than a Vogue minion would wear an Ann Taylor dress to a party given by Anna Wintour.

Especially in New York, where there are fewer status indicators (like cars and landscaped lawns), adjectives like local, organic and free range are signifiers of taste. In some homes, primarily midcentury modernized homes in metropolitan areas with his and hers subscriptions to The Art of Eating and an embargo on iceberg lettuce, the pork, the mesclun, the salad dressing — they’re all under scrutiny.

“Entertaining and cooking have become an integral part of how certain people demonstrate their cultural cachet,” said Joshua Schreier, a history professor at Vassar College who lives in Harlem and says he is a victim, and a propagator, of culinary anxiety. “There is a specific cachet that only a fiddlehead fern can convey. Saying, ‘I got this olive oil from this specific region in Greece,’ is like talking about what kind of car you have. And people don’t want to be associated with the wrong kind of olive oil. It becomes less about having people over and more about showing off your foodie credentials.”

Colleen McKinney, a freelance food writer and editor who lives in Brooklyn, said: “Food is cocktail party conversation. You cook it and then you talk about it all night long.”

Ms. McKinney is generally confident in the kitchen, except when it comes to one particular couple. When they have her over, dinner might be asparagus three ways, fresh pasta with sausage they made themselves and rhubarb pie with vanilla ice cream — homemade vanilla ice cream. When they go to her house for dinner, they take their own pickled ramps.

“It’s become very important to be all Alice Waters,” said Serena Bass, the Manhattan caterer. “Everyone wants to know where the poor pig you’re serving came from.”

Ms. Bass also pointed out that the new strain of entertaining anxiety extended well beyond food. “You can’t just serve purslane,” she said. “You have to serve purslane on Limoges you found in a Connecticut consignment shop with a fork that has a carved ivory handle you found in a flea market somewhere.”

Andy Birsh, owner of a letterpress print shop in Brooklyn, would rather make a mad, stressful dash to Brighton Beach for smoked sturgeon an hour before guests arrive for dinner than serve the kind he can buy from a market around the corner. And for him, serving a dish that is on the menu at several good restaurants in the city right now — a fava bean salad with shaved pecorino, for instance — would be like being caught reading “The Lovely Bones” right after Oprah Winfrey endorsed it.

“As soon as something becomes overpopularized, I don’t want to serve it anymore,” Mr. Birsh said. “I wouldn’t want anyone to be able to identify something I made as being from a book or a restaurant. I don’t want anyone to be able to say, oh, I see where he got this idea to put microgreens on top of his fish fillets.”

As a graduate of the French Culinary Institute and restaurant critic for Gourmet in the late ’80s and early ’90s, Mr. Birsh may have above-average pride when it comes to his cooking. But it is not out of the ordinary for hosts in this intensely food-cognizant dinner party circuit.

For them, home entertaining can become the white whale. It turns docile cooks into aggressive obsessives, the way an engagement can turn a well-meaning woman into bridezilla or how fatherhood can make a laid-back guy an apoplectic soccer dad.

“My ex got caught up in it,” said a Brooklyn woman who is going through a divorce and asked that her name not be used. “For a while, it was great. Until it wasn’t. We had a birthday party for our 1-year-old son and I ordered pizza. He spent another $1,000 on food. There were plates and plates of cheese and cured meats from this gourmet place. For a 1-year-old.”

Alan Palmer, co-owner of Blue Apron Foods, a specialty store in Park Slope, has seen the new strain of culinary anxiety in all forms. “Some people come in and ask for the most expensive cheese because they think it’s going to be the most impressive,” he said, recalling a time when Carr’s was the must-have brand of cracker.

“But a lot of people come in and ask for help because they’re afraid they’re going to make a mistake. They want raw-milk cheese because they heard it was better, or something local because that’s the new byword. I say: ‘Look, there really is no right or wrong here. People aren’t going to throw rocks at you if you serve the wrong cheese.’ ”

Wise counsel from a cheesemonger. But there is a flip side to this breed of home entertaining agita. Serve the right kind of cheese often enough, and you can end up holding the oven mitt for life. Professor Schreier, the self-proclaimed olive oil zealot, has found that certain friends of his, cowed by his Chez Panisse-style presentations, have given up trying to compete with him in the culinary arena altogether.

“People see the potential conflict and bow out,” he said. “If you’re the biggest foodie in the group, people will have you over and say, ‘So what should we get?’ We went to one couple’s home and they hadn’t even gone to the store yet.”

pork = love

after having dinner made for me on consecutive days (tuesday, bread pudding at 44, and wednesday, really excellent thin fettuccine with a roasted tomato and sausage sauce, at 24), i made dinner for 24 and 44. i wanted to do something fairly involved, so i did a chard tart from the joy that sonia had made a few months back - kind of like a quiche with much less egg and a whole lot of parmesan; braised pork ribs with sage and coriander seeds; arborio rice with onions and sage; roasted skinny asparagus; and a ginger cake with pears in a cognac-caramel sauce.

anyway, this was a totally unhealthy (ok, not that unhealthy, but it wasn't great for you either, what with the massive amount of parmesan and the ginger cake's caramel sauce) dinner, but it was really excellent - the coriander seeds and sage are a really excellent combination. after having made braised ribs more than a few times, they turned out especially well this time. and i think this was due to the cooking time, which was close to three hours. this is my favorite pork dish because it requires so few ingredients, and always tastes good, no matter what you do to it. this is essentially due to the cut of meat being pork that's bone-in - that's where all the flavor comes from. it's also a cheap dish to cook, as ribs often go on sale in all seasons, and are a cheap cut even when not on sale. add the onions and some herbs, and it's pretty sublime.

the chard tart was excellent as it was the other time i had it - it's a really easy thing to put together, like the pork - it turns out beautifully, as well, as it cuts neatly and is completely flat after being baked. the crust gets a special mention - the olive oil seems to make it extra crispy without generating too many crumbs - vaguely chewy and nicely crispy. the crust gets prebaked, and then baked with the filling inside. the filling is fairly dry for an egg mixture, so it doesn't soak into the crust too much, leaving the crust nicely crisp. even a day later, the crust is pretty excellent...mmm. this is one to make over and over again.

finally, a few words about the cake. i bought the pears at star market, and they were inauspiciously cheap (the cheapest, in fact) and pre-ripened. i wouldn't have bought pre-ripened fruit, but they were cheap...so i did buy them. but these pears turned out to be juicy even after sauteed, retaining their firm texture despite being cooked through. the cake was pretty good - not too heavy, and sufficiently ginger-y to overcome the molasses that provided much of the cake's moisture. it gets more gingery as time goes on, fyi. anyway, we had the cake with whipped cream - which, with the cake the pears with their caramel sauce is nothing short of a fantastic combination. i failed to read the recipe before i made it, and was expecting a cake that had the pears baked into it, but this was just as good. also, seemingly like everything else i made that day, really easy to make.

braised pork ribs
2T butter
1-2 T coriander seeds
1/2 package sage, chopped fine
3 large onions, halved and sliced into thin strips
chicken stock or water

2T butter
salt and pepper
2-3 lbs assorted pork ribs (country or southern style), bone in

1. pat the ribs dry and rub with salt and pepper. heat the butter in a large skillet and sear the ribs over high heat to brown. remove ribs to a plate with tongs.

2. reduce heat to medium-high. melt the remaining 2T butter in the skillet and saute onions, sage, and coriander seeds until onions are translucent and slightly browned, about 10 minutes.

3. add ribs and any accumulated juices back into skillet and add chicken stock/water until ribs are covered or skillet is almost full, whichever comes first. bring mixture to a simmer over medium-high heat and let simmer 1 hour. turn heat to medium and simmer 2 more hours. for the last 15-30 minutes, turn heat to medium-high to thicken the sauce.

[serves 4-5]

ginger cake with pears and caramel sauce
1/2c unsulfured molasses
1/2c sour cream
1/2c brown sugar, packed
1 stick butter, melted and cooled slightly
2 eggs
3T microplaned grated peeled fresh ginger
1t lemon zest
2c flour
1t baking soda
1/2t salt

pears with caramel sauce
8 medium pears
1T lemon juice
6T butter
3/4c sugar
12T water
3T cognac
12T heavy cream

1. preheat oven to 350F. butter and flour a 10-inch round baking pan.

2. in a bowl whisk together molasses, sour cream, butter, brown sugar, egg, ginger, and zest until smooth and add flour, baking soda, and salt. stir batter until just combined and spread in baking pan. bake 25 to 30 minutes until done.

3. peel, core and slice the pears into eighths. melt 3T butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat and saute half of pears until mostly translucent, about 5-8 minutes. add half of sugar and saute a few more minutes. remove pears with tongs or a slotted spoon to a bowl. add the remaining butter and saute remaining pears. add remaining sugar as before, and remove pears to bowl. caramelize sugar until dark amber. add water, cognac and cream; the mixture will foam and bubble frighteningly but will dissolve within a few minutes. let boil for a few minutes, then reduce heat to medium and add pears back in. simmer for 5 minutes, then keep warm over low heat.

4. serve slices of cake with pears and sauce, and whipped cream if you really want to punish your heart. if you like pears, you might want to up the pears per serving.

[serves 10-12]