Cornbread Stuffing

When I was a kid I had an irrational fear of three things: being kidnapped, quicksand and being poisoned.  The first two I blame on Scooby Doo and Bugs Bunny cartoons (no, seriously.  Those dang kids in the Mystery Machine were always getting themselves in trouble and would wind up in some haunted mansion tied up and left to fend for themselves and some Warner Bros. character was always either setting a trap over quicksand or falling into a pit of it.  Where I thought I’d find a pit of quicksand in downtown Chicago was beside the point.  As is this lenghty parenthetical, I realize). 

The poisoning was a little more rational, or at least a little more understandable.  My family, coming from an island, always worried about food spoiling if left out too long.  They would also get packages of canned food items from Jamaica like ackee–which were hard to find in New York–and talk of botchulism swirled around my grandmother’s kitchen (unripened ackee can also kill you, so there was that added delight).  I barely understood what they were talking about, but I knew enough to be afraid that one bite of the wrong thing could spell the end of me (dramatic? Me? Never…).

Anytime a turkey was involved the question of whether to put the stuffing inside or bake it separately came up, because stuffing left in the cavity of the bird could spoil, and you guessed it, kill us all.   It was a great debate each year, because the stuffing was more moist if baked inside the turkey, and that, for some reason, seemed worth the risk.  I wasn’t taking any chances, though, so I never ate stuffing unless it was of the Stovetop variety.  I refused to taste it, and truth be told, the texture and mushy look of it (plus the addition of things like giblets) let me know I wasn’t missing anything.

I’m not sure when my boycott against stuffing ended, but a few years ago I found a recipe (in a magazine ad for chicken stock) that sounded too good to pass up.  And it is so delicious that I make extra and freeze it so I can have some on a random Tuesday after Thanksgiving.  The recipe is also super easy, especially if you cheat and use Jiffy cornbread mix instead of making your own.  It’s moist and not the least bit mushy (thanks to the bits of french bread) and since you bake it separately from the turkey, there is no risk of poisoning yourself or your family, which is always a good thing….  Happiest of Thanksgivings to you!

Cornbread Stuffing

Corn Goodness

So Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. I love that there’s no pressure, no presents to buy, no songs to get sick of; it’s just about good food and family and friends and if you’re lucky lots of leftovers. I also love that you can make an entire meal out of the side dishes. Turkey and ham are lovely, but really, they just take up room on the plate when sweet potatoes and stuffing and rice and peas and roasted vegetables are available. For the next couple of days, I’ll be posting my favorite sides that I wish I could eat all the time, but only get made during the holidays (for no other reason than I totally OD on them for a month and then can’t really think about them again for awhile).

A friend of mine used to host a holiday girls’ night where she’d pull out her good plates and glasses, decorate her apartment and have about 10 us over for dinner. Some years it was just before she left to go home to Texas for Thanksgiving; other years it would be around Christmas and we’d do a present exchange.  We were all asked to bring something, and one year another Heather brought this corn dish that I took one bite of and promptly pulled the rest of closer to my plate and guarded it like a prisoner getting extra bread and water (or whatever prisoners eat). It was kind of like a soufflé, but a little denser and grainy, like polenta. I admit that I stalked Heather for the rest of the party until she finally wrote down the recipe for me and when I tell you it is the simplest—and likely one of the best—things I’ll ever post, I’m not exaggerating (like I’d ever do that). She didn’t have a name for it, so I instantly named it Corn Goodness, because that’s exactly what it tasted like—all the sweetness and goodness of corn, baked into this better than cornbread, almost like stuffing, happiness.

It’s insanely easy, but no one has ever tasted it and not asked me for the recipe immediately. It goes with just about everything, so memorize it and keep the ingredients handy, so you can whip it up on a cold day when you need a little goodness in your world…

Corn Goodness

• 1 box Jiffy cornbread mix
• 1 egg 
• 1 cup sour cream 
• 1 can sweet fresh corn 
• 1 can creamed corn 
• Dash of salt and pepper

Heat oven to 350 degrees.  Mix all of the ingredients in bowl.  Stir well until the mix is fully incorporated.  Pour into pie dish (or individual ramekins) and bake for 30 minutes or until knife inserted comes out clean. Cool slightly and then cut into triangles.  Serve warm.

Anniversary Potato Salad

A number of years ago today—I’d have to go into witness protection if I gave the actual number—my mother and aunt arrived in New York City from Jamaica.  They were 11 and 9 years old and had been separated from their parents and brother for four years.  My grandparents left one island where the sun actually provided warmth for another one where the few rays of sun were deceptive.  My grandmother left first, going to Canada and then coming into the United States where she found work in the Garment District and set up a small approximation of the life they’d had in pre-independence Kingston.  My grandfather and uncle followed, and I imagine that the rationale for leaving my mother and aunt behind was that it was easier to start a life in a new place with only one child instead of three.  I have been told this story for as long as I can remember. 

Every year on this day, either my mother or aunt would call the other and wish each other happy anniversary.  Then they would reminisce about how it was so cold, a sensation they couldn’t possibly have ever imagined, and how a few days later it snowed, just little flakes, but enough to make them stop whatever they were doing to watch this magic falling from the sky.  They’d talk about how the American accents sounded so odd to their ears—so flat—but how they were the ones who got teased for their lilting British voices.  The phone call always ended with memories of their first Thanksgiving, just a week after they arrived, with friends who lived in the same building.  First they were served Velveeta and Ritz crackers (imagine never having had American cheese and your first introduction being Velveeta!) and then the turkey and stuffing and ham and the thing my mother remembers most, potato salad with mayonnaise.  As she tells it, the white potatoes (which they’d also never had) were completely overwhelmed by heavy mayonnaise and it was cold and unfamiliar and just so not good.  The texture and the temperature and the very idea of mayonnaise were more than she could handle, and to this day she will make a face when she thinks of it.  Again, I’ve been told these stories for as long as I can remember. 

This is the first year that my aunt will not be here so that my mother can wish her a happy anniversary.  It is the second that my uncle is not here to chime in with what little he may have remembered about his two older sisters on this day.  It has been more than a decade since my grandparents told their version of the story.  Even though they were separated for years, the five of them stayed a family and were finally brought together many years ago today and remained together from that moment on.  There was so much between then and now, more than I’ll ever know, about struggles and fear and being strangers in a strange place where everything was new and sometimes not so shiny.  But I know that they were happy to be together, that they were happy to be here in this country where they made the best of every day, that they loved to dance and laugh and taste new foods (even things like mayonnaise), and that their story—which has become mine—is one of the best stories I’ve ever been told…

 Mustard Potato Salad With Capers (Happy Anniversary, Mom!)

Soup Dumplings (Shanghai Dumplings)

Many many months ago, Michelle and I got it into our heads that we wanted to make soup dumplings.  I’d read a recipe for them, but had never actually tasted them (sensing a theme here?) and Michelle had eaten them, but couldn’t find a good recipe.  We had all of these visions of how we would do a mini-cooking demonstration in her huge kitchen and post it here and become famous for our soup dumplings and end up on Good Morning America and Top Chef (ok, maybe that last part was more my vision than hers, but whatever).  Between the time we decided to try this (sometime last October) and the time we actually did it (sometime in April), I actually did get to try some dumplings, and even though they were prepackaged ones, they were tasty enough to get me hooked.  In the time since Michelle and I created our own version and now (let’s forget that two seasons have come and gone and that we’re well into a third), neither of us have tried the recipe again.  But we totally want you to, because it was yummy and fairly easy and totally impressive (and it wasn’t the bottle and a half of wine we drank while cooking that made us think that). 

We ended up using two recipes, one from Saveur and one from some random website I found when I googled “soup dumpling recipe.”  We like to believe that we are fairly good cooks (or in my case, a fairly good recipe follower), but we were stopped cold by the Saveur recipe, mainly because it made little sense to us, especially the first step of making gelatin out of pork skin.  What now?  Luckily, the second recipe said we could use gelatin packets, which we did.  The pork belly turned out to be the easiest of all of this, as Whole Foods had some on hand (call first) and I bet any big grocery store carries it (I was nervous about finding it, because it always seems so exclusive on menus, but there it was hanging out next to the pork loin).  Michelle found all of the other ingredients at a local Asian market and her grocery store and we decided to use pre-packaged wonton wrappers (they worked only ok.  They tore easily and we had to double wrap some of the dumplings, so we’d make our own next time [or how about you make some and tell us how it worked?]).

The other part of the recipe that we really didn’t get was where the soup part of the “soup dumplings” came in.  We knew that something would have to melt or dissolve and become a liquid, but we really couldn’t figure out what it was.  Michelle had the grand idea of freezing some soup first in a tiny star shaped ice cube tray (no particular reason for the stars, other than they were cute).   It wasn’t until we read the directions from the second recipe that we understood that it was the gelatin that would dissolve and give us our delicious soupiness (and maybe you all saw that one coming, but we–with 5 degrees between us–were completely bewildered).  We ended up doing two (ok, about 16) batches of dumplings, some with the frozen soup cubes and some with the gelatin.  The soup cubes were a lot faster, but the gelatin ones held together better.

If you’ve clicked on the Saveur link above (you can go ahead and do it now, I’ll wait), you’ve seen that the recipe has a lot of steps and as much as I’m committed to this whole blogging thing, I really don’t think you need me to retype it here.  But! I will give you our tweaks to each step in the recipe, so that you can run out, get the ingredients and impress your family or latest crush tonight…

1.  We are all for finding shortcuts to recipes to make the time between cooking and eating a little shorter.  We highly recommend using 2 packets of unflavored gelatin dissolved in 1-1/2 tablespoons of water and 1 tablespoon of soy sauce rather than all this crazy talk about boiling  and leaching pork skin. 

2.  We never really figured out why you needed to blanch the cabbage leaves, but we also didn’t figure out an alternative, so go ahead and do it.  We also didn’t have a bamboo steamer, so we used a colander (or the steam basket from a double pot) set over boiling water.

3.  This step is easy.  Go for it!

4.  This is the step where you break out the wine.  Really?  If you’re one of the people who just happens to have a meat grinder sitting in your kitchen, have me over; otherwise a food processor will do.

5.  We totally skipped this step and used premade wonton wrappers.  I think it would be worth trying to make your own wrappers, but make sure there is more wine somewhere.

6.  I highly recommend watching the little video that Saveur provides, because you think you know how to fold a dumpling (I mean, don’t we all think that?) until you read these directions and you realize that either you are illiterate or they make no sense.  We watched the video 3 days before we tried this, and ended up folding them any which way, but you aim high and do it right, ok?

7.  Don’t fall for the temptation of splitting one open to see if they are cooked, because all the soup will come out.  Not that we did that or anything.  Trust the timing directions here.  Totally worth the wait…

Food Challenge #2: Heidi’s Creamless Cream of Mushroom Soup

So the last couple of weeks in Chicago have been cold (which we know makes me very sad).  And I had a cold.  So the last thing I wanted to do was cook or think about cooking, but I also wanted some comfort food, because I felt incredibly sorry for myself.  I’d bought crimini mushrooms before I got sick, but mushrooms and cream and, frankly, the million and seven steps in Julia Child’s version of cream of mushroom soup did not fill me with any type of excitement or joy.  Like the previous challenge, I’ve never actually eaten cream of mushroom soup, aside from a little experiment that I did with chicken pot pie years ago.  The only canned soup we had when I was growing up was chicken noodle, and I’ve never had any desire to order cream of mushroom soup in a restaurant (and now that I think about it, I don’t know that I’ve ever seen it listed… Is it not a favorite?).

Given how I felt, plus the fact that I am not a fan of cream based soups, I decided that I was going to make a creamless version of a soup I’ve never actually had a good version of.  Why do I do these kinds of things to myself? Why do I feel as though I actually know what I’m doing in a kitchen?? What is wrong with me??? 

The idea for the creamless soup actually came from a roommate I had senior year of college.  There were four of us living in a townhouse and we would take turns cooking, which really meant we would take turns warming up meals one woman’s mom would freeze for us or making ridiculously large bowls of spaghetti with gobs of butter and salt.  My three roommates were vegetarians, which was fine, but really limited what we could eat since none of us had the time or ability to cook anything tasty (let me be honest: they truly drove me insane, because they would say things like “I’m a vegetarian, is there meat in that?” as you handed them a glass of water.  I knew that it was a passing fancy (especially since somehow going to McDonald’s for happy meals did not register on the vegetarian radar), which made it 20 times more annoying when I had to use separate pans to make chicken.  I know for a fact that two of them now eat meat happily). 

I digress… We ate a lot of beans and pasta and rice and one roommate taught us to make creamless cream of broccoli soup.  We would boil frozen broccoli in some water until it was cooked through and then strain the liquid and add the broccoli to a blender with salt, pepper, nutmeg and a little of the liquid.  Instant creamy soup (with a touch of milk if we were feeling extravagant) and incredibly healthy and easy.  The same thing can be done with pumpkin or butternut squash soup, so I figured why not mushroom?  So I chopped up my mushrooms and sautéed them in some butter with shallots and thyme, added them to some chicken broth and eventually decided to thicken it a bit with a super easy version of béchamel sauce (a white sauce which is the base for a lot of other sauces).

And kids, it was fabulous!  No seriously, I don’t think I’ve been this happy about an experiment in a really long time (if ever).  It was smooth and creamy with nice bits of mushrooms for texture.  The flavor tasted like fall to me, maybe because of the thyme and shallots. The white wine I used to deglaze the pan with the mushrooms and shallots added a bit of richness to it and brought it all together.

The recipe is a bit of Joy of Cooking with a bit of what-do-I-feel-like-doing, so once you get the base, I’m sure it would be easy to change it up with different mushrooms (I’d actually bought shitake mushrooms to sauté and put on top, but I let them sit a bit too long before cooking them and they seemed a bit rubbery.  I’m not a fan of the earthy taste of porcini mushrooms, but I bet they’d work well, too). 

The soup was the perfect comfort food on a cold day when all I wanted was a good book and something warm to make me feel better.  Of course, I hope that when you make it you are healthy and happy, but keep a bit in the freezer just in case…

Update:  Heidi made the soup and contributed this lovely photo…

Creamless Cream of Mushroom Soup

Food Challenge #1: Moe’s Mofongo

A friend from law school responded to our plea for things to make with a suggestion for mofongo.  I will readily admit that I had to Google it, because I had never heard of it, let alone tasted it.  I found out that it’s a traditional Puerto Rican dish made from fried plantains mashed together with garlic and pork cracklings or bacon.  A few things here: (1) anything mashed together with bacon will happily become a part of my life, but (2) what are pork cracklings? Are they pork rinds like the ones they sell at convenience stores?  Or was I going to be required to make my own and seriously, who does that and how?  And (3): despite the title of this blog, I don’t actually own a pestle and mortar, which in every recipe I read for mofongo said I must have—a food processor would not do (which is fine, because I don’t have one of those either).  So this little recipe became a challenge, because I’d never tasted what I was about to make so I’d never know if I got it right, I didn’t know what one of the main ingredients was exactly and I don’t own one of the appliances crucial to the recipe (actually, two appliances, because I discovered I should also have a deep fryer).  Oh, ok… Let’s start cooking!

 

Needless to say, I didn’t have a recipe for this.  I thought I’d come upon one in Bittman’s The Best Recipes in the World.  The recipe for fufu from Ghana sounded similar, but some searching on the interwebs led me to believe that these are two completely different foods with different textures and eaten in totally different ways.   My main problem was that I had no idea what the consistency of mofongo was supposed to be.  I could guess what plantain, garlic and pork would taste like together, but I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to have something creamy or crispy, dense or light at the end.  I thought all of the frying would leave me with crispy and dense, but then I discovered that the end result needed to be rolled into a ball that could be added to soup or eaten with a sauce, so how was crispy going to work?  Finally, one recipe said it should have the consistency of mashed (not whipped) potatoes.  I decided to go with that and hope for the best.

I made the decision that recipe integrity be damned, I was not going to schlep home a pestle and mortar and deep fryer for this one dish.  So I decided to use my blender set to chop and a deep bottomed skillet for frying.  Luckily I have a candy/deep fryer thermometer, so I could test the temperature of the oil.  I also decided to go with the bacon rather than trying to figure out the pork crackling sitch, because it was Sunday and I wanted bacon for breakfast anyway…

Green Plantain

All of the recipes called for green plantain, which was readily available at the local grocery store, so yeah! for one easy part of the recipe (an aside here: plantain is not pronounced plan-tane, but plan-tin.  Trust me on this [but if you don’t believe me or my Caribbean family, dictionary.com will say it for you].  If I can stop one person from mispronouncing this word again I will feel my work in the food blog world is done).

 

So the recipe. Most of the ones I found online were the same except for one thing, which I learned late Sunday afternoon is kind of a crucial difference between the recipe working and failing miserably.  The recipe I went with the first time around—from El Boricua, a Puerto Rican newsletter (http://www.elboricua.com/mofongo.html) –said that I needed to make tostones first and then use them in my mofongo.  Tostones are basically twice-fried plantains (you fry the plantain, then press them down so they spread a bit and then fry them again). 

Tostones

While really tasty and happy, I couldn’t get this version to stay in a ball if my culinary life depended on it. 

Extra Crispy Mofongo Before It Fell Apart...

 

It was too crispy and there wasn’t nearly enough moisture to hold it together.  I thought about adding some chicken broth, but that would have involved actually having chicken broth, so, um, yeah…. I also thought that adding broth would make it soggy rather than making it moist.  There’s no way that this version would hold up in a soup or sauce without falling apart, but I could see substituting it for breadcrumbs on chicken or fish or a roast.

I decided to do the recipe again, but skipped the second frying of the plantains and that led me to as close to a mofongo as I think I’ll get until I taste a professional version and try it again.  It was much easier the second time around, and the flavors and texture seemed right. 

Is this the real deal?

 I got the mashed potato consistency after about 10 seconds in the blender and was able to roll it into balls with no problem.  I didn’t try dropping them into soup to see how they’d hold up, but I think it’d work.  I leave it up to Moe to test and let me know if I’m even close…

 

 

Mofongo (compilation of recipes)

End of Summer Salad (not that summer actually ever started…)

Part of the reason—besides my procrastination—that I update so infrequently is that I really don’t know how to cook that many things.  Honestly, I have about six desserts that I make really well and about three dinner dishes that I feel confident about.  Nine specialties does not a blog make.  I have about 15 cookbooks, 100 back issues of Bon Appétit with all of my “must try one day” recipes tagged and six months worth of Food & Wine that started to magically appear in my mailbox and just as magically disappeared one day.  All of this to say that when I need to, I can follow a recipe pretty well, but god forbid I should be forced to cook a month’s worth of original meals on my own.  I am completely jealous of people who can look at a raw chicken and come up with seven different ways to prepare it without breaking out into a sweat. 

In an effort to get more comfortable in the kitchen, I try to take classes whenever I can. I don’t know that I’ve ever made one thing from any of the classes (aside from the couscous recipe below) ever again (sensing a pattern here?).  My cabinets are filled with all of the utensils I’ve sworn I’d use after the class—the mats and chopsticks from my sushi making class are still in the bag mocking me each time I open the drawer—and, like the road to hell, my kitchen is paved with the best of intentions.

Last winter I took a Moroccan cooking class at The Chopping Block with the hope that I could at least learn to prepare one entire meal that I could serve to people one day.  I don’t know who those people are or why they wouldn’t want to just eat out, but that was my plan.  On the menu that day was fennel spiced chickpea flatbread, Moroccan braised chicken with spices and apricots,  a date, saffron and mint couscous salad and an orange and saffron crème brulée.  I was paired with a mother and daughter who had some obvious tension between them.  The mother felt she knew everything there was to know about cooking and the daughter couldn’t have cared less about the class or learning how to dice an onion.   I tend to side with mothers in these little tiffs, mainly because I can only imagine what my own mother has had to put up with over the years, but after the mom tried to school me on pouring cream into a mixer and then tried to grab a knife out of my hand while I was “incorrectly” chopping dates (is there such a thing?) I understood why the daughter rolled her eyes every 25 seconds.  She and I shared a brief moment of schadenfreude when the mom poured an entire ramekin of saffron into our chicken (when we were supposed to use four strands).  The nice instructor’s head almost popped off, considering saffron can run about $10 a gram and Mommy Dearest had just poured about $100 into our pan of chicken breasts.

At any rate, the meal was actually pretty simple, and looks impressive enough to serve when those mystery people come over.  It’s a little much for a random Tuesday, though, which is why I’ve never tried it at home.  The only part of the meal I’ve duplicated is the couscous, which is the perfect thing to take to a picnic or make a batch of and have for lunch during the week.  What I like most about it is that once you get the basics in, anything you like can be added like tomatoes, tuna, or olives. I’ve also done it with orzo instead of couscous, which turned out just as well (add a little olive oil while it’s cooling). 

So if you’re lucky enough to live somewhere warm enough for a picnic this Labor Day, here’s your side dish.  Invite me over when you decide to make the chicken…

 

Talk to me about Italian food…

What I’m about to type is going to cause a stir, I know, because I’ve come to learn that people are passionate about this.  I’m not a fan of Italian food.  Catch your breath and stop cursing me.  Before you question my sanity and unfriend me on facebook, hear me out.  It’s not that I don’t like Italian food, it’s that I wouldn’t go out of my way to eat it.  It’s not my first choice of cuisine when deciding where to go out for dinner, but if it’s chosen for me, I’m ok with it.  I am a lover of cream sauces and slow cooked meats and roasted vegetables and wine reductions and butter and while I feel like I should be able to get all of these things with Italian food, it never seems to live up to what I expect it to taste like and I always end up adding salt and pepper—which is something I rarely do in restaurants—in the hopes of making my mouth as happy as my eyes and nose (because, really? what looks better than a plate of steaming pasta and smells better than sautéed garlic and onions?).  Maybe I have been completely spoiled by French food, but I always feel like something is missing from Italian dishes and whatever that thing is stops me from really enjoying them.  And before you ask, yes, I have been to Italy and yes, I have been to wonderful Italian restaurants in Chicago and New York (and I’ll tell you that the best Italian meal I’ve ever had—especially the meatballs—was in Pittsburgh).  Judge me if you must, but there you have it.

 

Given all of this, I am not sure what would possess me to decide to make lasagna for a couple of friends last week. There are only two things that could remotely pass for Italian that I’ve made in my kitchen: focaccia and pesto, both of which I learned to make in college.  Back then pesto either didn’t come in jars or we couldn’t afford it, but now that Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods have an entire line, there’s really no need to buy a bushel of basil when a pesto craving hits.  Anyhoo.  I got it into my head that I really wanted to make a pesto lasagna for a simple dinner while catching up with friends.  I figured that lasagna would be easy and hearty and the pesto would be a bit of Spring on a cold February night.  Um…yeah.  All I could think about as I debated between no-boil and regular lasagna, realized that I didn’t own a pot large enough to boil an entire package and had to do three different batches, scalded my fingers as I tried to lay out and trim wet hot noodles and squeezed water out of mozzarella balls is that I was right for only eating Stouffer’s lasagna before, because it is hard to make and ungrateful and unrelenting and so not worth it.

 

In the end, it turned out…fine.  All of the flavors were there, the pesto was light and garlic-y, the pasta was cooked to the right consistency, but as we ate, I kept thinking there was something missing; salt? spices? more cheese? I had that same feeling I have in restaurants of not being satisfied with the end result, even though everything looks and smells as though it is going to be divine.  Plus, I went to bed hungry and wishing I’d made Indian food…

 

Pesto Lasagna from Aida Mollenkamp via http://www.foodnetwork.com/ (my tweaks in red)

Lebanese Dinner Party

I love birthdays—your birthday, my birthday, your kid’s birthday.  I want to celebrate and drink Champagne and lick frosting off of my fingers every chance I get.  I love presents, too, but really it’s the idea that everyone has one day out of the year that is completely and totally theirs (except if you’re a twin… I spend way too much time thinking what I’ll do about birthdays if ever I have twins. Would I have two different parties on two different days?  Would I alternate whose would come first? Would one think the other’s was better? I digress…).  When I was in law school, I met a guy who, in 25 years on this earth, had never had his own birthday cake.  This was outrageous to me, especially considering I was so spoiled rotten that my grandparents thought it best that I have TWO birthday cakes—one yellow and one chocolate—in case there were people who didn’t like one or the other.  Sometimes an ice cream cake would make an appearance, too.  I balance out the potential obnoxiousness of that by believing that everyone should feel that special when their day arrives and I do my best to make it happen (and yes, I did bring that guy a cake of his very own on his birthday).

Last month, a friend of mine was celebrating her birthday and planned a night of gallivanting.  She has an amazing group of lovely friends, and one of them is obviously as in love with cooking and birthdays as I am, because he opened his house and kitchen for a pre-dancing dinner party, saying that no birthday is complete without a beautiful meal to celebrate it.  Using recipes from his mother and others that he remembered, he created a Lebanese feast for nine on a snowy Saturday evening.  We started the evening standing around the counter in his kitchen eating herbed olives and thick slices of bread dipped in labneh, a tangy condensed yogurt with mint and garlic olive oil. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next he pulled a zaatar manouche out of the oven that looked as though it would take years to perfect, but that he assured me was a simple paste made with thyme and sesame seeds spread on a thin flat bread and topped with yogurt with cucumber and mint. 

 

He eventually moved us to the dining table where a leafy green salad with feta and a rich balsamic vinaigrette (walnuts on the side) waited next to individual bundles of soft dough stuffed with spinach (and dipped in a pomegranate syrup) followed by kibbeh bil souniyye, a meat pie. 

We finished dinner by singing happy birthday in each of our native languages and slicing into a homemade French chocolate cake. 

I felt special after all of that homemade goodness, and it wasn’t even my birthday.  The host’s birthday is eight days before mine in July; I’m already thinking about what we’ll cook up….

 

Kibbeh bil souniyye (meat and bulgur pie in a tray)

Three Steps to the Best Sandwich Ever

It’s late January, the high temperature here in Wisconsin today is twelve, and you know what? I am sick of hearty soups and stews and roasts. I just want a little reminder that summer exists, that vegetables do actually grow in the (unfrozen) ground, and that one day, I might eat a light meal and go for a walk in a T-shirt. It is times like these that call for roasted red peppers.

I loved roasted red peppers. They are always fresh and bright and ready to perk up any dish with a robust smack of flavor. You can buy peppers already roasted and packed in oil, but I prefer to roast batches of them myself and keep them in jars in the fridge. They won’t go bad, or at least, I have never had a jar of them around long enough to find out. They are the perfect addition to any sandwich, but they are also great in starring roles.

So without further ado, here is step one to the best sandwich ever.

Step 1 or How to Roast Peppers

• Preheat oven to 450.
• De-stem and core red peppers (however many you like).
• Place them directly on the lowest oven rack. (Their juices might drip a little, but so what?)
• After about 15 minutes, turn.
• Roast and turn until burnt black on all sides.
• Place in a plastic bag and tie the bag tight.
• Wait until cool and then peel the charred skins off.
• Store in a glass jar in the fridge in their own oil.

Now that you have roasted all these peppers, what do you do with them? One of the many ways I use them is to make a salad of sorts and serve them as an appetizer or side dish. The recipe I use in Step 2 is my recreation of an amazing antipasto I had recently on a vacation in Italy.

Step 2 or Roasted Red Peppers and Capers Salad

• Cut four roasted red peppers into strips and arrange on a plate.
• Sprinkle with a tablespoon or so of capers (preferably packed in salt, but any will do), the juice of half a lemon, chopped parsley, oregano (preferably fresh, but dried is fine) salt, pepper, and the highest quality olive oil you have.
• Enjoy.

Step 3 or Roasted Red Pepper and Goat Cheese Sandwich (aka the Best Sandwich Ever)
If you and your guests can help yourselves, you may have some Step 2 leftovers hanging out in your fridge. Don’t fret, because they are the key ingredient to the Best Sandwich ever, a sandwich so good it will make you remember gentle summer breezes, weep tears of joy, and go dust off your sandals. Well, almost.

• Take two slices of fresh, crusty Italian bread.
• Spread one side with goat cheese.
• Place Step 2 on top.
• Garnish with alfalfa sprouts.
• Voila!

If ever there were a sandwich good enough to lure Persephone back to earth early, it would be this one.