Spork or Foon?

Braised Chicken Leg and White Beans with Rosemary and Garlic

I must say that I am a very lucky girl. That beautiful dish you see above is courtesy of my boyfriend, Jack.  He is, by all accounts, a fantastic cook.  I almost can attribute my love of cooking to him – but I won’t because he’ll gloat and rub it in.  But frankly, before I met Jack, my idea of a good meal was one piece of turkey and one piece of American cheese on dry whole wheat bread… with relish.  I never knew the wonders of simple flavors, like salt or lemon zest, that heighten the flavor of a dish, or the earthy taste of rosemary, the “foresty” (Jack’s adjective) scent of thyme, the wonders of roasted garlic, or the sweetness of sautéed onions.

I just finished reading Molly Wizenberg’s (Orangette) book, A Homemade Life (buy it -  seriously).  In the book, she mentions that her boyfriend at the time (now her husband), Brandon, is the more experimental cook of the two.  Where Molly is “hunched over a cookbook, hanging on every word, he’s at the stove with his fingers in the pot.”  If I weren’t paying attention, I would have thought Molly was talking about Jack and me. There were many times I would read this book and smile, thinking of Jack. I must admit, I sometimes envy his ability to pick up a few ingredients and create something without relying on a recipe, but at the same time, it inspires me to think off the page and trust my instincts.

Sometimes, he’ll work with a recipe to learn about the flavors and then the next time, he’ll wing it, eyeing measurements and adding his own spices and touches.  His mind is always churning.  We both absolutely love Alice Water’s the Art of Simple Food, because her recipes are a canvas to make it your own. If my boyfriend does work with a recipe, it is from her book.  Her recipes are like color by numbers – there is a guideline, but no one is forcing you to color within the lines.

Just so he doesn’t get a big ego, I tell him the food sucks, because I’m a big baby.  He often knows I’m lying from the smile that I try desperately to hide, the sighs that leave my lips, and the clean plate that sits in front of me.

The fact of the matter is I’m a better cook.  So there.

EDITOR'S NOTE:  After writing this post, I asked my boyfriend to read it, thinking that he’d appreciate my acknowledgement of his talents in the kitchen.  He instead edited my post as if he were Editor-in-Chief of Random House and then proceeded to tell me I know nothing about ingredients. 

This is why I have to tell him his food sucks.  

BLECH! Don’t make this recipe! (Ok, ok make it.)

Braised Chicken Leg and White Beans with Rosemary and Garlic adapted from The Art of Simple Food by Alice Waters

4 chicken legs

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 1/2 onions, sliced thick

5 garlic cloves, sliced thin

2 bay leaves

2 rosemary sprigs

4 tomatoes, diced large

1.5 cups chicken broth

2 tablespoons dry white wine

 

1 cup dried white beans

Salt

¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil

4 garlic cloves, coarsely chopped

2 teaspoons coarsely chopped rosemary leaves

For the Chicken:

Season the chicken a few hours before with salt and freshly ground black pepper.  Heat a heavy bottom pan over medium heat.  Add olive oil and place the chicken legs into the pan skin side down and cook until crisp and brown, about 12 minutes.  Turn and cook for another 4 minutes.  Remove the chicken an add onions.  Cook until translucent, about 5 minutes.  Add the garlic, rosemary, and bay leaves and cook for 2 minutes. Deglaze with white wine, scraping up brown bits from the bottom of the pan.  Add tomatoes and cook for an additional 5 minutes.

Arrange the chicken in the pan, skin side up, and pour in any juices that have collected.  Pour in chicken broth.  The liquid should reach halfway up the chicken; add more if needed. Bring to a boil and turn down to a simmer.  Cover and cook at a bare simmer or in a 325 degree F oven for 45 minutes.  When done, pour the braising liquid into a bowl and skim the fat.  Discard the bay leaves and rosemary stems.  Taste for salt and adjust as needed.

For the Beans:  Soak beans overnight in 4 cups of water.  Drain and transfer to a heavy pot.  Add water to cover by 2 inches.  Bring to a boil.  Lower the heat and skim off any foam.  Simmer gently for 2 hours or so, until the beans are tender.  Add more water if necessary during the cooking.  Season to taste with salt.

In a heavy bottomed saucepan or skillet, warm olive oil over low heat.  Add garlic and cook just until the garlic is soft, about 2 minutes.  Stir into the beans, taste for salt and adjust as needed.  Let the dish sit for a few minutes before serving to allow the flavors to marry.

 

 

 

Creamy Butternut Squash Soup

This is my go-to winter soup.  My boyfriend, Jack, makes a mean winter minestrone soup. Well, I make a mean winter squash soup.  We're going to have a soup-off one day. I'm totally going to win.

I love butternut squash.  Despite what you see posted here on this blog, I often try to eat very healthy.  My favorite snack is a roasted butternut squash drizzled with a touch of olive oil and sprinkled with kosher salt and cinnamon.  It is filling and actually satisfies my sweet tooth!  

I love to curl up on the couch with a bowl of this soup and savor its rich, silky texture.  The best part is, it is very healthy, as butternut squash is high in fiber, vitamin A, beta carotine and Vitamin C. And there is absolutely NO cream in this soup. Just butternut squash, garlic, onions, sage, rosemary, salt, pepper, and olive oil.

I bathe in butternut squash soup.

Winter Squash Soup (adapted from Martha Stewart Living)

Ingredients

2 lb butternut squash, peeled and cut into 2" chunks

2 medium Yukon gold potato, peeled and chopped

1 yellow onion, diced

3 cloves garlic, minced

3 cups low-sodium chicken broth

2 cups water

4 sage leaves

2 stems rosemary

1 bay leaf

2 tbsp unsalted butter

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Directions

Heat olive oil in a large suacepan over medium heat.  Add garlic and onion and saute until onion is transparent, about five minutes.  Add butternut squash, potato, chicken stock and water. Tie together sage, rosemary, and bay leaf with kitchen twine and add to pot.  Bring to a boil and reduce heat to a simmer for 15 minutes, or until squash and potato are tender.

Remove from heat and process in batches in a food processor or blender until smooth.  Season to taste with salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Serves 4.

Broccoli and Arugula Soup

I love this soup. I often make it when I am feeling lazy and just want to throw something together quickly.  It is filling (thanks fiber-rich broccoli) and healthy, and I first discovered it when doing the GOOP detox.  I know that this detox, the newsletter, and Gwenyth Paltrow as a human being, has been the subject of much ire on the interweb, but I don't really care, because I actually loved this detox.  I didn't starve, I was often very satisfied, and I really liked the recipes that were provided. And frankly, I was able to do this after gaining seven pounds over the holidays and not only lose that weight, but lost 3 more pounds, and have kept it off ever since, despite baking and tasting constantly. I basically have introduced many more foods back into my diet, but still try to maintain the all natural, no-proccessed food way of life. Alice Waters would be proud. 

Now please excuse my while I find a way down from my soapbox. 

Bring on the baked goods!

Oh, and I sometimes like to top this soup with some cornmeal crusted shrimp (SEE!).  But don't include them if you want this to be vegan/vegetarian (obviously!)

Cornmeal Crusted Shrimp (adapted from Epicurious)

• 12 uncooked large shrimp, peeled, deveined  
• 1 3/4 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, divided
• 2 large garlic cloves, peeled, smashed

• 1 cup cornmeal
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Place shrimp, 1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil, and 3 smashed garlic cloves in large resealable plastic bag; turn to coat. Chill 2 to 3 hours, turning bag occasionally.

Stir cornmeal, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper in medium bowl. Add shrimp; toss. Arrange in single layer on large plate.

Meanwhile, add enough vegetable oil to heavy large skillet to reach depth of 1/4 inch. Heat oil over high heat. Working in 2 batches, fry shrimp until golden brown and cooked through, about 1 1/2 minutes per side. Transfer to paper-towel-lined baking sheet and place in oven to keep warm.

Broccoli and Arugula Soup (adapted from Her GOOPiness)

1 tablespoon olive oil
3 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
1/2 yellow onion, roughly diced
1 head broccoli, cut into small florets (about 2/3 pound)
2 cups water
1 tablespoon (or more, depending on your tastes) coarse salt 
Freshly ground black pepper
3/4 cup arugula (watercress would be good, too)
2 tsp onion powder
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
1/2 lemon (optional)
1 tsp curry powder (optional)

Heat the olive oil in a medium nonstick saucepan over medium heat. Add the garlic and onion and sauté for just a minute or until fragrant. Add the broccoli and cook for four minutes or until bright green. Add the water, salt and pepper, bring to a boil, lower the heat and cover. Cook for eight minutes or until the broccoli is just tender. Pour the soup into a blender and puree with the arugula until quite smooth. Be very careful when blending hot liquids; start slowly and work in batches if necessary. Serve the soup with a bit of fresh lemon.

Petits Pois a` la Francais - Spring Peas with Lettuce, Chervil, and Onions

The Poulet Roti was accompanied by Petits Pois a` la Francaise (Spring Peas with Lettuce, Chervil, and Onions).

According to the book, peas should be small and squeaky fresh (seriously, that sounds like an adjective from the heyday of Run DMC or Will Smith - pre Fresh Prince of Bel Air and "Gettin' Jiggy Wit It"), then simmered with pearl onions, lettuce, and chervil (I used parsley).  Here, you cook 3 cups of peas with 5 tbsp butter, a chiffonade of lettuce, and the chervil (parsley), tied into a bouquet with kitchen twine (or my method, strewn about and needing to be fished out at the end while you curse yourself for being lazy and telling yourself you should have just tied it up in the first place) with water, a tbsp of sugar, and salt for 15 minutes.

These are not the gross, soggy, floppy, smushy, vomit inducing peas of your mother, my friends.  These peas are incredible. Tender. Buttery. Sweet. I went back for seconds. And thirds. I only imagined, after watching this week's episode of Top Chef, in which Carla (My girl! She's crazy and I love her! And she represents DC! And although I'm not a proud DCer, I do live here, and it's sometimes cool, but I desperately miss NY, but seriously, Carla is nuts and loveable and if I ever see her on the street, I'm going to send her some of my love.) cooks roasted squab and peas for Jaques Pepin (can we say jealous?), where the judges swooned over the "pure perfection" of her peas.

I could only imagine that these were the peas that Carla made. Ever since I had this meal, I have craved these peas. 

I am excited by PEAS! What is my life coming to?  Is this what it means to get old?

***I also have to note that this meal was supposed to be finished up with Salade des Fruits - Fresh Fruit Salad with Cointreau - which consists of oranges, peaches, apples, pears, pineapple, bananas, lemon juice, sugar, Cointreau, kiwi, and strawberries.  After we hulled a 1/2 a pint of strawberries, skinned a peach, cored apples and pears and let them soak in Cointreau and sugar, my boyfriend decided to salt the fruit.  Now, I don't know about you, but I don't like salty fruit. Call me crazy.  But my boyfriend, being the optimist that he is, tried to convince himself that it still tasted ok. It didn't. After his third bite, he came to his senses and promptly threw out the saltfruit. 

Sweet Potatoes Casserole with a Cashew and Maple Streusel Topping

I only have a few words for this dish. This is the best sweet potato dish in the history of man. And if any men from history tell you otherwise, they are lying.

I can't even express how absolutely amazing this dish is. Filled with fall spices,sweet and salty, soft and crunchy. It runs the gamut of pure awesomeness. Yes, that's right. Awesomeness.

I couldn't even get a photo of what the inside looked like, because after this photo, I proceeded to dive into this face first. There was no turning back.

Via Saveur

SERVES 8 – 10

This recipe was given to SAVEUR's assistant test kitchen director, Ben Mims, by his aunt Barbara Jane Busick, a home cook in Brandon, Mississippi.

4 lbs. sweet potatoes
1⁄2 cup evaporated milk
1⁄2 cup sugar
6 tbsp. unsalted butter, melted
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1⁄2 tsp. kosher salt
1⁄2 tsp. ground allspice
2 eggs, beaten
3⁄4 cup roasted salted cashews
1⁄2 cup light brown sugar
3 tbsp. flour
2 cups mini marshmallows

1. Heat oven to 400°. Place sweet potatoes on a parchment paper–lined baking sheet; bake until soft, about 1 1⁄2 hours. Let cool.

2. Reduce oven temperature to 350°. Peel potatoes; pass them through a food mill into a bowl. Whisk in evaporated milk, sugar, 4 tbsp. of the butter, vanilla extract, salt, allspice, and eggs. Transfer to a 2-qt. oval baking dish.

3. In a food processor, pulse together cashews, brown sugar, flour, and remaining 2 tbsp. of butter until coarsely ground. Crumble cashew mixture over half of casserole; top other half with marshmallows. Bake until marshmallows are golden brown, about 30 minutes.

Whisk Wednesdays: Bisque de Langoustines

Don't you hate it when you order lobster bisque restaurants cheat you out of the lobster (bastards!) and you barely get anything in there besides some soup and a few measly bits of lobster floating around?

When I was still an (active) actress, I was working at a restaurant where they would sometimes serve Lobster Bisque as a soup special. Now, the waitstaff usually was allowed to have unlimited soup at no cost (I think. If not, I'm sorry Steve and Tony!  I'll mail you a check!). But not the lobster bisque. Oh no. We couldn't even TOUCH the sacred stuff.

Well, now I know how to make it. So there.   

I must say, however, the best lobster bisque I have ever had is at David Burke and Donatella on the Upper East Side.  It is a very shi shi restaurant (that actually has a limo parked outside for anyone who wants to smoke in the winter months), with the most amazing dessert I have ever tasted, ie -Cheesecake lollipops that look like Chupa-Chups and taste exactly like bubblegum. It's crazy.

There was a big chunk of lobster in the toureen, with a lightly fried lobster cigar layed ever so perfectly on top of the bowl so that it hovered over the edges. The server then spooned the delicious lobster bisque into the toureen and it was now yours for the taking.

My lobster bisque was nowhere near as good as that.

First of all, I got shrimp, mainly due to the lack of car that has been wreacking havoc on my cooking schedule and making my life impossible (do I say enough that I can't wait until I move back to NYC so that I may never have to drive again and so everything is at my fingertips?) and I could not walk to the fish monger (it's really M. Slavin, a fantastic fish store, but I like the word "monger") to get lobster tail. Secondly, no cognac (again, no car, no liquor store).  I'm sure that made a huge difference.  For some reason, my bisque was kind of bitter. It cooked up beautifully.  The consistency was perfect.  Learning how to make the mousseline was excellent (and a definite way to impress your friends!) and very informative (and simple!).  But why was it bitter??? I don't get it! Could it have been the wine?  That's the only thing I could figure. 

Ah, well. Let's just say that this hasn't been my week when it comes to cooking. But I don't want to compain, it's all good, because I'm learning something new everyday! I guess my galettes weren't as ugly as I thought (ok, they were, but they tasted great)! I'll end up making that DB cake just yet!  I joined Operation Baking Gals and am sending a little baking love to the troops! I'm getting my car, my dog, and my boyfriend back on Friday and I'll be back and better than ever!  With a helper!

Oh, I made a bread with melted brie cheese and garlic to go with this.  I could have eating 40 of these. I just had two bites and then I threw the rest out.  I have to watch the calories with all of this food.

Just take some good, rustic bread, put it in the oven for a few minutes under broil, rub some garlic on it after it is a bit toasty, add the brie, pop it back under the broiler for ten minutes and Viola` (I will use that word in every French post I write because I love being cliche`) - delicious bread!

Check out the rest of the Whisk Wednesdays Group here!

Shrimp and Avocado Salad with Mango-Lime Dressing (via Food and Wine Magazine, June 2008)

Shrimp

• 6 cups water
• 1 lemon, halved
• 1 small onion, sliced
• 2 tablespoons kosher salt
• 1 Scotch bonnet or habanero chile, halved
• 1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
• One 12-ounce bottle of lager, such as Red Stripe
• 2 pounds large shrimp, shelled and deveined

Dressing

• 1 mango, peeled and finely diced (1 1/2 cups)
• 1/4 cup rice vinegar
• 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 1/2 cup canola oil
• 1 tablespoon chopped cilantro
• 1/2 teaspoon finely grated lime zest
• 1/4 teaspoon minced Scotch bonnet or habanero chile
• 1/4 cup thinly sliced red onion
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 2 Hass avocados, sliced
• Lime wedges, for serving

directions

1. Prepare the shrimp: Squeeze the lemon halves into a large saucepan then add them to the pan. Add the water, onion, salt, Scotch bonnet, ginger and beer and bring to a boil. Cover and simmer for 15 minutes. Add the shrimp and cook for 3 minutes, just until pink. Drain the shrimp and spread on a platter. Refrigerate until chilled. Halve the shrimp horizontally.
2. Meanwhile, make the dressing: In a blender, combine 1/3 cup of the diced mango with the vinegar, lime juice and mustard and puree until smooth. With the machine on, add the oil in a thin stream and blend until very smooth. Add the cilantro, lime zest and minced Scotch bonnet and pulse just to combine.
3. Transfer the dressing to a large bowl. Add the shrimp, red onion and the remaining mango and season with salt and pepper. Toss to coat. Arrange the avocado slices around a large platter. Mound the shrimp salad in the center and garnish with lime wedges. Serve right away.

I’m not going to lie, I was not the biggest fan of this recipe.  Shrimp, avocado, and mango are one of my favorite combos, but this just didn't work.

Let me start by saying that this was promising in the beginning.  The smell of the ginger, beer, lemon, and onions simmering on the stove was heavenly.  The dressing sounded interesting, but as I was pouring in the canola oil, I asked my boyfriend "Are you sure it says 1/2 a cup?"  I know dressing has a lot of oil, but this just seemed like it would drown out all of the other flavors. I was right.  If I ever make this again (which I don’t think I will), I will add something to sweeten up the dressing, like adding more mango or some agave nectar to add a subtle sweetness and use 1/4 cup instead of 1/2 cup oil. 

We hoped that, once combined with the shrimp, the flavors would balance a bit. I used maybe 2 or 3 tablespoons of this dressing (which basically made about a cup of dressing) and mixed it in.  It was still pretty strong. The shrimp didn't really take the flavor of the ginger and beer, either, which I would have loved. Overall, it was ok, but I would make a lot of adjustments to both the ginger/beer "broth" (reduced it and thickened it? Marinated the shrimp in the reduction?) and the dressing (more flavor, less oil!)