Kiss Me, I’m (1/4) Irish!

Living in Boston means that St Patrick’s Day is a true holiday. There’s the parade in Southie, the green beer everywhere and the long standing tradition of corned beef and cabbage. I’ve heard, though I am not sure it is true, that there are more celebrating the day here than in Ireland itself.

In my younger, before children days, I’d go my favorite Irish bar, conveniently located a block from where I lived at the time. The Hippo and I spent many an afternoon there, talking with Mike, the older Irish bartender, who would tell us we were too pretty to put up with crappy guys or that we were too cute to stay single for long. St. Patrick’s day there was like any other day but more crowded and more green.

Now that I have two kids, three jobs, two pets and assorted other responsibilities, my bar days are pretty much over.  I am ok with this, as I never really took to green beer anyway.  I’ll be spending the day of the parade at the ballet (talk about a 180!).  Tonight, however, I celebrated through food, making corned beef and my own version of colcannon.  I share it with you in case you, too, have moved past your green beer days.

Corned Beef and Colcannon, 1/4 Irish style

Corned Beef

1 first cut brisket (I use the Wellshire Farms one) with the seasoning packet

Enough water to cover

1/2 cup brown (or dijon but brown is better) mustard

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup water

Directions:

Throw the corned beef along with the seasoning into a slow cooker. Cover with hot water so that the meat is submerged by about an inch.  Cook on high for 8 hours.  Take it out and put it on a sheet or broiler pan.  Let it start to cool a bit and heat your oven to 350.  In a small saucepan, combine the mustard, water and sugar.  Cook over medium high heat for about five minutes, so that it starts to reduce a bit.

Brush some over the top of your meat and put the meat in the oven.  Cook for about half an hour, basting every five to ten minutes.  Take the meat out and let it rest for about five to ten minutes before slicing.

Colcannon (sort of)

Ingredients

4 potatoes, peeled and sliced into even pieces

1 stick of butter (yes, I said a stick)

2-3 tablespoons sour cream or plain greek yogurt

1/2 onion, chopped

3-4 cloves of garlic, chopped

several handfuls of fresh spinach, washed and dried

Directions

Place potatoes into a saucepan and cover with water.  Add a generous amount of salt.  Boil over high heat until potatoes are soft.  Drain and add the potatoes back to the pot.  Mash them.

In a skillet over medium heat, melt the butter.  Add the onions and garlic and cook until soft, taking care not to let the garlic burn.  Add the spinach and mix until it wilts.  Dump the whole thing in with the potatoes and mix well with a large spoon.  You may need to add a bit of milk or more butter or sour cream/greek yogurt to get the texture you like.

We also made brownies, at the toddler’s request.  They were great- fudgy and sweet and just the right amount of crunch on the top. We used this recipe.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!  Don’t forget to wear green and be safe!!

 

Copy Constant

One of my favorite people in the world writes one of my favorite food blogs in the world, The Hungry Hippo.  Her resolution for 2013 is to make more of the recipes from the cookbooks she owns.  These are cookbooks I love and I will sit for hours and browse them when I visit her (I can do this because she’s the one playing with my kids while I do).  She posted this recipe a few weeks ago (from a Parisian cookbook, no less!) and I could not wait to try it.

Broccoli and Cauliflower Gratin

Ingredients:
2 cups of broccoli
2 cups of cauliflower
2 Tablespoons butter
2 Tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons of flour
1 1/3 cups milk (I used whole)
2 egg yolks
2/3 cup cheese (according to the Hippo, the recipe called for gruyere, she used 1/3 C cheddar, 1/3 C parm and I used what I had in my fridge.  I think it was jack and cheddar, maybe?) plus some extra for sprinkling
about 1/4 cup bread crumbs (I used panko)
salt and pepper
sprinkle of nutmeg (I skipped this)

Directions

Wash and chop your veggies into same size florets.

Put some water on to boil and once it has come to a rolling boil, add the florets.  Cook them for 1-2 minutes.  Take them out immediately- you don’t want them to get mushy, just slightly less crisp.  Set them aside and work on the sauce.  Melt the butter in a saucepan.  When it has melted, add the flour and whisk together, letting it cook for a minute to get the raw flour taste out.  Slowly whisk in the milk and let it thicken. Take your pan off the heat and add the egg yolks one at a time, whisking while you do.  Try to avoid making scrambled eggs in your sauce.  Add the cheese, again, whisking while you do so that it will melt evenly.  Season with salt, pepper and nutmeg (if using).

I used ham in mine, even though the Hippo did not.  I cubed a ham steak.

Then I added it to a hot frying pan to brown and crisp it over medium high heat.

Butter a casserole dish and add your veggies.

Sprinkle the ham around to fill in the spaces.

Pour your sauce over this.

Mix your breadcrumbs with some of the cheese and sprinkle on top.

Bake at 400 until the top is golden brown and it’s heated through and bubbly, about 30 minutes.

This could be a side dish but with the added meat, it can also be a lovely main dish.  The egg yolks add a silkiness to the sauce that isn’t there in a basic white sauce.

It was good for a cold night.

Go To Foods

As you can see, it’s harder for me to post these days.  Work is so busy and both kids have hit strange sleeping phases which pretty much eat up my whole evenings.  This too shall pass.

The direct result of this is that I end up cooking the same old standbys for dinner.  I’m not so creative in my cooking when I have exactly an hour from when I set foot in the house to when my kids will begin to melt-down without eating.  Especially when that hour is also time for keeping the almostthisclosetowalking baby off the stairs, out of the dog’s dishes and off of his sister’s hair (he has a hair fetish.  I have no idea why.  If he can pull hair he is the happiest child alive and he will go to great lengths (ha!) to reach any available hair).

My most recent go-to food is from a blog called Brave Tart.  It is written by a CIA trained pastry chef, Stella Parks, who lives in Kentucky and has her own restaurant.  Her desserts have won awards and she has a number of posts about re-creating those processed desserts of our childhoods- fruit roll ups, keebler fudge strips and nutter butters, to name a few.  She also has this dish which is so, so good.  I’ve made it about ten times in the last two months.  It’s quick, easy, healthy and delicious.  I could not recommended it more.

Oyakodon (as written by Brave Tart)

Ingredients

1 large onion

2 Tablespoons of oil (Brave Tart says to use a neutral flavored oil, I like sesame or peanut)

2 Tablespoons of sugar

1/4 cup soy sauce

1 1/2 cups chicken stock or broth (you could use vegetable or beef)

4 eggs

2-4 cups rice, cooked and hot (I use Jasmine)

Optional:

1 cup shredded (cooked) chicken or meat (this time around, I had none)

1-2 cups of vegetables (I used sugar snap peas and spinach because that’s what I had)

Directions

Peel and slice your onion.  Heat the oil on medium heat and let the onion get slightly golden- should take about 15 minutes.

Wash and slice up your vegetables.

Once your onions are golden (not browned), add your vegetables.  I didn’t add the spinach right away because it would have gotten too wilt-y.

Once your vegetables are tender, add the sugar, soy sauce, and broth.  You can add the meat here as well if you’re using it.

Let this cook over medium heat for a few minutes.  I added my spinach at this point.

Let this cook until the spinach is wilty.

In a separate bowl, crack your eggs and whisk them together.  Pour them into your pan along the side and let them sit for about a  minute.  You can then start to scramble them into the broth.

Meanwhile, cook your rice.  I do it in my rice cooker.  I’ve also used day-old rice as well, heated up, and that’s been fine too.  Put some into a bowl.

With a slotted spoon, fish out the meat and vegetables and spoon them over the rice.  Pour the broth down the side of the bowl (in order to maintain the most clumpiness as possible).

It may not be that pretty but oh, it is just so delicious.  I may even make it tonight.

Comfort

Over the last week or so I’ve been craving comfort food.  For me, that means things like mashed potatoes, stews, soups and sugar.  Lots of sugar.  More on that later.

To be comforting, I made the Braised Short Ribs from Dinner: A Love Story, my new favorite cookbook and website.  They were delicious and may make it into the comfort food rotation.I also did my holiday baking.  That fulfilled the sugar needs.  This year rather than making for individuals, I made for groups.  That is, I brought cookies of all kinds to the guidance department meeting, biscuits and scones to the elementary team meeting and cookies and bars to the front office.  I tried Ina Garten’s Chocolate Chunk Blondies which were so. good.

I also made Walnut Snowball Cookies.  Which were also full of buttery, sugary goodness.

All in all, it was a week of comfort food.  I am now on vacation so will try to get a few more posts up- a tip on pomegranates and a yeast-free pizza dough.

Until then, I hope you are enjoying your holiday season.

Love Story

When I started my pre-doctoral internship, I did it at a site an hour and fifteen minutes from my house.  I figured I could do anything for a year.  In the end, I worked there for over three years and it was one of the best experiences of my life.  What I learned both professionally and personally has stayed with me over the years.  I could go on and on but what I want to tell you about now is one of the people I worked with there.

J. was the other predoctoral intern with me.  I met her for the first time on the day we both went for a tour.  My first impression was that she was gorgeous and clearly incredibly smart.  As the months went by, we became closer and closer and I began to admire her even more.  She was a mother and had given birth to her son at a young age. She was blessed with supportive parents and while her child’s father did not stay in her life, she raised her son and graduated from high school, college and graduate school (predoctoral internship, remember)?
J. was (and still is) kind, compassionate, smart, loving and always ready to see the best and have faith in  those around her.  She will always give those in her life second and third and fourth chances and will always encourage them to do their best.  As you can imagine, this can be both a positive and negative quality.

When I knew her best, J. was involved with a man she’d met a few years prior.  Their relationship was difficult with extreme highs and lows.  They became engaged a few months after I did and they were guests at my wedding.  J. and I began to lose touch after that when she left our common workplace.  We spoke a few times and through our emails and facebook, I saw that she had broken her engagement, met someone new and moved across the country after marrying him.  From all that I can tell now, this was the best decision she ever made.

She and her new husband are incredibly well suited, incredibly happy and, I must say, incredibly beautiful.  J. has found a happy ending to her love story.

But nothing in life is that cut and dry, black and white.  While she’s happy now, she could only get there by taking the path she did.  Her relationship with her former fiancée was difficult but had some good points as well.  One of them was this stew.  She posted about it on Facebook recently and it looked so good that I immediately emailed her, demanding the recipe.  She responded with some guidelines and I went to work.

I cooked a dish that I have never eaten.  I have no idea what it should look or taste like but it did end up being delicious.  I used J’s guidelines and searched the internet for cachupa rica.  This is what I ended up with- the wrong kind of corn (couldn’t find samp so had to use hominy), no plantains but, in the end, still delicious, filling and hardy.  Good for a cold day.  Plus, it made me think about J and her love story the whole time.  Made me happy.

Cachupa Rica (with deepest apologies to all Cape Verdens everywhere)

Ingredients

6 cups golden samp (I used plain hominy because I couldn’t find samp)

4 cups of beans (I used canned kidney and pinto)- You could use dry and soak them with the samp beforehand.

Meats of your choosing.  I used:

chicken thighs (about 4-6 boneless, skinless)

bacon (I used a package)

Chorizo sausage

country stye pork ribs

1 large onion

Lots of garlic

2 peeled carrots, cut into chunks

2 large sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks

between 6-10 cups of chicken broth

Directions:

I made it all in one pot.  J. makes it across several.  Because I used canned hominy and beans, I didn’t need to cook them separately.

Start by chopping up your bacon and browning it in a large pot.  Take out the bacon once it is crisp and add your sausage (chopped).  Let that brown up as well and then take it out and set it aside with the bacon.

Season your chicken with salt and pepper.  Add them to the pot with the bacon/sausage fat and brown them as well.

Once they’re brown on each side, set them aside with the bacon and sausage.

Finally, brown your short ribs in the pot.

It’s a lot of meat.  (insert dirty comment here)  Now, chop up your onion and garlic and brown it in the pot with all the fat left from the meat.  Maybe not all.  Maybe drain a bit of the fat, leaving about a tablespoon.

While the onions are cooking, peel and roughly chop your sweet potato and carrots.

Add them to the onions and let them brown a bit as well.

Once the veggies have started to soften and brown a little, add the hominy.

Add the beans and meats back in and then cover the whole thing with chicken broth.  Let it simmer over lowish heat for a long time.

J.  suggests making a sofrito of onion, garlic and tomato paste which you can then add for more flavor.  She also suggests a bay leaf or two (removed before serving) and some coriander.  Not my favorite flavors so I left them out.  J. also reminded me that if you were using samp and dry beans, you’d want to let them get good and tender (about an hour) before adding the veggies and meats back in- otherwise they’ll get too soft and be mushy.

Serve with lots of broth.  Mmmm.

J also suggests frying some of it the next morning (minus the broth), letting a good crisp form on the hominy/samp, and serving it with fried eggs.  I could see that being delicious.

200th Post

Not only is this my 200th post, according to WordPress, it is also the post that follows my Julia post, which was chosen to be “freshly pressed” by WordPress.  So, no small amount of pressure here.  It’s sort of paralyzing, really- should it be a Grandma recipe?  A family story?  A long over-due letter to my six month old son?

Yipes.  The pressure….

After much thought, I’m throwing caution to the winds and giving you a recipe from my father.  On this blog, I talk a lot about my grandmother who was a fantastic cook and poke fun at my mother, who was not.  I’ve written a bit about my father before but perhaps now I can say a bit more.

My dad and my mom divorced when I was 8.  They had been married 13 years and together for many years prior to that.  They were college sweethearts and managed to maintain a strong relationship after the divorce.  In fact, they remain friends now. Part of this was due to a mutual desire to co-parent me, part of it is just who they are.

A large piece of it was how close my dad was to my mother’s family.  Dad wasn’t close to his own family after high school and he and my (maternal) grandmother hit it off right away.  In fact, my parents are together- they both say- because when they broke up after college, my dad still spent time at the house with my mother’s brothers and parents.  When my mother pointed out to her family that they’d broken up and so maybe my dad shouldn’t be around all that much, her family replied, “But we didn’t break up with him, you did!”  My parents could see they weren’t going to win that battle and so, got married.

My father’s favorite memories of my grandmother are from when he would stay at the house.  He and my grandmother were morning people and so would sit together at the table, before anyone else was up, and have coffee, toast and chat about everything: stuff they read in the paper, things about the family, random thoughts.  They were very close.

So it’s only natural that my father was the other big cooking influence in my immediate family.  I mostly recall him cooking breakfasts for me but when I was in college, he’d cook dinner for me when I visited.  His range has expanded over the years but I most associate Tex-Mex with my college visits.  This is because we were in Colorado, not New England.

So, it’s no surprise that when he was here last, he cooked enchiladas for me.  He likes to cook when he comes to visit.  I cook with him- much like I did with my grandmother- and we chop vegetables, stir and gossip as we go.   In the end, we’re rewarded with yummy food and another bonding experience to add to our list (which includes wiffle ball games, walking on the beach, cook outs and attending CC  hockey games.  It also includes having “adventures”- which were everything from getting lost to trips to historical places.).

Here he is with my daughter, having an adventure (we visited the zoo). I’m pretty sure I have the exact same photo somewhere, only it’s me and we’re wearing more 70′s clothing.

I give you Dad’s bean enchiladas.  They’re quite good and other than the filling/rolling, not too hard or time-consuming.  You could, if you wanted to, add chicken or another meat but they don’t really need it.  The spice level can also be tailored to suit your tastes.  Dad eyeballed it and may have added a touch more cayenne than we meant to but in the end, it was all good.

Ingredients

1 red bell pepper, chopped

1/2 green bell pepper, chopped (I don’t like green so we used one orange pepper)

1/2 onion, chopped

28 oz can tomato sauce

1 1/2 cups of corn (frozen is ok)

1 can black beans, drained and rinsed

1 can pinto beans, drained and rinsed

2 Tablespoons cilantro, chopped (if you’ve been reading along you will not be surprised by my hiss as I left this out- cilantro is the devil)

2 Tablespoons chili powder

1 1/2 teaspoons cumin

1 1/2 teaspoons garlic powder

1/2- 1 teaspoon cayenne or 1 chopped jalapeno with seeds

1 package corn tortillas

4 cups of shredded mexican cheeses (usually cheddar and montery jack along with others)

1 28 oz can red enchilada sauce (you can actually make your own enchilada sauce without too much fuss- Cooks Illustrated has a great recipe)

Directions

Saute the peppers and onions in a little bit of olive oil over medium-high heat.  I’d throw in the onions first and let them brown a bit and then add the peppers. You want them soft but not burnt, crispy or caramelized.  Stir in the tomato sauce and the beans.  Then add the corn and seasonings.

Here’s Dad, adding ever so slightly too much cayenne pepper. Spicy!

You can vary the amount of sauce, adding a bit more if it seems too dry or thick.  Once it’s all combined, simmer over low heat for about five minutes.

Meanwhile, line a 9 x 13 baking pan with foil.  Trust me- it makes for easier clean-up.

I was going to add these tomatoes to the sauce but we ended up just snacking on them as we cooked.  Sungold tomatoes may be the best thing about summer.  I’m just sayin’.

Here is where I diverge with my dad.  He says to use the faucet to thoroughly wet two tortillas at a time and then to microwave them on a paper towel for 8-10 seconds.  He claims this will heat and soften them enough to fill and roll them without cracking.  This was not true for me.  Mine cracked anyway.  I usually dip each one in the enchilada sauce and then roll them.  And they crack anyway.  So, I’m open to tips on how to do this without cracking?  I suspect the brand of tortilla as well as its age may be a factor.

At any rate, pour a little bit of enchilada sauce into the baking pan and preheat your oven to 375.  Get your tortillas ready any way you please and spoon a bit of the filling into each one.  Be careful, the filling is probably hot.  I’d say about a solid tablespoon or two should do it.

Add some cheese. Or put in the cheese first.  Either way.

Then roll it up- carefully, as it will crack, unless you’re a wizard or something- and place it, seam side down in the pan.  Continue until you have run out of filling.  Or are too impatient to do any more. (If that’s the case, the filling is yummy over rice or pasta or just all on its own).

Pour the rest of the enchilada sauce over the pan, making sure to cover all the tortillas so they don’t dry out.  Top with cheese.  Lots of cheese, if you’re me.

Bake for about 15 minutes or until the cheese is all melted, gooey and yummy.

These freeze really well, too, so pop a few into a freezable container and then you’ll have dinner all ready when you’re craving something warm and comforting.

Pioneering

Well, hello there again!  Come on in, grab a seat.  Just move that basket of laundry aside (It’s clean, I promise), and, oh, wait, don’t sit on the crayons, let me move those.  Would you like something to drink?  I have….. milk, water and juice.  Hmm.  Apparently we have no wine or beer.  Anyway, would you like a snack?  I have, um, pretzels, snap-pea crisps and, um, baby yogurt.  Hmmm.  Apparently we don’t have much food.  Well, let’s chat about life.  What’s been going on with me?  Um….  actually, nothing.  Considering how much “free” time I have, it’s surprising how little I get done.  Mostly I spend time with my two kids- one is at daycare most days- and do laundry.  Lots of laundry.  Loads of laundry, if you will.

Sometimes I do watch television, though.  Mostly Food TV, Big Bang Theory re-runs on TBS and, sadly, various shows on Bravo (Millionaire Matchmaker and Tabatha Takes Over have sucked me in, hardcore.).  I recently got to watch an episode of The Pioneer Woman.  Now, I’ve been reading the blog for years and I love her recipes, her photographs and her story of falling in love with her husband (she was a city girl who fell in love with a cowboy and who moved to the middle of nowhere to live with him on a ranch.  She has four children and her life is magical- at least the public face of it.  Anytime I’m fed-up with my life, I click on her blog and daydream about moving somewhere isolated where I can simply spend time with my children and cook.  Then I return to reality.).  But I didn’t love her show.  She comes across differently in her writing than she does on television. Which is not a criticism, exactly, since who knows what it’s like to be on television?  I’d probably come across really differently too.

Anyway, I ended up making two recipes from that show and, who’s surprised, not only am I not the next iron chef, I am also not the pioneer woman.  The soup came out well- I’ll link to both her recipe and give you my take on it below- but the pots de creme did not work for me.  I followed her recipe exactly but for whatever reason, it didn’t set.  This is one of my continual kitchen issues.  Puddings just don’t set for me.  I did manage to fix it by cooking it in a water bath for a few minutes.  It ended up a bit like creme brulee- the top got a bit harder (read: slightly burnt) but the inside was silky smooth.

I may not be the pioneer woman, but I can pretend, right?

The Pioneer Woman’s Corn Chowder & Pots De Creme

Failure first:

The link to her Pot De Creme here.

I followed it exactly but used vanilla rather than grand marnier.  I don’t actually like chocolate and orange together.  As I said, they didn’t set but I fixed that with a bit of a bake in the oven.

Whipped cream will cover a multitude of sins.

Notice the “creme brulee” top.

Link to The Pioneer Woman’s Corn and Cheese Chowder here.

I actually followed her recipe pretty closely but I will admit, I did not measure anything.

I chopped the veggies.

Meanwhile, I cooked the onions in butter. I let mine get a bit darker than recommended.

I chopped the bacon (it’s easier to chop if it’s frozen and I tend to keep bacon in the freezer so that I always have some on hand- everything is better with bacon.) and added it to the onions.

Once the bacon and onions have cooked, add the chopped veggies.

Let those cook a bit as well.  Then add the corn.  I used frozen, the Pioneer Woman used fresh.

Sprinkle the flour over the veggies.

Stir and let the flour cook for a minute or two.  Then add the broth.

As it cooks, it will get thicker and creamy.  Add the milk or half and half or cream or whatever.

After that simmers for about fifteen minutes, add the cheese and let it all melt.

Mmmm.  So good.  The husband loved it (it has bacon) and he’s not generally a soup guy.

I may not be the Pioneer Woman but at least I can pretend sometimes.

First Kitchen Fail of the Year

Hey There.

No baby yet.

Which is ok.  I’ve been saying I need to get to tonight (I had a big week of meetings and other work obligations, wanted to be able to teach yesterday and to go to the theater with my mother- we saw American Idiot, about which I have many opinions but the basic one is, fantastic production!- and to be able to get some work done today, along with domestic things (laundry! food shopping!  cooking!)) as well as go to the theater again- this time, God of Carnage- and have dinner with my mother for her birthday).  If I can get to tonight, I’d also like to get some time in the upcoming week to get even more work done but, hey, I’ll consider it bonus time.

Of course, I’m due on Super Bowl Sunday- does this mean we have to name him after Tom Brady?

No, of course it doesn’t.  We have actually picked a name but we’re keeping pretty quiet about it until he’s here, just in case we change our minds.

At any rate, I thought I’d finally bring you a new post.  It was my first Kitchen Fail of 2012.  I actually made this on the 2nd of January, just to be sure to get it in early.  I was looking for something light and healthy, quick and easy, but not boring.

It passed on the first four but not the last one.  It was kind of bland.  I spiced it up a bit with some soy sauce but I’m not sure what it really needed.  Maybe some green onion (which I didn’t have so, to be fair, it may have been better if made correctly!).  I’m also not sure where I first read about this but I just googled it and came up with a dozen different sites with it so, you can always do that as well.

Chinese Egg and Tomato

I made the larger size since the husband adores eggs.  You can adjust for portion size- I’d say 2 eggs to 1 tomato ratio for each person.  Also, not a visually appealing dish, as far as I can tell (based on my search).  So maybe good quick-comfort-food but not dinner-for-the-queen-food.

Ingredients

2-4 eggs

1-2 tomatoes

pinch of salt

pinch of sugar

1/2 onion, minced or several scallions, chopped

Oil (I used sesame but I think peanut might have added a nice flavor)

Directions:

In a bowl, crack the eggs and beat them with the salt until they’re well combined.

Heat a tablespoon of oil in a non-stick pan over medium-high heat.  When hot, add the eggs and let them set.

Don’t let them cook all the way through and really, don’t let them brown.  Like I did.  Set them aside.

Meanwhile, chop your tomatoes into quarters.

Chop your onion as well.

In the same pan you used for the eggs, over medium high heat, add a bit more oil (if needed) and the onions.  Let them get soft and then add the tomatoes.

Cook for 2-4 minutes, letting the tomatoes release their juice and get a little bit brown and soft.  Sprinkle with a little bit of sugar, just to balance out the acidity of the tomatoes.

Add the eggs back in and mix around so that they cook throughly.

I served mine over rice and with a bit of soy sauce (I am in the camp that soy sauce makes everything better).  As I said, not visually appealing and not that exciting but it was quick, easy, filling and healthy.  Who knew they used tomatoes in China?  Not me- I always associate tomatoes with Mediterranean cuisine.

If you try it, let me know if you jazz it up and how- I have the feeling that this could be a spectacular dish with the right additions.

I’ll see you after I have a baby- I’m pretty sure I won’t have time to post until then.  Happy eating!

 

Old Friend Cornbread

I have spoken here before about one of my oldest and dearest friends, S.  We’ve known each other since the second grade and while we’ve traveled far and wide from each other, we have remained close.  Naturally, we’ve been cooking together since the second grade.  Back then, I was the more “experienced” cook.  These days we’re about equal (this is a lie, she is far more advanced than I, especially when it comes to healthy food.  Hey, she made me like both kale and quinoa- that’s no small feat!) and I often turn to her when I need a good, hardy, healthy recipe.

But when we were kids we got into more than one snafu with food.  There was the time we made scallops for my mother.  Should have been easy, right?  Yeh, well, we didn’t know how long to cook them and we didn’t want to undercook them so…  rubber.  Yick.  My mom was nice about it- had a few bites and said they were great but didn’t finish.  To be fair, these days, my darling friend makes a really delicious scallop dish that’s usually eaten around Christmas, a dish that’s so good, I sometimes wake up in the middle of the night craving it. And the scallops are never overdone.

Then there was the time we were going to make cookies and S. was reading the recipe as I gathered the ingredients.  “Oh no,” she cried, “We can’t make this!”

“Why not?” I asked, running through the ingredient list, thinking we had everything we needed- butter, sugar, flour, eggs, vanilla…

“It says, ‘cream the butter and sugar’ and we don’t have any cream!”

I burst out laughing, rather unkindly, and explained to her that the recipe meant for us to mix the butter and sugar well, not to actually add cream.

The joke’s on me these days because she can make some kick-ass cookies (she’s not always healthy).

The other wonderful thing about my friendship with S. is that we’re always in sync.  We’ll often email/call/text the other when she’s thinking of us- it’s that weird ESP-telepathy thing that women develop between themselves when they’re close.  Often when one of us is struggling with a particular situation, the other one is going through something similar.  And sometimes it’s just funny.  S. taught me how to make this cornbread once when I was visiting.  It was delicious and I make it often.  Last year I made it for the first time in a while and after I got it in the oven, I sat down to check my email.  One came in while I was checking, from S, asking me if I could send her the recipe since she was at her cousin’s house and wanted to make it.  See?  Telepathy!

Old  Friend Cornbread

I’ve never, ever been able to make cornbread.  Which has always made me feel a bit dumb—I can make Beef Wellington, cook for 200 with ease and improvise with the best of them but something as simple as cornbread eluded me.  Luckily, S saved me.  The following recipe is delicious and I’ve been able to emulate it many times.  Of course, the first few times I made it, it was awful because I was using baking soda instead of powder.  See?  The cornbread gods hate me.  Luckily, S corrected me and once again saved my cornbread from disaster.

This recipe makes an extremely large pan of cornbread- lasagna sized pan.  I tend to halve it and make an 8 inch square size since that’s a more reasonable amount of cornbread for us.  If you’re serving many (when the whole S family is together it’s something like 11 people, minimum), go ahead and make the full recipe I’m giving you here.

Ingredients:

4 c. flour

2 c. yellow cornmeal

1 ½ c. white sugar (although we’ve used brown as well and it’s been delicious)

1 tsp. salt

2 tb baking powder

4 eggs

3 c. buttermilk

2 ½ tb vegetable oil

½ c. butter, melted

 

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Sift your flour, cornmeal, sugar, salt and baking powder.  You know me, lazy, so I whisk them together rather than sift.

Stir in the eggs, buttermilk and oil.  I used a whisk but a spoon might actually work better- I switched halfway through.

As you stir, it will come together but be a bit rough and sort of sticky and dry-ish.

At this point, add the melted butter and mix to combine.  It will smooth out and moisten the batter.

Pour into a greased pan and bake for about 30-40 minutes (for 8 inch pan), about an hour to an hour fifteen for a larger pan.

It’s done when the top is sort of crackly and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.

Sunday

It’s Sunday morning here, around 9:30am.*  Sunday mornings are funny.  I know people who are just getting out of bed at this time, people who are just going to bed at this time and people who have been up for 3-4 hours by this time.  Some people spend Sunday mornings going to church or eating big breakfasts with friends and family.  Some people volunteer at food pantries or soup kitchens.  My dad used to turn on jazz and make pancakes.  My mom and I used to send one of us out for muffins and then curl up in bed with a good book.  My grandmother used to go out for bagels and lox so that her middle son and his wife could come over for breakfast.

Me?  I cook.  As much as I can because morning seems to be when the toddler can best amuse herself.  So as of the writing of this post, I have made chicken chili, cornbread and 7 loaves of challah.  I’ve also cleaned the kitchen and started removing things from the shelves (we’re moving around furniture today).  It’s been quite a morning.  I’m sure you can guess which of the above categories I fall into in terms of waking time.

Also, it’s freezing here all of a sudden.  I can’t really complain since it’s been an extremely mild and non-snowy winter (the only snow we’ve had so far was on Halloween) but, wow, is it suddenly cold.  Like 11 degrees out with a wind chill making it feel like 0 degrees kind of cold.  So chili is the thing to make on a day like this.  Plus, since it can sit on the stove all day and simmer while it gets more tasty, it’s the perfect thing for thanking my friends who will be coming over to help us move furniture (the husband is convinced that if I move heavy stuff this late in the pregnancy it will send me into labor).

Without further delay, I give you my chili recipe/guidelines.  The great thing about chili is that it is versatile.  Sometimes I add more veggies, other times, more beans.  Sometimes it’s really spicy, other times less so.  Chili is also one of those things that vary by region.  Some areas of the U.S. are aghast if you add beans to your chili, other areas serve it over pasta.  I refuse to get into that debate and simply make my chili as suits my mood each time.  So use this recipe as a jumping off point for yourself- make your chili to suit your mood.

Chili

This makes a big pot of chili which can probably serve 5-8 people, depending on portion size.  Chili also gets better over time so it’s good to have leftovers to eat throughout the week.  You can also substitute any kind of veggie or bean that sounds good to you at the time.

Ingredients

1-3 red, yellow and/or orange peppers (you can use green as well but I don’t like green peppers)

1 onion, chopped

3 stalks celery, chopped

3 carrots, peeled and chopped

3-4 cloves of garlic, smashed and chopped

1 lb ground meat (I use chicken)

2 cans kidney beans, 1 can black beans, 1 can garbonzo beans or any combo you like

1 large can diced tomatoes (or stewed or crushed)

1 cup frozen corn

salt, pepper, olive oil, chili powder, cumin, cayenne pepper

Directions:

In a large, heavy pot, heat some olive oil over medium-high heat.  How much?  A tablespoon or two.  Add your chopped onions and let them soften and get a bit charred.  It adds some nice, smoky flavor.

Once the onions have done their thing, add the ground meat (if using) and let that get brown. It helps to use the back of a spoon to break up the meat into chunks.

Chop your veggies.

Check your meat/onion mixture.  If it’s browning up, add some chili powder, cumin, cayenne, salt and pepper.  Maybe a few teaspoons.  I like to season at this step and then again further along in the cooking time.  The spices really need to be to your taste- some people like it really hot (cayenne) and others like the smoky, sort of earthy flavor of the cumin.  Stir the spices around and then add your veggies and stir again.

Let this cook for a few minutes while you open the beans and rinse them off.  You can use any combo of beans you like.  I tend to favor kidney (because they scream chili to me), black (because I love them and they’re a superfood) and garbanzo (I find them delightful in  any mix).  Just make sure to rinse them well since canned beans can sometimes taste like tin.  Of course you could use dried beans but that involves a soaking process which I never remember to do.

Add your beans to the pot and stir.

Add the tomatoes (juice and all) and stir again.  I’ve use fresh tomatoes as well, it just depends on what you have on hand.

Now, let it just sit, over low heat, covered for as little as 30 minutes to as long as all day.  Stir occasionally.  Towards the add, you can add the corn if you like.  I find it gives a nice sweet pop to the chili but I’m also loving corn right now, for whatever reason.

This chili is actually really good for you- it’s all veggies and good protein.  Which is why I do not feel badly eating big bowls of it and topping it with shredded cheese and sometimes even some greek yogurt or sour cream.  I also usually make cornbread to go with it.  I’ll save that one for another post but I have a really good cornbread recipe.  Really good.

As the chili sits, the liquid will release and make a kind of sauce.  You can add tomato paste if you want it thicker but I like it the way it is.  Adjust seasonings to taste.  I will often add a teaspoon or two of sugar, just to cut the acid of all the veggies.

Really delicious, pretty healthy and will definitely warm you up on a cold day.  Even if you make it in the morning.

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*Of course, I’m posting this around 6pm so that just tells you how my days tend to go.  To be fair, all furniture is moved (thank you to T, K and T!) and things have been put away but really, this is the first time I’ve sat down long enough to finish this!