Simple as That

Why does everything have to be so complicated? I’ve been asking myself that a lot this week. Well, the truth is, it doesn’t. Let’s take my new favorite cocktail as an example.

Last week, my friend Heidi and I were finishing up dinner at Oddfellows, and asked the bartender about her after dinner drinks. From a long list, we picked Carpano Antica--a sweet Itaian vermouth.  “It’s what the girls behind the bar are into these days."  Why not? Out it came, in a glass with ice and a hefty slice of lemon peel.

Let me tell you, it’s a gift from the heavens. Smooth and tangy, with a deep chocolatey richness. But not too sweet. And a little bitter bite from the lemon. We fell in love.

Now, dinner with Heidi is really good, no matter what we eat. And sometimes its glow can impair our judgment a little—like when a Cliff Bar actually tastes good after a long hike. So I tried it out on a few more people, including my mom. At this point, and I am still actively testing, 9 out of 10 people agree that Carpano Antica is damn good, and well worth the $40 it costs at the liquor store.

You have to try it. Simple as that.

Nettles! It Must Be Spring

With nettles popping up on everyone’s menu these last few weeks, I decided I had to try them myself. Or rather, try them again. When I was in middle school, I learned how to pick nettles without stinging myself (and without gloves) and set out to make nettle tea. But I forgot the cleaning step, and my tea tasted like mud. My tea was mud.

So last week, with my fearless friends, I headed out to hunt for nettles. They were young and about six inches high, which is great for eating because they are tender and you can still eat the stalks, but made them a bit hard to find. Once we got the hang of it though, we were nettle harvesting machines. Though no particular step was difficult, there were many steps.

We found them and clipped them.

This time, we decided to wash them.

Then we blanched them and squeezed out all the water.

 

Chopped and sautéed them, and put them on pizza. We made a few kinds. My favorite was a thinly veiled version of the nettle pizza at Delancey last week: nettles, caramelized onions, and ricotta.

Pizza Dough
This is my trusty pizza dough recipe from Martha Stewart, many years back. Never fails to deliver flavorful, crispy, thin crust. Works well on the grill or in the oven.

2 cups warm water

½ t sugar
2 packets active dry yeast
3T olive oil
6 cups flour
1T Kosher salt

• Mix water, sugar, and yeast in a bowl until the yeast has dissolved. Let stand for 5 minutes.
• Mix flour and salt in the bowl of an electric mixer. Add the yeast water. Knead for 5 minutes.  (You can do this by hand if you don't have a mixer.)
• Turn the dough onto a floured counter, make it into a ball, and put it in an oiled bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and let it rise for 40-60 minutes, until doubled.
• Punch it down, fold it over a few times, make it into a ball again, put it back in the bowl, cover and let it rise for another 40-60 minutes.
• Turn the dough onto the floured counter and cut it into 6 chunks. Knead each chunk into a ball and cover 5 of them with plastic. Flatten the remaining ball into a little disc and let it sit for 5 minutes. When the 5 minutes are up, remove another ball and flatten it. Then roll the rested disc into a pizza crust (8-10 inches in diameter). Repeat with all the dough balls.
• You can store the uncooked crusts, layered with parchment and wrapped with plastic, for a few days. When you’re ready to cook, oil them generously, top them sparingly, and cook as hot as you can for 5-10 minutes. My oven goes to 550 degrees, and the bbq gets hotter.

Broccoli Love

Nothing says “I love you” like broccoli. Candies are nice. Stuffed animals are cuddly. But true love comes in the form of a fresh, green head of broccoli. For starters, it makes a lovely bouquet.

And it’s very good for you. Chock-full of vitamin C, vitamin A, folic acid, calcium, potassium, anti-oxidants and fiber, broccoli has been credited with detoxifying, curing stomach problems, improving skin, reducing cholesterol, improving bone health, preventing cancer, and more.

And if that’s not enough, broccoli is incredibly tasty as well.

So this Valentine's Day, instead of burdening your sweetie with landfill junk or processed sugar, give them some broccoli. Straight from the heart.

Here is one of my favorite ways to prepare broccoli. It's great with steak and scalloped potatoes. The recipe comes from my friend Tom. He’s one of those guys who always has really good ideas. He’s overflowing with them. So all you need to do is hang with him and you’re bound to pick up a few yourself. Thanks, Tom!

Tom’s Broccoli
Broccoli, cut into bite-sized florets, stalk sliced thin
Olive oil
Salt
Red pepper flakes
Garlic
Lemon juice
Parmesan cheese

• Toss the broccoli with olive oil, salt, whole garlic cloves, and red pepper flakes.
• Roast in a single layer at 350 degrees for 45-50 minutes. The edges should be crispy and brown.
• Remove from the oven and toss with lemon juice and parmesan.

Ad Hoc at my Mom's House

Thomas Keller’s Ad Hoc at Home certainly got a lot of buzz this holiday season. It seemed to get reviewed by every cookbook critic, and make every "top gifts" list.

Come mid December, demand for the book was rampant, and it appeared to be poised for a top-notch holiday run. But apparently the publisher was the last to know—Ad Hoc at Home was out of stock, everywhere you looked.

I ordered one for my brother, wrapped an IOU for Christmas, and the book just arrived this week. It’s beautiful. Coffee table-worthy. So much so that we discussed how we’ll just need to get over its beauty and get it dirty like every other cook book.

And it’s a really great resource—step by step photo instructions on how to piece a chicken, transferrable tips sprinkled in to the recipes.

We tried our first recipe last night for my mom’s birthday—Chicken Mar i Muntanya, or paella. In my family, the best meals are the all-hands-on-deck kind, where everyone’s busy and working together. Someone’s frying chicken, someone’s washing dishes, someone’s chopping parsley, and someone’s holding the baby. And this was certainly an all-hands-on-deck meal.

We loved it. And I’m excited to try some more recipes from the book, which was worth the wait. It was so good that it made up for the disaster of a coconut birthday cake that I made and ruined.

Check out Chicken Mar i Muntanya, and let me know what you think.

Oh, Risotto

Sometimes winter just feels like the time we spend waiting for summer. Maybe if I was a skier I could appreciate it more. Or if Seattle delivered any sort of wonderland, I would find it to be more special. But instead I wait for the days to get longer. The drizzle to let up. The produce to fill out.

As a consolation prize, for the past few years I have tried to really learn a recipe in the winter. Learn it so well that I wouldn’t dream of using a recipe. So I know what every tweak will do to the final dish. I’ve tackled red sauce, and risotto, and this year I am learning meatballs.

I’ve tried my first batch and I have many more to try before I get there. The first round was tasty, but the flavor was a little too bacony. I need to try other meats, like lamb, veal, and pork, and to mess with the fillers a bit. How many bread crumbs give that held-together texture without feeling diluted?

Tonight, I made dinner with my mom and we made very classic mushroom risotto, calling on my lessons from a few years ago. Here’s where I've ended up with risotto.

Risotto

4 T butter

1onion, diced
3 small cloves garlic
6 cups liquid (broth, wine, mushroom water…)
1 ½ cups Arborio rice
1 T fresh herbs
1-2 cups solids (peas, cooked mushrooms, roasted squash, asparagus….)
½ cup parmesan or other hard salty cheese

1. Melt the butter in a large skillet and sauté the onion until translucent, about 15 min.
2. Add the rice and stir to coat.
3. Bring the liquid to a simmer in a separate sauce pan.
4. Add 1 ½ cups liquid to the rice. Stir until evaporated.
5. Keep adding liquid, ½ cup at a time, and stirring until it evaporates.
6. When you add the last of the liquid, add the solids and the herbs as well.
7. Turn off the heat and stir in the cheese.

Bloodhound Gang

I bought a family-sized can of Mentos at the duty free store last weekend. It felt like the right thing to do. It was late, and we had some more time in the car ahead of us until we made it to Whistler, so I thought we needed a boost. They came in special packaging only available at the duty free store (Travelers Only): individually wrapped, fancy pop-top that doubles as a Mento catapult, and two mystery flavors.

 

Silly marketing for kids. Except that my car full of 30 somethings loved it. What are the mystery flavors? Do I like them? Can I find another one? With all the real unanswered questions we wade through each day, there’s something fun about a mystery that can be solved. And is inconsequential. We were the Bloodhound Gang.

 

It’s like the fun of secret ingredients. Usually I am drawn to food that you can see and know what it is--nothing's better than a well composed cheese plate or a caprese salad. But the Bloodhound detective in me still likes a mystery ingredient challenge from time to time. And the rich lore around grandmas’ secret ingredients makes me think I should be building a cache of my own.

What are your favorite secret ingredients?  Here are a two of mine:

• Smoothies: I love to make them with frozen berries and yogurt. Instead of using juice or milk to thin them, use water! You’ll love it. No extra sugar from the juice, no extra dairy from the milk, just yummy drinkable fruitiness.
• Chicken stock: What gives my stock that sweet earthy roundness? Parsnips—my favorite for full flavored stocks.

Au Revoir, Gourmet

I was back at work this week after two and a half weeks off, and I feel so lucky to be able to say that it was great. I love my job. It’s busy and challenging, fun, and I work with amazing people.

So let me tell you about what I cooked this week. Nothing. I cooked nothing. If fried eggs count, then put that on the list, but I don’t think they do when the only reason I cooked them was because I was out of bread for toast, milk for granola, and I didn’t feel like eating almonds and a piece of cheese for breakfast—again.

So this weekend I am giving myself an emotional jumpstart—ready to roll on Monday with food in the fridge, a few meals planned, and the intention to cook. Part of my jumpstart is finally putting an end to my mourning period for Gourmet Magazine. I was a subscriber, and now it’s time to move on.

Here are the contenders.

Saveur: I love this magazine. Really interesting articles and cool recipes from around the world. I always learn something, but when I want to read a long article, I’m going to choose the New Yorker. My food magazine fills a different need. Save Saveur for plane rides.

Martha Stewart Living: Those who know me know about my strong allegiance to Martha. I stood by her when she was in jail. But I stopped subscribing when she started giving templates to trace for craft projects. I’m not seven—seriously. But that phase seems to have ended, and this is a really good magazine again. A top contender, for sure.

Bon Apetit: Conde Nast seems to think I should switch to Bon Apetit because they sent it to me for free, but I didn’t want to be swayed.

Cook’s Illustrated: This is a little unfair because I already subscribe to Cook’s Illustrated. I love it, and will continue to subscribe. It’s more of a “teach a girl to fish” than a “give a girl a fish” magazine, and I still remember tips that I read years ago. But CI fills a different need. It is not eye candy.

Food & Wine: Bad design. I can’t even make it to the recipes because there are too many dotted lines, and double borders and weird shapes and pointless graphics. Reading my food magazine shouldn’t be painful.

Fine Cooking: I think this is the winner. A family friend recommended it to my mom, who recommended it to me. I am new to it, so only have 2 months of experience, but I want to try all the recipes, I seem to be in line with their food philosophy, it’s a good mix of easy recipes, harder recipes, tips, and food info. Visually, it’s not as stunning as Living, but it’s way better than Food & Wine, and I think I can live with it.


Am I missing anything? If no, I think I’ll go ahead and subscribe to Fine Cooking.