Archive for the 'good eatin'' Category

August 10, 2008 | Filed under: country mouse, good eatin'

…and I won. Sort of. Technically I came in second, but really the 1st and 2nd place prizes were identical in value, but the 1st place winner got to choose which one they wanted.Not to put too fine a point on it (and not that it matters, because really it was all in good fun), but I was robbed. Robbed! I was robbed! My melon was SO much more bare than the winner’s! Ask anybody!  

June 8, 2008 | Filed under: 20 seconds and under, good eatin', misadventures

The day started off great! Birthday party, face-painting, pizza and good friends. Then it took an ugly turn.

The party was on Long Island and we were driving home upstate from there. We knew we had the Belmont Stakes, a Yankees game and just plain ‘Saturday’ to contend with traffic-wise, and because of that and the fact that we had my entire record collection and a whole mess of baby tomato plants in the bed of the truck on a 90F day, we knew we had to hit the road early.

But something went wrong. We zigged when we should have zagged and after a spell I looked out the window and saw water. We were deep South instead of Way North. We got off the highway but couldn’t get back on and ended up driving through the whole of Brooklyn– all of it, no really ALL OF IT from Canarsie through Kings Plaza, Midwood, Prospect Park, Park slope, Fort Green and Williamsburg– via Flatbush Ave. On a Saturday afternoon.

You may have to be a New Yorker to appreciate how awful that really is. If you’re not, here’s a visual:

The drivers were complete maniacs, we got cut off from the right at literally every block. The traffic getting past the GWB and Yankee Stadium was insane. We left the party at 2:30 and didn’t get out of the damn city ’till about 5:30.

We didn’t get home ’till 8:30.

We were broken.

So we broke out the champagne we’d been saving for a rainy day.

(it was also raining)

February 11, 2008 | Filed under: good eatin'

I love food. I love eating. I love cooking. I hate eggplant.

While in Istanbul I discovered something extraordinary: I love eggplant.

I’ve been testing several different eggplant recipes over the last couple of weeks and last night realized that I had forgotten the most obvious one, eggplant parmagiana. I love chicken parmagiana, so I figured I’d love the eggplant version, too.

But it just didn’t seem like enough; just eggplant tomato sauce and cheese? That’s it? Seemed sort of boring. Seemed like there wasn’t enough food in that food. I wanted to add another layer, but what? I have to admit that ‘chicken’ came to mind.

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. What’s that other vegetable that’s fabulous breaded and fried? Oh, yes.

Talk about obvious.

SOUTHERN FRIED PARM

1 medium sized eggplant, partially peeled in wide stripes, sliced 1/2″ thick

1 big green tomato sliced the same size as the eggplant

2 or 3 eggs well mixed in a bowl

flour with a little black pepper

bread crumbs + crushed Pepperidge Farm Stuffing + some parmesan cheese, too

oil for frying (or, a cookie sheet for baking if you’re not into frying, which is crazy, by the way)

the tomato sauce of your choice. I used a whole large jar of Classico Caramelized Onion & Roasted Garlic flavored sauce

more parmesan cheese — grate it fresh if you’ve got it

mozz

1. sprinkle eggplant slices very lightly with salt and set in a colander for 15 minutes.

2. to spare yourself more dirty dishes and, roll down the sides of a clean plastic grocery bag till it lays reasonably flat. Put the flour on the left and the breadcrumb mixture on the right. I like panko, but it really doesn’t hold up to all that time under sauce in the oven. I use Italian seasoned breadcrumbs mixed with some stuffing mix for extra crunch. The cheese is a bonus. Flour both sides of the slices, shake ‘em, then dip in egg, let the excess drip off, then dip it in the crumbs. Set aside on waxed paper or a rack. This process takes longer than you think. Mid-way through, heat up your frying oil.

3. Repeat with the tomato slices.

4. Test the oil with a small eggy bread crumb ball. If it sizzles in a lively happy way, then fry your eggplant slices in batches, followed by your tomato slices, about 3 minutes on a side for each. Don’t crowd them or the temperature of your oil will drop too far. Set slices aside on a rack as you go (NOT a paper towel! It’ll get all greasy, soggy and steamed!). Halfway through the frying, pre-heat your oven to 400F.

4. Put a little sauce in the bottom of a glass baking dish big enough to hold all the slices. I used a 3″ deep round one. Add a layer of eggplant, a sprinkle of parm and then a more sauce. Top with a layer of fried tomato, parm and sauce etc, till you end up with one last layer of eggplant. Top with remaining sauce and top THAT with shredded mozz. Use good mozz, if you can. I used lame generic shredded 2% mozz, which was fine, but the dish would have really benefited from decent cheese.

5. Bake till cheese is bubbly and lightly browned.

6. Let stand a couple of minutes, then serve with pasta tossed lightly with olive oil, or rice, or orzo, or whatever you want!

Serves 2 with seconds and leftovers for lunch, or four with no seconds and no leftovers.

December 19, 2007 | Filed under: good eatin'

I’ve been trying to post this video for four days. Apparently there are some signal problems at Time Warner Cable that are affecting upload speeds in my neighborhood. Mega annoying. But the nice man at TWC Tier Three Customer Service said it should be fixed before the weekend. I have my fingers crossed.

A third of the way through NaVloPoMo there was much twitterbuzz surrounding The Truth Fairy’s fantastically rich and butt-widening carbonara recipe (that I’ve made no less than five times since the posting; for Christmas, I’d like new jeans). Cheryl tweeted something like “The carbonara is so good we should do a vlog cook-off!” and then The Truth Fairy tweeted “You think THAT was good you should see my risotto!” and I tweeted “Oh yeah?” and he tweeted “Yeah!” and then I said “Oh YEAH?” and then…

…actually it didn’t go quite like that. But there was mention of risotto and a food challenge so I filled in much of the rest. There’s not much of December left, so get cooking! It’s DecVloRisMo!

(December Vlog Risotto Month! Duh!)

I make this dish all the time so exact measurements have long left my mind. But here’s an approximation of the recipe:

3 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 small onion chopped (about 1/2 cup)
1 small shallot finely chopped
1 cups arborio rice
1/4 cup dry white wine
About 3-4 cups of hot chicken stock or vegetable stock
1 small-med butternut squash cut into medium dice (3/4″)
4 slices cooked bacon, in little pieces, but not crumbled. Or 4oz chopped pancetta cooked till crispy.
1/2 cup grated Parmesan, or, if you’re me, way, way more
1 tablespoon unsalted butter (cut into little pieces)

a couple of drops of truffle oil (totally optional)
In a medium-size heavy saucepan, heat the olive oil over medium-high heat. Add the onion and shallot and saute until just soft, about 4-5 minutes. Add the rice and continue stirring (use a wooden spoon if you have one) coating all the rice with oil. Add the wine and stir till it has been absorbed by the rice.

Pour in just enough chicken stock to cover the rice, and stir often until all the liquid is absorbed. Add the cubed squash, and continue adding hot broth in small amounts (1/2 cup) and stirring frequently until the rice is creamy and the squash is just tender (don’t over cook it or it’ll be all mush and not cubed at all! Don’t obsess about constantly stirring. If you need to rest your arm or answer the phone or go pee, that’s fine. Your risotto will not suffer.

Add the bacon (mmmmmm…)

Stir in the parmesan and the butter.

Serve in warm bowls for a super fancy effect, and garnish with a sprinkle of additional cheese and little chopped Italian parsley or cilantro. One or two drops of truffle oil go a long, long way.

La Donna e Mobile from Rigoletto sung by Signore Bartolotta recorded on a British Sterling wax cylinder (#531) from 1906. Thanks, Internet Archive! You always have the coolest stuff!

November 23, 2007 | Filed under: NaVloPloMo 2007, Holiday! Celebrate!, good eatin'

Another Thanksgiving Day has passed us by. With all those friends, loved ones and food, one day is not enough! I think Thanksgiving should be a week-long national holiday (but with the banks open. And also the Post Office).

‘Round our house, Thanksgiving lasts until the last scrap of turkey is gone.