01.24.10
Posted in Beef, Breakfast, Cookies & Candies, Dessert, Dinner, Meats, Persnickety Bits, Pies & Tarts, Poultry, Quick Breads, Sides, Veggies at 7:34 pm by julie
It’s been a few months since I’ve managed to post anything on the blog. I wish I could use the busy holiday season as my excuse, but that really isn’t the case. In truth, I’ve been faithfully cataloging our meals by date, complete with edited photos and recipe notations. However, when it comes time to write up a finished post, I stall out trying to find some way around the admission that most of the food I cook these days is purely utilitarian. I cook largely from the pantry because getting to the grocery store is often problematic, and my pantry is stripped to the basics for financial reasons, so most of the time I feel like the little Dutch boy, constantly plugging the gaps in my recipes with substitutes. I’m also trying to cook for, and around, a 22-month old who is simultaneously going through a picky phase and cutting his 2-year molars. I like to say that cooking is the only hobby I can make time for these days, but it’s not true if I define the hobby aspect as pushing my boundaries with new ingredients and techniques. It’s all I can do to get a coherent meal on the table these days, and writing it in black and white on the blog just drives that point home.
I know I’m not the only one out there whose financial and family responsibilities sometimes overshadow the fun parts of cooking, so I’ll try to get past my writer’s block and get back to the posts. They may not always be exciting or challenging, but hopefully they may help some people who are in a similar predicament. I’ll start by filling in a few of the gaps since the holiday season.
We didn’t cook Thanksgiving dinner on Thanksgiving this year. We were invited up to eat with my husband’s relatives, and shared a great day with them. Nolan ate heartily and had a fantastic time sharing toys and kisses with everyone there. I brought along a batch of whole wheat-walnut butterhorns, a loaf of pumpkin bread with a banana cream swirl (leftover cannoli filling, actually), and two pies, white chocolate pecan and cinnamon crumble apple. We came home with just some the desserts leftover, and the refrigerator almost seemed haunted by a lack of turkey and sides; the extra pie disappeared far too quickly for our health.
About a week later, I gave into my itch and made a mini-Thanksgiving dinner centered around a roasted chicken. I used some pre-mixed turkey brine to flavor the chicken, but miscalculated the percentages, because the chicken came out extremely salty, so much so that the gravy I made from the drippings was nearly inedible. At least it was just a 4-lb chicken, and the sides helped balance out some of the overseasoning: steamed broccoli, apple and onion cornbread stuffing, mashed potatoes, pureed sweet potatoes with sherry and fried onions, and yeasted pan rolls left over from a previous meal. We didn’t much care for the stuffing, which was a little dry and gritty for our tastes, but I may not have added enough liquid. I liked the sweet potatoes quite a bit because they walked that line of sweet and savory; Jeremy thought they were good, but left off the fried onions. For dessert, I made a caramelized walnut tart that was very tasty and roundly appreciated. I should note that all of these items were made from the freezer and pantry.
The week before Christmas, Jeremy came home from Costco with an 11-lb turkey. I admit that my heart fell when I saw it, because we had talked about doing some sort of beef roast for Christmas dinner, and I thought he was changing the menu without a consult. As it turns out, there was just such a good deal on turkeys that he couldn’t pass it up: something like $10 for a turkey that size. This time I avoided the brining, and rubbed my turkey with miso butter; I also baked a loaf of bread in advance so we would be able to have our standard slow cooker stuffing, and tried out a carrot souffle since we were out of yams. The turkey made for great leftovers and stock, but was generally forgettable. The carrot souffle was interesting and worth making again with a few tweaks. I didn’t have sharp cheddar so I just used medium, which costs less. Although I minced the onion as finely as possible, we found their texture to be unpalatable in the otherwise smooth souffle, since they are added raw after the carrots are pureed, and didn’t cook through in the oven; next time I would either grate the onion on a microplane, saute it minced, or possibly cook it along with the carrot. It would definitely be a good change of pace for us from time to time, though, since I always seem to be working my way through a big bag of organic carrots from Costco.
I wasn’t able to make my Daring gingerbread house in December because I ran out of most of my baking spices (cinnamon, ginger, cloves, and vanilla), and needed to save what little I did have on hand for edible baked goods, like molasses spice cookies. The latter were addictive, made from my last little bit of freshly ground whole spices, plus organic molasses and demerara sugar. I also made my personal favorite, pecan snowballs, and tried out some cinnamon-kissed chocolate oatmeal cookies from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking.
With all those cookies in the house, we forsook a fancy dessert to go with our Christmas dinner, which was made all the more festive by my parents’ arrival at the airport at 4pm on the very day. I had anticipated making as much of the meal in advance as possible, and splurging on a beef tenderloin roast that would take less than an hour to cook, but the cost of a standing rib roast was so much more reasonable that I adjusted the plan. The roast was dry-brined overnight in the fridge, and removed to room temperature as we walked out the door for the airport. Upon returning, we opened presents and nibbled on stuffed mushrooms and fresh bread with white bean hummus until the roast and fixings were ready. I went with a porcini jus, sweet potato puree with goat cheese and truffle oil, mustard roasted potatoes, and the cream braised Brussels sprouts that I’ve made for my folks before. The roast beef came out delicious and perfectly cooked, the Brussels sprouts vanished in a flash, the roasted potatoes were adequate, and Jeremy thought the goat cheese masked the flavor of the sweet potatoes (which may have been why I thought they were pretty good).
The leftover prime rib made for excellent sandwiches in the days after Christmas, but the most interesting meal we had was not one I cooked. My father was kind enough to share his new speciality with us: ebelskivers. He’s made many varieties of these tiny round pancakes, both sweet and savory, usually with a dollop of filling hidden inside like a treasure. This time, he filled the ebelskivers with a cinnamon apple filling, and topped them off with powdered sugar. They made perfect, tender little bites, and we all loved them, so much so that I really wish I had an ebelskiver pan now.
That pretty much brings things up to speed. Since Nolan started cutting his 2-year molars just after New Years, he’s barely been eating at all. Suggestions on how to fatten up a scrawny toddler greatly appreciated!
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07.02.09
Posted in Cuisines, Dinner, Dips & Spreads, Italian, Pastas, Quick Breads at 5:02 pm by julie
I’ve made this recipe so many times I’ve lost count, and was actually surprised to discover that I hadn’t written it up on the blog before. It is a good way to use up that extra bit of ricotta you’ve neglected in the fridge, its remaining ingredients are all pantry staples, and the sauce takes no more time to cook than the pasta, so it is a particularly good recipe to have in the arsenal for those days when you’re looking around the kitchen at dinnertime, scratching your head and trying to figure out what to sling together (or maybe that’s just me!).
I’ve made it alternately with orecchiette, fusili, and these radiattore, and usually serve with some sort of bread for my bread fiend to dunk in the sauce. On this occasion, I went with parmesan popovers and garlic butter, as a quick take on garlic bread. They were alright, but the garlic butter really seemed to make all the difference, because I found the plain popovers on the bland side.
Pasta Pomodoro e Ricotta
3/4 lb. pasta (orecchiette, fusilli, or radiattore work well)
14 1/2 oz. can diced tomatoes
2 T tomato paste
1 T chopped fresh basil, or 1 tsp dried basil
6 oz. ricotta
salt and pepper, to taste
Boil pasta, as described on the package. Meanwhile, place the diced tomatoes and tomato paste in a medium sauce pan. Add the the ricotta and puree with a stick blender until the sauce is smooth (or alternately, combine the tomatoes, paste, and ricotta in a blender and puree before pouring in the sauce pan), and heat through, allowing the cheese to melt and combine with the tomatoes. Add the basil, and salt and pepper to taste. If desired, throw in a handful of baby spinach and let it just wilt from the heat of the sauce; a handful of frozen peas stirred in at the end would be another nice alternative.
When the pasta is ready, spoon it on a plate and top with the tomato sauce. Sprinkle with additional basil, ground pepper, or parmesan.
Source: Slightly adapted from Accidental Hedonist.
Parmesan Popovers
1 C AP flour
2 extra-large eggs
1 C whole milk
2/3 C parmesan
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1/2 tsp herbs de Provence
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.
In a blender, combine all ingredients. Blend on medium speed until combined. Spray a muffin pan with nonstick cooking spray. Pour the batter into the muffin cups, filling each cup 3/4 full. Bake until puffed and golden brown, about 40 minutes. Remove popovers from pan, and cut a slit in the top of each one to allow excess steam to escape, which will keep them from getting soggy. (As an added bonus, slather the insides of the popovers with garlic butter while they’re warm. I make mine with unsalted butter, lots of pan-roasted garlic—toast the cloves in a dry, hot skillet with their skins still on, until the skins brown up in spots, then flatten them with the side of your knife, remove the skins and mash them—some grated parmesan, a good pinch of salt, and a little paprika for color.)
Source: Adapted from Epicurious and Everyday Italian.
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04.18.09
Posted in American, Baby Food, Cuisines, Dinner, Meats, Pastas, Poultry, Quick Breads, Sausage at 1:17 pm by julie
I obviously do way more cooking than I have time or inclination to write about here. Many posts get put on the back burner so many times that they are out of season before I have a chance to come back to them; others were pretty good meals that I just can’t muster up pithy comments for. So I’ve decided to institute a new periodic series: Leftover Night, my way of cleaning out the virtual fridge from time to time.
Our first Leftover Night dish was nothing really innovative, just a pretty tasty pasta dish that made way more food than we could eat. I raided the freezer for the Italian sausage I had leftover from making last month’s lasagna, and paired it up with some tomatoes, cream and bowties. My only adjustment to the original recipe was deglazing the sausage, onions and garlic with a little white wine to hit some of the alcohol-soluble flavors in the tomato. I cut this recipe down a little in size and we still had two days worth of leftovers, but it reheated pretty well with a splash of cream to freshen it up.
I was looking for something really quick to make with chicken that wasn’t dead boring, and ended up making a Rachael Ray recipe, for heaven’s sake. It’s spinach-ricotta stuffed chicken (sans mushrooms); I simplified the sauce and just did a quick white wine reduction. I can’t look at the picture without recalling that the mashed potatoes, which had a few carrots and some garlic thrown in for interest, were practically a salt lick because my hand slipped while I was seasoning them. It made me wish I’d cooked extra chicken, which turned out well: I wilted baby spinach with the onions for the stuffing, seared off the stuffed breasts, and popped the skillet in the oven at 400F to finish cooking for a few minutes while I was busy hypersalinating the potatoes.
These sweet potato biscuits were the biggest success of the bunch. I had most of a can of organic mashed sweet potatoes open from Nolan’s lunch, and hybridized a Good Enough to Eat recipe with my standard buttermilk biscuit recipe to accompany some roasted cauliflower soup.
Sweet Potato Biscuits
2 C AP flour, plus an additional cup for shaping
1 T baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 T Sucanat
1 stick butter, cold
1 can mashed sweet potatoes
1/4 C buttermilk
Combine all dry ingredients from 2 C flour to Sucanat in a food processor, and pulse to blend. Cut 7 T of the butter into small pieces and add to the dry ingredients; pulse until butter resembles small peas. Add sweet potatoes and buttermilk; pulse again just until dough forms.
Butter a 9″ round cake pan and preheat oven to 350F. Pour about a cup into a shallow baking dish and scoop dough by quarter-cupfuls into the flour (I use a dough/ice cream scoop to make this easier); roll to coat in flour and pat gently to brush off the excess. You should end up with 12 floured biscuits in the cake pan; melt the remaining tablespoon of butter and brush their tops liberally. Bake at 350F for 20-25 minutes, until golden. Turn out onto a cooling rack, separate gently, and allow to cool for several minutes before consuming, preferably with butter and honey.
Source: Heavily adapted from The Good Enough to Eat Breakfast Cookbook.
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04.13.09
Posted in Baby Food, Breakfast, Dinner, Lamb, Meats, Quick Breads, Sides, Veggies at 7:46 pm by julie
I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter yesterday. Ours was pretty low-key, since the little man is not yet of an age to appreciate Easter egg hunts and jelly beans. Instead, I kept busy cooking while Jeremy watched a baseball game with Nolan.
First things first: I wanted to make some sort of Easter bread this year, but I decided to go the easy route and make a quick muffin version of hot cross buns rather than the yeasted sort. I chose the recipe from the King Arthur Flour Cookbook, and afterwards noticed that their website shows a different recipe for hot cross muffins that actually does incorporate yeast. It would be interesting to try that out sometime to compare and contrast. In any case, I made a few adjustments to the recipe I used, substituting blood orange juice for rum and dried cranberries and cherries in place of the more traditional golden raisins and candied citron; I also added about a tablespoon of blood orange zest to the batter, and used the juice instead of milk in my glaze, which gave it a lovely pink color. The muffins came out alright: Jeremy and Nolan seemed to think they were pretty good, but I found them to be kind of dense and dull, never mind my distaste for dried fruit in baked goods. I noticed the same quality in the doughnut muffins I made from the same cookbook, and after a number of other mixed results, this is definitely not my go-to baking book, much as I would like it to be.
For dinner, you know we had to have lamb. I’ve been braising most of our legs these past few months, so I mixed it up this time and did a roast. We get the boneless ones from Costco, so I smeared the inside with rosemary and garlic mixed with a little olive oil, tied it up, and slathered the outside with a mixture of softened butter (3 T), Dijon mustard (1 T), and rosemary (1 T); then it went in the oven at 450F for almost an hour and a half. Seems like our poor little oven always takes longer cooking big cuts of meat than the resources suggest. While it rested, I made a quick jus by deglazing the de-fatted pan drippings with white wine and a bit more Dijon, and threw on some potato pancakes to go with the meat. The idea was that the shredded potatoes were reminiscent of nests (or Easter grass, or whatever), in an abstract sort of way, at least. To save myself some dishewashing from another side dish, I sliced up and blanched a fistful of asparagus spears, chilled them in an ice bath, and mixed them into my potatoes. It worked out well, and the asparagus got nicely caramelized where it touched the cast iron. Next time, my only adjustment will be to slice the asparagus on a steeper bias, because the little chunks I cut sometimes escaped while shaping and flipping the pancakes. Nolan liked the lamb and loved the potato pancakes, last night and maybe even more today, as leftovers.
Potato-Asparagus Pancakes
2 eggs, beaten
4 medium russet potatoes (about 8 ounces each), peeled and shredded using the largest holes of a hand grater (yikes—or in the food processor!)
1/4 C all-purpose flour
1/4 C grated onion (pop it in the food processor with the potatoes)
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
about 8-10 spears of asparagus, woody ends snapped off and cut on the bias about 1/2″ wide
1/4 C olive oil
Boil a small pot of salted water and cook the asparagus just until they are tender when stabbed with a fork, 2-3 minutes. Remove to an ice bath, chill, and drain.
Combine the eggs, flour, salt, and pepper, stirring to blend. Squeeze out as much liquid as you can from the potatoes and onions. (You can just use your hands, or, as I do, load some shredded potato into your ricer with the smallest holes and squeeze. Once you’re done, you can poke at the potato starch that settles at the bottom of the liquid–entertaining!) Add the potatoes and cooled asparagus to the egg mixture, mixing well; hands work well here.
In a large cast-iron skillet, heat some of the oil over medium-high heat. Spoon the batter by quarter-cupfuls onto the hot skillet, flattening them with the back of the spoon. Fry until the bottom of the pancakes are nicely browned – between 3 and 5 minutes; flip the pancakes and cook for about 3 minutes longer. Repeat for the remaining pancakes, adding oil to the skillet as needed.
Drain on paper towels, salt while hot, and serve immediately.
Source: Adapted from Bette’s Oceanview Diner.
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01.27.09
Posted in Breakfast, Nuts, Grains & Legumes, Quick Breads, Veggies at 11:29 am by julie
I know I haven’t been posting on the blog much. My cooking has been less than inspiring lately, because I have no time to devote to it or money to spend on interesting ingredients, cookbooks, and equipment. If I’m lucky enough to get Nolan’s cooperation in the vicinity of dinnertime, I yank open the fridge and just cook the first thing that pops into my head and doesn’t need advance prep. Pitiful, I know, but it’s not much fun browsing the web and my cookbooks for meal planning with a squirmy 10-month old clamoring for my attention. This mom stuff is hard! At least I have a good little eater: Nolan has been off the pureed food for a while now, and even though he doesn’t feed himself, he wants to eat whatever we do. Chicken pad see euw is a favorite.
Since I haven’t made many meals worth sharing lately, I’m diving back in my stash of notes and photos for something I baked way back in September: zucchini muffins adapted from The Good Enough to Eat Breakfast Cookbook
. I’ve attempted to make her zucchini-prune bread every summer since Jeremy bought me the book in New York, round about 2005, with only marginal success: While the loaves always taste fantastic, they have always had varying degrees of liquid centers or dried out edges. The problem seemed to be twofold. First, the combination of oven temperature and loaf pan was clearly not appropriate, and my experiments with adjusting temperature and baking time were not successful. More alarming was the fact that the recipe called for 3/4 C (about 12 oz) grated young zucchini. Every single time I have ever weighed my shredded zucchini, 3/4 C amounts to nothing remotely close to 12 oz, no matter how firmly I pack it in. Since I was already having moisture issues, I mostly stuck with a heaping 3/4 C measurement and put away the scale. But my big experiment this year was to retire the loaf pan as well and make muffins, and I finally got a product I loved, and that’s saying a lot from someone who has turned her nose up at zucchini bread all her life (green flecks, eek!). They are moist and spicy, with gooey bits of prune and the crunch of walnuts—and no taste of vegetables, for those picky eaters out there. A sprinkle of demerara sugar on top would add some sparkle. Nolan was still just eating mashed avocados and bananas when I baked these, but he’ll love them if I ever have time to make them again.
Z-P Muffins
1 C coarsely grated young zucchini (unpeeled; do not grate seeded cores)
1/3 C prunes, pitted and slivered
1/3 C walnuts, toasted and chopped (or substitute raw sunflower seeds, as per the original recipe)
3/4 C plus 1 T AP flour
3/4 C plus 1 T whole wheat flour
1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/8 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 C sugar
6 T softened butter
1/3 C walnut oil (or canola oil)
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
Grease or line your muffin pan (or use a silicone one), and preheat the oven to 325F.
Combine the grated zucchini with the slivered prunes and walnuts. In another bowl, combine the dry ingredients: flours, spices, salt and soda.
In a third bowl, cream together the sugar and butter in a food processor until pale, then gradually add the oil. Stop the machine and scrape down the sides. (Do this each time you run the processor.) Add the eggs and vanilla, and beat in. Next, add the dry ingredients and pulse only long enough to blend. Do not leave it running! Turn the batter out onto the zucchini mixture, and incorporate it all together with the spatula. Scoop into muffin cups and bake at 325F for 30 minutes, or until they spring back when pressed gently with your finger. Cream cheese would be a lovely accompaniment, but I eat them plain.
Source: Adapted from The Good Enough to Eat Breakfast Cookbook, by Carrie Levin (p. 81-82).
Update 5/25/09: I made these muffins with some scraps leftover from making zucchini-wrapped halibut; I just threw the less-than-perfect strips of zucchini into the food processor and chopped them finely, then put them in my sieve over a bowl to drain off some of their excess moisture. Nolan finally got to try these muffins, and he really liked them a lot.
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03.10.08
Posted in American, Cuisines, Dinner, Italian, Lunch, Pastas, Quick Breads, Soups at 1:49 pm by julie
These are some meals I made a while back. For some reason I hadn’t gotten around to posting them, so I’ve decided to consolidate a bit, just to do some cyber-cleaning and get them out of the Drafts queue. First up is a pot of soup I made to use up the last few vegetables in the crisper prior to a grocery trip. We were entirely out of onions, which removed most recipes as options: what I did have access to at the time was one tiny carrot, some elderly celery (I never manage to use up all my celery before it goes limp; it’s just not one of my favorites), part of a Napa cabbage, and some leek tops that I had been saving to use for stock (for this meal, I stripped off the dark green outsides and used the lighter insides). With the addition of some diced pancetta and garlic, a cubed baking potato, a box of chicken stock, and a can each of tomatoes and kidney beans, it actually manifested into a respectable pot of soup.
Minestrone
1 can kidney beans, low sodium
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 lb pancetta or sliced lean bacon, chopped
1/3 C olive oil
1 C leek, pale parts only, rinsed and chopped
1 large carrot, cut into 1/2-inch dice
1 rib of celery, cut into 1/2-inch dice
3 garlic cloves, chopped fine
1/2 lb boiling potatoes
4 C shredded green cabbage (preferably Savoy)
1 14.5-ounce can tomatoes, chopped coarse and drained well
4 C chicken broth (preferably low-salt)
In a heavy kettle cook the pancetta in the oil over moderate heat, stirring, until it is crisp and pale golden, add the leek, and cook the mixture, stirring, until the leek is softened. Add the carrot, celery and garlic and cook the mixture, stirring, for 4 minutes. Add the potatoes, peeled and cut into 3/4-inch dice, and cook the mixture, stirring, for 4 minutes. Add the cabbage and cook, stirring, until the cabbage is wilted. Add the tomatoes and broth and simmer the soup, covered, for about an hour.
Drain the beans and stir into the soup. Simmer the soup, uncovered, for 15 minutes, and season it with salt and pepper. The soup may be made 3 days in advance and kept covered and chilled. Reheat the soup, thinning it with water as desired.
Source: Freely adapted from Epicurious.
Jeremy always likes some sort of bread or biscuit with his soup—really, who doesn’t?—so I made corny corn muffins to go with it. I’d never made the recipe before and actually wanted to follow it, but I nearly had to physically constrain my hands from adding cheddar cheese to it. It just sounded really good, and maybe I’ll try that out next time. They were delicious and easy to make, so there will definitely be a next time. The only adjustment I’ll admit to was the use of buttermilk powder rather than the fresh stuff, out of necessity.
Corniest Corn Muffins
1 C AP flour
1 C yellow cornmeal, preferably stone-ground
6 T sugar
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 C buttermilk (I used dry buttermilk and water)
3 T unsalted butter, melted and cooled
3 T corn oil (I used olive oil)
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
1 C corn kernels–fresh, frozen or canned
Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 400F.
In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, cornmeal, sugar, baking powder, soda, and salt. In a large glass measuring cup, whisk the buttermilk, melted butter, oil, egg, and yolk together until well blended. Pour the liquid ingredients over the dry ingredients and use a rubber spatula to gently but quickly stir. Don’t worry about being thorough–lumps are to be expected. Stir in the corn kernels. Divide the batter evenly among the 12 cups of a silicone muffin pan.
Bake for 15-18 minutes, or until the tops are golden and a thin knife inserted in the center of the muffins comes out clean. Transfer the pan to a rack to cool for several minutes before removing from the mold.
Source: Baking: From My Home to Yours, by Dorie Greenspan (p. 4).
Once the soup was all eaten up, we still had a few corn muffins leftover. As yummy as they were when fresh, stale cornbread just isn’t that great, but I hated to just throw them away. City Bakery to the rescue! From somewhere in the depths of my mind, I dredged up a recollection that City Bakery’s recipe for macaroni and cheese called for a cornbread crumb topping. I followed their proportions, but made a few slight adjustments for our personal mac and cheese tastes: pancetta added to the roux; a combination of sharp cheddar, gruyere, parmesan and pecorino cheese grated together in the Cuisinart; and a splash of Worcestershire added to the cheese sauce. It tasted great, but was rather fattier than our usual recipe (not that mac and cheese is ever health food) so I made sure to serve it with lots of broccoli. The original recipe is written out below, as I was unable to find the online source when I went back to look for it.
City Bakery Macaroni and Cheese
6 T butter, plus extra for the pan
1/4 C corn bread crumbs (or more, depending upon pan size)
1 pound elbow macaroni
1 qt whole milk
6 T flour
Kosher salt
Freshly ground pepper
1 1/4 C (5 ounces) grated Gruyere cheese, divided use
1 1/4 C cheddar cheese, divided use
1 1/4 C (5 ounces) grated Grana Padano or parmesan cheese, divided use
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly butter a 3 1/2-quart deep baking dish or a 13-by-9-by-2-inch baking pan. Spread the crumbs in a single layer on a baking sheet and bake until golden brown, 10 to 15 minutes. Set aside.
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil and cook the macaroni until al dente, 8 to 10 minutes, drain, and place in a large bowl. (To prepare up to a day ahead, mix in a small amount of canola oil, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate until ready to use.)
Bring the milk to a simmer in a small saucepan over medium-high heat. In a medium saucepan over medium-low heat, melt the 6 tablespoons of butter, add the flour, and mix well with a wooden spoon or spatula. Cook, stirring, for 3 minutes. Whisk in the hot milk and continue whisking until smooth. Raise the heat to medium and cook, stirring continuously, until the mixture thickens enough to coat the spoon. Season with salt and pepper and strain through a fine strainer.
Add the sauce to the cooked macaroni. Add 1 cup each of the Gruyere, cheddar and Grana Padano, and mix well. Taste, and season with salt and pepper if necessary. Pour the macaroni mixture into the baking dish and sprinkle with the remaining cheese. Sprinkle the toasted corn bread crumbs evenly over the casserole and cover with foil.
Bake on the middle shelf until heated through, about 20 minutes; remove foil and continue baking until the top is golden brown, an additional 10 minutes. Allow to stand for 10 minutes before serving.
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01.27.08
Posted in Breakfast, Quick Breads at 11:09 am by julie
As I write this, it is actually snowing here, not a common occurrence in Salem. I tried to obtain photographic evidence, but it eluded me. Even though it’s highly unlikely that any of it will stick on the ground, the mere sight of snowflakes drifting down is the perfect occasion to bake another batch of streusel-topped muffins, don’t you agree? Then again, what isn’t a good time for streusel?
I had some extremely ripe bananas just screaming to be made into banana bread, and had schemed to sneak a chocolate-marbled loaf under Jeremy’s radar. But in the end, I decided that I didn’t want to wait over an hour for it to come out of the oven, so banana muffins it is. Starting from a heavily-reviewed recipe on AllRecipes, I tweaked it a bit to our tastes. These have just enough nuts and spices to enhance the banana flavor, and the moist texture of the muffin is nicely counterpointed by those crunchy streusel caps. The perfect accompaniment for morning snow showers… which already seem to have ended. Darn it!
Banana Crumb Muffins
1 C AP flour
1/2 C white whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3 ripe bananas, mashed
3/4 C white sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten
1/3 C butter, melted
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground allspice
1/2 C chopped walnuts
1/3 C packed brown sugar
2 T AP flour
1 T oat bran
1/8 tsp ground cinnamon
1 1/2 T butter
Preheat oven to 375F. Lightly grease or paper 12 muffin cups, or use a silicone muffin pan.
In a large bowl, mix together flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, allspice and walnuts. In another bowl, beat together bananas, sugar, egg, melted butter and vanilla. Stir the banana mixture into the flour mixture just until moistened. Spoon batter into prepared muffin cups.
In a small bowl, mix together brown sugar, flour, cinnamon and oat bran. Cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse cornmeal. Sprinkle topping over muffins.
Bake in preheated oven for 18 to 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into center of a muffin comes out clean.
Source: Adapted from AllRecipes
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01.07.08
Posted in Breakfast, Quick Breads at 12:23 pm by julie
I thankfully don’t recall too many of my elementary school lunches. They were frequently a traumatic experience for picky eaters like myself, whether I purchased a hot lunch in the cafeteria or brought one from home (my mom pretty well gave up at some point and started sending me with just a baggie of carrot sticks because I’d bring everything else back untouched). I do remember liking the school’s tacos for some reason, but more than that, the cowboy coffee cake that came with it as a sort of dessert. It was a simple, fluffy beige cake with a crumb topping, cut in squares and smelling sweetly of cinnamon and spices. The fact that it was more like breakfast food than lunch food didn’t hurt.
When I picked out the allspice crumb muffins from Dorie for this weekend’s breakfast bread, I had no idea that they would conjure up such a strong memory of that cowboy coffee cake. Fluffy and brown with a sturdy streuseled cap, they were lightly perfumed with pure allspice, one of my favorite baking spices. They lasted us for two breakfasts, and I’m already contemplating making a second batch.
I made some minor tweaks to the recipe on the pretense of health, and they are reflected below. You can probably guess the first one without looking: 50% white whole wheat flour. I reduced the butter in the streusel by 1 tablespoon, and used that Smart Balance Butter Blend in the muffin batter; I also used 1% milk with about a tablespoon of heavy cream in place of whole milk, and 1 extra-large egg plus an egg white instead of two eggs, since I’m once again trying to use up a surplus of whites. (The reason for that surplus to be raved over in tomorrow’s post…). I was a little concerned as I filled the muffin pan that my adjustments would compromise the texture of the muffins, but they were light and fluffy and, well, pretty perfect as far as I’m concerned. Maybe I should make some tacos…
Allspice Crumb Muffins
Streusel:
1/2 C AP flour
1/2 C (packed) brown sugar
1/2 tsp ground allspice
4 T cold unsalted butter, cut into bits
Muffins:
1 C all purpose flour
1 C white whole wheat flour
1/2 C sugar
1 T baking powder
1/2 tsp ground allspice
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 C (packed) brown sugar
1 stick (8 T) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 extra-large egg plus 1 extra-large white
3/4 cup 1% milk
1 T heavy cream
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
Center a rack in the oven and preheat to 375F. Butter or paper the 12 molds in a regular sized muffin tin or use your handy-dandy silicone model.
To make the streusel: Put the flour, brown sugar, and allspice in a small bowl and sift them through your fingers to blend. Add the bits of cold butter into the dry ingredients and toss to coat, then use your fingers to work the butter into the dry ingredients until you’ve got irregularly shaped crumbs. Another option would be to use a small food processor or pastry cutter for this. Set aside in the refrigerator. (You can make the crumbs up to 3 days ahead and keep them covered in the fridge; the recipe makes enough for at least two batches of muffins.)
To make the muffins: In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, allspice and salt. Stir in the brown sugar, making certain there are no lumps; pushing it through a mesh strainer worked for me. In a large glass measuring cup or another bowl, whisk the melted butter, eggs, milk and vanilla together until well combined. Pour the liquid ingredients over the dry ingredients and, with a rubber spatula, quickly but gently stir to blend. The batter will and should be lumpy; the important thing is not to overblend. Divide the batter evenly among the muffin cups, at least 2/3d full. Sprinkle a spoonful or two of streusel over each muffin, then use your fingertips to gently press the crumbs into the batter. (I completely covered my muffin batter with a layer of streusel, and still had a ton leftover.)
Bake for about 20 minutes, or until the tops are golden and a thin knife inserted into the center of the muffins comes out clean. Transfer the pan to a rack and cool for 5 minutes before carefully removing each muffin from its mold. The recipe has a yield of 12; I overfilled my pan a bit because it produces smallish muffins, and had enough batter for about 10-11 muffins.
Source: Adapted from Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan.
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01.01.08
Posted in Breakfast, Quick Breads at 11:26 am by julie
It’s back to work already tomorrow, but it certainly was nice to have a week’s vacation… my next one won’t happen until I go into labor (scary!). I tried to take advantage of the free time by trying out some breakfast recipes, and this one was on the top of the list. They’re the nutmeg doughnut muffins Molly at Orangette wrote about a year or two ago. I thought maybe they’d make a slightly healthier alternative to fried doughnuts, and to that end, I made a few additional adjustments to the ingredients: namely, white whole wheat flour and Smart Balance 50/50 Butter Blend (I know, I know, but I decided to try it out since it was on sale, and it seems to work just fine for recipes that don’t ride on the quality of the butter.) I also used an equivalent amount of Greek yogurt for the buttermilk.
The resulting batter looked suspiciously like Bisquick dough, but I went with it, and 28 minutes later the first batch dropped onto the cooling rack. They smelled good enough to lure Jeremy into the kitchen with a plate before I had a chance to give them a tumble in the powdered sugar. He ate two by the time I got the next batch in the oven and didn’t think they needed sugar-coating at all, so I just dusted two to try for myself, and left the rest nude.
The verdict? Perhaps it was my substitutions, but they definitely felt more like muffin-shaped biscuits than muffin-shaped doughnuts. That wasn’t a bad thing, though: they were subtly spiced and sweetened, with a good mouthfeel. I liked them with the powdered sugar, but the numerous leftovers were delicious without, reheated with just a drizzle of honey.
Nutmeg Doughnut Muffins
2 C unbleached AP flour
1 C white whole wheat flour
2 ½ tsp baking powder
¼ tsp baking soda
Scant 1 tsp salt
½ tsp freshly ground nutmeg
¾ C plus 1 Tbs 1/% milk
2 T Greek yogurt
1 ½ sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature
¾ C plus 2 T granulated sugar
2 large eggs
For topping:
4-6 T unsalted butter
About 2 cups powdered sugar
Preheat the oven to 350F, and set a rack to the middle position. Get out your trusty silicone muffin pan or spray a standard-size muffin tin with cooking spray.
Place the butter in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (or, alternatively, in a large mixing bowl with electric beaters nearby), and beat on medium speed for a few seconds until soft and creamy. With the motor running, add the sugar in a steady stream. Continue beating, scraping down the sides of the bowl once or twice, until the mixture increases in volume and lightens to pale yellow. This could take a couple of minutes, so in the meantime, combine the flours, baking powder and soda, salt, and nutmeg in a medium bowl; whisk to mix them thoroughly. Now whisk together the milk and yogurt in a measuring cup, and set aside.
When the butter and sugar look light, fluffy, and as creamy as frosting, add the eggs one at a time, beating until they are just combined. With a wooden spoon, mix ¼ of the flour mixture into the butter mixture. Add 1/3 of the milk mixture. Continue to add the dry and wet ingredients alternately, ending with the dries. Mix until the dough is smooth and well combined, but do not overmix.
Divide the batter between the cups of the muffin tin. Bake until the muffins are firm to the touch and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 25-32 minutes.
When the muffins are cool enough to handle, prepare the topping: melt the butter in the microwave or on the stovetop, and pour the powdered sugar into a deep bowl. Using a pastry brush and working one muffin at a time, lightly brush the entire outside of the muffin with butter, and then roll it in the powdered sugar. Shake off any excess, and place the finished muffins on a rack or serving platter to serve.
This batter keeps, covered and chilled, for up to three days, and leftover baked muffins reheat perfectly in the microwave.
Source: Adapted from Orangette.
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07.16.07
Posted in Breakfast, Fruits, Quick Breads at 2:12 pm by julie
When I first got married at 20, I wasn’t much of a cook. I was a very picky eater with limited cooking experience, and there were only a few recipes I really felt comfortable making: chicken divan, chili and meatloaf, to name a few. Nevertheless, I carefully wrote up all the favorites that my mom used to make at home, and I still have that little binder in a prominent place in my kitchen, ready for use when I’m feeling nostalgic.
One of the recipes I brought with me from my parents’ house is for your standard banana bread. I know it came from a Southern cookbook, but I don’t remember its name now, and I don’t think my mom and I tried making any of the other recipes in that book. Perhaps we should have, because this banana bread has attained an almost legendary status in our home.
We frequently buy bunches of bananas, ostensibly for Jeremy to eat out of hand (I don’t care for plain bananas—way too mealy and mushy), but somehow they always end up languishing on the counter until they are too black and gooey for anything but baking. And Jeremy won’t let me experiment with banana bread recipes. Ever since the first time I made him a loaf of banana bread from my childhood recipe, that’s the one he wants. Oatmeal or crystallized ginger doesn’t interest him, and even chocolate swirls don’t tempt him on the subject. The man is steadfast. I’ve gotten very serious lectures on the subject. 
He even considers banana muffins or banana cake a waste of bananas that I could be using to make banana bread. Every so often, I still try to sneak something new under the radar, because after a while, the same old recipe starts to chafe. But who am I to deny my aficionado his banana bread?
Banana Bread
1 stick unsalted butter, room temperature
1 C sugar
2 eggs
3 over-ripe bananas, mashed
2 C flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 C walnuts, chopped
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp allspice
Cream butter and sugar together, add eggs and beat well. Mash bananas and add to butter mixture, then flour, soda, salt, and spices. Mix just to blend and fold in nuts. Bake in greased loaf pan at 350F for 1 hour or until top is browned and inserted toothpick comes out clean.
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