Category Archives: Recipes

Roots!

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This is not a Bittman recipe.  But it is something I made.  It’s hearty, it’s autumnal, it’s colorful, and it’s easy.  Oh, and it allows you to turn your oven on for around an hour and thereby heat up your house a bit!

Roasted Root Vegetables

3 carrots, peeled and cut into chunks

3 parsnips, peeled and cut into chunks

2 purple topped turnips, peeled and cut into chunks

2 rutabegas, peeled and cut into chunks (see a pattern here?)

1 sweet potato (or 1/2 of a mammoth yam), peeled and cut into chunks

1 tsp dried rosemary, or to taste

1 tsp sea salt

1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

olive oil to coat

Preheat your oven to 400F.  Peel and cut all vegetables into equal, bite-sized chunks.  Toss them with seasonings and olive oil in a 9×13 inch glass baking dish.  Use enough olive oil so that all chunks of root vegetable get an even coating and glisten slightly.  Depending on size of vegetables, this might range from between 1/2 – 1 cup of oil.

Roast until all vegetables are tender and begin to brown on the outside, 45 minutes to an hour, depending on size.

As you can see, this is almost ridiculously easy.  You can substitute for any of these vegetables you don’t like – easy additions or change-outs would be regular or fingerling potatoes, beets, even celery root.  Choose what you love, mix them well, and enjoy!

Mon petit chou

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And so, I’ve well and truly slacked.  At least in the food department.  Well, at least in the Bittman project part of the food department.  This year’s back-to-school experience of the frantic race-over-uneven-pavement-while-juggling-eggs-and-firecrackers was enhanced by the addition of navigating the cloudy, jagged-edged seas of the academic job market for the first time.  Three weeks in, and I’m starting to collect myself a little, realizing how much work this takes, and that I have to grab my free moments when they present themselves, not whenever I want them to happen.  And while by no means is my hiatus replaced by my regular schedule of the summer, I am slowly adjusting in a way that leaves me just enough time to be with you here tonight.  Well, that and N.’s kind insistence that he tackle the current sink full of dishes.  Don’t hold your breath for my next post, but here’s a snack, if you will, to tide things over?

Two Bittman recipes for you, then, and a brief assessment of each.  Oh, and an apology: since it has been several weeks since I made either of these, even my rough estimate ingredient quantities have long since flown my mind, to be replaced by such niceties as why Beowulf never had a male heir, how many pages my 33 students will produce together during the next week, and how I can make my 54 page first dissertation chapter into a 20 page writing sample.

72. Trim and shred raw brussels sprouts (the slicer on a food processor works well). Toss with lemon vinaigrette and shaved or grated Parmesan. Crumbled bacon, as usual, is a welcome visitor here.

Brussels sprouts are one of those near-universal vegetables no one seems to like.  They are bitter and, when boiled, smelly, and can only be saved when eaten in combination with copious quantities of cream or sugared vinegar.  Or, as it turns out, raw with lemon, cheese, and cured pork.  I used prosciutto instead of bacon, baking it for fifteen minutes or so on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper, and the effect was fabulous.  The prosciutto snapped into sharp fragments of pink shrapnel, and so the textual combination of the dish was amazing.  The sprout shreds (I did use my food processing slicer, and it worked perfectly) were crunchy and crisp but thin and light, like miniature tufts of coleslaw.  The cheese was chewy and grainy, and the prosciutto was crisp and flavorful, filing my mouth with saliva that the tart astringency of the lemon-honey vinaigrette I made just barely dried away.  This would be a great replacement for the heaviness of coleslaw, and is a near perfect quartet of ingredients.  Chopped salted walnuts or roasted, soy sauce drenched shiitake mushrooms might be a vegetarian-friendly replacement for the prosciutto or bacon, but I wouldn’t dare replace the cheese with anything.  It was far too perfect a nutty saltiness against the green resistance of the baby cabbages themselves. 

 

83. Onion-Rosemary Skillet Bread: In a 12-inch cast iron pan, sauté half a large, thinly sliced red onion in about ¼ cup olive oil until soft and beginning to color. Combine a cup of whole wheat flour with 1 teaspoon salt and 1 tablespoon rosemary leaves; add 1 ½ cups water and whisk until smooth. Pour the batter into the hot skillet and bake in a 450-degree oven until the flatbread is crisp on the edges and releases easily from the pan, about 30 to 40 minutes.

Since I got my cast iron skillet (a birthday gift that was purchased using last year’s Christmas present [don’t ask, it confuses me too]), I’ve been looking for recipes that let me use it as much as possible.  Though I am having trouble getting used to the whole well-seasoned thing (no soap?  Really?!), I adore the quick, crusty brown sear it imparts to anything you dump into it.  The appeal of making bread in this stove-to-oven vessel was too strong to pass up.

The challenge?  I bought a 10-inch skillet, and my math skills are weak for anything more complicated than halving or doubling a recipe.

I… estimated.

I did a pretty good job too, with two exceptions: the onions and the oil.  As a consequence, we ended up with a very onion-y bread that was also quite greasy.  Additionally, I was impatient in trying to emancipate my funny little bread from the pan, which resulted in some severe aesthetic imperfections (by which I mean, the whole thing broke up and we ate it in chunks rather than cutting slices). 

Still, it was really tasty.  I’ve never tasted fry bread, but I suspect this is probably similar.  The onion and rosemary worked well together, and the crunchy exterior of the bread was a delightful texture.  No leavening, no sweetening, and no rise time, just bread for dinner in less than an hour?  And out of a cast iron skillet?  We’ll be having this one again, and I intend to get the measurements right this time.

Off the horse

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As you might be able to tell, I’ve been busy.  School starts soon, the weather can’t decide whether to be summer or fall, and it seems like every thoroughfare in our town is under construction, with completion dates uncertain.  Somehow, this state of construction has incorporated itself into my life.  Most of my projects are far from done, and some have yet to be started.  When that happens, blogging goes awry, or at least gets pushed onto a sidewalk somewhere out of the way of the steaming hot asphalt I’m trying to spread evenly across my academic life.

Too much?

Maybe too much.

Anyway, with ground turkey in the freezer and a desire for protein in our hearts, we decided on this Bittman pick last week:

“30. Cook brown rice until just shy of done. Drain and mix with an equal amount of ground turkey and a little chopped fresh sage and chopped dried cherries. Form into patties and sauté or bake, turning once, until crisp and cooked all the way through.”

Sounded easy and filling and delicious.  I amassed:

1 cup brown rice, raw

1.25 pounds ground turkey (mine was frozen, so I defrosted it but it was still SO cold!)

2-3 TB dried cherries, coarsely chopped

10 fresh sage leaves, finely chopped

Salt and pepper

Olive oil, for sautéing

I cooked the brown rice in my rice cooker with two cups of water – a little shy of ideal so it would remain slightly underdone.  Then I let it cool until it was room temperature so it wouldn’t be a.) too hot to touch, and b.) so hot that it started cooking the turkey.

With cool, cooked rice, I just combined all the ingredients in a glass bowl and combined them with my fingers, working to incorporate the rice and turkey, and trying to distribute the cherries and sage evenly throughout the mix.

I formed the mixture into ten patties, each about the right size to fit nicely onto an English muffin (guess how we ate the leftovers!), then deposited them a few at a time into a preheated skillet containing a few tablespoons of olive oil.  Though I could have jammed them all into the skillet at the same time, this would have resulted in a big turkey pancake, which doesn’t sound delicious.  Rather, distribute the patties so they aren’t touching one another, which will give them room to brown.

After about five minutes on each side, I popped the burgers onto a plate so we could pop them into our mouths.  We had them alongside a salad of spinach, arugula, dried cherries, toasted walnuts, and chunks of cheddar, and they were tasty.  The sage added that dusty smokiness that suggests harvest and fall and Thanksgiving, and the cherries were chewy little morsels of brightness with a perfume-y, candy burst.

The only problem with these patties, as is often the issue with turkey, is that they ended up a little dry.  I don’t think I overcooked them, though I suppose that could have been the problem.  Rather, I think leaving the rice slightly underdone caused it to wick up the minimal moisture the turkey had.  The result was quite good, but not as moist as we’d hoped.

However, it was as leftovers that these patties really shined.  I reheated them for lunch sandwiches in a little pool of chicken broth, which I spooned over them as they warmed.  This added some much-needed moisture and prevented them from cooking much more.  We layered them into toasted English muffins along with arugula, cheddar cheese, and just a touch of mayonnaise.  Divine.

impromptu

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Friday, by the hours:

8am (or so… you know…): out walking the dog.  By the time I returned home, there was a message in my inbox from S., asking a few folks if they’d be interested in happy hour-ing that afternoon at 5.

9am: RSVPed  Absolutely. Affirmative.

9:05-3pm: The day got away from me a bit.  There was reading to be done, rooms to be tidied, and an unexpected nap to be taken…

3:30pm and I had nothing to bring to happy hour.  I shoved a bottle of wine into the refrigerator and riffled through my pages of Bittman options.  Then I set off to the grocery store to buy sun-dried tomatoes.

“82. Tomato Pinwheels: Soak 1 cup dried tomatoes in hot water, drain and pulse in a food processor with 1 tablespoon olive oil and 1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme (add water or oil if necessary). Combine 2 cups flour, 1 teaspoon salt, 2 teaspoons baking powder and 1 teaspoon baking soda with 4 tablespoons cold butter (use food processor or fingers). Stir in ¾ cup yogurt or buttermilk and gather the dough into a ball. Roll into a large rectangle on a floured surface, spread the tomatoes all over the dough and roll it up lengthwise. Cut the log crosswise into 1-inch slices, put them on a baking sheet and bake at 400 degrees until puffed and golden, 7 to 10 minutes.”

By 4pm I was back in the kitchen.  With miniscule exceptions, I followed Bittman’s directions exactly. I added a few grinds of black pepper to the tomato mixture in the food processor, I used greek yogurt with a splash of cream to bring the dough together, and I floured my bread board with whole wheat flour, because I hadn’t checked my flour supply before my trek to the store for tomatoes, and as it turned out I had exactly two cups of white flour in the whole house.  I also ended up baking the little pinwheels a bit longer than Bittman directs.

I have a deep and abiding fear of dough.  You know this, because I’ve told you before.  I buy pie crust for every quiche I make.  I routinely tear giant, unfixable holes in the pre-made, refrigerated dough I purchase to make pizza.  I’ve tackled, successfully, a total of one dough+yeast products, which just happens to make focaccia AND pizza, and despite that it comes out a little differently every time.  And yet, when I was in a hurry and hoping for something company-worthy, I picked a brand new recipe based on dough…

As it turns out, this one was pretty unthreatening, minus a terrifying moment when my half-rolled-out-kinda-sorta-rectangle was losing crumbly pieces all over the place.  I tried patching it back together, I tried pinching the corners and kneading, and finally what worked was dropping the bits in the middle of the rectangle of dough and running a rolling pin over them violently a couple of times.  Since my fingers were deeply crusted with sticky, floury bits, no photographs were taken during the rolling-patching-pinching process. I should hire a photographer who promises to only take pictures of the food.

The best thing, though, was spreading the tomato filling over the dough.  It made this beautiful bright textured layer over the dough and it smelled like summer and warmth.  Savory frosting.  Doubting but gleeful, I carefully rolled it into a fat log, encasing the filling safely inside.

You need a sharp knife to slice this log.  A really sharp knife.  Otherwise, the dough tears and the log becomes flat and the tomato filling crumbles out and there is no earthly way of getting it back into the sweet little curlicues it creates.  I spaced them out on a greased cookie sheet and stowed it in the oven with great hope. 

4:45pm: Makeup applied and hair combed, I returned to the kitchen to check my pinwheels.  At ten minutes, they were barely golden and the dough felt a bit squashy.  I gave them two additional minutes while I found a pair of shoes that were a.) not dusted red from the bark trail I walk the dog on, and b.) not grubby flip-flops.  Happy hour is a serious thing, you see.

When I pulled them out the second time, they were gorgeous: puffed, golden, tender, and smelling like a bakery and a garden.  Glamour shots, aluminum foil, and a brief car-ride later, and they were ready for their debut.

5:15pm: These are amazing. The dough was flaky and tender with a suggestion of sourness from the yogurt.  The tomato mixture was tart and sweet and herbaceous, and each pinwheel was a lovely three bite experience of lightness and flavor and the barest crunch.

5:45pm: Plate empty and wine glasses refilled, we were already talking about other things you could do with this foundation.  Tapenade, any kind of pesto (basil, arugula, parsley, kale, spinach), onion jam, whole or mashed cloves of roasted garlic, maybe even cheese… the possibilities loom large.

8pm: This is a strong contender for this year’s Thanksgiving appetizer menu.  And maybe Christmas too.

Simple Slaw

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This week, with a camping trip under our belts, I wanted distinctly contrasting things: to be back in my kitchen, and to have exquisitely simple things to make.  This salad seemed to fit that bill, given how easy it was to throw together AND how ripe it is for additions, which I will discuss in a bit…

“69. Shred carrots and cabbage (red, savoy or Napa). In a blender, whip olive oil, lemon or lime juice, a stemmed and seeded jalapeno, garlic and cilantro or parsley. Toss with the vegetables.”

This sounded easy and zesty – a new, simple take on coleslaw without the weighty mayonnaise.  I used the following:

2 carrots, peeled and cut into large chunks

1 head Napa cabbage, any dirty or severely damaged outer leaves removed, quartered and cored

½ green jalapeno, seeded (that was all I had.  Use more, if you like heat)

juice of 1 lime

2 TB parsley leaves

1 large clove garlic

½ – 1 cup olive oil (I didn’t measure, I drizzled)

salt and pepper to taste

honey to taste (around 1 TB)

For ease, I decided to use my food processor instead of the blender Bittman suggests.  I shredded the carrots using the shredder disk, which could not have been simpler.  I tried to do the same with the cabbage, but the shreds were too fine – almost like confetti-ed tissue, so I sliced the cabbage very finely with a sharp knife instead.

Once the carrot shreds and cabbage fluff were out of the food processor and ensconced safely in a big salad bowl, I fitted the machine with the blade instead and added the first 4 dressing ingredients.  I buzzed those until the jalapeno and garlic were finely diced, then began drizzling in the olive oil until a  dressing formed.  It didn’t emulsify and thicken as nicely as I would have liked, which I suspect was because 1.) I added the olive oil too quickly, and 2.) the food processor was not the best tool to use to create an emulsion.  Still, it smelled fresh and verdant and zesty.  I gave it a taste and decided it needed some seasoning and some sweetness, and therefore added salt, pepper, and a short drizzle of honey.  Then I poured just enough dressing to coat and moisten over the vegetables.  Adding the whole quantity would have caused a flood, so I stuck with a little over half.

As a very simple salad, this was good.  The vegetables were crisp and fresh, and the dressing had a definite citrus kick and a suggestion of heat.  As a foundation, or perhaps as a topping for pulled pork or a barbeque sandwich, this would be ideal.

I found myself imagining more, however.  You could add craisins to this, or golden raisins, and capitalize on the mild sweetness of the carrots and cabbage.  You could add toasted walnuts or sunflower seeds and get a different kind of crunch.  If you like a little extra zing, you could pop in some mandarin orange or grapefruit segments, or maybe even shredded or finely sliced green apple.  For additional vegetation, agonizingly thin slices of green or red onion, or another color of cabbage.  The adventurous might opt for radicchio or endive, though if you add such bitterness another tablespoon or two of honey in the dressing would be welcome.

But for me, if I’m honest, what was missing was not sweetness, or crunch, or bitter variety.  What was missing for me was the creamy, fatty, mouth-coating perfection of mayonnaise.  I couldn’t separate the shreds of cabbage and carrot from the perennial American picnic classic.  I wanted my veggies robed in that clumpy goopy stuff of sandwich and potato salad dreamscape and overdressed nightmare.  I didn’t want a simple healthy vegetable salad, apparently.  I wanted it to be coleslaw. 

Try some of these combinations out, because this would make a nice, light addition to grilled proteins, and if you do, tell me how you like it.  But don’t expect me to report on any of these fancy-pants ideas.  Because I just bet you can guess what I’ll be adding to my leftovers…

Into the Wilds

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Tomorrow morning, early, before the clouds burn off, before the fog-drizzle abates, N. and the dog and I will get into the car and drive east, and north, and east and north some more, and meet up with my parents to (gasp) camp for a couple of nights at the Newberry Caldera in the Deschutes National Forest.  We are ill fit for this adventure.  We own, between us, one down sleeping bag (which is really on possibly-permanent loan from my parents), two backpacks, and 75% of a set of doggie protective booties (what happened to the fourth one?  Did it tumble out of the car on a previous adventure?  Did it get sucked into the abyss in the back of one of our closets?  Did she eat it?  I have no idea!).  My parents are bringing us a tent, a second sleeping bag, and possibly a couple of nylon air mattresses.

But at least we won’t be without sustenance.  Our sad lack of camping gear will be made up for through this delicious (I hope) portable breakfast, which we will joyously share:

“86. Spiced Muffins: Mix 2 cups flour, ¼ cup sugar, ½ teaspoon salt, 1 tablespoon baking powder, 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, ½ teaspoon each allspice and ground ginger, and a pinch of cloves. In another bowl, combine 1 egg, 1 cup milk and 3 tablespoons melted butter. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry until just combined, adding milk if the batter seems too dry. Spoon into greased muffin tins and bake for 20 to 25 minutes at 375 degrees or until done.”

I haven’t tasted these yet, so I can’t yet reveal the no-doubt marvelous flavor and texture they possess, but I can tell you about the process of making them.

I didn’t have any allspice, so I used nutmeg instead.  Nutmeg is pretty strong, so I didn’t want to overpower the other spices by using a full ½ tsp.  Just a pinch, then.  I also thought these might be a little one-note, a little too homogenous, despite how excited I was about the spices, so I scattered about half a cup of golden raisins in along with the dry ingredients.  A little punch of fruit would add brightness and natural sweetness.  I think grated orange zest or dried currants would also be lovely.

When I whisked the dry ingredients together (I like a whisk rather than a wooden spoon, or even a spatula, because I think it mixes more thoroughly and adds a little air to the batter.  Since I never sift my dry ingredients – I’m much too lazy for that – I like thinking the whisk does some of that work for me after all), the flour turned a pale, pale pinky tan from the spices, and a warm, Christmasy smell wafted up from it.  I love that earthy spiciness ginger and cinnamon have, and the tingling deep mystery of the cloves.  Incense and aromatherapy, right in my kitchen.

I made a well in the center of the fluffy mix and poured in the wet ingredients, then stirred until barely combined so the muffins would (again, I hope!) remain tender.  I took a tiny taste while I filled the tins, and I can tell you, the flavor was very promising.  It was subtle heat and harvest spice against my tongue, like a pastel gingerbread.

I baked them for 22 minutes, at which point the toothpick I inserted in the largest dome came out with only a faint moist crumb clinging to it.  I’ve had too many tough, overdone muffins in my day (most of them my own fault, sadly), so that seemed perfect. The tops were crisp to the touch but the insides felt moist and tender crumbed, at least from a toothpick’s prodding standpoint.  Ah, projection.  How strong you can be!

They sit, and cool, and tempt me on my kitchen counter.  But if I eat one, there will only be 11, and that doesn’t divide evenly into 4… but if I eat enough to make them again divisible by 4, then I will have been an unforgivable glutton… but if I don’t eat any, I won’t know whether they are good enough to bring along… but if I eat one, there will only be 11… alas, the perils of arithmetic.

 

* Update: the muffins had excellent flavor – warm and spicy and earthy, as I had hoped – but were sadly a bit on the tough side.  They had a moist crumb, but it was not particularly tender.  They were either a bit overbaked, or needed some additional liquid in the batter.  Still, we ate them greedily on a very cold morning (33F just before the sun came up, almost 40F by the time coffee was ready), and found them best dunked into a blessedly hot beverage, where they eagerly drank up the liquid and collected the flavors of the drink on top of their own spicy blend.