"Secret Ingredients - The Magical Process of Combining Flavors" - Roasted Sirloin of Beef with Five Onions - for Iron Chef Gauntlet

Date I made this recipe – June 24, 2017 – Iron Chef America returns and a Father's Day do-over

Secret Ingredients – The Magical Process of Combining Flavors by Michael Roberts

Published by Bantam Books

ISBN: 0-553-05320-5; copyright 1988

Purchased at Magers & Quinn, Independent Booksellers, Minneapolis

Recipe:  Roasted Sirloin of Beef with Five Onions – p. 155

Before I get too deep into this blog post, let me get this off my chest:  aaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrggggggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

There, I feel so much better!

Here's the deal:  I set this cookbook aside while watching the return of Iron Chef Gauntlet on the Food Network because how perfect, right, and was all set and ready to roll in a timely manner until I was not ready to roll in a timely manner because things happened.  For the record, this series aired in May.  We are now nearing the end of June and by the time I post this, it will be early July.  You do the math.

If you read my Father's Day post, you'll know that I erred big time in making a pasta dish instead of burgers and it has bugged me ever since.  So for "redemption," I thought I should finally getting around to making the dish I selected for an Iron Chef post – "Roasted Sirloin of Beef with Five Onions," and I did but it didn't quite work (or redeem me) as I intended and now I have to deal with the fact that I botched both Father's Day – twice! – and Iron Chef. Rats.

By the way, let me just say that I thought the show I was watching was the Next Iron Chef, but no, that's a different series:  same format, different title.  There is also Iron Chef America but this was not that.  This was Iron Chef Gauntlet,[1] not to be confused with "Iron Chef Hands Tied Behind My Back," or "Iron Chef Blindfolded," or any Iron Chef-titled series, real or imagined to which I say "Come on Food Network.  Come on.  These are variations of the same thing so let's keep it simple out there m'kay?"

At any rate, the premise of ALL Iron Chef shows is that two chefs (or two chefs with teams of minions) compete against each other making several dishes from the "Secret Ingredient." The reveal of the secret ingredients makes me laugh every time as it is so dramatic, and yet sometimes it makes me almost hurl because of the ingredient is so egregious. [2] Although the cheftestants don't always make a dessert with a secret ingredient, some do, and I am sorry, there is no world out there in which "fish" and "dessert go together."[3]  Not happening.

The secret ingredient for my own private (and singular) Iron Chef competition, taken from today's cookbook, Secret Ingredients was "Battle...Meat."

Well, okay, nothing like a broad category, so I decided that the five onions in my dish – Roasted Sirloin of Beef with Five Onions - were way more interesting than "meat" and so I changed the battle to Battle...Onions!  I can do that.  It's my blog.  Also?  My late fathered loved sirloin and loved onions so this to me was the perfect Father's Day redemption recipe.  (There might even be an "Iron Chef Redemption" show although I can't be sure.  What I do know is that some cheftestants who were eliminated on a previous episode sometimes do come back for redemption.  This is not that story.)

We were lucky enough to enjoy plenty of sirloin steak dinners in our house, but only if it was on sale.  My mother always did her homework and studied the Munising News when it came out on Wednesdays as if she was a librarian at the Library of Congress. (She actually did a stint as a librarian before she was married.)  Then with the sales price firmly in her head, she went to whatever grocery store out of three featured the sale on steak and ordered up.  Suffice it to say that the local butchers became very familiar with my mom and knew to cut her a beautiful 2-inch thick piece of sirloin. "On sale" sirloin.  If it wasn't on sale, we didn't have it, the end. (She also often applied this reasoning to clothing which drove my dad crazy because he could afford her clothes and told her constantly "If you like it, buy it."  Yes, well, my mother wasn't buying any of that argument, clothes or no clothes, steak or no steak!)

As these things go, while mom might have purchased the steak, dad was in charge of cooking it because that's what dads did back then.  My dad's preferred method of cooking was the broiler and to see him in action was seeing a master at work.  He was so good, he could have easily worked in any steak house in America. 

If my dad had his way, every steak would be cooked to rare as in "practically mooing" as in "Why bother to even put it under the flame?"  My mother didn't roll like that.  My mother feared that we would all die someday from eating raw meat and so insisted that he cook hers to medium.

To his credit, my father never cried about this abomination against nature (his words) but he came close.  My brother and I redeemed ourselves though by asking for rare steak (we still do when dining out), but dad compromised and gave it to us medium-rare lest my mother keep him up all night over how her children were going to get sick and die from eating "raw" (rare) meat.  Never mind that none of us ever got sick from our parents' cooking (we wouldn't dare) but these are the things that mothers stressed about besides the current price of steak.

This recipe eschews a broiler for an oven, and roasting instead of broiling and I should have taken that as a sign and run away from this recipe because roasting the meat requires a thicker cut than I purchased and could afford.[4]  In fact, the first directions are to "...sear the meat on both sides very well and then place it in the oven" and I'm not going to lie – I should have stopped right then and there.  Right then and there.  Seared meat is the equivalent of rare meat (according to the Gospel of Lou Verme) but I didn't stop there and like a good soldier, followed directions to the letter.  Well, almost the letter.

This recipe called for a 2 ½ - 3 pound piece of sirloin and hahahahahaha...are they kidding?  Not at current market prices.  The roasting time for that amount of meat was 30-40 minutes but I knew that was too long for my little (but pricey) steak so I cut it down to about 15 minutes and also got out a trusty meat thermometer so I could double-check.  The recipe said to cook until rare to medium-rare, approximately 130-135°. 

So I took the meat out of the oven, and even took it out a few minutes early and...140.  The meat's temperature was at 140°. Crap!  Crap, crap, crap!  I kept an eye on it but you know what, steaks are tricky; one second too long and it's all over but the crying.   Keep in mind that steak continues to cook while resting and I knew as soon as I starting cutting it (after letting it rest), I was screwed; it started pink but ended up brown. 

Now, would the medium (and brown) meat have satisfied my mother?  Naturally!  My dad?  Well, this is when I let out one great big "argh," which, when my father did it, sounded just Chewbacca, the Wookie (from Star Wars) and it is funny, but it is not a good sound.[5] It is the sound of pain, crushing disappointment, and overdone meat!  And I have to say it, but damn, I was mad!  Had my father taught me nothing?  I am not worth Obi-[Lou]-Wan Kenobi.  I am not worthy.

As to onions, this recipe called for a yellow onion, a leek, a red onion, scallions, and chives.  The yellow onions and leeks were to be sautéed but the red onion, scallions, and chives were added as garnish.

Now, I like red onion but not raw and so I sautéed the red onion with the yellow onion and the leek, and then at the very last minute, threw in the scallions and the chives and let them cook for about a minute and the result was pretty good.

In my opinion though, all the onions could have all benefitted from longer cooking times, particularly the leeks as they remained crunchy and I hated that.  If I made this again (assuming I raise enough money for my sirloin budget), I would sauté the hell out of the three key onions until they were almost caramelized and then still throw in the scallions and chives just to soften them up for a bit.

Needless to say, I did not redeem myself for my late father, nor did I pass an Iron Chef test and dammit all, I was so ready, was I not? (!)  Exactly! Next time around, I'm going to "study" and then look out!

As to alternatives to the beef "secret" ingredient, you can also select a dish from more overly-broad categories such as:

• Soups
• Salads
• Raw, Marinated, and Cured First Courses
• Pancakes, Fritters, and Croquettes
• Sausages
• One-Dish Meals
• Quick Stews
• Meats
• Poultry
• Fish and Seafood
• Vegetables and Side Dishes
• Desserts
• Kitchen Pantry (Stocks, Dips, Condiments)

There's also a chapter titled "Pep Talk to the Reader" which I skipped (bad decision) but which I am pretty sure did not contain the directive "for best results, ensure that your steak is as thick as a wedge-heel sandal!"

Here then, is the "Secret Ingredient Sirloin" with Five Onions.

Roasted Sirloin of Beef with Five Onions – serves 4 to 6

1 tablespoon salad oil

2 ½ - to 3-pound New York sirloin

1 teaspoon salt

Freshly ground pepper to taste

4 tablespoons unsalted butter

1 medium leek, white part only, finely sliced

1 small yellow onion, finely diced (about ½ cup)

1 ½ cups veal stock or 1 ½ cups canned low-sodium beef broth

24 chives, finely minced

4 scallions, finely minced

½ small red onion, finely diced(about ½ cup)

Ann's Note:  what follows below is how the author wants you to cook the sirloin, but as I advised above, I don't think I would roast it at all as you are unlikely to get a piece of steak thick enough to withstand roasting.  Instead, I would broil the meat and/or sear the meat a little longer than required until you achieve the steak doneness that you want, and then move on to the onion mixture.

Preheat the oven to 425°F.  Heat the oil in a 12-inch ovenproof skillet or small roasting pan over high heat.  When the oil is very hot, sear the meat very well on both sides.  Sprinkle with salt and pepper and place in the oven.  Roast 30 to 40 minutes for rare to medium-rare, turning once.

Meanwhile, melt 1 tablespoon of the butter in a 1-quart saucepan over low heat, add the leek and the yellow onion, and cook gently, without letting them color, for 8 minutes.  Add the veal stock (beef stock), raise the heat to high, and cook until liquid reduces and thickens enough to coat the back of the spoon.  Remove from heat and whisk in the remaining butter.

Remove the steak from oven when cooked to desired doneness and let rest on a carving board for 5 minutes before carving.  Slice the steak against the grain into ½-inch thick slices, arrange on a platter, and spoon the sauce over it.  Garnish with the chives, scallions, and red onion.  Ann's Note:  I decided to cook all the onions as I wasn't that fond of them raw, particularly the red onion.  My recommendation is to cook the yellow and red onions and the leek until almost caramelized and then add the chives and scallions and cook them for about 1 minutes.

---

[1] On this season's Iron Chef Gauntlet (was there another season?), Chicagoan [chef] Stephanie Izard beat out several highly-talent chefs for the chance to become an Iron Chef.  Once she won all her cheftestant rounds against fellow chefs of similar caliber, Stephanie had to compete in three separate rounds against current Iron Chefs Morimoto, Flay (Bobby) and Symon (Michael) in order to become a true Iron Chef.  Spoiler alert:  she did, she is!  Stephanie also won Top Chef, season 4.  She is a one to watch.  Another one to watch is fellow Chicagoan, Sarah Grueneberg, top chef at Monteverde in Chicago.  This year, Sarah walked away with a coveted James Beard Award as the Best Chef: Great Lakes.  Even though she lost to Stephanie, she was mighty impressive and I need to eat at her restaurant, STAT!

[2] You cannot tell me that some of the cheftestants don't have the same reaction as I do. You cannot tell me that.  Oh sure, they act all giddy and jump up and down about having to use fish fins or eel eggs as a secret ingredient but I know this is not so.  I know it.

[3] Ibid.  Which is to say "ditto."

[4] I paid nearly $12.00 for a one-pound piece of sirloin that wasn't the correct thickness – yikes!

[5] After Star Wars came out, I noticed the startling similarities between Chewbacca and my dad when they were upset about something.  Chewy raised his arm when he bellowed and so did dad plus, they both made a similar sound.  My dad was not at all upset about this comparison which was a good thing because I teased him about it until the day he died.  He'd always chuckle and say "Yeah, you're right!"

"The New Joys of Jell-O" - Under-the-Sea-Pear-Salad - Celebrating the introduction of Jell-O to the marketplace

Date I made this recipe:  May 28, 2015 – the 118^th anniversary of the introduction of Jell-O to the world!

The New Joys of Jell-O Brand Gelatin Dessert by General Foods Kitchen

Published by:  General Foods Corporation

©1973; 3^rd edition 1975

Recipe:  Under-The-Sea Pear Salad – p. 69

Well was I excited or what?

According to  Food Network magazine's May culinary calendar showed that Jell-O was introduced to the world on May 28, 1897, a day that will live in infamy right along with Pearl Harbor Day.  That's 118 years of Jell-O salads, folks.  One hundred and eighteen years.

Faithful readers may recall that last summer, my husband, brother and sister-in-law visited the birthplace of Jell-O in LeRoy, NY.  My brother and sister-in-law live nearby and yet had never been – amazing, right?  After that visit, dubbed by my sister-in-law as "the trip of a lifetime," I just had to make a few Jell-O recipes from my collection.  And then of course, once I used those up, I had to replenish by Jell-O recipe book collection and found this one within days.  Remember, "There's always room for Jell-O."  (And by the by, the other day an ad for Jell-O aired and it was just like the days of old where they used to sing and spell out Jell-O:  "J-E-LL-O!"  I honestly needed a moment to compose myself after that.)

Just days before I made this dish, I talked to my Aunt Mary, who, at age 93, remembers well Jell-O's popularity.  Really, no table was complete without a Jell-O salad back in Jell-O's heyday and my mother's table was no exception.  I have and use, all of her fabulous Jell-O molds.  It's the gift that keeps on giving.

As to recipes, this book contains both sweet and savory Jell-O, and by savory I mean vegetables plus Jell-O and trust me when I say I have enjoyed both in my day.  You can find recipes for savory Jell-O throughout the book, like "Garden Soufflé Salad" on p. 70; "Turkey-Soufflé Salad," p. 71 and "Molded Vegetable Relish" on p. 99, just to name a few.  Mind you, I'm not exactly advocating that you make these (I can already see the look on some of your faces and it isn't pretty) but rather I'm just pointing out that you have options.  Jell-O is a very versatile product so why limit yourself to just the sweet stuff?

When it comes to sweets, Jell-O once again saves the day as you have recipes galore for Jell-O parfaits, Jell-O pies, and Jell-O salads like the one I made.  My mom made a version of this salad using cottage cheese instead of cream cheese and it was one of my favorites.  In fact, due to my own ineptitude at following directions, my cream cheese, which should have been softened until creamy, came out looking more like cottage cheese.  Perhaps I was channeling mother?

I loved this recipe and in fact, have probably eaten most of it.  My husband, Andy, doesn't mind Jell-O but I don't think his family embraced it like mine did and so it wouldn't occur to him to just have a small bowl of it to finish it up.  Thankfully, I am more than up to the task of polishing it off.  In fact, when we got a turkey dinner takeout from one of our favorite restaurants the other day, it almost made me cry to pull out my Jell-O creation as it was just the thing to go with a Thanksgiving meal.  I should talk to Key's Cafe about this combination....

So here you go, a quick and easy recipe for J-E-LL-O!  Enjoy.

Under-The-Sea Pear Salad – makes about 3 ½ cups or 6 servings

I can (16 oz.) pear halves in syrup

1 package (3 oz.) Jell-O Lime Gelatin

¼ teaspoon salt

1 cup boiling water

1 tablespoon lemon juice

2 packages (3 oz. each) cream cheese

1/8 teaspoon ginger

Drain pears, reserving ¾ cup of the syrup.  Coarsely dice pears and set aside.  Dissolve gelatin and salt in boiling water.  Add pear syrup and lemon juice.  Measure 1 ¼ cups into an 8x4-inch loaf pan or a 4-cup mold.  Chill until set, but not firm – about 1 hour.

Meanwhile, soften cheese until creamy.  Very slowly blend in remaining gelatin, beating until smooth.  Blend in ginger.  Stir in pears.  Spoon over set gelatin in pan.  Chill until firm – about 4 hours.  Unmold and garnish with chicory or watercress.  Serve with mayonnaise, if desired.  Makes about 3 ½ cups or 6 servings.  Note:  Recipe may be doubled, using a 9x5-inch loaf pan.
 

"Sara's Secrets for Weeknight Meals by Sara Moulton" - Sausage, Lentil. and Spinach Stew

Date I made this recipe:  November 16, 2013

Sara's Secrets for Weeknight Meals by Sara Moulton (of the Food Network)

Published by:  Broadway Books

ISBN:  0-7679-1689-X

Recipe:  Sausage, Lentils and Spinach Stew - p. 173

Earlier last week, I got around to watching a DVR recording of the Food Network's 20th anniversary show and I must say, it's hard to believe it's been 20 years.  Still, when you watch some of the clips of the earlier shows, you can see the difference between the new, fledgling network ("Food Network?  What?") with really abysmal kitchen sets and little-known stars, like today's featured cookbook author, Sara Moulton,  to the huge behemoth..um...juggernaught?...that it is today. 

Prior to joining the Food Network Family, Sara built up a lot of street cred in the culinary world (cooking with Julia Child, anybody?), but she, along with other soon-to-be TV powerhouses, Emeril Lagasse and Mario Batali, were virtual unknowns when the Food Network started. Sara's easy, comfortable show, Cooking Live (later followed by Sara's Secret) though, was an instant hit as she explained her way through endless cooking demonstrations, making every recipe seem imminently achievable.  Sara was featured on the Food Network's birthday show and said that she was told early on to keep smiling all the time, no matter what happened on the show, and that smile caught on.  But I also remember her telling folks that as her popularity grew, so did the minor critiques, such as "You touched your nose with your finger after making that pie."  Eh, the devil is in the details, right? (I will go on record as saying that aside from seeing some chefs "double-dip,"- ew- I am not that watchful.)

I didn't tune in to the very early years of the Food Network as it really flew under my radar at the time, but just a year or so after it started, I started watching Sara's show.  Watching Sara was like watching my mom in the kitchen - always warm and reassuring - whereas Emeril Lagasse was "dad" - lots of energy (lots), lots of volume, lots of just everything but with an end (cooking) result that tasted great.  And then there was Mario who we won't go into who took Emeril's catch phrase "Kick it up a notch" to a whole new level with Italian cooking. 

My money though, was always on Sara.  And when I met her to have her sign this cookbook, she was just as nice and welcoming in person as she is on TV.  I like that. I may have a big personality (I'm told) in public but in my kitchen, I enjoy my quiet time with my ingredients making my meal.

In the Twin Cities area, Sara has a twin in Lucia Watson, owner of the eponymous restaurant, Lucia's, in the Uptown area of Minneapolis and author of my favorite cookbook (out of 1800+) Savoring the Seasons of the Northern Heartland.  I've mentioned this before but I'll say it again - I love Lucia.  She is my hero.  She is to the Midwest what Sara Moulton is to the east coast:  determined, engaging and brilliantly talented - a  person who just quietly rises to the forefront before anyone knows what hit them. 

The Twin Cities just celebrated its third annual Charlie Awards - restaurant awards honoring those individuals who stand out in the industry, ranging from Outstanding Food Truck Item to Outstanding Bartender to Outstanding Restaurant Design.  It's a very fun event and I was tickled pink, maybe even joyous, to see Lucia honored with a (culinary) Charlie Lifetime Achievement Award.  It could not have gone to a more deserving person.  I am also pretty pumped on her behalf that she, a female chef and restaurateur, won in the third year of these award shows.  That's got to mean something, right? Right - girl power!    (By the way, Sara Moulton was a 2012 James Beard Award Nominee in the Best Media Personality Category.) 

The dish I selected from Sara's cookbook, Sausages, Lentils and Spinach Stew, is one I could also easily see Lucia making and serving in her restaurant so I think it's rather cosmic that I selected this dish and made it the night before the Charlie Awards ceremony.  I told some friends that I suppose I could have substituted chicken sausage for Italian sausage except it offended the Sicilian in me, but a friend emailed back and said that those sausages are often overloaded with salt.  Good call then.  I'm not a fan of large amounts of salt and I have a problem with sausages that aren't pork - it just doesn't seem natural. (And it isn't but we don't have time to go there.)

At any rate, aside from the sausage, this is a pretty healthy dish, loaded with all good things including warm fuzzies.  These days, you can catch Sara Moulton on her PBS show, Sara's Weeknight Meals (check local listings for program information) and you can always make a run for the Uptown area of Minneapolis to catch Lucia Watson in action - Lucia's, 1432 W. 31st St. and for heaven's sake, don't forget to stop at her store, Lucia's To Go (next to her restaurant) for incredible edibles to take home.

Enjoy everyone!

Sausage, Lentil and Spinach Stew - Makes 4 servings

1 pound Italian sweet or hot sausages, cut into 1-inch pieces

1 medium onion, chopped (about 1 cup)

1 medium carrot, chopped (1/2 cup)

2 garlic cloves, minced (about 2 teaspoons)

1 sprig rinsed and dried fresh oregano and 1/2 teaspoon dried

1 Turkish bay leaf

Two 14- or 14 1/2 ounce cans chicken broth or 3 1/2 cups Chicken Stock (Sara's recipe for chicken stock is on page 32)

8 ounces dried lentils (about 1 cup), sorted and rinsed

One 5-ounce package rinsed baby spinach

Kosher salt and freshly milled black pepper

Combine the sausages and 1/4 inch water in large saucepan.  Bring to a boil over high heat.  Reduce the heat to low, cover the pan, and simmer for 5 minutes.  Remove the lid and cook until all the water has evaporated and the sausage has browned lightly.  (Ann's Note:  I wish she would have indicated how long it was going to take until all the water evaporated because it seemed like it took forever.  I finally helped the process along by pouring out most of the water and the letting what remained cook down.)

Increase the heat to medium; add the onion, carrot, garlic, oregano, and bay leaf to the sausage and cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables have softened, about 5 minutes.  Add the broth and the lentils and bring the mixture to a boil over high heat.  Reduce the heat to low; cook, partially covered, until the lentils are just tender, 30 to 35 minutes.  Add the spinach and cook over medium heat until it is wilted.  Discard the bay leaf and oregano sprig and add salt and pepper to taste.  Add water and reheat if stew is too thick (or add more broth if you want to turn this into a soup).

                                                          

"The Avocado Lovers' Cookbook" - Chicken Breasts in Creamy Avocado Sauce

Date I made this recipe:   June 3, 2013

The Avocado Lovers’ Cookbook by Joyce Carlisle (purchased at Arc’s Value Village Thrift Stores)

Published by:  Celestial Arts

© 1985

Recipe:  Chicken Breasts in Creamy Avocado Sauce – p. 91

If you’re like me (and of course you are), you likely record a lot of TV shows and then take great pleasure in zipping through the commercials, right, because who has time to watch all that.  But live TV puts the kibosh on that tactic and so I found myself watching Subway (sandwiches) commercial for avocadoes this past weekend.  Apparently, and this is good information to have, May is avocado month.  I had no idea.  I can tell you with complete confidence, having been told by a local TV meteorologist, that May is Severe Weather Month but he failed to mention a word about avocados.  I’m sure it was an oversight on his part.

So there I was, watching endless Subway commercials (and I mean endless) telling me I should get a sandwich with delicious avocado filling and I thought “Shoot, I’ll just grab my very own avocado cookbook off the shelf and do it myself.”   And I did.

This book cuts to the chase:  we have a brief history of avocados, tips on buying and using them (with pictures illustrating how to peel, slice and dice) and then we move directly into recipes.  The previous owner of this book was kind enough to dog-ear a few pages of interest and I decided on the Chicken Breasts in Creamy Avocado Sauce in less time than it took Subway to play their commercial.

If any of you watch the Food Network show, Chopped, you know that the judges are especially hard on people who fail to incorporate the four (secret) basket ingredients in a dish.  I think this recipe showcases how avocado can be blended into a delicious sauce and so…I win!  But other recipes gave me pause:  Avocado Chiffon Pie (shudder); Avocado Cheesecake (ummm…no?) and Avocado Ice Cream.  I was already aware that Avocado Ice Cream existed but just because it exists, doesn’t mean I have to make it, right?  Right!  And so I did not.

If I have a complaint, and I really don’t, but if I did, it would be that the non-secret ingredients – white wine, onions and celery – almost overpowered this dish (another Chopped no-no) but hey, this wasn’t a cooking contest and we used the avocado (and cheese – love that) and it was all good and easy to make.  Case closed, avocado month celebrated (albeit a few days late).

Chicken Breasts in Creamy Avocado Sauce – serves 4

4 chicken breast halves, skinned and boned

Salt to taste

Freshly ground black pepper to taste

Flour (for coating chicken)

½ cup butter (divided)

½ cup chopped onion

¼ cup chopped celery

1 clove garlic

½ lb mushrooms

2 tablespoons flour

½ teaspoon white pepper

½ cup white wine

½ cup chicken stock

1 ½ cups grated cheddar cheese

1 avocado, mashed

Pound chicken breasts until flat and tender.  Dredge with salt, pepper and flour.  Melt ¼ cup of butter in a large skillet.  Saute chicken breasts until evenly browned on both sides.  Remove from skillet and set aside.  Place remaining butter in skillet.  Saute onion, celery, garlic and mushrooms until tender.  Slowly add flour, then stock.  Cook until thick.  Stir in wine, avocado and cheese.  Heat through.  Place chicken breasts in baking dish, pour sauce over and bake at 350F for 15 minutes.  Serve hot.

"(Ted Allen) The Food You Want to Eat" - Ziti with sausage, tomato, mushrooms, and spinach

Date I made this recipe:  June 24, 2012

The Food You Want To Eat – 100 Smart, Simple Recipes by Ted Allen

Published by:  Clarkson Potter/Publishers

ISBN:  1-4000-8090-8

Recipe:  Ziti with sausage, tomato, mushrooms, and spinach – p. 68-69

So, we’ve all had this same experience, right:  you’re out someplace like a grocery store or a mall and you see someone you’re pretty sure you know but you can’t figure out where you know them from?  It drives you nuts.  Days later, let’s say you are out for your daily walk around a park and this person runs by you and of course, you have the BIG DUH moment.  “That’s where I know them from!!” 

I had the same experience with today’s cookbook author, Ted Allen.  Ted is the host of the Food Network’s hit show, Chopped, a show I watch with religious fervor.  If you asked me, and you didn’t, the producers are beyond cruel, making four chefs make an edible meal out of food in a mystery basket, of which three items makes sense and one item, oh, say, marshmallow fluff, does not.

At any rate, one day, a couple of weeks ago, Ted appeared as a guest on another food-related TV show, The Chew (ABC), and a good couple of minutes passed before it dawned on me where I’d seen him before. See what I mean?  I was so used to seeing him on Chopped that when he was on another show, I didn’t even know who he was.  Talk about embarrassing!

To make matters worse, I had completely forgotten that Ted was one of the five guys hosting TV’s Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.  The premise of that show was that five gay guys (Ted was the “food guy”) worked with a straight man who usually looked like TV character Grizzly Adams, to get him all foofed and poofed so as to impress the ladies. They cleaned him up, they redid his apartment, his wardrobe and kitchen and then dealt with what one might call deportment – how to carry oneself in public (“pinkies up!”) I thought the show was an absolute hoot and yet I had completely forgotten all about it.  So sorry, Ted.

Seeing Ted outside his normal element of Chopped threw me for a (brief) loop but not so much that I couldn’t remember that I had his cookbook in my collection – The Food You Want to Eat, and so out it came and so “away we go!”

Ted’s recipes are pretty simple (as stated on the cover…and being truthful is always a good thing) and the one that caught my eye was the pasta recipe. Okay, truth be told, several recipes caught my eye but the one I settled on was the pasta. Although I initially intended to make this around Father’s Day, we got busy and so here we are, almost at the end of June already.  Time does fly when you are having fun.

Speaking of time flying, yesterday afternoon, Andy and I attended a high school graduation party for a friends’ son.  These friends got married the year after we did (our wedding inspired theirs) and it is hard to believe that their first-born is now college-bound. We left the party later than intended and that meant we got to the grocery store later than intended and so on and so forth and before we knew it, it was 8:30 and we were just sitting down to dinner.  Oh well…these things cannot be helped.

Seeing as how I was hot to get this dinner on the table, my only tiny complaint about the recipe is that while it was easy once the prep was done, the prep itself took a bit of time.  I had to chop the tomatoes, slice the mushrooms, chop the spinach (and my word, 10 ounces of spinach does not seem like much until you have to de-stem and chop it) and so on.  I also had to remove the casing from the sausage and then break it up as I was browning it.  So be warned that just a bit of sweat equity goes into this dish – not literally though, as that would be gross.

In his write-up about the recipe, Ted said “If you’re on a health kick, (ha, ha), use chicken stock instead of cream, and omit the pasta cooking liquid.  Or see the chapter on salads.”

Funny, Ted.  I was not necessarily on a health kick but I was on a money kick and nothing irritates me more than the way milk or cream is bottled and sold.  How many of us have purchased the smallest buttermilk container we could find only to need a mere teaspoon or so?  Same thing with cream:  I did not buy a container because I only needed ½ cup and just did not want to deal with the other half.  You’ve got clout, Ted, so see if you can do something about that! 

That said, I used the chicken broth and can’t say it totally floated my boat but it didn’t displease, either.  And the tomatoes I got were not up to par and were pretty grainy and I was not happy about that, but this is not Ted’s fault.  Like many pastas, I think the flavors might need overnight to truly make an impact but this was good and we ate it and so there it is.

Tomorrow night is when the next episode of Chopped is on and as always, I will nod in agreement as ingredients one, two and three are brought out (“Oh, I can so do something with that”) and will likely yelp when the last one is introduced.  All I can say is that I am grateful that Ted wrote this cookbook before hosting this show or lord knows what he would add to this ingredient list!

Ziti with sausage, tomato, mushrooms, and spinach – Serves 4 (Wine pairing:  Italian Cabernet Franc or Aglianico)

Kosher salt for boiling pasta, plus ½ teaspoon for seasoning

1 ½ pounds ripe plum tomatoes

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

½ pound sweet Italian pork sausage, removed from the casing, or other high-quality fresh sausage

1 large onion, sliced

1 bay leaf

½ pound Portobello mushrooms, stemmed, caps halved and sliced crosswise ¼ inch thick

1 pound dried ziti

½ cup whipping cream (or ½ cup chicken broth)

10 ounces fresh spinach, rinsed and drained, thick stems removed, leaves coarsely chopped

¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 cup finely grated aged Gouda cheese, or Parmigiano-Reggiano

Note:  Ted and I differ on when to start the pasta.  He wants you to bring the water to a boil and then start the sauce.  I knew that it would take me far longer than he anticipated in order to make the sauce so I started to boil my water during the last couple of minutes of making the sauce.)

Bring a large, covered pot of salted water (about 4 teaspoons salt and 4 quarts water) to a boil over high heat.

Cut the tomatoes in half through the equator and squeeze each half over the sink to release the seeds.  Cut off the stem ends.  Coarsely chop the tomatoes and set them aside.

Heat the oil in a large frying pan over medium flame.  Add the sausage, onion, bay leaf, and a ¼ teaspoon of the salt and cook, breaking up the sausage with the side of a spoon, until the onion is wilted and the sausage is browned, about 8 minutes.  Stir several times during the cooking.  Add the mushrooms and stir well to combine with the other ingredients.  Cook, stirring every now and then, until the mushrooms are wilted, about 3 more minutes.

The pasta water should have reached a boil by now.  Add the ziti and stir to keep it from sticking together.  Boil until tender but firm, 8 to 9 minutes.

While the pasta cooks, add the cream, chopped tomatoes, and ¼ teaspoon salt to the pan with the sausage mixture.  Turn the heat to medium-low, cover, and cook for 5 to 7 minutes to soften the tomatoes.  Add the spinach and ¼ cup of pasta cooking water.  Cover and cook for 3 more minutes to wilt the spinach; stir once during the cooking.  Remove the bay leaf.

When the pasta is cooked, drain it in the colander, reserving about ¼ cup of the cooking liquid.  Add the pasta to the frying pan and stir to coat with the sauce.  The sauce should be just thick enough to coat the pasta with a little remaining at the bottom of the pan.  If the sauce is very watery, stir the pasta for a few minutes over medium-high heat to thicken the sauce.  If the sauce is very thick and gloppy, add the reserved ¼ cup cooking liquid and cook until the sauce is the right consistency.  (The spinach and tomato should have added enough liquid to give you a nice thickness, but depending on your heat and pan, you may need to adjust.)

Dump the whole mess into a large pasta bowl.  Sprinkle with the pepper and the cheese, and toss.  Serve immediately.  (What is not to love about an instruction that says “dump” and “mess” all in the same sentence?)

"The Pioneer Woman Cooks" - Simple, Perfect Chili

Date I made this recipe: February 5, 2012 (Super Bowl Sunday)

The Pioneer Woman Cooks – Recipes from an Accidental Country Girl by Ree Drummond
Published by: William Morrow
ISBN: 978-0-06-165819-8
Recipe: Simple, Perfect Chili – p. 82-83

Today is Super Bowl Sunday and as a lifelong Packers fan, I can’t say I’m all that impressed with today’s teams – the New England Patriots and the New York Giants. The Giants, after all, beat my Packers (in one of the most surreal Packers games ever), knocking them out of the playoffs with a huge thud. And yet, I didn’t want the Patriots to win and they did not in fact win and so life was pretty good.

But even though I didn’t give a rip about the game (and to prove it, I watched Law & Order reruns all night!), I do care about celebrating the Super Bowl with “Super Bowl” food and so this chili recipe came in darned handy!

When this cookbook came out a few years ago, I put it on my “Looks Interesting” list and thought it would be a while before I bought it, but a friend of mine got it for me as a hostess gift for my annual holiday party. (Thank you, Nan!). I’m a sucker for a good story and lots of photographs and this had them both.

And then last year, the book was made into a TV show on the Food Network – The Pioneer Woman - and now every week or so, I get to see Ree Drummond actually make these delicious recipes.

I should tell you though, that I almost didn’t watch her show. Color me jealous (because I am) but when the Food Network advertised it, they stated that something like millions of people read her blog. What?? I can guarantee that millions of people don’t even know mine exists!

So of course she turned that hit blog into a hit book that is now a hit TV series featuring Ree and her handsome husband, “Marlboro Man,” and her adorable kids and her dogs and her cattle and her second kitchen that she has to drive to in order to get there as it’s in another building on the ranch. My kitchen, although not the smallest I’ve cooked in, is at the back end of my house—no driving needed. During a typical Minnesota winter, this is a good thing! (By the way, my husband's nickname is "Dude" and he is also handsome. He does not however, round up steer for a living.)

So I had every reason not to watch her show, right, except I tuned in to the first episode “just to see” and I actually like it. And when I read that she chose to do her own hair and makeup rather than get up early to have it done for her, I grudgingly decided to keep watching. You’ve got to respect a female television personality who wants to do her own thing!

Out of all the shows that I’ve watched so far, my only complaint is about the last one I viewed on February 4th. Call me crazy, but I do not want to see kids holding up bottles of pond water while she’s trying to make something - ew! (The kids’ science project was to collect water samples.)

And out of all the recipes in this book (complete with step-by-step photo instructions), I had a hard time choosing one as they all looked fantastic. But nothing says “Super Bowl” like a good chili and so that was that!

Ree gives you the option to add beans, jalapenos and tomatoes with chili to the recipe. I used beans (pinto and kidney), skipped the jalapeno and added tomatoes without green chilies since I am a northern Midwestern gal and I don’t “do” tongue-searing food. I’m happy to report that it was all good – every last bite of it!

As for my Packers, they’ll be back. In fact, during the 70’s and 80’s, that was the team mantra: “The Pack Will Be Back!” (True fans know to add the word “someday” to the end of that sentence!)

By the way, Ree met her husband while on a stop home on her way to Chicago where she intended to apply to law school. As a “second-career” attorney who went back to law school after years in the workplace, let me just commend your husband for stopping you from doing something foolish by proposing!. A law degree ain’t cheap and in today’s economic market, it’s hard for many attorneys to find work. But everybody needs cookbooks, right? You done good, Pioneer Woman!

Simple, Perfect Chili – makes 6 servings
2 garlic cloves, chopped
1 teaspoon ground oregano
1 tablespoon ground cumin
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
2 tablespoons chili powder
2 pounds ground beef
One 8-ounce can tomato sauce
1 teaspoon salt
¼ cup masa (corn flour, found in the Mexican food section of many supermarkets) (Ann’s note: I got mine at a co-op and measured out only what I needed – sweet!)
Optional ingredients:
1 can pinto beans, drained
1 can kidney beans, drained
1 jalapeno, seeded and finely diced
1 can diced tomatoes and chilies (the author recommends Rotel brand)
For serving:
Shredded cheddar cheese
Chopped onion
Fritos

Begin by measuring the spices: chopped garlic, oregano, cumin, cayenne and chili powder.

Place the ground beef in a large pot and throw in the garlic. Cook until the beef is brown and then drain. (Ann’s note: I had myself an Oprah “Ah Ha!” moment in the kitchen. I put a colander over an empty pot and threw in all the browned ground beef. Well this was just slick as all get-out and eliminated the need to drain the beef spoonful by spoonful. I am a GENIUS!)

Pour the tomato sauce into the beef mixed, followed by the spices and the salt. Stir together well, cover, and reduce the heat to low. Cover the pot and simmer for 1 hour, stirring occasionally. If the mixture becomes overly dry, add in ½ cup of water at a time as needed. (Ann’s note: water was needed if I didn’t want to scorch the bottom of my pan!)

After an hour, place the masa in a small bowl, add ½ cup water and stir together with a fork. Dump the masa mixture into the chili. Stir together well. Taste, adjust the seasonings, and add more masa paste and/or water to get the chili to your preferred consistency, or to add more corn flavor.

Add the beans, jalapeno, and tomatoes if desired. Simmer for 10 minutes.

Serve with shredded cheddar, chopped onion, and Fritos.

Ree’s Helpful Hint: To freeze the chili, allow it to cool completely, then place it in 1-cup portions in freezer bags. Flatten the bags for easy storage in the freezer.

Holiday Party Food - "Finger Food," Pestos, Tapenades & Spreads," "Delicious Dips," Pillsbury's Best of the Bake-Off," "Sugar Spoon"

Date I made these recipes: December 2-4

Finger Food by Confident Cooking
Published by Bay Books Australia
ISBN: 978-0681020535
Recipe: Savoury Shortbread with Tomato Jam – p. 93

Pestos, Tapenades & Spreads by Stacey Printz
Published by: Chronicle Books
ISBN: 978-0-8118-6589-0
Recipes: Balsamic Fig & Caramelized Onion Tapenade – p. 62 and Avocado-Chevre Spread – p. 75

Delicious Dips by Diane Morgan
Published by: Chronicle Books
ISBN: 10-0-8118-4220-7
Recipes: Roasted Butternut Squash Dip with Crème Fraiche – p. 27 and Blue Cheese Dip with Chives – p. 59

Pillsbury’s BEST 1000 Recipes – BEST of the BAKE-OFF® Collection, Edited and adapted by Ann Pillsbury and the staff of Pillsbury’s Home Service Kitchens
Published by: Wiley Publishing, Inc.
ISBN: 978-0-470-39559-2. Original publication date: 1959
Recipes: Jim Dandies (chocolate-cherry - p. 361 and Hawaiian Moon Drops (pineapple, nuts and coconut) – p. 367. The Jim Dandies recipe was a Junior (Award) Winner created by James Petersen, Withee, Wisconsin. The Hawaiian Moon Drops recipe was a Senior (Award) Winner created by Mrs. Lyell Roberts, Chisholm, Minnesota.

Sugar Spoon Recipes from the Domino Sugar Bowl Kitchen
Published by: American Sugar Company
© 1962, Second Printing
Recipe: Old-Fashioned Sugar Cookies – p. 6
For the past couple years, Target has aired a hilarious series of commercials showing a shopping-obsessed lady working out in order to get ready for Black Friday. Let me just say that I know how this woman feels.

Right around Black Friday, I started working out in order to get in gear for my annual holiday open house. Besides recipe planning, there’s ingredient shopping, decoration shopping, alcohol shopping (Absolutely essential!) and of course food preparation.

To expedite cookie baking matters, I took a moment or two or sixty to pre-measure and sift and whatnot all the dry goods. Then I put them into plastic bags and labeled them, for example: “Lemon bars base – 1 cup flour + 1 tsp salt…” I created this trick years ago when I did a lot of baking for a party and it works great. When it comes time to add the dry ingredients, you just locate the correct bag and fire away. Easy as pie…hahahahaha….

And for those of you who bake, you know that best results are achieved if your butter and dairy are at room temperature so if I made three baked goods that day, I took out all the required butter and eggs in advance so I could just get cracking when the time came. (Pun not intended but now that I look at it…eggs…cracking….)

As to my savory items, I left those all for one day so I could use my cutting board for veggies only. I also bagged those ingredients and labeled them accordingly although at the end of the day, we had one leftover bag of minced parsley and rosemary that my husband failed to see. That was my bad though, as I failed to include that in my tutorial when he took over making some items.

So that’s the back half of the equation. The first half of the equation is deciding what recipes to make. This year, all my hot food items came from magazines and almost all my cold savory items and desserts came from books. And since this blog is all about cookbooks, I’m only going to list the recipes from the books I made but will take a moment at the end to tell you where I found my hot food items because dang it all, they were great!

So speaking of cookbooks, when it comes to shopping for party food cookbooks, my desire to have a “collectible” cookbook goes out the window. Instead, I’m looking for recipes that are relatively easy to make and can be eaten without utensils; I rent plates and glassware for the party but draw the line at renting forks. We all have our standards.

So with that criterion in mind, I started stockpiling books early on (usually on sale) and made dishes from these recent acquisitions: Finger Food; Delicious Dips; Pestos, Tapenades & Spreads and Pillsbury’s Best 1000 Recipes – Best of the Bake-Off® Collection. I also made recipes from previous party cookbooks: Barefoot Contessa Parties!; Betty Crocker Party Book, Betty Crocker Christmas Cookbook and The New Basics Cookbook.

And with that, let’s commence firing. First up is the Finger Food book. This book was published in Australia and let me tell you folks, thank goodness for the internet so I could look up US equivalents to grams and millimeters and whatnot. And I also have to credit this boss of a kitchen scale I own as it measures everything in the measurement system of your choice. Need ounces? Check. Need grams? Check. Check, check, check!

This year’s winning recipe was for Savoury Shortbread with Tomato Jam and by god, my guests were lucky to have some of that jam to eat as it was so good I could have eaten the entire bowl. I stuck to the recipe and made the shortbread with bacon and parmesan cheese although next year I might try some of the other recommended herbs and cheeses.

I think the thing that made this jam so yummy was that the vine-ripened tomatoes are roasted first and that just added sweetness to the dish. And yes, I know that tomatoes are not even close to being in season, much less “vine-ripened” at this time of year, but such is life. When it comes to party food, one must do what one must do. (That being said, I passed on my husband’s recommendation for an asparagus dish as it is pretty darned pricey at this time of year. We won’t even talk about how I nixed his suggestion for a scallop appetizer!)

Although the dough-making process took a minute or two, I thought this dish was pretty easy and I’ll likely repeat it next year. You know the saying – “If some if good, more is better!”

Next up, I used the Delicious Dips cookbook to make Blue Cheese Dip with Chives. This was so easy and so good that my guests pretty much finished off the bowl. In fact, one of my guests suggested to another guest that she finish it off but the other guest wasn’t that fond of blue cheese dip. “All the more for me,” my friend replied!

And then we have the equally delicious Roasted Butternut Squash Dip with Crème Fraiche. My only disappointment is that I thought the dip would be thicker but no matter. It’s so tasty I’m almost tempted to heat it up and eat it as soup. Wouldn’t be the first time…

My other little quibble is that crème fraiche certainly makes the dish but I needed such a small amount (2 tablespoons) that I almost passed on it. I bought it already made from my grocery store but now need to figure out what to do with the rest. I thought about making it myself but the ingredients that I needed (again, in small amounts) were almost more than the pre-made stuff. But here’s a question for all of you: Is it me or does the dairy lobby have it in for us cooks? I’m hard pressed to find anything I need in small amounts and am tired of paying high prices for a tablespoon or so for a recipe. Further, why do they list serving size for things like heavy cream as “1 tablespoon” and then “number of tablespoons per container: one million? I am math-challenged and so when a recipe calls for ¼ cup, I do not want to do the conversions on this, I just want the carton to tell me. We must unite on this!

Okay, rant over. Moving on…

Pestos, Tapenades & Spreads yielded two recipes, Balsamic Fig & Caramelized Onion spread and an Avocado-Chevre spread. Both were really good but the making of the fig and onion spread yields the better story: all was going well until I was instructed to add 1/3 cup of oil to the chopped onion and fig mixture. People, this was way too much. When I tasted it, all I could taste was olive oil and that is never a good thing. (And so to cleanse the palate, I ate a cookie that I had just made! Wow that was so much better!)

So I drained the oil as best as I could using two paper towels in the process and then caramelized some more onions and then added the now-drained onion and fig mixture to the skillet and cooked the entire thing for a couple more minutes. To me, this made all the difference although the yield was so small for my party needs that I made another batch and this time I added the oil in increments – no fool me!

Now although I have yet to blog about The New Basics Cookbook, I’ve gone to it time and time again over the years to find recipes. I guess I just haven’t felt like I found “the one” to post. And this year’s appetizer, although a hit, was such a bitch to make that it’s not going to make it this year, either!

The recipe is simple: 3 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese plus ¼ cup of Mango Chutney plus finely copped pecans on the outside.

So I started to put this together thinking that this would take me mere minutes. I mean with two main ingredients, how hard could this be?

Well people, it was hard! The cheese and the chutney didn’t bind well at all so I pulsed the cheese in my Cuisinart thinking that the consistency (shredded versus grated) might be the problem. It was not. The balls just wouldn’t hang together. So I put them in the freezer thinking that would surely make things better but it didn’t. So I tried the Cuisinart again and this time added more chutney to the cheese and there was slight improvement. Mind you, I still walked around the kitchen with more cheese on my hands and on the counter than in the cheese bites but whatever. By this time, the damage was done and these are off my list for next year! If you have a hankering to try them go ahead but be warned that this is a messy operation.

So those are my savory cookbook recipes. In the cookie department, I tried a couple new recipes from the Pillsbury Bake-Off® book with mixed results although I do love the retro nature of the cookbook. And seeing as how I recently acquired all my mom’s copper cookie cutouts, I made a sugar cookie recipe from my Domino Sugar Spoon Recipe book. (By the way, my mom ordered these cookie cutouts from Kellogg’s for $1.50 plus two box tops!)

Back for another year were Ina Garten’s Lemon Bars, a peanut butter/Rice Krispies/chocolate chip and marshmallow bar and the glorious Almond Bonbons from last year’s party (See my blog post from 12/8/2010). (By the way, I goofed last year when I made these bonbons, now called Boo-Boo Bonbons, added the entire can of almond paste to the recipe and they were spectacular. So I repeated that mistake again this year and they were once again a gigantic hit.

Before I got on with the baking though, I re-read my Pillsbury recipe ingredients and saw that two of the cookies called for “shortening.” Hmmm….sometimes when people say shortening they mean butter (or margarine—ew) so to be sure, I called Pillsbury and talked to the Dough Boy (nah—just had to say that) and the woman assured me that shortening meant shortening and butter meant butter. Okay then, shortening it is!

I also contacted the Domino sugar people with a question about their sugar cookies: I didn’t want to make 7 dozen cookies so I wondered if the cookie dough would freeze. Well, I tell you what, they weren’t sure! What?! I know that my book is older (1962), but come on, isn’t that a basic request?

So to be on the safe side, I asked my friend, cookbook author, and baker extraordinaire, Kim Ode, if I could freeze the dough and she said sure. She also said I could halve the recipe, including one egg which you put in a measuring cup, beat slightly and then pour out what you need. After all that though, I decided that there was no way the dough could make 7 dozen cutout cookies and so I made the entire batch and I was right! But thanks, Kim, for saving my butt on that one. (By the way, Kim is the author of Baking with the St. Paul Bread Club and is also author of an upcoming cookbook (release date is March 1, 2012) Rhubarb Renaissance. I cannot wait!

Okay so comments: the Jim Dandies (maraschino cherry and chocolate) were easy to bake but a pain in the butt to finish. If the marshmallow on top of the hot cookie was supposed to melt, it didn’t and that marshmallow mound make the cookies extremely hard to frost. As for taste, they cookies were okay but the texture was too “cakey” for our tastes.

Similarly, the Hawaiian Moon Drops (crushed pineapple and lemon extract) were easy to make but they were a little large in size for our party and again, the cookie was more “cakey” than we prefer. Both were tasty but I think we might try other cookies in the book next time around.

Once I got past the sugar cookie freezer question, the sugar cookies were easy to make although our oven did a number on a few of them that ended up in the hot zone. Let’s just say some reindeer looked as brown as they actually are! (And reader, why does this always happen when I’m getting ready for a party? I’ve never had my oven be so wonky as it was this year!)

Before I get to the recipes and ingredients, let me tell you where I found some of the other recipes I made this year:

Coconut Macaroons, Food and Wine Magazine, December 2011, made by chef Danny Cohen. These.are.to.die.for.

Chocolate Chip Pound Cake, Family Circle, April 17, 2010. This makes two loaves for 24 slices total. I cut each slice in half for my party. This recipe was delicious.

Chicken Meatballs with Sweet Peanut Sauce, EveryDay with Rachael Ray. Go online to find the recipe. Note that this recipe does not give a yield. I doubled the chicken (use a mix of white meat and chicken thigh for a moister meatball) and it still wasn’t enough. These were my most popular party meatballs ever. One Rachael Ray reader who made these meatballs suggested baking them at 400 for 25 minutes and I have to agree that this made for a great meatball.

Meatballs a la Pizzaiola by Giada DeLaurentiis, Food Network Magazine (go to foodnetwork.com to obtain the recipe). This made about 36 meatballs (as stated—go figure!) and they were yummy. Note: you may have a hard time finding smoked mozzarella (I got mine at Broder’s Cucina Italiana in South Minneapolis) and Giada didn’t suggest an alternative although you might want to consider smoked provolone if you can find it.

(St. Louis) Toasted Ravioli, Food Network Magazine, October 2011. Note that this recipe said “serves: 4-6.” Okay, that’s pretty vague because who knows how many people will want to eat. We used 4 packages and had a few leftovers. I microwave the leftovers for 30 minutes and serve them with my leftover sauce. They are delicious!

Savoury Shortbread with Tomato Jam – makes 48 (and it does indeed make 48 shortbreads but it doesn’t make nearly enough Tomato Jam so you might want to double the jam recipe)
Tomato Jam
5 vine-ripened tomatoes, quartered
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
½ teaspoon cumin seeds
1 small red onion (I’m going to sound like the late Andy Rooney here, but I have yet to see a “small” red onion. Just sayin…)
2 cloves garlic
100 ml olive oil
1 ½ tablespoons soft brown sugar
1 ½ tablespoons red wine vinegar

Shortbread
250 g butter (about 18 T) at room temperature
1 tablespoon hot water
3 ¼ cup (405 g) plain flour (“plain” flour is the same as regular flour; do not use self-rising)
½ teaspoon sweet paprika
300 g bacon (about 8 ounces)
1 ¼ cups (125 g) grated Parmesan
60 g poppy seeds (about ¼ cup)
Small fresh basil leaves, to garnish

Preheat the oven to moderate – 350 (180 C or Gas 4). Place the tomatoes on a roasting tray and roast for 30 minutes. Cool slightly, then puree in a blender or food processor until just smooth. Toast the fennel and cumin seeds in a dry frying pan for 1-2 minutes, or until fragrant. Cool slightly, then grind the seeds to a powder.

Puree the onion, garlic, ground spices and half the olive oil in a food processor until well combined.

Heat the remaining olive oil in a large saucepan and cook the onion mixture over low heat for 25-30 minutes, or until the onion is just beginning to caramelize. Add the sugar and vinegar and cook for a further 2 minutes, then stir in the tomato mixture. Cook over very low heat, stirring occasionally, for 1-1 ½ hours, or until the paste is thick and there is very little liquid remaining. Remove from the heat and allow to cool. (Note, the jam will keep up to 4 weeks in the refrigerator.)

To make the shortbread, beat the butter in a bowl until pale. Gradually add the hot water. Sift the flour and paprika into the bowl and mix with a wooden spoon until smooth. Stir in the bacon, Parmesan and ¼ cup (60 ml) water, then season well with cracked black pepper, adding more water if necessary. Roll into four logs 3 cm thick. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 2 hours. Spread the poppy seeds out on a clean work surface and roll the logs in them until evenly coated. (Note, these can be made one week in advance and stored in single layers in an airtight container.)

Preheat the oven to warm – 325 degrees or 170C /Gas 3 and lightly grease two baking trays. Slice the logs into 5 mm thick slices. Place on the prepared trays and bake for 15-18 minutes, or until pale and crisp. Cool completely.

To serve the shortbread, top with 1 teaspoon tomato jam and a small basil leaf.

Variations: Grated Cheddar, chopped fresh herbs, finely chopped nuts or a spice mix can be used to flavor the dough.

Balsamic Fig and Caramelized Red Onion Tapenade – makes about 1 1/3 cups
1 tablespoon olive oil, plus 1/3 cup (NOTE: I found the 1/3 cup to be too much and suggest you add it incrementally and taste along the way)
1 medium red onion, chopped
1 cup chopped Black Mission figs
¼ cup balsamic vinegar, plus 2 tablespoons
Salt and freshly ground pepper
1 to 2 teaspoons honey (optional—but I used it and thought it added a little something!)

Heat 1 tablespoon oil over medium heat. Saute the onion until soft and beginning to brown, about 4 minutes. Add the figs and the ¼ cup balsamic vinegar and continue to sauté until most of the liquid is gone and the mixture is slightly caramelized, 2 to 3 minutes. Transfer the fig mixture to the bowl of a food processor. Add the remaining 2 tablespoons vinegar, season with salt and pepper, and add the honey (if using). (Note: the reason I added honey is that the taste of the 1/3 cup of olive oil was overpowering. The honey helped take away that taste.) Pulse until the ingredients start to come together. With the machine running, gradually stream in the remaining 1/3 cup oil and pulse until a coarse paste forms.

Avocado-Chevre Spread – makes about 1 ¼ cups
2 medium avocados split and flesh scooped out
One 5-ounce package of chevre (i.e. soft goat cheese)
3 teaspoons lemon zest
4 to 5 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
1 garlic clove, minced
¼ teaspoon salt
Freshly ground pepper

Place the avocado, chevre, lemon zest, lemon juice, garlic and salt in the bowl of a food processor and blend until smooth. Season with pepper.

As the author notes, this recipe is an alternative to guacamole and is great in sandwiches!

Roasted Butternut Squash Dip with Crème Fraiche – makes about 2 cups
1 butternut squash (1 ¾ to 2 pounds)
1 very small yellow onion, cut in half lengthwise, stem and root end trimmed
2 large cloves garlic, skin left on
2 tablespoons pure olive oil
2 tablespoons crème fraiche (crème fraiche is a soured cream. It’s kind of a cross between sour cream and cream cheese. To make your own, you’ll need heavy cream and buttermilk. Instructions can be found online by using Google)
1 ¼ teaspoon crème fraiche
1 ¼ teaspoons kosher salt
½ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Freshly ground white pepper

Preheat the oven to 350F. Brush the flesh of the squash, the onion and the garlic generously with the olive oil and arrange the squash and onion cut-side down on a rimmed baking sheet. Tuck a skin-on garlic clove in each cavity of the squash. Roast until very tender when pierced with a fork, about 50 minutes. Set aside until cool enough to handle, about 20 minutes.

Use a spoon to scrape out the flesh of the squash and put it in the workbowl of a food processor fitted with the metal blade. Discard the skins. . (Note: I’ve never roasted a squash before and was surprised that it was very watery when I scooped it out. Consequently, the dip was a little thin in the consistency department but the taste was great). Squeeze the garlic pulp from the cloves and add to the workbowl along with the onion. Puree until smotth. Add the crème fraiche, salt, nutmeg, cayenne, and a few grinds of (white) pepper. Process to combine and then taste and adjust the seasonings. Transfer to a serving bowl and serve immediately. (Now that being said, the author notes that you can prepare the dip up to 3 days in advance. Cover and refrigerate and then rewarm in a microwave or on the stove-top in a double-boiler just before serving).

Blue Cheese Dip with Chives – makes about 1 ½ cups
1 cup (4 ounces) crumbled blue cheese
¼ cup mayonnaise
¼ cup sour cream
1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh chives
Freshly ground black pepper

In a medium bowl, thoroughly mix together the blue cheese, mayonnaise and sour cream. Stir in the chives and add a few grinds of pepper. Taste and adjust the seasonings. Transfer to a serving bowl. Serve immediately (This dip can be prepared up to 3 days in advance. Serve at room temperature).

Notes: some people like big chunks of blue cheese but I like mine a little smaller so I pulsed the cheese in my food processor until I got more even chunks. Also, for whatever reason, Minnesotans seem to love the combination of French and Blue Cheese dressing. Not that I’m knocking it—it’s good, but I don’t recall seeing that combination done in restaurants anywhere else. But here—go out to dinner with a group of people and almost every request for the salad dressing will be “French and Blue Cheese.” If you do that, you’ll seem like a native!

Jim Dandies – makes about 3 dozen
1 ½ cups sifted Pillsbury’s Best All Purpose Flour
½ teaspoon soda
½ teaspoon salt + 1/8 teaspoon for frosting
2/3 cup firmly packed brown sugar
½ cup shortening (*do not use butter)
1 unbeaten egg
¼ cup maraschino cherry juice
2 tablespoons milk + 1/3 cup for frosting
4 squares (4 oz) unsweetened chocolate – 2 squares for cookies, 2 for frosting
½ cup walnuts, chopped
¼ cup chopped maraschino cherries
18 large marshmallows, halved
¼ cup butter or margarine for frosting
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 – 2 ½ cups sifted confectioners’ sugar

Sift together 1 ½ cups (sifted flour), ½ teaspoon soda and ½ teaspoon salt; set aside. Cream shortening and brown sugar then add the egg (which you should beat well). Mix. Add one-half the dry ingredients as well as the maraschino cherry juice and 2 tablespoons milk. Add the remaining dry ingredients and mix well. Blend in (melted) two squares of chocolate, walnuts and chopped cherries. Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls onto ungreased baking sheets. Bake at 350 degrees for 12 to 15 minutes.

Place one marshmallow half on the cookies, cut-side down (while hot), then cool on the rack. Frost with Chocolate Frosting; top each with a nut half.

To make the frosting, in top of double boiler over boiling water, cook the milk, butter, remaining two squares of chocolate and 1/8 teaspoon salt until thick. Remove from heat. Stir in 1 teaspoon vanilla and 2 to 2 ½ cups confectioners’ sugar until of spreading consistency.

Note: as stated above, if the marshmallow half was supposed to melt on the hot cookie it didn’t. So this left this huge marshmallow-mounded cookie that I now needed to frost. Right. In retrospect, I should have just microwaved the cookie for a couple seconds to melt the frosting but I didn’t. Oh well, they looked funny but tasted good.

Pillsbury wants you to know that if you use Pillsbury’s Best Self-Rising Flour, you may omit the soda and salt.

Hawaiian Moon Drops – makes about 4 dozen
3 cups sifted Pillsbury’s Best All Purpose Flour
1 teaspoon double-acting baking powder
1 teaspoon soda
1 teaspoon salt
¾ cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
2/3 cup shortening (*do not use butter)
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla + 1 teaspoon for frosting
¼ teaspoon lemon extract
2/3 cup drained crushed pineapple; reserve juice for frosting (Note: my husband made these and had to add more juice. Lucky for us, we had a couple cans of pineapple juice on hand.)
1 cup walnuts
1 ½ cups toasted coconut
½ cup pineapple juice (for frosting; use reserved juice from pineapple can and add more if needed)
¼ cup cornstarch
½ cup water
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 tablespoon butter (for frosting)
2 drops yellow food coloring
1 ½ cups sifted confectioners’ sugar

Sift together (sifted) flour, baking powder, soda, salt; set aside. Cream butter and sugars (brown and white) together. Blend in 2 unbeaten eggs, vanilla and lemon extract. Beat well. Stir in drained crushed pineapple. Add the dry ingredients gradually and then the chopped walnuts. Blend thoroughly.

Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls onto greased baking sheets. Bake at 375 for 12 to 15 minutes. Frost with Lemon Frosting and dip tops in toasted coconut.

To make the frosting, combine in saucepan ½ cup pineapple juice, ½ cup water and ¼ cup cornstarch. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until thickened. Add 2 tablespoons lemon juice, 1 tablespoon butter, 1 teaspoon vanilla and 2 drops yellow food coloring. Blend in confectioners’ sugar.

Old-Fashioned Sugar Cookies – yield: about 7 dozen cookies
1 cup Domino Granulated Sugar
½ teaspoon salt
¾ cup soft butter or margarine
1 egg
1 teaspoon grated lemon rind
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 cups sifted all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon double-acting baking powder
Egg white, slightly beaten
Domino Granulated Sugar

Cream sugar, salt and butter or margarine thoroughly. Beat egg, lemon rind and extract into creamed mixture until light and fluffy. Sift together flour and baking powder. Gradually stir into creamed ingredients.

Roll dough 1/8” thick on floured board. Cut into fancy shapes. Place on ungreased cookie sheet. Brush with egg white; sprinkle with sugar. Bake in moderate oven 350F, 11-12 minutes or until light brown around edges. Remove to cooling rack. Store in airtight container.