Summer Salads

As I've explained before, I'm not comfortable with salads. Their apparent simplicity intimidates the daylights out of me. I just have no confidence that I can make it taste good -- ridiculous as that may seem. Which is why I was very surprised when I realised I had a craving for one a few days ago. But instead of simply throwing a bunch of greens together and drizzling it with a quick vinaigrette, I had to go and make a project out of it. Tsk. Just like me. I can't just eat something. I have to go and think about it. Higher education at work here, people.

Not that this is a bad thing by any stretch of the imagination. I probably should have more greens in my diet anyway, if USDA's new nutrition chart is anything to go by... Tangent: was anyone else completely dumbfounded that they didn't think to use a pie chart in the first place? And their recommendations are still difficult to interpret, since they evidently can't even center the design accurately. Moral of the story: if you need a statistics degree to figure out how to eat, USDA's doing it wrong.

Return from tangent: furthermore, that's the exact kind of meal that you would want to have during summer. Fresh, crisp greens with an acid tang; anything else would add to the lethargy you already experience from the heat. Now, personally, I don't think that a salad by itself it enough to constitute an entire meal. A potato salad or a chicken salad, sure. But just a salad? Isn't that kinda... limited?

A question to be explored at a later date. In order to satisfy my craving and food preferences, I uncovered these two recipes, which have temporarily turned the Salad to an accessible summer meal for me.

Chicken Cherry Salad
Obviously, the best way to make a salad more meaty is to add, well, meat. (Duh.) But this one goes a step further by also adding croutons and cherries. Vegetables, protein, starch, fruit -- boom! Full nutritional value in a single dish. I'm waiting for the government to pat me on the head like a good little drone.

Facetiousness aside, I did continue eating this for several days in a row, jealously hiding it from my roommates. It's not as crisp as I expected (maybe I didn't toast the bread fast enough?), but that didn't bother me. In fact, that would have distracted me from the soft texture of the cherries and chicken. The vinaigrette gives everything a pleasant bite (in nice contrast to the cherries' sweetness), especially if you let it all soak it in for a few minutes.

For the Chicken:

• 6 (2,1/4 lbs) skin-on, bone-in chicken thighs
• 1 Tbs vegetable oil
• Salt and pepper

For the Salad:

• 1/4 cup lemon juice
• 3 tbs Dijon mustard
• 3 Tbs dill, chopped
• 2 Tbs honey
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• Salt and pepper
• 4 thick slices rustic bread, crusts removed, torn into 3/4-inch pieces
• 1 lb fresh cherries, stemmed, pitted, and lightly crushed
• 3 heads butter lettuce, cored and turned into pieces
• 4 radishes, thinly sliced
• 1 Tbs chopped chives

Preheat the oven to 475, and heat oil in a large cast-iron or heavy nonstick skillet over high heat until hot but not smoking. Season chicken with salt and pepper. Nestle chicken in skillet, skin side down, and cook 2 minutes. Reduce heat to medium-high; continue cooking skin side down, occasionally rearranging chicken thighs and rotating pan to evenly distribute heat, until fat renders and skin is golden brown, about 12min.

Transfer skillet to oven and cook 13min more. Flip chicken; continue cooking until skin crisps and meat is cooked through, about 5min longer. Transfer to a plate; reserve the fat.

Whisk together the lemon juice, Dijon mustard, dill, honey, and garlic together in a small bowl. Gradually whisk in oil. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Stir; set aside. Remove the crispy chicken skin and tear into pieces. Do the same with the chicken meat; discard the bones.

Heat the chicken fat over medium heat. Add bread to skillet and toast, turning frequently, until golden and crisp, about 2min. Remove with a slotted spoon and drain on paper towels. Season with salt and pepper while still hot.

Place chicken meat in a large bowl. Add cherries, lettuce, radishes, and chives and drizzle with vinaigrette; toss to coat. Divide salad among plates and garnish with croutons and chicken skin.


Celery, Grape, and Mushroom Salad
Another good way to add meatiness to a dish (minus the meat)? Mushrooms! This is a doubly good recipe for summer because it calls for a grill -- not only for the mushrooms, mind you, but for the grapes as well. What an awesome way to add smokiness to an otherwise fresh and nutty dish! At least, so I imagine. I don't have a grill, so I rely on my broiler. It still tastes excellent, but I will definitely have to make it again when I have earned that essential step on the path to adulthood. NB: if you happen to have unlocked this life achievement already, please make this in its original form and tell me what it's like!

Also, if you want to prove yourself a dork, place the oyster mushrooms on your face and pretend that you're Cthulu.

(...yes, I do such things.)

• 2 Tbs white wine vinegar
• 2 tsp lemon juice
• 1/2 tsp celery seeds
• 1/4 tsp Dijon mustard
• 2 small garlic cloves, minced
• 1/2 cup plus 1 Tbs olive oil (plus more for brushing)
• 1/4 cup almond oil
• Salt and pepper
• 1/2 cup parsley leaves
• 1/2 cup celery leaves
• 1/4 cup salted roasted almonds, chopped
• 1 lb king oyster mushrooms, sliced lengthwise 1/4 inch thick
• 2 cups (12oz) green grapes
• 2 heads butter lettuce, leaves separated
• 2 cups very thinly sliced celery

In a small bowl, whisk the vinegar with the lemon juice, celery seeds, mustard and half of the garlic. Gradually whisk in 1/4 cup of the olive oil and the almond oil until emulsified. Season the dressing with salt and pepper.

In a food processor, combine the remaining garlic with the parsley, celery leaves and almonds and pulse until finely chopped. Add another 1/4 cup of the olive oil and puree to a chunky paste. Season the pesto with salt and pepper.

Light a grill (or heat your broiler). Brush the mushrooms with oil and season with salt and pepper. Grill over high heat, turning once, until tender and browned, about 5min. In a bowl, toss the grapes with the remaining 1 Tbs of olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Grill over high heat until the skins begin to blacken in spots, about 3min; line the grill with perforated foil if the grapes will fall through. Transfer the grapes and mushrooms to a large bowl and toss with the pesto.

Arrange the lettuce leaves on a platter and drizzle with half of the dressing. Spoon the mushroom-and-grape salad onto the lettuce. Toss the celery with the remaining dressing, spoon it on top and serve.

Hallelujah!

Supporting local food production, getting high quality ingredients, being challenged with new and unusual foodstuffs, learning what happens to the things you eventually put in your body... there are so many reasons to love farmer's markets, I don't think I could list them all if I tried. My local market just reopened from the winter hiatus. It's a little thing, hosting no more than a handful of stalls any given week, but compared to the goods at the grocery store ("America's Most European Supermarket!" - gag me) it's well worth the weekly pilgrimages to quality food. But since I would do my little market a great injustice by singing its praises insufficiently, I think I'm going to stop while I'm ahead. Instead, I'm going to talk about one thing about it that has me jumping up and down. And that thing is...

Meat.

Since moving to Chicago, I have encountered many interesting diets. Some are borne out of necessity (allergies, diabetes), and some of personal choice. With the exception of Zuckerberg's new diet, I can't think of any that are so overtly bizarre as to throw me for a loop. A little odd, sure. But friends who are vegetarian, vegan, kosher, allergic, or adherents to a particular culinary denomination are all welcome in my kitchen. In the meantime, however, I will remain happily omnivorous; I'll eat anything. Except licorice. Y'all can keep that shit to yourselves.

Moxie, on the other hand, is a locavore when it comes to meat. Make no mistake: she loves the stuff, but doesn't want to eat faceless-industry-processed muck. A fair opinion to have for an old farmhand. The issue is, what is local (and accessible) during a Chicago winter, when we live down in the south side? The answer: not much. Stray cat, maybe. Or the odd fattened rodent, if you care to catch it yourself (Zuckerberg?)

The result is that we've been eating mostly vegetarian during cold months. It hasn't been an issue: I have the odd meat dish when she's not around, and it's not difficult for either of us to get enough protein. But occasionally, that's not enough. There's a craving that arises. And sometimes, we heathen flesh-eaters - must - have - MEAT.

And now we can! Hallelujah and bless the farmer's market! To celebrate its reopening, we probably bought enough meat to last us a month, plus some other goodies (because, y'know, why not?). And to further mark the occasion, we planned to make a dish that I've been eyeing for a long time now -- to be precise, since I first got a copy of The Silver Palate, when Neen marked "Duck with Forty Cloves of Garlic" with 4.5 stars and the comment "use chicken!" Ultimately, we used two Cornish hens. Then joined forces with another apartment couple to have a spontaneous dinner party feast.

You may still be reeling from the title of this dish, in which case, further mention will probably throw you back into a frenzy. Yes, it actually does use 40 cloves of garlic. And it's delicious.

I'll wait for you to recover. Better? Good. 40 cloves of garlic! Blücher!

In all seriousness (hah), this dish deserves every bit of those 4.5 stars. Don't worry - since you roast the fowl with the cloves still in their skins, you won't be overwhelming the meat with a super-intense astringency. Instead, you enrich the moist bird with a faint je-ne-sais-quoi, giving it depth and flavour. The garlic is then added to the vinegary gravy, whose creaminess (coming from a stick of butter) is enough to tame it. As a whole, this recipe is a study in how to take disparate and pucker-worthy tastes and combine them to form a rich and satisfying meal. Definitely a celebratory meal.

"Duck" with Forty Cloves of Garlic

• 1 duck, 4.5-5 lbs, fresh or thoroughly defrosted // or equivalent in other fowl
• salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 2 Tbs vegetable oil
• 1 cup finely chopped yellow onions
• 2 carrots, peeled and finely diced
• 1,1/2 cups chicken stock or canned chicken broth
• 1 tsp dried thyme
• 3 parsley sprigs
• 1 bay leaf
• 40 large garlic cloves
• 2 Tbs sherry vinegar
• 1 Tbs Crème de Cassis (black currant liqueur) // I skipped this
• 8 Tbs (1 stick) sweet butter, chilled
• chopped parsley (garnish)

Remove neck and giblets from the duck; save the liver for another use. Chop neck, heart, and gizzard. Cut off wing tips. Remove all possible fat from the duck's cavity and prick the skin all over with a fork. Salt the inside and outside of the duck and set it in a shallow baking pan just large enough to hold it comfortably. Set aside.

Heat the vegetable oil in a small saucepan, add chopped giblets and wing tips, and brown over high heat. Season with salt and pepper, reduce heat, and add the onions and carrots. Cover and cook until vegetables are tender and lightly colored, about 20min.

Add the chicken stock, thyme, parsley and bay leaf, season with salt and pepper, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, partially cover, and simmer while the duck roasts.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Separate the heads of garlic into cloves, discarding the papery skin from the heads; do not peel the cloves. Select about 6 of the largest cloves and stuff them into the duck. Arrange the rest of the garlic around the duck.

Set the pan on the middle level of the oven. After 15min turn the temperature down to 375 degrees and roast the bird for another 35min for medium; 5 to 10 for juicy and still slightly pink. Transfer duck to a platter, cover with foil, and keep warm.

Strain the broth, discard the solids (aside: don't you dare. Keep them to make the gravy chunky later, or eat them as is), and measure the broth. You should have 1/2 cup. If you have less, don't worry. If you have more, return it to the saucepan and cook briskly for 5min or so to reduce it.

Lift the garlic cloves from the cooking fat with a slotted spoon and force them through the medium disc of a food mill. Reserve the puréed garlic and discard the skins.

When the broth is properly reduced, add the vinegar and Cassis, bring to a boil, and reduce the mixture by one third. Whisk in the garlic purée and remove the pan from the heat.

Cut the chilled butter into 10 pieces and whisk the butter, piece by piece, into the hot sauce, always adding another piece of butter before the previous one is entirely absorbed. The sauce will begin to look creamy and thicken slightly. Cover the saucepan and set it in a warm (not hot) place.

Carve the duck and divide the serving pieces among multiple plates. Spoon some sauce over the duck and transfer the rest to a sauceboat. Retrieve the garlic cloves remaining inside the carcass and use them to garnish the sauced duck. Sprinkle with parsley and serve immediately.

Asian Fusion Weekend

This past weekend witnessed a host of continual successes in my kitchen. It seems that everything we made, be they desserts, breakfast, or actual main courses, ended up perfect. In addition to this excellence, it appears that we also had an unplanned theme of vaguely pan-Asian-ish flavours in our dinners. That probably had something to do with the abundance of teriyaki and soy sauce in use. Y'know, just maybe. In any case, both these dishes do a wonderful job of pairing distinct sweet and sour flavours together. They were such an unexpected treat, I can't help but blog about them.


Saturday: Teriyaki-Glazed Salmon Fillets
I don't eat enough fish in my life. This is because a) as a scuba dive instructor, I find it somewhat odd to eat my little aquatic friends, and more saliently, b) the price tag of fish in the Midwest doesn't like me. But when you get a craving, there's no fighting it. I needs me some fishies. So, bolstered by the earlier success of revisiting old cookbooks, I took another leap of faith and started examining the fish section ATK's 2009 Cooking for Two. I don't rely on this one much, because "for Two" doesn't generate sufficient leftovers in my opinion. The food is good, though, so there's no sense in completely ignoring it.

This dish stood out from the rest in the section. It involves pan-searing salmon until it's almost crisp, and then covering it in a thick, viscous glaze of homemade teriyaki sauce (because bottled just isn't good enough). What's more, the recipe leads you to serve it on a bed of simple cabbage-shiitake stir-fry. Though I would add more mushrooms next time, this is a quick way to add both the crunch of veggies and the je-ne-sais-quoi of shrooms to the already sweet-salty tang of the fish. Talk about rich in taste and texture! ATK FTW. And simple enough that even I might decide to assemble it on a weeknight. When I can afford salmon on a regular basis. Yeeaaah...

• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1 Tbs mirin
• 1 tsp cornstarch
• 2 scallions, sliced thin
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 tsp sesame oil
• 1/2 tsp grated or minced fresh ginger
• 4 tsp vegetable oil
• 6 oz shiitake mushrooms, stemmed and sliced 1/4 inch thick
• 1/2 small head napa cabbage (about 8oz), cored and cut into 1-inch pieces (about 4 cups)
• salt and pepper
• 2 (6oz) skinless center-cut salmon fillets, about 1,1/2 inches thick

Adjust an oven rack to the middle position and heat the oven to 200 degrees. Whisk the soy sauce, sugar, mirin, and cornstarch together in a small bowl. In a separate bowl, combine the scallions, garlic, sesame oil, and ginger.

Heat 1 Tbs of the vegetable oil in a 12-inch nonstick skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add the mushrooms and cook until they soften and just begin to brown, about 2min. Stir in the cabbage and cook until wilted, about 5min.

Clear the center of the skillet, add the scallion mixture, and cook, mashing the mixture into the pan, until fragrant, about 30sec. Stir the scallion mixture into the vegetables. Season with salt and pepper to taste, and transfer the mixture to a platter. Tent loosely with foil and keep warm in the oven while preparing the salmon.

Pat the salmon dry with paper towels and season with salt and pepper. Wipe out the skillet with a wad of paper towels, add the remaining 1 tsp oil, and heat over medium-high heat until just smoking. Place the salmon, skinned-side up, in the skillet and cook until well browned on the first side, about 5min. Flip the fish and continue to cook until the flesh is opaque and flakes apart when gently prodded with a paring knife, 3-5min longer. Transfer the fish to the platter with the cabbage in the oven while preparing the sauce.

Wipe out the skillet with a wad of paper towels. Whisk the soy sauce mixture to recombine, add it to the skillet, and bring to a simmer over medium ehat. Cook until the sauce is a thick, syrupy glaze, about 2min. Spoon the glaze over the salmon and serve.


Sunday: Honey-Chile Chicken Wings
This recipe has been on my waiting queue for a while: Moxie and I had been planning to wait until the local farmer's market reopens to purchase quality meat. Unfortunately, we've both been suffering from meat-cravings recently, so we caved and bought the best free-range chicken the supermarket could provide (which isn't so much "happy" chicken as "vaguely content"). But man, does it hit the spot.

My first reaction to biting into the finished product was: "...buffalo wings?" Because indeed, they are similar to the restaurant appetizer that Do wants to order by the bucketful whenever he comes to visit. They have the same crispy skin and juicy interior; both are doused in sauce; finally, eating them with your hands makes a tasty mess that will leave you licking your fingers for hours. The sauce itself is what makes all the difference; I'm sure you can imagine the depths of taste in the combination of vinegar, honey, and soy sauce. Adjust the spice content to match your heat tolerance (Do, for instance, would triple the amount of crushed red pepper, and then add some hot sauce), and you can add the right amount of burn to the sticky sweet & salty mixture.

• 4 lbs chicken wings // You don't need that much; we used less than 3 lb
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• salt and pepper
• 1/4 cup rice vinegar
• 1 tsp crushed red pepper
• 1/2 cup honey
• 2 Tbs soy sauce
• 2 scallions, thinly sliced

Preheat the broiler and set a rack in the center of the oven. In a large bowl, toss the chicken wings with the olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Arrange the wings on a wire rack set over a large, sturdy baking sheet. Broil for 45-50min, turning once or twice, until the wings are cooked through and crisp.

Meanwhile, in a small saucepan, combine the vinegar and crushed red pepper and simmer for 1min. Let cool, then whisk in the honey and soy sauce.

In a large bowl, carefully toss the chicken wings with the honey-soy mixture. Transfer the wings to a platter, sprinkle with the scallions and serve.

Surviving PhD Exams with Indonesian Chicken Soup

Do's PhD Qualifying Exams are this Wednesday. He has been studying every day, evenings and weekends, for 11 months. For those of you outside academia, this event carries all of the anxiety of an Indiana Jones "Are you worthy to pass through, if not you'll die a painful death" ancient booby trap, but without the 3rd Reich and the Steven Spielberg dramatic soundtrack playing in the background. Like in the ancient Roman Coliseum, it'll come down to a thumbs up or a thumbs down from the Committee: thumbs up and Do magically transforms into a PhD candidate, thumbs down and we have to go through this 11 month hell again. If you get thumbs down twice, you get fed to the Lions: you're kicked out of the PhD program and pretty much have to give up on a career in the sciences.

Yeah, and he goes to the Coliseum this Wednesday. In 3 days. After 11 months of preparation.

All things considered, he's handling it pretty well.

So we've been eating a lot of "whatever will make Do happy." Turns out these days that's a lot of chicken soup. Friday night was our Matzo ball soup, and the week before was this crazy Indonesian Chicken Noodle Soup.

The soup was beautiful. The flavors and textures were complex. The ****ing recipe had so many moving parts that you should not make it without a sous chef (unless it's a dire emergency, like the week before Quals). I knew what I was getting into: this is a recipe out of the Williams & Sonoma Asian cookbook, a source known to gratuitously throw in esoteric ingredients and insert as many unnecessarily cumbersome steps as possible. Don't believe me? This recipe calls for you to grind a bunch of ingredients into a paste, which you then cook until fragrant (pretty standard for a south Asian recipe). I used a cuisineart. This cookbook wants you to do it by hand using a mortar and pestle! I mean, even freakin' Madhur Jaffrey (the Julia Child of Indian cooking in the 1970s) wanted you to use a blender!! Gah!

Anyways. So the soup is complicated and hand-intensive. But Do was so happy. The noodles expanded so that they sucked up almost all the liquid (the proportions are more Udon-style than a western chicken noodle soup). The dish was bright yellow and green, very cheerful for a winter day. It's delicious hot or cold (so good for leftover lunches). The flavors are authentically complex and nuanced. The fried shallots and hard boiled eggs and mung beans and all the other goodies add a ton of varying texture in every bite. He'd like it a little hotter, but didn't think it really necessary. Seriously, he took this dish into work every day for lunch and was so happy.

It's easy to buy chocolates and roses. In this household, we tend to display love by undertaking a very personal, labor-intense project, preferably resulting in something edible. One of our very first blog posts was about one such endeavor. In the spirit of V-day, if you want to really pamper somebody special (including yourself, because you're special too right?), I offer you this recipe. It takes so much effort, it must mean love.







Indonesian Spicy Chicken Noodle Soup, from Williams-Sonoma Asian cookbook (serves 6-8)
8 cups Chicken stock
1/2 lb bone-in chicken breast, skin removed
1/2lb bone-in chicken thighs, skin removed
1/2lb vermicelli
3 jalapenos, chopped (or more)
7 shallots
2 fresh ginger slices, peeled
3 cloves garlic
5 blanched almonds
2 Tbs lemongrass, chopped.
2 tsp tumeric
1/4 tsp ground coriander
2 Tbs fish sauce
2 Tbs lemon juice (Neen: don't add more, or lemon flavor will be more dominant than you want it)
3 eggs
1 cup bean sprouts (~ 1oz)
1 bunch cilantro, chopped
3 green onions, sliced on the diagonal.

In a heavy bottomed pot or large saucepan, bring the chicken stock to boil. Add 1 Tbs salt and the chicken, and return to a boil. Reduce heat to meduim and cook, uncovered, until the chicken is opaque throughout (~30min).

Meanwhile, soak vermicelli in water to cover for 15min. Drain and set aside.

Meanwhile, hard boil your eggs. (Suggestion: put eggs in saucepan and add cold water to cover by 2 inches. Bring just to a boil over medium heat, remove from heat, cover, and let eggs stand in water 20min. Rinse under cold water until cool, peel).

Meanwhile, roughly chop 4 shallots. In a cuisineart, combine 2 jalapenos, chopped shallots, ginger, garlic, almonds, lemongrass, tumeric, coriander, and 1-2 Tbs of water. Grind together until a paste forms. Set aside (Neen: if you have leftover lemongrass, which I did, just toss it in the simmering chicken broth).

Meanwhile, slice remaining 3 shallots and fry in 3 tsp canola or peanut oil until crisp and golden brown (7-10min). Drain on paper towels.

Once the chicken is cooked, use tongs to transfer chicken to a plate to cool. Pour broth into a heat resistant bowl. In the pot or large saucepan over medium, heat 2 Tbs oil. Add chile paste and saute until fragrant (~2min). Pour reserved broth back into the pot and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer, uncovered, for 15min. Stir in fish sauce and lemon juice and season to taste with salt and pepper, and simmer for another 5min.

Meanwhile, shred the chicken into thin pieces, discarding bones. (Neen: again, throw them back into the simmering broth to add flavor).

Meanwhile, quarter the boiled eggs.

When broth is ready, discard all the solids (all that lemongrass and bones you added in). Add the drained noodles to broth and cook until just tender (~2min). Add chicken, bean sprouts, cilantro, green onions to pot. Ladle soup intro individual bowls and garnish with eggs, fried shallots, and the remaining jalapeno. Serve.

Craving Greens: Chinese Chicken Salad

As Spuds has already described, the 2009 December holidays were fantastic culinary experiences. The family classics were phenomenal, and the younger generation did its best to translate "until it looks good" into as many written recipes as possible. It was also a real coming-of-age experience to surprise parents and grandparents with the quality of the recipes that we had in our back pockets. The greatest validation came when my Prussian grandmother asked for a copy of my mint pea soup recipe and Do for the soy sauce-wine reduction he'd used over sashimi for a Christmas Eve appetizer. We do okay in the cooking department.

But it sure was hard to put together menus without our recipe notes! Since our blogging had lapsed, we found ourselves straining to remember the details of our 2009 culinary successes. "What was the secret behind that amazing kimchi soup?... oh well, we'll have to scratch that idea." Not to mention that, without the blog, it became a lot more difficult to share recipes with our family.

So here's a recipe y'all should know about: Chinese Chicken Salad. It's pseudo-Asian creation from the November 2009 Food & Wine magazine, designed to satisfy cravings for Chinese flavors while still serving a light, green-centric meal. When D and I got back from the holidays, we were craving greens -- this totally did the trick. It's super flavorful, a nice blend of crunchy and smooth textures, and colorful. For folks on the Perfect Ten diet, you can make the salad Aziz-friendlier by eliminating the sugar, making your own mayonnaise (which takes 5min, really), using Low Sodium Soy Sauce, and generally cutting down on the volume of dressing. Warning: this recipe makes a huge quantity (I had to break out D's massive Le Creuset just to hold everything!).

Oh, and did I mention it takes 20-30min to make, depending on how quick your knife skills are?

Chinese Chicken Salad (serves 8-10)
1/4 mayonnaise (feel free to make your own. It's just 1 egg + olive oil)
1/4 cup unseasoned rice vinegar
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 Tbs sesame oil
1-2 Tbs Tabasco
3 Tbs sugar (can be eliminated if your diet so dictates)
1-2 garlic cloves
One 1" nub of ginger, peeled and grated.
One 2.5lb rotisserie chicken (or smaller), meat shredded
3 scallions thinly sliced
1 bunch of cilantro
1 small napa cabbage
1 head of romaine lettuce
1 cup unsalted roast peanuts, coarsely chopped
1-4 celery ribs, sliced
2 oranges, peeled and cut into sections.

Thinly slice napa cabbage and romaine into ribbons. Rince, and put into very large bowl. Toss with 2 Tbs vinegar, 1 1/2 tps sugar, and 1 Tbs olive oil. Set aside.
In a large bowl, whisk mayonnaise with vinegar, sugar, soy sauce, sesame oil, Tabasco, ginger, and garlic. Add chicken, scallions, celery, peanuts, and cilantro. Mix to coat. Add the chicken mixture to the napa cabbage mixture. Add the orange wedges. Stir and serve.

30min Thai Chicken Curry

Last weekend Do and I undertook the pruning of our recipe clippings collection. Our stash was pretty typical: ~50 recipes at any one time waiting to be tested, sorted into self explanatory categories like "veggies" or "chicken" or "deserts." It had simply become unwieldy and uninspiring, with clippings for recipes that may have been inspiring two years ago but no longer. So we culled and reorganized... and in the process re-discovered some very exciting dishes, like the 30min Thai curry pictured at right.

If I remember correctly, this recipe was part of an article on weeknight chef-worthy meals, published in the May 2007 issue of Food & Wine (when we were still in college -eep!). The 30minutes is overly optimistic, unless you either a) buy chicken that is very quick to prep (i.e. boneless or pre-cubed), b) recruit your favorite kitchen buddy to help, or c) all of the above. Do thinks that the sauce could stand to be reduced a little further to be a little thicker, but that's a common criticism of his. He's really happiest when everything is stew-like.

And those are really our only criticisms. It's a fast but solidly-flavored south-east Asian curry, using only commonly-available ingredients. As in, you don't have to have access to Bay-area grocery stores or be feeling particularly adventurous to enjoy this -- m... (Do quietly covers Neens mouth before she says something unforgivable). Vegetarians should have no problem substituting a firm tofu for chicken. Oh, and as we discovered, this is one of those dishes that does just fine with less-than-stellar chicken (ours had been cheap to start with and then languished unloved in the freezer for, er, a long time. Tasted great in this recipe). Definitely moving this clipping to the permanent collection.

Spicy Red Curry Chicken (Food & Wine May 2007 issue).

2/3 c unsweetened coconut milk (~half a can)
2 -3 tsp Thai red curry paste (Do: Korean Red Pepper paste is a fine substitute. Siracha Chili paste is not flavorful enough, use it just to add extra spice.)
1 Tbs Asian Fish sauce
3 Tbs vegetable oil, separated
1 1/2 lb skinless boneless chicken thighs and/or breasts, cut into 1/2" strips or 1 1/2" chunks
1/2 lb shitake mushrooms, quartered
1 Tbs grated ginger
2 large garlic cloves, very finely chopped
1/2 cup water
1 cup frozen baby peas
For serving (all optional): rice, peanuts, chopped cilantro, and lime wedges

Do the prep: cut up chicken, clean and chop mushrooms. Start making rice, if you plan to serve the curry over rice.

Shake the can of coconut milk before opening. In a small bowl, whisk the 2/3 cup of coconut milk with the red curry paste and the fish sauce until combined. Set aside.

Heat a large wok or skillet until very hot. Add 2 Tbs vegetable oil and heat until just smoking. Season the chicken with salt and pepper, and add it to the wok in a single layer. Cook over high heat, turning once, until the chicken is browned but not cooked through (~4-5min). Transfer the chicken to a plate and pour off the fat in the wok.

Add the remaining 1 Tbs vegetable oil to the wok. Add shitake caps and stir fry ovr high heat until lightly browned (~5 min). Add ginger and garlic, and saute for 1 min. Return the chicken and any accumulated juices to the wok. Add the red curry mixture and the 1/2 cup water and bring to a boil. Add the frozen peas and simmer until the liquid is slightly reduced and the peas are warm (~2-3min).

To serve: transfer the chicken curry to a serving bowl and garnish with peanuts and cilantro. Serve immediately with rice and lime wedges.

*******
And I couldn't resist: when we were putting together our menus for this upcoming week, the more mischievous of our two cats, Harissa, somehow wedged himself into the empty spot in our cookbook bookshelf. Yeah Reesie, you almost look like Julia Child. Keep working on it.

Beer-Butt Chicken

Saturdays are great. I'm sitting here in the kitchen as Do makes Veal Stew and Lentil Soup, and the smells are getting better and better. He's been getting really in to "Freezer cooking" -- making large batches of stews, curries, or pasta sauces that freeze well on the weekends, so that he doesn't have to worry about cooking during the week. So far, the convenience far outweighs any nostalgia for last year's daily kitchen dances. It's not like I have time to hit the grocery store mid-week either!

He's currently manhandling 5.5 pounds of chuck roast. Sexy.

Last weekend, I decided that it was high time to introduce Do to beer-butt chicken. Most people know it as "beer can chicken" or somesuch nonsense, but c'mon. You stuff a beer can up a Chicken's BUTT people. Five year olds dissolve into giggles. Adults, moderately intoxicated (1st step in BBQing is to souse the cook), follow suit. And then you end up with the best chicken ever. Good food and a story, what's not to like?

My Mom gave my Dad a webster grill for his 50th birthday, which he then happily dragged to Switzerland and the Dominican Republic (the movers were really disturbed that they were being paid to ship woodchips across continents), taking diplomacy to a whole new level with Southern Bar-B-Q. I don't remember when Beer-Butt Chicken first made its appearance, though I do remember thinking it a rather deliciously heathen practice. Everything else was eclipsed by the amazingly succulent meat. This is really the most luscious way to cook chicken ever. The meat is spiced by the rub, emphatically not dry, and the skin is crispy.

My parents use Real Simple's recipe, so that's what I'm giving you here. We're probably going to reduce the sugar next time. Also, "medium heat" is relative -- our grill got really hot and the chicken was perfect in 40 minutes.

We then vegged out with really good chicken and watched West Wing. True Escapism. Just think that we used to live there...

Real Simple's Beer Butt Chicken

2 whole dried chiles, such as chipotle or New Mexico
2 tablespoons sugar (Consider reducing)
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 tablespoon oregano
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
1 3 1/2- to 4-pound whole chicken
1 12-ounce can of beer

In a blender, food processor, or spice grinder, combine the chiles, sugar, salt, and spices.

Remove the neck and giblets from the chicken and discard. Rub the chicken inside and out with the spice rub. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 4 hours or overnight.

Light a charcoal grill and allow the coals to burn until covered with gray ash or heat a gas grill to medium. Drink half the beer; leave the other half in the can. Slide the chicken over the can and place in the center of the cooking grate, balancing the chicken on its two legs and the can, like a tripod. Cover grill.

Grill about 1 1/4 hours or until an instant-read thermometer registers 170° F inserted in the breast and 180° F in the thigh, or until the juices run clear. Carefully remove the chicken and hot can from grill. Let the chicken rest 10 minutes before lifting it from the can.

Yield: Makes 4 servings

NUTRITION PER SERVING
CALORIES 528(0% from fat); FAT 28g (sat 8g); CHOLESTEROL 223mg; CALCIUM 84mg; CARBOHYDRATE 9g; SODIUM 1912mg; PROTEIN 56mg; FIBER 2g; IRON 5mg

Enchiladas Verdes: Worth the Effort.

I don't know much about Mexican food. If you don't count Do's sister's scuba-diving wedding in Cozumel (I wouldn't), I've never been to Mexico. I do know something about Dominican Republic food, since my family lived there for four years and I worked there for two summers, but since I live in San Francisco and not Brooklyn, that doesn't help me much.

When my Dad and I were driving from D.C. to Berkeley, we made a big effort to eat at uniquely local places. In El Paso, after driving 570 miles in a day, we had our socks knocked off at a Mexican roadside diner, Carnitas Queretaro. It didn't look like much on the outside, a cheap diner next to a gas station on a major thoroughfare. The restaurant had been recommended by Steve, a blogger who writes extremely thorough and helpful restaurant reviews. Oh man. The food was really, really superb. Moist, flavorful, with the right degree of spice, perfectly prepared -- this wasn't trashy Tex-Mex. This was top-of-the-line Mexican food. Wow. Must repeat.

Fortuitously, this month's Cook's Illustrated has a recipe for Enchiladas Verdes (someone has posted the full recipe here) This is your cue to laugh at me for trusting a guy from New Hampshire to teach me to make Mexican home-style food. A couple thoughts:

1) Tomatillos are just plain cool. They're not actually tomatoes -- check out that husk! -- though they are of the same family. Many Latin American sauces char-grill tomatillos before turning them into pulp for sauces, and the flavor is incredible. Think smokey and tart. I am SO EXCITED to have a neighborhood grocery store that offers tomatillos (and poblanos, and varieties of plums that I've never heard of... more on how much we worship the Berkeley Bowl at another point).

2) This recipe was a lot of work. Think Madhur Jaffrey or Silver Palate or Gourmet level of work. It consists of 6 mostly-unrelated steps that have to be done in sequence, so that you can add the broth from step 1 to the salsa in step 3 and stuff the filling from step 4 into the tortillas in step 5... ack! Definitely not a project for a weeknight or for a cook who doesn't excel at multi-tasking. I actually had a lot of fun, but that's probably because my little brother and I made this together, with a couple of beers, Randy Newman on the kitchen speakers, and a leisurely evening of Battlestar Galatica reruns in front of us. With two, the complicated, inter-related steps seemed almost like a dance.

Of course, it helped that the result was absolutely spectacular. This recipe gets added to our All Time Favorites category. It was that good. The chicken was moist and flavorful, the tortillas soaked up the tomatillo salsa and the cheese to have the perfect texture, and the salsa itself was delightfully smokey. The cumin and peppers give the salsa a light, bright flavor, then cheese and chicken keep the enchiladas firmly anchored on the ground. This recipe is outrageously good. Please, if you have two hours to spare and aren't feeling stressed, make this recipe. It's really, really good.

My brother and I followed the recipe closely, with very few changes (we added more cumin to the salsa and a dash of black pepper). Our tortillas were already pliant, so we didn't bother to soften them before stuffing them. We also couldn't bear to throw away the fragrant liquid in which the chicken cooked... so we drank it. It was so, so delicious. Finally, Cook's Illustrated didn't remind readers that roasted poblanos are easier to peel if you throw them in a paper bag and let them sit for a few minutes. As my brother discovered, it makes a big difference.

Two thumbs up.

Poulet Basquaise

On Monday this week (yeah, the post has been in the pipeline for a little while...), I made a dish that I fell in love with. Really. The recipe comes out of our Bistro Cooking cookbook, which I highly recommend if you can get your hands on a copy. Ours comes from a used bookstore in Austin, and it is fabulous. We have made a number of recipes out of it in the last 6 months and they are consistently surprising. My only caveat is that, despite having an entire chapter on potatoes, they are mostly potato gratin dishes (which I am reluctant to make just because of the time requirement for slicing all those potatoes). The rest of the cookbook has fantastic recipes, most of which are fairly simple to make but have a distinctly French flavor. High marks overall. (Though, I don't think I will be so bold as to recommend it to Kate, over at Thyme for Cooking.... There are some distinct advantages to living in the French countryside....)

The dish in question, in case you managed to miss the title of the post, is Poulet Basquaise. The dish is centered around the contrast of sweetness of bell peppers/chicken and the spice of hot peppers, but actually only calls for two hot peppers (seeded) to be used. Of course, since there are only two of us, I halved the recipe. I just didn't halve the hot peppers - and I didn't seed 'em either. :) This is yet another example of the dilemma that Neen finds herself in almost constantly. The pleasure of having a lover that will cook her dinner (and enjoy doing it), while simultaneously wishing that he would lay off the heat. The problem is that I really enjoy hot food, and there are very few dishes that would not be improved by adding some hot pepper. I am trying to be better, though - if only so that she will keep eating what I cook. Last night I made a pasta dish (to be described later) that I was very tempted to add Serrano peppers to, but I didn't! It took so much self-control not to add those little packets of delicious heat. They would have tasted great... I hope she appreciated it!

Back to the Poulet Basquaise, though. The dish worked out really well, but it was not at all what I had expected it to be. It was cooked in three different pots. One pot for the noodles (of course), one pot for the tomato and onion sauce, and one pot to bring them all and in the darkness bind them... Wait, that's not it. The other pot was for the fusion of chicken, bell peppers, hot peppers, ham, and garlic. I also added a reasonable dash of white wine. The result was fascinating - after cooking for an hour while covered the bell peppers released so much liquid as to make an almost soup-like mixture. The flavors had melded together to form a seamless whole that tasted richly of chicken and yet also light, almost spring-like with the flavors of bell- and Serrano peppers. One taste was enough - I was sold. I loved the combination of the chicken, garlic, and Serrano peppers all brought together by the sweetness of bell-peppers. The flavor of the wine offered additional complexity to the flavors, without being over-bearing.

To serve, the directions were very specific: the tomato sauce should put down and then the chicken placed on top. Of course, I added noodles (it sounded like a noodle kind of dish) so I put those on the bottom of everything.

I should note that while this dish quickly gained a spot in my heart, Neen had a couple of reservations. The chicken came out looking fairly dilapidated and the chicken skin had a flabby texture. Also, the sauce, since it is so broth like, will seep to the bottom of a bowl making it tricky to get a piece of chicken, noodles, and sauce all in one bite. I have two suggestions for modification to the recipe to correct for these issues. One, I would coat the chicken in seasoned flour before browning. Two, I would use the extra flour at the last step to make a roux for the soup and thicken it slightly. Not too much - you might loose the lightness of the flavor, but I would want to thicken it just enough that it can grab onto pasta noodles.
[Neen inserts: or we can serve the dish over rice, as the original recipe suggests, and thereby bypass the whole problem....]

Patricia Wells' Poulet Basquaise: Chicken with Hot Peppers, Ham, Tomatoes, and Onions
4-6 Servings

4 small, mildly hot green chiles (such as serrano), or 2 hot green chilies, or 1/2 tsp hot red pepper flakes (I doubled the quantity of chiles)
1 chicken (3-4 pounds), well rinsed, patted dry, cut into 8 serving pieces, and at room temperature
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
5 Tbs vegetable oil
12 fat garlic cloves, cut into thin slices
2 large onions, coarsely chopped
2 lb tomatoes, peeled, cored, seeded and chopped (or substitute 1 28oz can plum tomatoes, drained)
White Wine (my addition)

1. If you're a weenie, Core and seed the chiles. Slice into 1/8-inch strips; set aside
2. Season the chicken liberally with salt and pepper. Ina deep 12-inch skillet, heat 3 Tbs of oil over high heat. When the oil is hot but not smoking, add the chicken and brown on one side until the skin turns an even golden brown , about 5 min. Turn the pieces and brown them on the other side for an additional 5 min. Work in batches, if necessary.
   
3. Return all the chicken to the skillet. Add the garlic, bell peppers, chiles, and ham, burying all the ingredients admist the chicken pieces. (Add a general cup or so of white wine). Cook covered, over medium heat, until the chicken is cooked through and the peppers are meltingly soft (45min-1hr). The pan will make a lot of crackling noises as the peppers give off much of their liquid. Turn the mixture from time to time, and adjust the heat to avoid scorching. You want a tender sauce.
   
4. Meanwhile, in another large skillet, heat the remaining 2 Tbs of oil over high heat until hot but not smoking. Ad the onions. Reduce the heat to medium-low and cook until very soft, about 5 min. Add the tomatoes and continue cooking for another 30min. The mixture should be soft and well-blended. Season to taste with salt. (The dish can be easily made ahead at this point. Reheat both mixtures separately.)
5. To serve, layer the tomato and onion mixture on a preheated platter. Cover with the chicken mixture, and serve immediately, with white rice. (oops, I used noodles).
   

Modern yet Comforting Matzah Ball Soup, by a first-timer

Let's do the sensual before the esoteric for once, shall we? Sort of retroactively taking up Psychgrad's suggestion to do the food before the ritual. :)

Do is now addicted to this Matzah ball soup. He has literally eaten it for three out of the last four meals, and has added it to his mental "must repeat once a month" list. Which is about as successful as a recipe can get in our house!

The soup itself is scarily easy to make (more on that later) and yet has a surprisingly deep chicken-y flavor. This is no insipid liquid that barely hints that someone may have once waved a chicken over it. This is punch-you-in-the-face chicken flavor. This may be because you add chopped roasted chicken late in the game (Thank You, local super market rotisserie!), which comes with its own set of spices and flavors that boiled chicken just doesn't have. The behind-the-scenes support staff, the veggies, are also doing more than their fair share of the work in the flavor department, I speculate because they get chopped very very finely in the food processor. As a result, more flavor leaches out of the veggies into the soup and you aren't distracted by hunks-o-veggie while eating. Oh and I speculate that my soup (above) would have been almost as clear as the Food & Wine photo (below) had I not spontaneously added chopped mushrooms to mine.

The Matzah balls, Do assures me, were also a success. They're spongy and light, yet they soak up chicken soup like a camel in the desert (Manna for my Men and Matzah ball soup for my Horses? No? No one listens to Toby Keith here? Maybe that's just Do's bad taste rubbing off on me). So it's like biting into chicken soup in solid form. I think they look kinda ugly, maybe like brains, but Do assures me that Food&Wine must have used golf balls in their photograph (see left), because no one's Matzah balls look that good. I think that this was my first attempt ever at Matzah balls, so they'll only get prettier with more attempts.

The last component, the dill-horseradish pistou, was really what took this version of the age-old classic to the next level. It was brilliant. It's essentially a pungent sauce exploding will dill and horseradish flavor. Extremely refreshing, extremely interesting, and forcefully inserts a light, fresh flavor into the otherwise heavier flavor of chicken soup. It reminded me of Scandinavian flavors. And it's beautiful. An impressively insightful modification to the classic: it takes chicken soup from the realm of the stuck-in-bed-with-the-flu and elevates it to High Holy day mode. Congratulations, Food & Wine, you really outdid yourselves on this one.

It was scary as shit to make though; at least 4 times during assembly I was convinced that it would be a total failure. The pre-cooked Matzah balls had an odd consistency and wouldn't really hold their shape. And then, I was convinced that they would stick to each other while simmering, and that I'd wind up with one giant glob-o-Matzah at the bottom of my pot. And then, I was pretty sure they looked like brains. And then, the chicken soup itself is so scary simple that I was sure it would taste just like tinned chicken stock. Let us say, it was an experience replete with adrenaline rushes.

Now for the mildly esoteric. I think it really says a lot about Judaism as (interchageably) a religion, a faith, and/or a family heritage/identity that Chicken Soup, chicken soup, is traditionally served on one of the High Holy days. It's in no way glorious, awe-inspiring, or intimidating. Instead, the focus is on a dish that is comforting and home-y, that creates the feeling that you are taking care of/being taken care of by the family and friends around you. I mean, it's soup, for goodness sake! It excels at producing warm and fuzzy feelings! How cool that it's traditional to serve a dish that brings out and prioritizes those sentiments. I dig that. I'm a-ok with religious observances that revolve around chicken soup.

(And yes, Matzah Ball Soup is traditional only among a subset of Jewish families, particularly those of Ashkenaz descent. For all I know, other Jewish cultures may serve a different dish that is equally warm and fuzzy. Me and my WASP-y preconceptions are taking this all in from a very subjective point of view. Speaking of which, if you want to read more about our intimate Monday night Seder, be my guest!)

The original version of this recipe comes from the Food & Wine magazine, but the version below represents my improvements (er, modifications).

Matzah Ball Soup with Dill-Horseradish Pistou (F&W claims that it serves 4, we found it served 6)

For the Matzo Balls:
4 large eggs, beaten
Half of 1/3 cup olive oil
1/2 cup seltzer or club soda
1 tsp kosher salt
1 tsp ground pepper
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 cups Matzo meal

For the Pistou:
1/2 cup extra-virgen olive oil
1 cup coarsely chopped dill
2 Tbs finely grated horseradish
1 garlic clove
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground pepper (we used Lemon pepper, since we had some on hand)

For the soup:
Carrots, finely diced (I used all our leftover carrots, which was probably 1/2 pound. Allow me to recommend the food processor)
Other veggies, finely diced (F&W used a medium turnip and a celery rib; I used 4 leftover button mushrooms).
3 quarts chicken stock (F&W recommends homemade; we are lazy and used storebought)
4 cups diced chicken (3/4 inch) (we highly recommend buying a rotisserie chicken from the grocery store, as it saved you time and tastes better than boiled chicken)

• Make the Matzo Balls: In a bowl, whisk the eggs with the olive oil, salt, seltzer, pepper, and ginger. Add matzo meal and stir until moistened. Refrigerated until firm, at least two hours.
• Line baking sheets with wax paper. Scoop the Matzo meal mcture into 1" balls (really. Keep 'em small. Unlike with cookies, bigger isn't better.). Using lightly moistened hands, roll the matzo balls until smooth. Transfer to the baking sheets and refrigerate the matzo balls briefly.
• Meanwhile, make the pistou: In a food processor, pulse the olive oil with the dill, fresh horseradish, garlic, salt and pepper until the dill is finely chopped and a sauce has formed. (At this point, you can stop and fridge everything overnight if you wish).
• In a large pot of boiling salted water, simmer the matzo balls over very low heat, covered, until they are plump and cooked through, 25-30 minutes.
• Meanwhile, in another large pot, heat the stock. Add the finely diced vegetables, cook 5 min until crisp-tender. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the matzo balls to the soup; simmer for 5 more mnutes. Add the chicken and cook until heated through.
• [You may want to let the chicken sit in the soup for a bit (10 min), to let the flavors mingle. I had to because Do was late coming home, and I think it made a big difference]
• Serve the soul in bowls with a dollop of dill pistou.

Field Trip to the Indian Grocery: Boxed Dinner and Sweets!

Have I mentioned that neither D nor I have ever put on a Seder? It's always been at his family's, or a giant dorm event or, if you go far enough back, it was simply a date on the calendar. This leaves us in the slightly intimidating position of figuring it out on our own (gasp!), with some help from the internet, cookbooks, and vague memories. This is what our breakfast table looked like Saturday morning:

You see Gil Marks' "World of Jewish Cooking" open to a page on Sephardic Roast Lamb and Ashkenaz Sweet-and-Sour Meatballs, recipe clippings from last month's Gourmet article on Passover (including Matzah ball soup), and a shopping list. You also see our not-so-nutritious (sorry Mom!) breakfast of tea and Indian sweets. After taking this picture, I realized that I have not yet shared our glorious trip to the Indian grocery store last week. So I'm putting Passover blogging on the back burner, and moving over to our Indian food finds!

In search of mustard oil to fuel his dal kick, my Dad scoped out Indian grocery stores when he was here a few weeks ago. He found a wonderful one right off Rockville Pike (12213 Nebel St., Rockville MD), owned by a lovely entrepreneurial family that has just opened a Halal meat store next door. From what we could gather, the Dad runs the grocery and the daughter serves as the butcher. I took D there for kicks and tourism last weekend and we indulged in a lot of goodies, including samosas and stuffed buns, a boxed Tandoori Chicken spice mix, and three boxes of Indian sweets. And had a lot of fun chitchatting with the gentleman behind the counter... a misleading phrase, because he promptly left the counter and followed us around the store to describe all the products and insisted on carrying our selections for us. A slightly overwhelming but charming display of pride in his own establishment.

It's not exactly clear to me what is in these Indian sweets. The silver foil covered ones in the red box contain "Kaju, Sugar, and Desi Ghee" and the Nutritional Information is reported in grams. Extremely not helpful. A quick google search for "Kaju" reveals "Kaju Katli is an Indian sweet made from cashews, sugar, cardamom powder, and ghee. Typically cut into Rhombus pieces and covered with edible silver foil Varakh."

Um, and it's addictive. For reals. The pieces are so cute and little and tiny and not overwhelming that, before D knows what is what, I've scarfed down half a layer in a sitting. (D inserts: "HALF a Layer! More like half the box!") They go especially well with tea the morning before Passover. Or eaten in bed while reading Jane Austin. Or a mid-afternoon snack.... :) We opened this box on Disasterous Dinner night (Thursday), and the photo to the left was taken on Saturday morning. This cannot be good for my arteries (I should take a photo of the ghee in my fridge sometime. It looks like jarred cholesterol), but oh man. Oh man. I'll take some of these over corn syrup-laden candy bars or mediocre American chocolate any day of the week. And, though the powers that be certainly won't agree with me, Kaju Katli is kosher for Passover! Did YOU see any yeast or flour products on that ingredient list? I think not!

[Passes the talking stick to D.]

Well, while Neen was busy eying up all of the sweets, I went shopping around for some boxed food. I know, I know, boxed food is the sign of the ultimate fall into depravity. It is one step forward and half a step back and to the right from Ramen, but when faced in the inexorable complexity of Indian food I tend to freeze. So, being a well trained Foodie, when I can't produce myself, I cheat. Besides, boxed exotic food doesn't really count as boxed food at all, right...

Well, based on the huge selection of box preparations that existed at this store, I am clearly not the only person out there who is buying boxed foods. They had a huge array of different kinds of chicken and curry dishes. I was actually very impressed with the selection. Of course, as soon as I saw a chicken dish that had that spicy red look that I associate with tandoori - well, I had to have it. Of course, it wasn't tandoori (and only a heathen as ignorant as myself would be thinking of tandoori when faced with a box of Dum Ka Chicken Masala).

The deal maker in this case was that the box contained just the spice mix I needed to marinate the meat. I purchased the chicken, cilantro, hot peppers, onions, and yogurt for cooking. They had a very simple recipe, straightforward except for having to deep-fry the onion (which I just wasn't prepared to do). The chicken had to marinate for two hours, or so the box said. I let it marinate for an hour and the flavor seemed full and balanced to me, but I won't claim to be an expert on how the dish was supposed to taste. I will claim, however, that it was delicious. Extremely spicy, but delicious. The chicken wasn't as tender as it should have been (I think this is a fault in my preparation), but the flavor was a nice balance of smoke, strong Indian spices, a little richness from yogurt, and a lot of heat.

Of course, once Neen had picked out two boxes of sweets, it seemed only fair that I should get to pick one too. The box I picked was packed full of what looked like Indian donuts. On the bottom you could see the thick layer of golden viscous fluid. I am going to pretend that it was honey and not a sweetened oil (or industrial syrup). The donuts themselves were all very good. The flavors were varied, but the texture was predominantly a thick cake-y texture, completely saturated with that viscous "honey". I loved them all. Well, not quite all. I don't really enjoy the flavor of coconut in my sweets. So there are three oblong shaped sweets that I am avoiding for the time being. I may get around to them before they go bad, or I may try to pawn them off on Neen...

[Neen grabs the talking stick back]

Okay, so D told you my secret: I did get two boxes of sweets. To SHARE. Of course. I would never, ever, hoard them or keep them to myself. Right. My second choice was the "Mixed Sweets" box (on the right), which contains a mix of disturbingly pastel-colored goodies. Most have a crumbly, grainy texture like Halva (which I far prefer to D's syrupy donuts) but without any of Halva's sesame flavor. They are sweet (very) and nutty (a little) and maybe coconut-y. Really, the coolest part was the texture: crumbly, grainy, but it dissolves in your mouth... mmm. So cool! And so not something I know how to make myself!

Okay, back to Passover deprivation...er, celebration. :)

Chicken Cacciatore, for when your brain hurts

During our 4th year in college, we lived in this gorgeous, old low-rise apartment building in Chicago. Unlike our current place, the rooms were ample and always full of light, making it a great place to have people over. Our dining room table was (and is) a well-used ikea number that doubles as a two person desk during most of the day, and we had more than enough room for two couches where you could often find my little brother hammering away at his 1st year English essays or Calculus problem sets. I would let him know that something yummy was on that night's menu, and that there would be more than enough to share (being as yet unwilling to experiment with the proportions of all these 4 person recipes. Without my brother to act as an appreciative garbage disposal, we have since become very good at halving every recipe off the bat), and he would wander over sometime after afternoon class and plug himself into our wall sockets for hours on end. D would drag himself away from lab and bring a graduate student friend with him, enticed away from experiments in favor of a non-cafeteria, non-eateria dinner. It was great. I really miss it. Unfortunately, neither one of us has a brother in D.C. and we live too far away from our jobs to casually drag unsuspecting colleagues home. Ah well, hopefully when we go to grad school in the fall...

This recipe, I believe, may have been what convinced D to defer grad school and follow me out to DC for a year. It's that good. Or at least, he reacted that positively when I made it for the first time in college... in retrospect that may say more about what I'd been serving him to date, but ehh. :) Chicken Cacciatore is like pure yumminess in a bowl, slathered in hearty tomato sauce over pasta. This recipe is hearty and flavorful and classic, without being reduced to some trite Italian reference. D inserts, "It's everything you like about a classic pasta sauce, but more. More spiced, more complex, deeper." The chicken is super moist and melts off the bone. We always serve it over noodles, to lap up that great sauce and to make the dinner stretch to feed 3 hungry University boys. Best of all, it's simple enough that even I, a super inexperienced cook (at the time) and nervous hostess (still), could pull it off without thinking twice. If I had to list only three culinary successes that we got out of that year, Chicken Cacciatore would top the list.

A quick word on the source. I clearly didn't take the photo above (notice the lack of pasta and the professional lighting -- definitely not me); it's the photo that accompanies the recipe in the "Real Simple: Meals Made Easy" cookbook. I really recommend it, we've had good luck with everything we tried. Unlike with most cookbooks that are marketed as "simple" or "college-level," these recipes have all been very flavorful, well-balanced texture-wise, aesthetically pretty, crowd-pleasers, and INTERESTING. I've heard some folks complain that Rachel Ray-type recipes are more "simple," but I find these recipes very clearly written, straight-forward in terms of steps and techniques, and really not requiring a lot of stressful juggling in the kitchen. And every one can be accomplished on a weeknight. The only drawback is that some of the recipes are less inspiring to me, mostly the "empty pantry" and the "no-cook" meals. Ah well, definitely worth leafing through in a bookstore!

Chicken Cacciatore with Pasta
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
kosher salt and black pepper
1 3 1/2- to 4-pound chicken, cut into pieces
1/4 cup olive oil
1 medium yellow onion, roughly chopped
1 carrot, diced
1 celery stalk, diced (eeh, optional)
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
3 sprigs fresh thyme (more is always better)

1 bay leaf
1 28-ounce can plum tomatoes
Cayenne pepper to taste
1/3 cup dry red wine
1 lb pasta (more or less depending on how many you're feeding)
1/4 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves

In a shallow bowl, combine the flour, 1 teaspoon of the salt, and 1/2 teaspoon of the pepper. Rinse the chicken and pat it dry with paper towels. Heat the oil in a Dutch oven or large saucepan over medium heat. Working in batches, lightly coat the chicken in the flour mixture, shaking off any excess. Add some of the chicken to the pan, being careful not to crowd the pieces. Cook the chicken until browned, 4 to 5 minutes per side. Transfer to a plate; set aside. Repeat with the remaining chicken.

Add the onion to the pan and cook for 2 minutes. Add the carrot, celery, garlic, thyme, and bay leaf. Cook, stirring occasionally, for 10 minutes. Stir the tomatoes into the vegetables, crushing them with the back of your spoon as you go along. Add the wine, and salt, pepper, and cayenne to taste and bring to a simmer. Add the chicken, reduce heat, and cover. Simmer for 45 minutes, turning the pieces occasionally.

In the mean time, cook the pasta in boiling water. When the Chicken is ready, remove and discard the bay leaf. Serve the cacciatore on top of the pasta and sprinkle with parsley.

Serves 3-5, depending on how many starving college boys you have at your table.

Check out the Presto Pasta Nights roundup at Once Upon a Feast.