Caesar Salad and Chilling Out

Posted on May 20, 2013 by Alisa

We’ve been trying to eat outside on our patio table more often as the weather warms up and the days get longer. I want to enjoy myself in this zen-like way where I don’t care about a little extra mess, where Olive eats everything we serve and she isn’t wildly distracted by the dogs and the wind and the trees and the air and where I lean back in my chair, leisurely taking bites of my food and just enjoy the moment and the concept of taking a little longer than usual to eat dinner. But instead, what has happened the few times we’ve done this, is I get all worked up and stressed trying to feed Olive and trying not to make a complete mess without her in the playful looking restraints of a high chair, and I end up trying to scarf down my food so that I can tend to whatever mess is going on, or try to block Olive from feeding all her food to Cash.

I do this to myself. (For the record, this stress is only with food and dining – I am okay with a muddy kid or a messy house or whatever – but please, don’t put food in your hair and whatever you do, do NOT drop food from your tray!) I don’t enjoy the experience of something different and out of control, I let that ruin the experience for me. Now, my sweet husband might just say, “Let’s not eat outside anymore if it bothers you so much!” (always trying to keep me from feeling anything but joy) but I think what I need, instead, is MORE dining experiences where not everything is micro-managed by my desires for things to look and go perfectly.

It happened again this Sunday – we had a picnic in the park with some people from our church group and we brought a tish bit of an ambitious lunch. Matt had made all the components for this really great Vietnamese pork and noodle salad and everything was so delicious, but I instantly got down about: 1. the wind blowing lettuce and dirt in my face 2. my baby walking around the blanket and the park NOT eating and spitting things out that we tried to make her eat (God bless one of our friends who had the brains to bring a banana 3. just the overall lack of control I had over the components of my meal – it was messy and I needed a bowl and lots of napkins and NO wind, but I didn’t have those things and I became really negative and I am 100% sure I ruined the experience for Matt, who was trying his best to stay positive while eating beside a big rain cloud (me).

Whenever I struggle with sinful things in my life like jealousy or greed or pride or even the need for control (a sin, I believe), I try to do a bit of immersion therapy on myself and directly expose myself to the thing I can’t seem to handle as often as possible until I am over it. It has worked in the past and I think I will try to apply it here. I resolve to eat outside MORE often. To let messiness happen MORE in situations where I’d like to appear perfect, and I resolve to look at my situations like Olive would – like an opportunity she’s never had before and quite possibly might never have again!

An opportunity you might never have, again, is enjoying a properly made Caesar dressing, because absolutely no restaurants make this dressing right, or from scratch. This recipe is so flavorful and has just the right balance of tanginess from the lemon and anchovies and creaminess from the oil that it’s nearly like a beautiful, homemade mayonnaise with a kick! I see this salad happening a LOT during this hot summer ahead!

Just a little behind the scenes shot of how I usually take my food photos

Caesar Salad with Homemade Croutons*
makes about a cup of dressing

4 tbs lemon juice, plus more to taste
1 clove of garlic, minced
salt to taste
black pepper to taste
1 large egg yolk
4 anchovies, plus more for garnish, if you like
1/2 cup canola oil
3 tbs bacon grease from 4 strips of cooked bacon, or melted butter that has been cooled
Torn up romaine lettuce
Parmesan cheese, freshly grated

Combine all the ingredients except the canola oil in a tall, wide cup and blend with an immersion blender and then slowly drizzle in the oil. Taste and adjust for seasoning with salt and pepper and extra lemon juice.

Toss leftover cubed up bread on a baking sheet, brush with olive oil, and toast until golden brown.

Toss a couple tablespoons with the lettuce until nicely coated. Top with croutons, cut up pieces of the bacon and extra Parmesan cheese. And lots of cracked pepper!

*recipe adapted a lot from Ruhlman’s amazing sounding Chicken Fried Pork Belly Caesar.

Mini Cherry Pies with Brown Sugar Meringue

Posted on May 17, 2013 by Alisa

I fulfilled a little dream, today. I baked with my daughter. And she even wore a mini-apron. In just a few more months, she’ll be able to stand beside me on her stool and really help. Today, she got to sit on the counter, play with the rolling pin, say, “row, row, row” as she rolled the dough and even properly sneaked little bites of the raw dough to eat. This girl knows how to live. And I’m so happy that she’s teaching me how to live mine, all over again.

I found cherries on sale for $2.97, regularly over $7! Cherries are in season in May, so I really hope they stay cheap for a few more weeks! I did a couple things with my purchase. First, I put a few whole in a jar and covered them with bourbon.

A great addition to cocktails in a few weeks, I’m sure! Or a grown up ice cream Sunday. Or, a merciful substitution for those horrid Maraschino circles of candy that call themselves cherries.

For my second act, I overcooked a batch of cherry pie filling so much that it resembled bits of dried cherries, resting comfortably in glue. (I’d left it on the stove to “simmer” while I went to see my friend in the hospital. Um, don’t ask why I did that.) Matt rescued my near-break down by going and getting me another pound at 10:00 last night, then helped me pit every last one of them so I could start over. That’s true love.

So I had a vague vision of what I wanted to do. I wanted to make mini pies, fill them with tart cherry filling and use a brown sugar meringue that I’ve used before and wanted to make again because it’s close to perfection and is SO SWEET that it can really only be paired with something tart. So these little devils are a combination of three recipes: Martha Stewart’s hand pie dough, My Baking Addiction’s cherry pie filling and Cindy Pawlcyn’s brown sugar meringue that she uses on her mile high lemon meringue pie at her amazing restaurant, Mustards Grill in Napa Valley (we went! we ate! we went into a food coma!)

The results were pretty great. I think next time, I’d use my tried and true pie crust recipe and just add lemon zest to it. Other than that, this recipe is a winner! Especially for this super hot weekend that reminds us all too well that we live in the desert and it is officially summer.

Mini Cherry Pies with Brown Sugar Meringue
makes two dozen

For the Crust

3 cups AP flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp lemon zest (this microplane works best!)
1 stick of butter (1/2 cup, room temp)
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
3 oz. cream cheese at room temp
2 tbs buttermilk
1 tsp vanilla extract

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and zest.

With an electric mixer on high speed (I used my stand mixer with the paddle attachment), beat butter and sugar until pale and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Add the egg and beat until just combined. Add cream cheese, buttermilk, and vanilla; beat until well combined. Add reserved flour mixture, and beat until smooth. Form dough into a ball and cover with plastic wrap and flatten into a disc. Refrigerate 1 hour, up to overnight or freeze up to 1 month.

Let the dough come up to room temp and then roll out into a circle about 1/4 inch thick. Cut out 4″ rounds and press them into a standard muffin tin, making sure to patch up any holes that form. This dough is kind of crackly, so don’t fret. It patches up pretty easily. Prick the bottom of each pie with a fork and bake in a preheated 375 degree oven for 15 minutes, or until golden brown. Some of the bottoms of the pies will puff up, but when they’ve cooled just press the puffed up centers down a bit before filling. I wasn’t about to cut 24 parchment rounds and fill each cup with pie weights. I’m not THAT dedicated to perfection.

For the Filling

5 to 6 cups fresh, pitted cherries
1/2 cup water
2 tbs lemon juice (fresh!)
2/3 cup sugar
4 tbs constarch
1/2 tsp almond extract

In a saucepan over medium heat, combine the cherries, water, lemon juice, sugar and cornstarch. Bring to a boil; reduce heat to low and cook, stirring frequently, for about 10 minutes. Stir in the almond extract and cool slightly before using.

I really love using my copper jam pot – (pardon the iPhone pic) The copper heats up almost instantly, as do the sides, so it cooks jam more evenly. There are lovely, affordable ones here!

For the Meringue:

3/4 cup egg whites (about 6 large)
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 1/2 cups firmly packed brown sugar

Place the egg whites and cream of tartar in an electric mixer fitted with the whip attachment. Place the brown sugar in a medium, heavy saucepan with high sides (that sugar will boil up and scare the meringue right out of you if you have a small pan), add water to cover, attach a candy thermometer to the pan, and turn the heat on high. When the sugar is at about 240 degrees, start whipping the whites on high speed (they should be foamy and starting to thicken before you add the sugar). When the sugar is at the high soft-ball stage (245 degrees), remove the thermometer from the sugar and, with the mixer still running, carefully avoiding the whip, pour the sugar into the egg whites in a thin stream. When steam starts to come off the whites, add the sugar more quickly. When all sugar has been added, continue whipping until firm but soft peaks form.

Assemble!

Fill each pie shell with the filling. Then top each with a generous dollop of meringue (you’ll have leftover meringue) and then get a torch and torch those suckers. I don’t like toasting meringue in my oven because I inevitably scorch them and that makes me feel like a failure and I try to avoid that feeling whenever possible. It’s all about setting yourself up to succeed in the kitchen that will keep you coming back.

I think these are best served with iced coffee because that’s what you need on a 100 degree day like today!

Little fingers are very curious

JOY!

Food Memories: Chicken n’ Noodles

Posted on May 15, 2013 by Alisa

Many of us have memories of being little and watching our moms or dads or grandmas cook or bake for the family. The first memory that comes to mind for me is watching my mom cut out biscuits with an old green chili can she had cut the top and bottom off of (it’s the perfect biscuit size!) and then slap each side of the biscuit in vegetable oil, then slide the disc in line with the others to fill up an entire pizza pan. There is something methodically calming about watching someone cook. I always felt like I was helping, even if I never touched anything. I felt involved, because mom let me stand there or sit on the counter across from her and talk to her while she worked. I will always be thankful that she let me hang around the kitchen. She was always so busy doing a thousand things for our family that it was the one moment when things were somewhat calm and we could just be together and I could count on it every night because I (thankfully) had a mom that cooked dinner 6 out of the 7 days of the week. You really can’t replace that kind of experience with anything else. Those memories stick.

My dear friend, Louise Shoemaker, shared a memory and a meal with me last week that seemed so fitting for my blog and for what I love about cooking for my family and eating together. She is one of the best writers I know, (she was my 10th grade English teacher – how lucky I am to still be friends with her!) so I asked her to write a little blurb about the recipe and the memory that went along with it. My favorite part about this recipe was consulting her every 5 minutes to make sure I was doing things right. She had driven up to Lubbock for the day and ate this meal with us! I’d never made noodles from scratch, and technically, neither had she, but she’d watched her mother so much that she knew. Here is what she had to say about the chicken noodle soup that made a permanent home in her memory:

Louise and her Mother

It’s funny that a food memory starts with a sharp, clear visual. The bright yellow Pyrex bowl and the red-handled Daisy egg beater swirling the rich gold of fresh yolks. I’ll never forget the 50’s color scheme of the kitchen: pink walls, turquoise cabinet doors, chocolate brown trim. I can still see the white enamel-on-steel kitchen table and my mom in her long, slim dress with the apron tied smartly and the scarf pulled back over her careful bobby-pin curls. It’s as clear in my eye today as it was in those days 50-some years ago.

It must have been a Wednesday. Two days until payday and five mouths to feed on a budget stretched to the last nickel. So, a plump (cheap!) boiling hen, a dozen eggs, a pile of flour, a splash of water, and we knew we’d make it till Friday.

Chicken’n Noodles: made-from-scratch pasta boiled in rich, fresh stock, with chunks of chicken so tender it fell off the bone. A silky thickened sauce, glistening with a bit of butter, and thick, rustic slabs of slightly chewy noodles curling on a plate. YUMM!

The aroma of that meal is the smell of childhood, and it takes me right back there to that kitchen watching my mom pour the beaten eggs into the crater of the flour volcano and mix and knead and roll the dough out to a four-foot circle. I can see her boning a mountain of chicken, dropping heaping handfuls of raw noodles into bubbling broth. Cooking this meal was a production, an infrequent event. I’ve savored the memory of Chicken and Noodles for decades. It was amazing to re-create it with Alisa. And Olive.

I like to think of them cooking together for years to come, Olive sharing with her mother an experience so rich and elemental and, in today’s environment, rare. You’re a lucky (impossibly adorable) munchkin, Ollie! And your mama is pretty awesome, too!

I am giving you the recipe I did – I only added a few things to the stock, the rest, I followed Louise’s mom’s story-like recipe as best I could. With pointers from Louise along the way…

Chicken’n Noodles

For the stock:
1 chicken, cut into pieces (8 pieces, bone still in: wings, breasts, legs, thighs)
Water
Salt
1 onion, chopped into quarters
3 carrots, chopped into thirds
2 bay leaves
3 sprigs of thyme

Put the chicken pieces into a large stock pot and cover with water until covered by about 2 inches. Add a couple tablespoons of salt along with the onion, carrot, bay leaves and thyme. Bring to a boil, skimming any foam off the top as it comes. Reduce to a simmer and maintain a simmer (I left my burner on about a 3-4) for 1 and a half to 2 hours.
Remove the chicken from the pan and let it cool. Then, remove skin, bones and any fat that remains. Chop or hand-shred the chicken and set aside in a bowl in the fridge while you make the noodles. Skim the stock of as much fat as you can, but don’t fuss too much. Remove the carrots, onion and herbs and discard so you’re left with a (mostly) clear broth. Keep the broth at a simmer with the lid on while you make the noodles.

For the noodles:

3 eggs
a big ol’ mound of flour (maybe 4-6 cups)
salt
elbow grease

Pour a mound of flour on a clean work space and create a hole in the center, volcano-style. Make it deep enough so that when added, the eggs don’t spill over the side. Leave flour on the floor of the volcano so you can’t see your counter. Crack the eggs into the hole and with your hand or a fork, whip up the eggs, incorporating flour as you go from the sides. You won’t use all the flour, of course. Keep incorporating flour to the eggs, stirring all the while, until you are left with a ball of dough that isn’t very sticky anymore. Knead the ball for a good 10 minutes until you’re left with a very smooth ball of dough. Trade off with a friend if you get tired:

Clean your hands and insert your finger into the center of the dough. If it comes back super sticky, add more flour and knead some more. Cover your dough with a towel and let it rest for 10 minutes.

Clean off your work space and if you’ve worked clean, you can save most of the flour you didn’t use.

Roll out the dough on a lightly floured surface till it’s an 1/8th of an inch thin. Or thinner. You may need to let the dough rest a few times throughout this process because it will start to shrink back up. Once you get it thin enough, cut it into whatever shapes you like. I chose squares because I have a kiddo that needs everything cut up, anyway. Louise remembers her mom cutting looooooooong, thick strips, which would be wonderful, too. You could even get cute and cut out little shapes from tiny cookie cutters. Once you get all the dough cut, make sure each piece is coated in flour and bring at least a cup more flour with you to the stove to boil and put this dish together.

Making it Into Soup:

Get your stock to a rolling boil. Dump your noodles in a handful at a time until they’re all in the pot, stirring as you go so they don’t stick. This is the vague portion of our program. Once the noodles are al dente, add the chicken back in and bring it back up to a simmer over medium-low heat. While stirring, add a sprinkling of flour – maybe 1/4 cup – and stir until fully incorporated. Keep adding flour till a good consistency is reached. You’re wanting an opaque sauce that’s neither soupy nor gravy – somewhere in the middle. If it coats the back of a spoon, it’s probably ready. Adjust the seasoning with salt until it sings of chicken goodness. Ladle up, top with a good sprinkle of freshly ground black pepper and enjoy. We had ours with a wonderful Chardonnay and some crusty challah bread with butter. Really – it does NOT get better than that. The baby went crazy for this soup, too, and ate her entire bowl, plus some of ours.

Bread: Guest post from Matt Palmer, a.k.a. The Bread Man

Posted on May 13, 2013 by Alisa

Alisa: I wanted Matt to write about the bread that he’s made countless times in the past seven years. He started on a quest to learn to bake at the same time he wanted to become more likable at his office (to improve his performance review, which, the only thing that was negative was, “Matt’s kind of intimidating”) and so the two tasks naturally went hand in hand. After one year of bringing bread in to the office every Friday, not surprisingly, there wasn’t a negative comment on his next review Bread is the great equalizer. This loaf, in particular, is beautiful in its simplicity, flavor, crusty exterior and soft, spongy interior. Frankly, it’s the perfect loaf. I think life has a lot of challenges, but if you could say that you could turn out a loaf of bread like this (given a day’s notice) any time it was needed, well, I’d consider that success.

Matt: I like making things from scratch. I enjoy learning how things work, and with cooking you usually end up with something better than what you can get at the store – and it’s cheaper, better for you, and you even get a night’s entertainment out of it. So I guess it was just a matter of time before I got into baking. I’ve been making bread pretty regularly for a few years now, and I’ve certainly gotten better, but I’m still an amateur. Bread is one of those things that you could devote your life to (think Jiro Dreams of Sushi) and still find things to improve on.

That’s part of why I love it, but if that sounds disheartening to you, the good news is that even the poorest homemade loaf is better than anything you can get at the store. With a little bit of practice you can make bread better than you can get anywhere (unless you happen to live in San Francisco, New York, or a country that still cares about good bread). It’s kinda like chocolate chip cookies – the best bread you can buy where I live is essentially the bread equivalent of Chips Ahoy. Maybe you live somewhere with a bakery that sells something other than cupcakes, but unless the guy behind the counter looks like this, I’m guessing the bread there is still a Soft Batch at best. I’m sure the worst batch of homemade chocolate chip cookies that came out of your mom’s oven blows either of those away. The bread that will soon come from your oven is the same – once you’ve tried it, you’ll be hooked.

Bread

21 oz bread flour (or AP flour if you prefer)

14 oz water (66%, for the bread nerds out there)

1 tsp instant/rapid rise yeast

2 tsp salt

Mix up the dry ingredients (you are using a scale, aren’t you?) and then add the water. Mix until the flour is all hydrated then cover it and set it aside for twenty minutes. (Or I could just say autolyse. See, you should become a baker, we have our own secret language.)

Stretch the dough out and fold it back up in thirds like you would a letter. Turn the dough 90 degrees and repeat, then put it seam side down in an oiled bowl. Wait ten minutes, then repeat. After three of these stretch-and-fold sessions your dough is probably developed. Put the dough back in the bowl and cover it and place it in the fridge overnight, or for up to 2-3 days (you might use less yeast if you know you’re going to wait several days to bake).

About two hours before you want to bake, take the dough out and let it warm up on the counter for a bit. Press it out into a circle (gently, we’re not making pie), then gather each side up to form a ball. Roll the ball in small circles on the counter to develop surface tension. This is a lot easier to understand when you see it, so you might want to watch a video.

Put the dough (now a boule, if you want to talk the talk) into a bowl lined with a floured towel. I use a basket called a banneton, which I flour directly, and it leaves little rings of flour on the loaf.

Leave the dough covered, on the counter to rise. This will probably take about an hour and a half, but you can tell if a loaf is still rising by poking it gently – if it springs back quickly, leave it to rise some more. If the indention stays, you’re ready to bake.

About a half hour before baking, preheat your oven to 450, with your baking stone, Dutch oven, or preferred baking device inside. You can bake on a sheet pan, and if that’s your plan you don’t need to preheat for very long. I recommend a Lodge cast iron combo cooker, which gives you the added heat while also trapping steam, and you can put dough into it without getting second degree burns, which is tough to do in a normal Dutch oven.

When the dough is ready, remove your preheated Dutch oven and flip the bowl over to put the dough into the pan. Make a couple of cuts in the loaf so it doesn’t rupture when it rises in the oven (this is called scoring), then put the lid on the Dutch oven and return it to the oven for thirty minutes.

Remove the lid from the Dutch oven and bake another 30 minutes.

Remove the loaf from the oven (the interior of the loaf should be around 200 degrees, if you want to make sure it’s done) and put it on a rack to cool. Lean in close and I bet you can hear the loaf “sing.” It’s tempting to cut into it right away, but I promise it’s better if you let it sit and finish cooking – think of it like resting a steak.

Blackberry Jam Tart – I get pie with a little help from my friends…

Posted on May 10, 2013 by Alisa

This tart was made because I bought three packages of fresh blackberries at 99 cents a pack (usually $3) and after we had some for a snack, I realized they would probably mold by the next day, and I would have wasted them. So, looking up blackberry recipes on Martha Stewart Living online, I found a wonderful recipe that calls for a cornmeal crust, a jar of jam and some blackberries. Perfect. And I JUST happened to have the most perfect jar of blackberry jam in my pantry, made by my friends in Seattle, who have an entire acre, basically, of wild blackberry bushes beside their house. I think jams and preserves are one of those treats that should be enjoyed in season. It’s so much more satisfying to get a jar from the literal fruits of someone’s labor, than to just go pick up any ol’ flavor you want at the grocery store. I think eating this way is another way of naturally limiting one’s sugar intake. My friend, Brynn’s dad, makes this blackberry hybrid batch of jam each spring/early summer, and sometimes, there’s no fruit and we’re all sad, and sometimes there’s an abundance and I get one, coveted jar. This stuff is the most amazing jam I’ve ever eaten. So we wait, excitedly, all year for it. Tell me that’s not better for the soul than having exactly the flavor you want, any time of the year? Cook seasonally, bake seasonally, and natural moderation will follow.

My cousin, Kathleen, and her daughter, Hannah, stopped by earlier this week to pick up the disc from a senior session I did for Hannah. Hannah’s boyfriend was with them, too, and when I asked if they’d like a piece of the berry tart I’d just made that afternoon, this precious boy’s eyes lit up and he just said, “uhhhh.” All it takes is one in your group to say “yes” for you to feel comfortable to take a piece, as well! They all stayed and ate and chatted and kept Matt and me company as we started prep for our dinner. I was in my little piece of heaven. Just wish it happened more often. I don’t always have a piece of pie or tart or cookies, but I ALWAYS have coffee. Always. So stop by any time. You might get pie, if you’re lucky!

Blackberry Jam Tart*

For the crust: (I didn’t have enough butter, so I just halved the recipe. It makes two crusts, anyway, so it worked out! I’ll post the full, two-crust recipe. This recipe also uses a food processor, which is easier, but you don’t burn as many calories and you have a food processor to clean up. Sometimes I’d rather pull a muscle than have to clean gadgets)

2 cups AP flour
1/2 cup cornmeal
1 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar
2 sticks unsalted butter, cold, cut into small pieces
1/4 to 1/2 cup ice water

Place the flour, cornmeal, salt and sugar in a bowl and whisk until combined. Add the butter and cut with a pastry cutter until the mixture resembles coarse sand. Add a few tablespoons of water and continue cutting it into the mixture until the dough holds together when pressed between your fingers. Knead it inside the bowl about 10 times until it all holds together in a ball. Divide the dough in half and wrap in plastic wrap and press into a nice disc. Refrigerate for at least one hour, up to one day before using.

For the Tart:

AP flour, for surface rolling
half a jar (about one cup) of blackberry jam
12 ounces fresh blackberries (about 3 cups)
1/4 cup toasted, sliced almonds

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Roll out the crust into an 11 inch round (about 1/4 inch thick) on a floured surface. Press dough into the bottom and up the sides of a 10 inch springform pan. Trim the edges to come 1 inch up the sides using a paring knife. Use the trimmings to patch up any thin areas or holes in the crust bottom. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Prick the tart shell all over with a fork. Bake until golden brown, about 25 minutes. Immediately spread jam into the tart shell, top with blackberries, sprinkle with almonds and bake for 10 minutes more. Serve warm.

*adapted from Martha Stewart Living

Pizza Night!

Posted on May 9, 2013 by Alisa

We do pizza night nearly once a week. It’s kind of a weekend thing because Matt makes the dough the night before and we think up a new topping combination we haven’t tried, yet while flipping through magazines and cookbooks. It’s even better to have friends over, make individual pizzas and let everyone top their own. Matt has the crust down to an art. It’s perfect every time and trust me, he’s tried at least a half dozen different recipes and ways of doing the crust. He finally got the texture he was searching for: chewy, crispy, even in the very center under all the toppings and sauce, and great flavor. It’s honestly lacking nothing. And it makes us bitter when we go out for pizza, thinking, “Why didn’t we just make our own?”

We have Jim Lahey to thank, the pizza guru himself. His book, My Pizza, is forever bookmarked on the crust and sauces recipes. The recipe isn’t the only trick, though! We have a stone that we start heating up as soon as we begin prepping. We heat it as high as the oven will go – ours is 500 – and let it heat for at least 30 minutes. Then, right when we’re about to cook, we switch it to the high broil setting so that it cooks the top as fast as the stone cooks the bottom. I don’t trust my pizza peel skills, so I let Matt put them in the oven. (Self admitted wimp when it comes to this and frying things. I’m scared of lunging heat particles.)

You need never buy pizza sauce again in your life. If you do, you’re probably sacrificing flavor, money and freshness. The only thing it won’t save is time. But really, it doesn’t take that long and you get to squish tomatoes between your fingers. Always a bonus.

The topping combinations we came up with this week:

Sun Dried Tomato, Goat Cheese and Basil

Pea, Bacon and Mint with Bechemel Sauce (alfredo, basically)

Mexican Chorizo, Purple Potato, Queso Fresco and Fresh Corn (this was my idea and my favorite of the three, but chorizo is cheating because it makes everything delicious like bacon or butter. Three cheers for lymph nodes and salivary glands and such – I’m at least comforted that they don’t try to hide these ingredients from the list)

The best part of pizza night is that there’s no limit to your topping choices! We’ve done so many from buffalo chicken to dried cherries and sausage (a fav) and even Thai chicken. Get creative and get a pizza stone!

Pizza Dough:

500 grams all purpose flour
350 grams water
1/4 tsp active dry yeast
2 tsp fine sea salt

In a medium bowl, thoroughly blend the flour, yeast, and salt. Add the water and with a wooden spoon or your hands, mix thoroughly.

Cover the bowl with plastic wrap or a kitchen towel and allow it to rise at room temp for 18 hours or until it has more than doubled. it will take longer in a chilly room and less time in a very warm one.

Flour a work surface and scrape the dough out of the bowl. Divide it into 4 equal parts and shape them: For each portion, start with the right side of the dough and pull it toward the center; then do the same with the left, then the top, then the bottom. The order doesn’t actually matter; what you want is four folds. Shape each portion into a round and turn seam side down. Mold the dough into a neat circular mound. The mounds should not be sticky; if they are, dust with more flour.

If you don’t intend to use the dough right away, wrap the balls individually in plastic and refrigerate for up to 3 days. Return to room temp by leaving them out on the counter, covered in a damp cloth for 2 to 3 hours before needed.

Shape each ball into about an 8-9″ round (about 1/4″ thick). Put on a pizza peel (we have a wooden one and we dust it with cornmeal so that the dough slides off easily once topped) and top with a thin layer of desired sauce. We’ve used plain olive oil, pesto, bechemel, marinara, buffalo sauce, homemade ranch dressing, etc – possibilities are endless and should correspond with your toppings! One tip if you’re using a fresh mozzarella that might be watery is to sprinkle the top of the cheese with a little corn meal. It absorbs the extra moisture! Top your pizza as desired – maybe don’t go crazy because the weight makes it hard to get off the peel. If you’re using fresh herbs, put them on once your pizza comes out, unless you just want that charred effect. We cook our pizzas at a preheated 500F oven for exactly 5 minutes. Right before we put the pizzas in, we turn our oven to broil. Some of this may be trial and error depending on how your oven cooks (oh, for a wood-burning stove!) but that’s part of the fun of cooking – figure out what works!

Marinara Sauce that we use every time:

1 – 28oz. can whole tomatoes. We like San Marzano
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 tsp salt
2 tbs red wine vinegar

Combine all ingredients and crush tomatoes with your hands, removing the tough stem ends of the tomatoes. Mix well. That’s it! :)

Creamy Rice with Peas and Asparagus

Posted on May 6, 2013 by Alisa

There is a beautiful quarterly cookbook/magazine called Canal House cooking. It is founded by two friends who meet together every day to talk about what they had for dinner the night before, and then they get cooking. They decided to start writing down their recipes and what resulted was this beautiful magazine book. I like to try recipes out that are in season, and so I am currently going through their Spring issue. And even though there aren’t a lot of fresh peas in our produce bins, I know that they are currently in season somewhere out there in lands where it rains, so I felt this was still an appropriate recipe for an overcast May day. Asparagus is also in season, so I added some chopped up that I had roasted a few nights before and it was a really excellent addition. Canal House calls this dish Risi E Bisi (rice and peas) and it’s just that simple.

This is an excellent dish for little ones. The comfort of soft rice and cheese and the addition of greens and a dab of butter makes this dish all-inclusive. For smaller, toothless ones, this would be so simple to pulse a few times with an immersion blender! Olive still doesn’t like asparagus, but I think I’ve only given it to her 5 times. I’m going to try at least 15 more times before I determine that she does not, in fact, love asparagus. I challenge any mom out there to do the same! Case in point: I had nearly determined that Olive didn’t like peas until I hadn’t given them to her for a week or so, and then tried again and she gobbled them up. I realized that familiarity equals good for a child. So if you make a wide variety of vegetables simply familiar to a child, the enthusiasm will soon follow. I believe this with all my heart, even on days where Olive spits out anything green. One day she won’t, and I’ll be glad I didn’t let her under-developed, under-exposed palate determine her food preferences!

Creamy Rice with Peas and Asparagus
serves 6

2 tbs extra virgin olive oil
4 tbs butter
1 onion, finely chopped
2 cups fresh peas (you could also use frozen, as I did and it turned out great)
salt
6 cups hot chicken or vegetable stock
1 1/2 cups arborio rice, or other short grain rice. I didn’t have any on hand, so I used plain long grain white and it was just fine.
1/2 cup freshly grated parmigiano-reggiano
pepper to taste
1 bunch asparagus, roasted at 400 with olive oil, salt and pepper until tender

Heat the olive oil and 2 tbs of the butter together in a heavy medium pot over medium heat. Add the onions and cook until soft and golden, 5-10 minutes. Add the peas and season with salt. Cook for a minute or two, then add 1 cup of the hot stock.

Cover the pot, reduce the heat to medium-low, and simmer the peas until they begin to soften, about 5 minutes.

Stir in the rice and 4 cups of the remaining hot stock. Cover the pot and adjust the heat to maintain a gentle boil. Cook the rice, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 20 minutes.

Remove the pot from the heat and moisten the rice and peas (if needed and too thick) with the remaining cup of stock (I didn’t do this step – my rice didn’t absorb as much as arborio would have) Stir in the remaining 2 tbs of butter and half of the cheese. Fold in the chopped, roasted asparagus if you want. Season with salt and pepper and serve sprinkled with remaining cheese.

Coconut Cream Cheese Pound Cake

Posted on May 4, 2013 by Alisa

This picture is of the cake resting on my toy kitchen that I had as a child. Mom and I looked up pics of me and my cousin, Tracy, playing with this kitchen when I was three and she was five. We were both wearing frilly dresses and prancing around the room with spoons in hand, creating recipes out of air and pretending it was delicious. Ah, nostalgia

Doesn’t seem that long ago…

It’s funny how you can also be nostalgic about something that wasn’t even your personal memory. My mom made this cake for my older brother and it was his favorite, but it became part of my food nostalgia anyway. I think that’s another wonderful thing about food – others’ enjoyment of it can create memories for you, whether you took part or not. I like remembering foods my brothers’ liked. Matt loved cherry cheesecake, Chad was more of a savory guy and really had a thing for mustard. I love both! And I love that when I went home for a speedy trip this week to visit my mom, that we made this cake together and remembered good times. Olive sat on the stove while Mom narrated my work to her as I made the cake. Mom used to make it while I would sit on the counter and talk to her and now she plays with my daughter while I make it. Life just doesn’t get sweeter than that.

Coconut Cream Cheese Pound Cake

1/2 cup butter

1/2 cup shortening

1 8-oz pkg. cream cheese

3 cups sugar

1 tsp coconut flavor

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

6 eggs

3 cups flour

a pinch of salt

1/2 tsp baking powder

1 cup bakers coconut

Preheat oven to only 325 degrees. Grease and flour a 10″ tube pan or bundt pan. Cream butter, shortening and cream cheese together in a large bowl. Gradually add the sugar, beating at medium speed until light and fluffy. Stir in coconut flavoring and vanilla. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Combine the flour, salt and baking powder and add to batter. Stir just until blended. Fold in the coconut. Pour the batter into a prepared tube pan or bundt pan. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until a tester inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in the pan on a wire rack for 10-15 minutes. Remove cake from the pan and allow it to cool completely on a wire rack before cutting.

This cake is dense and rich. Don’t worry too much about the sugar content. It’s not an iced cake, anyway! Just imagine the sugar you wouldn’t bat an eye at putting into the frosting of a regular cake and instead, put it into the batter

And if you haven’t gotten the hint that weekends are for feasting and not for guilt, I fear you never will! Happy Eating!

The Ultimate Meatball and Taking Food to a Friend

Posted on May 1, 2013 by Alisa

We’ve been on the receiving end of food donations twice in our life and both times, we were touched by others’ thoughtfulness, great recipes and the comfort that was passed to us through the dishes they made. It takes a bit of humbling to bring food to someone who can’t cook for themselves, or simply don’t want to or don’t have the time. You worry if they’ll like what you made. You worry if they will critique the preparation or that you brought store-bought cookies instead of homemade. If I could only convince you that anything you bring is wonderful and welcome, I would. If they can’t eat it right away or they have duplicates, they can freeze what you brought! To worry too much about what to bring, or to worry the recipient about what you brought, shifts the focus off the deserving and on to you. Keep the focus where it belongs, ask if they have any requests or food allergies, and get cooking! Homemade is always nice, but I will admit, I did not turn away store-bought cookies, chocolate or coffee!

My wonderful, life-long friend, Summer, had her second baby almost two weeks ago. A beautiful, darling girl! I immediately began to think of what I would bring for Summer and Phil to eat. Summer is my food buddy. I trust her cooking as much as my own. Her sense of taste is far beyond most people, almost to a fault. We used to live together in college, and I think one of our first food-bonding moments was throwing chicken patties off the balcony of our apartment because they were just so disgusting. They were pre-cooked, breaded chicken patties and they tasted like…gray. Or sweat. It wasn’t good. We both were actually offended. How could you screw up a breaded piece of chicken, and worse, sell it to poor college students?! In our act of defiance against badly cooked food, we became unofficial food critics in our own right. We were each other’s taste-testers. A favorite game throughout our friendship is Guess the Ingredient! in which we excitedly wait while the other tastes and see if they guess right. I love that no matter what time of day, I can text Summer a description of something I made or want to make, and she will react with an appropriate amount of shock, enthusiasm and awe.

We joke that Summer always says her FAVORITE thing in the ENTIRE world is whatever I last cooked for her. True to the accusation, I asked if she had any requests for what I could bring for them, and she requested the last meal I made for her, which was the BEST meatball recipe I’ve ever run across. It’s tough to get a meatball right. They can be too dry or too mealy or rubbery from being over cooked, or simply too greasy. This recipe is perfect. And even more perfect, it came to me via fashion designer, Michael Kors in his appearance on Martha Stewart Living. So they’re both delicious AND fashionable. Win-win.

The secret ingredient to these meatballs is the water. Smooshing all these ingredients together, especially with the water, is not for the faint of heart. My mother would die a thousand deaths before making this recipe. She has a thing with texture. However, I like playing with my food, so it’s rather enjoyable for me. The meat mixture is very delicate, so be gentle as you turn them while cooking. I usually use two spatulas to help me turn them without smashing them apart. Getting a good crust on each side is key. Then, there will still be a slight crust, even after they’ve stewed in the sauce for a while. Oh, and serving this with spaghetti is up to you. It’s not tradition – the Italians eat their meatballs in a bowl with crusty bread. But, the recipe makes enough sauce that even after we finish up the meatballs, I have plenty of sauce left to toss with noodles the next day. Olive absolutely adores these. She ate two, 3 inch meatballs by herself before slowing down. They are so soft, you could easily smash it up for a little one. And they get better the next day!

Frankie’s Meatballs in Rao’s Marinara Sauce

1 pound lean ground beef
1 pound ground pork
1 1/2 cloves garlic
2 large eggs
1 cup freshly grated Pecorino Romano cheese
1 1/2 tablespoons chopped fresh Italian parsley
Coarse salt and freshly ground pepper
2 cups plain dry bread crumbs
2 cups water, room temperature
1 cup olive oil

In a large bowl, combine beef and pork using your hands. Mince 1/2 clove garlic and add to meat mixture along with the eggs, cheese, and parsley; season with salt and pepper. Continue mixing with your hand until well combined. Add bread crumbs and mix well. Add water, 1 cup at a time, and continue mixing until mixture is quite moist.
Shape mixture into 2 1/2-to-3-inch balls. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Smash remaining clove of garlic with the back of a knife and add to skillet. Cook until lightly browned and fragrant, 1 to 2 minutes; remove with a slotted spoon and discard. Working in batches, add meatballs to skillet. Cook until browned and cooked through, turning, about 10 minutes. Drain on paper towels and serve immediately.
Meanwhile, bring marinara sauce to a boil in a large nonreactive saucepan. Reduce heat to a simmer and add meatball. Let meatballs cook in sauce about 20 minutes; serve immediately with pasta, if desired.

Rao’s Marinara Sauce
Makes 7 cups

Four 28-ounce cans whole tomatoes with basil, preferably San Marzano
1/2 cup olive oil
6 tablespoons minced onion
4 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
Coarse salt and freshly ground pepper
12 leaves fresh basil, torn (optional)
Pinch of dried oregano

Remove tomatoes from can and place in a large bowl, reserving juices. Crush tomatoes using your hands; remove and discard the hard core from stem end, and any skin and tough membrane; set aside. (Wear an apron and keep your hand submerged as you crush. This is messy business, but kind of therapeutic .)
Place oil in a large, nonreactive saucepan over medium-low heat. Add onion, and cook until soft and just beginning to brown, about 3 minutes. Stir in garlic, and cook until softened, about 30 seconds. Stir in tomatoes and reserved juices; season with salt. Increase heat and bring to a boil. Immediately reduce heat to low and simmer until slightly thickened, about 1 hour.
Stir in basil, if using, oregano, and season with pepper; continue cooking 1 minute more. Remove from heat and serve.

*Recipes taken directly from Martha Stewart Living. They can not be improved upon.

Thai Basil Whatever

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Alisa

I wanted to share with you a recipe I’ve been making for years. Matt and I cooked a lot of Thai food in the first few years we were married. Matt had a version of this dish while living in Nashville at a place that served Chinese food, but had Thai posters all over their walls. So Matt asked one day if they would make him some Thai food and the guy excitedly made a chopped chicken dish with Thai basil and hot Thai chilies. Matt was hooked. We love the flavors of fish sauce, soy sauce, the heat of peppers and the sweetness of basil that this dish brings. It’s a wonderful mix of sweet/sour/spicy. Over the years, we’ve lost the original recipe we first referenced and so this is legitimately a Palmer original.

Again – don’t be afraid of fish sauce. It’s completely essential to the flavor balance of this dish. If you can’t find Thai basil, regular Italian basil works just fine. I’ve used ground pork, chicken and turkey, as well as hand chopped chicken thighs (so good), but my go-to is ground turkey. Don’t leave off the fried egg!

Thai Basil Turkey
serves 4

1lb ground chicken, turkey or pork
3 tbs peanut oil or canola oil
1 medium white onion, chopped fine
6 cloves garlic, chopped
4 or 5 seeded jalapenos, diced (or Thai chilies, or whatever kind of pepper/heat level you want)
1 tbs fish sauce
1 tbs soy sauce
1/2 cup chopped fresh basil leaves

This recipe goes quicker if you use a large wok over really high heat. If you don’t have a wok, use the largest stainless steal skillet, or cast iron skillet you have. Heat the oil over medium high heat till it shimmers. Add in the onion and stir a few times till they soften. Working quickly, stir in the garlic and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add in your ground meat and jalapenos and stir until meat is cooked through. If you want more heat, stir in your chilies closer to the end of cooking. When the meat has cooked through, toss in the fish and soy sauce and stir to coat. Remove the pan from heat, stir in the chopped basil and cover to keep warm. In a non-stick skillet, fry a couple eggs in peanut oil, and a splash of soy sauce and serve on top.

I typically serve this over about a half cup of rice. I’m not going to tell you how to cook rice.

The Family Meal

we eat together

Caesar Salad and Chilling Out

Mini Cherry Pies with Brown Sugar Meringue

Food Memories: Chicken n’ Noodles

Bread: Guest post from Matt Palmer, a.k.a. The Bread Man

Blackberry Jam Tart – I get pie with a little help from my friends…

Pizza Night!

Creamy Rice with Peas and Asparagus

Coconut Cream Cheese Pound Cake

The Ultimate Meatball and Taking Food to a Friend

Thai Basil Whatever

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