What He made for dinner

The other recipient of what I made for dinner has made a New Year's resolution to cook more, so here is his entry. He has this uncanny (heh heh) way of taking any food and putting it into a skillet and coming up with something delicious, whereas I would spend 30 min. trying to think of the best possible combination of what we had before I even started. His latest skillet included chicken thighs, red lentils, chicken broth ( I think), and every frozen vegetable in the freezer, which turned out to be broccoli, peas, and shitake mushrooms. He also threw in a can of tomatoes, and I think a Turkish type of seasoning, because it had a bit of a bite to it. There may have been wine thrown in too, but maybe that open bottle on the counter was destined only for my glass- I don't know. In any case, it was delicious. Thanks, New Year's resolution!

French Canadian Magic

If you've never experienced the wondrous creation that is Poutine, you are missing out. Served in roadside shacks, bars and ski lodges in Quebec, a basic description is cheese fries with gravy, but it's so much more. It's gotten pretty trendy in the last year or so, so you'll probably see it on a bar menu at some point, but it may not be authentic. Here's the real deal, in three acts:

I. Fries. Skinny, shoestring fries. No potato wedges.

II. Cheese curd. This is difficult to find outside of Wisconsin or Upstate New York. Cheese curd is a very mild, white cheese that "squeaks" as you chew it. The beauty of the curd is that it's quite mild and it melts well without dissolving. If you can't get it, queso fresco is a decent substitute, and if you can't get that, get the mildest white cheddar or Monterrey jack you can.

III. Gravy: Canned please. In Canada, it seems to be a beef gravy with a bit of a tomato taste, but any canned gravy will work.

You can imagine how to make this: cook the fries, add the cheese, pour the gravy.

To further gild the lily, we added cut up cheese bratwurst on top, but that's not for the faint of heart. The health conscious among you should know that the justification is that football season has an ending point, and unfortunately there are not many Sundays left to sit around and eat fatty food while it gets dark at 4pm. Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, I always say....

Poire au cafe

If you've never checked out Jacques Pepin's "Fast Food, My Way", you really should. Everything in this book is great, and the strange thing is, stuff that sounds kind of weird is always amazing. Case in point: coffee-poached pears. This one came about for three reasons: 1. It's January, and fruit dessert fits in with fat season. 2. I had pears that needed to be used. 3. The opening paragraph of this recipe said "if you're looking at a pot of coffee from breakfast..." and lo and behold: I was.

Here's the details: Peel 2 pears and cut into quarters. Put in a saucepan with a cup of old coffee, a little less than a 1/4c. of brown sugar, a cap of vanilla, and some booze. He called for port, but I didn't have any, so I used Creme de Noyaux, which is a bottle from the way back of the liquor cabinet that tastes like almonds. Poach for 10 min, or until the pears are soft. He called for thickening the remaining sauce, but I did'nt feel like it. I served with sliced almonds, chocolate chips, and a little yogurt, but if I'd had ice cream I would have used that. It's pretty deceptive: dark, dark brown pears look a little unappetizing, but the bitterness of the coffee and the sweet of the pears is really nice. If I'd taken the time to pretty it up it would actually look quite elegant.
Plus my acupuncturist just told me that pears are good for the lungs and the dry, hacking coughs everyone seems to be having this time of year. Health food! Who knew?

Eggplant Pizza

Pizza dough is such a blank canvas. Pretty much anything in your fridge can be dumped on top and taste great. We had two versions last night: plain cheese, which always ends up tasting way better than anything your order, and fresh tomato and eggplant. I had a small Japanese eggplant that I peeled, sliced, dipped in milk and cornmeal and lightly fried. A container of cherry tomatoes on the counter was sauteed with garlic until they burst as used as the sauce. Both were topped with mozzarella and parmesan cheese. I think I baked them at 425 for maybe 20 min? Usually I thrown them in there, pour myself a drink, and just keep checking until they look good.

Aladdin's Magic Chili

When I was in college I used to love this restaurant Aladdin's Natural Eatery in Ithaca, NY. It sounds earthy-crunchy, and it was, but it was also delicious. My go-to dish, for a quick $6, was the chicken chili with cheese. They used the vegetarian chili as a base, but topped it with this crispy, baked chicken that was so good. I tried to recreate this last night on the fly, so let me try to approximate. I sauteed onions, garlic and celery in a little oil, then added 2 qts. of salsa that I made last summer and canned. I didn't have any peppers, so I figured the salsa would solve the tomato and veg problem. It was very thin stuff, not like commercial salsa, so it you want to use salsa, add extra tomatoes, or a little water. The white beans I did in a pressure cooker and threw in (use canned of any kind if you want beans). I also added some water, a packet of chicken broth for flavor, and some dried chilis. For spices I used medium hot chili powder and chipotle powder, but if you don't have that, don't worry.
For the chicken, I marinated chicken thighs in the juice of a tangerine that was dying a slow death on my counter, and threw in some jerk chicken spices. I then baked it at 425 for about 20 min. while the chili was cooking down. I finished the chicken with a quick run under the broiler to give it that Aladdin's crispiness, chopped it up, and threw it in the pot.
If you've never made chili without a recipe, it's a good way to conquer the fear of going freestyle- you really will have a hard time messing it up. The one tip I can give you it keep an eye on the amount of liquids used. If it's too liquid, leave the lid off the pot and let some evaporate. If it's thick enough, leave the lid on.

It wasn't perfect, but it was a pretty good recreation of a nice college memory, except without the Hootie and the Blowfish blasting from the '85 Plymouth Acclaim.

It's a carbon copy...

...of a quick meal on a weeknight!

Wow, that's bad copy from something like a Good Housekeeping circa 1983. I'm referring to Pasta Carbonara, which most of us think as "That pasta dish that's really good and horribly bad for you". Except it's not as bad as you think. Carbonara in many American restaurants has cream in it, but the real thing does not. It's a perfect dish for a cold night when you're hungry and don't have the energy for something fancy. Here's the deal:

!.Cook up a couple slices of bacon (4 slices or so- this is for 2 people).

2. Boil water and cook pasta.

3. Take the bowl you're going to mix it in and fill it with very hot water so it's not cold.

4. Right before the pasta is done, throw out the water, and mix up 1 egg and 1/2 C. parmesan cheese in that warm bowl.

5. Immediately after draining the pasta, toss it in the bowl. Throw in the crumbled bacon. Feel hearty.

The heat of the pasta and the bowl cooks the eggs, so you end up with a creamy sauce that doesn't actually have cream . See? That's not so bad, is it?

Sorry folks

Tonight was pizza. Take the dough, put stuff on it. You can't really go wrong.


I'll get my cooking juices flowing soon enough, six readers. Don't worry.