Thursday, February 25, 2010

Skill Pickle


I've been thinking a lot about all the skills that are necessary for making a good meal. Guys only want girlfriends who have good skills. You know, like knife skills, whisking skills, kneading skills.

However, seems like the uber skill is timing. Think about it. Without good timing, your asparagus is done and getting cold while the pork is raw, or your guests are sitting -- stomachs growling -- waiting for a casserole to finish baking. You've got to know when to end a recipe, and I think what's even more tricky is knowing when to start a recipe. That's the worst. Not allocating enough time. At least if you start something too early you can re-heat it later.

It's been a long climb, but I think I've finally managed to get most of my timing down on the cooking. There have been a few awesome meals where I've been able to coordinate it so veggies, starches and meats are all completed at the same time. Strange how that can evoke such a sense of pride. Of course there have been many, oh so many, missteps along the way. Just two weeks ago I burnt a batch of cookies. And right now, I'm stomaching my way through a pot of overcooked tortellini soup. Mmmmm, bloated stuffed pasta (accompanied by mushy broccoli).

You'd think I'd learn. And even with this very endeavor. We TIMED IT PERFECTLY! Or, so we thought...Start practicing and baking in January. Perfect a recipe by March. Submit it in April. Be a millionaire by 2011. But oh, no! Turns out the P-bury bake-off is a bi-annual project. Timing fail! But better too early than too late. We can always re-heat these recipes when the time comes.

Monday, February 22, 2010

Live Free or Pie Hard

Blog overload! Claire has been too hard on herself below, with the descriptions of our caramel endeavors. And for the record, cubes of caramel WILL grate, but only on the largest holes of the box grater (and at an ambient room temperature below 71F). (Ted, I owe you $1.)


Truly yesterday was tremendous blog fodder. Before the crew came over for our usual dinner, I took the opportunity to hack up one bone-in pork shoulder – pernil, if you will. I won’t go into excruciating detail, but let’s just say there was a lot of blood. Something reminiscent of a certain scene from Carrie. OK, not quite that bad.


This hacked up pork became the base for a delicious meal of tinga and tostada. While it didn’t meet any of the P-bury bake-off requirements (not an easy entrée, nor an entertaining appetizer, and certainly not a family breakfast), it was a food product I was proud of. The slowly simmered pork, home-made chorizo and crispy corn tortillas came together nicely, and were even better when topped with a little queso fresco, cilantro, sour cream, lime and avocado. No pictures are available, and we licked the plates clean, so use your imagination.


I think the spices and labor-intensity of the entrée might have affected our judgment because, let’s be honest, we all made some mistakes on that dessert. The pie crust didn’t come out quite as planned. I also thought we probably should have doubled the amount of bananas used. It all worked out in the end though. I now have a half-consumed pie resting peacefully in my freezer, which I plan to wolf down as soon as I can leave my office. Also, I took the liberty of pouring Ted’s miraculous melted caramel cube/water syrup over the remaining pie as I was cleaning up last night. I’m salivating just thinking about it.

And while this blog is dedicated to the endeavor of pulling in some cold hard cash, I think we all know that the food has always been second fiddle to the real reason we cook. Having an opportunity to gather with friends, talk about the Olympics and pontificate about why competitors, namely gymnasts, aren’t naked. Claire really summed up the evening beautifully. “STDs! You can’t have everyone’s junk hitting the pommel horse.” Sigh…that’s what it’s all about.

Caramel Chameleon

Remember that fresh, spry idea we floated way-back-when in the first post, Frozen Bananas Foster Ice Cream Pie? Great. Now, what I really want to talk about is declensions. You see, the dative perhaps lends itself most easily, and confusingly, to elision in that...

Fine. I will admit to a highly embarrassing cooking gaffe, one so worn and predicable even dear Anne of Green Gables committed it: I mistook the salt for sugar. In my defense, and not to rip too much on her, Rachel keeps her flour, sugar, and salt in three neat storage containers on the counter, and has an inordinate amount of salt. As in, I drowned some bananas in almost a cup of it without really thinking because that amount did not significantly deplete the salt supply. Rachel also admitted to making this same mistake some weeks ago, despite having poured the salt into the container herself. So here are a few lessons:

- if you're making caramel (well, simple syrup in this case), don't use salt
- if you're making caramel and the "sugar" doesn't dissolve into the rapidly boiling water and become caramel, it is not sugar
- if you're making burnt-molasses-tasting, tooth-breaking, cement-setting candy, do rapidly boil brown sugar with butter for three minutes
- if you're making caramel with salt instead of sugar, but it didn't turn into caramel, and you're feeling like a flop, do not think that stirring in bananas will in any improve the concoction

I did not taste one, but apparently bananas soaked in a boiled solution of 3 parts salt to 2 parts water are horrifyingly inedible.

Before going completely bananas (ha...ha.) we thought, well, the Pills competition's secondary ingredients include Smucker's, so we'll just buy some caramel sauce. Bless them, Ted and Shenging volunteered to go to the store, and returned with caramels. The cubes. Note: these can not be grated at room temperature. They can be slowly melted with some water to form a pretty tasty sauce. Rachel snuck out and got some caramel sauce, and it felt like we might finally be on our way.

I somewhat redeemed myself by cleverly hacking away the ice-cream container and using a butcher knife to slice the ice cream, to more easily pack and shape it over a layer of bananas and caramel on the pie crust. We topped the ice cream with more bananas and caramel, and returned it to the freezer. Oh, topped with a single square of caramel.

Really, the most important thing is we had a good, though thoroughly exasperating -- in that way that comical mishaps make you giggle-groan, time. Culino ergo sum. And also, we are what we eat. Have another helping of laughter-producing-phallic-fruit-topping-with-frozen-cow-udder-discharge Dessert Delight. It will make you smile even if it doesn't taste amazing.

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Sappy New Year


With the confluence of Valentine's Day and the Chinese New Year, the choice was easy: we made lots of Chinese food. We're guilty of taking off a week from Pills baking, but refreshed our pallets with the revelation of Shenging's mirin-lip-smackin' shrimp. Kristen sweetly cheered for St. V with personalized sugar cookies that were worlds better than any other sugar cookie. How does that woman do it?

Well, we've written about clever and humbling cooking experiences past, so maybe we each have a story about a dish offered at the altar of love. (Tracy, you've *got* to have a good tale here...) As a firm believer in the romantic power of baked goods, I can pretty much accurately claim to have baked at least 100 batches of delectables for wooing and woo-related purposes. One of the simplest and most impressive is key lime pie:

4-6 limes
2 cans sweetened condensed milk
1 egg
graham cracker crust

This gem is supposedly straight from the Keys, where my dad's parents used to visit family, and nabbed the recipe from a hotel restaurant. It is tart. It is rich. It is both flirtatious and soothing to squeeze limes with someone by hand (a reamer is a little too violent -- you wouldn't suggest skinning a fresh-caught rabbit to your date, now, would you?), and while the ingredients seem comically simple, they come together like a sleight-of-hand trick. How did you pull that silver dollar from behind my ear? How do these few components combine into a silky, citrusy, almost-too-much gratification?

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

There's snow business...

Well...as long as we're off-topic. I too was out enjoying the snow today. Our office closed early (woo hoo!), so I took the opportunity to trek it over to one of my favorite Long Island City hot spots - Socrates Sculpture Park. The whole place was covered in a massive blanket of pristine snow. I of course upset this perfect landscape by running through the park snapping photographs of the various exhibits. The picture to the right is IN COLOR. Isn't that amazing??? Although I've been in New York for a solid 8 1/2 years, snow is still a novelty. I suppose if you don't truly experience something before age 18 or so, it will always remain a spectacle and mysterious.

Spending all that time outside, during the peak of the blizzard no less, I got a wee bit tired out and damp. So I decided the best way to warm up and re-fuel was whip up some potato leek soup. There's a recipe in the latest issue of Cooks Illustrated. About half the bowls in my entire apartment were used during the somewhat labor intensive process, but oh lordy, was it worth it. Simmered leeks and onion, hearty leek broth, thin sliced potato and a few chunks of toasted bread came together for one of the best soups I think I've ever had. My mom has accused me of describing everything I eat as "amazing" or "the best." I can't help it. It really is!! (Oh, those garlic croutons on top didn't hurt either.)
Well, the snow is still falling. I'm warm at home, with a belly full of leeks. American Idol will be on a mere 10 minutes. What else could a girl ask for?

SNOW


I hope no one will mind this departure from our usual topics, but I just wanted to say that NYC is being treated to incredibly beautiful, bounteous snow. My apologies to those with actual things to get done and/or those poor souls who do not welcome the joy of snow into their hearts. Snow is clean and bright and soft and quiet and fun in about 8,000 ways. It just wants to play and be your friend, and cover you in a blanket when you lie back in your sled to smile at it, and eat it. (I guess that has something to do with food...)

Monday, February 8, 2010

98% Perspiration

Truly this was an exhausting weekend in terms of culinary energy expended. 5 recipes on Saturday (!!!!) -- which Claire has covered below.

In addition to that, I decided to re-vamp the "Chipotle Chicken Poppers" by substituting chorizo for the chicken, and adding a couple tablespoons of tomato sauce. That gave it a little more zing, which countered the mellow dinner rolls well. I also wasn't chintzy with the cheese on top or in the middle. The new "Chipotle Chorizo Poppers" accompanied me to Steve's Superbowl gathering, and while no one gave them a resounding hurrah, Oscar did say, "Yes. These are better. But they're still missing something." I'll take what I can get.

The idea for the re-vamp came from a recipe I had just read in Cooks Illustrated. That magazine is THE best cooking magazine. If you've never read through one, I highly recommend picking one up the next time you're lurking around Barnes and Nobel(s). (Yes, I see you there, in the cafe, sneakily perusing the latest issues of Car and Driver and Playstation Magazine.)

In fact, I've been finding more and more sources for inspiration. After several trips to the electronics and 99 cents stores, I've finally jerry-rigged my Internet connection to provide a few cable channels (shhhhh...lets keep that on the dl), including THE FOOD NETWORK! Now many mindless hours of foodie joy are mine. I'm really trying to be more inspired by Iron Chef America than Sandra Lee, but honestly it's all good. And with my awesome pre-owned 27" TV, I can actually see what they're cooking.

And let's not forget the mecca of P-bury inspiration: thisiswhyyourefat.com. Before this website was recommended to me, I hadn't even fathomed wrapping bacon around anything more than a meatball. Now I know that there are no limits to where saturated and trans fats can be snuck into a meal. Surly the judges would appreciate a masterpiece such as the donut upside-down cake.

My mission is to harness all this good energy and turn it into a winning recipe of my own.

Yes We Pump-Can!

Since the snow didn't make it, we whipped up a veritable flurry of cooking this weekend. We started out the weekend with some impressive inspiration with dinner at South Gate on Friday. We came, we ate, we surrendered. From the mouth-amusing cheese puffs, eager bread roll distributors, weighty wine-list lap top, and delightful cocktails to the richness of bread pudding, cilantro-flecked steak, lemon-ginger seafood pasta, and an avalanche of chocolately and fruity desserts (tarts, pots au creme, sorbets, a pistachio mousse!), we were extremely joyful.

So on Saturday, we got down to business. Biz-NASS. With help from Ted, Shenging, and Matt, we turned out a smorgasboard of chocolate-ricotta cookies. Lessons learned (for me at least): 1. ricotta tastes like nothing, and 2. styling desserts after other foods is cute. While the taste was lackluster, our ravioli shapes were oddly adorable, like a dog dressed up in a kitten costume. Or, perhaps, a clock with a cozy flannel shirt.

After that warm-up round (and some dinner with actual vegetables to veer from our cookie-laden path to sugar-induced physical and emotional disorders), we considered one of the under-appreciated gems of baking: pumpkin puree. This humble, retro-colored, ploppy fellow warms the cockles of my heart and unhinges my jaws with joy throughout the seasons as pumpkin cookies, gnocchi, soup, roasted chunks on salad, and of course pie (and cheesecake!), and has even crossed over to assume beverage duties in our ale.

1 can of pumpkin. Endless baking properties. It adds moisture, texture, lightness, density, plays leading man or recedes to the background as a favorite character actor and work horse. We made monkey-bread my mixing it in with Pills cinnamon rolls, dipping scoops of that batter in butter, then topping the gooey mass of amazingness with pumpkin-spiked frosting. We also made muffins with a Pills cake mix base, apples, and cinnamon. Imagine the warm scent of these orange-gold splendorous orbs, baking that elemental yet exotic cinnamon into sweet-comfort perfection. I don't think I can say anything more.

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Curds and Whoa!

Claire's description below perfectly describes our Sunday night, but for those of you who've let TV rot your mind and imagination...here's a little peek at what we created.


We'll Always Have Stuffed French Toast...

Bonjour mes amis, et -- er? Sacre bleu!


This wily, experimental baking has made for a steep learning curve, but we're on it like a French guy with his girlfriend at the park. Well, objects of beauty (near-beauty) have been gazed upon and perilously mauled.

Rachel's poppers were a great kick-off, and I do think we deserve points for "nutting up" and going savory first. Anybody can make a good dessert. It takes that aforementioned moxie to mold chicken into tasty submission.


On Sunday, we continued the southwest theme with some Jalapeno-Cornbread Cheesy Surprises. (Yes, "surprise" is such a doomed culinary descriptor...) Mixing some minced jalaps, red bell pepper, cheddar, cornmeal, milk, and Pills Dinner Rolls was a snap, as I enjoy getting my hands covered in food-related goo. We plopped the new dough into a muffin tins, and secreted a cube of cheddar in the center. They tasted pretty durn good, though were quite heavy. Bombs, even. So perhaps a re-do with some baking soda and/or egg, and some spices to add a little je ne sais quoi.

Which brings us to the next trial: Stuffed French Toast. AKA French Maid Stuffed with White Sauce. Don't think about it.

Stop for just a minute and imagine: what if you had the ability to serve your own fresh-baked baguette to impress the hubby and wow the kiddies? Well, Pills is there to help you score all around. They have somehow in-tube-ated dough for French bread. You can cut the slits on top, brush it with egg, and everything. Maybe we should call it Freedom Bread.

Anyway, Rachel and I divided the dough so as to maximize experimentation (and minimize expenditure). After an ill-fated bowl of curded cream cheese and egg, we got our $hit together and made a yummy filling with said c.c., sugar, vanilla, and cinnamon. Then, genius flashed: Rachel thought to poke the bread with a fork, letting egg seep in and therefore rendering the bread french-toast-y. The two versions both tasted good, though the pans were not enticing.


So, three non-dessert recipes, with passing grades, in one weekend. Get ready for the overwhelming force of creativity that will be unleashed by our partaking in NYC's Restaurant Week TWICE this week!