Sardines!!

Whole grain spaghetti tossed with rehydrated sun-dried tomatoes, garlic and anchovies.

Anchovies are amazing.  Why didn't I know this before?

Han Nam Chain

So what do people do when they don't have easy access ethnic grocery stores?  Order everything online?  Search in your local store's ethnic isle?  Mitsuwa Marketplace is a few minutes away (and essentially has always been a few minutes away), and I swear a Korean grocery store is opening up somewhere within ten miles every few months or year. 

Do you want Dride Pink Shrimp?

In case you forgot this was an Asian grocery store...

Wait, did you forget about a toilet seat cover?

Who doesn't love a new cookbook?

There is such a thing as having too many cookbooks, but I can't help myself.

Two recent purchases:

(Wanted free shipping off Amazon and I needed another heavy vegetable based cookbook)

Had been eyeing this for a few years and finally caved.

Lentil Soup

Once when I was sick, or lazy, Adam went to the grocery store without me.   He came home with Dinty Moore microwaveable meals.  Do you know what they are?  Because I didn't, and I still wish I didn't.  Ever since then, I get really scared when Adam goes by himself (sorry, sweetie, love you!), which is pretty rare in itself (still love you).  He went by himself last night and came home with a can of Campbell's lentil soup. "But I make lentil soup all the time?" I asked.

Anyway.  Tonight, I made lentil soup.  The last lentil soup I made had bacon and the one before that was curried.  I didn't want to do either so I used the epicurious app to help me.  I wanted to use lentils and carrots, and while I suppose I could have thought of this easy Red Lentil and Carrot Soup by myself, I didn't.  I only read a few of the reviews before committing myself to this because I couldn't bare to read any more than a few (ADD) and because I didn't care.  I wanted lentil soup, and I got it!

I know I've mentioned how much I love recipes, but I haven't touched upon how I actually modify them to better fit my or Adam's preference:

ingredients

3/4 pound red lentils*, picked over 2 cups red and French green lentils

7 cups water 2 cups chicken broth, 5 cups water

1 cup chopped onion

3 4 garlic cloves, minced

1 teaspoon ground coriander

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1/4 teaspoon turmeric

5 carrots (about 10 ounces), halved lengthwise and sliced thin crosswise

1 diced yukon gold potato

1 cup finely chopped red bell pepper Adam does not like cooked peppers

1/4 cup packed fresh coriander sprigs, washed well, spin dry,  and chopped fine not in my fridge

1/4 cup chopped scallion greens forgot about this

cayenne to taste forgot about this too, but didn't really want a spicy lentil soup anyway

SALT AND PEPPER!!!

preparation

In a 4-quart saucepan bring lentils and water to a boil and skim froth. Stir in onion, garlic, ground coriander, cumin, and turmeric and simmer, partially covered, 15 minutes. Stir in carrots and bell pepper and simmer until carrots are tender, about 10 minutes. Soup may be prepared up to this point 3 days ahead, cooled, uncovered, and chilled, covered.

Stir in coriander, scallion greens, cayenne, and salt and pepper to taste.

Serve soup garnished with coriander sprigs

Rinse lentils.  Saute onions for a few minutes before adding garlic. Add chicken stock, water, lentils and spices.  (I would have added the spices before the liquid and lentils but I was short on time and I thought the garlic was one second away from burning).  Bring to boil, let simmer for 15-20 minutes.  SEASON with salt and pepper.  Add carrots and potatoes and let simmer for another 15 minutes.  Taste and SEASON AGAIN.  Then Booyah - Lentil Soup time.

Sea salt and freshly ground pepper are your best friends.  There is a difference between too salty, unsalted and perfectly seasoned.  Good luck.

p.s. I spilled Chimpy's food while trying to refill the container, and I contemplated leaving it all on the floor for him.  

I did not.

CARAMEL BUTTERCREAM NIGHTMARE

When I visit friends, especially those I do not see that often or are letting me stay over, I try to bring baked goods.  I went with a banana cupcake from Martha Stewart's Cupcakes, a recipe that I made before, and omitted the nuts - because let's face it, no one really wants nuts in their cupcakes.

I have never had a more horrific baking experience than the one I had on Friday night, and it wasn't even the baking, it was making the frosting - a frosting which I have dominated before.

While separating one of the eggs, some yolk got into the whites, and I decided it wouldn't be that bad and it would still stiffen.  It was that bad, and no, it did not stiffen in the slightest.  

Making the caramel was pretty easy/a success, until I tried to mix it into the second batch of meringue, now with butter, and it hardened so quickly that it caused my Kitchenaid to convulse violently because it got stuck in the paddle.

I salvaged what frosting I could, but it was the ultimate failure.  Luckily I had some peanut butter buttercream in the freezer to save the day.

Le Bernardin, Yelp, and Peasants

For my 27th birthday, Adam and I went to Al Forno in Providence, Rhode Island.  We both have an affinity for the Northeast, but I want to grow old there.  If I could part with being more than a few miles away from one of the biggest, best cities in the world, I'd be in a place like Amherst right now.

Anyway, the point is birthdays and celebrating them with amazing food.  Now as I get older, make slightly more money than I did a few years ago (and I really mean slightly), and start loving and appreciating food for all it's worth, I want to mark every birthday with a monumental dining experience.

Like going to Le Bernardin or WD50.  Or by flying to Chicago, another one of the best cities in the world, and going to Moto.

And I sure as hell would not trust Yelp reviews to help guide me to any of these dreamy places.  I love Yelp, a lot, but why for the love of god would I ever trust those idiots to accurately rate highly reputable, world reknowned restaurants?  Yelping should be limited to your local bodega, Thai joint, manicurist, and restaurants that don't require me to bust out the savings.  Leave the Michelin stars to the pros, you peasants.

Kimchi and Soba

There is a Korean owned bodega across town that shouldn't even be called a bodega.  It is one of the few reasons I would want to live anywhere other than the same apartment Adam and I have been calling home for four years.  They sell amazing homemade kimchi for like $1.50!  I guess I'm supposed to say my mom's kimchi is the best, but I don't think it is.  My mom's kkakdugi, however, is the best.

Kkakdugi does not get the attention that kimchi gets, so don't feel bad if you are not cultured enough to know about it.  In fact, feel terrible about yourself.  I think the main difference between the two is that kimchi is made from cabbage, and kkakdugi is made from daikon.  The internet tells me the same thing, so that's all you need to know. The texture makes all the difference though.

Anyway, I was hungry and wanted kimchi.  Sometimes I just eat these Korean bowl noodles - yes, the kind that just require boiling water - just so I can have some.  I knew I had soba noodles, so I googled "kimchi, soba" and came up with a recipe for bibim guksu, from a Korean food blog whose last entry was in 2007.  I didn't actually follow the recipe because 1. the topping ingredients are not in my crisper and 2. any recipe that says 'thumbnail' of anything is not something that has to be followed.

I used (too much) gochujang, rice vinegar, sesame oil and brown sugar and some of the soba water as the sauce, left the kimchi on the side and then topped it with green onions.

Valentine's Day, Part Two

"What do you want to eat with the steak?  We have some potatoes."
"Potatoes au Gratin."
"Are you kidding?"

We had New York strip and potato gratin.   I think Mark Bittman taught me to leave the cast iron skillet heating on the bottom floor of the oven - and that's what I do.  The oven was at 450 degrees for the potato gratin before I took out the skillet, put it on medium high and seared both sides of the steak for a few minutes. I finished it off in the oven at 350 degrees and just kept checking the internal temperature with a thermometer.  Still have not mastered cooking great meat without a thermometer...

Since I make ten times too many portions for just myself and Adam, I attempted to cut the recipe in half. I used less potatoes, a lot less heavy cream and cheese, and more garlic.  I couldn't find gruyere and used a Whole Foods shredded three cheese blend (fontina, asiago and parmesan) instead.

And then I baked the Funfetti cake, from the mix I purchased on clearance after Christmas hence the red and green, in a non-fluted bundt pan, covered it in Pillsbury white frosting and called it a day.

Here is to celebrating one, of many days, with someone you love more than small, appropriate portions of meat, potatoes without cream, and cake from scratch.


p.s. listen to the sizzle! look at cream and cheese bubble from residual heat!

Valentine's Day

Tonight, after steak and potatoes, I will be baking this:

Because Adam LOVES Funfetti cake, and as a sacrifice for love, I will "bake" from a box.

Eggs!

In a previous post, I said I wanted to make this Baked Eggs in the Basket recipe.

My butter was too cold to butter the muffin pan as much as I should have, and I obviously scrambled them, but it's a pretty great simple recipe/idea.  I used whole grain bread, but I think white would be best.  Mine broke while I was forming it in the tin - perhaps too much super human strength?

I topped it with some chopped garlic chives and shaved piave cheese.

If I was ever willing to serve brunch, this would be an incredibly great idea.  But I'm not, and I never will. 

Dessert

Adam doesn't cook, bake or know what most things in the kitchen do, but he does get some good treats.

Chicken Tikka Masala

For how traditional, aka boring, Adam's palate is, he seems to really like Indian food.  I asked him last week what he wanted to eat for dinner this week, and he said chicken tikka masala.

Whenever a recipe has total time estimates, I multiply that by at least two.   Tomorrow night's chicken tikka masala will have cost me approximately twenty hours.

Food and Wine is NOT for the weak.

Sunday Breakfast

Scrambled eggs with broccoli.  Leftover herbed potatoes from dinner this week.  Rosemary sourdough.  And cup of black tea, not featured.

Hosting Dinner - The Morning After

This is what my kitchen looks like the morning, and sometimes several days after, after I host dinner for two or more people:

Thursday Dinner

Whole Broiled/Baked Branzini - My first time baking and broiling a whole fish.  Whole Foods gutted, scaled and cleaned it for me, so it wasn't too difficult.  I rubbed it in some olive oil, seasoned it inside and out with salt and pepper and stuffed it with some lemon slices. Baking it in a foil packet at 400 degrees for whatever time Mark Bittman recommended, was not enough, and I was starving, so I opened it up, turned the broiler on high and just kept a close eye on it.

Red/White Quinoa with Sugar Snap Peas and Zucchini - While the quinoa was cooking in my homemade chicken stock, I cooked some shallots in olive oil and butter and threw in the diced zucchini and chopped snap peas.  Tossed in one teeny, thinly sliced garlic clove, along with a teeny bit of rice wine vinegar and soy sauce, salt and pepper.  I stirred in the quinoa with the vegetables, and when the fish was done, I called it a day.  

Pretty sure I could eat fish every single day for the rest of my life.

P.S. The Chocolate French Bread experiment was DELICIOUS.  Better than a chocolate croissant - suck on that, people!

Chocolate French Bread

I really wanted a chocolate croissant and had to think quick.  What did I have?  A bowl of the Master Recipe from Artisan Bread proofing in the fridge for over a week, cocoa powder, and milk chocolate chips.

What will happen?  French bread with a weird cocoa flavor and even weirder chocolate chunks?  OR An amazing Tuesday night treat?

I'm scared.