Bon Appetit & Easter Dessert

Adam's family has a lot of family gatherings, and I am responsible for bringing the dessert.  His dad is diabetic, his mom has a gluten allergy, and most other family members don't ever end up eating dessert.  True story.

For Easter dinner, I will be bringing half a ricotta cheesecake from the May issue of Bon Appetit.

Let's talk about the new Bon Appetit layout.  I liked it a little bit more after I read through the entire issue, so I can't say the hatred I felt when I first opened the magazine remained, but it still looks like a men's magazine for food.  Pretty sure most of the readership is female based, and that doesn't mean it ever looked like Cosmopolitan, so I don't know why I need to read my pasta tips in the same way GQ sets up their shaving tips for men.  One of their first ads is for Essie nail polish.  Granted, Essie is one of the best nail polish brands out there, but I liked looking at ads for industrial refrigerators in fancy homes and wondering when it would be mine.  Blegh.

Back to food.  I did a test run of the cheesecake the other day and made three mini-cheesecakes and brought them into work.  Success.  No one I know bakes though, so it's tough to really say they are being fair.  I've tasted some things non-baking co-workers have baked and almost thrown up.  But then again, it is nice being praised for my hard work.  I'd say I was overall happy with the way they came out, other than the way they looked.

The recipe calls to drain the ricotta.  Now after having done this twice for more than the time they recommended, I can say this is pointless.  I even bought a new strainer because I did not think the one I had was 1. big enough (it wasn't) or 2. fine enough.  It didn't matter.

There was no crust to this cheesecake, which was nice and easy, and you just had to mix some breadcrumbs with sugar and dust the pan.

 Lemon zest and juice, and the matzo meal and sugar.

I "cut" the cream cheese into cubes with my test run the other day, but like straining the ricotta, it was kind of pointless. Maybe it's just me, but cubing cream cheese is not easy, even when it's cold.  It's too creamy and sticky for that nonsense!  I guess it would have eased a slight strain on my Cuisinart, but that beast can take anything.  And it did.

This is the final result.  The recipe said to take it out once it was golden brown and "just set" but when the coloring was right, the texture was not.   It does not taste burned or crispy or anything, but it is a bit unsightly for me.

So I dusted it with powdered sugar, as the recipe called for, even though I did not really plan on it.

Saturday, Part 2: Appetizers in the form of Zucchini Keftedes

Last weekend, Adam's parents took us grocery shopping.  This will always and forever be an amazing treat because eating well can sometimes be extremely expensive. I picked up lots of fruits and vegetables and made a very conscious effort to use everything before it went bad and base our dinners off whatever we had, buying whatever we needed along the way.  So far so good!  The mushrooms we bought last Saturday were starting to fade, so when I was making turkey stock on Friday, I threw them in there, along with the leek ends I had saved from the chicken and leek stew earlier this week.  Take that!

I knew I wanted to try a bunch of recipes from Bon Appetit's latest issue because it got me that excited so I picked up a bunch of zucchini and dill so I could make the Zucchini Keftedes yesterday.  My girlfriend was coming over for a Harry Potter marathon, and she doesn't cook a lot at home, so I like to try out new recipes on her.  She is also one of those people who has said she will try anything once.  Good, because I know Adam and I won't.

I started prepping for the keftedes, or fritters as I called them, right after I put the Impossible Pie in the oven.  While holding a bunch of mint, I hacked into my finger nail.  Terrible.

After you grate a bunch of zucchini, you sprinkle it with some salt, let it sit for about an hour on a dishtowel, and then squeeze the hell out of it to get the water out.  This proved more difficult than expected because I was scared my fingernail was going to fall out, so I squeezed more delicately than normal, but I still got a lot of water out.

Mix up the zucchini with dill, mint and scallions!   GREEN! MY FAVORITE!! Oh, and lemon zest, garlic and pepper. 

Gently mix in a beaten egg and a cup of panko, and then even more gently fold in a cup of crumbled feta (not pictured).

Assemble into baby patties and let them sit in the fridge for a few hours.  This is crucial because they were starting to get pretty soft, and if you tried to fried them, they would just fall apart.  I think I left mine in the fridge for three hours.

I panfried them in an iron skillet with some canola oil.  However, at first I automatically threw in olive oil because it was right there, it's what I use the most, and then I realized I picked the wrong one.  I had so many keftedes to make that it was fine, eventually, but who the hell pan fries with olive oil?  NO ONE.

They were fucking delicious.  Definitely not a weeknight thing, but perfect for a nice Saturday with friends.  Also, that little bit of lemon zest?  Perfect.

Radishes = SASSY!

This month's issue of Bon Appetit is fucking banging.

Chock full of great recipes and an intro to radishes describing them as having "sassy flavor." Doesn't that just make you want to eat them all day?

Thursday: Turkey Time

Whenever possible, eat turkey in place of whatever meat you are thinking about for dinner.  Not just for your health, but to switch it up!  I don't eat red meat that often, or at least try not to, for general health reasons (i.e. being healthy), and I'd rather save my red meat fix for a quality steak than ground beef in pasta, tacos, whatever.

I make lasagna every few months, never usually with meat, but I had some ground turkey that I bought on sale earlier this week.  I realized I must have been subconsciously inspired by Bon Appetit's Lasagna with Turkey Sausage Bolognese.  I didn't follow the recipe at all, but what I came out with is relatively similar.  I did follow their advice to soak the no-boil lasagna noodles/sheets just to see what it was like, and I'm not sure it made that much of a difference.

The key to cooking, for anyone: do whatever you want.  You don't like a lot of cheese?  I don't.  Omit as much as you can.  Like spinach, want some extra nutritional value?  Throw it in there.  Call it a day.

Then eat.

Bon Appetempt, Bon Appetit, Bon Etc.

Do you know how many food blogs exist?  A LOT.  It's pretty insane.

I just came across Bon Appétempt though.  I love that her first blog entry was a failed attempt at a Bon Appetit four-layer chocolate cake.  For those of you who do not typically follow recipes, do not subscribe to multiple foodie magazines, and generally do not care about what the food looks like as long as it tastes good, will not understand what it's like when a Bon Appetit recipe fails in its final stages.  She still had the balls to put it online, and it says a lot about her and the blog itself. 

It does remind me that I need a cake pedestal and dome, similar to this one from Williams-Sonoma.  Maybe people will stop asking when Adam and I are going to get married when, instead of holiday cards, I start mailing out mock-registry-stock photos of cake pedestals and everything Le Creuset makes in kiwi.   

Anyway, at some point in recent past, I was receiving ALL of the following (somewhat) food-related magazines at one time:  Bon Appetit, Saveur, Real Simple, Everyday Food, and Martha Stewart Living.  With the exception of Saveur, they were all free, but Real Simple became less about home and food and Martha Stewart was for people who had expensive hobbies, big backyards/gardens and a penchant for interior design.  Everyday Food was fine, but more often than not, kind of boring and uninspiring.  

However, around Christmas, they sent me one of those "please reconsider your subscription with us, we will give you two years for TEN DOLLARS" and I caved.  Apparently I do not need to be inspired to cook, I just need a good deal.

Saveur, I am waiting for your version of the desperate "please don't leave me" notices before I make my final decision on whether or not to renew.  Let me know.  I will be waiting.

Cookbooks

I received my first "real" cookbook when I was supposed to be living back at home after college, but mostly living with my boyfriend in his tiny studio.  I had always loved food, but never really invested myself in cooking/baking until I had access to a kitchen that was mine, one that I didn't have to share.  This kitchen that kicked me into high gear was not even mine, and it was an even-tinier-than-the-studio-kitchenette with an electric range.   I still shudder at the thought of those glowing coils, even when I am able to think of the tasty memories Adam and I were able to create there, like the first turkey I ever made in some dollar store disposable roasting pan.

One day, Martha Stewart called out my name in our local Barnes & Noble with her clean, bright cover for Everyday Food: Great Food Fast.  I was a novice and so excited at the thought of owning a legitimate cookbook, and not some $4.00 mega-discounted pasta book, that it was gifted to me at full price, which was a lot for me back then, and even still now.  And I loved it.  Before Adam stopped eating pesto, I used to make this cavatappi with pesto and green beans and potatoes.  Did you know Martha Stewart taught me how to make pesto?  Because she did.

Fast forward four years, two Martha Stewart Living Cookbooks, and one Martha Stewart's Cupcakes later, I'm still in love with cookbooks and refusing to pay full price for them.  I've purchased two in the past week.  While looking for something not-food related at The Strand, I picked up The Best of Bon Appetit, partly because the recipes were simple and manageable, but mostly because of the inscription, dated October 1979:

To George,
May this be the first cookbook you receive for the loft!  See!  Cooking isn't as difficult as it seems!  Love and warm wishes, Bass.