What we eat when we talk about moving

Soon there will be a new kitchen to explore--a new kitchen with counter space and a dishwasher and still, a pantry. It boggles the mind what I have to look forward to, well, tomorrow.

But until then there are only boxes. Only boxes and cobbled-together meals and a lot of eating at restaurants, which is not to be complained about surely.

What follows is probably the last meal in a long series of "fusion" creations coming from the desperate need to stop buying groceries because I don't want to move them. Difficult, since the grocery store is perhaps my favorite place of all time. Once I went on vacation and went to a different grocery store every day. As part of the fun.

This is a riff on picadillo, a savory and sweet Latin American hash whose title means "small bits and pieces." There are Cuban versions, Mexican versions, Puerto Rican versions--mine is more of a Clean Out the Fridge version. It can be served with rice or over bread, or scooped up with triangles of tortilla. You'll see from the top photo that I actually originally planned on tiny pasta bows, but it turned out we didn't really even need pasta.

Picadillo con chorizo

1/2 lb fresh green beans

1 red bell pepper

2 small shallots

6 oz. spicy chorizo

1 package of corn tortillas (or use flour, whatever you like)

This recipe really just lets the chorizo take center stage, followed by a crisp bean supporting role.

Heat the oven to 400 degrees. Wash and trim the green beans. Cut into half-inch pieces. Chop the red pepper and shallots into similar-sized pieces. Brown the chorizo. It will produce a fair amount of drippings. Reserve that for cooking the black beans, if you're into that.

The chorizo will start to spatter around a little. Add in the chopped shallots at this point, followed by the pepper and green beans. I really like crisp vegetables, so I added these in last--if you like them a little more mushy, you might want to cook them first, because the chorizo really only takes a few minutes of cooking time.

While the chorizo is cooking, warm the tortillas. I spread them all out on a large cookie sheet and throw them in the oven for a few minutes while everything else is coming together. You want these nice and warm and soft.

Black beans

1 12 oz. can black beans

leftover chorizo pan that has not been cleaned

1 clove garlic

salt and pepper

Mince the garlic and cook it in the chorizo fat. Add in the black beans and season as necessary. These are ready when everything is heated through and smells so good you can't bear not to start eating.

Serve the picadillo with warmed tortillas, black beans, tomatoes and a salad on the side.

To eat picadillo, rip a triangle from a tortilla and fold it to make a little scoop to pick up the meat (similar to the way you might eat curry with naan bread).






The nice thing about picadillo is that you can really adjust it to whatever season you like. I have had it with ground beef, chopped apples, peppers, and potatoes.

Eggs in bell peppers

My relationship with food and drink is pretty trendy.



By which I mean, my taste buds crave the same things over and over, and then I'll abandon them for something entirely new (not that I don't run around the kitchen in my neo-eighties romper from Urban Outfitters, but that's a story for another time).* Sometimes I just have big taste preferences that pop out of nowhere and I eat them three, four, five times in a week and then no more. I just like thing X right now. A lot.

Last summer, the things I really liked were gin martinis and any Italian dish involving spicy sausage.

This past winter, I kept hankering for bourbon and curry. So many curries were made or eaten at disappointing Indian restaurants. (I recently removed one curry from the freezer to eat for lunch last week or some time, and I have to say, my flirtation with curry hasn't extended as well over the warmer months. Or maybe, don't freeze coconut milk for very long.) Also soup. More soup that you could shake a bread stick at.

But lately my food trend has been "what can I put underneath a poached egg?" and this breakfast is no exception to that rule.



Poached Eggs in Bell Peppers
loosely adapted from everydayfoodmag.com


1 large bell pepper, any color
4 eggs
salt
pepper
water

This recipe is a riff on the classic "Egg in a hole" type of breakfast that I used to eat as a child--a hole ripped in a piece of toast and then an egg fried in the middle--my parents called them "One-eyed Petes," which is not a name I'd like to dwell on for very long. The best part of those was the buttery, crunchy little bit of bread that had been ripped from the center of the bread. Very ceremoniously, I always ate that bit of bread last. Like an after-dinner espresso or something, at the fine age of eight or nine.

Anyway, onward. Cut the bell pepper into half-inch strips. I didn't bother with either end (they're in the fridge now, waiting to be used for something else), I just cut straight through the widest part to make the rings. Heat the stove to medium-high heat. Put the rings in your frying pan (one that has a lid) and then crack an egg into each one. Pour about a quarter-inch of water into the pan, put the lid on, and let them do their things.

I don't even flip the eggs. I check on them after about a minute and then sprinkle them with salt and pepper, and then let them keep cooking until the white has lost that clear-ish tint on the top. When they're done, the water is somehow all sucked into the pepper, making it just the perfect texture of firm but definitely cooked.

This recipe idea has already taken me to all sorts of culinary places in my head--what other round things could I put an egg inside? I think it might be fun to poach an egg inside a ring of red onion and then serve it over a bed of carpaccio or just thinly sliced roast beef. With some sort of horseradish hollandaise sauce. I've heard of little egg custards baked inside sugar pumpkin shells, and I'm thinking they could work for egg cups too, but you'd have to put two eggs in each one. The possibilities are endless!



The rest of the breakfast was pretty straightforward. A piece of french toast with sliced up peaches on top. The bread was some sort of store-bought freezer thing I'm trying to get rid of--hey, everything is better covered with peaches. I soaked the bread in the leftover egg wash from the almond pastries a little bit further down (waste not, want not!), some rice milk, and lots of nutmeg and cinnamon.



The other two things in the lead picture are roasted potatoes cooked with honey and chili powder (sorry, I don't have measurements), topped with goat cheese and red pepper sauce.


Red pepper sauce

1 red pepper
1 clove garlic
glug of olive oil



Mince the garlic and then cook it with a little bit of olive oil on low heat. This step is to cut the garlicky taste of the garlic. Last time I made this sauce, I used tomatoes and raw garlic, and it was VERY good. So good that I think every person I came in contact with for the next week knew how good it was, which is not generally something I require of my meals. SO. Cooked garlic is milder.

Roast the pepper over an open flame until it gets charred and wonderfully blistery. Turn it every so often to keep the charring even. It'll start to get soft and at that point, chop it into smaller pieces (remove the ribbing and seeds) and add to the garlic.



Stir it all around and continue to cook the pepper until completely soft. Blend the garlic and red pepper in the food processor and then sprinkle it all over your breakfast potatoes.

Friday breakfast, done and dusted.

* That's a joke. Please know that I stopped wearing rompers before learning how to tie my own shoes.

Folie aux amandes, part deux

So the problem with the recipe below is that it actually makes a blue ton of almond filling.

Perhaps you are a not a cook like me, and you happen to have 102 pounds of puff pastry on hand, due to an extreme love of baklava or an intimate relationship with a bulk foods provider.

But in case you happen to be more of a lackadaisical cook (like myself) and aren't swimming in the papery, buttery stuff, there will be a lot of leftover filling for the little almond pastries featured below.

And hopefully, your coworkers are also going to want to eat some sort of almond mess long after those teensy twelve pastries are gone, so the best option is clearly to make a coffee cake. Especially if, like me, your office party is at 2 on a Friday, prime time for coffee and wishing you weren't doing any work at all.


"What may seem like leftovers but is actually the real deal" almond coffee cake

1/2 C. butter, softened (one stick)
1 C. white sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract
2 C. all purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
pinch of salt
1/3 C. rice milk (I'm sure cow milk is fine, this is just what I had)
2 oz. cream cheese (I used neufschatel cheese)

1 C. almond filling (see recipe below)
2 oz. cream cheese (I used neufschatel cheese)
2 T. confectioner's sugar
pinch of powdered ginger

confectioner's sugar, for garnish
sliced almonds, for garnish

1. Cream the butter and sugar. Add eggs and vanilla; beat well. Add in the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Fold in 2 oz. cream cheese and pour in the rice milk at the end. Beat until smooth.

2. In a small mixing bowl, beat almond filling, 2 oz. cream cheese, confectioners' sugar and ginger until smooth.

3. Spoon half of the cake batter into a greased 10-in. tube pan. Top with filling and remaining batter.

3. Bake at 350 degrees F for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pan to wire rack. Once cooled, invert cake to a plate.


There she is, baking and golden brown.

4. Top with confectioner's sugar and slivered almonds before serving. I say that now, but I may end up drizzling the cake with some leftover cranberry simple syrup and then adding the almond sprinkles.

Trust me, no one at work is going to ever want to think of almonds ever again after this party.


The finished product. I went with confectioner's sugar after all.

I haven't even gotten to the brownie recipe for tomorrow yet, though really I may not post it here, since it's cribbed directly from allrecipes.com and uses the evil stepchild, shortening.

I would like to say I am the girl who makes a better, more healthy version of these brownies with a fat that doesn't make me cringe. The truth is, I have shortening in my pantry that I'm dying to get rid of before I move and I can't figure out how else to do that than to pawn it off on my unsuspecting work friends. Let this blog serve as a confession booth as well as a depository for recipes I've tried and maybe failed.

So, off to bed I must go, since I have my standing Friday brunch date in a few short hours and there is still a red pepper sauce to prepare. Good, gastronomical things are happening for breakfast tomorrow, involving the prettiest poached eggs you ever did see, and a lovely sauce to boot. But those, my dear, will have to wait for another time.

Ta ta.

Folie aux amandes

Tomorrow our assistant is leaving.

Other than general worries of calamity and "is it possible that I can work more hours?" kinds of feelings that usually drive me to a bottle of Cabernet and a loaf of Italian bread, I am looking forward to our farewell party.

Note that I am looking forward to our farewell party, not our farewell.

Nancy and I have developed quite the friendship over the last several months. She shares my love of bread and real tomato sauce. Not to mention that she's one of the few people I know who can match my enthusiasm for almond butter and flax seeds on toast. She was the only person at work to recognize that my Christmas lemon cookies had two kinds of citrus--lemon and a hint of lime. She also loaned me her Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, which pretty much changed my life and the way I make bread. Which is now all the time, in case you were wondering.

Food isn't the only reason I will miss Nancy, but it's one of the special ones. It's really a lucky thing to develop a rapport with a coworker--since really, I spend more time with my coworkers than with anyone else I know. Somehow, if you can share the doldrums of everyday work life with someone, the door is open for sharing all kinds of things. So even though we come from completely different corners of life and likely want completely different things, I'm glad to know her, and I feel enriched that she's been in my life, and I am definitely sad to see her go.

Alright, on to the party food.

This dessert is mostly a last-ditch effort at something not embarrassing for a company party.

I had meant to make a lovely, yeasty lemon bread from sk, but after taking into account the daunting rise times and the fact that I am moving and I have not packed one single box, I decided that I could spend my time idly drinking beer with a friend and NOT letting bread rise. (Hi, Erin! Welcome home!) Which is what I did. So. The following is just an excuse to use up some almond pie filling and puff pastry (both of which I weirdly had in the fridge), while raising the glycemic index of anyone who happens to show up at our little office party tomorrow.

Almond pastries

3 oz. almond pie filling (I used Solo brand. You use whatever you feel like.)
2 3/4 cups almond meal
2 T. butter
2 egg whites
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 T. brandy (or amaretto, but I don't like that, so I used brandy instead. You do what you want.)
1/2 C. white sugar
pinch of salt

3/4 lb puff pastry
1 egg
1 T. water
sliced almonds, for garnish
confectioner's sugar, for garnish

I really wish I could tell you that I made my own puff pastry for this. One day, when I am not moving households, I will attempt it, but this is not that day. It's after midnight, people.

1. In the electric mixer, beat the almond pie filling with the almond meal, sugar, and salt. Add in the butter, egg whites, vanilla extract and brandy on high speed until it is as fluffy as you can make it. Set aside the filling. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

2. Roll the dough onto a lightly floured surface and cut to 4 in. strips. Whisk the egg and water together and brush the egg wash onto one end of the strip of pastry dough.


A special look at my limited kitchen space.

3. DO NOT DO WHAT I DID. If you look carefully at this picture, you'll see my renegade attempt at home-making a pastry bag and filling it with the almond filling to pipe neatly onto the dough (uhhh, that would be the disgusting-looking parchment paper with almond paste smeared on it, bottom right). It was a spectacular catastrophe.

Just spread it on the bottom half of the dough with a spatula straight from the bowl, a lesson I only learned after wasting this delicious nectar inside of a piece of paper and then being forced to lick my fingers clean. So, maybe do what I did if you want a nice treat before everything is all baked up nice.

4. Fold the pastry over and press it down. Brush the whole thing with the egg wash and then cut it into three or four pieces. Feel free to get fancy and cut the folded side like a "bear claw" pastry if you want. I did not bother with this, but again, I was rushing.


Almond filling and egg wash


Folding, cutting

5. Sprinkle with confectioner's sugar and bake the pastries on a cookie sheet for about 15 minutes. Watch closely though; I may have baked them for closer to twenty. I'm always afraid of burning puff pastry. (See below.) Basically, everything should be pretty and golden brown.

6. Remove from the oven, sprinkle with sliced almonds as they cool. Serve to nearly former coworkers at an afternoon farewell.


Again, do as I say and not as I do. This unfortunate pastry met her end in the toaster oven. Although I have to say, I still ate it and it wasn't that bad.

break the fast

About once a week or slightly less, a friend and I get up ridiculously early to eat breakfast together. I'm not sure how it started, exactly, but it's not at all uncommon for Mandy to stumble into my apartment at an ungodly early hour on a weekday. We slowly come alive as the french press works its way through our veins. By that time, the bacon is cooking and we're pulling pancakes off the griddle one by one, smothering them with over-easy eggs.

It's almost as satisfying as getting together for dinner. Sadly, there's no wine, but the morning seems somehow sacred--like we're the only two people in the world who are awake, and we can gab about our jobs or other silly drama and then leave for work completely sated. I take great satisfaction knowing that I've already done something fun in my day by the time we all get to work on a Thursday morning. Not to mention, I've eaten a meal far superior to my everyday oatmeal or coffee in a rush out the door.

This recipe comes from the venerable smitten kitchen. I have had great success with Deb's recipes, especially the desserts. The whole lemon tart converted at least two of my co-workers to the ways of lemon love, and the crust did not shrink even a little. Really, her genius is commendable.

So, oatmeal pancakes. Making these only too slightly longer than the regular pancake mix + egg method, and they're far more healthy, not to mention much more delicious. The only thing I added was two tablespoons of ground flax seeds. And then I used ANOTHER sk recipe for the drizzle on top. These pancakes were also eaten with warmed peach preserves and received high compliments.




I started eating this pancake immediately after pulling it from the griddle, and then remembered that the whole point of making these again was so I could take photos. Whoops.


avec cranberry syrup


yummy pancakes with yummy typewriter. note what appears to be a clean desk in the background.

Oatmeal pancakes
from the smitten kitchen

The only change I made was to add two tablespoons of ground flax seeds to the batter. I probably added a little more butter to the pan than was absolutely necessary, but the pancakes got so crispy-delicious around the edges that I couldn't quite help it.

Cranberry drizzle
from the smitten kitchen

1/3 cup sugar
3/4 cup thawed frozen cranberries, chopped
1/2 cup water

Cook the sugar in a dry saucepan with a heavy bottom. The sugar will start to brown and get crumbly as it melts. Whisk it as it starts to melt and turns a caramel-y color. Add in the cranberries and water (the caramel will "seize," getting hard and starting to steam). Simmer over low heat, stirring, until the caramel is completely dissolved. Pour syrup through a sieve lined with cheesecloth, into a heatproof bowl. Press down on the solids as the sauce drips through.

Cinco de Mayo

I have been daydreaming about huevos rancheros and refritos and arroz y frijoles all day long and I came home from work and made hummus instead.



It doesn't exactly make sense to make hummus--enchiladas would probably be the more appropriate choice--but there has also been a jar of chickpeas staring me down every time I open the fridge these last few days, and I finally caved because I was sick of looking at it.

I finally started buying dried beans and soaking them overnight, a la Laura Ingalls Wilder, or really, a la anyone who (a) wants more control over how mushy or salty the beans get or (b) wants to buy cheap food. So this weekend when I soaked half a pound of chickpeas, I felt quite in touch with my inner pioneer woman and very proud of myself.

But now I realize how very many chickpeas that is, and how very only one of me there is. So they sit in their cute jar, staring up at me longingly from the otherwise empty shelf in the fridge. One day I am going to make an amazing chickpea dish that is daring and directional, but today is not that day. I've worked late every night of this very long week, I'm tired and whiny, blah blah. Fine. I will make hummus. And maybe some chips to go with.

One of the first times I made hummus was when I lived in Grand Rapids. I must have been a junior in college, because Jess and So Hang and I lived in the house on Kellogg street, with our landlord upstairs. One night instead of studying, I decided that the only thing I could possibly do was cook something, so I made hummus.

I remember all of us being in a punchy mood (so maybe we were drinking beer and not studying at all?), and not getting to the food prep until far too late. We turned on the blender well after midnight, only to get worried that the landlord would wake up (it was an old, heaving blender with a creaky motor as loud as our lawnmower), and I ended up scraping all the half-smashed peas out of the blender and into a mixing bowl, where I smashed the rest of them, quietly, by hand with a fork.

I don't know if we ever ate it, but sometimes Jess still teases me about the fork and hummus episode. And I definitely still cook in the middle of the night, though I'm less concerned about noise these day. In this apartment, my landlord lives next door instead of upstairs, so he can't hear a thing.

Hummus

16 oz. cooked chickpeas (or the 15.5 oz can, either one)
one big fat clove of garlic
1/4 C good olive oil, plus a little more
1 tsp. cumin
juice of half a lemon
1/4 tsp. salt, or to taste
warm water
paprika
parsley (for garnish)

In the food processor, whir the first five ingredients all together in this order. I tried to get away with using less olive oil, but I think you really need all of it. I don't care for tahini, which is why you don't see it here, but you could add some. Then, and I swear by this, add in slightly less than 1/4 cup of warm water and turn the food processor on the highest setting for over a minute. It seems excessive, but I really think this is what makes it so billowy and lovely. Add parsley flakes or paprika to make it pretty, and big glug of olive oil before serving.

The only thing is, now that there's tons of air in it, when you go back for the leftovers, it will have sunk a little bit, so warming the hummus or spinning it in the food processor again will give it the same airy texture it had when you first made it. Normally I don't have this problem of leftovers with hummus because I eat it all, but this is a lot of beans here. So I think there will be leftovers. Maybe not many, but still.

Serve with homemade tortilla chips

Homemade tortilla chips



1 package whole-wheat tortillas
olive oil
sea salt

Preheat oven to 405 degrees. Cut the tortillas into eight triangles and line them up on a cookie sheet. Brush with olive oil. Bake for 4 to 6 minutes, or until the edges curl up and the chips start to get brown. Remove chips from oven, sprinkle with sea salt, and let cool before diving in. They'll continue to crisp up as they cool.

For these I just put the chips in one layer on the pizza stone and then brushed oil on top of them before sliding the stone (carefully, carefully) back in the oven. It worked fine, and now I have one less pan to wash.

Serve the hummus with the chips.

Asparagus grain salad

Klein's family vegetable stand is Open. For. Business. Huzzah!



Klein's is a family-owned vegetable stand that runs from April until October in Elgin, Illinois and Udina, Illinois. They sell herbs, seedlings, flowers, local-ish sausage, cheese, and picked items (Wisconsin and Indiana, respectively) and most importantly, the best selection of local vegetables this side of the Fox River. An added bonus, I can walk there from my house. The trickier part is walking home with my produce-laden bags.

All through spring thaw, Klein's has taunted me with their signage about seedlings and springtime, informing me that things are growing, but not yet for sale. Well, finally, my time has come. They've been open about two weeks, and I made my first visit this past Sunday. Right now there are mostly herbs and flowers for sale, but inside there's a modest crop of shallots and the most beautiful, tender, asparagus you ever did see.

Not to mention the pickles. I could talk for days about those pickles. Two jars came home with me yesterday--just homely dill pickles and average pickled banana peppers. But you have never eaten a pickle until you've eaten these pickles. Where have I been my whole life? I had never heard of these, but a friend who was staying the weekend informed me that these are made fifteen minutes from his childhood home--further reason to pick some up.

Needless to say, the dill pickles are all gone. And the banana peppers are following closely behind--I think there are two left--but not for long.


Shall I eat a shallot?


black rice, chopped asparagus, pearl couscous

Asparagus grain salad
loosely adapted from 101 cookbooks

I knew I wanted to make a grain salad with springy foods, and originally I had barley in mind. But I had leftover pearl couscous on hand, so I went ahead and used it up. The first version of this salad was served with romaine lettuce, the couscous sprinkled on top like little gems. Very fresh and springy. For the second version, pictured here, I decided not to use lettuce at all, but instead added in black rice for color and heft. Both times I waited until serving to dress the salad. The salad is even better the next day, after all the flavors have mingled.

For the salad:

1 head of romaine lettuce
3 shallots
1 large picked banana pepper
small handful asparagus (six to ten pencil-thin stalks)
1 cup cooked pearl couscous
sesame seeds

For the dressing:

2 parts miso paste
1 part toasted sesame oil
1 part white wine vinegar
1/4 cup hot water
1 cup cooked pearl couscous

Chop the lettuce into 1 inch ribbons and add them to the salad bowl. Finely chop shallots, banana pepper, and asparagus; then add them to the salad. I didn't cook the asparagus because it's so new and tender, but you could steam it if you want. I cut these in circles about an eight of an inch in width--the way you'd chop a green onion. Stir in the cooked couscous and sprinkle the top with sesame seeds.

Whisk together the first three dressing ingredients; I used a small food processor. Drizzle in the hot water and continue to whisk--dressing will become creamy. Taste and then add pepper as needed, or more vinegar. It probably won't need more salt or oil, but make it how you like it.

Chill both the salad and the dressing before serving. Dress the salad immediately before serving. Serve cold.

For the version in these pictures, I swapped out one cup of cooked black rice for the romaine lettuce.

These flavors are all pretty strong, so I wanted a full-bodied dressing to counteract the fragrance of the shallots and the tang of the peppers. The miso/sesame combination is strong in a completely different direction. I think they work well together. You might want to skip the dressing entirely.

Add-ins are endless: for lunch tomorrow, I'll probably add in a chopped hard-boiled egg or a handful of chickpeas, or both. Or maybe next time I'll try it with barley after all.