Yes, I still cook sometimes

It’s been a while since I posted about food. This was Mother’s Day weekend, so that means we make some special things for Mommy that we hope know she’ll like. And it doesn’t count unless I feed her something I’ve never made before. If you’re going to make something awful, why not do it on Mom’s special day? But the boys helped me this time, so she had to say she liked it, even if she didn’t.

For months I’ve been dying to try what Alton Brown calls the world’s best banana ice cream. Since we just got an ice cream attachment for the stand mixer, I figured why not. So early Saturday morning I had Isaac go downstairs with me to help me freeze the bananas. After reading the reviews of the recipe I knew to peel them first. After they were frozen and thawed I assembled the ingredients and had Isaac and Jonathan put them in the food processor. After that it was just chill and run the ice cream maker.

That was pretty easy, but then I thought banana - chocolate swirl ice cream would be even better. I saw in one of Emeril’s cookbooks that he uses 6 ounces of chocolate and 2 tablespoons of oil to make vanilla - chocolate swirl ice cream, so that’s exactly what I do. It didn’t swirl. The ice cream froze the chocolate into rock hard ribbons dispersed throughout the dessert. Yummy, huh?

But then I thought “That was too easy, Karen will never let me get away with just that.” So I made this strawberry - almond cream tart to go with the ice cream. Desserts are a lot of fun to make. For this I also read the reviews so I knew to omit half the sugar from the strawberry topping and to add a little extra butter to the crust. It came out really well, thanks to our Carolina strawberries that were very sweet. We’ll have them locally in another month or so I think.

So the desserts went over well, and the everyone enjoyed them. Except for Isaac, who only ate the ice cream. The boys were very proud that they got to help make it. The biggest hit of the day, though, was a beverage made from cran-raspberry juice and soda water. Karen raved about it. Of course she did, it took no effort.

What if this was a sports car blog?

If this year’s Christmas takings were indicative of what kind of Christmas gifts I can expect in the future then I’m never stopping this blog.

So what did I open on Christmas morning? Well, Karen got me Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain, which is good reading in case you’ve been thinking about opening your own restaurant.

My sister got us some custom printed aprons, and these came with opening instructions. I was to open my present first,

Then Karen was to open hers.

I’m looking to market these in local Wal-Mart stores.  I’ll get them on the shelves, I know the overnight stockers.

My sister also sent a “Giant Art Jar” for Jonathan.  When this arrived I took a quick glance at the packing list and thought for sure I’d seen “Giant ANT Jar.”   I was on my way to Starbucks to get her kids some chocolate espresso beans when I realized my mistake.

A dear friend who visits this blog once a quarter got us a set of Alton Brown’s plungers, perfect for measuring and doling out those sticky ingredients.

Thanks, Michelle. Your copy of Why Mommy is a Democrat is on the way.

So how cool was that? Best Christmas Ever.  These presents give me the idea that people actually read this blog. Pretty soon I’ll get an ego like Stephen Colbert. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention what Aliyah gave me.

Boycott the doughboy

The biggest shock I received while working in the dairy section at Wal-Mart was just how little cooking we do as Americans. From TV dinners to frozen pizza, so much of what we eat is prepared for us. And no item brought that home to me as much as those Pillsbury biscuits.

I can understand why the crescent rolls are big sellers. I’ve looked up how to make them. They’re time consuming and difficult to prepare. But biscuits are supposed to be a staple of southern cooking, aren’t they? Don’t they come together so fast that your oven may not even have time to preheat? Well those things flew off the shelf. There’s even a local restaurant owner that stops by Wal-Mart and buys them out twice a week. Appalled, I decided to make some myself thinking that if I, a northeastern boy, can make biscuits, then anyone can.

And wouldn’t you know it, Alton made biscuits on Friday’s Good Eats rerun. So I got to see a master biscuit maker in action: Alton’s grandmother. And on Alton’s online recipe for biscuits she even comments that the recipe on the back of the bag of White Lily flour is hard to beat. I live in rural Pennsylvania so I can’t get White Lily flour. So I got this:

Gold Medal has their own recipe for biscuits on the back of their bag. Nicole from Pinch my Salt actually posted the recipe on the back of White Lily’s bag. She also did her homework and listed the protein content for all types of flours. That way I knew I wasn’t too far off with this flour. Way cool. (Go vote for her as the best food blog.) So should I use Alton’s recipe, White Lily’s or Gold Medal’s? Well since I’ve got Gold Medal flour I used their recipe.

Except I didn’t. I watched Good Eats and Alton said to replace some of the shortening with butter and it will taste better. I am fearless in the face of substitutions!

Looking around at the different recipes out there I must say that the one on the back of Gold Medal self-rising flour has twice the fat as all the others. I mean, EIGHT tablespoons of shortening? Really? I tried to use less, but it wouldn’t crumble the way the bag said it would. Oh, and another thing. Grocery stores here in Podunk don’t have all this low fat or fat free buttermilk. No, these biscuits were made with WHOLE buttermilk. Schedule my bypass for next Tuesday please.  (UPDATE: Karen tells me that the local Wal-Mart sells low fat buttermilk, but I really haven’t been in there since I picked up my last paycheck.)

I apparently used a very large biscuit cutter because I only got eight biscuits out. That’s what, one tablespoon of fat per hockey puck, right? They may not have been much to look at,

but they browned up kind of nice. And with all that shortening in there my biscuits definitely had flaky layers. They didn’t all rise the same, though, because I made them in my 12 year old toaster oven.

Okay, so here’s the point. These weren’t a home run, but they were a hit. Even the kids ate them. If a self-proclaimed wannabe in the kitchen can do this well on his first try then anyone can do this. These turned out good and I’ll definitely do it again. Next time I’ll try a recipe with less fat.

See you at the gym.

Sponsored by the letters A and B and the number 59

Inspiration can come from everywhere. For cooking, mine usually comes from the first two letters of the alphabet, which, when placed in, well, alphabetical order, are really the initials for Alton Brown (cue Good Eats theme music). He dedicated a show to milk, and in it he showed how to make your own cottage cheese. Ew.

But before that he showcased two desserts that I swore I would attempt. He made a tres leches cake and dulce de leche. It’s August, it’s ungodly hot, and there was an awesome ice cream topping staring me in the face. I had to make it. Now.

I had several reasons for being confident in this recipe. First, it only had four ingredients. Second, the directions included mixing everything in the pot and letting it simmer for three hours. “Sounds like soup,” I thought. I make good soup.

Step one was to pour the milk into the pot. Isaac did that:

Step two was put in a cup and a half of sugar into the pot. Isaac did that too. At this point he said “I’m bored,” and left the kitchen. “Your patience will be rewarded” echoed in my head. He was gone when time came to add the baking soda so I did, and I added the vanilla bean as well.

Karen told me a while ago that “yummy” or “yum” is not masculine enough and shouldn’t be used in my blog any more. But Alton uses words like “goodness” and “happiness” to describe food. So let me just say that dulce de leche is Spanish for happy.  Happy eating, that is, not cleaning.  This was very hard to clean up afterwards.

The Food Network is channel 59 on my cable box.

This is why I get the food network

Good Eats is by far the best food show ever. If my kids watch your cooking show and say “Play that again, Daddy” you know it’s great. And he always uses the most important phrase in any cooking show: “You’ll know it’s done when…“

I made cinnamon rolls this week. I’d made them before (and by “I” I mean Aliyah made them, but it was my idea) and they’d turned out great. This time I figured I’d document the process for posterity.

Alton showed me how to make them but some of these things I don’t have access to. Like a stand mixer.  Wanna know a good reason to get a stand mixer? I couldn’t quite get the butter mixed in all the way at the beginning with a whisk. Not soft enough I guess. See?

So I made Alton’s recipe with some changes. Here is my whisk attachment:

Here is my dough hook:

Have I told you that I hate my oven? Well, not for long. The oven switched off again. I swear the previous owners left just before everything in this house broke.  So twice now a $30 Wal-Mart toaster oven bought twelve years ago has come to the aid of a $2000 Jenn-Air downdraft convection oven.

It’s not just that the range is broken, what about my cinnamon rolls? They were half cooked after an hour. See what happened to my nice quiet Monday morning breakfast to finish off Karen’s vacation week? We went from this:

to this:

It’s still a great recipe, and if I can do it on the first try you know it’s good. I’ll have to do this again once our new oven is delivered.

Serious Yum

Have I said in the past that I’m a food network junkie? There are certain shows that I check almost every day to see what’s on and if it’s worth recording. Most Bobby Flay shows are good, and anything Alton Brown is great. I also like Mario, but he doesn’t do cheesesteaks.

I saw cheesesteaks on Good Eats and also on Throwdown, so I know what I’m doing. Heck, on Throwdown they had a master cheesesteak artist from Philly show us all how to make them. So now I’m an expert. Karen kept asking “Are you sure that’s how you do it?” and I kept saying “Tony Luke did it that way, so I’m doing it that way.” Name dropping gives me an air of credibility. Truth be told, I’m not even sure what kind of steak he used. But Bobby’s recipe was online, so I went with his, and Karen got a 1-pound sirloin from the butcher. She sliced it as thin as she could, which was pretty darn thin. I was skeptical because from what I’ve seen the meat is supposed to be deli thin, but it turned out to be very tasty.

Step 1 of this procedure is as follows: Open a can of Spaghetti-O’s for the kids. Seriously, this food is for me. Karen cut up the steak, so I set to work on everything else.

Ever see an instruction in a recipe and think “I’ve heard that word before, but how do I do it?” I like cookbooks that don’t assume any previous cooking knowledge and have good illustrations. I found one (Alton Brown of course) so now I can julienne cut an onion. Aren’t I special? I know it’s not authentic, but in our house onions just don’t happen without peppers and mushrooms. Karen was disappointed I didn’t throw in some garlic too. Those are creminis and shitakes in the picture.

I grated some provolone and it didn’t melt like I’d hoped. It was good, but it needed more than just residual heat to melt I suppose. Perhaps cheddar or american next time.

You know you want some. Do I even need to say it was yummy? Perhaps some hot peppers next time as well. Karen says jalepenos and serranos aren’t hot, but she does appreciate the effort.

Presents for Mark

I’m hard to shop for.  I admit it.  Karen has a heck of a time finding birthday and Christmas presents for me.  And to make matters worse, I’m always home, so she can’t buy something online and keep it a secret.  So last week, when she found something online that was a good idea, she bought it so she could keep it until my birthday, or father’s day or whatever.  But then she made a mistake.

She told me it was coming.

Not exactly, she just said “Don’t open that box when it arrives.”  So naturally I assumed there was something for me in it.  Now I’m happy, and I spend all afternoon staring at the box, imagining what’s inside.  Not really, but when she finally came home from work she told me that it was for my birthday.  In six months.  Like I’m gonna let that go by.  Long story short, she looked on despondently while I ripped the box open, revealing a present that she was excited to give me - when the time came. 

It was a cookbook.

Well, not really, more like a theory of cooking book.  Alton Brown’s I’m Just Here for the Food.  It’s got lots of food science knowledge that I’ve been lacking.  Very cool.  Except, two things strike me when I think about this as a gift:

• I no longer have an excuse to ruin dinner, and
• Karen doesn’t like my cooking

Actually I think it’s a very nice gift and I’m very happy with it; I’m just sorry that Karen is now going to have to think of something else when the time comes, or just count this as my present when father’s day arrives.

How I impressed myself, it isn’t too hard to do.

I didn’t sleep too well on Sunday night.  The idea of ruining a very expensive cut of meat was weighing heavily on my mind.  I mentioned to Karen my idea for Valentines day Monday morning and (as usual) she suggested some improvements.  How unlike her.  They were actually good ideas, and I implemented them grudgingly.

Thanks to old man winter, Karen had Tuesday afternoon and all day Wednesday off, so we decided to have V-day dinner Tuesday night after the kids went to bed.  That way could enjoy a leisurely dinner without worrying about bedtime.  Which was good, since dinner started at 9:30. 

Let it first be said that Karen trimmed the roast for me.  I don’t want to take credit for everything.

Have I told you Alton Brown is king?  He presented an impossible-to-ruin tenderloin roast recipe on “Tender is the Loin 2,” and I followed it with one minor alteration.  Instead of seasoning the roast with cumin, I used thyme (at Karen’s suggestion).  There are only three main parts to this method: Season, Sear, Roast.  And you must eat tenderloin medium-rare, it’s the law.  Here’s me searing the meat:

Alton and I disagree on so few things, but final roasting temperature is one of them.  He says pull from the oven at 135, we do it at 140-143 and we like it better that way.  It does carry over a bit, and the results were pleasantly pink.

Remember that soup from my first post?  Well I made it again with some modifications.  I didn’t use the crostini and I changed the mushrooms from creminis to morels.  Thank you to Mario Batali for the soup, it went perfectly with dinner.

Who really cares about dinner when there’s a dessert with Bailey’s in the ice cream, Kahlua in the brownies, and chocolate sprinkled on top?  Please visit Pinch my Salt for this wonderful recipe, the results were stellar.

One word: Wow.

 Click more for the soup recipe.

Pizza Markarita

I like pizza.  Making homemade pizza looks like a lot of fun.  And making pizza is something you can do with your kids.  If kids help make food they are more likely to eat it, but seriously, my kids would eat pizza three times a day if I made it.  However, some problems arise with pizza making:  (1) I know nothing about making dough, and (2) I know nothing about making sauce.  These are kind of important parts of the pizza, aren’t they?  So where do I look when I am totally and utterly lost?  That’s right, the internet.  So I look online and find a relatively simple pizza sauce recipe, and it turns out to be so ridiculously easy that I’m ashamed that I waited this long to try making it.  Fine. Then I start looking for a dough recipe.If I’m looking for recipes online I primarily look at two places: Cooking Light and the Food Network (Alton Brown is King).  I’ve seen Alton Brown talk about yeast and gluten and I’ve watched those awesome belching yeast puppets from “Dr. Strageloaf” and “House of the Rising Bun.”  (You know it’s a good cooking show if six- and three-year-old boys will watch it saying “Play that again!”)  So I suppose I understand the basic physics behind it. But often baking is subjective, and that’s where I tend to have problems.  Here, I’ll give you a good example:

THANK YOU Alton Brown for showing me the difference between SOFT PEAKS and STIFF PEAKS.  For all you foodies out there, you can stop laughing at me now, there are certain subjects in cooking and baking where it is assumed you know what you’re doing, and nobody actually shows you what they mean.  Now let’s talk about the dough.

 I found a good (I suppose, but what do I know?) recipe for a basic pizza dough from (who else?) Mario Batali.  Mario and I understand each other, and I feel like we have a good working relationship.  After watching “Molto Mario” I always leave thinking “Wow, I can do that, but LARD?  REALLY, Mario!”  (I never knew just how important pork fat was to italian cooking.)  Wow, that’s great.  I made the pizza and it turned out great.  The dough was very yeasty and the sauce was too acidy for me, but it was still very good.  I filed it away and planned on doing it again.

The NEXT time I made the recipe I looked for a different brand of canned tomatoes, and the sauce came out PERFECT.  I would choose this sauce over takeout any day.  I was completely stoked.  “Great!  Let’s make the dough!”

I make the dough.  I knead the dough.  HOW LONG SHOULD YOU KNEAD DOUGH?  Apparently the amount of time listed in the recipe is, well,  kind of a rough estimate.  Well, I really don’t know what I’m doing and after the dough rises I decide to have some fun with it.  Karen was working late so there I am in the kitchen spinning the dough up in the air like an idiot, all the while  humming the theme music to “Molto Mario.”  But immediately I know something is wrong.  It’s not stretching out like it should, and I know what the problem is.  I didn’t knead it long enough.  The recipe makes three pizzas, 12 inches or so each.  Let’s take a look at them one by one:

Pizza #1.  Very nice, the boys helped put on the cheese and pineapple, very nice, we assemble it on the pizza peel and I slide it into the oven and it bakes until (at least some of) the cheese is golden brown and delicious.  There is a problem.  After three bites the boys stop eating.  I taste some, and I really can’t blame them.  They get spaghetti-o’s instead.

Pizza #2.  At this point I was getting very cocky, even though I knew something was wrong.  After pizza #1 was in the oven I decided to assemble the pizza on the counter and then slide the pizza peel under it like “real italians” do.  You can see the results.  A round pizza ends up looking like New Hampshire (or is it Vermont?).

While I was cursing and trying to make pizza #2 edible, the remaining ball of dough siezed up into a rock and I couldn’t save it for the life of me.  I ate pizza #2 to destroy the evidence before Karen came home from work.