Month 11 day 16: Korean BBQ (for the third time?)

Today I made:
Korean Short Ribs, Food & Wine Magazine December 2010
Gingered Green Beans, Food & Wine Magazine December 2010

G likes short ribs, so we've done a few recipes over the year. Here was one more, by Food & Wine. It was sort of a peculiar recipe, with daikon and an Asian pear (although G went grocery shopping, and could only find western pears) in the marinade. It seemed like a waste! These were good, but not spectacularly better than the ones we've had so far, so we're not keeping this recipe.

I served it with rice and these gingered green beans. Although they refer to ginger in their name, the real dominant flavor is spice! They have a good helping of red pepper in them. You could barely taste the ginger at all. They were good, but I don't think we'll keep that recipe either. I like green beans that are sautéed with a lot of garlic though, yum!

Month 11 day 15: Kale and bacon pasta and banana cocoa

Today I made:
Orecchiette with Kale, Bacon, and Sun-Dried Tomatoes, Cooking Light December 2010
Banana Cream, Food Network Magazine December 2009

For dinner we made this light pasta, which is seemingly-healthy, except that everything is cooked in bacon fat-- yum! It's a very quick recipe. The kale is thrown in with the pasta for the last couple minutes to cook. The garlic, sun-dried tomatoes, and red pepper are cooked in the drippings from the bacon, which is crumbled over the top. Everything is just thrown together at the end and topped with some lemon juice, which gives it a sort of odd, out of place tang.

I don't normally choose recipes with sun-dried tomatoes since I don't like them very much, but G commented that he really likes them. I didn't remember that! So maybe we should try it more often. This was a good recipe, although G pointed out that he liked the Sunday Sauce more! It's hard for vegetables to compete with meat, I guess :-P

After dinner I whipped up this cocoa. The recipe isn't online, but it's just 1.5 c milk, 1/2 banana, 1 T sugar, 1/2 t cinnamon, and 2.5 oz chocolate chips melted in. You're supposed to puree it, but I didn't want to dirty another dish so I just mashed up the banana as I stirred. It's ok, but not spectacular. Blending it might have helped, but I think also it might just make a better milkshake than a cocoa.

Month 11 day 14: This dinner brought to you by the color yellow

Today I made:
Buttery Pigeon [yellow split] Pea Dal (Mitti Handi Dal), Food & Wine December 2010
Spiced Potatoes (Aloo Bhaji), Food & Wine December 2010
Served with Trader Joe's garlic naan and chai tea (decaf Tetley's British Blend simmered with cloves, cardamom, a cinnamon stick, and milk)

Today I made an Indian dinner. The grocery store didn't have quite exactly all the spices called for, or pigeon peas for that matter, so we had to make a few substitutions, but it ended up being pretty good. There was a lot of tumeric in everything, which is why everything is so yellow. Also a lot of cumin seeds. These are both pretty quick recipes, taking about 30 minutes of hands on time each (the peas take an additional ~30 minutes of soaking first), so that was nice. They were pretty flavorful too. I didn't have quite 2 lbs of yukon gold potatoes, so I threw in a sweet potato (a white-fleshed kind) in just for fun. It looked identical to the normal potatoes, but every once in a while you'd get a very sugary piece! Kind of fun.

Month 11 day 13: Curry breakfast and spaghetti dinner

Today I made:
Eggs Poached in Curried Tomato Sauce, Cooking Light December 2010
Spaghetti with Sunday Sauce, Food and Wine December 2010

I made this flavorful dish for brunch today. It's got garlic, ginger, jalapeño, curry powder, coconut milk, and cilantro and tastes really good. It reminded us of an Asian version of shakshuka, which I made a while back. I liked this one more, and so did G.

For dinner I made this slow-cooked meat sauce and pasta. I've heard a lot about Italian-American traditional Sunday sauces, but had never taken the time to make one before. It was different than I expected-- it's less a sauce than it is a bunch of shredded meat with a little bit of tomato puree. Not surprisingly, G really liked it, saying it reminded him of this hearty rigatoni from a couple months ago. This didn't have that much flavor, though. It was just seasoned with some rosemary and thyme. It seems overly long and time-intensive for what it is, but G liked it a lot so I guess we'll be keeping the recipe!

Month 11 day 12: Swedish meatballs minus the meatballs

Today I made:
Köttbullar med Potatismos ([Ikea] Swedish Meatballs with Mashed Potatoes), Saveur December 2011
served with steamed green beans

This recipe was for making Swedish meatballs along with mashed potatoes and gravy. But, I had Ikea meatballs in the freezer, so I just planned to make the mashed potatoes and gravy from the recipe. I feel like maybe those weren't the best parts of the recipe-- the gravy didn't get very thick, and the ratio of liquid to potatoes was just way too much. So everything ended up being a little bit liquidy :-P The spices in the meatball recipe sound good though, so maybe it's worth trying that someday.

Month 11 day 11: Thai fish chowder

Today I made:
Thai Fish Chowder, Every Day with Rachael Ray December 2011

Mom saw this recipe on my list and thought it sounded really good. It was a really fast, one-pot recipe, so I think it had that appeal too after yesterday's multi-hour, multi-dirty-dish, pokey croquembouche adventure. It has very few ingredients (it's in the $12 dinner section of the magazine), with no prep since it uses coleslaw mix. We couldn't get green curry paste at Trader Joe's, so we used about a third of a bottle of their green curry simmer sauce. It did end up costing just about $12 and 10-20 minutes. It tasted great, too! Nice and fresh. This recipe is definitely a keeper.

Today we also assembled a yule log (of sorts) from the extra cream filling from the croquembouche. Mom made a cake from one of her cookbooks, since the recipe I had in mind from Saveur had pretty poor reviews. Since we used filling and not normal frosting, it came out pretty terrible looking and the "branch" on top slipped off! Oh well, it tasted good. Luckily we had some plastic decorations that made it look more deliberate.

Nailed it!

Month 11 day 10: Croquembouche

Today I made:

Croquembouche, Food Network Magazine December 2009

We had a potluck to go to today, so for some excitement my mom encouraged me to make a croquembouche. Essentially, a croquembouche is a pyramid of cream puffs held together with a hard caramel candy. This one had cream puffs filled with vanilla cream or chocolate-coffee cream.

This recipe has several preps and several coolings, but it manages to fit together somehow (especially with Mom as a sous chef!) We started with the cream fillings, which take 12 egg yolks! We used vanilla extract instead of beans but otherwise followed the recipe as normal. While that cooled we had some lunch and then started making the choux pastry. Choux pastry is kind of strange because it gets cooked in a saucepan for a bit, which I don't think happens with most doughs. Instead of piping it, I just scooped it onto the parchment-paper-lined sheets and then smoothed it out. Luckily, it still puffed up beautifully! I poked holes in them and set them to cool.

While those cooled we went on a walk, and by the time we returned it was time to finish the filling and assemble. The puddingy filling gets softened out with whipping cream (whipped to soft peaks). Our vanilla filling had set up quite well because it was in a wide, shallow dish, so it was pretty hard to "fold in" to the soft whipped cream. It was also hard to pipe into the pastries, maybe because of the clumps. The chocolate filling on the other hand was in a narrow, deep dish, and was still almost luke-warm after a couple hours in the fridge. It folded into the whipped cream beautifully and piped easily.

While I filled the pastries Mom started the caramel-- just sugar, water, and some corn syrup. Once that was done, I just dipped the cream puffs into the caramel and tried to get them to stick together, then flailed some more caramel around to try to get the "spun" sugar. It didn't quite make the thin strands that it's supposed to (well, this happened, and one poked Mom, but they didn't happen when they were supposed to), but it still looked nice. And everything got eaten!

This evening I am having tea in one of the cups that had rock-hard caramel coating the bottom and it is very sweet! I think this caramel would make nice lollipops. It made really cool patterns as it cooled.

Month 11 day 9: Chicken, chard, and pumpkin

Today I made:

Chicken Baked on a Bed of Bread and Swiss Chard, Food & Wine December 2010
Ginger-Roasted Winter Squash, Food & Wine December 2010

I'm at home, where I have access to my parents' California backyard garden, teeming with all kinds of greens-- lettuces, komatsuna, mizuna, chard, kale, broccoli, and also rhubarb, beets, and eggplants (with snow peas on the way). I picked this recipe to make to spotlight their chard, along with Dad's freshly baked bread (and chicken from the freezer, meaning that we had everything on hand for this recipe!). (We had to buy a pumpkin for the side, though.)

The chicken was a hands-off one-pot meal. The chard and bread get tossed and seasoned (we left out capers and used black raisins, not golden, and onions, not shallots), and then the chicken just gets set on top and put in the oven. But after the recommended roasting time, the chicken was still quite red, so I think maybe it hadn't been entirely defrosted. We had to let it go an additional 20 minutes or so maybe, but by then the skin was crispy and the bread had soaked up the delicious chicken juices. It seemed like a nice Thanksgivingy dish that could be done for a small crowd.

The winter squash is supposed to bake for a really long time, but I just cut a pumpkin in half, deseeded it, and steamed it in the microwave until soft before slicing it and roasting as directed. I used dried cranberries instead of currants, and people liked that. The vinegar flavor seemed weird with sugarpie pumpkin, and the ginger flavor didn't come through too well (maybe we didn't quite use a full 1-inch piece, or maybe the microwave treatment didn't let it do its thing).

Month 11 day 8: Vanilla-spiced Nuts and buttermilk chicken

Today I made:
Vanilla-Spice Nuts, Cooking Light December 2010
and G made:
Buttermilk Ranch Chicken, Every Day with Rachael Ray December 2011 (not pictured)

Originally I tried to organize a cookie exchange party for today, but only one person signed up :( He decided to make cookies anyway and bring them to G and me, so I made these nuts to share with him. I also baked up some brown sugar cookies from dough that has been in our freezer, but they all got stuck to the cookie sheet and broke :( I ended up eating them all myself instead of sharing the broken shards. These nuts were super easy to make, but I wasn't sure about the flavor in the end. It tasted too strongly of egg for me.
We had another potluck to go to today, so while the nuts were in the oven I mixed up the marinade for the buttermilk ranch chicken. Then I had to tutor, so it was actually G who cooked the chicken up. He liked the recipe because it was easy (easy when someone does all the marinating for you ;) ). The chicken was really juicy-- maybe because of the buttermilk? It all got eaten at the potluck, so I guess other people liked it too!

Month 11, day 7: Chickpea Crostini

Today I made:
Chickpeas and Spinach with Smoky Paprika, Cooking Light December 2010

Tonight was a lab holiday party, which is a potluck. Our professor makes turkey and ham, so we're supposed to bring sides or desserts-- but the desserts are always in a different room and almost never get touched, so it's really better to bring a side. It's hard to think of side dishes though! I chose to make this crostini topper, which I figured would be tasty even at room temperature. In fact, we cooked this in the Dutch oven and carried it in a cardboard box so it didn't burn my lap in the car, and so it was still pretty warm when we got to the party. Unfortunately, we got there too late to make a label that indicated that it went with the bread, so I think people were just eating it like a stew. Oh well, I guess it's still good that way. I thought it was pretty tasty, and it's not to difficult either.

Month 11 day 6: Two-tone enchiladas

Today I made:
Christmas-Style Stacked Enchiladas, Food Network Magazine December 2009

These enchiladas look really great in the magazine, but the recipe is pretty weird actually. For example, the red sauce has 1 cup of chili powder and 5 cups of water, and ends up being as liquidy as you might expect (it simmers for just 15 minutes, so it's not like it reduces too much). But the whole thing is baked on a baking sheet, so it's kind of a problem to have a lot of liquid! I wish I had just made like 2/5 c chili powder in 2 cup of water. I guess I will freeze the left over "sauce" for the next time I made chili. Another thing about the recipe I thought was scary is that the green sauce has 3 4-oz cans of green chile peppers AND 1.5 teaspoons of red pepper flakes. Normally recipes call for like 1/4 tsp and are plenty hot! Since I've been burned (literally) in the past by canned green chiles, I decided to use just 2 cans and put in a full can of tomatoes instead of one cup. I just did a sprinkling of red pepper flakes. With these modifications, the sauce was still punchy but not overwhelming.
The enchiladas are supposed to be topped with a fried egg, but I don't like runny yolks, so I did more of a bit of a scramble. G thought the egg was a good touch. We have just a small amount of enchiladas left, but we do have a decent amount of each sauce, so I think we'll have that on scrambled eggs tomorrow for breakfast.

By the way, "Christmas-style" just refers to the fact that there's both a green sauce and a red sauce. It doesn't really have anything to do with the season!

Month 11 day 5: Salmon and Spuds

Today I made:
Arctic Char Salmon with Mushrooms, Food Network Magazine December 2009
Golden Butter-Crisped Spuds, Every Day with Rachael Ray December 2011

We haven't been at home much this month, since we took a long weekend trip to New York for an interview for G. And we'll both be going home for Christmas for a bit, so I think this month will be pretty sparse.

Anyway, today I finally got the chance to cook, but I had to go to the grocery store first so I opted for some quick recipes. The potatoes take about 35 minutes (boiling 15 minutes, baking 20), but for prep it's just a matter of quartering them, so it's pretty fast. The fish recipe is listed as 25 minutes, but really it's just cooking the fish  and the mushrooms for about 8 minutes each, which can be done in parallel. So pretty fast.

We both loveedddd these potatoes! It's really just potatoes with a good amount of butter, and some salt and pepper-- so how could you go wrong? They're boiled to the point of softness, and do start crumbling during the toss-with-butter step, but after being baked, they get so nice and crispy with a butter frond. It's really great, even though it's so simple.

The salmon is also cooked on the stovetop and then finished off in the oven. The mushrooms and shallots are sautéed separately, and then seasoned with mustard, red wine vinegar, chives (I just used green onion, close enough?) and parsley. In the magazine picture it looks like more of a sauce, but I didn't measure out 3 tablespoons of oil, so I think that is why mine was more of a solid relish.

Month 11 day 4: Salmon and mashed potatoes

Today I made:
Salmon-Potato Bake, Every Day with Rachael Ray, December 2011
with roasted butternut squash

Rachael Ray often has these quick, few-ingredient recipes in the front of the magazine-- like 10 per page, just a jumble of quick ideas described in about five sentences or less. Often they're pretty weird, or they're just for appetizers or sauces or something, but we thought this one sounded good. It's very simple-- it's just salmon with mashed potatoes on top. It's supposed to have some dill too, but I don't care for it. I thought about putting in some leftover rosemary, but the potatoes were already mashed so I just made it plain. Still good! The mashed potatoes tasted like butter. This is baked at 300 for 10 minutes, then broiled for a little bit longer until the potatoes get browned. G liked the crispy browned tops.

So, very simple. Is there an advantage to baking the mashed potatoes on top of the salmon? I'm not really sure. But, easy enough. I guess it makes it look kind of cool.

Month 11 day 3: Polenta and mushrooms

Today I made:
Fontal Polenta with Mushroom Sauté, Cooking Light December 2010
Braised Kale, Cooking Light December 2010

Here's a dinner that is vegetarian but it very hearty.* And fast, too! The braised kale takes the longest (30 minutes). The polenta with mushrooms is pretty fast. The mushrooms are just cooked with some herbs, and polenta is just a matter of boiling liquid (in this case, a mix of broth and milk) and stirring in the polenta and some cheese. It could be done at this point, but the recipe has you put the polenta into dishes and broil it for 5 minutes before topping with the mushrooms.
We do like polenta, and of course kale. I feel like most kale recipes are the same, or very slight variations of the same thing. I guess as long as you like it, it's ok for it to be the same? G likes kale a lot. He liked the polenta and mushrooms too. These days it's not that common for him to remark on the food (he's spoiled!) but today he said it was good.

* And high volume! The kale overflowed the Dutch oven before it cooked down, the polenta was about to the brim of the saucepan I used, and the mushrooms were definitely crowded-- Julia Child would have disapproved!

Month 11 day 2: Chili

Today I made:
White Bean and Hominy Chili, Cooking Light December 2011

This was a very good meal, although I didn't follow the recipe exactly. It' supposed to be vegetarian, with meatless chipotle sausage. We have so many types of sausage in our freezer that I didn't want to add another, so I used half of a Portuguese chorico sausage. To compensate for the lack of chipotle flavor, I put in a little adobo sauce while sautéing the sausage. I also only used one poblano chile instead of two and left out the Tabasco because I was nervous about this being too spicy-- I think poblanos are supposed to be pretty mild, but when I tasted a piece it seemed pretty punchy. In the end it wasn't spicy at all though, so I probably could have used both and been fine. I guess the heat evens out when it mixes with everything else. The hominy, beans, chile, and sausage all had slightly different textures, so it kept it interesting.
For a <40 minute meal, this is nice and flavorful! Definitely a keeper, I thought. G said "just ok," though.

Month 11 day 1: Squash, Soup, Pork, and Biscuits

Month 11!
I have six issues:

• Food Network Magazine, December 2009
• Food & Wine, December 2010
• Cooking Light, December 2010
• Cooking Light, December 2011
• Every Day with Rachael Ray, December 2011
• Saveur, December 2011

Since I'll be going home for a bit, I doubt I'll be able to make a dent in these recipes, especially since there are just sooo many cookie (and other baking) recipes. But maybe I will just have to clip some recipes to bring home with me to make there!

Today I made:
Sweet & Savory Spaghetti Squash, Every Day with Rachael Ray November 2011
Apple-Cheddar-Squash Soup, Food Network Magazine December 2009
Pork Tenderloin with Herbed Biscuits, Cooking Light December 2011

For lunch I made the squash that I forgot to make yesterday. It's a spaghetti squash cut in half, and then one is filled with savory spices and the other is filled with sweet spices. Both contain liberal amounts of butter, which melts and looks like this:

 It's a bath of butter.

But once it gets stirred into the rest of the squash it evens out and takes on the characteristic "spaghetti" look:

 I thought this was fun to have two different flavors in one. They're both very simple to put together, it's just that it takes a long time to bake. I'm sure this could be done in the microwave, though, to make this a faster side dish. Anyway though, it takes about 5 minutes of hands-on time and then goes in the oven for 55 minutes while you could be making the rest of the dinner. As I predicted, G liked the sweet one the best. I think I liked the savory one the best. It's good to have both!

For dinner I made this soup with pork tenderloin and biscuits. The pork and biscuits recipe is designed to be a main course for a casual (or more formal-- you choose) dinner party. The tenderloin is just browned and then roasted (whole) for about 20 minutes before being sliced. It doesn't have any seasoning besides salt and pepper, and the sauce is just a 4:1 mix of Dijon : maple syrup. (I wondered which would win-- G hates mustard but loves maple syrup. The mustard won out, probably because it's the more obvious ingredient visually. And tastewise too, I guess.) The biscuits have more flavor, with fresh sage and thyme and buttermilk. I was using powdered buttermilk, so I put in a half packet (halving the recipe), but then for some reason filled the measuring cup with 1-5/8 cup water instead of just 5/8 cup. I poured in most, (cleverly thinking, a little too late, that I should add it gradually in case it didn't need it all) and it was way too soupy. I considered adding more flour, but thought that might make them too dense unless I also supplemented the baking powder and soda, so ended up just deciding to see what happens. What happens is that the biscuits flow into each other a bit before the oven heat seals the edges, and then they don't rise basically at all. But they are surprisingly fluffy despite this, and taste great. It's too bad that they got messed up, because I was really looking forward to seeing how the texture was since I bought myself a pastry cutter finally on Black Friday. Well, next time! The biscuits are supposed to be cut in half to make a sandwich, but we couldn't do that.

The soup was pretty straightforward but flavorful, with tart apple and sweet butternut squash. It's topped with cooked prosciutto, which is quite salty. I wondered why not bacon, if you're going to cook it anyway, and it seems that many other reviewers just went for bacon instead. G liked it, but didn't like cleaning up the blender afterwards, since it had melted cheese that stuck everywhere! We need an immersion blender! Other than the blending step, this soup is pretty hands-off and is a great taste for fall.

Month 10 day 20: Coq au Vin

Today I made:
Easy Coq au Vin, Cooking Light November 2010
Served with a mix of jasmine and wild rice

This recipe took a whole bottle of wine! It is too bad because there was leftover red wine from a department event that no one wanted, but I forgot that this recipe was coming up, so I didn't take it either. We used cooking red wine, so I was worried that it might end up too salty, but it was fine. To my (happy) surprise, it didn't really end up tasting like wine, somehow. It just tasted really moist and tender.
This is pretty easy I guess, although it still took a long time (about 1.5 hours). We wanted to know what "hard" coq au vin is like, but the recipe in one of my other cookbooks seemed pretty similar. Julia Child might beg to differ. I'd never eaten this dish before, and G tasted some of his brother's when he was in Paris recently but couldn't recall what it was supposed to taste like. So, who knows! Naively though, it was good. I wondered though why the mushrooms and onions had to be sautéed separately though, if they're going to be added in later. And, why does the wine have to get reduced by half on two separate occasions? There were many mysteries with this recipe.
I forgot to make the squash along side, so that will have to be made tomorrow even though this is the LAST DAY IN NOVEMBER! Crazy! Without further ado, here are this month's top recipes:
My pick: Almost-Famous Cinnabuns
G's pick: Coq Au Vin

Month 10 day 19: Peekaboo Bundt Cake

Today I made:
Meyer Lemon-Cranberry Bundt Cake, Food Network Magazine November 2009

I decided to make this cake to bring to our Thanksgiving dinner with a friend and her family. G also baked! He wanted to bring his favorite cookies-- S'more cookies. I made these once and he became obsessed with them, asking for them any time I have occasion to bake cookies. I couldn't care less about these, but the people we shared them with seemed to side with G. Someday he'll make them for our grandchildren like my grandpa makes his famous hand-wrapped caramels!

In the magazine it looked very pretty-- it's a lemon bundt cake, but when you cut it open there is a cranberry filling surprise! I like lemon baked goods quite a bit so I was excited to make this. It contains a ton of ingredients-- almost 4 sticks of butter, 5 eggs, about 3 cups each of flour and sugar, 2 tablespoons of lemon zest, and two teaspoons of vanilla extract (I feel like I've never used more than 1 at once before).

To get the cranberry filling, you fill the bundt pan with about 2/3 of the batter, then put the cranberry sauce in, trying not to touch the sides. Then you cover it up with the rest of the batter. There was a lot of the cranberries though, so I accidentally touched the inside with them. Anyway, it came out of the oven looking like this:

It's bleeding a little :( Oh well, according to the reviews on the website, a lot of people had theirs completely stick to the pan or break open completely at the cranberry part... so better to ruin the surprise a bit than ruin the cake! After it is baked, you stab it a bunch with a skewer (which is really weird, because it does bleed red... when you do it) and then pour lemon syrup over the top (er, bottom... you do this before taking it out of the pan). The next day I glazed it and it mostly covered the exposed cranberry part, so that was good.

It was moist and very lemony. I didn't have Meyer lemons, or orange juice, so I couldn't do the magazine's recommended sub of Meyer juice = mix of lemon and orange juice. For me it's good to be tart, but maybe for others it was too much. We had some light eaters, so even though there were 6 of us and this serves 8-12, we only got through about 1/3 of the cake!

Month 10 day 18: Mushrooms on everything

Today I made:
Beef Pork Filets with Mushroom Sauce and Parmesan Popovers, Cooking Light November 2010
Green Bean Casserole with Madeira Mushrooms, Cooking Light November 2011

This was a bit of a labor-intensive meal! But amazingly, everything ended up getting finished right around the same time. First to start were the popovers, which are just milk, egg, and flour that starts by sitting for 30 minutes, and then the dried porcini, which rehydrate for 15 minutes. During that time I got started on the green bean casserole. The green beans are just parboiled, and then the onion, thyme, and mushrooms are sauteed in turn before adding Madeira wine, then some flour to thicken, then some chicken broth to turn it into a sauce. This joins the popovers (who were put in the oven at some point during the sauteeing) in the oven.

Then while that was all baking, I... did the exact same thing for the main dish's mushroom sauce. The shallots, thyme, garlic, and mushrooms are sauteed before adding red wine, then some flour to thicken, then the dried-mushroom-soaking broth to turn it into a sauce.

The magazine pictures the popovers and beef on a plate with some plain steamed green beans, and so I had those in my mind, but also had the recipe for the green bean casserole I wanted to try. Somehow I thought having mushrooms in both would be unifying or something, without reading the recipe details to see that really, it's the same sauce, just one is mixed with green beans and the other tops meat. But this let us compare and contrast. We did think that the main dish's sauce was a clear winner, probably because of the additional flavor of fresh sage that gets added in right at the end. And maybe it was just nicer in part because it was served with meat instead of green beans. For the meat, I used pork tenderloin instead of beef tenderloin when I realized that beef tenderloin = file mignon = $18/lb. We like pork tenderloin more than steak, and it's about $3/lb this month! We used a meat thermometer to check when it was cooked and it was so juicy and good. We didn't miss the beef.

The popovers were the biggest surprise. I was sure that the lack of a leavening agent was some oversight-- how are they supposed to pop if there isn't any yeast or baking powder? But sure enough, when I went to check on them, they were twice as tall! Turns out, it rises from the steam. I'm not sure how that relates (if it does) to the long sitting time. But I was quite impressed! They were quite eggy, like a crepe or the outside of an eclair. Other than needing to be started a while in advance, they were absurdly easy but tasted/looked like they required skill to make. That's my kind of recipe! The funny thing is that two of them turned out bifurcated, like with cat ears. I think those might have been the two right under the electric heating element in the stove! Very funny looking:

Month 10 day 17: Fast chipotle chicken soup

Today I made:
Chipotle Chicken Stoup, Every Day with Rachael Ray, November 2011
Super-concentrated cider syrup

Rachael Ray likes to use the term "stoup" to refer to a soup that is especially thick and hearty like a stew. But I don't think it really applies here at all. This recipe claims to serve four, but it was really just three bowls full-- one for me and two for G. This is to be expected, since it's basically like a 5-ingredient recipe-- chicken; hominy; broth; lettuce, cilantro, and radishes; and flavorings. I added in some extra green onions and a little cheese on mine, but really this was pretty light. If you just put the 1/4 lb chicken, 4 oz hominy, and lettuce and radishes on a plate, it would look very meager and sad. It's like something your people would eat in Oregon Trail.

Anyway, this was fine given that there were two of us, but there were no leftovers, and if we really had been trying to serve a family of four, this would have been a problem :-P The chipotle chiles in adobo sauce gave the broth quite the spicy kick! So it ended up tasting good anyway.

After dinner I wanted to make some mulled cider from the ~1.5 cups of cider we had in our fridge. I put in a bag of mulling spices and set it on the stove.

A while later I remembered this, and I also realized that instead of setting it on low, it was at a rapid boil, and had been for maybe ten minutes or so. There wasn't much left:

And what was left was quite thick! It had reduced down to a very thick syrup. Funny how things never reduce when I want them to, only when I forget about them. We tried sips, and it was sooo tart. G said it tasted like candy. We ended up adding some soda water to make a mulled-cider Italian soda. It foamed up a ton and ended up being pretty good! With the addition of the water, it was basically back to its normal concentration, and just tasted like mulled sparkling cider. G joked that we might buy another liter to do this on purpose! But I do prefer normal hot mulled cider.

Month 10 day 16: Pumpkin Punch and Persimmon Muffins

 Today I made:

Bob's Mexican Pumpkin Punch, Food Network Magazine October 2010

Spiced Persimmon and Pecan Chocolate Muffins, Cooking Light November 2010

(Actually I made this yesterday, but I drank it today after letting it mull overnight)

This pumpkin punch is kind of interesting. Each of the flavors (brown sugar, cinnamon, pumpkin, limes) are distinct and strong, but they sort of come and go in turns instead of mingling together. This is actually an October recipe, and I meant to make it a long time ago with canned pumpkin left over from various recipes, but then not getting around to it and tossing the leftover, old pumpkin. So finally I ended up having to buy a can of pumpkin just for this, and limes too. Then I waited another couple weeks. So, the lime rind was probably a bit more bitter than it was supposed to be, but it tasted fine. I fourthed this recipe to just make a couple cups. I think it would be a really interesting drink to serve at a fall or winter party as a change of pace from cider. It was a bit of a pain to make, though. The pumpkin pulp is supposed to settle. It did ever so slightly, but not enough to prevent it from immediately resuspending each time I ladled some out. When it came time to strain it, it drained so, so slowly. Would it have been bad to have the pumpkin pulp in the drink? It seems like it just would've affected the texture a bit, but would have saved some hassle.

I wanted to make these muffins about a week ago, but the persimmons were completely unripe. After letting them sit out for a week, they were still pretty hard, but I decided to just give it a try anyway. I omitted the pecans, because I don't like nuts in baked goods (except hazelnuts, and maybe almonds), but instead put in some chocolate chips. I couldn't find any dried cranberries in the pantry, but I did find some dried cherries, so I used those instead. I put some pumpkin seeds on the top for some crunch and show.

These were pretty good muffins! We have been eating them for breakfast each day, and they're staying pretty nice and moist. They actually don't taste that persimmony though, which is a shame because I consider persimmons to be an expensive treat. It seems like they could've been made with pumpkin in the batter and that would have been just as moist. But, I guess it's not bad to use two persimmons to make about 20 muffins!

Month 10 day 15: White bean soup

Today I made:
White Bean Soup with Kale Spinach and Chorizo Chorico, Cooking Light November 2010
Served with baked sweet potatoes

It's back to just the two of us again.

I was already hungry when I got home, but we didn't have anything to cook with on hand. Then, when I went to Shaw's, they had no kale and had rearranged their produce section (again). I started getting pretty hangry, but eventually just grabbed some spinach and got cooking. It's sad though, because kale in soup is one of the best things ever.

The other day G said we should make a white bean soup (specifically). When I asked why white beans, he observed that we've made a few soups with white beans in it, and those have been good. True, but I don't know if the beans are to credit. This soup was a little funny, for example, maybe because of the lack of kale :( Shaw's doesn't carry Spanish chorizo, but it has Portuguese chorico, which is apparently quite similar. The one they have isn't very flavorful though, so it just doesn't add much to the soup at all. Then, some of the beans were supposed to get mashed, which thickened the soup a little but made it a less enjoyable texture, I think. There really wasn't that much seasoning in this soup, and I wasn't impressed. Which is weird, because a soup I really like is essentially the same except for a can of tomatoes and subbing spicy portuguese sausage for the chorico. I dunno-- is it really just the tomatoes? Or would this have been amazing if it weren't for the spinach? I would really appreciate it if the grocery store could have some things more consistently :-P

In other news, I really should eat more sweet potatoes. They are pretty perfect.

Month 10 day 14: English Cottage Pie

Today Mom and Dad made:

English Cottage Pie, Cooking Light November 2010

Mom and Dad mixed up the mashed potatoes and the filling while we were at work, so then it was ready to be assembled and baked when we got home. It's a little like a shepherd's pie, but there's no Worchestershire sauce. This prompted a conversation about how to pronounce this word. Since moving to Boston, I learned that Worchester (the city, at least) is pronounced "wooster," not "war chest her" as I might have otherwise said. But no one believed me that it was wooster-shire sauce! Until it was confirmed on Wikipedia. So there you go, a nice English lesson for you all. English spelling can never be trusted.
Anyway, I used to love shepherd's pie until eventually I got a bit tired of the Worchestershire sauce, so I was interested to try this dish. In the end it seems like it's a bit wanting for flavor, I think because you are expecting the strong taste of Worchestershire sauce, but it's still good. We didn't have mashed potatoes as leftovers, but if you did then I think this would be pretty fast and easy.
I think I'll keep this recipe. Leftovers were good too!

Month 10 day 13: Panini and apple salad

Today we made:
Fall Apple Salad, Cooking Light 2010
Non-recipe panini with sautéed kale, Swiss cheese, and some deli turkey with red peppers or something in it.

We had a late lunch, after a morning in Harvard square drinking L.A. Burdicks hot chocolate and such.
G is a panini master with his George Foreman, so he put these together. (I was doing it wrong, not respecting that the cheese should be a moisture buffer between the bread and the kale, and that the multiple slices of meat and cheese should be alternated instead of clumped together.)
Meanwhile, I made this simple salad. Shockingly, the recipe is not online! But the dressing is as follows: 1 Tbs red wine vinegar, 1.5 tsp honey, 1 tsp Dijon, 1/4 tsp black pepper, 1/8 tsp salt, 1 minced garlic clove, and 2 Tbs. EVOO. It's meant to have butter lettuce, endive, and radicchio, but I just used a spring mix. And of course, an apple. Mom and Dad liked the dressing, and I thought it was pretty good too.

Month 10 day 12: Maple chicken and herbed biscuits

Today w made:
Maple-Glazed Chicken with Apple Brussels Sprout Slaw, Cooking Light November 2010
Herb-Scented Drop Biscuits, Cooking Light November 2010

Another 20-minute entree, paired with biscuits that don't take much longer. Mom made the biscuits while I made the chicken and slaw.

After cooking the chicken, it's glazed in a mix of red wine vinegar and maple syrup. It seems weird to add vinegar to the syrup, but its flavor didn't end up coming through much, so this was just nice and sweet. Everyone liked the chicken a lot.

I thought it would be weird to eat raw Brussels sprouts, so I decided to just cook the slaw through a bit. That ended up being pretty good, so I was glad that I did that. I think Brussels sprouts are best sautéed in olive oil with some cracked pepper.

These biscuits were great too. We didn't have any fresh thyme on hand, but we did have fresh rosemary, so Mom used that instead. It was really nice-- rosemary is so good! These had a nice texture--crunchy-toasty on the outside, but very soft and almost spongy on the inside (maybe from the yogurt in the dough?) I'd definitely want to make these biscuits again, and the chicken.

Month 10 day 11: Beef & Kale Stir-Fry

Today I made:
Beef & Kale Stir-Fry, Every Day with Rachael Ray November 2011

Here was another fast recipe while my parents are visiting. Can't spend the whole time cooking! In this, the beef gets browned, then the aromatics are added for 30 seconds. The kale gets simmered for 5 minutes, and then the sauce gets added and warmed through. Pretty quick! The rice is the part that takes the longest.

I think it's unusual to have kale in an Asiany dish (not that this is authentic), so this was kind of interesting. I liked the water chestnuts a lot and think I should add them to things more. When I went to Vietnam a couple of years ago, we took a boat tour of the Mekong Delta, including a visit to one of those floating markets. Our guides asked us what we wanted, and for some reason we chose water chestnuts, which they bought for us and opened fresh with a knife. I guess in America they're always canned, though. Maybe the demand is too low? Anyway, they have a good texture.

Month 10 day 10: Chicken Piccata

Today I made:
Chicken Piccata with Orzo, Cooking Light November 2010
Collard Greens with Tomatoes and Garlic, Food & Wine November 2010

Today my parents came to visit! They were coming around dinner time, so I made this to be ready when they arrived. I don't really like capers that much, but this chicken dish was nice and lemony. It was very fast ("SuperFast 20-Minute Cooking") and easy too, and I love orzo. I will definitely save this recipe. It's not a lot of chicken, though! I guess a quarter pound is chicken's serving size, but at 345 calories for a dinner this is certainly a Cooking Light recipe. That's a snack!

The collards were fine, but I think I'm just not really that into collards. I diced the jalapeño instead of putting it in halved and taking it out later, so I was a little worried that it might be too spicy, but it wasn't spicy at all (no seeds).

Month 10 day 9: Turkey Tamale Pie

Today I made:
Chicken Turkey-Chili Tamale Pie, Food & Wine November 2010

Today I used up the last turkey broth and almost all the rest of the turkey meat to make this tamale pie! Wow-- we made quick work of it despite it being 15 lbs (although, if you include leftovers, it will have provided the main ingredient for 9 meals x 2 people). There are about 2 cups left, which I've frozen along with the rest of the gravy, stuffing, and cranberry sauce.

I can't taste too much still, but I think this was good from what I could tell :-P G liked it too, but he tends to just like cornbread all the time. This is just a quickly-made chili with corn bread on top and baked for 45 minutes. Hm, not too much to say about it.

Month 10 day 8: Cinnabuns and turkey soup

Today I made:
Almost-Famous Cinnamon Buns, Food Network Magazine November 2009
Mexican Turkey Stew, Cooking Light November 2010

Since today was technically a holiday, we decided to go to lab a little late and have a nice breakfast. I made these cinnamon rolls the night before, so they puffed up in the fridge overnight and were pretty massive by the time they went into the oven-- there were only 6 in a 9x13 pan and they completely filled it!

 I've made cinnamon rolls once before, from my mom's recipe. She would always make it for Christmas morning breakfast, so last year I made it for our breakfast too. Those ones are not nearly as big, nor as chock-full of quite so much butter as is in these ones. But they are good! These come out very soft and delicious, but I think it's better to just eat half of one :-P

For dinner we had more turkey leftovers, in soup form.

Last night I let the turkey bones simmer for a few hours to make the broth for this soup. Since homemade broth tends to be less flavorful (or maybe just less salty?) than prefab, I used 7 cups of broth instead of half water as called for. This soup was pretty spicy! It has 3 Anaheim chiles in it, which I always think of as being pretty mild. I have a cold, so my nose was running anyway, but G's nose started running too. I think this is a pretty good soup for when you're sick! It probably has all of the benefits as chicken noodle, but it also has enough spice to clear out your sinuses. It's topped with pumpkin seeds, scallions, and cheese (supposed to be queso fresco; we used feta). It should have radishes too, but the grocery store was all out :-P

We still have ~1 gallon full of leftover turkey meat! We'll probably have to freeze it and use it later.

Month 10 day 7: Turkey arepas and cauliflower

Today I made:
Turkey Arepas, Cooking Light November 2010
Cauliflower filet, Food & Wine November 2010

This arepas recipe specifically says not to use masa harnia or cornmeal for the arepa flour, but we couldn't find either of those. We made arepas once before with just normal corn meal, so we figured it might be ok. But when I mixed the specified amount of water with the specified amount of flour, it was totally soupy. I ended up adding extra corn meal until it was finally a texture that could ever hope to be shaped into a ball. But then, they're supposed to puff up and get a pocket in the middle, but these were pretty solid, so maybe this wasn't the correct thing to do. Instead of making sandwiches, we just piled the turkey-onion-pepper-cheese mix on top. They were pretty good!

The side recipe is an unusual way of eating cauliflower-- instead of florets, you cut it through the center to make "steaks" which are browned and then baked along with a zesty mix of red chile, corn, scallions, and capers. I'm not sure if the intact fillet shape added anything, but this was certainly a more interesting side than some plain steamed cauliflower.

Month 10 day 6: Turkey, stuffing, gravy, and cranberry sauce

Today I made:
Roasted Turkey with Rosemary-Garlic Butter Rub and Pan Gravy, Cooking Light November 2011
Fennel, Sausage, and Caramelized Apple Stuffing, Cooking Light November 2011
Old-Fashioned Cranberry Sauce, Cooking Light November 2011

We expected that today, finally, the turkey would be defrosted. Unfortunately we didn't get home until ~7, so the turkey didn't go into the oven until ~8. And, it wasn't completely defrosted, despite being in the fridge for a week! But, I guess it's not too surprising since our fridge tends to freeze things, so of course it would stop things from unfreezing. I figured that once I bathed it in hot water and it relaxed from its tight, balled-up shape it wouldn't be that bad-- it was mostly defrosted after all.

I rubbed it underneath the skin with herbed/spiced butter and then it went in at 425 for 30 minutes, cooling down to 325 for the rest of the time. After about 2 hours or so the popup timer was up and our meat thermometer agreed that the leg and the breast were done. We cut off some leg to snack on, cut off the breasts to eat, and made the gravy and put the stuffing in the oven while the turkey relaxed and adjusted its juices (is this really a thing, or is it a wive's tale?)

After we ate though, we realized that the other parts of the turkey were most certainly not cooked through. The back, for example, was still squishy-soft. Other parts were a cooked texture, but were pretty pink. Back in the oven it went for another couple of hours until just before we went to sleep! The next day when I was picking off the meat for leftovers, some parts seemed pink still, although now that I take a second glance I think that turkey is just pinkish. Nevertheless, we decided to panfry the leftovers a bit or use them in things like soups just to make sure :-P

The gravy was tasty, and particularly important given that our turkey ended up baking for probably longer than intended when all was said and done, and some parts were quite dry by the end. It never got too thick, though-- I guess the ratios might be off because the recipe doesn't specify a total volume for drippings + broth, just the amount of broth to use. Anyway, it was thin in viscosity but not flavor.

The stuffing... I'll just go ahead and say that I grew up on boxed stuffing and I stand by it! Despite the time and effort, it tasted no better than boxed stuffing, and in my opinion was worse. Normally I'm a big believer in as-much-from-scratch-as-possible, but Stovetop stuffing is just my favorite, especially when you add in some sausage, apple, celery, etc. So we will not keep the stuffing recipe. Good to know though! The first time I ever tried to make stuffing was when I lived in Japan, before I had the internet at my apartment, so I just tried to derive it from first principles. I knew there were some spices, some stale bread, and some broth... but I really didn't know how much broth to add or anything. It turned out a mushy disaster! This was better (especially as leftovers when we let it bake a while longer)

I did get converted to home-made cranberry sauce though. It is so fast to make-- just about 10-15 minutes, and tastes so good. This recipe had orange zest in it. When I was a kid I could just eat cranberry sauce straight from the can I loved it so much! I could imagine just eating this too, or using it like jam or anything.

We made a ton of food, so we'll be needing to use turkey in the next few days' worth of recipes!

Month 10 day 5: Japanese-flavored scallops and carrots

Today I made:
Scallops with Green Tea Cream, Cooking Light November 2010
Red-Miso-Glazed Carrots, Food & Wine November 2010

I wanted to roast a turkey today, but it was still partially frozen! So I turned to the only other quick recipe we had the ingredients for. These scallops and carrots both are paired with a traditional Japanese ingredient to make two dishes that don't seem Japanese at all.

The scallops are really supposed to be the large ones, but we didn't think it was worth $6 extra per pound for a larger size. They're sprinkled with ginger and matcha before getting seared in the pan. The sauce was supposed to be creme fraiche, but Shaws didn't have any. I looked online and people said to substitute sour cream, so that's what I did, and I didn't beat it as prescribed. It is mixed with more matcha, lemon juice, salt, and paprika.

The carrots are blanched, coated in a mixture of miso and butter, then roasted. It seemed like there should have been more liquid, because things just got very charred-- not that that's a bad thing for vegetables. But it was hard for G to wash :-/

These were both interesting, but not spectacular. If I'm going to use miso, I'd rather make miso soup or mackerel or something more traditional.

Month 10 day 4: In which I realize that "puff pastry" doesn't mean "phyllo dough" but it turns out it doesn't matter

Today I made:
Mushroom pies with pear salad, Food Network Magazine November 2009
Served with sautéed mung bean sprouts, Satomi Hara-style

These mushroom pies are each a large portobello mushroom cap filled with a copious amount of cheese and breadcrumbs, wrapped in puff pastry-- that's it. (Ok, they're supposed to have a bit of mustard too, but I left it out because G doesn't like mustard.) It's kind of a weird idea. They each have 1/2 cup shredded cheese. Doesn't that seem excessive?? But, it ends up melting down so I guess it doesn't seem like so much in the end. But these do end up being more filling than you might expect (despite the pastry just flaking away everywhere and being impossible to eat)

When I first looked over the recipe, I saw the frozen puff pastry in the ingredient list and passed over it thinking of the phyllo dough we've had leftover from a [delicious] brunch pie a while back. But tonight when I looked again, I realized you're supposed to use one sheet, which is rolled out to get to the right size... whoops. So instead, I just subbed the amount of phyllo dough by weight and cut out the approximately right sized stack of sheets. I didn't layer them with butter or anything because I didn't want to spend that much time, so I just figured it would be an experiment to see what would happen. It ended up being fine. Although the sheets weren't quite large enough to wrap all the way around and seal up, they got crispy and golden-brown as the puff pastry was meant to. I didn't think G would enjoy it, meatless as it is, but actually he really liked it. I thought it was a bit meh, because there was just too much dough. I think if I made it again I would use sliced mushrooms as many of the reviewers suggest, because large portobello caps are just so unreasonably expensive and it doesn't really matter for this dish anyway.

The salad is just a normal vinaigrette over salad with some pear slices. Straightforward, but tasty.

When I studied abroad in Japan, one of the favorite things my host mom made was sautéed bean sprouts. She thought it was funny that I liked them so much, because they were just sautéed with some black pepper and soy sauce. But it's always what I think of when I have leftover sprouts. They were a bit too salty-- I'm used to low-sodium soy sauce but we have the normal kind right now. But it was fun while I was cooking to think of my 4th grade host brother as being a high schooler now! I wonder if he has a JET teacher in his English class.

Month 10 day 3: Pork and roasted vegetables

Today I made:
Crispy Pork Medallions, Cooking Light November 2011
Roasted Root Vegetables, Cooking Light November 2011

This was a straightforward meal, and quicker than you might think given the roasted vegetables. You just cut them up while the oven preheats and toss with some oil and garlic. Then while they are roasting you cut the pork tenderloin and coat in panko, thyme, and parsley, brown in a cast-iron skillet, and pop that in the oven too. Everything finishes around the same time (if you are like me and want your meat definitely well done).

We had some extra veggies left over from the Asian lettuce cups last week, so I went ahead and used them too in the roasted veggies. I also put in a sweet potato in place of one of the parsnips since G doesn't like them (but he didn't end up eating this, for dinner or lunch leftovers :-P). So I got all the colors! Red pepper, orange sweet potato, yellow parsnips, green daikon (It was the stem end of an aokubi daikon), purple onions, and white/red potatoes. It seems like roasting is such a good way to prepare vegetables! So easy and delicious.

The pork was good too, but not particularly crispy. The bottom layer of breading was pretty soggy from contact with the pan.

Month 10 day 2: Beef potpie and roasted eggplants

Today I made:
Beef-and-Vegetable Potpie with Cheddar Biscuits, Food & Wine November 2010
Roasted Eggplants with Herbs, Cooking Light November 2010

I paired these recipes together because they both needed a 450°F oven.

These are supposed to be small eggplants, but those cost $6/lb instead of $2/lb, and I figured it wasn't worth an extra $5 for the presentation. Instead, I just cut a large eggplant in 4ths and then cut those into the slices that are supposed to be fanned out. This was ok, but not that flavorful or anything. If you like eggplant by itself, this will be good too...  but it really is just eggplant. With some fresh herbs on top. It looks cool, though!

This potpie was pretty coming out of the oven too. It was supposed to be made in a 9x13 (actually two, but I halved the recipe. I'm not sure why they made the recipe for 12 servings in 2 pans...), but I had started cooking in my Dutch oven and figured, if it wasn't going to overflow, why not just keep going with it?
Inside of this potpie is onions, carrots, parsnips, peas, beef, thyme, and rosemary. The rosemary is really nice and flavorful. There's some flour added to the milky broth, but it didn't thicken up much for me. I don't have self-rising flour at home, so I just added some baking powder to the biscuit mix (which is really just flour, butter, milk, and cheddar cheese otherwise). It didn't end up rising too much, but it definitely got crispy on top while staying soft and moist wherever it stayed in the broth. G liked the potpie and had seconds (and maybe thirds!) I liked it too, but it was so filling! Those biscuits are light and fluffy, but they do have a substantial amount of flour :-P