What's Cooking (Take Four)

[Jenise]

Karen, I love the sound of that soup. Will you post the recipe?

We just finished lunch. I'm actually pretty proud of what I came up with. I wanted it to be meatless and had gone through the pantry yesterday, finding a pint carton of dehydrated potatoes. I'd bought two of these hoping they would be handy for on-the-fly hashed brown potatoes if I could forget the flavor of the real thing. Well, after making one of them: no, I couldn't. Also I found it a bit salty. A great hashed brown has pure unsalted potato flavor inside and salt only on the outside, and besides the fact that it lacks that perfect fresh potato taste I didn't like the thru-flavor of salt. Well, while contemplating my lunch options, and thinking about a notice I have to send out today about a Spanish wine tasting coming up, I had a Eureka moment. So I rehydrated the potatoes and stirred them into some sweated slivered sweet onion and poured four beaten eggs over the top. I didn't salt the eggs because the potatoes would bring all that was needed, but I did add a lot of pepper. Voila, Spanish tortilla for two which I served with a bright side salad of herby greens lightly dressed with lemon juice and roasted peanut oil. It's a decent shortcut, and I don't suffer shortcuts easily.

In the meantime we're going to a birthday party tomorrow and I need to take an appetizer. I'm having a hard time coming up with something that isn't all fatty cheesy (my issue), not seafood (another guest is bringing home-smoked salmon), contains no tomato or onion (the Picky People will be there) and is GF (our hostess' issue). Those four restrictions take about 95% of my usual ideas off the table.

Jenise, remember Linda Stradley from Whats Cooking America? She used to post on here years ago. She has turned over the management of her website to her daughters now. Just a note, I added salmon as I posted online, however, the salmon flavor took over the soup. It is still good, but if I were to add another seafood again, it would be crab as posted in the recipe. Here is the link to print.
https://whatscookingamerica.net/wprm_print/227648

[Jenise]

Karen, thanks. I would have to make some mods (no clam juice due to husband's allergy) but otherwise I like the looks of this. Speaking of clam juice, I'm amused that they advise shaking the clam juice even though it's going to get stirred into other wet ingredients. But yes I remember Linda very well.

The clam juice has some settling at the bottom much like the V8 or Knudsen Veggie juices, even on the bottle it says to shake well.

[Jenise]

The clam juice has some settling at the bottom much like the V8 or Knudsen Veggie juices, even on the bottle it says to shake well.

Sure if you're going to make a bloody mary. But if it's all going into the soup it's going to get mixed anyway, right?

The solids on the bottom of the cam juice bottle do not come out unless you shake the jar well. Those solids have a lot of flavor, hence the reason they say to shake the bottle. Many hot sauces are that way, as well, solids need to be shaken to remove them back into the rest of the liquids.

Things I'll be making this week:

Chao larou, a Sichuan dish very similar to the famous twice-cooked pork. It's made with cured pork belly (bacon) rather than fresh and the first cooking step (boiling in water) is skipped. Only the second, stir-fry step is done. The same seasonings are used (Pixian doubanjiang, fermented black beans, wheat flour paste).

Creole chicken with mushroom "dirty rice". Chicken pieces are seasoned with a Creole-style seasoning mix (such as Emeril's) and browned in a bit of oil. The mushroom "dirty rice" is made using reconstituted dried porcini and fresh exotic mushrooms such as chantrelles or maitake. The mushrooms are diced to form the "dirt" in the "dirty rice", which also has the Cajun trilogy, tomatoes, more Creole seasoning, and of course the soaking water from the porcini. The chicken pieces are laid skin side up on top of the rice mixture,. The whole lot is simmered for about 30 minutes and then left to sit off the heat for another 15 minutes.

-Paul W.

Sounds great Paul, your cooking always fascinates me. Many of your ingredients I have not heard of. I should take the time to visit one of our well-stocked Asian markets. But then, knowing me, I would buy a lot and forget what I bought it for!

[Jenise]

Paul you remind me that I've kind of forgotten about dirty rice. I used to make a Paul Prudhomme version which may have used all his seasonings but left out the giblets. Never had his books so nothing to refer back to and I don't even know where I got the recipe I used. But I sure loved that rice. I remember thyme + another herb, maybe basil, white pepper, cayenne pepper and maybe ground coriander or cumin. Or gosh, maybe both. Does that sound right?

He has a recipe for dirty rice in his first cookbook, Paul Prudhomme's Louisiana Cookbook. This book came out when Prudhomme was first starting to market his line of Magic Seasoning Blends, which he had first developed for use by the cooks at his restaurant, K-Paul's. So in this book each recipe has a seasoning mix specifically tailored to that recipe.

I made the Creole chicken and mushroom dirty rice dish last night. The chicken was what you'd expect from browning chicken pieces and then cooking them on top of rice for 1/2 hour. But the Creole mushroom dirty rice was outstanding. When I get a chance I'll post Paul Prudhomme's recipe for traditional Cajun dirty rice and the recipe for the Creole mushroom dirty rice.

-Paul W.

[Jenise]

I'd love that, Paul, thank you.

Today's my husband's birthday. I've invited three couples for dinner, and I'm serving:

With champagne:
black truffle salami
artichoke and lemon ricotta crostini

With Rochioli Sauvignon Blanc and a big Sancerre:
parmesan and garlic crusted shrimp
salad of green leaf lettuce, blue cheese, endive, pecans, watermelon radish, lemon juice, roasted peanut oil

With 20 year old Bordeauxs:
Veal pot roast, herb spaetzle, champagne-cream gravy, maitake mushrooms, tiny peas

And for dessert:
Dark chocolate and coconut marble cake, chocolate ganache, shards of dark chocolate, cocoa

I'd love that, Paul, thank you.

Today's my husband's birthday. I've invited three couples for dinner, and I'm serving:

My birthday is later in April. Just sayin'.

Can I have any leftovers?

I found a small filet mignon yesterday at our local market. I have not had a steak in a long time. Will marinate in something delicious.
A small Yukon Gold potato baked, and a stir fry of cauliflower, mushrooms, and broccoli.

[Jenise]

Larry and Jeff, you're welcome at my table any time!

Most of the food was as intended, but I changed a few of the wines.

Boy was that veal good. D'Artagnan sold the cut as 'chuck roast' or veal shoulder, can't recall which, but same thing. Bob had asked for veal osso buco but I went with this as easier to do for 8-12 people. At the time I ordered it I hadn't made the decision to limit the guest list to 8 in order to be able to serve higher end wines and not compromise serving sizes (I opened a Lafite, for instance) so I ordered the so-called chuck roast. Didn't know what it would look like. I ordered three (they were $50 ea, and supposed to be about 2.5 lb apiece--I figured I'd cook two and save one for another time). Well two of them were exactly that but one was well over three pounds and looked just right for eight, and it was. Shaped exactly like a football, it came in a net and I was a little surprised when I cut the net off that the meat was still a perfect football shape. In fact, I butterflied it for a more even braise. Very little visible fat, and no trimming whatsoever needed. A really elegant piece of meat. I look forward to cooking another in the style of an italian Sunday roast, perhaps Milanese in style with a saffron risotto.

Today, I am cooking chicken pieces and fennel, marinating them all in Ouzo, EVOO, fresh orange juice, grain mustard, and brown sugar.
Sliced mandarin oranges are added to the cooking pan, along with fennel seeds, fresh thyme, salt, and pepper. This is roasted in a 475° oven. Also, a stir fry of rainbow swiss chard, and onion, topped with Feta cheese. A herby salad consists of lime juice, walnut oil, honey, cumin seeds, celery seeds, salt, pepper, fresh chives, dill and tarragon, celery, celery seeds, and dried cranberries.

Tomorrow, I am going to an Easter brunch hosted by a neighbor, and my contribution is a multi-cheese dip using Mascarpone, goat cheese, sour cream, and creme fraiche. I am offering multi-colored baby carrots, celery, olive oil, and rosemary sourdough crackers, another cracker has dried apricots, almonds, brandy, and a few other types of fun and unusual crackers. Green olives stuffed with pimento and chopped will also be added to the mix.

I am going to a big wine event later today with a lot of local NYC winos and a lot of 1989 vintage wines. I've made a tray of Seafood Tetrazzini - clams, shrimp, salmon - to provide some ballast against the vinous onslaught.

[Jenise]

Jeff, your post makes me realize that though the term 'tetrazzini' has floated in my orbit for years I have no idea what a tetrazzini is. My first guess would have been something you make with leftover turkey. So what, exactly, is it?

It's a gussied-up mac and cheese with linguini instead of elbow macaroni.

-Paul W.

[Jenise]

We're having prime rib tonight. I'll pair it with asparagus and serve a shaved fennel salad to start. Life is good.

It's a gussied-up mac and cheese with linguini instead of elbow macaroni.

Approximately but not entirely.

The traditional style of tetrazzini is a casserole. It calls for poultry -- leftover turkey became a popular choice as T'Giving birds got larger and larger -- mixed with sauteed celery, onion, etc., stirred into a parmesan-cream-sherry sauce, stirred into cooked spaghetti, and then baked.

For mine, I replace the sherry with vinho verde and the spaghetti with tricolor farfalle but otherwise followed the basic plan. It came out very well.

Breakfast today is Kumato tomatoes sliced and placed on top of a thin slice of toasted sourdough bread. Sliced marinated eggs top the tomatoes and then a sprinkle of TJ's Chili Lime Seasoning. YUM

[Jenise]

Yesterday, in atonement for Sunday's prime rib, we went meatless. Coarse whole grain rye topped with avocado for breakfast, a maitake ramen for lunch and soup and salad for dinner wherein the soup was an asparagus vichysoisse.

[Jenise]

Today I'm taking a choucroute garni to Vancouver for Bill's lunch group. Going upscale with smoked pork chops, smoked duck breast 'bacon', and smoked duck and foie gras bratwurst for the meat components.