tonight's dinner - poutine

at one point in my life i spent some time off and on in Canada, most specifically in Quebec. those who know me know i retain few good memories of that time, but one thing i do remember fondly is poutine, that wonderful mix of french fries, deep bold beef gravy and farmer's cheese.

this is my 'slightly' healthier take on it

the french fries were baked, not fried in oil
(i used some colorful french purple potatoes from the east end co-op, cut into thin wedges, paper toweled dry and then tossed with olive oil and salt and pepper and baked at 450degF for 30 minutes)

and topped with a hearty beef stew using grass fed beef, a mirepoix vegetable base (onions, carrots, celery along with garlic and mushrooms to bring out some extra umami) and a good organic beef stock just to cover, which was simmered for an hour

and topped with our local version of the quintessential 'squeaky' cheese, namely that from Arsenal Cheese, our newest local cheese producer.

will i make it again? most definitely

neither win place or show

last night i went to the 5th annual macaroni and cheese invitation here in pittsburgh. below are some photos. i make a caramelized pancetta macaroni with goat cheese (and a few other french cheeses mixed in for good measure). there were, i think, 14 entries in total. the winning version (no. 11 below) (by a landslide) was a thai flavored dish (some of us surmised he used sirachi in it). it was very good. a lot of cooking creativity at the event.

my recipe was as follows:

Caramelized Pancetta and Goat Cheese Macaroni
serves 8

2 garlic cloves (roasted)
olive oil
1/2 pound pancetta (diced small)
2 tbl aged balsamic vinegar
1 large bag cavatappi pasta (enough to serve 8 people)
1 quart chicken stock (low salt)
3tbl butter
3tbl flour
1 cup heavy cream
1 1.2 cups whole milk
8 oz. fresh goat cheese
4-6oz. soft/ripe french cheeses (i like chaumes)
salt and pepper
chives to garnish


in a dry dutch oven or large sauce pan roast garlic in its skin for 4-5 minutes until it is soft and darkened in color (it is ok if the skin burns some, just keep moving the cloves about). peel the garlic and mince it very fine. set this aside

add a good helping of olive oil to the pan, once hot, add in the diced pancetta and cook on low heat for 6-8 minutes until the pork has darkened/caramelized and most of the fat has rendered out. sieve out the pancetta to a small bowl and add the balsamic vinegar to this, setting it aside.

to the oil/fat mixture, add the dried pasta and toast it for 8-10 minutes, you need to keep stirring it so that the pasta is coated in the oil/fat and does not burn while toasting.

in a separate smaller saucepan melt the butter and add the flour to make a roux, stir the roux for 1-2 minutes, working out any lumps of flour, until it is smooth. add the garlic, milk and heavy cream (add in salt and pepper to taste) and stir on low heat for 10 minutes.

while the liquids are simmering go back to the pasta which should be darker brown in color and smell nutty. add in enough chicken stock to just cover the pasta and cook on medium heat until this is absorbed (this will be similar to making risotto). keep adding in chicken stock as needed. the pasta will continue to absorb the stock. this will take 10-15 minutes.

pre-heat the oven to 400 degF

after the liquid mixture is hot, add in the goat cheese and the other french cheeses of your choice and stir so the cheese melts and the mixture is silky.

when the pasta is al dente (it should have absorbed most of the chicken stock by now), stir in half of the pancetta so it is well mixed. pour the milk and cheese sauce into the pasta, just until it covers the pasta and sprinkle the rest of the pancetta on top. cover with tin foil or the dutch oven lid and put it in the oven for 20 minutes.

then serve, garnished with chopped chives.



you'll likely have some milk/cheese sauce left over depending on the size of your dutch oven. this would be good on eggs benedict tomorrow morning.

cheese and honey pairings and a new contest

Recently, I decided to do a pairing of cheese and honey since I've been busy making infused honeys this early summer. I invited ms. cookworm to come over and she generously helped lay everything out and then helped me taste it all. We set up a little tasting station out in the garden on one of the tables I built recently and I brought out a number of tiny bowls from my collection for all the honeys to be contained in, and some of my antique spoons for the drizzling.

I had done some reading and research about which cheeses to choose and what honeys they should be paired with. As it ended up, I was surprised by which I liked the best.

our first pairing:

La Tur with rose infused honey

La Tur is a mixed milk cheese from Piedmont, Italy and comes with an interesting curling pattern across its face. It is a mix of cow, sheep and goat milk and is very soft and delicate. The pairing of rose infused honey was definitely the right choice, the floral quality of the roses mingled well with the cheese. This was my 2nd favorite of the testing.

our second pairing:

aged Gouda with rose infused honey

Aged Gouda is similar in texture to a Parmigiano-Reggiano. It is rich and crystalline and has a salty taste as well. It was paired with lavender honey (not infused but the bees were busy in the lavender to make this one). This one was ok but ended up being my least favorite. Perhaps some wine might have brought out something more complex in the taste.

our third pairing:

fresh goat cheese and Chaumes with rosemary infused honey

Chaumes is a strong smelling but mild tasting cheese and is my favorite when I do grilled cheese right. It is a cheese that definitely needs to sit out before eating to let it get properly runny. Goat cheese is, one of my other best liked, and I found a wonderful one at the store which was very creamy and mellow. Both of these were paired with a savory, rosemary infused honey I made last week. This pair turned out to also be a definitely one to remember. I think this time the cheese enhanced the honey instead of the other way round.

our fourth pairing:

Passendale and buckwheat honey

I was a little skeptical at first about this one. Buckwheat honey is really the molasses of honeys. It is deep and strong tasting and very thick. Passendale is a flemish cheese and is similar to Chaumes. It is creamy but firm and has a fairly upfront but not overpowering taste. And together, by far my favorite of the night. The Passendale does something complex to the buckwheat honey, some sympathetic magic. If you get a chance, definitely give it a try.

so on to the contest ....

I am going to give away a jar of the rose infused honey, handcrafted by me from the roses in my garden, to one lucky winner here on the blog. I'll run this contest until July 1st.

All you have to do is leave a comment on this post about cheese or honey, a memory of yours or a favorite recipe suggestion. Whatever you'd like to share with everyone. On July 1 I'll randomly pick a winner.

As a brief teaser, this year has been exceptional in my garden due to it being cool and rainy early on in the spring. A vintage year for rose infusing.

tonight's dinner - seafood flatbread pizza

vegetables, fresh mozzarella, scallops, plenty of garden herbs and good olive oil on whole wheat naan.

a shame i have no one to share dinner with.

tonight's dinner - herbed pasta

on tonight's menu

three cheese tortellini with sun dried tomatoes, salami, artichokes, fresh herbed goat cheese, good olive oil and aged balsamic vinegar and the following fresh herbs roughly chopped

chive blossoms (whole)

chives

rosemary

tarragon

greek basil

opal basil

oregano

cilantro

in heaping quantities

tonight's dinner - altered garlic bread

store bought frozen garlic bread with the addition of fresh oregano and basil, italian sausage, roasted yellow tomatoes, and plenty of fresh garlic

tonight's dinner - a fish and a cheese course

scallops sauteed in lime juice, butter and pepper and wrapped in scallions.

open face grilled cheese with a french rosemary boule, raclette and grayson cheeses and chives

tonight's dinner - spinach goat cheese gnocchi with mushrooms and burnt butter sauce

someone who knows me well, and knows i like to explore alterations to recipes, sent me this recipe for ricotta and spinach gnocchi with a burnt butter tomato sauce and wanted to see what i would do with it.

i did end up making a few changes:

used fresh baby spinach (worked out to be about 1.5 cups of fresh equaling the 1/2 cup of cooked/strained) (but i agree with her that frozen works very well) i cooked it with a bit of olive oil just until it wilted, then took it out, strained and pressed it and chopped it up very fine.

substituted 175g of goat cheese for the ricotta

used 1/2 cup of a good parmesan reggiano rather than 1/4 cup

used slightly more flour (this is more of a consistency thing than anything, if the dough seems soupy then add a bit more flour)

for the burnt butter and tomato sauce:

i did not agree with using olive oil and butter. olive oil is mixed with butter in order to increase the temperature at which butter begins to burn. this is done to give a butter flavor to a sauce but not have it burn under high heat. so i ended up using just 3 tablespoons of butter. you do want to stir this continuously after it begins to foam up. keep it moving under medium to medium low heat until it browns nicely and smells nutty

and as for the tomatoes which i agree would make a lovely sauce. i was at the market and they had all sorts of nice wood ear, crimini and oyster mushrooms which i could not pass up. i will end up using the tomato for something else today i think.

for the mushrooms i sauteed them with some additional butter until they were nicely done, then tossed them in the burnt butter sauce and poured it over the gnocchi.

she is right about the servings in her recipe. this dish is very very filling.

tonight's dinner - stamppot

tonight's stamppot (or mashed potatoes combined with other vegetables) recipe comes courtesy of a very nice dutch cooking blog which i am going to poke around in more - Dutch Girl Cooking. i was surprised how complex the set of flavors was from the sweetness of the roasted pepper, to the earthy potatoes to the nutmeg and gouda. very easy to make and should serve 4 to 6 comfortably. i used belgian endive instead of curly because that was what was at the store and i ended up caramelizing it with the onion instead of using it raw as she has done. 

i followed her advice though and sauteed some smoked sausage as an accompaniment, but this definitely stands on its own as a vegetarian meal.

tonight's dinner - grilled cheese

as promised did the grilled cheese tonight (using the english porter cheese as well as a cotswold) along with some cajun shrimp. the porter got very melty and molasses looking, quite good on the hearty wheat bread i bought to go along with it. the cotswold was another story but still quite good with its chive and onion flavor

bread and cheese

found a very interesting cheese today at whole foods while i was buying ingredients for my inaugural batch of ice cream in my new maker (stay tuned for further posts on that). its an english cheese with porter in it, and coupled with some very earthy bread and some irish butter, it should make for quite a grilled cheese sandwich tomorrow.

tonight's dinner - french onion soup

i made french onion soup for the first time tonight. surprised it takes several hours to make, but the results were pretty good and definitely hearty. plenty left over to reheat on another cold day as well.

tonight's dinner - seafood bruschetta

shrimp, scallops, scallions, red pepper and mozzarella with plenty of olive oil on half a loaf of ciabatta. and i was supposed to use artichoke hearts but i forgot until too late.

tonight's dinner - homemade ravioli

decided to try something simple but fancy. homemade italian sausage and goat cheese ravioli with olive oil, balsamic vinegar and chives on top. 

tonight's dinner - tart trio

so everyone knows i like to make tarts i think by now. i was inspired today by some things i saw recently and made my own versions.

left to right (these each used 1/3 of a sheet of puff pastry, 22 mins in the oven, the caramel for each was brown sugar, honey and butter with the juice of the fruit then reduced)

caramelized plum tart

boucheron goat cheese, peach and rosemary jam, and pears freshly picked from my tree tart

caramelized pluot and lemon thyme tart

tonight's dinner - roasted potatoes with cheese and poached egg

couldn't resist these peruvian purple potatoes at whole foods today (which are very purple with mottled white spots) so i did a stripped down version of allie's roasted vegetable recipe found elsewhere on this blog and over at her's. the cheese is a local cow's milk cheese and very soft and pungent.

also found time (while doing some work on the art project) to bake another tart. this one is raspberry and peach with a peach/lime glaze on it

tonight's dinner - flank steak

my friend elise, artist extraordinare and my chief book illustrator is in town for a few days and we can only lounge on the couch so long before becoming overcome by hunger. thus: dinner -

flank steak - rare
tomatoes from the garden diced and tossed with one of my garden herb-flavored vinegars
chevre - set out to be good and warm

cut steak on the diagonal, arrange on plate with tomatoes and chevre thrown on top and serve with a nice salad

tonight's dinner - three ingredient bread

three ingredient bread, what could be easier. i was talking to my friend mir today about the recipe and decided to continue my exploration of simple dinners by baking some tonight. this recipe is unusual in that you bake it for the first 30 minutes under a metal mixing bowl.

three ingredient bread - serves 4 comfortably

3 cups flour (i like to use 2c wheat and 1c bread flour)
1 1/2 cup milk
2 tsp baking powder

do not over-mix
knead lightly (5 times should do it)

form into a boule-shaped loaf and place on cookie sheet, cutting slight cross in top

place a metal mixing bowl over the loaf

bake at 450deg F for 30 minutes, covered by the bowl

take bowl off and bake another 30 minutes or so or until done. the loaf should make a nice hollow sound if you knock on the bottom of it

for dinner then: bread with good irish butter, brie i had left to warm for an hour on my table while the bread was baking, and a bowl of rainer cherries with rosewater (scroll down to find the "recipe" for this)

savory parmesan cheese cookies

i recently found this recipe and have been waiting to try it. tonight seemed a good opportunity. more and more these days i have been cooking meals that only have 3 or 4 ingredients. trying to be as simple as possible. this biscuit does have an italian name but i have not been able to remember it.

1 cup rough grated (or sharded) parmesan or romano cheese, good quality

1/4 cup flour

pepper to taste

combine all ingredients in a bowl and toss until mixed, use a round cookie cutter to form circular piles on parchment paper or silpat on a cookie sheet, about 3" in diameter, press lightly

400 degree oven 5-10 minutes or until melted and golden

makes 6-8 savory cookies