Power of Suggestion

As soon as I saw Ina Garten make this on her show, I knew I wanted it. Right now, right now. Luckily enough, it was a Saturday, so I could rush out, gather up the ingredients and make my own dreams come true. The pizza is topped with goat cheese, fontina and mozzarella and is creamy and rich and delicious. Then you top it with a lemony salad to balance all that cheesy goodness. So freakin' good. Also, major props to Ina for a pizza dough that only needs a half hour rise. That is something I can get behind.

WHITE PIZZAS WITH LEMONY GREENS
from Barefoot Contessa Back to Basics

INGREDIENTS:
for the dough:
1 1/4 C warm water (110 to 115 F)
2 packages dry yeast
1 T honey
4 C all purpose flour
olive oil
2 t Kosher Salt
for the cheesy topping:
1/2 C olive oil (you can probably get away with a 1/3 C)
4 sliced garlic cloves
5 springs fresh thyme
1/4 t red pepper flakes
fresh black pepper
3 C grated Fontina
1 1/2 C grate fresh mozzarella
1 small package cream goat cheese crumbled
for salad:
1/2 C olive oil (again, you can probably get away with less)
1/4 C fresh lemon juice
8 oz baby arugula (I used fresh spinach, since it's what Ryan prefers. It was also delicous).

DIRECTIONS:
for the dough:
Combine the water, yeast, honey and 3 T olive oil in the bowl of your stand mixer with dough hook attached. When the yeast is dissolved add 3 C of flour and then 2 t of Kosher salt and mix on medium low. Add up to 1 more cup of flour, enough to make a soft dough. Knead until smooth, about 10 minutes. Then turn the dough out onto a cutting board and knead by hand until smooth and elastic. Put in a well-oiled bowl and cover with a damp towel. Leave to rise for 30 minutes.

for garlic oil:
In a small saucepan, combine 1/2 C olive oil, the garlic, thyme and red pepper flakes. Cook on low heat for 10 minutes. Watch carefully that the garlic doesn't burn. Set aside for later.

back to the dough:
Preheat your (clean) oven to 500F. Cut the dough in as many pieces as you would like pizzas. We make 6 as Ina suggests, but you could just make maybe 4? I don't know about getting a whole one on one cooking sheet. Feel free to try it and report back. Place your dough on a baking sheet lined with parchment and cover again with the towel and let rise/rest for 10 minutes. If you're not using immediately, refrigerate for up to 4 hours. If you do refrigerate, allow dough to come back to room temperature before working with it. Press and stretch your dough balls into small pizza-y shapes and place on baking sheets.


pizzamaking time:
Brush the dough of each mini pizza with the garlic oil. Sprinkle each pizza with equal amounts of mozzarella, fontina and goat cheese. Bake for 10-15 minutes until the crust crips and the cheese is delicious and melty. SEE?

salad topping:
Mix the olive oil and lemon juice together with a pinch of salt and pepper. Dress only the greens you're using right away then place them on on hot pizza and enjoy!!

Aftermath

It's been a week, and I'm still reeling from Thanksgiving. First there's the marathon cooking sessions leading up to the big day (which thankfully, I was spared this year because my mother did just about everything herself), then there's the mad dash to eat, freeze and reinvent all the leftovers before anything spoils. And of course, the rush to post it all here before I forget what the hell it is I'm talking about.

This year my one contribution to Thanksgiving dinner (or dessert rather) was a sweet potato pie. I'd been eyeing it ever since I got my Best of the Best cookbook and the deal was sealed when my mother announced that no way no how was she making a pumpkin pie. I couldn't wait to report back. Then smittenkitchen waxed poetic about it and frankly, I lost momentum. I mean, no one cares what I have to say about the stupid pie, especially not when there are, you know, real food bloggers talking about it.

But it was heavenly and delicious and something I very cheerfully continued to eat in the days after Thanksgiving when turkey was becoming my sworn enemy. It is light and yet cheesecakey. It's really amazing I didn't just eat the whole thing in one sitting.

SWEET POTATO PIE
courtesy of the Lee Brothers, as featured in Best of the Best

CRUST:
Ingredients:
1.5 C sifted all purpose flour
1 T sugar
8 T butter
1/4 cup(ish) ice water

*original recipe called for 4 T of lard and 4 t of butter. I don't do lard, so I used all butter. I use salted butter. The original recipe also called for 1 t of salt. That in combination with the salted butter makes the crust nasty like a salt lick. Then you have to make another crust. Don't do that. If you use unsalted butter you can add a small pinch of salt, but I'd stay away from anything so large as a teaspoon.

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 325 F. Sift the dry ingredients together. Cut the butter into small chunks and cut it in using a pastry cutter or two knives. When the mixture gets a sandy texture like coarse crumbs you can add the water a tablespoon at a time. Make sure it's ice water. Toss with a fork to combine after each addition of water. When the dough holds together, form a round disk, wrap tightly and refrigerate for 15 minutes or until ready to use.

Roll out the dough (use flour as needed) until large enough for a 9" pie plate. Transfer the dough to a pie plate, trim the edges and crimp as desired. Again, refrigerate for 15 minutes.

Prebake the crust. First lay a sheet of aluminum foil on top of the dough and use pie weights (or beans or pennies) to weight it down. Bake for 12-15 minutes. Then remove the weights, use a fork to prick the bottom all over and then bake for 10 more minutes.

FILLING:

Ingredients:
1. 5 lbs sweet potatoes (about 2 medium sweet potatoes), peeled and chopped to a 1/2 inch dice
4 T unsalted butter, melted
1 T lemon juice *
1/2 t nutmeg
1/2 t ground cinnamon
1/2 t kosher salt
3 large eggs, separated
1/2 C sugar
2 T flour
1/4 C buttermilk

*the lemon juice is pretty strong in the pie, the Lee brothers ask for 2 T, and even being a lemon lover that seemed a bit much. I do like how it cuts the richness, so I hesitate to eliminate it entirely.

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 375 F.

Pour 1.5 inches of water into a large pot. Insert a strainer and bring to a boil over medium heat. Add the sweet potatoes and steam until tender about 20 minutes. Drain them, place them in a large bowl and allow to cool. Then mash until smooth. You'll want 1 and 1/4 C puree, so you can just eat the excess (or make another pie). Add the butter, lemon juice, nutmeg, cinnamon and salt. Mix thoroughly.

Separate the eggs. The whites can go in the base of your mixer (or another bowl, but I like to do egg whites in the stand mixer), the yolks go in a small bowl. Whisk together the egg yolks and the sugar until creamy and pale yellow. Then add to the sweet potato mixture. Add the flour and mix until thoroughly blended. Then add the buttermilk and mix that in.

In your mixer, whisk your egg whites to soft peaks. Then with a spatula fold the egg whites into the sweet potatoes and buttermilk. When well combined, pour the mixture into the pie crust and bake for 35-40 minutes. Cool completely on a rack and serve at room temperature or chilled from the fridge. Whipped cream is fabulous on top.

Thanksgiving Leftovers: White Turkey Chili

Sometimes the week following Thanksgiving can fill you with a growing sense of dread. It seems like ages ago that you were lobbying for a huge ass turkey so that you'd have enough leftovers. Now the thought of choking down another plate of turkey+gravy+stuffing is enough to make you queasy. What you need is something completely different. Something that does NOT remind you of Thanksgiving. This chili is perfect. It also freezes well, so you can even just make it and toss it in the freezer for a cold December night. Like all good leftovers recipes it is very flexible. You can use leftover chicken or turkey depending on what you have available.


WHITE TURKEY CHILI
adapted from Epicurious

INGREDIENTS:
2 T veggie oil
1/2 C onion
1 1/2 T garlic (about 2 cloves)
4 t cumin
between 1/2 lb and 1 lb ground turkey - I adjust this based on how much leftover turkey I have
I'd use 1lb of ground with 1 C of leftovers or 1/2 lb ground with 2 C leftovers.
around 1 C leftover turkey chopped into bite sized bits
3 C stock (you can use homemade from your turkey, or use store bought chicken stock)
1/4 C barley
2 t chopped jalepeno
1 can cannellini beans (rinsed and drained)
1 can small white beans (rinsed and drained)
optional - 1 t marjoram, 1 t summer savory - I own neither so have never added either.

For topping as you wish:
hot sauce
chopped scallions
grated cheddar
sour cream

DIRECTIONS:
In a very large skillet or a regular stockpot or Dutch oven, add the veggie oil, the garlic and the onion. Saute on medium low for 5 minutes or until onion is translucent. Stir in the cumin and then add the raw ground turkey. Cook stirring often until the ground turkey is browned.

Add the stock, barley, jalapenos and the marjoram and savory (if you're using them). Cook for 20-30 minutes. You need to watch it. The barley should be cooked but don't let all the liquid evaporate. Even with the pot covered all my liquid evaporated in about 25 minutes. If the barley seems raw and your chili is too liquidy cook a bit longer.

Add the beans and chicken and cook about 15 minutes more. Add the hot sauce.

When it's finished, you can top with any normal chili toppings, but we usually eat it pretty plain, with just the hot sauce.

Thanksgiving Leftovers: Nana Grenon's Ragout

My nana's mother was by all accounts a lovely woman and very talented at cooking in the old fashioned "a pinch of this, enough of that, cook until it's done" style. My nana was the baby of the family, and for a time after she had my father, she and my grampy lived with her parents. The result of this is that my father was completely beloved and spoiled by his grandparents. Grampy Grenon would wake my father up early and take him everywhere with him. His nana (Nana Grenon) would always cook up my father's favorites. One of his absolute all time favorites is Nana's Chicken Ragout. It also happens to be an ideal use of Thanksgiving leftovers. Nana Grenon is French Canadian, and like many French Canadian dishes this is meant to stretch a meal, with the dumplings being a substantial part of the soup. It's the French Canadian version of chicken noodle soup, and it's perfect comfort food. Feel free to adjust or adapt the ingredients. Think like a grandmother.

NANA GRENON'S CHICKEN RAGOUT

Ingredients:
For the soup -
1 C onion, chopped
1 C celery chopped (I mince mine because Ryan does not like celery)
2 C carrots (cut into disks, coins, whatever you call them)
5-6 C chicken stock (or turkey stock) preferably homemade
salt and pepper
2-3 T olive oil
1 T sage
1 T thyme
approximately 2 C of chopped leftover chicken or turkey. Use what you have. The dumplings will make up for it if you don't have enough. You can use chopped white meat or all the little bits you have, it's up to you.

For the dumplings -
1 C stock - cooled
2.5 C flour
salt and pepper
thyme

DIRECTIONS:
Pour the oil in a large stockpot. Add the onion and celery and cook on low for about 5 minutes. Add the stock, carrots and whatever chicken or turkey bits you're add. Add salt and pepper for taste. This recipe takes a lot of salt, so taste carefully. Bring the stock almost to a boil. While you're waiting for it to boil, make the dumplings. Use a cup of cool stock (I usually set it aside before I start cooking) and mix it together with the flour and about a teaspoon of salt and a pinch of pepper. Add about 2 t fresh thyme to the dumplings if you like. The thyme is completely inauthentic, but it is tasty. The dough will be incredibly sticky and hard to work with. With very well floured hands, roll out the dough very thin. If you don't get it thin you will have yucky gloppy dumplings. Make sure you move the dough a lot while rolling and keep it well floured. When it's thin (maybe less than a 1/4 inch thick?) slice in 1" squares. These can be very irregular, it gives the soup character. When the stock is very hot but not boiling, Add the thyme and sage and throw in the squares of dough and cook for 3-5 more minutes until the dough is cooked.

Butternut Squash Lasagna

I've been away from the blog for the last two weeks for many reasons. Some fun, some stressful, but let's pretend it's just because all my energy has been focused on bringing you more ways to make butternut squash, which I consider to be one of the true joys of fall. I'd been working on perfecting my butternut squash risotto recipe when I got distracted by the idea of butternut squash lasagna. This recipe seemed to be very highly recommended, but as someone who's spent a day picking the tiny shards of skin off a pan of hazelnuts, I'll admit, I was daunted. So I found one by Giata that did not require any earth-shattering efforts on my part and was quite pleased. It's sweet and cheesy and just may be that vegetarian entree you were looking to serve at Thanksgiving.

BUTTERNUT SQUASH LASAGNA
from Giata De Laurentiis
INGREDIENTS:
3 T olive oil
1 (1.5 -2lb) butternut squash, peeled, seeded and diced into 1 inch cubes
salt and pepper
3 amaretti cookies*, crumbled
1/4 C butter
1/4 C flour
3 1/2 C whole milk
pinch nutmeg
1/2 C fresh sage leaves
12 no boil lasagna noodles
2 1/2 C shredded mozzarella
1/3 C grated parm (I always mean the real stuff, parmigiano reggiano, not a shaker from Kraft)

*You may be able to find amaretti cookies at your local grocery store, but definitely at your Italian market or grocer. For heaven's sake, unless you love amaretti cookies, don't pay the premium to get Lazzaroni which are easily double or triple the price of less famous brands.

DIRECTIONS:
Preheat your oven to 450 F. Toss the squash with the olive oil and salt and pepper. Roast for 20-30 minutes, until tender. Cool slightly then puree the squash together with the amaretti cookies in a food processor. Taste and add salt and pepper as needed. Reduce oven temp to 375 F.

Melt the butter in a saucepan. Add the flour and stir for a few minutes until all flour is coated with butter and is sort of goldeny sludge. Add the milk slowly, whisking to incorporate the flour butter mixture. Bring to a boil then reduce the heat slightly and simmer for 5 minutes, stirring often. You are looking for slight thickening, the sauce should coat a spoon lightly. Add the nutmeg and stir through. Mince your sage and add that as well. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Assemble your lasagna. Lightly butter a 9 by 13 baking dish. On the bottom, put down a layer of the sauce, you should have plenty so be generous. Then add a layer of noodles. Cover with a layer of squash, then a layer of the mozzarella, then a layer of the sauce - I had a lot of extra sauce and just poured it over, it all got soaked up and the lasagna was not watery at all. Repeat three times. On the top add a bit more shredded mozzarella and the parm. Cover the top tightly with tin foil and bake for 40 minutes. Remove the cover and bake for 15 minutes more. Finally, remove from the oven and let sit for 15 minutes before serving. It will look delicious and golden and bubbly. Like so:

Candy Alternative

The next few weeks will be marked by furtive rustlings of wrappers, chocolate stained fingers and lips, and the general sugar induced mayhem that is the aftermath of Halloween. Once you've finished your binge, you may want something more homey and old-fashioned to serve as your dessert to tide you over 'til Thankgiving. Giant oatmeal cookies studded with walnuts, apples and raisins will definitely help you recover. They're the sort of thing just longing for a good cookie jar.

OATMEAL APPLE WALNUT RAISIN COOKIES

INGREDIENTS:
2 sticks butter
1 C brown sugar
1/2 C sugar
2 eggs (or equivalent amount of egg substitute)
1 t vanilla
1 1/2 C flour
1 t baking soda
1/2 t baking powder
1 t cinnamon
1/2 t salt
3 C oats
1 C raisins
1 C chopped nuts (I use walnuts)
1 apple cored and diced (I peel mine too).

DIRECTIONS:
Preheat your oven to 350 F. Cream the butter and sugar together. Add the eggs and mix until blended. Add the vanilla. In a separate bowl mix together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and mix well. Add the oats and blend until incorporated. Then add the chopped nuts and raisins and mix. Finally add the apple and mix gently. I've made these regular cookie size before, but I'm kind of loving the giant cookie jar filling size. To make regular cookies, use rounded tablespoons. To make giant cookies, form smallish patties, like you were making burgers, but a bit littler. You can use a greased cookie sheet, but parchment or a silpat is even better. Bake 10-12 for the little ones 12-13 for the big ones. Cool on the pan for a minute or so, don't try to transfer right away or they will fall apart on you. Then cool on a rack until completely cool.

Beginner's Duck

I did manage to rally last night, and pull together a nice dinner. Certainly not worthy of Julia, but a bit fancier than the usual - Pan roasted duck breast with green beans, polenta and mushrooms in a balsamic red wine glaze. This duck recipe is absolutely the most simple one I've seen and it turns out perfectly every time. The duck is juicy and flavorful and the skin is crispy, salty and delicious. If you like duck it's a wonderful preparation for guests or a special occasion because it takes less than twenty minutes and almost no fuss. You'll feel like Julia without having to struggle with deboning your own bird, use a chinois to strain sauce or deprive the tri-state area of its butter supply.

PAN-ROASTED DUCK
courtesy of Emeril Lagasse

INGREDIENTS:
duck breasts

• the number you cook will depend on how hearty your eaters and are the number of sides you are making. With my husband I assume he gets his own, but my parents would probably split one between the two of them.
• duck breasts are available in some grocery stores now and many specialty stores. D'Artagnan is a good brand. We usually get the Magret breasts, which should be a bit over $10.00 a pound. Online they sell the breasts in four packs for around $50.

essence of emeril - you can find the recipe on the food network link or here.
1 scant tablespoon olive oil.

DIRECTIONS:
Preheat your oven to 400 F. First rinse the duck and pat it dry. Then coat both sides in essence. Your ducks will look like this:

On the left is the underside of the duck, on the right, the delicious layer of fat. Mmm. Duck fat. In an ovenproof skillet, warm the oil. You really don't need a lot of oil because the duck will give off tons of fat. Have the pan on medium heat and when the oil is hot, place the ducks in the pan skin side down. Cook them for 6 minutes. At the end of six minutes flip them over. The skin will be browned and shiny and crisp. Pour off some of the duck fat*. Emeril doesn't mention this, but I'd rather not have any oven fires, so I drain probably three-quarters of what's in the pan. I drain into a metal mixing bowl just because it's so darn hot and I'm afraid glass would crack and plastic would melt. Once you've flipped the ducks and poured off some fat, place the pan in the hot oven for an additional 8-10 minutes. You can use a meat thermometer to check for doneness if you worry about that sort of thing, the final temperature you want is 120 F. Remember the duck will come up a few degrees while it rests so you can pull it around 110 F. When you remove the duck from the oven, cover it and let it sit for 2-3 minutes. Mine was still giving off quite a bit of juice after that time, so it really does need to sit. Slice it on the bias into quarter inch slices. Feel very gourmet and impressive indeed.

*Duck fat is great to freeze and use later to make Coq au Vin or other chicken dishes richer and more flavorful. Use duck fat as you would butter.

Gloom

It is completely vile out today. Also, we are much in need of a dessert here, having consumed the last of a batch of rugelach pinwheels. I had in mind an apple oatmeal cookie recipe that I make every year around this time, and have a devil of a time locating each time. I thought I'd do us both a favor and bake some up. You'd have more fall goodness, and I'd know exactly where to find the recipe the next time I needed it. But I don't want to. I am cold and damp and it is so very grey out that I simply cannot bring myself to do it. Not even just having finishedMy Life in France is enough to motivate me. And if the great Julia Child isn't enough to get you cooking, you're probably a lost cause. So I apologize for the lack of apple cookies, and hope to be back tomorrow, perhaps with a duck recipe, the apple cookies or perhaps just a list of books to make you drool slightly when you are unable to leave the couch for the kitchen.

Fig Jam

Not so very long ago, I had a delicious sandwich at a local restaurant, which I refuse to link to for many reasons, but mainly because they keep removing things I love from their menu and then charging more for the crap they still serve that I don't want. They've already done away with nachos and mac and cheese, so I shouldn't have been shocked when I realized they also scrapped my new favorite sandwich ever. Yes, I know I have a new favorite sandwich ever each month. Let's move on. Anyway. I'm loathe to give those people my money anyway, so it's just as well. My latest greatest sandwich is so very good, and its star ingredient is fig jam. It's also very versatile, I've had it three different ways, all heavenly. The only bad news, is there's not so much a recipe as a set of instructions. You need fig jam (obviously), crusty french bread (although not a baguette, the kind that gives you sandwich size slices), fresh mozzarella (yes, it must be fresh), balsamic vinegar and olive oil. Those are the key ingredients. The ones you can rotate in and out include cooked slices of chicken, prosciutto, spinach and arugula. The bread will absorb the delicious butter from your pan, the mozzarella will be creamy, the fig jam will be sweet and the balsamic will balance that sweetness with a hint of acid. You can choose to add other ingredients, or omit them depending on what you have in the house, or what you're in the mood for.


So here's my not-actually-a-recipe:
INGREDIENTS:
bread (2 slices crusty bread per person)
fresh mozzarella cheese - this is paler in color than regular mozzarella, you'll need a fist sized ball for two sandwiches.
1 T balsamic vinegar (per 2 sandwiches)
1-2 t olive oil (per 2 sandwiches)
salt and pepper
enough fig jam to cover one side of each sandwich (maybe a tablespoon or two per sandwich?)
one or more of the following:
leftover pieces of chicken
spinach or arugula
prosciutto

DIRECTIONS:
Cut 2 slices of bread per person. Smear one side of each sandwich with fig jam. Slice the mozzarella thin and layer on the sandwiches. Mix together the balsamic, olive oil and salt and pepper. If using leftover chicken (such as off a roast chicken), warm them slightly and toss with the balsamic mixture. If you're using the spinach or arugula, toss the greens in a pan with the mixtures for just about 30 seconds to a minute, just enough to warm very slightly. To the fig jam and mozzarella add either the chicken, or the chicken and greens or just greens or greens and prosciutto. Then cook as you would a grilled cheese. I suppose if you had a fancy panini press you could use that, but I'm not so fancy. I toss it in a pan with some butter and put a heavier pot on top to smoosh it down so it all gets cooked and melty and wonderful and then when the first side is golden brown, I flip adding a bit more butter until the other side is also golden and delicious.

Baby Shower Ducktacular!

A dear friend of mine is having a baby. Actually, a lot of friends of mine are having babies, but the friend in question has been telling me for years that she wants a ducky theme to her shower. And of course, when the time came for the actual shower, there were no ducky themed paper products to be had within a 40 mile radius. Rather than go duckless, I hatched (get it? hatched? I'm so hilarious...) a plan. I hunted down (hunted...down...I can't stop!) a duck cookie cutter. I engaged the services of a plucky friend (plucky!!) and baked up a flock (flock!!!) of ducky sugar cookies. I dipped them in pale yellow royal icing while my friend dabbed on their adorable blue eyes. Aside from a few duck-capitations, it all went swimmingly. The ducks were a huge hit at the shower, my friend was thrilled and my baking partner and I spent the evening high on sugar and cracking each other up. It was just ducky!

SUGAR COOKIES
courtesy of Martha. Who else?

INGREDIENTS:
2 C flour
1/4 t salt
1/2 t baking powder
1/2 C butter (this is one stick)
1 C sugar
1 egg lightly beaten
2 T milk
1/2 t vanilla extract

1 recipe Royal Icing - Please feel free to use Martha's. I used meringue powder, and so followed the directions on the package. Real Royal Icing requires raw egg whites and raw egg whites and pregnant women are not a good combination.

DIRECTIONS:
In a mixer, cream together the butter and sugar. Add the lightly beaten egg, the milk and the vanilla and mix until thoroughly incorporated. In a bowl, whisk together your flour, baking powder and salt. Add this to the butter/sugar/egg mixture.

Form into two disks, wrap tightly with plastic wrap and chill for at least an hour. I chilled mine overnight to make less work for the night before the shower.

Roll out on a floured surface until 1/8" thick. Cut into whatever shapes your heart desires. Place on a baking sheet - I highly recommend using a silpat mat or parchment paper. Leave about an inch between items on the baking sheet. Bake at 350 F for about 10 minutes. My oven runs hot and 8-9 was more like it, so watch carefully, especially if you're icing them, you don't want them to brown, just be barely golden.

When they're done, leave on the pan for a minute or so then transfer to a cooling rack. A woman much wiser than me just pours her royal icing over the cookies once they're cool. She leaves them on the rack and places a pan lined with wax paper or foil underneath to catch the excess. Then once the icing has hardened (leave hours for this, seriously), you can trim off extra with a knife. I applied my royal icing by knife until I decide to dip them. Dipping works reasonably well. The blue eyes were applied after the yellow icing had set a bit. You can use the tip of a toothpick, a skewer or if you're like me and own neither of those, the pointy part of a corn holder.