A Mid-Winter's Pasta

OK...maybe I haven't been as attentive as I'd hoped, blog-wise...but I have a note from my teacher! I'm involved with another show; directing Reefer Madness: The Musical at Suffolk University. (What...you didn't know there was a musical based on Reefer Madness? I didn't either 'til a few months ago. What...you didn't know I directed musicals?? Um...I didn't either until a few months ago.)

So we'll break momentarily from our recent aim to cover some culinary basics with a recipe for you to try.

It is said that necessity is the mother of invention. Right? A lot of times (particularly, you know, when you get home from a rehearsal around 10:30 at night and haven't eaten) one needs to throw together a dish with whatever you have on hand. We touched on this with the idea of Midnight Pasta. Invention and creativity in the kitchen, I'll confess, have not always been a strong suit of mine. There is...some risk involved. (The less said about the great Kraut Dog Burrito experiment of 1989, the better. However, I maintain: it was ALL WE HAD IN THE REFRIGERATOR.)

One night a few weeks ago, I found myself with several things on hand I thought could work together: Italian sausage, potatoes, and blue cheese and an apple. Feeling kinda New England-y, I decided to throw maple syrup into the equation. Here was the rationale: sausage and potatoes pair up naturally, as do apples and cheese, as do maple and pork. And pork with apples? Say it with me now, Peter Brady fans: "pawk shops...n'apple shaushe..." I have also really grown to like the presence of potato in pasta dishes, which may sound odd, but has - I believe - some traditional roots in Italian cuisine, and...is just good so you should try it. (Plus, necessity again, I only had one potato.)

Anyway, with other pantry staples on hand, I came up with this pasta dish - which I've tried a few times now, so as not to toss your way the latenight one-off of a starving man. I think it's nice and hearty. Give it a try and let me know what you think.


B's Mid-Winter Pasta

6 sundried tomato halves (if in oil, drained and chopped; dried - soak 6 minutes in boiling water, drain and chop)
1/2 lb. Sweet Italian Sausage, casings removed
3 cloves garlic, sliced
1/4 t. crushed red peppers
1 (generous) C. diced peeled Yukon Gold potato
1/2 lb. orrechiette pasta or shells
1 large Granny Smith apple, peeled, cored and diced
3/4 C. frozen peas (thawed or frozen is fine, just adjust when you add them)
6 T. dry white wine
1 1/4 C. chicken or vegetable stock
2 T. maple syrup (with all due respect to Mrs. Butterworth - REAL please!)
3/4 - 1 C. crumbled blue cheese

1. Heat a large saute pan over medium-high heat, add uncased sausage and begin breaking it up with a wooden spoon. Continue to break it up and cook the sausage until browned (about 5-6 minutes). Remove the sausage to a plate.

3. If there's not enough fat left in the saute pan - or you want to drain it all - add a tablespoon of olive oil to the saute pan, return to the heat, add the garlic, and saute until it just starts to color. Add crushed red peppers and potatoes and saute one more minute.

4. Add wine to pan and scrape up any brown bits on bottom (deglaze). Reduce wine for 1 minute, then add chicken stock, sundried tomatoes, and 1.5 teaspoon kosher salt. Bring to a simmer and cook for 12 minutes (until potatoes are just starting to soften). Add maple syrup, apples, and cooked sausage. Cook until apples are just tender (about another 10 minutes). Add in peas and cook 1 minute more. (Check for seasoning and remember the pasta cooked in salted water and blue cheese will add a bit more saltiness to the final dish.)

5. Meanwhile, cook orrechiette in salted water according to package instructions. Before draining the pasta , reserve about 1 cup of cooking water. Add drained pasta to saute pan, along with crumbled blue cheese, and toss over heat for a minute or two. If too dry add a little reserved pasta water.

Try it and let me know what you think.

De Glaze! De Glaaaze!

Smiles, everyone, smiles!


OK. Enough with my seventies flashback.

Today I want to talk about deglazing.

Deglazing is one of my all-time favorite things to do in the kitchen. Why? Well, probably because it generally involves wine and...well...B loves his wine. But wait - that's not really it BECAUSE deglazing doesn't necessarily have to be done with wine. (Can you feel me frowning?)


OK. When you're cooking something in a pan - be it vegetables or some sort of protein (meat, seafood...) - bits of what you're cooking stick to the bottom of the pan and become this highly flavorful brown stuff referred to as 'fond.'

Fond is good. (So is fondue, but FOCUS, Sven.)

It means foundation. (Stocks are referred to as 'fond de cuisine,' as in the base of cooking.) And that fond in your pan can be the foundation of a quick pan sauce for whatever was cooking in said pan. And you get that sauce, or incorporate all the flavor of that fond into your sauce, by deglazing.

To deglaze a pan, you add liquid to the hot pan and stir, scraping up the fond from the bottom of the pan. That flavor incorporates into the liquid and the liquid also reduces over the heat, so you are left with a lovely, flavorful sauce.

et voila!

If you cook for any length of time, you're going to deglaze a pan at some point - if you, in fact, already haven't. It was one of the first cooking techniques I learned that actually made me feel like I was COOKING something. (It's true, mom, opening the jar of Ragu did not count! Sticklers...) The liquid makes this great noise when it hits the pan. The entire room fills with a fabulous aroma. I still can't resist bending over the pan and inhaling every time I add some wine to a pan of sauteing tomatoes and garlic. Mm-mm!

So...love your fond. (And, yeah, you can't really get good fond with your non-stick pans, so...) Grab the wine (or stock or water or what have you) and create yourself some pan sauces, amigos.

Sauteing the shrimp leads to...


...fond!

And so we add some wine. (Say it with me, now: yay, wine!)

Look, ma, no fond!!

Mis En Scene

In theater and film, they talk about 'mis en scene' - staging basically, the composition of actors and set and props on the stage or in a shot.

In cooking, we do 'mis en place.' Again with the French! (Pronounce it: meez on plahss.) It's also staging. Preparing everything you need to cook with - food and tools - and having it all at the ready (composed), at hand, by the stove. I hear it translates to 'put in place' or 'everthing in its place'...but I regret to inform you that - are you sitting down? - aside from two years in Mr. Quercio's high school French, I am not fluent, and I am a trusting soul...so we're gonna go with 'put in place.' (Though I like the idea of it actually translating to 'stick it up your pants' and we all are just buying into it.)

It's a highly common-sensible thing to do. In school they stress it. It even has, in kitchens, become a bastardized verb or noun. 'I still have to meez...do your meez...meez this dish...' At home, to be honest, I do it or don't depending on the dishes being prepared. If you're doing a stir-fry, it's essential. A stew? Mm...probably not so much. You can generally do simultaneous prepping and cooking for something like that.

I like to meez.

Don't laugh. That is, to some, essentially saying you like to collect stamps or organize your sock drawer. BUT...I find prep work somehow relaxing and comforting. Sue me.

It's not rocket science. (Cooking seldom is.) Just go through your recipe and try to get everything cleaned, chopped up and ready to go, so once you start firing up your dish everything is at hand. The idea being, you don't want to toss that minced garlic in the pan and discover you don't have the accompanying...oh, say...minced ginger and said garlic burns while you attend to the skipped task. Or you need to whisk hot stock into your perfectly golden roux and remember you loaned your whisk to the plumber who lives next door (for reasons best left unsaid, un-wondered about...).

It will add some extra dishes, but let's just assume you have a dishwasher or a grateful spouse who jumps at the opportunity to clean up after you (we love you, spouse!). In school, I got a real jones for these little Pyrex prep dishes that could hold every chopped up individual ingredient. In fact, all my classmates apparently lusted after these things because there was generally one whopping shortage of little Pyrex prep dishes for those who didn't act fast enough. At home - yes...damn it! I DID get some little Pyrex prep dishes for home - I will generally prep things and try to organize them all onto a plate or couple plates, but sometimes I just have to break out the prep dishes.

So...

Do your meez, babies. Meez it! Get your shizzle all prepped and ready to go and you will be amazed at how fast and easy the actual process of cooking feels.


Mis for a pasta dish. (right) Notice those swanky prep dishes!

Mis for a stir-fry (above).

On Having Lost the Will to Blog...

Are you there, God? It's me, Bar-gret.

So...

Been a while.

Miss me?!

Comes a time, I suppose, in ever blogger's, um, inter-span, when he or she loses the will to blog. When life and family and work and love and friends take you by the proverbial collar (can't think of a proverb involving a collar, but give me a minute...), and yank you quickly and efficiently back into the real world. Away from one's tiny digital soapbox where one is free to wax poetical about canning and greens. (I once knew some greens from Nantucket...) Away from the 'virtual community' of the Internet, where one can measure his friends in numbers and stats, dictate his persona through judicious uploading and editing, and regularly place one's heart on his well-published sleeve via Facebook. Back into the world of work and cars and flesh and blood and hopes and dreams and love and sex and birth and death. Things you can touch. Things you can smell. Things you can taste. Things you can live with. Things that you can't live without.

But hey, Ebenezer, why such a DOWNER?? Let's talk about some FOOD. Mais oui?

Oui.

I'm in jeopardy of having my license to blog revoked (and then actually being replaced by Pierce Brosnan, or - worse - Timothy Dalton), so...baby steps here...I think I'd like to try and start back up with some techniques and terminology. Back to basics for me and for you, but I promise to try to show up more often. Shall we?

I Can Can

Calm yourself, Toulouse. Not that can-can.

Canning is fun.

Well..."fun" you say? Maybe not "fun" like...miniature golf or dancing the tango after several mojitos fun. Still, it's something that I like to do when I have the time (and a surplus of something I want to store for a while). Aside from the obvious benefit of having food 'put up' to eat over the cold winter, it gives you some insight into the way things worked kitchen-wise in the past. You get to live a little history here. Plus it's like a cool science experiment to boot!

Here's how it works in a nutshell: food and liquids (often hot) are placed into sterilized canning jars, fitted with two-piece lids, then placed in a hot water bath for 10-20 minutes. During that time, a vacuum is created where the hot water forces all the remaining air in the jar out. Once the jars are removed from the water bath and begin to cool, a vacuum seal is established between the jar and the lid. After they've completely cooled, you can remove the outer lid ring and feel the strong seal between the jar and the lid proper. Properly canned foods can last up to a year, kept in a cool, dark location.

Are there some inherent dangers to home-canning? Yes. Non-sterile jars and trapped air-bubbles within the food can introduce bacteria that may cause spoilage or, worse, botulism. You want to be careful to clean and boil your jars before filling, swipe around the inside of the jar with a knife to help remove any air pockets and make sure your seals are good and strong. Also be on the lookout for your product no longer looking 'right' after it's been stored for a while: mysterious growths (hey, look, sea monkeys!!), cloudiness, loss of seal or ESPECIALLY bulging out of the lid. Don't risk trying that stuff; chuck it. I don't want to scare you off; I've been canning for years now and have never had any issues.

There are so many foods you can preserve by canning. Jams and jellies, pickled vegetables of all kinds, simple packed fruits and vegetables like tomatoes and corn. Where do you start? Usually you want to start canning things WHILE they're in season (read: fresh, better tasting and obtainable at affordable prices). Those end of the season aforementioned corn and tomatoes are going to bring a little summer to you when you eat them in February. When strawberry's hit in the spring, make yourself (and your friends!) some strawberry preserves.

I've been getting in a holy ton of apples from the CSA, so...Apple Butter For Everyone!! Also pickled the green beans from the CSA in vinegar with some dill and garlic, and did my semi-regular pantry stock up of what Miss Kate likes to call "the Crack." It's just a simple pomodoro sauce I adapted from one of Lydia Bastianich's books, but she's quite fond of it so I try to keep us in a steady supply. Whatever you make - and whenever you try it - it's always appreciated.

What do you need to start canning?

Time, first of all. Do it when you're hanging around the house for lazy, rainy day or weekend. It's not hard work, but it can be time consuming between the preparing of what you'll be canning and the actual process itself.

The Blue Book of Preserving published by Ball, the manufacturer of all the supplies you need, is a great intro/starter/bible for canning.

A large pot for the boiling water bath. Big enough to hold water and as many (filled) jars as possible. So...BIG.

Canning jars and lids - again, made by Ball. You can find them at some grocery stores. I've found them a lot in local hardware stores. (Mom & Pop type businesses, not the mega Home Depot places...) $8-10 will get you a box of 12 jars and lids. The jars can be cleaned and used over and over again. Lids are only one-shot deals, though, so buy some extra lids if you become a regular canner.

Extras? A funnel for filling the jars without getting food or liquid on the lid is pretty essential. I have a handy (not at all necessary) slotted thingy for dipping the lids into the boiling water to sterilize. A (pretty close to essential) long set of (Ball designed, I'm sure) canning tongs for placing and removing the jars into the hot water. And a magnetic 'wand' for picking lids out of the hot water.

I'm sincerely not trying to shill for Ball, but I did just notice on their website they sell a whole Canning Basics Kit that looks like it has ALL of the above mentioned stuff. Take a look.

While we're on the subject of preserving, after a conversation a few weeks back with local playwright and all around lovely guy, Joe Byers, I realized I'd never tried drying my own tomatoes. (Joe just had.) It's really, really easy to make your own 'sun-dried' tomatoes - but they're really oven-dried. Hey...tomatoes dried under the Tuscan sun will most likely kick the tiny tomato butts of these, but still...if you have tomatoes piling up at the end of the summer, here's another easy way to keep enjoying them through the winter.

Wash the tomatoes and dry them off. Slice them in half. (There...wasn't that HARD?!) Place a rack over a cookie sheet and spread the tomatoes, cut side up over the rack. Sprinkle them with some Kosher salt. Place the pan in a 200 degree oven. (I used my convection oven at 170 degrees.) Leave them in there for about ten hours, then start checking every half hour or so to pull out the ones that are dry (but not hard). Store them in a Ziploc or other air-tight container. Or, for really nice rich sun-dried toms, put them in a sterile jar and cover them with olive oil and store them in your refrigerator.

early on in the process...

...some, oh, ten or eleven hours later

There are different ways to preserve foods. Give canning or dehydrating a try. Heck...get all pioneer on us and make yourself some jerky. If you like to cook but only find time to do it every once and a while, why not make a giant BATCH of your 'famous' soup or sauce and can a bunch of it to enjoy until the NEXT time you get around to some extended kitchen time. Give it a try, if you're curious, and let me know how things turn out.

Soup Night: Variations on the Kale Theme

Jeffrey, I do and I do and I do for you...

Took a shot at adapting Miss Deana's Kale Soup recipe for the vegetarian crowd last night and we were quite happy with the results. I tried a frequent 'stand in' for meat in vegetarian cooking by dicing up a portabello mushroom and sauteeing it over high heat to get good color and depth of flavor. Also, we were out of celery seed, so I went with fennel seed which really gave it some of the flavor missing from that banned substance: Italian sausage. Substituted red kidney beans for the cannellini because that's what we had in, but while the difference in taste is negligible, I think I'd prefer the 'look' of the cannellini (white kidney beans).

Again...what is soup night without bread? I remembered a bread recipe a director I worked with introduced me to a while back, which I hadn't tried in a while. It is about the fastest way to make a yeast bread I've come across and yields really great results if you are in need of something to dip in your soup or toast up some morning. Sure, it's not some artisinal country loaf from a starter with several rises - so you won't get that developed flavor and crust, but it's BREAD and your house smells like WARM BREAD and it's still really good.

Last night was the first time I made this bread using bread flour instead of all-purpose. Both work, but the bread flour - with its higher gluten content - provides better structure and results in a better 'crumb'. If you've got a KitchenAid stand mixer (best Christmas present ever!!!), this bread can't be easier. I think I got home around 6:30pm last night and the bread was ready to go on the table at 8:30pm.



B's Kale and White Bean Soup

1 portabello mushroom, gills scraped out, 1/4" dice
1 T. butter
1 t. olive oil
1 small onion, chopped
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 C. carrots, 1/4" dice
1 C. parsnips, 1/4" dice
1 large russet potato, 1/2" dice (about 1 C. or so)
1 t. fennel seed
1 t. dried rosemary
1 can (14 oz) diced tomatoes
1/2 can cannellini beans, rinsed and drained
1 pound fresh kale, ribs removed and chopped
1 can (14oz) vegetable stock
3 C. water
3 T. dry sherry
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Heat butter and olive oil in Dutch oven over high heat, add mushroom and saute until they release their liquid and begin to caramelize/brown. Reduce heat to medium and add onions, carrots and parsnips. Saute until onions are soft and translucent.

2. Add garlic, fennel seed and rosemary and cook another minute until fragrant. Add potato, tomatoes, stock and water to the pot. Season with salt and pepper. (You will need probably a good tablespoon of salt here.) Bring to a boil.

3. Add the chopped kale into the pot, stirring until wilted. Reduce heat to low, cover pan and simmer for 45 minutes to an hour. Serve topped with grated Parmesan and some crusty bread.



Quick White Bread

2 C. bread flour (or all-purpose flour)
1 T. sugar
1 t. salt
1 envelope (or 1 scant tablespoon) active dry yeast
1 C. warm water

1. Mix dry ingredients in bowl of standmixer fitted with dough hook. With mixer running, begin adding the warm water until a consistent dough forms. (This will vary, based on the weather, the flour, etc...last night, for instance, 3/4 C. did the trick.) Continue 'kneading' the dough with the mixer on medium speed for 4-5 minutes.

2. Scrape the ball of dough into a bowl coated with cooking spray and cover with plastic wrap. Allow to rise for 15 minutes or more. The longer the better. Last night I let it rise for 30-45 minutes.

3. Punch down the dough and scrape onto floured counter or board and form a round loaf (boule). Place the loaf on a baking tray or pizza pan coated with cooking spray and place it into a cold oven. Put a small oven safe bowl of water on a lower rack in the oven and turn the oven to 400 degrees. Bake until done - the loaf will give a hollow sound when rapped on the bottom - about 1 hour.

I Just Kaled To Say I Love You

We take requests!

Chronicles reader Jeff responded to our last post looking for a soup recipe using kale. Coincidentally, Kitchen Chronicles friend and my personal CSA Guru Deana Novembrino had recently sent me her recipe for kale soup to help me make use of that Red Russian kale we got in. Give it a try Jeff and let us know. I'm going to try a vegetarian-ized version at home for Miss Kate, but VERY happy to see the double-shot of bacon AND sausage/chourico in Deana's recipe. B loves his pork products.

D's Kale, White Bean and Sausage Soup

3 C. cubed potatoes
1 T. olive oil
2 C. sliced chourico or Italian sausage
1 C. finely chopped bacon
1 medium sized onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 cups carrots, 1/4" dice
1 T. celery seed
1 can (28 oz) diced tomatoes
1 can cannellini beans, rinsed and drained
2 pounds fresh kale, ribs removed and chopped
(if using a tender kale such as red russian, you may leave the ribs in
6-8 cups chicken stock
3 T. dry sherry
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Boil potatoes in about 4 cups water until softened, about 10 minutes. Set aside and reserve cooking water.

2. While potatoes are cooking, add olive oil to large stock pot and brown bacon and sausage. Once browned remove sausage and bacon.

3. In same stock pot sautee onions, garlic and carrots in remaining bacon fat. Add in celery seed and season with salt and pepper.

4. Once softened, add in tomatoes, cannellini beans, and kale. Cook until kale is cooked down. Add in potatoes and their cooking water and stock to cover ingredients and bring to a boil. Once boiling add sherry, cover and reduce to simmer for 45-60 minutes, Stirring occasionally.
Serve topped with grated parmesan and accompany with crusty bread.


Greens, beans, sausage...mm. Get your peasant on!