Bacon Mayonnaise a.k.a my new favorite thing ever

see, I have the teeshirt to prove it

DISH 39:
New Things: I've never made my own mayonnaise before

I just put on m I heart bacon shirt I'm so excited about this.

Bacon Mayonnaise. It is like the of Tommy Burger Mayonnaise. Possibly the unimog of mayonnaise. Big, serious, perfect.

I first read about it on Skillet Doux. He has a recipe there and that is the one that I worked from. He's funny too. He mentions the original idea isLouisa Chu's. She has quite a nice blog here.

So here is Skillet Doux's version of the bacon mayo.

I made mine slightly differently. And, I think the adjustment is fucking genius.

Instead of lemon, I added tomato pulp. The slimy stuff that the tomato seeds hang out it. I hate it on my sandwiches, but I thought it would have just the right amount of sour. Plus, I was out of lemon.

Not only did it make my mayo pretty, it made the mayo sort of taste like a BLT. Perfect for breakfast sandwiches, in tuna for tuna salad. It is pretty amazing.


I had a hard time getting the emulsion right. It tends to separate. In its current incarnation it is more of a sauce, or dressing. But as I am planning on making this often, I'm sure I'll get it right soon, and then. . . I can start taking over the world.


cue evil laughter.

I made a BLT out of it. I haven't eaten it yet. I am waiting for my husband to get home so he and I can bask in it's glory together.

technorati tags [bacon mayo] [genius invention] [BLT]

Dinner

wild mushroom lasagna with rapini and tomato olive salad

DISH 38
New Things: rapini, trying to reheat a cream sauce bases pasta

I made this lasagna last month and it has been sitting in my freezer waiting for guests to come over and eat it. I was worried, reheating such a cream sauce based dish. I let it defrost to room temp, then cooked it for as little time I I thouht I could get away with.

It turned out well.

Here are the recipes for the menu:

Wild Mushroom Lasagna

Serves 10 to 12
1/2 ounce dried porcini mushrooms , rinsed well
1 cup water
1 pound oyster mushrooms , cleaned, stems trimmed, and cut into 1-inch pieces (about 4 cups)
12 ounces chanterelle mushrooms , cleaned, stems trimmed, and cut into 1-inch pieces (about 3 cups)
10 ounces shiitake mushrooms , cleaned, stems removed, and sliced 1/4-inch thick (about 4 cups)
7 tablespoons unsalted butter , plus additional for greasing pan
Table salt and ground black pepper
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 large red onions , chopped medium (about 4 cups)
8 ounces cremini mushrooms , cleaned, stems trimmed, and broken into rough pieces
4 medium cloves garlic , minced or pressed through garlic press (about 1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon)
1/2 cup dry vermouth
3 tablespoons unbleached all-purpose flour
3 1/2 cups milk
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 cup minced fresh parsley leaves
1/4 cup minced fresh basil leaves plus an additional 2 tablespoons
8 ounces Italian fontina cheese , rind removed and shredded (about 2 1/4 cups)
1 1/2 ounces grated Parmesan cheese (about 3/4 cup)
12 no-boil lasagna noodles
1/2 teaspoon grated lemon zest from 1 lemon

1. Cover porcinis with water in small microwave-safe bowl; cover with plastic wrap, cut several steam vents in plastic with paring knife, and microwave on high power for 30 seconds. Let stand until mushrooms soften, about 5 minutes. Lift mushrooms from liquid with fork and roughly chop (you should have about 3 tablespoons). Strain liquid through fine-mesh strainer lined with paper towel into medium bowl. Set mushrooms and liquid aside.

2. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 425 degrees. Toss oyster, chanterelle, and shitake mushrooms together in large bowl. Heat 2 tablespoons butter in 12-inch nonstick skillet over medium-high heat; when foaming subsides, add half of mushrooms, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until mushrooms are tender and most of liquid has evaporated, about 5 minutes. Transfer mushrooms to rimmed baking sheet and set aside to cool. Repeat with another 2 tablespoons butter and remaining mushrooms.

3. Heat 1 tablespoon oil in now-empty skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering Add onions, 1/4 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon pepper and cook, stirring occasionally, until onions are browned around edges, about 10 minutes. Transfer onions to large bowl and set aside.

4. Meanwhile, process cremini mushrooms in food processor until uniformly coarsely chopped, about six 1-second pulses, stopping to scrape down bowl as needed. Heat remaining 1 tablespoon oil in now-empty skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add chopped cremini mushrooms and cook, stirring occasionally, until browned and all moisture has evaporated, 6 to 8 minutes.

5. Reduce heat to medium and stir in porcini mushrooms, 1 tablespoon garlic, 1 teaspoon salt, and 1 teaspoon pepper. Cook, stirring frequently, until garlic is fragrant, about 1 minute. Stir in vermouth and cook, stirring occasionally, until liquid has evaporated, 2 to 3 minutes.

6. Add remaining 3 tablespoons butter and cook until melted. Add flour and cook, stirring constantly, about 1 minute. Slowly add reserved porcini soaking liquid, scraping pan bottom to loosen browned bits. Add milk and nutmeg. Increase heat to medium-high and bring mixture to boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer until sauce has thickened and reached consistency of heavy cream, 10 to 15 minutes (you should have about 4 cups). Remove from heat and stir in 2 tablespoons parsley and 1/4 cup basil.

7. Combine fontina and Parmesan in medium bowl. Toss cooled wild mushrooms with onions in large bowl. Place noodles in 13 by 9-inch ovensafe baking dish and cover with hot tap water; let soak 5 minutes, agitating noodles occasionally to prevent sticking. Remove noodles from water and place in single layer on kitchen towel. Wipe baking dish dry and coat with butter.

8. Using rubber spatula, evenly distribute 1 cup mushroom sauce in bottom of baking dish; position 3 noodles on top of sauce. Spread 3/4 cup sauce evenly over noodles followed by 2 cups mushroom-onion mixture and 3/4 cup cheese. Repeat layering of noodles, sauce, mushroom-onion mixture, and cheese two more times. Place 3 remaining noodles on top of last layer of cheese. Spread remaining sauce over noodles and sprinkle with remaining cheese. Lightly spray large sheet foil with nonstick cooking spray and cover lasagna. Bake until bubbling, about 20 minutes.

9. While lasagna is baking, combine remaining 2 tablespoons parsley, 2 tablespoons basil, 1 teaspoon garlic, and lemon zest in small bowl. Increase oven temperature to 500 degrees, remove foil from lasagna, and continue to bake until cheese on top becomes spotty brown, 6 to 8 minutes. Remove lasagna from oven and sprinkle evenly with herb mixture. Cool 15 minutes, then cut into pieces and serve.


Tomato and Olive Salad
4 tomatoes, cored, cut into 3/4-inch pieces
1/3 cup brine-cured black olives (such as Kalamata), pitted, halved
1/3 cup very thinly sliced red onion or shallot
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

Combine tomatoes, black olives and onion in medium bowl. Add olive oil and balsamic vinegar; toss to blend well. Season salad to taste with salt and pepper. Mix in arugula and serve.

Makes 2 Servings.

Rapini
boil for 2 minutes, remove and shock with ice water. Heat pan with garlic and olive oil. Sautee for 4 minutes.

Pesto and Red Pepper Crostini

DISH 37
New thing: I never made crostini before

We had friends over for dinner last night so I took the oppertunity to maybe get a few dishes ahead. The next couple of posts are the menu.

BELL PEPPER AND ONION CROSTINI WITH PESTO
1 (18- to 22-inch-long) baguette, cut into 60 (1/4-inch-thick) slices
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

For peppers and onions
6 assorted red, yellow, and orange bell peppers (3 lb), cut into 1/4-inch-wide strips
2 large onions (1 1/2 lb), cut lengthwise into 1/4-inch-thick slices
1 teaspoon finely chopped garlic
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon red-wine vinegar

For pesto
1 cup coarsely chopped fresh basil
1/4 cup pine nuts, toasted
1/4 cup finely grated parmesan (1 oz)
2 teaspoons chopped garlic
2 tablespoons water
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
1/3 cup olive oil

Make toasts:
Preheat oven to 350°F. Put baguette slices on 2 large baking sheets, then brush tops with oil and season with salt and pepper. Bake in batches in middle of oven until pale golden, about 10 minutes. Cool on a rack.

Cook peppers and onions:
Cook bell peppers, onions, and garlic with salt in oil in a wide 4- to 6-quart heavy pot over moderately low heat, uncovered, stirring occasionally, until softened, 20 to 25 minutes. Cover pot and continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until vegetables are very tender and just starting to brown, 20 to 25 minutes more. Stir in vinegar and remove from heat.

Make pesto while peppers cook:
Pulse all pesto ingredients except oil in a food processor until finely chopped. With motor running, add oil in a slow stream and blend until combined well.

Assemble crostini:
Put about 1 tablespoon pepper mixture on each toast and top with about 1/4 teaspoon pesto.

Makes 60 crostini.

Do not make the same mistake that I did and get bad bread. I was feeling too lazy to walk up the the good bakery and instead settled on some terrible hero rolls from the Eastern European grocery store near my apartment. Mistake. This recipe really counts on a decent, hearty compact bread.

Other than that it was delicious and very easy to make. My daughter helped me put them together, but ofcourse refused to eat any of them.

I made about 30 of them and between 4 people there were none left over.

technorati tags [crostini] [pesto] [snacks]

Hedgehogs with Grape Jam and Ketsup

kid food

DISH 36
If it isn't mac and cheese, just cheese or pb&j, my daughter won't touch it. She's 3. My son will eat anything that isn't nailed down, and if it is nailed down, he'll hunker down and suck on it. He's almost 11 mo.

I've decided that I should cook kid centric some of the time. I've always wanted to make chicken nuggets, so from my ancient Better Homes cookbook I found on the street a couple of weeks ago. Easy chicken nuggets. I called them hedgehogs because I thought it might trick my 3 yo. into trying them. I say chicken and forget it.

Here is the slightly modified recipe:
Hedghogs
preheat oven to 450
1 lb. chicken breast chopped into bit sized pieces
15 whole wheat crackers mashed up
panko (only because I'm trying to use it all up)
2 tbs. melted butter
2 tsp. worcestershire sauce
3 tbs. fresh grated romano or asiago cheese

dredge chicken in the butter worcestershire sauce mixture.

Put crushed crackers, panko and cheese into a zip lock bag. Put chicken pieces in the bag a few at a time to coat. Repeat. Set of baking sheet and cook for 9 minutes.

Serve with whatever dipping sauce your child likes. I found a combo or grape jam and catsup was a good one for the kids. I ate a few with BBQ sauce from Curtis's BBQ (Georgian style) mixed with some store bought sugary BBQ sauce.

technorati tags [kid food] [hedgehogs] [dipping sauce]

10% done. . . 330 more to go

The next 10%: Tons of Indian food (I live in a largely Indian neighborhood), coca leaf sorbet, all sorts of sandwiches, camping food (we are driving xcountry soon), absinth--if I can get a distiller, a few more creole things.

my tiny kitchen after my son pulled everything he could reach out of the pantry

Grape Ape

The Grape Ape

DISH 35
Never used before: cremini mushrooms, pecorino toscano

Today I made a sandwich that I have been thinking about for months. The Grape Ape. Partially it is because I love the name, partially it is because it sounded so damn good.

I'm so not ashamed about how much I loved Top Chef. And early on Dave 'I'm-not-your-bitch, bitch' Martin became one of my favorites. He knew his junk food (like me), he had platinum blonde hair (like me most of the time) he would cry a lot (like me). He also invented what I thought would be one of my favorite dishes for the sandwich challenge in an episode of Top Chef. There are only 2 recipes from that challenge online. One from lame-ass Stephen (what was up with the tie, BTW?) and the other is the Grape Ape. I made it for a picnic we had this afternoon.

from tech to food is cool

The recipe is here

Really, really, I should have used sourdough. Dave knows what he is doing and by not using sourdough I didn't do the sandwich justice. Instead I used this huge and wonderful ciabatta bread I get at fairway. I love it, but it wasn't right. Other than that I followed the recipe to the letter. It was great. A little salty. It didn't mention adding any greens, but I might just do that next time. . . . and there will be a next time.

technorati tags [dave martin] [grape ape] [top chef]

Indian Sweet Potato Latkes with Curry Yogurt

this photo doesn't do these justice. They are a bright beautiful orange with spots of green

DISH 34
new things: tumeric

The idea of making this recipe actually prompted me to haul myself out of bed before my kids woke me. This is a even more amazing as I am still catching up on sleep lost at Burning Man and I had an ambien for dessert last night.

I was considering serving this with eggs, but thought I would jst start simple.

Here is how it goes:
Indian Sweet Potato Pancakes with Curry Yogurt
1/2 cup frozen peas
1 medium onion, peeled
6 large sweet potatoes peeled
2 large eggs
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon ground coriander
1/4 teaspoon ground turmeric
1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
2 tablespoons minced peeled fresh ginger
2 tablespoons minced fresh cilantro
6 tablespoons vegetable oil
6 tablespoons butter

1 cups plain yogurt (I used fat free and it was good)
2 teaspoons curry powder
1/4 teaspoon fresh lime juice, plus more to taste

Preheat oven to 200°F. Place 2 nonstick baking sheets in oven.

cook peas, drain and set aside

Coarsely grate potatoes and onion, add to colander, and set aside to drain.

In large mixing bowl, lightly beat eggs. Whisk in flour, coriander, turmeric, and cumin. Mix in ginger, cilantro, and peas.

Press potatoes and onion to extract as much liquid as possible, then add to bowl. Season mixture with salt and freshly ground black pepper.

In heavy-bottomed, large skillet over moderately high heat, heat 1 tablespoon oil and 1 tablespoon butter until hot but not smoking. Drop 4 scant 1/4-cup portions of potato mixture into pan and flatten with spatula to form four 3-inch pancakes.

Fry until bottoms are golden-brown, 4 to 5 minutes, then turn over and fry until golden-brown and crisp, an additional 4 to 5 minutes. Keep warm on baking sheets in oven.

Wipe out pan. And 1 tablespoon oil and 1 tablespoon butter and fry 4 more pancakes. Repeat with remaining batter, wiping out pan and adding 1 tablespoon oil and 1 tablespoon butter before each batch.

mix together yogurt, lime juice and curry and serve with the pancakes.

Soooooo sooooo good. Next time I think that I will make them with eggs and maybe either a curry gravy or a peanut (thai-ish) sauce. I'll let you know how that works out.

So far, this is one of the most delicious things that I have made.

It's a 9.5 out of 10.

technorati tags [latkes] [orange] [breakfast]

Crawfish Étouffée

creole food just ain't pretty

DISH 33

new things: crawfish

I'm getting to the end of my Creole kick--at least for the time being. I had both shelled and in the shell crawfish/crayfish. I wanted to use the in the shell ones, but couldn't find a recipe for etouffee that called for the ones in the shell for anything other than garnish. I think I'll do a crawfish boil with the shell ones. I was to lazy to do a recipe that called for a dark roux, so I chose one that called for a white roux. Basically, just throwing in some flour and not darkening it at all.

It was pretty simple and straight forward. Here is how it went:
Crawfish Étouffée
serves 6
2 pounds cleaned crawfish tails
1/4 pound butter
1 cup onion, chopped
1/2 cup celery, chopped
½ cup green bell pepper, chopped
½ cup red bell pepper, chopped
1 cup tomatoes, diced
2 tbsp garlic, diced
2 bay leaves
1 cup flour
2 quarts fish stock
1 ounce sherry
1 cup green onions, chopped
salt and cayenne pepper to taste
hot sauce
2 cups white or brown rice
In a stock pot or dutch oven melt butter over medium-high heat. Add onion, celery, bell peppers, tomatoes, garlic and bay leaves. Sauté until vegetables are wilted, approximately 3-5 minutes. Add crawfish tails and tomato and blend well into mixture. Blend flour into the vegetable mixture to form a white roux. Slowly add fish stock or water, a little at a time, until sauce consistency is achieved. Continue adding more stock as necessary to retain consistency. Bring to a rolling boil, reduce to simmer and cook 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add sherry, green onions and parsley and cook an additional 5 minutes. Season to taste using salt and cayenne pepper. Serve over rice and add hot sauce for desired heat.

It was fine. I'm over the creole flavor for now. I think I'll like it better in a few weeks when I defrost it and try it again.

technorati tags [ugly food] [creole] [crawfish]

Burning Man -Food of the Playa

My stash of food that I hardly ate


the amazing meat cookie invented by a space cowboy


avocado, tomato, crustini salad made by Lacey @ Disor6nt


Chair Taco. Panda said if I just set it outside for long enough it would cook itself. hmmm. . . .


Slash and Burn Huevos Rancheros

DISH 32

After we decided that we really couldn't hack it in the tent we moved into an RV. I got to cook a bit and I made a quick huevos with what was around. Panda bought mini tacos from Costco, we had eggs, spicy cheese, salsa and lettuce. I made an scramble with the eggs, salsa and cheese which I served over the pan fried (not chair made) tacos. It was tasty served wapped in lettuce.

technorati tags [meat cookie] [Burning Man] [playa food]

Pineapple Sage Sorbet

pineapple sage sorbet. looks alot like basil citrus sorbet

DISH 31
Yet another sorbet. I am running out of steam with them. No one is really eating them, they just languish in my freezer until I need another freezer dish or some space and then I take a last few obligitory bits and trash the rest. Same might happen with this one, but I at least have to try.

Pineapple Sage Sorbet
2 pounds pineapple, pureed
1/2 cup water
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup pulverized sage
Pinch salt

Chop up and then puree a pineapple that has been in the fridge or freezer.

Put 1/2 cup water in a saucepan. Whisk sugar into the water to avoid clumps. Add vanilla, sage and salt. Bring ingredients to a boil; pour into chilled pineapple puree.

Blend pineapple and sugar mixture in a blender. Let cool. Freeze in an ice cream freezer according to manufacturer’s directions.

I also hear that this is good with watermelon instead of sage.

Tasty. My son loves it.

technorati tags [pineapple sage sorbet]