The Gravy Boat

Valentine’s Day Gift: Breads 1 and 2

This weekend had its romantic overtures (see Temple Grandin post), but there were some small sentiments, too, for my Valentine.  (Though, in hindsight, making three kinds of bread and a shepherd’s pie for dinner meant the better part of the day was spent in the kitchen, so it’s not SUCH a small sentiment).

French Baguettes and Light Oat Bread

I made two French-ish baguettes and a loaf of oatmeal sandwich bread for Valentine’s Day.  My fella isn’t too keen on sweets, so bread and meat pies tend to do the trick.

Recipe 1: French-ish baguettes (link)

I call these French-ish, because they are not crusty like a real French baguette.  They are a little crispy on the outside, but they are soft on the inside.  They make fantastic sandwich rolls (think Banh Mi sandwiches!), and this is the second time I’ve made this recipe in as many weeks.  You can either hand knead, stand-mixer knead, or use the dough cycle on your bread machine and the results are consistent.

Modifications: boiling water in a pan at the bottom of the oven to get a chewier crust and honey instead of white sugar.

Recipe 2: Light Oatmeal Sandwich Bread (link)

It’s hard to get a decent sandwich bread out of a bread machine, namely, because the shape of the pan is so weird and the bread often gets too dense. So I modified this recipe a bit and got excellent results.

Modifications: A little more salt (heaping teaspoon).  Use on dough cycle (about 1.5 hours), then punch down, press into a rectangle, and roll loosely.  Place in a lightly oiled 9x5 loaf pan, cover, and rise in a warm place for another 35 minute

Mad Men Dinner: Meatloaf

I had this grand idea of hosting Mad Men dinners on Sunday nights- my friends would come over, we’d eat early 60s style dinner and drink cocktails, and then watch the show.

And then I realized that my friends who watch Mad Men are internet friends- I talk about it so much with them I have weirdly blurred my realities.  Oh well, luckily for me, my man and my sister watch the show, and that’s enough for my entertainment AND we have the bonus of leftovers.

Mad Men Meal #1 was a simple execution: meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and sauteed zucchini and squash. It’s a favorite in my house, as it was when I was growing up.  I know, however, that meatloaf is a very personal thing- you either love it or you hate it, you either eat it with gravy (which we called Salisbury Steak instead) or a ketchup topping. More than likely, if you do like it, you probably favor your mother’s way of doing things. But perhaps your mother never made it, or you didn’t like it as a kid?  Give it another try (unless you’re a vegetarian I guess)- I think it’s a great staple for the home cook to perfect.  It’s an economical way to stretch a meal, and people are often comforted if you serve it to them (casually, of course) on a chilly night.  To watch Mad Men, for instance.  AHEM.

This meatloaf is adapted from my mother’s, but with a bit of updating.

Ingredients

• 1 TB butter or oil
• 1/2 large onion, chopped fine
• 3 stalks celery, chopped fine
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 3 pounds ground meat* (I go for what’s on sale, but a combination of beef, pork, and veal is pretty good, though this one is all beef cause that’s what was on sale- it’s meatloaf!)
• 1 sleeve of Saltines, or 1.5 c oats or breadcrumbs
• 2 eggs
• a few splashes Worcestershire sauce
• 1 c ketchup
• salt and pepper
• any variety of dried herbs that you like with meat- some use oregano, basil, or parsley.  I usually go for just parsley- about 2 tsp.
• a few tablespoons of milk if needed
• 1/2 c ketchup (again)

*You can use lean meat here- ground sirloin, lean pork, even ground turkey if mixed with another meat.  But you will be missing the fat that would keep the loaf moist- so consider experimenting with more milk/egg/ketchup.

Make it

1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

2.  Heat butter or oil in a medium sized skillet. Add celery, onions, and garlic and sautee until tender, about 7 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool.

3.  While the vegetables cool, put all the rest of the ingredients (except for the milk and second ketchup measurement) into a large bowl.

4.  Mix it all up with your hands.  Add the cooled sauteed vegetables.

5.  If your mixture seems too dry (it should stick together like when you form meatball-sized balls), add a few TB of milk.

6.  Form into a loaf and place in a baking dish. You don’t want to fill the whole thing because you’re going to need room for the fat to collect, and you don’t want that grease re-forming back into your loaf.

7.  Spoon the remaining ketchup on the top and sides of the loaf.

8.  Cover with foil and bake 1 hour.

9.  Remove foil to allow the ketchup to carmelize, continuing to bake another 20-30 minutes.  An instant-read thermometer should come out at about 160 degrees F.

10. Drain off any excess fat. 

Tabbouleh!

It’s hot.  When it’s hot, I like cold salads and things that cook quickly, because I don’t have central AC, but instead a giant window unit in the middle of the house that cools the kitchen as long as you don’t cook in it.

It’s hot.  When it’s hot, our garden gives a plenty.  We have so many tomatoes, cucumbers, mint, zucchini and squash that our yard is getting choked.

Luckily, Greek style food relies on so much of what we’re growing.

First, tabbouleh. I saw the Greek meze menu in this month’s Cooking Light and was inspired.  Cooking Light’s version of the salad is good, but I made a few adapatations, as I always do with Cooking Light- and it’s always to add more flavor.  I’m not sure who’s in their tasting kitchen, but I imagine they are midwestern, because they have a very, very light hand with the spices.

Tabbouleh is easy, but takes a few minutes to prep all the vegetables.  If you had a Slap Chop, it would go lightning fast.  To me, this wasn’t enough chopping to pull out the food processor, but I am pretty handy with a knife, so it didn’t seem like a big deal.

For salads like these, I prefer mise en place- everything in its place.  It also allows me to assign chopping duties to a helper as well.

Recipe

You’ll need

• 1  cup  uncooked bulgur
• 1  cup  boiling water
• 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice (2 lemons should do it)
• 2  tablespoons  extra-virgin olive oil
• 3  garlic cloves, minced
• 3  cups  chopped tomato (about 2 large)
• 1 1/4  cups  chopped seeded peeled cucumber (about 1 medium)
• 1  cup  chopped fresh parsley
• 3/4  cup  chopped green onions (about 3)
• 1/2  cup  chopped fresh mint
• 1 1/2  teaspoon  salt
• 1 1/2  teaspoon  freshly ground black pepper

How To

1. Place bulgur in a large bowl and cover with one cup of boiling water. Let stand, covered, for about 30-45 minutes.
2. Throw everything else in and let it steep at room temperature for about an hour.  It’s even better the next day.

Have Zucchini, Will Bake

Zucchini, Onion, and Havarti Tart

The impetus for this savory tart is a full raised bed +several containers of quickly pollinating summer squash plants.  If you’re considering this tart, you’ve either a)overzealously planted summer squash like I did or b) you have a friend or relative who has and wanted to unload this bounty upon you.

Unlike the tomato, which I could eat undoctored and raw three times a day all summer long, the zucchini needs some enhancement after you have grilled, steamed, frittered, sauteed, and juiced it.  So here’s a savory tart to help you attempt to deplete those summer squashes that will soon be taking over your back yard.

The tart dough is a fantastically easy crust that’s unfussy and doesn’t require a food processor or ice cubes or even a pie pan- the original recipe is here at New World Geek (and the fruit galette recipes that are included with it are excellent as well). The filling should take advantage of whatever extra vegetables you have lying around- I have made this tart with tomatoes, mushrooms, and yellow squash so far, and I’m sad to report that SOMEone will probably soon start asking for a disgusting roasted beet tart. But YOU should use whatever vegetables you like the taste of when they are roasted.

Ingredients

Dough

• 1.5 cups flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 8 tablespoons butter (yep that’s a whole stick), cut into 16 tiny cubes
• 4 tablespoons water, plus a little more
• 1 egg, beaten (optional- makes it shiny)
• Parchment paper

Filling (this is HIGHLY variable- experiment!)

• 2 medium sized zucchini, sliced
• 1/2 a medium sized onion, sliced
• 1.5 TB olive oil (give or take- don’t make it too greasy!)
• Salt and Pepper to taste
• a few ounces of havarti cheese, cubed (yeah, you can grate it, but havarti is soft and annoying to grate and who has time to remember to freeze it before they want to grate it? not me, especially when I’m making this at breakfast)

Directions

Make the Filling

1. Preheat oven to 400 F.
2. Place vegetables on a cookie sheet and drizzle olive oil over them- rub them around with your hands to get an even coating.
3. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.
4. Roast until browned, about 20 minutes.
5. Allow to cool while you make the dough.

Make the Dough

1.  In a medium sized bowl, mix the flour and salt.
2.  Sprinkle the butter on top of the dry ingredients and avoid the temptation to eat one of the butter cubes.

3.  Using your hands, work the butter into the flour until it resembles chunky sand.    You can use a pastry blender or a two knives, but your hands will work just fine.  This takes all of 5 minutes, so have a quick fake fight in your head with someone who deserves a good ass whipping and your dough will be done in no time.

4.  Start by sprinkling 4 tablespoons of water over the dough and mix with a non-stick spatula/spoon.  This is a minimum number, wholly dependent on the planetary alignment of the day.  The dough should be sticky enough to form into  a ball but not SO sticky that you won’t be able to press it into a thin layer.  So add more water by the half tablespoon.  This particular tart took 6 TB of water, but just pay attention to the malleability of the dough rather than numbers.  If you got excited and added too much water, just add a bit more flour and you’ll be fine.

5.  Form the dough into a rough ball and place on parchment paper on a workspace.  Roll it out til it’s about 1/2” thick.  I don’t even have a rolling pin and I achieved this with a tall cocktail glass.  That’s how unfussy this dough is.

6.  Put your vegetable filling in the middle of the dough.
7.  Put the cheese chunks on top of that.
8.  Fold up the tart in whatever shape you want.
9.  Brush with beaten egg
10. Place parchment and tart on a cookie sheet and bake until golden, 25-35 minutes.

11. DO NOT eat immediately.  You will burn the hell out of your throat. Let cool about 10 minutes and then bask in the appreciation of whomever you’re going to share this with.

When In Doubt Red Beans and Rice

This is a recipe for quick red beans and rice.  Yes, yes, purists have particular steps and processes and spices, but I have to say, this is country food, and that means to me that you are using up what you have in your fridge, and tonight, my fridge had:

1 lb Polska Kielbasa (though andouille is really preferable), sliced into chunks small enough for your mouth

1  green bell pepper, chopped

1 white onion, chopped

2 stalks celery, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

2-3 tsps Creole seasoning

2 cans kidney beans, drained and rinsed

2 c water

1 c white rice

2 c water

Your fave cornbread recipe (Southern corn bread doesn’t have sugar)

Directions

1. Saute onions, bell pepper, and celery until tender in a Dutch oven.  Add garlic and stir.
2. Add sausage slices and cook till things are getting juicy.
3. Add beans to pot.
4. Add Creole seasoning and stir to coat everything.
5. Add some (~2 c) water. Bring to a boil, then turn down the heat to simmer and things start to thicken up a bit.
6. Meanwhile, steam some rice.  Put 1 c rice into medium sized pot and pour 2 c water on top.  Bring to a boil.  Cover and reduce heat to low. Steam for about 20 minutes.
7. While the rice steams, there should be enough time to make the cornbread (just let the rice sit and the beans to simmer while you finish up the cornbread).
8. Like all stew-ish type meals, this is even better the next day.  Make fresh rice for it, though.

Avocado & Lime Chicken Tacos

After I make something annoying and complicated, I make tacos the next day.  This is because

a) I can only handle making a tedious meal every other day

b) We usually have leftover produce and protein that needs to be eaten up.

c) Tacos are delicious.

This is not a recipe- more of a process.

1.  Start with a package of corn tortillas.  CORN.  Flour tortillas are bullshit. Try to get ones that are made in your town for maximum fresh.

2.  Next, marinate or fancy up some kind of protein you have around.  Here, I used a package of skinless thighs I got from Costco- about a pound.  We squeezed some lime juice on to them, added a little oil (cause they were skinless), cayenne, salt, and cumin.  Then we sauteed them in small chunks until they were done.

3.  Make your tacos.  Fill them with whatever you want—- tonight we had avocado, cilantro, plain yogurt, and salsa.  With refried beans and fruit.

Snappy Snapper

Grilled Red Snapper with Mojo de Ajo

We decided to grill up a whole fish, which we’ve never done before.  We went to Dirk’s, a great fishmonger here in Chicago, and picked up a red snapper.  The fish guy gave us a recipe from their recent cooking class- Red Snapper with onions and garlic.

We started with a cleaned, gutted and scaled fish.

Then we scored it and rubbed it down with olive oil, making sure to get oil inside the scores and the belly.

I stopped to make him sing for Nick.

Then I salted and peppered the fish and let him sit for about 45 minutes before we grilled him.  Meanwhile, we fired up the charcoals to get them HOT.

While the grill heated up, I chopped 1 large white onion (though in hindsight, it was WAY TOO much), and juiced 1/2 cup of lime juice.

I chopped up 1/2 c of mild spring garlic.

We grilled the fish about 8 minutes a side…

We heated up the canola oil to smoking, put the fish on the platter, and dumped the lime juice, garlic, and onions on top of him, then poured the hot oil on top of it all and sizzled the hell outta it.

Filleted the fish, served up with black beans and rice and mangoes.

Endnotes: Next time, I’ll cook the onions and garlic in a pan rather than relying on a hot flash of oil— I just can’t eat that much raw garlic/onion combo and plan on sleeping ever again- then I’ll top it with the lime juice, and some cilantro.