Update on Slightly Gourmet Class

I really enjoy teaching the cooking courses at OLLI. Some of my current students are returnees, others are new faces who have no idea what we generally do in the course. They quickly learn that it is very informal, that everyone seems to want to pitch in and the camaraderie is almost as good as the food.  Which has been very good so far. We've not had too many failures and even if the shortcoming of a particular food is a concern, it is something like the pie not having time to cool off and firm up before the end of class or the kale wasn't fresh enough by the time I brought it to class.

Still, I think we get a lot done in a short time. With the Slightly Gourmet class, last meeting we had shrimp stuffed with crab, sauteed kale, grits, and coconut custard pie. The latter quite sweet even though I cut short on some of the sugar called for in the recipe We finished up just in time as a new group was coming into the cottage for a class or club meeting.

Next class: Rock Cornish Game hens glazed with orange marmalade, rice pilaf with mushrooms, minted peas, a lettuce salad with grapefruit, red onion, and feta cheese, and for dessert: scoops of pumpkin ice cream, blood orange sherbet and a pumpkin cookie. Sound good? We'll see.

Easy Cooking with a Salt Block

Katy gave me the greatest toy for my birthday and I've been playing with it for awhile now and can recommend it to others. It is a block of pink salt, about the size and shape of a brick and very heavy.  You cook on it. First, you heat it up in a 375 degree oven for 30 minites. It comes out very hot so one's hands must be well protected when removing it from the oven. I put down a folded tea towel on  my cooktop and work with it there.  We cooked chicken cutlets, fish filets, shrimp and that worked quite well. I have cooked tuna steak and a salmon steak on it also.

Once the salt brick is out of the oven you lay down the raw fish on top and then monitor it for a few minutes. It will cook on one side, then you flip the fish over and finish it off in a few more minutes. For filets, this takes about eight minutes altogether. I sprinkle a little lemon on top, maybe add a sprig of thyme for flavor and that is it. The salt permeates the product in that short time to give it a nice flavor. I suspect that if one were doing a quantity it would have to go back into the oven for another heat -up.

We tried the another option which is to chill it in the fridge or freezer, and then lay down ice cream scoops; salt gives a nice touch to ice cream.   Ever enjoy ice cream with salted pretzels? A wonderful pairing!

Salt blocks come in various sizes and shapes.  The blocks are pretty too, being pink.

Our Family Cooks

I've neglected the blog..but not without an excuse. I've been celebrating with my family, all of whom descended on Reston at once from Norway and Copenhagen lasst month. Priscilla and the Norwegians have returned home but Katy is still with me until the end of the week. Lovely.

So with so many people around, we were continually planning wonderful meals, either in or out. Since all of us are good cooks, the kitchen became the center of much activity, including a small boy with a bouncing ball and a tall five year old girl climbing over her teen aged boy cousins. Oh how they hated that, you bet.

But this is a foodie blog; so on to the fact that the week we spent together, my family and the family of Pete's Janice,  each night a different pair of us would make the meal for that evening. So we had seafood and risotto, burgers on the grill, ciabolli  and a wonderful banana cake for my birthday and lots of watermelon and fresh beautiful tomatoes. As an old shore vacationer, I insisted that they visit the candy store and get some fudge and salt water taffy. Several kinds emerged and we spent some time checking which was the best.

That part of summer over, I'm now organizing the food list for the Summerfest party at OLLI on August 23rd. That too will be a food lover's paradise and I hope many OLLI folks have signed up to attend.

The Second Installment on Herbs

Just to finish up on the open kitchen theme, we had our second herb event and the last for the summer on Wednesday and it too went quite well. We shall have to make it an annual thing. This time the salads included a beet salad, and a fresh green...romaine and endive... with lots of parsley and basil and a light lemony vinaigrette dressing; also a salad that uses the ingredients of gazpacho soup but in a layered form...quite beautiful actually, and then I cooked some green beans and added blackberries and oregano. Then for the sandwiches we had English muffin pizzas using ketchup, basil, mozzarella and oregano; also roasted deli pork (Wegman's), slices of red onion, horseradish,  mayo and fresh sage leaves on rye/pumpernickel swirl bread. Finally, I had made some herb biscuits that used rosemary and thyme  and had a bunch of condiments to spread on them like Trader Joe's pub cheese, hummus, gorgonzola cheese (left over from my cheese class the day before) and some lovely Italian bread when the muffins ran out. I had also made some herb butter with soft butter and basil and another with rosemary. We had plenty to eat and about sixteen persons showed up. 

Valerie had extensive information written up on the chalk board telling about  herbs we used, a little history and usage, tips on keeping the herbs, etc. It tied everything together. She was really helpful with the whole project as was Bo-Kyung Kim, her sidekick who knows lots about herbs. I hope our lunchers will try some of these herbal ideas.

Open Kitchen Features Herbs

Yesterday we had our first drop-in kitchen event at OLLI where we had sandwiches and salads that incorporated a number of fresh herbs. This as a tribute to Valerie's Dirty Knee Club who have planted a variety of herbs outside the front door, handy to supply the dishes that we will be enjoying through  summers to come. We had 15 lunchers and I used maybe five different herbs, including basil, mint, chives, sage, parsley. Next week we will use different herbs for fresh new dishes.

So the salad menu included: cut-up watermelon, cherry tomatoes, chopped mint in a dressing of lemon juice, sugar, honey, tad of salt; French potato salad, an oil-based salad of small red and white  potatoes in an emulsion of olive oil, vinegar, dijon mustard, a little white wine, and a good quantity of chopped parsley, dill, and basil; cucumber and scallion salad; and storebought vinegar and oil cole slaw with sprinkled-on chopped dill.  For the sandwiches, we had chicken salad with chopped sage on white bread; cream cheese and smoked salmon on various bagels with chopped dill; and open faced tomato, mozzarella, pesto and fresh basil on ciabatta bread.  Iced tea was infused with mint because Valerie had made ice cubes with chopped mint frozen into them.

Comment and camaraderie were excellent and I think folks learned some new tricks and fresh ideas. Looking forward to next week's offerings.

Blood Kin and Fish

Mostly this is a family post, plus food. That's because I returned a few days ago from a long anticipated reunion with six of altogether 13 first cousins who came from various parts of the country. Sadly, four of those thirteen have passed and two couldn't make it, but it was a good lively group, full of funny stories, revealed information and tons of photos and home movies.

We gathered at Donna's house in Palm City, Florida, a beautiful home with lots of space to move about. Her gracious husband David vacated so as to leave us cousins alone with our memories and keep it "clean", I guess, of any interfering personalities. It wasn't necessary and he did return for an evening when we all went out to dinner. To add to the conversation was an elaborate genealogy David had worked up and bound for each to take home with us.

Well, dinner in Florida can be a fabulous experience. So much seafood, eaten beside the water with soft breezes blowing through our hair. Menus that offered so many choices made it difficult to settle but any choice was awesome. My new favorite is Conch Fritters. I love the seafood restaurants in Fairfax County and given an option will choose one of the best of those rather than a beefy grill. So of course I was in dining -out heaven because we always chose a seafood place wherein to hang out. Some of our favorite memories growing up were shared weeks in the summer at the New Jersey seashore, fish being a large part of that.

I've not seen these dear ones in a very long time and didn't realize how much I carried my love for them and theirs for me, into our mature adult years. To add to the fun, some of them look like me or my mother. Well they should, right?

Remembering the Sauce

I just finished a long chat with my grownup niece who lives in Michigan, the daughter of my late sister Deedy, the one who taught me so much about cooking. It was fun to rub memories with each other but what amused me was our discussion about spaghetti sauc. I learned how to make spaghetti sauce from my sister, the real stuff from scratch and I always thought it was wonderful. Remember, those were the days before jarred sauces so you began with browning the beef and adding tomatoes in the paste, sauce and whole forms. Lots of oregano and long cooking.  What my niece Sarah told me was a great surprise; she said that when she and her brothers were growing up, they literally hated that sauce. Imagine that.

As for my family, we were a two career family and so my husband was the cook and his spaghetti sauce was an adapted from scratch recipe so it wasn't my sister's sauce.   I think spaghetti sauce is a personal thing. I don't like any variety that is too sweet even if it is the best seller. If it is red and thick, I make it work.

Check OLLI's doc store for recipes

With the end of the spring term also came the end of our Ethnic Cooking class. I must say, we certainly did see a lot of good, varied cooking in those weekly 90 minute sessions and the variety was just delightful. Each week the students came in not knowing what we would be witnessing that day and they were always delighted and satisfied with the results. Each chef had his or her own individual style and discussions were unique since they had to do with the background of each chef.

Now you can check the OLLI doc store for the recipes except for the Lebanese that will come later when the chef gets back from her travels. Go to the website, click on doc store and scroll down to the F900 class and download the attachment there. Then cook  like crazy. Bon appetit.

Try this Vegetable Soup

So, yesterday I made the French Vegetable Soup that Cecile Heatley made with our ethnic cooking class several weeks ago and that is included in her book, "In Grandmere's Kitchen."  (reviewed elsewhere on this blog). This has to be the easiest soup in the world to make and it is so delicious. I call it basically a "chop and drop" recipe for into a large soup kettle of salted water, you drop chunks of peeled potato, carrots, celery, turnips and leeks. Trader Joe's sells a package of frozen cut up leeks and you only need to use part of the bag. Cook the soup for about an hour or until the vegetables are all soft. Then let it cool just a bit before you take the immersion blender to it to make a lovely puree. If you don't have that very useful tool, you can process by batches in the food processor. Check for seasoning...I like black pepper...and you have yourself a lot of really good vegetables. I'm inclined to drop in a glob of butter at this point or a swirl of cream, just to make it richer. But the soup can stand easily on its own. Cecile reminded me that you could also add any leftover veggies that are hanging around your fridge.

Vegetable cookbook from the "Good Old Days"

I've downloaded a very intriguing cookbook on my Kindle  and have enjoyed reading it, if not taking the recipes into my own repertoire. Published in 1919, "Vaughan's Vegetable Cook Book"  offers to tell us how to cook and use Rarer Vegetables and Herbs, "a Boon to Housewives" and published by Vaughan's Seed Store. Vaughan evidently operated out of New York and Chicago and he said he had greenhouses, nurseries and trial grounds in Western Springs, Illinois.  The delight of this book is the language and the delivery of recipes, using words like "gill"  (four ounces), "half teacup full", and other handy measurements not usually found on your  Pyrex glass cup, but still they work for me. I noticed also with the very complete listing of vegetables along with some I've never heard of, he used lots of butter, cream and eggs. Certainly if one were a vegetarian who eats eggs and cheese, this cookbook offers lots of ideas...albeit maybe not very healthy ones since many of the recipes are so rich.

What interests me is that here we have a cooking culture of the early twentieth century that is virtually out of fashion right now with our preference for steamed and roasted veggies. One wonders if many people are still cooking in the same way. I may just have to try a few recipes for a special event, not as a regular practice, to see how they go over with my diners. I would bet the amount of butter in itself would guarantee enthusiastic good reviews. All of the spinach recipes included hard boiled eggs in one way or another.

Ethnic Cooking Series half way through

Now that we've accomplished four classes in the ethnic cooking series, I'm happy to report it is going well. Last Monday, Cecile Heatley taught us how to make crepes and French mayonnaise and this week she returns for new culinary surprises. The final three classes will include my Norwegian family's favorite recipes and then we have contributions from our Korean and Lebanese friends. With such an assortment of cultures contributing, the class is very rich in so many ways.  We've managed to fill all twelve seats each week since those who must miss a class have been faithful in letting me know in advance so I can get someone from the wait list to fill in.

Perhaps we can do this again if we find some new cultural backgrounds among our members who will be willing to share.

Less work for me too.

Looking for fresh herb ideas

The Dirty Knee Club is planting an herb garden at the cottage. Because of that, I plan to do two presentations in the summer term on use of fresh herbs in sandwiches and salads. We'll have an open kitchen format so that folks can show up and learn how to use the various fresh herbs from our garden. I already have plenty of ideas for these herbs, but can always use a few new ones from cooks who enjoy using them in creative ways in sandwiches and salads. I can't do a cooking with herbs class because I don't have time this summer to tackle a wholesale herb-cooking program.  The herbs being planted are : sage, rosemary, parsley, chives, tarragon, basil, mint, oregano, thyme, and dill. Just email me with ideas at debbyhalv@aol.com with your suggestions.Thanks for the help.

Please ask to be an author

Today I urged the members of the Board of Directors at the tail end of their meeting to check out my blog. Self-serving as that would seem because as I look at it, mostly everything on it is me chattering on about family stuff that relates to food. Before those hard-working board members comply with my request, I'd like to have someone beside myself put something up here. At this point, it needs some fresh ideas, a different style of writing etc. So if you haven't been invited to author for the blog, as must be the case according to the bloggy rules, let me know by email ( debbyhalv@aol.com( that you would like to be an author. You will immediately receive a request to join as such from the blog people. The behind the scenes stats indicate that this blog is being read by a goodly number of people, even at odd little corners of the globe. So talk to us about restaurants, recipes, food tips, intense food dislikes and likes. Please help me keep the narrative going in a variety of directions.

On the way home from Fairfax, I had an early dinner at a local family restaurant. Sent the vegetables back, because even though they were lovely and fresh, they were barely cooked. My big complaint is about under-cooking fresh veggies. If I want a raw vegetable, I'll order a salad.  Green beans should be cooked through and carrots soft, not crunchy. This quick steaming thing may be the current popular way to present vegetables, but I want them cooked. The waiter graciously took them away and returned them to me steamed in lemon juice and quite edible.

The Season for Wishes

My mother enjoyed any opportunity to wish on something. In the spring, when in those olden days asparagus wasn't as plenteous throughout the year, she would wish on the first asparagus of the season to hit our table. So last week when asparagus was on sale and really very nice indeed, I bought a bunch and wished on it. Not going to tell you what my wish was, but I have put that bunch of the tender green stems to good use. Some to top my homemade white pizza, some to brighten a risotto dish and now looking for another use for the rest.

"Better Homes and Gardens" this month has some appealing ideas: There's "Avocado and Egg Sandwiches"; "Asparagus Fritter Sticks"; "Ham and Asparagus Stuffed Chicken; "Garlicky Asparagus Flatbread"; "Roasted Asparagus Orange Salad"; "Fresh Asparagus Ribbon Salad"; and finally "Grilled Asparagus Soup with Chili Croutons". You can look up these recipes on BH&G's website, but I'm sure you can create something akin just from reading  these good looking recipe titles.  Many good cooks  are roasting all of their vegetables  these days. As for me, I"m fine with steamed, sprinkled with lemon juice and buttered.

What's next to wish on? Maybe English peas. Something's got to work.

Full of bologna!

At the risk of ruining my culinary integrity, if I do indeed have that, I have been playing with that cheapest of cheap deli meats, bologna. Several years ago, I watched Emeril take a whole loaf of bologna, lather it with brown sugar and mustard and bake it for four hours. Bologna was the lunch meat of my childhood before we could afford to buy ham for sandwiches and for me they occasionally serve as comfort food, spread with lots of mayo on soft white bread.

Well, with the memory of Emeril's recipe, I picked up a one inch hunk of bologna from the deli and when I got it home, I cut it in half. With one half I decided to make salad.The web provided me with recipes for bologna salad...like ham salad and including hard boiled egg and pickle relish, all put through the food processor and mixed with mayo. The egg gave it good texture and broke the too much bologna taste. It was supposed to include capers but I was out of them.The other half of the chunk I slathered with a mixture of mustard and brown sugar, wrapped it in foil and baked it for about 45 minutes. The coating turned to a lovely sweet syrup and the meat turned out to be quite tasty. I was surprised it was as good as it was and decided that if I do it again, it will pair well with sweet potatoes or baked beans, even in a sandwich made of good brown bread.

Clearly I have the winter boredoms. Good thing classes start soon.

A Meal Planning Change (Temporary)

I've decided to do an experiment with my single lifestyle eating and cooking plan. I've toyed for a long time with the idea that I could eat quite well for less by eating out and carrying the leftovers home, and pairing that with trying the many very appealing convenience dishes from Trader Joe's. Adding the cost of those to what I need for breakfast and lunch, would I come up with a lower payout? Would I enjoy getting out more frequently to ethnic and family restaurants,would I eat as well as I do when cooking for myself?

Before I could do this, I had to consume what had piled up in my freezer like chicken, fish, pot roasts and leftover casseroles. Actually, I've just about done this since I began my plan a month ago. Now there are only a few burgers, a small chuck roast, a piece of frozen flounder and one turkey that I bought a few months ago for $5.00 when it was on sale and I couldn't resist. Of course, the freezer still holds a bunch of frozen vegetables and some breakfast waffles and a treat or two.  I will not succumb to good deals on chicken parts; I won't drop in to Safeway on $5.00 Fridays and pick up a rotisserie chicken, nor will I fill the freezer with single servings of sausage. My cart will include only fresh produce and dairy for breakfast and lunch and only if they are on my list.  I shall have to limit my cooking creative yearnings to those two meals.

I'll let you know how it turns out in a month but I think it will be fun.

Those Indians knew a good thing...

My dad loved succotash. That juicy combination of lima beans, corn, lots of pepper and salt and milk or cream in a side dish was something my mother served fairly often. I liked it too. But when I tried to serve it to my growing family, it was greeted with a unanimous "yuk". So that left the menu...until this week when I made it for myself and realized how much I had missed it. In truth, it became even better  like so many dishes do when heated up the night following its return to my table. Dad really knew what good food was (he also liked Scrapple and Taylor's Pork Roll) and so did the American Indians when they introduced it to the Pilgrims way back then.

Where do the Cubans get their pork?

My partner in crime with the cooking club, Doris Bloch, hosted a meeting that focused on Hawaiian and Caribbean flavors last week. I decided to do what I thought would be simple to make, which it really was, except that I had a real challenge finding an ingredient. I chose to make Cuban sandwiches, which is a lineup of pickle slices, roasted pork, ham, Swiss cheese, and yellow mustard on Cuban bread. French bread a suitable substitute. I was sure I had seen deli pork roast somewhere and didn't consider that a problem. After facing several supermarket deli persons' "duh, sorry" responses, I figured I'd have to actually roast a hunk of pork. Yet, when I approached Harris Teeter, they said that they would have roast pork that afternoon. When I got there after four pm, another blank stare when I asked for that pound of sliced roast pork. Turns out the roast pork they earlier mentioned was a hot hunk of roast pork scheduled to go over and join the rotisserie chickens. So, I bought it, sliced it down, layered my sandwiches and put them on the pannini machine and... became a fan of Cuban sandwiches.

But just to prove I wasn't dreaming about seeing roast pork in a deli: In my early exploratory moments, I had sent an email to Wegman's asking them if they had deli roast pork. A day or so after our party, the deli man from that incredible store called to tell me he had a very good roll of roast pork that goes for $10.00 a  pound. Now I plan to get some of that because my mouth is set for a good rye bread, mustard and pork sandwich, maybe with a slice of red onion. Keep in mind, however, HP's roast pork piece  weighed a pound, already cooked cost $6.99. To indulge my pricey fancies,  I have to drive 10 miles to my nearest Wegman's.

New Jersey has pork stores; what's the matter with Virginia?

La Caraquena, Falls Church

I occasionally watch "Diners, Drive-ins and Dives" on the Food Network, hosted by Guy Fieri, and always wonder if I shall ever be near any of the many restaurants he highlights. A week of so ago he did have a local Latin American restaurant featured and it looked really interesting and the food good. So I Googled it and saw that it had been reviewed in the local newspaper and with enthusiastic comment that indicated others feel as the reporter and Guy did. How many of our readers have been there? Would like to know before I venture outside of my Reston neighborhood.

Beginning Italian Students Love Ricotta Pie

My sources tell me that those taking Beginning Italian F501 recently had a foodie class where they each brought in a dish to class. The ricotta pie, made by the instructor Donna Kendall, was so good it has found its way to the doc store where all sorts of good stuff may be found.  Another reason to check out this wonderful OLLI reference source. Scroll to F501 and then you too can make a ricotta pie. It sounds just terrific!

Comfort Food Class Ends

It's been a few since I posted a new blog and that's because I've been distracted by the visit of my daughter Katy, here from Copenhagen just to visit with her mother. She's been here almost two weeks, quiet weeks, since I can't think of exciting things to do at this time of year that we both would enjoy. Nonetheless, she keeps busy with a book she's polishing up and what we both enjoy, eating. Yesterday she joined me in the comforts food class where we cooked shepherd's pie made with lamb and rice pudding. I think she expected to sit quietly in the corner and just observe, but it wasn't long before she was stirring and pitching in with others to save the day. It was fun for me, the students seemed to enjoy having her and final conclusion to this, the final day of the winter term for our class, the food came out really delicious. I shall miss this class as they  have been a fun group.

Within a week, I plan to put the recipes from this class on doc store so that everyone can replicate them. I expect to repeat this series again next winter term with new recipes that most of us find comforting.

Fish Night

This week's Fish Night was a very simple affair -- seven people and a simple crab and pasta dish. I had seen the recipe in the Food Section of the Washington Post the preceding Wednesday. Our Fish Night cocktail was really good -- something called an Apple Ginger Calvados Cocktail from a beautiful website called "Gourmande in the Kitchen." The honey ginger syrup that you make for this is a real keeper. I'm going to try to think of other ways to use it -- otherwise I might simply drink it straight from the fridge!

Last week's menu was more interesting, however, and I did not get a chance to blog about that because I did some traveling starting before dawn the next morning. Last week, our Monday Night cocktail was a Nassau Sam (using Hugo's Nassau Royale which I forgot to return to him on the preceding Fish Night). It was OK -- not very interesting. With our drinks, we munched from a cheese, olive, marcona almond platter.

There may actually have been a theme to this dinner -- four of the recipes I used are from "Essential Pepin" which is a collection of Jacques Pepin's recipes from throughout his career. He's one of my favorite TV chefs and this book is considered by many to be the best cook book of 2011, so it was a no-brainer to add it to my collection and starting cooking from it right away. We started with his Onion Soup-Lyonnaise Style which is truly wonderful and far easier to make than the classic version. I highly recommend this recipe. Then we had:

• Mousse-Stuffed Trout with Sweet Vermouth Sauce -- this is also from "Essential Pepin" but I can't find an internet link that will allow me to share the recipe. This is really sad because the dish was terrific -- very, very elegant and tasty! It would be perfect for a special dinner and makes an amazing presentation. So buy the book!
• "Cottage" Fried Potatoes -- just because I had some small red potatoes that needed to be used as they were starting to sprout!
• Braised Endive with Olives -- I don't get much positive reinforcement for this (to say the least!), but I love trying new and unusual side dishes for my Fish Night guests. I loved this, but it was not unanimously appreciated! Again, no link to the recipe, but you can watch Jacques make it online.
• Butter Glazed Carrots -- again from my "Essential Pepin." These were good, but I actually like other glazed carrot recipes better.

For dessert, with our coffee and tea, we had shortbread. I can say, without hesitation, that I have finally found the best recipe and technique for shortbread. I'm experimenting now with different flavors and seasonings. Tangy Line Shortbread? Lavender-Scented? What do you think? I'm convinced I can do even better next time.

"In Grandmère's Kitchen"

I've spent the last several hours doing what I enjoy most: reading through a new cookbook. This time, the book is written by our dear OLLI friend and wife to our OLLI member George Heatley. French chef Cécile Heatley has written  a wonderful book, which judging from the cover blurb suggests that this is only the first volume of more to come.  "In Grandmère's Kitchen: Food and Traditions from France and Around the World for the Modern Cook " is a well organized and very complete book of just under 150 pages. Bound in a spiral binding with slick covers that can be easily wiped off, this first volume is devoted to vegetables and fruit, my favorite ingredients.

Cécile begins by offering a glossary of fresh produce, describing them, how to select, how to store and prepare. Her following chapters are in these categories: soups, appetizers and salads, main courses and side dishes, desserts and finally, odds and ends. Her recipes, despite the fact that one assumes French recipes are complicated, are not complicated at all. Where an ingredient might seem obscure or difficult to find, she gives hints on either where to find it or a substitute. All written in plain English by this very French woman.  In between the aforementioned chapters, she inserts personal anecdotes, historical background, and even a list of foodie movies.

Noting that the title is "In Grandmère's Kitchen" you might expect that Cécile includes ways to include the grand-kids in the cooking process. You would be right.  Lovely pictures of the Heatley grand-kids begin the book, showing them peeling veggies for their grandmother's current cooking project.

What I like best about this book is that it gives me new ideas about how to cook some veggies that I've always done in the same old way. Little tips, putting something with something I've never tried before; my creative juices (sorry, no pun intended) are burbling, and I am about to run out and buy a few eggplants and a package of artichoke hearts to play with. This is a very practical book.

The price is $20 and very much worth it. Email Cécile at cecileheatley@gmail.com or grab George next time you see him on campus. Likely he'll have a few copies in the trunk of his car.

Comforting Foods

My comfort foods class on Monday really worked out well. Sometimes we don't have enough time to complete the recipes because we have just so many minutes to put the dishes together. But with some advance preparation that didn't rob my students of a learning process, it all came out better than good. We had ham and bean soup and I had soaked the beans at home and also I had boiled the ham hock at the same time in a separate pot with two teaspoons of herbes de Provence. When I arrived at the cottage kitchen, I presented the group with ham stock, softened beans and hocks with meat just falling off the bones Members of the group chopped an onion, several carrots and two sticks of celery and mushed up four cloves of garlic. They stripped the ham off the bones and then everything went into one pot and cooked for an hour by which time the beans were soft and I finished off the project by using a emulsion blender to mush up some of the  beans.

At the same time we put together two glorious egg custard pies. I used Pillsbury's ready made pie crust and lined two pie plates, building up the edges to make them deeper. Then mixed up eggs, milk and sugar with a little vanilla and poured into the shells, dotted with some butter and with great difficulty, one of my helpers moved the very sloppy pies to the oven where in about 35 minutes they had firmed up. Very eggy and creamy and the added whipped cream, raspberries, banana slices and shredded coconut didn't hurt this elegant dessert. I had also brought from home some from -scratch hot chocolate to further the comfort ambiance along A very happy, relaxed group of eaters.

Jersey Quality Diner in Virginia

I'm a Jersey girl through and through. So when I came to Virginia over eight years ago I looked around to find a good diner like I was accustomed to enjoying in my native state. New Jersey is famous for its diners. Alas, all I could find was the Silver Diner at the two locations that I know of and they just didn't measure up.

More recently, I stopped in at the Silver Diner one afternoon and was delighted to see a very fresh menu, with local products featured in imaginative variety. So, last evening, looking for something comfortable and homey, I stopped in for dinner. Again, as I looked through the menu I could have chosen any number of dishes to fit the bill,  but settled on an all-time favorite, liver and onions with bacon, mushrooms and all the fixings.  It was excellent, the liver soft and moist, and even the accompanying veggies were fresh and steamed correctly. I have a thing about half cooked, half not- cooked fresh vegetables.  The service was really good with a cute young waiter who seemed bent on keeping me in hot tea and checking my progress throughout the meal, but not annoyingly so. Restaurant not too crowded.  Best of all, someone was feeding silver into a juke box that was playing out tunes from the 50's and 60's with understandable lyrics and a gentle beat. I recommend you grab a friend or go by yourself  and give the Silver Diner at West Ox and Fair Lakes a try. Not as classy as my favorite fancy restaurants but for under fifteen dollars you get a delightful good meal. Like you can get at any Jersey diner.  Tell them, "Debbie sent you."

Fish Night

To celebrate Chinese New Year, we dined with some of our regular Fish Night guests at Asia Nine in D.C. They have a wonderful prix fixe menu especially for this great holiday, and the food was amazing. I can recommend it heartily! Is anyone else doing something food-wise to celebrate the Year of the Dragon?

The Soup That Keeps on Giving

Today in our Comfort Foods class we made Potato and Leek soup. It came out really good, everyone seemed to enjoy it although I contend that it needed more salt. Our brownies were really comforting and for a day like today both were pitched to bring the ultimate comfort.

After the class I scurried to Reston for my 2 pm. class, Gloria Sussman's music class that I absolutely never miss, although I was late, and after I picked my way across the darkened room to the only chair available so late in the session, I sat down to enjoy the violin music that was streaming from the speakers. As I sat there, something caused me to sniff and sure enough I realized that I smelled like an onion!  My clothes must have absorbed the cooking aromas from the soup. After the class, I asked the guy sitting next to me if he smelled the leek-y soup and he said he thought what he smelled was Chinese food. I made my impression. Next week 's offering may be loaded with garlic.

No More Free Juice Glasses

When I was a kid, my favorite refrigerator sneaky-snack was a  finger lick of pimiento cheese that came in a small glass, later recycled into a juice glass. I loved that stuff. But when it no longer appeared in our fridge, I forgot about it until more recent years when I would occasionally buy it. Pretty pricey for what it is. Then Bobbie Deen, Paula's son, brought it up on his show the other day and claimed his mother made it for his family, spreading it on grilled cheese sandwiches. I watched him put together pimiento cheese quick as a lick. A half cup of soft cream cheese, a half cup of shredded cheddar cheese, a quarter cup of jarred roasted red peppers, chopped,  and a hefty tablespoon of olive tapenade. Mix it all up and lather some between bread and make yourself the most delicious grilled cheese sandwich.  Gooey goodness, comfort food.

Not Your Canned Variety of Sardines

I've been getting the message from my Food Network that fresh sardines are terrific. I like sardines even in cans, but when I saw them fresh and plump in the fish case at Wegman's yesterday, I decided to try them. Picked up three about five inches long and undressed, so I had to gut and debone them, but that wasn't too hard or messy.

Once that was done and I'd rinsed them, I laid them flat on a parchment covered cookie sheet and spread them with a mixture of Panko flakes, oregano, salt, pepper and olive oil. Then I topped them with a slice of lemon and wrapped my package of fish tightly envelope style and baked them for about 40 minutes . On the same pan I had put some chunks of potatoes lathered in olive oil and herbs and they roasted along with the fish.

This was a really good dinner when sided with deli cole slaw. The fish was so delicate and sweet. I shall have to do that again as this fish is supposed to be extremely nourishing and pretty cheap.  I'm trying to try out new fish options.

Fish Night

Among our guests this week was a friend who will be moving to Costa Rica soon, so it was good to see her and have a chance to learn of her plans and bemoan her loss to our social circle. We toasted her new adventure with our Fish Night Cocktail – a Bahama Mama. I chose this drink because one of our regular guests told me he had some Nassau Royale Liqueur, a substance unknown to me, and I wanted to try something that included it. It was pretty tasty.

During drinks, I served some cheeses that I purchased over the week-end from a shop called Arrowine in Arlington (using a Social Living voucher). Arrowine is a great place, by the way. The cheesemongers were very welcoming and helpful. We started our dinner with the (almost) ever-present green salad and then had:

• Pan Fried Catfish with Crispy Mustard Crust – The recipe is from my new cookbook Good Fish. It was really delicious – a hit with all our guests. The recipe calls for char, but it seemed it would work with catfish and it was perfect. The recipe follows a technique I used to use a lot but have gotten away from – brushing a very flavorful sauce or paste on fish before breading and frying or baking it. In this case, the recipe called for a very simple sauce consisting mainly of Dijon mustard and lemon juice – yummy!
• Green Beans Amandine – a great recipe from Cook’s Illustrated.
  
• Parmesan Roasted Butternut Squash – I loved to roast root vegetables, but the last couple of times I roasted winter squash were not that successful – squash that was completely cooked before any browning or caramelization -- so I went online to try to figure out what I was doing wrong. I happened on this recipe, which is actually more of a casserole, and I can highly recommend it.
  

For dessert we had chocolate chip cookies with our tea. I used the Consumer Reports recipe. Sounds like a joke, right? But last year, the Consumer Reports folks offered a recipe for “The Practically Perfect Cookie” when they tested and rated store-bought chocolate chip cookies. I had always used the recipe on the chocolate chip bag and it was fine, but it turns out the Consumer Reports cookie really is “practically perfect.” Try it and let us know what you think. No need to do better next time!

Fascinating Fish Facts: Catfish produced on fish farms in this country is an excellent seafood choice. It’s not only delicious and inexpensive, but also provided to us in an environmentally sound manner. According to Monterey Bay Seafood Watch, US farmed catfish is “[r]aised in closed, inland ponds using recirculated fresh water and fed a mostly vegetarian diet of soybeans, corn and rice, [so it] is considered to be one of the most sustainable fish species available. Closed, inland ponds dramatically reduce the risk of farmed fish escaping and spreading disease to native wild populations. Their primarily vegetarian diet, with extremely low levels of fishmeal, reduces the number of wild fish caught.” As noted, catfish aquaculture is especially cool because farmed catfish (as opposed to farmed salmon or shrimp, for example) are vegetarians, so the end product is healthier and produced at less cost to other species and the environment. I just make sure my catfish is farmed in the United States – not only for environmental reasons, but also because I’m not confident that foreign farmed fish is a safe as it should be.

Catfish farmed in Asia is often sold under the name Basa or Swai (and sometimes just under the name “Catfish” even though this is not legal) and it’s also a good choice according to many (including Monterey Bay Seafood Watch), but I avoid it. I don’t know enough about this to offer firm recommendations to others, but there are plenty of examples of foreign raised seafood that we should NOT eat (banned chemicals, unsanitary conditions, etc.), and credible reports of poor oversight by the FDA, so I just err on the side of safety – especially inasmuch as farm raised fish is even if the US product is a tiny bit more expensive.